GMAT Diagnostic Test - Verbal

Test Questions

1. The petrochemical industry claims that chemical waste dumps pose no threat to people living near them. If this is true, then why do they locate the plants in sparsely populated regions? By not locating the chemical dumps in densely populated areas the petrochemical industry tacitly admits that these chemicals are potentially dangerous to the people living nearby.

Which of the following, if true, would most weaken the author's argument?
(A) Funding through the environmental Super Fund to clean up poorly run waste dumps is reserved for rural areas only.
(B) Until chemical dumps are proven 100% safe, it would be imprudent to locate them were they could potentially do the most harm.
(C) Locating the dumps in sparsely populated areas is less expensive and involves less government red tape.
(D) The potential for chemicals to leach into the water table has in the past been underestimated.
(E) People in cities are more likely to sue the industry if their health is harmed by the dumps.

2. The news media is often accused of being willing to do anything for ratings. However, recent action by a television network indicates that the news media is sometimes guided by moral principle. This network had discovered through polling voters on the east coast that the Republican candidate for President had garnered enough votes to ensure victory before the polls closed on the west coast. However, the network withheld this information until the polls on the west coast closed so that the information would not affect the outcome of key congressional races.

Which one of the following most strengthens the argument?
(A) The network had endorsed the Republican candidate for President.
(B) The network expected its ratings to increase if it predicted the winner of the presidential race, and to decrease if did not predict the winner.
(C) A rival network did predict a winner of the presidential race before the polls on the west coast closed.
(D) The network believed that it would receive higher ratings by not predicting the winner of the presidential race.
(E) The network feared that predicting the winner of the presidential race could so anger Congress that it might enact legislation preventing all future polling outside of voting centers.

3. To avoid economic collapse, Russia must increase its GNP by 20%. However, due to the structure of its economy, if the 20% threshold is reached, then a 40% increase in GNP is achievable.

Assuming that the above statements are true, which one of the following must also be true?
(A) If ethnic strife continues in Russia, then a 20% increase in GNP will be unattainable.
(B) If a 40% increase in Russia's GNP is impossible, its economy will collapse.
(C) If Russia's GNP increases by 40%, its economy will not collapse.
(D) If the 20% threshold is reached, then a 40% increase in GNP is achievable and a 60% increase is probable.
(E) If Russia's economy collapses, then it will not have increased its GNP by 40%.

4. The rising cost of government bureaucracy have made it all but impossible to reign in the budget deficit.
(A) The rising cost
(B) Since the rising costs
(C) Because of the rising costs
(D) The rising costs
(E) Rising cost

5. Using the Hubble telescope, previously unknown galaxies are now being charted.
(A) Using the Hubble telescope, previously unknown galaxies are now being charted.
(B) Previously unknown galaxies are now being charted, using the Hubble telescope.
(C) Using the Hubble telescope, previously unknown galaxies are now being charted by astronomers.
(D) Using the Hubble telescope, astronomers are now charting previously unknown galaxies.
(E) With the aid of the Hubble telescope, previously unknown galaxies are now being charted.

6. Common knowledge tells us that sensible exercise and eating properly will result in better health.
(A) eating properly will result
(B) proper diet resulted
(C) dieting will result
(D) proper diet results
(E) eating properly results

Passage for Question 7:
As Xenophanes recognized as long ago as the sixth century before Christ, whether or not God made man in His own image, it is certain that man makes gods in his. The gods of Greek mythology first appear in the writings of Homer and Hesiod, and, from the character and actions of these picturesque and, for the most part, friendly beings, we get some idea of the men who made them and brought them to Greece.

But ritual is more fundamental than mythology, and the study of Greek ritual during recent years has shown that, beneath the belief or skepticism with which the Olympians were regarded, lay an older magic, with traditional rites for the promotion of fertility by the celebration of the annual cycle of life and death, and the propitiation of unfriendly ghosts, gods or demons. Some such survivals were doubtless widespread, and, prolonged into classical times, probably made the substance of Eleusinian and Orphic mysteries. Against this dark and dangerous background arose Olympic mythology on the one hand and early philosophy and science on the other.

In classical times the need of a creed higher than the Olympian was felt, and Aeschylus, Sophocles and Plato finally evolved from the pleasant but crude polytheism the idea of a single, supreme and righteous Zeus. But the decay of Olympus led to a revival of old and the invasion of new magic cults among the people, while some philosophers were looking to a vision of the uniformity of nature under divine and universal law.

7. The main idea of the passage is that
(A) Olympic mythology evolved from ancient rituals and gave rise to early philosophy
(B) early moves toward viewing nature as ordered by divine and universal law coincided with monotheistic impulses and the disintegration of classical mythology
(C) early philosophy followed from classical mythology
(D) the practice of science, i.e., empiricism, preceded scientific theory