LSAC LSAT-TEST Online Practice Questions and Exam Preparation

LSAC LSAT-TEST Online Questions & Answers

• Question 111:

  The six messages on an answering machine were each left by one of Fleure, Greta, Hildy, Liam, Pasquale, or Theodore, consistent with the following:

  At most one person left more than one message.

  No person left more than three messages.

  If the first message is Hildy's, the last is Pasquale's.

  If Greta left any message, Fleure and Pasquale did also.

  If Fleure left any message, Pasquale and Theodore did also, all of Pasquale's preceding any of Theodore's.

  If Pasquale left any message, Hildy and Liam did also, all of Hildy's preceding any of Liam's.

  Which one of the following could be a complete and accurate list of the messages left on the answering machine, from first to last?

  A. Fleure's, Pasquale's, Theodore's, Hildy's,Pasquale's, Liam's
  B. Greta's, Pasquale's, Theodore's, Theodore's,Hildy's, Liam's
  C. Hildy's, Hildy's, Hildy's, Liam's, Pasquale's,Theodore's
  D. Pasquale's, Hildy's, Fleure's, Liam's,Theodore's, Theodore's
  E. Pasquale's, Hildy's, Theodore's, Hildy's, Liam's,Liam's
  D. Pasquale's, Hildy's, Fleure's, Liam's,Theodore's, Theodore's

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  This game wasn't easy, but this was the easiest question. Take the rules and use them to eliminate choices. Rule 1 kills E.. Rule 2 doesn't help, but Rule 3 eliminates [Hildy's, Hildy's, Hildy's, Liam's, Pasquale's,Theodore's]. Rule 4 axes [Greta's, Pasquale's, Theodore's, Theodore's,Hildy's, Liam's]., Rule 5 kills [Fleure's, Pasquale's, Theodore's, Hildy's,Pasquale's, Liam's], and we're down to [Pasquale's, Hildy's, Fleure's, Liam's,Theodore's, Theodore's], the correct answer.

• Question 112:

  Scientists have long known that the soft surface of the bill of the platypus is perforated with openings that contain sensitive nerve endings. Only recently, however, have biologists concluded on the basis of new evidence that the animal uses its bill to locate its prey while underwater, a conclusion suggested by the fact that the animal's eyes, ears, and nostrils are sealed when it is submerged. The new evidence comes from neurophysiological studies, which have recently revealed that within the pores on the bill there are two kinds of sensory receptors: mechanoreceptors, which are tiny pushrods that respond to tactile pressure, and electroreceptors, which respond to weak electrical fields. Having discovered that tactile stimulation of the pushrods sends nerve impulses to the brain, where they evoke an electric potential over an area of the neocortex much larger than the one stimulated by input from the limbs, eyes, and ears, Bohringer concluded that the bill must be the primary sensory organ for the platypus. Her finding was supported by studies showing that the bill is extraordinarily sensitive to tactile stimulation: stimulation with a fine glass stylus sent a signal by way of the fifth cranial nerve to the neocortex and from there to the motor cortex. Presumably nerve impulses from the motor cortex then induced a snapping movement of the bill. But Bohringer's investigations did not explain how the animal locates its prey at a distance.

  Scheich's neurophysiological studies contribute to solving this mystery. His initial work showed that when a platypus feeds, it swims along, steadily wagging its bill from side to side until prey is encountered. It thereupon switches to searching behavior, characterized by erratic movements of the bill over a small area at the bottom of a body of water, which is followed by homing in on the object and seizing it. In order to determine how the animal senses prey and then distinguishes it from other objects on the bottom, Scheich hypothesized that a sensory system based on electroreception similar to that found in sharks might exist in the platypus. In further experiments he found he could trigger the switch from patrolling to searching behavior in the platypus by creating a dipole electric field in the water with the aid of a small 1.5-volt battery. The platypus, sensitive to the weak electric current that was created, rapidly oriented toward the battery at a distance of 10 centimeters and sometimes as much as 30 centimeters. Once the battery was detected, the platypus would inevitably attack it as if it were food. Scheich then discovered that the tail flicks of freshwater shrimp, a common prey of the platypus, also produce weak electric fields and elicit an identical response. Scheich and his colleagues believe that it is reasonable to assume that all the invertebrates on which the platypus feed must produce electric fields.

  Which one of the following strategies is most similar to Scheich's experimental strategy as it is described in the passage?

  A. To determine the mating habits of birds, a biologist places decoys near the birds' nests that resemble the birds and emit bird calls.
  B. To determine whether certain animals find their way by listening for echoes to their cries, a biologist plays a tape of the animals' cries in their vicinity.
  C. To determine whether an animal uses heat sensitivity to detect prey, a biologist places a heat-generating object near the animal's home.
  D. A fisherman catches fish by dangling in the water rubber replicas of the fishes' prey that have been scented with fish oil.
  E. A game warden captures an animal by baiting a cage with a piece of meat that the animal will want to eat.
  C. To determine whether an animal uses heat sensitivity to detect prey, a biologist places a heat-generating object near the animal's home.

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  This question has a kind of Parallel Reasoning feel to it. We are looking for an experiment analogous with that of Scheich in 2, which means we need to re-read passage. Placing a small battery in the water triggered a switch in the platypus behavior from "patrolling" to "searching," which led Scheich to believe that those bill electroreceptors are sensitive to the electrical charges of prey. Well, if you use electricity to confirm whether an entity senses electricity, what's the best way to confirm whether an entity senses heat?

• Question 113:

  Psychologist: Doctors should never prescribe sedatives for people with insomnia. Most cases of insomnia that psychologists treat are known to be caused by psychological stress. This suggests that insomniacs do not need drugs that alter their biochemistry, but rather need psychotherapy to help them alleviate the stress causing their insomnia.

  Each of the following describes a flaw in the psychologist's reasoning EXCEPT:

  A. It presumes, without providing warrant, that insomnia contributes to an inability to cope with stress.
  B. It fails to consider the possibility that sedatives are the only treatment known to be effective for cases of insomnia not caused by stress.
  C. It neglects the possibility that for some people psychotherapy is a completely ineffective treatment for stress.
  D. It overlooks the possibility that sedatives could help insomniacs cope with stress.
  E. It presumes, without providing justification, that the cases of insomnia psychologists treat are representative of all cases of insomnia.
  A. It presumes, without providing warrant, that insomnia contributes to an inability to cope with stress.

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  One has to wonder if the psychologist went out of his way to construct such a lousy argument. After all, it's not easy to cram four distinct flaws into a three-sentence pronouncement, but the psychologists somehow manages to do just that. Sedatives should never be prescribed for insomnia because most cases of insomnia that psychologists treat are caused by stress. Well, there's a first possible flaw, the familiar non-representative sample: The psychologist can't form a general conclusion about how insomnia shouldn't be treated based only on evidence concerning people treated by psychologists; what about those who aren't? E. speaks directly to this issue and can therefore be eliminated. Furthermore, the fact that most cases of insomnia are caused by stress doesn't mean that all are, and so perhaps for the non-stress related cases sedatives can be helpful. So again the "never prescribe sedatives" recommendation overreaches, and B. describes this flaw perfectly. Now for the rest of the argument: Because these cases treated by psychologists are mostly caused by stress, insomniacs don't need drugs, but rather psychotherapy to alleviate stress. This sounds a bit self-serving and suspect, but if nothing specific hits you, then it's time to check out the remaining choices.

• Question 114:

  Bird-watchers explore a forest to see which of the following six kinds of birds -- grosbeak, harrier, jay, martin, shrike, wren -- it contains. The findings are consistent with the following conditions:

  If harriers are in the forest, then grosbeaks are not. If jays, martins, or both are in the forest, then so are harriers If wrens are in the forest, then so are grosbeaks If jays are not in the forest, then shrikes are

  If grosbeaks are in the forest, then which one of the following must be true?

  A. Shrikes are in the forest.
  B. Wrens are in the forest.
  C. The forest contains both wrens and shrikes.
  D. At most two kinds of birds are in the forest.
  E. At least three kinds of birds are in the forest.
  A. Shrikes are in the forest.

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  A straightforward chain. Choosing G mandates rejecting H (Rule 1). That in turn mandates

  rejecting J and M (Rule 2's contrapositive). And once J is gone, S must be chosen (Rule 4). W, the remaining entity, can be chosen but need not be, so neither choice [Wrens are in the forest.] nor [The forest contains both...] must be true.

  And since the total number of birds here is 2 or 3, options [At most two kinds of...] and [At least three kinds of...] are possible only.

• Question 115:

  This morning, a bakery makes exactly one delivery, consisting of exactly six loaves of bread. Each of the loaves is exactly one of three kinds: oatmeal, rye, or wheat, and each is either sliced or unsliced. The loaves that the bakery delivers this morning must be consistent with the following:

  Which one of the following statements CANNOT be true?

  A. The only unsliced loaves are oatmeal loaves.
  B. The only sliced loaves are rye loaves.
  C. The only unsliced loaves are rye loaves.
  D. The number of sliced loaves is exactly one greater than the number of sliced oatmeal loaves.
  E. The number of unsliced loaves is exactly one greater than the number of unsliced oatmeal loaves.
  C. The only unsliced loaves are rye loaves.

• Question 116:

  In a recent study, a group of subjects had their normal daily caloric intake increased by 25 percent. This increase was entirely in the form of alcohol. Another group of similar subjects had alcohol replace nonalcoholic sources of 25 percent of their normal daily caloric intake. All subjects gained body fat over the course of the study, and the amount of body fat gained was the same for both groups.

  Which one of the following is most strongly supported by the information above?

  A. Alcohol is metabolized more quickly by the body than are other foods or drinks.
  B. In the general population, alcohol is the primary cause of gains in body fat.
  C. An increased amount of body fat does not necessarily imply a weight gain.
  D. Body fat gain is not dependent solely on the number of calories one consumes.
  E. The proportion of calories from alcohol in a diet is more significant for body fat gain than are the total calories from alcohol.
  D. Body fat gain is not dependent solely on the number of calories one consumes.

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  This is an Inference question. Remember to stick close to the passage. In this passage the crucial thing to note is that one group increased its caloric intake by 25%, all of it alcohol. The other groupreplaced25% of its caloric intake with alcohol. And yet both groups gained equivalent amounts of body fat. Based on this information, you can infer that body fat gain is not dependent solely on the number of calories one consumes. If that were the only factor affecting body fat gain, then we would expect the two groups to have gained different amounts of body fat, since they had different caloric intakes. But they were equivalent, so we can infer that option [Body fat gain is not dependent solely...] on is correct.

• Question 117:

  Donna Haraway's Primate Visions is the most ambitious book on the history of science yet written from a feminist perspective, embracing not only the scientific construction of gender but also the interplay of race, class, and colonial and postcolonial culture with the "Western" construction of the very concept of nature itself. Primatology is a particularly apt vehicle for such themes because primates seem so much like ourselves that they provide ready material for scientists' conscious and unconscious projections of their beliefs about nature and culture.

  Haraway's most radical departure is to challenge the traditional disjunction between the active knower (scientist/historian) and the passive object (nature/history). In Haraway's view, the desire to understand nature, whether in order to tame it or to preserve it as a place of wild innocence, is based on a troublingly masculinist and colonialist view of nature as an entity distinct from us and subject to our control. She argues that it is a view that is no longer politically, ecologically, or even scientifically viable. She proposes an approach that not only recognizes diverse human actors (scientists, government officials, laborers, science fiction writers) as contributing to our knowledge of nature, but that also recognizes the creatures usually subsumed under nature (such as primates) as active participants in creating that knowledge as well. Finally, she insists that the perspectives afforded by these different agents cannot be reduced to a single, coherent reality ?there are necessarily only multiple, interlinked, partial realities.

  This iconoclastic view is reflected in Haraway's unorthodox writing style. Haraway does not weave the many different elements of her work into one unified, overarching Story of Primatology; they remain distinct voices that will not succumb to a master narrative. This fragmented approach to historiography is familiar enough in historiographical theorizing but has rarely been put into practice by historians of science. It presents a complex alternative to traditional history, whether strictly narrative or narrative with emphasis on a causal argument. Haraway is equally innovative in the way she incorporates broad cultural issues into her analysis. Despite decades of rhetoric from historians of science about the need to unite issues deemed "internal" to science (scientific theory and practice) and those considered "external" to it (social issues, structures, and beliefs), that dichotomy has proven difficult to set aside. Haraway simply ignores it. The many readers in whom this separation is deeply ingrained may find her discussions of such popular sources as science fiction, movies, and television distracting, and her statements concerning such issues as nuclear war bewildering and digressive. To accept her approach one must shed a great many assumptions about what properly belongs to the study of science.

  The passage suggests that Haraway would most probably agree with which one of the following statements about scientists observing animal behavior in the field?

  A. Those scientists who have been properly trained in field techniques will all record similar observations about the animals they are studying.
  B. Primatologists are more likely to record accurate and sensitive observations about the animals they are studying than are other animal behaviorists.
  C. Scientists studying primate behavior will probably record more accurate and sensitive observations than will scientists studying animals that are less like ourselves.
  D. Scientists who study primates will probably be more likely than will scientists studying other animals to interpret an animal's behavior in terms of the scientists' own beliefs.
  E. Scientists who take a passive role in interactions with the animals they study will probably record observations similar to those recorded by scientists taking a more active role.
  D. Scientists who study primates will probably be more likely than will scientists studying other animals to interpret an animal's behavior in terms of the scientists' own beliefs.

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  The passage suggests" again ?it's another Inference question. A search reveals no explicit reference to field observations of animal behavior, but it's a concept that seems to relate to 1 and/or 2, where the relationship of science to nature is topic [Those scientists who have been properly...].

• Question 118:

  A crew of up to five workers is to install a partition in at most three days. The crew completes five tasks in this order: framing, wallboarding, taping, sanding, priming. The crew is selected from the following list, which specifies exactly the tasks

  each person can do:

  George: taping

  Helena: sanding, priming

  Inga: framing, priming

  Kelly: framing, sanding

  Leanda: wallboarding, taping

  Maricita: sanding

  Olaf: wallboarding, priming

  The following conditions must apply:

  At least one task is done each day.

  Taping and priming are done on different days.

  Each crew member does at least one task during the installation, but no more than one task a day.

  Each task is done by exactly one worker, completed the day it is started and before the next task begins.

  Each of the following could be a complete and accurate list of the members of the crew EXCEPT:

  A. Helena, Inga, Kelly, Maricita
  B. Inga, Kelly, Leanda, Olaf
  C. George, Helena, Inga, Leanda
  D. Inga, Leanda, Maricita, Olaf
  E. Kelly, Leanda, Maricita, Olaf
  A. Helena, Inga, Kelly, Maricita

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  Here, four of the choices are acceptable crews; what makes this one tougher is that we don't know, in advance, which one of the conditions is going to render the right answer unacceptable. No reason to change our methodology, however.

  Put each of the tasks against the answer choices, and look for the one and only choice that leaves one or more tasks undone.

  We don't have to search for long. All five lists present at least one worker to handle task #1, framing; but option [Helena, Inga, Kelly, Maricita]'s list includes no one to handle the wallboarding, which is the sole province of Leanda and Olaf.

  Without one of them on the crew, the five tasks ain't gonna get done. So option [Helena, Inga, Kelly, Maricita] is, as quickly as that, the one we want. Sight unseen, the other four choices must involve an acceptable assortment of workers.

• Question 119:

  The number of airplanes equipped with a new anticollision device has increased steadily during the past two years. During the same period, it has become increasingly common for key information about an airplane's altitude and speed to disappear suddenly from air traffic controllers' screens. The new anticollision device, which operates at the same frequency as air traffic radar, is therefore responsible for the sudden disappearance of key information.

  Which one of the following, if true, most seriously weakens the argument?

  A. The new anticollision device has already prevented a considerable number of mid-aircollisions.
  B. It was not until the new anticollision device was introduced that key information first began disappearing suddenly from controllers' screens.
  C. The new anticollision device is scheduled to be moved to a different frequency within the next two to three months.
  D. Key information began disappearing from controllers' screens three months before the new anticollision device was first tested.
  E. The sudden disappearance of key information from controllers' screens has occurred only at relatively large airports.
  D. Key information began disappearing from controllers' screens three months before the new anticollision device was first tested.

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  The cause of the sudden disappearance of in-flight data is the new anticollision device. That's the author's conclusion, anyway, and it's based on the coincidence of the two things -- that is, the more widespread usage of the device and the increase in disappearances have occurred "during the same period." That's as it may be. But if option [Key information began...] is true, and the disappearing-data phenomenon predates the device's testing (not even its introduction!) by a full three months, then suspicions must be raised that the cause of the disappearing data lies elsewhere.

• Question 120:

  If relativity theory is correct, no object can travel forward in time at a speed greater than the speed of light. Yet quantum mechanics predicts that the tachyon, a hypothetical subatomic particle, travels faster than light. Thus, if relativity theory is correct, either quantum mechanics' prediction about tachyons is erroneous or tachyons travel backward in time.

  The pattern of reasoning in which one of the following arguments is most similar to that in the argument above

  A. According to a magazine article, the view that present-day English is a descendant of the ancient Proto-Indo-European language is incorrect. Rather, English more likely descended from a Finno-Ugric language, judging from the similarities between English and other languages of Finno-Ugric descent.
  B. If the defendant committed the crime, then either the defendant had a motive or the defendant is irrational, for only irrational persons act with no motive. If the psychologist is correct, then the defendant is not rational; on the other hand, according to the evidence, the defendant had a strong motive. Thus, since there is no reason to disbelieve the evidence, the defendant is guilty.
  C. The human brain can survive without oxygen only for a few minutes, according to modern medicine. Surprisingly, a reliable witness reported that a shaman has survived for an entire week buried five feet underground. Thus, if modern medicine is not wrong, either the witness is mistaken or the shaman's brain did not suffer any lack of oxygen.
  D. Alexander the Great was buried either in Alexandria or in Siwa, Egypt. However, the burial place is more likely to be Siwa. A limestone table engraved by Ptolemy, Alexander's lieutenant, was found in Siwa, attesting to Alexander's burial place.
  E. If the big bang theory is correct, the universe is currently expanding: the galaxies are moving away from each other and from the center of an original explosion. The same theory also predicts that, eventually, the gravitational forces among galaxies will counterbalance the galaxies' kinetic energy. It follows that, at some point, the universe will stop expanding.
  C. The human brain can survive without oxygen only for a few minutes, according to modern medicine. Surprisingly, a reliable witness reported that a shaman has survived for an entire week buried five feet underground. Thus, if modern medicine is not wrong, either the witness is mistaken or the shaman's brain did not suffer any lack of oxygen.

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  This one is a pip, because it looks long and forbidding and yet it can be assaulted and conquered in way under a minute. The conclusion is in either/or form: if a certain concept isn't wrong, then one or the other of two phenomena must be true. Well, only option [The human brain can survive without...] is conclusion is in that form. The conclusions of options [According to a magazine article...] and [Alexander the Great was buried either in...] are assertions of that which is "likely" to be true. Option [If the defendant committed the crime...] is a flat-out statement of fact ("The defendant is guilty"), while option [If the big bang theory is correct...] is a prediction ("The universe will stop expanding"). Regardless of what else is going on in the other choices, then, [The human brain can survive without...] has to be the correct answer.