RC Discussion for CAT 2013

MBA CAT 2022
481

For years scholars have contrasted slavery in the United States and in Brazil, stimulated by

the fact that racial patterns assumed such different aspects in the two countries after

emancipation. Brazil never developed a system of rigid segregation of the sort that replaced slavery in the United States, and its racial system was fluid because its definition of race was based as much on characteristics such as economic status as on skin color. Until recently, the most persuasive explanation for these differences was that Portuguese institutions especially the Roman Catholic church and Roman civil law, promoted recognition of the slave's humanity. The English colonists, on the other hand, constructed their system of slavery out of whole cloth. There were simply no precedents in English common law, and separation of church and state barred Protestant clergy from the role that priests assumed in Brazil.


But the assumption that institutions alone could so powerfully affect the history of two raw and malleable frontier countries seems, on reexamination, untenable. Recent studies focus instead on a particular set of contrasting economic circumstances and demographic profiles at significant periods in the histories of the two countries. Persons of mixed race quickly appeared in both countries. In the United States they were considered to be Black, a social definition that was feasible because they were in the minority. In Brazil, it was not feasible. Though intermarriage was illegal in both countries, the laws were unenforceable in Brazil since Whites formed a small minority in an overwhelmingly Black population. Manumission for persons of mixed race was also easier in Brazil, particularly in the nineteenth century when in the United States it was hedged about with difficulties. Furthermore, a shortage of skilled workers in Brazil provided persons of mixed race with the opportunity to learn crafts and trades, even before general emancipation, whereas in the United States entry into these occupations was blocked by Whites sufficiently numerous to fill the posts. The consequence was the development in Brazil of a large class of persons of mixed race, proficient in skilled trades and crafts, who stood waiting as a community for freed slaves to join.


There should be no illusion that Brazilian society after emancipation was color-blind. Rather, the large population of persons of mixed race produced a racial system that included a third status, a bridge between the Black caste and the White, which could be traversed by means of economic or intellectual achievement, marriage, or racial heritage. The strict and sharp line between the races so characteristic of the United States in the years immediately after emancipation was simply absent. With the possible exception of New Orleans, no special “place” developed in the United States for persons of mixed race. Sad to say, every pressure of society worked to prevent their attaining anything approximating the economic and social position available to their counterparts in Brazil.


1. In the passage, the author is primarily concerned with

(A) contrasting the systems of slavery that were established in Brazil and in the United States

(B) criticizing the arguments of those scholars who considered religion and law to be the determinants of the systems of slavery in Brazil and in the United States

(C) describing the factors currently thought to be responsible for the differences in the racial patterns that evolved in Brazil and in the United States

(D) advocating further study of the differences between the racial systems that developed in Brazil and in the United States

(E) pointing out the factors that made the status of Blacks in the United States

lower than that of Blacks in Brazil


2. According to the passage, early scholars explained the differences between the racial systems that developed in the United States and in Brazil as the result of which of the following factors?

(A) Institutional (B) Demographic (C) Economic (D) Geographical (E) Historical



3. In the context in which it is found, the phrase “constructed their system of slavery out of whole cloth” (lines 15-16) implies that the system of slavery established by the English settlers was

(A) based on fabrications and lies (B) tailored to the settlers' particular circumstances (C) intended to serve the needs of a frontier economy (D) developed without direct influence from the settlers' religion or legal system (E) evolved without giving recognition to the slave's humanity


4. The author implies that the explanation proposed by early scholars for the differences between the systems of slavery in the United States and in Brazil is

(A) stimulating to historians and legal scholars (B) more powerful than more recent explanations (C) persuasive in spite of minor deficiencies (D) excessively legalistic in its approach (E) questionable in light of current scholarly work



5. The author mentions intermarriage, manumission, and the shortage of skilled workers in Brazil primarily in order to establish which of the following?

(A) The environment in which Brazil's racial system developed

(B) The influence of different legal and economic conditions in Brazil and the United States on the life-style of persons of mixed race

(C) The origins of Brazil's large class of free skilled persons of mixed race

(D) The differences between treatment of slaves in Brazil and in the United States

(E) The difficulties faced by persons of mixed race in the United States, as compared to those in Brazil


6. According to the passage, Brazilian laws prohibiting intermarriage were ineffective because Brazil had a

(A) Portuguese Catholic heritage

(B) Small minority of whites (C) Liberal set of laws concerning manumission (D) Large number of freed slaves (E) Shortage of people in the skilled crafts and trades


7. The use of quotation marks around the word “place” (line 59) suggests that the author intended to convey which of the following?

(A) An ambivalent attitude toward the city of New Orleans

(B) A negative attitude toward the role of race in determining status in the United States

(C) A critical comment about the maltreatment of persons of mixed race in the United States

(D) A double meaning, indicating both a social status and a physical location

(E) An ambiguity, referring to either the role persons of mixed race actually played, or the role they were assigned by the society



8. With which of the following statements regarding human behavior would the author of the passage be most likely to agree?

(A) Only a fool or a political candidate would sing very loudly the glories of the institutions of Western culture.

(B) Contact sports—displacements of our abiding impulses to kill—speak of essential human behavior more truthfully than all the theories of psychologists and historians.

(C) Family, church, political party: these are the strong foundations of history and human behavior.

(D) Money and its pursuit: an exploration of that theme will chart accurately the development of civilizations and the determinants of human behavior.

(E) The circumstances in which humans find themselves—more than treasured beliefs or legal prescriptions—mold human behavior.

@scrabbler @ravi6389 please have a look.. have doubts here.. 😃

482

No one is eager to touch off the kind of hysteria that preceded the government's decision to move against Alar, the growth regulator once used by apple growers. When celebrities like Meryl Streep spoke out against Alar and the press fanned public fears, some schools and parents rushed to pluck apples out of the mouths of children. Yet all this happened before scientists had reached any consensus about Alar's dangers.

Rhetoric about dioxin may push the same kind of emotional buttons. The chemical becomes relatively concentrated in fat-rich foods—including human breast milk. Scientists estimate that a substantial fraction of an individual's lifetime burden of dioxin—as much as 12%— is accumulated during the first year of life. Nonetheless, the benefits of breast-feeding infants, the EPA and most everyone else would agree, far outweigh the hazards. Now environmentalists say dioxin and scores of other chemicals pose a threat to human fertility—as scary an issue as any policymakers have faced.

But in the absence of conclusive evidence, what are policymakers to do? What measure can they take to handle a problem whose magnitude is unknown? Predictably, attempts to whipsaw public opinion have already begun. Corporate lobbyists urge that action be put on hold until science resolves the unanswered questions. Environmentalists argue that evidence for harm is too strong to permit delay. This issue is especially tough because the chemicals under scrutiny are found almost everywhere.

Since many of them contain chlorine or are by-products of processes involving chlorine compounds, the environmental group Greenpeace has demanded a ban on all industrial uses of chlorine. The proposal seems appealingly simple, but it would be economically wrenching for companies and consumers alike. With the escalating rhetoric, many professionals in the risk-assessment business are worried that once again emotion rather than common sense will drive the political process. ―There is no free lunch,‖ observes Tammy Tengs, a public-health specialist at Duke University. ―When someone spends money in one place, that money is not available to spend on other things.‖ She and her colleagues have calculated that tuberculosis treatment can extend a person's life by a year for less than $10,000—surely a reasonable price tag. By contrast, extending a life by a year through asbestos removal costs nearly $2 million, since relatively few people would die if the asbestos were left in place. That kind of benefit-risk analysis all too rarely informs the decisions made by government regulators.

As the EPA raises anew the dangers of dioxin, the agency needs to communicate its findings to the public in a calm and clear fashion. John Graham, director of the Harvard Centre for Risk Analysis, suggests that people should strive to keep the perils posed by dioxin in perspective and remember other threats that are more easily averted. ―Phantom risks and real risks compete not only for our resources but also for our attention,‖ Graham observes. ―It's a shame when a mother worries about toxic chemicals, and yet her kids are running around unvaccinated and without bicycle helmets.

1. If it appeared in an article that the author read, he would most strongly agree with which of the following statements?

A. Asbestos and radon have caused serious health problems in the past that many government officials chose to ignore.

B. Dioxin is the foremost threat to human fertility and needs to be addressed in order to prevent serious health problems in the future.

C. Environmental groups and corporate lobbyists often take polarized stances which eventually are modified by governmental agencies.

D. Thorough research and investigation of environmental problems should be performed by the government before any unnecessary hysteria spreads throughout the public.

E. The mayor of a city has decided to ban the use of dioxins by industries in that city.

2. According to the passage, it is dangerous to react drastically to recently posed health hazards for all of the following reasons EXCEPT:

A. proven precautions are overlooked.

B. public fear leads to irrational action.

C. insurance premiums will increase.

D. economic burdens can occur.

E. emotion should not be allowed to overtake common sense.

3. In the context of the passage, the author uses the term ―whipsaw public opinion‖ (line 23) to refer to:

A. changing the needs of the community.

B. convincing citizens to accept a polarized viewpoint on health hazards.

C. offering a variety of alternatives for health hazards.

D. acting irrationally in response to government policy.

E. convincing citizens to take decisions lacking in common sense.

4. The primary aim of the passage is

A. to strongly discourage the use of dioxins by industries

B. to carry out a cost-benefit analysis of the continued use of dioxins

C. to argue that the problems associated with dioxins may have been overestimated

D. to assert that the opponents of the use of dioxins are exaggerating the problem for their own benefit

E. to call for a ban on the use of all dioxins


483

Please find below the passage. The screenshot of the question is attached.


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As founded by Puritan settlers, the college and its professors taught small communities of students in lectures modelled on sermons to the congregation. Like the sermon, then, the lecture relied on the concept of grace: that unpredictable moment when the congregant really hears the word of God in his heart; that unpredictable and magical moment when a student really gets it. This is what Emerson called the 'miraculous in the common'. This is what Socrates hoped to elicit and stir up in his questioning back and forth, the act of provoking a soul, not instructing it.

That spiritual authority has now gone and so too has the faith in the ability of education to draw out the one from the many, e pluribus unum, to form character from the messiness of subjective experience. College was not, however, just another word for church and nor was it a seminary. It was a place where the humanities took first place.

The liberal education that American colleges offered was rooted in the classical tradition of the artes liberals – stretching back to ancient Greece and Rome. But as Delbanco rightly argues, America's contribution was to democratise it, bringing what Matthew Arnold termed 'the best which has been thought and said in the world' to all, regardless of origin. He notes the hostility to the idea of the 'best' in today's relativist anti-elitist elites but reminds them how Arnold finishes his point: 'and through this knowledge, turning a stream of fresh and free thought upon our stock notions and habits'. That is to say, the danger of not knowing the best of the past is that the present stagnates and becomes fixed: our prejudices go unchallenged, our lives unexamined.

Yet it was just this democratic approach to tradition that was to be thrown out along with the bathwater of religious faith. Not in the 1960s, but nearly a hundred years before, when the college began to be seen as hopelessly backward, full of dull clergymen boring America's youth with ancient history, ill-suited to the pressing demands of the modern world and the new industrial nation.

We need new ways to manage that old tension between tradition and freedom in higher education. Our starting point must be the re-establishment of the authority of the professor as someone with something to say worth hearing. If that means traditional education, even religion – at least in the sense of striving for the apprehension, even a glimpse, of the sacred, of non-ordinary reality – then let it be so. College should be a place where we are offered a chance of going beyond the real and the quotidian, not a place that needs to be dragged any further into the real world. It is a sad fact but one well known to parents all over the American and Western world that faith schools and colleges retain a conviction as to the seriousness of the business of educating the young that is markedly absent from the secular institutions of today.

Many professors, know only too well how in American colleges what is now called the 'independent-operator professor' (structuring his teaching around his own interests and passions) is giving way to the 'instructor-for-hire', monitoring 'standardised content over some “delivery system”'. Some, like Delbanco, remind us what the word 'professor' once meant: 'A person who professes a faith, as in the Puritan churches, where the profession was made before the congregation as a kind of public initiation.' Someone 'undaunted by the incremental fatigue of repetitive work, who remains ardent, even fanatic, in the service of his calling'.


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484

Find the attached RC

485

@vijay_chandola , @grv750 @sam320 , @Rahul2133 @rubikmath @akki26 @sid2222000 @VINAY5890


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486

Shaw's defense of a theater of ideas brought him up against both his great bugbears—commercialized art on the one hand and Art for Art's Sake on the other. His teaching is that beauty is a by-product of other activity; that the artist writes out of moral passion (in forms varying from political conviction to religious zeal), not out of love of art; that the pursuit of art for its own sake is a form of self-indulgence as bad as any other sort of sensuality. In the end, the errors of “pure” art and of commercialized art are identical: they both appeal primarily to the senses. True art, on the other hand, is not merely a matter of pleasure. It may be unpleasant. A favorite Shavian metaphor for the function of the arts is that of tooth-pulling. Even if the patient is under laughing gas, the tooth is still pulled.

The history of aesthetics affords more examples of a didactic than of a hedonist view. But Shaw's didacticism takes an unusual turn in its application to the history of arts. If, as Shaw holds, ideas are a most important part of a work of art, and if, as he also holds, ideas go out of date, it follows that even the best works of art go out of date in some important respects and that the generally held view that great works are in all respects eternal is not shared by Shaw. In the preface to Three Plays for Puritans, he maintains that renewal in the arts means renewal in philosophy, that the first great artist who comes along after a renewal gives to the new philosophy full and final form, that subsequent artists, though even more gifted, can do nothing but refine upon the master without matching him. Shaw, whose essential modesty is as disarming as his pose of vanity is disconcerting, assigns to himself the role, not of the master, but of the pioneer, the role of a Marlowe rather than of a Shakespeare. “The whirligig of time will soon bring my audiences to my own point of view,” he writes, “and then the next Shakespeare that comes along will turn these petty tentatives of mine into masterpieces final for their epoch.”

“Final for their epoch”—even Shakespearean masterpieces are not final beyond that. No one, says Shaw, will ever write a better tragedy than Lear or a better opera than Don Giovanni or a better music drama than Der Ring des Nibelungen; but just as essential to a play as this aesthetic merit is moral relevance which, if we take a naturalistic and historical view of morals, it loses, or partly loses, in time. Shaw, who has the courage of his historicism, consistently withstands the view that moral problems do not change, and argues therefore that for us modern literature and music form a Bible surpassing in significance the Hebrew Bible. That is Shaw's anticipatory challenge to the neo-orthodoxy of today




1.The primary purpose of the passage is to discuss(A) the unorthodoxy of Shaws views on the Bible(B) the aesthetic merit of Shaws plays(C) Shaws theory of art(D) Shavian examples of the theater of ideas(E) Shaws naturalistic and historical view of morals



2.The author sets off the word pure (line 9) with quotation marks in order to(A) contrast it with the word true, which appears later (line 10)(B) suggest that, in this context, it is synonymous with commercialized (line 9)(C) underscore its importance(D) strip away its negative connotations(E) emphasize its positive connotations


3.According to the author, Shaw compares art to tooth-pulling (lines 12-14) in order to show that(A) the moral relevance of a work of art must be extracted from the epoch in which it was created(B) true art is painful to the senses(C) even the best works of art go out of date(D) pleasure is not the sole purpose of art(E) all art has a lasting effect on its audience


4.According to the author, Shaws didacticism was unusual in that it was characterized by(A) idealism(B) historicism(C) hedonism(D) moralism(E) religious zeal


5.It can be inferred from the passage that Shaw would probably agree with all of the following statements about Shakespeare EXCEPT:(A) He wrote out of a moral passion.(B) All of his plays are out of date in some important respect.(C) He was the most profound and original thinker of his epoch.(D) He was a greater artist than Marlowe.(E) His Lear gives full and final form to the philosophy of his age.


6.Which of the following does the author cite as a contradiction in Shaw?(A) Whereas he pretended to be vain, he was actually modest.(B) He questioned the significance of the Hebrew Bible, and yet he believed that a great artist could be motivated by religious zeal.(C) Although he insisted that true art springs from moral passion, he rejected the notion that morals do not change.(D) He considered himself to be the pioneer of a new philosophy, but he hoped his audiences would eventually adopt his point of view.(E) On the one hand, he held that ideas are a most important part of a work of art; on the other hand, he believed that ideas go out of date.


7.The ideas attributed to Shaw in the passage suggest that he would most likely agree with which of the following statements?(A) Every great poet digs down to a level where human nature is always and everywhere alike.(B) A play cannot be comprehended fully without some knowledge and imaginative understanding of its context.(C) A great music drama like Der Ring des Nibelungen springs from a love of beauty, not from a love of art.(D) Morality is immutable; it is not something to be discussed and worked out.(E) Don Giovanni is a masterpiece because it is as relevant today as it was when it was created.


8.The passage contains information that answers which of the following questions?I.According to Shaw, what is the most important part of a work of art?II.In Shaws view, what does the Hebrew Bible have in common with Don Giovanni?III.According to the author, what was Shaws assessment of himself as a playwright?(A) I only(B) III only(C) I and II only(D) II and III only(E) I, II, and III



9.As it is revealed in the passage, the authors attitude toward Shaw can best be described as(A) condescending(B) completely neutral(C) approving(D) envious(E) adulatory


@ravi6389 @scrabbler please look at the passage..

487

so there's no link where we can solve RC for cat 2013 ?? :(.. solving RC on paper and on PC is completely different.. I'm having a hard time solving RC , n that too in minimum time possible... any links i can get online for continuous practice?.


488

As formal organizations, business corporations are distinguished by their particular goals, which include maximization of profits, growth, and survival. Providing goods and services is a means to this end. If, for example, a number of individuals (outsiders or even insiders) believe that a company's aggressive marketing of infant formula in third world countries is morally wrong, the company is unlikely to be moved by arguments based on ethos alone as long as what it is doing remains profitable. But if those opposed to the company's practice organize a highly effective boycott of the company's products, their moral views will soon enter into the company's deliberations indirectly as limiting operating conditions. They can, at this point, no more be ignored than a prohibitive increase in the costs of certain raw materials.

Although the concepts and categories of ethics may be applied to the conduct of corporations, there are important differences between the values and principles underlying corporate behaviour and those underlying the actions of most individuals. If corporations are by their nature end- or goal-directed how can they acknowledge acts as wrong in and of themselves? Is it possible to hold one criminally responsible for acts that if performed by a human person would result in criminal liability?

The first case of this type to achieve widespread public attention was the attempt to prosecute the Ford Motor Company for manslaughter as the result of alleged negligent or reckless decision making concerning the safety engineering of the Pinto vehicle. Although the defendant corporation and its officers were found innocent after trial, the case can serve as an exemplar for our purposes.

In essence, the prosecution in this case attempted to show that the corporation had produced and distributed a vehicle that was known to be defective at the time of production and sale, and that even after a great deal of additional information accumulated regarding the nature of the problems, the corporation took no action to correct them. The obvious non-corporate analogy would be the prosecution of a person who was driving a car with brakes known to be faulty, who does not have them repaired because it would cost too much, and who kills someone when the brakes eventually fail and the car does not stop in time. Such cases involving individuals are prosecuted and won regularly.

If corporations have no concept of right or wrong because they are exclusively goal-directed, can they be convicted in cases of this type, and what purpose would be served by such a conviction? Perhaps we can make a utilitarian argument for convicting corporations of such crimes. The argument would be that of deterrence; conviction and punishment would deter other corporations from taking similar actions under similar circumstances. However, there appears to be considerable evidence that deterrence does not work on corporations, even if, arguably, it works on individuals. The possibility of being discovered and the potential magnitude of the fine merely become more data to be included in the analysis of limiting conditions.


1. A claim that things have ethical value to corporations only insofar as they are instrumental in furthering the ultimate goals of the corporation is:

A. necessarily true, given the information presented in the passage.

B. perhaps true, and supported by the information presented in the passage.

C. perhaps true, but not supported by any information in the passage.

D. necessarily false, given the information presented in the passage.

E. a figment of the author's imagination

2. If a company that produced shampoo products opted to stop the routine testing of its products on animals because it decided that it is wrong to cause the animals pain, what effect would this have on the argument made in the passage?

A. It would strongly support the argument.

B. It would support the argument somewhat, but not conclusively.

C. It would neither support nor substantially weaken the argument.

D. It would substantially weaken the argument.

E. It would weaken the argument only if the company is a government owned company

489

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490

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491

Hi Everyone !!

I need some insights on the type of passages being asked in recent CAT exams..!!

need answers for questions like

1. Length of the RC ( from CAT 2011 onwards)

2. Questions type - any particular inclination- inference/ direct fact

3. And no. of questions asked from RC..( rpugh estimate would do )

Thank you !

492

hello puys,need help regarding inference based questions as my accuracy in this type is deteriorating day by day.what should be the strategy for such questions(and can RC be improved in the next 2 months? )...plz help TIA 😃

493

Please solve the RC ,good one , CAT LEVEL

PFA. @Mr.WisePants , bhai dekhiyo fursat me.

494

Women's roles as patrons have attracted increasing scholarly attention in recent years. The role of the patron was crucial to art-making in the Renaissance. Indeed, one could argue that it was the patron who was the initiator of almost all significant artistic projects, and that it was the patron who determined an individual artwork's most important features and characteristics, including what material it was made from, where it was displayed, the subject it depicted, its size, and even, to a certain extent, its style and composition. Although knowing about a work's patron can never explain everything about an art object, understanding a patron's circumstances can provide us with important insights into why a particular work was commissioned and why it has some qualities rather than others. This is of particular relevance in the case of elite women patrons. Although many of their habits and concerns as patrons parallel those of their male contemporaries, there were important differences as well. By far the largest number whose patronage can be documented in this period were widows, like Atalanta Baglioni who hired Raphael to produce an altarpiece commemorating her murdered son or nuns living in convents. The prevalence of widows and nuns as art patrons is quite simple to explain: only these women had the financial and social independence to pay for works of art themselves. As a young girl or a married lady, a woman was legally and financially under the control of first her father and then her husband. Indeed, it was only if a woman outlived her husband that she could finally decide whether and how to spend her money on commissioning works of art. Likewise, until joining a convent, a young nun would have been unable to exercise any kind of independent artistic patronage within her family home. Only upon joining a female religious community could collective decisions about commissioning art be made, although in many cases it was the abbess who was in overall charge of such projects. Sticking to the secular sphere, the most common artistic commissions for women involved the tombs of their deceased husbands. Renaissance widows were exhorted to follow the Classical model of Artemisia, a widowed queen whose fabulous tomb for her husband, King Mausolus, became one of the seven wonders of the ancient world and has given us the word 'mausoleum'. Like Artemisia, 15th- and 16th-century widows were also usually concerned first, foremost, and often solely, with commissioning an appropriate funerary monument for their husbands. Some, but not all, monuments included an effigy of the deceased spouse. Sculpted effigies of women were rare, although wives did sometimes appear as kneeling donors together with their husbands in painted altarpieces or frescos painted for funerary chapels as seen, for instance, in the portrait of Nera Corsi in the Sassetti Chapel – although in this case, the project was commissioned by her still-living husband . However, even if a widow did not make a personal appearance in her husband's funerary chapel, she could remind posterity of her role as its patron through an inscription or by including her own coat of arms as well as that of her spouse. At the most elite levels, a very small number of women made much more impressive and longer-lasting marks thanks to their non-funereal artistic patronage.

Q1. Which of the statements given below contradicts the impression that the widows and nuns as art patrons left a deep impact?
(a) They had the time to spare for works of art and so could study art deeply.
(b) They had the money to spend on works of art and so could commission works of art.
(c) They had the financial and social independence to make decisions.
(d) None of the above


Q2. Which of the following is most true of the Renaissance widows?
(a) They wanted to make mausoleums that would be recognized as wonders of the world.
(b) They were concerned with the commissioning of an appropriate funerary monument for their husbands.
(c) All monuments included effigies of their deceased spouses.
(d) They appeared only in painted frescos in funerary chapels.

Q3. According to the author the role of the patron was crucial to art making in the Renaissance period because of which of the following reason?
(a) Everything of the art object reflected the patron's circumstances.
(b) The patron decided the most important characteristics and features of the artwork.
(c) The works of art were only financed by art patrons.
(d) It was the patron who was the initiator of all artistic projects.



Can someone please explain the answer to question 3...

thanks in advance.

495

DIRECTIONS for Questions:Read the passage given below and answer the questions that follow.

THERE is widespread disappointment with economists now because we did not forecast or prevent the financial crisis of 2008. The Economist's articles of July 18th on the state of economics were an interesting attempt to take stock of two fields, macroeconomics and financial economics, but both pieces were dominated by the views of people who have seized on the crisis as an opportunity to restate criticisms they had voiced long before 2008. Macroeconomists in particular were caricatured as a lost generation educated in the use of valueless, even harmful, mathematical models, an education that made them incapable of conducting sensible economic policy. I think this caricature is nonsense and of no value in thinking about the larger questions: What can the public reasonably expect of specialists in these areas, and how well has it been served by them in the current crisis?

One thing we are not going to have, now or ever, is a set of models that forecasts sudden falls in the value of financial assets, like the declines that followed the failure of Lehman Brothers in September. This is nothing new. It has been known for more than 40 years and is one of the main implications of Eugene Fama's “efficient-market hypothesis” (EMH), which states that the price of a financial asset reflects all relevant, generally available information. If an economist had a formula that could reliably forecast crises a week in advance, say, then that formula would become part of generally available information and prices would fall a week earlier. The term “efficient” as used here means that individuals use information in their own private interest. It has nothing to do with socially desirable pricing; people often confuse the two.

Mr Fama arrived at the EMH through some simple theoretical examples. This simplicity was criticised in The Economist's briefing, as though the EMH applied only to these hypothetical cases. But Mr Fama tested the predictions of the EMH on the behaviour of actual prices. These tests could have come out either way, but they came out very favourably. His empirical work was novel and carefully executed. It has been thoroughly challenged by a flood of criticism which has served mainly to confirm the accuracy of the hypothesis. Over the years exceptions and “anomalies” have been discovered (even tiny departures are interesting if you are managing enough money) but for the purposes of macroeconomic analysis and forecasting these departures are too small to matter. The main lesson we should take away from the EMH for policymaking purposes is the futility of trying to deal with crises and recessions by finding central bankers and regulators who can identify and puncture bubbles. If these people exist, we will not be able to afford them.


Q.1 The author's primary purpose in the passage is to

a show how economists have served the public during the crisis of 2008 and the fallacy of labelling them as obsolete.

b show the futility of labelling economists as having become obsolete and the role of the Efficient Market Hypothesis in the 2008 economic crisis.

c show argue that the Efficient Market Hypothesis model has lessons in store for economists and people.

d put forth his views regarding the Efficient Market Hypothesis in context to the present state of economics.

e None of these



Q.2 Which of the following can be inferred to be in line with the author's views in the passage?


a Macroeconomists cannot be caricatured as a lost generation as they have critical inputs for the future.

b Macroeconomists cannot be caricatured as a lost generation as they are capable of conducting sensible economic policy.

c Even though Macroeconomists have been caricatured as a lost generation, the caricatures become irrelevant when it comes to assessing the expectations of the public from the specialists in this area and how far these expectations were met by the macroeconomists during the 2008 crisis.

d Whether macroeconomists are a lost generation or not is irrelevant when we look at the role of economists in the economic crisis of 2008.

e None of these



Q.3 Which of the following statements can be inferred from the passage?

A. It is futile to expect specialists on economics to deal successfully with an economic crisis as they are too expensive even if available.

B. The author is an economist who is trying to explain by using the EMH Model that he could have never successfully forecast or prevented the economic crisis of 2008.

C. The economist's briefing deliberately overlooked the fact that Mr Fama had tested the EMH Model on actual prices.


a Only A

b A and B

c A, B and C

d None of the above

e Only B and C


496

Hey I got 98.62%tile in quant in CAT 2012 while got only 50.22 %tile in Verbal section -- and so I didn't receive call from any of the IIM's 😞
Friends can you suggest me what should I do to improve my verbal section. Plzz

498

I found dis RC to be gud in terms of content.


RC 228 :-

In the closing pages of A Brief History of Time Stephen Hawking took a sideswipe at contemporary philosophy, arguing that it has been reduced to an analysis of language. In his haste to dismiss philosophy he allowed himself to misunderstand not only language but the nature of the world. Hawking makes the simple error of assuming that the world and our descriptions of it might be one and the same. In our descriptions of the world we divide it into things: trees and houses, people and events, stars and planets, atoms and molecules. But the world is not a thing or a combination of things, for these categories-these closures, as I call them-are the outcome of our descriptions. Instead, the world is open and it is we who close it. Through our closures we grasp the openness of the world as things, and out of these things we build stories and models through which we are able to intervene. But these stories and models are not the world, nor could they in principle come close to being the world.

The world does not come pre-packaged and divided into its parts. We are not in a cosmic supermarket identifying cling-wrapped items of reality. Instead we find ourselves in openness, and in order to make sense of it, to have some means of intervening to certain effect, we realise closure. We do not form our closures in a vacuum. We find ourselves in a network of linguistic closures already realised and handed down by our culture from generation to generation. As biological organisms, we are already set up, through evolution, to generate certain types of sensory closure. These biological and cultural systems of closure have been adopted because they prove useful, not because they are true.

Current theories of astrophysics, with tales of the big bang, black holes and antimatter, have the feel of science fiction. And in a sense that is what they are: the stories of contemporary science. These stories are not unconstrained; they do not allow anything to be said. For the stories of science have an internal logic which drives them forward. They are often useful. We live by our closures. But we should not imagine that we have thereby captured the secrets of the universe. Nor should we suppose that there are not countless alternatives, offering other ways of holding the world that may be equally valid.

The closures of contemporary science appear to be unavoidable because they take their place in a system of closures that has been built and defended over centuries. When Hawking describes the universe as a vast array of galaxies exploding into the emptiness of space propelled by the energy from the original big bang, it is the outcome of a history of preceding closures, which combine to make it look as if Hawking's closure is the only available option. Yet there are other options, at every level of the account, from the tiniest detail to the most general theory; options that would grasp openness differently in some respect, that would draw attention to different patterns and different connections, and which would as a consequence offer different ways of intervening and to different purposes.


1) Which of the following statements is the thematic highlight of this passage?

a)Contemporary theories categorise various things in the world.

b)Science has no monopoly on truth.

c)Our closures help us grasp the openness of the world.

d)The effect of openness on science.

e)Stories help us understand the world.


2) It has been claimed in the passage that “Current theories of astrophysics, with tales of the big bang, black holes and antimatter, have the feel of science fiction.” According to the passage, which of the following seem(s) appropriate reason(s) for such a claim?

A. We feel that we have captured the secret of the universe.

B. Biological and cultural systems of closure have been adopted because they are credible.

C. These are stories of contemporary science which are useful; not necessarily true.

a)A only

b)B only

c)C only

d)A & B

e)A & C


3) What does the term 'closures' allude to in the passage?

a)An offshoot of our perceptions.

b)An outcome of our descriptions.

c)A combination of things.

d)A result of our experiments.

e)A show of contemporary philosophy.

499

The passage given below is followed by a set of four questions. Choose the best answer to each question.A game of strategy, as currently conceived in game theory, is a situation in which two or more €œplayers € make choices among available alternatives (moves). The totality of choices determines the outcomes of the game, and it is assumed that the rank order of preferences for the outcomes is different for different players. Thus the €œinterests € of the players are generally in conflict. Whether these interests are diametrically opposed or only partially opposed depends on the type of game.Psychologically, most interesting situations arise when the interests of the players are partly coincident and partly opposed, because then one can postulate not only a conflict among the players but also inner conflicts within the players. Each is tom between a tendency to cooperate, so as to promote the common interests, and a tendency to compete, so as to enhance his own individual interests.Internal conflicts are always psychologically interesting. What we vaguely call €œinteresting € psychology is in very great measure the psychology of inner conflict. Inner conflict is also held to be an important component of serious literature as distinguished from less serious genres. The classical tragedy, as well as the serious novel, reveals the inner conflict of central figures. The superficial adventure story, on the other hand, depicts only external conflict; that is, the threats to the person with whom the reader (or viewer) identifies stem in these stories exclusively from external obstacles and from the adversaries who create them. On the most primitive level this sort of external conflict is psychologically empty. In the fisticuffs between the protagonists of good and evil, no psychological problems are involved or, at any rate, none are depicted in juvenile representations of conflict.The detective story, the €œadult € analogue of a juvenile adventure tale, has at times been described as a glorification of intellectualized conflict. However, a great deal of the interest in the plots of these stories is sustained by withholding the unraveling of a solution to a problem. The effort of solving the problem is in itself not a conflict if the adversary (the unknown criminal) remains passive, like Nature, whose secrets the scientist supposedly unravels by deduction. If the adversary actively puts obstacles in the detective €™s path toward the solution, there is genuine conflict. But the conflict is psychologically interesting only to the extent that it contains irrational components such as a tactical error on the criminal €™s part or the detective €™s insight into some psychological quirk of the criminal or something of this sort. Conflict conducted in a perfectly rational manner is psychologically no more interesting than a standard Western. For example, Tic-tac-toe, played perfectly by both players, is completely devoid of psychological interest. Chess may be psychologically interesting but only to the extent that it is played not quite rationally. Played completely rationally, chess would not be different from Tic-tac-toe.In short, a pure conflict of interest (what is called a zero-sum game) although it offers a wealth of interesting conceptual problems, is not interesting psychologically, except to the extent that its conduct departs from rational norms.


* According to the passage, which of the following options about the application of game theory to a conflict-of-interest situation is true?






  • Accepting that the interests of different players are often in conflict.
  • Not assuming that the interests are in complete disagreement.
  • Assuming that the rank order of preferences for options is different for different players.
  • All are correct

0 voters

500

@Dearth

Even as the number of females processed through juvenile courts climbs steadily, an implicit consensus remains among scholars in criminal justice that male adolescents define the delinquency problem in the United States. We suggest two reasons why this view persists. First, female adolescents are accused primarily of victimless crimes, such as truancy, that do not involve clear-cut damage to persons or property. If committed by adults, these actions are not even considered prosecutable; if committed by juvenile males, they have traditionally been looked on leniently by the courts. Thus, ironically, the plight of female delinquents receives little scrutiny because they are accused of committing relatively minor offenses. Second, the courts have long justified so-called preventive intervention into the lives of young females viewed as antisocial with the rationale that women are especially vulnerable. Traditional stereotypes of women as the weaker and more dependent sex have led to earlier intervention and longer periods of misdirected supervision for female delinquents than for males.



The passage suggests that scholars in criminal justice could be criticized for which of the following?



4 answers 1) Underestimating the seriousness of juvenile crime



2 answers 2) Rationalizing the distinction made between juveniles and adults in the legal system



3 answers 3) Concerning themselves too little with the prevention of juvenile delinquency



3 answers 4) Focusing on those whose crimes have involved damage to persons or property



5 answers 5) Failing to point out injustices in the correctional system



—

answer??

501

The immigration of Europeans and the importation of West African slaves to America resulted in a convergence of cultures, traditions, and art forms, including music. Jazz, first played in New Orleans in the early 1900s, borrowed heavily from the European musical scale and harmonic system. Jazz ensembles were built predominantly on European instruments, manifested primarily in its performance. Scatting, a technique used by jazz vocalists to mimic the sounds of instruments, had its origin in West African vocal traditions. The emphasis on improvisation in jazz music, in addition to group participation, also came from West African music. Some musicologists argue that jazz is a purely American form of music. Others, however, contend that jazz is rooted in a history similar to that of such as the trumpet, trombone, saxophone, and piano. The West African influence on jazz was America itself, a history of confluence. Proponents of the argument that jazz is purely American often point to its genesis in New Orleans as evidence for this perspective. The irony, however, is that the essence of America lies in the plurality of its roots. To deny the rich and complex history of jazz, and the true origins of the art form, is to deny the very aspects of the art form that make it undeniably American.

1) It can be inferred from the passage that the author would be less inclined to label jazz an American art form if which of the following were true?
a) New Orleans was not the place where jazz music was first played.
b) Jazz music was first created in New York when four avant-garde musicians from different cultural backgrounds came together to experiment with unprecedented musical concepts.
c) With the influx of West Africans to the Americas came a very specific West African musical style which eventually came to be called “jazz” in New Orleans
d) Jazz music actually draws more of its character from South American and Native American traditions than from those of Europe or West Africa.
e) The instruments used by jazz musicians were predominately of West African origin, not European origin.

2) Which of the following statements concerning jazz is most directly suggested in the passage?
a) The plurality of jazz's roots has led multiple cultures to claim jazz as their own.
b) If jazz musicians had not borrowed from the European musical scale, they would have used the West African musical scale instead.
c) Only European and African cultures had an influence on the development of jazz
d) Jazz was played in West Africa prior to its introduction in New Orleans in the early 1900s.
e) Instrumentation was not a primary component of the West African influence on jazz.

3) Which of the following elements of jazz most likely has its origin in West African musical traditions? a) the emphasis on a tonal harmonic structure
b) the use of an instrument to mimic a vocalist's sound
c) the use of traditional African instruments
d) the use of many instruments in a jazz ensemble
e) an impromptu call-and-response between two instruments in the ensemble