#21 - Essayist: Winners of a Nobel prize for science, who

[Administrator]

Complete Question Explanation

Must Be True. The correct answer choice is (C)

This stimulus is a basic Fact Set, without any real conclusion, in which the essayist talks about various contributions to science. Nobel prize winners—typically professionals, often motivated by money or fame—have all contributed significantly to science, but amateur scientists motivated solely by the love of discovery have also made many significant contributions.

The question that follows asks for the choice that Must Be True, so the correct answer choice will be the only one that passes the Fact test, able to be confirmed by the few facts presented in the stimulus.

Answer choice (A): Although the stimulus states that Nobel Prize winners are typically professional scientists, the essayist does not specify whether or not the amateurs discussed were also Nobel laureates. Since this choice cannot be confirmed by the information in the stimulus, it cannot be the right answer to this Must Be True question.

Answer choice (B): The essayist says that professional scientists are “often” motivated by financial needs or the search for fame, but that does not mean that the love of discovery typically plays no role in motivating the work of Nobel prize winners. This choice fails the Fact Test and should be ruled out of contention.

Answer choice (C): This is the correct answer choice. The author specifies that amateur scientists have made many significant contributions to science, and that such scientists are motivated by the love of discovery. This choice passes the Fact Test, confirming it as the right answer choice.

Answer choice (D): The essayist does not compare the overall scientific contribution of professional scientists to that of amateur scientists, so this choice fails the Fact Test and should be eliminated from contention.

Answer choice (E): The stimulus mentions that many amateurs who have made significant scientific contributions were solely motivated by the love of discovery, but the essayist does not assert that this motivation makes a significant contribution any more likely.

[sarae]

Why is answer choice A incorrect? The stimulus states winners of the Noel prize for science were typically professional scientists. but it also states that amateur scientists have provided many significant contributions.

[Nikki Siclunov]

The stimulus holds that amateur scientists have made many significant contributions to science, motivated only by the love of discovery alone:

Sig. contributions Amateur Love of Discovery

This proves answer choice (C) correct: the love of discovery must be the motive behind many significant contributions to science.

Answer choice (A) cannot be proven by the information presented in the stimulus. Even though some amateur scientists have indeed made significant contributions to science (see above), we cannot know whether they did or didn't win a Nobel prize. Note that Nobel prize winners are typically professional scientists (Nobel Professional), which leaves open the possibility that some Nobel prize winners are not professional (i.e. they are amateurs). So, it is possible that all amateur scientists who made significant contributions to science are also Nobel prize winners.

This is a tricky question, where understanding of formal logic might prove useful in recognizing the correct answer choice (formal logic is discussed in the supplemental materials online for Lesson 8 in our FL course).

[sarae]

i actually did review that section but it didn't see how some translated into "many." I forgot that some could be anything from 1-all. i got it now!

thanks!

[SherryZ]

Logic Reasoning Sec 1 of June 2013 LSAT, #21:

I picked answer choice A, but the correct answer is C. Could you tell me why A is incorrect??

Thank you!

Sincerely,
Sherry

[cgriffie]

Hi Sherry!
First, let us discuss why 'C' is correct.

Keep in mind - these arrows are not showing a conditional relationship. I am simply showing you the connection between the two subject groups: Professional Scientists and Amateur Scientists

Professional scientists significant contributions to science motivated by economic necessity or fame.

Amateur scientists MANY significant contributions to science motivated by the love of discovery alone.

Does this look like one of our answer choices?
Take a look at answer choice 'C' now.

Answer choice 'A' deals with SOME amateur scientists, and we do not know anything about SOME Scientists, but we do know about the MANY contributions made by scientists.The writers of the LSAT are trying to link uncertain terms together and trick you into falling for their trap. Stick to what you know about the subject matter. If this were a 'could be true' question, 'A' might be a good answer.

Sometimes simple mapping can make all of the difference, and the answer just jumps out at you.

I hope that this helped a little.

-Cgriffie

[SherryZ]

Hi Cgriffie,

Thank you so much for answering my question! I sincerely appreciate it! It helps a lot.


Kindest regards,
Sherry

[MichaelJAG]

This is not a difficult problem, if you can mentally diagram the conditional statements and remember them after reading each wrong answer choice. However, there are a lot of conditional statements in here, and that makes it harder to remember them. Basically, how can I better pre-phrase for questions like this?: Must be True that are testing conditional reasoning. I am at a lost, because I feel that the question is so broad, and it can literally be anything within the large stimulus loaded with numerous conditional statements. Thank-you.

Regards,

Michael

[Jon Denning]

Hey Michael,

Thanks for the question! We get asked about prephrasing a lot, as it's something test takers recognize is crucial for success, but also an occasionally-confusing process to perform ideally.

What I always recommend is that people prephrase as specifically/precisely as they can say with certainty the answer will contain. Put another way, make a prediction that's as precise as you'd be willing to bet money on, but never more precise than that. Sometimes, as I'm sure you've seen, you can know with a ton of certainty exactly what the correct answer will look like—a Supporter Assumption, say, or a mechanistic-style Justify—but most of the time, sadly, this degree of confidence in answer content is impossible.

So what then?

The answer is that you simply, and quickly, note what the correct answer choice must do in order to be correct! Maybe it's a Weaken question where the author is in support of some course of action. You likely can't know just what the correct answer will say to attack that belief, but you know what it will do: it will provide a reason that that particular course of action might be unwise. So that becomes your prephrase, and you filter each answer through it until one gives you what you need.

For a Must Be True question with conditionality like we have here, a good prephrase would be something like "one of these I can prove directly by connecting the pieces above, while four I can dismiss as being unknown/merely possible." And then, at (A), "can I know this for sure? Nope. So (B)..." and so on.

Note here that I have framed it in terms of what I can confidently expect will make the right answer right, and why four will fail. That's often about the best you can do, but it's totally fine! It let's you attack the answers accurately and efficiently, knowing you've still got a tool to distinguish right from wrong.

So don't hold yourself to a higher standard of precision than is reasonable to assert with total assuredness. Trying to do that is not only impossible, but also burns a lot of time and energy, neither of which can be squandered on test day.

For more on this, I wrote a pair of blog articles about it a while back. Give them a read when you've got some time, and please let me know if this (and they) help to clear things up!

http://blog.powerscore.com/lsat/bid/153 ... ing-part-i
http://blog.powerscore.com/lsat/bid/153 ... ng-part-ii

Jon

[TigerJin]

I can see how C is correct, but I don't see how B is wrong. The stimulus says that professional scientists are "often" motivated by financial gain and that they "typically" are Nobel prize winners. So couldn't we say that Nobel prize winners are "typically" not motivated by love of discovery?

Thank you for your answer.