December 2010 LSAT
Section 4
Question 6
Which one of the following, if substituted for the condition that the telephone appointment cannot be scheduled for t...
Replies
Christopher on June 3, 2018
@meisenThe other answers may keep T out of position 6, but that's not what the question is asking. The question is asking for which of the following rules would have the same effect on the rest of the rules. So there are a few things that need to be possible for the replacement rule to have the same effect. Keeping T out of position 6 is only one of those.
T also needs to be able to land in position 1. The first question on this game has the order set at TWPLGS, which rules out (B).
(C) is ruled out by the potential of having L come before T in question 4. In that question you should have reached the conclusion that (E) is the answer, meaning all of the other options are possible. (D) from question 4, places TSG in 4, 5, and 6, meaning L has to come before T, so making T come before L would not produce the same results.
(D) is ruled out because the original rule does not determine the order of S or G. In the same scenario from question 4, the final three are TSG, but there is nothing preventing them from being TGS under the original rule, so saying that it must come immediately before G does not have the same impact.
(E) rules out the potential that is played out in several previous scenarios that L could be 6th. Both questions 4 and 5 allude to circumstances in which L is 6th, so making 6 only open to G or S does not have the same impact as the rule "T cannot be 6."
(A) is the only answer that has the same impact on the entire system of rules as "T cannot be 6." By saying it must be G or S or Both, it eliminates the possibility of it being in 6, allows it to be in 1, makes no determination on whether L can be in 6, and makes no determination as to the order of S or G. Thus it is the only answer that does everything that the original rule did.
This game provides an excellent example of the process necessary to succeed in these games. Given that this is the final question in the game, for me to be able to answer this particular question, I went back and worked through the entire game. Once I had worked through the previous five questions, I had seven possible orders written out with which to test the answers on this question. TWPLGS from question 1 helped me rule out answer (B). T _ _ GSL from question 4 ruled out (C). W/P _ P/L T S G from question 4 helped rule out (D). T _ _ GSL from question 4 also ruled out (E). If I had not written out these other possible answers, then tackling question 6 would have been extremely time consuming and likely devastating to my score. All that to say, make sure you're taking coherent notes as you progress through each game. These questions often build on each other.
saskipper on June 16, 2020
Thank you for this explanation, that video was pointless.