Q21 - Essayist: Winners of a Nobel prize

[schroeder.franzi]

Hi,
I think I need help with Inference questions that include some, all and most. I chose here A and I think I get why it is wrong. We don't know anything about the hobby scientists that did not win the Nobel prize. B is wrong bc the stimulus does not exclude that some professional scientists are not motivated by the love for science. D does not make sense bc we don't know the number of hobby scientists. Maybe they are so many that they contributed overall more to science then the professionals that won the Nobel prize. E is just not in the stimulus. We don't know whether they would be better if they would be motivated by the love of discovery.

I understand the stimulus the following:

Professional scientists (PS) that won Nobel prize ---> contribute to science
Some PS motivated by economic considerations or desire of fame
Some Amateur scientists (AS) --> Contribute to science
All AS --> love of discovery alone

Also, what are we able to infer about the professional scientists?

Thank you so much!

[christine.defenbaugh]

Great question Franzi!

You've done a lot of great work ferreting out a number of the inferences we can and cannot make. The stimulus is going to be a laundry list of facts, any one of which might support an inference - predicting them all would be exhausting! Rather, we want to diagram the stimulus, then investigate each answer choice to determine whether it is fully supported, eliminating as we go.

But for the sake of clarity, let's outline what we do know here:

All Nobel prize winners have made science contributions.
Nobel prize winners are typically professional scientists (PS).
Some amateur scientists (AS) have made science contributions.
PS are often motivated by econ. nec. or desire for fame.
AS are motivated only by love of discovery.

(C) is fully supported. Since some science contributions have been made by AS, and AS are always motivated by only the love of discovery, it must be true that some science contributions have been motivated by the love of discovery!


The incorrect answers:
(A) We know that some AS made contributions to science - but we don't know whether they won Nobel prizes! What if all of the AS who contributed to science won Nobels? Then all of the AS who didn't win Nobels would not have contributed to science!

(B) There are two problems here. Nobels are typically won by PS, and PS are often motivated by economics/fame. We can't link these statements! If strawberries are typically red, and red things are often cars, that does not mean that strawberries are typically cars.

Additionally, we know PS are often motivated by economics/fame, but that doesn't necessarily mean those PS aren't in some part by love of discovery too - just that they aren't motivated by it exclusively.

(D) While we don't know the number of the AS and the PS, what's more important is that we don't know the relative significance of their overall contributions. Even if there was just one AS ever who contributed to science, it's possible that his single contribution was more important than all the PS's contributions combined!

(E) There's no information about the love of discovery making anyone more likely to make a contribution.


You ask what we can infer about the PS, and the answer is: very little! We know some have won Nobel prizes, and some are motivated by economics/fame, and that's about it. Remember that the LSAT doesn't just want you to find answers, it also wants you to know where there are no answers! There's nothing much to know here about the PS!

Please let me know if this answered your question completely!

#officialexplanation

[asmaa737]

Hi!
You say that "it must be true that SOME science contributions have been motivated by the love of discovery!"

However, the answer choice states "the love of discovery is the motive behind MANY significant contributions to science."

When I looked at "many," I felt that it was too strong, especially since typically the winners of the Nobel are PS, who are motivated by economic necessity or fame.

Also, I'm wondering, does "typically" equate "most" on the LSAT?

[tommywallach]

Typically does equate to most. It implies that it happens more often than not.

-t

[juliana.ramirez]

I was also confused my the "many" in answer C, but the stimulus does say "AS have also provided MANY significant contributions"

C: Since AS are motivated only by the love of discovery and they have provided MANY significant contributions, it must be true that "the love of discovery is the motive behind many significant contributions to science"

I think the problem here was the whole Nobel prize thing, because it's true that we don't know whether most, many or some AS were awarded the prize. However, this has no relevance in the answer statement.

[abkrusemark]

I would like more clarification on answer choice B. Would the answer be right if it read: "Typically, winners of a Nobel price for science are not motivated by the love of discovery alone." ?

And, is it wrong because they could still be motivated by the love of discovery, however in most cases it is not the primary motivator?

Can you ever make inferences from two "typically" statements?

[ohthatpatrick]

You CAN make inferences from 2 "typically" ideas. As mentioned earlier, "typically" is the same as "most".

Most A are B
+
Most A are C
-------------------
Some B are C

So if we said
"most Nobel winners are professionals"
and
"most Nobel winners are motivated by economics / fame"

Then we could conclude
"At least some professional scientists won the Nobel and were motivated by $ / fame"

or
"Some Nobel winners were not motivated SOLELY by love of discovery"

We're at least two tweaks away from being able to conclude (B). Remember, the Most+Most inference indicates that there is SOME overlap, not that MOST people have both qualities.

Also, the word "often" (professionals are "often" motivated by $ / fame) is NOT a proxy for "most/typically/usually/generally/tends to".

'Often' does NOT tell us more than 50% of the time. So we would have to chance that to "typically motivated" and then we'd have to change choice (B) to "Sometimes" and "not SOLELY motivated".

Hope that helps.

[christian.zeigler]

What I don't get here is why C is right, in terms of motivation.

"AS are motivated by..." is a language shift to "...is the motive behind...contributions" !!!

Just because a scientist is motivated by something, doesn't necessarily mean his contribution is!

I am motivated by pizza, but that doesn't mean that my excellent mile time is motivated by pizza! You're shifting from the motive of the person to the motive of their contributions.

Also, it doesn't say that these are the only motivations; Bill Gates was motivated to make an operating system. Therefore, his motivation for making an operating system was the reason for his charitable contributions.

[ohthatpatrick]

Only actions can have motives. There's no motive behind "that chair"; there's only a motive behind "making that chair" (hoping to sell it for money) or "sitting in that chair" (hoping to rest for a bit).

It's technically incomplete to say "I am motivated by pizza". You're motivated by pizza to do what?

If you helped me move all day because you knew I would buy us pizza at the end of the day, then "Your love of pizza is the motive behind your helping me move".

As you were saying, an action can have more than one motive: maybe you helped me move based on motivations of pizza and friendship.

But we are told that amateur scientists are motivated by the love of discovery alone.

So the actions of amateur scientists (the ones relating to science at least) are motivated by only one thing: the love of discovery.

Since the actions of amateur scientists include "providing many significant contributions to science", we can say that "love of discovery" was the motive behind their providing many significant contributions to science.

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As a final note, you do have to constantly remind yourself that this test is about picking the BEST AVAILABLE answer. Correct answers aren't always perfect, even when a task like "must be true" makes it feel like they should be.