three days and counting

The Law School Admissions Test has become so important to me in the past six weeks that I hardly remember life without it. The LSAT is not a knowledge test, meaning, it does not test one’s understanding of laws, history or politics, for example, but rather tests a person’s ability to reason. All the questions involve logic and reasoning, reading comprehension, or a combination of both. It also tests one’s ability to think and comprehend complex written passages and break down the structure of arguments as quickly as possible.

The timing is extremely important. One of my biggest problems is getting flustered with a question and not just giving up and moving on as soon as possible. With 22-27 questions per section, 35 minutes for the entire section and every question valued equally, it’s crucial to not waste two or three minutes reading and re-reading tricky questions. I don’t like to give up, so it’s sometimes difficult for me to move on, and that usually means I am rushed and hence error-prone near the end of my sections.

Here’s an example of a logical reasoning question:

All intelligent people are nearsighted. I am very near-sighted. So I must be a genius.

Which one of the following exhibits both of the logical flaws exhibited in the argument above?

(A) I must be stupid because all intelligent people are nearsighted and I have perfect eyesight.
(B) All chickens have beaks. This bird has a beak. So this bird must be a chicken.
(C) All pigs have four legs, but this spider has eight legs. So this spider must be twice as big as any pig.
(D) John is extremely happy, so he must be extremely tall because all tall people are happy.
(E) All geniuses are very nearsighted. I must be very nearsighted since I am a genius.

When I first started prepping these flaw in reasoning questions were difficult for me, but now I’m pretty good at them.

The correct answer is D.

Then there are the infamous logic games. Some people find these games fun, I suppose I am one of them, unless I am missing something and it doesn’t all click together, and I can’t breeze through all the questions after creating a diagram. Then I hate the games, I hate them. Hate.

But I also love the games, and I think I might actually…. miss…. the games after Saturday. I might even like it if there were a website where other sick people such as myself might go to play these games, and there would be challenge after challenge and there is no timer and you could just solve and solve and solve until you were fully convinced of your own brilliance…

See? I told you it was sick.

I’ve also found some of my writing starting to sound like the LSAT logical reasoning questions. Especially when I am writing on I2US. For instance, I’ll just find myself structuring my arguments a little more succinctly, and perhaps with more clear causes and effects. There are a lot more words like “thus” and “therefore” as well. I guess lawyer-speak begins with the LSAT.

Wish me luck Saturday!