Make Failure Impossible (Ep. 383)
Thinking LSAT
Nathan Fox and Ben Olson
4.8 • 868 Ratings
🗓️ 2 January 2023
⏱️ 58 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
Students are often tempted to take the official LSAT before they’re ready or to apply to law school late in the cycle “just to see what happens.” On this week’s episode, Ben and Nathan explain why such plans are dangerous. They advise listeners to take a different approach: one that makes it impossible to settle for less than your best. Also on the pod, the guys discuss law schools with abysmal bar passage rates, compare “evidence” and “premises” in Logical Reasoning arguments, and offer advice on conditional scholarships.
0:25 - 3+3 Program - Listener Abe considers a course of study that consists of a three-year undergraduate degree followed by a three-year JD at the same university. Ben and Nathan discourage this idea because it could limit Abe’s opportunities to attend a better law school for free.
9:10 - Failing Law Schools - Three law schools have recently failed to meet the ABA’s minimum bar passage rate. Nathan and Ben suspect that the ABA is unlikely to take any meaningful action against these schools.
16:56 - Withdrawing from the January LSAT - Ben and Nathan assure Demon student Nate that it’s not too late to withdraw from the January LSAT. Withdrawals don’t appear on your record, so law schools won’t know.
18:05 - Score Conversion - The guys walk student Abby through the process of merging individual sections to get a full test score in the Demon. Convert your raw score from any official PrepTest to an LSAT score at lsatdemon.com/converter.
20:40 - Make Failure Impossible - An anonymous listener plans to take the January LSAT, despite not feeling ready, and then apply to law school in February just to see what happens. Nathan and Ben think this plan is a recipe for failure. You should plan to act in a way that makes failure impossible.
26:44 - “Evidence” vs. “Premise” - Ben and Nathan respond to listener Alex’s question about whether “evidence” and “premise” mean the same thing in LSAT Logical Reasoning. (They do.) The guys also discuss what it means for a conclusion to be implicit, how the LSAT rewards accuracy over speed, and why they no longer trust Malcolm Gladwell.
41:20 - LSAC PLUS - An anonymous listener describes their experience with the LSAC PLUS program at Alabama Law. They received some questionable counseling on how to afford law school. Nathan and Ben remind listeners that most advice about financing your education is designed to convince you that it’s okay to take on massive debt.
47:37 - Conditional Scholarships - Ben and Nathan break down conditional scholarships: what they are, whether you should accept one, and what to do if a law school reduces or eliminates your scholarship.
Transcript
Click on a timestamp to play from that location
| 0:00.0 | Hello and |
| 0:05.0 | welcome to episode 383 of the Thinking Elsat Podcast. |
| 0:10.0 | I'm Nathan Fox. |
| 0:11.0 | With me is Ben Olson. |
| 0:12.0 | We're the co-founder of |
| 0:13.3 | Elsat Demon.com and the Elsat Demon Daily podcast. You can be |
| 0:16.9 | Elsat famous by sharing news and questions on our website thinking |
| 0:20.3 | elseat.com. The show is going to air on Monday, |
| 0:23.1 | Monday, January 2nd. |
| 0:25.0 | First thing we have here is a, let's see, |
| 0:28.2 | it's an email from Abe. |
| 0:30.1 | Okay, the subject line is three plus three programs and their practicality. |
| 0:37.0 | Okay, I don't know what that means. |
| 0:38.8 | Hi, Ben and Nathan, I am a second year undergraduate student with the anticipated plan of attending law school |
| 0:44.8 | through the 3 plus 3 program offered by my university. |
| 0:49.8 | I recently fell in love with the show because of the incredible advice you give to |
| 0:53.2 | prospective law students which has brought about questions of my own I'd love for you |
| 0:58.0 | to discuss on a future episode exclamation point. First what are your thoughts on 3 plus 3 programs? I don't know what that is. Do you know what that is? |
| 1:06.1 | So yeah, a three year undergrad and a three year JD at the same school. |
| 1:11.0 | Oh, okay, interesting. To someone who is certain that they want to go to law school. To someone who is certain that they want to go to law school, it seems like a no-brainer. |
| 1:16.0 | However, do you think there is a benefit to completing a four-year undergrad degree? |
| 1:21.0 | In my case, a minimum El-Sat of 156, median of the incoming |
... |
Please login to see the full transcript.
Disclaimer: The podcast and artwork embedded on this page are from Nathan Fox and Ben Olson, and are the property of its owner and not affiliated with or endorsed by Tapesearch.
Generated transcripts are the property of Nathan Fox and Ben Olson and are distributed freely under the Fair Use doctrine. Transcripts generated by Tapesearch are not guaranteed to be accurate.
Copyright © Tapesearch 2025.