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GRE Big Book Critical Reasoning Test 37

Jimmy Wang
10/17/2024

GRE Critical Reasoning

Directions

Critical Reasoning questions test the ability to understand, analyze, and evaluate arguments. Some of the abilities tested by specific questions include identifying the roles played by specific phrases or sentences in an argument, recognizing the point of an argument, recognizing assumptions on which an argument is based" drawing conclusions and forming hypotheses, identifying methods of argumentation, evaluating arguments and counter-arguments, and analyzing evidence.

Each of the Critical Reasoning questions is based on a short argument, a set of statements, or a plan of action. For each question, select the best answer of the choices given.

The burden of taxation on the back of a people is not unlike the burden of a weight on the back of a horse. Just as a small burden badly placed may distress a horse that could carry with ease a much larger burden properly adjusted, so a people may be impoverished and their power of producing wealth destroyed by taxation that, if levied another way, could be borne with ease.

#1

Artificial seaweed made of plastic has been placed on a section of coast in order to reverse beach erosion. The inventor of the seaweed has concluded that the recent buildup of sand on that section of coast proves that the artificial seaweed reverses beach erosion.

#2

Which of the following, if true, would most seriously weaken the inventor's conc1usion?

The amount of recent sand buildup on that section of coast, although considerable, is not yet enough to replace the amount lost during storms on that section of coast in the last twenty years.

The amount of recent sand buildup on that section of coast was less than had been predicted on the basis of the results obtained in controlled experiments.

Because artificial seaweed would be buried eventually by additional sand deposits on the coast, more artificial seaweed would need to be put in place every four years.

Artificial seaweed of another material which had been previously developed by the inventor failed to add sand to coastline in past trials.

The amount of recent sand buildup on that section of coast is the same as the amount of recent sand buildup on otherwise very similar sections of coast without artificial seaweed.

Metropolis’ regulation limiting to four days the period during which milk can be sold to consumers after pasteurization is unreasonable. Under optimal conditions, pasteurized milk kept at 40 degrees Fahrenheit remains unspoiled for at least 14 days. If Metropolis’ current limitation were changed to eight days, milk prices would drop, but product quality would be unaffected.

#3

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

Metropolis’ grocery-store owners would prefer small, frequent deliveries of milk to larger, infrequent deliveries.

In Metropolis, conditions for handling and storing milk after pasteurization are seldom close to optimum.

Milk kept longer than 14 days after pasteurization generally presents no medical dangers if consumed.

A recent survey showed that 20 percent of Metropolis consumers favored extending the current limitation on the sale of milk to 8 days.

Most consumers keep milk no more than three days after purchase.

Company X recently bought Company Y. Since the two companies had previously been the only companies manufacturing cardboard containers, Company X now has a monopoly in this particular branch of industry and therefore will probably raise the price of its cardboard containers.

#4

Which of the following statements, if true, would most seriously weaken the claim made above?

There has been a recent increase in demand for cardboard containers.

An increase in the price of cardboard containers would not necessarily increase the retail price of items packed in these containers.

Manufacturers of cardboard containers face increasingly stiff competition from manufacturers of plastic containers.

Before Company X bought Company Y, Company X had consistently set the prices of its cardboard containers below the prices set by Company Y.

The cost of lumber is a major determinant of the cost of cardboard containers.

Chlorofluorocarbons (CFC’s) pose known dangers to public health. Only when the United States government imposes a specific ban on the industrial use of CFC’s will industry scientists make the alternatives to CFC’s cost-effective, and thus reduce public health hazards.

#5

Which of the following is an assumption on which the assertion made above is based?

Private industry has a responsibility to take voluntary measures to safeguard public health and absorb the costs of such measures.

CFC’s are currently the most serious public health hazard engendered by industry in the United States.

The alternatives to CFC’s are less hazardous to public health than are CFC’s.

The use of CFC’s can result in employee time lost because of illness.

The alternatives to CFC’s currently available are not widely used because they are not familiar to a sufficient number of industry scientists.

Lobsters usually develop one smaller, cutter claw and one larger, crusher claw. To show that exercise determines which claw becomes the crusher, researchers placed young lobsters in tanks and repeatedly prompted them to grab a probe with one claw-in each case always the same, randomly selected claw. In most of the lobsters the grabbing claw became the crusher. But in a second, similar experiment, when lobsters were prompted to use both claws equally for grabbing, most matured with two cutter claws, even though each claw was exercised as much as the grabbing claws had been in the first experiment.

#6

Which of the following is best supported by the information above?

Most lobsters raised in captivity will not develop a crusher claw.

Young lobsters usually exercise one claw more than the other.

Cutter claws are more effective for grabbing than are crusher claws.

Young lobsters that do not exercise either claw will nevertheless usually develop one crusher and one cutter claw.

Exercise is not a determining factor in the development of crusher claws in lobsters.

GRE Critical Reasoning

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