June 2010 LSAT Section 4 Question 12

Many nurseries sell fruit trees that they label "miniature." Not all nurseries, however, use this term in the same wa...

Bauer22 on March 8, 2020

Confused with E

I was debating between B and E and ultimately chose B. I am confused on how E is right, I looked at the precious post and that seemed to confuse me even more. Are we supposed to diagram answer E out?

Create a free account to read and take part in forum discussions.

Already have an account? log in

Skylar on March 8, 2020

@Bauer22, happy to help!

The last sentence of the passage states that "if a variety of fruit tree is not suitable for growing in a tub or a pot, no tree of that variety can be correctly labeled miniature."
We can diagram this statement as: not STP -> not CLM.
The contrapositive is: CLM -> STP.
(Here STP = suitable in a tub/pot and CLM = correctly labeled as miniature.)

Answer choice (B) can be diagrammed as: CLM -> not STP.
This does not follow from the diagram we made from the passage and is therefore incorrect.

Answer choice (E) can be diagrammed as: CLM -> STP.
To diagram a statement with "unless," we make the part of the statement following the word "unless" into the Necessary condition, and we negate the other part and make it the Sufficient condition.
This diagram matches the contrapositive of the diagram we constructed from the passage, so it can be properly inferred and is the correct answer.

Does that make sense? Please let us know if you have any other questions and best of luck with your studies!