|
|
TEST 20
25 Minutes 16 Questions
1. In the first half of this year, from January to June, about three million videocassette recorders were sold. This number is only 35 percent of the total number of videocassette recorders sold last year. Therefore, total sales of videocassette recorders will almost certainly be lower for this year than they were for last year.
Which of the following, if true, most seriously weakens the conclusion above?
(A) The total number of videocassette recorders sold last year was lower than the total number sold in the year before that.
(B) Most people who are interested in owning a videocassette recorder have already purchased one.
(C) Videocassette recorders are less expensive this year than they were last year.
(D) Of the videocassette recorders sold last year, almost 60 percent were sold in January.（E）
(E) Typically, over 70 percent of the sales of videocassette recorders made in a year occur in the months of November and December.
2. Mud from a lake on an uninhabited wooded island in northern Lake Superior contains toxic chemicals, including toxaphene, a banned pesticide for cotton that previously was manufactured and used, not in nearby regions of Canada or the northern United States, but in the southern United States. No dumping has occurred on the island. The island lake is sufficiently elevated that water from Lake Superior does not reach it.
The statements above, if true, most strongly support which of the following hypotheses?
(A) The waters of the island lake are more severely polluted than those of Lake Superior.
(B) The toxaphene was carried to the island in the atmosphere by winds.
(C) Banning chemicals such as toxaphene does not aid the natural environment.
(D) Toxaphene has adverse effects on human beings but not on other organisms.（B）
(E) Concentrations of toxaphene in the soil of cotton-growing regions are not sufficient of be measurable.
3. Last year in the United States, women who ran for state and national offices were about as likely to win as men. However, only about fifteen percent of the candidates for these offices were women. Therefore, the reason there are so few women who win elections for these offices is not that women have difficulty winning elections but that so few women want to run.
Which of the following, if true, most seriously undermines the conclusion given?
(A) Last year the proportion of women incumbents who won reelection was smaller than the proportion of men incumbents who won reelection.
(B) Few women who run for state and national offices run against other women.
(C) Most women who have no strong desire to be politicians never run for state and national offices.
(D) The proportion of people holding local offices who are women is smaller than the proportion of people holding state and national offices who are women.（E）
(E) Many more women than men who want to run for state and national offices do not because they cannot get adequate funding for their campaigns.
4. Samples from a ceramic vase found at a tomb in Sicily prove that the vase was manufactured in Greece. Since the occupant of the tomb died during the reign of a Sicilian ruler who lived 2,700 years ago, the location of the vase indicates that there was trade between Sicily and Greece 2,700 years ago.
Which of the following is an assumption on which the argument depends?
(A) Sicilian potters who lived during the reign of the ruler did not produce work of the same level of quality as did Greek potters.
(B) Sicilian clay that was used in the manufacture of pottery during the ruler’s reign bore little resemblance to Greek clay used to manufacture pottery at that time.
(C) At the time that the occupant of the tomb was alive, there were ships capable of transporting large quantities of manufactured goods between Sicily and Greece.
(D) The vase that was found at the Sicilian tomb was not placed there many generations later by descendants of the occupant of the tomb.（D）
(E) The occupant of the tomb was not a member of the royal family to which the Sicilian ruler belonged.
5. In several cities, the government is going ahead with ambitious construction projects despite the high office vacancy rates in those cities. The vacant offices, though available for leasing, unfortunately do not meet the requirements for the facilities needed, such as court houses and laboratories. The government, therefore, is not guilty of any fiscal wastefulness.
Which of the following is an assumption on which the argument above depends?
(A) Adaptation of vacant office space to meet the government’s requirements, if possible, would not make leasing such office space a more cost-effective alternative to new construction.
(B) The government prefers leasing facilities to owning them in cases where the two alternatives are equally cost-effective.
(C) If facilities available for leasing come very close to meeting the government’s requirements for facilities the government needs, the government can relax its own requirements slightly and consider those facilities in compliance.
(D) The government’s construction projects would not on being completed, add to the stock of facilities available for leasing in the cities concerned.（A）
(E) Before embarking on any major construction project, the government is required by law to establish beyond any reasonable doubt that there are no alternatives that are most cost-effective.
6. Potato cyst nematodes are a pest of potato crops. The nematodes can lie dormant for several years in their cysts, which are protective capsules, and do not emerge except in the presence of chemicals emitted by potato roots. A company that has identified the relevant chemicals is planning to market them to potato farmers to spread on their fields when no potatoes are planted; any nematodes that emerge will soon starve to death.
Which of the following, if true, best supports the claim that the company’s plan will be successful?
(A) Nematodes that have emerged from their cysts can be killed by ordinary pesticides.
(B) The only part of a potato plant that a nematode eats is the roots.
(C) Some bacteria commonly present in the roots of potatoes digest the chemicals that cause the nematodes to emerge from their cysts.
(D) Trials have shown that spreading even minute quantities of the chemicals on potato fields caused nine-tenths of the nematodes present to emerge from their cysts.（D）
(E) The chemicals that cause the nematodes to emerge from their cysts are not emitted all the time the potato plant is growing.
7. It is better for the environment if as much of all packaging as possible is made from materials that are biodegradable in landfills. Therefore, it is always a change for the worse to replace packaging made from paper or cardboard with packaging made from plastics that are not biodegradable in landfills.
Which of the following, if true, constitutes the strongest objection to the argument above?
(A) The paper and cardboard used in packaging are usually not biodegradable in landfills.
(B) Some plastic used in packaging is biodegradable in landfills.
(C) In many landfills, a significant proportion of space is taken up by materials other than discarded packaging materials.
(D) It is impossible to avoid entirely the use of packaging materials that are not biodegradable in landfills.（A）
(E) Sometimes, in packaging an item, plastics that are not biodegradable in landfills are combined with cardboard.
8. Any serious policy discussion about acceptable levels of risk in connection with explosions is not well served if the participants fail to use the word “explosion” and use the phrase “energetic disassembly” instead. In fact, the word “explosion” elicits desirable reactions, such as a heightened level of attention, whereas the substitute phrase does not. Therefore, of the two terms, “explosion” is the one that should be used throughout discussions of this sort.
Which of the following is an assumption on which the argument above depends?
(A) In the kind of discussion at issue, the advantages of desirable reactions to the term “explosion” outweigh the drawbacks, if any, arising from undesirable reactions to that term.
(B) The phrase “energetic disassembly” has not so far been used as a substitute for the word “explosion” in the kind of discussion at issue.
(C) In any serious policy discussion, what is said by the participants is more important than how it is put into words.
(D) The only reason that people would have for using “energetic disassembly” in place of “explosion” is to render impossible any serious policy discussion concerning explosions.（A）
(E) The phrase “energetic disassembly” is not necessarily out of place in describing a controlled rather than an accidental explosion.
9. Mannis Corporation’s archival records are stored in an obsolete format that is accessible only by its current computer system; thus they are inaccessible when that system is not functioning properly. In order to avoid the possibility of losing access to their archival records in the case of computer malfunction, Mannis plans to replace its current computer system with a new system that stores records in a format that is accessible to several different systems.
The answer to which of the following questions would be most helpful in evaluating the effectiveness of the plan as a means of retaining access to the archival records?
(A) Will the new computer system require fewer operators than the current system requires?
(B) Has Mannis Corporation always stored its archival records in a computerized format?
(C) Will the new computer system that Mannis plans ensure greater security for the records stored than does Mannis’ current system?
(D) Will Mannis’ current collection of archival records be readily transferable to the new computer system?（D）
(E) Will the new computer system be able to perform many more tasks than the current system is able to perform?
10. Last year the worldwide paper industry used over twice as much fresh pulp (pulp made directly from raw plant fibers) as recycled pulp (pulp made from wastepaper). A paper-industry analyst has projected that by 2010 the industry will use at least as much recycled pulp annually as it does fresh pulp, while using a greater quantity of fresh pulp than it did last year.
If the information above is correct and the analyst’s projections prove to be accurate, which of the following projections must also be accurate?
(A) In 2010 the paper industry will use at least twice as much recycled pulp as it did last years.
(B) In 2010 the paper industry will use at least twice as much total pulp as it did last year.
(C) In 2010 the paper industry will produce more paper from a given amount of pulp than it did last year.
(D) As compared with last year, in 2010 the paper industry will make more paper that contains only recycled pulp.（A）
(E) As compared with last year, in 2010 the paper industry will make less paper that contains only fresh pulp.
11. In malaria-infested areas, many children tend to suffer several bouts of malaria before becoming immune to the disease. Clearly, what must be happening is that those children’s immune systems are only weakly stimulated by any single exposure to the malaria parasite and need to be challenged several times to produce an effective immune response.
Which of the following, if true, most seriously undermines the explanatory hypothesis?
(A) Immediately after a child has suffered a bout of malaria, the child’s caregivers tend to go to great lengths in taking precautions to prevent another infection, but this level of attention is not sustained.
(B) Malaria is spread from person to person by mosquitoes, and mosquitoes have become increasingly resistant to the pesticides used to control them.
(C) A certain gene, if inherited by children from only one of their parents, can render those children largely immune to infection with malaria.
(D) Antimalaria vaccines, of which several are in development, are all designed to work by stimulating the body’s immune system.（E）
(E) There are several distinct strains of malaria, and the body’s immune response to any one of them does not protect it against the others.
12. An advertisement designed to convince readers of the great durability of automobiles manufactured by the Deluxe Motor Car Company cites as evidence the fact that over half of all automobiles built by the company since 1970 are still on the road today, compared to no more than a third for any other manufacturer.
Which of the following, if true, most strongly supports the advertisement’s argument?
(A) After taking inflation into account, a new Deluxe automobile costs only slightly more than a new model did in 1970.
(B) The number of automobiles built by Deluxe each year has not increased sharply since 1970.
(C) Owners of Deluxe automobiles typically keep their cars well maintained.
(D) Since 1970, Deluxe has made fewer changes in the automobiles it manufactures than other car companies have made in their automobiles.（B）
(E) Deluxe automobiles have been selling at relatively stable prices in recent years.
13. Many state legislatures are considering proposals to the effect that certain policies should be determined not by the legislature itself but by public referenda in which every voter can take part. Critics of the proposals argue that the outcomes of public referenda would be biased, since wealthy special-interest groups are able to influence voters’ views by means of television advertisements.
Which of the following, if true, most strengthens the critics’ argument?
(A) Many state legislators regard public referenda as a way of avoiding voting on issues on which their constituents are divided.
(B) During elections for members of the legislature, the number of people who vote is unaffected by whether the candidates run television advertisements or not.
(C) Proponents of policies that are opposed by wealthy special-interest groups are often unable to afford advertising time on local television stations.
(D) Different special-interest groups often take opposing positions on questions of which policies the state should adopt.（C）
(E) Television stations are reluctant to become associated with any one political opinion, for fear of losing viewers who do not share that opinion.
14. Advertisement: Of the many over-the-counter medications marketed for the relief of sinus headache. SineEase costs the least per dose. And SineEase is as effective per dose as the most effective of those other medications. So for relief from sinus headaches, SineEase is the best buy.
Which of
the following, if true, most seriously weakens the argument above?
(A) Most of the over-the-counter medications marketed for the relief of sinus headache are equally effective per dose in providing such relief.
(B) Many of the over-the-counter medications marketed for the relief of sinus headache contain the same active ingredient as SineEase.
(C) People who suffer from frequent sinus headaches are strongly advised to consult a doctor before taking any over-the-counter medication.
(D) An over-the-counter medication that is marketed for the relief of symptoms of head cold is identical in composition to SineEase but costs less per dose.（D）
(E) The per dose price for any given over-the-counter medication marketed for the relief of sinus headache is higher for smaller packages than it is for larger packages.
15. In the United States, vacationers account for more than half of all visitors to what are technically called “pure aquariums” but for fewer than one quarter of all visitors to zoos, which usually include a “zoo aquarium” of relatively modest scope.
Which of the following, if true, most helps to account for the difference described above between visitors to zoos and visitors to pure aquariums?
(A) In cities that have both a zoo and a pure aquarium, local residents are twice as likely to visit the aquarium as they are to visit the zoo.
(B) Virtually all large metropolitan areas have zoos, whereas only a few large metropolitan areas have pure aquariums.
(C) Over the last ten years, newly constructed pure aquariums have outnumbered newly established zoos by a factor of two to one.
(D) People who visit a zoo in a given year are two times more likely to visit a pure aquarium that year than are people who do not visit a zoo.（B）
(E) The zoo aquariums of zoos that are in the same city as a pure aquarium tend to be smaller than the aquariums of zoos that have no pure aquarium nearby.
16. Which of the following, if true, is the most logical completion of the argument below?
The tax system of the Republic of Grootland encourages borrowing by granting its taxpayers tax relief for interest paid on loans. The system also discourages saving by taxing any interest earned on savings. Nevertheless, it is clear that Grootland’s tax system does not consistently favor borrowing over saving, for if it did, there would be no______
(A) tax relief in Grootland for those portions of a taxpayer’s income, if any, that are set aside to increase that taxpayer’s total savings
(B) tax relief in Grootland for the processing fees that taxpayers pay to lending institutions when obtaining certain kinds of loans
(C) tax relief in Grootland for interest that taxpayers are charged on the unpaid balance in credit card accounts
(D) taxes due in Grootland on the cash value of gifts received by taxpayers from banks trying to encourage people to open savings accounts（A）
(E) taxes due in Grootland on the amount that a taxpayer has invested in interest-bearing savings accounts.
TEST 20
|
1. E |
2. B |
3. E |
4. D |
5. A |
|
6. D |
7. A |
8. A |
9. D |
10. A |
|
11. E |
12. B |
13. C |
14. D |
15. B |
|
16. A |
17.
|
18.
|
19.
|
20.
|
Where's My Stuff? |
|