Question:
Because the market system enables entrepreneurs and investors who develop new technology to reap financial rewards from their risk of capital, it may seem that the primary result of this activity is that some people who have spare capital accumulate more. But in spite of the fact that the profits derived from various technological developments have accrued to relatively few people, the developments themselves have served overall as a remarkable democratizing force. In fact, under the regime of the market, the gap in benefits accruing to different groups of people has been narrowed in the long term. This tendency can be seen in various well-known technological developments. For example, before the printing press was introduced centuries ago, few people had access to written materials, much less to scribes and private secretaries to produce and transcribe documents. Since printed materials have become widely available, however, people without special position or resources—and in numbers once thought impossible—can take literacy and the use of printed texts for granted. With the distribution of books and periodicals in public libraries, this process has been extended to the point where people in general can have essentially equal access to a vast range of texts that would once have been available only to a very few. A more recent technological development extends this process beyond printed documents. A child in school with access to a personal computer and modem— which is becoming fairly common in technologically advanced societies—has computing power and database access equal to that of the best-connected scientists and engineers at top-level labs of just fifteen years ago, a time when relatively few people had personal access to any computing power. Or consider the uses of technology for leisure. In previous centuries only a few people with abundant resources had the ability and time to hire professional entertainment, and to have contact through travel and written communication—both of which were prohibitively expensive—with distant people. But now broadcast technology is widely available, and so almost anyone can have an entertainment cornucopia unimagined in earlier times. Similarly, the development of inexpensive mail distribution and telephone connections and, more recently, the establishment of the even more efficient medium of electronic mail have greatly extended the power of distant communication. This kind of gradual diffusion of benefits across society is not an accident of these particular technological developments, but rather the result of a general tendency of the market system. Entrepreneurs and investors often are unable to maximize financial success without expanding their market, and this involves structuring their prices to the consumers so as to make their technologies genuinely accessible to an ever-larger share of the population. In other words, because market competition drives prices down, it tends to diffuse access to new technology across society as a result.
Question: It can be most reasonably inferred from the passage that the author would agree with which one of the following statements?
 A. The profits derived from computer technology have accrued to fewer people than have the profits derived from any other technological development.
 B. Often the desire of some people for profits motivates changes that are beneficial for large numbers of other people.
 C. National boundaries are rarely barriers to the democratizing spread of technology.
 D. Typically, investment in technology is riskier than many other sorts of investment.
 E. Greater geographical mobility of populations has contributed to the profits of entrepreneurs and investors in technology.
Answer:

Choices:
- A
- B
- C
- D
- E

Because the market system enables entrepreneurs and investors who develop new technology to reap financial rewards from their risk of capital, it may seem that the primary result of this activity is that some people who have spare capital accumulate more. But in spite of the fact that the profits derived from various technological developments have accrued to relatively few people, the developments themselves have served overall as a remarkable democratizing force. In fact, under the regime of the market, the gap in benefits accruing to different groups of people has been narrowed in the long term. This tendency can be seen in various well-known technological developments. For example, before the printing press was introduced centuries ago, few people had access to written materials, much less to scribes and private secretaries to produce and transcribe documents. Since printed materials have become widely available, however, people without special position or resources—and in numbers once thought impossible—can take literacy and the use of printed texts for granted. With the distribution of books and periodicals in public libraries, this process has been extended to the point where people in general can have essentially equal access to a vast range of texts that would once have been available only to a very few. A more recent technological development extends this process beyond printed documents. A child in school with access to a personal computer and modem— which is becoming fairly common in technologically advanced societies—has computing power and database access equal to that of the best-connected scientists and engineers at top-level labs of just fifteen years ago, a time when relatively few people had personal access to any computing power. Or consider the uses of technology for leisure. In previous centuries only a few people with abundant resources had the ability and time to hire professional entertainment, and to have contact through travel and written communication—both of which were prohibitively expensive—with distant people. But now broadcast technology is widely available, and so almost anyone can have an entertainment cornucopia unimagined in earlier times. Similarly, the development of inexpensive mail distribution and telephone connections and, more recently, the establishment of the even more efficient medium of electronic mail have greatly extended the power of distant communication. This kind of gradual diffusion of benefits across society is not an accident of these particular technological developments, but rather the result of a general tendency of the market system. Entrepreneurs and investors often are unable to maximize financial success without expanding their market, and this involves structuring their prices to the consumers so as to make their technologies genuinely accessible to an ever-larger share of the population. In other words, because market competition drives prices down, it tends to diffuse access to new technology across society as a result.
Question: It can be most reasonably inferred from the passage that the author would agree with which one of the following statements?
 A. The profits derived from computer technology have accrued to fewer people than have the profits derived from any other technological development.
 B. Often the desire of some people for profits motivates changes that are beneficial for large numbers of other people.
 C. National boundaries are rarely barriers to the democratizing spread of technology.
 D. Typically, investment in technology is riskier than many other sorts of investment.
 E. Greater geographical mobility of populations has contributed to the profits of entrepreneurs and investors in technology.
Answer: B


Question:
In a recent study, Mario Garcia argues that in the United States between 1930 and I960 the group of political activists he calls the "Mexican American Generation" was more radical and politically diverse than earlier historians have recognized. Through analysis of the work of some of the era's most important scholars, Garcia does provide persuasive evidence that in the 1930s and 1940s these activists anticipated many of the reforms proposed by the more militant Chicanos of the 1960s and 1970s. His study, however, suffers from two flaws.First, Garcia's analysis of the evidence he provides to demonstrate the Mexican American Generation's political diversity is not entirely consistent. Indeed, he undermines his primary thesis by emphasizing an underlying consensus among various groups that tends to conceal the full significance of their differences. Groups such as the League of United Latin American Citizens, an organization that encouraged Mexican Americans to pursue a civil rights strategy of assimilation into the United States political and cultural mainstream, were often diametrically opposed to organizations such as the Congress of Spanish-Speaking People, a coalition group that advocated bilingual education and equal rights for resident aliens in the United States. Garcia acknowledges these differences but dismisses them as insignificant, given that the goals of groups as disparate as these centered on liberal reform, not revolution. But one need only note the fierce controversies that occurred during the period over United States immigration policies and the question of assimilation versus cultural maintenance to recognize that Mexican American political history since 1930 has been characterized not by consensus but by intense and lively debate.Second, Garcia may be exaggerating the degree to which the views of these activists were representative of the ethnic Mexican population residing in the United States during this period. Noting that by 1930 the proportion of the Mexican American population that had been born in the United States had significantly increased, Garcia argues that between 1930 and 1960 a new generation of Mexican American leaders appeared, one that was more acculturated and hence more politically active than its predecessor. Influenced by their experience of discrimination and by the inclusive rhetoric of World War II slogans, these leaders, according to Garcia, were determined to achieve full civil rights for all United States residents of Mexican descent. However, it is not clear how far this outlook extended beyond these activists. Without a better understanding of the political implications of important variables such as patterns of and rates of Mexican immigration and naturalization, and the variations in ethnic consciousness these variables help to create, one cannot assume that an increase in the proportion of Mexican Americans born in the United States necessarily resulted in an increase in the ethnic Mexican population's political activism.
Question: The author of the passage expresses uncertainty with regard to which one of the following?
 A. whether or not one can assume that the increase in the number of Mexican Americans born in the United States led to an increase in Mexican American political activism
 B. whether or not historians preceding Garcia were correct in their assumptions about Mexican Americans who were politically active between 1930 and 1960
 C. whether or not there was general consensus among Mexican American political activists between 1930 and 1960
 D. the extent to which the views of Mexican American activists were shared by the ethnic Mexican population in the United States
 E. the nature of the relationship between the League of United Latin American Citizens and the Congress of Spanish-Speaking People
Answer:

Choices:
- A
- B
- C
- D
- E

In a recent study, Mario Garcia argues that in the United States between 1930 and I960 the group of political activists he calls the "Mexican American Generation" was more radical and politically diverse than earlier historians have recognized. Through analysis of the work of some of the era's most important scholars, Garcia does provide persuasive evidence that in the 1930s and 1940s these activists anticipated many of the reforms proposed by the more militant Chicanos of the 1960s and 1970s. His study, however, suffers from two flaws.First, Garcia's analysis of the evidence he provides to demonstrate the Mexican American Generation's political diversity is not entirely consistent. Indeed, he undermines his primary thesis by emphasizing an underlying consensus among various groups that tends to conceal the full significance of their differences. Groups such as the League of United Latin American Citizens, an organization that encouraged Mexican Americans to pursue a civil rights strategy of assimilation into the United States political and cultural mainstream, were often diametrically opposed to organizations such as the Congress of Spanish-Speaking People, a coalition group that advocated bilingual education and equal rights for resident aliens in the United States. Garcia acknowledges these differences but dismisses them as insignificant, given that the goals of groups as disparate as these centered on liberal reform, not revolution. But one need only note the fierce controversies that occurred during the period over United States immigration policies and the question of assimilation versus cultural maintenance to recognize that Mexican American political history since 1930 has been characterized not by consensus but by intense and lively debate.Second, Garcia may be exaggerating the degree to which the views of these activists were representative of the ethnic Mexican population residing in the United States during this period. Noting that by 1930 the proportion of the Mexican American population that had been born in the United States had significantly increased, Garcia argues that between 1930 and 1960 a new generation of Mexican American leaders appeared, one that was more acculturated and hence more politically active than its predecessor. Influenced by their experience of discrimination and by the inclusive rhetoric of World War II slogans, these leaders, according to Garcia, were determined to achieve full civil rights for all United States residents of Mexican descent. However, it is not clear how far this outlook extended beyond these activists. Without a better understanding of the political implications of important variables such as patterns of and rates of Mexican immigration and naturalization, and the variations in ethnic consciousness these variables help to create, one cannot assume that an increase in the proportion of Mexican Americans born in the United States necessarily resulted in an increase in the ethnic Mexican population's political activism.
Question: The author of the passage expresses uncertainty with regard to which one of the following?
 A. whether or not one can assume that the increase in the number of Mexican Americans born in the United States led to an increase in Mexican American political activism
 B. whether or not historians preceding Garcia were correct in their assumptions about Mexican Americans who were politically active between 1930 and 1960
 C. whether or not there was general consensus among Mexican American political activists between 1930 and 1960
 D. the extent to which the views of Mexican American activists were shared by the ethnic Mexican population in the United States
 E. the nature of the relationship between the League of United Latin American Citizens and the Congress of Spanish-Speaking People
Answer: D


Question:
The Internet makes possible the instaotaoeous transmission and retrieval of digital text. It is widely assumed that this capacity will lead to the displacement of printed books by digitized books that are read mainly on computer screens or handheld electronic devices. But it is more likely, I believe, that most digital files of books will be prioted and bound on demand at point of sale by machines that can quickly and inexpensively make single copies that are indistinguishable from books made in fiIctories. Once most books have been digitized, aoyone with access to the Internet will be able to purchase printed books from a practieally limitless digital catalog that includes even those books that, under traditional publishing assumptions, would have been desigoated "out of print." Also, the digital publication of a book online involves no pbysical inventory', thereby eliminating the costs of warehousing, shipping books to wholesalers and to retail stores, displaying pbysieal books in retail stores, and returning unsold books to publishers. This would make digital publishing much less expensive than traditional publishing. Given the economic efficiency and convenience for customers of this new digital model of publishing, it is likely to eventually supplant or at least rival traditional publishingalthough it will be some time before a catalog of printable digitized books becomes large enough to jusillY investment in book prioting machines at numerous regional sites. Moreover, the elimination of whole categories of expensemeans that under the digital publishing model,authors would be responsible for a greater proportion of the value of the final product and would therefore, according to literal)' agents, be entitled to a larger share of the proceeds. Currently a large percentage of publishers' revenue is absorbed by the costs of printing, selling, and distributing pbysical books, costs that are irrelevant to digital publication. LiteraI)' agents marketing new manuscripts could thus be expected to demand a significantly bigger slice of revenue for their authors than has been traditional. But large, established publishing houses, which are heavily invested in the infrastructure of traditional publishing, initially will be reluctant to accede. So the opportunity to bid for new manuscripts will go first to upstart digital-publishing firms unfettered by traditional practices or infrastructure. Under this competitive pressure, traditional publishers will have to reduee their redundant functions in order to accommodate higher royalty payments to authors or else they will lose their authors. Such adjustments are typical of the interval between a departing economic model and its successor and may help explain the caution with which today's publishing conglomerates are approaching the digital future.
Question: It can most reasonably be inferred that the aulbor would agree wilb which one oflbe following statements?
 A. Those publishers that fail to embrace the new digital model ofpub1ishing will be uuiikely to remain economically competitive.
 B. The primary threat to the spread of digital publishing will be the widespread use of computers aud haudheld devices for reading text.
 C. The growth of digital publishing is likely to revitalize the book retail business.
 D. Any book will sell more copies ifit is published digitally thau if it is published traditionally.
 E. Digital publishing will allow publishers to substantially decrease the amount of money they allocate for advertising their books.
Answer:

Choices:
- A
- B
- C
- D
- E

The Internet makes possible the instaotaoeous transmission and retrieval of digital text. It is widely assumed that this capacity will lead to the displacement of printed books by digitized books that are read mainly on computer screens or handheld electronic devices. But it is more likely, I believe, that most digital files of books will be prioted and bound on demand at point of sale by machines that can quickly and inexpensively make single copies that are indistinguishable from books made in fiIctories. Once most books have been digitized, aoyone with access to the Internet will be able to purchase printed books from a practieally limitless digital catalog that includes even those books that, under traditional publishing assumptions, would have been desigoated "out of print." Also, the digital publication of a book online involves no pbysical inventory', thereby eliminating the costs of warehousing, shipping books to wholesalers and to retail stores, displaying pbysieal books in retail stores, and returning unsold books to publishers. This would make digital publishing much less expensive than traditional publishing. Given the economic efficiency and convenience for customers of this new digital model of publishing, it is likely to eventually supplant or at least rival traditional publishingalthough it will be some time before a catalog of printable digitized books becomes large enough to jusillY investment in book prioting machines at numerous regional sites. Moreover, the elimination of whole categories of expensemeans that under the digital publishing model,authors would be responsible for a greater proportion of the value of the final product and would therefore, according to literal)' agents, be entitled to a larger share of the proceeds. Currently a large percentage of publishers' revenue is absorbed by the costs of printing, selling, and distributing pbysical books, costs that are irrelevant to digital publication. LiteraI)' agents marketing new manuscripts could thus be expected to demand a significantly bigger slice of revenue for their authors than has been traditional. But large, established publishing houses, which are heavily invested in the infrastructure of traditional publishing, initially will be reluctant to accede. So the opportunity to bid for new manuscripts will go first to upstart digital-publishing firms unfettered by traditional practices or infrastructure. Under this competitive pressure, traditional publishers will have to reduee their redundant functions in order to accommodate higher royalty payments to authors or else they will lose their authors. Such adjustments are typical of the interval between a departing economic model and its successor and may help explain the caution with which today's publishing conglomerates are approaching the digital future.
Question: It can most reasonably be inferred that the aulbor would agree wilb which one oflbe following statements?
 A. Those publishers that fail to embrace the new digital model ofpub1ishing will be uuiikely to remain economically competitive.
 B. The primary threat to the spread of digital publishing will be the widespread use of computers aud haudheld devices for reading text.
 C. The growth of digital publishing is likely to revitalize the book retail business.
 D. Any book will sell more copies ifit is published digitally thau if it is published traditionally.
 E. Digital publishing will allow publishers to substantially decrease the amount of money they allocate for advertising their books.
Answer: A


Question:
An organism is considered to have an infection when a disease-causing agent, called a pathogen, establishes a viable presence in the organism. This can occur only if the pathogenic agent is able to reproduce itself in the host organism. The only agents believed until recently to be responsible for infections—viruses, bacteria, fungi, and parasites—reproduce and regulate their other life processes by means of genetic material, composed of nucleic acid (DNA or RNA). It was thus widely assumed that all pathogens contain such genetic material in their cellular structure. This assumption has been challenged, however, by scientists seeking to identify the pathogen that causes Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease (CJD), a degenerative form of dementia in humans. CJD causes the brain to become riddled with tiny holes, like a sponge (evidence of extensive nerve cell death). Its symptoms include impaired muscle control, loss of mental acuity, memory loss, and chronic insomnia. Extensive experiments aimed at identifying the pathogen responsible for CJD have led surprisingly to the isolation of a disease agent lacking nucleic acid and consisting mainly, if not exclusively, of protein. Researchers coined the term "prion" for this new type of protein pathogen. Upon further study, scientists discovered that prions normally exist as harmless cellular proteins in many of the body's tissues, including white blood cells and nerve cells in the brain; however, they possess the capability of converting their structures into a dangerous abnormal shape. Prions exhibiting this abnormal conformation were found to have infectious properties and the ability to reproduce themselves in an unexpected way, by initiating a chain reaction that induces normally shaped prions to transform themselves on contact, one after another, into the abnormal, pathogenic conformation. This cascade of transformations produces a plaque, consisting of thread-like structures, that collects in the brain and ultimately destroys nerve cells. Because prions, unlike other pathogens, occur naturally in the body as proteins, the body does not produce an immune response when they are present. And in the absence of any effective therapy for preventing the cascade process by which affected prions reproduce themselves, CJD is inevitably fatal, though there are wide variations in pre-symptomatic incubation times and in how aggressively the disease progresses. Although the discovery of the link between prions and CJD was initially received with great skepticism in the scientific community, subsequent research has supported the conclusion that prions are an entirely new class of infectious pathogens. Furthermore, it is now believed that a similar process of protein malformation may be involved in other, more common degenerative neurological conditions such as Alzheimer's disease and Parkinson's disease. This possibility has yet to be fully explored, however, and the exact mechanisms by which prions reproduce themselves and cause cellular destruction have yet to be completely understood.
Question: Which one of the following is most strongly supported by the passage?
 A. Understanding the cause of CJD has required scientists to reconsider their traditional beliefs about the causes of infection.
 B. CJD is contagious, though not highly so.
 C. The prevention of CJD would be most efficiently achieved by the prevention of certain genetic abnormalities.
 D. Although patients with CJD exhibit different incubation times, the disease progresses at about the same rate in all patients once symptoms are manifested.
 E. The prion theory of infection has weak support within the scientific community.
Answer:

Choices:
- A
- B
- C
- D
- E

An organism is considered to have an infection when a disease-causing agent, called a pathogen, establishes a viable presence in the organism. This can occur only if the pathogenic agent is able to reproduce itself in the host organism. The only agents believed until recently to be responsible for infections—viruses, bacteria, fungi, and parasites—reproduce and regulate their other life processes by means of genetic material, composed of nucleic acid (DNA or RNA). It was thus widely assumed that all pathogens contain such genetic material in their cellular structure. This assumption has been challenged, however, by scientists seeking to identify the pathogen that causes Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease (CJD), a degenerative form of dementia in humans. CJD causes the brain to become riddled with tiny holes, like a sponge (evidence of extensive nerve cell death). Its symptoms include impaired muscle control, loss of mental acuity, memory loss, and chronic insomnia. Extensive experiments aimed at identifying the pathogen responsible for CJD have led surprisingly to the isolation of a disease agent lacking nucleic acid and consisting mainly, if not exclusively, of protein. Researchers coined the term "prion" for this new type of protein pathogen. Upon further study, scientists discovered that prions normally exist as harmless cellular proteins in many of the body's tissues, including white blood cells and nerve cells in the brain; however, they possess the capability of converting their structures into a dangerous abnormal shape. Prions exhibiting this abnormal conformation were found to have infectious properties and the ability to reproduce themselves in an unexpected way, by initiating a chain reaction that induces normally shaped prions to transform themselves on contact, one after another, into the abnormal, pathogenic conformation. This cascade of transformations produces a plaque, consisting of thread-like structures, that collects in the brain and ultimately destroys nerve cells. Because prions, unlike other pathogens, occur naturally in the body as proteins, the body does not produce an immune response when they are present. And in the absence of any effective therapy for preventing the cascade process by which affected prions reproduce themselves, CJD is inevitably fatal, though there are wide variations in pre-symptomatic incubation times and in how aggressively the disease progresses. Although the discovery of the link between prions and CJD was initially received with great skepticism in the scientific community, subsequent research has supported the conclusion that prions are an entirely new class of infectious pathogens. Furthermore, it is now believed that a similar process of protein malformation may be involved in other, more common degenerative neurological conditions such as Alzheimer's disease and Parkinson's disease. This possibility has yet to be fully explored, however, and the exact mechanisms by which prions reproduce themselves and cause cellular destruction have yet to be completely understood.
Question: Which one of the following is most strongly supported by the passage?
 A. Understanding the cause of CJD has required scientists to reconsider their traditional beliefs about the causes of infection.
 B. CJD is contagious, though not highly so.
 C. The prevention of CJD would be most efficiently achieved by the prevention of certain genetic abnormalities.
 D. Although patients with CJD exhibit different incubation times, the disease progresses at about the same rate in all patients once symptoms are manifested.
 E. The prion theory of infection has weak support within the scientific community.
Answer: B


Question:
The characteristic smell or taste of a plant, to insects as well as to humans, depends on its chemical composition. Broadly speaking, plants contain two categories of chemical substances: primary and secondary. The primary substances, such as proteins, carbohydrates, vitamins, and hormones, are required for growth and proper functioning and are found in all plants. The secondary substances are a diverse and multitudinous array of chemicals that have no known role in the internal chemical processes of plants' growth or metabolism. Only a few of these substances occur in any one species of plant, but the same or similar ones tend to occur in related plants such as the various species that constitute a single family. It is these secondary substances that give plants their distinctive tastes and smells. Insects appear to have played a major role in many plants' having the secondary substances they have today. Such substances undoubtedly first appeared, and new ones continue to appear, as the result of genetic mutations in individual plants. But if a mutation is to survive and be passed on to subsequent generations, it must pass the muster of natural selection—that is, it must increase the likelihood of the organism's surviving and reproducing. Some secondary substances are favored by natural selection because they are scents that attract pollinating insects to blossoms. Such scents signal the presence of nectar, which nourishes the insects without damage to the plants. Other secondary substances that arose by mutation were conserved by natural selection because they proved to be biochemical defenses against the enemies of plants, the majority of which are insects. Some of these defensive substances cause insects to suffer unpleasant symptoms or even to die. Still other secondary substances are not in themselves harmful to insects, but are characteristic smells or tastes that dissuade the insect from feeding by warning it of the presence of some other substance that is harmful. For hundreds of millions of years there has been an evolutionary competition for advantage between plants and plant-eating insects. If insects are to survive as the plants they eat develop defenses against them, they must switch to other foods or evolve ways to circumvent the plants' defenses. They may evolve a way to detoxify a harmful substance, to store it in their bodies out of harm's way, or to avoid its effects in some other manner. Insects quickly come to prefer the plants whose defenses they can circumvent, and they eventually evolve the ability to identify them by their characteristic flavors or odors, or both. As the competition has progressed, fewer and fewer plants have remained as suitable food sources for any one species of insect; species of insects have thus tended to become associated with narrowly defined and often botanically restricted groups of plants.
Question: Which one of the following most accurately expresses the main point of the passage?
 A. Although the secondary substances in plants do not take part in the plants' basic biological processes, these substances operate as natural defenses against damage and destruction by insects.
 B. Long-term competition between plants and insects has led to a narrowing of the range of secondary substances present in plants and, thus, also to a narrowing of the range of insect species that eat each species of plant.
 C. The particular secondary substances possessed by different plants, and thus the distinctive tastes and smells that present-day plants have, result in large part from an evolutionary process of teraction between plants and insects.
 D. Due to long-term evolutionary pressures exerted by insects, the secondary substances in plants have become numerous and diverse but tend to be similar among closely related species.
 E. Because plant mutations have led to the development of secondary substances, plants have come to participate in a continuing process of competition with plant-eating insects.
Answer:

Choices:
- A
- B
- C
- D
- E

The characteristic smell or taste of a plant, to insects as well as to humans, depends on its chemical composition. Broadly speaking, plants contain two categories of chemical substances: primary and secondary. The primary substances, such as proteins, carbohydrates, vitamins, and hormones, are required for growth and proper functioning and are found in all plants. The secondary substances are a diverse and multitudinous array of chemicals that have no known role in the internal chemical processes of plants' growth or metabolism. Only a few of these substances occur in any one species of plant, but the same or similar ones tend to occur in related plants such as the various species that constitute a single family. It is these secondary substances that give plants their distinctive tastes and smells. Insects appear to have played a major role in many plants' having the secondary substances they have today. Such substances undoubtedly first appeared, and new ones continue to appear, as the result of genetic mutations in individual plants. But if a mutation is to survive and be passed on to subsequent generations, it must pass the muster of natural selection—that is, it must increase the likelihood of the organism's surviving and reproducing. Some secondary substances are favored by natural selection because they are scents that attract pollinating insects to blossoms. Such scents signal the presence of nectar, which nourishes the insects without damage to the plants. Other secondary substances that arose by mutation were conserved by natural selection because they proved to be biochemical defenses against the enemies of plants, the majority of which are insects. Some of these defensive substances cause insects to suffer unpleasant symptoms or even to die. Still other secondary substances are not in themselves harmful to insects, but are characteristic smells or tastes that dissuade the insect from feeding by warning it of the presence of some other substance that is harmful. For hundreds of millions of years there has been an evolutionary competition for advantage between plants and plant-eating insects. If insects are to survive as the plants they eat develop defenses against them, they must switch to other foods or evolve ways to circumvent the plants' defenses. They may evolve a way to detoxify a harmful substance, to store it in their bodies out of harm's way, or to avoid its effects in some other manner. Insects quickly come to prefer the plants whose defenses they can circumvent, and they eventually evolve the ability to identify them by their characteristic flavors or odors, or both. As the competition has progressed, fewer and fewer plants have remained as suitable food sources for any one species of insect; species of insects have thus tended to become associated with narrowly defined and often botanically restricted groups of plants.
Question: Which one of the following most accurately expresses the main point of the passage?
 A. Although the secondary substances in plants do not take part in the plants' basic biological processes, these substances operate as natural defenses against damage and destruction by insects.
 B. Long-term competition between plants and insects has led to a narrowing of the range of secondary substances present in plants and, thus, also to a narrowing of the range of insect species that eat each species of plant.
 C. The particular secondary substances possessed by different plants, and thus the distinctive tastes and smells that present-day plants have, result in large part from an evolutionary process of teraction between plants and insects.
 D. Due to long-term evolutionary pressures exerted by insects, the secondary substances in plants have become numerous and diverse but tend to be similar among closely related species.
 E. Because plant mutations have led to the development of secondary substances, plants have come to participate in a continuing process of competition with plant-eating insects.
Answer: C


Question:
An organism is considered to have an infection when a disease-causing agent, called a pathogen, establishes a viable presence in the organism. This can occur only if the pathogenic agent is able to reproduce itself in the host organism. The only agents believed until recently to be responsible for infections—viruses, bacteria, fungi, and parasites—reproduce and regulate their other life processes by means of genetic material, composed of nucleic acid (DNA or RNA). It was thus widely assumed that all pathogens contain such genetic material in their cellular structure. This assumption has been challenged, however, by scientists seeking to identify the pathogen that causes Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease (CJD), a degenerative form of dementia in humans. CJD causes the brain to become riddled with tiny holes, like a sponge (evidence of extensive nerve cell death). Its symptoms include impaired muscle control, loss of mental acuity, memory loss, and chronic insomnia. Extensive experiments aimed at identifying the pathogen responsible for CJD have led surprisingly to the isolation of a disease agent lacking nucleic acid and consisting mainly, if not exclusively, of protein. Researchers coined the term "prion" for this new type of protein pathogen. Upon further study, scientists discovered that prions normally exist as harmless cellular proteins in many of the body's tissues, including white blood cells and nerve cells in the brain; however, they possess the capability of converting their structures into a dangerous abnormal shape. Prions exhibiting this abnormal conformation were found to have infectious properties and the ability to reproduce themselves in an unexpected way, by initiating a chain reaction that induces normally shaped prions to transform themselves on contact, one after another, into the abnormal, pathogenic conformation. This cascade of transformations produces a plaque, consisting of thread-like structures, that collects in the brain and ultimately destroys nerve cells. Because prions, unlike other pathogens, occur naturally in the body as proteins, the body does not produce an immune response when they are present. And in the absence of any effective therapy for preventing the cascade process by which affected prions reproduce themselves, CJD is inevitably fatal, though there are wide variations in pre-symptomatic incubation times and in how aggressively the disease progresses. Although the discovery of the link between prions and CJD was initially received with great skepticism in the scientific community, subsequent research has supported the conclusion that prions are an entirely new class of infectious pathogens. Furthermore, it is now believed that a similar process of protein malformation may be involved in other, more common degenerative neurological conditions such as Alzheimer's disease and Parkinson's disease. This possibility has yet to be fully explored, however, and the exact mechanisms by which prions reproduce themselves and cause cellular destruction have yet to be completely understood.
Question: If the hypothesis that CJD is caused by prions is correct, finding the answer to which one of the following questions would tend most to help a physician in deciding whether a patient has CJD?
 A. Has the patient suffered a severe blow to the skull recently?
 B. Does the patient experience occasional bouts of insomnia?
 C. Has the patient been exposed to any forms of radiation that have a known tendency to cause certain kinds of genetic damage?
 D. Has any member of the patient's immediate family ever had a brain disease?
 E. Does the patient's brain tissue exhibit the presence of any abnormal thread-like structures?
Answer:

Choices:
- A
- B
- C
- D
- E

An organism is considered to have an infection when a disease-causing agent, called a pathogen, establishes a viable presence in the organism. This can occur only if the pathogenic agent is able to reproduce itself in the host organism. The only agents believed until recently to be responsible for infections—viruses, bacteria, fungi, and parasites—reproduce and regulate their other life processes by means of genetic material, composed of nucleic acid (DNA or RNA). It was thus widely assumed that all pathogens contain such genetic material in their cellular structure. This assumption has been challenged, however, by scientists seeking to identify the pathogen that causes Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease (CJD), a degenerative form of dementia in humans. CJD causes the brain to become riddled with tiny holes, like a sponge (evidence of extensive nerve cell death). Its symptoms include impaired muscle control, loss of mental acuity, memory loss, and chronic insomnia. Extensive experiments aimed at identifying the pathogen responsible for CJD have led surprisingly to the isolation of a disease agent lacking nucleic acid and consisting mainly, if not exclusively, of protein. Researchers coined the term "prion" for this new type of protein pathogen. Upon further study, scientists discovered that prions normally exist as harmless cellular proteins in many of the body's tissues, including white blood cells and nerve cells in the brain; however, they possess the capability of converting their structures into a dangerous abnormal shape. Prions exhibiting this abnormal conformation were found to have infectious properties and the ability to reproduce themselves in an unexpected way, by initiating a chain reaction that induces normally shaped prions to transform themselves on contact, one after another, into the abnormal, pathogenic conformation. This cascade of transformations produces a plaque, consisting of thread-like structures, that collects in the brain and ultimately destroys nerve cells. Because prions, unlike other pathogens, occur naturally in the body as proteins, the body does not produce an immune response when they are present. And in the absence of any effective therapy for preventing the cascade process by which affected prions reproduce themselves, CJD is inevitably fatal, though there are wide variations in pre-symptomatic incubation times and in how aggressively the disease progresses. Although the discovery of the link between prions and CJD was initially received with great skepticism in the scientific community, subsequent research has supported the conclusion that prions are an entirely new class of infectious pathogens. Furthermore, it is now believed that a similar process of protein malformation may be involved in other, more common degenerative neurological conditions such as Alzheimer's disease and Parkinson's disease. This possibility has yet to be fully explored, however, and the exact mechanisms by which prions reproduce themselves and cause cellular destruction have yet to be completely understood.
Question: If the hypothesis that CJD is caused by prions is correct, finding the answer to which one of the following questions would tend most to help a physician in deciding whether a patient has CJD?
 A. Has the patient suffered a severe blow to the skull recently?
 B. Does the patient experience occasional bouts of insomnia?
 C. Has the patient been exposed to any forms of radiation that have a known tendency to cause certain kinds of genetic damage?
 D. Has any member of the patient's immediate family ever had a brain disease?
 E. Does the patient's brain tissue exhibit the presence of any abnormal thread-like structures?
Answer: E


Question:
The characteristic smell or taste of a plant, to insects as well as to humans, depends on its chemical composition. Broadly speaking, plants contain two categories of chemical substances: primary and secondary. The primary substances, such as proteins, carbohydrates, vitamins, and hormones, are required for growth and proper functioning and are found in all plants. The secondary substances are a diverse and multitudinous array of chemicals that have no known role in the internal chemical processes of plants' growth or metabolism. Only a few of these substances occur in any one species of plant, but the same or similar ones tend to occur in related plants such as the various species that constitute a single family. It is these secondary substances that give plants their distinctive tastes and smells. Insects appear to have played a major role in many plants' having the secondary substances they have today. Such substances undoubtedly first appeared, and new ones continue to appear, as the result of genetic mutations in individual plants. But if a mutation is to survive and be passed on to subsequent generations, it must pass the muster of natural selection—that is, it must increase the likelihood of the organism's surviving and reproducing. Some secondary substances are favored by natural selection because they are scents that attract pollinating insects to blossoms. Such scents signal the presence of nectar, which nourishes the insects without damage to the plants. Other secondary substances that arose by mutation were conserved by natural selection because they proved to be biochemical defenses against the enemies of plants, the majority of which are insects. Some of these defensive substances cause insects to suffer unpleasant symptoms or even to die. Still other secondary substances are not in themselves harmful to insects, but are characteristic smells or tastes that dissuade the insect from feeding by warning it of the presence of some other substance that is harmful. For hundreds of millions of years there has been an evolutionary competition for advantage between plants and plant-eating insects. If insects are to survive as the plants they eat develop defenses against them, they must switch to other foods or evolve ways to circumvent the plants' defenses. They may evolve a way to detoxify a harmful substance, to store it in their bodies out of harm's way, or to avoid its effects in some other manner. Insects quickly come to prefer the plants whose defenses they can circumvent, and they eventually evolve the ability to identify them by their characteristic flavors or odors, or both. As the competition has progressed, fewer and fewer plants have remained as suitable food sources for any one species of insect; species of insects have thus tended to become associated with narrowly defined and often botanically restricted groups of plants.
Question: In the passage, the author discusses primary substances mainly in order to
 A. provide information about how plants grow and metabolize nutrients
 B. help explain what secondary substances are
 C. help distinguish between two ways that insects have affected plant evolution
 D. indicate the great diversity of chemicals that occur in various species of plants
 E. provide evidence of plants' adaptation to insects
Answer:

Choices:
- A
- B
- C
- D
- E

The characteristic smell or taste of a plant, to insects as well as to humans, depends on its chemical composition. Broadly speaking, plants contain two categories of chemical substances: primary and secondary. The primary substances, such as proteins, carbohydrates, vitamins, and hormones, are required for growth and proper functioning and are found in all plants. The secondary substances are a diverse and multitudinous array of chemicals that have no known role in the internal chemical processes of plants' growth or metabolism. Only a few of these substances occur in any one species of plant, but the same or similar ones tend to occur in related plants such as the various species that constitute a single family. It is these secondary substances that give plants their distinctive tastes and smells. Insects appear to have played a major role in many plants' having the secondary substances they have today. Such substances undoubtedly first appeared, and new ones continue to appear, as the result of genetic mutations in individual plants. But if a mutation is to survive and be passed on to subsequent generations, it must pass the muster of natural selection—that is, it must increase the likelihood of the organism's surviving and reproducing. Some secondary substances are favored by natural selection because they are scents that attract pollinating insects to blossoms. Such scents signal the presence of nectar, which nourishes the insects without damage to the plants. Other secondary substances that arose by mutation were conserved by natural selection because they proved to be biochemical defenses against the enemies of plants, the majority of which are insects. Some of these defensive substances cause insects to suffer unpleasant symptoms or even to die. Still other secondary substances are not in themselves harmful to insects, but are characteristic smells or tastes that dissuade the insect from feeding by warning it of the presence of some other substance that is harmful. For hundreds of millions of years there has been an evolutionary competition for advantage between plants and plant-eating insects. If insects are to survive as the plants they eat develop defenses against them, they must switch to other foods or evolve ways to circumvent the plants' defenses. They may evolve a way to detoxify a harmful substance, to store it in their bodies out of harm's way, or to avoid its effects in some other manner. Insects quickly come to prefer the plants whose defenses they can circumvent, and they eventually evolve the ability to identify them by their characteristic flavors or odors, or both. As the competition has progressed, fewer and fewer plants have remained as suitable food sources for any one species of insect; species of insects have thus tended to become associated with narrowly defined and often botanically restricted groups of plants.
Question: In the passage, the author discusses primary substances mainly in order to
 A. provide information about how plants grow and metabolize nutrients
 B. help explain what secondary substances are
 C. help distinguish between two ways that insects have affected plant evolution
 D. indicate the great diversity of chemicals that occur in various species of plants
 E. provide evidence of plants' adaptation to insects
Answer: B


Question:
Advances in scientific understanding often do not build directly or smoothly in response to the data that are amassed, and in retrospect, after a major revision of theory, it may seem strange that a crucial bypothesis was long overlooked. A case in point is the discovery of a means by which the nuclei of atoms can be split Between 1934, when a group ofitalian physicists including Enrico Fermi first bombarded uranium with neutrons, and 1939, when exiled Austrian physicist Lise Meitner provided the crucial theoretical connection, scientists compiled increasing evidence that nuclear fission had been achieved, without, however, recognizing what they were witnessing.Earlier, even before the neutron and proton composition of atomic nuclei had been experimentally demonstrated, sometheoretical physicists had produced calculations indicating that in principle it should be possible to break atoms apart. But the neutron-bombardment experiments were not aimed at achieving such a result, and researchers were not even receptive to the possibility that it might happen in that context. A common view was that a neutron's breaking apart a uranium nucleus would be analogous to a pebble, thrown through a window, causing a house to collapse.In Berlin, Meitner pursued research related to that of the Italians, discovering a puzzling group of radioactive substances produced by neutron bombardment of uranium. Fermi and others achieved numerous similar results. These products remained unidentified partly because precise chemical analyses were hampered by the minute quantities of the substances produced and the dangers of working with highly radioactive materials, but more significantly because of the expectation that they would all be elements close to uranium in nuclear composition. In 1938 Meitner escaped from Nazi Germany and undertook related research in Sweden, but her research partner Otto Hahn kept her informed of his continuing experimentation. Late in that year he wrote to her of a surprising result: one of the substances resulting from the neutron bombardment of uranium had been conclusively identified as barium, an element whose structure would have made it impossible to produce through any mechanism he envisaged as being involved in the experiments. Hahn even remarked that, despite the clear chemical evidence of what had occmred, it went "against all previous experiences of nuclear physics," but be also noted that together the number of protons and neutrons in the nuclei of barium and technetium, the accompanying product of the experiment, added up to the number of such particles that compose a uranium nucleus.It was Meitner who finally recognized the significance of the data in relation to underlying theoretical considerations: the researchers had actually been splitting uranium atoms. Coining the term "nuclear fission," she quickly submitted her conclusion for publication in a paper coauthored with pbysicist Otto Frisch. When scientists in Europe and North America rushed to corroborate the findings, it became clear that the relevant evidence had been present for some rime, lacking mainly the right conceptual link.
Question: The author's primary aim in the passage is to
 A. criticize a traditional view of scientific progress and advocate a replacement
 B. illustrate the often erratic way in which a scientific community achieves progress
 C. judge the relative importance of theory and experimentation in science
 D. take issue with the idea that scientists make slow,steady progress
 E. display the way in which intellectual arrogance sometimes hinders scientific progress
Answer:

Choices:
- A
- B
- C
- D
- E

Advances in scientific understanding often do not build directly or smoothly in response to the data that are amassed, and in retrospect, after a major revision of theory, it may seem strange that a crucial bypothesis was long overlooked. A case in point is the discovery of a means by which the nuclei of atoms can be split Between 1934, when a group ofitalian physicists including Enrico Fermi first bombarded uranium with neutrons, and 1939, when exiled Austrian physicist Lise Meitner provided the crucial theoretical connection, scientists compiled increasing evidence that nuclear fission had been achieved, without, however, recognizing what they were witnessing.Earlier, even before the neutron and proton composition of atomic nuclei had been experimentally demonstrated, sometheoretical physicists had produced calculations indicating that in principle it should be possible to break atoms apart. But the neutron-bombardment experiments were not aimed at achieving such a result, and researchers were not even receptive to the possibility that it might happen in that context. A common view was that a neutron's breaking apart a uranium nucleus would be analogous to a pebble, thrown through a window, causing a house to collapse.In Berlin, Meitner pursued research related to that of the Italians, discovering a puzzling group of radioactive substances produced by neutron bombardment of uranium. Fermi and others achieved numerous similar results. These products remained unidentified partly because precise chemical analyses were hampered by the minute quantities of the substances produced and the dangers of working with highly radioactive materials, but more significantly because of the expectation that they would all be elements close to uranium in nuclear composition. In 1938 Meitner escaped from Nazi Germany and undertook related research in Sweden, but her research partner Otto Hahn kept her informed of his continuing experimentation. Late in that year he wrote to her of a surprising result: one of the substances resulting from the neutron bombardment of uranium had been conclusively identified as barium, an element whose structure would have made it impossible to produce through any mechanism he envisaged as being involved in the experiments. Hahn even remarked that, despite the clear chemical evidence of what had occmred, it went "against all previous experiences of nuclear physics," but be also noted that together the number of protons and neutrons in the nuclei of barium and technetium, the accompanying product of the experiment, added up to the number of such particles that compose a uranium nucleus.It was Meitner who finally recognized the significance of the data in relation to underlying theoretical considerations: the researchers had actually been splitting uranium atoms. Coining the term "nuclear fission," she quickly submitted her conclusion for publication in a paper coauthored with pbysicist Otto Frisch. When scientists in Europe and North America rushed to corroborate the findings, it became clear that the relevant evidence had been present for some rime, lacking mainly the right conceptual link.
Question: The author's primary aim in the passage is to
 A. criticize a traditional view of scientific progress and advocate a replacement
 B. illustrate the often erratic way in which a scientific community achieves progress
 C. judge the relative importance of theory and experimentation in science
 D. take issue with the idea that scientists make slow,steady progress
 E. display the way in which intellectual arrogance sometimes hinders scientific progress
Answer: B


Question:
"Stealing thunder" is a courtroom strategy that consists in a lawyer's revealing negative information about a client before that information is revealed or elicited by an opposing lawyer. While there is no point in revealing a weakness that is unknown to one's opponents or that would not be exploited by them, many lawyers believe that if the weakness is likely to be revealed in opposing testimony, it should be volunteered; otherwise, the hostile revelation would be more damaging.Although no empirical research has directly tested the effectiveness of stealing thunder in actual trials, studies involving simulated trial situations have suggested that the technique is, in fact, effective, at least within a reasonably broad range of applications. Lawyers' commonly held belief in the value of stealing thunder is not only corroborated by those experimental findings; it is also supported by several psychological explanations of why the technique should work. For one thing, volunteering damaging information early may create an image of credibility. Psychological research suggests that people who reveal information that appears to be against their own best interest are likely to be perceived as more credible and thus may be more persuasive. Stealing thunder may also provide juries with an impetus for critical assessment by previewing, and thus alerting them to, testimony that the opposition plans to present. In psychological experiments, audiences that were previously warned of an upcoming attempt at persuasion became more resistant to the persuasive attempt, forming counterarguments based on the warning. Also, the value placed on a persuasive message is probably much like the value placed on any commodity; the scarcer the commodity, the more valuable it is. A persuasive message will thus increase in value and effectiveness to the extent that it is seen as scarce. In the courtroom, a piece of evidence brought by both the prosecution and the defense, as when thunder is stolen, may be seen as less scarce becoming "old news." Thus, unless that evidence is of overriding consequence, it should carry less weight than if it had been included only in hostile testimony.Finally, stealing thunder may work because the lawyer can frame the evidence in his or her own terms and downplay its significance, just as politicians sometimes seek to put their "spin" on potentially damaging information. However, it may therefore be effective only when the negative information can be framed positively. Jurors, who often initially have little information about a case, are usually eager to solidify their position regarding the case. They can therefore be expected to use the early positive framing to guide their subsequent analysis of the trial information. But this also suggests limitations on the use of the technique: when information is very damaging, stealing thunder may create an early negative impression that forms a cognitive framework for jurors, who then filter subsequent information through this schema.
Question: The passage most strongly implies that many lawyers believe which one of the following concerning decisions about whether to steal thunder?
 A. A lawyer should be concerned with how readily the negative information can be positively framed, especially if the information is very negative.
 B. A lawyer should take into account, among other things, whether or not the jurors are already familiar with some of the relevant facts of the case prior to the trial.
 C. The decision should be based on careful deliberations that anticipate both positive and negative reactions of jurors and opposing lawyers.
 D. The decision should depend on how probable it is that the opposition will try to derive an advantage from mentioning the negative information in question.
 E. The decision should be based at least partly on a lawyer's knowledge of relevant psychological research findings and legal statistics.
Answer:

Choices:
- A
- B
- C
- D
- E

"Stealing thunder" is a courtroom strategy that consists in a lawyer's revealing negative information about a client before that information is revealed or elicited by an opposing lawyer. While there is no point in revealing a weakness that is unknown to one's opponents or that would not be exploited by them, many lawyers believe that if the weakness is likely to be revealed in opposing testimony, it should be volunteered; otherwise, the hostile revelation would be more damaging.Although no empirical research has directly tested the effectiveness of stealing thunder in actual trials, studies involving simulated trial situations have suggested that the technique is, in fact, effective, at least within a reasonably broad range of applications. Lawyers' commonly held belief in the value of stealing thunder is not only corroborated by those experimental findings; it is also supported by several psychological explanations of why the technique should work. For one thing, volunteering damaging information early may create an image of credibility. Psychological research suggests that people who reveal information that appears to be against their own best interest are likely to be perceived as more credible and thus may be more persuasive. Stealing thunder may also provide juries with an impetus for critical assessment by previewing, and thus alerting them to, testimony that the opposition plans to present. In psychological experiments, audiences that were previously warned of an upcoming attempt at persuasion became more resistant to the persuasive attempt, forming counterarguments based on the warning. Also, the value placed on a persuasive message is probably much like the value placed on any commodity; the scarcer the commodity, the more valuable it is. A persuasive message will thus increase in value and effectiveness to the extent that it is seen as scarce. In the courtroom, a piece of evidence brought by both the prosecution and the defense, as when thunder is stolen, may be seen as less scarce becoming "old news." Thus, unless that evidence is of overriding consequence, it should carry less weight than if it had been included only in hostile testimony.Finally, stealing thunder may work because the lawyer can frame the evidence in his or her own terms and downplay its significance, just as politicians sometimes seek to put their "spin" on potentially damaging information. However, it may therefore be effective only when the negative information can be framed positively. Jurors, who often initially have little information about a case, are usually eager to solidify their position regarding the case. They can therefore be expected to use the early positive framing to guide their subsequent analysis of the trial information. But this also suggests limitations on the use of the technique: when information is very damaging, stealing thunder may create an early negative impression that forms a cognitive framework for jurors, who then filter subsequent information through this schema.
Question: The passage most strongly implies that many lawyers believe which one of the following concerning decisions about whether to steal thunder?
 A. A lawyer should be concerned with how readily the negative information can be positively framed, especially if the information is very negative.
 B. A lawyer should take into account, among other things, whether or not the jurors are already familiar with some of the relevant facts of the case prior to the trial.
 C. The decision should be based on careful deliberations that anticipate both positive and negative reactions of jurors and opposing lawyers.
 D. The decision should depend on how probable it is that the opposition will try to derive an advantage from mentioning the negative information in question.
 E. The decision should be based at least partly on a lawyer's knowledge of relevant psychological research findings and legal statistics.
Answer: D


Question:
In studying the autobiographies of Native Americans, most scholars have focused on as-told-to life histories that were solicited, translated, recorded, and edited by non-Native American collaborators—that emerged from "bicultural composite authorship." Limiting their studies to such written documents, these scholars have overlooked traditional, preliterate modes of communicating personal history. In addition, they have failed to address the cultural constructs of the highly diverse Native American peoples, who prior to contact with nonindigenous cultures did not share with Europeans the same assumptions about self, life, and writing that underlie the concept of an autobiography— that indeed constitute the English word's root meaning. The idea of self was, in a number of pre-contact Native American cultures, markedly inclusive: identity was not merely individual, but also relational to a society, a specific landscape, and the cosmos. Within these cultures, the expression of life experiences tended to be oriented toward current events: with the participation of fellow tribal members, an individual person would articulate, reenact, or record important experiences as the person lived them, a mode of autobiography seemingly more fragmented than the European custom of writing down the recollections of a lifetime. Moreover, expression itself was not a matter of writing but of language, which can include speech and signs. Oral autobiography comprised songs, chants, stories, and even the process whereby one repeatedly took on new names to reflect important events and deeds in one's life. Dance and drama could convey personal history; for example, the advent of a vision to one person might require the enactment of that vision in the form of a tribal pageant. One can view as autobiographical the elaborate tattoos that symbolized a warrior's valorous deeds, and such artifacts as a decorated shield that communicated the accomplishments and aspirations of its maker, or a robe that was emblazoned with the pictographic history of the wearer's battles and was sometimes used in reenactments. Also autobiographical, and indicative of high status within the tribe, would have been a tepee painted with symbolic designs to record the achievements and display the dreams or visions of its owner, who was often assisted in the painting by other tribal members. A tribe would, then, have contributed to the individual's narrative not merely passively, by its social codes and expectations, but actively by joining in the expression of that narrative. Such intercultural collaboration may seem alien to the European style of autobiography, yet any autobiography is shaped by its creator's ideas about the audience for which it is intended; in this sense, autobiography is justly called a simultaneous individual story and cultural narrative. Autobiographical expressions by early Native Americans may additionally have been shaped by the cultural perspectives of the people who transmitted them.
Question: Which one of the following would be most consistent with the ideas about identity that the author attributes to pre-contact Native American cultures?
 A. A person who is born into one tribe but is brought up by members of another tribe retains a name given at birth.
 B. A pictograph that represents a specific person incorporates the symbol for a constellation.
 C. A similar ritual for assuming a new name is used in diverse communities.
 D. A name given to one member of a community cannot be given to another member of the same community.
 E. A decorated shield that belonged to an individual cannot be traced to a particular tribe.
Answer:

Choices:
- A
- B
- C
- D
- E

In studying the autobiographies of Native Americans, most scholars have focused on as-told-to life histories that were solicited, translated, recorded, and edited by non-Native American collaborators—that emerged from "bicultural composite authorship." Limiting their studies to such written documents, these scholars have overlooked traditional, preliterate modes of communicating personal history. In addition, they have failed to address the cultural constructs of the highly diverse Native American peoples, who prior to contact with nonindigenous cultures did not share with Europeans the same assumptions about self, life, and writing that underlie the concept of an autobiography— that indeed constitute the English word's root meaning. The idea of self was, in a number of pre-contact Native American cultures, markedly inclusive: identity was not merely individual, but also relational to a society, a specific landscape, and the cosmos. Within these cultures, the expression of life experiences tended to be oriented toward current events: with the participation of fellow tribal members, an individual person would articulate, reenact, or record important experiences as the person lived them, a mode of autobiography seemingly more fragmented than the European custom of writing down the recollections of a lifetime. Moreover, expression itself was not a matter of writing but of language, which can include speech and signs. Oral autobiography comprised songs, chants, stories, and even the process whereby one repeatedly took on new names to reflect important events and deeds in one's life. Dance and drama could convey personal history; for example, the advent of a vision to one person might require the enactment of that vision in the form of a tribal pageant. One can view as autobiographical the elaborate tattoos that symbolized a warrior's valorous deeds, and such artifacts as a decorated shield that communicated the accomplishments and aspirations of its maker, or a robe that was emblazoned with the pictographic history of the wearer's battles and was sometimes used in reenactments. Also autobiographical, and indicative of high status within the tribe, would have been a tepee painted with symbolic designs to record the achievements and display the dreams or visions of its owner, who was often assisted in the painting by other tribal members. A tribe would, then, have contributed to the individual's narrative not merely passively, by its social codes and expectations, but actively by joining in the expression of that narrative. Such intercultural collaboration may seem alien to the European style of autobiography, yet any autobiography is shaped by its creator's ideas about the audience for which it is intended; in this sense, autobiography is justly called a simultaneous individual story and cultural narrative. Autobiographical expressions by early Native Americans may additionally have been shaped by the cultural perspectives of the people who transmitted them.
Question: Which one of the following would be most consistent with the ideas about identity that the author attributes to pre-contact Native American cultures?
 A. A person who is born into one tribe but is brought up by members of another tribe retains a name given at birth.
 B. A pictograph that represents a specific person incorporates the symbol for a constellation.
 C. A similar ritual for assuming a new name is used in diverse communities.
 D. A name given to one member of a community cannot be given to another member of the same community.
 E. A decorated shield that belonged to an individual cannot be traced to a particular tribe.
Answer: B


Question:
"Never was anything as incoherent, shrill, chaotic and ear-splitting produced in music. The most piercing dissonances clash in a really atrocious harmony, and a few puny ideas only increase the disagreeable and deafening effect." This remark aptly characterizes the reaction of many listeners to the music of Arnold Schoenberg. But this particular criticism comes from the pen of the dramatist August von Kotzebue, writing in 1806 about the overture to Beethoven's opera Fidelio. Both Beethoven and Schoenberg stirred controversy because of the way they altered the language and extended the expressive range of music. Beethoven, of course, has stood as a cultural icon for more than a century, but that didn't happen overnight. His most challenging works did not become popular until well into the twentieth century and, significantly, after the invention of the phonograph, which made repeated listening possible. Like Beethoven, Schoenberg worked in a constantly changing and evolving musical style that acknowledged tradition while simultaneously lighting out for new territory. This is true of the three different musical styles through which Schoenberg's music evolved. He began in the late-Romantic manner—music charged with shifting chromatic harmonies—that was pervasive in his youth. People who enjoy the music of Brahms ought to love Schoenberg's Verklaerte Nacht, and they usually do, once they get past the fact that they are listening to a piece by Schoenberg. Schoenberg later pushed those unstable harmonies until they no longer had a tonal basis. He did this in part because in his view it was the next inevitable step in the historical development of music, and he felt he was a man of destiny; he also did it because he needed to in order to express what he was compelled to express. Finally, he developed the 12-tone technique as a means of bringing a new system of order to nontonal music and stabilizing it. In all three styles, Schoenberg operated at an awe-inspiring level of technical mastery. As his career progressed, his music became more condensed, more violent in its contrasts, and therefore more difficult to follow. But the real issue for any piece of music is not how it is made, but what it has to say. If Schoenberg hadn't existed, it would have been necessary to invent him, and not because of the 12-tone system, the seeds of which appear in Mozart. What makes Schoenberg's music essential is that he precisely delineated recognizable and sometimes disquieting emotional states that music had not recorded before. Some of his work remains disturbing not because it is incoherent shrill, and ear-splitting, but because it unflinchingly faces difficult truths.
Question: It can be inferred from the passage that the author would be most likely to agree with which one of the following statements about the relationships between the three styles in which Schoenberg wrote?
 A. Each successive style represents a natural progression from the previous one.
 B. Each successive style represents an inexplicabledeparture from the previous one.
 C. The second style represents a natural progression from the first, but the third style represents an inexplicable departure from the second.
 D. The second style represents an inexplicabledeparture from the first, but the third style represents a natural progression from the second.
 E. The second style represents an inexplicabledeparture from the first, but the third style represents a natural progression from the first.
Answer:

Choices:
- A
- B
- C
- D
- E

"Never was anything as incoherent, shrill, chaotic and ear-splitting produced in music. The most piercing dissonances clash in a really atrocious harmony, and a few puny ideas only increase the disagreeable and deafening effect." This remark aptly characterizes the reaction of many listeners to the music of Arnold Schoenberg. But this particular criticism comes from the pen of the dramatist August von Kotzebue, writing in 1806 about the overture to Beethoven's opera Fidelio. Both Beethoven and Schoenberg stirred controversy because of the way they altered the language and extended the expressive range of music. Beethoven, of course, has stood as a cultural icon for more than a century, but that didn't happen overnight. His most challenging works did not become popular until well into the twentieth century and, significantly, after the invention of the phonograph, which made repeated listening possible. Like Beethoven, Schoenberg worked in a constantly changing and evolving musical style that acknowledged tradition while simultaneously lighting out for new territory. This is true of the three different musical styles through which Schoenberg's music evolved. He began in the late-Romantic manner—music charged with shifting chromatic harmonies—that was pervasive in his youth. People who enjoy the music of Brahms ought to love Schoenberg's Verklaerte Nacht, and they usually do, once they get past the fact that they are listening to a piece by Schoenberg. Schoenberg later pushed those unstable harmonies until they no longer had a tonal basis. He did this in part because in his view it was the next inevitable step in the historical development of music, and he felt he was a man of destiny; he also did it because he needed to in order to express what he was compelled to express. Finally, he developed the 12-tone technique as a means of bringing a new system of order to nontonal music and stabilizing it. In all three styles, Schoenberg operated at an awe-inspiring level of technical mastery. As his career progressed, his music became more condensed, more violent in its contrasts, and therefore more difficult to follow. But the real issue for any piece of music is not how it is made, but what it has to say. If Schoenberg hadn't existed, it would have been necessary to invent him, and not because of the 12-tone system, the seeds of which appear in Mozart. What makes Schoenberg's music essential is that he precisely delineated recognizable and sometimes disquieting emotional states that music had not recorded before. Some of his work remains disturbing not because it is incoherent shrill, and ear-splitting, but because it unflinchingly faces difficult truths.
Question: It can be inferred from the passage that the author would be most likely to agree with which one of the following statements about the relationships between the three styles in which Schoenberg wrote?
 A. Each successive style represents a natural progression from the previous one.
 B. Each successive style represents an inexplicabledeparture from the previous one.
 C. The second style represents a natural progression from the first, but the third style represents an inexplicable departure from the second.
 D. The second style represents an inexplicabledeparture from the first, but the third style represents a natural progression from the second.
 E. The second style represents an inexplicabledeparture from the first, but the third style represents a natural progression from the first.
Answer: A


Question:
"Never was anything as incoherent, shrill, chaotic and ear-splitting produced in music. The most piercing dissonances clash in a really atrocious harmony, and a few puny ideas only increase the disagreeable and deafening effect." This remark aptly characterizes the reaction of many listeners to the music of Arnold Schoenberg. But this particular criticism comes from the pen of the dramatist August von Kotzebue, writing in 1806 about the overture to Beethoven's opera Fidelio. Both Beethoven and Schoenberg stirred controversy because of the way they altered the language and extended the expressive range of music. Beethoven, of course, has stood as a cultural icon for more than a century, but that didn't happen overnight. His most challenging works did not become popular until well into the twentieth century and, significantly, after the invention of the phonograph, which made repeated listening possible. Like Beethoven, Schoenberg worked in a constantly changing and evolving musical style that acknowledged tradition while simultaneously lighting out for new territory. This is true of the three different musical styles through which Schoenberg's music evolved. He began in the late-Romantic manner—music charged with shifting chromatic harmonies—that was pervasive in his youth. People who enjoy the music of Brahms ought to love Schoenberg's Verklaerte Nacht, and they usually do, once they get past the fact that they are listening to a piece by Schoenberg. Schoenberg later pushed those unstable harmonies until they no longer had a tonal basis. He did this in part because in his view it was the next inevitable step in the historical development of music, and he felt he was a man of destiny; he also did it because he needed to in order to express what he was compelled to express. Finally, he developed the 12-tone technique as a means of bringing a new system of order to nontonal music and stabilizing it. In all three styles, Schoenberg operated at an awe-inspiring level of technical mastery. As his career progressed, his music became more condensed, more violent in its contrasts, and therefore more difficult to follow. But the real issue for any piece of music is not how it is made, but what it has to say. If Schoenberg hadn't existed, it would have been necessary to invent him, and not because of the 12-tone system, the seeds of which appear in Mozart. What makes Schoenberg's music essential is that he precisely delineated recognizable and sometimes disquieting emotional states that music had not recorded before. Some of his work remains disturbing not because it is incoherent shrill, and ear-splitting, but because it unflinchingly faces difficult truths.
Question: All of the following are similarities between Beethoven and Schoenberg that the author alludes to EXCEPT:
 A. They worked for a time in the late-Romanticstyle.
 B. Their music has been regarded by some listeners as incoherent, shrill, and chaotic.
 C. Their compositions stirred controversy.
 D. They worked in changing and evolving musical styles.
 E. They altered the language and expressive range of music.
Answer:

Choices:
- A
- B
- C
- D
- E

"Never was anything as incoherent, shrill, chaotic and ear-splitting produced in music. The most piercing dissonances clash in a really atrocious harmony, and a few puny ideas only increase the disagreeable and deafening effect." This remark aptly characterizes the reaction of many listeners to the music of Arnold Schoenberg. But this particular criticism comes from the pen of the dramatist August von Kotzebue, writing in 1806 about the overture to Beethoven's opera Fidelio. Both Beethoven and Schoenberg stirred controversy because of the way they altered the language and extended the expressive range of music. Beethoven, of course, has stood as a cultural icon for more than a century, but that didn't happen overnight. His most challenging works did not become popular until well into the twentieth century and, significantly, after the invention of the phonograph, which made repeated listening possible. Like Beethoven, Schoenberg worked in a constantly changing and evolving musical style that acknowledged tradition while simultaneously lighting out for new territory. This is true of the three different musical styles through which Schoenberg's music evolved. He began in the late-Romantic manner—music charged with shifting chromatic harmonies—that was pervasive in his youth. People who enjoy the music of Brahms ought to love Schoenberg's Verklaerte Nacht, and they usually do, once they get past the fact that they are listening to a piece by Schoenberg. Schoenberg later pushed those unstable harmonies until they no longer had a tonal basis. He did this in part because in his view it was the next inevitable step in the historical development of music, and he felt he was a man of destiny; he also did it because he needed to in order to express what he was compelled to express. Finally, he developed the 12-tone technique as a means of bringing a new system of order to nontonal music and stabilizing it. In all three styles, Schoenberg operated at an awe-inspiring level of technical mastery. As his career progressed, his music became more condensed, more violent in its contrasts, and therefore more difficult to follow. But the real issue for any piece of music is not how it is made, but what it has to say. If Schoenberg hadn't existed, it would have been necessary to invent him, and not because of the 12-tone system, the seeds of which appear in Mozart. What makes Schoenberg's music essential is that he precisely delineated recognizable and sometimes disquieting emotional states that music had not recorded before. Some of his work remains disturbing not because it is incoherent shrill, and ear-splitting, but because it unflinchingly faces difficult truths.
Question: All of the following are similarities between Beethoven and Schoenberg that the author alludes to EXCEPT:
 A. They worked for a time in the late-Romanticstyle.
 B. Their music has been regarded by some listeners as incoherent, shrill, and chaotic.
 C. Their compositions stirred controversy.
 D. They worked in changing and evolving musical styles.
 E. They altered the language and expressive range of music.
Answer: A


Question:
One of the more striking developments in modem North American dance was African American choreographer Katherine Dunham's introduction of a technique known as dance-isolation, in which one part of the body moves in one rhythm while other parts are kept stationary or are moved in different rhythms. The incorporation of this technique into North American and European choreography is relatively recent, although various forms of the technique have long been essential to traditional dances of certain African, Caribbean, and Pacific-island cultures. Dunham's success in bringing dance-isolation and other traditional techniques from those cultures into the mainstream of modern North American dance is due in no small part to her training in both anthropological research and choreography.As an anthropologist in the 1930s, Dunham was one of the pioneers in the field of dance ethnology. Previously, dance had been neglected as an area of social research, primarily because most social scientists gravitated toward areas likely to be recognized by their peers as befitting scientifically rigorous, and therefore legitimate, modes of inquiry. Moreover, no other social scientist at that time was sufficiently trained in dance to be able to understand dance techniques, while experts in dance were not trained in the methods of social research. Starting in 1935, Dunham conducted a series of research projects into traditional Caribbean dance forms, with special interest in their origins in African culture. Especially critical to her success was her approach to research, which diverged radically from the methodology that prevailed at the time. Colleagues in anthropology advised her not to become too closely involved in the dances she was observing, both because of the extreme physical demands of the dances, and because they subscribed to the long-standing view, now fortunately recognized as unrealistic, that effective data gathering can and must be conducted from a position of complete detachment. But because of her interest and her skill as a performer, she generally eschewed such caution and participated in the dances herself. Through prolonged immersion of this kind, Dunham was able not only to comprehend various dances as complex cultural practices, but also to learn the techniques well enough to teach them to others and incorporate them into new forms of ballet. Between 1937 and 1945, Dunham developed a research-to-performance method that she used to adapt Caribbean dance forms for use in theatrical performance, combining them with modern dance styles she learned in Chicago. The ballets she created in this fashion were among the first North American dances to rectify the exclusion of African American themes from the medium of modern dance. Her work was thus crucial in establishing African American dance as an art form in its own right, making possible future companies such as Arthur Mitchell's Dance Theater of Harlem.
Question: In the last sentence of the second paragraph, the author mentions "experts in dance" primarily in order to
 A. suggest why a group of social scientists did not embrace the study of a particular cultural form
 B. suggest that a certain group was more qualified to study a particular cultural form than was another group
 C. identify an additional factor that motivated a particular social scientist to pursue a specific new line of research
 D. contribute to an explanation of why a particular field of research was not previously pursued
 E. indicate an additional possible reason for the tension between the members of two distinct fields of research
Answer:

Choices:
- A
- B
- C
- D
- E

One of the more striking developments in modem North American dance was African American choreographer Katherine Dunham's introduction of a technique known as dance-isolation, in which one part of the body moves in one rhythm while other parts are kept stationary or are moved in different rhythms. The incorporation of this technique into North American and European choreography is relatively recent, although various forms of the technique have long been essential to traditional dances of certain African, Caribbean, and Pacific-island cultures. Dunham's success in bringing dance-isolation and other traditional techniques from those cultures into the mainstream of modern North American dance is due in no small part to her training in both anthropological research and choreography.As an anthropologist in the 1930s, Dunham was one of the pioneers in the field of dance ethnology. Previously, dance had been neglected as an area of social research, primarily because most social scientists gravitated toward areas likely to be recognized by their peers as befitting scientifically rigorous, and therefore legitimate, modes of inquiry. Moreover, no other social scientist at that time was sufficiently trained in dance to be able to understand dance techniques, while experts in dance were not trained in the methods of social research. Starting in 1935, Dunham conducted a series of research projects into traditional Caribbean dance forms, with special interest in their origins in African culture. Especially critical to her success was her approach to research, which diverged radically from the methodology that prevailed at the time. Colleagues in anthropology advised her not to become too closely involved in the dances she was observing, both because of the extreme physical demands of the dances, and because they subscribed to the long-standing view, now fortunately recognized as unrealistic, that effective data gathering can and must be conducted from a position of complete detachment. But because of her interest and her skill as a performer, she generally eschewed such caution and participated in the dances herself. Through prolonged immersion of this kind, Dunham was able not only to comprehend various dances as complex cultural practices, but also to learn the techniques well enough to teach them to others and incorporate them into new forms of ballet. Between 1937 and 1945, Dunham developed a research-to-performance method that she used to adapt Caribbean dance forms for use in theatrical performance, combining them with modern dance styles she learned in Chicago. The ballets she created in this fashion were among the first North American dances to rectify the exclusion of African American themes from the medium of modern dance. Her work was thus crucial in establishing African American dance as an art form in its own right, making possible future companies such as Arthur Mitchell's Dance Theater of Harlem.
Question: In the last sentence of the second paragraph, the author mentions "experts in dance" primarily in order to
 A. suggest why a group of social scientists did not embrace the study of a particular cultural form
 B. suggest that a certain group was more qualified to study a particular cultural form than was another group
 C. identify an additional factor that motivated a particular social scientist to pursue a specific new line of research
 D. contribute to an explanation of why a particular field of research was not previously pursued
 E. indicate an additional possible reason for the tension between the members of two distinct fields of research
Answer: D