A wide variety of weather phenomena (heat and cold waves, winter storms, hurricanes, tornadoes, and flooding) display more-or-less consistent patterns of frequency and severity—but such patterns have been increasingly inconsistent during recent decades. Though natural variability plays a role in determining the course of weather systems, there is evidence that modern trends observed by scientists are driven by a unified causal factor. Isolating that causal factor, however, has proved remarkably difficult, despite substantial climatological research. The types of evidence analysis that normally yield understandings of broader climate phenomena, like glacial core sampling or the observation of tree rings, have been tricky to apply in analyzing more complex relationships between individual weather events. Moreover, climate scientists and meteorologists have to distinguish weather anomalies from weather events representative of relevant trends. To summarize, available information indicates that the effects of anthropogenic climate change, though significant, are difficult to disentangle from the welter of other variables that interact with weather phenomena.

     Nonetheless, detailed research indicates that the primary causal factor behind weather trends may be anthropogenic climate change. Recent decades have seen increases in the number of days yearly that reached record high temperatures and decreases in the number of days yearly that reached record lows, but instances of record-breaking winter precipitation (snow) have increased as temperatures have risen. This information was once seen as contradicting established models of climate change, but scientists have explained it through a new hypothesis that accounts for the amount of moisture in the atmosphere. Warm periods of increased duration are postulated to cause increased winter precipitation if, evaporating vast quantities of water into the air, they dry some areas while weather systems bring the evaporated moisture to others. Once the moisture reaches colder climates, it condenses, and falls back to earth as rain or snow. As more regions become warmer for longer periods, the amount of airborne water increases, as do instances of extreme rain and snow. Thus, seemingly minor changes in global temperature can have significant effects on the frequency and severity of weather phenomena in every season and environment.

     What most recommends this theory is its ultimate simplicity. Though it may seem that droughts in some areas are unrelated to periods of increased precipitation in others, climate change is responsible for an environmental continuum that produces both. Increasing temperatures worldwide is the one cause that can explain all of these disparate phenomena.

     Researchers have attempted to explain the withdrawal of many healthy adult men from the American workforce through traditional economics frameworks, such as overseas competition and increased automation of traditional blue-collar jobs, which are often cheaper options for companies looking to save money on labor. However, detailed investigation indicates that increased offshoring and automation fail to fully explain this drop in labor participation. Instead, this investigation yields data that suggest only a multiplicity of causes can wholly account for widespread male retreat from the workforce. One cause is criminal records: nearly one in eight American men possesses a criminal history, and that disqualifies candidates in the eyes of most potential employers. Another cause is low educational attainment, which diminishes access to an increasingly technical and information-based economy. In light of this investigation, which indicates that multiple social forces have converged to exclude a major swath of the potential working population of the United States, the government should take action to improve poor outcomes for these “missing men.” Legislators should take action to lessen the stigma of criminal convictions, advocate programs proven to reduce recidivism, increase financial support for young people looking to pursue higher education, and provide specialized training for young men who express an interest in the technology-driven fields of the new economy.

     In 1905 Max Weber published The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism, one of the foundational texts of modern sociology and of economic sociology, in particular, and also one of the first to take an interpretive approach to human participation in social and economic systems. His treatise documents the approaches that peoples of various religious beliefs have taken to labor, leisure, wages, and the moral significance of worldly professions since the advent of the industrial revolution and the development of global capitalism. Weber's work theorizes that the development of novel economic systems is contingent on the Protestant, as opposed to the Catholic, conception of work as inherently virtuous (wherein labor is seen as a theological and an economic imperative).

     Weber's work can be seen as an early criticism of Karl Marx's entirely materialistic conception of sociological progress, in that he suggests that religious conviction contributed to the development of economic systems and not the other way around. Moreover, Weber was admirably modest in his claims, acknowledging that his was not the definitive understanding of economic development. However, because of the ways social science has developed in the intervening century, Weber's work is more notable as a spur to further inquiry than as an enduring source of scientific truth. Additionally, Weber's thinking was hamstrung by the immaturity of sociological methodology in his time: statistical analysis, data collection, and mathematical economics were all in their theoretical infancy at the time of his writing. Given The Protestant Ethic's scientific obsolescence, it serves as an enduring example of how sociological analysis has changed since its inception and how it continues to do so.

     The works of two nineteenth century thinkers promote conflicting theories of the locus of responsibility for the course of historical events. Thomas Carlyle, in his 1841 treatise On Heroes, Hero-Worship, and the Heroic in History, places little emphasis on the events or conditions that produce major figures or the environments that allow them to rise to prominence. Instead, Carlyle posits that the extraordinary charisma, intelligence, wisdom, or political skill of individual “great” figures, invariably men, are the primary means by which social progress is effected. Herbert Spencer (1820–1903), though, writes not only that social environments are responsible for any great figures societies produce, but that Carlyle's approach is puerile and “unscientific” in the vein of many popular sociological works of the era. Although both thinkers promote a theory attempting to isolate the “mechanisms” of history vis-à-vis individual figures, only Spencer's has survived recent criticism largely intact. He emphasizes the lesser-understood contingencies of progress that comprise the immense majority of sociohistorical phenomena. He concludes that while major figures often take credit for the causal chain of significant events, the individuals themselves are less directly responsible for them than is commonly believed. This generality demonstrates how Spencer laid the foundation for twentieth-century historical scholarship, which holds to the belief that historical events, even those led by “heroes,” follow from multitudinous and sometimes untraceable social preconditions.

     As the end of World War II brought about a housing boom, the market for consumer home lending expanded significantly, and the financial institutions that had traditionally provided mortgages to working-class Americans faced new competitive pressures. Although the United States League of Local Buildings and Loans in America (USLLBLA), an association of institutions focused on savings accounts and homeowner lending, did not oppose the entry of other lenders into the market, it did lobby to retain the privilege of offering higher interest rates on savings accounts than banks were allowed to give.

     These efforts were spurred in part by the expansion of the Federal Housing Administration (FHA), a federal agency that began to insure mortgages with increasingly consumer-friendly terms. The FHA rules, like USLLBLA, allowed people to afford homes who otherwise could not have done so. It did this in part by relaxing the regulations governing the maximum length of a mortgage and the minimum down payment required, making the loans available to those who accrued capital more slowly than the typical homeowner previously had. In response, the USLLBLA also formed the Voluntary Home Mortgage Credit Program (VHMCP), taking advantage of the new regulations to offer the more affordable loans to people in rural areas in hopes of forestalling further expansion of federal agencies into the mortgage business.

Given the three points below, what is the area of the triangle formed by connecting them?

, ,

A client seeking to sue his lawyer for unethical practices will find it difficult to press charges if there is a lack of some other lawyer to advise on ethical legal procedures.

An interesting fact about the human ear is that in the cochlea, hair cells are placed close to each other, moving in unison and assuming distinct cell shapes independent of one another.

If , what is the value of ?

(1)

(2)

If P is a real number and list S is defined as {-4, 4, 2, 2, P}, what is the value of x?

(1) x is the mean of list S

(2) x is the median of list S

Which of the following numbers is not divisible by a perfect square?

For people living in the small town of Prudhoe Bay in Alaska, mukluk boots with footbed insulation and parka hoods with a ruff are essential items for daily wear, a method to protect wearers against the harsh cold of the Arctic winter.

The average test score in a class of four students is 100. If no scores are negative, how many students scored less than 90?

(1) Two students each scored 155 on the test.

(2) The median score of the class is 105.

In a mountainside car rally, a certain team traveled for two days. On the second day, the team traveled 2 hours longer than they did the first day, at an average speed 5 mph greater. If the team covered a total distance of 180 miles and took a total of 14 hours to complete the entire rally, what was their average speed, in miles per hour, on the second day?

A circle has a square drawn within it such that all the vertices of the square touch the circumference of the circle. If the radius of the circle is 6, what is the area of the square?

If two points and lie on a straight line, what is the slope of the line?

Does ?

(1)

(2)

The state legislature made a major error in the bill funding a new digital system to detect speeding violations on state freeways. The bill provides sufficient funding to pay for the digital system and its maintenance, but it provides no funding for the salaries of the additional administrative employees that will be necessary to process the fines and violations that this new system will generate. The bureaucratic deadlock resulting from the lack of necessary personnel will more than offset any gains from the system.

Which of the following, if true, would most seriously weaken the conclusion drawn above?

A group of students was asked to participate in a study on computer ethics. The students were exposed to a series of case-studies involving computer hacking, which were intended to illustrate both ethical and malicious hacks. Researchers found that engineering students consistently found no fault in the actions of ethical hacking. However, students in other fields frequently held that all hackers were unethical, regardless of details in the case. This shows that the general populace rejects the idea that a well-intentioned hacker can be ethical.

Which of the following, if true, would most seriously weaken the conclusion above?

Beatrix Potter had indomitable faith in her book The Adventures of Peter Rabbit; in 1901, she illustrated the characters at her own expense and decided on publishing it herself.