Rotelle: You are too old to address effectively the difficult issues facing the country, such as nuclear power, pove...
davidamayaJuly 8, 2019
Many=Some
@Mehran Rotelle states, "You are too old to address effectively the difficult issues facing the country, such as nuclear power, poverty, and pollution."
Answer choice A states "Many old people cannot effectively address the difficult issues facing the country."
We know that Many=some; some is at least one up to all. "You" is appropriately considered a "some" quantity.
What Rotelle is saying, from my understanding, "Some people are too old to address effectively the difficult issues facing the country, such as nuclear power, poverty, and pollution."
Why is answer choice A wrong?
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This is an interesting point of view, can someone answer @David question above please?
RaviAugust 21, 2019
@davidamaya,
Great question. Let's look at (A).
While "many" and "some" can almost always be interchanged on the LSAT, this is one question where the difference between "many" and "some" is important.
Think of it like this: "many" always includes "some," but "some" doesn't always include "many."
"Some" means "at least one" and can go from one all the way up to all.
"Many" means "more than one" and can go from two all the way up to all.
These terms almost always fill the same role on the LSAT except in cases where "some" signifies only one of a particular thing, as it does in this question.
This is why we can get rid of (A) since Rotelle is only addressing Sims as being too old and (A) is saying that there's more than one old person that can't effectively address the difficult issues facing our country. We just know that Rotelle thinks Sims is in this group, but we don't know of anyone else who Rotelle thinks is in that group.
Does this make sense? Let us know if you have any other questions!
RaviAugust 21, 2019
@meredith, see the explanation above, and let us know if you have any other questions!
abbygharrisAugust 5, 2020
How do we know that someone who is younger than Sims, say by a year or 2 is not also "too old." Does this not require an assumption?
