Q7 - Consultant: Most workers do not

[linda.jy.dai]

Can someone please help me with this one - I am having difficulties accepting B as the correct answer. Since B reads "By having every piece of their work evaluated, some workers are caused to produce high-quality work,' but since the question is a 'Must be True'-type, the LR bible states that no new information can be introduced in the correct answer. This is confusing because the prompt reads "Most workers do not ha every item they produce judged for quality..."

Thanks in advance!

[ManhattanPrepLSAT1]

It's been a while since I read the LR Bible, but if that's what it says than it's wrong. Sometimes the LSAT writer uses an interesting construct on these "must be true" questions.

The stimulus is not merely a set of facts; it contains an argument. When they ask you to find the answer choice that is "most strongly supported" and they have preceded that question stem with an argument, then you are looking for an assumption that fills a gap between the evidence and the conclusion.

The evidence is that "every piece authored by a freelance writer is evaluated."

The conclusion they reach from that is "That is why freelance writers produce such high-quality work."

If you ask yourself, "what is the reason being referred to in the conclusion?" you quickly realize that it must be the fact that freelance writers have each piece of their work evaluated.

Let's read the argument this way

P + (A) = C
premise + assumption = conclusion

Each piece a freelance writer authors is evaluated. By having every piece of their work evaluated [freelance writers] are caused to produce high-quality work. That is why freelance writers produce high quality work.

Answer choice (B) is an assumption that must be true in order for the argument presented in the stimulus to follow logically.


On a side note. The argument does say that most workers do not have every item they produce judged for quality. But answer choice (B) says "some workers." And it must be true that some workers have their work evaluated, if it is true that freelance writers have their work evaluated.

[damnsky]

I have to disagree with Matt here. In my opinion, this is not an assumption type of question. This is an inference question (by Manhattan method) that you take the stimulus for granted. You should be able to infer the correct answer solely from the stimulus, and hence it's a "Must be True" type of question (by the LR Bible method), whose correct answer "can not introduce new information".

Here is what I think about this question:
Stimulus:
Premise 1: most workers do not have every item they produce judged for quality...
Premise 2: each piece a freelance writers authors is evaluated...
Conclusion: Premise 2 is why freelance writers produce such high-quality work.

Correct answer (B) is inferable from the stimulus. Since for freelance writers, having every item they produce judged for quality leads to high-quality work, it is reasonable to believe high-quality work can also be produced by some of the workers if they start getting every item they produce judged for quality (or evaluate).

(A) The stimulus never talks about "more (or less) strictly". Hence it can't be inferred from the stimulus.
(C) "no other" is not supported by the stimulus. Typical LSAT wrong answer.
(D) "only" is not supported by the stimulus. Another typical LSAT wrong answer.
(E) A bit tricky, but the stimulus never talks about whether the quality of the work produced by some workers is high or not. It only says most of the workers don't have every item they produced judged for quality. Hence (E) can't be inferred from the stimulus.

[ManhattanPrepLSAT1]

I have to disagree with Matt here. In my opinion, this is not an assumption type of question. This is an inference question (by Manhattan method) that you take the stimulus for granted. You should be able to infer the correct answer solely from the stimulus, and hence it's a "Must be True" type of question (by the LR Bible method), whose correct answer "can not introduce new information".

I love being challenged! It means you are really thinking about what we see. That said, I'm sticking with the idea that the right answer represents an assumption between the evidence and the conclusion.

For another example of this take a look at:
PT44, S2, Q14 - The economy is doing badly

There are many Most Strongly Supported questions where the right answer is not stated, but assumed in the argument. The most telling thing about what I just said is that there is an argument in the stimulus! Typically Inference questions don't present arguments but only relay statements without drawing a conclusion.

damnsky, take a look at that question from PT44, I'd love to hear what you think about how these two questions are related!

[Crogati]

I agree this is most definitely an argument, not just a set of facts. However, I came to answer D by making inferences from the some/most statements rather than looking for an assumption that completes the argument. Can someone review my reasoning?

Here's what I think about the answers:

a.) This relative comparison is never made. There is nothing in the stimulus which supports work evaluated by a freelance writer is judged more strictly than items of most works.

b.) While it is true that some workers do have every item evaluated (a logical inference from the statement "most workers do not have every item judged for quality"), we do not know whether or not this means that their work is high-quality. I think because "workers" are not assumed to be "freelance writers."

c.) Again, another relative comparison we cannot make based on the stimulus.

d.) Yes! All freelancers have worked evaluated can be boiled down to only freelance writers have every item produced evaluated for quality.

e.) This mixes up a few concepts. As stated correctly in answer choice B some workers have every item judged for quality. But this answer choice says most workers have every item judged for quality, which is not a logical deduction from the "most" statement in the stimulus. Moreover, even if we were to accept this choice's hodgepodge premise, we still do not know whether or not workers produce high-qualitly work.

[ManhattanPrepLSAT1]

Hi Crogati,

The problem I see is that you're reasoning led you to the incorrect answer.

Answer choice (B) is an assumption on which the argument depends. Without, the argument will not hold.

Answer choice (D) is not supported. There is plenty of room in this argument for other workers to have every item they produce evaluated for quality.

[Crogati]

Oh wow! Thanks Matt. Valuable lesson learned regarding my assumption about "only." But how exactly do we know that workers produce high quality work when the argument explicitly says freelancers do this? I suppose we can reasonably assume freelancers are a type of worker? I know this seems so obvious but I was trying to stick with the LSAT's stringent reasoning and probably took it too far!

[vstoever]

Yes freelance writer is a type of worker, and it can be understood in the first sentence when it says, "most workers... but each piece a freelance writer..." Here we see that freelance writer is a type of worker, which is also an exception to what most workers do.

[AlisaS425]

Just reviewed this one and wanted to provide some insight, and hope there's some feedback

(A) the stimulus doesn't talk about "evaluate workpiece strictly", so it's not inferable.
(B) looks good. Keep it.
(C)(D) seem similarly flawed to me. We only know from the stimulus that freelance writers produce high-quality work and evaluate each piece, but we couldn't infer from this that they are the only ones who do so. Eliminate.
(E) I was tempted by this one. I thought it's not too strong and looks good. But the problem seems to be between "workers who don't judge every item they produce for quality" and "produce high-quality work". The former is indicated in the first sentence, while the latter talks about "freelance writer". However, if we combine first sentence and last sentence, we could infer that "some workers (freelance writer )that have every item they produce judged for quality produce high-quality work", which is actually different from (E) but looks pretty close!

Back to (B). Originally, I didn't think (B) was right since it has a "caused", which is harder to prove than "correlation". But then during review, I found that there's actually a causation in the stimulus - "each piece ... evaluated. That is why ... produce such high-quality work". So we can safely infer from this that (B) is right!

Any thoughts?