June 2007 PrepTest, Section 2, Question 11
By Brandon Beaver | Published October 29, 2024
Type: Role
Difficulty:
Explanations
What happened during the transition from oral culture to literary culture was just one example. We don’t know if a similar brain rot effect will happen. Also, what is that effect—it was never mentioned. What happened to the “powerful memory and extemporaneous eloquence that were intrinsic to oral culture” after the transition to literary culture?
Anyway, the sentence in question serves as a counterexample—it’s a time when a similar complaint arose, which complaint was conceivably unfounded.
A
No, it’s evidence against that.
B
No. The conclusion is the last sentence. There is no general hypothesis, and if there were, it wouldn’t be that.
C
Yup, that’s what it is—a counterexample. Previously, people thought a similar transition would have a detrimental effect on the human mind. Apparently (the passage doesn’t confirm that a detrimental effect didn’t occur), that thought was wrong.
D
Nah. Opponents don’t claim the skills are being “lost” (just that they are being “corroded”) and the author doesn’t go so far as to say the fear is “unwarranted.”
E
No, it’s evidence on the author’s side.
Passage
It is now a common complaint that the electronic media have
Question 11
The reference to the complaint of several centuries ago that