1 In the workplace, influenza is typically spread by infected individuals to others with whom they work in close quarters. A new medication that suppresses the symptoms of influenza therefore will actually increase the number of influenza cases, because this medication will allow people who would otherwise be home in bed to return to work while infected.
Which of the following, if true, most seriously chal-lenges the prediction?
(A) Coughing, a symptom of influenza that the new medication suppresses, is a primary mechanism in the spread of this illness.
(B) Some medications that are used to suppress symptoms of influenza are also used by many people to treat symptoms that are caused not by influenza but by other illnesses.
(C) Many workers who now remain at home when infected with influenza do so because the symptoms of influenza prevent them from per-forming their jobs effectively.
{D) Most adults who are immunized against influ-enza in order to avoid being infected are over
65 years old and retired and thus do not work outside the home.
(E) Symptoms of an illness are often the body's means of curing itself of the illness, and there-fore suppression of symptoms can prolong the illness that causes them.
2 Editorial:Critics of nuclear power complain about the allegedly serious harm that might result from continued operation of existing nuclear power plants. But such concerns do not justify closing these plants;after all, their operation has caused no more harm than that caused by pollution generated by coal-and oil-burning power plants, the most important other sources of energy.
Which of the following is an assumption on which the argument depends?
(A) Existing nuclear power plants should be closed only if it can be conclusively demonstrated that their continued operation is likely to cause harm more serious than the harm their operation has already caused.
(B) Closing existing nuclear power plants would require greatly increased reliance on coal-and oil-burning power plants.
(C) The harm that has resulted from operation of existing coal-and oil-burning power plants has been significant.
(D) The harm that a nuclear power plant is likely to cause as it continues to operate can be reliably predicted from the past history of nuclear power plants.
(E) The only harm that has resulted from operation of existing coal-and oil-burning power plants has resulted from the pollution generated by these plants.
3 Drug manufacturer: Although our company requires that patients who use our new drug also pur-chase from us nonreusable kits for weekly blood testing, the expense of those kits is an entirely necessary one: weekly blood testing must be done to monitor the drug's potential side effects, which can be very dangerous.
Which of the following, if true, most seriously weak-ens the manufacturer's argument?
(A) The expense of purchasing the blood-test kits has not prevented any patients from obtaining them or the drug.
(B) Medical laboratories can perform the blood test-ing at a lower cost to patients or their insurers than the price the manufacturer charges for the kits.
(C) A one-year supply of the drug and the weekly blood-test kits can cost patients or their insurers over $10,000.
{D) Most government and other health insurance programs will not reimburse patients for the full cost of both the drug and the blood-test kits.
(E) Patients who suffer one or more of the danger-ous side effects of the drug can incur heavy expenses for the treatment of those side effects.
4 Virginia and her brother William disagree over when their father was born: Virginia claims it was in 1935 and William claims it was in 1933. The hospital where their father was born has no records for 1933 but has complete records for 1935?records that do not include a birth record for their father. Therefore,he must have been born in 1933.
The argument depends on which of the following assumptions?
(A) Either Virginia's claim or William's claim is correct.
(B) The records of the hospital where their father was born date back to 1933.
(C) Virginia and William know the day and the month of their father's birth.
(D) There are urgent practical reasons why Virginia and William must know the date of their father's birth.
5 The town of San Leonardo has recently enacted a law banning smoking in all restaurants within town limits.Since many smokers who normally dine in San Leonardo's restaurants will not want to refrain from smoking during their meals, San Leonardo's restau-rants will undoubtedly lose many patrons and con-siderable income.
(A) Most residents of San Leonardo who eat in res-taurants are not smokers.
(B) Most smokers who dine in the company of non-smokers are willing to refrain from smoking during their meals.
(C) If the law banning smoking in restaurants had not been enacted, it is likely that a more stringent law banning smoking in all public places in San Leonardo would have been enacted instead.
(D) Prior to the enactment of the law banning smoking in San Leonardo's restaurant, the town had a law that required most restaurants to have nonsmoking sections.
(E) None of the other communities adjacent to San Leonardo, which have restaurants comparable to those of San Leonardo, has enacted and enforces any antismoking legislation.
6. Children whose biological parents both have Tic Syndrome Z (TSZ), which is characterized by the involuntary contraction of certain muscles, are about four times more likely to develop such contractions than are children whose biological parents do not have TSZ, It is likely, therefore, that predisposition to TSZ is an inherited trait.
Which of the following, if true, would most strengthen the conclusion above?
(A) Children whose parents have TSZ are more likely to develop TSZ if they are under unusual stress at school or at home than if they are not under such stress.
(B) Children whose biological parents do not have TSZ are more likely to develop TSZ if they are raised by adoptive parents with TSZ than if they are raised by their biological parents.
(C) Children whose biological parents have TSZ are as likely to develop TSZ if they are raised by adoptive parents who do not have TSZ as if they are raised by their biological parents.
(D) Children whose biological parents have TSZ and who develop TSZ usually avoid developing a severe form of the syndrome if they seek treatment for TSZ shortly after developing the first signs of it.
(E) Children with TSZ whose biological parents do not have TSZ are less likely to have the syn-drome diagnosed when symptoms first appear than are children with TSZ whose biological parents have TSZ.
7. Playing eighteenth-century music on the instruments of that period provides valuable information about how the music originally sounded. Eighteenth-century instruments cannot be played without being restored, however, and restoring such an instrument destroys all of the information that researchers could obtain from it about eighteenth-century instrument-making techniques.
(A) Eighteenth-century instruments cannot be used to provide information about the original techniques used in playing such instruments if they have been restored.
(B) Eighteenth-century instruments that have been restored can provide information only about how eighteenth-century music originally sounded
(C) Eighteenth-century instruments are the only source of information about the instrument-making techniques of that period.
(D) An eighteenth-century instrument that has not been restored can provide more information than can one that has been restored.
(E) An eighteenth-century instrument cannot serve as a source of new information about eighteenth-century instrument-making techniques once it can be played
1. A
2. D
3. B
4. A
5. E
6. C
7. E