“Provided that”

[Vy5]

First of all, I want to thank you for the comprehensive and well-written explanations on this board. As I was working through a question, I was wondering about the nature of “provided that” as an indicator. You have written that it functions as a sufficient indicator and not a necessary indicator in the explanation for 84.2.19 but can you explain exactly why? How is it different from “given that” or “assuming that” and what are some similar tricky phrases? I am hoping for a way to figure these things out even if I may have forgotten the precise indicator location or classification in the LRB.

[Dave Killoran]

Hi Vy5,

In that problem, "provided that" is working like "in the event of," which is similar to "if this occurs." Hence, it's on the sufficiency side. But,this isn't a phrase used often by them and so it's not on the list of regular indicators.

As far as list of unusual indicators, to be honest so many phrases can be tortured into giving a conditional idea that I don't find it very useful to memorize those. Instead, focus on the meaning of what a sufficient condition and a necessary condition are, as that will help more than focusing on outlier phrases you are very unlikely to see

Thanks!