LR Question 13 Explanation
QUESTION TEXT: Some of the politicians who strongly supported…
QUESTION TYPE: Must be True
FACTS:
- There were politicians who supported free trade between the US, Canada and Mexico.
- Some of those politicians now refuse to publicly support free trade with other Latin American countries.
ANALYSIS: Above all, the LSAT tests your ability to understand precisely what a text says, without adding in extra assumptions.
We know that some politicians who previously supported free trade now are not publicly supporting extending it. But that’s all we know. We don’t know their private opinions. And we don’t know if they publicly oppose it either.
A couple of wrong answers talk about those that do publicly support free trade. We have zero information about them. The stimulus only tells us about people that don’t publicly support it.
___________
- We don’t know anything about those who publicly support more free trade. Or even if they exist.
- Same as A. This answer is about those who do publicly support extended free trade. But the stimulus was only about those who don’t publicly support more free trade.
- Not necessarily. The politicians might privately support free trade, but they aren’t willing to say so publicly yet.
- CORRECT. This just says exactly what the stimulus said, with a slightly different phrasing. If some people don’t publicly support free trade, then that means not all people do publicly support it. Some do not = not all do. The LSAT considers making a “not all” statement to be a new deduction, rather than a mere repetition of the “some” statement.
- Not so. We know that some politicians have not publicly supported it. But that doesn’t mean they publicly opposed it. They might simply have said nothing publicly.
More Resources for Must Be True Questions
- Conditional Reasoning Article: Learn about conditional statements on the LSAT.
- LR Diagrams Guide: Learn how to draw LR diagrams.
- Intro to Conditional Reasoning: This intro course lesson covers conditional reasoning basics.
- Intro Course lesson: This intro course lesson covers Must Be True questions.
- Mastery Seminar lesson: This LR Mastery seminar lesson covers must be true questions.
I thought “some” in LSAT speak meant “at least one, could be all.” Why does “some” in this question mean not all?
“Some” does indeed mean “at least one, could be all”, and this question is no exception. We know that:
(1) Politicians who strongly supported free trade among Canada, the U.S. and Mexico SOME refuse to support publicly the idea that free trade should be extended to other Latin American countries
The correct answer choice is simply saying that:
Not all politicians who strongly supported free trade –> publicly support extending free trade to other Latin American countries
So, if we think about the entire group of politicians who strongly supported free trade among Canada, the U.S., and Mexico, we know that it’s impossible for ALL of them to publicly support extending free trade to other Latin American countries (2) because we know from Statement (1) that some of them now refuse to publicly support the idea that free trade should be extended to other Latin American countries.
I was suspicious of this question, because I couldn’t believe that they would be asking us to simply translate “some” to “not all.” Seemed way too easy.
MBT questions actually often ask for this translation. Likewise, they will translate “chloe’s comment” to “some comments” or vice-versa.
There’s basically no thing as too easy on MBT/Strengthen/weaken questions. If an answer seems obvious, and everything else is wrong, then you’ve generally got the right answer.