MCAT verbal test (10)

MCAT Section Tests
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ANSWER KEY:
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.

A
B
C
A
B

11.
12.
13.
14.
15.

A
C
A
A
C

21.
22.
23.
24.
25.

B
D
B
A
A

31.
32.
33.
34.
35.

C
B
D
A
D

41.
42.
43.
44.
45.

C
D
C
D
C

51.
52.
53.
54.
55.

A
B
D
A
D

6.
7.
8.
9.
10.

D
B
A
B
B

16.
17.
18.
19.
20.

B
B
D
C
D

26.
27.
28.
29.
30.

B
C
A
D
D

36.
37.
38.
39.
40.

C
C
A
B
C

46.
47.
48.
49.
50.

C
C
B
A
C

56.
57.
58.
59.
60.

D
B
C
D
C


“Test 5 Transcript”


VERBAL REASONING TEST 5 TRANSCRIPT

Passage I (Questions 1-7)
Topic and Scope: Volcanic activity can make an ancient ecosystem appear to have developed in a much drier
regional climate than actually existed.
Paragraph Structure: ¶1 uses a modern-climate example to introduce the idea of mock aridity, while ¶2 suggests
that mock aridity may alter our view of past ecosystems. ¶3 explains in detail how volcanism causes mock aridity.
¶s 4 and 5 discuss two particular paleoclimates whose climates may have been wetter than they appeared. This new
evidence means that the global climate may have stayed warm and wet for a longer time than scientists previously thought.
¶6 explains how the idea of mock aridity can be tested using ocean marine sediment records.
Questions:
1. (A)
I is definitely not an assumption Potts makes; the whole point of using marine records is to avoid the local effects of
terrestrial volcanism. III is wrong because the passage never talks about the ocean changing temperature.
II, however, is an assumption that Potts makes. The marine sediment record is supposed to be accurate because it was
never touched by volcanism, but it wouldn’t be accurate if it had been disturbed by something else.

2. (B)
Harris and Van Couvering would agree with this because their results agree more with the computer models than with
the fossils.
(A) Be careful. It’s not that the ecosystems were more successful than fossils indicate—the ecosystems were
continually disrupted. It’s that the climate was wetter than fossils indicated.
(C) This has to be wrong because we have fossils from volcanic regions, according to the passage.
(D) There is no basis for this in the passage.

3. (C)
The information in the stem has nothing to do with the passage; it’s a distortion of the image conjured in the first ¶ of
what the current Pacific Northwest climate will look like to someone a million years in the future.

4. (A)
Climax communities accurately reflect the regional climate, so fossils from climax communities should be an accurate
gauge of the climate, unlike the fossils from volcanically-disrupted communities.

(B) Due to mock aridity, this would be true even if East Africa had a wetter climate than previously suspected.
(C) This would support rather than challenge the idea that East Africa may have been wetter than expected, since
volcanism would have made the climate look drier.
(D) This too would support rather than challenge the idea.

5. (B)
The author compares the barren environment in a volcanic region to the barren environment in a desert.
(A) If ancient volcanic regions could be deemed savannah environments, there must have been volcanic activity.


(C) is wrong; see (B) above.
(D) The author says that biological communities develop but never reach climatic climax, which means they are
persistently mowed down by volcanism. This does not challenge Harris’s claim.

6. (D)
If global temperatures did not drop until after the Miocene, this would support Harris’s idea that the Miocene
environment was actually warm and wet and that the Miocene savannah environments in the fossil record are an effect of
volcanism. Thus, (D) is correct and (B) is wrong.
(A)’s claim is never made in the passage.
(C)’s claim is unaffected by the information in the stem.

7. (B)
We have no way of knowing whether or not there was volcanic activity in the Pacific Rim 38 million years ago, so the
most Harris and Van Couvering could assert is that the record may not be accurate.
(A) and (D) There may not have been any volcanoes back then in the Pacific Rim, which eliminates these choices.
(C) is much too extreme; the fossil record is only inaccurate, as far as we know, in regions that had volcanic activity.

Passage II (Questions 8-13)
Topic and Scope: The author argues that the original transformative feminist commitment to caring has been lost in
the equal-opportunity feminist drive to adapt to the realities of the masculine marketplace.

Paragraph Structure: ¶s 1 and 2 explain the transformative feminist vision, which is based on a commitment to
caring.
¶3 asserts that corporate America and the media have corrupted and masculinized feminism by defining liberation in
marketplace terms. The result of this corruption, we find out in ¶s 4, 5 and 6, is equal-opportunity feminism, which favors
adaptation to the marketplace over transformation of it.
In ¶7 and ¶8, the author says that the marketplace was just too seductive a trap for feminists, some of whom have
become successful but are now too caught up in their own success. These women may still be concerned about political
and social issues (¶9), but they are afraid that they’ll jeopardize what they have gained if they work for change.
Questions:
8. (A)
By “the victims of aggression identify with their aggressors,” the author means that the feminists, the victims, began to
identify with and accept the ideals of their aggressors, corporate America and the media.

9. (B)
The author does not agree with the equal-opportunity-feminist tenet that women should place competition above
caring; to the author, caring is the true feminist ideal.
(A) This does not really counter the equal-opportunity feminist’s argument.


(C) is wrong because it assumes the author would agree that the basic goal of feminism should be to help women
compete with men.
(D) runs counter to the author’s philosophy.

10. (B)
The author criticizes the successful women (according to “traditional American ideals”) who won’t work for change
because they are too caught up in being personally successful, so attainment of personal success is not the highest ideal to
her.
(A) is a tricky wrong choice. Not all feminists have lost touch with their roots, just the equal-opportunity feminists.
(C) This is too extreme to be correct.
(D) The author never mentions any other societal spheres besides the marketplace.

11. (A)
According to the author, some successful women are afraid to work for change for fear of jeopardizing their success.
(A) reflects this idea.
(B) There is no evidence to support this in the passage.
(C) and (D) both contradict information in the passage.

12. (C)
The author makes this claim but offers no specific evidence or examples to support it. The claim is consistent with the
reasoning of the passage, however.

13. (A)
This choice is consistent with all of the information in the passage regarding equal-opportunity feminists.
(B) According to the passage, some equal-opportunity feminists at least say that caring is important, though they may
not do anything about it.
(C) This is a former belief of the transformative feminists.
(D) This claim is never made.
Passage III (Questions 14-18)
Topic and Scope: Mass movements; specifically, the focus of mass movements.
Paragraph Structure: ¶s 1 and 2 assert that mass movements discredit both the past and present in order to get their
members to make sacrifices to achieve an idealized future.
¶s 3-6 simply build on this basic theme by providing more details about how mass movements operate and about what
they think.
The Big Picture: Don’t let flowery, indirect language throw you. The point here is rather straightforward: mass
movements focus on the future at the expense of the past and present. All the rest is detail that you can look up if
questions demand it.


Questions:
14. (A)

That mass movements look to the future at the expense of the present is discussed throughout the passage. Statement I,
therefore, is supported. Statements II and III, however, aren’t supported by evidence or explanation. The passage never
discusses the leadership of mass movements (statement II) or the relative success of religious and nationalist mass
movements (statement III).

15. (C)
In ¶6, the author remarks that religious, social, and nationalist mass movements all reject the present in favor of an
idealized future, even if they have different reasons for rejecting the present and looking toward the future. Thus, they are
all similar in this general respect.
(A) Mass movements assert that the future will be better than the present; there’s nothing in the passage to indicate
that the author would endorse this position.
(B) is beyond the scope of the passage. There’s no discussion of the actual achievements or failures of mass
movements.
(D) To the contrary. The author contends that mass movements invariably denounce the past in no uncertain terms.

16. (B)
The phrase “the campaign against the appetites” appears in the context of a discussion of mass movement attempts to
get members to eschew the comforts of the present in order to put all of their energies into molding a “glorious future.” In
other words, this phrase refers to mass movement efforts to steer members away from pleasures and comforts.
(A) To the contrary. Mass movements are all about political involvement.
(C) Mass movements don’t disavow miracles. Anyway, this choice focuses on a detail from the wrong ¶—¶4.
(D) is beyond the scope of the passage. Mass movement attitudes about governments aren’t mentioned in the passage.
17. (B)
The author contends that mass movements have their sights set on the future. Thus, a mass movement that was out to
reform the present political system would contradict his claim.
(A) and (C) are logically eliminated by (B).
(D) No, this information would contradict the author’s claim.

18. (D)
The basic idea of the passage is that mass movements want to build a “glorious future” that is fundamentally different

from the present. Hence, they surely believe that it’s necessary to destroy the present. Statement I is true. Statements II and
III, on the other hand, aren’t true. According to the author, mass movements denounce the past; they don’t glorify it. And
mass movements, according to ¶s 1-3, certainly do ask members to sacrifice themselves.


Passage IV (Questions 19-24)
Topic and Scope: By trying to expand into Poland, NATO is jeopardizing its relationship with Russia because (1)
Russians believe NATO is breaking a WWII promise and (2) Russians don’t want to lose influence over the countries
surrounding them.
Paragraph Structure: In ¶1, the author uses an analogy to make his point that NATO is trying to expand at a time
when it is confused about its identity. He goes on to point out that NATO officially says it’s expanding for security
reasons but the real goal would be to contain the Russians (¶2). The Russians, for their part, are ticked off about NATO
expansion but are trying to apply diplomatic pressure (¶3).
¶s 4 and 5 go into detail about why the Russians are unhappy about NATO expansion. In ¶6, the author explains that
most Russian politicians want to maintain a sphere of influence in former Soviet regions.
Questions:
19. (C)
In the author’s analogy, NATO is the couple in a crumbling marriage who is trying to have a baby—that is, expand by
absorbing an Eastern European country. The baby is the Eastern European country in the analogy.

20. (D)
(A), (B) and (C) are all actions that the author would support at least to some degree, but what he really would want
more than anything is for NATO to reconsider expanding into Eastern Europe (D).

21. (B)
The “clear though implicit” promise, as discussed in the last question, was that the West wouldn’t go into Eastern
Europe.
(A) was never a promise made to Russia.
(C) is wrong because it was the promise Russia made.
(D) was certainly not a promise the West would have made.

22. (D)
I can be found in ¶2, II is an appropriate inference based on the fact that Western diplomats privately say Russians are
paranoid to fear the loss of Ukraine to NATO, and III is true based on the fact that there is “Western criticism” of Russia’s
plans to maintain its sphere of influence (last sentence).

23. (B)
Both NATO and Russia, according to the passage, justify attempting to maintain and expand their sphere of influence
by saying they need it for greater security.
(A) is never mentioned in the passage and defies common sense.
(C) Refusing to admit defeat is never mentioned in the passage.
(D) NATO certainly isn’t engaging in careful planning or diplomatic negotiation.

24. (A)


The Russians “point to the Monroe Doctrine and the French sphere of influence in Africa” to justify their actions; in
other words, “You did it, so it’s all right for us to do it.” (A) paraphrases this idea.
Passage V (Questions 25-30)
Topic and Scope: Merchandising of political candidates is undermining democracy because it exploits the
electorate’s irrationality and vulnerability to persuasion.
Paragraph Structure:
¶1: The author argues that increasing population and technology have undermined democracy as the power has come
to be held by politicians and not by the people. ¶2: Although people are capable of making rational decisions in an
election, they don’t get a chance because candidates are marketed like supermarket items. ¶3 and 4: The author details how
a political campaign is constructed in order to take advantage of the public’s psychological weaknesses.
Questions:

25. (A)
According to the first ¶, an increase in population has resulted in an increase in officials’ power.

26. (B)
In the first ¶, the author says in a democracy that elected officials are supposed to be the servants of the people, not the
ones with power.
(A) The author would agree; in fact, he argues for this.
(C) Psychology and the social sciences are being used to manipulate the masses, according to the author.
(D) As far as we know from the passage, propaganda is very effective at exploiting voters’ weaknesses.

27. (C)
(B) and (D) are both irrelevant, so they can be eliminated, leaving you with (A) and (C). (A) is wrong because it’s
possible that Americans won’t bother to watch political debates but still care about candidates’ political principles and/or
know about them from the candidates’ campaigns. (C) is correct because if Americans vote for candidates without
knowing about their specific plans or principles regarding foreign policy, then (1) it wasn’t part of the selling of the
candidate to tell Americans about this and (2) Americans didn’t care enough to demand to know the candidates’ foreign
policy proposals.

28. (A)
Why would such an accusation work? Because people are afraid of crime. If one candidate runs a commercial that
attacks his opponent’s stance on crime, the commercial is playing on the public’s fears.
(B) This claim is never made, and besides, the opponent could indeed be soft on crime.
(C) Such a commercial does not appeal to the strengths of the voters.
(D) This claim is never made.

29. (D)
This choice is supported by the entire final paragraph.


(A) contradicts the author’s belief that the public can respond to rational appeal.
(B) The author would never come out in favor of the merchandising method.
(C) This choice has no basis in the passage.

30. (D)
Notice in ¶3 that a lot of the work on a political campaign is already done before a candidate is selected.
(A) This contradicts the whole idea behind merchandising, that surface matters most.
(B) If everybody had unique fears and desires, merchandisers wouldn’t be able to play on the collective fears and
desires of the people as they do.
(C) The author never claims that anyone can be molded into a political candidate.
Passage VI (Questions 31-36)
Topic and Scope: Messages; specifically, the relative effectiveness of one- and two-sided messages.
Paragraph Structure: ¶s 1 and 2 introduce the basic issue: which is more effective in persuading an audience, a oneor a two-sided message? ¶s 3 and 4 explain that there’s no clear answer to this question. It really depends on two variables:
the audience’s knowledge of the subject of the message and its views on that subject.
¶5 contends that two-sided messages are more effective when dealing with knowledgeable audiences, while one-sided
messages are more effective when dealing with uninformed audiences. ¶6 veers off the general topic a bit, to explain how
advertisers have applied information about the effectiveness of messages to their efforts. Finally, ¶7 points out that onesided messages are more effective with audiences that are predisposed to accept the communicator’s position, while twosided messages are more effective with audiences that are undecided about the communicator’s position.
The Big Picture: When a passage presents a number of relationships, be sure that you can discriminate among
them. The questions will probably test to see that you can.
Questions:
31. (C)
¶5 says that well-informed people are more likely to be persuaded by two-sided arguments. Since the congressional
“foreign policy experts” are definitely well-informed, the President should make a two-sided argument that addresses both
the potential benefits and the potential costs of troop deployment.
(A) and (B) One-sided arguments would not be effective in front of such an audience, particularly if they focus on
potential costs.
(D) is beyond the scope of the passage. There’s no discussion of emotions versus facts.
Strategy Point: If you don’t remember the nature of a particular relationship brought up in the passage, go
back and reread the relevant piece(s) of text. Don’t rely on your memory.

32. (B)

In the context of the passage, “comparative advertising” refers to advertising that mentions the competition by name.
An advertisment in which “the manufacturer of Brand W explains why its product is superior to Brand X’s product” fits the
bill.
(A), (C), and (D) None of these advertisements features a named product that is compared to another named product.

33. (D)
¶5 indicates that the less informed a person is about an issue, the more likely he or she is to be swayed by a one-sided
message. Underlying this thinking is the necessary assumption that the less a person knows about a subject, the more
willing he or she must be to accept someone else’s opinion about it.
(A) The authors never claim that advertisements are generally ineffective. Moreover, this isn’t an assumption implicit
in the authors’ opinion about audience receptivity to messages.
(B) is beyond the scope of the passage. The only reference to the mass media concerns the volume of messages that it
transmits to the public.
(C) The authors never claim that most people don’t think carefully about what others tell them. They simply say that
the less knowledge one has about a topic, the more likely one can be swayed by a one-sided message about it.

34. (A)
This choice reflects the basic point of ¶5.
(B) No, not when the leading brand uses comparative advertising.
(C) The passage speaks of “knowledgeable” people being more receptive to two-sided messages than “uninformed”
people. “Knowledgeable” is different than “educated.”
(D) The authors suggest that some audiences may view communicators as unfair if they employ one-sided messages;
but the authors themselves never make this charge.
Strategy Point: Make sure that you’re aware of the differences between authorial views and the views of
individuals or groups mentioned in the passage. Wrong choices will often confuse the two.
35. (D)
According to the passage, a well-informed, unbiased individual should react more favorably to a two-sided message.
So, a person like the one in I wouldn’t challenge information in the passage. The people in II and III are a different matter,
however. A poorly-informed, unbiased person, according to the passage, should react more favorably to a one-sided
message, while a well-informed, unbiased person should react favorably to a two-sided message.

36. (C)
According to the passage, knowledgeable and open-minded audiences would be more inclined to take seriously a twosided argument. Hence, a communicator in possession of this information would present this type of argument.
(A) Why would a communicator make no argument?
(B) is logically eliminated by (C).
(D) Why would a communicator appeal to emotions?
Passage VII (Questions 37-42)


Topic and Scope: The author thinks that punitive damages should not be awarded over and over again to different
plaintiffs against the same defendant for the same issue (one punishment is enough).
Paragraph Structure: ¶s 1 through 3 explain what punitive damage awards are and how they have increased in the
past five years. In ¶4, the author says although single punitive damage awards do some good, multiple awards are
ridiculous. He supports this position in ¶5 by bringing up and then countering the arguments of those who favor multiple
awards. ¶6 gives you some scope of the problem from the corporate point of view. ¶7 asserts, however, that corporations
just pass along the costs of suffering multiple damage awards to consumers. Finally, ¶8 says that the answer to the
problem is federal legislation.
Questions:
37. (C)
What the author really wants is to outlaw multiple punitive damage awards for the same act. This would do it.
(A) The author is not against single punitive damage awards, so this is wrong.
(B) The author would be in favor of this, but not nearly as much as he would favor the law in (C).
(D) Don’t confuse this with limiting multiple damage awards, which involve suing a corporation over and over for the
same act.

38. (A)
The argument would be more persuasive if the author were a plaintiff lawyer than if he were a CEO (B) because a
plaintiff lawyer would have a lot to lose if multiple damage awards were limited, and this would mean that the plaintiff
lawyer would not be making the argument in order to gain something personally. The CEO would definitely be arguing in
his own self-interest, making the argument less psychologically persuasive.

(C) and (D) don’t lend any particular credibility to the argument.

39. (B)
According to ¶7, corporations just pass on their losses to the consumer; that means that they aren’t at financial risk due
to punitive damages.
(A) This contradicts ¶6, which asserts that punitive damage awards are very substantial.
(C) and (D) There is no evidence in the passage to support either of these claims.

40. C)
Read the question stem carefully. The RAND study is too old to have an impact on the argument in the passage,
which has to do with the trend in litigation over the past five years.

41. (C)
I is out because multiple punitive damages has to do with only one offense (there are many separate cases having to do
with only one offense). II is true because the whole point of saying a jury may be aware of only the facts of its own case is
that there may be more facts in other cases about the offense in question that would show even more accurately how bad
the offense was. As stated above, in multiple damage awards multiple cases have been brought against the same defendant
for the same act. III is also true.
42. (D)


This claim is made in ¶4.
(A), (B) and (C) None of these claims is ever made in the passage.
Passage VIII (Questions 43-52)
Topic and Scope: Scholar A believes that the restoration of the Sistine Chapel ruined Michelangelo’s masterpiece
because the cleaning solvents removed his final touches and made everything too bright. Scholar B defends the restorers
and says the colors are what the artist intended to be seen.
Paragraph Structure: The idea behind ¶1 is that Scholar A thinks that Michelangelo himself would have been
appalled at the restoration. In ¶2, A goes on to say that the essential dark quality of the painting had been removed with the
dirt, and that this quality was not just the effect of dirt or grime but was rather the master’s work.

In ¶3, Scholar B responds by defending the restoration as scientifically justified and precise. B claims in ¶4 that
Scholar A had just gotten used to the wrong idea of Michelangelo which was based on dirty frescoes.
Scholar A gets a parting shot in ¶5 to the effect that the restorers have apparently made the ceiling vulnerable to
pollution.
Questions:
43. (C)
To say that Michelangelo would be “philosophical” about some of the damage is to say that he would be “unruffled”
by it. Always go back to the context for a question like this so that you can avoid wrong answer choices of the same type
as (A) and (B).
(D) To the contrary, Scholar A proposes that Michelangelo would have “taken in stride” the effects environment had
on the painting.

44. (D)
The fact that decades passed between the painting and the first application of glaze indicated to the restorers that
Michelangelo did not apply the glaze; that’s why they felt justified in removing it. They—and Scholar B—were assuming
in this argument that Michelangelo could not himself have put the glaze on decades after painting the ceiling.
(A) It was the first glaze, not the dirt, that was laid down decades after the painting’s completion.
(B) But the cleaning solvents did touch the frescoes.
(C) According to Scholar B’s theory, Michelangelo had nothing to do with the glaze.

45. (C)
The ceiling used to be dark and foreboding and isn’t anymore, so it must be the darkening of colors that made
Michelangelo look like a wayward genius. If he was wayward for doing this, it must mean that darkening colors wasn’t
common practice.
(A) Just because the painting is no longer unconventional doesn’t mean that Michelangelo wasn’t a fiercely
independent thinker.
(B) This is pretty far-fetched.
(C) Being a wayward genius isn’t a negative trait, is it?

46. (C)

This choice reflects the first ¶.
(A) Scholar A never says anything about immortality.
(B) This contradicts Scholar A’s claims that Michelangelo would have thought this, Michelangelo would have thought
that...
(D) Scholar A does think the ceiling has changed over time due to water damage, etc.

47. (C)
This is Scholar A’s position in a nutshell. He could very well be wrong.
(A)’s reasoning really doesn’t make sense.
(B) The assertion that the restorers reveled in brightening the ceiling doesn’t support the idea that Michelangelo would
be appalled unless Michelangelo didn’t intend the ceiling to look that way—which is uncertain.
(D) All of Scholar A’s statements are meant to support the claim that Michelangelo would be appalled.

48. (B)
Scholar A sarcastically suggests at the end of the passage that the climate-control system will itself probably damage
the painting. Since it did not, and since Scholar A is nothing but critical, one would expect him to attack the restorers again
for having allowed pollution damage to occur.
(A) Although Scholar A thinks the painting should have stayed dark, he is not at all happy about the idea of pollution
damage.
(C) Scholar A would never say anything positive about the restoration.
(D) There is no reason, as far as we know from the passage, that Scholar A would think this.

49. (A)
If Michelangelo seems like a “vagabond given a good scrubbing”—that is, if our view of him completely changes—
just because the painting has been brightened, it means that we know about Michelangelo only through his art. If we knew
a lot more about him, simply brightening one of his works wouldn’t make him seem like a different person to us.
(B), (C) and (D) all simply miss the point of Scholar B’s creative comparison.

50. (C)
Scholars A and B both think that the Sistine Chapel should look as Michelangelo intended it to look; they just have
different opinions on what were Michelangelo’s intentions.
(A) Scholar B prizes scientific methods above artistic sensibility.
(B) Scholar A would prefer to uphold long-standing traditions.
(D) Scholar B proposes this; Scholar A does not.

51. (A)
Scholar A immediately attributes the darkening of the ceiling to pollution, so he must be assuming that nothing else
could have caused the darkening (I). However, there is no reason for him to have assumed that II and III are true.


52. (B)
The “quality of suppressed anger etc.” was the result of the darkening by the dirt and glaze that Scholar B thinks was
NOT Michelangelo’s work.
(A) This is Scholar A’s claim, not Scholar B’s.
(C) Scholar B thinks that the darkening was NOT a typical Renaissance effect.
(D) Neither Scholar A nor Scholar B says that the “quality of suppressed anger” was the subject of many different
interpretations.
Passage IX (Questions 53-60)
Topic and Scope: The discovery of dinosaur DNA and its significance.
Paragraph Structure: ¶1 explains why it has been difficult to obtain dinosaur DNA and why polymerase chain
reaction (PCR) has helped researchers in their search.
¶2 discusses the research on other forms of ancient DNA in order to illustrate the significance of Woodward’s
discovery. ¶3 explains why the original cell had been preserved due to the inhibition of fossilization. The paragraph
elaborates on the research and introduces Woodward’s hypothesis that the DNA belonged to one or two species of
dinosaur. ¶4 proposes that some researchers believe the cytochrome b sequence contained so much variation because it
derived from several organisms. The paragraph concludes with the idea that regardless of the origin of the DNA, the
sample is still too small to offer substantial phylogenetic information.
The Big Picture: Often a passage will appear to be heading toward a particular point (scientists finally isolated

ancient dinosaur DNA) when, in actuality, it concludes with a different idea (the search for dinosaur DNA needs to
continue). This usually indicates that some of the questions will focus on the contrast between the final conclusion
and the development of the main idea.
Questions:
53. (A)
¶1 provides evidence and explanation in support of statement I. Statements II and III, on the other hand, are beyond the
scope of the passage.

54. (D)
¶4 introduces the idea that some researchers question the identity of the DNA, and that they believe it comes “from
several organisms.” If choice D were true, this would support the hypothesis of the questioning researchers.
(A) makes a vague statement that does not give support to the idea of Woodward’s DNA having a non-dinosaur origin.
(B) gives no support to the idea that Woodward’s DNA did not come from a dinosaur.
(C) is a general statement, which offers neither support nor opposition to the idea that Woodward’s DNA did not come
from dinosaur.

55. (A)
The beginning of ¶3 states that scientists used cytochrome b to study the DNA sequence.


(B) To the contrary, the end of ¶4 states that the “cytochrome b fragments were too short to offer meaningful
phylogenetic information.”
(C) Even Woodward believed that the DNA could have belonged to more than one species of dinosaur. There is no
evidence in the passage that the DNA came from one species of dinosaur.
(D) ¶3 states that researchers believed that the DNA was from a dinosaur, and not from a crocodile, because “the
bones visible in the mine were larger than those of a crocodile.” The passage never indicates that cytochrome b was used
to identify the DNA as non-crocodile.
56. (D)
¶2 claims that before Woodward, ancient DNA had been extracted, but never from bone.
(A) To the contrary, Woodward’s experiment did not provide much conclusive evidence, especially about any

evolutionary relationships.
(B) The passage never mentions Woodward as the first researcher to extract DNA from fossils. In fact, researchers
did indeed extract ancient DNA from fossils before Woodward; they just did not extract it from bone.
(C) ¶1 states that researchers have been using PCR since the late 1980s.
Strategy Point: Some questions may require close attention to detail. Choice B is tempting, yet careful
examination of the passage shows that Woodward distinguished himself by extracting DNA from dinosaur bone, not
from plants or bugs.

57. (B)
The first sentence of ¶3 states that siltstone inhibited fossilization and implies that this inhibition preserved the cell
structure and thus the structure of the DNA. Therefore, the author would definitely not agree with this statement.
(A) ¶1 mentions that the rocks of Utah are “fossil-rich.”
(C) paraphrases the last sentence of ¶2.
(D) paraphrases the last two sentences of ¶1.
58. (C)
The end of ¶4 proposes that the search for dinosaur DNA must continue because the extracted DNA was “too short” to
provide conclusive phylogenetic information.
(A) Woodward’s DNA may come from several species yet the passage never suggests that this is the reason the
“dinosaur hunt must continue.”
(B) To the contrary, as ¶1 states, PCR is used to copy “minute quantities of DNA.”
(D) To the contrary, ¶2 indicates that Woodward excavated in mines which “often contained dinosaur traces.”

59. (D)
The second sentence of ¶1 indicates that Woodward’s team distinguished itself by being the first to isolate dinosaur
DNA.
(A) The passage never indicates that Woodward developed PCR.


(B) is too general a statement. And, the passage indicates Woodward’s research has yet to provide conclusive
phylogenetic information.

(C) The beginning of ¶2 implies that many researchers know how to extract ancient DNA from fossils.

60. (C)
Researchers who question the identity of Woodward’s dinosaur DNA believe that the sample of DNA came from
multiple organisms. If it were proven that the sample of DNA came from one particular species of dinosaur, then this
would undermine their argument.
(A) offers evidence that Woodward’s sample of DNA derived from multiple sources. This would support the
researchers who question the identity of Woodward’s dinosaur DNA.
(B) does not have direct relevance to the argument.
(D) offers no substantial evidence for or against the argument.