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[
"historical knowledge can be too narrow to be useful",
"there are conventional criteria for calling a past action a mistake",
"history teaches any unequivocal lessons",
"there are any uncontested historical facts"
] | Lewis: Those who do not learn from past mistakes -- their own and those of others -- are condemned to repeat them. In order to benefit from the lessons of history, however, we first have to know history. That is why the acquisition of broad historical knowledge is so important. Morris: The trouble is that the past is infinitely various. From its inexhaustible storehouse of events it is possible to prove anything or its contrary. | 2 | train_600 | The issue that Morris raises in objecting to Lewis' view is whether |
[
"Many of the patients who receive coronary bypass surgery are less than 55 years old.",
"The patients who underwent coronary bypass surgery but who did not benefit from it were medically indistinguishable, prior to their surgery, from the patients who did benefit.",
"The patients over 65 years old who did not benefit from the coronary bypass surgery were as fully informed as those who did benefit from the surgery as to the risks of the surgery prior to undergoing it.",
"Most of the patients in the survey decided to undergo coronary bypass surgery because they were advised that the surgery would reduce their risk of future heart attacks."
] | Of patients over 65 years old who survived coronary bypass surgery-a procedure widely prescribed for people with heart disease-only 75 percent benefited from the surgery. Thus it appears that for one in four such patients, the doctors who advised them to undergo this surgery, with its attendant risks and expense, were more interested in an opportunity to practice their skills and in their fee than in helping the patient. | 1 | train_601 | Which of the following, if true, most seriously undermines the argument? |
[
"In East Africa gold coins from Mediterranean North Africa have been found at a tenth-century site but at no earlier sites.",
"Documents from Mediterranean Europe and North Africa that date back earlier than the tenth century show knowledge of East African animals.",
"East African carvings in a style characteristic of the tenth century depict seagoing vessels very different from those used by local sailors but of a type common in the Mediterranean.",
"The many surviving letters of pre-tenth-century North African merchants include no mention of business transactions involving East Africa."
] | A sudden increase in the production of elephant ivory artifacts on the Mediterranean coast of North Africa occurred in the tenth century. Historians explain this increase as the result of an area opening up as a new source of ivory and argue on this basis that the important medieval trade between North Africa and East Africa began at this period. | 1 | train_602 | Each of the following, if true, provides some support for the historians' account described above EXCEPT: |
[
"It would be less costly to have radio stations that give continual, lengthier traffic reports than to install a \"smart highway\" system.",
"Bad weather, which radio stations report, would cause traffic to slow down whether or not a \"smart highway\" system was in operation.",
"The proposed traffic monitoring would not reduce the privacy of drivers.",
"Radio reports can take note of congestion once it occurs, but a \"smart highway\" system could anticipate and forestall it in many instances."
] | Eva: A "smart highway" system should be installed, one that would monitor areawide traffic patterns and communicate with computers in vehicles or with programmable highway signs to give drivers information about traffic congestion and alternate routes. Such a system, we can infer, would result in improved traffic flow in and around cities that would do more than improve drivers' tempers; it would decrease the considerable loss of money and productivity that now results from traffic congestion. Louis: There are already traffic reports on the radio. | 0 | train_603 | Why would a "smart highway" system be any better? If Eva responded to Luis by saying that the current one-minute radio reports are too short to give a sufficient description of overall patterns of traffic congestion, which one of the following, if true, would most strengthen Luis's challenge? |
[
"Birds and reptiles share many physical features because they descend from common evolutionary ancestors.",
"During the age of dinosaurs, plesiosauromorphs were the only marine reptiles that had long, thin fins.",
"The shape of a marine animal's fin affects the way the animal swims in the same way as the shape of a bird's wing affects the way the bird flies.",
"A gigantic marine animal would not be able to find enough food to meet the caloric requirements dictated by its body size if it did not hunt by chasing prey over long distances."
] | Paleontologist: Plesiosauromorphs were gigantic, long-necked marine reptiles that ruled the oceans during the age of the dinosaurs. Most experts believe that plesiosauromorphs lurked and quickly ambushed their prey. However, plesiosauromorphs probably hunted by chasing their prey over long distances. Plesiosauromorph fins were quite long and thin, like the wings of birds specialized for long-distance flight. | 2 | train_604 | Which one of the following is an assumption on which the paleontologist's argument depends? |
[
"The evolution of human language began after the disappearance of an extinct species from which both humans and chimpanzees evolved.",
"The assumption that something like human language must exist in some species from which humans evolved has no clearcut linguistic implications for chimpanzees.",
"The communicative systems of chimpanzees are cruder than human language.",
"Human language is a by-product of human intelligence, which chimpanzees lack."
] | Anthropologist: Many people think that if human language evolved, then something like it must be present in those species most closely related to humans, such as chimpanzees. They reason that since new traits evolve gradually, something like human language, albeit cruder, must exist in some species from which humans evolved. This general line of argument may be reasonable, but it simply does not follow that chimpanzees have anything like human language, because humans did not evolve from chimpanzees. While chimpanzees are indeed closely related to humans, this is because both evolved from a common ancestor. The evolution of human language might easily have begun after the extinction of that common ancestor. | 1 | train_605 | Which one of the following most accurately expresses the main conclusion of the anthropologist's argument? |
[
"Philosophical paradoxes with one or two premises are more baffling than those with several premises.",
"Solving a philosophical paradox requires accepting something that intuitively seems to be incorrect.",
"The conclusion of a philosophical paradox cannot be false if all the paradox's premises are true.",
"If it is not possible to accept that the conclusion of a particular philosophical paradox is true, then it is not possible to solve that paradox."
] | A philosophical paradox is a particularly baffling sort of argument. Your intuitions tell you that the conclusion of a philosophical paradox is false, but they also tell you that its conclusion follows logically from true premises. Solving a philosophical paradox requires accepting any one of three things: that its conclusion is true, that at least one of its premises is not true, or that its conclusion does not really follow logically from its premises. | 1 | train_606 | If the statements above are true, which one of the following must also be true? |
[
"Continuing to produce nuclear weapons beyond the minimum needed for deterrence increases the likelihood of a nuclear accident.",
"The major powers have engaged in many smaller-scale military operations since the end of the Second World War, while refraining from a nuclear confrontation.",
"Maintaining a high level of nuclear armaments represents a significant drain on a country's economy.",
"It cannot be known whether it was nuclear deterrence that worked, or some other factor, such as a recognition of the economic value of remaining at peace."
] | That the policy of nuclear deterrence has worked thus far is unquestionable. Since the end of the Second World War, the very fact that there were nuclear armaments in existence has kept major powers from using nuclear weapons, for fear of starting a worldwide nuclear exchange that would make the land of the power initiating it uninhabitable. The proof is that a third world war between superpowers has not happened. | 3 | train_607 | Which one of the following, if true, indicates a flaw in the argument? |
[
"About a fifth of those polled did not know that Walker had been accused of ethics violations.",
"Walker has defended himself against the accusations by arguing that the alleged ethics violations were the result of honest mistakes by his staff members.",
"In the time since Walker was accused of ethics violations, there has been an increase in the percentage of city residents who judge the performance of Walker's political opponents to be good or excellent.",
"Almost all of the people who believe that Walker is guilty of ethics violations had thought, even before he was accused of those violations, that his performance as mayor was poor."
] | A recent poll showed that almost half of the city' s residents believe that Mayor Walker is guilty of ethics violations. Surprisingly, however, 52 percent of those surveyed judged Walker' s performance as mayor to be good or excellent, which is no lower than it was before anyone accused him of ethics violations. | 3 | train_608 | Which one of the following, if true, most helps to explain the surprising fact stated above? |
[
"The fat content of the dinners eaten at home by adults who do not work outside the home is 25 percent higher than national guidelines recommend.",
"Adults who work outside the home eat dinner at home 20 percent less often than do adults who do not work outside the home.",
"Adults who do not work outside the home tend to prepare breakfast more often than adults who work outside the home.",
"Adults who work outside the home spend 2 hours less time per day on all household responsibilities, including dinner preparation, than do adults who do not work outside the home."
] | Adults who work outside the home spend, on average, 100 minutes less time each week in preparing dinner than adults who do not work outside the home. But, contrary to expectation, comparisons show that the dinners eaten at home by the two groups of adults do not differ significantly with respect to nutritional value, variety of menus, or number of courses. | 1 | train_609 | Which one of the following, if true, most helps to resolve the apparent discrepancy in the information above? |
[
"It is not uncommon for more than one judge to have an influence on the way a dissenting opinion is written.",
"The law is not to any great extent determined by dissenting opinions.",
"Judicial decisions issued by panels of judges are likely to be more widely read than are judicial decisions issued by a single judge who hears a case alone.",
"Unlike literary works, legal opinions rely heavily on the use of technical terminology."
] | The writing styles in works of high literary quality are not well suited to the avoidance of misinterpretation. For this reason, the writing in judicial decisions, which are primarily intended as determinations of law, is rarely of high literary quality. However, it is not uncommon to find writing of high literary quality in dissenting opinions, which are sometimes included in written decisions in cases heard by a panel of judges. | 1 | train_610 | Which one of the following, if true, most helps to resolve the apparent discrepancy in the statements above? |
[
"describes a dissimilarity without citing any scientific evidence for the existence of that dissimilarity",
"ignores the possibility that the challenged proposal is deliberately crude in a way designed to elicit criticism to be used in refining the proposal",
"does not consider that new surgical procedures might be found to be intrinsically more harmful than the best treatment previously available",
"assumes that a surgeon's skills remain unchanged throughout the surgeon's professional life"
] | The proposal to extend clinical trials, which are routinely used as systematic tests of pharmaceutical innovations, to new surgical procedures should not be implemented. The point is that surgical procedures differ in one important respect from medicinal drugs: a correctly prescribed drug depends for its effectiveness only on the drug' s composition, whereas the effectiveness of even the most appropriate surgical procedure is transparently related to the skills of the surgeon who uses it. | 2 | train_611 | The reasoning in the argument is flawed because the argument |
[
"To raise revenues, new offices were often created and sold by the king.",
"Most government officials had close ties to the people in the provinces in which they held their positions.",
"It was difficult for the king to oust a disloyal government official from an inherited office.",
"Government officials often received financial gratuities from local merchants."
] | In seventeenth-century France, many remunerative government positions in the provinces were sold by the king and then passed from father to son. Historians have concluded that this system was more effective than a purely meritocratic system in ensuring not only that most of the officials were competent, but that they were more sympathetic to the local people than to the king. | 0 | train_612 | Each of the following, if true of seventeenth-century France, helps to support the historians' conclusion EXCEPT: |
[
"it will lead them to develop a taste for candy and sweets",
"their doing so interferes with the development of appreciation for more challenging literature",
"children may become so enthralled with books that they will want to spend all their time reading",
"their message may undermine the positive teaching done by parents"
] | Children should be discouraged from reading Jones' s books. Reading them is like eating candy, which provides intense, short-term sensory stimulation but leaves one poorly nourished and dulls one' s taste for better fare. In other words, the problem with letting children read Jones' s books is that__. | 1 | train_613 | Which one of the following most logically completes the argument above? |
[
"The only feasible way for the agency to resolve the budget shortfall would involve cutting transportation service and eliminating jobs.",
"The transportation employees' union should not accept cuts in retirement benefits if doing so would not be in the employees' best interest.",
"Cutting the retirement benefits would help resolve the agency's budget shortfall.",
"The transportation employees' union will not accept cuts in retirement benefits if doing so will not allow more transportation employees to keep their jobs."
] | Editorial: Our city' s public transportation agency is facing a budget shortfall. The fastest growing part of the budget has been employee retirement benefits, which are exceptionally generous. Unless the budget shortfall is resolved, transportation service will be cut, and many transportation employees will lose their jobs. Thus, it would be in the employees' best interest for their union to accept cuts in retirement benefits. | 2 | train_614 | Which of the following is an assumption the editorial's argument requires? |
[
"The United States has been developing and has achieved extremely sophisticated technology for saving premature and low-birth-weight babies, most of whom require extended hospital stays.",
"Low birth weight is a contributing factor in more than half of the infant deaths in the United States.",
"Babies who do not receive adequate attention from a caregiver fail to thrive and so they gain weight slowly.",
"In eleven states of the United States, the infant mortality rate declined last year."
] | A society' s infant mortality rate is an accepted indicator of that society' s general health status. Even though in some localities in the United States the rate is higher than in many developing countries, in the United States overall the rate has been steadily declining. This decline does not necessarily indicate, however, that babies in the United States are now, on the average, healthier at birth than they were in the past. | 0 | train_615 | Which one of the following reasons, if true, most strongly supports the claim made above about the implications of the decline? |
[
"The Smithfield River should be dammed to prevent flooding.",
"Nutrients from the Smithfield River are essential to the local fish population.",
"For Redhook to build a dam on the Smithfield River would be a mistake.",
"The Smithfield River floods cost Redhook $3 million every year."
] | Editorial: Almost every year the Smithfield River floods the coastal fishing community of Redhook, which annually spends $3 million on the cleanup. Some residents have proposed damming the river, which would cost $5 million but would prevent the flooding. However, their position is misguided. A dam would prevent nutrients in the river from flowing into the ocean. Fish that now feed on those nutrients would start feeding elsewhere. The loss of these fish would cost Redhook $10 million annually. | 2 | train_616 | Which one of the following most accurately expresses the main conclusion of the editorial's argument? |
[
"It supports an earlier statement regarding what is at issue in the argument.",
"It introduces an alternative solution to the problem the argument is addressing.",
"It indicates that the problem identified in the argument does not arise in every instance.",
"It concedes that a distinction on which the argument relies is unclear."
] | Unquestionably, inventors of useful devices deserve credit for their ingenuity, but the engineers who help develop an invention get too little recognition. Although inventors sometimes serve as their own engineers, more often, engineers must translate an inventor' s insight into something workable and useful. Ttherefore, engineers also deserve credit for their contribution. | 2 | train_617 | The claim that inventors sometimes serve as their own engineers plays which one of the following roles in the argument? |
[
"There have been several recent burglaries in the Fenwicks' neighborhood in which neighborhood children were suspected.",
"The Fenwicks returned home from their trip later than they had planned.",
"When the Fenwicks returned home, they found children's footprints on the back porch that had not been there before their trip.",
"A neighbor thought he had seen the Fenwicks' back door closing while the Fenwicks were away."
] | The Fenwicks returned home from a trip to find two broken bottles on their kitchen floor. There was no sign of forced entry and nothing in the house appeared to have been taken. Although the Fenwicks have a pet cat that had free run of the house while they were away, the Fenwicks hypothesized that they had left a back door unlocked and that neighborhood children had entered through it, attempted to raid the kitchen, and left after breaking the bottles. | 1 | train_618 | Each of the following, if true, helps to support the Fenwicks' hypothesis EXCEPT: |
[
"Diets that tend to lead to weight gain often contain not only excess fat but also unhealthful concentrations of sugar and sodium.",
"Smokers, who tend to be leaner than nonsmokers, tend to have shorter life spans than nonsmokers.",
"Individuals who reduce their cholesterol levels by losing weight can thereby also reduce their risk of dying from heart attacks or strokes.",
"The normal deterioration of the human immune system with age can be slowed down by a reduction in the number of calories consumed."
] | 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. | 1 | train_619 | Which one of the following, if true, most helps to resolve the apparently conflicting findings? |
[
"Certain side effects of cancer therapies that are detrimental to patients' overall health are not affected by vitamin C.",
"Cancer cells that are susceptible to certain types of cancer therapies are not likely to be affected by the presence of vitamin C.",
"Vitamin C has not been shown to reduce people's risk of developing cancer, even at the very high dosage levels recommended by some doctors.",
"Some kinds of cancer cells absorb large amounts of vitamin C, which interferes with the oxidation mechanism by which many cancer therapies kill cancer cells."
] | Medical columnist: Some doctors recommend taking vitamin C to help maintain overall health because vitamin C is an antioxidant, a substance that protects the body from certain types of oxygen particles that can trigger disease. People suffering from various ailments are encouraged to take vitamin C to guard against developing other health problems. However, doctors are now discouraging some cancer patients from taking vitamin C, even when they are undergoing therapies with side effects that are detrimental to their overall health. | 3 | train_620 | Which one of the following, if true, most helps to explain why the doctors' recommendation to some cancer patients differs from the general recommendation regarding vitamin C? |
[
"It fails to address the possibility that the studies on the beneficial effects of aspirin were conducted only in industrialized nations.",
"It overlooks the possibility that preventing or reducing the severity of heart disease has little or no effect on any of the other most common diseases in industrialized nations.",
"It overlooks the possibility that even if a disease is one of the most common in a nation, most people in that nation are not in significant danger of developing that disease.",
"It takes for granted that if medication can reduce the severity of heart disease, it can also prevent some cases of heart disease."
] | Medical reporter: Studies have consistently found that taking an aspirin a day thins the blood slightly, thereby helping to prevent or reduce the severity of heart disease. Since heart disease is one of the most common types of ill health in industrialized nations, most people in such nations would ttherefore be in better health if they took an aspirin a day. | 2 | train_621 | The reasoning in the doctor's argument is most vulnerable to criticism on which one of the following grounds? |
[
"predict the effect of the information contained in the report on future high school dropout rates for the city",
"take into account instances of respondents' dropping out that occurred before the respondents reached high school",
"consider whether a diploma from the city's high schools signaled the same level of achievement over time",
"distinguish between residents who had attended the city's schools and those who had received their schooling elsewhere"
] | A report of a government survey concluded that Center City was among the ten cities in the nation with the highest dropout rate from its schools. The survey data were obtained by asking all city residents over the age of 19 whether they were high school graduates and computing the proportion who were not. A city school of official objected that the result did not seem accurate according to the schools' figures. | 3 | train_622 | The school official can most properly criticize the reasoning by which the survey report reached its result for failure to do which one of me following? |
[
"Winning a trophy or championship is not important to athletes who play mainly for the love of their sport.",
"Athletes who play mainly for the love of their sport concentrate more on the sport itself during athletic competitions than do athletes whose main goal is winning a trophy or championship.",
"If an athlete's main goal during an athletic competition is winning a trophy or championship, that athlete will lack the concentration necessary for adequate vision during that competition .",
"It is impossible for an athlete to concentrate on more than one thing at a time during an athletic competition."
] | Researchers studying athletes found that those who played mainly for the love of their sport actually had sharper vision during athletic competitions than those whose main goal was winning a trophy or championship. The vision of the first group of athletes was sharper because the concentration necessary for acute vision during an activity is typically possessed to a greater degree by those whose attention is focused on the activity itself. | 1 | train_623 | Which one of the following is most strongly supported by the statements above? |
[
"Other factors besides the reflectivity of ice and snow affect the cooling of Earth's atmosphere.",
"The atmosphere derives most of its heat from the passage of sunlight through it.",
"Lighter-colored soil reflects more sunlight back into space than does darker-colored soil.",
"Ocean water and land heated by sunlight in turn warm Earth's atmosphere."
] | The more sunlight our planet reflects back into space, the cooler the global atmosphere tends to become. Snow and ice reflect much more sunlight back into space than do ocean water or land without snow cover. Ttherefore, the greater the area of Earth' s surface that is covered with snow and ice, the cooler, on average, the global atmosphere is likely to become. | 3 | train_624 | Which one of the following, if true, would most strengthen the argument? |
[
"Players' choices that have no effect on the outcome of a video game are irrelevant to the aesthetic experience produced by that game.",
"An aesthetic experience cannot be both interactive and controlled by the artist or artists who created the work.",
"Most video game creators do not intend their video games to be works of art.",
"Typically, video game players do not themselves create video games."
] | Columnist: Video games are not works of art. No matter how rich the aesthetic experience produced by a video game might be, it is interactive: players make choices that affect the outcome of the game. For something to be a work of art, it must produce an aesthetic experience that is controlled by the artist or artists who created the work. | 1 | train_625 | The conclusion of the columnist's argument can be properly drawn if which one of the following is assumed? |
[
"The flooding in the basement caused damage to the furnace and also caused a short in the electrical system. Fire investigators could not show that the damage to the furnace caused the fire that resulted shortly after the flooding, nor could they show that the fire was caused by the short in the electrical system. Ttherefore, we cannot claim that the flooding in the basement caused the fire.",
"We have good reason to believe that the cause of the flooding along the coast was the unusually high tides. We also have good reason to believe that the cause of the unusually high tides was either the sun or the moon. So it is reasonable to maintain that the cause of the flooding was either the sun or the moon.",
"It has not been conclusively proven that the accident was caused by John's driving at excessive speeds. Nor has it been conclusively proven that the accident was the result of John's weaving out of his lane. Hence, it has been conclusively proven that the cause of the accident was neither John's driving at excessive speeds nor John's weaving out of his lane.",
"I know that one cannot move this piano unless one can lift at least 150 kilograms. I doubt that either Leon or Pam can lift 150 kilograms alone. So I doubt that either Leon or Pam can move this piano alone. Thus, I doubt that Leon and Pam can move this piano together."
] | The asteroid that hit the Yucatan Peninsula 65 million years ago caused both long-term climatic change and a tremendous firestorm that swept across North America. We cannot show that it was this fire that caused the extinction of the triceratops, a North American dinosaur in existence at the time of the impact of the asteroid. Nor can we show that the triceratops became extinct due to the climatic changes resulting from the asteroid' s impact. Hence, we cannot attribute the triceratops' s extinction to the asteroid' s impact. | 0 | train_626 | Which one of the following has flawed reasoning most similar to the flawed reasoning in the argument above? |
[
"be best maintained by ensuring gradual assimilation of new technical knowledge and skills",
"be ensured by laws that protect the customs and traditions of that culture",
"be threatened only if the people of that culture fail to acquire the latest technical skills",
"decrease if that nation comes to have a high level of economic wealth"
] | Commentator: In the new century, only nations with all the latest electronic technology will experience great economic prosperity. The people in these nations will be constantly bombarded with images of how people in other countries live. This will increase their tendency to question their own customs and traditions, leading to a dissolution of those customs and traditions. Hence, in the new century, the stability of a nation' s cultural identity will likely __ . | 3 | train_627 | Which one of the following most logically completes the commentator's argument? |
[
"The more centralized a society is, the greater its need for increased food production.",
"Societies have become more centralized as technology has improved.",
"Not every problem associated with the collapse of a centralized society would be prevented by technological improvements.",
"The production of food can be increased only by improved technology."
] | Technological improvements will enable food production to increase as populations increase. However, increases in food production will be negligible unless societies become more centralized so that all factors contributing to the production of food can be better coordinated. But, historically, the more centralized a society was, the greater the percentage of its people who perished if and when it collapsed. Thus, increasing the centralization of societies in an effort to increase food production via better technology will merely exacerbate the disasters associated with societal collapse. | 2 | train_628 | The statements above, if true, most strongly support which one of the following? |
[
"Many summer jobs offer training that will help the teen-ager secure a full-time position after graduation.",
"During the summer, some teenagers continue to work at jobs that they have held during the school year.",
"Many state programs that have been developed to help teen-agers find summer employment have recently had their budgets increased.",
"Most summer jobs are located in suburban areas that are inaccessible to the high proportion of teen-agers who live in cities."
] | Last summer one out of every five teenagers who sought employment failed to find it. This is hard to understand, since during this same time employers were searching for teenagers to fill an abundance of summer jobs. Many employers had been offering good pay and, in some cases, medical benefits. | 3 | train_629 | Which of the following, if true, most helps to explain why teen-age unemployment was high when there were many job openings? |
[
"In 1965, subtantially more than one- seventh of the cars in Morodia were replaced with new cars.",
"Because of a driver-education campaign, most drivers and passengers in cars that did have safety belts used them in 1966.",
"An excessive reliance on the new safety features led many owners of new cars to drive less cautiously in 1966 than before.",
"Most of the new cars bought in 1966 were bought in the months of January and February."
] | Beginning in 1966 all new cars sold in Morodia were required to have safety belts and power steering. Previously, most cars in Morodia were without these features. Safety belts help to prevent injuries in collisions, and power steering helps to avoid collisions in the first place. But even though in 1966 one-seventh of the cars in Morodia were replaced with new cars, the number of car collisions and collision-related injuries did not decline. | 2 | train_630 | Which of the following, if true about Morodia, most helps to explain why the number of collisions and collision-related injuries in Morodia failed to decline in 1966? |
[
"Very few fatal collisions involving trucks in Partoria are collisions between two trucks.",
"No matter what changes Partoria makes in the regulation of trucking, it will have to keep some smaller roads off-limits to all large trucks.",
"Partorian trucking companies have so far used triple-trailer trucks on lightly traveled sections of major highways only.",
"In Partoria, the safety record of the trucking industry as a whole has improved slightly over the past ten years."
] | In the nation of Partoria, large trucks currently account for 6 percent of miles driven on Partoria' s roads but are involved in 12 percent of all highway fatalities. The very largest trucks-those with three trailers-had less than a third of the accident rate of single-and double-trailer trucks. Clearly, ttherefore, one way for Partoria to reduce highway deaths would be to require shippers to increase their use of triple-trailer trucks. | 2 | train_631 | Which of the following, if true, most seriously weakens the argument? |
[
"Whether any of the contents of the site will significantly deteriorate before the anticipated technology is available",
"Whether the site was inhabited by a very ancient culture",
"Whether the team can study a site other than the newly excavated site for the time being",
"Whether the anticipated technology will damage objects under study"
] | Archaeologists use technology to analyze ancient sites. It is likely that this technology will advance considerably in the near future, allowing archaeologists to gather more information than is currently possible. If they study certain sites now, they risk contaminating or compromising them for future studies. Ttherefore, in order to maximize the potential for gathering knowledge in the long run, a team of archaeologists plans to delay the examination of a newly excavated site. | 0 | train_632 | Which of the following would be most useful to investigate for the purpose of evaluating the plan's prospects for achieving its goal? |
[
"The primary reason that any country seeks economic prosperity is to foster political freedom in that country.",
"Every country should adopt at least some policies that encourage the development of political freedom in other countries.",
"A country should not do anything that might hinder the growth of political freedom in any other country.",
"Both economic prosperity and political freedom can contribute to the overall well-being of any country's inhabitants."
] | Trade negotiator: Increasing economic prosperity in a country tends to bring political freedom to its inhabitants. Ttherefore, it is wrong for any country to adopt trade policies that are likely to seriously hinder growth in the prosperity of any other country. | 2 | train_633 | Which one of the following principles, if valid, would most help to justify the trade negotiator's reasoning? |
[
"During rough voyages ship passengers in cabins providing a view of the water are less likely to get motion sickness than are passengers in cabins providing no view.",
"Some automobile passengers whose inner ears indicate that they are moving and who have a clear view of the objects they are passing get motion sickness.",
"Many people who are experienced airplane passengers occasionally get motion sickness.",
"People who have aisle seats in trains or airplanes are as likely to get motion sickness as are people who have window seats."
] | Astronauts who experience weightlessness frequently get motion sickness. The astronauts see their own motion relative to passing objects, but while the astronauts are weightless their inner ears indicate that their bodies are not moving. The astronauts' experience is best explained by the hypothesis that conflicting information received by the brain about the body' s motion causes motion sickness. | 0 | train_634 | Which one of the following, if true, provides the strongest additional support for the hypotheses above? |
[
"ignores the possibility that having high-tech equipment is required for adequate training of workers",
"overlooks the fact that increases in productivity may not be desirable in some circumstances",
"confuses a stated requirement for having high- tech equipment with a sufficient condition for having high-tech equipment",
"presumes without giving justification that educating workers always results in an increase in their productivity"
] | Productivity is average output per worker per unit of time. High productivity cannot be achieved without adequate training of workers. So high productivity does not depend on having high-tech equipment. | 0 | train_635 | The reasoning in the argument is most vulnerable to criticism on the grounds that the argument |
[
"Jurors who understand the technical information presented in a case can usually assess its legal implications accurately.",
"There should be limits placed on how much technical information can be considered by both sides in preparing a legal case.",
"Jury decisions in cases involving expert witness testimonies are not always determined by the reliability of those testimonies.",
"Expert witnesses who testify on opposite sides in legal cases are likely to agree in their evaluations of technical claims."
] | When expert witnesses give testimony, jurors often do not understand the technical information and thereby are in no position to evaluate such testimony. Although expert witnesses on opposite sides often make conflicting claims, the expert witnesses on both sides frequently seem competent, leaving the jury unable to assess the reliability of their testimonies. | 2 | train_636 | The statements above, if true, most strongly support which one of the following? |
[
"The sale of snacks and drinks in cinemas accounts for a steadily growing share of most cinema operators' profits.",
"As distinct from the existing cinemas, most of the cinemas being planned would be located in downtown areas, in hopes of stimulating an economic revitalization of those areas.",
"Over the next ten years, people in their teenage years, the prime moviegoing age, will be a rapidly growing proportion of the county's population.",
"Spending on video purchases, as well as spending on video rentals, has been increasing modestly each year for the past ten years."
] | In Washington County, attendance at the movies is just large enough for the cinema operators to make modest profits. The size of the county's population is stable and is not expected to increase much. Yet there are investors ready to double the number of movie screens in the county within five years, and they are predicting solid profits both for themselves and for the established cinema operators. | 2 | train_637 | Which of the following, if true about Washington County, most helps to provide a justification for the investors' prediction? |
[
"pre-1970 techniques for detecting TDX residue could detect it only when it was present on fruit in more than the trace amounts allowed by the new regulations",
"at least a small fraction of the fruit sold each year since the early 1960's has had on it greater levels of TDX than the regulation allows",
"many more people today than in the 1960's habitually purchase and eat fruit without making an effort to clean residues off the fruit",
"the presence of TDX on fruit in greater than trace amounts has not been shown to cause any harm even to children who eat large amounts of fruit"
] | Although the pesticide TDX has been widely used by fruit growers since the early 1960' s, a regulation in force since 1960 has prohibited sale of fruit on which any TDX residue can be detected. That regulation is about to be replaced by one that allows sale of fruit on which trace amounts of TDX residue are detected. In fact, however, the change will not allow more TDX on fruit than was allowed in the 1960' s, because __. | 0 | train_638 | Which of the following most logically completes the argument? |
[
"It introduces a judgment that the argument opposes.",
"It is an explanation that the argument concludes is correct.",
"It provides evidence in support of the main conclusion of the argument.",
"It is the main conclusion of the argument."
] | Hunter: <b> Many people blame hunters alone for the decline in Greenrock National Forest' s deer population over the past ten years. </b> Yet clearly, black bears have also played an important role in this decline. In the past ten years, the forest's protected black bear population has risen sharply, and examination of black bears found dead in the forest during the deer hunting season showed that a number of them had recently fed on deer. | 0 | train_639 | In the hunter's argument, the portion in boldface plays which of the following roles? |
[
"Only teachers at the Culinary Institute are allowed to use the institute's main kitchen. Most dinners at Cafe Delice are prepared in that kitchen. So at least some dinners at Cafe Delice must be prepared by Culinary Institute teachers.",
"Only teachers at the Culinary Institute are allowed to use the main kitchen of the institute. Dinners at Cafe Delice are usually prepared by Culinary Institute teachers. So dinners at Cafe Delice must sometimes be prepared in the main kitchen of the Culinary Institute.",
"Most dinners at Cafe Delice are prepared in the main kitchen of the Culinary Institute. All the teachers at the institute are allowed to use that kitchen. So at least some dinners at Cafe Delice must be prepared by Culinary Institute teachers.",
"All dinners at Cafe Delice are prepared in the main kitchen of the Culinary Institute. But only teachers at the institute are allowed to use that kitchen. So the dinners at Cafe Delice must be prepared by Culinary Institute teachers."
] | On Wednesdays, Kate usually buys some guava juice. But the only place she can buy guava juice is the local health food store. It follows that she must sometimes shop at the local health food store on Wednesdays. | 0 | train_640 | The argument above is most similar in its pattern of reasoning to which one of the following arguments? |
[
"the mass media regularly feature stories encouraging people to maintain diets that are low in cholesterol",
"the average length of time an employee stays with RenCo is less than it is with Garnet",
"RenCo has significantly more employees than Garnet has",
"RenCo's employees are unlikely to have higher cholesterol levels than Garnet's employees"
] | Garnet and RenCo each provide health care for their employees. Garnet pays for both testing of its employees' cholesterol levels and treatment of high cholesterol. This policy saves Garnet money, since high cholesterol left untreated for many years leads to conditions that require very expensive treatment. However, RenCo does not have the same financial incentive to adopt such a policy, because __. | 1 | train_641 | Which of the following most logically completes the passage? |
[
"A decrease in the level of carbon in the atmosphere causes decreased evaporation of ocean water.",
"A decrease in the level of atmospheric heat causes a decrease in the level of carbon in the atmosphere.",
"An increase in the level of atmospheric heat causes increased rainfall.",
"A decrease in the level of atmospheric heat causes a decrease in the amount of carbon that rain washes into the oceans from the air."
] | Nature constantly adjusts the atmospheric carbon level. An increase in the level causes the atmosphere to hold more heat, which causes more water to evaporate from the oceans, which causes increased rain. Rain washes some carbon from the air into the oceans, where it eventually becomes part of the seabed. A decrease in atmospheric carbon causes the atmosphere to hold less heat, which causes decreased evaporation from the oceans, which causes less rain, and thus less carbon is washed into the oceans. Yet some environmentalists worry that burning fossil fuels may raise atmospheric carbon to a dangerous level. It is true that a sustained increase would threaten human life. But the environmentalists should relax -- nature will continually adjust the carbon level. | 1 | train_642 | Each of the following can be inferred from the information in the passage EXCEPT: |
[
"people with insurance do not need to lock their doors because if anything is stolen the insurance company will pay to replace it",
"using a cell phone while driving is not dangerous because the number of traffic accidents has decreased since the invention of the cell phone",
"smoking cigarettes is not bad for one's health because not all cigarette smokers get smoking-related illnesses",
"inspecting commercial airplanes for safety is unnecessary because the number of commercial airplane crashes has decreased over the last decade"
] | Lobbyist: Those who claim that automobile exhaust emissions are a risk to public health are mistaken. During the last century, as automobile exhaust emissions increased, every relevant indicator of public health improved dramatically rather than deteriorated. | 1 | train_643 | The flaw in the lobbyist's reasoning can most effectively be demonstrated by noting that, by parallel reasoning, we could conclude that |
[
"It provides supplementary background information.",
"It states a possible objection to the argument's conclusion.",
"It is the conclusion of the argument.",
"It is one of the claims on which the conclusion is based."
] | Mainstream economic theory holds that manufacturers, in deciding what kinds of products to manufacture and what form those products should have, simply respond to the needs and desires of consumers. However, most major manufacturers manipulate and even create consumer demand, as anyone who watches television knows. Since even mainstream economic theorists watch television, their motive in advancing this theory must be something other than disinterested concern for scientific truth. | 3 | train_644 | The claim that manufacturers manipulate and create consumer demand plays which one of the following roles in the argument? |
[
"Anyone who is able to trust other people has a meaningful emotional connection to at least one other human being.",
"To avoid feeling isolated, it is essential to trust other people.",
"No one who is feeling isolated can feel happy.",
"Anyone who has a meaningful emotional connection to another human being can be happy."
] | Therapist: The ability to trust other people is essential to happiness, for without trust there can be no meaningful emotional connection to another human being, and without meaningful emotional connections to others we feel isolated. | 2 | train_645 | Which one of the following, if assumed, allows the conclusion of the therapist's argument to be properly inferred? |
[
"Converting a landfill into a public park will cause no damage to human health unless toxic vapors are produced in that landfill and humans are exposed to them.",
"If vapors toxic to humans are produced by the degradation of household cleaning products by bacteria in any landfill, then the health of at least some humans will suffer.",
"In at least some landfills that have been converted into public parks there are bacteria that degrade household cleaning products.",
"If a practice involves the exposure of humans to vapors from household cleaning products, then it causes at least some damage to human health."
] | Environmentalist: When bacteria degrade household cleaning products, vapors that are toxic to humans are produced. Unfortunately, household cleaning products are often found in landfills. Thus, the common practice of converting landfills into public parks is damaging human health. | 2 | train_646 | Which one of the following is an assumption the environmentalist's argument requires? |
[
"The majority of people who regularly drink coffee experience dental problems in the latter part of their lives. Since there is this correlation between drinking coffee and incurring dental problems, the government should make coffee less accessible to the general public.",
"Studies show that people who do not exercise regularly have a shorter life expectancy than those who exercise regularly. To help increase their patients' life expectancy, doctors should recommend regular exercise to their patients.",
"Studies have shown that cigarette smokers have a greater chance of incurring heart disease than people who do not smoke. Since cigarette smoking increases one's chances of incurring heart disease, people who want to try to avoid heart disease should give up cigarette smoking.",
"Most people who exercise regularly are able to handle stress. This shows that exercising regularly decreases one's chances of being overwhelmed by stress. So people who want to be able to handle stress should regularly engage in exercise."
] | Several carefully conducted studies showed that 75 percent of strict vegetarians reached age 50 without developing serious heart disease. We can conclude from this that avoiding meat increases one' s chances of avoiding serious heart disease. Ttherefore, people who want to reduce the risk of serious heart disease should not eat meat. | 3 | train_647 | The flawed pattern of reasoning exhibited by which one of the following is most similar to that exhibited by the argument above? |
[
"Glass products made from recycled glass are less expensive than comparable products made from quartz sand.",
"Products cannot presently be made out of plastic recycled entirely from the currently lowest commercial grade.",
"It is impossible to make glass products from recycled glass that are equal in quality to the best glass products made from the usual raw material.",
"The difference in quality between different grades of glass is not as great as that between different grades of plastic."
] | When glass products are made from recycled glass, the resulting products can be equal in quality to glass products made from quartz sand, the usual raw material. When plastics are recycled, however, the result is inevitably a plastic of a lower grade than the plastic from which it is derived. Moreover, no applications have been found for grades of plastic that are lower than the currently lowest commercial grade. | 1 | train_648 | Which one of the following is a conclusion that can be properly drawn from the statements above? |
[
"If the Coffee Shoppe's overall profitability decreases, the price it pays for coffee beans will have continued to increase.",
"The price it pays for coffee beans cannot decrease without the Coffee Shoppe's overall profitability also decreasing.",
"The Coffee Shoppe's overall profitability will decrease if the price it pays for coffee beans continues to increase.",
"Either the price it pays for coffee beans will continue to increase or the Coffee Shoppe's coffee sales will increase."
] | If the price it pays for coffee beans continues to increase, the Coffee Shoppe will have to increase its prices. In that case, either the Coffee Shoppe will begin selling noncoffee products or its coffee sales will decrease. But selling noncoffee products will decrease the Coffee Shoppe' s overall profitability. Moreover, the Coffee Shoppe can avoid a decrease in overall profitability only if its coffee sales do not decrease. | 2 | train_649 | Which one of the following statements follows logically from the statements above? |
[
"What stands Mr. Landon and Mr. Dewey took on issues considered most important by registered Democrat voters",
"How many voters in each of these two counties were aware of their respective Congressman's endorsement positions.",
"How these two counties have voted in US Congressional and US Presidential elections over the past decade.",
"How typical it has been throughout the state, in the past decade, for a Congressman to endorse a county supervisor candidate running in his Congressional district."
] | Mountain County and Sunrise County are two comparable counties, with similar numbers of registered voters. Both are in the same region of the state. In both counties, about 60% of the registered voters are registered Republicans, and almost all others are registered Democrats. In 2005, Republican candidate Alf Landon ran for supervisor of Mountain County, and Republican candidate Thomas Dewey ran for supervisor of Sunrise County. Both took similar stands on issues, and both ran against conservative Democratic candidates in the general county-wide election, and none of these four candidates was an incumbent at the time of this election. The Republican Congressman representing Sunrise County endorsed Mr. Dewey, but the Republican Congressman representing Mountain County refrained from endorsing Mr. Landon. Mr. Dewey won his election, but Mr. Landon lost his election. Clearly, the endorsement positions of the respective Congressmen were the deciding factors in these elections. | 1 | train_650 | In evaluating the argument, it would be most useful to know which of the following? |
[
"Low-income residents of Workney will continue to ride the buses in the same numbers despite the fare increase.",
"Buses provide the only means of public transportation in the city of Workney.",
"The proposed fare increase is needed for the purchase of new buses for the city's bus system.",
"The outlay of $10. 00 for the purchase of 9 fare tokens would not be prohibitive for low-income bus riders."
] | The city of Workney, in raising bus fares from $1. 00 to $1. 25, proposed that 18 fare tokens be sold for $20. 00 to alleviate the extra burden of the fare increase on the city' s low-income residents. Critics suggested alternatively that 9 fare tokens be sold for $10. 00, because a $20. 00 outlay would be prohibitive for low-income riders. | 3 | train_651 | The alternative proposal depends on which of the following assumptions? |
[
"Distinctions based on gender are frequently arbitrary.",
"Society rather than the individual decides what is considered proper behavior.",
"The terms \"sex\" and \"gender\" are not properly interchangeable.",
"Gender traits are not determined at birth."
] | The term "sex" and "gender" are often used interchangeably. But "sex" more properly refers to biological differences of male and female, while "gender" refers to society' s construction of a system that identifies what is masculine and feminine. Unlike the set of characteristics defining biological sex, the set of traits that are associated with gender does not sort people into two nonoverlapping groups. The traits characterize people in a complex way, so that a person may have both "masculine" and "feminine" traits. | 2 | train_652 | Which one of the following statements best expresses a main point of the argument? |
[
"dismisses moral considerations on the grounds that only matters of fact are relevant",
"relies on evidence drawn from a sample that there is reason to believe is unrepresentative",
"asserts that the rehabilitation of criminals is not a moral issue",
"allows moral issues to be a consideration in presenting evidence about matters of fact"
] | A controversial program rewards prison inmates who behave particularly well in prison by giving them the chance to receive free cosmetic plastic surgery performed by medical students. The program is obviously morally questionable, both in its assumptions about what inmates might want and in its use of the prison population to train future surgeons. Putting these moral issues aside, however, the surgery clearly has a powerful rehabilitative effect, as is shown by the fact that, among recipients of the surgery, the proportion who are convicted of new crimes committed after release is only half that for the prison population as a whole. | 1 | train_653 | A flaw in the reasoning of the passage is that it |
[
"No one can be morally required to do something that is impossible to do.",
"An action performed with the wrong motivations cannot be morally good.",
"If a person's motivations for acting are based on a sense of duty, then that person's action is morally good.",
"Some actions that are performed with the right motivations are not morally good."
] | Daniel: There are certain actions that moral duty obliges us to perform regardless of their consequences. However, an action is not morally good simply because it fulfills a moral obligation. No action can be morally good unless it is performed with the right motivations. Carrie: Our motivations for our actions are not subject to our conscious control. Ttherefore, the only thing that can be required for an action to be morally good is that it fulfill a moral obligation. | 1 | train_654 | The dialogue most supports the claim that Daniel and Carrie are committed to disagreeing with each other about the truth of which one of the following statements? |
[
"The members of the two groups received their instructions approximately the same amount of time before they were to make their telephone calls.",
"The same group of researchers answered the calls made by the callers in both study groups.",
"Both groups had unrestricted access to telephones for making the required calls.",
"There was the same number of people in each group."
] | In a recent study, each member of two groups of people, Group A (composed of persons sixty-five to seventy-five years old) and Group B (composed of college students), was required to make a telephone call to a certain number at a specified time. The time when each call was initiated was recorded electronically. Group A proved far better at remembering to make a telephone call precisely at a specified time than did Group B. There were fourteen lapses in Group B but only one lapse in Group A. Clearly, at least one type of memory does not suffer as a person ages. | 1 | train_655 | Which one of the following, if all of them are true, is LEAST helpful in establishing that the conclusion above is properly drawn? |
[
"More otherwise fit people are injured by participating in rigorous jogging and weight-lifting programs than are injured by participating in moderate jogging and weight-lifting programs.",
"Moderate fitness programs increase the average person's fitness to the same extent that rigorous fitness programs do.",
"The likelihood of incurring medical expenses is slightly greater for people who participate in fitness programs offered by their employers than it is for people who participate in programs offered commercially.",
"The medical expenses incurred by fit people who participate in a program of jogging and weight lifting are less than those incurred by fit people who do not participate in such a program."
] | Personnel officer: The exorbitant cost of our health-insurance benefits reflects the high dollar amount of medical expenses incurred by our employees. Employees who are out of shape, as a group, have higher doctor bills and longer hospital stays than do their colleagues who are fit. Ttherefore, since we must reduce our health-insurance costs, we should offer a rigorous fitness program of jogging and weight lifting to all employees, and require employees who are out of shape to participate. | 3 | train_656 | Which of the following, if true, provides the most support for the personnel officer's proposal? |
[
"The new law does not rule out that doctors may charge patients for extra expenses incurred specifically in order to comply with the new law.",
"The new law will require that doctors, when seeing a patient in their office, must be ready to produce the patient's records immediately, not just ready to retrieve them.",
"Some doctors have all along had a policy of allowing their patients access to their medical records, but those doctors' patients took no advantage of this policy.",
"The task of retrieving and returning files would fall to the lowest-paid member of a doctor's office staff."
] | "Though they soon will, patients should not have a legal right to see their medical records. As a doctor, I see two reasons for this. First, giving them access will be time-wasting because it will significantly reduce the amount of time that medical staff can spend on more important duties, by forcing them to retrieve and return files. Second, if my experience is anything to go by, no patients are going to ask for access to their records anyway. " | 1 | train_657 | Which one of the following, if true, establishes that the doctor's second reason does not cancel out the first? |
[
"Box jellyfish developed from jellyfish whose retinas received clear images.",
"Box jellyfish have a need to detect prominent features of objects but not fine details.",
"Box jellyfish would benefit from having retinas that allowed their eyes to focus more sharply.",
"Box jellyfish use vision as their main means of detecting prey."
] | Biologist: Marine animals known as box jellyfish have eyes with well-formed lenses capable of producing sharp images that reveal fine detail. But the box jellyfish' s retinas are too far forward to receive a clear image, so these jellyfish can receive only a blurry image that reveals prominent features of objects but not fine detail. This example shows that eyes are adapted only to an animal' s needs rather than to some abstract sense of how a good eye would be designed. | 1 | train_658 | The argument requires assuming which one of the following? |
[
"There is less danger that a transplanted organ will be rejected when the organ donor is a, close relative of the recipient.",
"In removing the portion of liver for transplant there is danger of causing damage to the spleen of the donor, and that could necessitate the removal of the spleen.",
"Each lobe of the liver functions separately, and it is possible to extract a portion of one lobe without disrupting critical liver functions.",
"There are so few suitable donors that about one-half of the babies with liver disease born in the United States each year die before they can receive a liver transplant."
] | Unlike the lungs and the kidneys, the liver is an organ well suited for living-donor transplants to children because the portion of the liver which must be removed from a healthy adult to replace the diseased liver of a child will be regenerated in the healthy adult within a few months. | 2 | train_659 | Which of the following, if true, provides the most additional support for the conclusion drawn above? |
[
"unless medical research findings are brought to peer review by a medical journal, peer review will not occur",
"the general public does not have access to the medical journals in which research findings are published",
"all medical research findings are subjected to prepublication peer review",
"anyone who does not serve on a medical review panel does not have the necessary knowledge and expertise to evaluate medical research findings"
] | Medical research findings are customarily not made public prior to their publication in a medical journal that has had them reviewed by a panel of experts in a process called peer review. It is claimed that this practice delays public access to potentially beneficial information that, in extreme instances, could save lives. Yet prepublication peer review is the only way to prevent erroneous and ttherefore potentially harmful information from reaching a public that is ill equipped to evaluate medical claims on its own. Ttherefore, waiting until a medical journal has published the research findings that have passed peer review is the price that must be paid to protect the public from making decisions based on possibly substandard research. | 0 | train_660 | The argument assumes that |
[
"It is possible that fire was used much earlier than 500, 000 years ago",
"The use of fire might have originated independently in several different parts of the world",
"It is impossible to determine whether a charred deposit dating from so long ago resulted from a fire caused by lightening or from the purposeful use of fire",
"Animal bones could have been discarded in a fire used for purposes such as protection or heat rather than for cooking"
] | People widely believed that the controlled use of fire originated 200, 000 years ago with the human species Homo sapiens. However, a site containing a deposit, estimated to be nearly 500, 000 years old, consisting of charcoal, burned animal bones, and charred rocks, has recently been found. Although homo sapiens did not exist at that time, this discovery provides no basis to the claim that the controlled use of fire preceded the Homo sapiens, since __. | 2 | train_661 | Which of the following most logically completes the passage? |
[
"Most of the zander removed were fully grown, and fully grown zander eat large numbers of smaller zander.",
"Every year a large number of zander are caught by sportfisher in Britain's waterway.",
"Previous government program designed to remove nonnative species from Britain's waterways have failed.",
"The climate in Britain is very similar to the climate in regions to which zander are native."
] | Sportfishers introduced the Zander, a type of perch, to Britain' s rivers and canals in the 1970s. Because zander eat large numbers of smaller fish, they have had a devastating effect on native fish populations. To protect the native fish, a government program removed a significant proportion of the zander from Britain' s waterways last year. Surprisingly, this year the loss of native fish to zander has been greater than before. | 0 | train_662 | Which of the following, if true, would most help to explain the greater effect of zander on the native fish population? |
[
"Abstract paintings often include shapes or forms that are suggestive of real objects or emotions.",
"The general public is unable to understand the theories on which abstract painting is based.",
"The artistic preferences of the art-viewing public stimulated the revival.",
"The art-viewing public wished to see traditional subjects treated in a nontraditional manner."
] | There is no mystery as to why figurative painting revived in the late 1970s. People want to look at recognizable images. Sorting out art theories reflected in abstract paintings is no substitute for the sense of empathy that comes from looking at a realistic painting of a figure in a landscape. Perhaps members of the art-viewing public resented abstract art because they felt that its lack of realistic subject matter was a rejection of the viewers and their world. | 2 | train_663 | Which one of the following most accurately expresses the main point of the passage? |
[
"In deciding the best way to proceed, a climber familiar with a mountain might do well to ignore the advice of mountain climbing experts unfamiliar with that mountain.",
"Although music theory is intrinsically interesting and may be helpful to certain musicians, it does not distinguish good music from bad:that is a matter of taste and not of theory.",
"A typical farmer is less likely to know what types of soil are most productive than is someone with an advanced degree in agricultural science.",
"Unlike society, one's own conscience speaks with a single voice; it is better to follow the advice of one's own conscience than the advice of society."
] | Parents should not necessarily raise their children in the ways experts recommend, even if some of those experts are themselves parents. After all, parents are the ones who directly experience which methods are successful in raising their own children. | 0 | train_664 | Which one of the following most closely conforms to the principle that the passage above illustrates? |
[
"appealing to an aesthetic principle to defend the tastes that people have",
"appealing to a historical fact to support a claim about people's artistic preferences",
"explaining a historical fact in terms of the artistic preferences of people",
"considering historical context to defend the artistic preferences of people"
] | People may praise the talent of a painter capable of realistically portraying a scene and dismiss as artistically worthless the efforts of abstract expressionists, but obviously an exact replica of the scene depicted is not the only thing people appreciate in a painting, for otherwise photography would have entirely displaced painting as an art form. | 1 | train_665 | The argument proceeds by |
[
"Most flints used by our cave-dwelling ancestors were not highly polished.",
"The caves in which the highly polished flints were found are unadorned by cave paintings.",
"Flints were often used by early humans for everyday chores other than hunting.",
"Any benefits that an aesthetic sense would have given to cave-dwelling humans are poorly understood."
] | There is evidence to suggest that our cave-dwelling ancestors polished many of their flints to a degree far surpassing what was necessary for hunting purposes. It seems, ttherefore, that early humans possessed an aesthetic sense. | 2 | train_666 | Which one of the following statements, if true, most seriously weakens the argument? |
[
"Comets but not asteroids release large amounts of water vapor into the upper atmosphere when they collide with Earth.",
"The fact that noctilucent clouds are made of ice particles in the upper atmosphere was only recently discovered.",
"Comets collide with Earth more frequently than asteroids do.",
"Noctilucent clouds are visible for many consecutive nights following the release of water vapor into the upper atmosphere."
] | On the nights immediately following the mysterious Tunguska event, which destroyed a tract of Siberian wilderness in 1908, eyewitnesses reported seeing noctilucent clouds -- brilliant night-visible clouds made up of ice particles that form rarely and only at very high altitudes. Recently, noctilucent clouds have been observed on the nights following launches of rockets that release large amounts of water vapor into the upper atmosphere. This shows that it was a comet impact and not the impact of an asteroid that caused the destruction in Siberia. | 0 | train_667 | The argument depends on assuming which one of the following? |
[
"When more than one anti-virus program is installed on a machine, the programs can become less effective.",
"SmartTech has lost approximately 25 percent of its clients as a result of its computers' vulnerability to viruses, though it regained a third of these with its recovery efforts.",
"Many consumers have found that it is more difficult to use a computer with three anti-virus programs than with one.",
"Corporations that are already vulnerable to hackers often use SmartTech's computers but have stopped doing so since the increased viruses."
] | Despite the anti-virus protection program installed on its computers, SmartTech has received many complaints from consumers that their computers had become infected with viruses. In order to reduce the number of its computers vulnerable to viruses, the CEO of SmartTech Corp. has had the company' s engineers install three different virus-blocking programs on each computer before shipping them to consumers. Nevertheless, customer reports of computer viruses have risen since the institution of this initiative. | 0 | train_668 | Which of the following, if true, most helps to explain why acting on the CEO's plan failed to achieve her goal? |
[
"treats a sufficient condition for the airport's being built as a necessary condition",
"overlooks the possibility that a new airport could benefit the local economy",
"fails to consider whether people living near Dalton would favor building the airport",
"concludes, on the basis that a certain event is unlikely to occur, that the event will not occur"
] | A development company has proposed building an airport near the city of Dalton. If the majority of Dalton' s residents favor the proposal, the airport will be built. However, it is unlikely that a majority of Dalton' s residents would favor the proposal, for most of them believe that the airport would create noise problems. Thus, it is unlikely that the airport will be built. | 0 | train_669 | The reasoning in the argument is flawed in that the argument |
[
"there were any volcanic eruptions near China around the time of Mount Etna's eruption",
"modern monitoring equipment can detect the precise path of volcanic ash in the atmosphere",
"the abnormal weather in China lasted for a full year or longer",
"subsequent eruptions of Mount Etna were as powerful as the one in 44 B. C."
] | Very powerful volcanic eruptions send large amounts of ash high into the atmosphere, blocking sunlight and causing abnormally cold temperatures for a year or more after the eruption. In 44 B. C. there was a powerful eruption of Mount Etna in Sicily. In the following year, Chinese historians recorded summer frosts and dimmed sunlight in China, thousands of miles east of Sicily. If these phenomena were caused by volcanic ash in the atmosphere, then the ash sent into the atmosphere by Mount Etna' s eruption must have spread over great distances. | 0 | train_670 | In evaluating the support given for the conclusion advanced in the last sentence of the passage, it would be most important to determine whether |
[
"offering an alternative explanation of the variation in the occurrence of psychological problems across seasons",
"demonstrating that fewer people actually suffer from seasonal affective disorder than psychologists had previously thought",
"questioning the representativeness of the population sample surveyed by the psychologists",
"questioning an assumption that the author attributes to the psychologists"
] | Psychologists have claimed that many people are more susceptible to psychological problems in the winter than in the summer; the psychologists call this condition seasonal affective disorder. Their claim is based on the results of surveys in which people were asked to recall how they felt at various times in the past. However, it is not clear that people are able to report accurately on their past psychological states. Ttherefore, these survey results do not justify the psychologists' claim that there is any such condition as seasonal affective disorder. | 3 | train_671 | The author criticizes the psychologists' claim by |
[
"If a word that is a preposition or conjunction should be capitalized, then it is the first or last word of the title.",
"Prepositions and conjunctions with five or more letters should be capitalized in any text.",
"If a word in the middle of a title should be capitalized, then that word is neither an article nor a conjunction shorter than five letters.",
"If a word is neither a main word nor a first or last word of a title, then it should not be capitalized."
] | One should always capitalize the main words and the first and last words of a title. But one should never capitalize articles, or prepositions and conjunctions with fewer than five letters, when they occur in the middle of a title. | 2 | train_672 | Which one of the following can be properly inferred from the statements above? |
[
"A hypothesis can be true even when it is not supported by available data.",
"If two assertions are known to be incompatible with each other and if one assertion is known to be false, it cannot be deduced from known facts that the other assertion is true.",
"Even if history suggests that an event was caused by a certain set of circumstances, it would be a mistake to assume that the event will only reoccur under the same set of circumstance as it occurred under before.",
"A conjecture is undermined when certain events do not occur that would be expected to occur if the conjecture were true."
] | There is speculation that the mayor will hire a new staff member this week. But before every prior hiring of a new staff member, the mayor has met with the city' s budget director and finance advisor. No meetings between the mayor and the city' s budget director and finance advisor have occurred or are planned. Ttherefore, the speculation is more than likely baseless. | 3 | train_673 | Which one of the following most accurately expresses a principle of reasoning employed by the argument in the paragraph above? |
[
"The Magno-Blanket is likely to be effective on cats and other pets as well if it is effective at reducing joint pain in arthritic dogs.",
"The patients in the hospital study suffering from severe joint pain who, after being treated with magnets, did not report reduced pain tended not to be those suffering from the most severe pain.",
"Most of the patients in the hospital study suffering from severe joint pain who received a placebo rather than treatment with magnets did not report reduced pain.",
"Magnets have been shown to be capable of intensifying the transmission of messages from people's nerve cells to their brains."
] | The Magno-Blanket is probably able to relieve arthritic pain in older dogs. A hospital study of people suffering from severe joint pain found that 76 percent of those who were treated with magnets reported reduced pain after just 3 weeks. Dogs and humans have similar physiologies and the Magno-Blanket brings magnets into the same proximity to the dog' s joints as they were to patients' joints in the hospital study. | 2 | train_674 | Which one of the following, if true, most strengthens the argument? |
[
"A person who is infected with malaria can infect a mosquito that is not carrying malaria, if that mosquito bites such a person.",
"Malaria is still endemic in many parts of the world, and many health workers believe that the global eradication of malaria is not possible.",
"Some people in areas where malaria is rife have developed an immunity to mosquitos, yet they also show a higher incidence of genetic disorders such as sickle-cell anemia.",
"Unless a mosquito bites an infected person, and then bites a non-infected person, malaria cannot be passed directly from human to human."
] | Epidemiologist: Malaria passes into the human population when a mosquito carrying the malaria protozoa bites a human who has no immunity. The malaria parasite can remain for up to forty days in the blood of an infected person. The disease cannot be passed from person to person, unless a non-infected person is exposed to the blood of an infected person. Theoretically, malaria could be eradicated in any given area, if all the mosquitoes carrying malaria in that area are exterminated. If such a course of action is carried out at a worldwide level, then the global eradication of malaria is possible. | 0 | train_675 | Which of the following, if true, suggests that the epidemiologist's plan for eliminating malaria is not viable? |
[
"Literature professors do not belong to the reading public.",
"John's literature professor can judge the greatness of works of literature accurately.",
"The vast majority of the reading public is unable to judge the greatness of works of literature accurately.",
"Anyone who is not a literature professor cannot judge the greatness of works of literature accurately."
] | John' s literature professor believes that the ability to judge the greatness of literary works accurately can be acquired only after years of specialized training. Such training is, in fact, what is required to become a literature professor. She is also well aware that the vast majority of the reading public does not have access to this specialized training. | 2 | train_676 | Which one of the following statements must be true if what John's literature professor believes is true? |
[
"The argument presumes, without giving justification, that all behavior can be explained in one or both of only two ways.",
"The argument incorrectly appeals to the authority of science in order to support its conclusion.",
"The argument fails to consider the possibility that walking on hind legs is the result of both learning and an innate capacity.",
"The word \"behavior\" illicitly changes meaning during the course of the argument."
] | Given the shape of the hip and foot bones of the Kodiak bear, it has been determined that standing and walking upright is completely natural behavior for these bears. Thus, walking on hind legs is instinctive and not a learned behavior of the Kodiak. | 2 | train_677 | To which one of the following criticisms is the argument most vulnerable? |
[
"tries to show that a set of principles is limited in a specific way by using an analogy to a similar principle that is limited in a similar way",
"presents numerous experimental results as evidence for a general principle",
"applies an empirical generalization to reach a conclusion about a particular case",
"attempts to demonstrate that an explanation of a phenomenon is flawed by showing that it fails to explain a particular instance of that phenomenon"
] | When a nation is on the brink of financial crisis, its government does not violate free-market principles if, in order to prevent economic collapse, it limits the extent to which foreign investors and lenders can withdraw their money. After all, the right to free speech does not include the right to shout "Fire! " in a crowded theatre, and the harm done as investors and lenders rush madly to get their money out before everyone else does can be just as real as the harm resulting from a stampede in a theatre. | 0 | train_678 | The argument does which one of the following? |
[
"Many other animal species from the era of the dinosaurs did not become extinct at the same time the dinosaurs did.",
"It cannot be determined from a study of dinosaur skeletons whether the animals died from the effects of a dust cloud.",
"The consequences for vegetation and animals of a comet colliding with Earth are not fully understood.",
"Various species of animals from the same era as the dinosaurs and similar to them in physiology and habitat did not become extinct when the dinosaurs did."
] | A plausible explanation of the disappearance of the dinosaurs is what is known as the comet theory. A large enough comet colliding with Earth could have caused a cloud of dust that enshrouded the planet and cooled the climate long enough to result in the dinosaurs' demise. | 3 | train_679 | Which one of the following statements, if true, most seriously weakens the argument? |
[
"equates a reduction in the rate at which the magazine's circulation is increasing with a decline in the magazine's circulation",
"treats an occurrence that will ensure a certain outcome as something that is required for that outcome",
"identifies some changes required for the magazine's circulation to continue its rapid increase and concludes from this that no other changes are needed",
"draws a conclusion that simply restates a claim that is presented in support of that conclusion"
] | If the magazine' s circulation continues to rise as it has over the last ten years, in another ten years it will be the largest-selling martial arts magazine in the world. Unfortunately, it has now become clear that the magazine' s publisher will not allow the managing editor to make the changes she has proposed, and without these changes, the magazine' s circulation will not rise as quickly over the next ten years as it has over the last ten. So the magazine will not be the largest-selling martial arts magazine ten years from now. | 1 | train_680 | The argument's reasoning is flawed because the argument |
[
"A member of the advisory council who is doing a bad job is just as likely to be familiar to the public as a member of the advisory council who is doing a good job.",
"Only council members are qualified to judge the quality of the advisory council's work.",
"The public's familiarity with the composition of the advisory council is an indication of the effectiveness of the advisory council's work.",
"The members of the advisory council were selected because each of them was already well known to the citizenry."
] | During a press conference, Council Member Johns stated that the advisory council appointed by Mayor Smith has been one of the least effective in recent history. When asked to support that claim, Johns pointed out that most citizens could not name any member of the advisory council. | 2 | train_681 | The rationale given by Council Member Johns depends on the assumption that |
[
"Without the implementation of the planned incentives, most Torinians who own an old car would be unlikely to buy a new car.",
"The manufacture and the scrapping of cars each generate significant amounts of air pollutants.",
"The largest source of atmospheric pollutants in Torinia is not automobile emissions, but emissions from power plants.",
"Torinia's automobile plant manufactures car models that typically generate smaller amounts of air pollutants than most similarly sized car models manufactured elsewhere."
] | Automobile emissions are a significant source of air pollutants, and cars over five years old typically generate significantly greater amounts of pollutants than newer cars. In Torinia, which has recently built its first automobile manufacturing plant, most cars are over five years old. Aiming to boost Torinia' s economy and reduce air pollution, the government plans to introduce incentives for Torinians to scrap their old cars every five years and replace them with new ones. | 1 | train_682 | Which of the following, if true, most seriously undermines the likelihood that the planned incentives, if implemented, will achieve both of the cited aims? |
[
"All of the country 's leaders have bootstrapped their way to the top.",
"Certain classes of people rely on social welfare programs to meet their basic needs.",
"Certain classes of people would be irreparably harmed if the country failed to provide a social welfare program.",
"Spending on social welfare programs increases the national debt."
] | Conservative Politician: Social welfare programs are destroying our country. These programs are not only adding to the annual deficit, which increases the national debt, but they also discourage hard work. Our country must continue producing leaders who bootstrap their way to the top. None of our country' s citizens truly need assistance from the government; rather, the assistance just makes things easier. Liberal Politician: Our great country is founded on the principle of hope. The country is built on the backs of immigrants who came here with nothing, except for the hope of a better life. Our country is too wealthy not to provide basic necessities for the less fortunate. Recent immigrants, single mothers, historically disenfranchised, disabled persons, and the elderly all require an ample safety net. | 2 | train_683 | What is the main point of dispute between the politicians? |
[
"there is more than one valid explanation for the dance of the honeybees",
"the honeybee is the only species of bee that is capable of communicating navigational information to other hive members",
"honeybees communicate the location of food sources through their dance",
"theories of animal behavior can be established on the basis of evidence about only one species of animal"
] | Henry: Some scientists explain the dance of honeybees as the means by which honeybees communicate the location of whatever food source they have just visited to other members of the hive. But honeybees do not need so complicated a mechanism to communicate that information. Forager honeybees returning to their hive simply leave a scent trail from the food source they have just visited. There must ttherefore be some other explanation for the honeybees' dance. Winifred: Not necessarily. Most animals have several ways of accomplishing critical tasks. Bees of some species can navigate using either the position of the Sun or the memory of landmarks. Similarly, for honeybees, scent trails are a supplementary not an exclusive means of communicating. | 2 | train_684 | The point at issue between Henry and Winifred is whether |
[
"When grizzly bears forage for iceberg lilies, they generally kill many more lilies than they eat.",
"The geographic regions in which iceberg lilies are most prevalent are those regions populated by grizzly bears.",
"Iceberg lilies contain plentiful amounts of some nutrients that are necessary for grizzly bears' survival.",
"Iceberg lilies produce so many offspring that, when undisturbed, they quickly deplete the resources necessary for their own survival."
] | In some places, iceberg lilies are the mainstay of grizzly bears' summer diets. The bears forage meadows for the lilies, uprooting them and eating their bulbs. Although the bears annually destroy a large percentage of the lilies, scientists have determined that the bears' feeding habits actually promote the survival of iceberg lilies. | 3 | train_685 | Which one of the following, if true, most helps to resolve the apparent discrepancy in the statements above? |
[
"A phaseout of use of antibiotics for hogs in one country reduced usage by over 50 percent over five years.",
"Other major pork marketers will probably stop buying pork raised on feed containing growth-promoting antibiotics if Smee no longer buys such pork.",
"Authorities are promoting the use of antibiotics to which microorganisms have not yet developed resistance.",
"The decline in hog growth due to discontinuation of antibiotics can be offset by improved hygiene."
] | The use of growth-promoting antibiotics in hog farming can weaken their effectiveness in treating humans because such use can spread resistance to those antibiotics among microorganisms. But now the Smee Company, one of the largest pork marketers, may stop buying pork raised on feed containing these antibiotics. Smee has 60 percent of the pork market, and farmers who sell to Smee would certainly stop using antibiotics in order to avoid jeopardizing their sales. So if Smee makes this change, it will probably significantly slow the decline in antibiotics' effectiveness for humans. | 1 | train_686 | Which of the following, if true, would most strengthen the argument above? |
[
"Before he became a detective, Carl was a neighborhood police officer and was highly respected by the residents of the neighborhood he patrolled.",
"Because the police chief regards Carl as the most capable detective, she assigns him only the most difficult cases, ones that others have failed to solve.",
"Carl was previously a detective in a police department in another city, and in the 4 years he spent there, he solved only 1 out of 30 crimes.",
"Many of the officers in the police department in which Carl serves were hired or promoted within the last 5 years."
] | Carl is clearly an incompetent detective. He has solved a smaller percentage of the cases assigned to him in the last 3 years -- only 1 out of 25 -- than any other detective on the police force. | 1 | train_687 | Which one of the following, if true, most seriously weakens the argument above? |
[
"Every reasonably well-educated person who is not an artist has more insight into political issues than any artist.",
"Politicians rarely have any artistic talent.",
"Some artists are no less politically insightful than some reasonably well-educated persons who are not artists.",
"A thorough education in art makes a person reasonably well educated."
] | There is little point in looking to artists for insights into political issues. Most of them hold political views that are less insightful than those of any reasonably well-educated person who is not an artist. Indeed, when taken as a whole, the statements made by artists, including those considered to be great, indicate that artistic talent and political insight are rarely found together. | 2 | train_688 | Which one of the following can be inferred from the passage? |
[
"Once an artist has produced works of true artistic excellence, he or she will never accept government funding.",
"Most taxpayers have little or no interest in the creation of works of true artistic excellence.",
"A contemporary work of art that does not reflect the independent artistic conscience of the artist cannot be a work of true artistic excellence.",
"Distribution of government funds for the arts is based on a broad agreement as to what constitutes artistic excellence."
] | The stated goal of the government' s funding program for the arts is to encourage the creation of works of artistic excellence. Senator Beton claims, however, that a government-funded artwork can never reflect the independent artistic conscience of the artist because artists, like anyone else who accepts financial support, will inevitably try to please those who control the distribution of that support. Senator Beton concludes that government funding of the arts not only is a burden on taxpayers but also cannot lead to the creation of works of true artistic excellence. | 2 | train_689 | Which one of the following is an assumption on which Senator Beton's argument is based? |
[
"People who have undergone throat surgery are no more likely to snore than people who have not undergone throat surgery.",
"The abnormalities in the throat muscles discovered in the study do not cause snoring.",
"The patients' throat surgery was not undertaken to treat abnormalities in their throat muscles.",
"The study relied on the subjects' self-reporting to determine whether or not they snored frequently."
] | Tissue biopsies taken on patients who have undergone throat surgery show that those who snored frequently were significantly more likely to have serious abnormalities in their throat muscles than those who snored rarely or not at all. This shows that snoring can damage the throat of the snorer. | 1 | train_690 | Which one of the following, if true, most strengthens the argument? |
[
"Some of the drugs that had been used to treat the symptoms of heart disease had a side effect of weakening the immune system.",
"Those in the study who survived into the 1980s had, in 1976, strengthened their immune systems through drug therapy.",
"Most of those in the study who survived beyond the two-year period had recovered from a serious infection sometime prior to 1978.",
"There were twice as many infections among those in the study with the weakest immune systems as among those with the strongest immune systems."
] | A two-year study beginning in 1977 found that, among 85-year-old people, those whose immune systems were weakest were twice as likely to die within two years as others in the study. The cause of their deaths, however, was more often heart disease, against which the immune system does not protect, than cancer or infections, which are attacked by the immune system. | 0 | train_691 | Which of the following, if true, would offer the best prospects for explaining deaths in which weakness of the immune system, though present, played no causal role? |
[
"All human adaptations to past environments were based on the human brain and its associated mental capacities.",
"Judgments that depend on individual preference or taste cannot be evaluated as true or false.",
"If something develops to serve a given function, the standard by which it must be judged is how well it serves that function.",
"Human capacities that do not contribute to the biological success of the human species cannot be evaluated."
] | The human brain and its associated mental capacities evolved to assist self-preservation. Thus, the capacity of make aesthetic judgments is an adaptation to past environments in which humans lived. So an individual' s aesthetic judgments must be evaluated in terms of the extent to which they promote the survival of that individual. | 2 | train_692 | Which one of the following is a principle that would, if valid, provide the strongest justification for the reasoning above? |
[
"The developers of a new technology are generally no better positioned than its potential buyers to gauge how rapidly the new technology can be efficiently mass-produced.",
"The potential buyers for not-yet-available technologies can seldom be reliably identified.",
"People who promote the virtues of a new technology typically fail to consider that the old technology that is currently in use continues to be improved, often substantially.",
"Investors are unlikely to invest substantial amounts of capital in a company whose own managers are skeptical about the commercial prospects of a new technology they are developing."
] | When trying to identify new technologies that promise to transform the marketplace, market researchers survey the managers of those companies that are developing new technologies. Such managers have an enormous stake in succeeding, so they invariably overstate the potential of their new technologies. Surprisingly, however, market researchers typically do not survey a new technology' s potential buyers, even though it is the buyers-not the producers-who will ultimately determine a technology' s commercial success. | 1 | train_693 | Which of the following, if true, best accounts for the typical survey practices among market researchers? |
[
"The main reason people have for attending a university is to prepare themselves for a career.",
"A primary goal of any university is to serve the educational needs of its community.",
"In a typical community, the primary educational need is to prepare community residents for careers.",
"Most universities adequately serve the educational needs of the communities in which they are located."
] | James: Community colleges, by their very nature, work to meet the educational needs of the communities they are in. The same is not true of universities, whose primary goals differ from those of community colleges. Margaret: A primary goal of any university is to serve the needs of the community where it is located. The main reason people have for attending a university is the same as that for attending a community college: preparing oneself for a career. | 1 | train_694 | James's and Margaret's statements provide the most support for the claim that they disagree over the truth of which one of the following? |
[
"Disagreement among cultural anthropological theorists does not necessarily imply that their approaches are incompatible.",
"Cultural anthropological theorists who focus on issues of meaning overlook the humanity of their individual subjects.",
"Cultural anthropologists too often rely on a conception of human needs that excludes the notion of community.",
"Systems of behavior can be understood only by experiencing the environments to which they respond."
] | Cultural anthropological theory tends to fall into two camps. One focuses on everyday social behavior as a system that has developed in response to human needs in a given environment. The other rejects this approach, focusing on the systems of meanings by which thoughts, rituals, and mythology in a society are structured. Cultural anthropologists, however, should employ both approaches, and also attend to a third, often neglected dimension: the view of a community as a set of individuals whose actions constitute the actual stuff of everyday life. | 0 | train_695 | Which one of the following statements is most strongly supported by the information above? |
[
"Good drivers tend to take more long trips than bad drivers.",
"The longer a car trip is, the more likely a passenger is to help the driver maintain alertness.",
"Most drivers take far more short trips than long trips.",
"On a long trip the likelihood of an accident does not increase with each additional passenger."
] | On a short trip a driver is more likely to have an accident if there is a passenger in the car, presumably because passengers distract drivers. However, on a long trip a driver is more likely to have an accident if the driver is alone. | 1 | train_696 | Which one of the following, if true, most helps to explain the facts described above? |
[
"Most air-conditioning in the region is used to cool businesses and factories.",
"Most air-conditioning systems could be made more energy efficient by implementing simple design modifications.",
"The heat wave is expected to abate in the near future.",
"Air-conditioning is not the only significant drain on the electrical system in the area."
] | Energy analyst: During this record-breaking heat wave, air conditioner use has overloaded the region' s electrical power grid, resulting in frequent power blackouts throughout the region. For this reason, residents have been asked to cut back voluntarily on air conditioner use in their homes. But even if this request is heeded, blackouts will probably occur unless the heat wave abates. | 0 | train_697 | Which one of the following, if true, most helps to resolve the apparent discrepancy in the information above? |
[
"The current level of unemployment is not moderate.",
"The fact that 90% of the people know someone who is unemployed is not an indication that unemployment is abnormally high.",
"It is unlikely that the people whose statements Roland cites are giving accurate reports.",
"If an unemployment figure is given as a certain percent, the actual percentage of those without jobs is even higher."
] | Roland: The alarming fact is that 90 percent of the people in this country now report that they know someone who is unemployed. Sharon: But a normal, moderate level of unemployment is 5 percent, with 1 out of 20 workers unemployed. So at any given time if a person knows approximately 50 workers, one or more will very likely be unemployed. | 1 | train_698 | Sharon's argument is structured to lead to which of the following as a conclusion? |
[
"overtime work, which is paid at a substantially higher rate than work done during the regular work week, is rare at both Yorco and Zortech",
"the proportion of all company employees who are hourly wage workers is significantly greater at Yorco than it is at Zortech",
"the work performed by hourly wage workers at Zortech does not require a significantly higher level of skill than the work performed by hourly wage workers at Yorco does",
"Zortech spends a higher total sum per year than Yorco does to provide its hourly wage workers with benefits other than wages"
] | Yorco and Zortech are two corporations that employ large numbers of full-time workers who are paid by the hour. Publicly available records indicate that Yorco employs roughly the same number of such hourly wage workers as Zortech does but spends a far higher total sum per year on wages for such workers. Ttherefore, hourly wages must be higher, on average, at Yorco than at Zortech, since __. | 0 | train_699 | Which of the following most logically completes the argument? |