#25 - It is likely that most of the new television programs

[mokkyukkyu]

Hi,

So I was not sure between C and D and...at first I thought they are saying the same thing.
And the way C is written is so hard to see the point...I thought the test writer prefers to use this confusing grammar to present correct answer often, so I thought this is the correct one (it's not good to think about whether an answer choice is correct or not this way obviously, but...)
Why is C wrong?

Thank you

[Nikki Siclunov]

Hi mokkyukkyu,

This is a tough question, so let's break down the argument first:

• Premise: WW shows last season Cancelled
  Premise: Police dramas Cancelled
  Premise: New WW shows Police dramas
  ===========
  Conclusion: New WW shows Cancelled

This argument relies on past performance to predict a probable future outcome. Apparently, most WW shows last year were cancelled, so the author predicts the same will happen this year. As additional evidence, we learn that all of their new shows are police dramas, which is not a terribly popular genre. The conclusion seems well-supported, but think about it: what if WW made a lot of shows last season, most of which lousy, but with a smattering of excellent police dramas? Say, they produced 10 shows last season, canceling all except the 2 police dramas that received popular acclaim? Imagine, further, that WW has a penchant for making outstanding police dramas, so this year they decided to focus on what they do best? Sure, police dramas aren't terribly popular, but maybe that's because the majority of police dramas out there are made by other producers who don't have a knack for it. WW does, so this year they have decided to focus their efforts exclusively on producing police dramas.

Do you still think that most of their new TV programs this season will be canceled? Of course not.

We've just identified the major weakness in this argument. To strengthen it, we need to establish a closer link between the type of WW show being produced this season and the type of WW show that was cancelled in the past. If answer choice (D) is true, and all of their cancelled shows last year were police dramas (cancelled last year police drama), then it becomes a lot more likely that the same fate will befall the current crop of TV shows.

As far as answer choice (C) is concerned, you're right: it's difficult to decipher thanks, in part, to the double negative construction. When simplified, answer choice (C) suggests the following:

NOT cancelled last year NOT police drama

Contrapositive: Police drama last year Cancelled

This is not a terrible answer, but what if last year they produced no police dramas? If you take my hypothetical scenario above to the extreme, maybe last year they produced 10 shows, none of which police dramas, canceling all 10 them ("most" could mean "all"). Maybe that's exactly why they cancelled them: perhaps the only shows they do well are police dramas, and they happened to produce no police dramas last year. If that's the case, then answer choice (C) means very little.

Does this make sense? Let me know.

Thanks,

[mokkyukkyu]

Hi,

Thanks for your reply,
So I guess when you say this:

Contrapositive: Police drama last year Cancelled
This is not a terrible answer, but what if last year they produced no police dramas?

You mean negating sufficient condition right?
So if we negate the sufficient part of the conditional statement we don't know what will happen...and that's no helpful to establish the conclusion correct?

[Nikki Siclunov]

Technically, this is correct; however, let's not get bogged down in the conditional aspect of this statement. According to answer choice (C), if WW produced any police dramas last season, those dramas have been cancelled. But what if they didn't produce a single police drama? Then the cancelled shows couldn't have been police dramas, and answer choice (C) would have no effect on the conclusion. Does this make sense?

Thanks!

[mokkyukkyu]

Yes, thanks!

[Etsevdos]

Based on the prior discussion, the major difference between C / D is the following:

C: When I see "none...not" I immediately make positive - ALL of the shows that WW produced last year that were cancelled were police dramas" PD last year--> Cancelled.

D. Cancelled last year ---> PD

The distinction is rather large - We want to rule out the possibility that PD's last year "carried the weight" for the team.

We know most items last year were cancelled and D would say that these all must have been PDs; therefore, they are not carrying the weight. C on the other hand might mean that none were even produced last year, and as you suggest, this might be their strong suit this year? Is this correct?

[Shannon Parker]

Etsevdos,

You are on the right track, but what C is actually saying, is that no new show last year, that was a PD was not cancelled. Another way of looking at it is, "IF" there were any new PDs last year, they were cancelled. But the answer does not tell us that there were any new PDs, and therefore does not address the glaring weakness in the argument, the lack of connection between PDs, and prior cancellations.

Answer D does address that, by showing that all of the new shows that were canceled last year by Wilke & Wilke, were police dramas.

Hope this clears it up.

[isoifer]

I can see now why D is correct, but can you please explain why B is incorrect? Based on the stimulus, it would appear that if it were true that most of the shows produced last year were police dramas, then they would be canceled. D just seems to be an expansion on that, if that makes sense...

[Adam Tyson]

Be careful not to make a reasoning flaw based on formal logic, isoifer! If it is true that most of their shows last year were cancelled, and most of their shows last year were police dramas, that would NOT indicate that most of their police dramas were cancelled! It could be that most of their police dramas were picked up for a second season, and most of their cancelled shows were not police dramas. If that was true, then answer B might actually weaken the argument! In other words, while the two groups (police dramas and cancelled shows) would have to overlap, they wouldn't have to overlap a lot. This type of formal logic/numbers and percentages question is pretty common on the LSAT, and the flaw you are committing is one the author often commit or try to get you to commit.

For purposes of illustration, I like to throw numbers at these types of questions. Try these numbers:

They produced 10 shows last year. 6 were police dramas, 4 were comedies.

6 of their shows were cancelled - all four of the comedies and 2 of the police dramas. That means the four shows that were NOT cancelled were ALL police dramas! This suggests that police dramas are what they do best, and what stand the best chance of being renewed for another season! After all, two thirds of the ones they did last year were renewed instead of being cancelled, right?

Beware any comparison of two groups, and be careful about making unwarranted assumptions about how much the two groups may or may not overlap!

[Sophia123]

Hi,

Similarly to the above posters, I was pretty confused between C and D. I initially diagrammed them to both say the same thing and thus during the timed test, eliminated both for that reason and opted for B since that seemed to be the next best answer.

Upon review, I can see why B is not correct since it is saying:

Shows WW produced last year police dramas combined with the fact in the stimulus: Police dramas NOT popular gives us: Shows WW produced last year PD NOT popular.
And based on formal logic no inference can be drawn from this type of statement so this does not help in any way.

Now where I am running into in an issue is determining the difference between C and D:
I negated the double negatives in C, so it read "All of the shows that WW produced last year that were cancelled were police dramas"
I then diagrammed this as: Cancelled --> Police dramas.

I seem to have this diagram backwards since the above post indicates that it is the opposite. I thought the formation "All X are Y" is diagrammed as X --> Y, so I am just a bit confused on what I am reading wrong in this statement.

I diagrammed D to say the exact same thing as the above: Cancelled --> Police dramas, which seems to be correct

Does someone mind explaining how to get the correct diagram for C? Thanks in advance!