#22- A tax preparation company automatically adds the

[na02]

Hi,
Would answer choice D be a necessary assumption, at best?
It seems prephrasing the correct "type" of answer is what's getting me as of now

Thanks!

[Zach Foreman]

Nao2,
This is a very tough question. However, I don't think D is a necessary assumption. We can use the Assumption Negation Technique to see why. "NONE of the recipients of the company’s e-mails will follow the advice contained in the body of at least some of the e-mails they receive." So, what happens if no one follows the advice? Well, we don't really know but I would think they could still need legal protection if they suggested something illegal even if no one followed that advice.

If we negate A: If the e-mail does not elsewhere suggest that the client do anything illegal, then the company DOES need legal protection.
Well, if the company needs legal protection (say from frivolous lawsuits) even if they don't suggest illegal activity, then perhaps the disclaimer is useful.

[crispycrispr]

It looks to me like you are approaching this one a little backwards, ynwasif. Your analysis suggests that you are questioning the truth of answer choice A, but we aren't supposed to do that in this case because the question stem says "if which of the following is assumed". In other words, you are supposed to treat each answer choice as if it is absolutely true! Don't question the truth of the answer, but just ask yourself what impact it would have IF it was true! That's the way weaken, strengthen, resolve the paradox, and justify the conclusion answers all work - we take them at face value, no matter how odd they may seem, and see what impact they have. Here's an example:

I am the tallest man in North America

How might I justify that answer? How about with this extreme answer choice:

I am the only man in North America

Now, that's obviously ridiculous, but so what? That's not the issue here. Instead, ask yourself "what if Adam is the only man in North America? What does that do to his claim that he is the tallest man in North America?" Well, it proves it, doesn't it? It also proves that I am the shortest man, the fattest man, the skinniest man, the smartest man, and the dumbest man in North America, right?

Don't question the answer! Instead, focus on the impact that answer has on the conclusion. Extreme language is welcome in these cases! Sometimes, the stronger language is what makes one answer better than another. It wouldn't prove my claim if I said I was ONE of the only men in North America, would it?

When the stem says to assume the answers, or to treat them as true, then treat them as true and don't doubt them, even if they seem ridiculous. That's part of the path to success on these question types. Give it another look and see if that makes more sense to you now!

Hi Adam,

I'm having trouble following why this argument is flawed. I diagrammed up to the second to last sentence as you did (suggest illegal --> no protect --> no purpose). I don't understand how the argument is flawed because isn't the conclusion just the contrapositive of the first premise, purpose --> protect?? I'm missing how adding the suggest illegal part makes this a flawed argument. Please help, thank you!!

[Robert Carroll]

crispy,

The conclusion is the last sentence, and that's not a conditional. In Adam's post viewtopic.php?p=62346#p62346 you can see Disclaimer has Purpose as the conclusion, and that's not a conditional...it's the necessary condition of the conditional. So it can't be a contrapositive.

So we have in the stimulus: Something Illegal Legal Protection Disclaimer has Purpose. The conclusion is the final necessary condition. All of those premises are conditional, and we can't infer any particular condition of any of that. We want to reach the necessary. We could get there if we knew the email elsewhere suggests the client do something illegal. That's fine, but no answer choice does that. Instead, an answer provides another conditional - the email could not elsewhere suggest the client do something illegal, and still the disclaimer offers no protection (because none is needed).

It's similar to the following: "If Philadelphia scores at least 14 points, I'll win my bet. Therefore, I'll win my bet." I could prove the conclusion two ways: if Philadelphia scores at least 14 points, I'd certainly win. But if I could provide another premise like "If Philadelphia scores fewer than 14 points, I'll also win my bet," I would definitely win my bet, because Philadelphia will either score 14+ points or not, and either way, I win. So I win no matter what. That's what happens with answer choice (A).

Robert Carroll

[crispycrispr]

Hi,

For this question, I understood the argument and got (A) a bit differently than how Adam does it, and I want to make sure if my thinking is right.

premise: purpose legal protection
premise: suggest illegal no legal protection no purpose (so only purpose is to suggest illegal)
conclusion: no purpose
I thought the gap was that we don't know if in every email, they suggest to do something illegal. Because to claim no purpose simply because if suggest illegal, then you need suggest illegal to actually be true. (A) was the only one that does this, because its contrapositive is: need legal protection suggest illegal, and I understood "need legal protection" as purpose fulfilled/only purpose.

[crispycrispr]

Thanks Robert! Your analogy helps! I guess this is just a new form of logic that the LSAT uses

[BenjaminTW]

I actually got this question right, but I didn't consciously understand it at all and I think I chose A as more of an instinctual play. Anyways, here's how I understand it now after some thought:

If purpose, then legal protection. But if elsewhere the email suggests something illegal, then not legal protection. Thus, no purpose.

Initially, I had neglected to consider elsewhere. The disclaimer itself was, presumably, providing protections for "any tax advice." So, here, I interpret "any tax advice" as not elsewhere. The author has already let us know that there would be no legal protections elsewhere, but what about for not elsewhere? [for the tax advice]. Answer A, then, would fill in this gap. Please, let me know if my thinking is clear on this. Thank you!

[Luke Haqq]

Hi BenjaminTW,

Glad to hear that you got the question right in the end! Your thinking generally seems correct overall, though I'll review some of the conditional reasoning that we can diagram.

For "The only purpose this disclaimer could serve is to provide legal protection for the company," we can diagram:

Disclaimer has purpose Purpose is legal protection

With that in hand, a worthwhile next step is to diagram the contrapositive as well:

~(Purpose is legal protection) ~(Disclaimer has purpose)

Then we have the next sentence, "But if the e-mail elsewhere suggests that the client do something illegal, then the disclaimer offers no legal protection." This can be diagrammed as:

Elsewhere recommends illegality Disclaimer gives no legal protection

The contrapositive of which is:

~(Disclaimer gives no legal protection) ~(Elsewhere recommends illegality)

Finally, it concludes, "So the disclaimer serves no purpose."

With these premises and conclusion, the question stem is asking for an answer that, if added as a premise, would be sufficient to permit the conclusion to be drawn. Let's look at the correct answer choice, (A): "If the e-mail does not elsewhere suggest that the client do anything illegal, then the company does not need legal protection."

I think I follow what you're saying about the word "elsewhere." As I read this paragraph, "elsewhere" is referring to anything other than the disclaimer. This seems to be the case because the sentence before the one mentioning "elsewhere" is discussing the disclaimer. And answer choice (A) utilizes the same word as well. That answer choice can be diagrammed as:

~(Elsewhere recommends illegality) ~(Need legal protection)

Or in its contrapositive form:

Need legal protection Elsewhere recommends illegality

This makes sense because we can add this premise to what we already had:

~(Disclaimer gives no legal protection) ~(Elsewhere recommends illegality) ~(Need legal protection)

which can be shortened to:

~(Disclaimer gives no legal protection) ~(Need legal protection)

or as the contrapositive:

Need legal protection Disclaimer gives no legal protection

In other words, the disclaimer serves no purpose because if the company needed legal protection, the disclaimer doesn't offer legal protection.