<p>Your epicness if you respond = over 9000!!! </p>
<p>2005 Official Practice Test</p>
<p>Page 71, Question 21: It talks about a planetarium experience.</p>
<p>
[quote]
Now realism was abandoned, for familiar artifice.
A model of the solar system was spinning away in its elegant
style. A bright bug took off from the Earth, heading
for Jupiter. I set my dodging and shrinking mind sternly
to recording facts. The mass of Jupiter two and a half
times that of all the other planets put together. The Great
Red Spot. The thirteen moons. Past Jupiter, a glance at
the eccentric orbit of Pluto, the icy rings of Saturn. Back
to Earth and moving in to hot and dazzling Venus. Atmospheric
pressure ninety times ours. Moonless Mercury
rotating three times while circling the Sun twice; an odd
arrangement, not as satisfying as what they used to tell us
—that it rotated once as it circled the Sun. No perpetual
darkness after all. Why did they give out such confident
information, only to announce later that it was quite wrong?
Finally, the picture already familiar from magazines: the
red soil of Mars, the blooming pink sky.
[/quote]
</p>
<p>In lines 40-43 (“Moonless . . . Sun”), the narrator’s
comment about the “arrangement” demonstrates
a preference for
(A) irony
(B) inventiveness
(C) symmetry
(D) ornamentation
(E) ambiguity</p>
<p>I got D, because it says that it was NOT AS SATISFYING as what people used to think it was. Can someone please explain the answer they got? I want to see if you guys can figure it out--or you could just go to the answer key on the pdf.</p>
<p>Page 78, question 10: </p>
<p>
[quote]
Darwin was not alone in his beliefs that dogs possess
15 human virtues. The characteristics of loyalty and obedience,
coupled with an expressive face and body, can account
for why dogs are such popular and valued pets in many
cultures. Depending on the breed and the individual, dogs
can be noble, charming, affectionate, and reliable. But
while all dog owners should rightly appreciate these and
other endearing traits in their pets, nothing says that the
cleverness of a highly intelligent primate such as a chimpanzee
is part of the package. Scientists generally believe
the reasoning abilities of chimps to be considerably greater
than that of dogs. But many people nonetheless believe that
dogs are smarter than chimps precisely because of our
familiarity and emotional ties with the dogs that we love.
We apply the same secret rules to our fellow humans: the
old in-group, out-group story. People in your in-group are
those who are similar to you, either because they belong
to the same organizations as you, or enjoy the same
activities, or, and this is the kicker, because they are simply
around more often. Dogs, because of their proximity to
their owners, are definitely in. The intensity of our
relationship with dogs causes us, quite naturally, to imbue
them with high-level mental abilities, whether they have
earned those extra intelligence points or not. We like them,
so we think well of them.
[/quote]
</p>
<p>The italics in line 25 most directly emphasize
(A) a misguided idea that is becoming obsolete
(B) a negative view that scientists adopt toward lay
people
(C) a common criticism of dog owners
(D) the controversial nature of an alternative theory
(E) the intensity of a conviction based on sentiment</p>
<p>How can C be disproved? </p>
<p>Question 15, page 79: (Find the passage in the pdf; the formatting is too weird)</p>
<p>Both the author of Passage 1 and the “experts”
mentioned in line 53 of Passage 2 directly support the
idea that
(A) writers of dog stories intentionally distort
the truth for dramatic purposes
(B) comparing the intelligence of dogs to that
of chimps is a pointless enterprise
(C) many people have an excessive emotional
attachment to their dogs
(D) dogs are less intelligent than many people
believe
(E) few people are familiar with learning theory
as it applies to dogs</p>
<p>Can't B be correct? Isn't it pointless because chimps are so obviously more intelligent than dogs are?</p>
<p>Thank you beforehand!</p>