Exam 2: Test of English as a Foreign Language - Reading Comprehension

Recent years have brought minority-owned businesses in the United States unprecedented opportunities-as well as new and significant risks. Civil rights activists have long argued that one of the principal reasons why Blacks, Hispanics and the other minority groups have difficulty establishing themselves in business is that they lack access to the sizable orders and subcontracts that are generated by large companies. Now congress, in apparent agreement, has required by law that businesses awarded federal contracts of more than $500,000 do their best to find minority subcontractors and record their efforts to do so on forms field with the government. Indeed, some federal and local agencies have gone so far as to set specific percentage goals for apportioning parts of public works contracts to minority enterprises. Corporate response appears to have been substantial. According to figures collected in 1977, the total of corporate contracts with minority business rose from $77 to $1. 1 billion in 1977. The projected total of corporate contracts with minority business for the early 1980's is estimated to be over $3 billion per year with no letup anticipated in the next decade. Promising as it is for minority businesses, this increased patronage poses dangers for them, too. First, minority firms risk expanding too fast and overextending themselves financially, since most are small concerns and, unlike large businesses they often need to make substantial investments in new plants, staff, equipment, and the like in order to perform work subcontracted to them. If, thereafter, their subcontracts are for some reason reduced, such firms can face potentially crippling fixed expenses. The world of corporate purchasing can be frustrating for small entrepreneurs who get requests for elaborate formal estimates and bids. Both consume valuable time and resources and a small company's efforts must soon result in orders, or both the morale and the financial health of the business will suffer. A second risk is that White-owned companies may-seek to cash inon the increasing apportionments through formation of joint ventures with minority-owned concerns, of course, in many instances there are legitimate reasons for joint ventures; clearly, white and minority enterprises can team up to acquire business that neither could Third, a minority enterprise that secures the business of one large corporate customer often runs the danger of becoming - and remaining dependent. Even in the best of circumstances, fierce competition from larger, more established companies makes it difficult for small concerns to broaden their customer bases; when such firms have nearly guaranteed orders from a single corporate benefactor, they may truly have to struggle against complacency arising from their current success. According to the passage, civil rights activists maintain that one disadvantage under which minority owned businesses have traditionally had to labor is that they have

The fossil remain of the first flying vertebrates, the pterosaurs, have intrigued paleontologists for more than two centuries. How such large creatures, which weighed in some cases as much as a piloted hangglider and had wingspans from 8 to 12 meters, solved the problems of powered flight, and exactly what these creatures were-reptiles or birds- are among the questions scientist have puzzled over. Perhaps the least controversial assertion about the pterosaurs is that they were reptiles. Their skulls, pelvises, and hind feet are reptilian. The anatomy of their wings suggests that they did not evolve into the class of birds. In pterosaurs a greatly elongated fourth finger of each forelimb supported a wing like membrane. The other fingers were short and reptilian, with sharp claws, In birds the second finger is the principle strut of the wing, which consists primarily of features. If the pterosaur walked or remained stationary, the fourth finger, and with it the wing, could only turn upward in an extended inverted V-shape along side of the animal's body. The pterosaurs resembled both birds and bats in their overall structure and proportions. This is not surprising because the design of any flying vertebrate is subject to aerodynamic constraints. Both the pterosaurs and the birds have hollow bones, a feature that represents a saving in weight. In the birds, however, these bones are reinforced more massively by internal struts. Although scales typically cover reptiles, the pterosaurs probably had hairy coats. T.H. Huxley reasoned that flying vertebrates must have been warm - blooded because flying implies a high internal temperature. Huxley speculated that a coat of hair would insulate against loss of body heat and might streamline the body to reduce drag in flight. The recent discovery of a pterosaur specimen covered in long, dense, and relatively thick hair like fossil material was the first clear evidenced that his reasoning was correct. Efforts to explain how the pterosaurs became air-borne have led to suggestions that they launched themselves by jumping from cliffs, by dropping from trees, or even by rising into light winds from the crests of waves. Each hypothesis has its difficulties. The first wrongly assumes that the pterosaur's hind feet resembled a bat's and could served as hooks by which the animal could bang in preparation for flight. The second hypothesis seems unlikely because large pterosaurs could not have landed in trees without damaging their wings. The birds calls for high waves to channels updrafts. The wind that made such waves however, might have been too strong for the pterosaurs to control their flight once airborne. According to the passage, the skeleton of a pterosaur can be distinguished form that of a bird by the

At the time Jane Austen's novels were published - between 1811 and 1818 - English literature was not part of any academic curriculum. In addition, fiction was under strenuous attack. Certain religious and political groups felt novels had the power to make so called immoral characters so interesting young readers would identify with them; these groups also considered novels to be of little practical use. Even Cole-ridge, certainly no literary reactionary, spoke for many when he asserted that "novel-reading occasions the destruction of the mind's power". These attitudes towards novels help explain why Austen received little attention from early nineteenth century literary critics. (In any case, a novelist published anonymously, as Austin was, would not be likely to receive much critical attention). The literary response that was accorded her, however, was often as incisive as twentieth century criticism. In his attack in 1816 on novelistic portrayals "outside of ordinary experience", for example, Scott made insightful remarks about the merits of Austen's fiction. Her novels, wrote Scott, "present to the reader an accurate and exact. picture of ordinary everyday people and places, reminiscent of seventeenth - century Flemish painting. " Scott did not use the word "realistic probability in judging novels. The critic whitely did not use the word realism either, but he expressed agreement with Scott's evaluation, and went on to suggest the possibilities for moral instruction in what we have called Austen's realistic method. Her characters, wrote whitely, are persuasive agents for moral truth since they are ordinary persons "so clearly evoked that was feel an interest in their fate as if it were our own" Moral instruction, explained Whitely, is more likely to be effective when conveyed through recognizably human and interesting characters then when imparted by a sermonizing narrator. Whately especially praised Austen's ability to create characters who "mingle goodness and villainy, weakness and virtue, as in life they are always mingled. "Whately concluded his remarks by comparing Austen's art of characterization to Sicken's, stating his preference for Austin's. often anticipated the reservations of twentieth-century critics. An example of such a response was Lewes' complaint in 1859 that Austen's range of subjects and characters was too narrow. Praising her verisimilitude, Lewes added that nonetheless her focus was too often upon only the unlofty and the common place. (Twentieth-century Marxists, on the other hand, were to complain about what they saw as her exclusive emphasis on a lofty upper-middle class) in any case, having been rescued by some literary critics from neglect and indeed gradually lionized by them, Austen's steadily reached, by the mid-nineteenth century, the enviable pinnacle of being considered controversial. The primary purpose of the passage is to

Woodraw Wilson was referring to the liberal idea of the economic market when he said that the free enterprise system is the most efficient economic system. Maximum freedom means maximum productiveness; our "openness" is to be the measure of our stability. Fascination with this ideal has made Americans defy the "Old World" categories of settled possessiveness versus unsettling deprivation., the cupidity of retention versus the cupidity of seizure, a "status quo" defended of attacked. The United States, it was believed, had no status quo ante. Our only "station" was the turning of a stationary wheel, spinning faster and faster. We did not base our system on property but opportunity-which meant we based it not on stability but on mobility. The more things changed, that is, the more rapidly the wheel turned, the steadier we would be. The conventional picture of class politics is composed of the Haves, who want a stability to keep what they have, and Have-Nots, who want a touch of instability and change in which to scramble for the things they have not. But Americans imagined a condition in which speculators, self-makers, runners are always using the new opportunities given by our land. These economic leaders (front-runners) would thus be mainly agents of Change. The nonstarters were considered the ones who wanted stability, a strong referee to give them some position in the race, a regulative hand to calm manic speculation; an authority that can call things to a half begin things again from compensatorily staggered "starting lines".:Reform" in America has been sterile because it can imagine no change except through the extension of this metaphor of the race, wider inclusion of competitors, "a piece of the action." As it were, of the disenfranchised. There is no attempt to call off the race. Since our only stability is change. America seems not to honor the quite work that achieves social interdependence and stability. There is, in our legends, no heroism of the office clerk, no stable industrial work force of the people who actually make the system work. There is no pride in being an employee (Wilson asked for a return to the time when everyone was an employer). There has been no boasting about our social workers-they are need; empty boasts from the past make us ashamed of our present achievements, make us try to forget or deny the, move away from them. There is no honor but in the wonderland race we must all run, all trying to win, none winning in the end (for there is no end). It can be inferred from the passage that Woodrow Wilson's idea's about the economic market

How many really suffer as a result of labor market problems? This is one of the most critical yet contentious social policy questions. In many ways, our social statistics exaggerate the degree of hardship. Unemployment does not have the same dire consequences today as it did in the 1930's when most of the unemployed were primary bread-winners, when income and earnings were usually much closer to the margin of subsistence, and when there were no countervailing social programs for those failing in the labor market. Increasing affluence, the rise of families with more than one wage earner, the growing predominance of secondary earners among the unemployed, and improved social welfare protection have unquestionably mitigated the consequences of joblessness. Earnings and income data also overstate the dimensions of hard-ship. Among the millions with hourly earnings at or below the minimum wage level, the overwhelming majority are from multiple-earner, relatively affluent families. Most of those counted by the poverty statistics are elderly or handicapped or have family responsibilities which keep them out of the labor force, so the poverty statistics are by no means an accurate indicator of labor market pathologies. Yet there are also many ways our social statistics underestimate the degree of labour-market-related hardship. The unemployment counts exclude the millions of fully employed workers whose wages are so low that their families remain in poverty. Low wages and repeated or prolonged unemployment frequently interact to undermine the capacity for self-support. Since the number experiencing job-lessness at some time during the year is several times the number unemployed in any month, those who suffers a result of forced idleness can equal or exceed average annual unemployment, even though only a minority of the jobless in any month really suffer. For every person counted in the month unemployment tallies, there is another working part-time because of the inability to find full-time work, or else outside the labor force but wanting a job. Finally, income transfers in our country have always focused on the elderly, disabled, and dependent, neglecting the needs of the working poor, so that the dramatic expansion of cash and in kind transfers does not necessarily mean that those failing in the labor market are adequately protected. As a result of such contradictory evidence, it is uncertain whether those suffering seriously as a result of labor market problems number in the hundreds of thousands or the tens of millions, and hence, whether high levels of joblessness can be tolerated or must be countered by job creation and economic stimulus. There is only one area of agreement in this debate-that the existing poverty, employment, and earnings statistics are inadequate for one of their primary applications, measuring the consequences of labor market problems. Which of the following is the principle topic of the passage?

How many really suffer as a result of labor market problems? This is one of the most critical yet contentious social policy questions. In many ways, our social statistics exaggerate the degree of hardship. Unemployment does not have the same dire consequences today as it did in the 1930's when most of the unemployed were primary bread-winners, when income and earnings were usually much closer to the margin of subsistence, and when there were no countervailing social programs for those failing in the labor market. Increasing affluence, the rise of families with more than one wage earner, the growing predominance of secondary earners among the unemployed, and improved social welfare protection have unquestionably mitigated the consequences of joblessness. Earnings and income data also overstate the dimensions of hard-ship. Among the millions with hourly earnings at or below the minimum wage level, the overwhelming majority are from multiple-earner, relatively affluent families. Most of those counted by the poverty statistics are elderly or handicapped or have family responsibilities which keep them out of the labor force, so the poverty statistics are by no means an accurate indicator of labor market pathologies. Yet there are also many ways our social statistics underestimate the degree of labour-market-related hardship. The unemployment counts exclude the millions of fully employed workers whose wages are so low that their families remain in poverty. Low wages and repeated or prolonged unemployment frequently interact to undermine the capacity for self-support. Since the number experiencing job-lessness at some time during the year is several times the number unemployed in any month, those who suffers a result of forced idleness can equal or exceed average annual unemployment, even though only a minority of the jobless in any month really suffer. For every person counted in the month unemployment tallies, there is another working part-time because of the inability to find full-time work, or else outside the labor force but wanting a job. Finally, income transfers in our country have always focused on the elderly, disabled, and dependent, neglecting the needs of the working poor, so that the dramatic expansion of cash and in kind transfers does not necessarily mean that those failing in the labor market are adequately protected. As a result of such contradictory evidence, it is uncertain whether those suffering seriously as a result of labor market problems number in the hundreds of thousands or the tens of millions, and hence, whether high levels of joblessness can be tolerated or must be countered by job creation and economic stimulus. There is only one area of agreement in this debate-that the existing poverty, employment, and earnings statistics are inadequate for one of their primary applications, measuring the consequences of labor market problems. According to the passage, one factor that causes unemployment and earnings figures to overpredict the amount of economic hardship is the

Those examples of poetic justice that occur in medieval and Elizabethan literature, and that seem so satisfying, have encouraged a whole school of twentieth-century scholars to "find" further examples. In fact, these scholars have merely forced victimized character into a moral framework by which the injustices inflicted on them are, somehow or other, justified. Such scholars deny that the sufferers in a tragedy are innocent; they blame the victims themselves for their tragic fates. Any misdoing is enough to subject a character to critical whips. Thus, there are long essays about the misdemeanors of Webster's Duchess of Malfi, who defined her brothers, and he behavior of Shakespeare's Desdemona, who disobeyed her father. Yet it should be remembered that the Renaissance writer Matteo Bandello strongly protests the injustice of the severe penalties issued to women for acts of disobedience that men could, and did, commit with virtual impunity. And Shakespeare, Chaucer, and Webster often enlist their readers on the side of their tragic heroines by describing injustices so cruel that readers cannot but join in protest. By portraying Griselda, in the Clerk's Tale, as a meek, gentle victim who does not criticize, much less rebel against the prosecutor, her husband Walter, Chaucer incites readers to espouse Griselda's cause against Walter's oppression. Thus, efforts to supply historical and theological rationalization for Walter's persecutions tend to turn Chaucer's fable upside down, to deny its most obvious effect on reader's sympathies. Similarly, to assert that Webster's Duchess deserved torture and death because she chose to marry the man she loved and to bear their children is, in effect to join forces with her tyrannical brothers, and so to confound the operation of poetic justice, of which readers should approve, with precisely those examples of social injustice that Webster does everything in his power to make readers condemn. Indeed. Webster has his heroin so heroically lead the resistance to tyranny that she may well in spire members of the audience to imaginatively join forces with her against the cruelty and hypocritical morality of her brothers. Thus Chaucer and Webster, in their different ways, attack injustice, argue on behalf of the victims, and prosecute the persecutors. Their readers serve them as a court of appeal that remains free to rule, as the evidence requires, and as common humanity requires, in favour of the innocent and injured parties. For, to paraphrase the noted eighteenth-century scholar, Samuel Johnson, despite all the refinements of subtlety and the dogmatism of learning, it is by the common sense and compassion of readers who are uncorrupted by the characters and situations in mereval and Elizabethan literature, as in any other literature, can best be judged. The author's tone in her discussion of the conclusions reached by the "school of twentieth-century scholars" (line 4) is best described as

The fossil remain of the first flying vertebrates, the pterosaurs, have intrigued paleontologists for more than two centuries. How such large creatures, which weighed in some cases as much as a piloted hangglider and had wingspans from 8 to 12 meters, solved the problems of powered flight, and exactly what these creatures were-reptiles or birds- are among the questions scientist have puzzled over. Perhaps the least controversial assertion about the pterosaurs is that they were reptiles. Their skulls, pelvises, and hind feet are reptilian. The anatomy of their wings suggests that they did not evolve into the class of birds. In pterosaurs a greatly elongated fourth finger of each forelimb supported a wing like membrane. The other fingers were short and reptilian, with sharp claws, In birds the second finger is the principle strut of the wing, which consists primarily of features. If the pterosaur walked or remained stationary, the fourth finger, and with it the wing, could only turn upward in an extended inverted V-shape along side of the animal's body. The pterosaurs resembled both birds and bats in their overall structure and proportions. This is not surprising because the design of any flying vertebrate is subject to aerodynamic constraints. Both the pterosaurs and the birds have hollow bones, a feature that represents a saving in weight. In the birds, however, these bones are reinforced more massively by internal struts. Although scales typically cover reptiles, the pterosaurs probably had hairy coats. T.H. Huxley reasoned that flying vertebrates must have been warm - blooded because flying implies a high internal temperature. Huxley speculated that a coat of hair would insulate against loss of body heat and might streamline the body to reduce drag in flight. The recent discovery of a pterosaur specimen covered in long, dense, and relatively thick hair like fossil material was the first clear evidenced that his reasoning was correct. Efforts to explain how the pterosaurs became air-borne have led to suggestions that they launched themselves by jumping from cliffs, by dropping from trees, or even by rising into light winds from the crests of waves. Each hypothesis has its difficulties. The first wrongly assumes that the pterosaur's hind feet resembled a bat's and could served as hooks by which the animal could bang in preparation for flight. The second hypothesis seems unlikely because large pterosaurs could not have landed in trees without damaging their wings. The birds calls for high waves to channels updrafts. The wind that made such waves however, might have been too strong for the pterosaurs to control their flight once airborne. The authors views the idea that the pterosaurs became airborne by rising into light winds created by waves as

Recent years have brought minority-owned businesses in the United States unprecedented opportunities-as well as new and significant risks. Civil rights activists have long argued that one of the principal reasons why Blacks, Hispanics and the other minority groups have difficulty establishing themselves in business is that they lack access to the sizable orders and subcontracts that are generated by large companies. Now congress, in apparent agreement, has required by law that businesses awarded federal contracts of more than $500,000 do their best to find minority subcontractors and record their efforts to do so on forms field with the government. Indeed, some federal and local agencies have gone so far as to set specific percentage goals for apportioning parts of public works contracts to minority enterprises. Corporate response appears to have been substantial. According to figures collected in 1977, the total of corporate contracts with minority business rose from $77 to $1. 1 billion in 1977. The projected total of corporate contracts with minority business for the early 1980's is estimated to be over $3 billion per year with no letup anticipated in the next decade. Promising as it is for minority businesses, this increased patronage poses dangers for them, too. First, minority firms risk expanding too fast and overextending themselves financially, since most are small concerns and, unlike large businesses they often need to make substantial investments in new plants, staff, equipment, and the like in order to perform work subcontracted to them. If, thereafter, their subcontracts are for some reason reduced, such firms can face potentially crippling fixed expenses. The world of corporate purchasing can be frustrating for small entrepreneurs who get requests for elaborate formal estimates and bids. Both consume valuable time and resources and a small company's efforts must soon result in orders, or both the morale and the financial health of the business will suffer. A second risk is that White-owned companies may-seek to cash inon the increasing apportionments through formation of joint ventures with minority-owned concerns, of course, in many instances there are legitimate reasons for joint ventures; clearly, white and minority enterprises can team up to acquire business that neither could Third, a minority enterprise that secures the business of one large corporate customer often runs the danger of becoming - and remaining dependent. Even in the best of circumstances, fierce competition from larger, more established companies makes it difficult for small concerns to broaden their customer bases; when such firms have nearly guaranteed orders from a single corporate benefactor, they may truly have to struggle against complacency arising from their current success. The author would most likely agree with which of the following statements about corporate response to working with minority subcontractors?

Those examples of poetic justice that occur in medieval and Elizabethan literature, and that seem so satisfying, have encouraged a whole school of twentieth-century scholars to "find" further examples. In fact, these scholars have merely forced victimized character into a moral framework by which the injustices inflicted on them are, somehow or other, justified. Such scholars deny that the sufferers in a tragedy are innocent; they blame the victims themselves for their tragic fates. Any misdoing is enough to subject a character to critical whips. Thus, there are long essays about the misdemeanors of Webster's Duchess of Malfi, who defined her brothers, and he behavior of Shakespeare's Desdemona, who disobeyed her father. Yet it should be remembered that the Renaissance writer Matteo Bandello strongly protests the injustice of the severe penalties issued to women for acts of disobedience that men could, and did, commit with virtual impunity. And Shakespeare, Chaucer, and Webster often enlist their readers on the side of their tragic heroines by describing injustices so cruel that readers cannot but join in protest. By portraying Griselda, in the Clerk's Tale, as a meek, gentle victim who does not criticize, much less rebel against the prosecutor, her husband Walter, Chaucer incites readers to espouse Griselda's cause against Walter's oppression. Thus, efforts to supply historical and theological rationalization for Walter's persecutions tend to turn Chaucer's fable upside down, to deny its most obvious effect on reader's sympathies. Similarly, to assert that Webster's Duchess deserved torture and death because she chose to marry the man she loved and to bear their children is, in effect to join forces with her tyrannical brothers, and so to confound the operation of poetic justice, of which readers should approve, with precisely those examples of social injustice that Webster does everything in his power to make readers condemn. Indeed. Webster has his heroin so heroically lead the resistance to tyranny that she may well in spire members of the audience to imaginatively join forces with her against the cruelty and hypocritical morality of her brothers. Thus Chaucer and Webster, in their different ways, attack injustice, argue on behalf of the victims, and prosecute the persecutors. Their readers serve them as a court of appeal that remains free to rule, as the evidence requires, and as common humanity requires, in favour of the innocent and injured parties. For, to paraphrase the noted eighteenth-century scholar, Samuel Johnson, despite all the refinements of subtlety and the dogmatism of learning, it is by the common sense and compassion of readers who are uncorrupted by the characters and situations in mereval and Elizabethan literature, as in any other literature, can best be judged. The author of the passage is primarily concerned with

Woodraw Wilson was referring to the liberal idea of the economic market when he said that the free enterprise system is the most efficient economic system. Maximum freedom means maximum productiveness; our "openness" is to be the measure of our stability. Fascination with this ideal has made Americans defy the "Old World" categories of settled possessiveness versus unsettling deprivation., the cupidity of retention versus the cupidity of seizure, a "status quo" defended of attacked. The United States, it was believed, had no status quo ante. Our only "station" was the turning of a stationary wheel, spinning faster and faster. We did not base our system on property but opportunity-which meant we based it not on stability but on mobility. The more things changed, that is, the more rapidly the wheel turned, the steadier we would be. The conventional picture of class politics is composed of the Haves, who want a stability to keep what they have, and Have-Nots, who want a touch of instability and change in which to scramble for the things they have not. But Americans imagined a condition in which speculators, self-makers, runners are always using the new opportunities given by our land. These economic leaders (front-runners) would thus be mainly agents of Change. The nonstarters were considered the ones who wanted stability, a strong referee to give them some position in the race, a regulative hand to calm manic speculation; an authority that can call things to a half begin things again from compensatorily staggered "starting lines".:Reform" in America has been sterile because it can imagine no change except through the extension of this metaphor of the race, wider inclusion of competitors, "a piece of the action." As it were, of the disenfranchised. There is no attempt to call off the race. Since our only stability is change. America seems not to honor the quite work that achieves social interdependence and stability. There is, in our legends, no heroism of the office clerk, no stable industrial work force of the people who actually make the system work. There is no pride in being an employee (Wilson asked for a return to the time when everyone was an employer). There has been no boasting about our social workers-they are need; empty boasts from the past make us ashamed of our present achievements, make us try to forget or deny the, move away from them. There is no honor but in the wonderland race we must all run, all trying to win, none winning in the end (for there is no end). The primary purpose of the passage is to

The discoveries of the white dwarf, the neutron star, and the black hole, coming well after the discovery of the red giant are among eh most exciting developments in decades because they may be well present physicists with their greatest challenge since the failure of classical mechanics. In the life cycle of the star, after all of the hydrogen and helium fuel has been burned, the delicate balance between the outer nuclear radiation. Pressure and the stable gravitational force becomes disturbed and slow contraction begins. As compression increases, very dense plasma forms. If the initial star had mass of less than 1.4 solar masses (1.4 times the mass of our sun), the process ceases at the density of 1,000 tons per cubic inch, and the star becomes the white dwarf. However, if the star was originally more massive, the white dwarf plasma can't resist the gravitations pressures, and in rapid collapse, all nuclei of the star are converted to a gas of free neutrons. Gravitational attraction compresses this neutron gas rapidly until a density of 10 tons per cubic inch is reached; at this point the strong nuclear force resists further contraction. If the mass of the star was between 1.4 and a few solar masses, the process stops here, and we have a neutron star. But if the original star was more massive than a few solar masses, even the strong nuclear forces cannot resist the gravitational brunch. The neutrons are forced into one another to form heavier hadrons and these in turn coalesce to form heavier entities, of which we as yet know nothing. At this point, a complete collapse of the stellar mass occurs; existing theories predict a collapse to infinite density and infinitely small dimensions Well before this, however, the surface gravitational force would become so strong that no signal could ever leave the star - any photon emitted would fall back under gravitational attraction - and the star would become black hole in space. This gravitational collapse poses a fundamental challenge to physics. When the most widely accepted theories predict such improbable things as infinite density and infinitely small dimensions, it simply means that we are missing some vital insight. This last happened in physics in the 1930's, when we faced the fundamental paradox concerning atomic structure. At that time, it was recognized that electrons moved in table orbits about nuclei in atoms. However, it was also recognized that if charge is accelerated, as it must be to remain in orbit, it radiates energy; so, theoretically, the electron would be expected eventually to spiral into the nucleus and destroy the atom. Studies centered around this paradox led to the development of quantum mechanics. It may well be that an equivalent t advance awaits us in investigating the theoretical problems presented by the phenomenon of gravitational collapse. The author asserts that the discoveries of the white dwarf, the neutron star, and the black hole are significant because these discoveries.

The discoveries of the white dwarf, the neutron star, and the black hole, coming well after the discovery of the red giant are among eh most exciting developments in decades because they may be well present physicists with their greatest challenge since the failure of classical mechanics. In the life cycle of the star, after all of the hydrogen and helium fuel has been burned, the delicate balance between the outer nuclear radiations. Pressure and the stable gravitational force become disturbed and slow contraction begins. As compression increases, very dense plasma forms. If the initial star had mass of less than 1.4 solar masses (1.4 times the mass of our sun), the process ceases at the density of 1,000 tons per cubic inch, and the star becomes the white dwarf. However, if the star was originally more massive, the white dwarf plasma can't resist the gravitations pressures, and in rapid collapse, all nuclei of the star are converted to a gas of free neutrons. Gravitational attraction compresses this neutron gas rapidly until a density of 10 tons per cubic inch is reached; at this point the strong nuclear force resists further contraction. If the mass of the star was between 1.4 and a few solar masses, the process stops here, and we have a neutron star. But if the original star was more massive than a few solar masses, even the strong nuclear forces cannot resist the gravitational brunch. The neutrons are forced into one another to form heavier hadrons and these in turn coalesce to form heavier entities, of which we as yet know nothing. At this point, a complete collapse of the stellar mass occurs; existing theories predict a collapse to infinite density and infinitely small dimensions Well before this, however, the surface gravitational force would become so strong that no signal could ever leave the star - any photon emitted would fall back under gravitational attraction - and the star would become black hole in space. This gravitational collapse poses a fundamental challenge to physics. When the most widely accepted theories predict such improbable things as infinite density and infinitely small dimensions, it simply means that we are missing some vital insight. This last happened in physics in the 1930's, when we faced the fundamental paradox concerning atomic structure. At that time, it was recognized that electrons moved in table orbits about nuclei in atoms. However, it was also recognized that if charge is accelerated, as it must be to remain in orbit, it radiates energy; so, theoretically, the electron would be expected eventually to spiral into the nucleus and destroy the atom. Studies centered around this paradox led to the development of quantum mechanics. It may well be that an equivalent t advance awaits us in investigating the theoretical problems presented by the phenomenon of gravitational collapse. The primary purpose of the passage is to

Recent years have brought minority-owned businesses in the United States unprecedented opportunities-as well as new and significant risks. Civil rights activists have long argued that one of the principal reasons why Blacks, Hispanics and the other minority groups have difficulty establishing themselves in business is that they lack access to the sizable orders and subcontracts that are generated by large companies. Now congress, in apparent agreement, has required by law that businesses awarded federal contracts of more than $500,000 do their best to find minority subcontractors and record their efforts to do so on forms field with the government. Indeed, some federal and local agencies have gone so far as to set specific percentage goals for apportioning parts of public works contracts to minority enterprises. Corporate response appears to have been substantial. According to figures collected in 1977, the total of corporate contracts with minority business rose from $77 to $1. 1 billion in 1977. The projected total of corporate contracts with minority business for the early 1980's is estimated to be over $3 billion per year with no letup anticipated in the next decade. Promising as it is for minority businesses, this increased patronage poses dangers for them, too. First, minority firms risk expanding too fast and overextending themselves financially, since most are small concerns and, unlike large businesses they often need to make substantial investments in new plants, staff, equipment, and the like in order to perform work subcontracted to them. If, thereafter, their subcontracts are for some reason reduced, such firms can face potentially crippling fixed expenses. The world of corporate purchasing can be frustrating for small entrepreneurs who get requests for elaborate formal estimates and bids. Both consume valuable time and resources and a small company's efforts must soon result in orders, or both the morale and the financial health of the business will suffer. A second risk is that White-owned companies may-seek to cash inon the increasing apportionments through formation of joint ventures with minority-owned concerns, of course, in many instances there are legitimate reasons for joint ventures; clearly, white and minority enterprises can team up to acquire business that neither could Third, a minority enterprise that secures the business of one large corporate customer often runs the danger of becoming - and remaining dependent. Even in the best of circumstances, fierce competition from larger, more established companies makes it difficult for small concerns to broaden their customer bases; when such firms have nearly guaranteed orders from a single corporate benefactor, they may truly have to struggle against complacency arising from their current success. The passage supplies information that would response which of the following questions?

Recent years have brought minority-owned businesses in the United States unprecedented opportunities-as well as new and significant risks. Civil rights activists have long argued that one of the principal reasons why Blacks, Hispanics and the other minority groups have difficulty establishing themselves in business is that they lack access to the sizable orders and subcontracts that are generated by large companies. Now congress, in apparent agreement, has required by law that businesses awarded federal contracts of more than $500,000 do their best to find minority subcontractors and record their efforts to do so on forms field with the government. Indeed, some federal and local agencies have gone so far as to set specific percentage goals for apportioning parts of public works contracts to minority enterprises. Corporate response appears to have been substantial. According to figures collected in 1977, the total of corporate contracts with minority business rose from $77 to $1. 1 billion in 1977. The projected total of corporate contracts with minority business for the early 1980's is estimated to be over $3 billion per year with no letup anticipated in the next decade. Promising as it is for minority businesses, this increased patronage poses dangers for them, too. First, minority firms risk expanding too fast and overextending themselves financially, since most are small concerns and, unlike large businesses they often need to make substantial investments in new plants, staff, equipment, and the like in order to perform work subcontracted to them. If, thereafter, their subcontracts are for some reason reduced, such firms can face potentially crippling fixed expenses. The world of corporate purchasing can be frustrating for small entrepreneurs who get requests for elaborate formal estimates and bids. Both consume valuable time and resources and a small company's efforts must soon result in orders, or both the morale and the financial health of the business will suffer. A second risk is that White-owned companies may-seek to cash inon the increasing apportionments through formation of joint ventures with minority-owned concerns, of course, in many instances there are legitimate reasons for joint ventures; clearly, white and minority enterprises can team up to acquire business that neither could Third, a minority enterprise that secures the business of one large corporate customer often runs the danger of becoming - and remaining dependent. Even in the best of circumstances, fierce competition from larger, more established companies makes it difficult for small concerns to broaden their customer bases; when such firms have nearly guaranteed orders from a single corporate benefactor, they may truly have to struggle against complacency arising from their current success. The passage most likely appeared in

At the time Jane Austen's novels were published - between 1811 and 1818 - English literature was not part of any academic curriculum. In addition, fiction was under strenuous attack. Certain religious and political groups felt novels had the power to make so called immoral characters so interesting young readers would identify with them; these groups also considered novels to be of little practical use. Even Cole-ridge, certainly no literary reactionary, spoke for many when he asserted that "novel-reading occasions the destruction of the mind's power". These attitudes towards novels help explain why Austen received little attention from early nineteenth century literary critics. (In any case, a novelist published anonymously, as Austin was, would not be likely to receive much critical attention). The literary response that was accorded her, however, was often as incisive as twentieth century criticism. In his attack in 1816 on novelistic portrayals "outside of ordinary experience", for example, Scott made insightful remarks about the merits of Austen's fiction. Her novels, wrote Scott, "present to the reader an accurate and exact. picture of ordinary everyday people and places, reminiscent of seventeenth - century Flemish painting. " Scott did not use the word "realistic probability in judging novels. The critic whitely did not use the word realism either, but he expressed agreement with Scott's evaluation, and went on to suggest the possibilities for moral instruction in what we have called Austen's realistic method. Her characters, wrote whitely, are persuasive agents for moral truth since they are ordinary persons "so clearly evoked that was feel an interest in their fate as if it were our own" Moral instruction, explained Whitely, is more likely to be effective when conveyed through recognizably human and interesting characters then when imparted by a sermonizing narrator. Whately especially praised Austen's ability to create characters who "mingle goodness and villainy, weakness and virtue, as in life they are always mingled. "Whately concluded his remarks by comparing Austen's art of characterization to Sicken's, stating his preference for Austin's. often anticipated the reservations of twentieth-century critics. An example of such a response was Lewes' complaint in 1859 that Austen's range of subjects and characters was too narrow. Praising her verisimilitude, Lewes added that nonetheless her focus was too often upon only the unlofty and the common place. (Twentieth-century Marxists, on the other hand, were to complain about what they saw as her exclusive emphasis on a lofty upper-middle class) in any case, having been rescued by some literary critics from neglect and indeed gradually lionized by them, Austen's steadily reached, by the mid-nineteenth century, the enviable pinnacle of being considered controversial. The passage supplies information to suggest that the religious and political groups mentioned and Whately might have agreed that a novel

The fossil remain of the first flying vertebrates, the pterosaurs, have intrigued paleontologists for more than two centuries. How such large creatures, which weighed in some cases as much as a piloted hangglider and had wingspans from 8 to 12 meters, solved the problems of powered flight, and exactly what these creatures were-reptiles or birds- are among the questions scientist have puzzled over. Perhaps the least controversial assertion about the pterosaurs is that they were reptiles. Their skulls, pelvises, and hind feet are reptilian. The anatomy of their wings suggests that they did not evolve into the class of birds. In pterosaurs a greatly elongated fourth finger of each forelimb supported a wing like membrane. The other fingers were short and reptilian, with sharp claws, In birds the second finger is the principle strut of the wing, which consists primarily of features. If the pterosaur walked or remained stationary, the fourth finger, and with it the wing, could only turn upward in an extended inverted V-shape along side of the animal's body. The pterosaurs resembled both birds and bats in their overall structure and proportions. This is not surprising because the design of any flying vertebrate is subject to aerodynamic constraints. Both the pterosaurs and the birds have hollow bones, a feature that represents a saving in weight. In the birds, however, these bones are reinforced more massively by internal struts. Although scales typically cover reptiles, the pterosaurs probably had hairy coats. T.H. Huxley reasoned that flying vertebrates must have been warm - blooded because flying implies a high internal temperature. Huxley speculated that a coat of hair would insulate against loss of body heat and might streamline the body to reduce drag in flight. The recent discovery of a pterosaur specimen covered in long, dense, and relatively thick hair like fossil material was the first clear evidenced that his reasoning was correct. Efforts to explain how the pterosaurs became air-borne have led to suggestions that they launched themselves by jumping from cliffs, by dropping from trees, or even by rising into light winds from the crests of waves. Each hypothesis has its difficulties. The first wrongly assumes that the pterosaur's hind feet resembled a bat's and could served as hooks by which the animal could bang in preparation for flight. The second hypothesis seems unlikely because large pterosaurs could not have landed in trees without damaging their wings. The birds calls for high waves to channels updrafts. The wind that made such waves however, might have been too strong for the pterosaurs to control their flight once airborne. It can be inferred from the passage that which of the following is characteristic of the pterosaurs?

In strongly territorial birds such as the indigo bunting, song is the main mechanism for securing g, defining, and defending an adequate breeding are. When population density is high, only the strongest males can retain a suitable are. The weakest males do not breed or are forced to nest on poor or marginal territories. During the breeding season, the male indigo bunting sings in his territory; each song lasts two or three seconds with a very short pause between songs, Melodic and rhythmic characteristics are produced by rapid changes in sound frequency and some regularity of silent periods between sounds. These modulated sounds form recognizable units, called figures, each of which is reproduced again and again with remarkable consistency. Despite the large frequency range of these sounds and the rapid frequency changes that the birds makes, the n umber of figures is very limited. Further, although we found some unique figures in different geographical populations, more than 90 percent of all Indigo bunting figures are extremely stable on the geographic basis . In our studies of isolated buntings we found that male indigo buntings are capable of singing many more types of figures than they usually do. Thus, it would seem that they copy their figures from other buntings they hear signing. Realizing that the ability to distinguish the songs of one species from those of another could be an important factor in the volition of the figures, we tested species recognition of a song. When we played a tape recording of a lazuli bunting or a painted bunting, male indigo bunting did not respond; Even when a dummy of male indigo bunting was placed near the tape recorder. Playing an indigo bunting song, however, usually brought an immediate response, making it clear that a male indigo bunting can readily distinguished songs of its own species from those of other species. The role of the songs figures in interspecies recognition was then examined. We created experimental songs composed of new figures by playing a normal song backwards, which changed the detailed forms of the figures without altering frequency ranges or gross temporal features. Since the male indigos gave almost a full response to the backward song, we concluded that a wide range of figures shapes can evoke positive responses. It seems likely, therefore, that a specific configuration is not essential for interspecies recognition, but it is clear that song figures must confirm to a particular frequency range, must be within narrow limits of duration, and must be spaced at particular intervals. There is evident that new figures may arise within a population through a slow process of change and selection. This variety is probably a valuable adaptation for survival: if every bird sang only a few types of figures, in dense woods or underbrush a female might have difficulty recognizing her mate's song and a male might not be able to distinguish a neighbor from a stranger. Our studies led us to conclude that there must be a balance between song stability and conservatism, which lead to clear-cut species recognition, and song variation, which leads to individual recognition. It can be inferred that the investigation that determined the similarly among more than 90 percent of all the figures produced by birds living in different regions was undertaken to response which of the following questions?

Those examples of poetic justice that occur in medieval and Elizabethan literature, and that seem so satisfying, have encouraged a whole school of twentieth-century scholars to "find" further examples. In fact, these scholars have merely forced victimized character into a moral framework by which the injustices inflicted on them are, somehow or other, justified. Such scholars deny that the sufferers in a tragedy are innocent; they blame the victims themselves for their tragic fates. Any misdoing is enough to subject a character to critical whips. Thus, there are long essays about the misdemeanors of Webster's Duchess of Malfi, who defined her brothers, and he behavior of Shakespeare's Desdemona, who disobeyed her father. Yet it should be remembered that the Renaissance writer Matteo Bandello strongly protests the injustice of the severe penalties issued to women for acts of disobedience that men could, and did, commit with virtual impunity. And Shakespeare, Chaucer, and Webster often enlist their readers on the side of their tragic heroines by describing injustices so cruel that readers cannot but join in protest. By portraying Griselda, in the Clerk's Tale, as a meek, gentle victim who does not criticize, much less rebel against the prosecutor, her husband Walter, Chaucer incites readers to espouse Griselda's cause against Walter's oppression. Thus, efforts to supply historical and theological rationalization for Walter's persecutions tend to turn Chaucer's fable upside down, to deny its most obvious effect on reader's sympathies. Similarly, to assert that Webster's Duchess deserved torture and death because she chose to marry the man she loved and to bear their children is, in effect to join forces with her tyrannical brothers, and so to confound the operation of poetic justice, of which readers should approve, with precisely those examples of social injustice that Webster does everything in his power to make readers condemn. Indeed. Webster has his heroin so heroically lead the resistance to tyranny that she may well in spire members of the audience to imaginatively join forces with her against the cruelty and hypocritical morality of her brothers. Thus Chaucer and Webster, in their different ways, attack injustice, argue on behalf of the victims, and prosecute the persecutors. Their readers serve them as a court of appeal that remains free to rule, as the evidence requires, and as common humanity requires, in favour of the innocent and injured parties. For, to paraphrase the noted eighteenth-century scholar, Samuel Johnson, despite all the refinements of subtlety and the dogmatism of learning, it is by the common sense and compassion of readers who are uncorrupted by the characters and situations in mereval and Elizabethan literature, as in any other literature, can best be judged. It can be interred from the passage that the author consider Chaucer's Grisselda to be

Recent years have brought minority-owned businesses in the United States unprecedented opportunities-as well as new and significant risks. Civil rights activists have long argued that one of the principal reasons why Blacks, Hispanics and the other minority groups have difficulty establishing themselves in business is that they lack access to the sizable orders and subcontracts that are generated by large companies. Now congress, in apparent agreement, has required by law that businesses awarded federal contracts of more than $500,000 do their best to find minority subcontractors and record their efforts to do so on forms field with the government. Indeed, some federal and local agencies have gone so far as to set specific percentage goals for apportioning parts of public works contracts to minority enterprises. Corporate response appears to have been substantial. According to figures collected in 1977, the total of corporate contracts with minority business rose from $77 to $1. 1 billion in 1977. The projected total of corporate contracts with minority business for the early 1980's is estimated to be over $3 billion per year with no letup anticipated in the next decade. Promising as it is for minority businesses, this increased patronage poses dangers for them, too. First, minority firms risk expanding too fast and overextending themselves financially, since most are small concerns and, unlike large businesses they often need to make substantial investments in new plants, staff, equipment, and the like in order to perform work subcontracted to them. If, thereafter, their subcontracts are for some reason reduced, such firms can face potentially crippling fixed expenses. The world of corporate purchasing can be frustrating for small entrepreneurs who get requests for elaborate formal estimates and bids. Both consume valuable time and resources and a small company's efforts must soon result in orders, or both the morale and the financial health of the business will suffer. A second risk is that White-owned companies may-seek to cash inon the increasing apportionments through formation of joint ventures with minority-owned concerns, of course, in many instances there are legitimate reasons for joint ventures; clearly, white and minority enterprises can team up to acquire business that neither could Third, a minority enterprise that secures the business of one large corporate customer often runs the danger of becoming - and remaining dependent. Even in the best of circumstances, fierce competition from larger, more established companies makes it difficult for small concerns to broaden their customer bases; when such firms have nearly guaranteed orders from a single corporate benefactor, they may truly have to struggle against complacency arising from their current success. The authors implied that the minority owned concern that does the greater part of its business with one large corporate customer should