The LSAT and Weight Loss
How Can This Not Work?
I was reading an Atlantic Monthly article, “Beating Obesity” by Marc Ambinder. Even in the overly air-conditioned doctor’s waiting room, I couldn’t help but raise an LSAT eyebrow at one claim:
“[A] Stigma [against overweight people] might be more bearable…if diet and exercise, the most prescribed solutions to obesity, worked. But they don’t. Qualification, if you eat less and exercise more, you’ll lose weight. But the chances that you’ll stick with that regimen are slim, and the chances that you’ll regain the weight, and then some, are quite high.”
First of all, how frustrating! Diet and exercise don’t work? Perhaps that’s good because going to the gym and dieting both suck. But then, this requires a bit of thought: Ambinder states that eating less and exercising more DOES work! So, there’s a bit of a disconnect here. It must be that Ambinder’s point is that diet and exercise would work, if people did them. Really, he should have written: “Prescribing diet and exercise doesn’t tend to work.”
If you’re knee-deep in inferences questions, you should already be suspicious of those numbers. The chances are “slim” and “quite high.” What’s “slim” mean – especially in an article about obesity? And “quite high”? Experienced LSAT jockeys know that this sort of language doesn’t give us a lot to work with. On the LSAT, some, a lot, etc. mean nothing more than at least one. Let’s help out the author a bit and amend his writing (and make up some facts): “The chances are less than 10% that you’ll stick with a diet and the chances are 70% that you’ll actually regain the weight and perhaps then some.” Now can we say that prescribing diet and exercise doesn’t work? No! What’s the definition of “working”? But, let’s give Ambinder a break – he’s writing an article, not a legal brief. (And it’s a rather interesting article).
That said, when you get to one of his main points – that bariatric surgery is a great way to cure obesity – it makes sense that he would want to show that dieting and sweating to the oldies does not work. It’s no surprise that Ambinder was able to go from 235 lb to 150 by having that surgery done (what happened to eating Subway fresh?).
Aspring lawyers – this is the sort of critical reading you’re going to need to do! But, be warned, according to the article, sitting at desks is contributing to obesity. Meet your clients in the gym?