Question1: Start-up companies financed by venture capitalist have a much lower failure rate than companies financed by other means. Source of financing, therefore, must be a more important causative factor in the success of a start-up company than are such factors as the personal characteristics of the entrepreneur, the quality of strategic planning, or the management structure of the company.
Which of the following, if true, most seriously weakens the argument above?
Question2: Johnson is on firm ground when he asserts that the early editors of Dickinson's poetry often distorted her intentions. Yet Johnson's own, more faithful, text is still guilty of its own forms of distortion. To standardize Dickinson's often indecipherable handwritten punctuation by the use of the dash is to render permanent a casual mode of poetic phrasing that Dickinson surely never expected to see in print. It implies that Dickinson chose the dash as her typical mark of punctuation when, in fact, she apparently never made any definitive choice at all.
Which of the following best summarizes the author's main point?
Question3: Read the passage carefully and then choose the best answer to each question. Answer the question based upon what is stated or implied in the reading passage.
In Ursula LeGuin's short story "The Ones Who Walk Away from Omelas," everyone in the city of Omelas is happy - everyone, that is, except the child who is kept locked in a basement closet. The child is left entirely alone and neglected except for occasional visits from the citizens of Omelas. They come at a certain age as a rite of initiation, to learn the secret of the happiness they enjoy. They come to learn that their happiness has a price: the suffering of an innocent child. In the end, most people stay in Omelas; but a few, unable to bear the fact that they are responsible for the suffering of that child, reject this utopia built upon a utilitarian morality.
Utilitarianism is an ethical theory based upon the belief that happiness is the ultimate good and that people should use happiness as the measure for determining right and wrong. For utilitarian, the right thing to do is that which will bring about the greatest amount of happiness for the greatest number of people.
Furthermore, utilitarianism argues that the intention of people's actions does not matter; only the consequences of their actions are morally relevant, because only the consequences determine how much happiness is produced.
Although many useful social policies and much legislation are founded on this "greatest good" philosophy, utilitarianism can be problematic as a basis for morality. First, happiness is not so easy to quantify, and any measurement is bound to be subjective. Second, in a theory that treats everything except happiness as instrumentally rather than intrinsically valuable, anything - or, more importantly, anyone - can (and should) be treated as a means to an end, if it means greater happiness. This rejects the notion that human beings have their own intrinsic value. Further, utilitarianism puts the burden of the happiness of the masses on the suffering of the few. Is the happiness of many worth the suffering of a few? Why do those few deserve to suffer? Isn't this burden of suffering morally irresponsible? This is the dilemma so brilliantly illustrated in LeGuin's story.
From the author's summary of LeGuin's story, the reader can infer that
Question4: Parasitic wasps lay their eggs directly into the eggs of various host insects in exactly the right numbers for any suitable size of host egg. If they laid too many eggs in a host egg, the developing wasp larvae would compete with each other to the death for nutrients and space. If too few eggs were laid, portions of the host egg would decay, killing the wasp larvae.
Which of the following conclusions can properly be drawn from the information above?
Question5: If A, then B.
If B, then C.
If C, then D.
If all of the statements above are true, which of the following must also be true?
Question6: With the proliferation of electronic technologies in the latter part of the twentieth century, many aspects of cultural practice have been redefined. The eradication of physical boundaries that limit discourse and information access has had profound effects upon the manner in which we conduct democracy. Yet, opinions strongly differ over whether or not the growth of electronic networks will result in expanded democracy. On one side of the debate are anti-utopians who fear that with the intrusion of the Internet into many facets of life, personal freedom will be impeded and the existing rift between the "haves" and "have- nots" in society will grow. On the other side, many 'cyber-utopians' believe that new technologies can eliminate the democracy of elected representatives with which so many people are dissatisfied. The Internet, they say, will allow for a true participatory democracy in which citizens can govern themselves without the interference of bureaucrats and legislators.
Neither of these theories by themselves can fully address the role of democracy in the age of information.
As debates about censorship and encryption have shown, government regulation of the Internet can result in violations of the basic rights of speech set forth in the constitution of the United States. Yet, groups that preach 'Big Brother' theories of paranoia tend to neglect the fact that new technologies can help balance the injustices of traditional power found in a centralized government. At the same time, the likelihood of doing away with the present system of democracy in favor of complete and pure self-governance seems impossible and likely undesirable.
Both arguments about the future of the way in which discourse will occur highlight the inherent relationship between communication and democracy. Perhaps a more useful model for the study of this dynamic can be found in the model of the public sphere proposed by Jorgen Habermas. In this realm, free and diverse equals come together to deliberate and discuss pertinent issues without the impediment of external coercion. The ensuing dialogue transpires in a profoundly democratic forum. The dispensing of traditional hierarchies that occurs on the Internet appears to make possible the type of categories necessary for Habermas 'ideal speech situation to occur.
However, postmodern critics indicate that the autonomous individual no longer exists in a world where our identities are constructed as much for us as by us. And indeed, much of the postmodern notion of self seems to fit closely with reconfigurations of the subject brought on by electronic technologies. The question that arises then is how might the reconfiguration of communication enabled by the Internet work to create a new form of cyber-democracy' that better represents citizen's interests?
The passage supports which of the following statements about government regulation of the Internet?
Question7: People can debate the aesthetic merits of these overwrought, disquieting, sometimes gruesome works of art, but no one can dispute their creators' mastery of the paintbrush as a blunt instrument.
Question8: Zsa Zsa has just opened a beauty salon in her neighborhood. The neighborhood already has two salons- one that caters mostly to older women and one that seems to cater to a general clientele. Zsa Zsa has decided to cater to young clientele to create a niche for herself in the neighborhood. Zsa Zsa's plan of action is based on all of the following assumptions EXCEPT
Question9: Now is an excellent time to invest in the catering business. A survey conducted by Weddings magazine found that 70 percent of the magazine's readers want a catered wedding reception. An analysis of the catering industry, however, shows that the current number of caterers can serve only 55 percent of the weddings likely to occur each year.
Which of the following, if true, would undermine the validity of the investment advice in the paragraph above?
Question10: In tests for pironoma, a serious disease, a false positive result indicates that people have pironoma when, in fact, they do not; a false negative result indicates that people do not have pironoma when, in fact, they do. To detect pironoma most accurately, physicians should use the laboratory test that has the lowest proportion of false positive results.
Which of the following, if true, gives the most support to the recommendation above?
Question11: Property values in South Orange, New Jersey, have nearly doubled in the last six years. South Orange is located in Essex County, 17 miles from New York City.
Which of the following, if true, best explains the results described in the statement?
Question12: Nearly one in three subscribers to Financial Forecaster is a millionaire, and over half are in top management. Shouldn't you subscribe to Financial Forecaster now?
A reader who is neither a millionaire nor in top management would be most likely to act in accordance with the advertisement's suggestion if he or she drew.
Which of the following questionable conclusions invited by the advertisement?
Question13: Using art to condemn the moral shortcomings of society is nothing new. English artist William Hogarth (1697 - 1764) was renowned for prints that revealed the moral lapses of eighteenth-century England.
Despite the fact that Hogarth enjoyed the patronage of England's wealthier citizens, he did not shrink away from producing scathing depictions of all levels of English society.
In the ten-print series Industry and Idleness, Hogarth presents two apprentices who begin working side by side only to arrive at vastly different ends. The first apprentice is portrayed as a morally incorruptible, diligent worker. He is promoted, marries his boss's daughter, and achieves great distinction and financial success. The other apprentice does little work and engages in many unsavory activities. He is fired from his apprenticeship and continues down a path of illicit behavior and corruption. The series comes to a climax when the two former coworkers are reunited with the industrious apprentice - now elevated to alderman - standing in judgment of the idle coworker brought before him for murder. The idle apprentice is sentenced to death and executed, whereas the industrious apprentice goes on to become Lord Mayor of London. Among Hogarth's most popular series was The Rake's Progress, which tells the story of wealthy Tom Rakewell. In the first of eight prints, Tom inherits a large sum of money that he foolishly spends on enhancing his image and prestige in superficial ways. His prodigal ways lead to his rapid decline as he is arrested for debt and in return marries an old maid for her money. He begins gambling, is imprisoned, and eventually goes insane in Bedlam. Tom's descent and desperate outcome, like many of Hogarth's subjects, is tied directly to moral corruption and poor self-discipline. It is interesting that Hogarth's prints were extremely popular in his day. Whatever the moral shortcomings of eighteenth-century England, its citizens welcomed Hogarth's social critiques and harsh judgments.
Based on the passage, which of the following best expresses the main lesson of Hogarth's work?
Question14: A newly discovered disease is thought to be caused by a certain bacterium. However, recently released data notes that the bacterium thrives in the presence of a certain virus, implying that it is actually the virus that causes the new disease.
Which of the following pieces of evidence would most support the data's implication?
Question15: Despite growing evidence of global warming; 34 different states plan to develop nearly 100 new coal burning electric plants in the next decade.
Question16: Read the passage carefully and then choose the best answer to each question. Answer the question based upon what is stated or implied in the reading passage.
In Ursula LeGuin's short story "The Ones Who Walk Away from Omelas," everyone in the city of Omelas is happy - everyone, that is, except the child who is kept locked in a basement closet. The child is left entirely alone and neglected except for occasional visits from the citizens of Omelas. They come at a certain age as a rite of initiation, to learn the secret of the happiness they enjoy. They come to learn that their happiness has a price: the suffering of an innocent child. In the end, most people stay in Omelas; but a few, unable to bear the fact that they are responsible for the suffering of that child, reject this utopia built upon a utilitarian morality.
Utilitarianism is an ethical theory based upon the belief that happiness is the ultimate good and that people should use happiness as the measure for determining right and wrong. For utilitarian, the right thing to do is that which will bring about the greatest amount of happiness for the greatest number of people.
Furthermore, utilitarianism argues that the intention of people's actions does not matter; only the consequences of their actions are morally relevant, because only the consequences determine how much happiness is produced.
Although many useful social policies and much legislation are founded on this "greatest good" philosophy, utilitarianism can be problematic as a basis for morality. First, happiness is not so easy to quantify, and any measurement is bound to be subjective. Second, in a theory that treats everything except happiness as instrumentally rather than intrinsically valuable, anything - or, more importantly, anyone - can (and should) be treated as a means to an end, if it means greater happiness. This rejects the notion that human beings have their own intrinsic value. Further, utilitarianism puts the burden of the happiness of the masses on the suffering of the few. Is the happiness of many worth the suffering of a few? Why do those few deserve to suffer? Isn't this burden of suffering morally irresponsible? This is the dilemma so brilliantly illustrated in LeGuin's story.
According to the passage, in utilitarianism
Question17: Most employees in the computer industry move from company to company, changing jobs several times in their careers. However, Summit Computers is known throughout the industry for retaining its employees.
Summit credits its success in retaining employees to its informal, non hierarchical work environment.
Which of the following, if true, most strongly supports Summit's explanation of its success in retaining employees?
Question18: Lark Manufacturing Company initiated a voluntary Quality Circles program for machine operators.
Independent surveys of employee attitudes indicated that the machine operators participating in the program were less satisfied with their work situations after two years of the program's existence than they were at the program's start. Obviously, any workers who participate in a Quality Circles program will, as a result, become less satisfied with their jobs.
Each of the following, if true, would weaken the conclusion drawn above EXCEPT:
Question19: Between 1975 and 1985, nursing-home occupancy rates averaged 87 percent of capacity, while admission rates remained constant, at an average of 95 admissions per 1,000 beds per year. Between 1985 and
1988, however, occupancy rates rose to an average of 92 percent of capacity, while admission rates declined to 81 per 1,000 beds per year.
If the statements above are true, which of the following conclusions can be most properly drawn?
Question20: Kylie eats at Moe's Diner every Thursday, but last Thursday she ate at Joe's. On Friday, she was sick to her stomach. It must have been the food at Joe's.
Which of the following is the best criticism of this argument?
Question21: Opponents of laws that require motorcycle riders to wear helmets argue that in a free society people have the right to take risks as long as the people do not harm others as a result of taking the risks. As a result, they conclude that it should be each person's decision whether or not to wear a helmet.
Which of the following, if true, seriously weakens the conclusion drawn above?
Question22: Two groups of laboratory mice were injected with cancerous cells. One group's cages were rotated in a disorienting manner. Two-thirds of these mice developed cancers. One-tenth of the mice in stationary cages developed cancers. The researchers concluded that stress enhances the development of cancer in laboratory mice.
The researchers' conclusion logically depends on which of the following assumptions?
Question23: Damaged nerves in the spinal cord do not regenerate themselves naturally, nor even under the spur of nerve-growth stimulants. The reason, recently discovered, is the presence of nerve-growth inhibitors in the spinal cord. Antibodies that deactivate those inhibitors have now been developed. Clearly, then, nerve repair will be a standard medical procedure in the foreseeable future.
Which of the following, if true, casts the most serious doubt on the accuracy of the prediction above?
Question24: Extinction is a process that can depend on a variety of ecological, geographical, and physiological variables. These variables affect different species of organisms in different ways, and should, therefore, yield a random pattern of extinctions. However, the fossil record shows that extinction occurs in a surprisingly definite pattern, with many species vanishing at the same time.
Which of the following, if true, forms the best basis for at least a partial explanation of the patterned extinctions revealed by the fossil record?
Question25: According to a recent survey, the establishment of natural parks to preserve existing plant and animal life in Colorado is still a priority of a majority of residents, like that of earlier test groups.
Question26: Determining the authenticity of purported pre-Columbian artifacts is never easy. Carbon-14 dating of these artifacts is often impossible due to contamination by radioactive palladium (which occurs naturally in the soils of Central and South America). However, historians and anthropologists have evolved two reliable criteria, which, utilized in combination, have proven effective for dating these artifacts. First, because authentic pre-Columbian artifacts characteristically occur in a coarse, granular matrix that is shifted by major earthquakes, they often exhibit the unique scratch patterns known as girding. In addition, true pre- Columbian artifacts show a darkening in surface color that is caused by centuries of exposure to the minute amounts of magnesium in the soil of the Americas.
The criteria above would be LEAST useful in judging the authenticity of which of the following?
Question27: Federal agricultural programs aimed at benefiting one group whose livelihood depends on farming often end up harming another such group.
Which of the following statements provides support for the claim above?
I. An effort to help feed-grain producers resulted in higher prices for their crops, but the higher prices decreased the profits of livestock producers.
II. In order to reduce crop surpluses and increase prices, growers of certain crops were paid to leave a portion of their land idle, but the reduction was not achieved because improvements in efficiency resulted in higher production on the land in use.
III. Many farm workers were put out of work when a program meant to raise the price of grain provided grain growers with an incentive to reduce production by giving them surplus grain from government reserves.
Question28: Large national budget deficits do not cause large trade deficits. If they did, countries with the largest budget deficits would also have the largest trade deficits. In fact, when deficit figures are adjusted so that different countries are reliably comparable to each other, there is no such correlation.
If the statements above are all true, which of the following can properly be inferred on the basis of them?
Question29: Parents of some of the children in a particular class have claimed that the teacher is not objective and favors his male students with higher grades. But the record showed that 92% of the female students received a passing grade in this teacher's class. This record demonstrates that the teacher has not discriminated against women when assigning grades.
The argument above is flawed in that it ignored the possibility that
Question30: Harper's Pencils manufactures and sells the same pencils as Johnson's Supply. Employee wages account for forty percent of the cost of manufacturing pencils at both factories. Harper's is seeking a competitive edge over Johnson's supply. Therefore, to promote this end, Harper's should lower employee wages.
Which of the following, if true, seriously weakens the argument above?
Question31: The recent upheaval in the office-equipment retail business, in which many small firms have gone out of business, has been attributed to the advent of office equipment "superstores" whose high sales volume keeps their prices low. This analysis is flawed, however, since even today the superstores control a very small share of the retail market.
Which of the following, if true, would most weaken the argument that the analysis is flawed?
Question32: Hardin argued that grazing land held in common (that is, open to any user) would always be used less carefully than private grazing land. Each rancher would be tempted to overuse common land because the benefits would accrue to the individual, while the costs of reduced land quality that results from overuse would be spread among all users. But a study comparing 217 million acres of common grazing land with
433 million acres of private grazing land showed that the common land was in better condition.
The answer to which of the following questions would be most useful in evaluating the significance, in relation to Hardin's claim, of the study described above?
Question33: It is true that unionized women earn, on average, more than a third more than non-unionized women do.
But the unionized women work in industries where wages happen to be high, their non-unionized counterparts in these industries earn about as much as they do. Therefore, unionization does not raise women's wages.
Which of the following, if true, most seriously weakens the argument above?
Question34: Which of the following best completes the passage below?
"Government" does not exist as an independent entity defining policy. Instead there exists a group of democratically elected pragmatists sensitive to the electorate, who establish policies that will result in their own reelection. Therefore, if public policy is hostile to, say, environmental concerns, it is not because of governmental perversity but because elected officials believe that ______
Question35: In an attempt to discourage the widespread acceptance of clothing manufactured in sweatshops, the council of a small town plans to ban the sale of sweatshop goods for which substitutes manufactured under humane conditions exist. The council argues that non-sweatshop apparel is morally preferable.
Which of the following, if true, indicates that the plan to ban the sale of sweatshop goods is ill suited to the town council's moral objectives?
Question36: For a generation of suppressed, restless, working-class youths living in 1960 Jamaica, ska was a medium through which they could find expression. Since its original appearance, ska has resurfaced twice, each time presenting itself in a different guise to a new generation of music aficionados. Overcoming its humble beginnings, it has become one of the twentieth century's most enduring and influential styles of music.
Since the early 1940's, Jamaica had adopted and adapted many forms of American musical styles. The predominantly black inhabitants of Jamaica took a liking to rhythm and blues music, importing a considerable number of American records that were showcased at dance halls in the early 1960s.
Jamaican musicians took up the elements of rhythm and blues and combined it with traditional Jamaican mento music. The result was the first wave of ska. Musically, ska is a shuffle rhythm similar to mento but with even closer ties to rhythm and blues, placing the accent on the second and fourth beats, often moving in a 12-bar blues frame. The after beat, played on the piano or strummed by a rhythm guitar, came to be characteristic of the form. A horn section, usually consisting of trumpets, trombones, and saxophones, was a vital element. Classic bands, such as the Wailers wrote songs written about Trench Town (a ghetto), rude boys (street thugs), romance, and even religious themes. In 1965, ska began to take a backseat to a newly evolved type of music, called rock steady, which was more dependent than ska had been on rhythm provided by the bass guitar and drums.
Ska was later exported by traveling Jamaican artists to Great Britain, where it became known as "blue beat." By the mid 1970's, early British punk bands were infusing reggae, a style of music that came from rock steady, into their music. Near the end of the decade, however, there was a resurgence of the influence of ska because of its upbeat, danceable rhythm. This faster paced ska came to be known as two tone. One of the essential messages of two-tone ska was the promotion of racial harmony and of having fun in the face of subjugation.
The third wave of ska began in America around 1990. Bands influenced by the two-tone ska scene began to use punk and metal music to a greater extent. The combination, which is much faster than two tone, sounds very different from the original Jamaican brand of ska.
In its three different waves, ska has given voice to seemingly voiceless, downtrodden generations. Each time it resurfaces, a new message is taken up, however, the old messages are never forgotten The passage suggests that two tone music
I. Resurged near the end of the 1970s
II. Influenced bands in America in the 1990s
III. Promoted of racial harmony and of having fun in the face of oppression.
Question37: The proportion of Afro-American students enrolled in Gilmore Community College has increased over the past decades. This is partly shown by the fact that in 1965, only 6 percent of Afro-American between twenty and twenty-three in the town of Gilmore were enrolled in college, while in 1997, 13 percent of the Afro-Americans between twenty and twenty-three were enrolled in Gilmore Community College.
To evaluate the argument above, it would be most useful to compare 1965 and 1997 with regard to which of the following characteristics
Question38: There are any number of skilled freelancers who can develop strategy and create marketing materials with a keen eye to using proven methods, but also to developing new and innovative techniques.
Question39: Pop singer Clive Jones has been nominated for six Grammy Awards and his new album is enjoying its eighth consecutive week at number one on the charts. It is safe to say that Jones is today's best pop artist.
Which of the following assumptions is most pivotal to this argument?
Question40: The reason much refrigerated food spoils is that it ends up out of sight at the back of the shelf. So why not have round shelves that rotate? Because such rotating shelves would have just the same sort of drawback, since things would fall off the shelves' edges into the rear corners.
Which of the following is presupposed in the argument against introducing rotating shelves?
Question41: Record companies defend their substitution of laser-read compact discs (CD's) for the much less expensive traditional long-playing vinyl records in their catalogs by claiming that the audio market is ruled by consumer demand for ever-improved sound reproduction rather than by record manufacturers' profit- motivated marketing decisions. But this claim cannot be true, because if it were true, then digital audiotape, which produces even better sound than CD's, would be commercially available from these same record companies, but it is not.
Which of the following, if true, would most strengthen the argument against the record companies' claim?
Question42: The average life expectancy for the United States population as a whole is 73.9 years, but children born in Hawaii will live an average of 77 years, and those born in Louisiana, 71.7 years. If a newlywed couple from Louisiana were to begin their family in Hawaii, therefore, their children would be expected to live longer than would be the case if the family remained in Louisiana.
Which of the following statements, if true, would most significantly strengthen the conclusion drawn in the passage?
Question43: Able to out-navigate other vehicles on rutted roads, it was decided that the police chief would allot motorcycles to some of her staff.
Question44: Walter: A copy of an artwork should be worth exactly what the original is worth if the two works are visually indistinguishable. After all, if the two works are visually indistinguishable, they have all the same qualities, and if they have all the same qualities, their prices should be equal.
Marissa: How little you understand art! Even if someone could make a perfect copy that is visually indistinguishable from the original, the copy would have a different history and hence not have all the same qualities as the original.
Marissa uses which of the following techniques in attempting to refute Walter's argument?
Question45: For a generation of suppressed, restless, working-class youths living in 1960 Jamaica, ska was a medium through which they could find expression. Since its original appearance, ska has resurfaced twice, each time presenting itself in a different guise to a new generation of music aficionados. Overcoming its humble beginnings, it has become one of the twentieth century's most enduring and influential styles of music.
Since the early 1940's, Jamaica had adopted and adapted many forms of American musical styles. The predominantly black inhabitants of Jamaica took a liking to rhythm and blues music, importing a considerable number of American records that were showcased at dance halls in the early 1960s.
Jamaican musicians took up the elements of rhythm and blues and combined it with traditional Jamaican mento music. The result was the first wave of ska. Musically, ska is a shuffle rhythm similar to mento but with even closer ties to rhythm and blues, placing the accent on the second and fourth beats, often moving in a 12-bar blues frame. The after beat, played on the piano or strummed by a rhythm guitar, came to be characteristic of the form. A horn section, usually consisting of trumpets, trombones, and saxophones, was a vital element. Classic bands, such as the Wailers wrote songs written about Trench Town (a ghetto), rude boys (street thugs), romance, and even religious themes. In 1965, ska began to take a backseat to a newly evolved type of music, called rock steady, which was more dependent than ska had been on rhythm provided by the bass guitar and drums.
Ska was later exported by traveling Jamaican artists to Great Britain, where it became known as "blue beat." By the mid 1970's, early British punk bands were infusing reggae, a style of music that came from rock steady, into their music. Near the end of the decade, however, there was a resurgence of the influence of ska because of its upbeat, danceable rhythm. This faster paced ska came to be known as two tone. One of the essential messages of two-tone ska was the promotion of racial harmony and of having fun in the face of subjugation.
The third wave of ska began in America around 1990. Bands influenced by the two-tone ska scene began to use punk and metal music to a greater extent. The combination, which is much faster than two tone, sounds very different from the original Jamaican brand of ska.
In its three different waves, ska has given voice to seemingly voiceless, downtrodden generations. Each time it resurfaces, a new message is taken up; however, the old messages are never forgotten The primary purpose of this passage is to
Question46: Environmentalist: The commissioner of the Fish and Game Authority would have the public believe that increases in the number of marine fish caught demonstrate that this resource is no longer endangered.
This is a specious argument, as unsound as it would be to assert that the ever-increasing rate at which rain forests are being cut down demonstrates a lack of danger to that resource. The real cause of the increased fish-catch is a greater efficiency in using technologies that deplete resources.
Which of the following strategies is used in the presentation of the environmentalist's position?
Question47: Gene therapy offers a new treatment paradigm for curing human disease. Rather than altering the disease phenotype by using agents that interact with gene products, or are themselves gene products, gene therapy can theoretically modify specific genes resulting in disease cure following a single administration.
Initially gene therapy was envisioned for the treatment of genetic disorders, but is currently being studied for use with a wide range of diseases, including cancer, peripheral vascular disease, arthritis, Neurodegenerative disorders and other acquired diseases.
Certain key elements are required for a successful gene therapy strategy. The most elementary of these is that the relevant gene be identified and cloned. Upon completion of the Human Genome Project, gene availability will be unlimited. Once identified and cloned, the next consideration must be expression of the gene. Questions pertaining to the efficiency of gene transfer and gene expression remain at the forefront of gene therapy research, with current debates revolving around the transfer of desired genes to appropriate cells, and then to obtaining sufficient levels of expression for disease treatment. With luck, future research on gene transfer and tissue-specific gene expression will resolve these issues for the majority of gene therapy protocols.
Other important considerations for a gene therapy strategy include a sufficient understanding of the pathogenesis of the targeted disorder, potential side effects of the gene therapy treatment, and a more in depth understanding of the target cells which are to receive gene therapy.
Gene transfer vector is the mechanism by which the gene is transferred into a cell. Currently there are at least 150 clinical gene therapy protocols worldwide. Since the approval process for these protocols is not as public outside the U.S., it is difficult to ascertain the exact number of worldwide protocols. As of December 1995, 1024 patients had been treated with either a gene transfer or gene therapy protocol.
Much controversy exists regarding how many of these patients have benefited from their gene therapy, and no one has yet been cured.
Public controversy in the field of human gene therapy is driven by several factors. Ordinary citizens as well as scientists easily understand the enormous potential of gene therapy, but the former may not appreciate all the pitfalls and uncertainly that lie in the immediate future. The financial interests of biotechnology firms and, some have asserted the career interests of some gene therapists have encouraged extravagant, or at least verily optimistic public statements about contemporary gene therapy. In spite of the proliferation of protocols, the actual number of patients treated remains small, and only one genuinely controlled study of human gene therapy has been published as of this date The author's attitude toward the gene therapy as a future cure for cancer, peripheral vascular disease, arthritis, Neurodegenerative disorders and other acquired diseases is
Question48: Now is an excellent time to invest in the catering business. A survey conducted by Weddings magazine found that 70 percent of the magazine's readers want a catered wedding reception. An analysis of the catering industry, however, shows that the current number of caterers can serve only 55 percent of the weddings likely to occur each year.
Which of the following, if true, reveals a weakness in the evidence cited above?
Question49: Many people claim that advertisements of alcoholic drinks influence young people to start drinking socially.
In Iceland, however, where there has been a ban on the advertisement of alcoholic beverages since 1982, drinking is at least as prevalent among young people as it is in countries that do not have a similar ban.
Which of the following statements draws the most reliable conclusion from the information above?
Question50: Take a very commonplace, often discussed and critical topic: Are we detecting a greenhouse effect, and related to this, is it exacerbated by "homogenic factors," i.e., human actions? Most would be inclined to give a positive answer to both of these questions. But, if pushed, what would be the evidence, and how well grounded would it be for such affirmations?
Within scientific communities and associated scientifically informed circles, the answers have to be somewhat more ambiguous, particularly when rigorous questions concerning evidence are raised. Were scientific truth to be a matter of consensus, and some argue that scientific truth often turns out to be just that, then it is clear that there is beginning to be a kind of majority consensus among many earth science practitioners that the temperature of the Earth, particularly of the oceans, is indeed rising and that this is a crucial indicator for a possible greenhouse effect.
Most of these scientists admit that the mean oceanic temperature has risen globally in the last several decades. But this generalization depends upon how accurate measurements may be, not just for samples, but also for the whole Earth. A hot spot, for example the now four year old hot spot near New Guinea which is part of the El Niño cycle, does not count by itself because it might be balanced by cold spots elsewhere. And the fact of the matter is that "whole earth measurements" are still rare and primitive in the simple sense that we simply do not have enough thermometers out. Secondly, even if we had enough thermometers, a simply synchronic whole earth measurement over three decades is but a blip in the diachronic history of ice age cycles over the last tens of thousands of years. Thirdly, even if we know that the earth is now heating up, has an ever increasing ozone hole, and from this strange weather effects can be predicted, how much of this is due to homogenic factors, such as CFCs, CO2 increases, hydrocarbon burning, and the like? Is it really the case, as Science magazine claimed in l990, "24% of greenhouse encouraging gases are of homogenic origin"?
The author of the passage would be most likely to agree with which of the following statements about the greenhouse effect?
Question51: Record companies defend their substitution of laser-read compact discs (CD's) for the much less expensive traditional long-playing vinyl records in their catalogs by claiming that the audio market is ruled by consumer demand for ever-improved sound reproduction rather than by record manufacturers' profit- motivated marketing decisions. But this claim cannot be true, because if it were true, then digital audiotape, which produces even better sound than CD's, would be commercially available from these same record companies, but it is not.
Which of the following, if true, best explains how the record companies' claim about the nature of the audio reproduction market could be true and digital audiotape nevertheless be unavailable for the commercial market?
Question52: One analyst predicts that Hong Kong can retain its capitalist ways after it becomes part of mainland China in 1997 as long as a capitalist Hong Kong is useful to China; that a capitalist Hong Kong will be useful to China as long as Hong Kong is prosperous; and that Hong Kong will remain prosperous as long as it retains its capitalist ways.
If the predictions above are correct, which of the following further predictions can logically be derived from them?
Question53: After graduating from high school, people rarely multiply fractions or discuss ancient Rome, but they are confronted daily with decisions relating to home economics. Yet whereas mathematics and history are required courses in the high school curriculum, home economics is only an elective, and few students choose to take it.
Which of the following positions would be best supported by the considerations above?
Question54: Read the passage carefully and then choose the best answer to each question. Answer the question based upon what is stated or implied in the reading passage.
In Ursula LeGuin's short story "The Ones Who Walk Away from Omelas," everyone in the city of Omelas is happy - everyone, that is, except the child who is kept locked in a basement closet. The child is left entirely alone and neglected except for occasional visits from the citizens of Omelas. They come at a certain age as a rite of initiation, to learn the secret of the happiness they enjoy. They come to learn that their happiness has a price: the suffering of an innocent child. In the end, most people stay in Omelas; but a few, unable to bear the fact that they are responsible for the suffering of that child, reject this utopia built upon a utilitarian morality.
Utilitarianism is an ethical theory based upon the belief that happiness is the ultimate good and that people should use happiness as the measure for determining right and wrong. For utilitarian, the right thing to do is that which will bring about the greatest amount of happiness for the greatest number of people.
Furthermore, utilitarianism argues that the intention of people's actions does not matter; only the consequences of their actions are morally relevant, because only the consequences determine how much happiness is produced.
Although many useful social policies and much legislation are founded on this "greatest good" philosophy, utilitarianism can be problematic as a basis for morality. First, happiness is not so easy to quantify, and any measurement is bound to be subjective. Second, in a theory that treats everything except happiness as instrumentally rather than intrinsically valuable, anything - or, more importantly, anyone - can (and should) be treated as a means to an end, if it means greater happiness. This rejects the notion that human beings have their own intrinsic value. Further, utilitarianism puts the burden of the happiness of the masses on the suffering of the few. Is the happiness of many worth the suffering of a few? Why do those few deserve to suffer? Isn't this burden of suffering morally irresponsible? This is the dilemma so brilliantly illustrated in LeGuin's story.
From the passage, it can be inferred that the author
Question55: In the years since the city of London imposed strict air-pollution regulations on local industry, the number of bird species seen in and around London has increased dramatically. Similar air-pollution rules should be imposed in other major cities.
Each of the following is an assumption made in the argument above EXCEPT:
Question56: When people predict that certain result will not take place unless a certain action is taken, they believe that they have learned that the prediction is correct when the action is taken and the result occurs. On reflection, however, it often becomes clear that the result admits of more than one interpretation.
Which of the following, if true, best supports the claims above?
Question57: Hardin argued that grazing land held in common (that is, open to any user) would always be used less carefully than private grazing land. Each rancher would be tempted to overuse common land because the benefits would accrue to the individual, while the costs of reduced land quality that results from overuse would be spread among all users. But a study comparing 217 million acres of common grazing land with
433 million acres of private grazing land showed that the common land was in better condition.
Which of the following, if true, and known by the ranchers, would best help explain the results of the study?
Question58: An overly centralized economy, not the changes in the climate, is responsible for the poor agricultural production in Country X since its new government came to power. Neighboring Country Y has experienced the same climatic conditions, but while agricultural production has been falling in Country X, it has been rising in Country Y.
Which of the following, if true, would most weaken the argument above?
Question59: Advertisement: The world's best coffee beans come from Colombia. The more Colombian beans in a blend of coffee, the better the blend, and no company purchases more Colombian beans than Kreemo Coffee, Inc. So it only stands to reason that if you buy a can of Kreemo's coffee, you're buying the best blended coffee available today.
The reasoning of the argument in the advertisement is flawed because it overlooks the possibility that
Question60: Industrialists from the country Distopia were accused of promoting the Distopian intervention in the Arcadian civil war merely to insure that the industrialists' facilities in Arcadia made substantial profits during the war. Yet this cannot be the motive since, as the Distopians foresaw, Distopia's federal expenses for the intervention were eight billion dollars, whereas, during the war, profits from the Distopian industrialists' facilities in Arcadia totaled only four billion dollars.
Which of the following, if true, exposes a serious flaw in the argument made in the second sentence above?
Question61: (F) We ought not to test the safety of new drugs on sentient animals, such as dogs and rabbits. Our benefit means their pain, and they are equal to us in the capacity to feel pain.
(G) We must carry out such tests; otherwise, we would irresponsibly sacrifice the human lives that could have been saved by the drugs.
Which of the following, if true, is the best objection that could be made from F's point of view to counter G's point?
Question62: The price the government pays for standard weapons purchased from military contractors is determined by a pricing method called "historical costing." Historical costing allows contractors to protect their profits by adding a percentage increase, based on the current rate of inflation, to the previous year's contractual price.
Which of the following statements, if true, is the best basis for a criticism of historical costing as an economically sound pricing method for military contracts?
Question63: Because the Dvorak keyboard puts vowels and other frequently used letters right under the fingers on home row, where typists make 70% of their keystrokes, people can type 20% to 30% faster and make 50% less errors.
Question64: Technological improvements and reduced equipment costs have made converting solar energy directly into electricity far more cost-efficient in the last decade. However, the threshold of economic viability for solar power (that is, the price per barrel to which oil would have to rise in order for new solar power plants to be more economical than new oil-fired power plants) is unchanged at thirty-five dollars.
Which of the following, if true, does most to help explain why the increased cost-efficiency of solar power has not decreased its threshold of economic viability?
Question65: Since a rhinoceros that has no horn is worthless to poachers, the Wildlife Protection Committee plans to protect selected rhinoceroses from being killed by poachers by cutting off the rhinos' horns.
The Wildlife Protection Committee's plan assumes that
Question66: Although no conclusive scientific evidence proves that angels exist, many highly intelligent and respectable people believe they exist and have even claimed to have spoken with angels. It is therefore reasonable to assume that angels do exist, but we just don't have the means to prove their existence.
All of the following, if true, are valid objections to this argument EXCEPT
Question67: After observing the Earth's weather patterns and the 11-year sunspot cycle of the Sun for 36 years, scientists have found that high levels of sunspot activity precede shifts in wind patterns that affect the Earth's weather. One can conclude that meteorologists will be able to improve their weather forecasts based on this information.
Which of the following, if true, most seriously weakens the argument above?
Question68: Old English had three genders that resembled those of the Germans and so was probably very difficult for a foreign traveler to learn in a short time.
Question69: Although the new cochleae manufactured by Medotech will cost more than twice as much as the cochlear implants now in use, Medotech implants should still be cost-effective. Not only will surgery and recovery time be reduced, but Medotech cochlear replacements should last longer, thereby reducing the need for further hospital stays.
Which of the following must be studied in order to evaluate the argument presented above?
Question70: Division manager: I want to replace the Microton computers in my division with Vitech computers.
General manager: Why?
Division manager: It costs 28 percent less to train new staff on the Vitech.
General manager: But that is not a good enough reason. We can simply hire only people who already know how to use the Microton computer.
Which of the following, if true, most seriously undermines the general manager's objection to the replacement of Microton computers with Vitechs?
Question71: Blood banks will shortly start to screen all donors for NANB hepatitis. Although the new screening tests are estimated to disqualify up to 5 percent of all prospective blood donors, they will still miss two-thirds of donors carrying NANB hepatitis. Therefore, about 10 percent of actual donors will still supply NANB- contaminated blood.
The argument above depends on which of the following assumptions?
Question72: New stores financed by investors have a much lower failure rate than stores financed by other means.
Source of financing, therefore, must be a more important causative factor in the success of a new store than are such factors as the location of the store, the quality of the staff, or the choice of merchandise.
Which of the following, if true, most seriously weakens the argument above?
Question73: A government agency that reimburses its clients for bills they have paid for medical care has had this year's budget cut. To save money without cutting reimbursements or otherwise harming clients financially, it plans to delay reimbursements to clients for forty days, thereby earning $180 million per year in interest on the reimbursement money.
Which of the following, if true, is the best criticism of the agency's plan?
Question74: Of all the possible disasters that threaten the upcoming Olympic games, the possibility of forceful winds affecting the rowing venue is maybe the more difficult for analysis.
Question75: As one who has always believed that truth is our nation's surest weapon in the propaganda war against our foes, I am distressed by reports of "disinformation" campaigns by American intelligence agents in Western Europe. In a disinformation campaign, untruths are disseminated through gullible local journalists in order to damage the interests of our enemies and protect our own. Those who defend this practice say that lying is necessary to counter Soviet disinformation campaigns aimed at damaging America's political interests. These apologists contend that one must fight fire with fire. I would point out to the apologists that the fire department finds water more effective.
The author of the passage above bases his conclusion on which of the following?
Question76: Many companies now have employee assistance programs that enable employees, free of charge, to improve their physical fitness, reduce stress, and learn ways to stop smoking. These programs increase worker productivity, reduce absenteeism, and lessen insurance costs for employee health care. Therefore, these programs benefit the company as well as the employee.
Which of the following, if true, most significantly strengthens the conclusion above?
Question77: Fresh potatoes generally cost about $2 for a 10-pound bag, whereas dehydrated instant potatoes cost, on average, about $3 per pound. It can be concluded that some consumers will pay 15 times as much for convenience, since sales of this convenience food continue to rise.
Which of the following, if true, indicates that there is a major flaw in the argument above?
Question78: Six months or so after getting a video recorder, many early buyers apparently lost interest in obtaining videos to watch on it. The trade of businesses selling and renting videos is still buoyant, because the number of homes with video recorders is still growing. But clearly, once the market for video recorders is saturated, businesses distributing videos face hard times.
Which of the following, if true, would most seriously weaken the conclusion above?
Question79: Professor A: We must make a strong moral statement against Country X's policies. Only total divestment
- the sale of all stock in companies that have factories or business offices in X - can do this. Therefore, the university should divest totally.
Professor B: Our aim should be to encourage X to change its policies. Partial divestment is the best way to achieve this aim. Therefore, the university should sell its stock only in companies that either sell goods to X's government, or do the majority of their business in X, or treat their workers in X unfairly.
Professor A's and Professor B's arguments differ in which of the following ways?
Question80: In recent years many cabinetmakers have been winning acclaim as artists. But since furniture must be useful, cabinetmakers must exercise their craft with an eye to the practical utility of their product. For this reason, cabinetmaking is not art.
Which of the following is an assumption that supports drawing the conclusion above from the reason given for that conclusion?
Question81: The government should stop permitting tobacco companies to subtract advertising expenses from their revenues in calculating taxable income. Tobacco companies would then have to pay more taxes. As a consequence, they would raise the prices of their products and this price increase would raise the prices of their products and this price increase would discourage tobacco use.
Which of the following is an additional premise required by the argument above?
Question82: The ancient city of Cephesa was not buried by an eruption of Mt. Amnos in A.D. 310, as some believe. The eruption in the year 310 damaged the city, but it did not destroy it. Cephesa survived for another century before it finally met its destruction in another eruption around A.D. 415.
Which of the following, if true, would most strengthen the author's claim that the city of Cephesa was not buried by the eruption of Mt. Amnos in A.D. 310?
Question83: June is taller than Kristin.
Letty is taller than Maria.
Maria is shorter than Nancy.
Kristin and Nancy are exactly the same height.
If the information above is true, which of the following must also be true?
Question84: Although on the one hand it is true that the lack of computer-related skills accounts for and explains many of the problems in today's job market, there is meanwhile a lack of skilled labor in many different fields.
Question85: When a normally functioning immune system attacks a non self molecule, the system has the ability to
"remember" the specifics of the foreign body, and upon subsequent encounters with the same species of molecules, it reacts accordingly.
Question86: In order to relieve congestion in the airspace near the airports of a certain country, transportation officials propose sending passengers by new rapid trains between the country's major airport and several small cities within a 300-mile radius of it. This plan was proposed even though the officials realized that it is the major airport that is congested, not those in the small cities.
The plan to relieve congestion would work best if which of the following were true about the major airport?
Question87: In the United States in 1986, the average rate of violent crime in states with strict gun-control laws was 645 crimes per 100,000 persons - about 50 percent higher than the average rate in the eleven states where strict gun-control laws have never been passed. Thus one way to reduce violent crime is to repeal strict gun control laws.
Which of the following, if true, would most weaken the argument above?
Question88: The main principle of feng shui is that our environment must be ordered to permit and encourage the free flow of energy. One of the fundamental steps is to eliminate clutter, which blocks the flow of energy.
Based upon the previous information, which of the following statements is also likely to be true?
Question89: Last year in the United States, women who ran for state and national offices were about as likely to win as men. However, only about fifteen percent of the candidates for these offices were women. Therefore, the reason there are so few women who win elections for these offices is not that women have difficulty winning elections but that so few women want to run.
Which of the following, if true, most seriously undermines the conclusion given?
Question90: Read each passage carefully and then choose the best answer to each question. Answer the questions based upon what is stated or implied in the reading passage.
For many years, there has been much hand-wringing over the fate of Social Security once the baby boomers reach retirement age. Baby boomers, people born between 1946 and 1964, represent the largest single sustained growth of population in the history of the United States. It is the sheer enormity of this generation that has had economists worried as retirement beckons. According to the U.S. Census Bureau, by 2020, an estimated 80,000,000 Americans will have reached or surpassed the conventional age of retirement. With so many boomers retiring and drawing benefits but no longer paying into Social Security, many fear that the Social Security fund itself could go bankrupt.
However, a study released by the American Association for Retired Persons (AARP) that examined baby boomers' plans for retirement found that for the most part, this generation is not expected to adhere to the conventional retirement scheme, a fact that may please the worriers in Washington, DC.
In its survey, the AARP broke baby boomers into different categories based on their financial standing, degree of preparedness for retirement, and optimism toward the future. The AARP found that of all groups surveyed, only 13% planned to stop working altogether once they reached retirement age; the remaining
87% planned to continue working for pay. The reasons to continue working varied among the different groups. For some, the plan to continue working is a financial decision. Between 25% and 44% of respondents reported they are not financially prepared to retire and will therefore continue working past retirement age. For the remainder of those planning to work past their mid to late 60s, the decision is based on long-held goals to start a business and/or the desire to stay active in their industry or community.
Eventually, most baby boomers will need to stop working as they progress into their 70s, 80s, and beyond.
But with such large numbers planning to continue working, thereby continuing to pay into the Social Security fund, perhaps Social Security will be able to withstand the end of the baby boom and continue to be a safety net for future generations.
According to the author, baby boomers are not likely to bankrupt the Social Security fund primarily because
Question91: With the emergence of biotechnology companies, it was feared that they would impose silence about proprietary results on their in-house researchers and their academic consultants. This constraint, in turn, would slow the development of biological science and engineering.
Which of the following, if true, would tend to weaken most seriously the prediction of scientific secrecy described above?
Question92: Considerable debate exists in the self-perception literature over the impact of positively biased self- perceptions on social and psychological functioning. Positively based self-perceptions are those in which an individual has a more positive opinion of himself than objective indicators warrant. One view suggests that positive perceptual biases are characteristic of normal human thought across a variety of domains and correlate positively with good mental and psychological health. Certain researchers and clinicians have even proposed that by boosting self-concepts, symptoms of depression and levels of aggression may be reduced.
Investigators on the other side of the debate maintain that when most positive self-perceptions are compared to an objective criterion, they appear neither positively biased nor adaptive. In fact, Baumeister, Smart, and Boden suggest that positively biased self-concepts may have a 'dark side'. They proposed that it is persons with very positive self-views who are prone to be aggressive. As a result, building up individuals' self-perceptions may serve only to increase levels of aggression rather than curb them.
According to Baumeister et al., not all individuals with positive self-perceptions are going to be interpersonally aggressive. Rather, individuals who are extremely positive in their perceptions of themselves and their functioning are proposed to be the most likely to become angry and potentially violent. The mechanism that triggers aggressive behavior by these individuals has been suggested to be negative social feedback that challenges their positive self-views. Such threats to positive self-esteem give rise to anger and hostility.
If negative social information is encountered that challenges established positive self-perceptions, Baumeister et al. propose that individuals must choose to either accept the feedback and lower their self- perceptions or reject the feedback to maintain their positive self-views. The chosen reaction then influences their subsequent affective states and behavioral expressions. By accepting the external appraisals and adjusting self-perceptions downward, dysphoric feelings and social withdrawal may result.
Conversely, the rejection of the validity of the unfavorable feedback results in feelings of anger and resentment toward the source of the threat. Dodge and colleagues demonstrated that children who interpret social cues as threatening direct their anger and aggression at the peers who gave the negative evaluations. Anger stemming from the receipt of social criticism is a way to deny the legitimacy of the negative information. By directing hostile reactions toward the source of the negative feedback, the influx of disconfirming information may end. Unless individuals react against the self-esteem threat, they may be compelled to revise their self-concepts negatively, in line with the information provided. By discounting the negative social feedback, individuals can protect themselves from dysphoric feelings and maintain their positively biased self-perceptions, but they may be setting themselves up to become interpersonally aggressive.
Although positively biased self-perceptions may place individuals at risk for negative social feedback and subsequent increases in aggressive behavior, not all positive self-concepts are suggested to be harmful.
The relationship between positive self-perceptions and aggression may depend on the degree of perceptual distortion (i.e., moderate vs. extreme distortion). Baumeister (1989) and Baumeister et al.
(1996) proposed that an optimal range of moderate bias might exist within which mental health is encouraged. Maladjustment in psychological and social functioning is suggested to occur when the degree of bias of self-perceptions shifts from moderate to extreme levels. Extremely negative and positive perceptual bias would be related to different but equally harmful difficulties.
The passage discusses the likelihood of violence stemming from which of the following types of individuals?
Question93: Surveys show that every year only 10 percent of cigarette smokers switch brands. Yet the manufacturers have been spending an amount equal to 10 percent of their gross receipts on cigarette promotion in magazines. It follows from these figures that inducing cigarette smokers to switch brands did not pay, and that cigarette companies would have been no worse off economically if they had dropped their advertising.
Of the following, the best criticism of the conclusion that inducing cigarette smokers to switch brands did not pay is that the conclusion is based on
Question94: Within 20 years it will probably be possible to identify the genetic susceptibility an individual may have toward any particular disease. Eventually, effective strategies will be discovered to counteract each such susceptibility. Once these effective strategies are found, therefore, the people who follow them will never get sick.
The argument above is based on which of the following assumptions?
Question95: Although Binofram has been proven to alleviate certain skin rashes associated with some medical conditions, many physicians no longer routinely prescribe this drug for this purpose. A rash can stimulate the activity of the body's T-cells and also inhibit growth of some strains of virus.
If the statements above are true, which of the following conclusion is most strongly supported by them?
Question96: Read the passage carefully and then choose the best answer to each question. Answer the question based upon what is stated or implied in the reading passage.
In Ursula LeGuin's short story "The Ones Who Walk Away from Omelas," everyone in the city of Omelas is happy - everyone, that is, except the child who is kept locked in a basement closet. The child is left entirely alone and neglected except for occasional visits from the citizens of Omelas. They come at a certain age as a rite of initiation, to learn the secret of the happiness they enjoy. They come to learn that their happiness has a price: the suffering of an innocent child. In the end, most people stay in Omelas; but a few, unable to bear the fact that they are responsible for the suffering of that child, reject this utopia built upon a utilitarian morality.
Utilitarianism is an ethical theory based upon the belief that happiness is the ultimate good and that people should use happiness as the measure for determining right and wrong. For utilitarian, the right thing to do is that which will bring about the greatest amount of happiness for the greatest number of people.
Furthermore, utilitarianism argues that the intention of people's actions does not matter; only the consequences of their actions are morally relevant, because only the consequences determine how much happiness is produced.
Although many useful social policies and much legislation are founded on this "greatest good" philosophy, utilitarianism can be problematic as a basis for morality. First, happiness is not so easy to quantify, and any measurement is bound to be subjective. Second, in a theory that treats everything except happiness as instrumentally rather than intrinsically valuable, anything - or, more importantly, anyone - can (and should) be treated as a means to an end, if it means greater happiness. This rejects the notion that human beings have their own intrinsic value. Further, utilitarianism puts the burden of the happiness of the masses on the suffering of the few. Is the happiness of many worth the suffering of a few? Why do those few deserve to suffer? Isn't this burden of suffering morally irresponsible? This is the dilemma so brilliantly illustrated in LeGuin's story.
The author summarizes LeGuin's story primarily to
Question97: Opponents of laws that require automobile drivers and passengers to wear seat belts argue that in a free society people have the right to take risks as long as the people do not harm others as a result of taking the risks. As a result, they conclude that it should be each person's decision whether or not to wear a seat belt.
Which of the following, if true, most seriously weakens the conclusion drawn above?
Question98: Reviewer: The book Art's Decline argues that European painters today lack skills that were common among European painters of preceding centuries. In this the book must be right, since its analysis of 100 paintings, 50 old and 50 contemporary, demonstrates convincingly that none of the contemporary paintings are executed as skillfully as the older paintings.
Which of the following points to the most serious logical flaw in the reviewer's argument?
Question99: Of the countries that were the world's twenty largest exporters in 1953, four had the same share of total world exports in 1984 as in 1953. These countries can therefore serve as models for those countries that wish to keep their share of the global export trade stable over the years.
Which of the following, if true, casts the most serious doubt on the suitability of those four countries as models in the sense described?
Question100: Recent audits revealed that BanqueCard, a credit service, has erred in calculating the interest it charges its clients. But BanqueCard's chief accountant reasoned that the profits that the company shows would remain unaffected by a revision of its clients' credit statements to correct its previous billing errors, since just as many clients had been overcharged as undercharged.
Which of the following is a reasoning error that the accountant makes in concluding that correcting its clients' statements would leave BanqueCard's profits unaffected?
Question101: A group of children of various ages was read stories in which people caused harm, some of those people doing so intentionally, and some accidentally. When asked about appropriate punishments for those who had caused harm, the younger children, unlike the older ones, assigned punishments that did not vary according to whether the harm was done intentionally or accidentally. Younger children, then, do not regard people's intentions as relevant to punishment.
Which of the following, if true, would most seriously weaken the conclusion above?
Question102: Less than 50 percent of a certain tropical country's wildlands remains intact. Efforts are under way to restore biological diversity in that country by restoring some destroyed wild habitats and extending some relatively intact portions of forests. However, opponents argue that these efforts are not needed because there is still plenty of wild land left.
Which of the following, if true, most significantly weakens the argument of the opponents of conservation efforts?
Question103: If the airspace around centrally located airports were restricted to commercial airliners and only those private planes equipped with radar, most of the private-plane traffic would be forced to use outlying airfields. Such a reduction in the amount of private-plane traffic would reduce the risk of midair collision around the centrally located airports.
Which of the following, if true, would most strengthen the conclusion drawn in the second sentence?
Question104: Today's low gasoline prices make consumers willing to indulge their preference for larger cars, which consume greater amounts of gasoline as fuel. So United States automakers are unwilling to pursue the development of new fuel-efficient technologies aggressively. The particular reluctance of the United States automobile industry to do so, however, could threaten the industry's future.
Which of the following, if true, would provide the most support for the claim above about the future of the United States automobile industry?
Question105: An electric-power company gained greater profits and provided electricity to consumers at lower rates per unit of electricity by building larger-capacity more efficient plants and by stimulating greater use of electricity within its area. To continue these financial trends, the company planned to replace an old plant by a plant with triple the capacity of its largest plant.
The company's plan as described above assumed each of the following EXCEPT:
Question106: The lobbyists argued that because there is no statistical evidence that breathing other people's tobacco smoke increases the incidence of heart disease or lung cancer in healthy nonsmokers, legislation banning smoking in workplaces cannot be justified on health grounds.
Of the following, which is the best criticism of the argument reported above?
Question107: Which of the following, if true, is the most logical completion of the argument below?
The tax system of the Republic of Grootland encourages borrowing by granting its taxpayers tax relief for interest paid on loans. The system also discourages saving by taxing any interest earned on savings.
Nevertheless, it is clear that Grootland's tax system does not consistently favor borrowing over saving, for if it did, there would be no ______
Question108: Some species of dolphins find their prey by echolocation; they emit clicking sounds and listen for echoes returning from distant objects in the water. Marine biologists have speculated that those same clicking sounds might have a second function: particularly loud clicks might be used by the dolphins to stun their prey at close range through sensory overload.
Which of the following, if discovered to be true, would cast the most serious doubt on the correctness of the speculation described above?
Question109: A greater number of newspapers are sold in Town S than in Town T.
Therefore, the citizens of Town S are better informed about major world events than are the citizens of Town T.
Each of the following, if true, weakens the conclusion above EXCEPT:
Question110: Nearly a decade ago, researchers at Brandeis University conducted an interesting experiment with small robots. The robots were programmed to get as many individual points as possible by finding small metal pucks and taking them to a nest in a corner of the lab. Robots were rewarded with points whenever they found a puck. But their excessive self-interest led to poor performance as robots repeatedly interfered with one another and battled over pucks. Researchers then reprogrammed the robots to share information:
Robots would announce when they found a puck and listen to what other robots had to say. The robots were able to gather twice as many pucks as they had before they were reprogrammed.
Which of the following conclusions can be drawn from the experiment described in this passage?
Question111: The most important aspect of moviemaking is conveying a scene's rhythm. Conveying rhythm depends less on the artistic quality of the individual photographic images than on how the shots go together and the order in which they highlight different aspects of the action taking place in front of the camera.
If the statements above are true, which of the following must be true on the basis of them?
Question112: Politician: Fewer people are entering the labor market now than previously. If the economy grows, the demand for motivated and educated people will far outstrip the supply. Some companies have already started to respond to this labor-market situation by finding better ways to keep their current employees.
Their concern is a sure indicator that the economy is growing.
Which of the following is the best criticism of the politician's reasoning?
Question113: The earth's resources are being depleted much too fast. To correct this, the United States must keep its resource consumption at present levels for many years to come.
Which of the following, if true, would most strengthen the argument above?
Question114: Presumed to be genetic or partially genetic in origin, about three in every 100 children are born with a severe disorder.
Question115: The school board has determined that it is necessary to reduce the number of teachers on the staff. Rather than deciding which teachers will be laid off on the basis of seniority, the school board plans to lay off the least effective teachers first.
The school board's plan assumes that
Question116: Alexander Calder was one of the most innovative and original American artists of the twentieth century.
Calder arrived in Paris in 1926 and devoted himself to a innovative project comprised of animals made out of wire, scraps of cloth, wood, cork, labels, bits of scrap metal and pieces of rubber that he called the Circus. During his performances, Calder invented ways to simulate the flight of birds: "These are little bits of white paper, with a hole and slight weight on each one, which flutter down several variously coiled thin steel wires which I jiggle so that they flutter down like doves." The Circus was the laboratory of Calder's work; in it he experimented with new formulas and techniques. By 1930, Calder's Circus had developed into one of the real successes of the Montparnasse art world attracting the attention of such renowned artists as Fernand Leger and Joan Micro. Encouragement from the upper echelons of the Parisian art scene undoubtedly led him to try more serious experiments in wire sculptures. Calder eventually becoming interested in the movement of objects, some of which he motorized. In 1933, Calder completed Object with Red Discs, a sculpture he described as a two-meter rod with a heavy sphere, suspended from the apex of a wire, giving it a cantilever effect. It had five thin aluminum discs projected at right angels from five wires, held in position by a spherical counterweight. With this new creation, the idea of the mobile was born. In creating a work named Constellations in 1943, Calder explored the plastic possibilities of mobiles; he used small pieces of wood, which he shaped and sometimes painted. From this point on, Calder's ambition changed focus. He sought more challenging designs. One of Calder's objectives was to display objects in the air, giving the viewer the experience of finding new skies filled with moving and colored constellations.
Calder accomplished this in Acoustic Ceiling (1954). Calder's humor was evident in such works as Le Bougnat (1959) and The Pagoda (1963). Later, Calder cut fantastic animals from sheet metal, creating La Vache and Elephant (both 1970) and a mobile entitled Nervous Wreck (1976), which represents the red skeleton of a fish. Calder defined volume without mass and incorporated movement and time in art. His inventions, which redefined certain basic principles of sculpture, have established him as the most innovative sculptor of the twentieth century.
According to the passage, which of the following is an accurate statement about Object with Red Discs?
Question117: On May 5th, 1997, the European edition of Business Tech Magazine led with Hoffman's cover story
"Internet Communities: How they're Shaping Electronic Commerce". This cover story highlights the extent to which the term virtual community has become almost synonymous with various forms of group-CMCs (computer mediated communication), including email-list forums, chat-systems such as IRC, web-based discussion areas and UseNet news-groups. There was no debate in the Business Tech Magazine article as to whether the group-CMC discussions are really 'communities', rather how community as opposed to content can be used to encourage people to return to a particular part of cyberspace for commercial gain.
In a similar vein, Simpson and Armstrong in "Internet Gain" argue that ignoring virtual communities would be a great loss of a marketing tool for businesses. They define virtual communities as computer mediated space where there is an integration of content and communication with an emphasis on member- generated content.
Not all virtual community commentators agree with the Spartan position taken by Hoffman. Rheingold, one of the prime popularizes of the term virtual community, provides us with a more emotive definition in his book The Virtual Community: Homesteading on the Electronic Frontier. According to Rheingold, "virtual communities are social aggregations that emerge from the Net when enough people carry on those public discussions long enough, with sufficient human feeling, to form webs of personal relationships in cyberspace". Rheingold's definition is extremely popular and has been quoted in many discussions about virtual communities. As discussed below, for social scientists, particularly sociologists, Rheingold's definition raises many issues, especially concerning the notion of community. This is because Rheingold argues via a variety of analogies from the real world such as homesteading that virtual communities are indeed new forms of "community". In fact, Rheingold implies that virtual communities are actually "a kind of ultimate flowering of community". Moreover, Rheingold maintains that whenever computer mediated communications technology becomes available; people inevitably create communities with it. Rheingold can thus be labeled as a technological determinist as he holds that there is a predictable relationship between technology and people's behavior.
The debate over the validity of Rheingold's position has raised doubts about the existence of virtual communities and the appropriate use of the term. Weinreich claims that the idea of virtual communities must be wrong because community is a collective of kinship networks that share a common geographic region, a common history, and a shared value system, usually rooted in a common religion. In other words, Weinreich rejects the existence of virtual communities because group-CMC discussions cannot possibly meet his definition. In Weinreich's view, anyone with even a basic knowledge of sociology understands that information exchange in no way constitutes a community The author says 'there was no debate in the Business Tech Magazine article' to emphasize which of the following points?
Question118: Which of the following, best completes the passage below?
At last month's symposium on the increasing air pollution affecting the Beaumont forest, most participating members favored uniform controls on the quality of exhaust fumes, whether of not specific environmental damage could be attributed to a particular source of fumes. What must, of course, be shown, in order to avoid excessively restrictive controls, is that __________ .
Question119: Mud from a lake on an uninhabited wooded island in northern Lake Superior contains toxic chemicals, including toxaphene, a banned pesticide for cotton that previously was manufactured and used, not in nearby regions of Canada or the northern United States, but in the southern United States. No dumping has occurred on the island. The island lake is sufficiently elevated that water from Lake Superior does not reach it.
The statements above, if true, most strongly support which of the following hypotheses?
Question120: A publisher is now providing university professors with the option of ordering custom textbooks for their courses. The professors can edit out those chapters of a book they are not interested in and add material of their own choosing.
The widespread use of the option mentioned above is LEAST likely to contribute to fulfilling which of the following educational objectives?
Question121: Don't be surprised if we have an unusually cold winter this year. The last time we had a very cold winter was 12 years ago, and the last time before that was 12 years earlier, and the time before that was also 12 years earlier. Brace yourself for another cold one.
Which of the following would most strengthen this argument?
Question122: Because of a recent drought in Florida during the orange-growing season, the price of oranges this season will be three times the usual price. This will drive up the cost of producing orange juice and thus push up the price of orange juice for the consumer.
Which of the following, if true, most seriously weakens the argument above?
Question123: Although its purpose is laudable, the exclusionary rule, which forbids a court to consider evidence seized in violation of the defendant's constitutional rights, has unduly hampered law-enforcement efforts. Even when the rights violation was a minor or purely technical one, turning on a detail of procedure rather than on the abrogation of some fundamental liberty, and even when it has been clear that the police officers were acting in good faith, the evidence obtained has been considered tainted under this rule and may not even by introduced. In consequence, defendants who were undoubtedly guilty have been set free, perhaps to steal, rape, or murder again.
It can be inferred from the passage that the author would most likely endorse which of the following proposals?
Question124: The number of young adults that are illiterate has dropped significantly in a certain county over the last fifteen years. Education officials attribute this decrease entirely to improved conditions in the schools, which made for a better teaching environment, reducing the level of illiteracy.
Which of the following, if true, would most seriously weaken the education officials' explanation for the lower incidence of the disease?
Question125: Potato cyst nematodes are a pest of potato crops. The nematodes can lie dormant for several years in their cysts, which are protective capsules, and do not emerge except in the presence of chemicals emitted by potato roots. A company that has identified the relevant chemicals is planning to market them to potato farmers to spread on their fields when no potatoes are planted; any nematodes that emerge will soon starve to death.
Which of the following, if true, best supports the claim that the company's plan will be successful?
Question126: In general, a professional athlete is offered a million-dollar contract only if he or she has just completed an unusually successful season. However, a study shows that an athlete signing such a contract usually suffers a decline in performance the following season. This study supports the theory that a million-dollar contract tends to weaken an athlete's desire to excel by diminishing his or her economic incentive.
Which of the following, if true, would most strengthen the conclusion drawn above?
Question127: Excavation of the ancient city of Kourion on the island of Cyprus revealed a pattern of debris and collapsed buildings typical of towns devastated by earthquakes. Archaeologists have hypothesized that the destruction was due to a major earthquake known to have occurred near the island in A.D. 365.
Which of the following, if true, most strongly supports the archaeologists' hypothesis?
Question128: The main reason for the decline in worldwide illiteracy rates, which have dropped over the last 20 years, is the sharp increase of literacy rates among young women, which is the result of campaigns to increase educational opportunities for girls.
Question129: Creating a fundamental shift in American foreign policy and establishing a "policy of containment" that framed our foreign policy as a battle between the forces of good (America and other democratic societies) and evil (the Soviet Union and other communist nations), was the 1947 Truman Doctrine.
Question130: Interviewer: An alarming statistic reported in the Hobern Medical Journal is that 90 percent of the people in this country now report that they know someone who has heart disease.
Dr. Summer: But an expected level of heart disease is 5 percent, or in other words, 1 out of every 20 people. So at any given time if a person knows approximately 50 people, 1 or more will very likely suffer from heart disease.
Dr, Summer's argument relies on the assumption that
Question131: Linguistically, the Pokot seem to be related to numerous peoples who live in the region with both ties to the Nilo-Hamitic peoples who come from the north and to Bantu peoples who come from central Africa.
Question132: Anuj wants to lose about 15 pounds. He knows several people who have lost 10 to 20 pounds in just one month with a particular over-the-counter diet pill. Anuj plans to buy the diet pill in order to lose 15 pounds in the same time period. Based on the previous information, for Anuj's plan to succeed, which of the following must be true?
Question133: The Sumerians, who founded the first cities, not only invented writing, created poetry and the rule of law, and were also extraordinary craftsmen.
Question134: Mr. Janeck: I don't believe Stevenson will win the election for governor. Few voters are willing to elect a businessman with no political experience to such a responsible public office.
Ms. Siuzdak: You're wrong. The experience of running a major corporation is a valuable preparation for the task of running a state government.
M. Siuzdak's response shows that she has interpreted Mr. Janeck's remark to imply which of the following?
Question135: Which of the following best completes the passage below?
At a recent conference on environmental threats to the North Sea, most participating countries favored uniform controls on the quality of effluents, whether or not specific environmental damage could be attributed to a particular source of effluent. What must, of course, be shown, in order to avoid excessively restrictive controls, is that______
Question136: Houses built during the last ten years have been found to contain indoor air pollution at levels that are, on average, much higher than the levels found in older houses. The reason air-pollution levels are higher in the newer houses is that many such houses are built near the sites of old waste dumps or where automobile emissions are heavy.
Which of the following, if true, calls into question the explanation above?
Question137: The fewer restrictions there are on the advertising of legal services, the more lawyers there are who advertise their services, and the lawyers who advertise a specific service usually charge less for that service than lawyers who do not advertise. Therefore, if the state removes any of its current restrictions, such as the one against advertisements that do not specify fee arrangements, overall consumer legal costs will be lower than if the state retains its current restrictions.
If the statements above are true, which of the following must be true?
Question138: At one time, European and Japanese companies tried to imitate their American rivals. Today, American appliance manufacturers import European scientists to lead their research staffs; American automakers design cars that mimic the styling of German, Italian, and French imports; and American electronics firms boast in their advertising of "Japanese-style" devotion to quality and reliability. In the world of high technology, America has lost the battle for international prestige.
Each of the following statements, if true, would help to support the claim above EXCEPT:
Question139: Polycystic ovarian syndrome, or PCOS (aka Stein-Leventhal disease), is a condition that affects between
6% and 20% of women in the United States. It is a little understood syndrome that often goes undetected and is frequently misdiagnosed. PCOS produces tiny cysts on the surface of a woman's ovaries. These cysts are undeveloped follicles (eggs) that inexplicably fail to release through the ovarian wall as part of the menstrual cycle. Some researchers believe the eggs fail to release from the ovary because of the presence of male hormones in the blood. However, new research is indicating that PCOS is related to insulin resistance. Unfortunately, the cysts themselves are only a small part of this syndrome. PCOS can present a variety of symptoms, including hair growth on the face and chest, stubborn acne, hair loss, obesity, irregular menses, infertility, and an increased risk of diabetes. Many of these symptoms impact a woman's physical appearance and her self-esteem. If left untreated, women suffering from PCOS may experience greater levels of stress and depression. A woman exhibiting any of these symptoms should contact her physician to determine if she has PCOS. Although there is no cure for PCOS, a number of different treatments can stop or reverse many of the symptoms The author implies that PCOS is often misdiagnosed because
Question140: Read the passage carefully and then choose the best answer to each question. Answer the question based upon what is stated or implied in the reading passage.
In Ursula LeGuin's short story "The Ones Who Walk Away from Omelas," everyone in the city of Omelas is happy - everyone, that is, except the child who is kept locked in a basement closet. The child is left entirely alone and neglected except for occasional visits from the citizens of Omelas. They come at a certain age as a rite of initiation, to learn the secret of the happiness they enjoy. They come to learn that their happiness has a price: the suffering of an innocent child. In the end, most people stay in Omelas; but a few, unable to bear the fact that they are responsible for the suffering of that child, reject this utopia built upon a utilitarian morality.
Utilitarianism is an ethical theory based upon the belief that happiness is the ultimate good and that people should use happiness as the measure for determining right and wrong. For utilitarian, the right thing to do is that which will bring about the greatest amount of happiness for the greatest number of people.
Furthermore, utilitarianism argues that the intention of people's actions does not matter; only the consequences of their actions are morally relevant, because only the consequences determine how much happiness is produced.
Although many useful social policies and much legislation are founded on this "greatest good" philosophy, utilitarianism can be problematic as a basis for morality. First, happiness is not so easy to quantify, and any measurement is bound to be subjective. Second, in a theory that treats everything except happiness as instrumentally rather than intrinsically valuable, anything - or, more importantly, anyone - can (and should) be treated as a means to an end, if it means greater happiness. This rejects the notion that human beings have their own intrinsic value. Further, utilitarianism puts the burden of the happiness of the masses on the suffering of the few. Is the happiness of many worth the suffering of a few? Why do those few deserve to suffer? Isn't this burden of suffering morally irresponsible? This is the dilemma so brilliantly illustrated in LeGuin's story.
Which of the following best sums up the author's opinion of utilitarianism?
Question141: A violin constructed to have improved sound would sound different from the best-sounding existing violins.
To professional violinists, a violin that sounds different from the best-sounding existing violins sounds less like a violin and therefore worse than the best-sounding existing violins.
Professional violinists are the only accepted judges of the sound quality of violins.
Would be the best supported by those statements?
Question142: Since the invention of digital readout, machine designers have rushed to replace conventional dials and gauges with digital units. Yet the digital gauge has drawbacks in some situations. Since it presents an exact numeric value, it must be decoded and analyzed by a human operator; its meaning cannot be read in an instantaneous scanning. An analog dial or gauge can be marked with red to alert the operator when a value is entering a danger zone; a digital gauge cannot. And it is difficult to tell whether a digital readout is increasing or decreasing over time, while the up or down movement of a pointer on an analog gauge can be quickly and easily observed.
The author of the passage above would probably recommend the use of digital gauge in cases when
I. warning of a sudden rise or fall in value is needed
II. an operator must read and interpret several gauges within a few seconds III. a precise numeric value is essential
Question143: Teresa: Manned spaceflight does not have a future, since it cannot compete economically with other means of accomplishing the objectives of spaceflight.
Edward: No mode of human transportation has a better record of reliability: two accidents in twenty-five years. Thus manned spaceflight definitely has a positive future.
Which of the following is the best logical evaluation of Edward's argument as a response to Teresa's argument?
Question144: Surveys indicate that 52 percent of all women aged eighteen to sixty-five are in the labor force (employed outside the home) in any given month. On the basis of these surveys, a market researcher concluded that
48 percent of all women aged eighteen to sixty-five are full-time homemakers year-round.
Which of the following, if true, would most seriously weaken the researcher's conclusion?
Question145: Instead of blaming an airline accident on pilot error, investigators should find out why the error was made by analyzing airplane design, airline management, and pilot-training programs. For only then can changes be made to ensure that the same type of error does not recur and cause another accident.
Which of the following is a presupposition of the argument above?
Question146: Some people have questioned the judge's objectivity in cases of sex discrimination against women. But the record shows that in sixty percent of such cases, the judge has decided in favor of the women. This record demonstrates that the judge has not discriminated against women in cases of sex discrimination against women.
The argument above is flawed in that it ignores the possibility that
Question147: In the United States, injuries to passengers involved in automobile accidents are typically more severe than in Europe, where laws require a different kind of safety belt. It is clear from this that the United States needs to adopt more stringent standards for safety belt design to protect automobile passengers better.
Each of the following, if true, weakens the argument above EXCEPT:
Question148: The World Bank, the only one of its kind, provides loans to developing member countries, gives technical assistance for development projects, and for projects from other public and private sources encourages co-financing.
Question149: For each question, select the best answer from the choices given.
Without a doubt, one of America's greatest science-fiction writers is Kurt Vonnegut, who has written dozens of stories and novels, including the masterpiece Slaughterhouse Five. Yet for decades, Vonnegut denied that what he was writing was science fiction. Today, however, Vonnegut embraces his rightful place as a master of the genre. All of the following, if true, are helpful in accounting for the phenomenon described in this passage EXCEPT
Question150: Walter: A copy of an artwork should be worth exactly what the original is worth if the two works are visually indistinguishable. After all, if the two works are visually indistinguishable, they have all the same qualities, and if they have all the same qualities, their prices should be equal.
Marissa: How little you understand art! Even if someone could make a perfect copy that is visually indistinguishable from the original, the copy would have a different history and hence not have all the same qualities as the original.
Which of the following is a point at issue between Walter and Marissa?
Question151: A study of business partnerships in which one partner's management style differs from that of the other partner reveals that such partnerships are more likely be fraught with problems and to ultimately end in dissolution. Thus, mismatched management styles can seriously jeopardize a business partnership.
Which of the following, if true, most seriously weakens the argument above?
Question152: After adopting broadband internet access, wireless personal digital assistants, and super-fast home PCs, Weston Insurance has hired new employees, which doubles to 250 the junior staff in the claims department working from home.
Question153: Among the era's triumphs were the Civil Rights Act of 1964, barring segregation in public places; the 24th Amendment to the Constitution, ratified in 1964, prohibiting the poll tax; and the 1965 Voting Rights Act, which ordered the state should abolish literacy tests as a requirement for registering to vote.
Question154: Corporate Officer: Last year was an unusually poor one for our chemical division, which has traditionally contributed about 60 percent of the corporation's profits. It is therefore encouraging that there is the following evidence that the pharmaceutical division is growing stronger: it contributed 45 percent of the corporation's profits, up from 20 percent the previous year.
On the basis of the facts stated, which of the following is the best critique of the evidence presented above?
Question155: In the industrialized nations, the last century has witnessed a shortening of the average workday from twelve hours or longer to less than eight hours. Mindful of this enormous increase in leisure time over the past century, many people assume that the same trend has obtained throughout history, and that, therefore, prehistoric humans must have labored incessantly for their very survival.
We cannot, of course, directly test this assumption. However, a study of primitive peoples of today suggests a different conclusion. The Mbuti of central Africa, for instance, spend only a few hours each day in hunting, gathering, and tending to other economic necessities. The rest of their time is spent as they choose. The implication is that the short workday is not peculiar to industrialized societies. Rather, both the extended workday of 1880 and the shorter workday of today are products of different stages of the continuing process of industrialization.
Which of the following inferences about industrialization is best supported by the passage above?
Question156: A famous singer recently won a lawsuit against an advertising firm for using another singer in a commercial to evoke the famous singer's well-known rendition of a certain song. As a result of the lawsuit, advertising firms will stop using imitators in commercials. Therefore, advertising costs will rise, since famous singers' services cost more than those of their imitators.
The conclusion above is based on which of the following assumptions?
Question157: At an enormous research cost, a leading chemical company has developed a manufacturing process for converting wood fibers into a plastic. According to the company, this new plastic can be used for, among other things, the hulls of small sailboats. But what does the company think sailboat hulls used to be made of? Surely the mania for high technology can scarcely go further than this.
The author's opinion of the manufacturing process described in the passage is based primarily on the fact that
Question158: Passengers must exit airplanes swiftly after accidents, since gases released following accidents are toxic to humans and often explode soon after being released. In order to prevent passenger deaths from gas inhalation, safety officials recommend that passengers be provided with smoke hoods that prevent inhalation of the gases.
Which of the following, if true, constitutes the strongest reason not to require implementation of the safety officials' recommendation?
Question159: Since the passage of the state's Clean Air Act ten years ago, the level of industrial pollutants in the air has fallen by an average of 18 percent. This suggests that the restrictions on industry embodied in the act have worked effectively. However, during the same period the state has also suffered through a period of economic decline. The number of businesses in the state has fallen by 10 percent, and the number of workers employed has fallen by 12 percent. It is probable that the business decline, rather than the regulations in the act, is responsible for at least half of the decline in the pollution.
Which of the following, if true, would most seriously weaken the conclusion drawn in the passage above?
Question160: A warrant was issued on Sunday by a New York prosecutor for the arrest of Henry Urick, until recently chairman of the mobile telecommunications company Telecom, including eleven other people connected with his family's business empire.
Question161: The poet William Blake believed that true religion reveals through art, not through nature.
Question162: Researchers have found that when very overweight people, who tend to have relatively low metabolic rates, lose weight primarily through dieting, their metabolisms generally remain unchanged. They will thus burn significantly fewer calories at the new weight than do people whose weight is normally at that level.
Such newly thin persons will, therefore, ultimately regain weight until their body size again matches their metabolic rate.
The conclusion of the argument above depends on which of the following assumptions?
Question163: The burden of maintaining the U.S. highway system falls disproportionately on the trucking industry. Trucks represent only about 10 percent of the vehicles on U.S. roads. Yet road use taxes assessed on trucks amount to almost half the taxes paid for highway upkeep and repair.
Which of the following, if true, would most weaken the argument above?
Question164: A nutritionist studying the effects of massive doses of vitamin C found that of a group of 600 people who regularly took 1,500 mg of vitamin C daily for a year, fewer than 9 percent suffered serious cases of flu; of a group of 600 people who took 250 mg of vitamin C (the standard recommended daily allowance) daily for a year, 34 percent suffered at least one serious case of flu; and of a group of 600 people who took no vitamin C for a year (other than that found in the foods in a balanced diet), 32 percent suffered at least one serious case of flu.
Which of the following hypotheses is best supported by the evidence above?
Question165: At an enormous research cost, a leading chemical company has developed a manufacturing process for converting wood fibers into a plastic. According to the company, this new plastic can be used for, among other things, the hulls of small sailboats. But what does the company think sailboat hulls used to be made of? Surely the mania for high technology can scarcely go further than this.
Which of the following, if true, would most seriously weaken the author's conclusion?
Question166: Financing for a large construction project was provided by a group of banks. When the money was gone before the project was completed, the banks approved additional loans. Now, with funds used up again and completion still not at hand, the banks refuse to extend further loans, although without those loans, the project is doomed.
Which of the following, if true, best explains why the bank's current reaction is different from their reaction in the previous instance of depletion of funds?
Question167: DNA evidence has increasingly been used in court to prove guilt and to exonerate the innocent.
Because so many convicted felons have been cleared by DNA evidence, all cases in which someone was convicted largely on circumstantial evidence should be called into question and reviewed.
Which of the following, if true, would most strengthen this argument?
Question168: Gloria: Those who advocate tuition tax credits for parents whose children attend private schools maintain that people making no use of a government service should not be forced to pay for it. Yet those who choose to buy bottled water rather than drink water from the local supply are not therefore exempt from paying taxes to maintain the local water supply.
Roger: Your argument is illogical. Children are required by law to attend school. Since school attendance is a matter not of choice, but of legal requirement, it is unfair for the government to force some parents to pay for it twice.
Which of the following responses by Gloria would best refute Roger's charge that her argument is illogical?
Question169: A pharmaceutical company developed a new diuretic reported to cause fewer side effects than their old diuretic, which was still being manufactured. During the first year that both were sold, the earlier medication far outsold the new one; the manufacturer thus concluded that reducing side effects was not the customers' primary consideration.
Which of the following, if true, would most seriously weaken the manufacturer's conclusion?
Question170: In Spartans territory, archaeologists discovered charred bone fragments dating back 1 million years.
Analysis of the fragments, which came from a variety of animals, showed that they had been heated to temperatures no higher than those produced in experimental campfires made from branches of white stinkwood, the most common tree around Spartans.
Which of the following, if true, would, together with the information above, provide the best basis for the claim that the charred bone fragments are evidence of the use of fire by early hominids?
Question171: Neither a rising standard of living nor balanced trade, by itself, establishes a country's ability to compete in the international marketplace. Both are required simultaneously since standards of living can rise because of growing trade deficits and trade can be balanced by means of a decline in a country's standard of living.
If the facts stated in the passage above are true, a proper test of a country's ability to be competitive is its ability to
Question172: Black Americans are, on the whole, about twice as likely as White Americans to develop high blood pressure. This likelihood also holds for westernized Black Africans when compared to White Africans.
Researchers have hypothesized that this predisposition in westernized Blacks may reflect an interaction between western high-salt diets and genes that adapted to an environmental scarcity of salt.
Which of the following statements about present-day, westernized Black Africans, if true, would most tend to confirm the researchers' hypothesis?
Question173: Commentator: The theory of trade retaliation states that countries closed out of any of another country's markets should close some of their own markets to the other country in order to pressure the other country to reopen its markets. If every country acted according to this theory, no country would trade with any other.
The commentator's argument relies on which of the following assumptions?
Question174: In the past most airline companies minimized aircraft weight to minimize fuel costs. The safest airline seats were heavy, and airlines equipped their planes with few of these seats. This year the seat that has sold best to airlines has been the safest one - a clear indication that airlines are assigning a higher priority to safe seating than to minimizing fuel costs.
Which of the following, if true, most seriously weakens the argument above?
Question175: Men are primarily and secondarily socialized into believing certain characteristics are definitive in determining their masculinity. These characteristics range from playing violently to not crying when they are injured. The socialization of masculinity in our society begins as early as the first stages of infancy, with awareness of adult gender role differences being internalized by children as young as two years old.
Studies show that advertising imagery equates masculinity with violence by portraying the trait of aggression as instrumental to establishing their masculinity. Lee Bowker, who researched the influence of advertisements on youth, asserts that toy advertisements featuring only boys depict aggressive behavior and that the aggressive behavior produces positive consequences more often than negative.
Bowker also looked at commercials with boys that contain references to domination. His results indicated that 68.6% of the commercials positioned toward boys contain incidents of verbal and physical aggression.
However, there were no cross gender displays of aggressive behavior. Interestingly, not one single-sex commercial featuring girls showed any act of aggression. Bowker's research helps explain that it is not just the reinforcement of a child's close caretakers that lends legitimacy to aggressive masculine tendencies but society as a whole, using the medium of television.
William Pollack, a Harvard clinical psychologist, talks about how males have been put in a "gender straightjacket" that leads to anger, despair and often violence. Pollack states that society asks men to put a whole range of feelings and emotions behind a mask and shames them if they display any emotion.
Pollack contends that boys are 'shame phobic', even killing, in extreme cases, to avoid dishonor. It appears that the standard defined by society allows men to express their emotion only through anger.
Ironically, though these rigid stereotypes of what it means to be a man have been inculcated from an early age, men are often criticized for being one-dimensional in their behavior and emotions.
Women often verbalize a desire for males to be sensitive and express their emotions. But male insensitivity is the culmination of a societal indoctrination begun at birth. Realistically, men are in a damned if they do, damned if they don't situation. If they fail to show their emotions, they are berated for being detached from the essence of what constitutes a human being. On the other hand, if a male decides to expose his emotions, he is often branded effeminate and regarded as inferior to other males who stick closer to their gender's traditional doctrine.
The passage suggests that, when compared with television advertisement featuring boys, advertisements that had only girls were found
Question176: Airplane manufacturer: I object to your characterization of our X-387 jets as dangerous. No X-387 in commercial use has ever crashed or even had a serious malfunction.
Airline regulator: The problem with the X-387 is not that it, itself, malfunctions, but that it creates a turbulence in its wake that can create hazardous conditions for aircraft in its vicinity.
The airline regulator responds to the manufacturer by doing which of the following?
Question177: Unlike the United States with its generalissimo politicians - Washington, Jackson, Grant, and Eisenhower- the 'martial arts' have been conspicuously absent from Canadian politics. The exception to the rule is former Prime Minister Pierre Elliot Trudeau, who became the first Canadian leader to bring a gunslinger ethos to Canadian politics. Trudeau introduced Canada to the refined art of single combat; it was the politics of "doing it my way". Single-combat confrontation implied much more than the renegade in power did, and far less than the tricks of William Lyon Mackenzie King, prime minister intermittently between 1921 and 1948.
Trudeau's unique background prepared him for the role of authoritarian leader he would assume later in life. Born on October 18, 1919, Trudeau lived in French-speaking Montreal, but heard English at home from his mother, making it easy for the young politician to appeal to all sectors of Canada, a bilingual country. As a young man, he walked and cycled through Europe, finding himself on occasion on the wrong side of the bars in foreign jails. By 1940, Trudeau entered the law faculty at the University of Montreal. As a student he enlisted in the Canadian Officers Training Corps, where he was given a commission as a lieutenant, a rank he held until his retirement in 1947. Trudeau, a renowned sportsman, held a brown belt in karate, knew how to skin dive and could descend 150 feet off a cliff with ease. He continued performing flamboyant physical feats even in later life as Canada's fifteenth prime minister, astounding Canadians with his prowess. The public's adoration made it possible for him to practice his personal brand of 'do it my way' politics, initiating profound and long-lasting changes to his country.
Other leaders would never have undertaken to deal with such taboo issues as divorce, abortion and homosexuality- matters likely to infuriate conservative Canada from coast to coast. Even the powerful Mackenzie King dared not touch any of the three, though Trudeau tackled them together in an omnibus bill as Minister of Justice under Lester B.
Pearson. His reason for loosening legislation on these issues was, as he put poetically put it, "The state has no business in the bedrooms of the nation." The myths-makers have it that this was Trudeau's first deliberate 'gun slinging' move, performed with the ultimate goal of attaining national leadership. Contrary to popular belief, Trudeau had no leadership aspirations at the time; all he had was a passion for combat that eclipsed other religious considerations. Trudeau instigated far- reaching changes in legislation governing divorce, abortion and homosexuality that have had a major impact on Canada, shaping the country into what it is today.
The author of the passage mentions Trudeau's accomplishments in sports primarily in order to
Question178: Health club membership has increased dramatically over the last five years. In order to take advantage of this increase, Fitness Express plans to open more of the same types of classes available during the week, while continuing its already very extensive advertising in newspapers and on the radio.
Which of the following, if true, provides most support for the view that Fitness Express cannot increase membership to its gyms by adopting the plan outlined above?
Question179: The chanterelle, a type of wild mushroom, grows beneath host trees such as the Douglas fir, which provide it with necessary sugars. The underground filaments of chanterelles, which extract the sugars, in turn provide nutrients and water for their hosts. Because of this mutually beneficial relationship, harvesting the chanterelles growing beneath a Douglas fir seriously endangers the tree.
Which of the following, if true, casts the most doubt on the conclusion drawn above?
Question180: Today, children whose parents are deemed incapable of caring for them are put into foster care. These children are moved into strangers' homes, where they are cared for until their own parents can regain custody, which may not happen for years, if it happens at all. Although it means well, the current foster care program is so poorly funded, staffed, and managed that it cannot ensure the safety and wellbeing of the children in the system. The laudable idea behind foster care is that children will fare best if placed in a family setting until they can be reunited with their parents, even if it is a family of strangers. However, while in foster care, children typically get shuffled between many different foster homes, preventing them from developing long-term, supportive relationships with their foster families. Foster care placements can also force siblings to be separated, further isolating these vulnerable children. When a child is moved to a new foster home, he or she may also have to enroll in a new school, a disruptive process that has a negative impact on the child's education. The bureaucracy that oversees this system is overwhelmed to the point that social workers are unable to adequately screen potential foster parents and keep accurate track of the children placed in foster care. There must be a better means of caring for these children. Perhaps it is time to consider creating special group homes as a means of providing these children with stable and safe environments.
A child could live in one group home for the duration of his or her time in foster care and be supervised by a team of social workers and other lay people. Children would receive proper meals and healthcare, attend the same school, and develop relationships with others experiencing the trauma of being separated from their parents. In addition, social workers and staff would have daily access to these children, enabling them to better determine if a child has a special physical or psychological need and arrange for the necessary services. Would this approach be perfect? No, but it would solve many of the problems that plague the current system. For some, the idea of a government agency housing, clothing, and feeding needy children may sound extreme, but it only suggests that we provide these children with the same basic necessities that we give to prison inmates.
The passage states that
Question181: One way to judge the performance of a company is to compare it with other companies. This technique, commonly called "benchmarking," permits the manager of a company to discover better industrial practices and can provide a justification for the adoption of good practices.
Any of the following, if true, is a valid reason for benchmarking the performance of a company against companies with which it is not in competition rather than against competitors EXCEPT:
Question182: Unlike the wholesale price of raw wool, the wholesale price of raw cotton has fallen considerably in the last year. Thus, although the retail price of cotton clothing at retail clothing stores has not yet fallen, it will inevitably fall.
Which of the following, if true, most seriously weakens the argument above?
Question183: Airline: Newly developed collision-avoidance systems, although not fully tested to discover potential malfunctions, must be installed immediately in passenger planes. Their mechanical warnings enable pilots to avoid crashes.
Pilots: Pilots will not fly in planes with collision-avoidance systems that are not fully tested. Malfunctioning systems could mislead pilots, causing crashes.
The pilots' objection is most strengthened if which of the following is true?
Question184: Mary Shelley's 1818 classic Frankenstein has been the most-taught novel on college campuses in the country for the past 10 years. This is due primarily to the worries about scientific responsibility brought on by the recent surge of advances in science and technology, especially biotechnology. Which of the following statements, if true, would be most helpful in evaluating this argument?
Question185: "Fast cycle time" is a strategy of designing a manufacturing organization to eliminate bottlenecks and delays in production. Not only does it speed up production, but it also assures quality. The reason is that the bottlenecks and delays cannot be eliminated unless all work is done right the first time.
The claim about quality made above rests on a questionable presupposition that
Question186: Which of the following best completes the argument below?
One effect of the introduction of the electric refrigerator was a collapse in the market for ice. Formerly householders had bought ice to keep their iceboxes cool and the food stored in the iceboxes fresh. Now the iceboxes cool themselves. Similarly, the introduction of crops genetically engineered to be resistant to pests will______
Question187: Increasing the speed limit to 65 miles per hour or more on highways is dangerous and only leads to more accidents. Whenever the highway speed has been increased, accident rates have increased in that state.
Maine raised its turnpike speed to 65 mph in November, and more fatal accidents occurred in December than any other month in the year. Highway fatalities in December and January combined were up 18% from November.
All of the following are valid criticisms of this argument EXCEPT
Question188: The U.S. census is not perfect: thousands of Americans probably go uncounted. However, the basic statistical portrait of the nation painted by the census is accurate. Certainly some of the poor go uncounted, particularly the homeless; but some of the rich go uncounted as well, because they are often abroad or traveling between one residence and another.
Which of the following is an assumption on which the argument above depends?
Question189: When romance novels were located in the back of the bookstore, they accounted for approximately 6% of total sales. Since we moved romance novels close to the front of the store and put several books on display, sales of romance novels have increased to 14% to 18% of total sales.
All of the following conclusions can logically be drawn from this argument EXCEPT
Question190: Interviewer: An alarming statistic reported in the Hobern Medical Journal is that 90 percent of the people in this country now report that they know someone who has heart disease.
Dr. Summer: But an expected level of heart disease is 5 percent, or in other words, 1 out of every 20 people. So at any given time if a person knows approximately 50 people, 1 or more will very likely suffer from heart disease.
Dr. Summer's argument is structured to lead to which of the following conclusion?
Question191: The following proposal to amend the bylaws of an organization was circulated to its members for comment.
When more than one nominee is to be named for an office, prospective nominees must consent to nomination and before giving such consent must be told who the other nominees will be.
Which of the following comments concerning the logic of the proposal is accurate if it cannot be known who the actual nominees are until prospective nominees have given their consent to be nominated?
Question192: The only way to captivate the audience is to surprise them constantly with new scenes and new actors before they completely lose interest in the play.
Question193: Toughened hiring standards have not been the primary cause of the present staffing shortage in public schools. The shortage of teachers is primarily caused by the fact that in recent years teachers have not experienced any improvements in working conditions and their salaries have not kept pace with salaries in other professions.
Which of the following, if true, would most support the claims above?
Question194: A computer equipped with signature-recognition software, which restricts access to a computer to those people whose signatures are on file, identifies a person's signature by analyzing not only the form of the signature but also such characteristics as pen pressure and signing speed. Even the most adept forgers cannot duplicate all of the characteristics the program analyzes.
Which of the following can be logically concluded from the passage above?
Question195: In 1980, a Danish ten-øre coin minted in 1747 was sold at auction for $8,000. Eleanor Bixby owns another Danish ten-øre coin minted in 1747. When she puts it on the market next week, it will fetch a price over
$18,000.
Which of the following, if true, would most weaken the conclusion drawn above?
Question196: George Bernard Shaw wrote: "That any sane nation, having observed that you could provide for the supply of bread by giving bakers a pecuniary interest in baking for you, should go on to give a surgeon a pecuniary interest in cutting off your leg is enough to make one despair of political humanity." Shaw's statement would best serve as an illustration in an argument criticizing which of the following?
Question197: Banning cigarette advertisements in the mass media will not reduce the number of young people who smoke. They know that cigarettes exist and they know how to get them. They do not need the advertisements to supply that information.
The above argument would be most weakened if which of the following were true?
Question198: We now have wireless computer networks, direct-broadcast satellite television, digital wireless cable television networks, global telephone service, and global positioning systems that can pinpoint an individual's location to a few inches.
Question199: James weighs more than Kelly.
Luis weighs more than Mark.
Mark weighs less than Ned.
Kelly and Ned are exactly the same weight.
If the information above is true, which of the following must also be true?
Question200: Current farm policy is institutionalized penalization of consumers. It increases food prices for middle- and low-income families and costs the taxpayer billions of dollars a year.
Which of the following statements, if true, would provide support for the author's claims above?
I. Farm subsidies amount to roughly $20 billion a year in federal payouts and $12 billion more in higher food prices.
II. According to a study by the Department of Agriculture, each $1 of benefits provided to farmers for ethanol production costs consumers and taxpayers $4.
III. The average full-time farmers have an average net worth of over $300,000.
Question201: Since the routine use of antibiotics can give rise to resistant bacteria capable of surviving antibiotic environments, the presence of resistant bacteria in people could be due to the human use of prescription antibiotics. Some scientists, however, believe that most resistant bacteria in people derive from human consumption of bacterially infected meat.
Which of the following statements, if true, would most significantly strengthen the hypothesis of the scientists?
Question202: Millions of people in the United States are affected by eating disorders, more than 90% of those afflicted are adolescents or young women.
Question203: The Florida panther, known for its distinctive characteristics, including a kinked tail and cowlicks, is nearing extinction with the help of scientists and government officials. Though once abundant in Florida, by the end of the twentieth century, only approximately 30 Florida panthers remained. Efforts to preserve the panthers had focused on shielding them from human encroachment with the hope that they could develop sustainable numbers to survive as a species. However, pressure from development caused officials to grow impatient and shift their strategy and goals.
In 1995, new breeds of female panthers were brought to Florida from Texas to bolster the population. The change has been dramatic. In 1990, 88% of the panthers in Florida had the distinct kinked tail. By 2000, five years after the introduction of the Texas panthers, not a single kitten born to the Texas females had a kinked tail. The breed known as the Florida panther is now on an expedited, ineluctable road to extinction
- with the assistance of wildlife protection agencies.
If the goal was to have any kind of panther in Florida, it has been realized. Since the introduction of the Texas panthers, the panther population in Florida has risen to approximately 80 mixed-breed panthers.
However, this "success" could portend a tragic trend in wildlife management in the United States. We cannot and should not create genetically mixed species as a means of achieving a compromise between the needs of development and a species' survival. This type of species tampering is a perversion of the ideal of wildlife management and will irrevocably transform our national landscape.
It can be inferred from the passage that
Question204: Advertisement: For sinus pain, three out of four hospitals give their patients Novex. So when you want the most effective painkiller for sinus pain, Novex is the one to choose.
Which of the following, if true, most seriously undermines the advertisement's argument?
Question205: There are fundamentally two possible changes in an economy that will each cause inflation unless other compensating changes also occur. These changes are either reductions in the supply of goods and services or increases in demand. In a prebanking economy the quantity of money available, and hence the level of demand, is equivalent to the quantity of gold available.
If the statements above are true, then it is also true that in a prebanking economy
Question206: Defense Department analysts worry that the ability of the United States to wage a prolonged war would be seriously endangered if the machine-tool manufacturing base shrinks further. Before the Defense Department publicly connected this security issue with the import quota issue, however, the machine-tool industry raised the national security issue in its petition for import quotas.
Which of the following, if true, contributes most to an explanation of the machine-tool industry's raising the issue above regarding national security?
Question207: New home buyers are all financially protected against bankruptcy of the contractor because of a law requiring the contractor to get bank backing to insure all individual investments. An economist argues that this insurance is partly responsible for the high rate of bankruptcies among contractors, since it removes from buyers any financial incentive to find out the financial status of the contractor they are hiring. If buyers were more selective, then contractors would need to be secure in order to compete for buyers.
The economist's argument makes which of the following assumptions?
Question208: Civil trials often involve great complexities that are beyond the capacities of jurors to understand. As a result, jurors' decisions in such trials are frequently incorrect. Justice would therefore be better served if the more complex trials were decided by judges rather than juries.
The argument above depends on which of the following assumptions?
Question209: After the national speed limit of 55 miles per hour was imposed in 1974, the number of deaths per mile driven on a highway fell abruptly as a result. Since then, however, the average speed of vehicles on highways has risen, but the number of deaths per mile driven on a highway has continued to fall.
Which of the following conclusions can be properly drawn from the statements above?
Question210: Despite protests from some share holders, committee members have ordered the levels of department head involvement to be curtailed and that the advertising program be undertaken.
Question211: Recently, a court ruled that current law allows tour operators that travel to potentially dangerous locations, such as the Amazon, to reject potential customers if there is a 50 percent chance that the traveler would contract malaria on the trip. The presiding judge justified the ruling, saying that it protected both travelers and tour operators.
This use of his court ruling as part of the law could not be effective if which of the following were true?
Question212: In 1980, 18% of American families lived under the poverty line. In 1990, only 12% of families lived under the poverty line. But that doesn't mean fewer families were living in poverty. Indeed, the statistics hide the fact that more families were actually living in destitution. The difference in percentages appears because the poverty line was redefined and the income level was reduced. Thus, many families were above the poverty line even though they did not earn any more income. Which of the following statements, if true, would most strengthen this argument?
Question213: The pharmaceutical industry argues that because new drugs will not be developed unless heavy development costs can be recouped in later sales, the current 20 years of protection provided by patents should be extended in the case of newly developed drugs. However, in other industries new-product development continues despite high development costs, a fact that indicates that the extension is unnecessary.
Which of the following, if true, most strongly supports the pharmaceutical industry's argument against the challenge made above?
Question214: Since the national postal service in country X was privatized six months ago, delays in the delivery of mail have increased by 20 percent. To combat this problem, more sorting and delivering staff must be hired in the busiest regions of the country.
Which of the following, if true, casts the most doubt on the effectiveness of the solution proposed above
Question215: An Australian group named Action Council on Smoking and Health (ACSH) has recently lobbied to make warnings on cigarette packets more graphic. The council proposed that striking visual photos of diseased organs should be put on at least 50% of outside packaging, in conjunction with health warnings outlining smoking hazards enumerated in a separate leaflet placed inside the cigarette packet. The ACSH claim that bland and ineffectual warnings like "Smoking is a health hazard" currently found on cigarette packets are not nearly sufficient.
Substituting those inadequate admonitions with explicit photos will provide a powerful visual stimulus to help smokers relinquish their habit. The current cautions on cigarette packets have little or no impact on smokers who have grown immune to the warnings that focus on abstract tobacco related risks and illnesses from which smokers can easily disassociate themselves. The proposed new tactics would concentrate on the perspective of the individual smoker through a demonstration of what is occurring in his body each time he reaches for a cigarette, rather than a generic cautionary word of advise.
The ACSH cited the results of recent studies conducted by psychologists at McKean University confirming that evidence related to one's own experience is more effective at influencing future behavior than a presentation of facts and figures. A further rationale for the addition of pictures to cigarette packages is the finding that smokers handle their packets 20-30 times a day, on average, thus, if graphic pictures on cigarette packets were introduced, smoker would have 20-30 chances to face the harsh reality of what damage they are doing to themselves each time they light up.
Even more essential than the pictures on the outside label, ACSH strongly advocate including warnings and helpful information in a leaflet inserted into the packet of cigarettes. Even an analgesic, ACSH adds, found in every bathroom cabinet has all possible side effects enumerated in the insert. How much more imperative is it then when the substance in question is tobacco, a dried weed that contains highly noxious nicotine that society still accepts even though it kills one of every two of its users.
Fundamentally, what is at stake here is consumer rights. Smokers should know what substances they are inhaling, and what damage they are inflicting to their bodies, though surprisingly, even today, many do not.
For this reason alone, the recommendation for more graphic pictures and warnings on cigarette packets, which many seem excessive, is being seriously considered.
It can be inferred from the passage
Question216: What was as remarkable as the development of the after-school enrichment programs has been New York City's nonprofit Chess-in-the-Schools initiative, giving more girls than ever before the opportunity to learn the rules of the game.
Question217: The Florida panther, known for its distinctive characteristics, including a kinked tail and cowlicks, is nearing extinction with the help of scientists and government officials. Though once abundant in Florida, by the end of the twentieth century, only approximately 30 Florida panthers remained. Efforts to preserve the panthers had focused on shielding them from human encroachment with the hope that they could develop sustainable numbers to survive as a species. However, pressure from development caused officials to grow impatient and shift their strategy and goals.
In 1995, new breeds of female panthers were brought to Florida from Texas to bolster the population. The change has been dramatic. In 1990, 88% of the panthers in Florida had the distinct kinked tail. By 2000, five years after the introduction of the Texas panthers, not a single kitten born to the Texas females had a kinked tail. The breed known as the Florida panther is now on an expedited, ineluctable road to extinction
- with the assistance of wildlife protection agencies.
If the goal was to have any kind of panther in Florida, it has been realized. Since the introduction of the Texas panthers, the panther population in Florida has risen to approximately 80 mixed-breed panthers.
However, this "success" could portend a tragic trend in wildlife management in the United States. We cannot and should not create genetically mixed species as a means of achieving a compromise between the needs of development and a species' survival. This type of species tampering is a perversion of the ideal of wildlife management and will irrevocably transform our national landscape.
The author supports the central idea of this passage primarily by
Question218: Identical twins tend to have similar personalities; if environment outweighs heredity in personality development, twins raised together should presumably have more similar personalities than those raised apart. A recent study of identical twins in both situations measured 11 key traits through a questionnaire, and concluded that 7 of the 11 are primarily products of heredity.
Which of the following, if established, would cast the most doubt on the study's results?
Question219: The Burmese ferret badger burrows its home in the ground. Based on the fact that different local populations of Burmese ferret badgers of the same species dig homes of different styles, zoologists have concluded that the badgers building styles are a culturally acquired, rather than a genetically transmitted, trait.
Which of the following, if true, would most strengthen the conclusion drawn by the zoologists?
Question220: The Competitive Civil Service system is designed to give applicants fair and equal treatment and to ensure that federal applicants are hired based in objective criteria.
Question221: The proportion of women among students enrolled in higher education programs has increased over the past decades. This is partly shown by the fact that in 1959, only 11 percent of the women between twenty and twenty-one were enrolled in college, while in 1981, 30 percent of the women between twenty and twenty-one were enrolled in college.
To evaluate the argument above, it would be most useful to compare 1959 and 1981 with regard to which of the following characteristics?
Question222: According to a recent study, fifteen corporations in the United States that follow a credo of social responsibility are also very profitable. Because of their credos, these fifteen corporations give generously to charity, follow stringent environmental-protection policies, and have vigorous affirmative-action programs.
Which of the following can be correctly inferred from the statements above?
Question223: In 1987 sinusitis was the most common chronic medical condition in the United States, followed by arthritis and high blood pressure, in that order.
The incidence rates for both arthritis and high blood pressure increase with age, but the incidence rate for sinusitis is the same for people of all ages.
The average age of the United States population will increase between 1987 and 2000.
Which of the following conclusions can be most properly drawn about chronic medical conditions in the United States from the information given above?
Question224: Naturally occurring chemicals cannot be newly patented once their structures have been published. Before a naturally occurring chemical compound can be used as a drug, however, it must be put through the same rigorous testing program as any synthetic compound, culminating in a published report detailing the chemical's structure and observed effects.
If the statements above are true, which of the following must also be true on the basis of them?
Question225: Wood smoke contains dangerous toxins that cause changes in human cells. Because wood smoke presents such a high health risk, legislation is needed to regulate the use of open-air fires and wood- burning stoves.
Which of the following, if true, provides the most support for the argument above?
Question226: While some economists believe that Germany should be warned by the European Commission that it could face the imposition of radical restrictions on its domestic fiscal policymaking as early as the beginning of next year, others say that Germany will take the warning seriously only if it would be backed by sanctions.
Question227: Excavations on the now uninhabited isle of Kelton reveal a scene typical of towns decimated by volcanic ash. Archaeologists have hypothesized that the destruction was due to volcanic activity known to have occurred in the vicinity of the island in 160 B.
C.
Which of the following, if true, most strongly supports the archaeologists' hypothesis?
Question228: Informed people generally assimilate information from several divergent sources before coming to an opinion. However, most popular news organizations view foreign affairs solely through the eyes of our State Department. In reporting the political crisis in foreign country B, news organizations must endeavor to find alternative sources of information.
Which of the following inferences can be drawn from the argument above?
Question229: An annually conducted, nationwide survey shows a continuing marked decline in the use of illegal drugs by high school seniors over the last three years.
Which of the following, if true, would provide most support for concluding from the survey results described above that the use of illegal drugs by people below the age of 20 is declining?
Question230: Dear Applicant:
Thank you for your application. Unfortunately, we are unable to offer you a position in our local government office for the summer. As you know, funding for summer jobs is limited, and it is impossible for us to offer jobs to all those who want them. Consequently, we are forced to reject many highly qualified applicants.
Which of the following can be inferred from the letter?
Question231: A report that many apples contain a cancer-causing preservative called Alar apparently had little effect on consumers. Few consumers planned to change their apple-buying habits as a result of the report.
Nonetheless, sales of apples in grocery stores fell sharply in March, a month after the report was issued.
Which of the following, if true, best explains the reason for the apparent discrepancy described above?
Question232: In an effort to go beyond resumes as tools in its search for executives, one leading company has resorted to interviewing the top candidates for a position all together in a single group. This technique is supposed to afford a direct comparison of the candidates with respect to some personal qualities that cannot be gleaned from a resume.
Which of the following, if true, casts the most serious doubt on the value of the simultaneous interview technique?
Question233: Manager: Accounting and Billing are located right next to each other and the two departments do similar kinds of work; yet expenditures for clerical supplies charged to Billing are much higher. Is Billing wasting supplies?
Head of Billing: Not at all.
Which of the following, if true, best supports the position of the Head of Billing?
Question234: Are you still reading the other newspaper in town? Did you know that the Daily Bugle is owned by an out- of-town business syndicate that couldn't care less about the people of Gotham City? Read the Daily Clarion, the only real voice of the people of Gotham City!
Which of the following most directly refutes the argument raised in the advertisement above?
Question235: Previous studies have indicated that eating chocolate increases the likelihood of getting heart disease.
However, a new, more reliable study has indicated that eating chocolate does not increase the likelihood of getting heart disease. When the results of the new study become known, consumption of chocolate will undoubtedly increase.
Which of the following is an assumption on which the conclusion above is based?
Question236: Hotco oil burners, designed to be used in asphalt plants, are so efficient that Hotco will sell one to the Clifton Asphalt plant for no payment other than the cost savings between the total amount the asphalt plant actually paid for oil using its former burner during the last two years and the total amount it will pay for oil using the Hotco burner during the next two years. On installation, the plant will make an estimated payment, which will be adjusted after two years to equal the actual cost savings.
Which of the following, if it occurred, would constitute a disadvantage for Hotco of the plan described above?
Question237: Suggested by new research is the fact that people who achieve phenomenal success do so, not only by visualizing their success in future endeavors, but also, by recalling their past successes, creating a tremendous surge in confidence.
Question238: Since applied scientific research is required for technological advancement, many have rightly urged an increased emphasis in universities on applied research. But we must not give too little attention to basic research, even though it may have no foreseeable application, for tomorrow's applied research will depend on the basic research of today.
If the statements above are true, which of the following can be most reliably inferred?
Question239: In Asia, where palm trees are non-native, the trees' flowers have traditionally been pollinated by hand, which has kept palm fruit productivity unnaturally low. When weevils known to be efficient pollinators of palm flowers were introduced into Asia in 1980, palm fruit productivity increased - by up to fifty percent in some areas - but then decreased sharply in 1984.
Which of the following statements, if true, would best explain the 1984 decrease in productivity?
Question240: In January there was a large drop in the number of new houses sold, because interest rates for mortgages were falling and many consumers were waiting to see how low the rates would go. This large sales drop was accompanied by a sharp rise in the average price of new houses sold.
Which of the following, if true, best explains the sharp rise in the average price of new houses?
Question241: If the county continues to collect residential trash at current levels, landfills will soon be overflowing and parkland will need to be used in order to create more space. Charging each household a fee for each pound of trash it puts out for collection will induce residents to reduce the amount of trash they create; this charge will therefore protect the remaining county parkland.
Which of the following is an assumption made in drawing the conclusion above?
Question242: A severe drought can actually lessen the total amount of government aid that United States farmers receive as a group. The government pays farmers the amount, if any, by which the market price at which crops are actually sold falls short of a preset target price per bushel for the crops. The drought of 1983, for example, caused farm-program payments to drop by $10 billion.
Given the information above, which of the following, if true, best explains why the drought of 1983 resulted in a reduction in farm-program payments?
Question243: The program to control the entry of illegal drugs into the country was a failure in 1987. If the program had been successful, the wholesale price of most illegal drugs would not have dropped substantially in 1987.
The argument in the passage would be most seriously weakened if it were true that
Question244: Using art to condemn the moral shortcomings of society is nothing new. English artist William Hogarth (1697 - 1764) was renowned for prints that revealed the moral lapses of eighteenth-century England.
Despite the fact that Hogarth enjoyed the patronage of England's wealthier citizens, he did not shrink away from producing scathing depictions of all levels of English society.
In the ten-print series Industry and Idleness, Hogarth presents two apprentices who begin working side by side only to arrive at vastly different ends. The first apprentice is portrayed as a morally incorruptible, diligent worker. He is promoted, marries his boss's daughter, and achieves great distinction and financial success. The other apprentice does little work and engages in many unsavory activities. He is fired from his apprenticeship and continues down a path of illicit behavior and corruption. The series comes to a climax when the two former coworkers are reunited with the industrious apprentice - now elevated to alderman - standing in judgment of the idle coworker brought before him for murder. The idle apprentice is sentenced to death and executed, whereas the industrious apprentice goes on to become Lord Mayor of London. Among Hogarth's most popular series was The Rake's Progress, which tells the story of wealthy Tom Rakewell. In the first of eight prints, Tom inherits a large sum of money that he foolishly spends on enhancing his image and prestige in superficial ways. His prodigal ways lead to his rapid decline as he is arrested for debt and in return marries an old maid for her money. He begins gambling, is imprisoned, and eventually goes insane in Bedlam. Tom's descent and desperate outcome, like many of Hogarth's subjects, is tied directly to moral corruption and poor self-discipline. It is interesting that Hogarth's prints were extremely popular in his day. Whatever the moral shortcomings of eighteenth-century England, its citizens welcomed Hogarth's social critiques and harsh judgments.
According to the passage, Hogarth's prints
Question245: Advances in networking technology and home computers have made it easy for millions of Americans to work in their homes, often facilitating the communication between the manager, who continues to work on- site at the office, with his distant employees.
Question246: Professor A: We must make a strong moral statement against Country X's policies. Only total divestment- the sale of all stock in companies that have factories or business offices in X-can do this. Therefore, the university should divest totally.
Professor B: Our aim should be to encourage X to change its policies. Partial divestment is the best way to achieve this aim. Therefore, the university should sell its stock only in companies that either sell goods to X's government, or do the majority of their business in X, or treat their workers in X unfairly.
Which of the following, if true, would be evidence that the university would not be harmed economically if it followed Professor A's recommendation.
Question247: In 1985 state border colleges in Texas lost the enrollment of more than half, on average, of the Mexican nationals they had previously served each year. Teaching faculties have alleged that this extreme drop resulted from a rise in tuition for international and out-of-state students from $40 to $120 per credit hour.
Which of the following, if feasible, offers the best prospects for alleviating the problem of the drop in enrollment of Mexican nationals as the teaching faculties assessed it?
Question248: By necessary, munitions plants hired many young woman during the war; at least as much as 500,00 and more others who had not any previous experience in factory work of any kind.
Question249: Unemployment in Winston County has risen only 4% since I took office. Under my predecessor, unemployment rose 14%. Clearly, my economic policies are far more effective.
Which of the following must be true in order for this argument to be valid?
Question250: Many plant varieties used in industrially developed nations to improve cultivated crops come from less developed nations. No compensation is paid on the grounds that the plants used are "the common heritage of humanity." Such reasoning is, however, flawed. After all, no one suggests that coal, oil, and ores should be extracted without payment.
Which of the following best describes an aspect of the method used by the author in the argument above?
Question251: In the United States, vacationers account for more than half of all visitors to what are technically called
"pure aquariums" but for fewer than one quarter of all visitors to zoos, which usually include a "zoo aquarium" of relatively modest scope.
Which of the following, if true, most helps to account for the difference described above between visitors to zoos and visitors to pure aquariums?
Question252: Which of the following is the most logical completion of the passage below?
Many companies have been pushing for a three-week extension of daylight saving time, which would mean that the sun would continue to set an hour later during the fall months. The owners of a chain of convenience stores, for example, expect to gain $15 million a year in additional sales, mostly from people who tend to______
Question253: A report on acid rain concluded, "Most forests in Canada are not being damaged by acid rain." Critics of the report insist the conclusion be changed to, "Most forests in Canada do not show visible symptoms of damage by acid rain, such as abnormal loss of leaves, slower rates of growth, or higher mortality." Which of the following, if true, provides the best logical justification for the critics' insistence that the report's conclusion be changed?
Question254: Low-income families are often unable to afford as much child care as they need. One government program would award low-income families a refund on the income taxes they pay of as much as $1,000 for each child under age four. This program would make it possible for all low-income families with children under age four to obtain more child care than they otherwise would have been able to afford.
Which of the following, if true, most seriously calls into question the claim that the program would make it possible for all low-income families to obtain more child care?
Question255: Purebred cows native to Mongolia produce, on average, 400 liters of milk per year; if Mongolian cattle are crossbred with European breeds, the crossbred cows can produce, on average, 2,700 liters per year. An international agency plans to increase the profitability of Mongolia's dairy sector by encouraging widespread crossbreeding of native Mongolian cattle with European breeds.
Which of the following, if true, casts the most serious doubt on the viability of the agency's plan?
Question256: When three Indian-owned trains purchased from Transcontinental Trains crashed within a two month time period, the Indian parliament ordered the acquisition of three new Transcontinental trains as replacements.
This decision surprised many because it is customary for users to shun a product after it is involved in accidents. Which of the following, if true, provides the best indication that the decision of the Indian government was well supported?
Question257: A sociologist recently studied two sets of teenagers. The members of one set spent 10 or more hours per week watching violent television programs, and the members of the other set spent 2 hours or less per week watching violent television programs. A significantly greater proportion of the teenagers in the former group exhibited aggressive behavior during the period of the study. The sociologists reasoned that the prolonged exposure to television violence caused the aggressive behavior.
Which of the following, if true, of the teenagers in the study, provides the strongest challenge to the sociologist's conclusion?
Question258: Approximately two hundred brands of personal computers are being manufactured, but we currently limit our inventory to only the eight most popular brands. We plan to increase greatly the number of computers we sell by expanding our inventory to include the ten best-selling brands.
Which of the following, if true, points out a major weakness of the plan above?
Question259: The technological conservatism of art supply manufacturers is a reflection of the kinds of demands they are trying to meet. The only customers who are seriously interested in purchasing new products are professional artists. Therefore, innovation in art supply technology is limited by what art critics and gallery owners accept as a proper medium of expression for artists.
Which of the following is an assumption made in drawing the conclusion above?
Question260: Advertiser: The revenue that newspapers and magazines earn by publishing advertisements allows publishers to keep the prices per copy of their publications much lower than would otherwise be possible.
Therefore, consumers benefit economically from advertising.
Consumer: But who pays for the advertising that pays for low-priced newspapers and magazines? We consumers do, because advertisers pass along advertising costs to us through the higher prices they charge for their products.
Which of the following best describes how the consumer counters the advertiser's argument?
Question261: An Australian group named Action Council on Smoking and Health (ACSH) has recently lobbied to make warnings on cigarette packets more graphic. The council proposed that striking visual photos of diseased organs should be put on at least 50% of outside packaging, in conjunction with health warnings outlining smoking hazards enumerated in a separate leaflet placed inside the cigarette packet. The ACSH claim that bland and ineffectual warnings like "Smoking is a health hazard" currently found on cigarette packets are not nearly sufficient.
Substituting those inadequate admonitions with explicit photos will provide a powerful visual stimulus to help smokers relinquish their habit. The current cautions on cigarette packets have little or no impact on smokers who have grown immune to the warnings that focus on abstract tobacco related risks and illnesses from which smokers can easily disassociate themselves. The proposed new tactics would concentrate on the perspective of the individual smoker through a demonstration of what is occurring in his body each time he reaches for a cigarette, rather than a generic cautionary word of advise.
The ACSH cited the results of recent studies conducted by psychologists at McKean University confirming that evidence related to one's own experience is more effective at influencing future behavior than a presentation of facts and figures. A further rationale for the addition of pictures to cigarette packages is the finding that smokers handle their packets 20-30 times a day, on average, thus, if graphic pictures on cigarette packets were introduced, smoker would have 20-30 chances to face the harsh reality of what damage they are doing to themselves each time they light up.
Even more essential than the pictures on the outside label, ACSH strongly advocate including warnings and helpful information in a leaflet inserted into the packet of cigarettes. Even an analgesic, ACSH adds, found in every bathroom cabinet has all possible side effects enumerated in the insert. How much more imperative is it then when the substance in question is tobacco, a dried weed that contains highly noxious nicotine that society still accepts even though it kills one of every two of its users.
Fundamentally, what is at stake here is consumer rights. Smokers should know what substances they are inhaling, and what damage they are inflicting to their bodies, though surprisingly, even today, many do not.
For this reason alone, the recommendation for more graphic pictures and warnings on cigarette packets, which many seem excessive, is being seriously considered.
The author cites studies conducted at McKean University to account for why
Question262: Stronger patent laws are needed to protect inventions from being pirated. With that protection, manufacturers would be encouraged to invest in the development of new products and technologies. Such investment frequently results in an increase in a manufacturer's productivity.
Which of the following conclusions can most properly be drawn from the information above?
Question263: When a person is under intense psychological stress, his or her cardiovascular response is the same as it is during vigorous physical exercise. Psychological stress, then, must be beneficial for the heart as is vigorous physical exercise.
The argument above relies on which of the following assumptions?
Question264: Fact 1: Television advertising is becoming less effective: the proportion of brand names promoted on television that viewers of the advertising can recall is slowly decreasing.
Fact 2: Television viewers recall commercials aired first or last in a cluster of consecutive commercials far better than they recall commercials aired somewhere in the middle.
Fact 2 would be most likely to contribute to an explanation of fact 1 if which of the following were also true?
Question265: The number of musicians employed to play accompaniment for radio and television commercials has sharply decreased over the past ten years. This has occurred even though the number of commercials produced each year has not significantly changed for the last ten years.
Which of the following, if it occurred during the past ten years, would contribute LEAST to an explanation of the facts above?
Question266: While royal governor of New Jersey, William Franklin's conviction that the colonies should remain part of England was not unlike that of his father Benjamin Franklin, who initially preferred a continued association with England, though he eventually played a role in forging America's independence, helping craft the Declaration of Independence after a change of heart
Question267: A researcher discovered that people who have low levels of immune-system activity tend to score much lower on tests of mental health than do people with normal or high immune-system activity. The researcher concluded from this experiment that the immune system protects against mental illness as well as against physical disease.
The researcher's conclusion would be most seriously weakened if it were true that
Question268: Two small-business owners, Jensen and Ling, could not be more different. Jensen is easy going, easy to talk to, good at delegating responsibility, and quick to acknowledge the contributions of others. Ling, however, is often high strung, generally unfriendly, and unable to give up any authority; she is determined to be involved in every decision. This explains why Jensen's business is successful while Ling's business has failed.
The conclusion of this argument is based upon all of the following assumptions EXCEPT
Question269: In the aftermath of a worldwide stock-market crash, Country T claimed that the severity of the stock-market crash it experienced resulted from the accelerated process of denationalization many of its industries underwent shortly before the crash.
Which of the following, if it could be carried out, would be most useful in an evaluation of Country T's assessment of the causes of the severity of its stock-market crash?
Question270: Named a member of the committee to draw up a Declaration of Independence, the basic draft was completed by Thomas Jefferson in a week.
Question271: Shelby Industries manufactures and sells the same gauges as Jones Industries. Employee wages account for forty percent of the cost of manufacturing gauges at both Shelby Industries and Jones Industries.
Shelby Industries is seeking a competitive advantage over Jones Industries. Therefore, to promote this end, Shelby Industries should lower employee wages.
Which of the following, if true, would most weaken the argument above?
Question272: A 20 percent decline in lobster catches in Maine waters since 1980 can be justifiably blamed on legislation passed in 1972 to protect harbor seals. Maine's population of harbor seals is now double the level existing before protection was initiated, and these seals are known to eat both fish and lobsters.
Which of the following, if true, would most seriously weaken the argument above?
Question273: The highest number of structural fires in the country are in Buffalo, New York, which the cause of fourteen percent of them were deliberately set or are suspected of having been deliberately set.
Question274: Shereen cosmetics sometimes discount the price of its premium eye shadows to retailers for a promotion period when the product is advertised to consumers. Such promotions often result in a dramatic increase in amount of premium eye shadows sold by the manufacturers to retailers. Nevertheless, the manufacturers could often make more profit by not holding the promotions.
Which of the following, if true, most strongly supports the claim above about the manufacturers' profit?
Question275: In a study of the effect of color on productivity, 50 of 100 factory workers were moved from their drab workroom to a brightly colored workroom. Both these workers and the 50 who remained in the drab workroom increased their productivity, probably as a result of the interest taken by researchers in the work of both groups during the study.
Which of the following, if true, would cast most doubt upon the author's interpretation of the study results given above?
Question276: An advertisement designed to convince readers of the great durability of automobiles manufactured by the Deluxe Motor Car Company cites as evidence the fact that over half of all automobiles built by the company since 1970 are still on the road today, compared to no more than a third for any other manufacturer.
Which of the following, if true, most strongly supports the advertisement's argument?
Question277: Rural households have more purchasing power than do urban or suburban households at the same income level, since some of the income urban and suburban households use for food and shelter can be used by rural households for other needs.
Which of the following inferences is best supported by the statement made above?
Question278: In the industrialized nations, the last century has witnessed a shortening of the average workday from twelve hours or longer to less than eight hours. Mindful of this enormous increase in leisure time over the past century, many people assume that the same trend has obtained throughout history, and that, therefore, prehistoric humans must have labored incessantly for their very survival.
We cannot, of course, directly test this assumption. However, a study of primitive peoples of today suggests a different conclusion. The Mbuti of central Africa, for instance, spend only a few hours each day in hunting, gathering, and tending to other economic necessities. The rest of their time is spent as they choose. The implication is that the short workday is not peculiar to industrialized societies. Rather, both the extended workday of 1880 and the shorter workday of today are products of different stages of the continuing process of industrialization.
Which of the following, if true, would most greatly strengthen the argument made in the passage above?
Question279: Despite the approach of winter, oil prices to industrial customers are exceptionally low this year and likely to remain so. Therefore, unless the winter is especially severe, the price of natural gas to industrial customers is also likely to remain low.
Which of the following, if true, provides the most support for the conclusion above?
Question280: Take a very commonplace, often discussed and critical topic: Are we detecting a greenhouse effect, and related to this, is it exacerbated by "homogenic factors," i.e., human actions? Most would be inclined to give a positive answer to both of these questions. But, if pushed, what would be the evidence, and how well grounded would it be for such affirmations?
Within scientific communities and associated scientifically informed circles, the answers have to be somewhat more ambiguous, particularly when rigorous questions concerning evidence are raised. Were scientific truth to be a matter of consensus, and some argue that scientific truth often turns out to be just that, then it is clear that there is beginning to be a kind of majority consensus among many earth science practitioners that the temperature of the Earth, particularly of the oceans, is indeed rising and that this is a crucial indicator for a possible greenhouse effect.
Most of these scientists admit that the mean oceanic temperature has risen globally in the last several decades. But this generalization depends upon how accurate measurements may be, not just for samples, but also for the whole Earth. Hot spots, for example the now four year old hot spot near New Guinea which is part of the El Niño cycle, does not count by itself because it might be balanced by cold spots elsewhere.
And the fact of the matter is that "whole earth measurements" are still rare and primitive in the simple sense that we simply do not have enough thermometers out. Secondly, even if we had enough thermometers, a simply synchronic whole earth measurement over three decades is but a blip in the diachronic history of ice age cycles over the last tens of thousands of years. Thirdly, even if we know that the earth is now heating up, has an ever increasing ozone hole, and from this strange weather effects can be predicted, how much of this is due to homogenic factors, such as CFCs, CO2 increases, hydrocarbon burning, and the like? Is it really the case, as Science magazine claimed in l990, "24% of greenhouse encouraging gases are of homogenic origin"?
The author's claim that, a simply synchronic whole earth measurement over three decades is but a blip in the diachronic history of ice age cycles over the last tens of thousands of years would be strengthened if the author
Question281: With Proposition 13, if you bought your house 11 years ago for $75,000, your property tax would be approximately $914 a year (1 percent of $75,000 increased by 2 percent each year for 11 years); and if your neighbor bought an identical house next door to you for $200,000 this year, his tax would be $2,000 (1 percent of $200,000). Without Proposition 13, both you and your neighbor would pay $6,000 a year in property taxes (3 percent of $200,000).
Which of the following is the conclusion for which the author most likely is arguing in the passage above?
Question282: Toby has breakfast at Good Eats Diner every morning before work. He always orders the same thing: two eggs over easy with three strips of extra crispy bacon, unbuttered wheat toast, and a large coffee. Today, he ordered a bagel with light cream cheese and a large orange juice. Something must be wrong with Toby.
All of the following, if true, are also plausible explanations for Toby's behavior EXCEPT
Question283: The upcoming presidential election in the West African republic of Ganelon is of grave concern to the U.S.
State Department. Ganelon presently has strong political and military ties to the United States. However, the Socialist party is widely expected to win the election, leading to fears that Ganelon will soon break away from the pro-American bloc and adopt a nonaligned or openly anti-American stance.
Which of the following is an assumption made in the passage above?
Question284: Although they are not considered the most highest evolved of the cephalopods, cuttlefish are extremely intelligent.
Question285: Since Lotta came out of her shell, she has made a lot of new friends.
Which of the following is the best criticism of this statement?
Question286: The recent decline in land prices has hurt many institutions that had invested heavily in real estate. Last year, before the decline began, a local college added 2,000 acres to its holdings. The college, however, did not purchase the land but received it as a gift. Therefore, the price decline will probably not affect the college.
Which of the following, if true, casts most doubt on the conclusion above?
Question287: Wheat has more nutritional value than rye. But since oats have more nutritional value than rice, it follows that wheat has more nutritional value than rice.
Any of the following, if introduced into the argument as an additional premise, makes the argument above logically correct EXCEPT:
Question288: Mainline Airways was bought by its employees six years ago. Three years ago, Mainline hired QualiCo Advertising Agency to handle its promotions and advertising division. Today Mainline's profits are over 20 percent higher than they were five years ago and 10 percent higher than they were three years ago.
Employee ownership and a good advertising agency have combined to make Mainline more profitable.
Which of the following best describes the weak point in the argument above?
Question289: In malaria-infested areas, many children tend to suffer several bouts of malaria before becoming immune to the disease. Clearly, what must be happening is that those children's immune systems are only weakly stimulated by any single exposure to the malaria parasite and need to be challenged several times to produce an effective immune response.
Which of the following, if true, most seriously undermines the explanatory hypothesis?
Question290: Blood banks will shortly start to screen all donors for NANB hepatitis. Although the new screening tests are estimated to disqualify up to 5 percent of all prospective blood donors, they will still miss two-thirds of donors carrying NANB hepatitis. Therefore, about 10 percent of actual donors will still supply NANB- contaminated blood.
Which of the following inferences about the consequences of instituting the new tests is best supported by the passage above?
Question291: In some cities, many potters have been winning acclaim as artists. But since pottery must be useful, potters must exercise their craft with an eye to the practical utility of their product. For this reason, pottery is not an art.
Which of the following, is an assumption that supports drawing the conclusion above from the reason given for that conclusion?
Question292: Gene therapy offers a new treatment paradigm for curing human disease. Rather than altering the disease phenotype by using agents that interact with gene products, or are themselves gene products, gene therapy can theoretically modify specific genes resulting in disease cure following a single administration.
Initially gene therapy was envisioned for the treatment of genetic disorders, but is currently being studied for use with a wide range of diseases, including cancer, peripheral vascular disease, arthritis, Neurodegenerative disorders and other acquired diseases.
Certain key elements are required for a successful gene therapy strategy. The most elementary of these is that the relevant gene be identified and cloned. Upon completion of the Human Genome Project, gene availability will be unlimited. Once identified and cloned, the next consideration must be expression of the gene. Questions pertaining to the efficiency of gene transfer and gene expression remain at the forefront of gene therapy research, with current debates revolving around the transfer of desired genes to appropriate cells, and then to obtaining sufficient levels of expression for disease treatment. With luck, future research on gene transfer and tissue-specific gene expression will resolve these issues for the majority of gene therapy protocols.
Other important considerations for a gene therapy strategy include a sufficient understanding of the pathogenesis of the targeted disorder, potential side effects of the gene therapy treatment, and a more in depth understanding of the target cells which are to receive gene therapy.
Gene transfer vector is the mechanism by which the gene is transferred into a cell. Currently there are at least 150 clinical gene therapy protocols worldwide. Since the approval process for these protocols is not as public outside the U.S., it is difficult to ascertain the exact number of worldwide protocols. As of December 1995, 1024 patients had been treated with either a gene transfer or gene therapy protocol.
Much controversy exists regarding how many of these patients have benefited from their gene therapy, and no one has yet been cured.
Public controversy in the field of human gene therapy is driven by several factors. Ordinary citizens as well as scientists easily understand the enormous potential of gene therapy, but the former may not appreciate all the pitfalls and uncertainly that lie in the immediate future. The financial interests of biotechnology firms and, some have asserted the career interests of some gene therapists have encouraged extravagant, or at least verily optimistic public statements about contemporary gene therapy. In spite of the proliferation of protocols, the actual number of patients treated remains small, and only one genuinely controlled study of human gene therapy has been published as of this date All of the following are mentioned in the passage as elements that are required for a successful gene therapy strategy EXCEPT:
Question293: Normally, increases in the price of a product decrease its sales except when the price increase accompanies an improvement in the product. Wine is unusual, however. Often increases in the price of a particular producer's wine will result in increased sales, even when the wine itself is unchanged.
Which of the following, if true, does most to explain the anomaly described above?
Question294: Athletes who suffer from asthma need to work in the conjunction of a doctor who understands the disease and can design a proper training regimen.
Question295: Since the mayor's publicity campaign for Greenville's bus service began six months ago, morning automobile traffic into the midtown area of the city has decreased seven percent. During the same period, there has been an equivalent rise in the number of persons riding buses into the midtown area. Obviously, the mayor's publicity campaign has convinced many people to leave their cars at home and ride the bus to work.
Which of the following, if true, casts the most serious doubt on the conclusion drawn above?
Question296: Meteorologists say that if only they could design an accurate mathematical model of the atmosphere with all its complexities, they could forecast the weather with real precision. But this is an idle boast, immune to any evaluation, for any inadequate weather forecast would obviously be blamed on imperfections in the model.
Which of the following, if true, could best be used as a basis for arguing against the author's position that the meteorologists' claim cannot be evaluated?
Question297: Unlike musical talent or other creative skills, there is a disinclination on the part of many participants in the program to acknowledge the degree to which their writing talents are weak.
Question298: From time to time, the press indulges in outbursts of indignation over the use of false or misleading information by the U.S. government in support of its policies and programs. No one endorses needless deception. But consider this historical analogy. It is known that Christopher Columbus, on his first voyage to the New World, deliberately falsified the log to show a shorter sailing distance for each day out than the ships had actually traveled. In this way, Columbus was able to convince his skeptical sailors that they had not sailed past the point at which they expected to find the shores of India. Without this deception, Columbus's sailors might well have mutinied, and the New World might never have been discovered.
Which of the following is the main weakness of the historical analogy drawn in the passage above?
Question299: The level of lead contamination in United States rivers declined between 1975 and 1985. Federal regulations requiring a drop in industrial discharges of lead went into effect in 1975, but the major cause of the decline was a 75 percent drop in the use of leaded gasoline between 1975 and 1985.
Which of the following, if true, best supports the claim that the major cause of the decline in the level of lead contamination in United States rives was the decline in the use of leaded gasoline?
Question300: One variety of partially biodegradable plastic beverage container is manufactured from small bits of plastic bound together by a degradable bonding agent such as cornstarch. Since only the bonding agent degrades, leaving the small bits of plastic, no less plastic refuse per container is produced when such containers are discarded than when comparable non-biodegradable containers are discarded.
Which of the following, if true, most strengthens the argument above?
Question301: Left-handed persons suffer more frequently than do right-handed persons from certain immune disorders, such as allergies. Left-handers tend to have an advantage over the right-handed majority, however, on tasks controlled by the right hemisphere of the brain, and mathematical reasoning is strongly under the influence of the right hemisphere in most people.
If the information above is true, it best supports which of the following hypotheses?
Question302: For a generation of suppressed, restless, working-class youths living in 1960 Jamaica, ska was a medium through which they could find expression. Since its original appearance, ska has resurfaced twice, each time presenting itself in a different guise to a new generation of music aficionados. Overcoming its humble beginnings, it has become one of the twentieth century's most enduring and influential styles of music.
Since the early 1940's, Jamaica had adopted and adapted many forms of American musical styles. The predominantly black inhabitants of Jamaica took a liking to rhythm and blues music, importing a considerable number of American records that were showcased at dance halls in the early 1960s.
Jamaican musicians took up the elements of rhythm and blues and combined it with traditional Jamaican mento music. The result was the first wave of ska. Musically, ska is a shuffle rhythm similar to mento but with even closer ties to rhythm and blues, placing the accent on the second and fourth beats, often moving in a 12-bar blues frame. The after beat, played on the piano or strummed by a rhythm guitar, came to be characteristic of the form. A horn section, usually consisting of trumpets, trombones, and saxophones, was a vital element. Classic bands, such as the Wailers wrote songs written about Trench Town (a ghetto), rude boys (street thugs), romance, and even religious themes. In 1965, ska began to take a backseat to a newly evolved type of music, called rock steady, which was more dependent than ska had been on rhythm provided by the bass guitar and drums.
Ska was later exported by traveling Jamaican artists to Great Britain, where it became known as "blue beat." By the mid 1970's, early British punk bands were infusing reggae, a style of music that came from rock steady, into their music. Near the end of the decade, however, there was a resurgence of the influence of ska because of its upbeat, danceable rhythm. This faster paced ska came to be known as two tone. One of the essential messages of two-tone ska was the promotion of racial harmony and of having fun in the face of subjugation.
The third wave of ska began in America around 1990. Bands influenced by the two-tone ska scene began to use punk and metal music to a greater extent. The combination, which is much faster than two tone, sounds very different from the original Jamaican brand of ska.
In its three different waves, ska has given voice to seemingly voiceless, downtrodden generations. Each time it resurfaces, a new message is taken up; however, the old messages are never forgotten Which of the following statements about ska music is supported by information in the passage?
Question303: Drinking milk enriched with vitamin D may significantly reduce the risk of rickets and also aid for sufferers of heart disease, according to studies recently completed at the University of California in San Francisco.
Question304: Most archaeologists have held that people first reached the Americas less than 20,000 years ago by crossing a land bridge into North America. But recent discoveries of human shelters in South America dating from 32,000 years ago have led researchers to speculate that people arrived in South America first, after voyaging across the Pacific, and then spread northward.
Which of the following, if it were discovered, would be pertinent evidence against the speculation above?
Question305: Bank depositors in the United States are all financially protected against bank failure because the government insures all individuals' bank deposits. An economist argues that this insurance is partly responsible for the high rate of bank failures, since it removes from depositors any financial incentive to find out whether the bank that holds their money is secure against failure. If depositors were more selective, then banks would need to be secure in order to compete for depositors' money.
Which of the following, if true, most seriously weakens the economist's argument?
Question306: One out of four heart surgery patients at St.Vincent's dies from complications during surgery. Only one out of six heart surgery patients at St.Mary's dies from complications during surgery. If you need heart surgery, make sure you go to St.Mary's, not St.Vincent's.
Which of the following, if true, is the best reason to reject this argument?
Question307: Adult female rats who have never before encountered rat pups will start to show maternal behaviors after being confined with a pup for about seven days. This period can be considerably shortened by disabling the female's sense of smell or by removing the scent-producing glands of the pup.
Which of the following hypotheses best explains the contrast described above?
Question308: Country Y uses its scarce foreign-exchange reserves to buy scrap iron for recycling into steel. Although the steel thus produced earns more foreign exchange than it costs, that policy is foolish. Country Y's own territory has vast deposits of iron ore, which can be mined with minimal expenditure of foreign exchange.
Which of the following, if true, provides the strongest support for Country Y's policy of buying scrap iron abroad?
Question309: Kale has more nutritional value than spinach. But since collard greens have more nutritional value than lettuce, it follows that kale has more nutritional value than lettuce.
Any of the following, if introduced into the argument as an additional premise, makes the argument above logically correct EXCEPT:
Question310: The program to control the entry of illegal drugs into the country was a failure in 1987. If the program had been successful, the wholesale price of most illegal drugs would not have dropped substantially in 1987.
The argument in the passage depends on which of the following assumptions?
Question311: Robinson is a botanist whose dream is to reestablish an authentic pre-human piece of Hawaii, a place now awash with introduced species of plants and animals.
Question312: Men are primarily and secondarily socialized into believing certain characteristics are definitive in determining their masculinity. These characteristics range from playing violently to not crying when they are injured. The socialization of masculinity in our society begins as early as the first stages of infancy, with awareness of adult gender role differences being internalized by children as young as two years old.
Studies show that advertising imagery equates masculinity with violence by portraying the trait of aggression as instrumental to establishing their masculinity. Lee Bowker, who researched the influence of advertisements on youth, asserts that toy advertisements featuring only boys depict aggressive behavior and that the aggressive behavior produces positive consequences more often than negative.
Bowker also looked at commercials with boys that contain references to domination. His results indicated that 68.6% of the commercials positioned toward boys contain incidents of verbal and physical aggression.
However, there were no cross gender displays of aggressive behavior. Interestingly, not one single-sex commercial featuring girls showed any act of aggression. Bowker's research helps explain that it is not just the reinforcement of a child's close caretakers that lends legitimacy to aggressive masculine tendencies but society as a whole, using the medium of television.
William Pollack, a Harvard clinical psychologist, talks about how males have been put in a "gender straightjacket" that leads to anger, despair and often violence. Pollack states that society asks men to put a whole range of feelings and emotions behind a mask and shames them if they display any emotion.
Pollack contends that boys are 'shame phobic', even killing, in extreme cases, to avoid dishonor. It appears that the standard defined by society allows men to express their emotion only through anger.
Ironically, though these rigid stereotypes of what it means to be a man have been inculcated from an early age, men are often criticized for being one-dimensional in their behavior and emotions.
Women often verbalize a desire for males to be sensitive and express their emotions. But male insensitivity is the culmination of a societal indoctrination begun at birth. Realistically, men are in a damned if they do, damned if they don't situation. If they fail to show their emotions, they are berated for being detached from the essence of what constitutes a human being. On the other hand, if a male decides to expose his emotions, he is often branded effeminate and regarded as inferior to other males who stick closer to their gender's traditional doctrine.
According to the passage, the television commercials examined by Bowker
Question313: All across Europe, midwives are the most common choice for prenatal care and delivery. In America, however, midwives are the minority, with most women choosing obstetricians to help them deliver their babies. But using midwives could save millions of dollars a year in healthcare costs. All of the following information would be helpful in evaluating this argument EXCEPT
Question314: Organic farmers are looking for non-chemical methods to rid their crops of pests.
Giving crops a slight electric shock has no ill effect on crops but rids them of caterpillars. This method should be employed by organic farmers all over the country.
Which of the following, if true, most strongly supports the view that it would not be advisable to try to eradicate agricultural pests with the method mentioned above?
Question315: Last year the rate of inflation was 1.2 percent, but for the current year it has been 4 percent. We can conclude that inflation is on an upward trend and the rate will be still higher next year.
Which of the following, if true, most seriously weakens the conclusion above?
Question316: People who own dangerous pets such as poisonous snakes or ferocious dogs are morally and legally responsible for their pet's actions. If someone is hurt by such a pet, the owner should be held 100% accountable.
All of the following statements, if true, would strengthen this argument EXCEPT
Question317: Dr. A: The new influenza vaccine is useless at best and possibly dangerous. I would never use it on a patient.
Dr. B: But three studies published in the Journal of Medical Associates have rated that vaccine as unusually effective.
Dr. A: The studies must have been faulty because the vaccine is worthless.
In which of the following is the reasoning most similar to that of Dr. A?
Question318: More sports journals are sold in Hornby than in Milston. Therefore, the residents of Hornby are better informed about major sporting events than are the residents of Milston.
Each of the following, if true, weakens the conclusion above EXCEPT:
Question319: The value of a product is determined by the ratio of its quality to its price. The higher the value of a product, the better will be its competitive position. Therefore, either increasing the quality or lowering the price of a given product will increase the likelihood that consumer will select that product rather than a competing one.
Which of the following, if true, would most strengthen the conclusion drawn above?
Question320: The earth's resources are being depleted much too fast. To correct this, the United States must keep its resource consumption at present levels for many years to come.
The argument above depends on which of the following assumptions?
Question321: Holiday receipts - the total sales recorded in the fourth quarter of the year - determine the economic success or failure of many retail businesses. Camco, a retailer selling just one camera model, is an excellent example. Camco's holiday receipts, on average, account for a third of its yearly total receipts and about half of its yearly profits.
If the statements above are true, which of the following must also be true about Camco on the basis of them?
Question322: Which of the following best completes the passage below?
Established companies concentrate on defending what they already have. Consequently, they tend not to be innovative themselves and tend to underestimate the effects of the innovations of others. The clearest example of this defensive strategy is the fact that______
Question323: At many colleges today, regulations have been imposed that forbid the use in speech or print of language that "offends" or "insults" the members of any group, especially women and racial, ethnic, and religious minorities. Although these regulations are defended in the name of "democracy," they restrict freedom of speech and the press in a way that opposes the true spirit of democracy.
The argument above attempts to prove its case primarily by
Question324: Consumer income reports produced by the government distinguish between households and families by means of the following definition: "A family is a household containing a householder and at least one person related to the householder." Except for the homeless and people in group living quarters, most people live in households.
According to the definition above, which of the following must be true?
Question325: A recent spate of launching and operating mishaps with television satellites led to a corresponding surge in claims against companies underwriting satellite insurance. As a result, insurance premiums shot up, making satellites more expensive to launch and operate. This, in turn, has added to the pressure to squeeze more performance out of currently operating satellites.
Which of the following, if true, taken together with the information above, best supports the conclusion that the cost of television satellites will continue to increase?
Question326: Installing scrubbers in smokestacks and switching to cleaner-burning fuel are the two methods available to Northern Power for reducing harmful emissions from its plants. Scrubbers will reduce harmful emissions more than cleaner-burning fuels will. Therefore, by installing scrubbers, Northern Power will be doing the most that can be done to reduce harmful emissions from its plants.
Which of the following is an assumption on which the argument depends?
Question327: The Florida panther, known for its distinctive characteristics, including a kinked tail and cowlicks, is nearing extinction with the help of scientists and government officials. Though once abundant in Florida, by the end of the twentieth century, only approximately 30 Florida panthers remained. Efforts to preserve the panthers had focused on shielding them from human encroachment with the hope that they could develop sustainable numbers to survive as a species. However, pressure from development caused officials to grow impatient and shift their strategy and goals.
In 1995, new breeds of female panthers were brought to Florida from Texas to bolster the population. The change has been dramatic. In 1990, 88% of the panthers in Florida had the distinct kinked tail. By 2000, five years after the introduction of the Texas panthers, not a single kitten born to the Texas females had a kinked tail. The breed known as the Florida panther is now on an expedited, ineluctable road to extinction
- with the assistance of wildlife protection agencies.
If the goal was to have any kind of panther in Florida, it has been realized. Since the introduction of the Texas panthers, the panther population in Florida has risen to approximately 80 mixed-breed panthers.
However, this "success" could portend a tragic trend in wildlife management in the United States. We cannot and should not create genetically mixed species as a means of achieving a compromise between the needs of development and a species' survival. This type of species tampering is a perversion of the ideal of wildlife management and will irrevocably transform our national landscape.
The primary goal of this passage is to
Question328: The acrimony in Washington, communicated to the general public to a large degree in sound-bite epithets from the principals on evening television newscasts, contributed to a sour mood between the electorate.
Question329: Television programming experts maintain that with each 1% increase in the prime-time ratings of a television station there is a 3.5% increase in the number of people who watch its evening news program.
However, in the last ten years at Channel NTR, there was only one year of extremely high prime-time ratings and during that year, fewer people than ever watched Channel NTR's evening news program.
Which of the following conclusions can properly be drawn from the statements above?
Question330: Investigator: XYZ Coins has misled its clients by promoting some coins as "extremely rare" when in fact those coins are relatively common and readily available.
XYZ agent: That is ridiculous. XYZ Coins is one of the largest coin dealers in the world. We authenticate the coins we sell through a nationally recognized firm and operate a licensed coin dealership.
The XYZ agent's reply is most vulnerable to the criticism that it
Question331: Polycystic ovarian syndrome, or PCOS (aka Stein-Leventhal disease), is a condition that affects between
6% and 20% of women in the United States. It is a little understood syndrome that often goes undetected and is frequently misdiagnosed. PCOS produces tiny cysts on the surface of a woman's ovaries. These cysts are undeveloped follicles (eggs) that inexplicably fail to release through the ovarian wall as part of the menstrual cycle. Some researchers believe the eggs fail to release from the ovary because of the presence of male hormones in the blood. However, new research is indicating that PCOS is related to insulin resistance. Unfortunately, the cysts themselves are only a small part of this syndrome. PCOS can present a variety of symptoms, including hair growth on the face and chest, stubborn acne, hair loss, obesity, irregular menses, infertility, and an increased risk of diabetes. Many of these symptoms impact a woman's physical appearance and her self-esteem. If left untreated, women suffering from PCOS may experience greater levels of stress and depression. A woman exhibiting any of these symptoms should contact her physician to determine if she has PCOS. Although there is no cure for PCOS, a number of different treatments can stop or reverse many of the symptoms.
The passage suggests that the most damaging aspect of misdiagnosed or untreated PCOS is often
Question332: We commonly speak of aesthetic judgments as subjective, and in the short term they are, since critics often disagree about the value of a particular contemporary work of art. But over time, the subjective element disappears. When works of art have continued to delight audiences for centuries, as have the paintings of Michelangelo, the music of Bach, and the plays of Shakespeare, we can objectively call them great.
The statements above best support which of the following conclusions?
Question333: Mouth cancer is a danger for people who rarely brush their teeth. In order to achieve early detection of mouth cancer in these individuals, a town's public health officials sent a pamphlet to all town residents, describing how to perform weekly self-examinations of the mouth for lumps.
Which of the following, if true, is the best criticism of the pamphlet as a method of achieving the public health officials' goal?
Question334: Because postage rates are rising, Home Decorator magazine plans to maximize its profits by reducing by one half the number of issues it publishes each year. The quality of articles, the number of articles published per year, and the subscription price will not change. Market research shows that neither subscribers nor advertisers will be lost if the magazine's plan is instituted.
Which of the following, if true, provides the strongest evidence that the magazine's profits are likely to decline if the plan is instituted?
Question335: In 1986, the city of Los Diablos had 20 days on which air pollution reached unhealthful amounts and a smog alert was put into effect. In early 1987, new air pollution control measures were enacted, but the city had smog alerts on 31 days that year and on 39 days the following year. In 1989, however, the number of smog alerts in Los Diablos dropped to sixteen. The main air pollutants in Los Diablos are ozone and carbon monoxide, and since 1986 the levels of both have been monitored by gas spectrography.
Which of the following statements, assuming that each is true, would be LEAST helpful in explaining the air pollution levels in Los Diablos between 1986 and 1989?
Question336: Medical waste is generally collected by gravity chutes, carts, or pneumatic tubes, each of which have their own advantages and disadvantages.
Question337: The argument above would be most significantly weakened if which of the following were true?
Question338: Since the 55-mile-per-hour speed limit was mandated on our highways, both money and human lives have been saved.
All of the following, if true, would strengthen the claim above EXCEPT:
Question339: Under current federal law, employers are allowed to offer their employees free parking spaces as a tax- free benefit, but they can offer employees only up to $180 per year as a tax-free benefit for using mass transit. The government could significantly increase mass transit rider ship by raising the limit of this benefit to meet commuters' transportation costs.
The proposal above to increase mass transit rider ship assumes that
Question340: Many institutions of higher education suffer declining enrollments during periods of economic slowdown. At two-year community colleges, however, enrollment figures boom during these periods when many people have less money and there is more competition for jobs.
Each of the following, if true, helps to explain the enrollment increases in two-year community colleges described above EXCEPT:
Question341: The fact that several of the largest senior citizens' organizations are constituted almost exclusively of middle-class elderly people has led critics to question the seriousness of those organizations' commitment to speaking out on behalf of the needs of economically disadvantaged elderly people.
Which of the following generalizations, if true, would help to substantiate the criticism implicit in the statement above?
Question342: Art is visible. However, everything one sees is filtered through certain conditions, some of them historical, and others, natural. The historical conditions include the material, which is used - oil, colors, and the canvas; second, a certain style, i.e., a system of rules by which things visible are submitted a priori. There can be a general style, for example, the style of Impressionism, or a particular style, for example, the individual ways in which two painters, both impressionists, paint. The natural conditions include certain unchanging psychological laws of sight, for instance, the effects of colors or optical illusions.
The conditions of art are nothing but a particular way of interpreting reality. To understand this, one can examine the difference between the classical Greek and the classical Egyptian styles. For the Greeks, the reality of the visible was given by the perspective and the situation in which the object appears; for that reason, they presented a person in his individual movements. For the Egyptians, however, this was only the appearance of a transitory moment, which, according to their beliefs, was not real. Therefore, the Egyptians searched for the permanent essence and the typical character in their depiction of an object. For the Egyptians, Greek art was an illusion; for the Greeks, on the other hand, Egyptian art was unrealistic constructivism.
The way in which reality appears in art must not be regarded on its own. It is affected by many other systems of recognizing reality, including the political, religious, economic, intellectual, and social - in short, all the phenomena of human life. Moreover, art is always of a certain epoch, with its particular conception of reality. Thus, when discussing, for example, the art of ancient myth, of medieval Christianity, or that of the technological age, one must be aware that myth, Christianity, or technology was the most salient feature of the epoch.
It is paradoxical to understand art as some kind of copy of the fields of experience connected with it. So, for example, it is meaningless for the work of art as such if one compares the landscape of a painting with the landscape, which served the artist as his model. Even if the artist had tried to make what he painted as similar as possible to the model he used, the landscape which he saw is only the matter from which something completely different emerges since he has submitted its view to the a priori conditions of art:
namely to the material used (colors, canvas, etc.), to his style, and even to the fact that he paints on a flat surface. Thus one must contemplate a work of art by itself. Even if it is connected to other fields of experience it nevertheless displays something unique which appears in that piece of art and there alone.
According to the passage, classical Egyptians did not present a person in his individual movements
Question343: William Hornby acquired bison herds for breeding stock hoping that this move would eventually lead to increasing in their numbers, and a fortification of their environment.
Question344: Traditionally, decision-making by managers that is reasoned step-by-step has been considered preferable to intuitive decision-making. However, a recent study found that top managers used intuition significantly more than did most middle- or lower-level managers. This confirms the alternative view that intuition is actually more effective than careful, methodical reasoning.
The conclusion above is based on which of the following assumptions?
Question345: Reviewing historical data, medical researchers in California found that counties with the largest number of television sets per capita have had the lowest incidence of a serious brain disease, mosquito-borne encephalitis. The researchers have concluded that people in these counties stay indoors more and thus avoid exposure to the disease.
The researchers' conclusion would be most strengthened if which of the following were true?
Question346: The most important issue relating to computer technology and the Internet is the right of individual privacy, this includes the privacy of our personal data and our actions in cyberspace.
Question347: Contrary to the statements of labor leaders, the central economic problem facing America today is not the distribution of wealth. It is productivity. With the productivity of U.S. industry stagnant, or even declining slightly, the economic pie is no longer growing. Labor leaders, of course, point to what they consider an unfair distribution of the slices of pie to justify their demands for further increases in wages and benefits.
And in the past, when the pie was still growing, management could afford to acquiesce. No longer. Until productivity resumes its growth, there can be no justification for further increases in the compensation of workers.
Which of the following statements by a labor leader focuses on the logical weakness in the argument above?
Question348: Meteorologists say that if only they could design an accurate mathematical model of the atmosphere with all its complexities, they could forecast the weather with real precision. But this is an idle boast, immune to any evaluation, for any inadequate weather forecast would obviously be blamed on imperfections in the model.
Which of the following, if true, would cast the most serious doubt on the meteorologists' boast, aside from the doubt expressed in the passage above?
Question349: In the past, teachers, bank tellers, and secretaries were predominantly men; these occupations slipped in pay and status when they became largely occupied by women. Therefore, if women become the majority in currently male-dominated professions like accounting, law, and medicine, the income and prestige of these professions will also drop.
Which of the following, if true, would most likely be part of the evidence used to refute the conclusion above?
Question350: An experiment was done in which human subjects recognize a pattern within a matrix of abstract designs and then select another design that completes that pattern. The results of the experiment were surprising.
The lowest expenditure of energy in neurons in the brain was found in those subjects who performed most successfully in the experiments.
Which of the following hypotheses best accounts for the findings of the experiment?
Question351: Juror anonymity was unknown to American common law and jurisprudence in the country's first two centuries. Anonymity was first employed in federal prosecutions of organized crime in New York in the
1980's. Although anonymous juries are unusual since they are typically only empanelled in organized- crime cases, its use has spread more recently to widely publicized cases, such as the federal prosecution of police officers accused of beating Rodney King and the trial of those accused of the 1993 World Trade Center bombing.
In these cases, attorneys selected a jury from a panel of prospective jurors whose names, addresses, ethnic backgrounds and religious affiliations remained unknown to either side. This unorthodox procedure, designed to protect jurors from outside influence and the fear of retaliation, has occasionally been employed in New York federal courts since the trial of drug kingpin Leroy "Nicky" Barnes. Despite apparent benefits, critics assail anonymous juries on the grounds that they are an infringement of the sixth amendment guarantee of an impartial jury and because they present a serious and unnecessary erosion of the presumption of innocence.
Since many attorneys believe trials are frequently won or lost during jury selection, any procedure diminishing the role of counsel in the procedure necessitates close scrutiny and criticism. Opponents of anonymous juries argue that the procedure restricts meaningful voir dire, (questioning of the jury panel), and thereby undermines the defendant's sixth amendment right to an impartial jury. Critics also claim that jurors interpret their anonymity as proof of the defendant's criminal proclivity, thereby subverting the presumption of innocence.
However, consistent with due process and the sixth amendment, the trial judge may refuse to ask prospective jurors any questions not reasonably calculated to expose biases or prejudices relevant to the case. Although addresses and group affiliations may indicate significant potential for bias, attorneys do not have an unfettered right to this information in every circumstance. Denying access to these facts may indeed constrain an attorney's ability to assemble an ideal jury, but it violates no constitutional right One function of the fourth paragraph of the passage is to
Question352: Gene therapy offers a new treatment paradigm for curing human disease. Rather than altering the disease phenotype by using agents that interact with gene products, or are themselves gene products, gene therapy can theoretically modify specific genes resulting in disease cure following a single administration.
Initially gene therapy was envisioned for the treatment of genetic disorders, but is currently being studied for use with a wide range of diseases, including cancer, peripheral vascular disease, arthritis, Neurodegenerative disorders and other acquired diseases.
Certain key elements are required for a successful gene therapy strategy. The most elementary of these is that the relevant gene be identified and cloned. Upon completion of the Human Genome Project, gene availability will be unlimited. Once identified and cloned, the next consideration must be expression of the gene. Questions pertaining to the efficiency of gene transfer and gene expression remain at the forefront of gene therapy research, with current debates revolving around the transfer of desired genes to appropriate cells, and then to obtaining sufficient levels of expression for disease treatment. With luck, future research on gene transfer and tissue-specific gene expression will resolve these issues for the majority of gene therapy protocols.
Other important considerations for a gene therapy strategy include a sufficient understanding of the pathogenesis of the targeted disorder, potential side effects of the gene therapy treatment, and a more in depth understanding of the target cells which are to receive gene therapy.
Gene transfer vector is the mechanism by which the gene is transferred into a cell. Currently there are at least 150 clinical gene therapy protocols worldwide. Since the approval process for these protocols is not as public outside the U.S., it is difficult to ascertain the exact number of worldwide protocols. As of December 1995, 1024 patients had been treated with either a gene transfer or gene therapy protocol.
Much controversy exists regarding how many of these patients have benefited from their gene therapy, and no one has yet been cured.
Public controversy in the field of human gene therapy is driven by several factors. Ordinary citizens as well as scientists easily understand the enormous potential of gene therapy, but the former may not appreciate all the pitfalls and uncertainly that lie in the immediate future. The financial interests of biotechnology firms and, some have asserted the career interests of some gene therapists have encouraged extravagant, or at least verily optimistic public statements about contemporary gene therapy. In spite of the proliferation of protocols, the actual number of patients treated remains small, and only one genuinely controlled study of human gene therapy has been published as of this date The primary function of the fifth paragraph is to
Question353: In 1960, 10 percent of every dollar paid in automobile insurance premiums went to pay costs arising from injuries incurred in car accidents. In 1990, 50 percent of every dollar paid in automobile insurance premiums went toward such costs, despite the fact that cars were much safer in 1990 than in 1960.
Which of the following, if true, best explains the discrepancy outlined above?
Question354: It would cost Rose town one million dollars to repair all of its roads. In the year after completion of those repairs, however, Rose town would thereby avoid incurring three million dollars worth of damages, since currently Rose town pays that amount annually in compensation for damage done to cars each year by its unrepaired roads.
Which of the following, if true, gives the strongest support to the argument above?
Question355: With more and more classes being offered online, more and more students will earn their degrees in virtual universities. Students in California will graduate from schools in New York without ever leaving their state.
Because online courses offer flexibility without geographic boundaries, virtual degrees will be in greater demand, and colleges and universities should invest the bulk of their resources in developing online degree programs.
All of the following, if true, are valid objections to this argument EXCEPT
Question356: This year the New Hampshire Division of Company X set a new record for annual sales by that division.
This record is especially surprising since the New Hampshire Division has the smallest potential market and the lowest sales of any of Company X's divisions.
Which of the following identifies a flaw in the logical coherence of the statement above?
Question357: Radio interferometry is a technique for studying details of celestial objects that combines signals intercepted by widely spaced radio telescopes. This technique requires ultraprecise timing, exact knowledge of the locations of the telescopes, and sophisticated computer programs. The successful interferometric linking of an Earth-based radio telescope with a radio telescope on an orbiting satellite was therefore a significant technological accomplishment.
Which of the following can be correctly inferred from the statements above?
Question358: Read each passage carefully and then choose the best answer to each question. Answer the questions based upon what is stated or implied in the reading passage.
For many years, there has been much hand-wringing over the fate of Social Security once the baby boomers reach retirement age. Baby boomers, people born between 1946 and 1964, represent the largest single sustained growth of population in the history of the United States. It is the sheer enormity of this generation that has had economists worried as retirement beckons. According to the U.S. Census Bureau, by 2020, an estimated 80,000,000 Americans will have reached or surpassed the conventional age of retirement. With so many boomers retiring and drawing benefits but no longer paying into Social Security, many fear that the Social Security fund itself could go bankrupt.
However, a study released by the American Association for Retired Persons (AARP) that examined baby boomers' plans for retirement found that for the most part, this generation is not expected to adhere to the conventional retirement scheme, a fact that may please the worriers in Washington, DC.
In its survey, the AARP broke baby boomers into different categories based on their financial standing, degree of preparedness for retirement, and optimism toward the future. The AARP found that of all groups surveyed, only 13% planned to stop working altogether once they reached retirement age; the remaining
87% planned to continue working for pay. The reasons to continue working varied among the different groups. For some, the plan to continue working is a financial decision. Between 25% and 44% of respondents reported they are not financially prepared to retire and will therefore continue working past retirement age. For the remainder of those planning to work past their mid to late 60s, the decision is based on long-held goals to start a business and/or the desire to stay active in their industry or community.
Eventually, most baby boomers will need to stop working as they progress into their 70s, 80s, and beyond.
But with such large numbers planning to continue working, thereby continuing to pay into the Social Security fund, perhaps Social Security will be able to withstand the end of the baby boom and continue to be a safety net for future generations.
It can be inferred from the AARP survey results that
Question359: Considerable debate exists in the self-perception literature over the impact of positively biased self- perceptions on social and psychological functioning. Positively based self-perceptions are those in which an individual has a more positive opinion of himself than objective indicators warrant. One view suggests that positive perceptual biases are characteristic of normal human thought across a variety of domains and correlate positively with good mental and psychological health. Certain researchers and clinicians have even proposed that by boosting self-concepts, symptoms of depression and levels of aggression may be reduced.
Investigators on the other side of the debate maintain that when most positive self-perceptions are compared to an objective criterion, they appear neither positively biased nor adaptive. In fact, Baumeister, Smart, and Boden suggest that positively biased self-concepts may have a 'dark side'. They proposed that it is persons with very positive self-views who are prone to be aggressive. As a result, building up individuals' self-perceptions may serve only to increase levels of aggression rather than curb them.
According to Baumeister et al., not all individuals with positive self-perceptions are going to be interpersonally aggressive. Rather, individuals who are extremely positive in their perceptions of themselves and their functioning are proposed to be the most likely to become angry and potentially violent. The mechanism that triggers aggressive behavior by these individuals has been suggested to be negative social feedback that challenges their positive self-views. Such threats to positive self-esteem give rise to anger and hostility.
If negative social information is encountered that challenges established positive self-perceptions, Baumeister et al. propose that individuals must choose to either accept the feedback and lower their self- perceptions or reject the feedback to maintain their positive self-views. The chosen reaction then influences their subsequent affective states and behavioral expressions. By accepting the external appraisals and adjusting self-perceptions downward, dysphonic feelings and social withdrawal may result.
Conversely, the rejection of the validity of the unfavorable feedback results in feelings of anger and resentment toward the source of the threat. Dodge and colleagues demonstrated that children who interpret social cues as threatening direct their anger and aggression at the peers who gave the negative evaluations. Anger stemming from the receipt of social criticism is a way to deny the legitimacy of the negative information. By directing hostile reactions toward the source of the negative feedback, the influx of disconfirming information may end. Unless individuals react against the self-esteem threat, they may be compelled to revise their self-concepts negatively, in line with the information provided. By discounting the negative social feedback, individuals can protect themselves from dysphoric feelings and maintain their positively biased self-perceptions, but they may be setting themselves up to become interpersonally aggressive.
Although positively biased self-perceptions may place individuals at risk for negative social feedback and subsequent increases in aggressive behavior, not all positive self-concepts are suggested to be harmful.
The relationship between positive self-perceptions and aggression may depend on the degree of perceptual distortion (i.e., moderate vs. extreme distortion). Baumeister (1989) and Baumeister et al.
(1996) proposed that an optimal range of moderate bias might exist within which mental health is encouraged. Maladjustment in psychological and social functioning is suggested to occur when the degree of bias of self-perceptions shifts from moderate to extreme levels. Extremely negative and positive perceptual bias would be related to different but equally harmful difficulties.
The primary purpose of this passage is to
Question360: The lobbyists argued that because there is no statistical evidence that breathing other people's tobacco smoke increases the incidence of heart disease or lung cancer in healthy nonsmokers, legislation banning smoking in workplaces cannot be justified on health grounds.
The argument reported above would be most seriously weakened if it were true that
Question361: Archaeologists seeking the location of a legendary siege and destruction of a city are excavating in several possible places, including a middle and a lower layer of a large mound. The bottom of the middle layer contains some pieces of pottery of type 3, known to be from a later period than the time of the destruction of the city, but the lower layer does not.
The force of the evidence cited above is most seriously weakened if which of the following is true?
Question362: There are far fewer children available for adoption than there are people who want to adopt. Two million couples are currently waiting to adopt, but in 1982, the last year for which figures exist, there were only some 50,000 adoptions.
Which of the following statements, if true, most strengthens the author's claim that there are far fewer children available for adoption than there are people who want to adopt?
Question363: It seemed that hardly any vote was cast on the Senate or House floor without some calculation as to how it might affect the midterm election.
Question364: To deal with this explosion of data, one can use the computer and communications technology to help us sort, store, transport, and most important, understand the information.
Question365: Canadian wheat farmers produced so much wheat over the last season that wheat prices plummeted. The government tried to boost wheat prices by offering farmers who agreed not to harvest 20 percent of their wheat field compensation up to a specified maximum per farm.
The Canadian government's program, if successful, will not be a net burden on the budget. Which of the following, if true, is the best basis for an explanation of how this could be so?
Question366: The only purpose for which a particular type of tape is needed is to hold certain surgical wounds closed for ten days - the maximum time such wounds need tape. New tape is a new brand of this type of tape. New tape's salespeople claim that New tape will improve healing because New tape adheres twice as long as the currently used tape does.
Which of the following statements, if true, would most seriously call into question the claim made by New tape's salespeople?
Question367: Companies O and P each have the same number of employees who work the same number of hours per week. According to records maintained by each company, the employees of Company O had fewer job- related accidents last year than did the employees of Company P.
Therefore, employees of Company O are less likely to have job-related accidents than are employees of Company P.
Which of the following, if true, would most weaken the conclusion above?
Question368: Unlike the United States with its generalissimo politicians - Washington, Jackson, Grant, and Eisenhower- the 'martial arts' have been conspicuously absent from Canadian politics. The exception to the rule is former Prime Minister Pierre Elliot Trudeau, who became the first Canadian leader to bring a gunslinger ethos to Canadian politics. Trudeau introduced Canada to the refined art of single combat; it was the politics of "doing it my way". Single-combat confrontation implied much more than the renegade in power did, and far less than the tricks of William Lyon Mackenzie King, prime minister intermittently between 1921 and 1948.
Trudeau's unique background prepared him for the role of authoritarian leader he would assume later in life. Born on October 18, 1919, Trudeau lived in French-speaking Montreal, but heard English at home from his mother, making it easy for the young politician to appeal to all sectors of Canada, a bilingual country. As a young man, he walked and cycled through Europe, finding himself on occasion on the wrong side of the bars in foreign jails. By 1940, Trudeau entered the law faculty at the University of Montreal. As a student he enlisted in the Canadian Officers Training Corps, where he was given a commission as a lieutenant, a rank he held until his retirement in 1947. Trudeau, a renowned sportsman, held a brown belt in karate, knew how to skin dive and could descend 150 feet off a cliff with ease. He continued performing flamboyant physical feats even in later life as Canada's fifteenth prime minister, astounding Canadians with his prowess. The public's adoration made it possible for him to practice his personal brand of 'do it my way' politics, initiating profound and long-lasting changes to his country.
Other leaders would never have undertaken to deal with such taboo issues as divorce, abortion and homosexuality- matters likely to infuriate conservative Canada from coast to coast. Even the powerful Mackenzie King dared not touch any of the three, though Trudeau tackled them together in an omnibus bill as Minister of Justice under Lester B.
Pearson. His reason for loosening legislation on these issues was, as he put poetically put it, "The state has no business in the bedrooms of the nation." The myths-makers have it that this was Trudeau's first deliberate 'gun slinging' move, performed with the ultimate goal of attaining national leadership. Contrary to popular belief, Trudeau had no leadership aspirations at the time; all he had was a passion for combat that eclipsed other religious considerations. Trudeau instigated far- reaching changes in legislation governing divorce, abortion and homosexuality that have had a major impact on Canada, shaping the country into what it is today.
It can be inferred from the passage that former Prime Minister William Lyon Mackenzie King.
Question369: To entice customers away from competitors, Red Label supermarkets have begun offering discounts on home appliances to customers who spend $50 or more on any shopping trip to Red Label. Red Label executives claim that the discount program has been a huge success, since cash register receipts of $50 or more are up thirty percent since the beginning of the program.
Which of the following, if true, most seriously weakens the claim of the Red Label executives?
Question370: In many hospitals, more and more monitoring is being carried out by automated equipment instead of human employees who previous carried out the work. This is done in an attempt to save hospital expenses. However, many employees who lose their jobs to automation will need government assistance to get by, and the same corporations that are laying people off will eventually pay for that assistance through increased taxes and unemployment insurance payments.
Which of the following, if true, most strengthens the author's argument?
Question371: Coca-Cola, which sold 10 billion cases of soft drinks in 1992, now finds itself asking, where will sales of the next 10 billion cases come from? The answer lies overseas, where income levels and appetites for Western products are at an all time high.
Often, the company that gets into a foreign market earliest dominates that country's market. Coke patriarch Robert Woodruff realized this and unleashed a brilliant ploy to make Coke the early bird in many of the major foreign markets. At the height of World War II, Woodruff proclaimed, "Wherever American boys were fighting, they'd be able to get a Coke." By the time Pepsi tried to make its first international pitch in the
1950s, Coke had established its brand name along with a powerful distribution network.
During the last 40 years, many new markets have emerged. In order to tap into these opportunities, both coke and Pepsi have attempted to find ways to cut through the red tape that thwarts their efforts to conduct business in these new regions.
One key maneuver in the soda wars occurred in 1972, when Pepsi signed an agreement with the Soviet Union that made it the first Western product to be sold to consumers in Russia. This landmark agreement gave Pepsi the upper hand. At present, Pepsi has 23 plants in the former Soviet Union and is the leader in the soft-drink industry in Russia. It outsells Coca-Cola by a ratio of 6 to 1 and is seen there as a local brand, similar to Coke's homegrown reputation in Japan. However, Pepsi has also encountered some obstacles. An expected increase in brand loyalty for Pepsi subsequent to its advertising blitz in Russia has not materialized; even though Pepsi produced commercials tailored to the Russian market and sponsored televised concerts.
Some analysts believe that Pepsi's domination of the Russian market has more to do with pricing. While Pepsi sells for 250 Rubles (about 25 cents) a bottle, Coca-Cola sells for 450 Rubles. Likewise, Pepsi sells their 2 liter economy bottle for 1,300 Rubles, while Coca-Cola's 1.5 liters is marketed at 1,800 rubles. On the other hand, Coca-Cola only made its first inroads into Russia 2 years ago. What's more, although Coca-Cola's bottle and label give it a high-class image, Russians do not perceive Coca-Cola as a premium brand in the Russian market. Consequently, it has so far been unable to capture a market share.
The passage suggests which of the following about the Russian soft drink market?
Question372: According to an independent computer-industry analyst, the new Regent microcomputer is of high quality, is fast, and costs less than any currently existing competing model. It is reasonable to conclude, therefore, as the manufacturer's prospectus does, that the Regent will quickly establish itself as a fast-selling, low- priced alternative to currently available microcomputers.
Which of the following, if true, would LEAST weaken the argument above?
Question373: By analyzing the garbage of a large number of average-sized households, a group of modern urban anthropologists has found that a household discards less food the more standardized-made up of canned and prepackaged foods - its diet is. The more standardized a household's diet is, however, the greater the quantities of fresh produce the household throws away.
Which of the following can be properly inferred from the passage?
Question374: If there is an oil-supply disruption resulting in higher international oil prices, domestic oil prices in open- market countries such as the United States will rise as well, whether such countries import all or none of their oil.
Which of the following conclusions is best supported by the statement above?
Question375: Local phone companies have monopolies on phone service within their areas. Cable television can be transmitted via the wires that are already in place and owned by the phone companies. Cable television companies argue that if the telephone companies were to offer cable service, these telephone companies would have an unfair advantage, because their cable transmissions could be subsidized by the profits of their monopolies on phone service.
Which of the following, if true, would ease the cable companies' fear of unfair competition?
Question376: Since the passage of the state's Clean Air Act ten years ago, the level of industrial pollutants in the air has fallen by an average of 18 percent. This suggests that the restrictions on industry embodied in the act have worked effectively. However, during the same period the state has also suffered through a period of economic decline. The number of businesses in the state has fallen by 10 percent, and the number of workers employed has fallen by 12 percent. It is probable that the business decline, rather than the regulations in the act, is responsible for at least half of the decline in the pollution.
Which of following is an assumption made in the passage above?
Question377: Often attractive and charming, and always inordinately self-confident, people which suffer from antisocial personality disorder demonstrate a disturbing emotional shallowness.
Question378: To prevent some conflicts of interest, Congress could prohibit high-level government officials from accepting positions as lobbyists for three years after such officials leave government service. One such official concluded, however, that such a prohibition would be unfortunate because it would prevent high- level government officials from earning a livelihood for three years.
The official's conclusion logically depends on which of the following assumptions?
Question379: An experimental microwave clothes dryer heats neither air nor cloth. Rather, it heats water on clothes, thereby saving electricity and protecting delicate fibers by operating at a lower temperature. Microwaves are waves that usually heat metal objects, but developers of a microwave dryer are perfecting a process that will prevent thin metal objects such as hairpins from heating up and burning clothes.
Which of the following, if true, most strongly indicates that the process, when perfected, will be insufficient to make the dryer readily marketable?
Question380: On May 5th, 1997, the European edition of Business Tech Magazine led with Hoffman's cover story
"Internet Communities: How they're Shaping Electronic Commerce". This cover story highlights the extent to which the term virtual community has become almost synonymous with various forms of group-CMCs (computer mediated communication), including email-list forums, chat-systems such as IRC, web-based discussion areas and UseNet news-groups. There was no debate in the Business Tech Magazine article as to whether the group-CMC discussions are really 'communities', rather how community as opposed to content can be used to encourage people to return to a particular part of cyberspace for commercial gain.
In a similar vein, Simpson and Armstrong in "Internet Gain" argue that ignoring virtual communities would be a great loss of a marketing tool for businesses. They define virtual communities as computer mediated space where there is an integration of content and communication with an emphasis on member- generated content.
Not all virtual community commentators agree with the Spartan position taken by Hoffman. Rheingold, one of the prime popularizes of the term virtual community, provides us with a more emotive definition in his book The Virtual Community: Homesteading on the Electronic Frontier. According to Rheingold, "virtual communities are social aggregations that emerge from the Net when enough people carry on those public discussions long enough, with sufficient human feeling, to form webs of personal relationships in cyberspace". Rheingold's definition is extremely popular and has been quoted in many discussions about virtual communities. As discussed below, for social scientists, particularly sociologists, Rheingold's definition raises many issues, especially concerning the notion of community. This is because Rheingold argues via a variety of analogies from the real world such as homesteading that virtual communities are indeed new forms of "community". In fact, Rheingold implies that virtual communities are actually "a kind of ultimate flowering of community". Moreover, Rheingold maintains that whenever computer mediated communications technology becomes available; people inevitably create communities with it. Rheingold can thus be labeled as a technological determinist as he holds that there is a predictable relationship between technology and people's behavior.
The debate over the validity of Rheingold's position has raised doubts about the existence of virtual communities and the appropriate use of the term. Weinreich claims that the idea of virtual communities must be wrong because community is a collective of kinship networks that share a common geographic region, a common history, and a shared value system, usually rooted in a common religion. In other words, Weinreich rejects the existence of virtual communities because group-CMC discussions cannot possibly meet his definition. In Weinreich's view, anyone with even a basic knowledge of sociology understands that information exchange in no way constitutes a community.
According to Simpson and Armstrong, virtual communities
Question381: A program instituted in a particular state allows parents to prepay their children's future college tuition at current rates. The program then pays the tuition annually for the child at any of the state's public colleges in which the child enrolls. Parents should participate in the program as a means of decreasing the cost for their children's college education.
Which of the following, if true, is the most appropriate reason for parents not to participate in the program?
Question382: Coca-Cola, which sold 10 billion cases of soft drinks in 1992, now finds itself asking, where will sales of the next 10 billion cases come from? The answer lies overseas, where income levels and appetites for Western products are at an all time high.
Often, the company that gets into a foreign market earliest dominates that country's market. Coke patriarch Robert Woodruff realized this and unleashed a brilliant ploy to make Coke the early bird in many of the major foreign markets. At the height of World War II, Woodruff proclaimed, "Wherever American boys were fighting, they'd be able to get a Coke." By the time Pepsi tried to make its first international pitch in the
1950s, Coke had established its brand name along with a powerful distribution network.
During the last 40 years, many new markets have emerged. In order to tap into these opportunities, both coke and Pepsi have attempted to find ways to cut through the red tape that thwarts their efforts to conduct business in these new regions.
One key maneuver in the soda wars occurred in 1972, when Pepsi signed an agreement with the Soviet Union that made it the first Western product to be sold to consumers in Russia. This landmark agreement gave Pepsi the upper hand. At present, Pepsi has 23 plants in the former Soviet Union and is the leader in the soft-drink industry in Russia. It outsells Coca-Cola by a ratio of 6 to 1 and is seen there as a local brand, similar to Coke's homegrown reputation in Japan. However, Pepsi has also encountered some obstacles. An expected increase in brand loyalty for Pepsi subsequent to its advertising blitz in Russia has not materialized; even though Pepsi produced commercials tailored to the Russian market and sponsored televised concerts.
Some analysts believe that Pepsi's domination of the Russian market has more to do with pricing. While Pepsi sells for 250 Rubles (about 25 cents) a bottle, Coca-Cola sells for 450 Rubles. Likewise, Pepsi sells their 2 liter economy bottle for 1,300 Rubles, while Coca-Cola's 1.5 liters is marketed at 1,800 rubles. On the other hand, Coca-Cola only made its first inroads into Russia 2 years ago. What's more, although Coca-Cola's bottle and label give it a high-class image, Russians do not perceive Coca-Cola as a premium brand in the Russian market. Consequently, it has so far been unable to capture a market share.
The primary purpose of the passage is to
Question383: A law requiring companies to offer employees unpaid time off to care for their children will harm the economic competitiveness of our nation's businesses. Companies must be free to set their own employment policies without mandated parental-leave regulations.
Which of the following, if true, would most seriously weaken the conclusion of the argument above?
Question384: Canadians now increasingly engage in "out-shopping," which is shopping across the national border, where prices are lower. Prices are lower outside of Canada in large part because the goods-and-services tax that pays for Canadian social services is not applied.
Which one of the following is best supported on the basis of the information above?
Question385: When limitations were in effect on nuclear-arms testing, people tended to save more of their money, but when nuclear-arms testing increased, people tended to spend more of their money. The perceived threat of nuclear catastrophe, therefore, decreases the willingness of people to postpone consumption for the sake of saving money.
The argument above assumes that
Question386: Over his 65-year life span, Hughes, one of America's most enduring writers and a key figure in the Harlem Renaissance of the 1920's, will have published hundreds of poems, plus novels, short stories, autobiographies, librettos, essays and children's books.
Question387: Even though most universities retain the royalties from faculty members' inventions, the faculty members retain the royalties from books and articles they write. Therefore, faculty members should retain the royalties from the educational computer software they develop.
The conclusion above would be more reasonably drawn if which of the following were inserted into the argument as an additional premise?
Question388: Child's World, a chain of toy stores, has relied on a "supermarket concept" of computerized inventory control and customer self-service to eliminate the category of sales clerks from its force of employees. It now plans to employ the same concept in selling children's clothes.
The plan of Child's World assumes that
Question389: The city's public transportation system should be removed from the jurisdiction of the municipal government, which finds it politically impossible either to raise fares or to institute cost-saving reductions in service. If public transportation were handled by a private firm, profits would be vigorously pursued, thereby eliminating the necessity for covering operating costs with government funds.
The statements above best support the conclusion that
Question390: James's grade point average puts him in the top third of the graduating class of college A.
Nestor is in the top tenth of the same class. Elizabeth had the same grade point average as Nestor. Nancy has a lower grade point average than Elizabeth.
If the information above is true, which of the following must also be true?
Question391: People living in the undeveloped wilderness area want jobs, and commercial development of the area will create jobs. But if the new commercial development plan is carried out, the wilderness will suffer. Thus the board considering the area's future must choose between the preservation of the wilderness and the wishes of the local people.
The answer to which of the following questions would be LEAST relevant to evaluating whether the board indeed faces the choice the author says it faces?
Question392: During the Second World War, about 375,000 civilians died in the United States and about 408,000 members of the United States armed forces died overseas. On the basis of those figures, it can be concluded that it was not much more dangerous to be overseas in the armed forces during the Second World War than it was to stay at home as a civilian.
Which of the following would reveal most clearly the absurdity of the conclusion drawn above?
Question393: Most consumers do not get much use out of the sports equipment they purchase. For example, seventeen percent of the adults in the United States own jogging shoes, but only forty-five percent of the owners jog more than once a year, and only seventeen percent jog more than once a week.
Which of the following, if true, casts most doubt on the claim that most consumers get little use out of the sports equipment they purchase?
Question394: The labor market is changing yet again. Increasingly, American business is turning to interim staffing to cover a greater number of its employment vacancies. Once interim (or temporary) staffing was reserved for the lower-level positions requiring little training, such as an envelope stuffer, receptionist, day laborer, and the like. Today, however, a more highly trained professional is being sought for interim work. It is not uncommon to find computer programmers, writers, marketing professionals, CPAs, and even chief financial officers working in an interim capacity. The reasons for these changes in staffing norms are generated at both the employer and employee level. Employers are pushing the drive toward interim staffing in order to maintain maximum flexibility.
Companies can be more innovative and flexible in their planning cycles if they have the option to hire employees on an as-needed basis. Additionally, employers save money using interim staffers, as they are not required to provide health insurance to temporary workers and they are not obligated to pay severance when the job terminates. Employees, too, are pushing the trend toward interim staffing. Increasingly, professionals are seeking more flexibility in their work schedules-often in response to family obligations.
No longer does the permanent 9 to 5, Monday through Friday schedule work for everyone. By working interim, employees can work when it fits their schedules. However, interim staffing is not for everyone.
Organizations whose workflow requires continuity of personnel may find interim staffing an impediment to productivity. Likewise, employees who need a steady source of income or who require the health insurance and other benefits provided by permanent employers may find the unpredictability in interim work problematic.
From the passage, it can be inferred that
Question395: Many consumers are concerned about the ecological effects of wasteful packaging. This concern probably explains why stores have been quick to stock new cleaning products that have been produced in a concentrated form. The concentrated form is packaged in smaller containers that use less plastic and require less transportation space.
Which of the following, if true, most seriously undermines the explanation offered above?
Question396: Alexander Calder was one of the most innovative and original American artists of the twentieth century.
Calder arrived in Paris in 1926 and devoted himself to a innovative project comprised of animals made out of wire, scraps of cloth, wood, cork, labels, bits of scrap metal and pieces of rubber that he called the Circus. During his performances, Calder invented ways to simulate the flight of birds: "These are little bits of white paper, with a hole and slight weight on each one, which flutter down several variously coiled thin steel wires which I jiggle so that they flutter down like doves." The Circus was the laboratory of Calder's work; in it he experimented with new formulas and techniques. By 1930, Calder's Circus had developed into one of the real successes of the Montparnasse art world attracting the attention of such renowned artists as Fernand Leger and Joan Miro. Encouragement from the upper echelons of the Parisian art scene undoubtedly led him to try more serious experiments in wire sculptures. Calder eventually becoming interested in the movement of objects, some of which he motorized. In 1933, Calder completed Object with Red Discs, a sculpture he described as a two-meter rod with a heavy sphere, suspended from the apex of a wire, giving it a cantilever effect. It had five thin aluminum discs projected at right angels from five wires, held in position by a spherical counterweight. With this new creation, the idea of the mobile was born. In creating a work named Constellations in 1943, Calder explored the plastic possibilities of mobiles; he used small pieces of wood, which he shaped and sometimes painted. From this point on, Calder's ambition changed focus. He sought more challenging designs. One of Calder's objectives was to display objects in the air, giving the viewer the experience of finding new skies filled with moving and colored constellations.
Calder accomplished this in Acoustic Ceiling (1954). Calder's humor was evident in such works as Le Bougnat (1959) and The Pagoda (1963). Later, Calder cut fantastic animals from sheet metal, creating La Vache and Elephant (both 1970) and a mobile entitled Nervous Wreck (1976), which represents the red skeleton of a fish. Calder defined volume without mass and incorporated movement and time in art. His inventions, which redefined certain basic principles of sculpture, have established him as the most innovative sculptor of the twentieth century.
It can be inferred from the passage that which of the following statement was true of the Parisian art scene?
Question397: Surveys show that every year only 10 percent of cigarette smokers switch brands. Yet the manufacturers have been spending an amount equal to 10 percent of their gross receipts on cigarette promotion in magazines. It follows from these figures that inducing cigarette smokers to switch brands did not pay, and that cigarette companies would have been no worse off economically if they had dropped their advertising.
Which of the following, if true, most seriously weakens the conclusion that cigarette companies could have dropped advertising without suffering economically?
Question398: In an experiment, two different types of recorded music were played for neonates in adjacent nurseries in a hospital. In nursery A, classical music was played; in nursery B, rock music was played. After two weeks, it was found that the babies in nursery A cried less, suffered fewer minor ailments, and gained more weight than did the babies in nursery B.
Which of the following additional experimental data would support the hypothesis that classical music is beneficial to the development of newborn?
Question399: Men are primarily and secondarily socialized into believing certain characteristics are definitive in determining their masculinity. These characteristics range from playing violently to not crying when they are injured. The socialization of masculinity in our society begins as early as the first stages of infancy, with awareness of adult gender role differences being internalized by children as young as two years old.
Studies show that advertising imagery equates masculinity with violence by portraying the trait of aggression as instrumental to establishing their masculinity. Lee Bowker, who researched the influence of advertisements on youth, asserts that toy advertisements featuring only boys depict aggressive behavior and that the aggressive behavior produces positive consequences more often than negative.
Bowker also looked at commercials with boys that contain references to domination. His results indicated that 68.6% of the commercials positioned toward boys contain incidents of verbal and physical aggression.
However, there were no cross gender displays of aggressive behavior. Interestingly, not one single-sex commercial featuring girls showed any act of aggression. Bowker's research helps explain that it is not just the reinforcement of a child's close caretakers that lends legitimacy to aggressive masculine tendencies but society as a whole, using the medium of television.
William Pollack, a Harvard clinical psychologist, talks about how males have been put in a "gender straightjacket" that leads to anger, despair and often violence. Pollack states that society asks men to put a whole range of feelings and emotions behind a mask and shames them if they display any emotion.
Pollack contends that boys are 'shame phobic', even killing, in extreme cases, to avoid dishonor. It appears that the standard defined by society allows men to express their emotion only through anger.
Ironically, though these rigid stereotypes of what it means to be a man have been inculcated from an early age, men are often criticized for being one-dimensional in their behavior and emotions.
Women often verbalize a desire for males to be sensitive and express their emotions. But male insensitivity is the culmination of a societal indoctrination begun at birth. Realistically, men are in a damned if they do, damned if they don't situation. If they fail to show their emotions, they are berated for being detached from the essence of what constitutes a human being. On the other hand, if a male decides to expose his emotions, he is often branded effeminate and regarded as inferior to other males who stick closer to their gender's traditional doctrine.
According to Pollack, one of the reasons for male violence is that
Question400: Partly because of bad weather, but also partly because some major pepper growers have switched to high-priced cocoa, world production of pepper has been running well below worldwide sales for three years. Pepper is consequently in relatively short supply. The price of pepper has soared in response: it now equals that of cocoa.
Some observers have concluded that the rise in the price of pepper means that the switch by some growers from pepper to cocoa left those growers no better off than if none of them had switched; this conclusion, however, is unwarranted because it can be inferred to be likely that
Question401: For almost five thousand years after its beginning 2.5 million years ago, Homo habilis roamed the earth, lived in semi-permanent camps, gathered food and shared their economy.
Question402: Last year the worldwide paper industry used over twice as much fresh pulp (pulp made directly from raw plant fibers) as recycled pulp (pulp made from wastepaper). A paper-industry analyst has projected that by
2010 the industry will use at least as much recycled pulp annually as it does fresh pulp, while using a greater quantity of fresh pulp than it did last year.
If the information above is correct and the analyst's projections prove to be accurate, which of the following projections must also be accurate?
Question403: We have heard a good deal in recent years about the declining importance of the two major political parties. It is the mass media, we are told, that decide the outcome of elections, not the power of the parties. But it is worth noting that no independent or third-party candidate has won any important election in recent years, and in the last nationwide campaign, the two major parties raised and spent more money than ever before in support of their candidates and platforms. It seems clear that reports of the imminent demise of the two-party system are premature at best.
Which of the following is an assumption made in the argument above?
Question404: The U.S. Forest Service, then five years old, decided to put out every fire in its domain, and within three decades the agency formulated what it called the 10 A.M. policy, directing that fires be extinguished quicker than they had been in the past.
Question405: Which of the following best completes the passage below?
One tax-reform proposal that has gained increasing support in recent years is the flat tax, which would impose a uniform tax rate on incomes at every level. Opponents of the flat tax say that a progressive tax system, which levies a higher rate of taxes on higher-income taxpayers, is fairer, placing the greater burden on those better able to bear it. However, the present crazy quilt of tax deductions, exemptions, credits, and loopholes benefits primarily the high-income taxpayer, who is consequently able to reduce his or her effective tax rate, often to a level below that paid by the lower-income taxpayer. Therefore, ______
Question406: Although custom prosthetic bone replacements produced through a new computer-aided design process will cost more than twice as much as ordinary replacements, custom replacements should still be cost- effective. Not only will surgery and recovery time be reduced, but custom replacements should last longer, thereby reducing the need for further hospital stays.
Which of the following must be studied in order to evaluate the argument presented above?
Question407: A public-service advertisement advises that people who have consumed alcohol should not drive until they can do so safely. In a hospital study, however, subjects questioned immediately after they consumed alcohol underestimated the time necessary to regain their driving ability. This result indicates that many people who drink before driving will have difficulty following the advertisement's advice.
Which of the following, if true, most strongly supports the argument above?
Question408: The president of a consulting firm analyzed the decisions made about marketing by her clients and concluded that the decisions were correct only about half of the time.
The conclusion above depends on the presupposition that
Question409: In prenatal testing for spina bifida, a life threatening disease, a false positive result indicates that an fetus has spina bifida when, in fact, it does not; a false negative result indicates that a fetus does not have spina bifida when, in fact, it does. To detect spina bifida most accurately, physicians should use the laboratory test that has the lowest proportion of false positive results.
Which of the following, if true, gives the most support to the recommendation above?
Question410: Using art to condemn the moral shortcomings of society is nothing new. English artist William Hogarth (1697 - 1764) was renowned for prints that revealed the moral lapses of eighteenth-century England.
Despite the fact that Hogarth enjoyed the patronage of England's wealthier citizens, he did not shrink away from producing scathing depictions of all levels of English society.
In the ten-print series Industry and Idleness, Hogarth presents two apprentices who begin working side by side only to arrive at vastly different ends. The first apprentice is portrayed as a morally incorruptible, diligent worker. He is promoted, marries his boss's daughter, and achieves great distinction and financial success. The other apprentice does little work and engages in many unsavory activities. He is fired from his apprenticeship and continues down a path of illicit behavior and corruption. The series comes to a climax when the two former coworkers are reunited with the industrious apprentice - now elevated to alderman - standing in judgment of the idle coworker brought before him for murder. The idle apprentice is sentenced to death and executed, whereas the industrious apprentice goes on to become Lord Mayor of London. Among Hogarth's most popular series was The Rake's Progress, which tells the story of wealthy Tom Rakewell. In the first of eight prints, Tom inherits a large sum of money that he foolishly spends on enhancing his image and prestige in superficial ways. His prodigal ways lead to his rapid decline as he is arrested for debt and in return marries an old maid for her money. He begins gambling, is imprisoned, and eventually goes insane in Bedlam. Tom's descent and desperate outcome, like many of Hogarth's subjects, is tied directly to moral corruption and poor self-discipline. It is interesting that Hogarth's prints were extremely popular in his day. Whatever the moral shortcomings of eighteenth-century England, its citizens welcomed Hogarth's social critiques and harsh judgments.
The passage suggests that Hogarth's work is important because
Question411: Some communities in Florida are populated almost exclusively by retired people and contain few, if any, families with small children. Yet these communities are home to thriving businesses specializing in the rental of furniture for infants and small children.
Which of the following, if true, best reconciles the seeming discrepancy described above?
Question412: Neighboring landholders: Air pollution from the giant aluminum refinery that has been built next to our land is killing our plants.
Company spokesperson: The refinery is not to blame, since our study shows that the damage is due to insects and fungi.
Which of the following, if true, most seriously weakens the conclusion drawn by the company spokesperson?
Question413: Between 1990 and 1998, occupancy in Branson Hospital averaged 79 percent of capacity, while admission rates remained constant, at an average of 9 admissions per 100 beds per year. Between 1998 and 2002, however, occupancy rates increased to an average of 85 percent of capacity, while admission rates declined to 8 per 100 beds per year.
Which of the following conclusions can be most properly drawn from the info given above?
Question414: Civic Leader: The high cancer rate among our citizens is the result of hazardous material produced at your plant.
Board of Directors: Our statistics show that rates of cancer are high throughout the valley in which the plant is situated because local wells that supply drinking water are polluted, not because of the plant.
Which of the following, if true, most seriously weakens the board's claims?
Question415: In the past year, there has been a large drop in the number of new cars sold, due to harsh economic conditions in the marketplace and high taxes. At the same time, the average price paid for a new car has risen dramatically.
Which of the following, if true, best explains the increase in the average price of a new car?
Question416: Take a very commonplace, often discussed and critical topic: Are we detecting a greenhouse effect, and related to this, is it exacerbated by "homogenic factors," i.e., human actions? Most would be inclined to give a positive answer to both of these questions. But, if pushed, what would be the evidence, and how well grounded would it be for such affirmations?
Within scientific communities and associated scientifically informed circles, the answers have to be somewhat more ambiguous, particularly when rigorous questions concerning evidence are raised. Were scientific truth to be a matter of consensus, and some argue that scientific truth often turns out to be just that, then it is clear that there is beginning to be a kind of majority consensus among many earth science practitioners that the temperature of the Earth, particularly of the oceans, is indeed rising and that this is a crucial indicator for a possible greenhouse effect.
Most of these scientists admit that the mean oceanic temperature has risen globally in the last several decades. But this generalization depends upon how accurate measurements may be, not just for samples, but also for the whole Earth. A hot spot, for example the now four year old hot spot near New Guinea which is part of the El Niño cycle, does not count by itself because it might be balanced by cold spots elsewhere. And the fact of the matter is that "whole earth measurements" are still rare and primitive in the simple sense that we simply do not have enough thermometers out. Secondly, even if we had enough thermometers, a simply synchronic whole earth measurement over three decades is but a blip in the diachronic history of ice age cycles over the last tens of thousands of years. Thirdly, even if we know that the earth is now heating up, has an ever increasing ozone hole, and from this strange weather effects can be predicted, how much of this is due to homorganic factors, such as CFCs, CO2 increases, hydrocarbon burning, and the like? Is it really the case, as Science magazine claimed in l990, "24% of greenhouse encouraging gases are of homorganic origin"?
In this passage the author is primarily interested in
Question417: It is widely assumed that a museum is helped financially when a generous patron donates a potential exhibit. In truth, however, donated objects require storage space, which is not free, and routine conservation, which is rather expensive. Therefore, such gifts exacerbate rather than lighten the demands made on a museum's financial resources.
Which of the following, if true, most seriously weakens the argument above?
Question418: Bonuses at DSR Industries cannot be awarded unless profits exceed a ten percent return on stockholders' investments in the company. Higher profits mean higher bonuses. Therefore, bonuses in a year of general economic recession will be considerably lower than bonuses in a year of peak profits at DSR.
The conclusion above depends on the assumption that
Question419: The average age of chief executive officers (CEO's) in a large sample of companies is 57. The average age of CEO's in those same companies 20 years ago was approximately eight years younger. On the basis of those data, it can be concluded that CEO's in general tend to be older now.
Which of the following casts the most doubt on the conclusion drawn above?
Question420: Companies considering new cost-cutting manufacturing processes often compare the projected results of making the investment against the alternative of not making the investment with costs, selling prices, and share of market remaining constant.
Which of the following, assuming that each is a realistic possibility, constitutes the most serious disadvantage for companies of using the method above for evaluating the financial benefit of new manufacturing processes?
Question421: In a psychological experiment conducted at South bay University, groups of men with various levels of education read stories in which people caused harm, some of them doing so intentionally, and some accidentally. When asked about appropriate penalization for those who had caused harm, the less educated men, unlike the educated ones, assigned punishments that did not vary according to whether the harm was done intentionally or accidentally. Uneducated men, then, do not regard people's intentions as relevant to penalization.
Which of the following, if true, would most seriously weaken the conclusion above?
Question422: A researcher studying drug addicts found that, on average, they tend to manipulate other people a great deal more than non addicts do. The researcher concluded that people who frequently manipulate other people are likely to become addicts.
Which of the following, if true, most seriously weakens the researcher's conclusion?
Question423: A recent report determined that although only three percent of drivers on Maryland highways equipped their vehicles with radar detectors, thirty-three percent of all vehicles ticketed for exceeding the speed limit were equipped with them. Clearly, drivers who equip their vehicles with radar detectors are more likely to exceed the speed limit regularly than are drivers who do not.
The conclusion drawn above depends on which of the following assumptions?
Question424: One state adds a 7 percent sales tax to the price of most products purchased within its jurisdiction. This tax, therefore, if viewed as tax on income, has the reverse effect of the federal income tax: the lower the income, the higher the annual percentage rate at which the income is taxed.
The conclusion above would be properly drawn if which of the following were assumed as a premise?
Question425: Residents of an apartment complex are considering two possible plans for collecting recyclable trash.
Plan 1 - Residents will deposit recyclable trash in municipal dumpsters located in the parking lot. The trash will be collected on the first and the fifteenth days of each month.
Plan 2 - Residents will be given individual containers for recyclable trash. The containers will be placed at the curb twice a week for trash collection.
Which of the following points raised at a meeting of the residents, if valid, would most favor one of the recycling plans over the other?
Question426: Brought on by weightlessness in protracted space flight, besides the obvious hazards of meteors, rocky debris, and radiation, astronauts also have to deal with muscle atrophy.
Question427: The fossil record shows that the climate of North America warmed and dried at the end of the Pleistocene period. Most of the species of large mammals then living on the continent became extinct, but the smaller mammalian species survived.
Which of the following, if true, provides the best basis for an explanation of the contrast described above between species of large mammals and species of small mammals?
Question428: Polycystic ovarian syndrome, or PCOS (aka Stein-Leventhal disease), is a condition that affects between
6% and 20% of women in the United States. It is a little understood syndrome that often goes undetected and is frequently misdiagnosed. PCOS produces tiny cysts on the surface of a woman's ovaries. These cysts are undeveloped follicles (eggs) that inexplicably fail to release through the ovarian wall as part of the menstrual cycle. Some researchers believe the eggs fail to release from the ovary because of the presence of male hormones in the blood. However, new research is indicating that PCOS is related to insulin resistance. Unfortunately, the cysts themselves are only a small part of this syndrome. PCOS can present a variety of symptoms, including hair growth on the face and chest, stubborn acne, hair loss, obesity, irregular menses, infertility, and an increased risk of diabetes. Many of these symptoms impact a woman's physical appearance and her self-esteem. If left untreated, women suffering from PCOS may experience greater levels of stress and depression. A woman exhibiting any of these symptoms should contact her physician to determine if she has PCOS. Although there is no cure for PCOS, a number of different treatments can stop or reverse many of the symptoms.
According to the passage, many women who have PCOS
Question429: The local board of education found that, because the current physics curriculum has little direct relevance to today's world, physics classes attracted few high school students. So to attract students to physics classes, the board proposed a curriculum that emphasizes principles of physics involved in producing and analyzing visual images.
Which of the following, if true, provides the strongest reason to expect that the proposed curriculum will be successful in attracting students?
Question430: Which of the following best completes the passage below?
the most serious flaw in television's coverage of election campaigns is its tendency to focus on the horse- race side of politics-that is, to concentrate on the question "Who's winning?" at the expense of substantive coverage of the issues and the candidates' positions on them. The endless interviews with campaign managers, discussions of campaign strategies, and, especially, the obsession with opinion polls have surrounded elections with the atmosphere of a football game or a prizefight. To reform this situation, a first step might well be______
Question431: Which of the following best completes the passage below?
In today's pluralistic society, textbook publishers find themselves in an increasingly uncomfortable position.
Since the schools are regarded as a repository of society's moral and cultural values, each group within society wishes to prevent any material that offends its own values from appearing in textbooks. As a result, stance on an issue is certain to run afoul of one group or another. And since textbook publishers must rely on community goodwill to sell their books, it is inevitable that______
Question432: Which of the following best completes the passage below?
In a survey of job applicants, two-fifths admitted to being at least a little dishonest. However, the survey may underestimate the proportion of job applicants who are dishonest, because______
Question433: Contrary to the charges made by some of its opponents, the provisions of the new deficit-reduction law for indiscriminate cuts in the federal budget are justified. Opponents should remember that the New Deal pulled this country out of great economic troubles even though some of its programs were later found to be unconstitutional.
The author's method of attacking the charges of certain opponents of the new deficit-reduction law is to
Question434: Using computer techniques, researchers analyze layers of paint that lie buried beneath the surface layers of old paintings. They claim, for example, that additional mountainous scenery once appeared in Leonardo da Vinci's Mona Lisa, which was later painted over. Skeptics reply to these claims, however, that X-ray examinations of the Mona Lisa do not show hidden mountains.
Which of the following, if true, would tend most to weaken the force of the skeptics' objections?
Question435: The First Banking Group's decision to invest in an electronic network for transferring funds was based on a cost advantage over a nonelectronic system of about ten dollars per transaction in using an electronic system. Executives reasoned further that the system would give them an advantage over competitors.
Which of the following, if it is a realistic possibility, most seriously weakens the executives' projection of an advantage over competitors?
Question436: Recent evidence appears to contradict earlier findings that suggested that those who are physically fit cope better with stressful real-life events. Of a group of healthy women, those randomly assigned to a ten- week program of aerobic exercises performed no better in laboratory tests simulating stressful situations than did the subgroup assigned to a program without exercise.
Which of the following, if true, provides evidence for determining whether physical fitness makes one react better to stress?
Question437: A year after the start an experiment to decrease crime in two high-crime subway stations by the installation of closed-circuit televisions, the experiment is being discontinued, city officials say the program has led to an increase in crime, citing the fact that following the installation, both stations showed increases in the number of crimes reported.
Which of the following, if true, most seriously weakens the claim of the city officials that the program has led to an increase in crime?
Question438: The late 1990s saw the comeback of many rock-n-roll bands that had enjoyed great fame in the 1960s and
1970s, but had fallen into relative obscurity in the 1980s and early 1990s. Bands such as Santana and Aero smith released new albums at the end of the millennium and embarked on worldwide tours to sold-out audiences.
Which of the following, if true, best explains the phenomenon described in this passage?
Question439: Ross: The profitability of Company X, restored to private ownership five years ago, is clear evidence that businesses will always fare better under private than under public ownership.
Julia: Wrong. A close look at the records shows that X has been profitable since the appointment of a first- class manager, which happened while X was still in the public sector.
Which of the following best describes the weak point in Ross's claim on which Julia's response focuses?
Question440: In comparison to the standard typewriter keyboard, the EFCO keyboard, which places the most-used keys nearest the typist's strongest fingers, allows faster typing and results in less fatigue, Therefore, replacement of standard keyboards with the EFCO keyboard will result in an immediate reduction of typing costs.
Which of the following, if true, would most weaken the conclusion drawn above?
Question441: Which of the following best completes the passage below?
At large amusement parks, live shows are used very deliberately to influence crowd movements.
Lunchtime performances relieve the pressure on a park's restaurants. Evening performances have a rather different purpose: to encourage visitors to stay for supper. Behind this surface divergence in immediate purpose there is the unified underlying goal of______
Question442: The proportion of manufacturing companies in Alameda that use microelectronics in their manufacturing processes increased from 6 percent in 1979 to 66 percent in 1990. Many labor leaders say that the introduction of microelectronics is the principal cause of the great increase in unemployment during that period in Alameda. In actual fact, however, most of the job losses were due to organizational changes.
Moreover, according to new figures released by the labor department, there were many more people employed in Alameda in the manufacturing industry in 1990 than in 1979.
Which of the following, if true, would most strengthen the labor leaders' claim concerning the manufacturing industry in Alameda?
Question443: The average life expectancy for the United States population as a whole is 73.9 years, but children born in Hawaii will live an average of 77 years, and those born in Louisiana, 71.7 years. If a newlywed couple from Louisiana were to begin their family in Hawaii, therefore, their children would be expected to live longer than would be the case if the family remained in Louisiana.
Which of the following, if true, would most seriously weaken the conclusion drawn in the passage?
Question444: A milepost on the towpath read "21" on the side facing the hiker as she approached it and "23" on its back.
She reasoned that the next milepost forward on the path would indicate that she was halfway between one end of the path and the other. However, the milepost one mile further on read "20" facing her and "24" behind.
Which of the following, if true, would explain the discrepancy described above?
Question445: Some governments have tried to make alcohol and tobacco less attractive to consumers by regulating what can be shown in advertisements for these products, rather than by banning advertising of them altogether. However, the need to obey the letter of these restrictions has actually stimulated advertisers to create advertisements that are more inventive and humorous than they were prior to the restrictions' introduction.
which of the following, if true, would, in conjunction with the statements above, best support the conclusion that the government policy described above fails to achieve its objective?
Question446: Below is an excerpt from a letter that was sent by the chairman of a corporation to the stockholders.
A number of charges have been raised against me, some serious, some trivial. Individuals seeking to control the corporation for their own purposes have demanded my resignation. Remember that no court of law in any state has found me guilty of any criminal offense whatsoever. In the American tradition, as you know, an individual is considered innocent until proven guilty. Furthermore, as the corporation's unbroken six-year record of growth will show, my conduct of my official duties as chairman has only helped enhance the success of the corporation, and so benefited every stockholder.
Which of the following can be properly inferred from the excerpt?
Question447: In an experiment, two different types of recorded music were played for neonates in adjacent nurseries in a hospital. In nursery A, classical music was played; in nursery B, rock music was played. After two weeks, it was found that the babies in nursery A cried less, suffered fewer minor ailments, and gained more weight than did the babies in nursery B.
In evaluating the validity of the conclusion suggested by the experiment above, it would be most important to know which of the following?
Question448: The labor market is changing yet again. Increasingly, American business is turning to interim staffing to cover a greater number of its employment vacancies. Once interim (or temporary) staffing was reserved for the lower-level positions requiring little training, such as an envelope stuffer, receptionist, day laborer, and the like. Today, however, a more highly trained professional is being sought for interim work. It is not uncommon to find computer programmers, writers, marketing professionals, CPAs, and even chief financial officers working in an interim capacity. The reasons for these changes in staffing norms are generated at both the employer and employee level. Employers are pushing the drive toward interim staffing in order to maintain maximum flexibility.
Companies can be more innovative and flexible in their planning cycles if they have the option to hire employees on an as-needed basis. Additionally, employers save money using interim staffers, as they are not required to provide health insurance to temporary workers and they are not obligated to pay severance when the job terminates. Employees, too, are pushing the trend toward interim staffing. Increasingly, professionals are seeking more flexibility in their work schedules - often in response to family obligations.
No longer does the permanent 9 to 5, Monday through Friday schedule work for everyone. By working interim, employees can work when it fits their schedules. However, interim staffing is not for everyone.
Organizations whose workflow requires continuity of personnel may find interim staffing an impediment to productivity. Likewise, employees who need a steady source of income or who require the health insurance and other benefits provided by permanent employers may find the unpredictability in interim work problematic.
According to the passage, the main benefit to employers of interim staffing is
Question449: While diabetes does not interfere with digestion, on the other hand, it does prevent the body from converting an important product of digestion, glucose, which is commonly known as sugar, into energy.
Question450: We have heard a good deal in recent years about the declining importance of the two major political parties. It is the mass media, we are told, that decide the outcome of elections, not the power of the parties. But it is worth noting that no independent or third-party candidate has won any important election in recent years, and in the last nationwide campaign, the two major parties raised and spent more money than ever before in support of their candidates and platforms. It seems clear that reports of the imminent demise of the two-party system are premature at best.
Which of the following, if true, would most strengthen the argument above?
Question451: By using tiny probes as neural prostheses, surgeons may be able to restore nerve function in quadriplegics and make the blind see or the deaf hear.
Question452: Alba: I don't intend to vote for Senator Frank in the next election. She is not a strong supporter of the war against crime.
Tam: But Senator Frank sponsored the latest anticrime law passed by the Senate.
Alba: If Senator Frank sponsored it, it can't be a very strong anticrime law.
Which of the following identifies the most serious logical flaw in Alba's reasoning?
Question453: A report on the use of monosodium glutamate in food concluded, "Most Americans who consume monosodium glutamate regularly are not being harmed." Critics of the report insist the conclusion be changed to, "Most Americans who consume monosodium glutamate do not show visible symptoms of harm by the substance, such as abnormal rashes or slower rates of metabolism." Which of the following, if true, provides the best logical justification for the critics' insistence that the report's conclusion be changed?
Question454: The interview is an essential part of a successful hiring program because, with it, job applicants who have personalities that are unsuited to the requirements of the job will be eliminated from consideration.
The argument above logically depends on which of the following assumptions?
Question455: The proposal to hire ten new police officers in Middletown is quite foolish. There is sufficient funding to pay the salaries of the new officers, but not the salaries of additional court and prison employees to process the increased caseload of arrests and convictions that new officers usually generate.
Which of the following, if true, will most seriously weaken the conclusion drawn above?
Question456: The rising of costs of medication has created growing concern about the long-term threat the virus presents to human health on a national level.
Question457: Many community colleges suffer declining enrollments during periods of economic recession. At government retraining programs, which are not provided free of charge, enrollment figures boom during these periods when many people have less money and there is more competition for jobs.
Each of the following, if true, helps to explain the enrollment increases in government retraining programs above EXCEPT:
Question458: In several cities, the government is going ahead with ambitious construction projects despite the high office vacancy rates in those cities. The vacant offices, though available for leasing, unfortunately do not meet the requirements for the facilities needed, such as court houses and laboratories. The government, therefore, is not guilty of any fiscal wastefulness.
Which of the following is an assumption on which the argument above depends?
Question459: The more frequently employees that take a break for guided relaxation exercises during working hours each week, the fewer sick days they take. Even workers who take a guided relaxation break once a week during working hours take less sick leave than those who do not perform relaxation. Therefore, if companies started guided relaxation programs, the absentee rate in those companies would decrease significantly.
Which of the following, if true, most seriously weakens the argument above?
Question460: Roland: The alarming fact is that 90 percent of the people in this country now report that they know someone who is unemployed.
Sharon: But a normal, moderate level of unemployment is 5 percent, with 1 out of 20 workers unemployed.
So at any given time if a person knows approximately 50 workers, 1 or more will very likely be unemployed.
Sharon's argument relies on the assumption that
Question461: With the proliferation of electronic technologies in the latter part of the twentieth century, many aspects of cultural practice have been redefined. The eradication of physical boundaries that limit discourse and information access has had profound effects upon the manner in which we conduct democracy. Yet, opinions strongly differ over whether or not the growth of electronic networks will result in expanded democracy. On one side of the debate are anti-utopians who fear that with the intrusion of the Internet into many facets of life, personal freedom will be impeded and the existing rift between the "haves" and "have- nots" in society will grow. On the other side, many 'cyber-utopians' believe that new technologies can eliminate the democracy of elected representatives with which so many people are dissatisfied. The Internet, they say, will allow for a true participatory democracy in which citizens can govern themselves without the interference of bureaucrats and legislators.
Neither of these theories by themselves can fully address the role of democracy in the age of information.
As debates about censorship and encryption have shown, government regulation of the Internet can result in violations of the basic rights of speech set forth in the constitution of the United States. Yet, groups that preach 'Big Brother' theories of paranoia tend to neglect the fact that new technologies can help balance the injustices of traditional power found in a centralized government. At the same time, the likelihood of doing away with the present system of democracy in favor of complete and pure self-governance seems impossible and likely undesirable.
Both arguments about the future of the way in which discourse will occur highlight the inherent relationship between communication and democracy. Perhaps a more useful model for the study of this dynamic can be found in the model of the public sphere proposed by Jorgen Habermas. In this realm, free and diverse equals come together to deliberate and discuss pertinent issues without the impediment of external coercion. The ensuing dialogue transpires in a profoundly democratic forum. The dispensing of traditional hierarchies that occurs on the Internet appears to make possible the type of categories necessary for Habermas 'ideal speech situation to occur.
However, postmodern critics indicate that the autonomous individual no longer exists in a world where our identities are constructed as much for us as by us. And indeed, much of the postmodern notion of self seems to fit closely with reconfigurations of the subject brought on by electronic technologies. The question that arises then is how might the reconfiguration of communication enabled by the Internet work to create a new form of cyber-democracy' that better represents citizen's interests?
The author is primarily concerned with
Question462: There is a great deal of geographical variation in the frequency of many surgical procedures-up to tenfold variation per hundred thousand between different areas in the numbers of hysterectomies, prostatectomy's, and tonsillectomies.
To support a conclusion that much of the variation is due to unnecessary surgical procedures, it would be most important to establish which of the following?
Question463: Any combination of overwork and stress inevitably leads of insomnia. Managers at HiCorp, Inc., all suffer from stress. A majority of the managers - despite their doctors' warnings - work well over 60 hours per week, whereas the other managers work no more than the normal 40 hours per week. HiCorp gives regular bonuses only to employees who work more than 40 hours per week.
Which of the following conclusions is most strongly supported by the statements above?
Question464: Unlike the United States with its generalissimo politicians - Washington, Jackson, Grant, and Eisenhower- the 'martial arts' have been conspicuously absent from Canadian politics. The exception to the rule is former Prime Minister Pierre Elliot Trudeau, who became the first Canadian leader to bring a gunslinger ethos to Canadian politics. Trudeau introduced Canada to the refined art of single combat; it was the politics of "doing it my way". Single-combat confrontation implied much more than the renegade in power did, and far less than the tricks of William Lyon Mackenzie King, prime minister intermittently between 1921 and 1948.
Trudeau's unique background prepared him for the role of authoritarian leader he would assume later in life. Born on October 18, 1919, Trudeau lived in French-speaking Montreal, but heard English at home from his mother, making it easy for the young politician to appeal to all sectors of Canada, a bilingual country. As a young man, he walked and cycled through Europe, finding himself on occasion on the wrong side of the bars in foreign jails. By 1940, Trudeau entered the law faculty at the University of Montreal. As a student he enlisted in the Canadian Officers Training Corps, where he was given a commission as a lieutenant, a rank he held until his retirement in 1947. Trudeau, a renowned sportsman, held a brown belt in karate, knew how to skin dive and could descend 150 feet off a cliff with ease. He continued performing flamboyant physical feats even in later life as Canada's fifteenth prime minister, astounding Canadians with his prowess. The public's adoration made it possible for him to practice his personal brand of 'do it my way' politics, initiating profound and long-lasting changes to his country.
Other leaders would never have undertaken to deal with such taboo issues as divorce, abortion and homosexuality- matters likely to infuriate conservative Canada from coast to coast. Even the powerful Mackenzie King dared not touch any of the three, though Trudeau tackled them together in an omnibus bill as Minister of Justice under Lester B.
Pearson. His reason for loosening legislation on these issues was, as he put poetically put it, "The state has no business in the bedrooms of the nation." The myths-makers have it that this was Trudeau's first deliberate 'gun slinging' move, performed with the ultimate goal of attaining national leadership. Contrary to popular belief, Trudeau had no leadership aspirations at the time; all he had was a passion for combat that eclipsed other religious considerations. Trudeau instigated far- reaching changes in legislation governing divorce, abortion and homosexuality that have had a major impact on Canada, shaping the country into what it is today.
The quotation "The state has no business in the bedrooms of the nation," is most probably used to
Question465: Of course, the Task Force on Crime is going to conclude that crime is on the way up. If they conclude it's on the way down, they would have to disband, wouldn't they?
Which of the following assumptions is most pivotal to this argument?
Question466: Unlike the wholesale price of uncut diamonds, the wholesale price of other uncut gemstones has fallen considerably in the last year. Thus, although the retail price of jewelry made with gemstones other than diamonds has not yet fallen, it will inevitably fall.
Which of the following, if true, most seriously weakens the argument above?
Question467: In the effort to fire a Civil Service employee, his or her manager may have to spend up to $100,000 of tax money. Since Civil Service employees know how hard it is to fire them, they tend to loaf. This explains in large part why the government is so inefficient.
It can be properly inferred on the basis of the statements above that the author believes which of the following?
I. Too much job security can have a negative influence on workers.
II. More government workers should be fired.
III. Most government workers are Civil Service employees.
Question468: From time to time, the press indulges in outbursts of indignation over the use of false or misleading information by the U.S. government in support of its policies and programs. No one endorses needless deception. But consider this historical analogy. It is known that Christopher Columbus, on his first voyage to the New World, deliberately falsified the log to show a shorter sailing distance for each day out than the ships had actually traveled. In this way, Columbus was able to convince his skeptical sailors that they had not sailed past the point at which they expected to find the shores of India. Without this deception, Columbus's sailors might well have mutinied, and the New World might never have been discovered.
The author of the passage above assumes each of the following EXCEPT:
Question469: In the suburbs surrounding Middletown, there is an average of 2.4 automobiles per family, and thus very few suburban residents use public buses. The suburban communities, therefore, would derive little benefit from continuing to subsidize the portion of Middletown's public bus system that serves the suburbs.
Which of the following, if true, casts the most serious doubt on the conclusion drawn above?
Question470: Using art to condemn the moral shortcomings of society is nothing new. English artist William Hogarth (1697 - 1764) was renowned for prints that revealed the moral lapses of eighteenth-century England.
Despite the fact that Hogarth enjoyed the patronage of England's wealthier citizens, he did not shrink away from producing scathing depictions of all levels of English society.
In the ten-print series Industry and Idleness, Hogarth presents two apprentices who begin working side by side only to arrive at vastly different ends. The first apprentice is portrayed as a morally incorruptible, diligent worker. He is promoted, marries his boss's daughter, and achieves great distinction and financial success. The other apprentice does little work and engages in many unsavory activities. He is fired from his apprenticeship and continues down a path of illicit behavior and corruption. The series comes to a climax when the two former coworkers are reunited with the industrious apprentice - now elevated to alderman - standing in judgment of the idle coworker brought before him for murder. The idle apprentice is sentenced to death and executed, whereas the industrious apprentice goes on to become Lord Mayor of London. Among Hogarth's most popular series was The Rake's Progress, which tells the story of wealthy Tom Rakewell. In the first of eight prints, Tom inherits a large sum of money that he foolishly spends on enhancing his image and prestige in superficial ways. His prodigal ways lead to his rapid decline as he is arrested for debt and in return marries an old maid for her money. He begins gambling, is imprisoned, and eventually goes insane in Bedlam. Tom's descent and desperate outcome, like many of Hogarth's subjects, is tied directly to moral corruption and poor self-discipline. It is interesting that Hogarth's prints were extremely popular in his day. Whatever the moral shortcomings of eighteenth-century England, its citizens welcomed Hogarth's social critiques and harsh judgments.
The description of Industry and Idleness suggests that
Question471: A proposed ordinance requires the installation in new homes of sprinklers automatically triggered by the presence of a fire. However, a home builder argued that because more than ninety percent of residential fires are extinguished by a household member, residential sprinklers would only marginally decrease property damage caused by residential fires.
Which of the following, if true, would most seriously weaken the home builder's argument?
Question472: On the basis of a decrease in the college-age population, many colleges now anticipate increasingly smaller freshman classes each year. Surprised by a 40 percent increase in qualified applicants over the previous year, however, administrators at Nice College now plan to hire more faculty for courses taken by all freshmen.
Which of the following statements about Nice College's current qualified applicants, if true, would strongly suggest that the administrators' plan is flawed?
Question473: Meteorite explosions in the Earth's atmosphere as large as the one that destroyed forests in Siberia, with approximately the force of a twelve-megaton nuclear blast, occur about once a century.
The response of highly automated systems controlled by complex computer programs to unexpected circumstances is unpredictable.
Which of the following conclusions can most properly be drawn, if the statements above are true, about a highly automated nuclear-missile defense system controlled by a complex computer program?
Question474: Corporate officers and directors commonly buy and sell, for their own portfolios, stock in their own corporations. Generally, when the ratio of such inside sales to inside purchases falls below 2 to 1 for a given stock, a rise in stock prices is imminent. In recent days, while the price of MEGA Corporation stock has been falling, the corporation's officers and directors have bought up to nine times as much of it as they have sold.
The facts above best support which of the following predictions?
Question475: The cost of producing radios in Country Q is ten percent less than the cost of producing radios in Country
Y. Even after transportation fees and tariff charges are added, it is still cheaper for a company to import radios from Country Q to Country Y than to produce radios in Country Y.
The statements above, if true, best support which of the following assertions?
Question476: To reduce costs, a company is considering a drastic reduction in the number of middle-level managers.
This reduction would be accomplished by first offering early retirement to those 50 years of age or older with 15 years of service, and then by firing enough of the others to bring the overall reduction to 50 percent.
Each of the following, assuming that it is a realistic possibility, is a possible disadvantage to the company of the plan EXCEPT:
Question477: Researchers recently discovered that lipstick can become contaminated with bacteria that causes mononucleosis. They found that contamination usually occurs after the lipstick has been used for six months. For that reason, women should dispose of any lipstick after six months of use.
Which of the following, if true, would most weaken the conclusion above?
Question478: The Florida panther, known for its distinctive characteristics, including a kinked tail and cowlicks, is nearing extinction with the help of scientists and government officials. Though once abundant in Florida, by the end of the twentieth century, only approximately 30 Florida panthers remained. Efforts to preserve the panthers had focused on shielding them from human encroachment with the hope that they could develop sustainable numbers to survive as a species. However, pressure from development caused officials to grow impatient and shift their strategy and goals.
In 1995, new breeds of female panthers were brought to Florida from Texas to bolster the population. The change has been dramatic. In 1990, 88% of the panthers in Florida had the distinct kinked tail. By 2000, five years after the introduction of the Texas panthers, not a single kitten born to the Texas females had a kinked tail. The breed known as the Florida panther is now on an expedited, ineluctable road to extinction
- with the assistance of wildlife protection agencies.
If the goal was to have any kind of panther in Florida, it has been realized. Since the introduction of the Texas panthers, the panther population in Florida has risen to approximately 80 mixed-breed panthers.
However, this "success" could portend a tragic trend in wildlife management in the United States. We cannot and should not create genetically mixed species as a means of achieving a compromise between the needs of development and a species' survival. This type of species tampering is a perversion of the ideal of wildlife management and will irrevocably transform our national landscape.
The passage suggests that the author
Question479: Male bowerbirds construct elaborately decorated nests, or bowers. Basing their judgment on the fact that different local populations of bowerbirds of the same species build bowers that exhibit different building and decorative styles, researchers have concluded that the bowerbirds' building styles are a culturally acquired, rather than a genetically transmitted, trait.
Which of the following, if true, would most strengthen the conclusion drawn by the researchers?
Question480: Alexander Calder was one of the most innovative and original American artists of the twentieth century.
Calder arrived in Paris in 1926 and devoted himself to a innovative project comprised of animals made out of wire, scraps of cloth, wood, cork, labels, bits of scrap metal and pieces of rubber that he called the Circus. During his performances, Calder invented ways to simulate the flight of birds: "These are little bits of white paper, with a hole and slight weight on each one, which flutter down several variously coiled thin steel wires which I jiggle so that they flutter down like doves." The Circus was the laboratory of Calder's work; in it he experimented with new formulas and techniques. By 1930, Calder's Circus had developed into one of the real successes of the Montparnasse art world attracting the attention of such renowned artists as Fernand Leger and Joan Miro. Encouragement from the upper echelons of the Parisian art scene undoubtedly led him to try more serious experiments in wire sculptures. Calder eventually becoming interested in the movement of objects, some of which he motorized. In 1933, Calder completed Object with Red Discs, a sculpture he described as a two-meter rod with a heavy sphere, suspended from the apex of a wire, giving it a cantilever effect. It had five thin aluminum discs projected at right angels from five wires, held in position by a spherical counterweight. With this new creation, the idea of the mobile was born. In creating a work named Constellations in 1943, Calder explored the plastic possibilities of mobiles; he used small pieces of wood, which he shaped and sometimes painted. From this point on, Calder's ambition changed focus. He sought more challenging designs. One of Calder's objectives was to display objects in the air, giving the viewer the experience of finding new skies filled with moving and colored constellations.
Calder accomplished this in Acoustic Ceiling (1954). Calder's humor was evident in such works as Le Bougnat (1959) and The Pagoda (1963). Later, Calder cut fantastic animals from sheet metal, creating La Vache and Elephant (both 1970) and a mobile entitled Nervous Wreck (1976), which represents the red skeleton of a fish. Calder defined volume without mass and incorporated movement and time in art. His inventions, which redefined certain basic principles of sculpture, have established him as the most innovative sculptor of the twentieth century.
The author's attitude toward the mobiles of Alexander Calder is best described as
Question481: The Commerce Department recently put limits on machine-tool imports from two countries whose exports of machine tools into the United States have been substantial. As a result of these restrictions, analysts predict that domestic sales of machine tools manufactured in the United States are bound to rise considerably, starting in the very near future.
Which of the following, if true, would be most likely to cause the analysts' prediction to be inaccurate?
Question482: Certain messenger molecules fight damage to the lungs from noxious air by telling the muscle cells encircling the lungs' airways to contract. This partially seals off the lungs. An asthma attack occurs when the messenger molecules are activated unnecessarily, in response to harmless things like pollen or household dust.
Which of the following, if true, points to the most serious flaw of a plan to develop a medication that would prevent asthma attacks by blocking receipt of any messages sent by the messenger molecules referred to above?
Question483: Investing in real estate would be a profitable venture at this time. A survey in House magazine revealed that 85% of the magazine's readers are planning to buy a second home over the next few years. A study of the real estate industry, however, revealed that the current supply of homes could only provide for 65% of that demand each year.
Which of the following, if true, reveals a weakness in the evidence cited above?
Question484: Mayor: In each of the past five years, the city has cut school funding and each time school officials complained that the cuts would force them to reduce expenditures for essential services. But each time, only expenditures for nonessential services were actually reduced. So school officials can implement further cuts without reducing any expenditures for essential services.
Which of the following, if true, most strongly supports the mayor's conclusion?
Question485: The first science-fiction novel, Mary Shelley's Frankenstein, actually contains very little science, but it masterfully explores the social and moral repercussions of what might happen if certain scientific advances were possible.
Question486: The average normal infant born in the United States weighs between twelve and fourteen pounds at the age of three months. Therefore, if a three-month-old child weighs only ten pounds, its weight gain has been below the United States average.
Which of the following indicates a flaw in the reasoning above?
Question487: The imposition of quotas limiting imported steel will not help the big American steel mills. In fact, the quotas will help "mini-mills" flourish in the United States. Those small domestic mills will take more business from the big American steel mills than would have been taken by the foreign steel mills in the absence of quotas.
Which of the following, if true, would cast the most serious doubt on the claim made in the last sentence above?
Question488: An Australian group named Action Council on Smoking and Health (ACSH) has recently lobbied to make warnings on cigarette packets more graphic. The council proposed that striking visual photos of diseased organs should be put on at least 50% of outside packaging, in conjunction with health warnings outlining smoking hazards enumerated in a separate leaflet placed inside the cigarette packet. The ACSH claim that bland and ineffectual warnings like "Smoking is a health hazard" currently found on cigarette packets are not nearly sufficient.
Substituting those inadequate admonitions with explicit photos will provide a powerful visual stimulus to help smokers relinquish their habit. The current cautions on cigarette packets have little or no impact on smokers who have grown immune to the warnings that focus on abstract tobacco related risks and illnesses from which smokers can easily disassociate themselves. The proposed new tactics would concentrate on the perspective of the individual smoker through a demonstration of what is occurring in his body each time he reaches for a cigarette, rather than a generic cautionary word of advise.
The ACSH cited the results of recent studies conducted by psychologists at McKean University confirming that evidence related to one's own experience is more effective at influencing future behavior than a presentation of facts and figures. A further rationale for the addition of pictures to cigarette packages is the finding that smokers handle their packets 20-30 times a day, on average, thus, if graphic pictures on cigarette packets were introduced, smoker would have 20-30 chances to face the harsh reality of what damage they are doing to themselves each time they light up.
Even more essential than the pictures on the outside label, ACSH strongly advocate including warnings and helpful information in a leaflet inserted into the packet of cigarettes. Even an analgesic, ACSH adds, found in every bathroom cabinet has all possible side effects enumerated in the insert. How much more imperative is it then when the substance in question is tobacco, a dried weed that contains highly noxious nicotine that society still accepts even though it kills one of every two of its users.
Fundamentally, what is at stake here is consumer rights. Smokers should know what substances they are inhaling, and what damage they are inflicting to their bodies, though surprisingly, even today, many do not.
For this reason alone, the recommendation for more graphic pictures and warnings on cigarette packets, which many seem excessive, is being seriously considered.
The passage does NOT state which of the following about smoking warnings.
Question489: Which of the following best completes the passage below?
The unemployment rate in the United States fell from 7.5 percent in 1981 to 6.9 percent in 1986. It cannot, however, be properly concluded from these statistics that the number of unemployed in 1986 was lower than it had been in 1981 because ______
Question490: The tobacco industry is still profitable and projections are that it will remain so. In the United States this year, the total amount of tobacco sold by tobacco-farmers has increased, even though the number of adults who smoke has decreased.
Each of the following, if true, could explain the simultaneous increase in tobacco sales and decrease in the number of adults who smoke EXCEPT:
Question491: High levels of fertilizer and pesticides, needed when farmers try to produce high yield of the same crop year after year, pollute water supplies. Experts therefore urge farmers to diversify their crops and to rotate their plantings yearly.
To receive governmental price-support benefits for a crop, farmers must have produced that same crop for the past several years.
The statements above, if true, best support which of the following conclusions?
Question492: A manufacturer of men's dress socks sought to increase profits by increasing sales. The size of its customer pool was remaining steady, with the average customer buying twelve pairs of dress socks per year. The company's plan was to increase the number of promotional discount-sale periods to one every six months.
Which of the following, if it is a realistic possibility, casts the most serious doubt on the viability of the company's plan?
Question493: Working shorter workweeks causes managers to feel less stress than does working longer workweeks. In addition, greater perceived control over one's work life reduces stress levels. It can be concluded, therefore, that shorter workweeks cause managers to feel they have more control over their work life.
The argument made above uses which of the following questionable techniques?
Question494: Continuous indoor fluorescent light benefits the health of hamsters with inherited heart disease. A group of them exposed to continuous fluorescent light survived twenty-five percent longer than a similar group exposed instead to equal periods of indoor fluorescent light and of darkness.
The method of the research described above is most likely to be applicable in addressing which of the following questions?
Question495: For a generation of suppressed, restless, working-class youths living in 1960 Jamaica, ska was a medium through which they could find expression. Since its original appearance, ska has resurfaced twice, each time presenting itself in a different guise to a new generation of music aficionados. Overcoming its humble beginnings, it has become one of the twentieth century's most enduring and influential styles of music.
Since the early 1940's, Jamaica had adopted and adapted many forms of American musical styles. The predominantly black inhabitants of Jamaica took a liking to rhythm and blues music, importing a considerable number of American records that were showcased at dance halls in the early 1960s.
Jamaican musicians took up the elements of rhythm and blues and combined it with traditional Jamaican mento music. The result was the first wave of ska. Musically, ska is a shuffle rhythm similar to mento but with even closer ties to rhythm and blues, placing the accent on the second and fourth beats, often moving in a 12-bar blues frame. The after beat, played on the piano or strummed by a rhythm guitar, came to be characteristic of the form. A horn section, usually consisting of trumpets, trombones, and saxophones, was a vital element. Classic bands, such as the Wailers wrote songs written about Trench Town (a ghetto), rude boys (street thugs), romance, and even religious themes. In 1965, ska began to take a backseat to a newly evolved type of music, called rock steady, which was more dependent than ska had been on rhythm provided by the bass guitar and drums.
Ska was later exported by traveling Jamaican artists to Great Britain, where it became known as "blue beat." By the mid 1970's, early British punk bands were infusing reggae, a style of music that came from rock steady, into their music. Near the end of the decade, however, there was a resurgence of the influence of ska because of its upbeat, danceable rhythm. This faster paced ska came to be known as two tone. One of the essential messages of two-tone ska was the promotion of racial harmony and of having fun in the face of subjugation.
The third wave of ska began in America around 1990. Bands influenced by the two-tone ska scene began to use punk and metal music to a greater extent. The combination, which is much faster than two tone, sounds very different from the original Jamaican brand of ska.
In its three different waves, ska has given voice to seemingly voiceless, downtrodden generations. Each time it resurfaces, a new message is taken up; however, the old messages are never forgotten According to the passage, Ska music has
Question496: Red blood cells in which the malarial-fever parasite resides are eliminated from a person's body after 120 days. Because the parasite cannot travel to a new generation of red blood cells, any fever that develops in a person more than 120 days after that person has moved to a malaria-free region is not due to the malarial parasite.
Which of the following, if true, most seriously weakens the conclusion above?
Question497: Many state legislatures are considering proposals to the effect that certain policies should be determined not by the legislature itself but by public referenda in which every voter can take part. Critics of the proposals argue that the outcomes of public referenda would be biased, since wealthy special-interest groups are able to influence voters' views by means of television advertisements.
Which of the following, if true, most strengthens the critics' argument?
Question498: President of the United States: I have received over 2,000 letters on this issue, and the vast majority of them support my current position. These letters prove that most of the people in the country agree with me.
Which of the following, if true, most weakens the President's conclusion?
Question499: Gene therapy offers a new treatment paradigm for curing human disease. Rather than altering the disease phenotype by using agents that interact with gene products, or are themselves gene products, gene therapy can theoretically modify specific genes resulting in disease cure following a single administration.
Initially gene therapy was envisioned for the treatment of genetic disorders, but is currently being studied for use with a wide range of diseases, including cancer, peripheral vascular disease, arthritis, Neurodegenerative disorders and other acquired diseases.
Certain key elements are required for a successful gene therapy strategy. The most elementary of these is that the relevant gene be identified and cloned. Upon completion of the Human Genome Project, gene availability will be unlimited. Once identified and cloned, the next consideration must be expression of the gene. Questions pertaining to the efficiency of gene transfer and gene expression remain at the forefront of gene therapy research, with current debates revolving around the transfer of desired genes to appropriate cells, and then to obtaining sufficient levels of expression for disease treatment. With luck, future research on gene transfer and tissue-specific gene expression will resolve these issues for the majority of gene therapy protocols.
Other important considerations for a gene therapy strategy include a sufficient understanding of the pathogenesis of the targeted disorder, potential side effects of the gene therapy treatment, and a more in depth understanding of the target cells which are to receive gene therapy.
Gene transfer vector is the mechanism by which the gene is transferred into a cell. Currently there are at least 150 clinical gene therapy protocols worldwide. Since the approval process for these protocols is not as public outside the U.S., it is difficult to ascertain the exact number of worldwide protocols. As of December 1995, 1024 patients had been treated with either a gene transfer or gene therapy protocol.
Much controversy exists regarding how many of these patients have benefited from their gene therapy, and no one has yet been cured.
Public controversy in the field of human gene therapy is driven by several factors. Ordinary citizens as well as scientists easily understand the enormous potential of gene therapy, but the former may not appreciate all the pitfalls and uncertainly that lie in the immediate future. The financial interests of biotechnology firms and, some have asserted the career interests of some gene therapists have encouraged extravagant, or at least verily optimistic public statements about contemporary gene therapy. In spite of the proliferation of protocols, the actual number of patients treated remains small, and only one genuinely controlled study of human gene therapy has been published as of this date.
In the passage, the author anticipates which of the following as a possible obstacle to the introduction of gene therapy to mainstream medicine?
Question500: The ice on the front windshield of the car had formed when moisture condensed during the night. The ice melted quickly after the car was warmed up the next morning because the defrosting vent, which blows only on the front windshield, was turned on full force.
Which of the following, if true, most seriously jeopardizes the validity of the explanation for the speed with which the ice melted?
Question501: Y has been believed to cause Z.
A new report, noting that Y and Z are often observed to be preceded by X, suggests that X, not Y, may be the cause of Z.
Which of the following further observations would best support the new report's suggestion?
Question502: When the government of a nation announced recently that a leader of the nation's political opposition had died of a mysterious illness in prison, few seasoned observers of the regime were surprised. As the police captain in an old movie remarked when asked about the condition of a prisoner, "We're trying to decide whether he committed suicide or died trying to escape." The statements above invite which of the following conclusions?
Question503: Increases in the level of high-density lipoprotein (HDL) in the human bloodstream lower bloodstream- cholesterol levels by increasing the body's capacity to rid itself of excess cholesterol. Levels of HDL in the bloodstream of some individuals are significantly increased by a program of regular exercise and weight reduction.
Which of the following can be correctly inferred from the statements above?
Question504: Having logged thousands of hours watching primates from chimpanzees to macaques, chimps and other primates are no longer thought to be natural-born killers by Dr. Swenson, they are attuned to peacemaking.
Question505: Generally, marine biologists enter their field with the goal of doing important new research. They expect their colleagues to have similar goals. Therefore, when any marine biologist becomes a household name in the field of documentary nature films, most other scientists conclude that this biologist should no longer be regarded as a true colleague. The explanation offered above for the low esteem in which marine biologists who make documentary films are held by research scientists assumes that
Question506: Morning Glory, the coffee shop on the corner, has lost nearly 50% of its business because a national retail coffee chain opened up a store down the street. Instead of closing up shop, the owner of Morning Glory plans to draw in customers by offering coffee, tea, and pastries at much lower prices than the national coffee chain.
The owner's plan of action is based on all of the following assumptions EXCEPT
Question507: Demographers doing research for an international economics newsletter claim that the average per capita income in the country of Kuptala is substantially lower than that in the country of Bahlton. They also claim, however, that whereas poverty is relatively rare in Kuptala, over half the population of Bahlton lives in extreme poverty. At least one of the demographers' claims must, therefore, be wrong.
The argument above is most vulnerable to which of the following criticisms?
Question508: Typically, people think of genius, whether it manifests itself in Mozart composing symphonies at age five or Einstein's discovery of relativity, as having a quality not just of the supernatural but also they are eccentric.
Question509: Psychological research indicates that college hockey and football players are more quickly moved to hostility and aggression than are college athletes in no contact sports such as swimming. But the researchers' conclusion - that contact sports encourage and teach participants to be hostile and aggressive - is untenable. The football and hockey players were probably more hostile and aggressive to start with than the swimmers.
Which of the following, if true, would most strengthen the conclusion drawn by the psychological researchers?
Question510: Useful protein drugs, such as insulin, must still be administered by the cumbersome procedure of injection under the skin. If proteins are taken orally, they are digested and cannot reach their target cells. Certain nonprotein drugs, however, contain chemical bonds that are not broken down by the digestive system.
They can, thus, be taken orally.
The statements above most strongly support a claim that a research procedure that successfully accomplishes which of the following would be beneficial to users of protein drugs?
Question511: Insurance Company X is considering issuing a new policy to cover services required by elderly people who suffer from diseases that afflict the elderly. Premiums for the policy must be low enough to attract customers. Therefore, Company X is concerned that the income from the policies would not be sufficient to pay for the claims that would be made.
Which of the following strategies would be most likely to minimize Company X's losses on the policies?
Question512: Which of the following best completes the passage below?
The computer industry's estimate that it loses millions of dollars when users illegally copy programs without paying for them is greatly exaggerated. Most of the illegal copying is done by people with no serious interest in the programs. Thus, the loss to the industry is much smaller than estimated because______
Question513: Ralph Waldo Emerson, the renowned poet, essayist, and transcendentalist, believed that the universe is a transcendent "over-soul" and that every living thing is a part of this "blessed Unity."
Question514: Which of the following best completes the passage below?
In opposing government regulation of business, conservatives often appeal to the Jeffersonian ideal of limited government, expressing the wish that government would "get off the backs of the American people." Yet, paradoxically, many of these same conservatives address questions of private morality, such as those dealing with sexual behavior, by calling for______
Question515: In the course of her researches, a historian recently found two documents mentioning the same person, Erich Schnitzler. One, dated May 3, 1739, is a record of Schnitzler's arrest for peddling without a license.
The second, undated, is a statement by Schnitzler asserting that he has been peddling off and on for 20 years.
The facts above best support which of the following conclusions?
Question516: Which of the following best completes the passage below?
As long as savings deposits are insured by the government, depositors will have no incentive to evaluate the financial strength of a savings bank. Yield alone will influence their choice of bank. To attract deposits, banks will be forced to offer the highest possible interest rates. And since paying higher rates inevitably strains the financial strength of a bank, ______
Question517: Although its purpose is laudable, the exclusionary rule, which forbids a court to consider evidence seized in violation of the defendant's constitutional rights, has unduly hampered law-enforcement efforts. Even when the rights violation was a minor or purely technical one, turning on a detail of procedure rather than on the abrogation of some fundamental liberty, and even when it has been clear that the police officers were acting in good faith, the evidence obtained has been considered tainted under this rule and may not even by introduced. In consequence, defendants who were undoubtedly guilty have been set free, perhaps to steal, rape, or murder again.
The author of the passage above assumes all of the following EXCEPT:
Question518: Merco has been in business longer than Nolen. Inc, Olean Industries was founded years before the Potter Company, and the Potter Company was started years after the Quarles Corporation. Nolen, Inc., and the Quarles Corporation were founded in the same year.
If the information above is true, which of the following must also be true?
Question519: Republicans also benefited from the enthusiastic and well-organized support of conservative Christians concerning about social issues, including abortion.
Question520: Among the more effective kinds of publicity that publishers can get for a new book is to have excerpts of it published in a high-circulation magazine soon before the book is published. The benefits of such excerption include not only a sure increase in sales but also a fee paid by the magazine to the book's publisher.
Which of the following conclusions is best supported by the information above?
Question521: Half of the subjects in an experiment - the experimental group - consumed large quantities of a popular artificial sweetener. Afterward, this group showed lower cognitive abilities than did the other half of the subjects - the control group - who did not consume the sweetener. The detrimental effects were attributed to an amino acid that is one of the sweetener's principal constituents.
Which of the following, if true, would best help explain how the sweetener might produce the observed effect?
Question522: Some anthropologists study modern-day societies of foragers in an effort to learn about our ancient ancestors who were also foragers. A flaw in this strategy is that forager societies are extremely varied.
Indeed, any forager society with which anthropologists are familiar has had considerable contact with modern non forager societies.
Which of the following, if true, would most weaken the criticism made above of the anthropologists' strategy?
Question523: Considerable debate exists in the self-perception literature over the impact of positively biased self- perceptions on social and psychological functioning. Positively based self-perceptions are those in which an individual has a more positive opinion of himself than objective indicators warrant. One view suggests that positive perceptual biases are characteristic of normal human thought across a variety of domains and correlate positively with good mental and psychological health. Certain researchers and clinicians have even proposed that by boosting self-concepts, symptoms of depression and levels of aggression may be reduced.
Investigators on the other side of the debate maintain that when most positive self-perceptions are compared to an objective criterion, they appear neither positively biased nor adaptive. In fact, Baumeister, Smart, and Boden suggest that positively biased self-concepts may have a 'dark side'. They proposed that it is persons with very positive self-views who are prone to be aggressive. As a result, building up individuals' self-perceptions may serve only to increase levels of aggression rather than curb them.
According to Baumeister et al., not all individuals with positive self-perceptions are going to be interpersonally aggressive. Rather, individuals who are extremely positive in their perceptions of themselves and their functioning are proposed to be the most likely to become angry and potentially violent. The mechanism that triggers aggressive behavior by these individuals has been suggested to be negative social feedback that challenges their positive self-views. Such threats to positive self-esteem give rise to anger and hostility.
If negative social information is encountered that challenges established positive self-perceptions, Baumeister et al. propose that individuals must choose to either accept the feedback and lower their self- perceptions or reject the feedback to maintain their positive self-views. The chosen reaction then influences their subsequent affective states and behavioral expressions. By accepting the external appraisals and adjusting self-perceptions downward, dysphoric feelings and social withdrawal may result.
Conversely, the rejection of the validity of the unfavorable feedback results in feelings of anger and resentment toward the source of the threat. Dodge and colleagues demonstrated that children who interpret social cues as threatening direct their anger and aggression at the peers who gave the negative evaluations. Anger stemming from the receipt of social criticism is a way to deny the legitimacy of the negative information. By directing hostile reactions toward the source of the negative feedback, the influx of disconfirming information may end. Unless individuals react against the self-esteem threat, they may be compelled to revise their self-concepts negatively, in line with the information provided. By discounting the negative social feedback, individuals can protect themselves from dysphoric feelings and maintain their positively biased self-perceptions, but they may be setting themselves up to become interpersonally aggressive.
Although positively biased self-perceptions may place individuals at risk for negative social feedback and subsequent increases in aggressive behavior, not all positive self-concepts are suggested to be harmful.
The relationship between positive self-perceptions and aggression may depend on the degree of perceptual distortion (i.e., moderate vs. extreme distortion). Baumeister (1989) and Baumeister et al.
(1996) proposed that an optimal range of moderate bias might exist within which mental health is encouraged. Maladjustment in psychological and social functioning is suggested to occur when the degree of bias of self-perceptions shifts from moderate to extreme levels. Extremely negative and positive perceptual bias would be related to different but equally harmful difficulties.
According to the passage, which of the following is mentioned as a factor in determining whether an individual with positively biased self-perception would actually be likely to perform an act of violence?
Question524: Intuitively, intellectual skills and perceptual-motor skills seem very different because perceptual-motor skills appear more primitive. Ontogenetically, perceptual-motor skills develop before intellectual skills, or at least before most intellectual skills are manifested. Phylogenetically, creatures "high on the evolutionary ladder" are more obviously capable of intellectual skills than are creatures "lower down ".
Perceptual-motor skills also seem more closely tied to specific forms of expression. Being a chess player does not mean one can only play with pieces of a certain size, that one can only move pieces with one's right hand, and so on. By contrast, being a violinist means one can play an instrument whose size occupies a fairly narrow range and that one must play with a rather rigid assignment of functions to effectors (bowing with the right hand, and fingering with the left). The seeming narrowness of this perceptual-motor skill expression, contrasted with the seeming openness of intellectual skill expression, seems to follow from intellectual skills having symbolic outcomes and perceptual-motor skills having non- symbolic outcomes. Symbolic outcomes need not be realized in specific ways and can rely on abstract rules. Non-symbolic outcomes, by contrast, need more specific forms of realization and seem to depend on restricted associations between stimuli and response.
Another difference between intellectual and perceptual-motor skills is that the two kinds of skill seem to be represented in different parts of the brain. For example, structures homologous to the optic rectum, a nucleus located on the dorsal surface of the midbrain, have a common function in all vertebrates- coordinating visual, auditory, and somatosensory information relevant to the control of orienting movements of the eyes, ears, and head. Similarities in structure and function between these and other brain areas associated with perceptual-motor behavior suggest that mechanisms for control of perceptual- motor skills are both highly specialized and conserved across species. In contrast, what distinguishes the human brain from the brains of other species - even closely related ones - is the differential growth of brain regions most strongly associated with intellectual skills, such as the association areas of the cerebral cortex.
The contention that these areas serve intellectual functions is supported by a large body of clinical and experimental literature. Together, these diverse sources of information suggest that perceptual-motor and intellectual skills depend on distinct brain circuits.
The passage is chiefly concerned with
Question525: Having seen first-hand this recipe for disaster, Roberta Henson wished to make clear that free trade is unfair and that poor nations should be liberated from the one-size-fits-all trading model, promoted by the World Bank, the International Monetary Fund and the World Trade Organization.
Question526: Throughout the 1950's, there were increases in the numbers of dead birds found in agricultural areas after pesticide sprayings. Pesticide manufacturers claimed that the publicity given to bird deaths stimulated volunteers to look for dead birds, and that the increase in numbers reported was attributable to the increase in the number of people looking.
Which of the following statements, if true, would help to refute the claim of the pesticide manufacturers?
Question527: Samples from a ceramic vase found at a tomb in Sicily prove that the vase was manufactured in Greece.
Since the occupant of the tomb died during the reign of a Sicilian ruler who lived 2,700 years ago, the location of the vase indicates that there was trade between Sicily and Greece 2,700 years ago.
Which of the following is an assumption on which the argument depends?
Question528: In 1846 about 80 percent of the towns in New York State banned the sale of alcoholic beverages. A recent article about the bans concludes that mid-nineteenth-century supporters of the temperance movement were not residents of remote rural areas, as has often been asserted; rather, they were concentrated in centers of economic opportunity.
Which of the following, if true, best supports the conclusion reached in the article?
Question529: The country of Maravia has severe air pollution, 80 percent of which is caused by the exhaust fumes of cars. In order to reduce the number of cars on the road, the government is raising taxes on the cost of buying and running a car by 20 percent. This tax increase, therefore, will significantly reduce air pollution in Maravia.
Which of the following, if true, most seriously weakens the argument above?
Question530: In the 1970's there was an oversupply of college graduates. The oversupply caused the average annual income of college graduates to fall to a level only 18 percent greater than that of workers with only high school diplomas. By the late 1980's the average annual income of college graduates was 43 percent higher than that of workers with only high school diplomas, even though between the 1970's and the late
1980's the supply of college graduates did not decrease.
Which of the following, if true, in the late 1980's, best reconciles the apparent discrepancy described above?
Question531: The number of people diagnosed as having a certain intestinal disease has dropped significantly in a rural county this year, as compared to last year, Health officials attribute this decrease entirely to improved sanitary conditions at water-treatment plants, which made for cleaner water this year and thus reduced the incidence of the disease.
Which of the following, if true, would most seriously weaken the health officials' explanation for the lower incidence of the disease?
Question532: Company Alpha buys free-travel coupons from people who are awarded the coupons by Bravo Airlines for flying frequently on Bravo airplanes. The coupons are sold to people who pay less for the coupons than they would pay by purchasing tickets from Bravo. This marketing of coupons results in lost revenue for Bravo.
To discourage the buying and selling of free-travel coupons, it would be best for Bravo Airlines to restrict the
Question533: Firms adopting "profit-related-pay" (PRP) contracts pay wages at levels that vary with the firm's profits. In the metalworking industry last year, firms with PRP contracts in place showed productivity per worker on average 13 percent higher than that of their competitors who used more traditional contracts.
If, on the basis of the evidence above, it is argued that PRP contracts increase worker productivity, which of the following, if true, would most seriously weaken that argument?
Question534: Any tax relief received by the solar industry would not benefit the homeowner who installs a solar-energy system. Even though homeowners would pay a lower price for solar-energy system installations because of this tax relief, with the government paying the balance, government revenues come from the public.
The argument above is based on which of the following assumptions?
Question535: Like Carl Jung, Joseph Campbell believed that the archetypal story of the hero who ventures from the safety of his village, endures many trials and triumphs, and returns with knowledge or goods that will save or enlighten his people, is part of the collective unconscious of all humankind.
Question536: Which of the following best completes the passage below?
When a project is failing and should be terminated, plan to bring in a new manager. New managers are more likely to terminate the project than are the original managers because______
Question537: Recent estimates predict that between 1982 and 1995 the greatest increase in the number of people employed will be in the category of low-paying service occupations. This category, however, will not increase its share of total employment, whereas the category of high-paying service occupations will increase its share.
If the estimates above are accurate, which of the following conclusions can be drawn?
Question538: The labor market is changing yet again. Increasingly, American business is turning to interim staffing to cover a greater number of its employment vacancies. Once interim (or temporary) staffing was reserved for the lower-level positions requiring little training, such as an envelope stuffer, receptionist, day laborer, and the like. Today, however, a more highly trained professional is being sought for interim work. It is not uncommon to find computer programmers, writers, marketing professionals, CPAs, and even chief financial officers working in an interim capacity. The reasons for these changes in staffing norms are generated at both the employer and employee level. Employers are pushing the drive toward interim staffing in order to maintain maximum flexibility.
Companies can be more innovative and flexible in their planning cycles if they have the option to hire employees on an as-needed basis. Additionally, employers save money using interim staffers, as they are not required to provide health insurance to temporary workers and they are not obligated to pay severance when the job terminates. Employees, too, are pushing the trend toward interim staffing. Increasingly, professionals are seeking more flexibility in their work schedules-often in response to family obligations.
No longer does the permanent 9 to 5, Monday through Friday schedule work for everyone. By working interim, employees can work when it fits their schedules. However, interim staffing is not for everyone.
Organizations whose workflow requires continuity of personnel may find interim staffing an impediment to productivity. Likewise, employees who need a steady source of income or who require the health insurance and other benefits provided by permanent employers may find the unpredictability in interim work problematic.
Given the author's purpose, which of the following would most enhance this passage?
Question539: Mr. Lawson: We should adopt a national family policy that includes legislation requiring employers to provide paid parental leave and establishing government-sponsored day care. Such laws would decrease the stress levels of employees who have responsibility for small children. Thus, such laws would lead to happier, better-adjusted families.
Which of the following, if true, would most strengthen the conclusion above?
Question540: The National Institute on Drug Abuse Warning Network reported an increase both in the number of admissions to hospital emergency rooms nationwide that involved drug abuse and a change in procedures used in rehabilitation clinics.
Question541: In Millington, a city of 50,000 people, Mercedes Pedrosa, a realtor, calculated that a family with Millington's median family income, $28,000 a year, could afford to buy Millington's median-priced $77,000 house. This calculation was based on an 11.2 percent mortgage interest rate and on the realtor's assumption that a family could only afford to pay up to 25 percent of its income for housing.
Which of the following corrections of a figure appearing in the passage above, if it were the only correction that needed to be made, would yield a new calculation showing that even incomes below the median family income would enable families in Millington to afford Millington's median-priced house?
Question542: Mr. Primm: If hospitals were private enterprises, dependent on profits for their survival, there would be no teaching hospitals, because of the intrinsically high cost of running such hospitals.
Ms. Nakai: I disagree. The medical challenges provided by teaching hospitals attract the very best physicians. This, in turn, enables those hospitals to concentrate on no routine cases.
Which of the following, if true, would most strengthen Ms. Nakai's attempt to refute Mr. Primm's claim?
Question543: Lists of hospitals have been compiled showing which hospitals have patient death rates exceeding the national average. The data have been adjusted to allow for differences in the ages of patients.
Each of the following, if true, provides a good logical ground for hospitals to object to interpreting rank on these lists as one of the indices of the quality of hospital care EXCEPT:
Question544: Art is visible. However, everything one sees is filtered through certain conditions, some of them historical, and others, natural. The historical conditions include the material, which is used - oil, colors, and the canvas; second, a certain style, i.e., a system of rules by which things visible are submitted a priori. There can be a general style, for example, the style of Impressionism, or a particular style, for example, the individual ways in which two painters, both impressionists, paint. The natural conditions include certain unchanging psychological laws of sight, for instance, the effects of colors or optical illusions.
The conditions of art are nothing but a particular way of interpreting reality. To understand this, one can examine the difference between the classical Greek and the classical Egyptian styles. For the Greeks, the reality of the visible was given by the perspective and the situation in which the object appears; for that reason, they presented a person in his individual movements. For the Egyptians, however, this was only the appearance of a transitory moment, which, according to their beliefs, was not real. Therefore, the Egyptians searched for the permanent essence and the typical character in their depiction of an object. For the Egyptians, Greek art was an illusion; for the Greeks, on the other hand, Egyptian art was unrealistic constructivism.
The way in which reality appears in art must not be regarded on its own. It is affected by many other systems of recognizing reality, including the political, religious, economic, intellectual, and social - in short, all the phenomena of human life. Moreover, art is always of a certain epoch, with its particular conception of reality. Thus, when discussing, for example, the art of ancient myth, of medieval Christianity, or that of the technological age, one must be aware that myth, Christianity, or technology was the most salient feature of the epoch.
It is paradoxical to understand art as some kind of copy of the fields of experience connected with it. So, for example, it is meaningless for the work of art as such if one compares the landscape of a painting with the landscape, which served the artist as his model. Even if the artist had tried to make what he painted as similar as possible to the model he used, the landscape which he saw is only the matter from which something completely different emerges since he has submitted its view to the a priori conditions of art:
namely to the material used (colors, canvas, etc.), to his style, and even to the fact that he paints on a flat surface. Thus one must contemplate a work of art by itself. Even if it is connected to other fields of experience it nevertheless displays something unique which appears in that piece of art and there alone.
The author cites the example of psychological laws of sight, for instance, the effects of colors or optical illusions in order to illustrate
Question545: Employees that get a thorough medical examination twice a year take fewer sick days. Even employees who get examined only once a year take less sick time than those who do not get checked. Therefore, if companies instituted in-house medical examination programs, the absentee rate in those companies would decrease significantly.
Which of the following, if true, most seriously weakens the argument above?
Question546: Investing in real estate would be a profitable venture at this time. A survey in House magazine revealed that 85% of the magazine's readers are planning to buy a second home over the next few years. A study of the real estate industry, however, revealed that the current supply of homes could only provide for 65% of that demand each year.
Which of the following, if true, would undermine the validity of the investment advice in the paragraph above?
Question547: State X's income-averaging law allows a portion of one's income to be taxed at lower rate than the rate based on one's total taxable income. To use income averaging, the taxpayer must have earned taxable income for a particular year that exceeds 140 percent of his or her average taxable income for the previous three years. People using income averaging owe less tax for that year than they would without income averaging.
Which of the following individuals would be most seriously affected if income averaging were not permitted in computing the taxes owed for current year?
Question548: Both Writewell and Express provide round-the-clock telephone assistance to any customer who uses their word-processing software. Since customers only call the hot lines when they find the software difficult to use, and the Writewell hot line receives four times as many calls as the Express hot line, Writewell's word- processing software must be more difficult to use than Express's.
Which of the following, if true, most strengthens the argument above?
Question549: Juror anonymity was unknown to American common law and jurisprudence in the country's first two centuries. Anonymity was first employed in federal prosecutions of organized crime in New York in the
1980's. Although anonymous juries are unusual since they are typically only empanelled in organized- crime cases, its use has spread more recently to widely publicized cases, such as the federal prosecution of police officers accused of beating Rodney King and the trial of those accused of the 1993 World Trade Center bombing.
In these cases, attorneys selected a jury from a panel of prospective jurors whose names, addresses, ethnic backgrounds and religious affiliations remained unknown to either side. This unorthodox procedure, designed to protect jurors from outside influence and the fear of retaliation, has occasionally been employed in New York federal courts since the trial of drug kingpin Leroy "Nicky" Barnes. Despite apparent benefits, critics assail anonymous juries on the grounds that they are an infringement of the sixth amendment guarantee of an impartial jury and because they present a serious and unnecessary erosion of the presumption of innocence.
Since many attorneys believe trials are frequently won or lost during jury selection, any procedure diminishing the role of counsel in the procedure necessitates close scrutiny and criticism. Opponents of anonymous juries argue that the procedure restricts meaningful voir dire, (questioning of the jury panel), and thereby undermines the defendant's sixth amendment right to an impartial jury. Critics also claim that jurors interpret their anonymity as proof of the defendant's criminal proclivity, thereby subverting the presumption of innocence.
However, consistent with due process and the sixth amendment, the trial judge may refuse to ask prospective jurors any questions not reasonably calculated to expose biases or prejudices relevant to the case. Although addresses and group affiliations may indicate significant potential for bias, attorneys do not have an unfettered right to this information in every circumstance. Denying access to these facts may indeed constrain an attorney's ability to assemble an ideal jury, but it violates no constitutional right It can be inferred from the passage that a jurors ethnic background and religious affiliation
Question550: As literary criticism grows more complex, students majoring in specialized areas like those of post- colonialism and Marxist discourse have been becoming increasingly successful at finding positions in the faculties of top universities.
Question551: A researcher discovered that people who have low levels of immune-system activity tend to score much lower on tests of mental health than do people with normal or high immune-system activity. The researcher concluded from this experiment that the immune system protects against mental illness as well as against physical disease.
The researcher's conclusion depends on which of the following assumptions?
Question552: Over the last century, paleontologists have used small differences between fossil specimens to classify triceratops into sixteen species. This classification is unjustified, however, since the specimens used to distinguish eleven of the species come from animals that lived in the same area at the same time.
Which of the following, if true, would enable the conclusion of the argument to be properly drawn?
Question553: The strand fills with water during the rainy season that the peat then holds and keeps it humid, all of which creates conditions enabling trees to grow.
Question554: The proportion of manufacturing companies in Alameda that use microelectronics in their manufacturing processes increased from 6 percent in 1979 to 66 percent in 1990. Many labor leaders say that the introduction of microelectronics is the principal cause of the great increase in unemployment during that period in Alameda. In actual fact, however, most of the job losses were due to organizational changes.
Moreover, according to new figures released by the labor department, there were many more people employed in Alameda in the manufacturing industry in 1990 than in 1979.
Which of the following, if true, best reconciles the discrepancy between the increase in unemployment and the increase in jobs in the manufacturing industry of Alameda?
Question555: Which of the following best completes the passage below?
People buy prestige when they buy a premium product. They want to be associated with something special. Mass-marketing techniques and price-reduction strategies should not be used because______
Question556: For the safety-conscious Swedish market, a United States manufacturer of desktop computers developed a special display screen that produces a much weaker electromagnetic field surrounding the user than do ordinary screens. Despite an advantage in this respect over its competitors, the manufacturer is introducing the screen into the United States market without advertising it as a safety improvement.
Which of the following, if true, provides a rationale for the manufacturer's approach to advertising the screen in the United States?
Question557: Psychologists conducted a series of experiments to test the effect upon schoolchildren of violence in films.
In the first experiment, grammar school children were shown a film that included scenes of a male teenager engaging in violent acts against others, such as punching, pushing, and kicking. During a free- play session following the film viewing, 42 percent of the children were observed to engage in one or more violent acts similar to those in the film. In a second experiment, a different group of children was shown a similar film featuring a female teenager. Only 14 percent of the children were observed behaving violently afterward. The psychologists concluded that children are more likely to imitate violent behavior on film when a male model is shown than when a female model is shown.
Which of the following, if true, would most seriously weaken the psychologists' conclusion?
Question558: A new law gives ownership of patents-documents providing exclusive right to make and sell an invention
- to universities, not the government, when those patents result from government-sponsored university research. Administrators at Logos University plan to sell any patents they acquire to corporations in order to fund programs to improve undergraduate teaching.
Which of the following, if true, would cast most doubt on the viability of the college administrators' plan described above?
Question559: Technically a given category of insurance policy is under priced if, over time, claims against it plus expenses associated with it exceed total income from premiums. But premium income can be invested and will then yield returns of its own. Therefore, an under priced policy does not represent a net loss in every case.
The argument above is based on which of the following assumptions?
Question560: Because no employee wants to be associated with bad news in the eyes of a superior, information about serious problems at lower levels is progressively softened and distorted as it goes up each step in the management hierarchy. The chief executive is, therefore, less well informed about problems at lower levels than are his or her subordinates at those levels.
The conclusion drawn above is based on the assumption that
Question561: Eclampsia in pregnancy is especially prevalent among women who are seriously malnourished. In order to achieve early detection of eclampsia in these individuals, public health officials distributed pamphlets explaining the importance of early detection of this potentially fatal disease.
Which of the following, if true, is the best criticism of the use of the pamphlet as a method of achieving the public health officials' goal?
Question562: Ronald: According to my analysis of the national economy, housing prices should not increase during the next six months unless interest rates drop significantly.
Mark: I disagree. One year ago, when interest rates last fell significantly, housing prices did not increase at all.
It can be inferred from the conversation above that Mark has interpreted Ronald's statement to mean that
Question563: Generally scientists enter their field with the goal of doing important new research and accept as their colleagues those with similar motivation. Therefore, when any scientist wins renown as an expounder of science to general audiences, most other scientists conclude that this popularizer should no longer be regarded as a true colleague.
The explanation offered above for the low esteem in which scientific popularizes are held by research scientists assumes that
Question564: It is better for the environment if as much of all packaging as possible is made from materials that are biodegradable in landfills. Therefore, it is always a change for the worse to replace packaging made from paper or cardboard with packaging made from plastics that are not biodegradable in landfills.
Which of the following, if true, constitutes the strongest objection to the argument above?
Question565: A recent survey of all auto accident victims in Dole County found that, of the severely injured drivers and front-seat passengers, 80 percent were not wearing seat belts at the time of their accidents. This indicates that, by wearing seat belts, drivers and front-seat passengers can greatly reduce their risk of being severely injured if they are in an auto accident.
The conclusion above is not properly drawn unless which of the following is true?
Question566: In 1985 the city's Fine Arts Museum sold 30,000 single-entry tickets. In 1986 the city's Folk Arts and Interior Design museums opened, and these three museums together sold over 80,000 such tickets that year. These museums were worth the cost, since more than twice as many citizens are now enjoying the arts.
Which of the following, if true, most seriously weakens the author's assertion that more than twice as many citizens are now enjoying the arts?
Question567: Denying that one of its many irregularities had been the long-term mismanaging of company funds, the AD
& M company produced clear evidence to back its claim.
Question568: It is true that it is against international law to sell plutonium to countries that do not yet have nuclear weapons. But if United States companies do not do so, companies in other countries will.
Which of the following is most like the argument above in its logical structure?
Question569: A drug that is highly effective in treating certain types of cancerous growth can, at present, be obtained only from the cartilage of a particular sub-species of shark, a sub-species which is quite rare in the wild.
One must kill 50 sharks to make one pound of the drug. If follows, therefore, that continued production of the drug must inevitably lead to the extinction of this sub-species of shark.
Which of the following, if true, most seriously weakens the argument above?
Question570: The British colonies in North America attracted a mass immigration of religious dissenters and poor people throughout the 17th and 18th centuries, coming from all parts of the British Isles, Germany, the Netherlands, and other countries.
Question571: The cities with the densest population have the highest ratio of police officers to citizens. Such cities also have the lowest rates of property crime without contact between perpetrator and victim. Thus maintaining a high ratio of police officers to citizens can serve as an effective deterrent to at least certain kinds of property crime.
Which of the following, if true, most seriously weakens the argument above?
Question572: Activity levels of the green iguana vary in cycles that are repeated every 24 hours. It is logical to assume that alteration in the intensity of incident light is the stimulus that controls these daily biological rhythms.
But there is much evidence to contradict this hypothesis.
Which of the following, if known, is evidence that contradicts the hypothesis stated above?
Question573: On May 5th, 1997, the European edition of Business Tech Magazine led with Hoffman's cover story
"Internet Communities: How they're Shaping Electronic Commerce". This cover story highlights the extent to which the term virtual community has become almost synonymous with various forms of group-CMCs (computer mediated communication), including email-list forums, chat-systems such as IRC, web-based discussion areas and UseNet news-groups. There was no debate in the Business Tech Magazine article as to whether the group-CMC discussions are really 'communities', rather how community as opposed to content can be used to encourage people to return to a particular part of cyberspace for commercial gain.
In a similar vein, Simpson and Armstrong in "Internet Gain" argue that ignoring virtual communities would be a great loss of a marketing tool for businesses. They define virtual communities as computer mediated space where there is an integration of content and communication with an emphasis on member- generated content.
Not all virtual community commentators agree with the Spartan position taken by Hoffman. Rheingold, one of the prime popularizes of the term virtual community, provides us with a more emotive definition in his book The Virtual Community: Homesteading on the Electronic Frontier. According to Rheingold, "virtual communities are social aggregations that emerge from the Net when enough people carry on those public discussions long enough, with sufficient human feeling, to form webs of personal relationships in cyberspace". Rheingold's definition is extremely popular and has been quoted in many discussions about virtual communities. As discussed below, for social scientists, particularly sociologists, Rheingold's definition raises many issues, especially concerning the notion of community. This is because Rheingold argues via a variety of analogies from the real world such as homesteading that virtual communities are indeed new forms of "community". In fact, Rheingold implies that virtual communities are actually "a kind of ultimate flowering of community". Moreover, Rheingold maintains that whenever computer mediated communications technology becomes available; people inevitably create communities with it. Rheingold can thus be labeled as a technological determinist as he holds that there is a predictable relationship between technology and people's behavior.
The debate over the validity of Rheingold's position has raised doubts about the existence of virtual communities and the appropriate use of the term. Weinreich claims that the idea of virtual communities must be wrong because community is a collective of kinship networks that share a common geographic region, a common history, and a shared value system, usually rooted in a common religion. In other words, Weinreich rejects the existence of virtual communities because group-CMC discussions cannot possibly meet his definition. In Weinreich's view, anyone with even a basic knowledge of sociology understands that information exchange in no way constitutes a community.
The primary purpose of the passage is to
Question574: An annually conducted, nationwide survey shows a continuing marked decline in the use of illegal drugs by high school seniors over the last three years.
Which of the following, if true, casts most doubt on the relevance of the survey results described above for drawing conclusions about illegal drug use in the teen-age population as a whole?
Question575: In a political system with only two major parties, the entrance of a third-party candidate into an election race damages the chances of only one of the two major candidates. The third-party candidate always attracts some of the voters who might otherwise have voted for one of the two major candidates, but not voters who support the other candidate. Since a third-party candidacy affects the two major candidates unequally, for reasons neither of them has any control over, the practice is unfair and should not be allowed.
If the factual information in the passage above is true, which of the following can be most reliably inferred from it?
Question576: Arthur: Do animals have rights? Well, they have feelings, and I think if you can feel pain, you do have some rights, particularly the right not to have pain inflicted on you.
Brandon: Animals like lions would kill me if they were hungry for food. That inflicts pain on me, all right!
Which of the following is the best criticism of Brandon's response?
Question577: Sales taxes tend to be regressive, affecting poor people more severely than wealthy people. When all purchases of consumer goods are taxed at a fixed percentage of the purchase price, poor people pay a larger proportion of their income in sales taxes than wealthy people do.
It can be correctly inferred on the basis of the statements above that which of the following is true?
Question578: Any serious policy discussion about acceptable levels of risk in connection with explosions is not well served if the participants fail to use the word "explosion" and use the phrase "energetic disassembly" instead. In fact, the word "explosion" elicits desirable reactions, such as a heightened level of attention, whereas the substitute phrase does not. Therefore, of the two terms, "explosion" is the one that should be used throughout discussions of this sort.
Which of the following is an assumption on which the argument above depends?
Question579: Clarinet reeds often lose their freshness - become less responsive - after a few weeks of intense use.
One clarinetist has hypothesized that a buildup of oil, rather than changes in the material properties of the reed, were responsible.
Which of the following investigations is most likely to yield significant information that would help to evaluate the hypothesis?
Question580: The National Museum of American History owns Harley-Davidsons of various vintages on account of having evolved into an American touchstone.
Question581: With an increasing amount of vegetarians, more stores are beginning to stock their shelves with standard vegetarian fare, such as soy milk and tofu.
Question582: On May 5th, 1997, the European edition of Business Tech Magazine led with Hoffman's cover story
"Internet Communities: How they're Shaping Electronic Commerce". This cover story highlights the extent to which the term virtual community has become almost synonymous with various forms of group-CMCs (computer mediated communication), including email-list forums, chat-systems such as IRC, web-based discussion areas and UseNet news-groups. There was no debate in the Business Tech Magazine article as to whether the group-CMC discussions are really 'communities', rather how community as opposed to content can be used to encourage people to return to a particular part of cyberspace for commercial gain.
In a similar vein, Simpson and Armstrong in "Internet Gain" argue that ignoring virtual communities would be a great loss of a marketing tool for businesses. They define virtual communities as computer mediated space where there is an integration of content and communication with an emphasis on member- generated content.
Not all virtual community commentators agree with the Spartan position taken by Hoffman. Rheingold, one of the prime popularizes of the term virtual community, provides us with a more emotive definition in his book The Virtual Community: Homesteading on the Electronic Frontier. According to Rheingold, "virtual communities are social aggregations that emerge from the Net when enough people carry on those public discussions long enough, with sufficient human feeling, to form webs of personal relationships in cyberspace". Rheingold's definition is extremely popular and has been quoted in many discussions about virtual communities. As discussed below, for social scientists, particularly sociologists, Rheingold's definition raises many issues, especially concerning the notion of community. This is because Rheingold argues via a variety of analogies from the real world such as homesteading that virtual communities are indeed new forms of "community". In fact, Rheingold implies that virtual communities are actually "a kind of ultimate flowering of community". Moreover, Rheingold maintains that whenever computer mediated communications technology becomes available; people inevitably create communities with it. Rheingold can thus be labeled as a technological determinist as he holds that there is a predictable relationship between technology and people's behavior.
The debate over the validity of Rheingold's position has raised doubts about the existence of virtual communities and the appropriate use of the term. Weinreich claims that the idea of virtual communities must be wrong because community is a collective of kinship networks that share a common geographic region, a common history, and a shared value system, usually rooted in a common religion. In other words, Weinreich rejects the existence of virtual communities because group-CMC discussions cannot possibly meet his definition. In Weinreich's view, anyone with even a basic knowledge of sociology understands that information exchange in no way constitutes a community.
Weinreich rejects Rheingold's inclusion of virtual communities in the definition of communities for all of the following reasons EXCEPT
Question583: A light bulb company produces 2,000 light bulbs per week. The manager wants to ensure that standards of quality remain constant from week to week. The manager, therefore, claims that out of 2,000 light bulbs produced per week, 500 light bulbs are rejected.
Of the following, the best criticism of the manager's plan is that the plan assumes that
Question584: The woodland sub-species were in isolation from contact with humans longer than either their marsh cousins or the tree-dwelling sub-species.
Question585: A young man eager to become a master swordsman journeyed to the home of the greatest teacher of swordsmanship in the kingdom. He asked the teacher, "How quickly can you teach me to be a master swordsman?" The old teacher replied, "It will take ten years." Unsatisfied, the young man asked, "What if I am willing to work night and day, every day of the year?" the teacher replied, "In that case, it will take twenty years." The teacher's main point is that an important quality of a master swordsman is
Question586: To avoid a hostile takeover attempt, the board of directors of Wellco, Inc., a provider of life and health insurance, planned to take out large loans and use them to purchase a publishing company, a chocolate factory, and a nationwide chain of movie theaters. The directors anticipated that these purchase initially would plunge the corporation deep into debt, rendering it unattractive to those who wanted to take it over, but that steadily rising insurance rates would allow the company to pay off the debt within five years.
Meanwhile, revenues from the three new businesses would enable the corporation as a whole to continue to meet its increased operating expenses. Ultimately, according o the directors' plan, the diversification would strengthen the corporation by varying the sources and schedules of its annual revenues.
Which of the following, assuming that all are equally possible, would most enhance the chances of the plan's success?
Question587: The human body secretes more pain-blocking hormones late at night than during the day. Consequently, surgical patients operated on at night need less anesthesia. Since larger amounts of anesthesia pose greater risks for patients, the risks of surgery could be reduced if operations routinely took place at night.
Which of the following, if true, argues most strongly against the view that surgical risks could be reduced by scheduling operations at night?
Question588: Brianna's has been feeling jittery over the last three weeks. She has also been putting in extra hours at work, sometimes pulling double shifts. To stay alert, she has been drinking six or seven cups of coffee a day rather than her usual two or three cups. The jitters are interfering with her ability to do her work, so she has decided to stop drinking coffee altogether to eliminate the jitters. All of the following are valid criticisms of Brianais's plan of action EXCEPT
Question589: Magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) - a noninvasive diagnostic procedure - can be used to identify blockages in the coronary arteries. In contrast to angiograms - the invasive procedure customarily used
- MRI's pose no risk to patients. Thus, to guarantee patient safety in the attempt to diagnose arterial blockages, MRI's should replace angiograms in all attempts at diagnosing coronary blockages.
Which of the following, if true, would most support the recommendation above?
Question590: Suitable habitats for gray wolves have greatly diminished in area. In spite of this fact, the most sensible course would be to refrain from reestablishing gray wolves in places where previously they have been hunted out of existence. Striving to bring back these animals to places where they will only face lethal human hostility is immoral.
The argument above depends on
Question591: If a latter-day Robinson Crusoe was marooned on an island with an eclectic mix of palms, he could eat dates and coconut meat, relax in a palm recliner in his palm-post bungalow under a palm-thatch roof, buff his palm-plank surfboard with carnauba palm wax and watch a palm-fringed sunset.
Question592: Two experimental garden plots were each planted with the same number of tomato plants. Magnesium salts were added to the first plot but not to the second. The first plot produced 20 pounds of tomatoes and the second plot produced 10 pounds. Since nothing else but water was added to either plot, the higher yields in the first plot must have been due to the magnesium salts.
Which of the following, if true, most seriously weakens the argument above?
Question593: Teenagers are often priced out of the labor market by the government-mandated minimum-wage level because employers cannot afford to pay that much for extra help. Therefore, if Congress institutes a subminimum wage, a new lower legal wage for teenagers, the teenage unemployment rate, which has been rising since 1960, will no longer increase.
Which of the following, if true, would most weaken the argument above?
Question594: A study comparing a group of chronically depressed individuals with an otherwise matched group of individuals free from depression found significantly more disorders of the immune system among the depressed group. According to the researchers, these results strongly support the hypothesis that mental states influence the body's vulnerability to infection.
Which of the following, if true, casts the most serious doubt on the researchers' interpretation of their findings?
Question595: Bill: Smoke-detecting fire alarms can save lives. I believe that every apartment in this city should be required by law to be equipped with a smoke detector.
Joe: I disagree with your proposal. Smoke detectors are just as important for safety in private houses as they are in apartment.
From this exchange, it can be inferred that Joe has interpreted Bill's statement to mean that
Question596: When hypnotized subjects are told that they are deaf and are then asked whether they can hear the hypnotist, they reply, "No." Some theorists try to explain this result by arguing that the selves of hypnotized subjects are dissociated into separate parts, and that the part that is deaf is dissociated from the part that replies.
Which of the following challenges indicates the most serious weakness in the attempted explanation described above?
Question597: The original Star Wars film (1977), in which Luke Skywalker saved Princess Leia and battled against the evil Empire, was followed by two equally successful sequels-The Empire Strikes back and Return of the Jedi. Nearly 25 years later, the Star Wars prequels have arrived, and they are even more successful than the original series. The prequels (The Phantom Menace, Attack of the Clones, and the soon-to-be released Episode III) have shattered box office records, filling theaters with audiences of young children, teenagers, and adults alike.
Which of the following conclusions can properly be drawn from this statement?
Question598: Take a very commonplace, often discussed and critical topic: Are we detecting a greenhouse effect, and related to this, is it exacerbated by "homogenic factors," i.e., human actions? Most would be inclined to give a positive answer to both of these questions. But, if pushed, what would be the evidence, and how well grounded would it be for such affirmations?
Within scientific communities and associated scientifically informed circles, the answers have to be somewhat more ambiguous, particularly when rigorous questions concerning evidence are raised. Were scientific truth to be a matter of consensus, and some argue that scientific truth often turns out to be just that, then it is clear that there is beginning to be a kind of majority consensus among many earth science practitioners that the temperature of the Earth, particularly of the oceans, is indeed rising and that this is a crucial indicator for a possible greenhouse effect.
Most of these scientists admit that the mean oceanic temperature has risen globally in the last several decades. But this generalization depends upon how accurate measurements may be, not just for samples, but also for the whole Earth. Hot spots, for example the now four year old hot spot near New Guinea which is part of the El Niño cycle, does not count by itself because it might be balanced by cold spots elsewhere.
And the fact of the matter is that "whole earth measurements" are still rare and primitive in the simple sense that we simply do not have enough thermometers out. Secondly, even if we had enough thermometers, a simply synchronic whole earth measurement over three decades is but a blip in the diachronic history of ice age cycles over the last tens of thousands of years. Thirdly, even if we know that the earth is now heating up, has an ever increasing ozone hole, and from this strange weather effects can be predicted, how much of this is due to homogenic factors, such as CFCs, CO2 increases, hydrocarbon burning, and the like? Is it really the case, as Science magazine claimed in l990, "24% of greenhouse encouraging gases are of homogenic origin"?
It can be inferred from the passage that
Question599: Studies of fatal automobile accidents reveal that, in the majority of cases in which one occupant of an automobile is killed while another survives, it is the passenger, not the driver, who is killed. It is ironic that the innocent passenger should suffer for the driver's carelessness, while the driver often suffers only minor injuries or none at all.
Which of the following is an assumption underlying the reasoning in the passage above?
Question600: Exports of United States wood pulp will rise considerably during this year. The reason for the rise is that the falling value of the dollar will make it cheaper for paper manufacturers in Japan and Western Europe to buy American wood pulp than to get it from any other source.
Which of the following is an assumption made in drawing the conclusion above?
Question601: An airplane engine manufacturer developed a new engine model with safety features lacking in the earlier model, which was still being manufactured. During the first year that both were sold, the earlier model far outsold the new model; the manufacturer thus concluded that safety was not the customers' primary consideration.
Which of the following, if true, would most seriously weaken the manufacturer's conclusion?
Question602: A weapons-smuggling incident recently took place in country Y.
We all know that Y is a closed society. So Y's government must have known about the weapons.
Which of the following is an assumption that would make the conclusion above logically correct?
Question603: In 1990 all of the people who applied for a job at Evco also applied for a job at Radeco, and Evco and Radeco each offered jobs to half of these applicants. Therefore, every one of these applicants must have been offered a job in 1990.
The argument above is based on which of the following assumptions about these job applicants?
Question604: A cost-effective solution to the problem of airport congestion is to provide high-speed ground transportation between major cities lying 200 to 500 miles apart. The successful implementation of this plan would cost far less than expanding existing airports and would also reduce the number of airplanes clogging both airports and airways.
Which of the following, if true, could proponents of the plan above most appropriately cite as a piece of evidence for the soundness of their plan?
Question605: Caterpillars of all species produce an identical hormone called "juvenile hormone" that maintains feeding behavior. Only when a caterpillar has grown to the right size for pupation to take place does a special enzyme halt the production of juvenile hormone. This enzyme can be synthesized and will, on being ingested by immature caterpillars, kill them by stopping them from feeding.
Which of the following, if true, most strongly supports the view that it would not be advisable to try to eradicate agricultural pests that go through a caterpillar stage by spraying croplands with the enzyme mentioned above?
Question606: Cable-television spokesperson: Subscriptions to cable television are a bargain in comparison to "free" television. Remember that "free" television is not really free. It is consumers, in the end, who pay for the costly advertising that supports "free" television.
Which of the following, if true, is most damaging to the position of the cable-television spokesperson?
Question607: Today, children whose parents are deemed incapable of caring for them are put into foster care. These children are moved into strangers' homes, where they are cared for until their own parents can regain custody, which may not happen for years, if it happens at all. Although it means well, the current foster care program is so poorly funded, staffed, and managed that it cannot ensure the safety and wellbeing of the children in the system. The laudable idea behind foster care is that children will fare best if placed in a family setting until they can be reunited with their parents, even if it is a family of strangers. However, while in foster care, children typically get shuffled between many different foster homes, preventing them from developing long-term, supportive relationships with their foster families. Foster care placements can also force siblings to be separated, further isolating these vulnerable children. When a child is moved to a new foster home, he or she may also have to enroll in a new school, a disruptive process that has a negative impact on the child's education. The bureaucracy that oversees this system is overwhelmed to the point that social workers are unable to adequately screen potential foster parents and keep accurate track of the children placed in foster care. There must be a better means of caring for these children. Perhaps it is time to consider creating special group homes as a means of providing these children with stable and safe environments.
A child could live in one group home for the duration of his or her time in foster care and be supervised by a team of social workers and other lay people. Children would receive proper meals and healthcare, attend the same school, and develop relationships with others experiencing the trauma of being separated from their parents. In addition, social workers and staff would have daily access to these children, enabling them to better determine if a child has a special physical or psychological need and arrange for the necessary services. Would this approach be perfect? No, but it would solve many of the problems that plague the current system. For some, the idea of a government agency housing, clothing, and feeding needy children may sound extreme, but it only suggests that we provide these children with the same basic necessities that we give to prison inmates.
According to the passage, a group home system has all of the following advantages over the current foster care system EXCEPT
Question608: Every painting hanging in the Hoular Gallery is by a French painter. No painting in the Hoular Gallery is by a Vorticist. Only Vorticists use acrylic monochromes in their works.
If the information above is true, which of the following must also be true?
Question609: Partly because of bad weather, but also partly because some major pepper growers have switched to high-priced cocoa, world production of pepper has been running well below worldwide sales for three years. Pepper is consequently in relatively short supply. The price of pepper has soared in response: it now equals that of cocoa.
Which of the following can be inferred from the passage?
Question610: In order for us within our society to be able to make decisions about the kinds of punishments we impose upon those criminals who are convicted of crimes, we must first understand why we punish criminals.
Question611: A famous painter has recently won a lawsuit against a major food manufacturer for commissioning a graphic designer to design the packaging of its chocolate chip cookies in the painter's distinctive style. As a result of the lawsuit, manufacturers will stop asking graphic artists to copy distinctive painting styles.
Therefore, the cost of package design will rise because employing the services of known artists cost more than those of graphic designer that imitate their style.
The conclusion above is based on which of the following assumptions?
Question612: Tocqueville, a nineteenth-century writer known for his study of democracy in the United States, believed that a government that centralizes power in one individual or institution is dangerous to its citizens.
Biographers claim that Tocqueville disliked centralized government because he blamed Napoleon's rule for the poverty of his childhood in Normandy.
Which of the following, if true, would cast the most serious doubt on the biographers' claim?
Question613: Some commentators complain that a "litigation explosion" in the past decade has led to unreasonably high costs for U.S. businesses by encouraging more product liability suits against manufacturers. However, these complaints are based mainly on myth. Statistics show that the number of successful product liability suits has remained almost the same, and the average sum awarded in damages has grown no faster than the inflation rate.
Which of the following, if true, would most weaken the argument above?
Question614: No nation can long survive unless its people are united by a common tongue. For proof, we need only consider Canada, which is being torn asunder by conflicts between French-speaking Quebec and the other provinces, which are dominated by English speakers.
Which of the following, if true, most effectively challenges the author's conclusion?
Question615: Common stocks, which are shares of ownership in a corporation, is the most direct way to participate in the fortunes of a company.
Question616: Which of the following, if true, most seriously weakens the economist's argument?
Question617: Mannis Corporation's archival records are stored in an obsolete format that is accessible only by its current computer system; thus they are inaccessible when that system is not functioning properly. In order to avoid the possibility of losing access to their archival records in the case of computer malfunction, Mannis plans to replace its current computer system with a new system that stores records in a format that is accessible to several different systems.
The answer to which of the following questions would be most helpful in evaluating the effectiveness of the plan as a means of retaining access to the archival records?
Question618: A company is considering changing its policy concerning daily working hours. Currently, this company requires all employees to arrive at work at 8 a.m. The proposed policy would permit each employee to decide when to arrive-from as early as 6 a.m. to as late as 11 a.m.
The adoption of this policy would be most likely to decrease employees' productivity if the employees' job functions required them to
Question619: A study of marital relationships in which one partner's sleeping and waking cycles differ from those of the other partner reveals that such couples share fewer activities with each other and have more violent arguments than do couples in a relationship in which both partners follow the same sleeping and waking patterns. Thus, mismatched sleeping and waking cycles can seriously jeopardize a marriage.
Which of the following, if true, most seriously weakens the argument above?
Question620: The recent decline in the value of the dollar was triggered by a prediction of slower economic growth in the coming year. But that prediction would not have adversely affected the dollar had it not been for the government's huge budget deficit, which must therefore be decreased to prevent future currency declines.
Which of the following, if true, would most seriously weaken the conclusion about how to prevent future currency declines?
Question621: In the United States, the Postal Service has a monopoly on first-class mail, but much of what is sent first class could be transmitted electronically. Electronic transmittal operators argue that if the Postal Service were to offer electronic transmission, it would have an unfair advantage, since its electronic transmission service could be subsidized from the profits of the monopoly.
Which of the following questions can be answered on the basis of the information in the passage above?
Question622: Advertisement: Of the many over-the-counter medications marketed for the relief of sinus headache. Sine Ease costs the least per dose. And Sine Ease is as effective per dose as the most effective of those other medications. So for relief from sinus headaches, Sine Ease is the best buy.
Which of the following, if true, most seriously weakens the argument above?
Question623: The postal service is badly mismanaged. Forty years ago, first-class letter delivery cost only three cents.
Since then, the price has increased nearly tenfold, with an actual decrease in the speed and reliability of service.
Each of the following statements, if true, would tend to weaken the argument above EXCEPT:
Question624: As part of our program to halt the influx of illegal immigrants, the administration is proposing the creation of a national identity card. The card would be available only to U.S. citizens and to registered aliens, and all persons would be required to produce the card before they could be given a job. Of course, such a system holds the potential, however slight, for the abuse of civil liberties. Therefore, all personal information gathered through this system would be held strictly confidential, to be released only by authorized personnel under appropriate circumstances. Those who are in compliance with U.S. laws would have nothing to fear from the identity card system.
In evaluating the above proposal, a person concerned about the misuse of confidential information would be most interested in having the author clarify the meaning of which of the following phrases?
Question625: Although aspirin has been proven to eliminate moderate fever associated with some illnesses, many doctors no longer routinely recommend its use for this purpose. A moderate fever stimulates the activity of the body's disease-fighting white blood cells and also inhibits the growth of many strains of disease- causing bacteria.
If the statements above are true, which of the following conclusions is most strongly supported by them?
Question626: Seven countries signed a treaty binding each of them to perform specified actions on a certain fixed date, with the actions of each conditional on simultaneous action taken by the other countries. Each country was also to notify the six other countries when it had completed its action.
The simultaneous-action provision of the treaty leaves open the possibility that
Question627: In Argonia the average rate drivers pay for car accident insurance is regulated to allow insurance companies to make a reasonable profit. Under the regulations, the rate any individual driver pays never depends on the actual distance driven by that driver each year. Therefore, Argonians who drive less than average partially subsidize the insurance of those who drive more than average.
The conclusion above would be properly drawn if it were also true that in Argonia
Question628: Electric boats have eliminated the noise pollution that conventional powerboats made and reduce the loathsome discharges of oil that foul American rivers and lakes, threatening fish and bird life.
Question629: Currently people in the United States eat, on the average, 1,431 pounds of food per year, 35 pounds more than in 1980. This increase is, at least in part, because people between the ages of 15 and 64 have accounted for an increasing share of the population.
Which of the following can be properly inferred from the passage above?
Question630: The amount of time it takes for most of a worker's occupational knowledge and skills to become obsolete has been declining because of the introduction of advanced manufacturing technology (AMT). Given the rate at which AMT is currently being introduced in manufacturing, the average worker's old skills become obsolete and new skills are required within as little as five years.
Which of the following plans, if feasible, would allow a company to prepare most effectively for the rapid obsolescence of skills described above?
Question631: For a local government to outlaw all strikes by its workers is a costly mistake, because all its labor disputes must then be settled by binding arbitration, without any negotiated public-sector labor settlements guiding the arbitrators. Strikes should be outlawed only for categories of public-sector workers for whose services no acceptable substitute exists.
The statements above best support which of the following conclusions?
Question632: The opponents could effectively defend their position against the author's strategy by pointing out that
Question633: For years, Americans have been told to stay away from fat. Feeding the market of those anxiously watching their waistlines, food manufacturers have filled grocery store shelves with low-fat and fat-free foods. Now, however, some researchers are blaming the fat-free craze for the American crisis of obesity.
Foods without fat, they argue, leave us feeling unsatisfied and craving even more food. As a result, we end up eating a whole bag of low-fat potato chips when we would have only eaten half a bag of regular (fat- laden) potato chips.
Which of the following is the most logical conclusion that can be drawn from the passage?
Question634: Home insurance premiums are typically set after an appraiser assigns an official assessed value.
Reassessments should be frequent in order to remove distortions that arise when property value changes at differential rates. In actual fact, however, properties are reassessed only when they stand to benefit the insurance company. In other words, a reassessment takes place when the most likely outcome is in increase in insurance premiums to the homeowner.
Which of the following, if true, describes a situation in which a reassessment should occur but in unlikely to do so?
Question635: Since 1975 there has been in the United States a dramatic decline in the incidence of traditional childhood diseases such as measles. This decline has been accompanied by an increased incidence of Peterson's disease, a hitherto rare viral infection, among children. Few adults, however, have been affected by the disease.
Which of the following, if true, would best help to explain the increased incidence of Peterson's disease among children?
Question636: The exhibition of ancient Egyptian funerary art - imposing statues, intricately painted coffins, and numerous accoutrements, drew hundreds of people each day, equivalent to the number of visitors to last year's Impressionist show.
Question637: The expansion of the influence of the Gregorian calendar system in non-European regions can be traced from European colonies such as India and Egypt, and the independent countries, replacing traditional calendars at least for official purposes.
Question638: The expedition did not enter the water-filled clearing because it believed that to do it endangers the rare Spanish moss hanging from the trees.
Question639: A conservation group in the United States is trying to change the long-standing image of bats as frightening creatures. The group contends that bats are feared and persecuted solely because they are shy animals that are active only at night.
Which of the following, if true, would cast the most serious doubt on the accuracy of the group's contention?
Question640: Which of the following best completes the passage below?
Monarch butterflies, whose average life span is nine months, migrate from the Midwestern United States to selected forests outside Mexico City. It takes at least three generations of monarchs to make the journey, so the great-great-grandchildren who finally arrive in the Mexican forests have never been there before.
Yet they return to the same trees their forebears left. Scientists theorize that monarchs, like homing pigeons, map their routes according to the earth's electromagnetic fields. As a first step in testing this theory, lepidopterists plan to install a low-voltage transmitter inside one grove of "butterfly trees" in the Mexican forests. If the butterflies are either especially attracted to the grove with the transmitter or especially repelled by it, lepidopterists will have evidence that______
Question641: Roland: The alarming fact is that 90 percent of the people in this country now report that they know someone who is unemployed.
Sharon: But a normal, moderate level of unemployment is 5 percent, with 1 out of 20 workers unemployed.
So at any given time if a person knows approximately 50 workers, 1 or more will very likely be unemployed.
Sharon's argument is structured to lead to which of the following as a conclusion?
Question642: Millions of identical copies of a plant can be produced using new tissue-culture and cloning techniques.
If plant propagation by such methods in laboratories proves economical, each of the following, if true, represents a benefit of the new techniques to farmers EXCEPT:
Question643: With the proliferation of electronic technologies in the latter part of the twentieth century, many aspects of cultural practice have been redefined. The eradication of physical boundaries that limit discourse and information access has had profound effects upon the manner in which we conduct democracy. Yet, opinions strongly differ over whether or not the growth of electronic networks will result in expanded democracy. On one side of the debate are anti-utopians who fear that with the intrusion of the Internet into many facets of life, personal freedom will be impeded and the existing rift between the "haves" and "have- nots" in society will grow. On the other side, many 'cyber-utopians' believe that new technologies can eliminate the democracy of elected representatives with which so many people are dissatisfied. The Internet, they say, will allow for a true participatory democracy in which citizens can govern themselves without the interference of bureaucrats and legislators.
Neither of these theories by themselves can fully address the role of democracy in the age of information.
As debates about censorship and encryption have shown, government regulation of the Internet can result in violations of the basic rights of speech set forth in the constitution of the United States. Yet, groups that preach 'Big Brother' theories of paranoia tend to neglect the fact that new technologies can help balance the injustices of traditional power found in a centralized government. At the same time, the likelihood of doing away with the present system of democracy in favor of complete and pure self-governance seems impossible and likely undesirable.
Both arguments about the future of the way in which discourse will occur highlight the inherent relationship between communication and democracy. Perhaps a more useful model for the study of this dynamic can be found in the model of the public sphere proposed by Jorgen Habermas. In this realm, free and diverse equals come together to deliberate and discuss pertinent issues without the impediment of external coercion. The ensuing dialogue transpires in a profoundly democratic forum. The dispensing of traditional hierarchies that occurs on the Internet appears to make possible the type of categories necessary for Habermas 'ideal speech situation to occur.
However, postmodern critics indicate that the autonomous individual no longer exists in a world where our identities are constructed as much for us as by us. And indeed, much of the postmodern notion of self seems to fit closely with reconfigurations of the subject brought on by electronic technologies. The question that arises then is how might the reconfiguration of communication enabled by the Internet work to create a new form of cyber-democracy' that better represents citizen's interests?
According to the passage, which of the following is considered by postmodern critics to be a threat to the notion of self?
Question644: Reva: Using extraneous incentives to get teenagers to change their attitude toward school and schoolwork won't work. Take the program in West Virginia, for instance, where they tried to reduce their dropout rate by revoking the driving licenses of kids who left school. The program failed miserably.
Anne: It's true that the West Virginia program failed, but many schools have devised incentive programs that have been very successful in improving attendance and reducing discipline problems.
According to Anne, the weak point in Reva's claim is that it
Question645: In her old apartment, Hermione had trouble sleeping. She had difficulty falling asleep and would wake up several times in the night. Since Hermione moved from that apartment into her new home, she has been sleeping better. She is able to fall asleep quickly and usually stays asleep through the night. All of the following, if true, could account for the phenomenon described in the passage EXCEPT
Question646: It will improve education, make government at all levels more cost-effective and user friendly, reduce health-car costs while improving quality, and give communities new ways to address problems such as crime and pollution.
Question647: Some analysts maintain that an embargo by country Litora on the export of a strategic metal to country Zenda, if imposed, would drive up the price of the metal in Zenda at least tenfold. They note that few other countries export the metal and that, with an embargo, Zenda might have to depend on as-yet-unexploited domestic sources of the metal.
Which of the following, if true, constitutes the most serious objection to the analysis above?
Question648: Guitar strings often go "dead" - become less responsive and bright in tone - after a few weeks of intense use. A researcher whose son is a classical guitarist hypothesized that dirt and oil, rather than changes in the material properties of the string, were responsible.
Which of the following investigations is most likely to yield significant information that would help to evaluate the researcher's hypothesis?
Question649: The CEO of Black's International has proposed replacing their Marmacil semiconductor manufacturing equipment with Fasttech equipment since it costs 30 percent less to train new staff on the Fasttech equipment. Those opposed to the change have pointed out the savings in training cost does not justify the change. Instead, they suggested that the company hire only people who already know how to use the Marmacil equipment.
Which of the following, if true, most seriously undermines the objection to the replacement of Marmacil semiconductor manufacturing equipment with Fasttechs?
Question650: The financial hub of a business management information system (MIS) is accounting, the system of recording, analyzing, and reporting economic transactions.
Question651: In 1981, for the first time in over two decades, the average scores of high school students on standardized math and English tests did not decline. During the same year, millions of American students enjoyed their first exposure to the new world of the microcomputer, whether in schools, video arcades, or other settings.
The conclusion is clear: far from stultifying the intellectual capacities of students, exposure to computers can actually enhance them.
The most serious weakness of the argument above is its failure to
Question652: A company's personnel director surveyed employees about their satisfaction with the company's system for awarding employee performance ratings. The survey data indicated that employees who received high ratings were very satisfied with the system. The personnel director concluded from these data that the company's best-performing employees liked the system.
The personnel director's conclusion assumes which of the following?
Question653: Holden's Ltd. two subsidiaries performed with remarkable consistency over the past five years: in each of those years, Lexton has accounted for roughly 30 percent of dollar sales and 60 percent of profits, and Still more for the balance.
Which of the following can properly be inferred regarding the past five years from the statement above?
Question654: Although perioral dermatitis rashes are believed to be caused by reactions to Sodium Laurel Sulfate (SLS) found in shampoos and other personal care products, instructing patients to eliminate all products with SLS frequently does not stop the perioral dermatitis. Obviously, some other cause of perioral dermatitis besides reactions to SLS must exist.
Which of the following, if true, would most seriously weaken the conclusion above?
Question655: The cost of manufacturing sports shoes in Macao is 25% less than the cost of manufacturing them in the Philippines. Even after transportation fees and tariff charges are added, it is still cheaper for a company to import sport shoes from Macao to the Philippines than to manufacture sports shoes in the Philippines.
The statements above, if true, best support which of the following assertions?
Question656: Today, children whose parents are deemed incapable of caring for them are put into foster care. These children are moved into strangers' homes, where they are cared for until their own parents can regain custody, which may not happen for years, if it happens at all. Although it means well, the current foster care program is so poorly funded, staffed, and managed that it cannot ensure the safety and wellbeing of the children in the system. The laudable idea behind foster care is that children will fare best if placed in a family setting until they can be reunited with their parents, even if it is a family of strangers. However, while in foster care, children typically get shuffled between many different foster homes, preventing them from developing long-term, supportive relationships with their foster families. Foster care placements can also force siblings to be separated, further isolating these vulnerable children. When a child is moved to a new foster home, he or she may also have to enroll in a new school, a disruptive process that has a negative impact on the child's education. The bureaucracy that oversees this system is overwhelmed to the point that social workers are unable to adequately screen potential foster parents and keep accurate track of the children placed in foster care. There must be a better means of caring for these children. Perhaps it is time to consider creating special group homes as a means of providing these children with stable and safe environments.
A child could live in one group home for the duration of his or her time in foster care and be supervised by a team of social workers and other lay people. Children would receive proper meals and healthcare, attend the same school, and develop relationships with others experiencing the trauma of being separated from their parents. In addition, social workers and staff would have daily access to these children, enabling them to better determine if a child has a special physical or psychological need and arrange for the necessary services. Would this approach be perfect? No, but it would solve many of the problems that plague the current system. For some, the idea of a government agency housing, clothing, and feeding needy children may sound extreme, but it only suggests that we provide these children with the same basic necessities that we give to prison inmates.
It can be inferred from the passage that the author
Question657: Biometric access-control systems - those using fingerprints, voiceprints, etc., to regulate admittance to restricted areas - work by degrees of similarity, not by identity. After all, even the same finger will rarely leave exactly identical prints. Such systems can be adjusted to minimize refusals of access to legitimate access-seekers. Such adjustments, however, increase the likelihood of admitting impostors.
Which of the following conclusions is most strongly supported by the information above?
Question658: Whenever a major airplane accident occurs, there is a dramatic increase in the number of airplane mishaps reported, a phenomenon that may last for as long as a few months after the accident. Airline officials assert that the publicity given the gruesomeness of major airplane accidents focuses media attention on the airline industry and the increase in the number of reported accidents is caused by an increase in the number of news sources covering airline accident, not by an increase in the number of accidents.
Which of the following, if true, would seriously weaken the assertions of the airline officials?
Question659: Read the passage carefully and then choose the best answer to each question. Answer the question based upon what is stated or implied in the reading passage.
In Ursula LeGuin's short story "The Ones Who Walk Away from Omelas," everyone in the city of Omelas is happy - everyone, that is, except the child who is kept locked in a basement closet. The child is left entirely alone and neglected except for occasional visits from the citizens of Omelas. They come at a certain age as a rite of initiation, to learn the secret of the happiness they enjoy. They come to learn that their happiness has a price: the suffering of an innocent child. In the end, most people stay in Omelas; but a few, unable to bear the fact that they are responsible for the suffering of that child, reject this utopia built upon a utilitarian morality.
Utilitarianism is an ethical theory based upon the belief that happiness is the ultimate good and that people should use happiness as the measure for determining right and wrong. For utilitarian, the right thing to do is that which will bring about the greatest amount of happiness for the greatest number of people.
Furthermore, utilitarianism argues that the intention of people's actions does not matter; only the consequences of their actions are morally relevant, because only the consequences determine how much happiness is produced.
Although many useful social policies and much legislation are founded on this "greatest good" philosophy, utilitarianism can be problematic as a basis for morality. First, happiness is not so easy to quantify, and any measurement is bound to be subjective. Second, in a theory that treats everything except happiness as instrumentally rather than intrinsically valuable, anything - or, more importantly, anyone - can (and should) be treated as a means to an end, if it means greater happiness. This rejects the notion that human beings have their own intrinsic value. Further, utilitarianism puts the burden of the happiness of the masses on the suffering of the few. Is the happiness of many worth the suffering of a few? Why do those few deserve to suffer? Isn't this burden of suffering morally irresponsible? This is the dilemma so brilliantly illustrated in LeGuin's story.
Utilitarianism could best be expressed in which of the following formulas?
X _ action
Y _ consequences that create happiness
Z _ consequences that create unhappiness
Question660: Freud's theories of the workings of the mind, while brilliant for their day, were formulated before most of this century's great advances in neurophysiology and biochemistry. Today, we have a far deeper understanding of the biological components of thought, emotion, and behavior than was dreamed of eighty years ago. It would be foolish to continue parroting Freud's psychological theories as if these advances had never occurred.
It can be inferred from the passage above that the author would be most likely to favor
Question661: Art is visible. However, everything one sees is filtered through certain conditions, some of them historical, and others, natural. The historical conditions include the material, which is used - oil, colors, and the canvas; second, a certain style, i.e., a system of rules by which things visible are submitted a priori. There can be a general style, for example, the style of Impressionism, or a particular style, for example, the individual ways in which two painters, both impressionists, paint. The natural conditions include certain unchanging psychological laws of sight, for instance, the effects of colors or optical illusions.
The conditions of art are nothing but a particular way of interpreting reality. To understand this, one can examine the difference between the classical Greek and the classical Egyptian styles. For the Greeks, the reality of the visible was given by the perspective and the situation in which the object appears; for that reason, they presented a person in his individual movements. For the Egyptians, however, this was only the appearance of a transitory moment, which, according to their beliefs, was not real. Therefore, the Egyptians searched for the permanent essence and the typical character in their depiction of an object. For the Egyptians, Greek art was an illusion; for the Greeks, on the other hand, Egyptian art was unrealistic constructivism.
The way in which reality appears in art must not be regarded on its own. It is affected by many other systems of recognizing reality, including the political, religious, economic, intellectual, and social - in short, all the phenomena of human life. Moreover, art is always of a certain epoch, with its particular conception of reality. Thus, when discussing, for example, the art of ancient myth, of medieval Christianity, or that of the technological age, one must be aware that myth, Christianity, or technology was the most salient feature of the epoch.
It is paradoxical to understand art as some kind of copy of the fields of experience connected with it. So, for example, it is meaningless for the work of art as such if one compares the landscape of a painting with the landscape, which served the artist as his model. Even if the artist had tried to make what he painted as similar as possible to the model he used, the landscape which he saw is only the matter from which something completely different emerges since he has submitted its view to the a priori conditions of art:
namely to the material used (colors, canvas, etc.), to his style, and even to the fact that he paints on a flat surface. Thus one must contemplate a work of art by itself. Even if it is connected to other fields of experience it nevertheless displays something unique which appears in that piece of art and there alone.
The author mentions which of the following as one of the conditions through which art is seen?
Question662: In the past, teachers, bank tellers, and secretaries were predominantly men; these occupations slipped in pay and status when they became largely occupied by women. Therefore, if women become the majority in currently male-dominated professions like accounting, law, and medicine, the income and prestige of these professions will also drop.
The argument above is based on
Question663: If there is an oil-supply disruption resulting in higher international oil prices, domestic oil prices in open- market countries such as the United States will rise as well, whether such countries import all or none of their oil.
If the statement above concerning oil-supply disruptions is true, which of the following policies in an open- market nation is most likely to reduce the long-term economic impact on that nation of sharp and unexpected increases in international oil prices?
Question664: Economies in which a high percentage of resources are invested in research and development show greater growth in the long run than do those in which resources are channeled into consumption.
Japanese workers spend a higher percentage of their income investing in research and development than do American workers.
To grow as fast as Japan has in the past three decades, the United States must change the tax code in order to encourage savings and investment and discourage debt.
Which of the following, if true, tends to weaken the argument?
Question665: Consumers in California seeking personal loans have fewer banks to turn to than do consumers elsewhere in the United States. This shortage of competition among banks explains why interest rates on personal loans in California are higher than in any other region of the United States.
Which of the following, if true, most substantially weakens the conclusion above?
Question666: The situation is too serious to guess hazardously, we need more data to draw a real conclusion.
Question667: Contrary to earlier predictions, demand for sugarcane has not increased in recent years. Yet, even though prices and production amounts have also been stable during the last three years, sugarcane growers last year increased their profits by more than ten percent over the previous year's level.
Any of the following statements, if true, about last year, helps to explain the rise in profits EXCEPT:
Question668: In a marketing study, consumers were given two unlabeled cartons of laundry detergent. One carton was bright green and yellow; the other was drab brown and gray. After using the detergent in the two cartons for one month, 83 percent of the consumers in the study reported that the detergent in the bright green and yellow carton cleaned better. This study shows that packaging has a significant impact on consumers' judgment of the effectiveness of a laundry detergent.
Which of the following, if true, would most strengthen the conclusion drawn in the marketing study?
Question669: Sales of telephones have increased dramatically over the last year. In order to take advantage of this increase, Mammoth Industries plans to expand production of its own model of telephone, while continuing its already very extensive advertising of this product.
Which of the following, if true, provides most support for the view that Mammoth Industries cannot increase its sales of telephones by adopting the plan outlined above?
Question670: The Asian American History Association receives approximately 1,000 proposals each year from individuals who wish to present papers at its annual meeting. The association's officers would like to ensure constant standards of quality in the presentations from year to year. The officers have therefore decided to accept for presentation each year only the best 300 papers selected on the basis of the quality of the proposals submitted.
Of the following, the best criticism of the officers' plan is that the plan assumes that
Question671: Each increase of 1 percent in real disposable personal income per capita will increase the share of the electorate for an incumbent by about 2.2 percentage points, other things being equal. Since 1952 there has been a decline in real disposable income during only one presidential election year. The incumbent lost that election.
Which of the following conclusions can be properly drawn from the statements above?
Question672: Although parapsychology is often considered a pseudoscience, it is in fact a genuine scientific enterprise, for it uses scientific methods such as controlled experiments and statistical tests of clearly stated hypotheses to examine the questions it raises.
The conclusion above is properly drawn if which of the following is assumed?
Question673: Of those person who became teachers in 1968 and who later left the profession, 30 percent today earn salaries above $35,000 a year: of those who became teachers in 1968 and have remained in the profession, only 15 percent today earn salaries above $35,000 a year. These figures indicate how underpaid teachers are today.
The argument above depends on which of the following assumptions about the persons for whom statistics are cited?
Question674: Recombinant DNA technology allows scientists to cut segments of DNA from one type of organism and combine them with the genes of a second organism, also called genetic engineering.
Question675: Dr. Kevorkian, the so-called suicide doctor, on November 5 was imprisoned in Wayne County Jail in Detroit for his alleged role in the suicides of two men, and he then began a hunger strike.
Question676: A private bus company gained greater profits and provided bus service to the area at lower fares by running buses more frequently and stimulating greater rider ship. Hoping to continue these financial trends, the company plans to replace all older buses with new, larger buses, including some double-decker buses.
The plan of the bus company as described above assumes all of the following EXCEPT
Question677: Archaeologists have found wheeled ceramic toys made by the Toltec, twelfth-century inhabitants of what is now Vera Cruz. Although there is no archaeological evidence that the Toltec used wheels for anything but toys, some anthropologists hypothesize that wheeled utility vehicles were used to carry materials needed for the monumental structures the Toltec produced.
Which of the following, if true, would most help the anthropologists explain the lack of evidence noted above?
Question678: Technological improvements have made electric cars far more cost-efficient in the last decade. However, the threshold of economic viability for electric cars (that is, the cost of running an electric car compared to a gasoline powered car) has remained unchanged.
Which of the following, if true, does most to help explain why the increased cost-efficiency of electric cars has not decreased its threshold of economic viability?
Question679: Environmentalist: The commissioner of the Fish and Game Authority would have the public believe that increases in the number of marine fish caught demonstrate that this resource is no longer endangered.
This is a specious argument, as unsound as it would be to assert that the ever-increasing rate at which rain forests are being cut down demonstrates a lack of danger to that resource. The real cause of the increased fish-catch is a greater efficiency in using technologies that deplete resources.
The environmentalist's statements, if true, best support which of the following as a conclusion?
Question680: In 1984 Exco, which sells its products only through mail-order catalogs, began distributing its catalog to people who had never purchased Exco's products, while it continued to distribute the catalog to previous customers. Total dollar sales increased in 1984, but Exco's profits that year were smaller than in 1983.
Which of the following, if true, contributes most to an explanation of Exco's smaller profits in 1984, as compared to 1983?
Question681: Human beings can see the spatial relations among objects by processing information conveyed by light.
Scientists trying to build computers that can detect spatial relations by the same kind of process have so far designed and built stationary machines. However, these scientists will not achieve their goal until they produce such a machine that can move around in its environment.
Which of the following, if true, would best support the prediction above?
Question682: In 1985 in the country of Alissia, farmers brought to market a broccoli crop that was one-and-a-half times as large as the 1985 broccoli crop in its neighbor country, Barbera. Yet total quantities of broccoli available for sale to consumers in Alissia were smaller than were total quantities in Barbera in 1985.
Which of the following, if true, in 1985, contributes most to an explanation of why there was less broccoli available for sale to consumers in Alissia than in Barbera?
Question683: An Australian group named Action Council on Smoking and Health (ACSH) has recently lobbied to make warnings on cigarette packets more graphic. The council proposed that striking visual photos of diseased organs should be put on at least 50% of outside packaging, in conjunction with health warnings outlining smoking hazards enumerated in a separate leaflet placed inside the cigarette packet. The ACSH claim that bland and ineffectual warnings like "Smoking is a health hazard" currently found on cigarette packets are not nearly sufficient.
Substituting those inadequate admonitions with explicit photos will provide a powerful visual stimulus to help smokers relinquish their habit. The current cautions on cigarette packets have little or no impact on smokers who have grown immune to the warnings that focus on abstract tobacco related risks and illnesses from which smokers can easily disassociate themselves. The proposed new tactics would concentrate on the perspective of the individual smoker through a demonstration of what is occurring in his body each time he reaches for a cigarette, rather than a generic cautionary word of advise.
The ACSH cited the results of recent studies conducted by psychologists at McKean University confirming that evidence related to one's own experience is more effective at influencing future behavior than a presentation of facts and figures. A further rationale for the addition of pictures to cigarette packages is the finding that smokers handle their packets 20-30 times a day, on average, thus, if graphic pictures on cigarette packets were introduced, smoker would have 20-30 chances to face the harsh reality of what damage they are doing to themselves each time they light up.
Even more essential than the pictures on the outside label, ACSH strongly advocate including warnings and helpful information in a leaflet inserted into the packet of cigarettes. Even an analgesic, ACSH adds, found in every bathroom cabinet has all possible side effects enumerated in the insert. How much more imperative is it then when the substance in question is tobacco, a dried weed that contains highly noxious nicotine that society still accepts even though it kills one of every two of its users.
Fundamentally, what is at stake here is consumer rights. Smokers should know what substances they are inhaling, and what damage they are inflicting to their bodies, though surprisingly, even today, many do not.
For this reason alone, the recommendation for more graphic pictures and warnings on cigarette packets, which many seem excessive, is being seriously considered.
Which of the following, if true, would be most useful in supporting the claims made by the ACSH?
Question684: Known as the Australian Eleanor Roosevelt, Jessie Street lived a life in privilege while at the same time devoting her efforts to working for the rights of the disenfranchised, including workers, women, refugees, and Aborigines.
Question685: Statement of a United States copper mining company: Import quotas should be imposed on the less expensive copper mined outside the country to maintain the price of copper in this country; otherwise, our companies will not be able to stay in business.
Response of a United States copper wire manufacturer: United States wire and cable manufacturers purchase about 70 percent of the copper mined in the United States. If the copper prices we pay are not at the international level, our sales will drop, and then the demand for United States copper will go down.
If the factual information presented by both companies is accurate, the best assessment of the logical relationship between the two arguments is that the wire manufacturer's argument
Question686: A company has initiated a health program for its employees that enables the worker, free of charge, to receive a monthly massage treatment, consult with a dietician and attend lectures in healthy living. These programs increase worker productivity and absenteeism for employee health care. Therefore, these programs provide as much benefit to the company as they do to the employees.
Which of the following, if true, most significantly strengthens the conclusion above?
Question687: Which of the following, if true, best completes the argument below?
Comparisons of the average standards of living of the citizens of two countries should reflect the citizens' comparative access to goods and services. Reliable figures in a country's own currency for the average income of its citizens are easily obtained. But it is difficult to get an accurate comparison of average standards of living from these figures, because______
Question688: Companies O and P each have the same number of employees who work the same number of hours per week. According to records maintained by each company, the employees of Company O had fewer job- related accidents last year than did the employees of Company P.
Therefore, employees of Company O are less likely to have job-related accidents than are employees of Company P.
Which of the following, if true, would most strengthen the conclusion above?
Question689: In many surveys, American consumers have expressed a willingness to spend up to 10 percent more for products that are ecologically sound. Encouraged by such surveys, Bleach-O Corporation promoted a new laundry detergent, Bleach-O Green, as safer for the environment. Bleach-O Green cost 5 percent more than typical detergents. After one year, Bleach-O Green had failed to capture a significant share of the detergent market and was withdrawn from sale.
Which of the following questions is LEAST likely to be relevant in determining the reasons for the failure of Bleach-O Green?
Question690: Which of the following best completes the passage below?
The more worried investors are about losing their money, the more they will demand a high potential return on their investment; great risks must be offset by the chance of great rewards. This principle is the fundamental one in determining interest rates, and it is illustrated by the fact that______
Question691: As one who has always believed that truth is our nation's surest weapon in the propaganda war against our foes, I am distressed by reports of "disinformation" campaigns by American intelligence agents in Western Europe. In a disinformation campaign, untruths are disseminated through gullible local journalists in order to damage the interests of our enemies and protect our own. Those who defend this practice say that lying is necessary to counter Soviet disinformation campaigns aimed at damaging America's political interests. These apologists contend that one must fight fire with fire. I would point out to the apologists that the fire department finds water more effective The author's main point is that
Question692: Correctly measuring the productivity of service workers is complex. Consider, for example, postal workers:
they are often said to be more productive if more letters are delivered per postal worker. But is this really true? What if more letters are lost or delayed per worker at the same time that more are delivered?
The objection implied above to the productivity measure described is based on doubts about the truth of which of the following statements?
Question693: The cotton farms of Country Q became so productive that the market could not absorb all that they produced. Consequently, cotton prices fell. The government tried to boost cotton prices by offering farmers who took 25 percent of their cotton acreage out of production direct support payments up to a specified maximum per farm.
The government's program, if successful, will not be a net burden on the budget. Which of the following, if true, is the best basis for an explanation of how this could be so?
Question694: They were in mind, of a like manner about how to handle Carson's breach of contract.
Question695: Today, children whose parents are deemed incapable of caring for them are put into foster care. These children are moved into strangers' homes, where they are cared for until their own parents can regain custody, which may not happen for years, if it happens at all. Although it means well, the current foster care program is so poorly funded, staffed, and managed that it cannot ensure the safety and wellbeing of the children in the system. The laudable idea behind foster care is that children will fare best if placed in a family setting until they can be reunited with their parents, even if it is a family of strangers. However, while in foster care, children typically get shuffled between many different foster homes, preventing them from developing long-term, supportive relationships with their foster families. Foster care placements can also force siblings to be separated, further isolating these vulnerable children. When a child is moved to a new foster home, he or she may also have to enroll in a new school, a disruptive process that has a negative impact on the child's education. The bureaucracy that oversees this system is overwhelmed to the point that social workers are unable to adequately screen potential foster parents and keep accurate track of the children placed in foster care. There must be a better means of caring for these children. Perhaps it is time to consider creating special group homes as a means of providing these children with stable and safe environments.
A child could live in one group home for the duration of his or her time in foster care and be supervised by a team of social workers and other lay people. Children would receive proper meals and healthcare, attend the same school, and develop relationships with others experiencing the trauma of being separated from their parents. In addition, social workers and staff would have daily access to these children, enabling them to better determine if a child has a special physical or psychological need and arrange for the necessary services. Would this approach be perfect? No, but it would solve many of the problems that plague the current system. For some, the idea of a government agency housing, clothing, and feeding needy children may sound extreme, but it only suggests that we provide these children with the same basic necessities that we give to prison inmates.
The passage suggests that the idea of creating group homes in lieu of foster care
Question696: Affirmative action is good business. So asserted the National Association of Manufacturers while urging retention of an executive order requiring some federal contractors to set numerical goals for hiring minorities and women. "Diversity in work force participation has produced new ideas in management, product development, and marketing," the association claimed.
The association's argument as it is presented in the passage above would be most strengthened if which of the following were true?
Question697: Companies in the country of Kollontay can sell semiconductors in the country of Valdivia at a price that is below the cost to Valdivian companies of producing them. To help those Valdivian companies, the Valdivian legislature plans to set a minimum selling price in Valdivia for semiconductors manufactured in Kollontay that is ten percent greater than the average production costs for companies in Valdivia.
Which of the following, if true, most seriously threatens the success of the plan?
Question698: A certain mayor has proposed a fee of five dollars per day on private vehicles entering the city, claiming that the fee will alleviate the city's traffic congestion. The mayor reasons that, since the fee will exceed the cost of round-trip bus fare from many nearby points, many people will switch from using their cars to using the bus.
Which of the following statements, if true, provides the best evidence that the mayor's reasoning is flawed?
Question699: Art is visible. However, everything one sees is filtered through certain conditions, some of them historical, and others, natural. The historical conditions include the material, which is used - oil, colors, and the canvas; second, a certain style, i.e., a system of rules by which things visible are submitted a priori. There can be a general style, for example, the style of Impressionism, or a particular style, for example, the individual ways in which two painters, both impressionists, paint. The natural conditions include certain unchanging psychological laws of sight, for instance, the effects of colors or optical illusions.
The conditions of art are nothing but a particular way of interpreting reality. To understand this, one can examine the difference between the classical Greek and the classical Egyptian styles. For the Greeks, the reality of the visible was given by the perspective and the situation in which the object appears; for that reason, they presented a person in his individual movements. For the Egyptians, however, this was only the appearance of a transitory moment, which, according to their beliefs, was not real. Therefore, the Egyptians searched for the permanent essence and the typical character in their depiction of an object. For the Egyptians, Greek art was an illusion; for the Greeks, on the other hand, Egyptian art was unrealistic constructivism.
The way in which reality appears in art must not be regarded on its own. It is affected by many other systems of recognizing reality, including the political, religious, economic, intellectual, and social - in short, all the phenomena of human life. Moreover, art is always of a certain epoch, with its particular conception of reality. Thus, when discussing, for example, the art of ancient myth, of medieval Christianity, or that of the technological age, one must be aware that myth, Christianity, or technology was the most salient feature of the epoch.
It is paradoxical to understand art as some kind of copy of the fields of experience connected with it. So, for example, it is meaningless for the work of art as such if one compares the landscape of a painting with the landscape, which served the artist as his model. Even if the artist had tried to make what he painted as similar as possible to the model he used, the landscape which he saw is only the matter from which something completely different emerges since he has submitted its view to the a priori conditions of art:
namely to the material used (colors, canvas, etc.), to his style, and even to the fact that he paints on a flat surface. Thus one must contemplate a work of art by itself. Even if it is connected to other fields of experience it nevertheless displays something unique which appears in that piece of art and there alone.
By asserting that art is filtered through certain conditions (line???), the author suggests which of the following?
Question700: While Governor Verdant has been in office, the state's budget has increased by an average of 6 percent each year. While the previous governor was in office, the state's budget increased by an average of 11.5 percent each year. Obviously, the austere budgets during Governor Verdant's term have caused the slowdown in the growth in state spending.
Which of the following, if true, would most seriously weaken the conclusion drawn above?
Question701: Read each passage carefully and then choose the best answer to each question. Answer the questions based upon what is stated or implied in the reading passage.
For many years, there has been much hand-wringing over the fate of Social Security once the baby boomers reach retirement age. Baby boomers, people born between 1946 and 1964, represent the largest single sustained growth of population in the history of the United States. It is the sheer enormity of this generation that has had economists worried as retirement beckons. According to the U.S. Census Bureau, by 2020, an estimated 80,000,000 Americans will have reached or surpassed the conventional age of retirement. With so many boomers retiring and drawing benefits but no longer paying into Social Security, many fear that the Social Security fund itself could go bankrupt.
However, a study released by the American Association for Retired Persons (AARP) that examined baby boomers' plans for retirement found that for the most part, this generation is not expected to adhere to the conventional retirement scheme, a fact that may please the worriers in Washington, DC.
In its survey, the AARP broke baby boomers into different categories based on their financial standing, degree of preparedness for retirement, and optimism toward the future. The AARP found that of all groups surveyed, only 13% planned to stop working altogether once they reached retirement age; the remaining
87% planned to continue working for pay. The reasons to continue working varied among the different groups. For some, the plan to continue working is a financial decision. Between 25% and 44% of respondents reported they are not financially prepared to retire and will therefore continue working past retirement age. For the remainder of those planning to work past their mid to late 60s, the decision is based on long-held goals to start a business and/or the desire to stay active in their industry or community.
Eventually, most baby boomers will need to stop working as they progress into their 70s, 80s, and beyond.
But with such large numbers planning to continue working, thereby continuing to pay into the Social Security fund, perhaps Social Security will be able to withstand the end of the baby boom and continue to be a safety net for future generations.
Which of the following titles would be most appropriate for this passage?
Question702: The greatest failure of modern American society is its rejection of the extended family. It is no wonder our society is so violent and so many Americans feel a deep sense of isolation and overwhelming stress.
This argument is based on all of the following assumptions EXCEPT
Question703: People tend to estimate the likelihood of an event's occurrence according to its salience; that is, according to how strongly and how often it comes to their attention.
By placement and headlines, newspapers emphasize stories about local crime over stories about crime elsewhere and about many other major events.
It can be concluded on the basis of the statements above that, if they are true, which of the following is most probably also true?
Question704: Government policies should ensure that network owners charge nondiscriminatory prices to any client who wants to use their home network to distribute information.
Question705: The labor market is changing yet again. Increasingly, American business is turning to interim staffing to cover a greater number of its employment vacancies. Once interim (or temporary) staffing was reserved for the lower-level positions requiring little training, such as an envelope stuffer, receptionist, day laborer, and the like. Today, however, a more highly trained professional is being sought for interim work. It is not uncommon to find computer programmers, writers, marketing professionals, CPAs, and even chief financial officers working in an interim capacity. The reasons for these changes in staffing norms are generated at both the employer and employee level. Employers are pushing the drive toward interim staffing in order to maintain maximum flexibility.
Companies can be more innovative and flexible in their planning cycles if they have the option to hire employees on an as-needed basis. Additionally, employers save money using interim staffers, as they are not required to provide health insurance to temporary workers and they are not obligated to pay severance when the job terminates. Employees, too, are pushing the trend toward interim staffing. Increasingly, professionals are seeking more flexibility in their work schedules-often in response to family obligations.
No longer does the permanent 9 to 5, Monday through Friday schedule work for everyone. By working interim, employees can work when it fits their schedules. However, interim staffing is not for everyone.
Organizations whose workflow requires continuity of personnel may find interim staffing an impediment to productivity. Likewise, employees who need a steady source of income or who require the health insurance and other benefits provided by permanent employers may find the unpredictability in interim work problematic.
The main purpose of this passage is to
Question706: The people who are least likely to be audited by the Internal Revenue Service this year are those who have been audited since 1985 and who were found to have made no mistakes in filing their returns during that audit.
Of the following people, who is MOST likely to be audited by the IRS?
Question707: Read each passage carefully and then choose the best answer to each question. Answer the questions based upon what is stated or implied in the reading passage.
For many years, there has been much hand-wringing over the fate of Social Security once the baby boomers reach retirement age. Baby boomers, people born between 1946 and 1964, represent the largest single sustained growth of population in the history of the United States. It is the sheer enormity of this generation that has had economists worried as retirement beckons. According to the U.S. Census Bureau, by 2020, an estimated 80,000,000 Americans will have reached or surpassed the conventional age of retirement. With so many boomers retiring and drawing benefits but no longer paying into Social Security, many fear that the Social Security fund itself could go bankrupt.
However, a study released by the American Association for Retired Persons (AARP) that examined baby boomers' plans for retirement found that for the most part, this generation is not expected to adhere to the conventional retirement scheme, a fact that may please the worriers in Washington, DC.
In its survey, the AARP broke baby boomers into different categories based on their financial standing, degree of preparedness for retirement, and optimism toward the future. The AARP found that of all groups surveyed, only 13% planned to stop working altogether once they reached retirement age; the remaining
87% planned to continue working for pay. The reasons to continue working varied among the different groups. For some, the plan to continue working is a financial decision. Between 25% and 44% of respondents reported they are not financially prepared to retire and will therefore continue working past retirement age. For the remainder of those planning to work past their mid to late 60s, the decision is based on long-held goals to start a business and/or the desire to stay active in their industry or community.
Eventually, most baby boomers will need to stop working as they progress into their 70s, 80s, and beyond.
But with such large numbers planning to continue working, thereby continuing to pay into the Social Security fund, perhaps Social Security will be able to withstand the end of the baby boom and continue to be a safety net for future generations.
The author cites statistics from the AARP survey primarily to
Question708: Intuitively, intellectual skills and perceptual-motor skills seem very different because perceptual-motor skills appear more primitive. Ontogenetically, perceptual-motor skills develop before intellectual skills, or at least before most intellectual skills are manifested. Phylogenetically, creatures "high on the evolutionary ladder" are more obviously capable of intellectual skills than are creatures "lower down ".
Perceptual-motor skills also seem more closely tied to specific forms of expression. Being a chess player does not mean one can only play with pieces of a certain size, that one can only move pieces with one's right hand, and so on. By contrast, being a violinist means one can play an instrument whose size occupies a fairly narrow range and that one must play with a rather rigid assignment of functions to effectors (bowing with the right hand, and fingering with the left). The seeming narrowness of this perceptual-motor skill expression, contrasted with the seeming openness of intellectual skill expression, seems to follow from intellectual skills having symbolic outcomes and perceptual-motor skills having non- symbolic outcomes. Symbolic outcomes need not be realized in specific ways and can rely on abstract rules. Non-symbolic outcomes, by contrast, need more specific forms of realization and seem to depend on restricted associations between stimuli and response.
Another difference between intellectual and perceptual-motor skills is that the two kinds of skill seem to be represented in different parts of the brain. For example, structures homologous to the optic tectum, a nucleus located on the dorsal surface of the midbrain, have a common function in all vertebrates- coordinating visual, auditory, and somatosensory information relevant to the control of orienting movements of the eyes, ears, and head. Similarities in structure and function between these and other brain areas associated with perceptual-motor behavior suggest that mechanisms for control of perceptual- motor skills are both highly specialized and conserved across species. In contrast, what distinguishes the human brain from the brains of other species - even closely related ones - is the differential growth of brain regions most strongly associated with intellectual skills, such as the association areas of the cerebral cortex.
The contention that these areas serve intellectual functions is supported by a large body of clinical and experimental literature. Together, these diverse sources of information suggest that perceptual-motor and intellectual skills depend on distinct brain circuits.
It can be inferred from the passage that the optic tectum
Question709: Crops can be traded on the futures market before they are harvested. If a poor corn harvest is predicted, prices of corn futures rise; if a bountiful corn harvest is predicted, prices of corn futures fall. This morning meteorologists are predicting much-needed rain for the corn-growing region starting tomorrow. Therefore, since adequate moisture is essential for the current crop's survival, prices of corn futures will fall sharply today.
Which of the following, if true, most weakens the argument above?
Question710: Half of the subjects in an experiment - the experimental group - consumed large quantities of a popular artificial sweetener. Afterward, this group showed lower cognitive abilities than did the other half of the subjects - the control group - who did not consume the sweetener. The detrimental effects were attributed to an amino acid that is one of the sweetener's principal constituents.
Which of the following, if true, would best support the conclusion that some ingredient of the sweetener was responsible for the experimental results?
Question711: Being literal-minded about the afterlife, both royalty and commoners arranged to fill their tombs with household objects, each object a necessity for daily life, ready for use
Question712: The Florida panther, known for its distinctive characteristics, including a kinked tail and cowlicks, is nearing extinction with the help of scientists and government officials. Though once abundant in Florida, by the end of the twentieth century, only approximately 30 Florida panthers remained. Efforts to preserve the panthers had focused on shielding them from human encroachment with the hope that they could develop sustainable numbers to survive as a species. However, pressure from development caused officials to grow impatient and shift their strategy and goals.
In 1995, new breeds of female panthers were brought to Florida from Texas to bolster the population. The change has been dramatic. In 1990, 88% of the panthers in Florida had the distinct kinked tail. By 2000, five years after the introduction of the Texas panthers, not a single kitten born to the Texas females had a kinked tail. The breed known as the Florida panther is now on an expedited, ineluctable road to extinction
- with the assistance of wildlife protection agencies.
If the goal was to have any kind of panther in Florida, it has been realized. Since the introduction of the Texas panthers, the panther population in Florida has risen to approximately 80 mixed-breed panthers.
However, this "success" could portend a tragic trend in wildlife management in the United States. We cannot and should not create genetically mixed species as a means of achieving a compromise between the needs of development and a species' survival. This type of species tampering is a perversion of the ideal of wildlife management and will irrevocably transform our national landscape.
The author suggests that blame for the extinction of Florida panthers rests chiefly upon
Question713: According to a review of 38 studies of patients suffering from water retention, a large majority of the patients reported that fasting eased their suffering considerably. Yet fasting is not used to treat water retention even though the conventional medications often have serious side effects.
Which of the following, if true, best explains the fact that fasting is not used as a treatment for water retention?
Question714: Critics of sales seminars run by outside consultants point out that since 1987, revenues of vacuum cleaner companies whose employees attended consultant-led seminars were lower than revenues of vacuum cleaner companies whose employees did not attend such seminars. The critics charge that for vacuum cleaner companies, the sales seminars are ill conceived and a waste of money.
Which of the following, if true, is the most effective challenge to the critics of sales seminars?
Question715: It's time we stopped searching for new statistics to suggest that we are not spending enough on education.
In fact, education spending increased 30 percent overall during the last decade.
Which of the following, if true, would most weaken the argument above?
Question716: For over fifty years, the ocean-freight industry worked to make ocean freighters faster and to lower their fuel consumption. Despite considerable success, the economics of the industry grew worse, until the industry was almost dead. What was wrong was an incongruity between assumptions and realities. The real costs came, not from time spent at sea, but from time spent in port during loading and unloading.
Which of the following actions would be most likely to lead to a solution of the problem faced by the ocean- freight industry, as it is analyzed in the passage?
Question717: Archaeologists seeking the location of a legendary siege and destruction of a city are excavating in several possible places, including a middle and a lower layer of a large mound. The bottom of the middle layer contains some pieces of pottery of type 3, known to be from a later period than the time of the destruction of the city, but the lower layer does not.
Which of the following hypotheses is best supported by the evidence above?
Question718: Bank depositors in the United States are all financially protected against bank failure because the government insures all individuals' bank deposits. An economist argues that this insurance is partly responsible for the high rate of bank failures, since it removes from depositors any financial incentive to find out whether the bank that holds their money is secure against failure. If depositors were more selective, then banks would need to be secure in order to compete for depositors' money.
The economist's argument makes which of the following assumptions?
Question719: Traffic safety experts predict that the installation of newly designed air bags in all cars in the United States would reduce the average number of fatalities per traffic accident by 30 percent. In order to save lives, the Department of Transportation (DOT) is considering requiring automobile manufacturers to install air bags of this design in all cars produced after 1998.
Which of the following, if true, represents the strongest challenge to the DOT's proposal?
Question720: Crimes are mainly committed by the young, and for this reason merely increasing the number of police officers or expenditures on police services has little effect on reducing the crime rate. In fact, the only factor associated with a crime-rate drop is a decrease in the number of people in the community aged fourteen to thirty.
The findings above can best serve as part of an argument against
Question721: The fewer restrictions there are on the advertising of legal services, the more lawyers there are who advertise their services, and the lawyers who advertise a specific service usually charge less for that service than lawyers who do not advertise. Therefore, if the state removes any of its current restrictions, such as the one against advertisements that do not specify fee arrangements, overall consumer legal costs will be lower than if the state retains its current restrictions.
Which of the following, if true, would most seriously weaken the argument concerning overall consumer legal costs?
Question722: Which of the following best completes the passage below?
Sales campaigns aimed at the faltering personal computer market have strongly emphasized ease of use, called user-friendliness. This emphasis is oddly premature and irrelevant in the eyes of most potential buyers, who are trying to address the logically prior issue of whether______
Question723: In the first half of this year, from January to June, about three million videocassette recorders were sold.
This number is only 35 percent of the total number of videocassette recorders sold last year. Therefore, total sales of videocassette recorders will almost certainly be lower for this year than they were for last year.
Which of the following, if true, most seriously weakens the conclusion above?
Question724: United States hospitals have traditionally relied primarily on revenues from paying patients to offset losses from unreimbursed care. Almost all paying patients now rely on governmental or private health insurance to pay hospital bills. Recently, insurers have been strictly limiting what they pay hospitals for the care of insured patients to amounts at or below actual costs.
Which of the following conclusions is best supported by the information above?
Question725: Many breakfast cereals are fortified with vitamin supplements. Some of these cereals provide 100 percent of the recommended daily requirement of vitamins. Nevertheless, a well-balanced breakfast, including a variety of foods, is a better source of those vitamins than are such fortified breakfast cereals alone.
Which of the following, if true, would most strongly support the position above?
Question726: Some who favor putting governmental enterprises into private hands suggest that conservation objectives would in general be better served if private environmental groups were put in charge of operating and financing the national park system, which is now run by the government.
Which of the following, assuming that it is a realistic possibility, argues most strongly against the suggestion above?
Question727: In the United States, the Postal Service has a monopoly on first-class mail, but much of what is sent first class could be transmitted electronically. Electronic transmittal operators argue that if the Postal Service were to offer electronic transmission, it would have an unfair advantage, since its electronic transmission service could be subsidized from the profits of the monopoly.
Which of the following, if each is true, would allay the electronic transmittal operators' fears of unfair competition?
Question728: Which of the following best completes the passage below?
A primary factor in perpetuating the low salaries of women workers has been their segregation in the so- called pink-collar occupations, such as nursing, teaching, library science, and secretarial work. Partly because these jobs have traditionally been held by women, their salary levels have been depressed, and, despite increased attempts to unionize these workers in recent years, their pay continues to lag. Moreover, although a large percentage of women than ever before are now entering and remaining in the job market, most continue to gravitate toward the pink-collar fields, despite the lower salaries. It seems clear, therefore, that if the average salaries of women workers are to approach those of men, ______
Question729: Technological education is worsening. People between eighteen and twenty-four, who are just emerging from their formal education, are more likely to be technologically illiterate than somewhat older adults. And yet, issues for public referenda will increasingly involve aspects of technology.
Which of the following conclusions can be properly drawn from the statements above?
Question730: The city council will certainly vote to approve the new downtown redevelopment plan, despite the objections of environmentalists. After all, most of the campaign contributions received by members of the city council come from real estate development firms, which stand to benefit from the plan.
Which of the following statements, if true, would most weaken the argument above?
Question731: Today, children whose parents are deemed incapable of caring for them are put into foster care. These children are moved into strangers' homes, where they are cared for until their own parents can regain custody, which may not happen for years, if it happens at all. Although it means well, the current foster care program is so poorly funded, staffed, and managed that it cannot ensure the safety and wellbeing of the children in the system. The laudable idea behind foster care is that children will fare best if placed in a family setting until they can be reunited with their parents, even if it is a family of strangers. However, while in foster care, children typically get shuffled between many different foster homes, preventing them from developing long-term, supportive relationships with their foster families. Foster care placements can also force siblings to be separated, further isolating these vulnerable children. When a child is moved to a new foster home, he or she may also have to enroll in a new school, a disruptive process that has a negative impact on the child's education. The bureaucracy that oversees this system is overwhelmed to the point that social workers are unable to adequately screen potential foster parents and keep accurate track of the children placed in foster care. There must be a better means of caring for these children. Perhaps it is time to consider creating special group homes as a means of providing these children with stable and safe environments.
A child could live in one group home for the duration of his or her time in foster care and be supervised by a team of social workers and other lay people. Children would receive proper meals and healthcare, attend the same school, and develop relationships with others experiencing the trauma of being separated from their parents. In addition, social workers and staff would have daily access to these children, enabling them to better determine if a child has a special physical or psychological need and arrange for the necessary services. Would this approach be perfect? No, but it would solve many of the problems that plague the current system. For some, the idea of a government agency housing, clothing, and feeding needy children may sound extreme, but it only suggests that we provide these children with the same basic necessities that we give to prison inmates.
Which of the following best expresses the main idea of this passage?
Question732: Mahatma Gandhi's is credited as having championed a nonviolent approach to reform as a practical and moral means to struggle against social injustice.
Question733: Local phone companies have monopolies on phone service within their areas. Cable television can be transmitted via the wires that are already in place and owned by the phone companies. Cable television companies argue that if the telephone companies were to offer cable service, these telephone companies would have an unfair advantage, because their cable transmissions could be subsidized by the profits of their monopolies on phone service.
On the basis of the information provided in the passage above, which of the following questions can be answered?
Question734: Alexander Calder was one of the most innovative and original American artists of the twentieth century.
Calder arrived in Paris in 1926 and devoted himself to a innovative project comprised of animals made out of wire, scraps of cloth, wood, cork, labels, bits of scrap metal and pieces of rubber that he called the Circus. During his performances, Calder invented ways to simulate the flight of birds: "These are little bits of white paper, with a hole and slight weight on each one, which flutter down several variously coiled thin steel wires which I jiggle so that they flutter down like doves." The Circus was the laboratory of Calder's work; in it he experimented with new formulas and techniques. By 1930, Calder's Circus had developed into one of the real successes of the Montparnasse art world attracting the attention of such renowned artists as Fernand Leger and Joan Miro. Encouragement from the upper echelons of the Parisian art scene undoubtedly led him to try more serious experiments in wire sculptures. Calder eventually becoming interested in the movement of objects, some of which he motorized. In 1933, Calder completed Object with Red Discs, a sculpture he described as a two-meter rod with a heavy sphere, suspended from the apex of a wire, giving it a cantilever effect. It had five thin aluminum discs projected at right angels from five wires, held in position by a spherical counterweight. With this new creation, the idea of the mobile was born. In creating a work named Constellations in 1943, Calder explored the plastic possibilities of mobiles; he used small pieces of wood, which he shaped and sometimes painted. From this point on, Calder's ambition changed focus. He sought more challenging designs. One of Calder's objectives was to display objects in the air, giving the viewer the experience of finding new skies filled with moving and colored constellations.
Calder accomplished this in Acoustic Ceiling (1954). Calder's humor was evident in such works as Le Bougnat (1959) and The Pagoda (1963). Later, Calder cut fantastic animals from sheet metal, creating La Vache and Elephant (both 1970) and a mobile entitled Nervous Wreck (1976), which represents the red skeleton of a fish. Calder defined volume without mass and incorporated movement and time in art. His inventions, which redefined certain basic principles of sculpture, have established him as the most innovative sculptor of the twentieth century.
According to the passage, all of the following are characteristic of Calder's work EXCEPT
Question735: Probably as old as human society, and defined as "the willful, malicious, and repeated following and harassing of another person," is stalking.
Question736: A mail order company recently had a big jump in clothing sales after hiring a copywriter and a graphic artist to give its clothing catalog a magazine like format designed to appeal to a more upscale clientele. The company is now planning to launch a house wares catalog using the same concept.
The company's plan assumes that
Question737: The atmosphere forms a gaseous envelope around the earth, protecting it from the cold of space, harmful ultraviolet light, and meteors that are large, but not the largest.
Question738: In order to increase revenues, an airport plans to change the parking fees it charges at its hourly parking lots. Rather than charging $2.00 for the first two-hour period, or part thereof, and $1.00 for each hour thereafter, the airport will charge $4.00 for the first four-hour period, or part thereof, and $1.00 for each hour thereafter.
Which of the following is a consideration that, if true, suggests that the plan will be successful in increasing revenues?
Question739: Coca-Cola, which sold 10 billion cases of soft drinks in 1992, now finds itself asking, where will sales of the next 10 billion cases come from? The answer lies overseas, where income levels and appetites for Western products are at an all time high.
Often, the company that gets into a foreign market earliest dominates that country's market. Coke patriarch Robert Woodruff realized this and unleashed a brilliant ploy to make Coke the early bird in many of the major foreign markets. At the height of World War II, Woodruff proclaimed, "Wherever American boys were fighting, they'd be able to get a Coke." By the time Pepsi tried to make its first international pitch in the
1950s, Coke had established its brand name along with a powerful distribution network.
During the last 40 years, many new markets have emerged. In order to tap into these opportunities, both coke and Pepsi have attempted to find ways to cut through the red tape that thwarts their efforts to conduct business in these new regions.
One key maneuver in the soda wars occurred in 1972, when Pepsi signed an agreement with the Soviet Union that made it the first Western product to be sold to consumers in Russia. This landmark agreement gave Pepsi the upper hand. At present, Pepsi has 23 plants in the former Soviet Union and is the leader in the soft-drink industry in Russia. It outsells Coca-Cola by a ratio of 6 to 1 and is seen there as a local brand, similar to Coke's homegrown reputation in Japan. However, Pepsi has also encountered some obstacles. An expected increase in brand loyalty for Pepsi subsequent to its advertising blitz in Russia has not materialized; even though Pepsi produced commercials tailored to the Russian market and sponsored televised concerts.
Some analysts believe that Pepsi's domination of the Russian market has more to do with pricing. While Pepsi sells for 250 Rubles (about 25 cents) a bottle, Coca-Cola sells for 450 Rubles. Likewise, Pepsi sells their 2 liter economy bottle for 1,300 Rubles, while Coca-Cola's 1.5 liters is marketed at 1,800 rubles. On the other hand, Coca-Cola only made its first inroads into Russia 2 years ago. What's more, although Coca-Cola's bottle and label give it a high-class image, Russians do not perceive Coca-Cola as a premium brand in the Russian market. Consequently, it has so far been unable to capture a market share.
According to the passage, all of the following have been used to attract customers to buy a one of the two brands of soft drink mentioned in the passage EXCEPT
Question740: In the thirties and forties, devotees of Willa Cather's maintained that her writing has all the qualities found in the highest order of American writers of the nineteenth and twentieth century.
Question741: If the airspace around centrally located airports were restricted to commercial airliners and only those private planes equipped with radar, most of the private-plane traffic would be forced to use outlying airfields. Such a reduction in the amount of private-plane traffic would reduce the risk of midair collision around the centrally located airports.
The conclusion drawn in the first sentence depends on which of the following assumptions?
Question742: Lewis and Clark were not the first white men to cross the continent from the Atlantic to the Pacific north of Mexico, and they did not visit places not already seen and mapped by generations of native people.
Question743: The increased concentration of salt in the bay, which is the result of recent drought and high temperatures, will cause many fish to die. Shrimp, however, can tolerate high salt levels; the shrimp industry will not, therefore, be hurt by the increased concentration of salt.
Which of the following statements, if true, would weaken the argument above?
Question744: Two decades after the Emerald River Dam was built, none of the eight fish species native to the Emerald River was still reproducing adequately in the river below the dam. Since the dam reduced the annual range of water temperature in the river below the dam from 50 degrees to 6 degrees, scientists have hypothesized that sharply rising water temperatures must be involved in signaling the native species to begin the reproductive cycle.
Which of the following statements, if true, would most strengthen the scientists' hypothesis?
Question745: Small-business groups are lobbying to defeat proposed federal legislation that would substantially raise the federal minimum wage. This opposition is surprising since the legislation they oppose would, for the first time, exempt all small businesses from paying any minimum wage.
Which of the following, if true, would best explain the opposition of small-business groups to the proposed legislation?
Question746: Intuitively, intellectual skills and perceptual-motor skills seem very different because perceptual-motor skills appear more primitive. Ontogenetically, perceptual-motor skills develop before intellectual skills, or at least before most intellectual skills are manifested. Phylogenetically, creatures "high on the evolutionary ladder" are more obviously capable of intellectual skills than are creatures "lower down ".
Perceptual-motor skills also seem more closely tied to specific forms of expression. Being a chess player does not mean one can only play with pieces of a certain size, that one can only move pieces with one's right hand, and so on. By contrast, being a violinist means one can play an instrument whose size occupies a fairly narrow range and that one must play with a rather rigid assignment of functions to effectors (bowing with the right hand, and fingering with the left). The seeming narrowness of this perceptual-motor skill expression, contrasted with the seeming openness of intellectual skill expression, seems to follow from intellectual skills having symbolic outcomes and perceptual-motor skills having non- symbolic outcomes. Symbolic outcomes need not be realized in specific ways and can rely on abstract rules. Non-symbolic outcomes, by contrast, need more specific forms of realization and seem to depend on restricted associations between stimuli and response.
Another difference between intellectual and perceptual-motor skills is that the two kinds of skill seem to be represented in different parts of the brain. For example, structures homologous to the optic tectum, a nucleus located on the dorsal surface of the midbrain, have a common function in all vertebrates- coordinating visual, auditory, and somatosensory information relevant to the control of orienting movements of the eyes, ears, and head. Similarities in structure and function between these and other brain areas associated with perceptual-motor behavior suggest that mechanisms for control of perceptual- motor skills are both highly specialized and conserved across species. In contrast, what distinguishes the human brain from the brains of other species - even closely related ones - is the differential growth of brain regions most strongly associated with intellectual skills, such as the association areas of the cerebral cortex.
The contention that these areas serve intellectual functions is supported by a large body of clinical and experimental literature. Together, these diverse sources of information suggest that perceptual-motor and intellectual skills depend on distinct brain circuits.
The author mentions the game of chess in paragraph two primarily in order to
Question747: The increase in land area which the virus has colonized suggest that birds are the more usual host for the virus, strengthening researchers' original contention that migratory birds have contributed to the virus's spread across the nation.
Question748: A drug that is highly effective in treating many types of infection can, at present, be obtained only from the bark of the ibora, a tree that is quite rare in the wild. It takes the bark of 5,000 trees to make one kilogram of the drug. It follows, therefore, that continued production of the drug must inevitably lead to the ibora's extinction.
Which of the following, if true, most seriously weakens the argument above?
Question749: Juror anonymity was unknown to American common law and jurisprudence in the country's first two centuries. Anonymity was first employed in federal prosecutions of organized crime in New York in the
1980's. Although anonymous juries are unusual since they are typically only empanelled in organized- crime cases, its use has spread more recently to widely publicized cases, such as the federal prosecution of police officers accused of beating Rodney King and the trial of those accused of the 1993 World Trade Center bombing.
In these cases, attorneys selected a jury from a panel of prospective jurors whose names, addresses, ethnic backgrounds and religious affiliations remained unknown to either side. This unorthodox procedure, designed to protect jurors from outside influence and the fear of retaliation, has occasionally been employed in New York federal courts since the trial of drug kingpin Leroy "Nicky" Barnes. Despite apparent benefits, critics assail anonymous juries on the grounds that they are an infringement of the sixth amendment guarantee of an impartial jury and because they present a serious and unnecessary erosion of the presumption of innocence.
Since many attorneys believe trials are frequently won or lost during jury selection, any procedure diminishing the role of counsel in the procedure necessitates close scrutiny and criticism. Opponents of anonymous juries argue that the procedure restricts meaningful voir dire, (questioning of the jury panel), and thereby undermines the defendant's sixth amendment right to an impartial jury. Critics also claim that jurors interpret their anonymity as proof of the defendant's criminal proclivity, thereby subverting the presumption of innocence.
However, consistent with due process and the sixth amendment, the trial judge may refuse to ask prospective jurors any questions not reasonably calculated to expose biases or prejudices relevant to the case. Although addresses and group affiliations may indicate significant potential for bias, attorneys do not have an unfettered right to this information in every circumstance. Denying access to these facts may indeed constrain an attorney's ability to assemble an ideal jury, but it violates no constitutional right The primary purpose of the passage is to
Question750: With the proliferation of electronic technologies in the latter part of the twentieth century, many aspects of cultural practice have been redefined. The eradication of physical boundaries that limit discourse and information access has had profound effects upon the manner in which we conduct democracy. Yet, opinions strongly differ over whether or not the growth of electronic networks will result in expanded democracy. On one side of the debate are anti-utopians who fear that with the intrusion of the Internet into many facets of life, personal freedom will be impeded and the existing rift between the "haves" and "have- nots" in society will grow. On the other side, many 'cyber-utopians' believe that new technologies can eliminate the democracy of elected representatives with which so many people are dissatisfied. The Internet, they say, will allow for a true participatory democracy in which citizens can govern themselves without the interference of bureaucrats and legislators.
Neither of these theories by themselves can fully address the role of democracy in the age of information.
As debates about censorship and encryption have shown, government regulation of the Internet can result in violations of the basic rights of speech set forth in the constitution of the United States. Yet, groups that preach 'Big Brother' theories of paranoia tend to neglect the fact that new technologies can help balance the injustices of traditional power found in a centralized government. At the same time, the likelihood of doing away with the present system of democracy in favor of complete and pure self-governance seems impossible and likely undesirable.
Both arguments about the future of the way in which discourse will occur highlight the inherent relationship between communication and democracy. Perhaps a more useful model for the study of this dynamic can be found in the model of the public sphere proposed by Jorgen Habermas. In this realm, free and diverse equals come together to deliberate and discuss pertinent issues without the impediment of external coercion. The ensuing dialogue transpires in a profoundly democratic forum. The dispensing of traditional hierarchies that occurs on the Internet appears to make possible the type of categories necessary for Habermas 'ideal speech situation to occur.
However, postmodern critics indicate that the autonomous individual no longer exists in a world where our identities are constructed as much for us as by us. And indeed, much of the postmodern notion of self seems to fit closely with reconfigurations of the subject brought on by electronic technologies. The question that arises then is how might the reconfiguration of communication enabled by the Internet work to create a new form of cyber-democracy' that better represents citizen's interests?
According to the passage, the 'cyber-utopians' mentioned in the passage would most likely be in favor of which of the following innovations?