[HN Gopher] Lightweight LSAT
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Lightweight LSAT
Author : gregsadetsky
Score : 47 points
Date : 2025-08-07 17:51 UTC (5 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (lightweightlsat.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (lightweightlsat.com)
| rbarnes01 wrote:
| > A history exam might ask a question like "When was the US
| Constitution ratified?" Suppose you pick answer "(a) 1776". Then
| you look at the answer key and you see that the correct answer
| was actually "(b) 1789".
|
| Wasn't the constitution ratified in 1788?
| toast0 wrote:
| The Constitution was ratified by state's conventions in 1787,
| 1788, 1789, and 1790. The convention of the ninth state (New
| Hampshire) ratified on June 21, 1788.
|
| However, the operation of the Constitution didn't commence
| until March 1789 [1] [2]. Prior to that commencement,
| government still operated under the Articles of Confederation.
| The question is poorly worded, if they're asking for when the
| federal government began operating under the Constitution; but
| it's also poorly worded if they're asking for when the ninth
| state ratified it.
|
| [1] https://supreme.justia.com/cases/federal/us/18/420/ [2]
| https://tile.loc.gov/storage-services/service/ll/usrep/usrep...
| mdaniel wrote:
| Heh, this is the thread I came to see on a submission about
| the LSAT on HN o/
| treetalker wrote:
| > The question is poorly worded ...
|
| That sums up roughly 95% of daily practice in US trials and
| appeals!
| ethan_smith wrote:
| The Constitution was indeed ratified on June 21, 1788 when New
| Hampshire became the 9th state to ratify it, though it didn't
| go into effect until March 4, 1789.
| rayiner wrote:
| This is great. My tip: don't spend money on LSAT prep (unless you
| have no impulse control and can't learn from a book). Just take
| practice tests, and when you get an answer wrong, carefully
| articulate exactly why each of the wrong answers was wrong and
| the right answer was correct. At least when I took it (17 years
| ago now) there was always a clearly right answer and three
| clearly wrong answers. I've never seen a single LSAT where that
| wasn't the case. During the test you should be able to not only
| identify the correct answer, but articulate in your head why each
| other answer is clearly wrong.
| piker wrote:
| Absolutely correct.
| tzs wrote:
| I was puzzled by the site only talking about two kinds of
| sections on the LSAT, so did some checking.
|
| In 2024 they dropped the analytic reasoning section. Now it just
| tests logical reasoning and reading comprehension.
| jmogly wrote:
| Mixed on this -- I personally struggled with logic games, being
| dyslexic, the diagrams would easily get mixed up. On the other
| hand, an extra logical reasoning section could really beat the
| crap out of you mentally. Wonder what people who have taken
| both versions think?
| tzs wrote:
| Funny thing about the logic games. I aced that section and
| enjoyed them.
|
| A few weeks after the test I was looking at the magazine rack
| at the grocery store, and saw a magazine called "Dell Logic
| Puzzles". I took a look inside and it was full of the same
| kind of logic games as on the LSAT, with 5 different
| difficulty levels.
|
| From the ads in the magazine it was clear that the target
| audience for this was old ladies.
|
| I bought it figuring that since I had aced those puzzles on
| the LSAT (and on all my practice tests beforehand) I'd have
| no trouble with any of the puzzles in the magazine, but the
| harder ones might provide some mild amusement.
|
| Man was I wrong. I could barely do the level 1 puzzles.
| jmogly wrote:
| Haha, I could imagine. The logic games in the LSAT aren't
| particularly "hard" as much as they're just uncommon.
| You're kind of just applying procedural rules, like a human
| calculator. I suppose if you enjoy it as an activity, the
| LSAT logic games must be like child's play.
| scarecrw wrote:
| This looks fantastic! I work in test preparation myself (though
| not for the LSAT) and this ticks all the boxes for the best
| approaches. I also really appreciate it being direct and
| opinionated without the obnoxious tendency of a lot of guides to
| denigrate alternatives.
| retskrad wrote:
| Speaking of these standardised tests, I think it's ridiculous
| that even for someone like Elon Musk, who read for up to 10 hours
| a day for most of his of pre college days and learned how to
| build rockets with the use of books och instruction manuals, only
| scored 730 on the Math section and 670 on the Verbal section for
| a total composite score of 1400. The fact that he couldn't get
| higher score means something is wrong with these tests. They are
| mirroring a very narrow frequency of aptitude.
| Aurornis wrote:
| > only scored 730 on the Math section and 670 on the Verbal
| section for a total composite score of 1400.
|
| Those numbers are well above average. Good results. I don't
| know the context but if he didn't prepare much or at all then
| those results are quite good.
|
| If you expected him to get a perfect score, your expectations
| might be too high or there might be some hero worship going on.
| ghaff wrote:
| Been a very, very long time. But I expect that getting a top
| score involved being both "smart" (whatever that means
| exactly) and having done a ton of prep work.
| tzs wrote:
| Assuming those are SAT scores, at the time Musk would have
| taken it those scores would be around 90th percentile for math,
| 75th for verbal, and 92nd for the overall test. That's pretty
| good.
| Jtsummers wrote:
| > The fact that he couldn't get higher score means something is
| wrong with these tests.
|
| Does it? As others pointed out, those _aren 't_ bad scores. Not
| the highest scores, but not embarrassing for a better student.
|
| It could be that his claimed reading time is just that, a
| claim, and not true. Or the material he was reading wasn't
| challenging in a way that would help with test prep to get him
| a higher score.
| giantg2 wrote:
| I was going to say, you can study 10 hours a day on topics
| that you like or find valuable and not cover all the material
| for the test. I took the SAT as a junior and didn't really
| study for it, so I hadn't covered some of the math types yet.
| I still did fine and got into all the colleges I applied to.
| It really only seems to matter if you want to go to a
| prestigious school.
| almostgotcaught wrote:
| the only secret to the LSAT is to grind practice tests. back in
| the day (~10 years ago) i torrented all the available tests (~70)
| and all the practice books. I did one of the books to learn the
| "tricks" and then just took all the tests. scored a 178 (and then
| never went to law school lol).
| gowld wrote:
| Did you track your progress across practice tests? Did you need
| 70 tests to reach 178 performance?
| lyrrad wrote:
| I think 70 tests is overkill. As long as you are able to
| analyze and learn from your mistakes, you should be able to
| improve doing a fraction of the tests.
|
| My experience was from almost two decades ago and is
| atypical. I had decided to write it only just a month before
| the LSAT, and so I started prior tests only four weeks before
| the test date. In that time, I did 27 official practice
| tests. I also read a couple books and tried two unofficial
| tests.
|
| I tracked my results in a spreadsheet and had a marginal
| improvement from 173.4 to 176 for the first five and last
| five tests. But, essentially all improvement happened after
| just ten tests.
|
| In all practice tests, I did best in logic games, answering
| 98.1% correct, compared with 93.5% for logical reasoning and
| 91.4% for reading comprehension.
|
| I was somewhat lucky and got 97/99 on the actual test, enough
| for a 180 that time (2 incorrect in logical reasoning). I had
| only got that twice in the practice tests with an expectation
| between 174 and 180 with a median of 176.
|
| After each test I analyzed every incorrect answer as well as
| the ones I was less sure about. There were online forums
| where I could ask about, or see other people's analysis of
| the problem questions.
|
| I think a strategy aimed understanding wrong answers in your
| weakest area can be a more efficient use of preparation time.
| giantg2 wrote:
| "I think a strategy aimed understanding wrong answers in
| your weakest area can be a more efficient use of
| preparation time."
|
| This is how I study. I don't need to review my strong
| areas, I need to learn the weak ones. I can cruise through
| tech certs very quickly this way. People are always
| surprised when I can learn earn a cert after studying only
| 2-10 hours for it.
| almostgotcaught wrote:
| Not with intent - I remember that I was excited the first
| time I got a 180 (maybe half-way through?) but I didn't stop
| at that point. Each test only took about two hours (I didn't
| practice the essay section because it was well-known it
| didn't matter) so it wasn't such a huge investment to do them
| all. Including the practice book it took me about 2 months of
| 1-2 practice tests a day.
| giantg2 wrote:
| That's a good score. I took a practice LSAT once. I think I got
| a 148 or a 152. I thought that was pretty good until I looked
| it up. Not terrible for not studying, but it was only the 40th
| percentile haha.
| graeme wrote:
| This works if you're already smart. Have seen plenty of people
| grind through all the tests while barely improving their score
| or ending well below their goals.
| almostgotcaught wrote:
| Anecdotes abound <shrug>. My only advantage going into it was
| 1) I was a good reader 2) I was well familiar with logical
| fallacies from a childhood of trolling/debating people
| online. But it's a standardized test that covers a very small
| set of skills. So just like any other standardized thing it's
| trainable.
| rsingel wrote:
| Don't bother with the writing section. Leave it blank, turn in
| your test and leave early. The proctor might say you can't do
| that but you can. Nobody cares about it. No one ever has. It's
| only there to deflect criticism from LSAC.
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