Welcome to the Knewton Verbal Challenge! From 1/19 to 1/25, I'll post a tough GMAT question every day for you to try -- well, every day except Saturday and Sunday
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Read it over, then reply to this thread with your answer and an explanation for how you got it. I'll choose the best explanation at 11 pm EST each day, and the daily winner will get free access to the Beat the GMAT Practice Questions!
You can enter every day, so be sure to check the CR and SC forums tomorrow for the next question (I'll post a link to the next question here, or you can search for "Knewton Challenge").
Good luck!
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Question 1.
Archaeologists propose that some stone tablets excavated from ancient Egyptian sites were designed in accordance with the famous mathematical ratio of 1.618, also known as the "Golden Ratio." Archaeologists claim that the Egyptian scribes who believed in the divinity of this ratio constructed every symbol on their tablets to preserve it. Mathematicians often oppose this claim, asserting that the ratio was instead discovered by Greek mathematicians and architects, such as Euclid, Phidias, and Pythagoras, hundreds of years later.
Which of the following, if true about a limestone tablet recently uncovered at an ancient Egyptian burial site, would most strongly support an archaeologist's analysis targeted at disproving the mathematicians' assertion?
(A) Some Greek mathematicians measured ancient artifacts, like the stone tablet found, to determine whether their predecessors had discovered the ratio.
(B) No art or writing that has used the "Golden Ratio" and that is older than the stone tablet has been found.
(C) The tablet was signed by a well-known Egyptian scribe, most famous for his contributions to the field of mathematics.
(D) The burial site from which the tablet was found contained many objects that were made from the exact cut of rare limestone rock that was used to construct the tablet.
(E) Though the symbols on the tablet are now chipped and broken, the longer half of the first symbol, if complete, would have been 1.618 times longer than the shorter half.