Q11 - Building a space station

[ebrickm2]

I'm having difficulty with this question. After reading the explanation for the question, I'm still somewhat uncertain about how exactly a premise can have an assumption of it's own.

Does the necessary nature of the premise create it or what?

[ebrickm2]

I've thought about it a good bit more, and it seems like it is saying something like this:

A conditional statement establishes something that necessarily must occur, so anything that would negate that the necessary condition occurred has to necessarily be false if we are going to have a valid conditional statement.

This doesn't seem like attacking the argument to me, this just seems like something that is necessarily true of a conditional statement. I suppose that we could call it an assumption in that the argument wouldn't make sense if we negated a conditional statement's necessary condition, but this just seems so out of the ordinary when it comes to assumption questions that it has left me quite flummoxed.

I mean, it just seems too obvious. So if we ever saw a conditional statement in any argument in which we are asked to identify an assumption of the argument, we could always assume that it is not the case that there is something that would invalidate the necessary condition of a conditional statement? The omnipresence of such an assumption just seems a bit odd to me.

So am I reading this question right, am I understanding this correctly and that this is just a very atypical assumption question in which we address a fundamental property of a conditional statement?

[noah]

Tricky question to pick apart deeply. I'm actually - if it's OK - going to sidestep most of this discussion, as you can approach this much more simply, and that's going to be much more effective for you.

Let's take it from the top: It's a necessary assumption question. So, we know it'll address a gap in the argument, and if we negate the answer choice, it should destroy the argument's validity.

The simplified core of this argument is:

to explore Mars, we'll need to know about the human limits of living in a spacecraft --> building a space station is essential

("--->" means therefore).

So, this is the core of the argument. The gap is hard to spot, which is sometimes the case with necessary assumption questions. So, probably you'd work pretty purely from wrong-to-right. The gap that came to mind for me was "who is to say that the mission to Mars is essential?" Turns out that's not the issue at play. Looking at the answer choices, when we negate (A) - the exploration of Mars will not be carried out by people instead of robots (i.e., it'll be carried out by robots) - the argument doesn't make sense. Why would the information be needed?

The takeaway: when you're down to two answers for a necessary assumption question, negate them and see which one destroys the argument.

The more formal reason this happens is that the argument is structured like this:

(med. knwldg re: humans in space --> future missions to Mars) --> essential to build a space station.

(A) destroys the first first relationship, and thus that sufficient condition, so we can't necessarily conclude the final conclusion.

As for the wrong answers:

(B) contains a detail creep. Nowhere do we learn that anything will involve normal humans.

(C) is tempting, but why would an unforeseen medical problem be an issue? In fact, isn't that what the point of the test run is?

(D) is too broad - we're not interested in future missions, just the one to Mars.

(E) is strange. Why is it necessary that the problems be insurmountable? Would it be a problem if we negate (E) and say that the problems are surmountable? No, that's fine. So, (E) is not necessary.

Does that clear things up?

You're right that it's a bit strange that the assumption is lodged within the premise, but if you apply the negation test, the answer is easy to spot. As for the formal logic, if A --> B, and you say ~ A, then you can't conclude B (nor can you conclude ~ B) - it's unknown. So, if the argument is (C --> D) --> E, and you're no longer sure that (C --> D) is true, then you can't infer E. I wouldn't worry much about this as the negation test is much cleaner than this sort of thinking, and much better under pressure.

[rgrijalb]

can a LSAT geek please clarify the stimulus portion meaning of "even if the space station project were to contribute no new knowledge about space or Earth that could not otherwise be obtained"? Here is my interpretation: even if (space station proj) it would not contribute knowledgeX where knowledge x= knowledge that is exclusively obtainable only by the space station proj. and nothing else.

i know this portion plays little role in answering the question, just want to get a grip on the interpretation thats all.

[noah]

can a LSAT geek please clarify the stimulus portion meaning of "even if the space station project were to contribute no new knowledge about space or Earth that could not otherwise be obtained"? Here is my interpretation: even if (space station proj) it would not contribute knowledgeX where knowledge x= knowledge that is exclusively obtainable only by the space station proj. and nothing else.

i know this portion plays little role in answering the question, just want to get a grip on the interpretation thats all.

I guess you could formalize the sentence, but it's better to just get the meaning using natural language and reasoning.

In short, it's staying that it doesn't matter if the space station project doesn't tell us anything new about space or Earth--it's still an essential project.

That make sense?

[contropositive]

im still confused on how B is wrong. If the argument is telling us that space station is essential BECAUSE we need the knowledge of human capacity then wouldn't that mean that capacity of astronauts is the same as ordinary human beings? this is the only way we can say space station is essential.

[jwms]

im still confused on how B is wrong. If the argument is telling us that space station is essential BECAUSE we need the knowledge of human capacity then wouldn't that mean that capacity of astronauts is the same as ordinary human beings? this is the only way we can say space station is essential.

But this isn't part of the argument's core at all. Ordinary human beings are never mentioned in the stimulus.

to explore Mars, we will need the medical knowledge about the limits of human capacities to live in spacecraft for an extended time --> building a space station is essential

Where do 'ordinary human beings' come in to play here? They don't. They're irrelevant. You need to focus on what is assumed during that '-->' phase. If robots are doing the exploring, then the premise is destroyed here.

[maryadkins]

Great follow-up question and discussion!

I was also kind of taken by (B) for a moment, but jwms is right—presumably we aren't going to be sending "ordinary human beings" to Mars unless they are astronauts. The whole thing is about the people who are in space, not people who AREN'T in space. This is why (B) doesn't have to be true. Astronauts can still have different capacities than "ordinary human beings" and the space station info. could be useful in determining the capacities of them, the people actually in space.

[contropositive]

So I got the same argument core,

we will need the medical knowledge about the limits of human capacities to live in spacecraft for an extended time --> building a space station is essential

I understand that I need to focus on what is connecting these two statments (the assumtion or --->) but what I am confused about is when you guys responded saying there is no mention of human beings.

If you look at the argument core it says "...limits of HUMAN capacities"

isn't that referring to human beings? wouldn't it just say "astronauts capacities"

ugh. I hate answer choice B , never been so confused on an lsat question

[maryadkins]

"Ordinary" is the problem. Human beings who go into space do not have to have the same capacities of "ordinary" human beings because the argument is about "limits of human capacities," meaning the threshold at which humans can survive in space for a long time. (In fact, it's probably NOT going to match up to whatever capacities an "ordinary" or average human has— think of it that way.)

The argument isn't about the ordinary or average folks, at all, but about the limits of what a human being can withstand.

[xjiang.xj]

It took me quite a long time to see the relationship between the first sentence and the second sentence in the stimulus. I find it very difficult to spot the premise-conclusion logic chain for this stimulus right away. For the first couple of reads, I just couldn't identify it as an argument. What is wrong with me? Could anyone give me a diagnosis please?

[BarryM800]

I've difficulty analyzing the argument in the stimulus. The word "essential" in the first sentence creates a conditional statement: space station knowledge (successfully obtained or not) → build a space station with astronauts on board. The word "need" in the second sentence creates another conditional statement: explore Mars → space station knowledge (specifically, medical knowledge about the limits of human capacities to live in a space station/spacecraft). The transitive nature of these two conditional statements makes them function more like two premises and leads us to: explore Mars → space station knowledge → build a space station with astronauts on board. So where is the conclusion, as I'm looking for "explore Mars → build a space station with astronauts on board"? Thanks!