Logical reasoning PrepTest 107 · Section 1 · Question 18

Question prompt

Some planning committee members—those Remaining source text redacted.
Why the credited answer is right

Credited answer: E

The notes below walk through why it fits the stem and how to eliminate the rest.

Argument or Facts

Facts

Valid or Flawed

NA

Question Type

Must Be True Questions

Stimulus Summary

Planning committee member --some-- Financial interest in decisions Construction industry representative --some-- Financial interest in decisions Planning committee member → ~Live in suburbs Planning committee member --some-- Work in suburbs

Answer Anticipation

The LSAT tests your ability to make inferences with conditional and quantifier statements a couple of times per test, so you should identify a question like this as falling into that category and shift into the right mindset to tackle it!
Let’s start with our diagram. The opening line uses some, and here, we broke it into two parts to represent the members of the committee, and the fact that they’re representatives of the construction industry. The next statement is a conditional, and we diagram, “No As are B,” as, “If you are A, then you’re not B.” And the final statement is a some statement (“many” = some, not most).
With all that noted, we have few enough statements here that it’s worth working through the inferences ahead of time:
1+2) You can’t combine two some statements
1+3) The sufficient condition of the conditional lines up with a term in this some statement, so we can make an inference: Financial interest in decisions --some-- ~Live in suburbs
1+4) You can’t combine two some statements
2+ 3/4) These don’t share terms, so we can’t draw an inference
3+4) Same pattern as 1+3, so: ~Live in suburbs --some--Work in suburbs
Let’s write out the two inferences that could show up as correct answers, and remember that some statements are reversible, so we need to stay open to the reverse of these:
Financial interest in decisions --some-- ~Live in suburbs
~Live in suburbs --some-- Work in suburbs

Answer choices

  1. A
    No persons with significant Remaining source text redacted.
    Why choice A is not credited
    There was only a single conditional, so we won’t be able to draw a conditional inference (other than the contrapositive, which this isn’t) - this should have been a quick elimination.
  2. B
    No person who has Remaining source text redacted.
    Why choice B is not credited
    There was only a single conditional, so we won’t be able to draw a conditional inference (other than the contrapositive, which this isn’t) - this should have been a quick elimination.
  3. C
    Some persons with significant Remaining source text redacted.
    Why choice C is not credited
    Financial interest in decisions --some-- Work in suburbs. This answer would need to combine statements 1 and 4, but we can’t draw an inference from two some statements.
  4. D
    Some planning committee members Remaining source text redacted.
    Why choice D is not credited
    The statements don’t allow us to infer anything about people who don’t work in the suburbs, so this answer is out of scope.
  5. E
    Some persons with significant Remaining source text redacted.
    Why choice E matches the stem
    Financial interests in decisions --some-- ~Live in suburbs. This inference is drawn from the combination of statements 1 and 3, so it’s the correct answer.

What this tests

Question analytics

Based on historical answer selection rates for this question.

Answer choice distribution

  1. A 5%
  2. B 14%
  3. C 15%
  4. D 8%
  5. E Credited 58%

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Discussion

  • Why not B? 1 reply

    Started by caydencemarley

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