Question 1 · Verbal Ability and Reading Comprehension
MCQ
Common Description:
Instructions [1 - 4]
The passage below is accompanied by a set of questions. Choose the best answer to each question.
[Octopuses are] misfits in their own extended families . . . They belong to the Mollusca class Cephalopoda. But they don’t look like their cousins at all. Other molluscs include sea snails, sea slugs, bivalves - most are shelled invertebrates with a dorsal foot. Cephalopods are all arms, and can be as tiny as 1 centimetre and as large at 30 feet. Some of them have brains the size of a walnut, which is large for an invertebrate. . . .
It makes sense for these molluscs to have added protection in the form of a higher cognition; they don’t have a shell covering them, and pretty much everything feeds on cephalopods, including humans. But how did cephalopods manage to secure their own invisibility cloak? Cephalopods fire from multiple cylinders to achieve this in varying degrees from species to species. There are four main catalysts - chromatophores, iridophores, papillae and leucophores. . . .
[Chromatophores] are organs on their bodies that contain pigment sacs, which have red, yellow and brown pigment granules. These sacs have a network of radial muscles, meaning muscles arranged in a circle radiating outwards. These are connected to the brain by a nerve. When the cephalopod wants to change colour, the brain carries an electrical impulse through the nerve to the muscles that expand outwards, pulling open the sacs to display the colours on the skin. Why these three colours? Because these are the colours the light reflects at the depths they live in (the rest is absorbed before it reaches those depths). . . .
Well, what about other colours? Cue the iridophores. Think of a second level of skin that has thin stacks of cells. These can reflect light back at different wavelengths. . . . It’s using the same properties that we’ve seen in hologram stickers, or rainbows on puddles of oil. You move your head and you see a different colour. The sticker isn’t doing anything but reflecting light - it’s your movement that’s changing the appearance of the colour. This property of holograms, oil and other such surfaces is called “iridescence”. . . .
Papillae are sections of the skin that can be deformed to make a texture bumpy. Even humans possess them (goosebumps) but cannot use them in the manner that cephalopods can. For instance, the use of these cells is how an octopus can wrap itself over a rock and appear jagged or how a squid or cuttlefish can imitate the look of a coral reef by growing miniature towers on its skin. It actually matches the texture of the substrate it chooses.
Finally, the leucophores: According to a paper, published in Nature, cuttlefish and octopuses possess an additional type of reflector cell called a leucophore. They are cells that scatter full spectrum light so that they appear white in a similar way that a polar bear’s fur appears white. Leucophores will also reflect any filtered light shown on them . . . If the water appears blue at a certain depth, the octopuses and cuttlefish can appear blue; if the water appears green, they appear green, and so on and so forth.
Based on the passage, it can be inferred that camouflaging techniques in an octopus are most dissimilar to those in:
- A.
sea snails
- B.
cuttlefish
- C.
polar bears
- D.
squids
Step-by-Step Solution
Key idea: This is a comparative inference question, recognisable because it asks which animal's camouflaging technique is MOST dissimilar to that of an octopus.
Step 1: Identify what the passage says about octopus camouflage. Octopuses use active, specialised skin mechanisms: chromatophores, iridophores, papillae, and leucophores.
Step 2: Check cuttlefish and squids. The passage explicitly states they share these cephalopod mechanisms (leucophores and papillae). They are highly similar.
Step 3: Check polar bears. The passage uses polar bear fur as an analogy for leucophores, as both scatter full spectrum light to appear white. This establishes a specific functional similarity in their camouflage mechanism.
Step 4: Check sea snails. The passage introduces sea snails in paragraph 1 as shelled mollusc cousins, contrasting them with cephalopods that lack shells and rely on active skin-based camouflage.
Step 5: Compare the degree of dissimilarity. Sea snails rely on passive shell protection, which is fundamentally and structurally dissimilar to the active, multi-layered skin camouflage of the octopus.
Answer: Option A.
Question 2 · Verbal Ability and Reading Comprehension
MCQ
Common Description:
Instructions [1 - 4]
The passage below is accompanied by a set of questions. Choose the best answer to each question.
[Octopuses are] misfits in their own extended families . . . They belong to the Mollusca class Cephalopoda. But they don’t look like their cousins at all. Other molluscs include sea snails, sea slugs, bivalves - most are shelled invertebrates with a dorsal foot. Cephalopods are all arms, and can be as tiny as 1 centimetre and as large at 30 feet. Some of them have brains the size of a walnut, which is large for an invertebrate. . . .
It makes sense for these molluscs to have added protection in the form of a higher cognition; they don’t have a shell covering them, and pretty much everything feeds on cephalopods, including humans. But how did cephalopods manage to secure their own invisibility cloak? Cephalopods fire from multiple cylinders to achieve this in varying degrees from species to species. There are four main catalysts - chromatophores, iridophores, papillae and leucophores. . . .
[Chromatophores] are organs on their bodies that contain pigment sacs, which have red, yellow and brown pigment granules. These sacs have a network of radial muscles, meaning muscles arranged in a circle radiating outwards. These are connected to the brain by a nerve. When the cephalopod wants to change colour, the brain carries an electrical impulse through the nerve to the muscles that expand outwards, pulling open the sacs to display the colours on the skin. Why these three colours? Because these are the colours the light reflects at the depths they live in (the rest is absorbed before it reaches those depths). . . .
Well, what about other colours? Cue the iridophores. Think of a second level of skin that has thin stacks of cells. These can reflect light back at different wavelengths. . . . It’s using the same properties that we’ve seen in hologram stickers, or rainbows on puddles of oil. You move your head and you see a different colour. The sticker isn’t doing anything but reflecting light - it’s your movement that’s changing the appearance of the colour. This property of holograms, oil and other such surfaces is called “iridescence”. . . .
Papillae are sections of the skin that can be deformed to make a texture bumpy. Even humans possess them (goosebumps) but cannot use them in the manner that cephalopods can. For instance, the use of these cells is how an octopus can wrap itself over a rock and appear jagged or how a squid or cuttlefish can imitate the look of a coral reef by growing miniature towers on its skin. It actually matches the texture of the substrate it chooses.
Finally, the leucophores: According to a paper, published in Nature, cuttlefish and octopuses possess an additional type of reflector cell called a leucophore. They are cells that scatter full spectrum light so that they appear white in a similar way that a polar bear’s fur appears white. Leucophores will also reflect any filtered light shown on them . . . If the water appears blue at a certain depth, the octopuses and cuttlefish can appear blue; if the water appears green, they appear green, and so on and so forth.
Based on the passage, we can infer that all of the following statements, if true, would weaken the camouflaging adeptness of Cephalopods EXCEPT:
- A.
the number of chromatophores in Cephalopods is half the number of iridophores and leucophores.
- B.
the temperature of water at the depths at which Cephalopods reside renders the transmission of neural signals difficult.
- C.
light reflects the colours red, green, and yellow at the depths at which Cephalopods reside.
- D.
the hydrostatic pressure at the depths at which Cephalopods reside renders radial muscle movements difficult.
Step-by-Step Solution
Key idea: This is a Weaken EXCEPT question applied to a scientific mechanism. We must find the option that does NOT damage the cephalopod's camouflaging adeptness.
Step 1: Understand the mechanism. Camouflage relies on: Chromatophores (red, yellow, brown pigments) expanded by radial muscles via neural signals; Iridophores (reflecting light at different wavelengths); Papillae (deforming skin texture); Leucophores (scattering full spectrum light).
Step 2: Evaluate Option B. If water temperature renders neural signal transmission difficult, the brain cannot activate the chromatophore muscles. This weakens camouflage.
Step 3: Evaluate Option C. The passage states chromatophores have red, yellow, and brown because those are the colors light reflects at their depth. If light actually reflects red, green, and yellow, the cephalopod lacks the green pigment needed to match the environment. This weakens camouflage.
Step 4: Evaluate Option D. If hydrostatic pressure makes radial muscle movement difficult, the pigment sacs cannot expand. This weakens camouflage.
Step 5: Evaluate Option A. The passage never specifies a required ratio of chromatophores to iridophores or leucophores. Having "half the number" might still be perfectly adequate for effective camouflage. It does not inherently weaken the adeptness.
Answer: Option A.
Question 3 · Verbal Ability and Reading Comprehension
MCQ
Common Description:
The passage below is accompanied by four questions. Based on the passage, choose the best answer for each question.
In 1982, a raging controversy broke out over a forest act drafted by the Government of India. This act sought to strengthen the already extensive powers enjoyed by the forest bureaucracy in controlling the extraction, disposal and sale of forest produce. It also gave forest officials greater powers to strictly regulate the entry of any person into reserved forest areas. While forest officials justified the act on the grounds that it was necessary to stop the continuing deforestation, it was bitterly opposed by representatives of grassroots organisations, who argued that it was a major violation of the rights of peasants and tribals living in and around forest areas. . . .
The debate over the draft forest act fuelled a larger controversy over the orientation of state forest policy. It was pointed out, for example, that the draft act was closely modelled on its predecessor, the Forest Act of 1878. The earlier Act rested on a usurpation of rights of ownership by the colonial state which had little precedent in precolonial history. It was further argued that the system of forestry introduced by the British—and continued, with little modification, after 1947 —emphasised revenue generation and commercial exploitation, while its policing orientation excluded villagers who had the most longstanding claim on forest resources. Critics called for a complete overhaul of forest administration, pressing the government to formulate policy and legislation more appropriate to present needs. . . .
That debate is not over yet. The draft act was shelved, though it has not as yet been formally withdrawn. Meanwhile, the 1878 Act (as modified by an amendment in 1927) continues to be in operation. In response to its critics, the government has made some important changes in forest policy, e.g., no longer treating forests as a source of revenue, and stopping ecologically hazardous practices such as the clearfelling of natural forests. At the same time, it has shown little inclination to meet the major demand of the critics of forest policy—namely, abandoning the principle of state monopoly over forest land by handing over areas of degraded forests to individuals and communities for afforestation.
. . . [The] 1878 Forest Act itself was passed only after a bitter and prolonged debate within the colonial bureaucracy, in which protagonists put forward arguments strikingly similar to those being advanced today. As is well known, the Indian Forest Department owes its origin to the requirements of railway companies. The early years of the expansion of the railway network, c. 1853 onwards, led to tremendous deforestation in peninsular India owing to the railway's requirements of fuelwood and construction timber. Huge quantities of durable timbers were also needed for use as sleepers across the newly laid tracks. Inexperienced in forestry, the British called in German experts to commence systematic forest management. The Indian Forest Department was started in 1864, with Dietrich Brandis, formerly a Lecturer at Bonn, as the first Inspector General of Forests. The new department needed legislative backing to function effectively, and in the following year, 1865, the first forest act was passed. . . .
According to the passage, which one of the following reforms is yet to happen in India’s forest policies?
- A.
Recognising the state’s claim to forest land use.
- B.
A ban on deforestation.
- C.
Recognising the significance of forests to ecology.
- D.
Involving local people in cultivating forests.
Step-by-Step Solution
Key idea: This is an Author's Viewpoint EXCEPT question. You must find the option the author would NOT support. The passage discusses "unintended consequences" (externalities) of technology, contrasting benign/beneficial past examples with potentially dangerous modern ones.
Step 1: Analyze Option A. The author describes past consequences (spectacles, migration) as innocuous or beneficial, while highlighting modern threats (climate change, CFCs) as global and dangerous. The author supports this contrast.
Step 2: Analyze Option C. Paragraph 6 states it is "increasingly possible for individuals or small groups to create new scientific advances... setting off unintended consequences that reverberate on a global scale." The author supports this view.
Step 3: Analyze Option D. Paragraph 5 notes that health threats of leaded fuel were visible in the 1920s, implying they were known but not addressed, unlike the invisible early carbon buildup. The author implies they should have been addressed. Supported.
Step 4: Analyze Option B. The option claims leaded fuel by-products caused carbon-related gas buildup. Paragraph 4 attributes carbon buildup to the Industrial Revolution (burning fossil fuels generally). Paragraph 5 discusses leaded fuel (Ethyl) and its waste by-products separately, linking them to health threats, not carbon/climate change. Conflating these two distinct externalities is incorrect. The author would NOT support this.
Answer: Option B.
Question 4 · Verbal Ability and Reading Comprehension
MCQ
Common Description:
The passage below is accompanied by four questions. Based on the passage, choose the best answer for each question.
Understanding the key properties of complex systems can help us clarify and deal with many new and existing global challenges, from pandemics to poverty . . . A recent study in Nature Physics found transitions to orderly states such as schooling in fish (all fish swimming in the same direction), can be caused, paradoxically, by randomness, or 'noise' feeding back on itself. That is, a misalignment among the fish causes further misalignment, eventually inducing a transition to schooling. Most of us wouldn't guess that noise can produce predictable behaviour. The result invites us to consider how technology such as contact-tracing apps, although informing us locally, might negatively impact our collective movement. If each of us changes our behaviour to avoid the infected, we might generate a collective pattern we had aimed to avoid: higher levels of interaction between the infected and susceptible, or high levels of interaction among the asymptomatic.
Complex systems also suffer from a special vulnerability to events that don't follow a normal distribution or 'bell curve'. When events are distributed normally, most outcomes are familiar and don't seem particularly striking. Height is a good example: it's pretty unusual for a man to be over 7 feet tall; most adults are between 5 and 6 feet, and there is no known person over 9 feet tall. But in collective settings where contagion shapes behaviour - a run on the banks, a scramble to buy toilet paper - the probability distributions for possible events are often heavy-tailed. There is a much higher probability of extreme events, such as a stock market crash or a massive surge in infections. These events are still unlikely, but they occur more frequently and are larger than would be expected under normal distributions.
What's more, once a rare but hugely significant 'tail' event takes place, this raises the probability of further tail events. We might call them second-order tail events; they include stock market gyrations after a big fall and earthquake aftershocks. The initial probability of second-order tail events is so tiny it's almost impossible to calculate - but once a first-order tail event occurs, the rules change, and the probability of a second-order tail event increases.
The dynamics of tail events are complicated by the fact that they result from cascades of other unlikely events. When COVID-19 first struck, the stock market suffered stunning losses followed by an equally stunning recovery. Some of these dynamics are potentially attributable to former sports bettors, with no sports to bet on, entering the market as speculators rather than investors. The arrival of these new players might have increased inefficiencies and allowed savvy long-term investors to gain an edge over bettors with different goals. . . .
One reason a first-order tail event can induce further tail events is that it changes the perceived costs of our actions and changes the rules that we play by. This game-change is an example of another key complex systems concept: nonstationarity. A second, canonical example of nonstationarity is adaptation, as illustrated by the arms race involved in the coevolution of hosts and parasites [in which] each has to 'run' faster, just to keep up with the novel solutions the other one presents as they battle it out in evolutionary time.
Which one of the options below best summarises the passage?
- A.
The passage explains how social outcomes generally follow normal distributions. So, extreme events are negligible, and policy should stabilise averages rather than learn from large shocks in fast-changing collective settings.
- B.
The passage explains how noise can create order, then shows why complex systems with contagion are vulnerable to heavy-tailed cascades. It also explains why early shocks change rules through nonstationarity with a market illustration during the COVID-19 disruption.
- C.
The passage explains how speculative entrants always produce inefficiency after health shocks. Therefore, long-term investors invariably profit when new participants push prices away from fundamentals under pandemic conditions and comparable crises.
- D.
The passage explains how nonstationarity works in evolutionary biology and rejects applications in markets or public health because adaptation is exclusive to parasite-host systems and cannot arise in technology-mediated social dynamics.
Step-by-Step Solution
Key idea: This is a summary question, recognisable because it asks for the option that "best summarises the passage." A correct summary must capture the main themes without being too narrow or contradicting the text.
Step 1: Identify the core themes of each paragraph.
Paragraph 1 introduces the paradox that "noise" (randomness) can create order in complex systems (e.g., fish schooling). It also hints at unintended collective consequences of individual actions (contact tracing).
Paragraph 2 explains that complex systems are vulnerable to "heavy-tailed" events (extreme outliers), unlike normal distributions (bell curves).
Paragraph 3 discusses "second-order tail events," where an initial shock increases the probability of further shocks.
Paragraph 4 illustrates these dynamics with the COVID-19 stock market crash and recovery, mentioning new players (bettors).
Paragraph 5 introduces "nonstationarity"—the idea that rules change after a shock, citing evolutionary adaptation as another example.
Step 2: Evaluate Option B.
It mentions "noise can create order" (Para 1), "vulnerability to heavy-tailed cascades" (Para 2 & 3), and "nonstationarity changing rules" with a "market illustration during COVID-19" (Para 4 & 5). This covers all major structural points accurately.
Step 3: Reject other options.
Option A claims social outcomes follow normal distributions. The text explicitly states the opposite: they follow heavy-tailed distributions.
Option C focuses exclusively on speculative entrants (sports bettors). This is a minor detail from Para 4, not the main summary. It also uses absolute language ("always produce inefficiency") which is unsupported.
Option D claims the author rejects applications in markets. The text actually uses market dynamics as a key example of nonstationarity. It also falsely claims adaptation is exclusive to biology, whereas the text uses it as an analogy for game-changes in general.
Answer: Option B.
Question 5 · Verbal Ability and Reading Comprehension
MCQ
Common Description:
Instructions [9 - 12]
The passage below is accompanied by a set of questions. Choose the best answer to each question.
Nature has all along yielded her flesh to humans. First, we took nature’s materials as food, fibers, and shelter. Then we learned to extract raw materials from her biosphere to create our own new synthetic materials. Now Bios is yielding us her mind—we are taking her logic.
Clockwork logic—the logic of the machines—will only build simple contraptions. Truly complex systems such as a cell, a meadow, an economy, or a brain (natural or artificial) require a rigorous nontechnological logic. We now see that no logic except bio-logic can assemble a thinking device, or even a workable system of any magnitude.
It is an astounding discovery that one can extract the logic of Bios out of biology and have something useful. Although many philosophers in the past have suspected one could abstract the laws of life and apply them elsewhere, it wasn’t until the complexity of computers and human-made systems became as complicated as living things, that it was possible to prove this. It’s eerie how much of life can be transferred. So far, some of the traits of the living that have successfully been transported to mechanical systems are: self-replication, self-governance, limited self-repair, mild evolution, and partial learning.
We have reason to believe yet more can be synthesized and made into something new. Yet at the same time that the logic of Bios is being imported into machines, the logic of Technos is being imported into life. The root of bioengineering is the desire to control the organic long enough to improve it. Domesticated plants and animals are examples of technos-logic applied to life. The wild aromatic root of the Queen Anne’s lace weed has been fine-tuned over generations by selective herb gatherers until it has evolved into a sweet carrot of the garden; the udders of wild bovines have been selectively enlarged in an “unnatural” way to satisfy humans rather than calves. Milk cows and carrots, therefore, are human inventions as much as steam engines and gunpowder are. But milk cows and carrots are more indicative of the kind of inventions humans will make in the future: products that are grown rather than manufactured.
Genetic engineering is precisely what cattle breeders do when they select better strains of Holsteins, only bioengineers employ more precise and powerful control. While carrot and milk cow breeders had to rely on diffuse organic evolution, modern genetic engineers can use directed artificial evolution—purposeful design—which greatly accelerates improvements.
The overlap of the mechanical and the lifelike increases year by year. Part of this bionic convergence is a matter of words. The meanings of “mechanical” and “life” are both stretching until all complicated things can be perceived as machines, and all self-sustaining machines can be perceived as alive. Yet beyond semantics, two concrete trends are happening: (1)Human-made things are behaving more lifelike, and (2) Life is becoming more engineered. The apparent veil between the organic and the manufactured has crumpled to reveal that the two really are, and have always been, of one being.
The author claims that, “The apparent veil between the organic and the manufactured has crumpled to reveal that the two really are, and have always been, of one being.” Which one of the following statements best expresses the point being made by the author here?
- A.
Organic reality has crumpled under the veil of manufacturing, rendering the apparent and the real as the same being.
- B.
The crumpling of the organic veil between apparent and manufactured reality reveals them to have the same being.
- C.
Scientific advances are making it increasingly difficult to distinguish between organic reality and manufactured reality.
- D.
Apparent reality and organic reality are distinguished by the fact that the former is manufactured.
Step-by-Step Solution
Key idea: This is a Metaphor Analysis question, recognisable because it asks for the meaning of a figurative statement ("veil has crumpled") within the context of the passage.
Step 1: Locate the quote in the final paragraph. The author states: "The apparent veil between the organic and the manufactured has crumpled to reveal that the two really are, and have always been, of one being."
Step 2: Decode the metaphor. A "veil" represents a barrier, boundary, or distinction. "Crumpled" implies this barrier is collapsing, fading, or disappearing. "Of one being" means they share the same fundamental nature or are converging.
Step 3: Read the surrounding context. The sentences immediately preceding the quote state: "(1) Human-made things are behaving more lifelike, and (2) Life is becoming more engineered." This confirms the metaphor is about convergence.
Step 4: Evaluate the options. Option C ("Scientific advances are making it increasingly difficult to distinguish between organic reality and manufactured reality") perfectly captures the fading distinction ("crumpled veil") due to convergence.
Step 5: Reject other options. Options A and B are syntactic jumbles that misuse the words "crumpled" and "veil" to create nonsensical meanings. Option D contradicts the text by claiming they are "distinguished".
Answer: C
Question 6 · Verbal Ability and Reading Comprehension
MCQ
Common Description:
The passage below is accompanied by four questions. Based on the passage, choose the best answer for each question.
Different sciences exhibit different science cultures and practices. For example, in astronomy, observation - until what is today called the new astronomy - had always been limited to what could be seen within the limits of optical light. Indeed, until early modernity the limits to optical light were also limits of what humans could themselves see within their limited and relative perceptual spectrum of human vision. With early modernity and the invention of lensed optical instruments - telescopes - astronomers could begin to observe phenomena never seen before. Magnification and resolution began to allow what was previously imperceptible to be perceived - but within the familiar limits of optical vision. Galileo, having learned of the Dutch invention of a telescope by Hans Lippershey, went on to build some hundred of his own, improving from the Dutch 3x to nearly 30x telescopes - which turn out to be the limit of magnificational power without chromatic distortion. And it was with his own telescopes that he made the observations launching early modern astronomy (phases of Venus, satellites of Jupiter, etc.). Isaac Newton’s later improvement with reflecting telescopes expanded upon the magnificational-resolution capacity of optical observation; and, from Newton to the twentieth century, improvement continued on to the later very large array of light telescopes today - following the usual technological trajectory of “more-is-better” but still remaining within the limits of the light spectrum. Today’s astronomy has now had the benefit of some four centuries of optical telescopy. The “new astronomy,” however, opens the full known electromagnetic spectrum to observation, beginning with the accidental discovery of radio astronomy early in the twentieth century, and leading today to the diverse variety of EMS telescopes which can explore the range from gamma to radio waves. Thus, astronomy, now outfitted with new instruments, “smart” adaptive optics, very large arrays, etc., illustrates one style of instrumentally embodied science - a technoscience. Of course astronomy, with the very recent exceptions of probes to solar system bodies (Moon, Mars, Venus, asteroids), remains largely a “receptive” science, dependent upon instrumentation which can detect and receive emissions.
Contemporary biology displays a quite different instrument array and, according to Evelyn Fox- Keller, also a different scientific culture. She cites her own experience, coming from mathematical physics into microbiology, and takes account of the distinctive instrumental culture in her Making Sense of Life (2002). Here, particularly with the development of biotechnology, instrumentation is far more interventional than in the astronomy case. Microscopic instrumentation can be and often is interventional in style: “gene-splicing” and other techniques of biotechnology, while still in their infancy, are clearly part of the interventional trajectory of biological instrumentation. Yet, in both disciplines, the sciences involved are today highly instrumentalized and could not progress successfully without constant improvements upon the respective instrumental trajectories. So, minimalistically, one may conclude that the sciences are technologically, instrumentally embodied. But the styles of embodiment differ, and perhaps the last of the scientific disciplines to move into such technical embodiment is mathematics, which only contemporarily has come to rely more and more upon the computational machinery now in common use.
To which one of the following instruments would the characterisations of instruments in the passage be least applicable?
- A.
Milestone
- B.
Kitchen oven
- C.
Scalpel
- D.
Saxophone
Step-by-Step Solution
Key idea: This is an application or "least applicable" question, recognisable because it asks to apply the passage's characterization of scientific instruments to a new set of real-world objects.
Step 1: Identify the passage's definition of scientific instruments. The passage defines them as tools that are "technologically, instrumentally embodied" to either extend human perception (receptive, like telescopes) or intervene in the subject of study (interventional, like gene-splicing or surgery).
Step 2: Evaluate the options against this definition.
Step 3: A scalpel is an interventional tool used in biology/medicine to cut and alter physical subjects. It fits the "interventional" characterization.
Step 4: A kitchen oven is an interventional tool that applies heat to transform materials (cooking). It shares the interventional trajectory.
Step 5: A saxophone is a functional tool requiring technical embodiment and physical manipulation to produce specific outputs, somewhat analogous to technical skill.
Step 6: A milestone, however, is merely a static marker of distance or progress; it does not extend perception, intervene in a process, or embody a scientific/technical trajectory in the way the passage describes.
Step 7: Select Option A (Milestone) as it is purely a passive marker, lacking the receptive or interventional agency described in the text.
Answer: A
Question 7 · Verbal Ability and Reading Comprehension
MCQ
Common Description:
The passage below is accompanied by four questions. Based on the passage, choose the best answer for each question.
Different sciences exhibit different science cultures and practices. For example, in astronomy, observation - until what is today called the new astronomy - had always been limited to what could be seen within the limits of optical light. Indeed, until early modernity the limits to optical light were also limits of what humans could themselves see within their limited and relative perceptual spectrum of human vision. With early modernity and the invention of lensed optical instruments - telescopes - astronomers could begin to observe phenomena never seen before. Magnification and resolution began to allow what was previously imperceptible to be perceived - but within the familiar limits of optical vision. Galileo, having learned of the Dutch invention of a telescope by Hans Lippershey, went on to build some hundred of his own, improving from the Dutch 3x to nearly 30x telescopes - which turn out to be the limit of magnificational power without chromatic distortion. And it was with his own telescopes that he made the observations launching early modern astronomy (phases of Venus, satellites of Jupiter, etc.). Isaac Newton’s later improvement with reflecting telescopes expanded upon the magnificational-resolution capacity of optical observation; and, from Newton to the twentieth century, improvement continued on to the later very large array of light telescopes today - following the usual technological trajectory of “more-is-better” but still remaining within the limits of the light spectrum. Today’s astronomy has now had the benefit of some four centuries of optical telescopy. The “new astronomy,” however, opens the full known electromagnetic spectrum to observation, beginning with the accidental discovery of radio astronomy early in the twentieth century, and leading today to the diverse variety of EMS telescopes which can explore the range from gamma to radio waves. Thus, astronomy, now outfitted with new instruments, “smart” adaptive optics, very large arrays, etc., illustrates one style of instrumentally embodied science - a technoscience. Of course astronomy, with the very recent exceptions of probes to solar system bodies (Moon, Mars, Venus, asteroids), remains largely a “receptive” science, dependent upon instrumentation which can detect and receive emissions.
Contemporary biology displays a quite different instrument array and, according to Evelyn Fox- Keller, also a different scientific culture. She cites her own experience, coming from mathematical physics into microbiology, and takes account of the distinctive instrumental culture in her Making Sense of Life (2002). Here, particularly with the development of biotechnology, instrumentation is far more interventional than in the astronomy case. Microscopic instrumentation can be and often is interventional in style: “gene-splicing” and other techniques of biotechnology, while still in their infancy, are clearly part of the interventional trajectory of biological instrumentation. Yet, in both disciplines, the sciences involved are today highly instrumentalized and could not progress successfully without constant improvements upon the respective instrumental trajectories. So, minimalistically, one may conclude that the sciences are technologically, instrumentally embodied. But the styles of embodiment differ, and perhaps the last of the scientific disciplines to move into such technical embodiment is mathematics, which only contemporarily has come to rely more and more upon the computational machinery now in common use.
Which one of the following observations is a valid conclusion to draw from the statement that “the sciences involved are today highly instrumentalised and could not progress successfully without constant improvements upon the respective instrumental trajectories”?
- A.
The use of instruments in scientific trajectories must be respected in order to see successful progress in them.
- B.
The growth of scientific technologies has led to the embodiment of progress in the trajectories of improvement.
- C.
In both astronomy and microbiology, progress has been the consequence of improvements in the instruments they use.
- D.
Highly instrumentalised work in the sciences has resulted in the progressive improvement of scientific constants.
Step-by-Step Solution
Key idea: This is a logical inference question asking for a valid conclusion from a specific statement.
Step 1: Analyze the target statement: "the sciences involved are today highly instrumentalised and could not progress successfully without constant improvements upon the respective instrumental trajectories."
Step 2: Break down the logic.
- Premise 1: Sciences are highly instrumentalised (dependent on instruments).
- Premise 2: Progress is impossible without constant instrument improvement.
- Conclusion: Therefore, progress in these sciences is a direct consequence of instrument improvement.
Step 3: Evaluate Option C. "In both astronomy and microbiology, progress has been the consequence of improvements in the instruments they use." This matches the logic derived in Step 2.
Step 4: Reject others.
- Option A talks about "respect," which is a value judgment not present in the text.
- Option B is vague and uses jargon ("embodiment of progress") that doesn't clearly follow.
- Option D mentions "scientific constants," which is unrelated to instrument trajectories.
Answer: Option C.
Question 8 · Verbal Ability and Reading Comprehension
MCQ
Common Description:
The passage below is accompanied by four questions. Based on the passage, choose the best answer for each question.
Comprehension:
The biggest challenge [The Nutmeg’s Curse by Ghosh] throws down is to the prevailing understanding of when the climate crisis started. Most of us have accepted . . . that it started with the widespread use of coal at the beginning of the Industrial Age in the 18th century and worsened with the mass adoption of oil and natural gas in the 20th. Ghosh takes this history at least three centuries back, to the start of European colonialism in the 15th century. He [starts] the book with a 1621 massacre by Dutch invaders determined to impose a monopoly on nutmeg cultivation and trade in the Banda islands in today’s Indonesia. Not only do the Dutch systematically depopulate the islands through genocide, they also try their best to bring nutmeg cultivation into plantation mode. These are the two points to which Ghosh returns through examples from around the world. One, how European colonialists decimated not only indigenous populations but also indigenous understanding of the relationship between humans and Earth. Two, how this was an invasion not only of humans but of the Earth itself, and how this continues to the present day by looking at nature as a ‘resource’ to exploit. . . .
We know we are facing more frequent and more severe heatwaves, storms, floods, droughts and wildfires due to climate change. We know our expansion through deforestation, dam building, canal cutting - in short, terraforming, the word Ghosh uses - has brought us repeated disasters . . . Are these the responses of an angry Gaia who has finally had enough? By using the word ‘curse’ in the title, the author makes it clear that he thinks so. I use the pronoun ‘who’ knowingly, because Ghosh has quoted many non-European sources to enquire into the relationship between humans and the world around them so that he can question the prevalent way of looking at Earth as an inert object to be exploited to the maximum.
As Ghosh’s text, notes and bibliography show once more, none of this is new. There have always been challenges to the way European colonialists looked at other civilisations and at Earth. It is just that the invaders and their myriad backers in the fields of economics, politics, anthropology, philosophy, literature, technology, physics, chemistry, biology have dominated global intellectual discourse. . . .
There are other points of view that we can hear today if we listen hard enough. Those observing global climate negotiations know about the Latin American way of looking at Earth as Pachamama (Earth Mother). They also know how such a framing is just provided lip service and is ignored in the substantive portions of the negotiations. In The Nutmeg’s Curse, Ghosh explains why. He shows the extent of the vested interest in the oil economy - not only for oil-exporting countries, but also for a superpower like the US that controls oil drilling, oil prices and oil movement around the world. Many of us know power utilities are sabotaging decentralised solar power generation today because it hits their revenues and control. And how the other points of view are so often drowned out.
On the basis of information in the passage, which one of the following is NOT a reason for the failure of policies seeking to address climate change?
- A.
The greed of organisations benefiting from non-renewable energy resources.
- B.
The global dominance of oil economies and international politics built around it.
- C.
The marginalised status of non-European ways of looking at nature and the environment.
- D.
The decentralised characteristic of renewable energy resources like solar power.
Step-by-Step Solution
Key idea: This is a Detail Inference / EXCEPT question, asking for the option that is NOT a reason for the failure of policies seeking to address climate change.
Step 1: Identify the target. We need to find three options that ARE stated as reasons for policy failure, and one that is NOT.
Step 2: Evaluate Option A. The passage mentions "the extent of the vested interest in the oil economy" and that "power utilities are sabotaging decentralised solar power generation... because it hits their revenues and control." This supports Option A.
Step 3: Evaluate Option B. The passage explicitly mentions "a superpower like the US that controls oil drilling, oil prices and oil movement around the world," supporting the global dominance of oil economies.
Step 4: Evaluate Option C. The passage states that the Latin American way of looking at Earth as Pachamama is "just provided lip service and is ignored in the substantive portions of the negotiations," supporting the marginalized status of non-European views.
Step 5: Evaluate Option D. The passage mentions that power utilities sabotage decentralised solar power because it hits their revenues, but it does NOT state that the "decentralised characteristic" itself is a reason for policy failure. The sabotage by vested interests is the reason, not the characteristic of the energy resource.
Answer: D
Question 9 · Verbal Ability and Reading Comprehension
MCQ
Common Description:
The passage below is accompanied by four questions. Based on the passage, choose the best answer for each question.
Time and again, whenever a population [of Mexican tetra fish] was swept into a cave and survived long enough for natural selection to have its way, the eyes disappeared. “But it’s not that everything has been lost in cavefish . . . Many enhancements have also happened.” . . . Studies have found that cave-dwelling fish can detect lower levels of amino acids than surface fish can. They also have more tastebuds and a higher density of sensitive cells alongside their bodies that let them sense water pressure and flow. . . .
Killing the processes that support the formation of the eye is quite literally what happens. Just like non-cave-dwelling members of the species, all cavefish embryos start making eyes. But after a few hours, cells in the developing eye start dying, until the entire structure has disappeared. [Developmental biologist Misty] Riddle thinks this apparent inefficiency may be unavoidable. “The early development of the brain and the eye are completely intertwined—they happen together,” she says. That means the least disruptive way for eyelessness to evolve may be to start making an eye and then get rid of it. . . .
It’s easy to see why cavefish would be at a disadvantage if they were to maintain expensive tissues they aren’t using. Since relatively little lives or grows in their caves, the fish are likely surviving on a meager diet of mostly bat feces and organic waste that washes in during the rainy season. Researchers keeping cavefish in labs have discovered that, genetically, the creatures are exquisitely adapted to absorbing and storing nutrients. . . .
Fats can be toxic for tissues, [evolutionary physiologist Nicolas] Rohner explains, so they are stored in fat cells. “But when these cells get too big, they can burst, which is why we often see chronic inflammation in humans and other animals that have stored a lot of fat in their tissues.” Yet a 2020 study by Rohner, Krishnan and their colleagues revealed that even very well-fed cavefish had fewer signs of inflammation in their fat tissues than surface fish do. Even in their sparse cave conditions, wild cavefish can sometimes get very fat, says Riddle. This is presumably because, whenever food ends up in the cave, the fish eat as much of it as possible, since there may be nothing else for a long time to come. Intriguingly, Riddle says, their fat is usually bright yellow because of high levels of carotenoids, the substance in the carrots that your grandmother used to tell you were good for your…eyes.
“The first thing that came to our mind, of course, was that they were accumulating these because they don’t have eyes,” says Riddle. In this species, such ideas can be tested: Scientists can cross surface fish (with eyes) and cavefish (without eyes) and look at what their offspring are like. When that’s done, Riddle says, researchers see no link between eye presence or size and the accumulation of carotenoids. Some eyeless cavefish had fat that was practically white, indicating lower carotenoid levels. Instead, Riddle thinks these carotenoids may be another adaptation to suppress inflammation, which might be important in the wild, as cavefish are likely overeating whenever food arrives.
All of the following statements from the passage describe adaptation in Mexican tetra cavefish EXCEPT:
- A.
“It’s easy to see why cavefish would be at a disadvantage if they were to maintain expensive tissues they aren’t using.”
- B.
“Since relatively little lives or grows in their caves, the fish are likely surviving on a meager diet of mostly bat feces and organic waste that washes in during the rainy season.”
- C.
“‘But when these cells get too big, they can burst, which is why we often see chronic inflammation in humans and other animals that have stored a lot of fat in their tissues.’”
- D.
“Even in their sparse cave conditions, wild cavefish can sometimes get very fat, says Riddle.”
Step-by-Step Solution
Key idea: This is a Detail Extraction / EXCEPT question, recognisable because it asks to identify the statement that does NOT describe an adaptation in the cavefish.
Step 1: Understand the task. We need to find the option that does not describe an adaptation or the evolutionary pressure for it in the Mexican tetra cavefish.
Step 2: Evaluate Option A. The passage states that maintaining expensive tissues (eyes) is a disadvantage, which explains the evolutionary pressure to lose them (an adaptation). Valid.
Step 3: Evaluate Option B. This describes the meager diet and environment, which provides the selective pressure for their nutrient-storing adaptations. Valid context for adaptation.
Step 4: Evaluate Option D. This describes the cavefish getting very fat in sparse conditions, which is a direct result of their genetic adaptation to store nutrients. Valid.
Step 5: Evaluate Option C. This quote describes chronic inflammation in "humans and other animals" when fat cells burst. It is used as a contrast to highlight the cavefish's unique adaptation (suppressing inflammation). It does not describe an adaptation IN the cavefish. Invalid.
Step 6: Since the question asks for the EXCEPT option, the statement about humans and other animals is the correct answer.
Answer: C
Question 10 · Verbal Ability and Reading Comprehension
MCQ
Common Description:
The passage below is accompanied by four questions. Based on the passage, choose the best answer for each question.
Landing in Australia, the British colonists weren't much impressed with the small-bodied, slender-snooted marsupials called bandicoots. “Their muzzle, which is much too long, gives them an air exceedingly stupid,” one naturalist noted in 1805. They nicknamed one type the “zebra rat” because of its black-striped rump.
Silly-looking or not, though, the zebra rat—the smallest bandicoot, more commonly known today as the western barred bandicoot—exhibited a genius for survival in the harsh outback, where its ancestors had persisted for some 26 million years. Its births were triggered by rainfall in the bone-dry desert. It carried its breath-mint-size babies in a backward-facing pouch so mothers could forage for food and dig shallow, camouflaged shelters.
Still, these adaptations did not prepare the western barred bandicoot for the colonial-era transformation of its ecosystem, particularly the onslaught of imported British animals, from cattle and rabbits that damaged delicate desert vegetation to ravenous house cats that soon developed a taste for bandicoots. Several of the dozen-odd bandicoot species went extinct, and by the 1940s the western barred bandicoot, whose original range stretched across much of the continent, persisted only on two predator-free islands in Shark Bay, off Australia’s western coast.
“Our isolated fauna had simply not been exposed to these predators,” says Reece Pedler, an ecologist with the Wild Deserts conservation program.
Now Wild Deserts is using descendants of those few thousand island survivors, called Shark Bay bandicoots, in a new effort to seed a mainland bandicoot revival. They've imported 20 bandicoots to a preserve on the edge of the Strzelecki Desert, in the remote interior of New South Wales. This sanctuary is a challenging place, desolate much of the year, with one of the world’s most mercurial rainfall patterns—relentless droughts followed by sudden drenching floods.
The imported bandicoots occupy two fenced “exclosures,” cleared of invasive rabbits (courtesy of Pedler’s sheepdog) and of feral cats (which slunk off once the rabbits disappeared). A third fenced area contains the program’s Wild Training Zone, where two other rare marsupials (bilbies, a larger type of bandicoot, and mulgaras, a somewhat fearsome fuzzball known for sucking the brains out of prey) currently share terrain with controlled numbers of cats, learning to evade them. It’s unclear whether the Shark Bay bandicoots, which are perhaps even more predator-naive than their now-extinct mainland bandicoot kin, will be able to make that kind of breakthrough.
For now, though, a recent surge of rainfall has led to a bandicoot joey boom, raising the Wild Deserts population to about 100, with other sanctuaries adding to that number. There are also signs of rebirth in the landscape itself. With their constant digging, the bandicoots trap moisture and allow for seed germination so the cattle-damaged desert can restore itself.
They have a new nickname—a flattering one, this time. “We call them ecosystem engineers,” Pedler says.
Which one of the following statements provides a gist of this passage?
- A.
The onslaught of animals, such as cattle, rabbits and housecats, brought in by the British led to the extinction of the western barred bandicoot.
- B.
The negligent attitude of the British colonists towards these bandicoots evidenced by the names given to them led to their annihilation.
- C.
Marsupials are going extinct due to the colonial era transformation of the ecosystem which also destroyed natural vegetation
- D.
A type of bandicoots was nearly wiped out by invasive species but rescuers now pin hopes on a remnant island population.
Step-by-Step Solution
Key idea: This is a Main Idea / Gist question, recognizable because it asks for the overall summary or primary focus of the passage.
Step 1: Identify the core narrative arc. It starts with the historical British view of bandicoots, explains their native survival traits, details their near-extinction due to invasive British animals, and concludes with modern conservation efforts using island survivors.
Step 2: Evaluate Option A. It claims the bandicoot went extinct. The passage explicitly states they persisted on two predator-free islands and are now being revived. False.
Step 3: Evaluate Option B. It blames the "negligent attitude" and "names given to them" for their annihilation. The names were descriptive; the annihilation was caused by invasive species. False.
Step 4: Evaluate Option C. It makes a sweeping generalization that "Marsupials are going extinct". The passage is specifically about the western barred bandicoot. False.
Step 5: Evaluate Option D. It accurately captures the near-wipeout by invasive species and the current hope pinned on the remnant island population. This perfectly matches the passage's narrative arc.
Answer: Option D.
Question 11 · Verbal Ability and Reading Comprehension
MCQ
Common Description:
The passage below is accompanied by four questions. Based on the passage, choose the best answer for each question.
The job of a peer reviewer is thankless. Collectively, academics spend around 70 million hours every year evaluating each other’s manuscripts on the behalf of scholarly journals — and they usually receive no monetary compensation and little if any recognition for their effort. Some do it as a way to keep abreast with developments in their field; some simply see it as a duty to the discipline. Either way, academic publishing would likely crumble without them.
In recent years, some scientists have begun posting their reviews online, mainly to claim credit for their work. Sites like Publons allow researchers to either share entire referee reports or simply list the journals for whom they’ve carried out a review…. The rise of Publons suggests that academics are increasingly placing value on the work of peer review and asking others, such as grant funders, to do the same. While that’s vital in the publish-or-perish culture of academia, there’s also immense value in the data underlying peer review. Sharing peer review data could help journals stamp out fraud, inefficiency, and systemic bias in academic publishing….
Peer review data could also help root out bias. Last year, a study based on peer review data for nearly 24,000 submissions to the biomedical journal eLife found that women and non- Westerners were vastly underrepresented among peer reviewers. Only around one in every five reviewers was female, and less than two percent of reviewers were based in developing countries…. Openly publishing peer review data could perhaps also help journals address another problem in academic publishing: fraudulent peer reviews. For instance, a minority of authors have been known to use phony email addresses to pose as an outside expert and review their own manuscripts.…
Opponents of open peer review commonly argue that confidentiality is vital to the integrity of the review process; referees may be less critical of manuscripts if their reports are published, especially if they are revealing their identities by signing them. Some also hold concerns that open reviewing may deter referees from agreeing to judge manuscripts in the first place, or that they’ll take longer to do so out of fear of scrutiny….
Even when the content of reviews and the identity of reviewers can’t be shared publicly, perhaps journals could share the data with outside researchers for study. Or they could release other figures that wouldn’t compromise the anonymity of reviews but that might answer important questions about how long the reviewing process takes, how many researchers editors have to reach out to on average to find one who will carry out the work, and the geographic distribution of peer reviewers.
Of course, opening up data underlying the reviewing process will not fix peer review entirely, and there may be instances in which there are valid reasons to keep the content of peer reviews hidden and the identity of the referees confidential. But the norm should shift from opacity in all cases to opacity only when necessary.
According to the passage, some are opposed to making peer reviews public for all the following reasons EXCEPT that it
- A.
makes reviewers reluctant to review manuscripts, especially if these are critical of the submitted work.
- B.
leaves the reviewers unexposed to unwarranted and unjustified criticism or comments from others.
- C.
deters reviewers from producing honest, if critical, reviews that are vital to the sound publishing process.
- D.
delays the manuscript evaluation process as reviewers would take longer to write their reviews.
Step-by-Step Solution
Key idea: This is an "EXCEPT" detail question, recognizable by the keyword "EXCEPT" and asking for the option that is NOT a reason provided by opponents in the text.
Step 1: Locate the opponents' arguments in paragraph 4: "Opponents of open peer review commonly argue that confidentiality is vital... referees may be less critical... open reviewing may deter referees... or that they'll take longer to do so out of fear of scrutiny."
Step 2: Map the text to the options.
- Option A (reluctant to review/critical): Matches "deter referees" and "less critical".
- Option C (deters honest/critical reviews): Matches "less critical of manuscripts if their reports are published".
- Option D (delays evaluation): Matches "take longer to do so out of fear of scrutiny".
Step 3: Evaluate Option B. It claims making reviews public "leaves the reviewers unexposed to unwarranted criticism". However, the text says opponents fear "scrutiny". Making reviews public exposes them to scrutiny; it does not leave them unexposed. Thus, B is factually opposite to the opponents' fears and is the correct "EXCEPT" answer.
Answer: B