gre 阅读错题整理1

Passage 112

Whereas Carlos Bulosan aimed through fiction and personal testimony to advance both Filipino civil rights in the United States and the social transformation of the Philippines, Yen Le Espiritu has set herself the task of recovering life histories of Filipino Americans. Her work brings Filipino Americans of the generation following the 1934-1965 immigration hiatus graphically to life. A special strength is the representation of Filipino American women, who were scarce among immigrants before the 1934 American curb on Filipino immigration but composed more than half of the immigrants to America since liberalization in 1965. Espiritu’s subjects document their changing sense of Filipino identity in the United States, much as Bulosan did as a member of the first substantial wave of immigrants.

Passage 114

Many scholars have argued that government investment in manufacturing in the southern United States during the Second World War spurred a regional economic boom that lasted into the postwar period. But much of this investment went to specialized plants, many of them unsuitable for postwar production. Large-scale, wartime government funding led to a massive increase in the number and scale of munitions facilities. By the war’s end, 216 munitions establishment costing more than $3.5 billion had been built, many of them located in the south. Indeed, according to one estimate, more than 70 percent of federally financed manufacturing construction capital in Alabama, Arkansas, Mississippi, and Tennessee went into munitions plants.

1. The primary purpose of the passage is to

A. propose an alternative explanation

B. challenge a widely held position

C. contrast two views of a phenomenon

D. explain why a particular claim has been influential

E. evaluate evidence used to support a particular view

You need to offer the meaning of “challenge”

3. In the passage, the mention of “Alabama, Arkansas, Mississippi, and Tennessee” serves primarily to

A. suggest that some states were better than others at anticipating postwar economic needs

B. identify evidence used to support a view held by scholars mentioned at the beginning of the passage

C. suggest that federal investment in some kinds of manufacturing was excessive

D. identify the states that received the largest allocations of federal funds

E. provide information to support a point about the nature of government investment made earlier in the paragraph (south)

We use example to prove the previous sentences.

Dispute

Argue … but

Many scholars have argued that government investment in manufacturing in the southern United States during the Second World War spurred a regional economic boom that lasted into the postwar period. But much of this investment went to specialized plants, many of them unsuitable for postwar production. Large-scale, wartime government funding led to a massive increase in the number and scale of munitions facilities. By the war’s end, 216 munitions establishment costing more than $3.5 billion had been built, many of them located in the south. Indeed (further)(detail in order to prove), according to one estimate, more than 70 percent of federally financed manufacturing construction capital in Alabama, Arkansas, Mississippi, and Tennessee went into munitions plants.

Even in the northern regions with strong prewar manufacturing economics, these plants were difficult to deal with once the imperative of war had been removed. In the south few industrialists had the capacity or desire to transform these factories to a peacetime function. Accordingly, at war’s end almost all of the southern munitions facilities were shut down, placed on standby, operated at a very low capacity, or converted to nonmanufacturing functions, usually storage. Although some reopened a few years later for use during the Korean War, the impact of the special plants on the South’s postwar economy was marginal at best. (evidence)

Passage 115

Although the passenger pigeons, now extinct, were abundant in eighteenth- and nineteenth century America, archaeological studies at twelfth-century Cahokian sites in the present day United States examined household food trash and found that traces of passenger pigeon were quite rare. Given that the sites were close to a huge passenger pigeon roost documented by John James Audubon in the nineteenth century and that Cahokians consumed almost every other animal protein source available, the archaeologists conducting the studies concluded the passenger pigeon population had once been very limited before increasing dramatically in post-Columbian America. Other archaeologists have criticized those conclusions on the grounds that passenger pigeon bones would not be likely to be preserved. But all the archaeological projects found plenty of bird bones and even tiny bones from fish.

Passage 117

Many researchers attribute the large number of physiological and behavioral similarities between birds and mammals, which have separate evolutionary histories, to endothermy (a thermoregulatory strategy whereby warm body temperature is maintained through internal heat sources). However, Farmer argues that parental care rather than endothermy is the key to understanding the similarities between mammals and birds. According to Farmer (evidence, detail), while (granted) endothermy provides an explanation for a few similarities, such as the presence of body insulation, endothermy is just one characteristic among many related to parental care. The two purported advantages (granted) of endothermy that have been most frequently cited by researchers are an expanded range of inhabitable environments and the ability to sustain vigorous exercise. But (disputes the “granted”) metabolism has to increase substantially (at great energy cost) therefore conferring any significant thermoregulatory advantage in terms of the former, and there is no causal biological linkage to explain why endothermy would be essential to sustain exercise. Farmer argues instead that endothermy evolved as a means to control incubation temperature and that the ability to sustain exercise evolved separately, as a means to improve a parent’s ability to forage and provision its young.

(prove the second point)

Many researchers (tend to be the wrong ideas)

Passage 120

The finding that there were rock-melting temperatures on asteroids for sustained periods is puzzling: asteroids’ heat source is unknown, and unlike planet-sized bodies, such small bodies quickly dissipate heat. Rubin suggests that asteroids’ heat could have derived from collisions between asteroids. Skeptics have argued that a single impact would raise an asteroid’s overall temperature very little and that asteroids would cool too quickly between impacts to accumulate much heat. However, these objections assumed that asteroids are dense, solid bodies. A recent discovery that asteroids are highly porous makes Rubin’s hypothesis more plausible. When solid bodies collide, much debris is ejected, dissipating energy. Impacts on porous bodies generate less debris, so more energy goes into producing heat. Heat could be retained as debris fall back into impact craters, creating an insulating blanket.

 

Passage 123

Biologist know that some marine algae can create clouds by producing the gas dimethyl sulphide (DMS), which reacts with oxygen in air above the sea to form solid particles. These particles provide a surface on which water vapor can condense to form clouds. Lovelock contends that this process is part of global climatic-control system. (This is a theory) According to Lovelock, Earth acts like a super organism, with all its biological and physical systems cooperating to keep it healthy. He hypothesized that warmer conditions increase algal activity and DMS output, seeding more clouds, which cool the planet by blocking out the Sun. Then, as the climate cools, algal activity and DMS level decrease and the cycle continues. In response to biologists who question how organisms presumably working for their own selfish ends could have evolved to behave in a way that benefits not only the planet but the organisms as well, Lovelock points out that cooling benefits the algae, which remain at the ocean surface, because it allows the cooled upper layers of the ocean to sink, and then the circulating water carries nutrients upward from the depths below. Algae may also benefit from nitrogen raining down from clouds they have helped to form.

6. The primary purpose of the passage is to

A. explain the role played by temperature in the stimulation of DMS production by marine algae

B. outline the sequence of events that occurs during the process of cloud formation caused by algal activity (Not facts, only a theory)

C. describe a dispute about the role played by marine algae in certain instances of cloud formation

D. propose a way in which scientists might be able to understand the effects of clouds on marine algae

E. discuss a theory regarding the function of DMS production by marine algae

Passage 125

Some researchers claim that cetaceans—whales and dolphins—have culture, which the researchers define as the ability to learn from one another. Skeptics, however, demand clear evidence that cetaceans can acquire new behaviors through some form of social learning, preferably clear-cut instances of imitation or teaching. But such evidence is difficult to obtain. While few people doubt that captive cetaceans are adept at imitation or that they reproduce behaviors taught by researchers, biologists seeking insight into cetaceans’ behavior in their natural habitats must rely on deduction rather than experiments. If members of a particular group share behaviors that do not result from genetic inheritance or environmental variation, then they have almost certainly learned them by watching, following, or listening to other animals.

2. The passage suggests which of the following about captive cetaceans?

A. Whether they are engaged in social learning is a subject of disagreement among biologists. (false) (more clean evidence)

B. Their ability to imitate new behaviors is more extensive than that of noncaptive cetaceans. (not mentioned comparison)

C. They exhibit few behaviors that have not also been observed in cetaceans in their natural habitats. (not mentioned)

D. They appear to adopt new behaviors more quickly than noncaptive cetaceans. (not mentioned comparison)

E. They exhibit tendencies that suggest a capacity for the kind of behavior that qualifies as cultural.

(In this question, you need to answer use newly defined phrases)

(you should eliminate your choices)

 

 

Passage 126

Hotter and more massive than the Sun, stars called “stragglers” are puzzling to astronomers because such rapidly burning stars would not be expected to persist in ancient star clusters. Some researchers believe that the typical blue stragglers formed when two ancient, lower-mass stars collide and merge form more massive, hotter star. Peter Leonard theorizes alternatively that in low density globular clusters, where mergers between single stars occur too infrequently to account for the observed quantity of blue stragglers, these stragglers are created instead by a group of stars.(main part of the sentence)(This is his view) He suggests that a pair of stars already orbiting each other presents a larger target for a third star or another pair. Once this new grouping (you need to find the relative information) forms, close encounters between the stars could prompt any two to merge as a blue straggler. Leonard’s model predicts that each blue straggler has a distant orbiting companion —as appears true of many blue stragglers in the M67 cluster of the Milky Way galaxy.

2. Information presented in the passage suggests which of the following about blue stragglers (a kind of star) (they are also a kind of star)?

A. They originate (not mentioned) from stars that are hotter and more massive than the Sun.

B. They are burning more rapidly than other types of stars observed in ancient star clusters.

C. They are older (not mentions) than most other types of stars within the same star cluster.

D. They are less numerous (merge rare, rather than this) in low-density globular clusters than are pairs of stars.

E. They generally originate from the oldest stars among those found in ancient star clusters.

3. The passage cites which of the following as evidence undermining the theory presented in the second sentence?

A. a discrepancy between the number of mergers between single stars in certain low-density globular clusters and that in other low-density globular clusters

B. a discrepancy between the heat and mass of blue stragglers formed by one type of process and the heat and mass of blue stragglers formed by another type of process

C. a discrepancy between the frequency of star mergers in low-density globular clusters and those in high-density globular clusters (not mentioned information)

D. a discrepancy between the amount of heat and mass of ancient single stars and that of blue stragglers

E. a discrepancy between the number of mergers between single stars in certain star clusters and the number of blue stragglers in those clusters

This passage indicates the mergers make this is more likely to happen

Passage 127

Most seismologists assume that following a major earthquake and its aftershocks, the fault (a break in Earth’s crust where pressure can trigger an earthquake) will remain quiet until stresses have time to rebuild, typically over hundreds or thousands of years. Recent evidence of subtle interactions between earthquakes may overturn this assumption, however. According to the stress-triggering hypothesis, faults are unexpectedly responsive to subtle stresses they acquire as neighboring faults shift. Rather than simply dissipating, (old theory)stress relieved during an earthquake travels along the fault, concentrating in sites nearby; even the smallest additional stresses may then trigger another quake along the fault or on a nearby fault. Although scientists have long viewed such subtle interactions as nonexistent, the hypothesis has explained the location and frequency of earthquakes following several destructive quakes in California, Japan, and Turkey.

Passage 128

MacArthur and Wilson suggested that the biodiversity of an island will vary in direct proportion to a function of the island’s size (i.e., larger islands can support a greater number of species) and in inverse proportion to a function of its distance from the mainland (i.e., many remote islands will tend to support fewer species). Reduced biodiversity in an island context is likely to require significant adaptation on the part of colonizing human populations. Evans argues that this limitation makes islands ideal laboratories for the study of human adaptations to the natural environment, whilst Renfrew and Wagstaff, in the introduction to their study of Melos, focus on this limitation in biodiversity as a “significant characteristic of the island ecosystem.” For human communities, however, this limitation may potentially be offset by other factors. The reduced biodiversity of an island ecosystem applies only to terrestrial resources: the resources of the sea will be as rich as on any other coastal area, and may be equally important to human communities. A small island such as Malta or Melos allows all communities direct access to the sea, providing an important nutritional “safety net,” as well as an element of dietary diversity, which may actually give island communities an advantage over their landlocked counterparts. Islands may also have specific nonbiological resources (such as obsidian on Melos), which may be used in exchange with communities on other islands and adjacent mainlands.

 

Passage 129

A critical consensus has emerged that Mary McCarthy will be remembered primarily as an essayist rather than as a novelist. But despite her formidable gifts as a polemical and discursive (here positive)writer, and for all her reputation as an intellectual who sacrificed feeling to intelligence, what powers McCarthy’s best essays are her fictional rather than strictly intellectual gifts. She makes her points by telling stories or by way of vivid description, arresting images and subtle characterization. And for all her exacting sense of fact, McCarthy’s greatest contribution was to blur the distinctions between different kinds of prose writing: to show how fiction could be opened up to the thinking mind and how essays could profit from the techniques of fiction.

philosophy: marked by a method of resolving complex expressions into simpler or more basic ones: marked by analytical reasoning

For the following question, consider each of the choices separately and select all that apply.

1. The author of the passage suggests that Mary McCarthy’s writing is characterized by

A. The use in her essays of devices more typical in works of fiction

B. A narrowing of the differences between narrative and expository prose

C. Careful attention to factual accuracy.

This problem you should not choose directly.

Passage 130

Some archaeologists speculate that the Americas might have been initially colonized between 40,000 and 25,000 years ago. (so, we already know the theme, here)However, to support this theory it is necessary to explain the absence of generally accepted habitation sites for that time interval in what is now the United States. Australia, which has a smaller land area than the United States, has many such sites, supporting the generally accepted claim that the continent was colonized by humans at least 40,000 years ago. Australia is less densely populated (resulting in lower chances of discovering sites) and with its overall greater aridity would have presented conditions less favorable for hunter-gatherer occupation. Proportionally, at least as much land area has been lost from the coastal regions of Australia because of postglacial sea-level rise as in the United States, so any coastal archaeological record in Australia should have been depleted about as much as a coastal record in the United States. Since there are so many resource-rich rivers leading inland from the United States coastlines, it seems implausible that a growing population of humans would have confined itself to coasts for thousands of years. If inhabitants were present 25,000 years ago, the chances of their appearing in the archaeological record would seem to be greater than for Australia.

2. The author of the passage implies which of the following about 25,000 years ago?

A. The coastline of the region that is now the United States is longer than it was 40,000 years ago. (wrong information)

B. Rivers in what is now the United States were numerous than they are now. C. Australia was less densely populated at that time than was the region that is now the United States.

D. Australia’s climate was significantly drier than it is now.

E. Global sea level was lower than it is now(today)(right).

Passage 131

Animals live longer when their calorie intake is restricted to two-thirds of what is considered normal for their species. Animals so restricted are also generally healthier: most disease, including cancer, diabetes, and neurodegenerative illness, are forestalled. This phenomenon was long attributed to a simple slowing of metabolism (cells’ production of energy from fuel molecules) and consequent reproduction of its toxic by-products in response to less food. In fact, however, calorie restriction does not slow mammalian metabolism, and in yeast and worms, metabolism is both sped up and altered. Some scientists now theorize that calorie restriction is a biological stressor that, like natural food scarcity, induces a more complex defensive response, which in mammals includes changes in cellular defenses and repair.

 

2. The passage implies which of the following about the explanation mentioned in the

highlighted text (This phenomenon… of metabolism)?

A. There are empirical findings that conflict with a presumption of the explanation.

B. The explanation predicts that the effect of calorie restriction on longevity will be the greatest for the species with the highest rate of metabolism.(not mentioned information)

C. The explanation predicts that the effects of calorie restriction will be uniformly positive.

Passage 133

Some historians question the widely held belief that continually improving education led to gradual African American empowerment in the southern United States from the late nineteenth century through the mid-twentieth century. (Here, two position already appear)They note that the development of Black educational institutions in the segregated South was never rapid or steady:(this is a useless detail, paraphrase the previous information) disparities between Black and White schools sometimes grew in the early decades of the twentieth century. And African Americans’ educational gains did not bring commensurate economic gains. (the short sentences tend to be important. Sentences like these always make conclusion, while longer ones constantly give relative details) Starting in the 1940s, even as Black and White schools in the South moved steadily toward equality, Black southerners remained politically marginalized and experienced systematic job discrimination. Although Black schools had achieved near parity with White schools in per capita spending and teachers’ salaries by 1965, African Americans’ income still lagged behind that of Whites. Nonetheless, educational progress did contribute toward economic and political empowerment. African Americans’ campaigns to support Black schools fostered a sense of community, nurtured political determination, and often increased literacy. More significantly, politically outspoken Black newspapers achieved record circulation during the 1940s, just as the literacy rate among African Americans approached 90 percent. Finally, the leadership of the Civil Rights movement of the 1960s was composed largely of graduates of Black colleges.

You should understand the perspective of different people

the widely held belief-> improving empowerment

Some historians -> this is useless

Nonetheless -> useful

Details are always given after topic sentences.

You really need to understand this is who opinion.

Some historians

The author

Or …

Passage 135

The revival of mural painting that has occurred in San Francisco since the 1970s, especially among the Chicano population of the city’s Mission District, has marked differences from its social realist forerunner in Mexico and the United States some 40 years earlier. Rather than being government sponsored and limited to murals on government buildings, the contemporary mural movement sprang from the people themselves, with murals appearing on community buildings and throughout college campuses. Perhaps the biggest difference, however, is the process. In earlier twentieth-century Mexico, murals resulted from the vision of individual artists. But today’s murals are characteristically the products of artists working with local residents on design and creation.

Such community engagement is characteristic of the Chicano art movement as a whole, which evolved from the same foundations as the Chicano civil rights movement of the mid-1960s. Both were a direct response to the needs of Chicanos in the United States, who were fighting for the right to adequate education, political empowerment, and decent working conditions. Artists joined other cultural workers in making political statements and played a key role in taking these statements to the public. They developed collectives and established cultural centers that functioned as the public-relations arm of the Chicano sociopolitical movement.

2. According to the passage, which of the following statements about the “cultural centers” is true?

A. They were the venue where many later leaders of the Chicano civil rights movement first became politically active.

B. Though later widespread, they originated in San Francisco area.

C. Springing up in a number of communities, they initially had largely apolitical goals centered on art instruction.

D. They constituted the nucleus from which the Chicano civil rights movement originated.

E. Founded by artists, they provided support for the Chicano civil rights movement.

Eliminate and directly choose

Passage 137

A bird’s plumage, while contributing to structural integrity and participating in aerial locomotion, completely obscures a bird’s internal activity from human view, greatly impeding our attempts to understand birds as functioning animals. Plumage has even made it difficult to describe bird movement. When describing the movement of mammals, writers turn to well-worn clichés like “grace in motion.” A mammal’s rippling muscles slide smoothly over one another in eyecatching ways. With a mammal, whether a mouse or hippopotamus, we recognize that the underlying body parts are similar to our own and we know these parts will act predictably. Not so with a bird. For centuries, we knew little more about a bird’s movement than that it was a mystery that seemed to be based on the flapping of wings.

Passage 139

Analyzing levels of proportional representation of American Indians in state and local government jobs is important for several reasons. First, the basic idea underlying the theory of representative bureaucracy is that the demographic composition of bureaucracy should mirror the demographic composition of the general public. This is because in addition to its symbolic value, increased access to managerial position may lead to greater responsiveness on the part of policy makers to the policy interests of traditionally disadvantaged groups such as American Indians. Second, the focus on higher level jobs in bureaucracies (as opposed to non-managerial positions) is especially important because managerial positions represent a major source of economic progress for members of traditionally disadvantaged groups, as these jobs confer good salaries, benefits, status, security, and mobility. Third, it is important to know if there has been growth in the American Indian share of more desirable public sector positions over the last two decades. For instance, Peterson and Duncan argue that the population and power of American Indians have been growing in certain states. Peterson and Duncan also suggest that this growth may reflect the possibility that American Indian population are becoming more active in nontraditional areas of politics, assimilating into mainstream culture, and securing with greater frequency leadership positions in non-tribal government.

One key word “managerial position” may appear at various places.

3. The passage suggests which of the following regarding “access to managerial positions” for disadvantaged groups?

A. This access is only significant when the percentage of disadvantaged group members in managerial positions mirrors the percent of that group in the general public.

B. This access is largely the result of (error) (this is not the result of this, instead the result is because of the access) (a direction error) policy decisions made response to interest of those groups.

C. This access has meaning (other meanings) apart from any policy benefits it confer on those groups.

D. This access often creates increased access to non-managerial position for those groups.

E. The extent of this access tends to be similar across different disadvantaged groups.

View point

Passage 141

As of late 1980s, neither theorists nor large-scale computer climate models could accurately predict whether cloud systems would help or hurt a warming globe. (the two points here, cause the problem) Some studies suggested that a four percent increase in stratocumulus clouds over the ocean could compensate for a doubling in atmospheric carbon dioxide, preventing a potentially disastrous planet-wide temperature increase. On the other hand, an increase in cirrus clouds could increase global warming. (details to prove)

(different clouds have different consequences)

That clouds represented the weakest element in climate models was illustrated by a study of fourteen such models. Comparing climate forecasts for a world with double the current amount of carbon dioxide, researchers found that the models agreed quite well if clouds were not included. But when clouds were incorporated, a wide range of forecasts was produced. With such discrepancies plaguing the models, scientists could not easily predict how quickly the world’s climate would change, nor could they tell which regions would face dustier droughts or deadlier monsoons.

Topic sentence

2. It can be inferred that one reason the fourteen models described in the passage failed to agree was that

A. they failed to incorporate the most up-to-date information about the effect of clouds on climate

B. they were based on faulty information about factors other than clouds that affect climate (agree)

C. they were based on different assumptions about the overall effects of clouds on climate

D. their originators disagreed about the kinds of forecasts the models should provide

E. their originators disagreed about the factors other than clouds that should be included in the models

3. The information in the passage suggests that scientists would have to answer which of the following questions in order to predict the effect of clouds on the warming of the globe?

A. What kinds of cloud systems will form over the Earth? (the first paragraph’s problem)

B. How can cloud systems be encouraged to form over the ocean?

C. What are the causes of the projected planetwide temperature increase?

D. What proportion of cloud systems are currently composed of cirrus clouds?

Passage 142

Many theorists now doubt that heat loss from Earth’s core and radioactive decay(inner) are sufficient by themselves to produce all the energy driving the tectonic plates whose movements have helped shaped Earth’s surface. This leaves a loose end in current geological theory. Herbert Shaw argues that because scientists have underestimated the input of substantial amounts of energy from extraterrestrial impactors (outer) (asteroids and comets striking Earth), they have difficulty accounting for the difference between the quantity of energy produced from sources intrinsic to Earth and that involved in plate tectonics. Whereas most geologists have treated the addition of energy through the bombardment of Earth’s surface by such impactors as a process separate and independent from the movement of Earth’s tectonic plates, Shaw asserts that these processes are indivisible. (details of the previous sentence)Shaw’s revolutionary “open-system” view recognizes a continuum between terrestrial and extraterrestrial dynamics, whereas modern plate tectonic theory, like the classical geology developed during the nineteenth century, is founded on the view that Earth’s geological features have changed through gradual, regular processes intrinsic to Earth, without reference to unique catastrophic events. Classical geology borrowed a decisive, if unspoken, premise from Newton—the independence of Earth’s processes from any astronomical context.

1. The author’s primary purpose is to

A. identify the influences informing a particular geological theory about the processes that have shaped Earth’s surface

B. identify differences between two views of the extraterrestrial impactors and argue that the phenomenon has influenced the development of plate tectonic theory

C. argue that an explanation is based on a dubious evidence and propose an alternative explanation

D. discuss an explanation and place that explanation under theoretical context

E. suggest that apparent discrepancy poses a serious problem for a particular theory that many have believed

(combine the inner and outer forces)

2. The author of the passage mentions the “continuum” in order to

(function, previous sentence)

A. point out a relationship between plate tectonics and the nineteenth-century geology

B. explain how a theory of Newton’s could influence geology and plate tectonic theory.

C. distinguish between two sources of energy that contributed to the development of Earth’s surface.

D. point out a similarity between the surface of impactors and the surface of Earth.

E. identify a feature of Shaw’s view that deviates from current scientific theories.

(The main part of the sentence) (details in order to prove theme)

: presence everywhere or in many places especially simultaneously: omnipresence

Passage 146

The editors of the essay collection Romantic biography tell us repeatedly that biography is an invention of the Romantic period in British literature (late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries), yet we are never shown that process of invention motion. Hazlitt, the most prominent example of the Romantic biographer, is almost invisible. The Romantic period was not just the period (prove the main part) in which biography was invented—or, rather, the period in which some of its informing principles were invented, since biography could just as easily be said to have originated in the scandalous memoirs that formed part of the pre-Romantic culture of the novel. It was also the period in which biography, through its sheer ubiquity, became an object of major ideological significance within British culture.

Not invent but because its ubiquity. So, it appears to be invented in that time.

Invention may not because …, but because …. Or simply is not because of invention.

Passage 147

Our study revealed that nest-guarding long-tailed skinks (a species of lizard) homed (returned to their nests) more successfully when displaced shorter distances. There are two reasons why homing success rates decreased with increasing displacement distance. (parallel)One possibility is that females were simply displaced too far to find their way home. However, this is unlikely given that some individuals managed to find their way home from each distance we used. The second possibility deals with trade-offs between the risks associated with making a long return trip and the benefits of returning. Animals should expend energy only when the associated costs are low. As reptiles increase the time spent moving, their daily energy expenditure increases dramatically. The energetic costs of returning home and the chances that the eggs will have been preyed upon during the return trip both increase substantially as displacement distance increases. For example, the 130 hours (5.5 days) that female skinks spent returning from a distance of 300 meters is sufficient for an egg-eating snake to locate and prey upon the entire clutch. However, females with larger clutches were more likely to home at distances over 50 meters. For these females, the relative fitness benefits associated with having more eggs successfully hatch may outweigh the energetic costs of returning to a nest site, even if the nest may have already been preyed upon.

1. The primary purpose of the passage is to

A. question the validity of research on nest-guarding behavior in long-tailed skinks

B. consider explanations for a finding regarding long-tailed skinks

C. discuss the importance of homing for long-tailed skinks

D. describe the relationship between clutch size and homing success in long-tailed skinks

(only conclude one reason)

E. identify the benefits of a behavior common among long-tailed skinks

2. The claim in the highlighted sentence assumes which of the following about the individuals that managed to find their way home from each distance?

A. They were less able to detect egg-eating predators than were the other long-tailed skinks studied.

B. They were more averse to risk than were the other long-tailed skinks studied

C. They expended less energy when homing than did the other long-tailed skinks studied.

D. They did not possess better homing skills than did the other long-tailed skinks studied.

E. They had significantly smaller clutches than did the other long-tailed skinks studied.

(a logic problem)

Passage 148

Mary Barton, particularly in its early chapters, is a moving response to the suffering of the industrial worker in the England of the 1840s. What is most impressive about the book is the intense and painstaking effort made by the author, Elizabeth Gaskell, to convey the experience of everyday life in working class homes. Her method is partly documentary in nature: the novel includes such features as a carefully annotate reproduction of dialect, the exact details of food prices in an account of a tea party, an itemized description of the furniture of the Bartons’ living room, and a transcription (again annotated) of the ballad “The Oldham Weaver”. The interest of this record is considerable, even though the method has a slightly distancing effect.

 

As a member of the middle class, Gaskell could hardly help approaching working-class life as an outside observer and a reporter, and the reader of the novel is always conscious of this fact. But there is genuine imaginative re-creation in her accounts of the walk in Green Heys Fields, of tea at the Bartons’ house, and of John Barton and his friend’s discovery of the starving family in the cellar in the chapter “Poverty and Death.” Indeed, for a similarly convincing re-creation of such families’ emotions and responses (which are more crucial than the material details on which the mere reporter is apt to concentrate), the English novel had to wait 60 years for the early writing of D. H. Lawrence. If Gaskell never quite conveys the sense of full participation that would completely authenticate this aspect of Mary Bartons, she still brings to these scenes an intuitive recognition of feelings that has its own sufficient conviction.

 

The chapter “Old Aice’s History” brilliantly dramatizes the situation of that early generation of workers brought from the villages and the countryside to the urban industrial centers. The account of Job Leigh, the weaver and naturalist who is devoted to the study of biology, vividly embodies one kind of response to an urban industrial environment: an affinity for living things that hardens, by its very contrast with its environment, into a kind of crankiness. The early chapters—about factory workers walking out in spring into Green Heys Fields, about Alice Wilson, remembering in her cellar the twig-gathering for brooms in the native village that she will never again see, about job Leigh, intent on his impaled insects—capture the characteristic responses of a generation to the new and crushing experience of industrialism. The other early chapters eloquently portray the development of the instinctive cooperation with each other that was already becoming an important tradition among workers.

2. It can be inferred that the author of the passage believes that Mary Barton might have been an even better novel if Gaskell

A. concentrated on the emotions of a single character

B. made no attempt to re-create experiences of which she had no firsthand knowledge

C. made no attempt to reproduce working-class dialects

D. grown up in an industrial city (class, rather than place)

E. managed to transcend her position as an outsider

Long passages may have choices that are easy to understand