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TEST 9
SECTION I
Time 35 minutes 25 Questions
Directions: The questions in this section are based on the reasoning contained in brief statements or passages...
1. Of all of the surgeons practicing at the city hospital, the chief surgeon has the worst record in terms of the percentage of his patients who die either during or immediately following an operation performed by him. Paradoxically, the hospital’s administrators claim that he is the best surgeon currently working at the hospital.
Which one of the following, if true, goes farthest toward showing that the administrators’ claim and the statistic cited might both be correct?
(A) Since the hospital administrators appoint the chief surgeon, the administrators are strongly motivated to depict the chief surgeon they have chosen as a wise choice.
(B) In appointing the current chief surgeon, the hospital administrators followed the practice, well established at the city hospital, of promoting one of the surgeons already on staff.
(C) Some of the younger surgeons on the city hospital’s staff received part of their training from the current chief surgeon.
(D) At the city hospital those operations that inherently entail the greatest risk to the life of the patient are generally performed by the chief surgeon.（D）
(E) The current chief surgeon has a better record of patients’ surviving surgery than did his immediate predecessor.
2. Between 1971 and 1975, the government office that monitors drug companies issued an average of 60 citations a year for serious violations of drug-promotion laws. Between 1976 and 1980, the annual average for issuance of such citations was only 5. This decrease indicates that the government office was, on average, considerably more lax in enforcing drug-promotion laws between 1976 and 1980 than it was between 1971 and 1975.
The argument assumes which one of the following?
(A) The decrease in the number of citations was not caused by a decrease in drug companies violations of drug-promotion laws.
(B) A change in enforcement of drug-promotion laws did not apply to minor violations.
(C) The enforcement of drug-promotion laws changed in response to political pressure.
(D) The government office should not issue more than an average of 5 citations a year to drug companies for serious violations of drug-promotion laws.（A）
(E) Before 1971 the government office issued more than 60 citations a year to drug companies for serious violations of drug-promotion laws.
3. Sheila: Health experts generally agree that smoking a tobacco product for many years is very likely to be harmful to the smoker’s health.
Tim: On the contrary, smoking has no effect on health at all: although my grandfather smoked three cigars a day from the age of fourteen, he died at age ninety-six.
A major weakness of Tim’s counterargument is that his counterargument
(A) attempts to refute a probabilistic conclusion by claiming the existence of a single counterexample
(B) challenges expert opinion on the basis of specific information unavailable to experts in the field
(C) describes an individual case that is explicitly discounted as an exception to the experts’ conclusion
(D) presupposes that longevity and health status are unrelated to each other in the general population（A）
(E) tacitly assumes that those health experts who are in agreement on this issue arrived at that agreement independently of one another
4. The case of the French Revolution is typically regarded as the best evidence for the claim that societies can reap more benefit than harm from a revolution. But even the French Revolution serves this role poorly, since France at the time of the Revolution had a unique advantage. Despite the Revolution, the same civil servants and functionaries remained in office, carrying on the day-to-day work of government, and thus many of the disruptions that revolutions normally bring were avoided.
Which one
of the following most accurately characterizes the argumentative strategy used
in the passage?
(A) demonstrating that the claim argued against is internally inconsistent
(B) supporting a particular position on the basis of general principles
(C) opposing a claim by undermining evidence offered in support of that claim
(D) justifying a view through the use of a series of persuasive examples（C）
(E) comparing two positions in order to illustrate their relative strengths and weaknesses
5. A person can develop or outgrow asthma at any age. In children under ten, asthma is twice as likely to develop in boys. Boys are less likely than girls to outgrow asthma, yet by adolescence the percentage of boys with asthma is about the same as the percentage of girls with asthma because a large number of girls develop asthma in early adolescence.
Assuming the truth of the passage, one can conclude from it that the number of adolescent boys with asthma is approximately equal to the number of adolescent girls with asthma, if one also knows that
(A) a tendency toward asthma is often inherited
(B) children who develop asthma before two years of age are unlikely to outgrow it
(C) there are approximately equal numbers of adolescent boys and adolescent girls in the population
(D) the development of asthma in childhood is not closely related to climate or environment（C）
(E) the percentage of adults with asthma is lower than the percentage of adolescents with asthma
6. Harry Trevalga: You and your publication have unfairly discriminated against my poems. I have submitted thirty poems in the last two years and you have not published any of them! It is all because I won the Fenner Poetry Award two years ago and your poetry editor thought she deserved it.
Publisher: Ridiculous! Our editorial policy and practice is perfectly fair, since our poetry editor judges all submissions for publication without ever seeing the names of the poets, and hence cannot possibly have known who wrote your poems.
The publisher makes which one of the following assumptions in replying to Trevalga’s charges of unfair discrimination?
(A) The poetry editor does not bear a grudge against Harry Trevalga for his winning the Fenner Poetry Award.
(B) It is not unusual for poets to contribute many poems to the publisher’s publication without ever having any accepted for publication.
(C) The poetry editor cannot recognize the poems submitted by Harry Trevalga as his unless Trevalga’s name is attached to them.
(D) The poetry editor’s decisions on which poems to publish are not based strictly on judgments of intrinsic merit.（C）
(E) Harry Trevalga submitted his poems to the publisher’s publication under his pen name.
7. In a study of the effect of radiation from nuclear weapons plants on people living in areas near them, researchers compared death rates in the areas near the plants with death rates in areas that had no such plants. Finding no difference in these rates, the researchers concluded that radiation from the nuclear weapons plants poses no health hazards to people living near them.
Which one of the following, if true, most seriously weakens the researchers’ argument?
(A) Nuclear power plants were not included in the study.
(B) The areas studied had similar death rates before and after the nuclear weapons plants were built.
(C) Exposure to nuclear radiation can cause many serious diseases that do not necessarily result in death.
(D) Only a small number of areas have nuclear weapons plants.（C）
(E) The researchers did not study the possible health hazards of radiation on people who were employed at the nuclear weapons plants if those employees did not live in the study areas.
8. It was once believed that cells grown in laboratory tissue cultures were essentially immortal. That is, as long as all of their needs were met, they would continue dividing forever. However, it has been shown that normal cells have a finite reproductive limit. A human liver cell, for example, divides 60 times and then stops. If such a cell divides 30 times and then is put into a deep freeze for months or even years. It “remembers” where it stopped dividing. After thawing, it divides another 30 times—but no more.
If the information above is accurate, a liver cell in which more than 60 divisions took place in a tissue culture CANNOT be which one of the following?
(A) an abnormal human liver cell
(B) a normal human liver cell that had been frozen after its first division and afterward thawed
(C) a normal cell that came from the liver of an individual of a nonhuman species and had never been frozen
(D) a normal liver cell that came from an individual of a nonhuman species and had been frozen after its first division and afterward thawed（B）
(E) an abnormal cell from the liver of an individual of a nonhuman species
9. Complaints that milk bottlers take enormous markups on the bottled milk sold to consumers are most likely to arise when least warranted by the actual spread between the price that bottlers pay for raw milk and the price at which they sell bottled milk. The complaints occur when the bottled-milk price rises, yet these price increases most often merely reflect the rising price of the raw milk that bottlers buy from dairy farmers. When the raw-milk price is rising, the bottlers’ markups are actually smallest proportionate to the retail price. When the raw-milk price is falling, however, the markups are greatest.
If all of the statements above are true, which one of the following must also be true on the basis of them?
(A) Consumers pay more for bottled milk when raw-milk prices are falling than when these prices are rising.
(B) Increases in dairy farmers’ cost of producing milk are generally not passed on to consumers.
(C) Milk bottlers take substantially greater markups on bottled milk when its price is low for an extended period than when it is high for an extended period.
(D) Milk bottlers generally do not respond to a decrease in raw-milk prices by straightaway proportionately lowering the price of the bottled milk they sell.（D）
(E) Consumers tend to complain more about the price they pay for bottled milk when dairy farmers are earning their smallest profits.
Questions 10-11
If the public library shared by the adjacent towns of Redville and Glenwood were relocated from the library’s current, overcrowded building in central Redville to a larger, available building in central Glenwood, the library would then be within walking distance of a larger number of library users. That is because there are many more people living in central Glenwood than in central Redville, and people generally will walk to the library only if it is located close to their homes.
10. Which one of the following, if true, most strengthens the argument?
(A) The public library was located between Glenwood and Redville before being moved to its current location in central Redville.
(B) The area covered by central Glenwood is approximately the same size as that covered by central Redville.
(C) The building that is available in Glenwood is smaller than an alternative building that is available in Redville.
(D) Many of the people who use the public library do not live in either Glenwood or Redville.（B）
(E) The distance that people currently walk to get to the library is farther than what is generally considered walking distance.
11. Which one of the following, if true, most seriously weakens the argument?
(A) Many more people who currently walk to the library live in central Redville than in central Glenwood.
(B) The number of people living in central Glenwood who would use the library if it were located there is smaller than the number of people living in central Redville who currently use the library.
(C) The number of people using the public library would continue to increase steadily if the library were moved to Glenwood.
(D) Most of the people who currently either drive to the library or take public transportation to reach it would continue to do so if the library were moved to central Glenwood.（B）
(E) Most of the people who currently walk to the library would remain library users if the library were relocated to central Glenwood.
12. Light utility trucks have become popular among consumers who buy them primarily for the trucks’ rugged appearance. Yet although these trucks are tough-looking, they are exempt from the government’s car-safety standards that dictate minimum roof strength and minimum resistance to impact. Therefore, if involved in a serious high-impact accident, a driver of one of these trucks is more likely to be injured than is a driver of a car that is subject to these government standards.
The argument depends on the assumption that
(A) the government has established safety standards for the construction of light utility trucks
(B) people who buy automobiles solely for their appearance are more likely than other people to drive recklessly
(C) light utility trucks are more likely than other kinds of vehicles to be involved in accidents that result in injuries
(D) the trucks’ rugged appearance is deceptive in that their engines are not especially powerful（E）
(E) light utility trucks are less likely to meet the car-safety standards than are cars that are subject to the standards
13. Five years ago, during the first North American outbreak of the cattle disease CXC, the death rate from the disease was 5 percent of all reported cases, whereas today the corresponding figure is over 18 percent. It is clear, therefore, that during these past 5 years, CXC has increased in virulence.
Which one of the following, if true, most substantially weakens the argument?
(A) Many recent cattle deaths that have actually been caused by CXC have been mistakenly attributed to another disease that mimics the symptoms of CXC.
(B) During the first North American outbreak of the disease, many of the deaths reported to have been caused by CXC were actually due to other causes.
(C) An inoculation program against CXC was recently begun after controlled studies showed inoculation to be 70 percent effective in preventing serious cases of the illness.
(D) Since the first outbreak, farmers have learned to treat mild cases of CXC and no longer report them to veterinarians or authorities.（D）
(E) Cattle that have contracted and survived CXC rarely contract the disease a second time.
Questions 14-15
Economist: Some policymakers believe that our country’s continued economic growth requires a higher level of personal savings than we currently have. A recent legislative proposal would allow individuals to set up savings accounts in which interest earned would be exempt from taxes until money is withdrawn from the account. Backers of this proposal claim that its implementation would increase the amount of money available for banks to loan at a relatively small cost to the government in lost tax revenues. Yet, when similar tax-incentive programs were tried in the past, virtually all of the money invested through them was diverted from other personal savings, and the overall level of personal savings was unchanged.
14. The passage as a whole provides the most support for which one of the following conclusions?
(A) Backers of the tax-incentive proposal undoubtedly have some motive other than their expressed aim of increasing the amount of money available for banks to loan.
(B) The proposed tax incentive is unlikely to attract enough additional money into personal savings accounts to make up for the attendant loss in tax revenues.
(C) A tax-incentive program that resulted in substantial loss of tax revenues would be likely to generate a large increase in personal savings.
(D) The economy will be in danger unless some alternative to increased personal savings can be found to stimulate growth.（B）
(E) The government has no effective means of influencing the amount of money that people are willing to put into savings accounts.
15. The author criticizes the proposed tax-incentive program by
(A) challenging a premise on which the proposal is based
(B) pointing out a disagreement among policymakers
(C) demonstrating that the proposal’s implementation is not feasible
(D) questioning the judgment of the proposal’s backers by citing past cases in which they had advocated programs that have proved ineffective（A）
(E) disputing the assumption that a program to encourage personal savings is needed
16. Although all birds have feathers and all birds have wings, some birds do not fly. For example, penguins and ostriches use their wings to move in a different way from other birds. Penguins use their wings only to swim under water at high speeds. Ostriches use their wings only to run with the wind by lifting them as if they were sails.
Which one of the following is most parallel in its reasoning to the argument above?
(A) Ancient philosophers tried to explain not how the world functions but why it functions. In contrast, most contemporary biologists seek comprehensive theories of how organisms function, but many refuse to speculate about purpose.
(B) Some chairs are used only as decorations, and other chairs are used only to tame lions. Therefore, not all chairs are used for sitting in despite the fact that all chairs have a seat and some support such as legs.
(C) Some musicians in a symphony orchestra play the violin, and others play the viola, but these are both in the same category of musical instruments, namely string instruments.
(D) All cars have similar drive mechanisms, but some cars derive their power from solar energy, whereas others burn gasoline. Thus, solar-powered cars are less efficient than gasoline-powered ones.（B）
(E) Sailing ships move in a different way from steamships. Both sailing ships and steamships navigate over water, but only sailing ships use sails to move over the surface.
Questions 17-18
Jones: Prehistoric wooden tools found in South America have been dated to 13,000 years ago. Although scientists attribute these tools to peoples whose ancestors first crossed into the Americas from Siberia to Alaska, this cannot be correct. In order to have reached a site so far south, these peoples must have been migrating southward well before 13,000 years ago. However, no such tools dating to before 13,000 years ago have been found anywhere between Alaska and South America.
Smith: Your evidence is inconclusive. Those tools were found in peat bogs, which are rare in the Americas. Wooden tools in soils other than peat bogs usually decompose within only a few years.
17. The point at issue between Jones and Smith is
(A) whether all prehistoric tools that are 13,000 years or older were made of wood
(B) whether the scientists’ attribution of tools could be correct in light of Jones’s evidence
(C) whether the dating of the wooden tools by the scientists could be correct
(D) how long ago the peoples who crossed into the American from Siberia to Alaska first did so（B）
(E) whether Smith’s evidence entails that the wooden tools have been dated correctly
18. Smith responds to Jones by
(A) citing several studies that invalidate Jones’s conclusion
(B) accusing Jones of distorting the scientists’ position
(C) disputing the accuracy of the supporting evidence cited by Jones
(D) showing that Jones’s evidence actually supports the denial of Jones’s conclusion（E）
(E) challenging an implicit assumption in Jones’s argument
19. Editorial: It is clear that if this country’s universities were living up to both their moral and their intellectual responsibilities, the best-selling publications in most university bookstores would not be frivolous ones like TV Today and Gossip Review. However, in most university bookstores the only publication that sells better than Gossip Review is TV Today.
If the statements in the editorial are true, which one of the following must also be true on the basis of them?
(A) People who purchase publications that are devoted primarily to gossip or to television programming are intellectually irresponsible.
(B) It is irresponsible for university bookstores to carry publications such as Gossip Review and TV Today.
(C) Most people who purchase publications at university bookstores purchase either TV Today or Gossip Review.
(D) Many people who attend this country’s universities fail to live up to both their moral and their intellectual responsibilities.（E）
(E) At least some of this country’s universities are not meeting their moral responsibilities or their intellectual responsibilities or both.
Questions 20-21
Saunders: Everyone at last week’s neighborhood association meeting agreed that the row of abandoned and vandalized houses on Carlton Street posed a threat to the safety of our neighborhood. Moreover, no one now disputes that getting the houses torn down eliminated that threat. Some people tried to argue that it was unnecessary to demolish what they claimed were basically sound buildings, since the city had established a fund to help people in need of housing buy and rehabilitate such buildings. The overwhelming success of the demolition strategy, however, proves that the majority, who favored demolition, were right and that those who claimed that the problem could and should be solved by rehabilitating the houses were wrong.
20. Which one of the following principles, if established, would determine that demolishing the houses was the right decision or instead would determine that the proposal advocated by the opponents of demolition should have been adopted?
(A) When what to do about an abandoned neighborhood building is in dispute, the course of action that would result in the most housing for people who need it should be the one adopted unless the building is believed to pose a threat to neighborhood safety.
(B) When there are two proposals for solving a neighborhood problem, and only one of them would preclude the possibility of trying the other approach if the first proves unsatisfactory, then the approach that does not foreclose the other possibility should be the one adopted.
(C) If one of two proposals for renovating vacant neighborhood buildings requires government funding whereas the second does not, the second proposal should be the one adopted unless the necessary government funds have already been secured.
(D) No plan for eliminating a neighborhood problem that requires demolishing basically sound houses should be carried out until all other possible alternatives have been thoroughly investigated.（B）
(E) No proposal for dealing with a threat to a neighborhood’s safety should be adopted merely because a majority of the residents of that neighborhood prefer that proposal to a particular counterproposal.
21. Saunders’ reasoning is flawed because it
(A) relies on fear rather than on argument to persuade the neighborhood association to reject the policy advocated by Saunders’ opponents
(B) fails to establish that there is anyone who could qualify for city funds who would be interested in buying and rehabilitating the houses
(C) mistakenly equates an absence of vocal public dissent with the presence of universal public support
(D) offers no evidence that the policy advocated by Saunders’ opponents would not have succeeded if it had been given the chance（D）
(E) does not specify the precise nature of the threat to neighborhood safety supposedly posed by the vandalized houses
22. For the writers who first gave feudalism its name, the existence of feudalism presupposed the existence of a noble class. Yet there cannot be a noble class, properly speaking, unless both the titles that indicate superior, noble status and the inheritance of such titles are sanctioned by law. Although feudalism existed in Europe as early as the eighth century, it was not until the twelfth century, when many feudal institutions were in decline, that the hereditary transfer of legally recognized titles of nobility first appeared.
The
statements above, if true, most strongly support which one of the following
claims?
(A) To say that feudalism by definition requires the existence of a nobility is to employ a definition that distorts history.
(B) Prior to the twelfth century, the institution of European feudalism functioned without the presence of a dominant class.
(C) The fact that a societal group has a distinct legal status is not in itself sufficient to allow that group to be properly considered a social class.
(D) The decline of feudalism in Europe was the only cause of the rise of a European nobility.（A）
(E) The prior existence of feudal institutions is a prerequisite for the emergence of a nobility, as defined in the strictest sense of the term.
23. Mayor Smith, one of our few government officials with a record of outspoken, informed, and consistent opposition to nuclear power plant construction projects, has now declared herself in favor of building the nuclear power plant at Littletown. If someone with her past antinuclear record now favors building this power plant, then there is good reason to believe that it will be safe and therefore should be built.
The argument is vulnerable to criticism on which one of the following grounds?
(A) It overlooks the possibility that not all those who fail to speak out on issues of nuclear power are necessarily opposed to it.
(B) It assumes without warrant that the qualities enabling a person to be elected to public office confer on that person a grasp of the scientific principles on which technical decisions are based.
(C) It fails to establish that a consistent and outspoken opposition is necessarily an informed opposition.
(D) It leads to the further but unacceptable conclusion that any project favored by Mayor Smith should be sanctioned simply on the basis of her having spoken out in favor of it.（E）
(E) It gives no indication of either the basis of Mayor Smith’s former opposition to nuclear power plant construction or the reasons for her support for the Littletown project.
24. Advertisement: In today’s world, you make a statement about the person you are by the car you own. The message of the SKX Mach-5 is unambiguous: Its owner is Dynamic, Aggressive, and Successful. Shouldn’t you own an SKX Mach-5?
If the claims made in the advertisement are true, which one of the following must also be true on the basis of them?
(A) Anyone who is dynamic and aggressive is also successful.
(B) Anyone who is not both dynamic and successful would misrepresent himself or herself by being the owner of an SKX Mach-5.
(C) People who buy the SKX Mach-5 are usually more aggressive than people who buy other cars.
(D) No car other than the SKX Mach-5 announces that its owner is successful.（B）
(E) Almost no one would fail to recognize the kind of person who would choose to own an SKX Mach-5.
25. The great medieval universities had no administrators, yet they endured for centuries. Our university has a huge administrative staff, and we are in serious financial difficulties. Therefore, we should abolish the positions and salaries of the administrators to ensure the longevity of the university.
Which one of the following arguments contains flawed reasoning that most closely parallels the flawed reasoning in the argument above?
(A) No airplane had jet engines before 1940, yet airplanes had been flying since 1903. Therefore, jet engines are not necessary for the operation of airplanes.
(B) The novelist’s stories began to be accepted for publication soon after she started using a computer to write them. You have been having trouble getting your stories accepted for publication, and you do not use a computer. To make sure your stories are accepted for publication, then, you should write them with the aid of a computer.
(C) After doctors began using antibiotics, the number of infections among patients dropped drastically. Now, however, resistant strains of bacteria cannot be controlled by standard antibiotics. Therefore, new methods of control are needed.
(D) A bicycle should not be ridden without a helmet. Since a good helmet can save the rider’s life, a helmet should be considered the most important piece of bicycling equipment.（B）
(E) The great cities of the ancient world were mostly built along waterways. Archaeologists searching for the remains of such cities should therefore try to determine where major rivers used to run.
SECTION IV
Time 35 minutes 25 Questions
Directions: The questions in this section are based on the reasoning contained in brief statements or passages...
1. The cafeteria at Acme Company can offer only four main dishes at lunchtime, and the same four choices have been offered for years. Recently mushroom casserole was offered in place of one of the other main dishes for two days, during which more people chose mushroom casserole than any other main dish. Clearly, if the cafeteria wants to please its customers, mushroom casserole should replace one of the regular dishes as a permanent part of the menu.
The argument is most vulnerable to criticism on the grounds that it fails to consider
(A) the proportion of Acme Company employees who regularly eat lunch in the company cafeteria
(B) whether any of the ingredients used in the cafeteria’s recipe for mushroom casserole are included in any of the regular main dishes
(C) a desire for variety as a reason for people’s choice of mushroom casserole during the days it was offered
(D) what foods other than main dishes are regularly offered at lunchtime by the cafeteria（C）
(E) whether other meals besides lunch are served in the Acme Company cafeteria
2. When old-grow forests are cleared of tall trees, more sunlight reaches the forest floor. This results in a sharp increase in the population of leafy shrubs on which the mule deer depend for food. Yet mule deer herds that inhabit cleared forests are less well-nourished than are herds living in old-growth forests.
Which one of the following, if true, most helps to resolve the apparent paradox?
(A) Mule deer have enzyme-rich saliva and specialized digestive organs that enable the deer to digest tough plants inedible to other deer species.
(B) Mule deer herds that inhabit cleared forests tend to have more female with young offspring and fewer adult males than do other mule deer populations.
(C) Mule deer populations are spread throughout western North America and inhabit hot, sunny climates as well as cool, wet climates.
(D) As plants receive more sunlight, they produce higher amounts of tannins, compounds that inhibit digestion of the plants’ proteins.（D）
(E) Insect parasites, such as certain species of ticks, that feed primary on mule deer often dwell in trees, from which they drop onto passing deer.
3. Genevieve: Increasing costs have led commercial airlines to cut back on airplane maintenance. Also, reductions in public spending have led to air traffic control centers being underfunded and understaffed. For these and other reasons it is becoming quite unsafe to fly, and so one should avoid doing it.
Harold: Your reasoning may be sound, but I can hardly accept your conclusion when you yourself have recently been flying on commercial airlines even more than before.
Which one of the following relies on a questionable technique most similar to that used in Harold’s reply to Genevieve?
(A) David says that the new film is not very good, but he has not seen it himself, so I don’t accept his opinion.
(B) A long time ago Maria showed me a great way to cook lamb, but for medical reasons she no longer eats red meat, so I’ll cook something else for dinner tonight.
(C) Susan has been trying to persuade me to go rock climbing with her, claiming that it’s quite safe, but last week she fell and broke her collarbone, so I don’t believe her.
(D) Pat has shown me research that proves that eating raw green vegetables is very beneficial and that one should eat them daily, but I don’t believe it, since she hardly ever eats raw green vegetables.（D）
(E) Gabriel has all the qualifications we have specified for the job and has much relevant work experience, but I don’t believe we should hire him, because when he worked in a similar position before his performance was mediocre.
4. All people residing in the country of Gradara approve of legislation requiring that certain hazardous waste be disposed of by being burned in modern high-temperature incinerators. However, waste disposal companies planning to build such incinerators encounter fierce resistance to their applications for building permits from the residents of every Gradaran community that those companies propose as an incinerator site.
Which one of the following, if true, most helps to explain the residents’ simultaneously holding both of the positions ascribe them?
(A) High-temperature incineration minimizes the overall risk to the human population of the country from the wastes being disposed of, but it concentrates the remaining risk in a small number of incineration sites.
(B) High-temperature incineration is more expensive than any of the available alternatives would be and the higher costs would be recovered through higher product prices.
(C) High-temperature incineration will be carried out by private companies rather than by a government agency so that the government will not be required to police itself.
(D) The toxin fumes generated within a high-temperature incinerator can be further treated so that all toxic residues from a properly operating incinerator are solids.（A）
(E) The substantial cost of high-temperature incineration can be partially offset by revenue from sales of electric energy generated as a by-product of incineration.
5. Elena: While I was at the dog show, every dog that growled at me was a white poodle, and every white poodle I saw growled at me.
Which one of the following can be properly inferred from Elena’s statement?
(A) The only white dogs that Elena saw at the dog show were poodles.
(B) There were no gray poodles at the dog show.
(C) At the dog show, no gray dogs growled at Elena.
(D) All the white dogs that Elena saw growled at her.（C）
(E) Elena did not see any gray poodles at the dog show.
Questions 6-7
Derek: We must exploit available resources in developing effective anticancer drugs such as the one made from mature Pacific yew trees. Although the yew population might be threatened, the trees should be harvested now, since an effective synthetic version of the yew’s anticancer chemical could take years to develop.
Lola: Not only are mature yews very rare, but most are located in areas where logging is prohibited to protect the habitat of the endangered spotted owl. Despite our eagerness to take advantage of a new medical breakthrough, we should wait for a synthetic drug rather than threaten the survival of both the yew and the owl, which could have far-reaching consequences for an entire ecosystem.
6. Which one of the following is the main point at issue between Lola and Derek?
(A) whether the harvesting of available Pacific yews would have far-reaching environmental repercussions
(B) whether the drugs that are effective against potentially deadly diseases should be based on synthetic rather than naturally occurring chemicals
(C) whether it is justifiable to wait until a synthetic drug can be developed when the capacity for producing the yew-derived drug already exists
(D) the extent of the environmental disaster that would result if both the Pacific yew and the spotted owl were to become extinct（C）
(E) whether environmental considerations should ever have any weight when human lives are at stake
7. Lola’s position most closely conforms to which one of the following principles?
(A) Unless people’s well-being is threatened, there should be no higher priority than preserving endangered plant and animal populations.
(B) Medical researchers should work with environmentalists to come to an agreement about the fate of the Pacific yew and the spotted owl.
(C) Environmental concerns should play a role in decisions concerning medical research only if human lives are not at stake.
(D) Only medical breakthroughs that could save human lives would justify threatening the environment.（E）
(E) Avoiding actions that threaten an entire ecosystem takes precedence over immediately providing advantage to a restricted group of people.
8. The director of a secondary school where many students were having severe academic problems impaneled a committee to study the matter. The committee reported that these students were having academic problems because they spent large amounts of time on school sports and too little time studying. The director then prohibited all students who were having academic problems from taking part in sports in which they were active. He stated that this would ensure that such students would do well academically.
The reasoning on which the director bases his statement is not sound because he fails to establish that
(A) some students who spend time on sports do not have academic problems
(B) all students who do well academically do so because of time saved by not participating in sports
(C) at least some of the time the students will save by not participating in sports will be spent on solving their academic problems
(D) no students who do well academically spend time on sports（C）
(E) the quality of the school’s sports program would not suffer as a result of the ban
9. It can safely be concluded that there are at least as many trees in Seclee as there are in Martown.
From which one of the following does the conclusion logically follow?
(A) More trees were planted in Seclee in the past two years than in Martown.
(B) Seclee is the region within which Martown is located.
(C) Martown is suffering from an epidemic of tree-virus infection.
(D) The average annual rainfall for Seclee is greater than the average annual rainfall for Martown.（B）
(E) The average number of trees cut down annually in Martown is higher than in Seclee.
Questions 10-11
A distemper virus has caused two-thirds of the seal population in the North Sea to die since May 1988. The explanation for the deaths cannot rest here, however. There must be a reason the normally latent virus could prevail so suddenly: clearly the severe pollution of the North Sea waters must have weakened the immune system of the seals so that they could no longer withstand the virus.
10. The argument concerning the immune system of the seals presupposes which one of the following?
(A) There has been a gradual decline in the seal population of the North Sea during the past two centuries.
(B) No further sources of pollution have been added since May 1988 to the already existing sources of pollution in the North Sea.
(C) There was no sudden mutation in the distemper virus which would have allowed the virus successfully to attack healthy North Sea seals by May 1988.
(D) Pollution in the North Sea is no greater than pollution in the Mediterranean Sea, off the coast of North America, or in the Sea of Japan.（C）
(E) Some species that provide food for the seals have nearly become extinct as a result of the pollution.
11. Which one of the following, if true, most strongly supports the explanation given in the argument?
(A) At various times during the last ten years, several species of shellfish and seabirds in the North Sea have experienced unprecedented steep drops in population.
(B) By reducing pollution at its source, Northern Europe and Scandinavia have been taking the lead in preventing pollution from reaching the waters of the North Sea.
(C) For many years, fish for human consumption have been taken from the waters of the North Sea.
(D) There are two species of seal found throughout the North Sea area, the common seal and the gray seal.（A）
(E) The distemper caused by the virus was a disease that was new to the population of North Sea seals in May 1988, and so the seals’ immune systems were unprepared to counter it.
12. It is clear that none of the volleyball players at yesterday’s office beach party came to work today since everyone who played volleyball at that party got badly sunburned and no one at work today is even slightly sunburned.
Which one
of the following exhibits a pattern of reasoning that most closely parallels
that in the argument above?
(A) Since everyone employed by TRF who was given the opportunity to purchase dental insurance did so and everyone who purchased dental insurance saw a dentist, it is clear that no one who failed to see a dentist is employed by TRF.
(B) Since no one who was promoted during the past year failed to attend the awards banquet, evidently none of the office managers attended the banquet this year since they were all denied promotion.
(C) Since the Donnely report was not finished on time, no one in John’s group could have been assigned to contribute to that report since everyone in John’s group has a reputation for getting assignments in on time.
(D) Everyone with an office on the second floor works directly for the president and, as a result, no one with a second floor office will take a July vacation because no one who works for the president will be able to take time off during July.（D）
(E) Since all of the people who are now on the MXM Corporation payroll have been employed in the same job for the past five years, it is clear that no one who frequently changes jobs is likely to be hired by MXM.
Questions 13-14
The dean of computing must be respected by the academic staff and be competent to oversee the use of computers on campus. The only deans whom academics respect are those who hold doctoral degrees, and only someone who really knows about computers can competently oversee the use of computers on campus. Furthermore, the board of trustees has decided that the dean of computing must be selected from among this university’s staff. Therefore, the dean of computing must be a professor from this university’s computer science department.
13. Which one of the following is an assumption on which the argument depends?
(A) Academics respect only people who hold doctoral degrees.
(B) All of this university’s professors have obtained doctoral degrees.
(C) At this university, every professor who holds a doctoral degree in computer science really knows about computers.
(D) All academics who hold doctoral degrees are respected by their academic colleagues.（E）
(E) Among this university’s staff members with doctoral degrees, only those in the computer science department really know about computers.
14. Which one of the following statements, if true, would weaken the argument?
(A) There are members of this university’s staff who hold doctoral degrees and who are not professors but who really know about computers.
(B) There are members of this university’s philosophy department who do not hold doctoral degrees but who really know about computers.
(C) Computer science professors who hold doctoral degrees but who are not members of this university’s staff have applied for the position of dean of computing.
(D) Several members of the board of trustees of this university do not hold doctoral degrees.（A）
(E) Some members of the computer science department at this university are not respected by academics in other departments.
Questions 15-16
Consumer advocate: Under the current absence of government standards for food product labeling, manufacturers are misleading or deceiving consumers by their product labeling. For example, a certain brand of juice is labeled “fresh orange juice,” yet the product is made from water, concentrate, and flavor enhancers. Since “fresh” as applied to food products is commonly understood to mean pure and unprocessed, labeling that orange juice “fresh” is unquestionably deceptive.
Manufacturer: Using words somewhat differently than they are commonly used is not deceptive. After all, “fresh” can also mean never frozen. We cannot be faulted for failing to comply with standards that have not been officially formulated. When the government sets clear standards pertaining to product labeling, we will certainly comply with them.
15. On the basis of their statements above, the consumer advocate and the manufacturer are committed to disagreeing about the truth of which one of the following statements?
(A) In the absence of government standards, common understanding is the arbiter of deceptive labeling practices.
(B) Truthful labeling practices that reflect common standards of usage can be established by the government.
(C) The term “fresh” when it is applied to food products is commonly understood to mean pure and unprocessed.
(D) Terms that apply to natural foods can be truthfully applied to packaged foods.（A）
(E) Clear government standards for labeling food products will ensure truthful labeling practices.
16. Which one of the following principle, if established, would contribute most to a defense of the manufacturer’s position against that of the consumer advocate?
(A) In the absence of government definitions for terms used in product labeling, common standards of understanding alone should apply.
(B) Government standards for truthful labeling should always be designed to reflect common standards of understanding.
(C) People should be free to the extent that it is legal to do so, to exploit to their advantages the inherent ambiguity and vagueness in language.
(D) When government standards and common standards for truthful labeling are incompatible with each other, the government standards should always take precedence.（C）
(E) In their interpretation of language, consumers should never presume that vagueness indicates an attempt to deceive on the part of manufacturers unless those manufacturers would reap large benefits from successful deception.
17. Certain items—those with that hard-to-define quality called exclusivity—have the odd property, when they become available for sale, of selling rapidly even though they are extremely expensive. In fact, trying to sell such an item fast by asking too low a price is a serious error, since it calls into question the very thing—exclusivity—that is supposed to be the item’s chief appeal. Therefore, given that a price that will prove to be right is virtually impossible for the seller to gauge in advance, the seller should make sure that any error in the initial asking price is in the direction of setting the price too high.
The argument recommends a certain pricing strategy on the grounds that
(A) this strategy lacks a counterproductive feature of the rejected alternative
(B) this strategy has all of advantages of the rejected alternative, but fewer of its disadvantages
(C) experience has proven this strategy to be superior, even though the reasons for this superiority elude analysis
(D) this strategy does not rely on prospective buyers estimates of value（A）
(E) the error associated with this strategy, unlike the error associated with the rejected alternative, is likely to go unnoticed
18. In order to control the deer population, a biologist has proposed injecting female deer during breeding season with 10 milligrams of a hormone that would suppress fertility. Critics have charged that the proposal poses health risks to people who might eat the meat of treated deer and thereby ingest unsafe quantities of the hormone. The biologist has responded to these critics by pointing out that humans can ingest up to 10 milligrams of the hormone a day without any adverse effects, and since no one would eat even one entire deer a day, the treatment would be safe.
The biologist’s response to critics of the proposal is based on which one of the following assumptions?
(A) People would be notified of the time when deer in their area were to be treated with the hormone.
(B) The hormone that would be injected into the deer is chemically similar to hormones used in human contraceptives.
(C) Hunting season for deer could be scheduled so that it would not coincide with breeding season.
(D) The hormone in question does not occur naturally in the female deer that would be injected.（D）
(E) Most people do not consider deer meat to be part of their daily diet and eat it only on rare occasions.
19. A recent survey conducted in one North American city revealed widespread concern about the problems faced by teenagers today. Seventy percent of the adults surveyed said they would pay higher taxes for drug treatment programs, and 60 percent said they were willing to pay higher taxes to improve the city’s schools. Yet in a vote in that same city, a proposition to increase funding for schools by raising taxes failed by a narrow margin to win majority approval.
Which one of the following factors, if true, would LEAST contribute to an explanation of the discrepancy described above?
(A) The survey sample was not representative of the voters who voted on the proposition.
(B) Many of the people who were surveyed did not respond truthfully to all of the questions put to them.
(C) The proposition was only part of a more expensive community improvement program that voters had to accept or reject in total.
(D) A proposition for increasing funds for local drug treatment centers also failed to win approval.（D）
(E) The proposition to raise taxes for schools was couched in terminology that many of the voters found confusing.
Questions 20-21
So-called environmentalists have argued that the proposed Golden Lake Development would interfere with bird-migration patterns. However, the fact that these same people have raised environmental objections to virtually every development proposal brought before the council in recent years indicates that their expressed concern for bird-migration patterns is nothing but a mask for their antidevelopment, antiprogress agenda. Their claim, therefore, should be dismissed without further consideration.
20. Which one of the following questionable argumentative techniques is employed in the passage?
(A) taking the failure of a given argument to establish its conclusion as the basis for claiming that the view expressed by that conclusion is false
(B) rejecting the conclusion of an argument on the basis of a claim about the motives of those advancing the argument
(C) using a few exceptional cases as the basis for a claim about what is true in general
(D) misrepresenting evidence that supports the position the argument is intended to refute（B）
(E) assuming that what is true of a group as a whole is necessarily true of each member of that group
21. For the claim that the concern expressed by the so-called environmentalists is not their real concern to be properly drawn on the basis of the evidence cited, which one of the following must be assumed?
(A) Not every development proposal opposed in recent years by these so-called environmentalists was opposed because they believed it to pose a threat to the environment.
(B) People whose real agenda is to block development wherever it is proposed always try to disguise their true motives.
(C) Anyone who opposes unrestricted development is an opponent of progress.
(D) The council has no reason to object to the proposed Golden Lake Development other than concern about the development’s effect on bird-migration patterns.（A）
(E) When people say that they oppose a development project solely on environmental grounds, their real concern almost always lies elsewhere.
22. Psychologists today recognize childhood as a separate stage of life which can only be understood in its own terms, and they wonder why the Western world took so long to see the folly of regarding children simply as small, inadequately socialized adults. Most psychologists, however, persist in regarding people 70 to 90 years old as though they were 35 year olds who just happen to have white hair and extra leisure time. But old age is as fundamentally different from young adulthood and middle age as childhood is—a fact attested to by the organization of modern social and economic life. Surely it is time, therefore, to acknowledge that serious research into the unique psychology of advanced age has become indispensable.
Which one of the following principles, if established, would provide the strongest backing for the argument?
(A) Whenever current psychological practice conflicts with traditional attitudes toward people, those traditional attitudes should be changed to bring them in line with current psychological practice.
(B) Whenever two groups of people are so related to each other that any member of the second group must previously have been a member of the first, people in the first group should not be regarded simply as deviant members of the second group.
(C) Whenever most practitioners of a given discipline approach a particular problem in the same way, that uniformity is good evidence that all similar problems should also be approached in that way.
(D) Whenever a society’s economic life is so organized that two distinct times of life are treated as being fundamentally different from one another, each time of life can be understood only in terms of its own distinct psychology.（D）
(E) Whenever psychologists agree that a single psychology is inadequate for two distinct age groups, they should be prepared to show that there are greater differences between the two age groups than there are between individuals in the same age group.
23. Sabina: The words used in expressing facts affect neither the facts nor the conclusions those facts will support. Moreover, if the words are clearly defined and consistently used, the actual words chosen make no difference to an argument’s soundness. Thus, how an argument is expressed can have no bearing on whether it is a good argument.
Emile: Badly chosen words can make even the soundest argument a poor one. After all, many words have social and political connotations that influence people’s response to claims expressed in those words, regardless of how carefully and explicitly those words are defined. Since whether people will acknowledge a fact is affected by how the fact is expressed, the conclusions they actually draw are also affected.
The point
at issue between Emile and Sabina is whether
(A) defining words in one way rather than another can alter either the facts or the conclusions the facts will justify
(B) a word can be defined without taking into account its social and political connotations
(C) a sound argument in support of a given conclusion is a better argument than any unsound argument for that same conclusion
(D) it would be a good policy to avoid using words that are likely to lead people either to misunderstand the claims being made or to reason badly about those claims（E）
(E) a factor that affects neither the truth of an argument’s premises nor the logical relation between its premises and its conclusion can cause an argument to be a bad one
24. Most disposable plastic containers are now labeled with a code number (from 1 to 9) indicating the type or quality of the plastic. Plastics with the lowest code numbers are the easiest for recycling plants to recycle and are thus the most likely to be recycled after use rather than dumped in landfills. Plastics labeled with the highest numbers are only rarely recycled. Consumers can make a significant long-term reduction in the amount of waste that goes unrecycled, therefore, by refusing to purchase those products packaged in plastic containers labeled with the highest code numbers.
Which one of the following, if true, most seriously undermines the conclusion above?
(A) The cost of collecting, sorting, and recycling discarded plastics is currently higher than the cost of manufacturing new plastics from virgin materials.
(B) Many consumers are unaware of the codes that are stamped on the plastic containers.
(C) A plastic container almost always has a higher code number after it is recycled than it had before recycling because the recycling process causes a degradation of the quality of the plastic.
(D) Products packaged in plastics with the lowest code numbers are often more expensive than those packaged in the higher-numbered plastics.（C）
(E) Communities that collect all discarded plastic containers for potential recycling later dump in landfills plastics with higher-numbered codes only when it is clear that no recycler will take them.
25. Despite a steady decrease in the average number of hours worked per person per week, the share of the population that reads a daily newspaper has declined greatly in the past 20 years. But the percentage of the population that watches television daily has shown a similarly dramatic increase over the same period. Clearly, increased television viewing has caused a simultaneous decline in newspaper reading.
Which one of the following, if true, would be most damaging to the explanation given above for the decline in newspaper reading?
(A) There has been a dramatic increase over the past 20 years in the percentage of people who tell polltakers that television is their primary source of information about current events.
(B) Of those members of the population who do not watch television, the percentage who read a newspaper every day has also shown a dramatic decrease.
(C) The time people spend with the books and newspapers they read has increased, on average, from 1 to 3 hours per week in the past 20 years.
(D) People who spend large amounts of time each day watching television are less able to process and remember printed information than are those who do not watch television.（B）
(E) A typical television set is on 6 hours a day, down from an average of 6 1/2 hours a day 5 years ago.
TEST 9
SECTION I
|
1. D |
2. A |
3. A |
4. C |
5. C |
|
6. C |
7. C |
8. B |
9. D |
10. B |
|
11. B |
12. E |
13. D |
14. B |
15. A |
|
16. B |
17. B |
18. E |
19. E |
20. B |
|
21. D |
22. A |
23. E |
24. B |
25. B |
SECTION IV
|
1. C |
2. D |
3. D |
4. A |
5. C |
|
6. C |
7. E |
8. C |
9. B |
10. C |
|
11. A |
12. D |
13. E |
14. A |
15. A |
|
16. C |
17. A |
18. D |
19. D |
20. B |
|
21. A |
22. D |
23. E |
24. C |
25. B |
Where's My Stuff? |
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