#15 - The only plants in the garden were tulips, but they

[Johnclem]

Hello,
Oh boy ! I spent so long on this question . What's going on here ? Is the flaw attributing the characteristics of the necessary condition to the sufficient condition .

Stimulus :
Plants --> tulips --> Tall tulips
c: plants --> tall plants




Thanks
John

[Adam Tyson]

In a sense, John, you're correct - just because it's true of the necessary condition doesn't mean it's true of the sufficient condition - but the reason it's true here and not, for example, in answer A, is because of the relative nature of that condition.

There's nothing relative about black (in answer A). A black poodle is a black dog. But now think about the gorillas in answer C - does being a small gorilla mean you are a small primate? Nope, because smallness here is a relative term - we are talking about small RELATIVE to other gorillas and then RELATIVE to other primates.

Same thing in the stimulus - the tulips are tall relative to other tulips, but does that mean they are tall relative to other plants? Maybe the tall tulips are 3cm high, compared to a typical 1cm high regular tulip. That could still be a pretty short plant when stacked up against other plants! Our "small" gorillas might still be triple the size of chimps, monkeys, humans, etc. It's the relativity that creates the flaw here, rather than the conditional issues.

I hope that explanation was relatively helpful!

[Johnclem]

Hi again,
I understand what you mean with the comparison . But if the are the " only plants " than why aren't they tall too ? - if they are the only plants then there is no other plant in the garden.. So why is it wrong to say they are tall?


Thanks
John

[Adam Tyson]

Tall compared to what? Just because there are no other plants nearby to compare to doesn't mean we can't make a comparison. How tall is tall? Is a 3cm high flower a tall flower, in the absolute sense of the word tall, or is it only tall as compared to the 1cm flowers? Can I look at a group of jockeys, for example, all of whom are taller than the average jockey, and conclude that they must be tall people, just because there are no other people around to compare them to? They may very well be tall people in the absolute sense, but can I conclude that just because I know that they are tall jockeys?

The stimulus here is making that larger comparison - tall tulips must be tall plants - so we aren't doing anything wrong when we think about these tulips in comparison to all other plants, even the ones that are not present in this garden. The author already went there, so we can follow.

[PositiveThinker]

Diagrammed the stimulus as


Plants in garden: PG
Tulips: T
Tall tulips : TT
Tall Plants: TP


Premise: PG----> T----> TT

Conclusion PG---->TP


For starters i don't even see how this is a flaw.
I chose answer choice C just because the language and reasoning was the same but i simply do not see how that is bad logic. How is this a flaw?

After looking at it some more the stimulus could be possible saying but *some* of the tulips were tall. Is that what the stimulus is saying? It seems like it is saying all of the tulips are tall in which case the logic fits. Even if i read it as "some" the right answer choice has nothing to do with some relationships.


If i could get some help that would be great.

[Dave Killoran]

Hey Positive,

I've always liked this question, but the error can be hard to see. The clue is that they switch terms when they go into the conclusion. Whenever that happens, be on guard. In this case, they go from "tall tulips" to "tall plants," and the problem here is that a tall tulip might not actually qualify as a tall plant. to help see this even more clearly, consider the following analogy:

• "The only people in the room were children, but they were tall children. So the only people in the room were tall people."

Answer choice (C) makes this same kind of switch, going from "small gorillas" to "small primates."

Thanks!

[PositiveThinker]

I have never seen a flaw like that. Now I will have to be on guard for it. It makes sense. This is an old test but the LSAT makers may still trade on poor understanding so I will keep this question in my pocket and refer back to it regularly



Thanks a lot!

[Dave Killoran]

It does not come up often, but we refer to it as a Relativity Flaw, and it's covered in the 2017 LRB on pages 496 and 497.

Thanks!

[adlindsey]

Yea I don't see how this is a flaw either! The only plants were tulips. So the garden only had tall plants. This is talking about PLANTS. Nothing else! How is this reasoning faulty?

[Dave Killoran]

Yea I don't see how this is a flaw either! The only plants were tulips. So the garden only had tall plants. This is talking about PLANTS. Nothing else! How is this reasoning faulty?

Hi A,

I explain this flaw above in detail—go up about 4 messages and look for my comments. That should help make this clearer!

Thanks!