Reading Comprehension

Georges LeClerc (1707-1788) proposed a mechanism for calculating the
age of the Earth using molten spheres of iron and measuring cooling
times, after which he proposed that the Earth was at least 75,000 years
old and perhaps as old as three million years.

Some students may feel that we should not focus on the past, and
that our thoughts should be trained on new knowledge and invention,
rather than antiquated ideas. What these students do not understand is
the importance of the old ideas in shaping our current understanding of
the world around us, and that an outright dismissal of past theories
simply because they have been rejected by new evidence may limit our
understanding of current theories.

There is value of learning about hypotheses that were once espoused
to explain an observed phenomenon, but that have now been long
disproved and invalidated. Darwin's theory of natural selection as the
mechanism for evolution is all too often taught in a vacuum in high school
biology classrooms, as if this brilliant naturalist developed a ground-
breaking theory on natural order which had never before been
contemplated in any form. It is only by learning about the gradual
development of evolutionary theory, and the role of some religious
individuals in shaping this theory, that students may come to see the
logic and power behind Darwin's relatively simple ideas.

Many of the contributions upon which Darwin built his ideas came
from scientists who were staunch creationists themselves. These
scientists believed that all organisms on Earth had been placed here
through "•special creation,"– by God, because there was little evidence at
the time to support evolution. LeClerc also perceived that species were
not fixed and could change over time; he even proposed that closely
related species, such as the horse and donkey, had developed from a
common ancestor and had been modified by different climactic
conditions. Yet, LeClerc was a devout Christian creationist and devoted
much of his writing to the debunking of evolutionary ideas. Despite their
commitments to religion, LeClerc and Linnaeus both gave Darwin crucial
raw material to work with-their ideas concerning the similarities between
related species and possible connections with common ancestors cried
out for a reasonable explanation.

For centuries before Darwin, data that challenged the biblical account
of creation was surfacing in many fields of research. As explorers began
to study the forces that shape the Earth, such as mountain building and
volcanic eruptions, accounts from scripture and assertions that the Earth
was very young began to be called into question. Uniformitarian
geologists such as Charles Lyell felt that the only reason mountains and
other features of the Earth's terrain had been built the way they had was
because of long, gradual processes that shaped these structures. There
was no way, he felt, that the Earth could be several thousand years old
as asserted in the Bible. In addition, the discovery of new plants,
animals, and fossils as explorers travelled to uncharted regions of the
world aroused suspicion about the paucity of animal and plant "•kinds"– in
the Bible. Improvements in scientists' abilities to estimate the age of the
Earth and the relative ages of fossils also pushed people to question old
assumptions.


Question 1: Taking into account all that was argued by the author, the main idea of this
passage is that:

A. religious scientists before Darwin greatly influenced his formation of
the theory of natural selection.
B. similarities between species of plants and animals were too great to
ignore as people attempted to explain relationships in nature.
C. Darwin relied on a great deal of information from those who lived
before him as he formed his well-known conclusions about the
mechanisms of evolution.
D. old ideas should not be dismissed simply because they are old and
disproved.
E. There is no connection between old ideas and new ones


2. If the author were teaching a class on evolution in a university in the Unites
States, the passage suggests that the class would spend a significant amount
of time discussing:

A. the origins of Darwin's theory of natural selection.
B. details of Darwin's theory of natural selection.
C. the Biblical account of creation.
D. taxonomy and classification and their importance in Darwin's ideas.
E. the future of evolution


[spoiler] OA is 1) C and 2) A . Why? IMO for 1) it should be D since it captures the essence of the entire passage and is not as specific as C. For 2), I thought it was C since in paragraph three it specifically says "It is only by learning about the gradual development of evolutionary theory, and the role of some religious individuals in shaping this theory, that students may come to see the logic and power behind Darwin's relatively simple ideas." The ideas preceding Darwin's theory doesn't capture the idea that other views (biblical) may help understand evolution. Looking at the details of Darwin's theory would actually be looking at evolution "in a vacuum", no? Also, it even says "and the role of some religious individuals in shaping this theory (e.g. Darwin's), that students may come to see the logic and power behind Darwin's relatively simple ideas.[/spoiler]

Can someone please prove without a doubt why the OA is correct and I'm off? I'm doubting RC99 more and more as a good RC source as I continue to find either debatable or unjustified answer choices. Thanks. [/spoiler]

I agree that RC99 isn't flawless -- but I actually think both of these questions are pretty solid.

For #1, just because a Main Idea answer choice mentions specifics doesn't mean it's wrong. Choice (D), after all, is almost directly quoting the last sentence of the second paragraph, which is equally suspicious in a Main Idea answer choice. Almost the entire passage, beyond the second paragraph, talks about Darwin; the first paragraph is even giving a specific predecessor Darwin. While I agree that the more likely GMAT answer choice would have been something like "The role that old, discarded theories played in the development of new scientific theories is important to a full understanding of current ideas," (D) doesn't give us this, either. The one Big Idea in this passage was that old ideas led to new ideas, such as Darwin's, and are thus necessary to understand the latter; only (C) paints this causal relationship correctly ("relied on a great deal of information from those who lived before him")

For #2, although the author does believe that religious theories such as creationism were part of Darwin's context, the author does not imply that these specific theories would be given a lot of weight, and doesn't mention the Bible at all; instead, he suggests that, as you pointed out, these competing theories should be provided as a context, and to explain how these ideas came about. As a result, (A) captures the relevance of these theories to Darwin's, which the author of this passage firmly believes is the more correct theory.

In general, the key in a hard passage like this is to really get the relationship between the two competing models, in this case, the Old Theories and Darwin. Here are the opinions given:
* Current science classes = "OT irrelevant, D correct, that's it"
* Author - "OT relevant because D used them to make his own theories, so they should be studied, too."
It's not just that the Author is arguing that the Old Theories are important or should be studied, as your answers to both questions above implied; that is too simplistic a reading. It's that they had a causal influence on the development of Darwin's theory. Thus, the author shares the opinion of current science classes that Darwin's theory is the One True Theory; he only believes that is "origins" are also worth studying to understand where Darwin got some of his ideas from.

Hope that helps!

@Adam
Amazing explanation by Adam! Your approach is very structured which you need in order to eliminate options

@thp510
I think you need to be more flexible with your viewpoint while doing questions. Instead of saying that this answer is wrong and then sticking to your viewpoint,you may wanna make recheck whether your approach to the question and your understanding of the passage,question and answer choices is correct. The answers choices to a question on the actual GMAT are even more confusing(from what I have heard) ,there again you cannot start challenging the options. Come to think of it, you'd not be able to do that as you won't get to see the OAs So try being more holistic in your approach and I think you should improve.

Thanks for the help.

I will say that with the OG Reading Comp problems, the wrong answers are definite and clearly explained. However, I see so many haphazard explanations or justifications on the RC99 answers that it's almost baffling in terms of why a right answer is right and why a wrong answer is wrong. On the GMAT, right answer choices must have compelling justification on why it's right. I don't see that in the RC99 passages. At times it feels like whoever wrote the prompts were under some type of time crunch to justify an answers. Nothing like Adam's detailed explanation, so the right answers are suspect to say the least.

thp510 wrote:Thanks for the help.

I will say that with the OG Reading Comp problems, the wrong answers are definite and clearly explained. However, I see so many haphazard explanations or justifications on the RC99 answers that it's almost baffling in terms of why a right answer is right and why a wrong answer is wrong. On the GMAT, right answer choices must have compelling justification on why it's right. I don't see that in the RC99 passages. At times it feels like whoever wrote the prompts were under some type of time crunch to justify an answers. Nothing like Adam's detailed explanation, so the right answers are suspect to say the least.

Dude,the Official Guide is official material so it's bound to be better than the material by any Test Prep company ,but that doesn't mean that the non-official material is not good enough.The passages in RC99 may not have as elaborate explanations as the OG, but doesn't mean that the answers are "suspect".In fact ,what I like about RC99 is that each passage has a passage map,and the explanations don't run into several paragraphs( as they do in the official Guide)which I used to get bored reading and hence never actually read properly. I am using RC99 and don't think that it has issues which you mention. However ,if you have issues with it , then why are you still doing the passages and complaining? You'd be better off leaving it. LOL!

Well, I'd say MGMAT's math books are about 100x better than any official guide books. Referring to your last statement... I'm just testing what others think about RC99 and not dismissing it all together (yet). Funny, it reminds me of a book titled: "Mom, get out of my life, but can you first drive me & Cheryl to the mall"

Empirestateofmind wrote: Dude,the Official Guide is official material so it's bound to be better than the material by any Test Prep company ,but that doesn't mean that the non-official material is not good enough.

There is actually good reason to think that the OG material is NOT the best material out there. For one, it's not clear that it's made up entirely of official questions -- they advertise "more than 800 past GMAT questions" but have well over 1000 questions in the book, which leads me to believe (did someone say, Infer? haha) that some of the questions in the OG may have never appeared on a test.

Furthermore, it turns out it's really hard to make a good question from the perspective of the CAT algorithm. They look for questions that clearly differentiate between different ability levels and have smooth curves over the course of increasing ability levels (that is, fewer people get them right as their ability levels decrease, consistently). Many well-designed questions fail these criteria and thus can't be used as scored items in the real CAT. Where do they go, you wonder? They end up in the GMATPrep tests and the Official Guide.

Test-prep companies, on the other hand, want to give you all their best questions -- they're not saving any for the "real thing"! So, in a strange way, you might see more realistic questions in terms of CAT-like performance from test prep companies than from officially released materials. I'm not saying this as a certainty, as what makes for "better practice questions" is often subjective; just a thought to keep in mind that official does not automatically mean better.

I am currently studying RC-99 and at RC#25 Q#1, I also felt that answer should have been D rather than A. At least that how the pattern is in all the RCs that I have done till now.

The pattern of paragraphs is to introduce an idea followed by an example but I guess its not clear when to make idea primary and when to made the example primary.......

I feel a typical GMAT pattern answer would be D....(obviously not in the form given), but ya good to know how tat can be twisted too...

I have been doing RC 99 for a while....did the first half pretty well...but struggled badly with the high difficulty section....neither cud i cope with the accuracy nor with the time....have been doing them between 9-12 mins....most of them at 10 mins....but there are enuf passages where i felt, i didnt grasp the full content....but went ahead to do problems....

Arey they too tough?

In high difficulty, i felt both the passage is tough to comprehend...and over that the questions are equally challenging..(not all obviously but gud say 60% are tough )

How do i compare or analyze by RC 99 scores vs times?
what should my aim be....to finish it in 8 mins? or ?

Drop your thoughts....hope to crack RC....as its something im still not confident about....!