Clark and Florence Wallace, a husband-and-wife medical team, worked steadily and efficiently through the night, but sipping their coffee the next morning, she noticed that he seemed disoriented.

Very popular from 1900 until the 1920’s, the renewed interest in ceiling fans began when the energy crisis in 1974 forced homeowners to look for alternative methods of heating and cooling.

Since a rhinoceros that has no horn is worthless to poachers, the Wildlife Protection Committee plans to protect selected rhinoceroses form being killed by poachers by cutting off the rhinos’ horns.

The Wildlife Protection Committee’s plan assumes that

There is speculation that increasing cold weather was what may have been responsible for the Anasazi move from Mesa Verde to sites in other canyons.

Crimes are mainly committed by the young, and for this reason merely increasing the number of police officers or expenditures on police services has little effect on reducing the crime rate. In fact, the only factor associated with a crime-rate drop is a decrease in the number of people in the community aged fourteen to thirty.

The findings above can best serve as part of an argument against

A 20 percent decline in lobster catches in Maine waters since 1980 can be justifiably blamed on legislation passed in 1972 to protect harbor seals. Maine’s population of harbor seals is now double the level existing before production was initiated, and these seals are known to eat both fish and lobsters.

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

In Aristophanes’ Lysistrata women are seen as the means of bringing peace and good sense to a wartorn world.

Despite no proof that the consumption of any particular foods reverse hardening of the arteries, studies indicate that refraining from eating certain foods could help reverse blockage of coronary arteries, the blood vessels that feed the heart.

Artificial intelligence emerged during the late 1950’s as an academic discipline based on the assumption that computers are able to be programmed to think like people.

Politician: Fewer people are entering the labor market now than previously. If the economy grows, the demand for motivated and educated people will far outstrip the supply. Some companies have already started to respond to this labor-market situation by finding better ways to keep their current employees. Their concern is a sure indicator that the economy is growing.

Which of the following is the best criticism of the politician’s reasoning?

Under current federal law, employers are allowed to offer their employees free parking spaces as a tax-free benefit, but they can offer employees only up to $180 per year as a tax-free benefit for using mass transit. The government could significantly increase mass transit ridership by raising the limit of this benefit to meet commuters’ transportation costs.

The proposal above to increase mass transit ridership assumes that

Although the coordination of monetary policy can help facilitate the orderly financing of existing imbalances, it is unlikely that its effect on their size is significant in the absence of an appropriate fiscal adjustment.

The proposed health care bill would increase government regulation of health insurance, establish standards that would guarantee wider access to people with past health problems and to workers changing jobs who otherwise could be uncovered for months.

Which of the following best completes the passage below?

“Government” does not exist as an independent entity defining policy. Instead there exists a group of democratically elected pragmatists sensitive to the electorate, who establish policies that will result in their own reelection. Therefore, if public policy is hostile to, say, environmental concerns, it is not because of governmental perversity but because elected officials believe that ——.

Many writers of modern English have acquired careless habits that damage the clarity of their prose, but these habits can be broken if they are willing to take the necessary trouble.

Fresh potatoes generally cost about $2 for a 10-pound bag, whereas dehydrated instant potatoes cost, on average, about $3 per pound. It can be concluded that some consumers will pay 15 times as much for convenience, since sales of this convenience food continue to rise.

Which of the following, if true, indicates that there is a major flaw in the argument above?

While the base salary for the top five officers of the company did not change from 1990 to 1991, cuts were made in nonsalary compensation, as in allowances for overseas assignments and club memberships.

Consumers in California seeking personal loans have fewer banks to turn to than do consumers elsewhere in the United States. This shortage of competition among banks explains why interest rates on personal loans in California are higher than in any other region of the United States.

Which of the following, if true, most substantially weakens the conclusion above?