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 Alexandra Ruby
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#37455
Hi LSATer,

Yes, you are correct that Answer choice (A) is not correct because it simply restates the information in the stimulus.

However, to further clarify and to respond to your question about logically negating Answer Choice (A), the correct logical negation of "an ideal bureaucracy will..." in the answer choice is not "will not." Rather, the correct negation is "an ideal bureaucracy could possibly..."

Recall that the logical negation of something requires you to cover all logical possibilities from 0-100. So if the answer choice states that something will happen, i.e. that it is inevitable or 100%, the logical opposite is the possibility from 0-99 that it could or could not happen.

So if you plug in "an ideal bureaucracy could provide an appeal procedure for complaints even after it has defined and classified all possible problems and set out regulations regarding each eventuality." it does not destroy the argument in the stimulus.

Hop this helps!
 LSATer
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#37992
Got it! Thank you!
 cmnoury1221
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#71635
Hello,
I do not entirely understand the negated form of answer choice B; is this answer choice wrong bc the negated form does not connect with the ever-expanding system of regulations?

Thank you!!
 Jeremy Press
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#71698
Hi Carolyn,

As Steve mentioned in his post above, the negated form of answer choice B is, "For each problem that an ideal bureaucracy has defined and classified, the bureaucracy has not necessarily received at least one complaint revealing that problem." That is functionally the equivalent of saying that there could be some problems that the ideal bureaucracy has defined and classified, but has not received any complaints about. In other words, the ideal bureaucracy might not have received complaints about certain problems, but they might have been able to anticipate those problems from the beginning of the bureaucracy and put regulations in place to address those anticipated problems. That's not a problem for the argument, and wouldn't destroy its validity, because the argument is focused instead on what the consequence is of complaints that reveal unanticipated problems. Assuming the bureaucracy is always receiving at least some complaints that reveal unanticipated problems (the correct answer), and adding the premise that the bureaucracy will craft new regulations for those unanticipated problems, the conclusion follows that the ideal bureaucracy will have an "ever-expanding system of regulations," even if there are some problems that the bureaucracy anticipated (by defining and classifying) and didn't receive complaints about.

Since the negated form of answer choice B is consistent with the argument and its conclusion, answer choice B is not a necessary assumption of the argument.

I hope this helps!

Jeremy
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 ToadKing
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#86321
Hi,

I had a question about C. I ended up choosing it because none of the other answers seemed correct, but when I negated C it did not seem to destroy the argument.

To me, the stimulus points out two ways that a government can issue new regulations. (1) According to the first sentence, the government itself will always search for problems to classify/define. (2) According to the the remaining premises, the public can also complain, which can yield more regulations.

(C) says that a bureaucracy will never permanently be without complaints. However, if I logically negate it to "an ideal bureaucracy will sometimes be permanently without complaints" couldn't the conclusion still stand because the government can continue to expand its system of regulations by defining/classifying problems that they find themselves?

Thank you!
 Rachael Wilkenfeld
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#87072
Hello Toad,

Answer choice (C) is interesting from a negation perspective. It's a bit more complex here than switching never to sometimes. Why? Because of that term "permanently." Once something is permanent, it doesn't change. So something can't be sometimes permanent. If I permanently bulldoze my house, it's not sometimes bulldozed. It's done. It's like flipping a switch.

So how do you negate answer choice (C)? You have to negate the never and the permanently together. The negation is something like "the bureaucracy will sometimes be permanently without complaints." What does that even mean? Remember that "sometimes" means at least one time. So here, it means that there will be a time that the bureaucracy is permanently without the category of complaints described.

If we put that into the argument, it hurts the conclusion. Because once the bureaucracy hits the point where they are permanently without new complaints, they won't have an ever-expanding list of things that need regulations to fix. Therefore, it must be required that the bureaucracy is never permanently without those complaints.

Hope that helps!

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