https://www.facebook.com/events/997471466982241/
1. C. Rangarajan, chairman of the Economic Advisory Council to the
former Prime Minister, had said that the Indian education system was
more focussed on answering examinations than on imparting knowledge.
Questions being asked in examinations did not call for an application
of the mind or critical analyses. Most often, they were a test of
memory. Therefore, he said, there was an urgent need to reform the
examination system. In this regard, several changes to the structure
of exams as well as the syllabus had been recommended, but no
consensus reached yet, and India was falling behind developed nations.
Which of the following can be inferred from this paragraph?
a)
Students should regard learning as an exciting experience and show a
genuine desire to learn and keep other interests out of their minds.
They should demand a rigorous education and a better examination
system.
b)
The developed nations have moved ahead of India with better structured
education systems.
c)
No changes have ever been made to the Indian higher education system.
There is infighting and lack of political will on the issue which
prevents a consensus being reached.
d)
Fifteen years ago India was on par with developed nations and the
changes that have been recommended need to be immediately put into
effect.
2.Biochar is a name for charcoal when it is used for particular
purposes, especially as a soil amendment. Like most charcoal, biochar
is created by pyrolysis of biomass. Burn any kind of organic material
− corn husks, hazelnut shells, bamboo − in an oxygen depleted process
called pyrolysis, and you generate gases and heat that can be used as
energy − biochar. Biochar is under investigation as an approach to
carbon sequestration to produce negative carbon dioxide emissions.
Biochar thus has the potential to help mitigate climate change, via
carbon sequestration. It thus proves helpful in reducing global
warming.
Which of the following, if true, would weaken the claim that biochar
is helpful in reducing global warming?
a)
The process of pyrolysis itself produces carbon dioxide emissions more
than normal energy sources.
b)
By using biochar, the farmers could fertilize existing plots instead
of clearing more land.
c)
Pyrolysis can produce enough energy in an efficient way to power a
tractor and biochar can improve soils.
d)
When added to thin and acidic soils, biochar produces higher
agricultural yields and cuts down fertilizers.
3.Sluggishness or a lack of energy or vigor or interest or enthusiasm
has to be overcome before one can achieve one's goals and targets and
meet expectations. To overcome sluggishness its existence has to be
accepted.
The above statements imply all of the following EXCEPT?
a)
Acceptance of sluggishness is a necessary precondition to meeting
one's goals and targets. Goals and targets can be met only by those
who have successfully dealt with their sluggishness.
b)
A person who does not take sluggishness seriously always fall short of
expectations.
c)
To meet expectations and achieve goals and targets, accepting and
overcoming sluggishness is a must.
d)
People who readily accept their sluggishness and are ready to face it
succeed in meeting expectations.
4.(a) Hitler next positioned his divisions along the Czechoslovakian
border, demanding that Britain and France turn a blind eye to
Germany's impending assault on that helpless country.
(b) Chamberlain even said of the meeting, "I got the impression that
here was a man who could be relied upon when he had given his word."
(c) Hitler, knowing his army might suffer a crushing defeat if Britain
and France combined forces to resist the attack, called for a meeting
in Germany, where he bullied and cajoled, setting off frightful
emotions in Chamberlain.
(d) Later historians would write that Chamberlain's distorted
perceptions of reality created deadly flaws in his thinking at a time
when Great Britain desperately needed realistic thinking about the
intentions of Hitler.
(e) When Adolf Hitler marched his troops into Austria, British Prime
Minister Neville Chamberlain hoping for peace dismissed the incident
as only an isolated event.
(f) At the meeting, when Hitler called Czechoslovakia his "last
territorial demand," Chamberlain deceived himself into believing it,
even though reality belied everything Hitler said.
a)
ceabdf
b)
cefbad
c)
eacfbd
d)
ecabdf
5.OMO
a)
The entire conceptual edifice of modern science is a product of biology.
b)
Even the most basic and profound ideas of science − relativity,
quantum theory, the theory of evolution by natural selection −are
generated and necessarily limited by the particular capacities of our
human biology, the limitations of our human brains.
c)
There was also the discovery of DNA and the genetic code with its
implication (to quote James Watson) that "There are only molecules.
Everything else is sociology" and there was also the Darwinian
revolution; the idea that far from being the climax of "intelligent
design" we are merely neotonous apes that happen to be slightly
cleverer than our cousins.
d)
This implies that the content and scope of scientific knowledge is not
open ended.
6. OMO
a)
So far archaeologists have discovered 40 large burial mounds
containing 600 likenesses of mythical animals, gods and chieftains in
what is South America's largest complex of megalithic statues.
b)
The museum has adopted its own form of protest and opened the
exhibition minus statues; light is projected where the statues would
have been; guides use a virtual-reality program and tablet computers
to show visitors a 3D image of what was meant to be there.
c)
Nestled between the headwaters of the Magdalena river and high Andean
moorland, the ancient stone statues at San Agustín are among the most
mysterious pre-Columbian archaeological artefacts.
d)
Like other sites in the region, San Agustín has suffered plunder, both
organised and freelance; Konrad Preuss, a German anthropologist who
led the first European excavations there, shipped 35 statues that he
found to a museum in Berlin, where they remain.
OMO
7.
a)
Rich prizes beckon companies that grasp digital opportunities;
ignominy awaits those that fail.
b)
The days of derision are long gone: now geeks are gods.
c)
To thousands of bright young people, nothing is cooler than coding the
night away, striving to turn their own startup into the next big
thing.
d)
Amazon, Apple, Facebook, Google and Twitter are reinventing the ways
in which mere mortals converse, read, play, shop and live.
SUMMARY
8. Everybody at Harmony Villa loved the birch grove behind the house,
though to none of them did it mean what it meant to Alice. For her it
lived. She not only knew the birches but they knew her: the fern-sweet
solitudes, threatened with shadows, knew her; the wind in the boughs
always made her a glad salutation. From the first beginnings of memory
she had played in it and wandered in it and dreamed in it. She could
not remember the time it had not held her imagination in thrall and
dominated her life. It could never be to Alice just the ordinary grove
of white-skinned trees and ferny hollows it was to other people.
a)
All the residents of Harmony Villa loved the birch grove behind the
house, especially Alice.
b)
For Alice, the birch grove behind Harmony Villa was almost like a living thing.
c)
The birch grove behind the house was special to Alice in ways it was
not to other people.
d)
The grove of birch trees behind her house had always dominated Alice's life.
SUMMARY
9. Our cultural backgrounds influence not only how we marry but how we
make choices in nearly every area of our lives. From early on, members
of individualistic societies are taught the special importance of
personal choice. Even a walk through the grocery store becomes an
opportunity to teach lessons about choosing, particularly in the
United States, where stores routinely offer hundreds of options. A
parent will probably narrow down the number of choices and explain the
differences between this cereal and that one, or that toy and this
one, but the child would be encouraged to express a preference. By
contrast, members of collectivist societies place greater emphasis on
duty. Children are often told, "If you are a good child, you'll do
what your parents tell you," and the parents need not explain
themselves. From what you eat to what you wear, the toys you play with
to what you study, it is what you are supposed to do that is most
important.
a)
Individualist societies have greater dialogue with their children
whereas collectivist societies mostly talk down to their children.
b)
Individualistic societies stress more on the individual and are more
self centered, whereas collectivist societies stress more on social
units such as families and are unselfish.
c)
Children of individualist societies become accustomed to making their
own decisions whereas children in collectivist societies such as India
prefer to let their elders decide for them.
d)
Culture influences choice making. Individualistic societies emphasize
personal choice while collectivist societies emphasize duty.
summary
10. Corruption is an intractable problem. Like Diabetes, it can be
controlled but can't be eliminated. Despite moaning about corruption,
we don't hesitate to vote for the same tainted persons. Choosing
honest and dedicated people, introducing electoral reforms and
controlling electoral expenses can combat corruption to some extent.
Inculcating values in our young children might give us some hope in
future. Corruption has to be rooted out from the roots.
a)
The person who gives bribe is as much responsible for corruption as
the person who takes it.
b)
It is not easy to wipe out corruption from the world.
c)
To tackle the epidemic of corruption which can only be controlled but
not eliminated, measures like electoral reforms, choosing people of
integrity and focussing on moral values in youth can help to an
extent.
d)
Corruption can be rooted out only if every citizen vows to keep himself clean.
11 SC
Select all that are correct:
a)
With Susana Diaz beaming radiant from the conference stage after
winning control of the Spanish Socialists' mighty Andalusian branch
b)
in Granada last month, fans hailed a generational and gender
revolution in the party. Her victory confirmed that the
c)
energetic 39-years-old, who also runs the region's government, is now
Spain's most powerful Socialist.
d)
That is a big role in a country where the ruling Popular Party of
Mariano Rajoy and the Socialists tends to alternate in power.
e)
Ms Diaz's smile hides an iron will. She is at ease with power and is
reputedly ruthless against rivals.
12 SC
Identify Correct
a)
The digital revolution is transforming the process of innovation
itself. Thanks to off-the-shelf code from the internet and platforms
b)
that host services, provide distribution and offer marketing, the
number of digital startups have exploded.
c)
Just as computer-games designers invented a product that humanity
never knew it needed, these firms will dream up new products to employ
millions.
d)
When Instagram, a popular photo-sharing site, was sold to Facebook for
about $1 billion in 2012, it had 30m customers and employed 13 people.
e)
Kodak, which filed for bankruptcy a few months earlier, employed
145,000 people in its heyday.
13SC
Select all that are correct:
a)
The prospect from Sam mountain, rocky outcrop in southern Vietnam's
Mekong delta, is timeless.
b)
Paddy fields shine like emeralds and irrigation canals reflect the
sunlight as mirrors.
c)
Three times a year, farmers in surrounding towns put on their rubber
boots and plant rice seedlings deep in the soil.
d)
Rice cultivation is rooted in the Vietnamese psyche deeply.
e)
Today Vietnam's $ 4 billion in rice exports account for more than a
fifth of the global total.
14 sc
Select all that are correct:
a)
For much of the 27 years that Nelson Mandela was in prison, another
South African led an equally almost solitary life,
b)
in purely political terms, with virtue of her role as the sole liberal
member of parliament. Helen Suzman, a beacon of decency, courage and
common sense,
c)
tormented a succession of justice ministers with her barbed wit. A
string of former political prisoners, including Mandela himself,
d)
testified of her courage and, perhaps even more important, to the
effect she had in publicising and often alleviating the harshness of
their conditions behind bars.
e)
She never shrank from inveighing the tendency of the African National
Congress (ANC) to put party and state above the individual, whether
black or white.
15.Research has shown that meditation can contribute to an
individual's psychological and physiological well-being. This is
accomplished as meditation brings the brainwave pattern into an alpha
state, which is a level of consciousness that promotes the healing
state. There is scientific evidence that meditation can reduce blood
pressure and relieve pain and stress. Research has shown that hormones
and other biochemical compounds in the blood indicative of stress tend
to decrease during meditation. These changes also stabilize over time,
so that a person is actually less stressed biochemically during daily
activity. When used in combination with biofeedback, meditation
enhances the effectiveness of biofeedback. The benefits of an ongoing
meditation practice as it impacts our health can be classified further
into three categories: physiological, psychological and spiritual.
Most people who practise meditation do so to reduce stress, anxiety,
anger and other negative emotions. Increasingly, physicians prescribe
meditation as part of the treatment for a large and growing number of
medical conditions.
Which of the following, if true, significantly strengthens the idea
given in the passage?
a)
People who meditate for long periods of time often cannot distinguish
between their meditative state and reality.
b)
History of medicine shows that meditation is the oldest and most
popular system of relaxation and meditation has been proven to have no
side effects.
c)
Meditation has been recommended by people from many walks of life as a
valuable form of exercise for those living in noisy and fast cities.
d)
In a credible survey conducted to find out the impact of meditation,
70% of respondents said they felt more relaxed and less worried about
daily happenings after meditating.
#RC
One of the most influential philosophers of the post-Renaissance
period was René Descartes, who also contributed to the study of the
anatomy of the brain and the relation between the mind and body. In De
homine (On Man), published posthumously in 1662, Descartes theorized
that filaments within each nerve tube operated tiny "valvules" that
could control the flow of animal spirits into the nerves. He thought
that external stimuli would move the skin, which would pull on these
filaments to open valvules in the ventricles. This allowed animal
spirits to be released from the ventricular reservoirs into the
nerves, which in turn would trigger the muscles to move.
Descartes (1650, 1662) presented this reflexive theory only to account
for involuntary behaviour. He believed that voluntary behaviour
demanded the interaction of the rational soul with the automaton. He
maintained that this occurred through the pineal gland, a small
central body suspended between the anterior ventricles. Small
movements by the pineal gland regulated the flow of spirits through
the intricate system of pipes and valves.
It is often stated that Descartes may have considered the pineal gland
simply because it was unitary rather than double. Although this was an
important factor, Descartes also selected the pineal gland because it
was surrounded by cerebrospinal fluid, which he believed served as a
reservoir for animal spirits.
The solution to the mind-body problem proposed by Descartes was not
widely accepted. Among other things, it was argued that the pineal
gland was even better developed in wild animals than in humans, even
though the brutes were considered soulless automata. Descartes should
have expected this. In 1543, Andreas Vesalius had discussed the gross
anatomy of the pineal gland when dissecting human brains. In fact, in
Book VII of his De HumaniCorporisFabrica (The Fabric of The Human
Body), he decried, "I wish that a sheep's brain be at hand, since it
shows the gland more distinctly than does the human head."
Even Galen had discussed the pineal gland in his anatomy lesson of
A.D. 177, which called for the brain of an ox. But perhaps, even more
interestingly, in the eighth book of his De UsuPartium (On The Use of
Parts of The Body), Galen mentioned the idea of pineal movements
regulating the flow of spirits. He wrote that he evaluated this theory
and found it absurd.
For this and other reasons, opinions varied as to whether the pineal
gland could be regarded as the seat of the soul. In this context, a
few of Descartes' contemporaries suggested that the honour should be
granted to another unique structure, the corpus callosum. In
retrospect, Descartes' ideas about the brain as a reflexive machine
probably had more impact on the development of scientific thought than
his specific solution to the mind-body problem.
16. What is the primary function of the passage?
a)
To present an argument and provide examples supporting the argument.
b)
To present a hypothesis and prove the hypothesis using other studies.
c)
To present a theory and critically discuss it.
d)
To present various solutions to a scholarly dilemma.
17. According to the passage, what should Descartes have expected (in para 4)?
a)
That the pineal gland could not have been the seat of the soul.
b)
That the pineal gland could not have regulated the flow of animal spirits.
c)
That the pineal gland in wild animals was better developed than in humans.
d)
That the nature of the pineal gland in wild animals would be used to
challenge his theory.
18. Which of the following is an assumption made by Descartes while
proposing his solution to the mind-body problem?
a)
The movements of pineal glands regulates the flow of animal spirits.
b)
The pineal gland is unitary.
c)
The pineal gland is not well developed in wild animals.
d)
Cerebrospinal fluid serves as a reservoir for animal spirits.
19. DIRECTIONS for question 85: Select one or more answer choices
according to the directions given in the question.
Which of the following statements can be inferred from the passage
about the corpus callosum?
Select all that apply:
a)
The amount of cerebrospinal fluid surrounding it is more than that
surrounding pineal gland.
b)
It is a gland present in the brain
c)
It is also unitary like the pineal gland
d)
None of the above
20.(a) It's the leading edge of the train of knowledge − containing
all the history of the past and all the infinite possibilities of the
future −that keeps the whole train on the track.
(b) You don't have pure reason − you have pure confusion.
(c) Romantic reality is the cutting edge of experience.
(d) Traditional knowledge is only the collective memory of where that
leading edge has been.
(e) At the leading edge, there are no subjects, no objects, only the
track of quality ahead, and if you have no formal way of evaluating,
no way of acknowledging this quality, then the entire train has no way
of knowing where to go.
a)
ecdab
b)
decba
c)
cbeda
d)
cadeb
#RC
In the period between 1961 and 1989, the regulated art system of the
German Democratic Republic (GDR) led to a large scale exodus of at
least fifteen hundred artists to the Federal Republic of Germany
(FRG). Several young artists, who were born in the post-World War II
period, did so in order to discontinue working according to the rigid
confines of the art policy that favoured Socialist Realism as an ideal
style for the construction of a socialist utopia. For this generation,
who experienced the devastating impact of World War II only through
the stories of their parents, the GDR was "a dead corpse, dead to an
extent that you could only make fun of it", as the performance artist
Else Gabriel stated shortly after the collapse of the regime. Their
utter disillusionment in the failing socialist society was expressed
in autonomous artistic production that embraced Western modernist
approaches such as performance art, and sought legitimation in its
disturbing impact on a closed society. However, this nonconformist
attitude put artists in the crosshairs of the secret police (Minister
iumfürStaatssicherheit/MfS or Stasi), that in turn criminalized their
actions, and ultimately sought to dismantle or destroy artistic
groups. In order to continue developing their modernist art practice
and being recognized as artists, several artists were left no other
choice than to emigrate, whether through internal migration or fleeing
to 'non-socialist' foreign countries.
This exodus occurred despite the fact that the bureaucracy of an
emigration application (Ausreiseantrag) was unyielding and the process
could take up to six years. In the mid-1980s, when the overall
problems of the socialist system became more apparent, the application
rate increased significantly. For years, applicants literally lived
amidst their packed boxes in anticipation of a definitive answer on
their emigration applications. Once in the West, they faced new
challenges as they transitioned from the state-controlled model of
artistic production of the East towards the market-led approach
favoured in the West, with marked effects on their work. After all of
these efforts and sacrifices, deserting artists ended up only a few
years later in a state where the former East suddenly became West.
Why would an artist who was the visual translator of the socialist
utopia and thus generally enjoyed a high status and a good income have
a desire to fleein the first place? By pointing out the core
limitations artists found themselves confronted with, a better
understanding of their motives for pursuing emigration to the West
will evolve. By focusing on the (self-) controlled and regulate dart
system of the GDR we can define the artistic constraints and thereby
the limitations for the younger generation. The hierarchal structure
of East Germany's ruling party, the SED (Sozialistische Einheitspartei
Deutschlands/Socialist Unity Party of Germany), was reflected in its
subsidized cultural sector. In order to influence the artistic
landscape and promote the official artistic style, Socialist Realism,
the state government founded the Verband Bildender Künstler
Deutschlands (short: VBKD or VBK), the artists' union, in the early
1950s. Association with this union was mandatory to pursue an artistic
career. The union enforced the right to use special food cards in the
early years of the socialist state, supported artists' efforts to find
a studio or apartment, and most importantly assigned commissions for
art works. Simultaneously, the VBK was used as apolitical instrument
that implemented actual dogmas of the art policy, such as the
promotion of the prototypical function of Soviet art in society.
Meanwhile, the cultural department carried out campaigns against
expressionism, formalism, cosmopolitism, abstract art and heavily
debated performance arts in the 1980s.Non-conformists, i.e. those who
worked in an independent manner, could continue their work only
through private funding or at their own expense. Artists whose art was
not in alignment with the dogma prescribed by the official socialist
style were therefore excluded from art exhibitions and commissions and
could even be banned from exhibition and work.
21. According to the passage, who among the following is most likely
to be a non-conformist artist?
a)
An artist who practised Socialist Realism.
b)
An artist who was born in the post-World War II era.
c)
An artist who was associated with VBKD.
d)
An artist who practised abstract art.
22. In the second para, when the author mentions "…amidst their packed
boxes...", he intends to convey that
a)
the applicants were eager to move to the West.
b)
the applicants were against Socialism.
c)
the applicants were eager to leave the GDR.
d)
the Ausreiseantrag was about to accept their application.
23. The primary function that the quote in the first paragraph, "a
dead corpse, dead to an extent that you could only make fun of it",
serves is to
a)
indicate the tone of the passage.
b)
indicate the importance of art in the GDR.
c)
indicate the lack of activism by the state government in patronising art.
d)
indicate the general sentiment of the young post war populace of GDR.
24. Which of the following situations would be most similar to that of
a non-conformist artist in GDR during the period 1961-1989?
a)
A teenager pursuing his hobby against the wishes of his parents.
b)
A researcher publishing only the optimistic findings of his research.
c)
A book vendor selling books that are against the political sentiments
of the state.
d)
A rebel leader fighting for his principles.
25.(a) Thankfully we do not have to reinvent the wheel time and again,
but occasionally we find ourselves using wheels when, in fact, we need
to invent new forms of transportation.
(b) We may chuckle today at the Church's opposition to Galileo, but we
have our own share of favourite preconceptions embedded in our
consciousness.
(c) Sharp minds like Galileo's resist the temptation, indeed
compulsion, to rely on old mental patterns when only new ones will do
and fully appreciate the often unconscious mental process by which we
perceive events, people and things.
(d) Entrenched patterns, right or wrong, become extremely difficult to
change, as Galileo discovered when he suggested, counter to Church
dogma, that the Earth does not occupy the centre of the Universe.
(e) The ability of humans to think in patterns as they navigate
through life's sophisticated and mundane tasks is at once the greatest
strength and the most pernicious weakness of healthy human brains,
regardless of IQ.
a)
cebad
b)
eadbc
c)
cedab
d)
badec
According to Stamps, indicators of habitat quality, as perceived by an
individual of a dispersing species, include the presence of resources,
conspecifics, and hetero specifics. As you might imagine, dispersers
lack the time and energy needed to complete in-depth assessments of
critical resources in the habitats they encounter. Evidence suggests
that some dispersers rely on "quick and dirty" cues to assess the
relative quality of prospective settlement sites. For example, young
lizards (Anolisaeneus) that leave their natal site to search for
feeding territories spend only about six hours evaluating a particular
location. Given their varied diet of arthropods, this time period is
probably too short to permit a detailed assessment of prey
availability. So, rather than assessing arthropod availability at each
site, the lizards seem to assess habitat characteristics such as light
intensity and amount of leaf litter. These characteristics correlate
with prey availability and lend themselves to more rapid evaluation
than the painstaking task of evaluating the local availability of
several different prey species.
What about conspecifics? Should dispersers evaluate their presence or
absence in the vicinity of a prospective home? Absence of conspecifics
from a particular site might be a good thing. After all, if an
individual settles into an unoccupied site, then it would avoid all
that nasty intraspecific (i.e., within the same species) competition
for resources. There are two main ideas concerning how fitness might
change with number of conspecifics in an area. One model, proposed by
Fretwell, called the ideal free distribution, predicts that individual
fitness will decline as the number of conspecifics in a patch
increases. Another idea, proposed by Allee, suggests that individual
fitness increases with the number of conspecifics at low to moderate
densities, and then declines from moderate to high densities.
Stamps concluded that presence of conspecifics in an area could also
serve as a source of information about habitat quality. Juvenile
lizards (A. aeneus), for example, seem to use conspecific presence as
an indirect cue to habitat quality. Juveniles were allowed to view two
sites of equivalent quality; a territory owner was present in one site
but not on the other. After ten days, the territory owner was removed
and the juveniles were allowed to select between the two sites. The
young lizards preferred the previously occupied site to the equivalent
unoccupied site.
The presence of hetero specifics in a particular habitat can have
costs and benefits for an animal considering whether to settle there.
Interactions between species that share mutual resources could be
negative due to interspecific (i.e., between different species)
competition. Interactions between hetero specific individuals can also
be beneficial, however, such as when birds from mixed species flock
and experience the benefits of enhanced food acquisition and
antipredator behaviour. Thus, moving in where there are neighbours of
other species may be beneficial under certain circumstances. This idea
has been formalized by Mönkkönen as the heterospecific attraction
hypothesis which states that individuals choose habitat patches based
on the presence of established residents of other species. This model
predicts that individuals searching for a new home will display the
strongest attraction to heterospecifics when the benefits of social
aggregation outweigh the costs of competition and when the costs of
independent sampling of habitats are high.
26. Which of the following statements regarding dispersers and
conspecifics is accurate according to the passage?
a)
Dispersers tend to consider the presence of conspecifics to be a
negative indicator of the quality of a prospective habitat.
b)
If the population of conspecifics is high, it will increase the
individual fitness of the dispersers.
c)
Dispersers assess the characteristics of a habitat and correlate them
with the presence of conspecifics.
d)
The presence of conspecifics in a habitat is considered to be a
positive indicator of the quality of a prospective habitat by some
dispersers.
27. "After all, if an individual settles into an unoccupied site, then
it would avoid all that nasty intraspecific competition for
resources." The model proposed by which of the following authors
mentioned in the passage would support the above statement?
a)
Allee
b)
Fretwell
c)
Mönkkönen
d)
Stamps
28. Which of the following statements can definitely be inferred about
the territory owner of a habitat, in the context of the selection of a
site by a juvenile lizard?
a)
Territory owner is a conspecific whose presence indicates a high
quality habitat.
b)
The territory owner is a prey of the disperser indicating higher
resource availability and a better quality of settlement site.
c)
The territory owner is a conspecific whose presence will result in
lower individual fitness for the disperser.
d)
Both A and C
29. It can be inferred from the passage that, heterospecifics and
conspecifics in a habitat often
a)
share a predator and prey relation.
b)
serve diametrically opposite purposes during habitat selection by dispersers.
c)
coexist in a symbiotic relationship, sharing mutual benefits.
d)
do not prefer to co-exist in the same territory.
30.(a) Those in the comfort zone dislike and fear change. They avoid
risk − and, given their presence, even dominance, in some
organizations, they let conformity trump creativity whenever new
thinking threatens the status quo.
(b) However, creative minds must march courageously to the beat of a
different drum, one not always pleasing to those with trained years.
(c) Critics need not take personal responsibility for ideas, since
they only invest themselves in finding fault in the ideas of others.
(d) Those who muster the courage to rock boats quite often invite the
suspicion, resistance and even sabotage of shipmates who prefer a
comfortable ride.
(e) It's all quite natural because we all find it easier to criticize
than create.
(f) Breaking ranks always requires courage, in the navy and elsewhere.
a)
caedbf
b)
ecfdab
c)
fdaecb
d)
facdeb
Digitization is upending many core tenets of competition among
industries by lowering the cost of entering markets and providing
high-speed passing lanes to scale up enterprises. At the extreme are
hyperscale businesses that are pushing the new rules of digitization
so radically that they are challenging conventional management
intuition about scale and complexity. These businesses have users,
customers, devices, or interactions numbered in the hundreds of
millions, billions, or more. Billions of interactions and data points,
in turn, mean that events with only a one-in-a-million probability are
happening many times a day.
Taken individually, each of these businesses seems like a special
case. After all, how many companies can be like Google, which
processes around four billion searches a day; Twitter, handling 500
million tweets a day; or Alibaba, the world's largest e-commerce
market, which facilitated 254 million orders in one day?
Yet the existence of even a small but growing number of such
businesses represents a new and potent competitive force. Digital
powerhouses already are flexing their hyperscale muscles to move from
search and social networking into new sectors, like banking and
retailing. Furthermore, hyperscaling will probably touch more areas as
cheaper computer power, sensors, and communications accelerate the
pace at which businesses adopt digital technologies. Already, the
number of subscribers to China Mobile's digital and voice services has
grown to over 760 million; payments networks such as Visa process
billions of transactions; and new hyperscale segments are emerging in
manufacturing industries thanks to the Internet of Things, which
creates massive data flows from machine-to-machine interactions. For
example, the GE twin-jet engines on a Boeing 787 Dreamliner generate a
terabyte of information a day.
In the face of these developments, senior leaders and boards will need
not only to focus on their current digitization strategies but also to
consider which hyperscale businesses could threaten their existing or
emerging digital models. Alternatively, as established businesses
become more fully digitized, they may find they have opportunities to
compete at hyperscale in some segments. Large retail businesses can
exploit immense data troves that enable hyperscaling. New business
models may emerge from exploiting machine-to-machine data, making it
possible for companies that draw revenues from sales of physical
assets, such as vehicles or factory machines, to evolve into service
businesses based on usage charges. Clearly, the game is still in its
early innings and therefore, the business leaders need to have a
closer view of the new terrain at the frontiers of digital
competition.
31.The author used the phrase "high-speed passing lanes", most likely
in order to indicate that digitization is
a)
providing a path for easier entry into the market due to lower costs.
b)
creating an avenue for increased competition between large and small companies.
c)
providing an opportunity to scale up rapidly by challenging
conventional management principles.
d)
is a likely means of threat to existing businesses as new companies
manage to scale up rapidly.
32.What does the author imply when he states the fact, "twin-jet
engines on a Boeing 787 Dreamliner generate a terabyte of information
a day", in the passage?
a)
Communication between machines is significant in manufacturing industries
b)
The data generated because of machine-to-machine interactions is huge in scale.
c)
Internet of Things, involving machine-to-machine interactions has
helped manufacturing industries.
d)
Hyperscaling can be relevant even to manufacturing industries.
33.According to the passage, which of the following is necessary for
hyperscaling to affect an industry?
a)
The industry should be a nascent one.
b)
The industry should involve generating and managing massive data.
c)
The industry should follow conventional business practices.
d)
The industry should primarily be based on digital technology.
34.At the end of the passage, the author said "the game is still in
its early innings" most likely because he believes that
a)
the impact that hyper scaling can have on businesses has not been
fully realized.
b)
the business leaders of digital businesses are all very young.
c)
hyper scaling has changed the business practices of conventional businesses.
d)
many business leaders are not aware of hyper scaling.
Sunday 28 February 2016
29.02.16
https://www.facebook.com/events/1051680678223018/
1.(a) World Bank reports, among others, have come to the conclusion
that the growth of the biofuel industry has a serious impact on food
scarcity and food inflation the world over.
(b) Biofuel evangelism started in the 1970s and was at its peak in the
following decades.
(c) US markets have seen major distortions in the food market because
of ethanol subsidies while there has been food scarcity in Mexico
because of the diversion of corn for ethanol production.
(d) But over the past few years, there has been a mounting pile of
evidence that going the biofuel route can cause more harm than good.
(e) The more arable land is diverted to growing biofuel crops, the
less there is for cultivating food crops.
a)
bdaec
b)
abdec
c)
baecd
d)
ecabd
2.(a) The principal assumption of the anti-smoking movement has been
that tobacco companies persuade teens to smoke by lying to them, by
making smoking sound a lot more desirable and a lot less harmful than
it really is.
(b) And we've run extensive public health campaigns on television and
radio and in magazines to try to educate teens about the dangers of
smoking.
(c) We've raised the price of cigarettes and enforced the law against
selling tobacco to minors, to try to make it much harder for teens to
buy cigarettes.
(d) To address that problem, then, we've restricted and policed
cigarette advertising, so it's a lot harder for tobacco companies to
lie.
(e) Teenage smoking is one of the great, baffling phenomena of modern
life – no one really knows how to fight it, or even, for that matter,
what it is.
a)
edcba
b)
eadcb
c)
aedcb
d)
ecbda
3.(a) Although they may sound as if they don't have very much in
common, they share a basic, underlying pattern.
(b) They simply wore the shoes when they went to clubs or cafes or
walked the streets of downtown New York, and in so doing exposed other
people to their fashion sense.
(c) The rise of Hush Puppies and the fall of New York's crime rate are
textbook examples of epidemics in action.
(d) No one took out an advertisement and told people that the
traditional Hush Puppies were cool and they should start wearing them.
(e) They infected them with the Hush Puppies "virus".
(f) First of all, they are clear examples of contagious behavior.
a)
cfdabe
b)
cfadeb
c)
cafdbe
d)
dbecaf
OMO
4.
a)
However, Golden Rice is not produced by a corporate behemoth but by
the public sector whose aim is to double food production; and reduce
the number of deaths and cases of blindness caused by vitamin A
deficiency.
b)
If the green revolution had never happened, and yields had stayed at
1960 levels, the world could not produce its current food output even
if it ploughed up every last acre of cultivable land.
c)
In August 2014, environmentalists in the Philippines vandalised a
field of Golden Rice − an experimental grain whose genes had been
modified to carry beta-carotene, a chemical precursor of vitamin A −
claiming that genetically modified (GM) crops pose health risks.
d)
Hence, vandalising Golden Rice (GM) field trials is a bit like the
campaign of some religious leaders to prevent smallpox inoculations:
it causes misery, even death, in the name of obscurantism and
unscientific belief.
OMO
5.
a)
A few though, keep getting better when they're dead, such as the
Chilean novelist and short story writer, Roberto Bolaño.
b)
The successful contemporary writer is an extremely laudable, and
lauded, person, but can also be a pompous and precious one.
c)
Some great authors have published their worst works from beyond the grave.
d)
His seminal five-part novel, 2666, came out posthumously, won the
National Book Critics Circle Award and convinced the world he was not
just a master of the short form but could put out his life's best work
at nearly 900 pages, even after death.
OMO
6.
a)
For Europe's surviving piano-makers, it's a case of changing their
tune or facing the music.
b)
Pleyel, in business for over two centuries, was Chopin's favourite and
counted Stravinsky, Liszt and Debussy among its customers.
c)
The endorsement of august musicians has not saved it after decades of
struggling to compete with less pricey pianos from the Far East.
d)
But the French piano-maker recently said that its last workshop will
close this month.
OMO
7.
a)
Worthless currency is not necessarily useless; it can be a pointed way
of shaming someone who asks for a bribe.
b)
They look roughly like 50-rupee notes; people are encouraging to hand
them to corrupt officials, signalling resistance to sleaze.
c)
That is the thinking behind zero-rupee notes, an Indian
anti-corruption gimmick now attracting world-wide interest.
d)
But in places where public opinion is already shifting, they could be
a useful way of making bureaucrats behave better.
8.Diwali, the festival of lights, signifies that good will always be
better than evil. In the present day many people have developed a lot
of negativity in their minds and hearts, which has led to high
corruption and higher crime rates. Value based education is the need
of the day to eliminate the darkness of cruelty, selfishness and greed
and bring the light of wisdom, peace, kindness, truthfulness, right
attitude, hard work and co-operation. Mahatma Gandhi said that we
should eradicate not the sinner but the sins from our hearts; if a
society has people with good hearts, it will definitely flourish.
What conclusion can be drawn from the above argument?
a)
Nowadays nobody is good even though good is always better than evil.
b)
Nowadays everybody is a corrupt person or a criminal.
c)
Value based education can save a society from crime and corruption.
d)
It is not possible to fight against corruption as everybody is corrupt.
9.There is a direct correlation between the return rate of customers
and the type of service provided by a customer-service employee. The
theory is simple. If employees are happy and motivated, they will
treat customers well. If customers are treated well, they will return.
What inference can be drawn from the above argument?
a)
If customers are treated badly, they will be inclined to switch to
another service provider.
b)
If customer-service employees are paid badly they will become
unmotivated and reluctant to provide quality service to their
customers.
c)
If customers are treated badly by the customer-service employees, the
return rate of customers will increase.
d)
Both (A) and (C)
10.Generally the male catbirds construct decorated nests. Based on the
fact that different local populations of catbirds belonging to the
same species build nests that exhibit different building and
decorative styles, researchers have concluded that catbirds' building
styles are a culturally acquired rather than a genetically transmitted
trait.
Which of the following strengthens the argument?
a)
There are more common characteristics than differences in styles of
local catbird population.
b)
Nests of one species of catbird have fewer flowers and ornamental
characteristics than nests of another species.
c)
Young male catbirds are inept at nest building and spend years
watching elders before becoming accomplished.
d)
Catbirds are found only in New Guinea and Australia apparently when
local populations of birds seldom have contact with one another.
#SC
Select all that are correct:
11
a)
Costa Rica's Turrialba volcano belched up a column of gas and ash up
to 3,280 feet (1 km) into the air on Thursday
b)
in its powerful eruption in two decades. Four explosions emanated from
the volcano in central Costa Rica
c)
and ash reached parts of San Jose, the capital, some 30 miles (50 km)
away, where the airport was closed.
d)
It was the volcano's strongest eruption from 1996. Costa Rica's
emergency services ordered the close of access roads
e)
near the volcano, which is major tourist draw, and were evacuating
residents from a radius of just over a mile around the volcano.
#SC
12
Select all that are correct:
a)
Scientists always wish to learn more about watery worlds which may
exist in the universe because life depends on water to thrive.
b)
They have suspected long that there was an ocean of liquid water on
Ganymede – Jupiter's largest moon and the largest moon in the solar
system.
c)
NASA scientists have located an ocean on Ganymede that may actually
hold more water than all of Earth's surface water combined.
d)
Scientists think the ocean is about 100 kilometers thick, 10 times as
the depth of Earth's oceans, NASA added.
e)
Parts of Ganymede may have been formed by water bubbling up from the
moon's interior through faults or cryo-volcanos.
#SC
13
Select all that are correct:
a)
Within two months, the Large Hadron Collider (LHC) particle
accelerator that had been shut up
b)
will be back in with a vengeance, colliding protons at mind-numbing
energies that have never been achieved in a man-made machine.
c)
Physicists hope that these energies will be enough to produce new
particles or phenomena that exposes secrets the universe has thus far
been unwilling to give up.
d)
In particular, the upcoming run at the LHC could yield evidence for an
idea called supersymmetry, which would be upheld
e)
if extra particles and dimensions of matter showed up, and which would
explain many puzzling facets of the cosmos.
#SC
14
Select all that are correct:
a)
Amid rumours that precision gene-editing technique have been used to
modify the DNA of human embryos,
b)
researchers have called for a moratorium in the use of the technology
in reproductive cells.
c)
Gene-editing tools, are currently used to develop therapies that
correct genetic defects in people, could be exploited for
non-therapeutic modifications.
d)
Known as germline modification, edits to embryos, eggs or sperm are of
particular concern because persons created using such cells
e)
would have had their genetic make-up changed without consent, and
would permanently hand that change down to future generations.
15.(a) And the schoolbook pictures of primitive man sometimes omit
some of the detractions of his primitive life – the pain, the disease,
famine, the hard labour needed just to stay alive.
(b) But this argument, though romantically appealing, doesn't hold up.
(c) From that agony of bare existence to modern life can be soberly
described only as upward progress and the sole agent for this progress
is quite clearly reason itself.
(d) It's sometimes argued that there's no real progress; that a
civilization that kills multitudes in mass warfare, that pollutes the
land and oceans with ever larger quantities of debris, can hardly be
called an advance over the simpler hunting and gathering and
agricultural existence of prehistoric times.
(e) The primitive tribes permitted far less individual freedom than
does modern society, ancient wars were committed with far less moral
justification than modern ones, and a technology that produces debris
can find ways of disposing of it without ecological upset.
a)
eadcb
b)
deacb
c)
daceb
d)
dbeac
16.Researchers studying the Ngamambo tribes, which inhabited parts of
South Africa as early as 1200 BC, have unearthed certain relics that
have led anthropologists to conclude that the tribals could read and
write in an undeciphered non-Semitic language. This proves that
contrary to popular belief, the Ngamambo tribes were actually a
cultured people.
Which of the following, if true, offers the most support for the
conclusion drawn in the paragraph above?
a)
The relics unearthed by the researchers also include refined pottery
and sophisticated architecture.
b)
There are many non-Semitic languages prevalent in various parts of
South Africa in periods as early as 800 B.C. A lot of interest has
been generated by anthropologists around the world about the language
spoken by the Ngamambo tribes as it may help them to understand the
lifestyles of tribals.
c)
All through history it has been demonstrated that communities that
have only speech do not move beyond very low levels of cultural
development.
d)
The Ovimbundu tribes, known to be very cultured and sophisticated,
inhabited some periods of South Africa during the same period as the
Ngamambo tribes.
17."Constant and consistent communication, while at times sounding
like a broken record, is the single most reassuring thing I can do for
all stakeholders: employees, investors, customers, media, and senior
management... And it's always the same basic message, which is our
vision for the company."
If the author is a CEO of the company, he is most likely to agree with
which of the following?
a)
The vision of the company, and the basic message that the CEO would
like to give all stakeholders, is that they will always remain in
touch with all of them and will deliver consistent content in their
communication.
b)
Appreciation of employees' efforts by the CEO is missing in today's
world. Employees in organizations where the CEO does not communicate
to them on a frequent basis are likely to be demotivated.
c)
Senior management has the responsibility to communicate frequently to
all shareholders.
d)
It is not just communication of our views that is important, one needs
to reiterate the same on multiple forums for it to be digested by all
stakeholders.
18.Most companies that use satisfaction surveys to learn how happy
their customers are with their products and services often mislead
themselves. What matters is not what customers say about the level of
satisfaction, but whether they feel thevalue they received will keep
them loyal. Loyalty or repurchase behaviour is the only true measure
of customer satisfaction. As tools for measuring the value a company
delivers to its customers, satisfaction surveys are not very useful
because, amongst other reasons, they focus primarily on transactional
issues, such as product quality, deliveries, technical knowledge,
hygiene factors, product specs etc. These items are simply the minimum
requirements for entry into the market. As tools for predicting
whether customers will purchase more of the company's products and
services, they have proved to be all but useless. Many executives feel
that "good" scores (e.g. an average of 4 out of 5) are an indication
that the company/customer relationship is strong. In other words, a
level of satisfaction below complete (5) is acceptable. After all,
this is the real world, where products and services are rarely perfect
and customers are hard to please. However, research has shown that
there is no direct (straight line) correlation between customer
satisfaction and customer loyalty and only customers showing "top box"
scores close to 100% are likely to remain loyal.
Which of the following strengthens the argument?
a)
Perception is a far better indicator of a brand's future than current reality.
b)
A company XYZ used customer satisfaction surveys but its sales were
lower than the last year.
c)
ABC Corporation, a company outsourcing customer satisfaction surveys
has shown a drastic cut in business.
d)
There are many companies that have fallen on troubled times, not
because they no longer paid attention to customer requirements,
product quality/ specifications, technical knowledge etc., but because
previous customers renounced their faith in the company's product.
22.Which of the following is a viable conclusion to the debate on
whether scientists should look for connections between genes and
violent behavioural patterns?
a)
The government will be able to screen people to see if they have genes
that incline them to violence.
b)
There is a definite connection between genes and violent behavioural
patterns amongst adolescents as all aggressive people have low
serotonin levels and the way out of criminality is to find out how
genes contribute to violence.
c)
Scientists are naive about the implications of their research and the
political agendas it might further even as demonising or stereotyping
certain minorities becomes a norm.
d)
Scientists will be able to better understand human behaviour and will
be able to consider genetic research on violence in the context of a
society desperately seeking solutions to violent crime.
#RC
Football refers to a number of sports that involve, to varying
degrees,kicking aball with the foot to score agoal. The different
variations of football are called football codes. Some examples of
these codes include soccer (UK), gridiron football (United States and
Canada); rules football orrugby league (Australia);Gaelic football
(Ireland); andrugby football (New Zealand).
Imagine a football game. The players wish to gain the advantage for
their own side, and their behaviour is ordered, with shared rules,
governing the unpredictable immediacy of the run of play. The
spectators are absorbed in watching.
But on the sideline, player number twelve wants to get on the pitch to
take part. How is the substitution to be done? If he leaps about, his
frantic antics might be noticed as a distraction, but they won't get
him on. To succeed he needs, first, to be known and recognized as a
bona fide player. Second, he must go through an established routine to
catch the referee's eye. Finally, some other player has to be
displaced from the field to make room for him. Only then will he make
his mark and, if he's lucky, gain the attention of the spectators.
Events don't get into the news simply by happening, no matter how
frantically. They too must fit in with what is already there. Events
need to be known and recognized, coming from a known, trusted and
representative source. To win inclusion in any particular news, they
must fulfill a certain number of criteria and must be seen as
newsworthy. Finally, newsworthy events themselves must jostle for
inclusion in the limited number of slots available.
In order to pick out newsworthy events from the jostling crowd of
clowns on the sidelines of their game, journalists use an informal
paradigm of news values. Galtang and Ruge isolated a series of
conditions which have to be fulfilled before an event is selected for
attention. Some of these are general conditions, applicable not just
to news, but to the perception of events at large. The others are more
'culture-bound': these are the news values underlying selection in
news media in the 'north-western corner of the world'. Here is their
list of general news values:
(1) Frequency: Murders take very little time and their meaning is
quickly arrived at. Hence their frequency fits that of daily
newspapers and programmes. On the other hand, economic, social or
cultural trends take longer to unfold and to be made meaningful and
they have to be 'marked' by means of devices like the release of
reports or statistics on a particular day.
(2) Threshold: There is a threshold below which an event will not be
reported at all (varying in intensity between, for instance, local and
national news). And once reported, there is a further threshold of
drama: the bigger the story, the more added drama is needed to keep it
going. War reporting is an example of this.
(3) Unambiguity: The clarity of an event. Events don't have to be
simple, necessarily, but the range of possible meanings must be
limited. In this way news-discourse differs radically from literary
discourse. In news, the intrinsic polysemic nature of both events and
accounts of them is reduced as much as possible; in literature it is
celebrated and exploited.
(4) Meaningfulness:
(a) Cultural proximity: Events that accord with the cultural
background of the news-gatherers will be seen as more meaningful than
others and so more liable to be selected. Also, within 'our' culture,
events connected with underprivileged or ethnic groups, with regions
remote from the centralized bases of news organizations, or with
specifically working-class culture, will be seen as less intrinsically
meaningful than those associated with central, official, literate
culture.
(b) Relevance: Events in far-off cultures will nevertheless become
newsworthy if they impinge on the news-gatherer's 'home' culture −
usually in the form of a threat; as with OPEC and the (mostly Arab)
countries with oil − their lifestyles are suddenly fascinating for
Western journalists.
(5) Consonance: The predictability of, or desire for, an event. If the
media expect something to happen, then it will.
(6) Unexpectedness: The unpredictability, or rarity, of an event.
(7) Continuity: The 'running' story. If an event is covered, it will
continue to be covered for some time.
(8) Composition: The mixture of different kinds of event. If a
newspaper or TV bulletin is packed with major foreign stories, a
relatively insignificant domestic story will be included to balance
the mixture.
These basic news values give a good idea of the kind of event that
will survive the selection process.
23. DIRECTIONS for question 89: Select one or more answer choices
according to the directions given in the question.
Which of the following statements can be understood from the passage?
Select all that apply:
a)
Events get into the news by being a part of the event.
b)
Galtang and Ruge studied the 'culture bound' nature of news.
c)
Player 12 gets into the game by getting the referee's eye, by being a
bonafide player and by being known and recognized.
d)
The word 'polysemic' means 'explicitness'.
e)
According to the passage, frequency is one thing for murders and the
like, and another for events that unfold slowly – frequency is marked
by periodic release of analysis or data.
24. 'Culture bound' in the context of the passage would be
a)
contextual news in a culture or news related to culture.
b)
defined, shaped and limited by culture.
c)
within the cultural bounds.
d)
All of the above.
25. Which of the following could be an appropriate title to the passage?
a)
Galtang and Ruge analysis
b)
News and Newsworthiness
c)
Understanding News
d)
Newsworthy News
#RC
Darn those pesky Japanese. Sometime over the last few years, when I
wasn't looking, the Japanese muda-mura-muri meme slipped into the
lexicon of people concerned with lean process management. The
elimination of waste has been the goal of Lean, a production practice
that considers the expenditure of resources for any goal other than
the creation of value for the end customer to be wasteful and thus a
target for elimination. Muda, muri and mura are the three types of
waste defined by Toyota Production System (TPS).
Muda is unproductive waste: any activity or excess resource
consumption that does not add value to whatever you're creating. Mura
is any imbalance, unevenness or inconsistency in your process, whether
brought on by you, or imposed on you from the outside. Mura drives
Muda! By failing to smooth our demand you put unfair demands on your
processes and people and cause the creation of inventory and other
wastes. Muri means unreasonableness, to cause overburden or give
unnecessary stress to your employees or processes. This is caused by
failures in our system such as lack of training, unclear or no defined
ways of working, wrong tools, and ill thought out measures of
performance. To reiterate, Muri is all the unreasonable work that
management imposes on workers and machines because of poor
organization, such as carrying heavy weights, dangerous tasks, even
working significantly faster than usual. It is pushing a person or a
machine beyond its natural limits. This may simply be asking a greater
level of performance from a process than it can handle without taking
shortcuts and informally modifying decision criteria. Unreasonable
work is almost always a cause of multiple variations. There are
distinctions between value-adding activity, waste and non-value adding
work. Non-value adding work is waste that must be done under the
present work conditions.
To link these three types of wastes is simple. Firstly, muri focuses
on the preparation and planning of the process, or what work can be
avoided proactively by design. Next, mura then focuses on how the work
design is implemented and the elimination of fluctuation at the
scheduling or operation level, such as quality and volume. Muda is
then discovered after the process is in place and is dealt with
reactively. It is seen through variation in output. It is the role of
management to examine the muda, in the processes and eliminate the
deeper causes by considering the connections to the muri and the mura
of the system. ___________________________________
A typical example of the interplay of these wastes is the corporate
behavior of "making the numbers" as the end of a reporting period
approaches. Demand is raised to 'make plan', increasing (mura), when
the numbers are low, which causes production to try to squeeze extra
capacity from the process, which causes routines and standards to be
modified or stretched. This stretch and improvisation leads to
muri-style waste, which leads to downtime, mistakes and backflows, and
waiting, thus the muda of waiting, correction and movement.
The popular seven muda are:
(1) Transport (moving products that are not actually required to
perform the processing, the waste is in terms of loads and distance
travelled)
(2) Inventory (all components, work in progress and stocks of finished
products and raw material that a company holds)
(3) Motion (people or equipment moving or walking more than is
required to perform the processing)
(4) Waiting (waiting for the next production step, for the machine to
finish or for the product to arrive)
(5) Overproduction (production ahead of demand or beyond what the
customer ordered)
(6) Overprocessing (conducting operations beyond those that the
customer requires, resulting from poor tool or product design creating
activity)
(7) Defects (product rejects and the effort involved in inspecting for
and fixing defects).
It is important to measure or estimate the size of these wastes, to
demonstrate the effect of the changes achieved and the movement
towards the goal. The "flow" (or smoothness) based approach aims to
achieve Just-in-Time (JIT), by removing the variation caused by work
scheduling and thereby provide a driver, rationale or target and
priorities for implementation, using a variety of techniques. The
effort to achieve JIT exposes many quality problems that are hidden by
buffer stocks; by forcing smooth flow of only value-adding steps,
these problems become visible and must be dealt with explicitly.
27. Which of the following statements is/ are true as per the passage?
(i) It is not possible for Mura and Muda to precede Muri.
(ii) Muda is result, Mura is action and Muri is thought.
(iii) Muda is independent of Muri and Mura.
(iv) Achieving Mura, Muri and Muda are the goals of Lean and Toyota.
a)
(ii) and (iii)
b)
(ii), (iii) and (iv)
c)
Only (ii)
d)
(i) and (iv)
28. Which of the following recommendations/ situations correspond to
the interrelation or interplay among muda, mura and muri?
a)
One should design the system with sufficient capacity to fulfill
customer requirements without overburdening people, equipment, or
methods (muri), strive to reduce variation/fluctuation (mura) to a
bare minimum and then strive to eliminate sources of waste (muda).
b)
If you're running a delivery business and you overload a truck (muri)
to the point where it breaks down, that truck's load will now have to
be redistributed to other trucks, which will disrupt the normal routes
of those trucks (mura) and doubtless cause them to burn more gas and
wear out brake pads faster due to the added weight and extra time
spent on the road (muda).
c)
You need to write a 10,000-word document in 20 working days and you
plan to do all of this in one night. The unrealistic burden of one
night's stress is muri. The unevenness of the process (19 days of no
writing, then one day of frantic writing) is mura. The sheer
wastefulness of spending a disproportionate amount of time on research
(allowing only a tiny amount of time for actual writing) is muda.
d)
All of the above.
29. Which of the following statements can be understood from the passage?
a)
A feature of 'Just in Time (JIT)' is that production of goods is not
delayed but defects and flaws of the product are not detected.
b)
The blank in the third paragraph can be completed by − The muda and
mura inconsistencies must be fed back to the muri, or planning stage
for the next project.
c)
A key distinction between non-value adding work and waste is that the
former is unavoidable and can be classified as Mura whereas the latter
is avoidable and can be classified as Muda.
d)
A key distinction between non-value adding work and waste is that the
former is a result of poor planning whereas the latter is a result of
poor implementation.
30. Given below are sets of examples (some of which may be
inappropriate) for each of the three types of wastes as discussed in
the passage.
Muda − (a) Using an excess of laundry detergent while doing a load of
laundry; (b) Inventory of final stock goes up and it needs additional
storage space; (c) Inventory piling up long before it is needed for
the next process.
Mura − (a) Henry Ford standardised on one colour of paint (black, the
fastest to dry) to eliminate waste on the assembly line caused by
uneven drying times of paints; (b) In a production process where a
department's performance is measured by monthly output, the department
rushes like mad in the final week of the month to meet targets, and
operates considerably slowly in the first week or two.
Muri − (a) Putting two tons of cargo in a truck designed to carry one
ton; (b) Improvising production methods and stretching processes with
a view to achieve the set targets; (c) Planning production targets in
excess of actual demand.
Choose the option corresponding to the wastes for which ALL examples
are correctly mentioned.
a)
muri, mura and muda
b)
mura and muri
c)
muda and mura
d)
muri and muda
Organic evolution is a process entirely materialistic in its origin
and operation, although no explicit conclusion was made or considered
possible as to the origin of the laws and properties of matter in
general under which organic evolution operates. Man arose as a result
of the operation of organic evolution and his being and activities are
also materialistic, but the human species has properties unique to
itself among all forms of life, superadded to the properties unique to
life among all forms of matter and of action. Man's intellectual,
social, and spiritual natures are altogether exceptional among animals
in degree, but they arose by organic evolution. They usher in a new
phase of evolution, and not a new phase merely but also a new kind,
which is thus also a product of organic evolution and can be no less
materialistic in its essence even though its organization and
activities are essentially different from those in the process that
brought it into being. The objective phenomena of the history of life
can be explained by purely materialistic factors − on the basis of
differential reproduction in populations (main factor in the modern
conception of natural selection) and of the mainly random interplay of
the known process of hereditary.
Man is the result of a purposeless and materialistic process that did
not have him in mind. Man was not planned. He is a state of matter, a
form of life, a sort of animal, and a species of the Order Primates,
akin nearly or remotely to all of life and indeed to all that is
material. It is, however, a gross misrepresentation to say that he is
just an accident or nothing but an animal. Among all the myriad forms
of matter and of life on earth or as far as we know in the universe,
man is unique. He happens to represent the highest form of
organization of matter and energy that has ever appeared. Among the
many different lines that show progress, the line leading to man
reaches much the highest level yet developed. Recognition of this
kinship with the rest of the universe is necessary for understanding
him, but his essential nature is defined by qualities found nowhere
else, not by those he has in common with apes, fishes, trees, fires or
anything other than himself.
It is part of this unique status that in man a new form of evolution
begins, overlying and largely dominating the old, organic evolution
which nevertheless also continues in him. This new form of evolution
works in the social structure, as the old evolution does in the
breeding population structure, and it depends on learning, the
inheritance of knowledge, as the old does on physical inheritance. Its
possibility arises from man's intelligence and associated flexibility
of response. His reactions depend far less than other organisms' on
physically inherited factors, far more on learning and on perception
of immediate and of new situations.
This flexibility brings with it the power and need for constant choice
between different courses of action. Man plans and has purposes. Plan,
purpose, goal, all absent in evolution to this point, enter with the
coming of man and are inherent in the new evolution, which is confined
to him. With these comes the need for criteria of choice. Good and
evil, right and wrong, concepts largely irrelevant in nature except
from the human viewpoint, become real and pressing features of the
whole cosmos as viewed by man − the only possible way in which the
cosmos can be viewed morally because morals arise only in man.
The discovery that the universe, apart from man or before his coming,
lacked any purpose or plan, has the inevitable corollary that the
workings of the Universe cannot provide any automatic universal,
eternal, or absolute ethical criteria of right and wrong. This
discovery has completely undermined all older attempts to find an
intuitive ethic or to accept such an ethic as revelation. It equally
undermines attempts to find a naturalistic ethic which will flow with
absolute validity from the workings of nature or of evolution as a new
revelation. Such attempts, arising from discovery of the baselessness
of intuitive ethics, have commonly fallen into the same mistake of
seeking an absolute ethic or one outside of man's own nature and have
then been doomed to failure by their own premises.
31. Among all the myriad forms of matter and life, man is unique. How?
a)
Man was not planned, he is a state of matter, a form of life, a sort
of animal and a species of the order of Primates. Man also shares a
kinship with the rest of the universe.
b)
Man happens to represent the most highly endowed organization of
matter that has yet appeared on earth and there is no good reason to
believe there is any higher in the universe. Also morals arise only in
man.
c)
Man is not necessarily among the higher animals.
d)
Man did originate after a tremendously long sequence of events in
which both chance and orientation played a role.
32. How according to the passage can the history of life be explained
by purely materialistic factors?
a)
Man was certainly not the goal of evolution which evidently had no goals.
b)
Discovery of genetic facts integrated with knowledge of life from
other fields of study has produced a materialistic theory that no
longer gives motive for vitalistic or finalistic theories.
c)
On the basis of differential reproduction in populations and the
mainly random interplay of the known process of hereditary.
d)
Man is the result of a purposeless and materialistic process that did
not have him in mind.
33. Which of the following is definitely incorrect about the older
phase or organic form of evolution?
a)
This form of evolution depends on learning, the inheritance of
knowledge. Plans, purposes and goals are inherent in it.
b)
It determines genetic differences, mutations and inheritance and helps
in perception of immediate and of new situations.
c)
It depends on physical inheritance and works in breeding population structure.
d)
The old organic form of evolution also continues in man.
34. Which phenomenon has undermined all older attempts to find an
intuitive ethic or revelation?
a)
A naturalistic ethic, drawing validity from the workings of Nature of evolution.
b)
The discovery that the Universe without or prior to the advent of man
lacked any purpose or plan and attempts at seeking an absolute ethic,
outside man's own nature.
c)
The discovery of the groundlessness of intuitive ethic.
d)
Purpose and plan are characteristic in social evolution because man
has purposes and he makes plans.
1.(a) World Bank reports, among others, have come to the conclusion
that the growth of the biofuel industry has a serious impact on food
scarcity and food inflation the world over.
(b) Biofuel evangelism started in the 1970s and was at its peak in the
following decades.
(c) US markets have seen major distortions in the food market because
of ethanol subsidies while there has been food scarcity in Mexico
because of the diversion of corn for ethanol production.
(d) But over the past few years, there has been a mounting pile of
evidence that going the biofuel route can cause more harm than good.
(e) The more arable land is diverted to growing biofuel crops, the
less there is for cultivating food crops.
a)
bdaec
b)
abdec
c)
baecd
d)
ecabd
2.(a) The principal assumption of the anti-smoking movement has been
that tobacco companies persuade teens to smoke by lying to them, by
making smoking sound a lot more desirable and a lot less harmful than
it really is.
(b) And we've run extensive public health campaigns on television and
radio and in magazines to try to educate teens about the dangers of
smoking.
(c) We've raised the price of cigarettes and enforced the law against
selling tobacco to minors, to try to make it much harder for teens to
buy cigarettes.
(d) To address that problem, then, we've restricted and policed
cigarette advertising, so it's a lot harder for tobacco companies to
lie.
(e) Teenage smoking is one of the great, baffling phenomena of modern
life – no one really knows how to fight it, or even, for that matter,
what it is.
a)
edcba
b)
eadcb
c)
aedcb
d)
ecbda
3.(a) Although they may sound as if they don't have very much in
common, they share a basic, underlying pattern.
(b) They simply wore the shoes when they went to clubs or cafes or
walked the streets of downtown New York, and in so doing exposed other
people to their fashion sense.
(c) The rise of Hush Puppies and the fall of New York's crime rate are
textbook examples of epidemics in action.
(d) No one took out an advertisement and told people that the
traditional Hush Puppies were cool and they should start wearing them.
(e) They infected them with the Hush Puppies "virus".
(f) First of all, they are clear examples of contagious behavior.
a)
cfdabe
b)
cfadeb
c)
cafdbe
d)
dbecaf
OMO
4.
a)
However, Golden Rice is not produced by a corporate behemoth but by
the public sector whose aim is to double food production; and reduce
the number of deaths and cases of blindness caused by vitamin A
deficiency.
b)
If the green revolution had never happened, and yields had stayed at
1960 levels, the world could not produce its current food output even
if it ploughed up every last acre of cultivable land.
c)
In August 2014, environmentalists in the Philippines vandalised a
field of Golden Rice − an experimental grain whose genes had been
modified to carry beta-carotene, a chemical precursor of vitamin A −
claiming that genetically modified (GM) crops pose health risks.
d)
Hence, vandalising Golden Rice (GM) field trials is a bit like the
campaign of some religious leaders to prevent smallpox inoculations:
it causes misery, even death, in the name of obscurantism and
unscientific belief.
OMO
5.
a)
A few though, keep getting better when they're dead, such as the
Chilean novelist and short story writer, Roberto Bolaño.
b)
The successful contemporary writer is an extremely laudable, and
lauded, person, but can also be a pompous and precious one.
c)
Some great authors have published their worst works from beyond the grave.
d)
His seminal five-part novel, 2666, came out posthumously, won the
National Book Critics Circle Award and convinced the world he was not
just a master of the short form but could put out his life's best work
at nearly 900 pages, even after death.
OMO
6.
a)
For Europe's surviving piano-makers, it's a case of changing their
tune or facing the music.
b)
Pleyel, in business for over two centuries, was Chopin's favourite and
counted Stravinsky, Liszt and Debussy among its customers.
c)
The endorsement of august musicians has not saved it after decades of
struggling to compete with less pricey pianos from the Far East.
d)
But the French piano-maker recently said that its last workshop will
close this month.
OMO
7.
a)
Worthless currency is not necessarily useless; it can be a pointed way
of shaming someone who asks for a bribe.
b)
They look roughly like 50-rupee notes; people are encouraging to hand
them to corrupt officials, signalling resistance to sleaze.
c)
That is the thinking behind zero-rupee notes, an Indian
anti-corruption gimmick now attracting world-wide interest.
d)
But in places where public opinion is already shifting, they could be
a useful way of making bureaucrats behave better.
8.Diwali, the festival of lights, signifies that good will always be
better than evil. In the present day many people have developed a lot
of negativity in their minds and hearts, which has led to high
corruption and higher crime rates. Value based education is the need
of the day to eliminate the darkness of cruelty, selfishness and greed
and bring the light of wisdom, peace, kindness, truthfulness, right
attitude, hard work and co-operation. Mahatma Gandhi said that we
should eradicate not the sinner but the sins from our hearts; if a
society has people with good hearts, it will definitely flourish.
What conclusion can be drawn from the above argument?
a)
Nowadays nobody is good even though good is always better than evil.
b)
Nowadays everybody is a corrupt person or a criminal.
c)
Value based education can save a society from crime and corruption.
d)
It is not possible to fight against corruption as everybody is corrupt.
9.There is a direct correlation between the return rate of customers
and the type of service provided by a customer-service employee. The
theory is simple. If employees are happy and motivated, they will
treat customers well. If customers are treated well, they will return.
What inference can be drawn from the above argument?
a)
If customers are treated badly, they will be inclined to switch to
another service provider.
b)
If customer-service employees are paid badly they will become
unmotivated and reluctant to provide quality service to their
customers.
c)
If customers are treated badly by the customer-service employees, the
return rate of customers will increase.
d)
Both (A) and (C)
10.Generally the male catbirds construct decorated nests. Based on the
fact that different local populations of catbirds belonging to the
same species build nests that exhibit different building and
decorative styles, researchers have concluded that catbirds' building
styles are a culturally acquired rather than a genetically transmitted
trait.
Which of the following strengthens the argument?
a)
There are more common characteristics than differences in styles of
local catbird population.
b)
Nests of one species of catbird have fewer flowers and ornamental
characteristics than nests of another species.
c)
Young male catbirds are inept at nest building and spend years
watching elders before becoming accomplished.
d)
Catbirds are found only in New Guinea and Australia apparently when
local populations of birds seldom have contact with one another.
#SC
Select all that are correct:
11
a)
Costa Rica's Turrialba volcano belched up a column of gas and ash up
to 3,280 feet (1 km) into the air on Thursday
b)
in its powerful eruption in two decades. Four explosions emanated from
the volcano in central Costa Rica
c)
and ash reached parts of San Jose, the capital, some 30 miles (50 km)
away, where the airport was closed.
d)
It was the volcano's strongest eruption from 1996. Costa Rica's
emergency services ordered the close of access roads
e)
near the volcano, which is major tourist draw, and were evacuating
residents from a radius of just over a mile around the volcano.
#SC
12
Select all that are correct:
a)
Scientists always wish to learn more about watery worlds which may
exist in the universe because life depends on water to thrive.
b)
They have suspected long that there was an ocean of liquid water on
Ganymede – Jupiter's largest moon and the largest moon in the solar
system.
c)
NASA scientists have located an ocean on Ganymede that may actually
hold more water than all of Earth's surface water combined.
d)
Scientists think the ocean is about 100 kilometers thick, 10 times as
the depth of Earth's oceans, NASA added.
e)
Parts of Ganymede may have been formed by water bubbling up from the
moon's interior through faults or cryo-volcanos.
#SC
13
Select all that are correct:
a)
Within two months, the Large Hadron Collider (LHC) particle
accelerator that had been shut up
b)
will be back in with a vengeance, colliding protons at mind-numbing
energies that have never been achieved in a man-made machine.
c)
Physicists hope that these energies will be enough to produce new
particles or phenomena that exposes secrets the universe has thus far
been unwilling to give up.
d)
In particular, the upcoming run at the LHC could yield evidence for an
idea called supersymmetry, which would be upheld
e)
if extra particles and dimensions of matter showed up, and which would
explain many puzzling facets of the cosmos.
#SC
14
Select all that are correct:
a)
Amid rumours that precision gene-editing technique have been used to
modify the DNA of human embryos,
b)
researchers have called for a moratorium in the use of the technology
in reproductive cells.
c)
Gene-editing tools, are currently used to develop therapies that
correct genetic defects in people, could be exploited for
non-therapeutic modifications.
d)
Known as germline modification, edits to embryos, eggs or sperm are of
particular concern because persons created using such cells
e)
would have had their genetic make-up changed without consent, and
would permanently hand that change down to future generations.
15.(a) And the schoolbook pictures of primitive man sometimes omit
some of the detractions of his primitive life – the pain, the disease,
famine, the hard labour needed just to stay alive.
(b) But this argument, though romantically appealing, doesn't hold up.
(c) From that agony of bare existence to modern life can be soberly
described only as upward progress and the sole agent for this progress
is quite clearly reason itself.
(d) It's sometimes argued that there's no real progress; that a
civilization that kills multitudes in mass warfare, that pollutes the
land and oceans with ever larger quantities of debris, can hardly be
called an advance over the simpler hunting and gathering and
agricultural existence of prehistoric times.
(e) The primitive tribes permitted far less individual freedom than
does modern society, ancient wars were committed with far less moral
justification than modern ones, and a technology that produces debris
can find ways of disposing of it without ecological upset.
a)
eadcb
b)
deacb
c)
daceb
d)
dbeac
16.Researchers studying the Ngamambo tribes, which inhabited parts of
South Africa as early as 1200 BC, have unearthed certain relics that
have led anthropologists to conclude that the tribals could read and
write in an undeciphered non-Semitic language. This proves that
contrary to popular belief, the Ngamambo tribes were actually a
cultured people.
Which of the following, if true, offers the most support for the
conclusion drawn in the paragraph above?
a)
The relics unearthed by the researchers also include refined pottery
and sophisticated architecture.
b)
There are many non-Semitic languages prevalent in various parts of
South Africa in periods as early as 800 B.C. A lot of interest has
been generated by anthropologists around the world about the language
spoken by the Ngamambo tribes as it may help them to understand the
lifestyles of tribals.
c)
All through history it has been demonstrated that communities that
have only speech do not move beyond very low levels of cultural
development.
d)
The Ovimbundu tribes, known to be very cultured and sophisticated,
inhabited some periods of South Africa during the same period as the
Ngamambo tribes.
17."Constant and consistent communication, while at times sounding
like a broken record, is the single most reassuring thing I can do for
all stakeholders: employees, investors, customers, media, and senior
management... And it's always the same basic message, which is our
vision for the company."
If the author is a CEO of the company, he is most likely to agree with
which of the following?
a)
The vision of the company, and the basic message that the CEO would
like to give all stakeholders, is that they will always remain in
touch with all of them and will deliver consistent content in their
communication.
b)
Appreciation of employees' efforts by the CEO is missing in today's
world. Employees in organizations where the CEO does not communicate
to them on a frequent basis are likely to be demotivated.
c)
Senior management has the responsibility to communicate frequently to
all shareholders.
d)
It is not just communication of our views that is important, one needs
to reiterate the same on multiple forums for it to be digested by all
stakeholders.
18.Most companies that use satisfaction surveys to learn how happy
their customers are with their products and services often mislead
themselves. What matters is not what customers say about the level of
satisfaction, but whether they feel thevalue they received will keep
them loyal. Loyalty or repurchase behaviour is the only true measure
of customer satisfaction. As tools for measuring the value a company
delivers to its customers, satisfaction surveys are not very useful
because, amongst other reasons, they focus primarily on transactional
issues, such as product quality, deliveries, technical knowledge,
hygiene factors, product specs etc. These items are simply the minimum
requirements for entry into the market. As tools for predicting
whether customers will purchase more of the company's products and
services, they have proved to be all but useless. Many executives feel
that "good" scores (e.g. an average of 4 out of 5) are an indication
that the company/customer relationship is strong. In other words, a
level of satisfaction below complete (5) is acceptable. After all,
this is the real world, where products and services are rarely perfect
and customers are hard to please. However, research has shown that
there is no direct (straight line) correlation between customer
satisfaction and customer loyalty and only customers showing "top box"
scores close to 100% are likely to remain loyal.
Which of the following strengthens the argument?
a)
Perception is a far better indicator of a brand's future than current reality.
b)
A company XYZ used customer satisfaction surveys but its sales were
lower than the last year.
c)
ABC Corporation, a company outsourcing customer satisfaction surveys
has shown a drastic cut in business.
d)
There are many companies that have fallen on troubled times, not
because they no longer paid attention to customer requirements,
product quality/ specifications, technical knowledge etc., but because
previous customers renounced their faith in the company's product.
22.Which of the following is a viable conclusion to the debate on
whether scientists should look for connections between genes and
violent behavioural patterns?
a)
The government will be able to screen people to see if they have genes
that incline them to violence.
b)
There is a definite connection between genes and violent behavioural
patterns amongst adolescents as all aggressive people have low
serotonin levels and the way out of criminality is to find out how
genes contribute to violence.
c)
Scientists are naive about the implications of their research and the
political agendas it might further even as demonising or stereotyping
certain minorities becomes a norm.
d)
Scientists will be able to better understand human behaviour and will
be able to consider genetic research on violence in the context of a
society desperately seeking solutions to violent crime.
#RC
Football refers to a number of sports that involve, to varying
degrees,kicking aball with the foot to score agoal. The different
variations of football are called football codes. Some examples of
these codes include soccer (UK), gridiron football (United States and
Canada); rules football orrugby league (Australia);Gaelic football
(Ireland); andrugby football (New Zealand).
Imagine a football game. The players wish to gain the advantage for
their own side, and their behaviour is ordered, with shared rules,
governing the unpredictable immediacy of the run of play. The
spectators are absorbed in watching.
But on the sideline, player number twelve wants to get on the pitch to
take part. How is the substitution to be done? If he leaps about, his
frantic antics might be noticed as a distraction, but they won't get
him on. To succeed he needs, first, to be known and recognized as a
bona fide player. Second, he must go through an established routine to
catch the referee's eye. Finally, some other player has to be
displaced from the field to make room for him. Only then will he make
his mark and, if he's lucky, gain the attention of the spectators.
Events don't get into the news simply by happening, no matter how
frantically. They too must fit in with what is already there. Events
need to be known and recognized, coming from a known, trusted and
representative source. To win inclusion in any particular news, they
must fulfill a certain number of criteria and must be seen as
newsworthy. Finally, newsworthy events themselves must jostle for
inclusion in the limited number of slots available.
In order to pick out newsworthy events from the jostling crowd of
clowns on the sidelines of their game, journalists use an informal
paradigm of news values. Galtang and Ruge isolated a series of
conditions which have to be fulfilled before an event is selected for
attention. Some of these are general conditions, applicable not just
to news, but to the perception of events at large. The others are more
'culture-bound': these are the news values underlying selection in
news media in the 'north-western corner of the world'. Here is their
list of general news values:
(1) Frequency: Murders take very little time and their meaning is
quickly arrived at. Hence their frequency fits that of daily
newspapers and programmes. On the other hand, economic, social or
cultural trends take longer to unfold and to be made meaningful and
they have to be 'marked' by means of devices like the release of
reports or statistics on a particular day.
(2) Threshold: There is a threshold below which an event will not be
reported at all (varying in intensity between, for instance, local and
national news). And once reported, there is a further threshold of
drama: the bigger the story, the more added drama is needed to keep it
going. War reporting is an example of this.
(3) Unambiguity: The clarity of an event. Events don't have to be
simple, necessarily, but the range of possible meanings must be
limited. In this way news-discourse differs radically from literary
discourse. In news, the intrinsic polysemic nature of both events and
accounts of them is reduced as much as possible; in literature it is
celebrated and exploited.
(4) Meaningfulness:
(a) Cultural proximity: Events that accord with the cultural
background of the news-gatherers will be seen as more meaningful than
others and so more liable to be selected. Also, within 'our' culture,
events connected with underprivileged or ethnic groups, with regions
remote from the centralized bases of news organizations, or with
specifically working-class culture, will be seen as less intrinsically
meaningful than those associated with central, official, literate
culture.
(b) Relevance: Events in far-off cultures will nevertheless become
newsworthy if they impinge on the news-gatherer's 'home' culture −
usually in the form of a threat; as with OPEC and the (mostly Arab)
countries with oil − their lifestyles are suddenly fascinating for
Western journalists.
(5) Consonance: The predictability of, or desire for, an event. If the
media expect something to happen, then it will.
(6) Unexpectedness: The unpredictability, or rarity, of an event.
(7) Continuity: The 'running' story. If an event is covered, it will
continue to be covered for some time.
(8) Composition: The mixture of different kinds of event. If a
newspaper or TV bulletin is packed with major foreign stories, a
relatively insignificant domestic story will be included to balance
the mixture.
These basic news values give a good idea of the kind of event that
will survive the selection process.
23. DIRECTIONS for question 89: Select one or more answer choices
according to the directions given in the question.
Which of the following statements can be understood from the passage?
Select all that apply:
a)
Events get into the news by being a part of the event.
b)
Galtang and Ruge studied the 'culture bound' nature of news.
c)
Player 12 gets into the game by getting the referee's eye, by being a
bonafide player and by being known and recognized.
d)
The word 'polysemic' means 'explicitness'.
e)
According to the passage, frequency is one thing for murders and the
like, and another for events that unfold slowly – frequency is marked
by periodic release of analysis or data.
24. 'Culture bound' in the context of the passage would be
a)
contextual news in a culture or news related to culture.
b)
defined, shaped and limited by culture.
c)
within the cultural bounds.
d)
All of the above.
25. Which of the following could be an appropriate title to the passage?
a)
Galtang and Ruge analysis
b)
News and Newsworthiness
c)
Understanding News
d)
Newsworthy News
#RC
Darn those pesky Japanese. Sometime over the last few years, when I
wasn't looking, the Japanese muda-mura-muri meme slipped into the
lexicon of people concerned with lean process management. The
elimination of waste has been the goal of Lean, a production practice
that considers the expenditure of resources for any goal other than
the creation of value for the end customer to be wasteful and thus a
target for elimination. Muda, muri and mura are the three types of
waste defined by Toyota Production System (TPS).
Muda is unproductive waste: any activity or excess resource
consumption that does not add value to whatever you're creating. Mura
is any imbalance, unevenness or inconsistency in your process, whether
brought on by you, or imposed on you from the outside. Mura drives
Muda! By failing to smooth our demand you put unfair demands on your
processes and people and cause the creation of inventory and other
wastes. Muri means unreasonableness, to cause overburden or give
unnecessary stress to your employees or processes. This is caused by
failures in our system such as lack of training, unclear or no defined
ways of working, wrong tools, and ill thought out measures of
performance. To reiterate, Muri is all the unreasonable work that
management imposes on workers and machines because of poor
organization, such as carrying heavy weights, dangerous tasks, even
working significantly faster than usual. It is pushing a person or a
machine beyond its natural limits. This may simply be asking a greater
level of performance from a process than it can handle without taking
shortcuts and informally modifying decision criteria. Unreasonable
work is almost always a cause of multiple variations. There are
distinctions between value-adding activity, waste and non-value adding
work. Non-value adding work is waste that must be done under the
present work conditions.
To link these three types of wastes is simple. Firstly, muri focuses
on the preparation and planning of the process, or what work can be
avoided proactively by design. Next, mura then focuses on how the work
design is implemented and the elimination of fluctuation at the
scheduling or operation level, such as quality and volume. Muda is
then discovered after the process is in place and is dealt with
reactively. It is seen through variation in output. It is the role of
management to examine the muda, in the processes and eliminate the
deeper causes by considering the connections to the muri and the mura
of the system. ___________________________________
A typical example of the interplay of these wastes is the corporate
behavior of "making the numbers" as the end of a reporting period
approaches. Demand is raised to 'make plan', increasing (mura), when
the numbers are low, which causes production to try to squeeze extra
capacity from the process, which causes routines and standards to be
modified or stretched. This stretch and improvisation leads to
muri-style waste, which leads to downtime, mistakes and backflows, and
waiting, thus the muda of waiting, correction and movement.
The popular seven muda are:
(1) Transport (moving products that are not actually required to
perform the processing, the waste is in terms of loads and distance
travelled)
(2) Inventory (all components, work in progress and stocks of finished
products and raw material that a company holds)
(3) Motion (people or equipment moving or walking more than is
required to perform the processing)
(4) Waiting (waiting for the next production step, for the machine to
finish or for the product to arrive)
(5) Overproduction (production ahead of demand or beyond what the
customer ordered)
(6) Overprocessing (conducting operations beyond those that the
customer requires, resulting from poor tool or product design creating
activity)
(7) Defects (product rejects and the effort involved in inspecting for
and fixing defects).
It is important to measure or estimate the size of these wastes, to
demonstrate the effect of the changes achieved and the movement
towards the goal. The "flow" (or smoothness) based approach aims to
achieve Just-in-Time (JIT), by removing the variation caused by work
scheduling and thereby provide a driver, rationale or target and
priorities for implementation, using a variety of techniques. The
effort to achieve JIT exposes many quality problems that are hidden by
buffer stocks; by forcing smooth flow of only value-adding steps,
these problems become visible and must be dealt with explicitly.
27. Which of the following statements is/ are true as per the passage?
(i) It is not possible for Mura and Muda to precede Muri.
(ii) Muda is result, Mura is action and Muri is thought.
(iii) Muda is independent of Muri and Mura.
(iv) Achieving Mura, Muri and Muda are the goals of Lean and Toyota.
a)
(ii) and (iii)
b)
(ii), (iii) and (iv)
c)
Only (ii)
d)
(i) and (iv)
28. Which of the following recommendations/ situations correspond to
the interrelation or interplay among muda, mura and muri?
a)
One should design the system with sufficient capacity to fulfill
customer requirements without overburdening people, equipment, or
methods (muri), strive to reduce variation/fluctuation (mura) to a
bare minimum and then strive to eliminate sources of waste (muda).
b)
If you're running a delivery business and you overload a truck (muri)
to the point where it breaks down, that truck's load will now have to
be redistributed to other trucks, which will disrupt the normal routes
of those trucks (mura) and doubtless cause them to burn more gas and
wear out brake pads faster due to the added weight and extra time
spent on the road (muda).
c)
You need to write a 10,000-word document in 20 working days and you
plan to do all of this in one night. The unrealistic burden of one
night's stress is muri. The unevenness of the process (19 days of no
writing, then one day of frantic writing) is mura. The sheer
wastefulness of spending a disproportionate amount of time on research
(allowing only a tiny amount of time for actual writing) is muda.
d)
All of the above.
29. Which of the following statements can be understood from the passage?
a)
A feature of 'Just in Time (JIT)' is that production of goods is not
delayed but defects and flaws of the product are not detected.
b)
The blank in the third paragraph can be completed by − The muda and
mura inconsistencies must be fed back to the muri, or planning stage
for the next project.
c)
A key distinction between non-value adding work and waste is that the
former is unavoidable and can be classified as Mura whereas the latter
is avoidable and can be classified as Muda.
d)
A key distinction between non-value adding work and waste is that the
former is a result of poor planning whereas the latter is a result of
poor implementation.
30. Given below are sets of examples (some of which may be
inappropriate) for each of the three types of wastes as discussed in
the passage.
Muda − (a) Using an excess of laundry detergent while doing a load of
laundry; (b) Inventory of final stock goes up and it needs additional
storage space; (c) Inventory piling up long before it is needed for
the next process.
Mura − (a) Henry Ford standardised on one colour of paint (black, the
fastest to dry) to eliminate waste on the assembly line caused by
uneven drying times of paints; (b) In a production process where a
department's performance is measured by monthly output, the department
rushes like mad in the final week of the month to meet targets, and
operates considerably slowly in the first week or two.
Muri − (a) Putting two tons of cargo in a truck designed to carry one
ton; (b) Improvising production methods and stretching processes with
a view to achieve the set targets; (c) Planning production targets in
excess of actual demand.
Choose the option corresponding to the wastes for which ALL examples
are correctly mentioned.
a)
muri, mura and muda
b)
mura and muri
c)
muda and mura
d)
muri and muda
Organic evolution is a process entirely materialistic in its origin
and operation, although no explicit conclusion was made or considered
possible as to the origin of the laws and properties of matter in
general under which organic evolution operates. Man arose as a result
of the operation of organic evolution and his being and activities are
also materialistic, but the human species has properties unique to
itself among all forms of life, superadded to the properties unique to
life among all forms of matter and of action. Man's intellectual,
social, and spiritual natures are altogether exceptional among animals
in degree, but they arose by organic evolution. They usher in a new
phase of evolution, and not a new phase merely but also a new kind,
which is thus also a product of organic evolution and can be no less
materialistic in its essence even though its organization and
activities are essentially different from those in the process that
brought it into being. The objective phenomena of the history of life
can be explained by purely materialistic factors − on the basis of
differential reproduction in populations (main factor in the modern
conception of natural selection) and of the mainly random interplay of
the known process of hereditary.
Man is the result of a purposeless and materialistic process that did
not have him in mind. Man was not planned. He is a state of matter, a
form of life, a sort of animal, and a species of the Order Primates,
akin nearly or remotely to all of life and indeed to all that is
material. It is, however, a gross misrepresentation to say that he is
just an accident or nothing but an animal. Among all the myriad forms
of matter and of life on earth or as far as we know in the universe,
man is unique. He happens to represent the highest form of
organization of matter and energy that has ever appeared. Among the
many different lines that show progress, the line leading to man
reaches much the highest level yet developed. Recognition of this
kinship with the rest of the universe is necessary for understanding
him, but his essential nature is defined by qualities found nowhere
else, not by those he has in common with apes, fishes, trees, fires or
anything other than himself.
It is part of this unique status that in man a new form of evolution
begins, overlying and largely dominating the old, organic evolution
which nevertheless also continues in him. This new form of evolution
works in the social structure, as the old evolution does in the
breeding population structure, and it depends on learning, the
inheritance of knowledge, as the old does on physical inheritance. Its
possibility arises from man's intelligence and associated flexibility
of response. His reactions depend far less than other organisms' on
physically inherited factors, far more on learning and on perception
of immediate and of new situations.
This flexibility brings with it the power and need for constant choice
between different courses of action. Man plans and has purposes. Plan,
purpose, goal, all absent in evolution to this point, enter with the
coming of man and are inherent in the new evolution, which is confined
to him. With these comes the need for criteria of choice. Good and
evil, right and wrong, concepts largely irrelevant in nature except
from the human viewpoint, become real and pressing features of the
whole cosmos as viewed by man − the only possible way in which the
cosmos can be viewed morally because morals arise only in man.
The discovery that the universe, apart from man or before his coming,
lacked any purpose or plan, has the inevitable corollary that the
workings of the Universe cannot provide any automatic universal,
eternal, or absolute ethical criteria of right and wrong. This
discovery has completely undermined all older attempts to find an
intuitive ethic or to accept such an ethic as revelation. It equally
undermines attempts to find a naturalistic ethic which will flow with
absolute validity from the workings of nature or of evolution as a new
revelation. Such attempts, arising from discovery of the baselessness
of intuitive ethics, have commonly fallen into the same mistake of
seeking an absolute ethic or one outside of man's own nature and have
then been doomed to failure by their own premises.
31. Among all the myriad forms of matter and life, man is unique. How?
a)
Man was not planned, he is a state of matter, a form of life, a sort
of animal and a species of the order of Primates. Man also shares a
kinship with the rest of the universe.
b)
Man happens to represent the most highly endowed organization of
matter that has yet appeared on earth and there is no good reason to
believe there is any higher in the universe. Also morals arise only in
man.
c)
Man is not necessarily among the higher animals.
d)
Man did originate after a tremendously long sequence of events in
which both chance and orientation played a role.
32. How according to the passage can the history of life be explained
by purely materialistic factors?
a)
Man was certainly not the goal of evolution which evidently had no goals.
b)
Discovery of genetic facts integrated with knowledge of life from
other fields of study has produced a materialistic theory that no
longer gives motive for vitalistic or finalistic theories.
c)
On the basis of differential reproduction in populations and the
mainly random interplay of the known process of hereditary.
d)
Man is the result of a purposeless and materialistic process that did
not have him in mind.
33. Which of the following is definitely incorrect about the older
phase or organic form of evolution?
a)
This form of evolution depends on learning, the inheritance of
knowledge. Plans, purposes and goals are inherent in it.
b)
It determines genetic differences, mutations and inheritance and helps
in perception of immediate and of new situations.
c)
It depends on physical inheritance and works in breeding population structure.
d)
The old organic form of evolution also continues in man.
34. Which phenomenon has undermined all older attempts to find an
intuitive ethic or revelation?
a)
A naturalistic ethic, drawing validity from the workings of Nature of evolution.
b)
The discovery that the Universe without or prior to the advent of man
lacked any purpose or plan and attempts at seeking an absolute ethic,
outside man's own nature.
c)
The discovery of the groundlessness of intuitive ethic.
d)
Purpose and plan are characteristic in social evolution because man
has purposes and he makes plans.
Friday 26 February 2016
TEST
https://www.facebook.com/events/427617414095645/
Each of the following questions presents four statements, of which
three, when placed in appropriate order, would form a contextually
complete paragraph. Pick the statement that is not part of the
context.
1.
a)
You may say that even if they do not speak English well themselves,
they at least understand it when the speaker is a foreigner; the
better he speaks the harder it is to understand him.
b)
But if you shout "Please! Charing Cross! Which way?" you will have no
difficulty and half a dozen people will give you directions at once.
c)
In London nine hundred and ninety nine out of every thousand people
not only speak bad English but speak even that very badly.
d)
Therefore the first thing you have to do is to speak with a strong
foreign accent, and speak broken English: that is English without any
grammar and then every English person will at once know that you are a
foreigner, and try to understand and be ready to help you.
DIRECTIONS for questions 1 to 4: Each of the following questions
presents four statements, of which three, when placed in appropriate
order, would form a contextually complete paragraph. Pick the
statement that is not part of the context.
2.
a)
Extracting common elements from various episodes helps us learn rules
that govern our environment, preparing us for similar experiences and
that ability is fundamental to higher cognition.
b)
Bees may not be able to tell tales about being under fire in flights
over Iraq, but they do demonstrate remarkable memory ability.
c)
That's what makes them valuable models to researchers trying to find
the roots of complex brain functions in the simpler structures
preserved across species over many millions of years of evolution.
d)
And because they have a mere 960,000 neurons compared with the human
complement of about 85 billion, they probably need to economize on
storage and processing.
Each of the following questions presents four statements, of which
three, when placed in appropriate order, would form a contextually
complete paragraph. Pick the statement that is not part of the
context.
3.
a)
Auschwitz, for the Jews, and not only for them, was a destination with
no return ticket, a place of gas and ashes.
b)
But some did survive; those sent the other way on the ramp to be
worked to death for Hitler's Reich, except of course that it might
just be, if they were resilient enough, that the 1,000-year Reich
expired in flames before them.
c)
One of the great merits of Rosenberg's book is the way he contrives to
relive his father's life forwards, not prejudging events through the
prism of the outcome, but imbuing each stage of what he calls "the
project" with a kind of tender hope.
d)
The most important word in the title of Goran Rosenberg's beautifully
wrought book, "A Brief Stop on the Road From Auschwitz," is the
unlikely one that precedes the name of the Nazi death camp.
Each of the following questions presents four statements, of which
three, when placed in appropriate order, would form a contextually
complete paragraph. Pick the statement that is not part of the
context.
4.
a)
The way you get over this natural tendency to sell yourself short is
by setting small goals, making plans, and working on them each day.
b)
Social problems resulting from learned helplessness may seem
unavoidable; however, when induced in experimental settings learned
helplessness resolves with the passage of time
c)
People who get stuck in a comfort zone, if it is combined with learned
helplessness, find it very difficult to move forward.
d)
In this way, you gradually develop greater courage and confidence,
like building up a muscle and as you become more confident in yourself
and your abilities, you can set even larger goals.
The sentences given in the following questions, when properly
sequenced, form a coherent paragraph. Figure out the most logical
order of sentences that constructs a coherent paragraph and enter that
sequence in the input box given below the question. For example, if
you think that (A)(B)(C)(D)(E) is the most logical order of sentences
that constructs a coherent paragraph, then enter ABCDE in the input
box.
5.(A) Chernobyl's engineers, peering outside, wondered what had happened.
(B) Within hours they would be dead, having suffered exposure to
massive radiation doses.
(C) With power surging out of control, expanding gas literally blew
the lid off the huge reactor and spewed pulverized graphite from the
reactor's inner core onto the surrounding grounds like black snow.
(D) Unable to accept a reactor failure, they simply could not believe
their eyes, even with obvious evidence falling from the sky.
(E) The explosion of Chernobyl nuclear power plant created a
nightmare, the consequences of which will last for thousands of years.
The sentences given in each of the following questions, when properly
sequenced, form a coherent paragraph. Each sentence is labeled with a
letter. From among the four choices given below the question, choose
the most logical order of sentences that constructs a coherent
paragraph.
6.(a) And the good news is that you have complete control over your
mental pictures for good or for ill.
(b) Your performance on the outside is always consistent with your
self-image on the inside.
(c) The choice is upto you.
(d) You can choose to feed your mind with positive, exciting success
images, or you can, by default, allow yourself to be preoccupied by
failure images.
(e) Your self-image is made up of the mental pictures that you feed
into your mind prior to any event.
a)
bacde
b)
beadc
c)
eadcb
d)
adceb
The sentences given in each of the following questions, when properly
sequenced, form a coherent paragraph. Each sentence is labeled with a
letter. From among the four choices given below the question, choose
the most logical order of sentences that constructs a coherent
paragraph.
7.(a) Increasingly, managers have to rely on the judgment of these
experts who "do not fit neatly together into a chain-of-command
system" and "cannot wait for their expert advice to be approved at a
higher level."
(b) Solid state physicists, computer programmers, systems designers,
operation researchers, engineering specialists − such men are assuming
a new decision-making function.
(c) Today, the managers are losing their monopoly on decision-making
and there is no longer a strict allegiance to hierarchy.
(d) This silent but significant deterioration of hierarchy, now
occurring in the executive suite as well as at the ground level of the
factory floor, is intensified by the arrival on the scene of hordes of
experts − specialists in vital fields so narrow that often the men on
top have difficulty understanding them.
(e) At one time, they merely consulted with executives who reserved
unto themselves the right to make managerial decisions.
a)
deabc
b)
dcbea
c)
becda
d)
caebd
8 in each of the following questions, there are sentences or
fragments of sentences that form a paragraph. Identify and select the
sentence(s) or fragments of sentence(s) that is/are correct in terms
of grammar and usage, including spelling, punctuation and logical
consistency.
Select all that are correct:
a)
Kazuo Ishiguro, Man Booker winner in 1989 with The Remains of the Day,
is famously slow writer.
b)
His late novel, The Buried Giant, has been published just and took a
full ten years to write.
c)
He has written 'only' seven novels in all. Imagine his surprise, then,
when he discovered that there were two other novels that had somehow
slipped his memory.
d)
When sorting about his papers recently he came across two books that
pre-date his official first novel A Pale View of Hills (1982).
e)
Ishiguro's words to an interviewer makes it clear that they will never
be seen in print.
9.DIRECTIONS for questions 8 to 10: In each of the following
questions, there are sentences or fragments of sentences that form a
paragraph. Identify and select the sentence(s) or fragments of
sentence(s) that is/are correct in terms of grammar and usage,
including spelling, punctuation and logical consistency.
Select all that are correct:
a)
Education is humanity's best hope and effective means in the quest to
achieve sustainable development.
b)
This powerful statement was made in 1997 in UNESCO report, Educating
for a Sustainable Future.
c)
Five years later, it was bought to the attention of the world leaders
at the Johannesburg World Summit on Sustainable Development,
d)
paving out the way to the establishment of the United Nations Decade
for Education for Sustainable Development (2005-2014).
e)
UNESCO was designated as the lead agency for implementing the Decade
and has helped catalyse, guide, co-ordinate and document related
efforts around the world.
10 In each of the following questions, there are sentences or
fragments of sentences that form a paragraph. Identify and select the
sentence(s) or fragments of sentence(s) that is/are correct in terms
of grammar and usage, including spelling, punctuation and logical
consistency.
Select all that are correct:
a)
As a middle-class boy growing up in Oxford at the turn of the 20th
century, young Lawrence (of Arabia) was idiosyncratic certainly.
b)
He was sceptical over received truths, easily bored but passionate
about medieval history, cathedrals and brass rubbings.
c)
He would hang at building sites and gather fragments of pots which he
reconstituted and delivered to museum curators.
d)
Now, his biographers have to be diggers and restorers, sifting a mass
of evidence and gluing the bits of his mysterious life together.
e)
But these bits never quite constitute a whole, comprehensible human
being; much about Lawrence remains an enigma.
The following question presents four statements, of which three, when
placed in appropriate order, would form a contextually complete
paragraph. Pick the statement that is not part of the context.
11.
a)
However, like all scientific theories, the theory of evolution is
subject to continuing refinement as new areas of science emerge or as
new technologies enable observations and experiments that were not
possible previously.
b)
In everyday usage, "theory" often refers to a hunch or a speculation;
when people say, "I have a theory about why that happened," they are
often drawing a conclusion based on fragmentary or inconclusive
evidence.
c)
Like these other foundational scientific theories, the theory of
evolution is supported by so many observations and confirming
experiments that scientists are confident that the basic components of
the theory will not be overturned by new evidence.
d)
Many scientific theories are so well-established that no new evidence
is likely to alter them substantially, for example, no new evidence
will demonstrate that the Earth does not orbit around the sun
(heliocentric theory), or that living things are not made of cells
(cell theory).
The sentences given in the following question, when properly
sequenced, form a coherent paragraph. Each sentence is labeled with a
letter. From among the four choices given below the question, choose
the most logical order of sentences that constructs a coherent
paragraph.
12.(a) Likewise, Seyfert galaxies were suspected to be "industrial
accidents" because their enormous and directed energy output had no
initial explanation.
(b) This has been suspected several times.
(c) Pulsars, when first discovered, were called little green men
(LGM), because of the precise repetition of their pulses (they rival
the best atomic clocks).
(d) One way that astronomy might find evidence of an extraterrestrial
civilization is that conventional astronomers, studying stars,
planets, and galaxies, might serendipitously observe some phenomenon
that cannot be explained without positing an intelligent civilization
as the source.
(e) Eventually, natural explanations not involving intelligent life
have been found for all such observations to date, but the possibility
of discovery of intelligent life remains.
a)
cedba
b)
dbeca
c)
dbcae
d)
dabec
14.Recent updates to Google's search algorithms (Panda and Penguin)
have caused many website owners to doubt whether they know what hit
them before they took action. Since Penguin and Panda target two
different issues, it's extremely important to know the exact algorithm
update that hit your website. Panda targets low quality content, thin
content, duplicate content, etc., while Penguin targets webspam (and
at this point it's heavily targeting unnatural inbound links). So, if
you incorrectly believe you were hit by Penguin and start addressing
links, then you would be wasting your time… On the flip side, if you
incorrectly believe you were hit by Panda and start addressing low
quality content, then you could also be wasting your time. And to make
matters worse, both Penguin and Panda will be rolled out periodically.
That means you won't know if your latest refinements actually made a
difference until Pandas and Penguins come knocking on your door again.
What does the above paragraph imply?
a)
Google believes that earlier algorithms have not been able to
differentiate between high and low quality content.
b)
Google is making significant shifts in its value system and is
changing focus from customers to users.
c)
Google has drawn the ire of a lot of users due to changes in its
search ranking algorithms.
d)
You should not prune your links if you were hit by Panda, and you
should not gut content if you were hit by Penguin.
Four alternative summaries are given below the text. Which of the
options best captures the essence of the text?
13.Real and false intuition confused even highly talented thinkers
like Lee Iacocca. Both originate in the subconscious mind and call on
information and experiences stored there. As with conscious thinking,
subconscious patterns can produce both valid and invalid results.
Thus, as with conscious thinking, we must test the validity of
subconsciously produced thoughts. With intuition, however, we must
exercise special care because, unlike conscious reasoning, we cannot
objectively monitor the subconscious intuitive process.
a)
Real and false intuition confused even highly talented thinkers like
Lee Iacocca. Both arise in the subconscious and yield confusing
results which need testing.
b)
While real intuition arises in the conscious mind and produces valid
results, false intuition arises in the subconscious mind and produces
invalid results.
c)
Intuition which emerges from the subconscious mind needs to be
validated with special care because unlike conscious thinking, the
intuitive process cannot be controlled and just like conscious
thinking, it may yield erroneous results.
d)
Intuition needs to be monitored with care as like conscious thinking,
it often produces both valid and invalid results.
15.Those who have followed the curriculum revision movement in recent
years no doubt have been impressed by the frequency of the word
'tentative', as used in describing the courses of study. Sometimes the
impression is given that the most prominent characteristic of the
'curriculum planner' is his persistent inability, or refusal, to make
up his mind. It should be added at once, of course, that the practice
of re-examining fixed courses of study, handed down from one year, and
even from one generation to the next, is an utterly wholesome one. The
question to be raised is not regarding the values of flexibility and
openness to changing conditions, but whether or not 'tentativeness'
carried beyond a certain point may not be a signal of weakness in an
educational position. Some educators would say that the problem is
whether or not an educational programme can go on indefinitely without
deciding what it is educating for.
Which of the following is nearest to the central idea of the paragraph?
a)
The best possible way to redesign curriculum is by incorporating last
minute changes and simultaneously keeping the course curriculum open
for further revisions.
b)
Tentativeness in curriculum design leads to too much of flexibility
and openness, thereby challenging and defeating the idea of content
updation.
c)
The curriculum revision movement is especially marked by the word
'tentative' while describing the courses of study.
d)
In recent years, curriculum planners have not been able to adequately
describe course composition and objective.
ead the following passage which consists of two extracts and answer
the questions given below it.
Extract 1:
Reading takes your focus of attention off your everyday troubles as it
relaxes and transports you to seemingly better places of fantasy
worlds. Reading can give you an insight into different cultures and it
can open your mind up to new ways of thinking, perceiving and doing
things. Reading is still the best source of information available and
it can give you a distinct edge in life. It feeds your hungry mind
with an endless supply of knowledge and information which it seeks.
Reading improves the quality of conversations. Your vast array of new
found knowledge will help you to become more involved in discussions,
you will be more able to instigate much more variable and interesting
levels of conversations. Reading can intrigue you while at the same
time, it can stimulate your imagination, arouse your curiosity and
unleash the creative part of your mind into action. And Mark Twain
quoted, "The man who does not read has no advantage over the man who
cannot read".
In his classic essay, "Of Studies", Francis Bacon writes, "Crafty men
contemn books, simple men admire them, and wise men use them. Read not
to contradict and confute; nor to believe and take for granted; nor to
find talk and discourse; but to weigh and consider. Some books are to
be tasted, others to be swallowed, and some few to be chewed and
digested; that is, some books are to be read only in parts; others to
be read, but not curiously; and some few to be read wholly, and with
diligence and attention. Some books also may be read by deputy, and
extracts made of them by others; but that would be only in the less
important arguments, and the meaner sort of books, else distilled
books are like common distilled waters, flashy things. Reading maketh
a full man; conference a ready man; and writing an exact man. And
therefore, if a man write little, he had need have a great memory; if
he confer little, he had need have a present wit: and if he read
little, he had need have much cunning, to seem to know, that he doth
not".
Extract 2:
Born into a milieu where reading was rare and deriving little pleasure
from the activity, I have found myself in the delicate situation of
having to express my thoughts on books I haven't read. I also find it
unsurprising that so few texts extol the virtues of nonreading.
Indeed, to describe your experience in this area demands a certain
courage, for doing so clashes inevitably with some internalized
constraints. The first constraint is the obligation to read. We still
live in a society where reading remains the object of a kind of
worship. This worship applies particularly to a number of canonical
texts − the list varies according to the circles you move in − which
it is practically forbidden not to have read if you want to be taken
seriously.
The second constraint is called the obligation to read thoroughly. If
it's frowned upon not to read, it's almost as bad to read quickly or
to skim, and especially to say so. For example, it's virtually
unthinkable for literary intellectuals to acknowledge that they have
flipped through Proust's work without having read it in its entirety;
though this is certainly the case for most of them.
The third constraint concerns a tacit understanding in our culture
that one must read a book in order to talk about it. I think it's
totally possible to do justice to a book and carry on an engaging
conversation about a book you haven't read in its entirety or even
opened; and perhaps with someone else who hasn't read it either. Our
propensity to lie when we talk about books is a logical consequence of
the stigma attached to non-reading, which in turn arises from a whole
network of anxieties rooted (no doubt) in early childhood.
The concept of nonreading is unclear, and it is often hard to know
whether we're lying or not when we say that we've read a book. The
very question implies that we can draw a clear line between reading
and not reading, while in fact many of the ways we encounter texts sit
somewhere between the two. ___________________________________ In the
case of books we have supposedly read, we must consider just what is
meant by reading, a term that can refer to a variety of practices.
Conversely, any books that by all appearances we haven't read exert an
influence on us nevertheless, as their reputations spread through
society.
16. What does the word 'contemn' mean in the context of the passage?
a)
condemn
b)
scorn
c)
eulogize
d)
scrutinize
17. What does Francis Bacon indicate can be done with the meaner sort of books?
a)
Replace them with other eclectic reading sources.
b)
Use the opportunity to explore a tough subject through mental
association and a casual ramble of the mind.
c)
Appoint and empower a scribe to make extracts.
d)
Chew and digest them thoroughly.
18. DIRECTIONS for question 84: Select one or more answer choices
according to the directions given in the question.
Which of the following statements can be understood from the passage?
Select all that apply:
a)
Extract 1 throws light on the importance of reading and how one should
read. Extract 2 presents the non-reader's experience and the
constraints a non-reader faces because of the value society places on
reading.
b)
Bacon proposed the statement: Listening is a dying art, we hardly
listen to understand, we only listen to refute or reply.
c)
The last para of Extract 2 can be best completed by: Between a book
we've read closely and a book we've never even heard of, there is a
whole range of gradations that deserve our attention.
d)
The last para of Extract 2 can be logically completed by: It is easier
to be objective about a book if you have no personal experience with
it.
e)
A person who favours the reading habit would echo the view that
reading can help to broaden one's mind or it can keep one intrigued in
a story line and prompt the power of curiosity.
19. What can be inferred about the three constraints against reading
discussed in Extract 2?
a)
The second and the third constraints are necessarily dependent on the
first constraint. The second constraint is similar to the first but
nonetheless distinct.
b)
The first constraint is a facilitating condition for the second and
third constraints. The three constraints mentioned in the correct
sequence in the extract are the obligation to read thoroughly, the
obligation to read a book before discussing it and the obligation to
read.
c)
For the third constraint to be considered valid, one has to
acknowledge both the first and second constraints as invalid.
d)
The third constraint and the first constraint are independent.
Four alternative summaries are given below the text. Which of the
options best captures the essence of the text?
20."What a delightful place Yorkshire is," said Mrs. Karen as they sat
down near the great clock, after parading the room till they were
tired; "and how pleasant it would be if we had any acquaintance here."
This sentiment had been uttered so often in vain that Mrs. Karen had
no particular reason to hope it would be followed with more advantage
now; but we are told to "despair of nothing we would attain," as
"unwearied diligence our point would gain"; and the unwearied
diligence with which she had every day wished for the same thing was
at length to have its just reward, for hardly had she been seated ten
minutes before a lady of about her own age, who was sitting by her,
and had been looking at her attentively for several minutes, addressed
her with great complaisance in these words: "I think, madam, I cannot
be mistaken; it is a long time since I had the pleasure of seeing you,
but is not your name Karen?"
a)
Though Mrs. Karen had often wished for acquaintances at Yorkshire, it
was unlikely that her wish would be fulfilled. But now she was
approached by a lady who claimed to know her.
b)
Mrs. Karen had diligently wished everyday that she would meet an
acquaintance in Yorkshire, and finally her wish was fulfilled, as the
lady she had hoped to meet addressed her.
c)
Mrs. Karen's assiduity in waiting for an acquaintance in Yorkshire was
rewarded when a lady who seemed to know her spoke to her.
d)
Just as Mrs. Karen had begun to despair of meeting anyone she knew in
Yorkshire, a lady who had been observing her for a while started
speaking to her.
Business process re-engineering (BPR) is a business management
strategy, focusing on the analysis and design of workflows and
business processes within an organization.
BPR seeks to help companies radically restructure their organizations
by focusing on the ground-up design of their business processes.
Re-engineering emphasizes a holistic focus on business objectives and
processes related to them, encouraging full-scale recreation of
processes rather than iterative optimization of subprocesses. BPR
doesn't try to change the behaviour of workers and managers. Indeed,
it takes advantage of talents and unleashes ingenuity.
In 1990, Michael Hammer, professor at MIT, published the article
"Reengineering Work: Don't Automate, Obliterate" in HBR, claiming that
the major challenge for managers is to obliterate forms of work that
do not add value, rather than using technology for automating it. At
the heart of business reengineering, lies the notion of discontinuous
thinking − abandoning the outdated rules that underlie current
business operations: "Customers don't repair their own equipment."
"Local warehouses and superficial reorganizations are necessary for
good service." "Merchandising decisions are made at headquarters."
These rules are based on assumptions about technology, people and
goals that no longer hold.
Reengineering starts with a high-level assessment of the
organization's mission andcustomer needs. Basic questions are asked,
such as "Does our mission need to be redefined? Are our strategic
goals aligned with our mission? Who are our customers? Are the
suggested techniques for change transferrable to other organizations
in other lines of business? Could they be applied to companies as a
whole instead of only to small, discrete parts of an organization?"
Within the framework of this basic assessment of mission and goals,
re-engineering focuses on the organization's business processes. As a
structured ordering of work steps across time and place, a business
process can be decomposed into specific activities, measured, modeled,
and improved. It can also be completely redesigned or eliminated
altogether. Re-engineering identifies, analyses and re-designs an
organization's core business processes with the aim of achieving
dramatic improvements in critical performance measures, such as cost,
quality, service, and speed.
Many successful companies in the past had not changed the businesses
they were in; rather, they had significantly altered the processes
they followed in these businesses − or even replaced these old
processes entirely. This process change was accompanied by an equally
radical change in the shape and character of those parts of the
organization that were involved in performing it. It struck us that
these companies were achieving dramatic results in part because they
would accept nothing less. They weren't asking "How can we do what we
do faster?" or "How can we do what we do better?" or "How can we do
what we do at a lower cost?" Instead they were asking "Why do we do
what we do at all?" We discovered that most of the companies we
examined that had succeeded in radically changing one or more of their
processes had, albeit unknowingly, used a common set of tools and
tactics.
Re-engineering recognizes that an organization's business processes
are usually fragmented into subprocesses and tasks that are carried
out by several specialized functional areas within the organization.
Re-engineering maintains that optimizing the performance of
subprocesses can result in some benefits, but cannot yield dramatic
improvements if the process itself is fundamentally inefficient and
outmoded. Re-engineering focuses on re-designing the process as a
whole in order to achieve the greatest possible benefits to the
organization and their customers. This drive for realizing dramatic
improvements by fundamentally re-thinking how the organization's work
should be done distinguishes re-engineering from process improvement
efforts that focus on functional or incremental improvement.
Reengineering can't be carried out in small and cautious steps. It is
an all-or-nothing proposition that produces dramatically impressive
results. Most companies have no choice but to muster the courage to do
it. Reengineering is the hope for breaking away from the ineffective,
antiquated ways of conducting business.
21. Which of the following choices exemplifies the concept of
discontinuous thinking?
a)
Customers don't repair their own equipment; merchandising decisions
are made at headquarters; local warehouses are necessary for good
service.
b)
The lab attendant in the chemistry laboratory of a college can be
empowered to take college management-related decisions.
c)
Short-term thinking, risk aversion and top-down decision making.
d)
Junior experts like computer programmers, systems designers, operation
researchers, engineering specialists can provide consulting to other
companies to optimise productivity.
22. Which of the following statements can be inferred from the passage
about business process reengineering?
a)
The organizations which implemented business process reengineering
chose radical change over the less painful remedy of steady,
incremental improvements that most businesses usually prefer.
b)
Business process reengineering aims to decrease manual interventions
in the work place, emphasises managerial control and therefore
justifies downsizing.
c)
Reengineering focuses on optimizing the performance of subprocesses.
d)
Business reengineering is based on a philosophy that would have "us"
become more like "them" and this involves instilling behavioural
changes in workers and managers.
23. According to the passage, companies that had implemented Business
Process Reengineering would have
a)
deliberately used a common set of tools and tactics to change their
processes and improve their performance.
b)
created a product high in quality, supplied that product at a fair
price, and provided excellent service.
c)
significantly altered the processes they followed in their business
and had asked different and more relevant questions from those asked
by other organizations.
d)
simply accomplished tasks to satisfy the internal demands of the organization.
24. All of the following steps differentiate BPR from process
improvements that an organization may undertake EXCEPT
a)
Radical process changes accompanied by equally radical changes in the
shape and character of those parts of the organization that were
involved in performing them.
b)
Realizing dramatic improvements by fundamentally re-thinking how the
organization's work should be done with a holistic focus on business
objectives and processes related to them.
In each of the following questions, there are sentences or fragments
of sentences that form a paragraph. Identify and select the
sentence(s) or fragments of sentence(s) that is/are correct in terms
of grammar and usage, including spelling, punctuation and logical
consistency.
Select all that are correct.
a)
Amidst the grim backdrop over a war-torn Vienna, Karl Landsteiner's
scientific explorations in the areas of hematology, immunology and
bacteriology
b)
cemented his place in history as one of the most influential figures
in modern medicine.
c)
He is noted for having distinguished first the main blood groups in
1900, having developed the modern system of classification of blood
groups
d)
from his identification of the presence of agglutinins in the blood,
and having identified, with Alexander S. Wiener the Rhesus factor in
1937 thus
e)
enabling physicians to transfuse blood without endangering the patient's lives
c)
Identifying and abandoning the outdated rules and fundamental
assumptions that underlie current business operations.
d)
A bureaucratic approach to making decisions, assessing missions and
goals, and performing reorganizations within the company.
It seems appropriate to start our survey of trends in traditional and
present-day linguistics by asking how linguists tend to define
(explicitly or implicitly) the scope of their discipline. Linguistics
is a term which covers certain types of scientific approaches to
language; it does not denote all sciences or scientific activities
that are concerned with language and the use of language.
What then is the traditional content of linguistics? Originally, i.e.
through most of our long history almost up to the 19th and 20th
centuries, it contained phonology, grammar (especially morphology and
syntax (which, however, did not consider word order very much) and
some of their semantic aspects), logic, and rhetorics, and also
philology (text interpretation etc.). Later, philology was
(temporarily) relegated from linguistics (because it did not study
language for its own sake), and something similar happened to logic
and rhetorics. Hence, according to our 20th century conception,
linguistics is basically phonology, grammar (morphology, syntax) and
semantics (especially word semantics; sentence semantics is a rather
recent rediscovery). In the 1970's logic and rhetorics have also been
reincorporated under the headings of (formal) semantics and
pragmatics, respectively.
In a more global perspective, the linguists' approach(es) to language
must be considered narrow, and this is also true of today's
linguistics. For example, one very important aspect of language which
is seldom or never discussed in linguistics (and this also applies to
psycho-linguistics) is the question why people use language, for what
purposes utterances and written messages are compiled and used.
Instead the typical linguist's attitude is this: Given that people use
messages formulated in natural languages, i.e. in terms of linguistic
expressions, how are these expressions structurally organized, and
what meanings can be attached to the expressions qua items in an
abstract, supra individual linguistic code. Accordingly, linguistics
in the usual traditional (though still widely accepted) sense is
narrow in scope, (Lyons, 1981:36, has proposed the term
'microlinguistics' for it). Many scientific studies of the structure,
function and use of language simply do not belong to linguistics in
this traditional sense. Such fields as the psychology, sociology and
philosophy of language are concerned with linguistic phenomena, but
they are said to do so from the vantage points of other disciplines
(outside linguistics). Such scholars as Wundt, Mead and Wittgenstein
do not belong to the history of linguistics, although they made
contributions to the study of language which compete quite well with
those of, say, Humboldt, Sapir, Saussure and Chomsky. Even such
borderline disciplines as psycholinguistics, sociolinguistics and
neurolinguistics do not really count as linguistics proper, according
to many scholars in the field.
Another interesting field that is concerned with linguistic phenomena
but from the vantage point of other related disciplines is social
semiotics. Social semiotics expands on Saussure's founding insights by
exploring the implications of the fact that the "codes" of language
and communication are formed by social processes. The crucial
implication here is that meanings and semiotic systems are shaped by
relations of power, and that as power shifts in society, our languages
and other systems of socially accepted meanings can and do change. The
Semiotic Learning framework uses social semiotics theory as one of its
foundational conceptual approaches. Social semiotics, developed by
Halliday and Kress among others, raised out of the Saussurean school
of thought. Saussure claimed that we use language not only to
communicate but to construct our world, and when he distinguished
between langue, the abstract structure of a language, and parole, the
way it was actually used in practice, he directed his attention to the
former. Subsequent developments from this movement and focus on
langue, on the abstract structures of a language, were structuralism
and also positivist approaches to signification and interpretation.
Social semiotics, on the other hand, focussed on language as it was
actually used, on parole, thus taking the rich and fuzzy world of
social, cultural and political spheres into
account.____________________
26. Which of the following questions does the passage mainly answer?
a)
What is the traditional content of linguistics and microlinguistics?
b)
How is linguistics studied by linguistics?
c)
How has linguistics evolved over the 19th and 20th centuries?
d)
How narrow is the scope of linguistics as considered currently?
27. Which of the following questions reflects the primary concern of a
traditional linguist?
a)
Why do people use language?
b)
How are linguistic expressions structurally organized? What meanings
can be attached to linguistic expression in an abstract, supra
individual linguistic code?
c)
Why are utterances and written messages compiled and used?
d)
Both (B) and (C).
28. Which of the following is true about Wundt, Mead and Wittgenstein?
a)
They belong to psychology, sociology and philosophy.
b)
They did not make any significant contribution to the study of language.
c)
They are not mainly concerned with the study of linguistic phenomena.
d)
Their contributions to the study of language were better than those of
Sapir, Saussure and Chomsky.
29. Which of the following sentences can conclude the last paragraph
of the passage?
a)
Social semiotics explicitly takes a non-positivist approach as it
focuses on the contexts, prerequisites and conditions of possibility
for a meaningful dialogue to occur.
b)
Social semiotics focuses on social subjectivity and therefore takes a
non-cognitivist approach: instead of referring to meaning-making as
something that is done by the minds, it points to the role of social
practices within communities.
c)
Social semiotics may be understood as a discourse on meaning-making
where the aim is to examine the functions and the effects of the
meanings we make in every day life as we communicate, within
communities, organisations and society.
d)
In a playful way, social semiotics is known to have developed out of
what Saussure dismissed and put to the side, thus working on what was
inside Saussure's 'dustbin'.
The sentences given in the following questions, when properly
sequenced, form a coherent paragraph. Figure out the most logical
order of sentences that constructs a coherent paragraph and enter that
sequence in the input box given below the question. For example, if
you think that (A)(B)(C)(D)(E) is the most logical order of sentences
that constructs a coherent paragraph, then enter ABCDE in the input
box.
30.(A) This provides the clue as to why divinity or consciousness
would also escape our attempt to grasp it objectively.
(B) But since the mystical never shows up there, it must not exist.
(C) Moreover, our mind cannot fully grasp the same mind since most of
its real substance is engaged in grasping.
(D) Reductionists, on the other hand, claim that if a mystical element
really exists, then it would show up at the lowest level of matter.
(E) Thus, mind always eludes complete objectification of the same mind.
(F) Lower-level scientific analysis is incapable of grasping quality
differences at higher levels.
Scientific theories can be clearly distinguished from all other
theories in that they bear a special mark − falsifiability. Said
Popper: Any scientific theory could be shown to be false if some
conceivable observation were true. As Popper represents it, the
central problem in the philosophy of science is that of demarcation,
i.e., of distinguishing between science and 'non-science', under which
heading he ranks, amongst others, logic, metaphysics, psychoanalysis,
and Adler's individual psychology. Popper is unusual amongst
contemporary philosophers in that he accepts the validity of the
Humean critique of induction, and indeed, goes beyond it in arguing
that induction is never actually used by the scientist. However, he
does not concede that this entails the scepticism which is associated
with Hume, and argues that the Baconian / Newtonian insistence on the
primacy of 'pure' observation, as the initial step in the formation of
theories, is completely misguided: all observation is selective and
theory-laden − there are no pure or theory-free observations.
Popper, then, repudiates induction, and rejects the view that it is
the characteristic method of scientific investigation and inference,
and substitutes falsifiability in its place. It is easy to obtain
evidence in favour of virtually any theory, and such 'corroboration',
should count scientifically only if it is the positive result of a
genuinely 'risky' prediction, which might conceivably have been false.
For Popper, a theory is scientific only if it is refutable by a
conceivable event. Every genuine test of a scientific theory, is
logically an attempt to refute or to falsify it, and one genuine
counter-instance falsifies the whole theory. Popper's theory of
demarcation is based upon his perception of the logical asymmetry
which holds between verification and falsification: it is logically
impossible to conclusively verify a universal proposition by reference
to experience, but a single counter-instance conclusively falsifies
the corresponding universal law.
Every genuine scientific theory is prohibitive, in the sense that it
forbids, by implication, particular events or occurrences. It can be
tested and falsified, but never logically verified. Thus Popper
stresses that it should not be inferred from the fact that a theory
has withstood the most rigorous testing, for however long a period of
time, that it has been verified; rather we should recognise that such
a theory has received a high measure of corroboration and may be
provisionally retained as the best available theory until it is
finally falsified, and/or is superseded by a better theory.
While advocating falsifiability as the criterion of demarcation for
science, Popper explicitly allows for the fact that in practice a
single conflicting or counter-instance is never sufficient
methodologically to falsify a theory, and that scientific theories are
often retained even though much of the available evidence conflicts
with them, or is anomalous with respect to them. Scientific theories
arise genetically in many different ways, and the manner in which a
particular scientist comes to formulate a particular theory may be of
biographical interest, but it is of no consequence as far as the
philosophy of science is concerned. Popper stresses in particular that
there is no unique way, no single method such as induction, which
functions as the route to scientific theory, a view which Einstein
personally endorsed with his affirmation that 'There is no logical
path leading to [the highly universal laws of science]. They can only
be reached by intuition, based upon something like an intellectual
love of the objects of experience'. Science, in Popper's view, starts
with problems rather than with observations − it is, indeed, precisely
in the context of grappling with a problem that the scientist makes
observations in the first instance: his observations are selectively
designed to test the extent to which a given theory functions as a
satisfactory solution to a given problem.
Popper claimed scientific beliefs are universal in character, and have
to be so if they are to serve us in explanation and prediction. For
the universality of a scientific belief implies that, no matter how
many instances we have found positive, there will always be an
indefinite number of unexamined instances which may or may not also be
positive. We have no good reason for supposing that any of these
unexamined instances will be positive, or will be negative, so we must
refrain from drawing any conclusions. On the other hand, a single
negative instance is sufficient to prove that the belief is false, for
such an instance is logically incompatible with the universal truth of
the belief. Provided, therefore, that the instance is accepted as
negative we must conclude that the scientific belief is false.
31. What is the primary purpose of the author of the passage?
a)
To indicate that science allows the possibility of rejecting a theory
or hypothesis through induction.
b)
To prove that actual scientific work does not follow the scheme of
conjecture and refutation as laid out by the idea of falsifiability.
c)
To explain how a set of shared scientific beliefs evolve into a paradigm.
d)
To show that existing scientific methodologies permit the development
of scientific theories that can be, at best, only approximations of
highly universal laws of science.
Select one or more answer choices according to the directions given in
the question.
32 Which of the following observations, experiments or scenarios
suggest an application of the concept of 'falsification' as discussed
in the passage?
Select all that apply:
a)
Re-examining the conclusion that "it has snowed in Massachusetts every
December in recorded history" in the light of the observation of a
single year when it did not snow in Massachusetts in December.
b)
Re-examining the claims of ten independent witnesses who said that
John Depp committed the murder using a single finding that throws
light on certain facts such as John actually addressing a gathering at
the time of the murder and the murder weapon having no fingerprints of
John.
c)
Re-examining the conclusion that all uranium isotopes exhibit
radioactivity in the light of the observation of a single uranium
isotope that does not exhibit radioactivity.
d)
Re-examining a statement such as 'rape is a heinous crime' when the
speaker of such a statement was caught in the crime of rape.
e)
Re-examining Darwin's theory that all life forms evolved from simple
life forms in the light of the finding of the fossil of a complex life
form that predates all known life forms.
33. Which of the following can be understood from the passage?
a)
A summary of the boldface part of the text is − We can only induce
that a scientific belief is false but cannot induce that it is true.
b)
Corroboration of a scientific theory is not valid if it is the
positive result of a prediction which might conceivably have been
true.
c)
A scientific attitude implies endless questioning and cannot lead to
strong beliefs.
d)
Science focuses on anomalies and exceptions so that fundamental truths
can be uncovered.
34. The author of the passage is most likely to agree with which of
the following?
a)
When a scientist formulates a scientific theory, he should also
address the scientific question from the philosophical point of view
and not just from the biographical angle.
b)
Verification provides a rationale for not rejecting a claim.
c)
All scientific theories are inherently prohibitive and all reasons for
rejecting a scientific belief are provided by falsification.
d)
The number of negative instances of a scientific belief exceeds the
number of positive instances of a scientific belief.
Each of the following questions presents four statements, of which
three, when placed in appropriate order, would form a contextually
complete paragraph. Pick the statement that is not part of the
context.
1.
a)
You may say that even if they do not speak English well themselves,
they at least understand it when the speaker is a foreigner; the
better he speaks the harder it is to understand him.
b)
But if you shout "Please! Charing Cross! Which way?" you will have no
difficulty and half a dozen people will give you directions at once.
c)
In London nine hundred and ninety nine out of every thousand people
not only speak bad English but speak even that very badly.
d)
Therefore the first thing you have to do is to speak with a strong
foreign accent, and speak broken English: that is English without any
grammar and then every English person will at once know that you are a
foreigner, and try to understand and be ready to help you.
DIRECTIONS for questions 1 to 4: Each of the following questions
presents four statements, of which three, when placed in appropriate
order, would form a contextually complete paragraph. Pick the
statement that is not part of the context.
2.
a)
Extracting common elements from various episodes helps us learn rules
that govern our environment, preparing us for similar experiences and
that ability is fundamental to higher cognition.
b)
Bees may not be able to tell tales about being under fire in flights
over Iraq, but they do demonstrate remarkable memory ability.
c)
That's what makes them valuable models to researchers trying to find
the roots of complex brain functions in the simpler structures
preserved across species over many millions of years of evolution.
d)
And because they have a mere 960,000 neurons compared with the human
complement of about 85 billion, they probably need to economize on
storage and processing.
Each of the following questions presents four statements, of which
three, when placed in appropriate order, would form a contextually
complete paragraph. Pick the statement that is not part of the
context.
3.
a)
Auschwitz, for the Jews, and not only for them, was a destination with
no return ticket, a place of gas and ashes.
b)
But some did survive; those sent the other way on the ramp to be
worked to death for Hitler's Reich, except of course that it might
just be, if they were resilient enough, that the 1,000-year Reich
expired in flames before them.
c)
One of the great merits of Rosenberg's book is the way he contrives to
relive his father's life forwards, not prejudging events through the
prism of the outcome, but imbuing each stage of what he calls "the
project" with a kind of tender hope.
d)
The most important word in the title of Goran Rosenberg's beautifully
wrought book, "A Brief Stop on the Road From Auschwitz," is the
unlikely one that precedes the name of the Nazi death camp.
Each of the following questions presents four statements, of which
three, when placed in appropriate order, would form a contextually
complete paragraph. Pick the statement that is not part of the
context.
4.
a)
The way you get over this natural tendency to sell yourself short is
by setting small goals, making plans, and working on them each day.
b)
Social problems resulting from learned helplessness may seem
unavoidable; however, when induced in experimental settings learned
helplessness resolves with the passage of time
c)
People who get stuck in a comfort zone, if it is combined with learned
helplessness, find it very difficult to move forward.
d)
In this way, you gradually develop greater courage and confidence,
like building up a muscle and as you become more confident in yourself
and your abilities, you can set even larger goals.
The sentences given in the following questions, when properly
sequenced, form a coherent paragraph. Figure out the most logical
order of sentences that constructs a coherent paragraph and enter that
sequence in the input box given below the question. For example, if
you think that (A)(B)(C)(D)(E) is the most logical order of sentences
that constructs a coherent paragraph, then enter ABCDE in the input
box.
5.(A) Chernobyl's engineers, peering outside, wondered what had happened.
(B) Within hours they would be dead, having suffered exposure to
massive radiation doses.
(C) With power surging out of control, expanding gas literally blew
the lid off the huge reactor and spewed pulverized graphite from the
reactor's inner core onto the surrounding grounds like black snow.
(D) Unable to accept a reactor failure, they simply could not believe
their eyes, even with obvious evidence falling from the sky.
(E) The explosion of Chernobyl nuclear power plant created a
nightmare, the consequences of which will last for thousands of years.
The sentences given in each of the following questions, when properly
sequenced, form a coherent paragraph. Each sentence is labeled with a
letter. From among the four choices given below the question, choose
the most logical order of sentences that constructs a coherent
paragraph.
6.(a) And the good news is that you have complete control over your
mental pictures for good or for ill.
(b) Your performance on the outside is always consistent with your
self-image on the inside.
(c) The choice is upto you.
(d) You can choose to feed your mind with positive, exciting success
images, or you can, by default, allow yourself to be preoccupied by
failure images.
(e) Your self-image is made up of the mental pictures that you feed
into your mind prior to any event.
a)
bacde
b)
beadc
c)
eadcb
d)
adceb
The sentences given in each of the following questions, when properly
sequenced, form a coherent paragraph. Each sentence is labeled with a
letter. From among the four choices given below the question, choose
the most logical order of sentences that constructs a coherent
paragraph.
7.(a) Increasingly, managers have to rely on the judgment of these
experts who "do not fit neatly together into a chain-of-command
system" and "cannot wait for their expert advice to be approved at a
higher level."
(b) Solid state physicists, computer programmers, systems designers,
operation researchers, engineering specialists − such men are assuming
a new decision-making function.
(c) Today, the managers are losing their monopoly on decision-making
and there is no longer a strict allegiance to hierarchy.
(d) This silent but significant deterioration of hierarchy, now
occurring in the executive suite as well as at the ground level of the
factory floor, is intensified by the arrival on the scene of hordes of
experts − specialists in vital fields so narrow that often the men on
top have difficulty understanding them.
(e) At one time, they merely consulted with executives who reserved
unto themselves the right to make managerial decisions.
a)
deabc
b)
dcbea
c)
becda
d)
caebd
8 in each of the following questions, there are sentences or
fragments of sentences that form a paragraph. Identify and select the
sentence(s) or fragments of sentence(s) that is/are correct in terms
of grammar and usage, including spelling, punctuation and logical
consistency.
Select all that are correct:
a)
Kazuo Ishiguro, Man Booker winner in 1989 with The Remains of the Day,
is famously slow writer.
b)
His late novel, The Buried Giant, has been published just and took a
full ten years to write.
c)
He has written 'only' seven novels in all. Imagine his surprise, then,
when he discovered that there were two other novels that had somehow
slipped his memory.
d)
When sorting about his papers recently he came across two books that
pre-date his official first novel A Pale View of Hills (1982).
e)
Ishiguro's words to an interviewer makes it clear that they will never
be seen in print.
9.DIRECTIONS for questions 8 to 10: In each of the following
questions, there are sentences or fragments of sentences that form a
paragraph. Identify and select the sentence(s) or fragments of
sentence(s) that is/are correct in terms of grammar and usage,
including spelling, punctuation and logical consistency.
Select all that are correct:
a)
Education is humanity's best hope and effective means in the quest to
achieve sustainable development.
b)
This powerful statement was made in 1997 in UNESCO report, Educating
for a Sustainable Future.
c)
Five years later, it was bought to the attention of the world leaders
at the Johannesburg World Summit on Sustainable Development,
d)
paving out the way to the establishment of the United Nations Decade
for Education for Sustainable Development (2005-2014).
e)
UNESCO was designated as the lead agency for implementing the Decade
and has helped catalyse, guide, co-ordinate and document related
efforts around the world.
10 In each of the following questions, there are sentences or
fragments of sentences that form a paragraph. Identify and select the
sentence(s) or fragments of sentence(s) that is/are correct in terms
of grammar and usage, including spelling, punctuation and logical
consistency.
Select all that are correct:
a)
As a middle-class boy growing up in Oxford at the turn of the 20th
century, young Lawrence (of Arabia) was idiosyncratic certainly.
b)
He was sceptical over received truths, easily bored but passionate
about medieval history, cathedrals and brass rubbings.
c)
He would hang at building sites and gather fragments of pots which he
reconstituted and delivered to museum curators.
d)
Now, his biographers have to be diggers and restorers, sifting a mass
of evidence and gluing the bits of his mysterious life together.
e)
But these bits never quite constitute a whole, comprehensible human
being; much about Lawrence remains an enigma.
The following question presents four statements, of which three, when
placed in appropriate order, would form a contextually complete
paragraph. Pick the statement that is not part of the context.
11.
a)
However, like all scientific theories, the theory of evolution is
subject to continuing refinement as new areas of science emerge or as
new technologies enable observations and experiments that were not
possible previously.
b)
In everyday usage, "theory" often refers to a hunch or a speculation;
when people say, "I have a theory about why that happened," they are
often drawing a conclusion based on fragmentary or inconclusive
evidence.
c)
Like these other foundational scientific theories, the theory of
evolution is supported by so many observations and confirming
experiments that scientists are confident that the basic components of
the theory will not be overturned by new evidence.
d)
Many scientific theories are so well-established that no new evidence
is likely to alter them substantially, for example, no new evidence
will demonstrate that the Earth does not orbit around the sun
(heliocentric theory), or that living things are not made of cells
(cell theory).
The sentences given in the following question, when properly
sequenced, form a coherent paragraph. Each sentence is labeled with a
letter. From among the four choices given below the question, choose
the most logical order of sentences that constructs a coherent
paragraph.
12.(a) Likewise, Seyfert galaxies were suspected to be "industrial
accidents" because their enormous and directed energy output had no
initial explanation.
(b) This has been suspected several times.
(c) Pulsars, when first discovered, were called little green men
(LGM), because of the precise repetition of their pulses (they rival
the best atomic clocks).
(d) One way that astronomy might find evidence of an extraterrestrial
civilization is that conventional astronomers, studying stars,
planets, and galaxies, might serendipitously observe some phenomenon
that cannot be explained without positing an intelligent civilization
as the source.
(e) Eventually, natural explanations not involving intelligent life
have been found for all such observations to date, but the possibility
of discovery of intelligent life remains.
a)
cedba
b)
dbeca
c)
dbcae
d)
dabec
14.Recent updates to Google's search algorithms (Panda and Penguin)
have caused many website owners to doubt whether they know what hit
them before they took action. Since Penguin and Panda target two
different issues, it's extremely important to know the exact algorithm
update that hit your website. Panda targets low quality content, thin
content, duplicate content, etc., while Penguin targets webspam (and
at this point it's heavily targeting unnatural inbound links). So, if
you incorrectly believe you were hit by Penguin and start addressing
links, then you would be wasting your time… On the flip side, if you
incorrectly believe you were hit by Panda and start addressing low
quality content, then you could also be wasting your time. And to make
matters worse, both Penguin and Panda will be rolled out periodically.
That means you won't know if your latest refinements actually made a
difference until Pandas and Penguins come knocking on your door again.
What does the above paragraph imply?
a)
Google believes that earlier algorithms have not been able to
differentiate between high and low quality content.
b)
Google is making significant shifts in its value system and is
changing focus from customers to users.
c)
Google has drawn the ire of a lot of users due to changes in its
search ranking algorithms.
d)
You should not prune your links if you were hit by Panda, and you
should not gut content if you were hit by Penguin.
Four alternative summaries are given below the text. Which of the
options best captures the essence of the text?
13.Real and false intuition confused even highly talented thinkers
like Lee Iacocca. Both originate in the subconscious mind and call on
information and experiences stored there. As with conscious thinking,
subconscious patterns can produce both valid and invalid results.
Thus, as with conscious thinking, we must test the validity of
subconsciously produced thoughts. With intuition, however, we must
exercise special care because, unlike conscious reasoning, we cannot
objectively monitor the subconscious intuitive process.
a)
Real and false intuition confused even highly talented thinkers like
Lee Iacocca. Both arise in the subconscious and yield confusing
results which need testing.
b)
While real intuition arises in the conscious mind and produces valid
results, false intuition arises in the subconscious mind and produces
invalid results.
c)
Intuition which emerges from the subconscious mind needs to be
validated with special care because unlike conscious thinking, the
intuitive process cannot be controlled and just like conscious
thinking, it may yield erroneous results.
d)
Intuition needs to be monitored with care as like conscious thinking,
it often produces both valid and invalid results.
15.Those who have followed the curriculum revision movement in recent
years no doubt have been impressed by the frequency of the word
'tentative', as used in describing the courses of study. Sometimes the
impression is given that the most prominent characteristic of the
'curriculum planner' is his persistent inability, or refusal, to make
up his mind. It should be added at once, of course, that the practice
of re-examining fixed courses of study, handed down from one year, and
even from one generation to the next, is an utterly wholesome one. The
question to be raised is not regarding the values of flexibility and
openness to changing conditions, but whether or not 'tentativeness'
carried beyond a certain point may not be a signal of weakness in an
educational position. Some educators would say that the problem is
whether or not an educational programme can go on indefinitely without
deciding what it is educating for.
Which of the following is nearest to the central idea of the paragraph?
a)
The best possible way to redesign curriculum is by incorporating last
minute changes and simultaneously keeping the course curriculum open
for further revisions.
b)
Tentativeness in curriculum design leads to too much of flexibility
and openness, thereby challenging and defeating the idea of content
updation.
c)
The curriculum revision movement is especially marked by the word
'tentative' while describing the courses of study.
d)
In recent years, curriculum planners have not been able to adequately
describe course composition and objective.
ead the following passage which consists of two extracts and answer
the questions given below it.
Extract 1:
Reading takes your focus of attention off your everyday troubles as it
relaxes and transports you to seemingly better places of fantasy
worlds. Reading can give you an insight into different cultures and it
can open your mind up to new ways of thinking, perceiving and doing
things. Reading is still the best source of information available and
it can give you a distinct edge in life. It feeds your hungry mind
with an endless supply of knowledge and information which it seeks.
Reading improves the quality of conversations. Your vast array of new
found knowledge will help you to become more involved in discussions,
you will be more able to instigate much more variable and interesting
levels of conversations. Reading can intrigue you while at the same
time, it can stimulate your imagination, arouse your curiosity and
unleash the creative part of your mind into action. And Mark Twain
quoted, "The man who does not read has no advantage over the man who
cannot read".
In his classic essay, "Of Studies", Francis Bacon writes, "Crafty men
contemn books, simple men admire them, and wise men use them. Read not
to contradict and confute; nor to believe and take for granted; nor to
find talk and discourse; but to weigh and consider. Some books are to
be tasted, others to be swallowed, and some few to be chewed and
digested; that is, some books are to be read only in parts; others to
be read, but not curiously; and some few to be read wholly, and with
diligence and attention. Some books also may be read by deputy, and
extracts made of them by others; but that would be only in the less
important arguments, and the meaner sort of books, else distilled
books are like common distilled waters, flashy things. Reading maketh
a full man; conference a ready man; and writing an exact man. And
therefore, if a man write little, he had need have a great memory; if
he confer little, he had need have a present wit: and if he read
little, he had need have much cunning, to seem to know, that he doth
not".
Extract 2:
Born into a milieu where reading was rare and deriving little pleasure
from the activity, I have found myself in the delicate situation of
having to express my thoughts on books I haven't read. I also find it
unsurprising that so few texts extol the virtues of nonreading.
Indeed, to describe your experience in this area demands a certain
courage, for doing so clashes inevitably with some internalized
constraints. The first constraint is the obligation to read. We still
live in a society where reading remains the object of a kind of
worship. This worship applies particularly to a number of canonical
texts − the list varies according to the circles you move in − which
it is practically forbidden not to have read if you want to be taken
seriously.
The second constraint is called the obligation to read thoroughly. If
it's frowned upon not to read, it's almost as bad to read quickly or
to skim, and especially to say so. For example, it's virtually
unthinkable for literary intellectuals to acknowledge that they have
flipped through Proust's work without having read it in its entirety;
though this is certainly the case for most of them.
The third constraint concerns a tacit understanding in our culture
that one must read a book in order to talk about it. I think it's
totally possible to do justice to a book and carry on an engaging
conversation about a book you haven't read in its entirety or even
opened; and perhaps with someone else who hasn't read it either. Our
propensity to lie when we talk about books is a logical consequence of
the stigma attached to non-reading, which in turn arises from a whole
network of anxieties rooted (no doubt) in early childhood.
The concept of nonreading is unclear, and it is often hard to know
whether we're lying or not when we say that we've read a book. The
very question implies that we can draw a clear line between reading
and not reading, while in fact many of the ways we encounter texts sit
somewhere between the two. ___________________________________ In the
case of books we have supposedly read, we must consider just what is
meant by reading, a term that can refer to a variety of practices.
Conversely, any books that by all appearances we haven't read exert an
influence on us nevertheless, as their reputations spread through
society.
16. What does the word 'contemn' mean in the context of the passage?
a)
condemn
b)
scorn
c)
eulogize
d)
scrutinize
17. What does Francis Bacon indicate can be done with the meaner sort of books?
a)
Replace them with other eclectic reading sources.
b)
Use the opportunity to explore a tough subject through mental
association and a casual ramble of the mind.
c)
Appoint and empower a scribe to make extracts.
d)
Chew and digest them thoroughly.
18. DIRECTIONS for question 84: Select one or more answer choices
according to the directions given in the question.
Which of the following statements can be understood from the passage?
Select all that apply:
a)
Extract 1 throws light on the importance of reading and how one should
read. Extract 2 presents the non-reader's experience and the
constraints a non-reader faces because of the value society places on
reading.
b)
Bacon proposed the statement: Listening is a dying art, we hardly
listen to understand, we only listen to refute or reply.
c)
The last para of Extract 2 can be best completed by: Between a book
we've read closely and a book we've never even heard of, there is a
whole range of gradations that deserve our attention.
d)
The last para of Extract 2 can be logically completed by: It is easier
to be objective about a book if you have no personal experience with
it.
e)
A person who favours the reading habit would echo the view that
reading can help to broaden one's mind or it can keep one intrigued in
a story line and prompt the power of curiosity.
19. What can be inferred about the three constraints against reading
discussed in Extract 2?
a)
The second and the third constraints are necessarily dependent on the
first constraint. The second constraint is similar to the first but
nonetheless distinct.
b)
The first constraint is a facilitating condition for the second and
third constraints. The three constraints mentioned in the correct
sequence in the extract are the obligation to read thoroughly, the
obligation to read a book before discussing it and the obligation to
read.
c)
For the third constraint to be considered valid, one has to
acknowledge both the first and second constraints as invalid.
d)
The third constraint and the first constraint are independent.
Four alternative summaries are given below the text. Which of the
options best captures the essence of the text?
20."What a delightful place Yorkshire is," said Mrs. Karen as they sat
down near the great clock, after parading the room till they were
tired; "and how pleasant it would be if we had any acquaintance here."
This sentiment had been uttered so often in vain that Mrs. Karen had
no particular reason to hope it would be followed with more advantage
now; but we are told to "despair of nothing we would attain," as
"unwearied diligence our point would gain"; and the unwearied
diligence with which she had every day wished for the same thing was
at length to have its just reward, for hardly had she been seated ten
minutes before a lady of about her own age, who was sitting by her,
and had been looking at her attentively for several minutes, addressed
her with great complaisance in these words: "I think, madam, I cannot
be mistaken; it is a long time since I had the pleasure of seeing you,
but is not your name Karen?"
a)
Though Mrs. Karen had often wished for acquaintances at Yorkshire, it
was unlikely that her wish would be fulfilled. But now she was
approached by a lady who claimed to know her.
b)
Mrs. Karen had diligently wished everyday that she would meet an
acquaintance in Yorkshire, and finally her wish was fulfilled, as the
lady she had hoped to meet addressed her.
c)
Mrs. Karen's assiduity in waiting for an acquaintance in Yorkshire was
rewarded when a lady who seemed to know her spoke to her.
d)
Just as Mrs. Karen had begun to despair of meeting anyone she knew in
Yorkshire, a lady who had been observing her for a while started
speaking to her.
Business process re-engineering (BPR) is a business management
strategy, focusing on the analysis and design of workflows and
business processes within an organization.
BPR seeks to help companies radically restructure their organizations
by focusing on the ground-up design of their business processes.
Re-engineering emphasizes a holistic focus on business objectives and
processes related to them, encouraging full-scale recreation of
processes rather than iterative optimization of subprocesses. BPR
doesn't try to change the behaviour of workers and managers. Indeed,
it takes advantage of talents and unleashes ingenuity.
In 1990, Michael Hammer, professor at MIT, published the article
"Reengineering Work: Don't Automate, Obliterate" in HBR, claiming that
the major challenge for managers is to obliterate forms of work that
do not add value, rather than using technology for automating it. At
the heart of business reengineering, lies the notion of discontinuous
thinking − abandoning the outdated rules that underlie current
business operations: "Customers don't repair their own equipment."
"Local warehouses and superficial reorganizations are necessary for
good service." "Merchandising decisions are made at headquarters."
These rules are based on assumptions about technology, people and
goals that no longer hold.
Reengineering starts with a high-level assessment of the
organization's mission andcustomer needs. Basic questions are asked,
such as "Does our mission need to be redefined? Are our strategic
goals aligned with our mission? Who are our customers? Are the
suggested techniques for change transferrable to other organizations
in other lines of business? Could they be applied to companies as a
whole instead of only to small, discrete parts of an organization?"
Within the framework of this basic assessment of mission and goals,
re-engineering focuses on the organization's business processes. As a
structured ordering of work steps across time and place, a business
process can be decomposed into specific activities, measured, modeled,
and improved. It can also be completely redesigned or eliminated
altogether. Re-engineering identifies, analyses and re-designs an
organization's core business processes with the aim of achieving
dramatic improvements in critical performance measures, such as cost,
quality, service, and speed.
Many successful companies in the past had not changed the businesses
they were in; rather, they had significantly altered the processes
they followed in these businesses − or even replaced these old
processes entirely. This process change was accompanied by an equally
radical change in the shape and character of those parts of the
organization that were involved in performing it. It struck us that
these companies were achieving dramatic results in part because they
would accept nothing less. They weren't asking "How can we do what we
do faster?" or "How can we do what we do better?" or "How can we do
what we do at a lower cost?" Instead they were asking "Why do we do
what we do at all?" We discovered that most of the companies we
examined that had succeeded in radically changing one or more of their
processes had, albeit unknowingly, used a common set of tools and
tactics.
Re-engineering recognizes that an organization's business processes
are usually fragmented into subprocesses and tasks that are carried
out by several specialized functional areas within the organization.
Re-engineering maintains that optimizing the performance of
subprocesses can result in some benefits, but cannot yield dramatic
improvements if the process itself is fundamentally inefficient and
outmoded. Re-engineering focuses on re-designing the process as a
whole in order to achieve the greatest possible benefits to the
organization and their customers. This drive for realizing dramatic
improvements by fundamentally re-thinking how the organization's work
should be done distinguishes re-engineering from process improvement
efforts that focus on functional or incremental improvement.
Reengineering can't be carried out in small and cautious steps. It is
an all-or-nothing proposition that produces dramatically impressive
results. Most companies have no choice but to muster the courage to do
it. Reengineering is the hope for breaking away from the ineffective,
antiquated ways of conducting business.
21. Which of the following choices exemplifies the concept of
discontinuous thinking?
a)
Customers don't repair their own equipment; merchandising decisions
are made at headquarters; local warehouses are necessary for good
service.
b)
The lab attendant in the chemistry laboratory of a college can be
empowered to take college management-related decisions.
c)
Short-term thinking, risk aversion and top-down decision making.
d)
Junior experts like computer programmers, systems designers, operation
researchers, engineering specialists can provide consulting to other
companies to optimise productivity.
22. Which of the following statements can be inferred from the passage
about business process reengineering?
a)
The organizations which implemented business process reengineering
chose radical change over the less painful remedy of steady,
incremental improvements that most businesses usually prefer.
b)
Business process reengineering aims to decrease manual interventions
in the work place, emphasises managerial control and therefore
justifies downsizing.
c)
Reengineering focuses on optimizing the performance of subprocesses.
d)
Business reengineering is based on a philosophy that would have "us"
become more like "them" and this involves instilling behavioural
changes in workers and managers.
23. According to the passage, companies that had implemented Business
Process Reengineering would have
a)
deliberately used a common set of tools and tactics to change their
processes and improve their performance.
b)
created a product high in quality, supplied that product at a fair
price, and provided excellent service.
c)
significantly altered the processes they followed in their business
and had asked different and more relevant questions from those asked
by other organizations.
d)
simply accomplished tasks to satisfy the internal demands of the organization.
24. All of the following steps differentiate BPR from process
improvements that an organization may undertake EXCEPT
a)
Radical process changes accompanied by equally radical changes in the
shape and character of those parts of the organization that were
involved in performing them.
b)
Realizing dramatic improvements by fundamentally re-thinking how the
organization's work should be done with a holistic focus on business
objectives and processes related to them.
In each of the following questions, there are sentences or fragments
of sentences that form a paragraph. Identify and select the
sentence(s) or fragments of sentence(s) that is/are correct in terms
of grammar and usage, including spelling, punctuation and logical
consistency.
Select all that are correct.
a)
Amidst the grim backdrop over a war-torn Vienna, Karl Landsteiner's
scientific explorations in the areas of hematology, immunology and
bacteriology
b)
cemented his place in history as one of the most influential figures
in modern medicine.
c)
He is noted for having distinguished first the main blood groups in
1900, having developed the modern system of classification of blood
groups
d)
from his identification of the presence of agglutinins in the blood,
and having identified, with Alexander S. Wiener the Rhesus factor in
1937 thus
e)
enabling physicians to transfuse blood without endangering the patient's lives
c)
Identifying and abandoning the outdated rules and fundamental
assumptions that underlie current business operations.
d)
A bureaucratic approach to making decisions, assessing missions and
goals, and performing reorganizations within the company.
It seems appropriate to start our survey of trends in traditional and
present-day linguistics by asking how linguists tend to define
(explicitly or implicitly) the scope of their discipline. Linguistics
is a term which covers certain types of scientific approaches to
language; it does not denote all sciences or scientific activities
that are concerned with language and the use of language.
What then is the traditional content of linguistics? Originally, i.e.
through most of our long history almost up to the 19th and 20th
centuries, it contained phonology, grammar (especially morphology and
syntax (which, however, did not consider word order very much) and
some of their semantic aspects), logic, and rhetorics, and also
philology (text interpretation etc.). Later, philology was
(temporarily) relegated from linguistics (because it did not study
language for its own sake), and something similar happened to logic
and rhetorics. Hence, according to our 20th century conception,
linguistics is basically phonology, grammar (morphology, syntax) and
semantics (especially word semantics; sentence semantics is a rather
recent rediscovery). In the 1970's logic and rhetorics have also been
reincorporated under the headings of (formal) semantics and
pragmatics, respectively.
In a more global perspective, the linguists' approach(es) to language
must be considered narrow, and this is also true of today's
linguistics. For example, one very important aspect of language which
is seldom or never discussed in linguistics (and this also applies to
psycho-linguistics) is the question why people use language, for what
purposes utterances and written messages are compiled and used.
Instead the typical linguist's attitude is this: Given that people use
messages formulated in natural languages, i.e. in terms of linguistic
expressions, how are these expressions structurally organized, and
what meanings can be attached to the expressions qua items in an
abstract, supra individual linguistic code. Accordingly, linguistics
in the usual traditional (though still widely accepted) sense is
narrow in scope, (Lyons, 1981:36, has proposed the term
'microlinguistics' for it). Many scientific studies of the structure,
function and use of language simply do not belong to linguistics in
this traditional sense. Such fields as the psychology, sociology and
philosophy of language are concerned with linguistic phenomena, but
they are said to do so from the vantage points of other disciplines
(outside linguistics). Such scholars as Wundt, Mead and Wittgenstein
do not belong to the history of linguistics, although they made
contributions to the study of language which compete quite well with
those of, say, Humboldt, Sapir, Saussure and Chomsky. Even such
borderline disciplines as psycholinguistics, sociolinguistics and
neurolinguistics do not really count as linguistics proper, according
to many scholars in the field.
Another interesting field that is concerned with linguistic phenomena
but from the vantage point of other related disciplines is social
semiotics. Social semiotics expands on Saussure's founding insights by
exploring the implications of the fact that the "codes" of language
and communication are formed by social processes. The crucial
implication here is that meanings and semiotic systems are shaped by
relations of power, and that as power shifts in society, our languages
and other systems of socially accepted meanings can and do change. The
Semiotic Learning framework uses social semiotics theory as one of its
foundational conceptual approaches. Social semiotics, developed by
Halliday and Kress among others, raised out of the Saussurean school
of thought. Saussure claimed that we use language not only to
communicate but to construct our world, and when he distinguished
between langue, the abstract structure of a language, and parole, the
way it was actually used in practice, he directed his attention to the
former. Subsequent developments from this movement and focus on
langue, on the abstract structures of a language, were structuralism
and also positivist approaches to signification and interpretation.
Social semiotics, on the other hand, focussed on language as it was
actually used, on parole, thus taking the rich and fuzzy world of
social, cultural and political spheres into
account.____________________
26. Which of the following questions does the passage mainly answer?
a)
What is the traditional content of linguistics and microlinguistics?
b)
How is linguistics studied by linguistics?
c)
How has linguistics evolved over the 19th and 20th centuries?
d)
How narrow is the scope of linguistics as considered currently?
27. Which of the following questions reflects the primary concern of a
traditional linguist?
a)
Why do people use language?
b)
How are linguistic expressions structurally organized? What meanings
can be attached to linguistic expression in an abstract, supra
individual linguistic code?
c)
Why are utterances and written messages compiled and used?
d)
Both (B) and (C).
28. Which of the following is true about Wundt, Mead and Wittgenstein?
a)
They belong to psychology, sociology and philosophy.
b)
They did not make any significant contribution to the study of language.
c)
They are not mainly concerned with the study of linguistic phenomena.
d)
Their contributions to the study of language were better than those of
Sapir, Saussure and Chomsky.
29. Which of the following sentences can conclude the last paragraph
of the passage?
a)
Social semiotics explicitly takes a non-positivist approach as it
focuses on the contexts, prerequisites and conditions of possibility
for a meaningful dialogue to occur.
b)
Social semiotics focuses on social subjectivity and therefore takes a
non-cognitivist approach: instead of referring to meaning-making as
something that is done by the minds, it points to the role of social
practices within communities.
c)
Social semiotics may be understood as a discourse on meaning-making
where the aim is to examine the functions and the effects of the
meanings we make in every day life as we communicate, within
communities, organisations and society.
d)
In a playful way, social semiotics is known to have developed out of
what Saussure dismissed and put to the side, thus working on what was
inside Saussure's 'dustbin'.
The sentences given in the following questions, when properly
sequenced, form a coherent paragraph. Figure out the most logical
order of sentences that constructs a coherent paragraph and enter that
sequence in the input box given below the question. For example, if
you think that (A)(B)(C)(D)(E) is the most logical order of sentences
that constructs a coherent paragraph, then enter ABCDE in the input
box.
30.(A) This provides the clue as to why divinity or consciousness
would also escape our attempt to grasp it objectively.
(B) But since the mystical never shows up there, it must not exist.
(C) Moreover, our mind cannot fully grasp the same mind since most of
its real substance is engaged in grasping.
(D) Reductionists, on the other hand, claim that if a mystical element
really exists, then it would show up at the lowest level of matter.
(E) Thus, mind always eludes complete objectification of the same mind.
(F) Lower-level scientific analysis is incapable of grasping quality
differences at higher levels.
Scientific theories can be clearly distinguished from all other
theories in that they bear a special mark − falsifiability. Said
Popper: Any scientific theory could be shown to be false if some
conceivable observation were true. As Popper represents it, the
central problem in the philosophy of science is that of demarcation,
i.e., of distinguishing between science and 'non-science', under which
heading he ranks, amongst others, logic, metaphysics, psychoanalysis,
and Adler's individual psychology. Popper is unusual amongst
contemporary philosophers in that he accepts the validity of the
Humean critique of induction, and indeed, goes beyond it in arguing
that induction is never actually used by the scientist. However, he
does not concede that this entails the scepticism which is associated
with Hume, and argues that the Baconian / Newtonian insistence on the
primacy of 'pure' observation, as the initial step in the formation of
theories, is completely misguided: all observation is selective and
theory-laden − there are no pure or theory-free observations.
Popper, then, repudiates induction, and rejects the view that it is
the characteristic method of scientific investigation and inference,
and substitutes falsifiability in its place. It is easy to obtain
evidence in favour of virtually any theory, and such 'corroboration',
should count scientifically only if it is the positive result of a
genuinely 'risky' prediction, which might conceivably have been false.
For Popper, a theory is scientific only if it is refutable by a
conceivable event. Every genuine test of a scientific theory, is
logically an attempt to refute or to falsify it, and one genuine
counter-instance falsifies the whole theory. Popper's theory of
demarcation is based upon his perception of the logical asymmetry
which holds between verification and falsification: it is logically
impossible to conclusively verify a universal proposition by reference
to experience, but a single counter-instance conclusively falsifies
the corresponding universal law.
Every genuine scientific theory is prohibitive, in the sense that it
forbids, by implication, particular events or occurrences. It can be
tested and falsified, but never logically verified. Thus Popper
stresses that it should not be inferred from the fact that a theory
has withstood the most rigorous testing, for however long a period of
time, that it has been verified; rather we should recognise that such
a theory has received a high measure of corroboration and may be
provisionally retained as the best available theory until it is
finally falsified, and/or is superseded by a better theory.
While advocating falsifiability as the criterion of demarcation for
science, Popper explicitly allows for the fact that in practice a
single conflicting or counter-instance is never sufficient
methodologically to falsify a theory, and that scientific theories are
often retained even though much of the available evidence conflicts
with them, or is anomalous with respect to them. Scientific theories
arise genetically in many different ways, and the manner in which a
particular scientist comes to formulate a particular theory may be of
biographical interest, but it is of no consequence as far as the
philosophy of science is concerned. Popper stresses in particular that
there is no unique way, no single method such as induction, which
functions as the route to scientific theory, a view which Einstein
personally endorsed with his affirmation that 'There is no logical
path leading to [the highly universal laws of science]. They can only
be reached by intuition, based upon something like an intellectual
love of the objects of experience'. Science, in Popper's view, starts
with problems rather than with observations − it is, indeed, precisely
in the context of grappling with a problem that the scientist makes
observations in the first instance: his observations are selectively
designed to test the extent to which a given theory functions as a
satisfactory solution to a given problem.
Popper claimed scientific beliefs are universal in character, and have
to be so if they are to serve us in explanation and prediction. For
the universality of a scientific belief implies that, no matter how
many instances we have found positive, there will always be an
indefinite number of unexamined instances which may or may not also be
positive. We have no good reason for supposing that any of these
unexamined instances will be positive, or will be negative, so we must
refrain from drawing any conclusions. On the other hand, a single
negative instance is sufficient to prove that the belief is false, for
such an instance is logically incompatible with the universal truth of
the belief. Provided, therefore, that the instance is accepted as
negative we must conclude that the scientific belief is false.
31. What is the primary purpose of the author of the passage?
a)
To indicate that science allows the possibility of rejecting a theory
or hypothesis through induction.
b)
To prove that actual scientific work does not follow the scheme of
conjecture and refutation as laid out by the idea of falsifiability.
c)
To explain how a set of shared scientific beliefs evolve into a paradigm.
d)
To show that existing scientific methodologies permit the development
of scientific theories that can be, at best, only approximations of
highly universal laws of science.
Select one or more answer choices according to the directions given in
the question.
32 Which of the following observations, experiments or scenarios
suggest an application of the concept of 'falsification' as discussed
in the passage?
Select all that apply:
a)
Re-examining the conclusion that "it has snowed in Massachusetts every
December in recorded history" in the light of the observation of a
single year when it did not snow in Massachusetts in December.
b)
Re-examining the claims of ten independent witnesses who said that
John Depp committed the murder using a single finding that throws
light on certain facts such as John actually addressing a gathering at
the time of the murder and the murder weapon having no fingerprints of
John.
c)
Re-examining the conclusion that all uranium isotopes exhibit
radioactivity in the light of the observation of a single uranium
isotope that does not exhibit radioactivity.
d)
Re-examining a statement such as 'rape is a heinous crime' when the
speaker of such a statement was caught in the crime of rape.
e)
Re-examining Darwin's theory that all life forms evolved from simple
life forms in the light of the finding of the fossil of a complex life
form that predates all known life forms.
33. Which of the following can be understood from the passage?
a)
A summary of the boldface part of the text is − We can only induce
that a scientific belief is false but cannot induce that it is true.
b)
Corroboration of a scientific theory is not valid if it is the
positive result of a prediction which might conceivably have been
true.
c)
A scientific attitude implies endless questioning and cannot lead to
strong beliefs.
d)
Science focuses on anomalies and exceptions so that fundamental truths
can be uncovered.
34. The author of the passage is most likely to agree with which of
the following?
a)
When a scientist formulates a scientific theory, he should also
address the scientific question from the philosophical point of view
and not just from the biographical angle.
b)
Verification provides a rationale for not rejecting a claim.
c)
All scientific theories are inherently prohibitive and all reasons for
rejecting a scientific belief are provided by falsification.
d)
The number of negative instances of a scientific belief exceeds the
number of positive instances of a scientific belief.
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