SECTION Ⅳ

Time-35 minutes

24 Questions

Directions: The questions in this section are based on the reasoning contained in brief statements or passages. For some questions, more than one of the choices could conceivably answer the question. You should not make assumptions that are by commonsense standards implausible, superfluous, or incompatible with the passage. After you have chosen the best answer, blacken the corresponding space on your answer sheet.

1. Most regular coffee is made from arabica coffee beans because the great majority of consumers prefer its generally richer flavor to that of coffee made from robusta beans. Coffee drinkers who switch to decaffeinated coffee, however, overwhelmingly prefer coffee made from robusta beans, which are unlike arabica beans in that their flavors is not as greatly affected by decaffeination. Depending on the type of bean involved, decaffeination reduces or removes various substances, most of which are flavor-neutral but one of which contributes to the richness of the coffee’s flavor.

The statements above provide the most support for which one of the following conclusion?

(A) The annual world crop of arabica beans is not large enough to satisfy completely the world demand for regular coffee.

(B) Arabica beans contain more caffeine per unit of weight than do robusta beans.

(C) Coffee drinkers who drink decaffeinated coffee almost exclusively are the ones who prefer regular coffee made from robusta beans to regular coffee made from arabica beans.

(D) Decaffeination of arabica beans extracts more of the substance that enhances a coffee’s flavor than does decaffeination of robusta beans.

(E) There are coffee drinkers who switch from drinking regular coffee made from arabica beans to drinking decaffeinated coffee made from arabica beans is less costly.

2. For the past 13 years, high school guidance counselors nationwide have implemented an aggressive program to convince high school students to select careers requiring college degrees. The government reported that the percentage of last year’s high school graduates who went on to college was 15 percent greater than the percentage of those who graduated 10 years ago and did so. The counselors concluded from this report that the program had been successful.

The guidance counselors’ reasoning depends on which one of the following assumptions about high school graduates?

(A) The number of graduates who went on to college remained constant each year during the 10-year period.

(B) Any college courses that the graduates take will improve their career prospects.

(C) Some of the graduates who went on to college never received guidance from a high school counselor.

(D) There has been a decrease in the number of graduates who go on to college without career plans.

(E) Many of last year’s graduates who went on to college did so in order to prepare for careers requiring college degrees.

3. Insectivorous plants, which unlike other plants have the ability to trap and digest insects, can thrive in soils that are too poor in minerals to support noninsectivorous plants. Yet the mineral requirements of insectivorous plants are not noticeably different from the mineral requirements of noninsectivorous plants.

The statements above, if true, most strongly support which one of the following hypotheses?

(A) The insects that insectivorous plants trap and digest are especially abundant where the soil is poor in minerals.

(B) Insectivorous plants thrive only in soils that are too poor in minerals to support noninsectivorous plants.

(C) The types of minerals required by noninsectivorous plants are more likely than are the types of minerals required by insectivorous plants to be found in soils poor in minerals.

(D) The number of different environments in which insectivorous plants thrive is greater than the number of different environments in which noninsectivorous plants thrive.

(E) Insectivorous plants can get some of the minerals they require from the insects they trap and digest.

4. The region’s water authority is responding to the current drought by restricting residential water use. yet reservoir levels are now at the same height they were during the drought ten years ago when no restrictions were put into effect and none proved necessary. Therefore, imposing restriction now is clearly premature.

Which one of the following, if true, most seriously calls the conclusion above into question?

(A) There are now more water storage reservoirs in the region than there were ten years ago.

(B) The population of the region is approximately three times greater than it was ten years ago.

(C) The region currently has more sources outside the drought-stricken area from which to draw water t

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han it did ten years ago.

(D) The water-consuming home appliances and fixtures sold today are designed to use water more efficiently than those sold ten years ago.

(E) The price of water for residential use is significantly higher in the region than it is in regions that are not drought-stricken.

5. Montgomery, a biologist who is also well read in archaeology, has recently written a book on the origin and purpose of ancient monumental architecture. This book has received much positive attention in the popular press but has been severely criticized by many professional archaeologists for being too extreme. Montgomery’s views do not deserve a negative appraisal, however, since those views are no more extreme than the views of some professional archaeologists.

The argument is most vulnerable to which one of following criticisms?

(A) It fails to establish that professional archaeologists’ views that are at least as extreme as Montgomery’s views do not deserve negative appraisal for that reason.

(B) It assumes without warrant that many professional archaeologists consider biologists unqualified to discuss ancient architecture.

(C) It overlooks the possibility that many professional archaeologists are unfamiliar with Montgomery’s views.

(D) It provides no independent evidence to show that the majority of professional archaeologists do not support Montgomery’s views.

(E) It attempts to support its position by calling into question the motives of anyone who supports an opposing position.

6. Chronic fatigue syndrome is characterized by prolonged fatigue, muscular pain, and neurological problems. It is not know whether these symptoms are all caused by a single virus or whether each symptom is the result of a separate viral infection. A newly synthesized drug has been tested on those who suffer from chronic fatigue syndrome. Although the specific antiviral effects of this drug are unknown. It has lessened the severity of all of the symptoms of chronic fatigue syndrome. Thus there is evidence that chronic fatigue syndrome is, in fact, caused by one virus.

The argument assumes which one of following?

(A) All those who suffer from prolonged fatigue also suffer from neurological problems.

(B) It is more likely that the new drug counteracts one virus than that it counteracts several viruses.

(C) The symptoms of chronic fatigue syndrome are dissimilar to those of any other syndrome.

(D) Most syndromes that are characterized by related symptoms are each caused by a single viral infection.

(E) An antiviral medication that eliminates the most severe symptoms of chronic fatigue syndrome thereby cures chronic fatigue syndrome.

7. DataCom, a company that filed many patents last year, was financially more successful last year than were its competitors, none of which filed many patents. It is therefore likely that DataCom owed its greater financial success to the fact that it filed many patents last year.

The argument is most vulnerable to criticism on the grounds that it

(A) presupposes what it sets out to demonstrate about the relationship between the financial success of DataCom’s competitors and the number of patents they filed.

(B) confused a company’s financial success with its technological innovativeness

(C) fails to establish whether any one of DataCom’s competitors was financially more successful last year than was any other

(D) gives no reason to exclude the possibility that other differences between DataCom and its competitors accounted for its comparative financial success

(E) applies a generalization to an exceptional case .

8. A history book written hundreds of years ago contains several inconsistencies. Some scholars argue that because the book contains inconsistencies, the author must have been getting information from more than one source.

The conclusion cited does not follow unless

(A) author generally try to reconcile discrepancies between sources

(B) the inconsistencies would be apparent to the average reader of the history book at the present time

(C) the history book’s author used no source that contained inconsistencies repeated in the history book

(D) the author of the history book was aware of the kinds of inconsistencies that can arise when multiple sources are consulted

(E) the author of the history book was familiar with all of the available source material that was relevant to the history book .

9. Some games such as chess and soccer, are competitive and played according to rules, but others, such as children’s games of make believe, are neither. Therefore, being competitive and involving rules are not essential to being a game.

Which one of following is most similar in its logical features to the argument above?

(A) Both the gourmet and the glu

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tton enjoy eating. However, one can be a glutton, but not a gourmet, without having an educated palate. therefore, having an educated palate is essential to being a gourmet, but enjoying food is not.

(B) All North American bears eat meat. Some taxonomists, however, have theorized that the giant panda, which eats only bamboo shoots, is a kind of bear. Either there taxonomists are wrong or eating meat is not essential to being a bear.

(C) It is true that dogs occasionally eat vegetation but if dogs were not carnivorous they would be shaped quite differently from the way they are. Therefore, being carnivorous is essential to being a dog.

(D) Most automobiles, and nearly all of those produced today, are gasoline-fueled and four-wheeled, but others, such as some experimental electric cars, are neither. Therefore, being gasoline-fueled and having four wheels are not essential to being an automobile.

(E) Montreal’s most vaunted characteristics, such as its cosmopolitanism and its vitality, are all to be found in many other cities. Therefore, cosmopolitanism and vitality are not essential properties of Montreal.

Questions 10-11

Household indebtedness, which some theorists regard as causing recession, was high preceding the recent recession, but so was the value of assets owned by households. Admittedly, if most of the assets were owned by quite affluent households, and most of the debt was owed by low-income households, high household debt levels could have been the cause of the recession despite high asset values: low-income households might have decreased spending in order to pay off debts while the quite affluent ones might simply have failed to increase spending. But, in fact, quite affluent people must have owed most of the household debt, since money is not lent to those without assets. Therefore, the real cause must lie elsewhere.

10. The argument is structured to lead to which one of the following conclusions?

(A) High levels of household debt did not cause the recent recession.

(B) Low-income households succeeded in paying off their debts despite the recent recession.

(C) Affluent people probably increased their spending levels during the recent recession.

(D) High levels of household debt have little impact on the economy.

(E) When people borrowed money prior to the recent recession, they did not use it to purchase assets.

11. Which one of the following, if true, casts the most doubt on the argument?

(A) Prior to the recent recession, middle-income households owed enough debt that they had begun to decrease spending.

(B) The total value of the economy’s household debt is exceeded by the total value of assets held by households.

(C) Low-income households somewhat decreased their spending during the recent recession.

(D) During a recession the affluent usually borrow money only in order to purchase assets.

(E) Household debt is the category of debt least likely to affect the economy.

12. Fossil-fuel emissions, considered a key factor in the phenomenon known as global warming, contain two gases, carbon dioxide and sulfur dioxide, that have opposite effects on atmospheric temperatures. Carbon dioxide traps heat, tending to warm the atmosphere, whereas sulfur dioxide turns into sulfate aerosols that reflect sunlight back toward space, thereby tending to cool the atmosphere. Given that the heat-trapping effect is stronger than the cooling effect, cutting fossil-fuel emissions might be expected to slow the rise in global temperatures. Yet, surprisingly, if fossil-fuel emissions were cut today, global warming would actually be enhanced for more than three decades before the temperature rise began to slow.

Which one of the following, if true, most helps to explain the claim made in the last sentence above?

(A) Carbon dioxide stays in the atmosphere for many decades, while the sulfate aerosols falls out within days.

(B) Sulfur pollution is not spread evenly around the globe but is concentrated in the Northern Hemisphere, where there is a relatively high concentration of industry.

(C) While it has long been understood that sulfur dioxide is a harmful pollutant, it has been understood only recently that carbon dioxide might also be a harmful pollutant.

(D) Carbon dioxide is produced not only by automobiles but also by power plants that burn fossil fuels.

(E) Because fossil-fuel emission contain sulfur dioxide, they contribute not only to global warming but also to acid rain.

13. Police published a “wanted” poster for a criminal fugitive in a medical journal, because the fugitive was known to have a certain acute noninfectious skin problem that would eventually require a visit to a doctor. The poster asked for information about the whereabouts of the fugitive. A physician’s responding to the poster’s request for i

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nformation would not violate medical ethics, since physicians are already subject to requirements to report gunshot wounds to police and certain infectious diseases to health authorities. These exceptions to confidentiality are clearly ethical.

Which one of the following principles, while remaining compatible with the requirements cited above, supports the view that a physician’s responding to the request would violate medical ethics?

(A) Since a physician acts both as a professional person and as a citizen, it is not ethical for a physician to conceal information about patients from duly constituted law enforcement agencies that have proper jurisdiction.

(B) Since a patient comes to a physician with the expectation that the patient’s visit and medical condition will remain confidential, it is not ethical for a physician to share this information with anyone except personnel within the physician’s office.

(C) Since the primary concern of medicine if individual and public health, it is not ethical for a physician, except in the case of gunshot wounds, to reduce patients’ willingness to come for treatment by a policy of disclosing their identities to law-enforcement agencies.

(D) Except as required by the medical treatment of the patient, physicians cannot ethically disclose to others information about a patient’s identity or medical condition without the patient’s consent.

(E) Except to other medical personnel working to preserve or restore the health of a patient or of other persons, physicians cannot ethically disclose information about the identity of patients or their medical condition.

14. Ingrid: Rock music has produced no songs as durable as the songs of the 1940s, which continue to be recorded by numerous performers.

Jerome: True, rock songs are usually recorded only once. If the original recording continues to be popular, however, that fact can indicate durability, and the best rock songs will prove to be durable.

Jerome responds to Ingrid’s claim by

(A) intentionally misinterpreting the claim

(B) showing that the claim necessarily leads to a contradiction

(C) undermining the truth of the evidence that Ingrid presents

(D) suggesting an alternative standard for judging the point at issue

(E) claiming that Ingrid’s knowledge of the period under discussion incomplete .

15. Health insurance insulates patients from the expense of medical care, giving doctors almost complete discretion in deciding the course of most medical treatments. Moreover, with doctors being paid for each procedure performed, they have an incentive to overtreat patients. It is thus clear that medical procedures administered by doctors are frequently prescribed only because these procedures lead to financial rewards.

The argument uses which one of the following questionable techniques?

(A) assigning responsibility for a certain result to someone whose involvement in the events leading to that result was purely coincidental

(B) inferring the performance of certain actions on no basis other than the existence of both incentive and opportunity for performing those actions

(C) presenting as capricious and idiosyncratic decisions that are based on the rigorous application of well-defined principles

(D) depicting choices as having been made arbitrarily by dismissing without argument reasons that have been given for these choices

(E) assuming that the irrelevance of a consideration for one participant in a decision makes that consideration irrelevant for each participant in the decision .

16. Chlorofluorocarbons are the best possible solvents to have in car engines for cleaning the electronic sensors in modern automobile ignition systems. These solvents have contributed significantly to automakers’ ability to meet legally mandated emission standards. Now automakers will have to phase out the use of chlorofluorocarbons at the same time that emission standards are becoming more stringent.

If under the circumstances described above cars continue to meet emission standards, which one of the following is the most strongly supported inference?

(A) As emission standards become more stringent, automakers will increasingly cooperate with each other in the area of emission control.

(B) Car engines will be radically redesigned so as to do away with the need for cleaning the electronic ignition sensors.

(C) There will be a marked shift toward smaller, lighter cars that will have less powerful engines but will use their fuel more efficiently.

(D) The solvents developed to replace chlorofluorocarbons in car engines will be only marginally less effective than the chlorofluorocarbons themselves.

(E) Something other than the cleansers for electronic ignition sensors will make a relatively greater contribution to meeting emission standards

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than at present.

Question 17-18

Two alternative drugs are available to prevent blood clots from developing after a heart attack. According to two major studies, drug Y does this no more effectively than the more expensive drug Z, but drug Z is either no more or only slightly more effective than drug Y. Drug Z’s manufacturer, which has engaged in questionable marketing practices such as offering stock options to doctors who participate in clinical trials of drug Z, does not contest the results of the studies but claims that they do not reveal drug Z’s advantages. However, since drug Z does not clearly treat the problem more effectively than drug Y, there is no established medical reason for doctors to use drug Z rather than drug Y on their heart-attack victims.

17. A major flaw in the argument is that the argument

(A) does not consider drugs or treatments other than drug Y and Z that may be used to prevent blood clotting in heart-attack patients

(B) neglects to compare the marketing practices of drug Y’s manufacturer with those of drug Z’s manufacturer

(C) fails to recognize that there may be medical criteria relevant to the choice between the two drugs other than their effectiveness as a treatment

(D) assumes without proof that the two drugs are similar in their effectiveness as treatments because they are similar in their chemical composition

(E) confuses economic reasons for selecting a treatment with medical reasons .

18. Which one of the following principles, if established, would most help to justify a doctor’s decision to use drug Z rather than drug Y when treating a patient?

(A) Only patients to whom the cost of an expensive treatment will not be a financial hardship should receive that treatment rather than a less expensive alternative one.

(B) Doctors who are willing to assist in research on the relative effectiveness of drugs by participating in clinical trials deserve fair remuneration for that participation.

(C) The decision to use a particular drug when treating a patient should not be influenced by the marketing practices employed by the company manufacturing that drug.

(D) A drug company’s criticism of studies of its product that do not report favorably on that product is unavoidably biased and therefore invalid.

(E) Where alternative treatments exist and there is a chance that one is more effective than the other, the possibly more effective one should be employed, regardless of cost.

19. Jane: According to an article in this newsmagazine, children’s hand-eye coordination suffers when they spend a great amount of time watching television. Therefore, we must restrict the amount of time Jacqueline and Mildred are allowed to watch television.

Alan: Rubbish! The article says that only children under three are affected in that way. Jacqueline is ten and Mildred is eight. Therefore, we need not restrict their television viewing.

Alan’s argument against Jane’s conclusion makes which one of the following errors in

reasoning?

(A) It relies on the same source that Jane cited in support of her conclusion.

(B) It confuses undermining an argument in support of a given conclusion with showing that the conclusion itself is false.

(C) It does not address the main point of Jane’s argument and focuses instead on a side issue.

(D) It makes an irrelevant appeals to an authority.

(E) It fails to distinguish the consequences of a certain practice from the causes of the practice.

20. A new gardening rake with an S-shaped handle reduces compression stress on the spine during the pull stroke to about one-fifth of what it is with a straight-handled rake. During the push stroke, however, compression stress is five times more with the new rake than with a straight-handled rake. Neither the push stroke nor the pull stroke with a straight-handled rake produces enough compression stress to cause injury, but compression stress during the push stroke with the new rake is above the danger level. Therefore, straight-handled rakes are better than the new rakes for minimizing risk of spinal injury.

The conclusion above is properly drawn from the permission given if which one of the following is true?

(A) Compression stress resulting from pushing is the only cause of injuries to the spine that occurs as a result of raking.

(B) Raking is a frequent cause of spinal injury among gardeners.

(C) The redesign of a tool rarely results in a net gain of efficiency, since gains tend to be counterbalanced by losses.

(D) A garden rake can never be used in such a way that all the strokes with that rake are push strokes.

(E) It is not possible to design a garden rake with a handle that is other than straight or S-shaped.

21. Some people fear that global warming will cause the large ice formations in

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the polar seas to melt, thereby warming the water of those seas and threatening the plankton that is crucial to the marine food chain. Some scientists contend that it is unlikely that the melting process has begun, since water temperatures in the polar seas are the same today as they were a century ago.

Which one of the following, if true, most seriously undermines the scientists’ contention?

(A) Much of the marine plant life that flourished in the polar seas will die in the event that the water temperatures rise above their present levels.

(B) The overall effect of the melting process will be an increase in global sea levels.

(C) The mean air temperature above both and water in the polar regions has not varied significantly over the past 100 years.

(D) The temperature of water that contains melting ice tends to remain constant until all of the ice in the ice-and-water mixture has melted

(E) The mean temperature of ocean waters near the equator has remained constant over the past 100 years.

22. A long-term health study that followed a group of people who were age 35 in 1950 found that those whose weight increased by approximately half a kilogram or one pound per year after the age of 35 tended, on the whole, to live longer than those who maintained the weight they had at age 35. This finding seems at variance with other studies that have associated weight gain with a host of health problems that tend to lower life expectancy.

Which one of the following, if true, most helps to resolve the apparently conflicting findings?

(A) As people age, muscle and bone tissue tends to make up a smaller and smaller proportion of total body weight.

(B) Individuals who reduce their cholesterol levels by losing weight can thereby also reduce their risk of dying from heart attacks or strokes.

(C) Smokers, who tend to be leaner than nonsmokers, tend to have shorter life spans than nonsmokers.

(D) The normal deterioration of the human immune system with age can be slowed down by a reduction in the number of calories consumed.

(E) Diets that tend to lead to weight gain often contain not only excess fat but also unhealthful concentrations of sugar and sodium.

23. Insurance industry statistics demonstrate that cars with alarms or other antitheft devices are more likely to be stolen or broken into than cars without such devices or alarms. Therefore antitheft devices do not protect cars against thieves.

The pattern of flawed reasoning in the argument above is most similar to that in which one of the following?

(A) Since surveys reveal that communities with flourishing public libraries have, on average, better-educated citizens, it follows that good schools are typically found in communities with public libraries.

(B) Most public libraries are obviously intended to serve the interests of the casual reader, because most public libraries contain large collections of fiction and relatively small reference collections.

(C) Studies reveal that people who are regular users of libraries purchase more books per year than do people who do not use libraries regularly. Hence using libraries regularly does not reduce the number of books that library patrons purchase.

(D) Since youngsters who read voraciously are more likely to have defective vision than youngsters who do not read very much, it follows that children who do not like to read usually have perfect vision.

(E) Societies that support free public libraries are more likely to support free public universities than are societies without free public libraries. Hence a society that wished to establish a free public university should first establish a free public library.

24. The problem that environmental economics aims to remedy is the following: people making economic decisions cannot readily compare environmental factors, such as clean air and the survival of endangered species, with other costs and benefits. As environmental economists recognize, solving this problem requires assigning monetary values result from people comparing costs and benefits in order to arrive at economic decisions. Thus, environmental economics is stymied by what motivates it.

If the considerations advanced in its support are true, the passage’s conclusion is supported

(A) strongly, on the assumption that monetary values for environment factors cannot be assigned unless people make economic decisions about these factors

(B) strongly, unless economic decision-making has not yet had any effect on the things categorized as environmental factors

(C) at best weakly, because the passage fails to establish that economic decision-makers do not by and large take adequate account of environmental factors

(D) at best weakly, because the argument assumes that pollution and other effects on environmental factors rarely res

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ult from economic decision-making

(E) not at all, since the argument is circular, taking that conclusion as one of its premises

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