By identifying stable isotopes of carbon-12 in human tissue, scientists have been able to prove that 25% of all carbon molecules consumed by Americans originate in corn. One of the most ubiquitous substances in the North American diet, corn has seemingly innumerable, multifarious uses. Each corn kernel's endosperm contains a preponderance of starch, a substance made of glucose molecules connected by glycosidic bonds which create long and complex chains of carbohydrate molecules that scientists have learned to separate and rearrange to form crucial raw materials for food and other industries. In the form of cattle feed, corn provides the key ingredient in the production of cheap meat, the basis of the contemporary American diet, while high fructose corn syrup is the major component of carbonated beverages so popular in the West. It could be argued that the current American way of life is not imaginable without the abundant supply of this staple crop. Therefore, given the multitude of corn's benefits unlocked by modern technology, it is ironic that an earlier culture equally dependent on it for sustenance might have been severely hampered by its limitations.
According to most scientists, corn is a mutated descendent of teosinte, a wild grass native to Central America. The ears of the teosinte plant were not large, encased the seeds in a hard envelope and contained much less seed than comparable grains, making them unappealing to primitive humans. However, several thousand years ago, an evolutionary jump redesigned the teosinte. The tassel, the male inflorescence at the end of a primary lateral branch of the plant, underwent a feminization which monopolized the resources of the lateral branch, creating larger ears with a corresponding number of seeds with higher nutritional content.
This evolutionary path is, according to anthropologist Jared Diamond, a key to the condition of pre-Columbian American societies. While Eurasian societies had an abundance of wild grains available for cultivation and, therefore, moved to agriculture tens of thousands of years ago, a time period which allowed for the creation of large populations and, eventually, a market for advanced technologies, pre-Columbian Americans had no enticement to form agricultural societies. They made this move relatively late and therefore had no time to create societies as large and complex as the Europeans, a fact that led to their defeat when the latter arrived in Central America.
Diamond's argument is not only innovative and parsimonious but relies on a seemingly unassailable basis of our knowledge of the evolutionary biology of corn. However, historical considerations make one reluctant to accept the veracity of Diamond's elegant argumentation. Whenever they started to grow, as we now know, Central American societies achieved significant demographic growth and technological progress and were able to mobilize significant resources for the conduct of war. Therefore, one must seek the roots of their defeat not in their dependence on corn but in factors such as epidemics launched by European arrival and the political dissensions in their midst.
Q1: Which of the following, if true, would weaken the author's objections to Diamond's theory?
(A) Although the population of pre-Columbian America was decimated by disease, the armies arrayed against the Europeans did not suffer the same fate because they did not live in close quarters.
(B) While they were outnumbered, the Europeans' use of iron breastplates allowed them to withstand the impact of bronze-tipped arrows used by pre-Columbian Americans.
(C) Remains of pre-historic agricultural societies in Eurasia show evidence of sophisticated technologies at much higher levels than those achieved by American societies at that time.
(D) Some societies of pre-Columbian America were strong enough to enforce their will on their neighbors and drew on those resources to present a united front against a third party.
(E) The average size of a pre-Columbian American village and the average yield of its crops were only half as large as their European counterparts.[/list]
Q2: The author of the passage is mainly concerned with
(A) debating the negative influence of corn's evolutionary development on the conflicts between the pre-Columbian Americans and Europeans, in contrast to corn's positive influence on our society today
(B) comparing the uses of corn in the present to the use of teosinte in the past, which led pre-Columbian American societies to develop in drastically different ways from their European counterparts, possibly leading to the former's downfall
(C) arguing against the theories of Jared Diamond which stipulate that corn's late evolutionary development caused Native American societies to develop later than European societies, leading to the former's downfall
(D) discussing the effects of corn on both the current American society and the pre-Columbian American society, which, as Jared Diamond argues so elegantly, caused the latter's downfall in its conflict with the Europeans
(E) explaining the benefits of corn's use today and explaining how the theory that corn's use by pre-Columbian American societies put them at a disadvantage in comparison to European societies is at odds with today's knowledge of the former
Q3: According to Jared Diamond, immediately after teosinte's mutation
(A) pre-Columbian American societies turned to agriculture
(B) its descendant was the only grain available for cultivation in the pre-Columbian Americas
(C) corn did not yet possess nutritional value equivalent to those of other grains
(D) pre-Columbian American societies started to cultivate corn and other wild grains
(E) the disparity between pre-Columbian American and Eurasian populations was equal to the disparity between the two populations during the Europeans' arrival to the Americas
Q4: One purpose of the second paragraph is to
(A) compare the uses and effects of a plant on a culture to the uses and effects, described in the first paragraph, of that plants' descendent on another culture
(B) put forth a scientific fact which clarifies a statement made in the first paragraph and whose possible historical significance is presented in the third paragraph
(C) explain a statement made in the first paragraph whose possible implications are detailed in the third paragraph
(D) describe a scientific process whose possible implications, according to one scholar, are detailed in the third paragraph and fourth paragraphs
(E) provide scientific background information that explains the topic which the author is most concerned with in the first paragraph[/list]
According to most scientists, corn is a mutated descendent of teosinte, a wild grass native to Central America. The ears of the teosinte plant were not large, encased the seeds in a hard envelope and contained much less seed than comparable grains, making them unappealing to primitive humans. However, several thousand years ago, an evolutionary jump redesigned the teosinte. The tassel, the male inflorescence at the end of a primary lateral branch of the plant, underwent a feminization which monopolized the resources of the lateral branch, creating larger ears with a corresponding number of seeds with higher nutritional content.
This evolutionary path is, according to anthropologist Jared Diamond, a key to the condition of pre-Columbian American societies. While Eurasian societies had an abundance of wild grains available for cultivation and, therefore, moved to agriculture tens of thousands of years ago, a time period which allowed for the creation of large populations and, eventually, a market for advanced technologies, pre-Columbian Americans had no enticement to form agricultural societies. They made this move relatively late and therefore had no time to create societies as large and complex as the Europeans, a fact that led to their defeat when the latter arrived in Central America.
Diamond's argument is not only innovative and parsimonious but relies on a seemingly unassailable basis of our knowledge of the evolutionary biology of corn. However, historical considerations make one reluctant to accept the veracity of Diamond's elegant argumentation. Whenever they started to grow, as we now know, Central American societies achieved significant demographic growth and technological progress and were able to mobilize significant resources for the conduct of war. Therefore, one must seek the roots of their defeat not in their dependence on corn but in factors such as epidemics launched by European arrival and the political dissensions in their midst.
Q1: Which of the following, if true, would weaken the author's objections to Diamond's theory?
(A) Although the population of pre-Columbian America was decimated by disease, the armies arrayed against the Europeans did not suffer the same fate because they did not live in close quarters.
(B) While they were outnumbered, the Europeans' use of iron breastplates allowed them to withstand the impact of bronze-tipped arrows used by pre-Columbian Americans.
(C) Remains of pre-historic agricultural societies in Eurasia show evidence of sophisticated technologies at much higher levels than those achieved by American societies at that time.
(D) Some societies of pre-Columbian America were strong enough to enforce their will on their neighbors and drew on those resources to present a united front against a third party.
(E) The average size of a pre-Columbian American village and the average yield of its crops were only half as large as their European counterparts.[/list]
Q2: The author of the passage is mainly concerned with
(A) debating the negative influence of corn's evolutionary development on the conflicts between the pre-Columbian Americans and Europeans, in contrast to corn's positive influence on our society today
(B) comparing the uses of corn in the present to the use of teosinte in the past, which led pre-Columbian American societies to develop in drastically different ways from their European counterparts, possibly leading to the former's downfall
(C) arguing against the theories of Jared Diamond which stipulate that corn's late evolutionary development caused Native American societies to develop later than European societies, leading to the former's downfall
(D) discussing the effects of corn on both the current American society and the pre-Columbian American society, which, as Jared Diamond argues so elegantly, caused the latter's downfall in its conflict with the Europeans
(E) explaining the benefits of corn's use today and explaining how the theory that corn's use by pre-Columbian American societies put them at a disadvantage in comparison to European societies is at odds with today's knowledge of the former
Q3: According to Jared Diamond, immediately after teosinte's mutation
(A) pre-Columbian American societies turned to agriculture
(B) its descendant was the only grain available for cultivation in the pre-Columbian Americas
(C) corn did not yet possess nutritional value equivalent to those of other grains
(D) pre-Columbian American societies started to cultivate corn and other wild grains
(E) the disparity between pre-Columbian American and Eurasian populations was equal to the disparity between the two populations during the Europeans' arrival to the Americas
Q4: One purpose of the second paragraph is to
(A) compare the uses and effects of a plant on a culture to the uses and effects, described in the first paragraph, of that plants' descendent on another culture
(B) put forth a scientific fact which clarifies a statement made in the first paragraph and whose possible historical significance is presented in the third paragraph
(C) explain a statement made in the first paragraph whose possible implications are detailed in the third paragraph
(D) describe a scientific process whose possible implications, according to one scholar, are detailed in the third paragraph and fourth paragraphs
(E) provide scientific background information that explains the topic which the author is most concerned with in the first paragraph[/list]
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