CHAPTER 2 / DIAGNOSTIC SAT 75
8.C The passage says that the comic... seems
bound to its time, society, cultural anthropology(lines
7–8). This implies that it’s harder to find something hu-
morous if it is from another culture or time. Choice (C)
is the most foreign to modern Americans.
9.C Because the passage says that it is harder to
understand the comedy of other societies and eras
because of cultural obstacles, the effortis in overcom-
ing these obstacles.
10.B The author states that the host’s introduction
dropped like a stone in our midst(lines 9–10), and that
no response at all to this introduction was the proper
response(line 12). The rest of the essay makes clear that
the author considers the host’s comments, particularly
with its focus on literature,to be inappropriate.
11.C The author defines the term somewhat in
lines 55–57 by listing the forms to which the term lit-
eraryis applied: novels and short stories and poems.
Throughout the passage, the author distinguishes lit-
eraryworks from works of nonfiction, which can be
very well written.
12.B The interviewer asked the writers about the “lit-
erary experience” (line 20) of the day, and then whether
they “write anything literary” (lines 36–37), when in fact
they did not write literature at all, but rather nonfiction.
13.C Those writers are mentioned as our modelsby
the author, suggesting that the author and the other
writers have been influenced by them.
14.B In saying that writers were admired for their
ability to harness the issues,the author is saying that
they make them easy to understand for their readers.
15.E The writers being interviewed had said that
they felt they were already doing satisfactory work(lines
37–38). The callers implied that they felt the same way.
16.C The phrase the great preponderance of what
writers now write and sellrefers to the majorityof
what they write and sell.
17.B The first sentence indicates the purpose of this
passage: To understand... Aristotle... it is necessary
to apprehend his imaginative background(lines 1–3),
in other words, to understand the preconceptions be-
hind his theories.
18.E This paragraph discusses the ancient Greek
idea that mechanical devices are somehow imbued
with the spirit of animals with similar abilities, for
instance, an airplane having the spirit of a bird. The
comment that animals have lost their importance in our
imaginative pictures of the worldindicates that modern
thinkers no longer suppose any link between the life-
spirit of animals and the behavior of machines.19.C The imaginative preconceptionsof Aristotle are
explained in the second and third paragraphs, where
it says that to the Greek, it seemed more natural to as-
similate apparently lifeless motions to those of animals
(lines 47–49).20.A The passage says that the... mechanical view
hardly suggested itself, except in the case of a few men
of genius(lines 36–38). So these men of genius had
the mechanical view.21.E The passage says that to the modern man of sci-
ence, the body of an animal is a very elaborate machine
(lines 42–43). The difference between animals and ma-
chines is diminished with discoveries about the
physico-chemical structure(lines 44–45) of animals, or
the mechanical and chemical nature of biology.22.A In saying that, to the ancient Greek, it seemed
more natural to assimilate apparently lifeless motions
to those of animals(lines 47–49), the author is saying
that Greeks were inclined to compare the motions of
lifeless things to the motions of living things, and that
these comparisons were the basis of a general theory
of physics(lines 53–54).23.C The passage says that Every Greek philoso-
pher... had been taught in childhood to regard the sun
and moon as gods(lines 58–61), and then that Anaxago-
ras was prosecuted for impiety because he thought that
they were not alive(lines 61–63). This implies that he de-
parted dramatically from his childhood teachings.24.B The Hellenic love of order and geometric sim-
plicity(line 67) is attributed to the Divine Being who
moves the heavenly bodies. These heavenly bodies
were said to move with regularity(line 56) and supe-
rior perfection(lines 57–58). Therefore, it can be in-
ferred that this love of order and geometric simplicity
pertains to the movement of the heavenly bodies.Section 71.C
(Chapter 7, Lesson 3: Fractions)2.D 4 x+ 2 y= 8Divide by 4:(Chapter 6, Lesson 4: Simplifying Problems)xy+=1
2
2
2
3
of 60 is 40, and 50