The stated goal of the government's funding program for the arts is to encourage the creation of works of artistic ex...

Sandra August 29, 2021

When to negate all and when to negate some?

How do we know when to negate all statements in the sentence and when to negate only one? In this question if you negate both then you would not achieve the right answer. Can you please clarify?

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Ross-Rinehart September 13, 2021

Here are some general tips for negating a statement ...

1. Most claims on the LSAT can be negated by simply adding a "not" to it, or taking the "not" away if it's already there (e.g., "All dogs are friendly" should be negated to "Not all dogs are friendly"; "Not all dogs are friendly" should be negated to "All dogs are friendly"
2. When negating a "some " statement, just change it to "none." When negating a "none" statement, change it to "some" (e.g., "Some of my friends have brown hair" should be negated to "None of my friends have brown hair"; "None of my friends have brown hair" should be negated to "Some of my friends have brown hair.")
3. If you ever get stuck and are unsure on how to negate, simply put "It is not true that ..." in front of the statement.

For answer choice (E), we can simply follow the first rule above and take away the "not" in "cannot be a work of true artistic excellence." So the negated claim is: "A contemporary work of art that does not reflect the independent artistic conscience of the artist can be a work of true artistic excellence."

Alternatively, you could have followed rule 3 and negated (E) as: "It is not true that a contemporary work of art that does not reflect the independent artistic conscience of the artist cannot be a work of true artistic excellence."