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Medical College Admission Test: Verbal Reasoning, Biological Sciences, Physical Sciences, Writing Sample (Page 18 )

Updated On: 24-Sep-2026
Page 18 of 164
PDF with 811 Questions

At a recent meeting of the American Public Transit Association, the Environmental Protection Agency unveiled stringent new standards for pollution control. The transit authorities were particularly concerned about the implementation of a proposed "Clean Air Act." They believed the provisions of the Clean Air Act could severely affect basic services to their local communities. Many transit agencies were concerned that it would be difficult to comply with the pollution and emissions control standards while continuing to operate within realistic budgets.
The aim of the Clean Air Act is to assure that by the year 2000, there will be a reduction of at least 10 million tons of sulfur dioxide from 1980 levels. The bill also calls for a reduction in pollutants that contribute to the depletion of ozone. Strict regulations of toxic air emissions would have to be established and enforced. Additionally, the Clean Air Act would establish specific acid-rain reduction quotas and enforce severe penalties for transgressors of any of the new clean air regulations.
There is little doubt that mass-transit suppliers will be considerably affected by this new legislation, just as the chemical and petroleum industries have already been affected by similar legislation. Transit authorities are challenged to strike a difficult balance between complying with the government's new standards and developing an official concern for the environment, while continuing to fulfill the transportation needs of the general population.
Among the areas addressed by the Clean Air Act, the topic of mobile resources is of particular interest to mass transit authorities. Provisions contained in the Act under this title are aimed at encouraging the development and practical use of alternative fuel sources, like solar energy and methane fuel. The goal of this section of the Act is to eradicate toxic fuel emissions in order to provide cleaner air and a more favorable environment. The Act even goes so far as to declare that in cities like New York, Los Angeles and Houston ­ where air quality is particularly noxious and toxins exceed the limits of federal regulations ­ forms of mass transit should run on so- called "clean-burning fuels" by the year 2000. Such fuels include reformulated gasoline, propane, electricity, natural gas, ethanol, methanol, or any similar type of low-emission fuel. In addition, the Act proposes that, by 1994, all new urban buses in cities with populations exceeding one million must operate solely on clean-burning fuels.
The topics of alternative fuels and alternative fuel vehicles represent, by far, the most controversial issue in the Clean Air Act. President Bush has called alternative fuels "bold and innovative" means to control pollution, but according to many transportation experts, the Act's proposals on alternative fuel usage are unrealistic. The transit authorities recognize that concern for the environment and health hazards like pollution are global issues. However, most transit officials concur that inventing and developing new ways to fuel mass transit will take at least 50 years to realize. They point out that the Act does not mention the political and social ramifications of usurping the role of the petroleum industries. The Act does not mention if or how the thousands of people employed by the oil industry will get retrained to produce and implement the use of "clean" fuel.
No one disputes the fact that people need some form of transportation to get from place to place. Preserving the environment should be a priority, yet we need to remember that even if toxic emissions are completely eliminated sometime in the future, the challenge of moving mass numbers of people where they want to go will still exist and must remain a priority. Transit authorities contend that unless the Clean Air Act also acknowledges this, and develops a way to encourage mass transit over personal transportation, the problems of pollution might not be significantly altered. They suggest that there are many areas in this country that have

little or no mass transit and that, if the Clean Air Act's goal is to reduce pollution, perhaps the most practical and realistic means to achieve that goal is to encourage the development and maintenance of mass transit systems.
Transit authorities feel that the Act errs in NOT:

  1. sufficiently discussing the problems of lead emissions in the atmosphere.
  2. adequately acknowledging the environmental benefits of mass transportation.
  3. offering financial incentives to induce private automobile owners to use mass transit instead.
  4. adequately emphasizing the role and responsibility of private industry in the current global warming crisis.

Answer(s): B

Explanation:

Look at the first two sentences of the last paragraph. Transit authorities contend that unless the Act acknowledges the need for some form of public transportation and takes steps to encourage mass transit, pollution levels might not be significantly altered by the Act. Choice B is therefore the correct response.
Nothing is said in the passage about lead emissions, financial incentives to encourage the use of mass transit, or the role of private industry in the global warming crisis, so A, C, and D can all be eliminated.



The rich analyses of Fernand Braudel and his fellow Annales historians have made significant contributions to historical theory and research. In a departure from traditional historical approaches, the Annales historians, assume (as do Marxists) that history cannot be limited to a simple recounting of conscious human actions, but must be understood in the context of forces and material conditions that underlie human behavior. Braudel was the first Annales historian to gain widespread support of the idea that history should synthesize data from various social sciences, especially economics, in order to provide a broader view of human societies over time (although Febvre and Bloch, founders of the Annales school, had originated this approach).
Braudel conceived of history as the dynamic interaction of three temporalities. The first of these, the evenementielle, involved short-lived dramatic "events," such as battles, revolutions and the actions of great men, which had preoccupied traditional historians like Carlyle. Conjonctures was Braudel's term for larger cyclical processes that might last up to half a century. The longue duree, a historical wave of great length, was for Braudel the most fascinating of the three temporalities. Here he focused on those aspects of everyday life that might remain relatively unchanged for centuries. What people ate, what they wore, their means and routes of travel ­ for Braudel these things create "structures" which define the limits of potential social change for hundreds of years at a time.
Braudel's concept of the longue duree extended the perspective of historical space as well as time.
Until the Annales school, historians had taken the juridical political unit the nation-state, duchy, or whatever as their starting point. Yet, when such enormous timespans are considered, geographical features may well have more significance for human populations than national borders. In his doctoral thesis, a seminal work on the Mediterranean during the reign of Philip II, Braudel treated the geohistory of the entire region as a "structure" that had exerted myriad influences on human lifeways since the first settlements on the shores of the Mediterranean Sea. And so the reader is given such arcane information as the list of products that came to Spanish shores from North Africa, the seasonal routes followed by Mediterranean sheep and their shepherds, and the cities where the best ship timber could be bought.
Braudel has been faulted for the imprecision of his approach. With his Rabelaisian delight in concrete detail, Braudel vastly extended the realm of relevant phenomena; but this very achievement made it difficult to delimit the boundaries of observation, a task necessary to beginning any social investigation. Further, Braudel and other Annales historians minimize the differences among the social sciences. Nevertheless, the many similarly- designed studies aimed at both professional and popular audiences indicate that Braudel asked significant questions which traditional historians had overlooked.

The author refers to the work of Febvre and Bloch in order to:

  1. illustrate the limitations of the Annales tradition of historical interpretation.
  2. suggest the relevance of economics to historical investigation.
  3. debate the need for combining various sociological approaches.
  4. show that previous Annales historians anticipated Braudel's focus on economics.

Answer(s): D

Explanation:

The reason that the author refers to Febvre and Bloch is explained in the parentheses at the end of Paragraph
1. The author states that Febvre and Bloch had anticipated Braudel by originating the historical approach that emphasized economics. Choice D is the correct answer here.
Choice A is out because the limitations of the Annales approach are not discussed until the end of the passage.
The relevance of economics to history has already been suggested by the time the author mentions Febvre and Bloch, so Choice B is wrong. Choice C is incorrect because the need for combining various sociological approaches is not debated in the first paragraph or anywhere else.



The rich analyses of Fernand Braudel and his fellow Annales historians have made significant contributions to historical theory and research. In a departure from traditional historical approaches, the Annales historians, assume (as do Marxists) that history cannot be limited to a simple recounting of conscious human actions, but must be understood in the context of forces and material conditions that underlie human behavior. Braudel was the first Annales historian to gain widespread support of the idea that history should synthesize data from various social sciences, especially economics, in order to provide a broader view of human societies over time (although Febvre and Bloch, founders of the Annales school, had originated this approach).
Braudel conceived of history as the dynamic interaction of three temporalities. The first of these, the evenementielle, involved short-lived dramatic "events," such as battles, revolutions and the actions of great men, which had preoccupied traditional historians like Carlyle. Conjonctures was Braudel's term for larger cyclical processes that might last up to half a century. The longue duree, a historical wave of great length, was for Braudel the most fascinating of the three temporalities. Here he focused on those aspects of everyday life that might remain relatively unchanged for centuries. What people ate, what they wore, their means and routes of travel ­ for Braudel these things create "structures" which define the limits of potential social change for hundreds of years at a time.
Braudel's concept of the longue duree extended the perspective of historical space as well as time. Until the Annales school, historians had taken the juridical political unit the nation-state, duchy, or whatever as their starting point. Yet, when such enormous timespans are considered, geographical features may well have more significance for human populations than national borders. In his doctoral thesis, a seminal work on the Mediterranean during the reign of Philip II, Braudel treated the geohistory of the entire region as a "structure" that had exerted myriad influences on human lifeways since the first settlements on the shores of the Mediterranean SeA. And so the reader is given such arcane information as the list of products that came to Spanish shores from North Africa, the seasonal routes followed by Mediterranean sheep and their shepherds, and the cities where the best ship timber could be bought.
Braudel has been faulted for the imprecision of his approach. With his Rabelaisian delight in concrete detail, Braudel vastly extended the realm of relevant phenomena; but this very achievement made it difficult to delimit the boundaries of observation, a task necessary to beginning any social investigation. Further, Braudel and other Annales historians minimize the differences among the social sciences. Nevertheless, the many similarly- designed studies aimed at both professional and popular audiences indicate that Braudel asked significant questions which traditional historians had overlooked.
According to the passage, all of the following are aspects of Braudel's approach to history EXCEPT that he:

  1. attempted to draw on various social sciences.
  2. studied social and economic activities that occurred across national boundaries.
  3. pointed out the link between increased economic activity and the rise of nationalism.
  4. examined seemingly unexciting aspects of everyday life.

Answer(s): C

Explanation:

Choice C is the correct answer to this All-Except question because nationalism is never mentioned in the passage. All the other choices are aspects of Braudel's approach to history. A is mentioned in Paragraph 1.
Paragraph 3 explains that Braudel ignored national boundaries in favor of geographical features in his work on the Mediterranean (Choice B). In the same paragraph, you find out that unchanging aspects of everyday life (Choice D) were what the French historian studied most closely.



The rich analyses of Fernand Braudel and his fellow Annales historians have made significant contributions to historical theory and research. In a departure from traditional historical approaches, the Annales historians, assume (as do Marxists) that history cannot be limited to a simple recounting of conscious human actions, but must be understood in the context of forces and material conditions that underlie human behavior. Braudel was the first Annales historian to gain widespread support of the idea that history should synthesize data from various social sciences, especially economics, in order to provide a broader view of human societies over time (although Febvre and Bloch, founders of the Annales school, had originated this approach).
Braudel conceived of history as the dynamic interaction of three temporalities. The first of these, the evenementielle, involved short-lived dramatic "events," such as battles, revolutions and the actions of great men, which had preoccupied traditional historians like Carlyle. Conjonctures was Braudel's term for larger cyclical processes that might last up to half a century. The longue duree, a historical wave of great length, was for Braudel the most fascinating of the three temporalities. Here he focused on those aspects of everyday life that might remain relatively unchanged for centuries. What people ate, what they wore, their means and routes of travel ­ for Braudel these things create "structures" which define the limits of potential social change for hundreds of years at a time.
Braudel's concept of the longue duree extended the perspective of historical space as well as time. Until the Annales school, historians had taken the juridical political unit the nation-state, duchy, or whatever as their starting point. Yet, when such enormous timespans are considered, geographical features may well have more significance for human populations than national borders. In his doctoral thesis, a seminal work on the Mediterranean during the reign of Philip II, Braudel treated the geohistory of the entire region as a "structure" that had exerted myriad influences on human lifeways since the first settlements on the shores of the Mediterranean Sea. And so the reader is given such arcane information as the list of products that came to Spanish shores from North Africa, the seasonal routes followed by Mediterranean sheep and their shepherds, and the cities where the best ship timber could be bought.
Braudel has been faulted for the imprecision of his approach. With his Rabelaisian delight in concrete detail, Braudel vastly extended the realm of relevant phenomena; but this very achievement made it difficult to delimit the boundaries of observation, a task necessary to beginning any social investigation. Further, Braudel and other Annales historians minimize the differences among the social sciences. Nevertheless, the many similarly- designed studies aimed at both professional and popular audiences indicate that Braudel asked significant questions which traditional historians had overlooked.
In the third paragraph, the author is primarily concerned with discussing:

  1. Braudel's fascination with obscure facts.
  2. Braudel's depiction of the role of geography in human history.
  3. the geography of the Mediterranean region.
  4. the irrelevance of national borders.

Answer(s): B

Explanation:

This is a paragraph question, so the right answer has to cover the entire paragraph. You should beware of choices that are just details from the paragraph in question (in this case the third paragraph), like Choice C.
The author only mentions the geography of the Mediterranean in the context of discussing his real subject:
Braudel's depiction of the role of geography in human history (Choice B) when a long view of history is taken.
Choice A should be eliminated because Braudel's use of obscure facts does not mean that he was "fascinated" with them. D is out because the author never says that national borders are irrelevant; they were just less significant to Braudel than geographical boundaries.



The rich analyses of Fernand Braudel and his fellow Annales historians have made significant contributions to historical theory and research. In a departure from traditional historical approaches, the Annales historians, assume (as do Marxists) that history cannot be limited to a simple recounting of conscious human actions, but must be understood in the context of forces and material conditions that underlie human behavior. Braudel was the first Annales historian to gain widespread support of the idea that history should synthesize data from various social sciences, especially economics, in order to provide a broader view of human societies over time (although Febvre and Bloch, founders of the Annales school, had originated this approach).
Braudel conceived of history as the dynamic interaction of three temporalities. The first of these, the evenementielle, involved short-lived dramatic "events," such as battles, revolutions and the actions of great men, which had preoccupied traditional historians like Carlyle. Conjonctures was Braudel's term for larger cyclical processes that might last up to half a century. The longue duree, a historical wave of great length, was for Braudel the most fascinating of the three temporalities. Here he focused on those aspects of everyday life that might remain relatively unchanged for centuries. What people ate, what they wore, their means and routes of travel ­ for Braudel these things create "structures" which define the limits of potential social change for hundreds of years at a time.
Braudel's concept of the longue duree extended the perspective of historical space as well as time. Until the Annales school, historians had taken the juridical political unit the nation-state, duchy, or whatever as their starting point. Yet, when such enormous timespans are considered, geographical features may well have more significance for human populations than national borders. In his doctoral thesis, a seminal work on the Mediterranean during the reign of Philip II, Braudel treated the geohistory of the entire region as a "structure" that had exerted myriad influences on human lifeways since the first settlements on the shores of the Mediterranean Sea. And so the reader is given such arcane information as the list of products that came to Spanish shores from North Africa, the seasonal routes followed by Mediterranean sheep and their shepherds, and the cities where the best ship timber could be bought.
Braudel has been faulted for the imprecision of his approach. With his Rabelaisian delight in concrete detail, Braudel vastly extended the realm of relevant phenomena; but this very achievement made it difficult to delimit the boundaries of observation, a task necessary to beginning any social investigation. Further, Braudel and other Annales historians minimize the differences among the social sciences. Nevertheless, the many similarly- designed studies aimed at both professional and popular audiences indicate that Braudel asked significant questions which traditional historians had overlooked.
The passage suggests that, compared with traditional historians, Annales historians are:

  1. more interested in other social sciences than in history.
  2. critical of the achievements of famous historical figures.
  3. skeptical of the validity of most economic research.
  4. more interested in the underlying context of human behavior.

Answer(s): D

Explanation:

The author states in Paragraph 1 that unlike conventional historians, the Annales historians emphasized understanding history in the context of the forces and material conditions that underlying human behavior.
Choice D paraphrases this.
Annales historians are interested in synthesizing data from social sciences in order to do history, but they are not more interested in other social sciences than in history, so Choice A is wrong. Braudel incorporated the study of great figures into his framework of the three temporalities, so there is no reason to think Annales historians would be critical of the achievements of historical figures (Choice B). Choice C is incorrect because the author states in Paragraph 1 that the Annales historians advocate using economic data in historical research.



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