Logical Reasoning · Main Conclusion
PrepTest 115 · Section 2 · Question 1
Phase 1 (your first ~400 questions): read the guidance, then answer. No clock.
Step 1 · Pre-Question Guidance · read this first
- “or else”
- “little reason”
- “should”
Playground logic
Lulu says the hamster can find his water, or else his cage is set up wrong, and nothing looks wrong. The top bun is 'the hamster can find his water.' The 'nothing looks wrong' part is patty that props it up.
Step 2 · The kid story
Lulu Inspects the Hamster Cage
Lulu marched up to the class hamster cage with her clipboard. Marcus was worried. "What if Peanut can't find his water bottle? He might be thirsty all day!" Lulu tapped her pencil. "Peanut should be able to find his water. If he couldn't, something would be seriously wrong with how his cage is set up. And I checked: the bottle is low, the spout works, the tube is clear. There's no sign anything is wrong with the setup." Marcus scratched his head. "So your point is that the cage is fine?" Priya sipped her juice box. "Nope. The cage being fine is her evidence. Her point is about Peanut: he can find his water." Lulu smiled and checked a box on her clipboard. Marcus decided to stop worrying about Peanut and start worrying about lunch.
Step 3 · Try the model question
Lulu: Peanut the hamster should be able to find his water bottle, or else something would be seriously wrong with how his cage is set up. And there is no sign that anything is wrong with the setup.
What is Lulu mainly trying to prove?
Step 4 · The courtroom tale
The Case of the Lopsided Muffins
A bakery sued an oven maker, claiming the oven could not bake evenly. Mr. Whitfield snapped his suspenders. "Your Honor, any oven from this factory should bake evenly, or else the factory made a bad batch. My expert inspected the batch records, the parts, the test logs. There is no sign of a bad batch." The judge peered over her glasses. "So you are telling me the factory is fine?" "That is my support, Your Honor. My point is that this oven can bake evenly. The lopsided muffins came from somewhere else." The judge nodded slowly and wrote one line on her pad: the oven can bake evenly. Then she asked who had brought the muffins, because she was hungry.
Step 5 · Work the real question
Open PrepTest 115, Section 2, Question 1 in your official copy from LSAC (for example in LawHub) and read it there.
Your answer
How to apply it
Read the whole argument and find every claim. Look for a sentence shaped like 'this should be so, otherwise something is badly off' followed by a reason to think nothing is badly off. Those two pieces combine to prove the first part, so that first part is the top bun. Ask which claim the other sentences are working to support, then pick the choice that states it. Run the 'because' test: the top bun should sit after 'therefore,' never before it.