dondaz
06-12-2008, 09:49 PM
Hey folks, Rob Menard mentioned LSATS are a good resorse for learning. I've been having a look see at LSATS and have found them to be very useful in learning analytical, reasoned thinking. Get your head stuck into these:
LSATS:
Directions: The questions in this section are based on the reasoning contained in brief statements or passages. For some questions, more than one of the choices could conceivably answer the question. However, you are to choose the best answer; that is, the response that most accurately and completely answers the question. You should not make assumptions that are by commonsense standards implausible, superfluous, or incompatible with the passage. After you have chosen the best answer, blacken the corresponding space on your answer sheet.
1. French divers recently found a large cave along the
coast of the Mediterranean Sea. The cave is accessible
only through an underwater tunnel. The interior of the
cave is completely filled with seawater and contains
numerous large stalagmites, which are stony pillars
that form when drops of water fall repeatedly on a
single spot on a cave floor, leaving behind mineral
deposits that accumulate over time.
The information above most strongly supports
which one of the following?
(A) The Mediterranean Sea was at a higher level in
the past than it is now.
(B) The water level within the cave is higher now
than it once was.
(C) The French divers were the first people who knew
that the tunnel leading to the cave existed.
(D) There was once an entrance to the cave besides
the underwater tunnel.
(E) Seawater in the Mediterranean has a lower
mineral content now than it had when the
stalagmites were being formed.
2. Adirector of the Rexx Pharmaceutical Company argued
that the development costs for new vaccines that the
health department has requested should be subsidized by
the government, since the marketing of vaccines
promised to be less profitable than the marketing of any
other pharmaceutical product. In support of this claim
the director argued that sales of vaccines are likely to be
lower since each vaccine is administered to a patient
only once, whereas medicines that combat diseases and
chronic illnesses are administered many times to each
patient.
Which one of the following, if true, most weakens the
support offered by the company director for the claim
concerning the marketing of vaccines?
(A) Vaccines are administered to many more people
than are most other pharmaceutical products.
(B) Many of the diseases that vaccines are designed
to prevent can be successfully treated by
medicines.
(C) Pharmaceutical companies occasionally market
products that are neither medicines nor vaccines.
(D) Pharmaceutical companies other than the Rexx
Pharmaceutical Company produce vaccines.
(E) The cost of administering a vaccine is rarely
borne by the pharmaceutical company that
manufactures that vaccine.
3. Manager: Our new computer network, the purpose of
which is to increase productivity, can be installed
during the day, which would disrupt our
employees’ work, or else at night, which would
entail much higher installation charges. Since
saving money is important, we should have the
network installed during the day.
The manager’s argument assumes which one of the
following?
(A) The monetary value of the network equipment
would not exceed the cost of having the
equipment installed at night.
(B) The monetary value of any productivity lost
during a daytime installation would be less
thanthe difference betweendaytime and
nighttime installation costs.
(C) A daytime installation would be completed by
no larger a crew and would take the crew no
more time than would a nighttime installation.
(D) Once the network has been installed, most of the
company’s employees will be able to use it
immediately to increase their productivity.
(E) Most of the company’s employees would be
able to work productively while a daytime
installation is in progress.
4. An ingredient in marijuana known as THC has been
found to inactivate herpesviruses in experiments. In
previous experiments researchers found that inactivated
herpesviruses can convert healthy cells into cancer cells.
It can be concluded that the use of marijuana can cause
cancer.
Which one of the following, if true, most seriously
weakens the argument?
(A) Several teams of scientists performed the various
experiments and all of the teams had similar
results.
(B) The carcinogenic effect of THC could be
neutralized by the other ingredients found in
marijuana.
(C) When THC kills herpesviruses it weakens the
immune system, and it might thus diminish the
body’s ability to fight other viruses, including
viruses linked to cancers.
(D) If chemists modify the structure of THC, THC
can be safely incorporated into medications to
prevent herpes.
(E) To lessen the undesirable side effects of
chemotherapy, the use of marijuana has been
recommended for cancer patients who are free of
the herpesvirus.
5. Archaeologist: Alarge corporation has recently offered
to provide funding to restore an archaeological site
and to construct facilities to make the site readily
accessible to the general public. The restoration will
conform to the best current theories about
howthe site appearedatthe height of theancient
civilization that occupied it. This offer should be
rejected, however, because many parts of the site
contain unexamined evidence.
Which one of the following principles, if valid, justifies
the archaeologist’s argument?
(A) The ownership of archaeological sites should not
be under the control of business interests.
(B) Any restoration of an archaeological site should
represent only the most ancient period of that
site’s history.
(C) No one should make judgments about what
constitutes the height of another civilization.
(D) Only those with a true concern for an
archaeological site’s history should be involved
in the restoration of that site.
(E) The risk of losing evidence relevant to possible
future theories should outweigh any advantages
of displaying the results of theories already
developed.
6. Besides laying eggs in her own nest, any female wood
duck will lay an egg in the nest of another female wood
duck if she sees the other duck leaving her nest. Under
natural nesting conditions, this parasitic behavior is
relatively rare because the ducks’ nests are well hidden.
However, when people put up nesting boxes to help the
ducks breed, they actually undercut the ducks’
reproductive efforts. These nesting boxes become so
crowded with extra eggs that few, if any, of the eggs in
those boxes hatch.
The statements above, if true, most strongly support
which one of the following?
(A) Female wood ducks will establish nests in nest
boxes only when natural nesting sites are not
available.
(B) Nesting female wood ducks who often see other
female wood ducks are the most successful in
their breeding efforts.
(C) The nesting boxes for wood ducks have less space
for eggs than do natural nesting sites.
(D) The nesting boxes would be more effective in
helping wood ducks breed if they were less
visible to other wood ducks than they currently
are.
(E) Nesting boxes are needed to supplement the
natural nesting sites of wood ducks because of
the destruction of much of the ducks’ habitat.
7. The crux of creativity resides in the ability to
manufacture variations on a theme. If we look at the
history of science, for instance, we see that every idea is
built upon a thousand related ideas. Careful analysis
leads us to understand that what we choose to call a new
theme or a new discovery is itself always and without
exception some sort of variation, on a deep level, of
previous themes.
If all of the statements in the passage are true, each of
the following must also be true EXCEPT:
(A) A lack of ability to manufacture a variation on a
previous theme connotes a lack of creativity.
(B) No scientific idea is entirely independent of all
other ideas.
(C) Careful analysis of a specific variation can reveal
previous themes of which it is a variation.
(D) All great scientific discoverers have been able to
manufacture a variation on a theme.
(E) Some new scientific discoveries do not represent,
on a deep level, a variation on previous themes.
8. Millions of female bats rear their pups in Bracken Cave.
Although the mothers all leave the cave nightly, on their
return each mother is almost always swiftly reunited
with her own pup. Since the bats’ calls are their only
means of finding one another, and a bat pup cannot
distinguish the call of its mother from that of any other
adult bat, it is clear that each mother bat can recognize
the call of herpup.
The argument seeks to do which one of the following?
(A) derive a general conclusion about all members of
a group from facts known about representative
members of that group
(B) establish the validity of one explanation for a
phenomenon by excluding alternative
explanations
(C) support, by describing a suitable mechanism, the
hypothesis that a certain phenomenon can occur
(D) conclude that members of two groups are likely to
share a certain ability because of other
characteristics they share
(E) demonstrate that a general rule applies in a
particular case
9. Someone who gets sick from eating a meal will often
develop a strong distaste for the one food in the meal
that had the most distinctive flavor, whether or not that
food caused the sickness. This phenomenon explains
why children are especially likely to develop strong
aversions to some foods.
Which one of the following, if true, provides the
strongest support for the explanation?
(A) Children are more likely than adults to be given
meals composed of foods lacking especially
distinctive flavors.
(B) Children are less likely than adults to see a
connection between their health and the foods
they eat.
(C) Children tend to have more acutetaste andto
become sick more often than adults do.
(D) Children typically recover more slowly than
adults do from sickness caused by food.
(E) Children are more likely than are adults to refuse
to eat unfamiliar foods.
10. Premiums for automobile accident insurance are often
higher for red cars than for cars of other colors. To
justify these higher charges, insurance companies claim
that, overall, a greater percentage of red cars are
involved in accidents than are cars of any other color. If
this claim is true, then lives could undoubtedly be saved
by banning red cars from the roads altogether.
The reasoning in the argument is flawed because
the argument
(A) accepts without question that insurance
companies have the right to charge higher
premiums for higher-risk clients
(B) fails to consider whether red cars cost the same to
repair as cars of other colors
(C) ignores the possibility that drivers who drive
recklessly have a preference for red cars
(D) does not specify precisely what percentage of red
cars are involved in accidents
(E) makes an unsupported assumption that every
automobile accident results in some loss of life
11. A certain credit-card company awards its customers
bonus points for using its credit card. Customers can
use accumulated points in the purchase of brand name
merchandise by mail at prices lower than the
manufacturers’ suggested retail prices. At any given
time, therefore, customers who purchase merchandise
using the bonus points spend less than they would spend
if they purchased the same merchandise in retail stores.
Which one of the following is an assumption on which
the argument depends?
(A) The merchandise that can be ordered by mail
using the bonus points is not offered at lower
prices by other credit-card companies that award
bonus points.
(B) The bonus points cannot be used by the credit-card
customers in the purchase of brand name
merchandise that is not available for purchase in
retail stores.
(C) The credit-card company does not require its
customers to accumulate a large number of
bonus points before becoming eligible to order
merchandise at prices lower than the
manufacturers’ suggested retail price.
(D) The amount credit-card customers pay for
shipping the merchandise ordered by mail does
not increase the amount customers spend to an
amount greater than they would spend if they
purchased the same merchandise in retail stores.
(E) The merchandise available to the company’s
credit-card customers using the bonus points
is frequently sold in retail stores at prices that are
higher than the manufacturers’ suggested retail
prices.
12. It is probably not true that colic in infants is caused by
the inability of those infants to tolerate certain antibodies
found in cow’s milk, since it is often the case that
symptoms of colic are shown by infants that are fed
breast milk exclusively.
Which one of the following, if true, most seriously
weakens the argument?
(A) A study involving 500 sets of twins has found
that if one infant has colic, its twin will probably
also have colic.
(B) Symptoms of colic generally disappear as infants
grow older, whether the infants have been fed
breast milk exclusively or have been fed infant
formula containing cow’s milk.
(C) In a study of 5,000 infants who were fed only
infant formula containing cow’s milk, over
4,000 of the infants never displayed any
symptoms of colic.
(D) When mothers of infants that are fed only breast
milk eliminate cow’s milk and all products made
from cow’s milk from their own diets, any colic
symptoms that their infants have manifested
quickly disappear.
(E) Infants that are fed breast milk develop mature
digestive systems at an earlier age than do those
that are fed infant formulas, and infants with
mature digestive systems are better able to
tolerate certain proteins and antibodies found in
cow’s milk.
If anyone has any LSATS based on actual Laws, please feel free to post them, cheers! There's over fifty more in this pdf to get your teeth into:
http://www.lsac.org/pdfs/2007-2008/SamplePT07webrenumbered.pdf
LSATS:
Directions: The questions in this section are based on the reasoning contained in brief statements or passages. For some questions, more than one of the choices could conceivably answer the question. However, you are to choose the best answer; that is, the response that most accurately and completely answers the question. You should not make assumptions that are by commonsense standards implausible, superfluous, or incompatible with the passage. After you have chosen the best answer, blacken the corresponding space on your answer sheet.
1. French divers recently found a large cave along the
coast of the Mediterranean Sea. The cave is accessible
only through an underwater tunnel. The interior of the
cave is completely filled with seawater and contains
numerous large stalagmites, which are stony pillars
that form when drops of water fall repeatedly on a
single spot on a cave floor, leaving behind mineral
deposits that accumulate over time.
The information above most strongly supports
which one of the following?
(A) The Mediterranean Sea was at a higher level in
the past than it is now.
(B) The water level within the cave is higher now
than it once was.
(C) The French divers were the first people who knew
that the tunnel leading to the cave existed.
(D) There was once an entrance to the cave besides
the underwater tunnel.
(E) Seawater in the Mediterranean has a lower
mineral content now than it had when the
stalagmites were being formed.
2. Adirector of the Rexx Pharmaceutical Company argued
that the development costs for new vaccines that the
health department has requested should be subsidized by
the government, since the marketing of vaccines
promised to be less profitable than the marketing of any
other pharmaceutical product. In support of this claim
the director argued that sales of vaccines are likely to be
lower since each vaccine is administered to a patient
only once, whereas medicines that combat diseases and
chronic illnesses are administered many times to each
patient.
Which one of the following, if true, most weakens the
support offered by the company director for the claim
concerning the marketing of vaccines?
(A) Vaccines are administered to many more people
than are most other pharmaceutical products.
(B) Many of the diseases that vaccines are designed
to prevent can be successfully treated by
medicines.
(C) Pharmaceutical companies occasionally market
products that are neither medicines nor vaccines.
(D) Pharmaceutical companies other than the Rexx
Pharmaceutical Company produce vaccines.
(E) The cost of administering a vaccine is rarely
borne by the pharmaceutical company that
manufactures that vaccine.
3. Manager: Our new computer network, the purpose of
which is to increase productivity, can be installed
during the day, which would disrupt our
employees’ work, or else at night, which would
entail much higher installation charges. Since
saving money is important, we should have the
network installed during the day.
The manager’s argument assumes which one of the
following?
(A) The monetary value of the network equipment
would not exceed the cost of having the
equipment installed at night.
(B) The monetary value of any productivity lost
during a daytime installation would be less
thanthe difference betweendaytime and
nighttime installation costs.
(C) A daytime installation would be completed by
no larger a crew and would take the crew no
more time than would a nighttime installation.
(D) Once the network has been installed, most of the
company’s employees will be able to use it
immediately to increase their productivity.
(E) Most of the company’s employees would be
able to work productively while a daytime
installation is in progress.
4. An ingredient in marijuana known as THC has been
found to inactivate herpesviruses in experiments. In
previous experiments researchers found that inactivated
herpesviruses can convert healthy cells into cancer cells.
It can be concluded that the use of marijuana can cause
cancer.
Which one of the following, if true, most seriously
weakens the argument?
(A) Several teams of scientists performed the various
experiments and all of the teams had similar
results.
(B) The carcinogenic effect of THC could be
neutralized by the other ingredients found in
marijuana.
(C) When THC kills herpesviruses it weakens the
immune system, and it might thus diminish the
body’s ability to fight other viruses, including
viruses linked to cancers.
(D) If chemists modify the structure of THC, THC
can be safely incorporated into medications to
prevent herpes.
(E) To lessen the undesirable side effects of
chemotherapy, the use of marijuana has been
recommended for cancer patients who are free of
the herpesvirus.
5. Archaeologist: Alarge corporation has recently offered
to provide funding to restore an archaeological site
and to construct facilities to make the site readily
accessible to the general public. The restoration will
conform to the best current theories about
howthe site appearedatthe height of theancient
civilization that occupied it. This offer should be
rejected, however, because many parts of the site
contain unexamined evidence.
Which one of the following principles, if valid, justifies
the archaeologist’s argument?
(A) The ownership of archaeological sites should not
be under the control of business interests.
(B) Any restoration of an archaeological site should
represent only the most ancient period of that
site’s history.
(C) No one should make judgments about what
constitutes the height of another civilization.
(D) Only those with a true concern for an
archaeological site’s history should be involved
in the restoration of that site.
(E) The risk of losing evidence relevant to possible
future theories should outweigh any advantages
of displaying the results of theories already
developed.
6. Besides laying eggs in her own nest, any female wood
duck will lay an egg in the nest of another female wood
duck if she sees the other duck leaving her nest. Under
natural nesting conditions, this parasitic behavior is
relatively rare because the ducks’ nests are well hidden.
However, when people put up nesting boxes to help the
ducks breed, they actually undercut the ducks’
reproductive efforts. These nesting boxes become so
crowded with extra eggs that few, if any, of the eggs in
those boxes hatch.
The statements above, if true, most strongly support
which one of the following?
(A) Female wood ducks will establish nests in nest
boxes only when natural nesting sites are not
available.
(B) Nesting female wood ducks who often see other
female wood ducks are the most successful in
their breeding efforts.
(C) The nesting boxes for wood ducks have less space
for eggs than do natural nesting sites.
(D) The nesting boxes would be more effective in
helping wood ducks breed if they were less
visible to other wood ducks than they currently
are.
(E) Nesting boxes are needed to supplement the
natural nesting sites of wood ducks because of
the destruction of much of the ducks’ habitat.
7. The crux of creativity resides in the ability to
manufacture variations on a theme. If we look at the
history of science, for instance, we see that every idea is
built upon a thousand related ideas. Careful analysis
leads us to understand that what we choose to call a new
theme or a new discovery is itself always and without
exception some sort of variation, on a deep level, of
previous themes.
If all of the statements in the passage are true, each of
the following must also be true EXCEPT:
(A) A lack of ability to manufacture a variation on a
previous theme connotes a lack of creativity.
(B) No scientific idea is entirely independent of all
other ideas.
(C) Careful analysis of a specific variation can reveal
previous themes of which it is a variation.
(D) All great scientific discoverers have been able to
manufacture a variation on a theme.
(E) Some new scientific discoveries do not represent,
on a deep level, a variation on previous themes.
8. Millions of female bats rear their pups in Bracken Cave.
Although the mothers all leave the cave nightly, on their
return each mother is almost always swiftly reunited
with her own pup. Since the bats’ calls are their only
means of finding one another, and a bat pup cannot
distinguish the call of its mother from that of any other
adult bat, it is clear that each mother bat can recognize
the call of herpup.
The argument seeks to do which one of the following?
(A) derive a general conclusion about all members of
a group from facts known about representative
members of that group
(B) establish the validity of one explanation for a
phenomenon by excluding alternative
explanations
(C) support, by describing a suitable mechanism, the
hypothesis that a certain phenomenon can occur
(D) conclude that members of two groups are likely to
share a certain ability because of other
characteristics they share
(E) demonstrate that a general rule applies in a
particular case
9. Someone who gets sick from eating a meal will often
develop a strong distaste for the one food in the meal
that had the most distinctive flavor, whether or not that
food caused the sickness. This phenomenon explains
why children are especially likely to develop strong
aversions to some foods.
Which one of the following, if true, provides the
strongest support for the explanation?
(A) Children are more likely than adults to be given
meals composed of foods lacking especially
distinctive flavors.
(B) Children are less likely than adults to see a
connection between their health and the foods
they eat.
(C) Children tend to have more acutetaste andto
become sick more often than adults do.
(D) Children typically recover more slowly than
adults do from sickness caused by food.
(E) Children are more likely than are adults to refuse
to eat unfamiliar foods.
10. Premiums for automobile accident insurance are often
higher for red cars than for cars of other colors. To
justify these higher charges, insurance companies claim
that, overall, a greater percentage of red cars are
involved in accidents than are cars of any other color. If
this claim is true, then lives could undoubtedly be saved
by banning red cars from the roads altogether.
The reasoning in the argument is flawed because
the argument
(A) accepts without question that insurance
companies have the right to charge higher
premiums for higher-risk clients
(B) fails to consider whether red cars cost the same to
repair as cars of other colors
(C) ignores the possibility that drivers who drive
recklessly have a preference for red cars
(D) does not specify precisely what percentage of red
cars are involved in accidents
(E) makes an unsupported assumption that every
automobile accident results in some loss of life
11. A certain credit-card company awards its customers
bonus points for using its credit card. Customers can
use accumulated points in the purchase of brand name
merchandise by mail at prices lower than the
manufacturers’ suggested retail prices. At any given
time, therefore, customers who purchase merchandise
using the bonus points spend less than they would spend
if they purchased the same merchandise in retail stores.
Which one of the following is an assumption on which
the argument depends?
(A) The merchandise that can be ordered by mail
using the bonus points is not offered at lower
prices by other credit-card companies that award
bonus points.
(B) The bonus points cannot be used by the credit-card
customers in the purchase of brand name
merchandise that is not available for purchase in
retail stores.
(C) The credit-card company does not require its
customers to accumulate a large number of
bonus points before becoming eligible to order
merchandise at prices lower than the
manufacturers’ suggested retail price.
(D) The amount credit-card customers pay for
shipping the merchandise ordered by mail does
not increase the amount customers spend to an
amount greater than they would spend if they
purchased the same merchandise in retail stores.
(E) The merchandise available to the company’s
credit-card customers using the bonus points
is frequently sold in retail stores at prices that are
higher than the manufacturers’ suggested retail
prices.
12. It is probably not true that colic in infants is caused by
the inability of those infants to tolerate certain antibodies
found in cow’s milk, since it is often the case that
symptoms of colic are shown by infants that are fed
breast milk exclusively.
Which one of the following, if true, most seriously
weakens the argument?
(A) A study involving 500 sets of twins has found
that if one infant has colic, its twin will probably
also have colic.
(B) Symptoms of colic generally disappear as infants
grow older, whether the infants have been fed
breast milk exclusively or have been fed infant
formula containing cow’s milk.
(C) In a study of 5,000 infants who were fed only
infant formula containing cow’s milk, over
4,000 of the infants never displayed any
symptoms of colic.
(D) When mothers of infants that are fed only breast
milk eliminate cow’s milk and all products made
from cow’s milk from their own diets, any colic
symptoms that their infants have manifested
quickly disappear.
(E) Infants that are fed breast milk develop mature
digestive systems at an earlier age than do those
that are fed infant formulas, and infants with
mature digestive systems are better able to
tolerate certain proteins and antibodies found in
cow’s milk.
If anyone has any LSATS based on actual Laws, please feel free to post them, cheers! There's over fifty more in this pdf to get your teeth into:
http://www.lsac.org/pdfs/2007-2008/SamplePT07webrenumbered.pdf