Free ACT Test Exam Braindumps (page: 129)

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SOCIAL SCIENCE: Passage A is adapted from the book Apple: A Global History by Erika Janik (©2011 by Erika Janik). Passage B is adapted from the article "The Fatherland of Apples" by Gary Nabhan (©2008 by The Orion Society).

Passage A by Erika Janik

(1) In early September of 1929, Nikolai Vavilov, famed Russian plant explorer and botanist, arrived in the central Asian crossroads of Alma-Ata, Kazakhstan. Climbing up the Zailijskei Alatau slopes of the Tian Shan mountains separating Kazakhstan from China, Vavilov found thickets of wild apples stretching in every direction, an extensive forest of fruit coloured russet red, creamy yellow, and vibrant pink. Nowhere else in the world do apples grow thickly as a forest or with such incredible diversity. Amazed by what he saw, Vavilov wrote: `I could see with my own eyes that I had stumbled upon the centre of origin for the apple.'

(2) With extraordinary prescience and few facts, Vavilov suggested that the wild apples he had seen growing in the Tian Shan were in fact the ancestors of the modern apple. He tracked the whole process of domestication to the mountains near Alma-Ata, where the wild apples looked awfully similar to the apples found at the local grocery. Unfortunately, Vavilov's theory would remain mostly unknown for decades.

(3) Exactly where the apple came from had long been a matter of contention and discussion among people who study plant origins. Vavilov, imprisoned by Joseph Stalin in 1940 for work in plant genetics that challenged Stalin's beliefs, died in a Leningrad prison in 1943. Only after the fall of communism in Russia did Vavilov's theory, made more than half a century earlier, become widely recognized.

(4) As Vavilov predicted, it's now believed that all of the apples known today are direct descendents of the wild apples that evolved in Kazakhstan. Apples do not comprise all of Kazakhstan's plant bounty, however. At least 157 other plant species found in Kazakhstan are either direct precursors or close wild relatives of domesticated crops, including 90 per cent of all cultivated temperate fruits. The name of Kazakhstan's largest city, Alma-Ata, or Almaty as it is known today, even translates as `Father of Apples' or, according to some, `where the apples are'. So this news about the apple's origins was probably no surprise to residents, particularly in towns where apple seedlings are known to grow up through the cracks in the pavements. The apple has been evolving in Central Asia for upwards of 4.5 million years.

Passage B by Gary Nabhan

(5) Nikolai Vavilov is widely regarded as the world's greatest plant explorer, for he made over 250,000 seed, fruit, and tuber collections on five continents. Kazakh conservationist Tatiana Salova credits him with first recognizing that Kazakhstan was the center of origin and diversity for apples. "It is not surprising," she concedes, "that when Vavilov first came to Kazakhstan to look at plants he was so amazed. Nowhere else in the world do apples grow as a forest. That is one reason why he stated that this is probably where the apple was born, this was its birthing grounds."

(6) Discerning where a crop originated and where the greatest portion of its genetic diversity remains extant may seem esoteric to the uninitiated. But knowing where exactly our food comes from ­ geographically, culturally, and genetically ­ is of paramount importance to the rather small portion of our own species that regularly concerns itself with the issue of food security. The variety of foods that we keep in our fields, orchards, and, secondarily, in our seed banks is critically important in protecting our food supply from plagues, crop diseases, catastrophic weather, and political upheavals. Vavilov himself was personally motivated to become an agricultural scientist by witnessing several famines during the czarist era of Russia. He hoped that by combining a more diverse seed portfolio with knowledge from both traditional farmers and collaborating scientists, the number of Russian families suffering from hunger might be reduced.

(7) In a very real sense, the forests of wild foragers and the orchards of traditional farmers in such centers of crop diversity are the wellsprings of diversity that plant breeders, pathologists, and entomologists return to every time our society whittles the resilience in our fields and orchards down to its breaking point.

(8) And whittle away we have done. Here in North America, according to apple historian Dan Bussey, some 16,000 apple varieties have been named and nurtured over the last four centuries. By 1904, however, the identities and sources of only 7,098 of those varieties could be discerned by USDA scientist W. H. Ragan. Since then, some 6,121 apple varieties ­ 86.2 percent of Ragan's 1904 inventory ­ have been lost from nursery catalogs, farmers' markets, and from the American table.

Which of the following statements best describes the difference in the tone of the two passages?

  1. Passage A is defensive, whereas Passage B is dispassionate.
  2. Passage A is solemn, whereas Passage B is optimistic.
  3. Passage A is celebratory, whereas Passage B is cautionary.
  4. Passage A is accusatory, whereas Passage B is sentimental.

Answer(s): C



SOCIAL SCIENCE: Passage A is adapted from the book Apple: A Global History by Erika Janik (©2011 by Erika Janik). Passage B is adapted from the article "The Fatherland of Apples" by Gary Nabhan (©2008 by The Orion Society).

Passage A by Erika Janik

(1) In early September of 1929, Nikolai Vavilov, famed Russian plant explorer and botanist, arrived in the central Asian crossroads of Alma-Ata, Kazakhstan. Climbing up the Zailijskei Alatau slopes of the Tian Shan mountains separating Kazakhstan from China, Vavilov found thickets of wild apples stretching in every direction, an extensive forest of fruit coloured russet red, creamy yellow, and vibrant pink. Nowhere else in the world do apples grow thickly as a forest or with such incredible diversity. Amazed by what he saw, Vavilov wrote: `I could see with my own eyes that I had stumbled upon the centre of origin for the apple.'

(2) With extraordinary prescience and few facts, Vavilov suggested that the wild apples he had seen growing in the Tian Shan were in fact the ancestors of the modern apple. He tracked the whole process of domestication to the mountains near Alma-Ata, where the wild apples looked awfully similar to the apples found at the local grocery. Unfortunately, Vavilov's theory would remain mostly unknown for decades.

(3) Exactly where the apple came from had long been a matter of contention and discussion among people who study plant origins. Vavilov, imprisoned by Joseph Stalin in 1940 for work in plant genetics that challenged Stalin's beliefs, died in a Leningrad prison in 1943. Only after the fall of communism in Russia did Vavilov's theory, made more than half a century earlier, become widely recognized.

(4) As Vavilov predicted, it's now believed that all of the apples known today are direct descendents of the wild apples that evolved in Kazakhstan. Apples do not comprise all of Kazakhstan's plant bounty, however. At least 157 other plant species found in Kazakhstan are either direct precursors or close wild relatives of domesticated crops, including 90 per cent of all cultivated temperate fruits. The name of Kazakhstan's largest city, Alma-Ata, or Almaty as it is known today, even translates as `Father of Apples' or, according to some, `where the apples are'. So this news about the apple's origins was probably no surprise to residents, particularly in towns where apple seedlings are known to grow up through the cracks in the pavements. The apple has been evolving in Central Asia for upwards of 4.5 million years.

Passage B by Gary Nabhan

(5) Nikolai Vavilov is widely regarded as the world's greatest plant explorer, for he made over 250,000 seed, fruit, and tuber collections on five continents. Kazakh conservationist Tatiana Salova credits him with first recognizing that Kazakhstan was the center of origin and diversity for apples. "It is not surprising," she concedes, "that when Vavilov first came to Kazakhstan to look at plants he was so amazed. Nowhere else in the world do apples grow as a forest. That is one reason why he stated that this is probably where the apple was born, this was its birthing grounds."

(6) Discerning where a crop originated and where the greatest portion of its genetic diversity remains extant may seem esoteric to the uninitiated. But knowing where exactly our food comes from ­ geographically, culturally, and genetically ­ is of paramount importance to the rather small portion of our own species that regularly concerns itself with the issue of food security. The variety of foods that we keep in our fields, orchards, and, secondarily, in our seed banks is critically important in protecting our food supply from plagues, crop diseases, catastrophic weather, and political upheavals. Vavilov himself was personally motivated to become an agricultural scientist by witnessing several famines during the czarist era of Russia. He hoped that by combining a more diverse seed portfolio with knowledge from both traditional farmers and collaborating scientists, the number of Russian families suffering from hunger might be reduced.

(7) In a very real sense, the forests of wild foragers and the orchards of traditional farmers in such centers of crop diversity are the wellsprings of diversity that plant breeders, pathologists, and entomologists return to every time our society whittles the resilience in our fields and orchards down to its breaking point.

(8) And whittle away we have done. Here in North America, according to apple historian Dan Bussey, some 16,000 apple varieties have been named and nurtured over the last four centuries. By 1904, however, the identities and sources of only 7,098 of those varieties could be discerned by USDA scientist W. H. Ragan. Since then, some 6,121 apple varieties ­ 86.2 percent of Ragan's 1904 inventory ­ have been lost from nursery catalogs, farmers' markets, and from the American table.

Compared to the author of Passage A, the author of Passage B provides more information about the:

  1. reduction in the number of apple varieties in North America over the past four centuries.
  2. methods Vavilov used to prove to other scientists that the apples growing in the Tian Shan are the ancestors of the modern apple.
  3. number of apple varieties that are thriving in Kazakhstan today.
  4. techniques used by researchers to determine the regions with the greatest genetic diversity in plants.

Answer(s): A



SOCIAL SCIENCE: Passage A is adapted from the book Apple: A Global History by Erika Janik (©2011 by Erika Janik). Passage B is adapted from the article "The Fatherland of Apples" by Gary Nabhan (©2008 by The Orion Society).

Passage A by Erika Janik

(1) In early September of 1929, Nikolai Vavilov, famed Russian plant explorer and botanist, arrived in the central Asian crossroads of Alma-Ata, Kazakhstan. Climbing up the Zailijskei Alatau slopes of the Tian Shan mountains separating Kazakhstan from China, Vavilov found thickets of wild apples stretching in every direction, an extensive forest of fruit coloured russet red, creamy yellow, and vibrant pink. Nowhere else in the world do apples grow thickly as a forest or with such incredible diversity. Amazed by what he saw, Vavilov wrote: `I could see with my own eyes that I had stumbled upon the centre of origin for the apple.'

(2) With extraordinary prescience and few facts, Vavilov suggested that the wild apples he had seen growing in the Tian Shan were in fact the ancestors of the modern apple. He tracked the whole process of domestication to the mountains near Alma-Ata, where the wild apples looked awfully similar to the apples found at the local grocery. Unfortunately, Vavilov's theory would remain mostly unknown for decades.

(3) Exactly where the apple came from had long been a matter of contention and discussion among people who study plant origins. Vavilov, imprisoned by Joseph Stalin in 1940 for work in plant genetics that challenged Stalin's beliefs, died in a Leningrad prison in 1943. Only after the fall of communism in Russia did Vavilov's theory, made more than half a century earlier, become widely recognized.

(4) As Vavilov predicted, it's now believed that all of the apples known today are direct descendents of the wild apples that evolved in Kazakhstan. Apples do not comprise all of Kazakhstan's plant bounty, however. At least 157 other plant species found in Kazakhstan are either direct precursors or close wild relatives of domesticated crops, including 90 per cent of all cultivated temperate fruits. The name of Kazakhstan's largest city, Alma-Ata, or Almaty as it is known today, even translates as `Father of Apples' or, according to some, `where the apples are'. So this news about the apple's origins was probably no surprise to residents, particularly in towns where apple seedlings are known to grow up through the cracks in the pavements. The apple has been evolving in Central Asia for upwards of 4.5 million years.

Passage B by Gary Nabhan

(5) Nikolai Vavilov is widely regarded as the world's greatest plant explorer, for he made over 250,000 seed, fruit, and tuber collections on five continents. Kazakh conservationist Tatiana Salova credits him with first recognizing that Kazakhstan was the center of origin and diversity for apples. "It is not surprising," she concedes, "that when Vavilov first came to Kazakhstan to look at plants he was so amazed. Nowhere else in the world do apples grow as a forest. That is one reason why he stated that this is probably where the apple was born, this was its birthing grounds."

(6) Discerning where a crop originated and where the greatest portion of its genetic diversity remains extant may seem esoteric to the uninitiated. But knowing where exactly our food comes from ­ geographically, culturally, and genetically ­ is of paramount importance to the rather small portion of our own species that regularly concerns itself with the issue of food security. The variety of foods that we keep in our fields, orchards, and, secondarily, in our seed banks is critically important in protecting our food supply from plagues, crop diseases, catastrophic weather, and political upheavals. Vavilov himself was personally motivated to become an agricultural scientist by witnessing several famines during the czarist era of Russia. He hoped that by combining a more diverse seed portfolio with knowledge from both traditional farmers and collaborating scientists, the number of Russian families suffering from hunger might be reduced.

(7) In a very real sense, the forests of wild foragers and the orchards of traditional farmers in such centers of crop diversity are the wellsprings of diversity that plant breeders, pathologists, and entomologists return to every time our society whittles the resilience in our fields and orchards down to its breaking point.

(8) And whittle away we have done. Here in North America, according to apple historian Dan Bussey, some 16,000 apple varieties have been named and nurtured over the last four centuries. By 1904, however, the identities and sources of only 7,098 of those varieties could be discerned by USDA scientist W. H. Ragan. Since then, some 6,121 apple varieties ­ 86.2 percent of Ragan's 1904 inventory ­ have been lost from nursery catalogs, farmers' markets, and from the American table.

Passage A quotes Vavilov as saying "`I could see with my own eyes that I had stumbled upon the centre of origin for the apple'" (paragraph 1). In Passage B this quote is directly:

  1. invoked by the passage author as he imagines what Kazakhstan looked like centuries ago.
  2. used to support an argument by USDA scientists.
  3. paraphrased by Salova.
  4. refuted by Bussey.

Answer(s): C



HUMANITIES: This passage is adapted from the article "The Quiet Sideman" by Colin Fleming (©2008 by The American Scholar)

(1) Near the end of his eight years as a recording-session musician, tenor saxophonist Leon "Chu" Berry landed a short-lived spot with Count Basie's orchestra. Standing in for one of the Basie band's two tenor giants, Berry took a lead solo on "Oh, Lady Be Good," the 1924 Gershwin song that Basie had played for years. In the 28 seconds that the solo lasted on February 4, 1939, we are treated to no less than the musical personification of mind and body working together in divine tandem. When you hear the recording for the first time, you're likely to wonder why you've never heard of Chu Berry before.

(2) Why you've never heard of him is pretty simple: a lot of hard-core jazz buffs don't know much about him. Berry was a solid session player who turns up on recordings with Basie, Bessie Smith, Fletcher Henderson, and Billie Holiday. But he did not cut many sessions himself as a leader, and when he soloed, he worked within the recording constraints of the era and the swing genre ­ fast-moving 78s with solos often lasting for a mere 32 beats.

(3) The people who loved Berry were, not surprisingly, other tenor players, a situation leading to the dreaded "musician's musician" tag. But that's not nearly praise enough to describe Chu Berry, who, when given opportunity, displayed a musical dexterity that would be envied by future generations of horn men.

(4) Berry faced the lot of other horn players: having to grind it out long and hard until something memorable burst through; the prejudices and expectations of the listening public; and the accepted wisdom of what is and isn't art in a given medium. In this case, swing was fodder for dance parties, not music worthy of study.

(5) Oddly enough, Berry's geniality might help explain his failure to court history's favor: it wasn't in his nature to call attention to himself or his playing. Born in 1908 into the black middle class in Wheeling, West Virginia, the laid-back, affable Berry attended West Virginia State in Charleston, where he switched from alto sax to tenor and exhibited the willingness to fit in that characterized his presence in so many dance bands. He was the rare artist who refused to put his interests above those of the band, even if that meant playing ensemble passages rather than taking a healthy allotment of solo breaks.

(6) College proved a training ground for Berry the bandsman, as he teamed up with a number of amateur outfits. He never played simply to show off. Instead, he tried to bring out the positive attributes in any given situation or setting. Later, when Berry is performing with the Calloway ensemble, we hear some ragged, out-of- tune playing until Berry's first few solo notes emerge. The other players, no longer languidly blowing through their charts, immediately surge up behind him, all fighting-fit. Once Berry finishes his solo, the shenanigans resume.

(7) After making his way to New York, Berry immediately became a presence and soon was in demand. The great jazz orchestras of the swing era were fronted by musical directors/arrangers ­ Duke Ellington was preeminent ­ who drew the acclaim. The sidemen were musical traveling salesmen who sold someone else's wares in the best style they could manage. It was with Fletcher Henderson that Berry began to ditch some of the sideman's subservient trappings. For starters, Henderson wrote in keys that were rare for the jazz orchestras of the day, and his somber, indigo-inflected voicings were ideal for a player of Berry's introspective approach to his instrument: Berry sounds as if he's being swallowed by his sax. "Blues in C Sharp Minor," for instance, is odd, haunting, and ultimately relaxing. A Berry solo in it is slightly off mike, making the listener feel as though he's been playing for some time before we finally hear him. The effect is unnerving, as if we weren't paying close attention.

(8) In June 1940, Cab Calloway granted Berry a showcase piece, "A Ghost of a Chance," the sole recording in Berry's career to feature him from start to finish. It was his "Body and Soul," a response to Coleman Hawkins's famous recording, intended not as a riposte to a rival, but as the other half of a dialogue. Its rubato lines are disembodied from the music meant to accompany it, which is spartan to begin with. This may be Berry's one and only instance of indulgence on a record, a cathedral of a solo in its flourishes, angles, ornamentations, reflexivity. If sunlight could pass through music, "A Ghost of a Chance" would funnel it out in the broadest spectrum of colors.

Based on the passage, how did Berry's personality affect his career?

  1. His ambitious, competitive personality was off-putting to other musicians, who were reluctant to play with him.
  2. His genial personality endeared him to other musicians, but his career suffered when he spent more time socializing than practicing.
  3. His modest and easygoing personality kept him out of the spotlight and, consequently, he received less attention as a performer.
  4. His shy, introspective personality was misunderstood as snobbish arrogance, so he was offered few recording-session jobs.

Answer(s): C



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