June 2014 LSAT
Section 2
Question 20
Agricultural scientist: Wild apples are considerably smaller than cultivated apples found in supermarkets. In one par...
Replies
Emil-Kunkin on July 16, 2022
Hi Mazen,Good job spotting the flaw! I have two responses to your objection.
First, is that I think the two categories at play are not exactly "wild and cultivated" but rather, "wild and supermarket." It is quite possible that there are cultivated apples that are not sold in supermarkets, which may be different sizes.
Second, there actually may be a third category between wild and cultivated, a semi-domestic apple. That is, an apple that farmers have started domesticating, but have not fully domesticated yet. (As an aside, the history of plant domestication is really cool, and recent research has found a lot of examples of plants that people started and then stopped domesticating, or cultivated in a weird form that was halfway between their wild state and a later domesticated state).
I think the explanation is correct in saying that the author does not rule out the possibility of other kinds of apples, only the two categories of supermarket and wild. Thus, C is wrong because it does not describe what the author actually did.
Wrong answer choices are often wrong for more than one reason. I think your line of reasoning is good here for eliminating C, and I don't think it is mutually exclusive with the written explanation.
Mazen on July 17, 2022
Hi Emil,Great post on many levels, the most helpful, to me, was your first point.
I reread the stimulus after I read your post, and I agree with you. The language in the stimulus does yield to the "quite possible" idea that there might be a third category of apples: cultivated yet NOT sold/found in supermarkets. Impressive dedication to the precision of the language.
Comparing one set (X) to a subset (Y_a) of another set (Y) rather than to Y (the other set itself).
X = wild apples
Y_a = cultivated apples found in supermarkets
Y = the cultivated apples from which some are sold/found in the supermarkets
The statement "Wild apples are considerably smaller than cultivated apples found in supermarkets" is, in my mind, equivalent to members of X are considerably smaller than members of Y_a found in supermarkets; Y_a is a subset of Y (cultivated apples).
(Concerning the aside note, whenever I take a breather from studying, I look up these intriguing facts, scholars, concepts I read about RC and RL. Thanks for sharing).
Thank you Emil
Mazen
Eugene on August 4, 2023
It came down to B and C for me. I eliminated B because of the short-time vs long-time comparison, which I thought was out of scope and not discussed in the passage. I see the point of B now. Thanks!