SECTION II Time—35 minutes 25 Questions Directions: The questions in this section are based on the reasoning contained in brief statements or passages. For some questions. more than one of the choices could conceivably answer the question. However, you are to choose the best answer, that is, the response that most accurately and completely answers the questions. You should not make assumptions that are by blacken the corresponding space on your answer sheet.
1. When politicians resort to personal atacks many editortalists criticize thest attacks but most voters pay them scant attention. Eeveryone knows such attacks will end after election day, and politicians can be excused for mudslinging. Political commentators, however, cannot be. Political commentators should be engaged in sustained and senous debate about ideas and policies. In such a context personal attacks on opponents serve not to beat those opponents but to cut off the debate.
Which of the following most accurately states the main point of the argument?
(A) Dersonal attacks on opponets serve a usuful purpose for politicians. (B) Political commentators should not resort to personal attacks on their opponents. (C) Editonalists are right to criticize politicians who resort to personal attacks on their opponents. (D) The purpose of serious debate about ideas and policies is to counteract the effect of personal attacks by politicians. (E) Voters should be concerned about the personal attacks politicians make on each other.
2. Throughout the Popoya Islands community pressure is exerted on people who win the national lottery to share their good fortune with their neighbors. When people living in rural areas win the lottery they invariably throw elaborate neighborhood feasts, often wiping, out all of their lottery winmmings. However, in the cities, lottery winners frequently use their winnings for their own personal investment rather than sharing their good fortune with their neighbors.
Which one of the following true, contributes most to an explanation of the difference between the behavior of lottery winners in rural areas and those in cities?
(A) Twice as many Popoyans live in rural areas as live in the city. (B) Popoyan city dwellers tend to buy several lottery tickets at a time, but they buy tickets less frequently than do rural dwellers. (C) Lottery winners in rural areas are notified of winning by public posting of lists of winners, but notification in the city is by private mail. (D) Families in rural areas in the Popoyas may contain twelve or foruteen people, but city families average six or seven. (E) Twice as many lottery tickets are sold in rural areas as are sold in the city.
3. A new medication for migraine seems effective, but there is concern that the medication might exacerbate heart disease. If patiens with heart disease take the medication under careful medical supervision. however, harmful side effects can definitely be averted. The concern about those side effects is thus unfounded.
The argument depends on which one of the following assumptions?
(A) The new medication actually is effective when taken by patients with heart disease. (B) No migraine sufferers with heart disease will take the new medication except under careful medical supervision. (C) Most migraine sufferers who have taken the new medication in trials also had heart disease (D) The new medication has various other side effects, but none as serious as that of exacerbating heart disease. (E) The new medication will displace all migrame medicztions currently being used.
4. The highest-ranking detectives in the city s police department are also the most adept at solving crimes. Yet in each of the past ten years. the average success rate for the city s highest-ranking detectives in solving crimnal cases has been no higher than the average success rate for its lowest-ranking detectives.
Which one of the follwing, if true, most helps to resolve the apparent paradox?
(A) The detectives who have the highest success rate in solving criminal cases are those who have worked as detectives the longest. (B) It generally takes at least ten years for a detective to rise from the lowest to the highest ranks of the city s detective force. (C) Those detectives in the police department who are the most adept at solving criminal cases are also those most likely to remain in the police department. (D) The police department generally gives the criminal cases that it expects to be the easiest to solve to its lowest-ranking detectives. (E) None of the lowest-ranking detectivesin the police department had experiecne in solving critninal cases prior to joining the police deparment.
5. Imgation runoff from neighboring farms may well have increased the concentration of phosphorus in the local swamp above previous levels, but the claim that the increase in phosphorus is harming the swamp s native aquatie wildlife is false: the phospborus concentration in the swamp is actually less than that found in certain kinds of bottled water that some people drink every day.
The argument is vulnerable to criticism on the ground that it
(A) makes exaggerations in formulating the claim against which it argues (B) bases its conclusion on two contradictiry claims (C) relies on evidence the relevance of which has not been established (D) concedes the very point that it argues against (E) makes a generalization that is unwarranted because the sources of the data on which it is based have not been specified.