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125
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To evaluate a plan to save money on office-space expenditures by having its employees work at home, XYZ Company asked volunteers from its staff to try the arrangement for six months. During this period, the productivity of these employees was as high as or higher than before.
Which of the following, if true, would argue most strongly against deciding, on the basis of the trial results, to implement the company's plan?
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126
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A child learning to play the piano will not succeed unless the child has an instrument at home on which to practice. However, good-quality pianos, whether new or secondhand, are costly. Buying one is justified only if the child has the necessary talent and perseverance, which is precisely what one cannot know in advance. Consequently, parents should buy an inexpensive
secondhand instrument at first and upgrade if and when the child's ability and inclination are proven.
Which of the following, if true, casts the most serious doubt on the course of action recommended for parents?
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127
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Nutritionists are advising people to eat more fish, since the omega-3 fatty acids in fish help combat many diseases. If everyone took this advice, however, there would not be enough fish in oceans, rivers, and lakes to supply the demand; the oceans are already being overfished. The obvious method to ease the pressure on wild fish populations is for people to increase their consumption of farmed fish.
Which of the following, if true, raises the most serious doubt concerning the prospects for success of the solution proposed above?
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128
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Which of the following most logically completes the market forecaster's argument?
Market forecaster: The price of pecans is high when pecans are comparatively scarce but drops sharply when pecans are abundant. Thus, in high-yield years, growers often store part of their crop in refrigerated warehouses until after the next year's harvest, hoping for higher prices then. Because of bad weather, this year's pecan crop will be very small. Nevertheless,
pecan prices this year will not be significantly higher than last year, since _________.
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129
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It is often said that high rates of inflation tend to diminish people's incentive to save and invest. This view must be incorrect, however, because people generally saved and invested more of their income in the 1970's when inflation rates were high than they did in the 1980's when inflation rates were low.
Of the following, the best criticism of the argument above is that it overlooks the possibility that
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130
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Which of the following most logically completes the argument below?
Within the earth's core, which is iron, pressure increases with depth. Because the temperature at which iron melts increases with pressure, the inner core is solid and the outer core is molten. Physicists can determine the melting temperature of iron at any given pressure and the pressure for any given depth in the earth. Therefore, the actual temperature at the boundary of the earth's outer and inner cores-the melting temperature of iron there-can be determined, since ______.
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131
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Which of the following most logically completes the reasoning?
Either food scarcity or excessive hunting can threaten a population of animals. If the group faces food scarcity, individuals in the group will reach reproductive maturity later than otherwise. If the group faces excessive hunting, individuals that reach reproductive maturity earlier will come to predominate. Therefore, it should be possible to determine whether prehistoric
mastodons became extinct because of food scarcity or human hunting, since there are fossilized mastodon remains from both before and after mastodon populations declined, and _____.
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132
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Many office buildings designed to prevent outside air from entering have been shown to have elevated levels of various toxic substances circulating through the air inside, a phenomenon known as sick building syndrome. Yet the air in other office buildings does not have elevated levels of these substances, even though those buildings are the same age as the "sick" buildings and have similar designs and ventilation systems.
Which of the following, if true, most helps to explain why not all office buildings designed to preven't outside air from entering have air that contains elevated levels of toxic substances?
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133
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Newsletter: A condominium generally offers more value for its cost than an individual house because of economies of scale.
The homeowners in a condominium association can collectively buy products and services that they could not afford on their own. And since a professional management company handles maintenance of common areas, condominium owners spend less time and money on maintenance than individual homeowners do.
The two portions in boldface play which of the following roles in the newsletter's argument?
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134
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Which of the following most logically completes the argument?
When officials in Tannersburg released their plan to widen the city's main roads, environmentalists protested that widened roads would attract more traffic and lead to increased air pollution. In response, city officials pointed out that today's pollution-control devices are at their most effective in vehicles traveling at higher speeds and that widening roads would increase the average speed of traffic. However, this
effect can hardly be expected to offset the effect pointed out by environmentalists, since ___
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135
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Premature babies who receive regular massages are more active than premature babies who do not. Even when all the babies drink the same amount of milk, the massaged babies gain more weight than do the unmassaged babies. This is puzzling because a more active person generally requires a greater food intake to maintain or gain weight.
Which of the following, if true, best reconciles the apparent discrepancy described above?
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136
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In Australia, in years with below-average rainfall, less water goes into rivers and more water is extracted from rivers for drinking and irrigation. Consequently, in such years, water levels drop considerably and the rivers flow more slowly. Because algae grow better the more slowly the water in which they are growing moves, such years are generally beneficial to populations of algae. But, by contrast, populations of algae drop in periods of extreme drought.
Which of the following, if true, does most to explain the contrast?
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137
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Which of the following, if true, most logically completes the politician's argument?
United States politician: Although the amount of United States goods shipped to Mexico doubled in the year after tariffs on trade between the two countries were reduced, it does not follow that the reduction in tariffs caused the sales of United States goods to companies and consumers in Mexico to double that year, because ___
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138
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Budget constraints have made police officials consider reassigning a considerable number of officers from traffic enforcement to work on higher-priority, serious crimes. Reducing traffic enforcement for this reason would be counterproductive, however, in light of the tendency of criminals to use cars when engaged in the commission of serious crimes. An officer stopping a car for a traffic violation can make a search that turns up evidence of serious crime.
Which of the following, if true, most strengthens the argument given?
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139
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Conventional wisdom suggests vaccinating elderly people first in flu season, because they are at greatest risk of dying if they contract the virus. This year's flu virus poses particular risk to elderly people and almost none at all to younger people, particularly children. Nevertheless, health professionals are recommending vaccinating children first against the virus rather than elderly people.
Which of the following, if true, provides the strongest reason for the health professionals' recommendation?
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140
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Pro-Teet Insurance Company has recently been paying out more on car-theft claims than it expected. Cars with special antitheft devices or alarm systems are much less likely to be stolen than are other cars. Consequently Pro-Teet, as part of an effort to reduce its annual payouts, will offer a discount to holders of car-theft policies if their cars have antitheft devices or alarm systems.
Which of the following, if true, provides the strongest indication that the plan is likely to achieve its goal?
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141
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While the total enrollment of public elementary and secondary schools in Sondland is one percent higher this academic year than last academic year, the number of teachers there increased by three percent. Thus, the Sondland Education Commission's prediction of a teacher shortage as early as next academic year is unfounded.
Which of the following, if true, most seriously weakens the claim that the prediction of a teacher shortage as early as next academic year is unfounded?
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142
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Art restorers who have been studying the factors that cause Renaissance oil paintings to deteriorate physically when subject to climatic changes have found that the oil paint used in these paintings actually adjusts to these changes well. The restorers therefore hypothesize that it is a layer of material called gesso, which is under the paint, that causes the deterioration.
Which of the following, if true, most strongly supports the restorers' hypothesis?
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143
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A newly discovered painting seems to be the work of one of two 17th-century artists, either the northern German Johannes Drechen or the Frenchman Louis Birelle, who sometimes painted in the same style as Drechen. Analysis of the carved picture frame, which has been identified as the painting's original 17thcentury frame, showed that it is made of wood found widely in northern Germany at the time, but rare in the part of France where Birelle lived. This shows that the painting is most likely the work of Drechen.
Which of the following is an assumption that the argument requires?
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144
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Archaeologists working in the Andes Mountains recently excavated a buried 4,000-year-old temple containing structures that align with a stone carving on a distant hill to indicate the direction of the rising sun at the summer solstice. Alignments in the temple were also found to point toward the position, at the summer solstice, of a constellation known in Andean culture as the Fox. Since the local mythology represents the fox as teaching people how to cultivate and irrigate plants, the ancient Andeans may have built the temple as a religious representation of the fox.
Which of the following is an assumption on which the argument is based?
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