Para Summary Questions for CAT

The passage given below is followed by four alternate summaries. Choose the option that best captures the essence of the passage.

The human brain is a remarkable object. It is the only object that can comprehend the existence and nature of the cosmos, the infinite patterns of numbers, the laws of physics, the moral implications of its actions, its own identity and consciousness. It is also the only object that can achieve extraordinary feats that are beyond the reach of any other object - launching itself into space, predicting and averting a potential collision with a meteor, cooling matter to near absolute zero, detecting and communicating with other brains across vast distances. However, despite its unparalleled capabilities, the human brain remains a mystery to itself. We can’t understand how the brain performs any of these functions. The field of artificial general intelligence (AGI), which attempts to create machines that can emulate the brain’s abilities, has not made any significant progress in its 60-year history. This is because we are plagued by many false assumptions and misconceptions about the brain and intelligence, both among experts and the general public. AGI is also overoptimistic in forecasting its imminent breakthrough.

Many believe that social media connects people. Yet studies show that heavy users report higher rates of loneliness. This paradox—more connection, more isolation—suggests that digital interaction cannot replace genuine human contact.

What is the main idea?

Urban farming has emerged as a solution to food deserts. Community gardens provide fresh produce in areas lacking supermarkets. They also create green spaces in concrete neighborhoods. Moreover, they foster community engagement. However, urban farming cannot replace the scale of traditional agriculture. What is the main idea?

The passage given below is followed by four summaries. Choose the option that best captures the author’s position.

In the future, the history of the Mughal Empire may be less widely known than it is now, despite our current enthusiasm for storing information electronically. This is because most digital media contents are prone to disappearing sooner than words printed on high-quality paper, and they also become obsolete due to the rapid pace of technological advancement. Unlike paper documents, accessing digital information requires a two-step process of retrieving and decoding the data using the appropriate software. This presents a risk of losing crucial historical records from our current era due to the limitations of the digital medium used to store them.

The passage given below is followed by four summaries. Choose the option that best captures the author’s position.

Why did the BJP engineer a coup in the NCP when its government in Maharashtra was sitting pretty? And why did Ajit Pawar raise a rebellion when the public mood is changing? The Shiv Sena-NCP-Congress alliance looked formidable a year ago. Internal surveys by the BJP showed that it would sweep the state that sends 48 members to the Lok Sabha. So, the BJP had to do something. They got Shinde on their side. Even if it looked ugly and morally corrupt.

The passage given below is followed by four summaries. Choose the option that best captures the author’s position. Rhythm is based on expectations. Rather than reacting to beats, we anticipate them. We dance, clap or nod our heads along to well-placed, predictable notes. This entrainment is more than human nature. Scientists have found that cockatoos, parrots, sea lions and rats all dance to repetitive beats (dogs and most other animals apparently don’t). The shared experience of rhythm can, in some circumstances, be downright subversive. In 1994, the UK Criminal Justice and Public Order Act responded to a moral panic about young people attending raves by giving the police new powers to shut down gatherings involving music ‘predominantly characterised by the emission of a succession of repetitive beats’.

The passage given below is followed by four alternate summaries. Choose the option that best captures the essence of the passage.

More than 5,000 containerships sail the oceans today, and they are in no danger of vanishing from the scene. But the temporary COVID-19 pandemic-driven boom in trade in goods notwithstanding, the cargo these giant vessels carry is becoming steadily less important as the world economy is reshaped by a new form of globalisation. Over time, globalisation will gradually have less to do with exporting material goods across borders and much more to do with trading services and ideas. This will have important consequences for workers, communities, and the health of national economies.

Passage First and Last Sentences: Paragraph 1 first: Universal basic income has gained traction recently. Paragraph 1 last: Yet the idea is not as novel as proponents suggest. Paragraph 2 first: Experimental programs in the 1970s provide instructive lessons. Paragraph 2 last: These studies showed both promise and pitfalls. Paragraph 3 first: Contemporary advocates have largely ignored these findings. Paragraph 3 last: This historical amnesia risks repeating past mistakes.

The passage proceeds by:

The passage given below is followed by four alternate summaries. Choose the option that best captures the essence of the passage.

The challenge to the idea of ‘greatness’ - the challenge to assigning hierarchical value to cultural expressions - isn’t as preposterous as it might first appear. If, for example, one points to the aesthetic qualities of a work, one must reckon with the fact that aesthetic quality is notoriously difficult to pin down, and that attempts going back to antiquity have failed to give us an objective standard by which to judge. Moreover, aesthetic judgments can easily boil down to individual preferences, which, though perhaps finely attuned to prevailing social norms, are actually the result of particular kinds of education. In other words, it’s hard to extricate aesthetic value from cultural - and aristocratic - prejudice.

The passage given below is followed by four alternate summaries. Choose the option that best captures the essence of the passage.

Consumerism is a ubiquitous pursuit of materialistic goods and conspicuous consumption which has become an increasingly pervasive phenomenon in the contemporary milieu. However, its multifarious ramifications have engendered a contentious discourse. On one hand, consumerism is heralded as an instrumental catalyst propelling economic growth, galvanizing production and proffering job opportunities. Although it ostensibly accords individuals access to an expansive array of commodious products, the pernicious downsides of consumerism cannot be overlooked. Despite its promises of gratification, it often engenders environmental degradation, inordinate indebtedness, and exacerbates societal disparities. Moreover, the ceaseless pursuit of material acquisitions can leave individuals ensnared in an abyss of insatiable yearnings, rendering them perennially unfulfilled. Consequently, a judicious and introspective evaluation of consumption patterns, coupled with a conscientious approach, becomes indispensable in fostering equilibrium between individual exigencies and the sustainable fabric of our planet.

Read the following paragraph and choose the option that best captures its essence.

Seven months after igniting a firestorm and having its initial release scrapped, The Hunt is finally arriving in theatres this weekend. But audiences may end up wishing it had just stayed on the shelf. A horror-comedy in which humans are hunted for sport, Craig Zobel's The Hunt generated quite a stir last summer. After advertising for it was pulled in the wake of two deadly mass shootings, reports emerged that the film's plot specifically involved liberal elites hunting red-state 'deplorables.' The outrage was fierce, with Fox News commentators railing against the film while painting it as a celebration of the killing of President Trump's supporters, and Trump even tweeted that the movie was 'made in order to inflame and cause chaos.' Universal cancelled the planned September release, only to suddenly announce last month that it would hit theatres after all.

Read the following paragraph and choose the option that best captures its essence.

On 13 February 1945, British aircrafts launched an attack on the eastern German city of Dresden. In the days that followed, they and their US allies would drop nearly 4,000 tons of bombs in the assault. The ensuing firestorm killed 25,000 people, ravaging the city centre, sucking the oxygen from the air and suffocating people trying to escape the flames. Dresden was not unique. Allied bombers killed tens of thousands and destroyed large areas with attacks on Cologne, Hamburg and Berlin, and the Japanese cities of Tokyo, Hiroshima and Nagasaki. But the bombing has become one of the most controversial Allied acts of World War Two. Some have questioned the military value of Dresden. Even British Prime Minister Winston Churchill expressed doubts immediately after the attack.

Read the following paragraph and select the option that best captures its essence:

A man should learn to detect and watch that gleam of light which flashes across his mind from within, more than the lustre of the firmament of bards and sages. Yet he dismisses without notice his thought, because it is his. In every work of genius we recognize our own rejected thoughts; they come back to us with a certain alienated majesty. Great works of art have no more affecting lesson for us than this.

The passage given below is followed by four alternate summaries. Choose the option that best captures the essence of the passage.

The influence of the classical civilizations of Greece and Rome on Western culture and Politics, is undeniable. However, it is important to recognize the diverse and multifaceted nature of their legacy. These ancient civilizations comprised various regions, peoples, and traditions that interacted and competed with each other. Spanning over a millennium, from the archaic period to late antiquity, classical antiquity witnessed significant changes and transformations. Studying these civilizations requires a critical and nuanced perspective. While the Greek and Roman classics have been revered as sources of inspiration, they have also faced challenges and criticisms. Throughout history, they have been appropriated and adapted, serving as instruments of power, but also deconstructed by scholars, revealing their biases. Regardless of one's stance, the classics have stimulated intellectual debate and fostered cultural creativity. They are not static entities but living phenomena that continually invite reevaluation and reinterpretation.

The passage given below is followed by four summaries. Choose the option that best captures the author’s position.

It is a truth universally acknowledged that there is nothing worse than a person who walks slowly when you’re in a hurry. There’s even a name for the emotion the experience evokes — sidewalk rage. The resentment builds even though we may rationally know the person isn’t walking that slow — we’re just in a hurry. So why do we hate walking behind slow people so much? First, healthy brains are notoriously poor markers of time — for a variety of neurological reasons, they tend to perceive time as passing slightly slower than it really does, identifying a 90-second interval at 95 or 100 seconds, according to a report by Cody C. Delistraty for The Atlantic. And under stress — which, to a relative degree, occurs when you’re walking behind someone who just won’t move faster — healthy brains have the potential to experience time even more slowly.

The passage given below is followed by four alternate summaries. Choose the option that best captures the essence of the passage.

We seem to take it for granted that, in order for us all to get on the same page as each other, in order for us as speakers to be clear, we need to define our terms [...] If you tell your interlocutor what you mean by a term, then you free them from the cognitive labour of working out what you mean by it, which labour they can then spend more productively [...] But defining terms is not a panacea [...] There are substantive philosophical issues at play here; the goal here is just to put a bit of initial pressure on the too-easy thought that, in order to understand what we mean, it is sufficient to define our terms. Our understandings of terms sometimes outpace our definitions of them and, when that happens, offering definitions can muddy the waters.

Modernist architecture promised to improve society through rational design. Yet its housing projects became symbols of urban decay. This failure does not invalidate the modernist impulse. What it reveals is that architecture cannot engineer social outcomes. It can only create conditions that either enable or inhibit human flourishing. The most successful contemporary designs embrace this limitation.

Which of the following would be the most appropriate title?

Passage Outline:

1. Many believe social media algorithms create echo chambers.
2. Evidence shows users actively seek out opposing views.
3. However, when exposed to opposing views, users dismiss them.
4. Therefore, echo chambers result from psychological bias, not algorithms.

Which of the following best describes the structure?

The passage given below is followed by four alternate summaries. Choose the option that best captures the essence of the passage.

The weight of society’s expectations is hardly a new phenomenon but it has become particularly draining over recent decades, perhaps because expectations themselves are so multifarious and contradictory. The perfectionism of the 1950s was rooted in the norms of mass culture and captured in famous advertising images of the ideal white American family that now seem self-satirising. In that era, perfectionism meant seamlessly conforming to values, behaviour and appearance: chiselled confidence for men, demure graciousness for women. The perfectionist was under pressure to look like everyone else, only more so. The perfectionists of today, by contrast, feel an obligation to stand out through their idiosyncratic style and wit if they are to gain a foothold in the attention economy.

The passage given below is followed by four alternate summaries. Choose the option that best captures the essence of the passage.

Critical thinking is difficult. It is more like running a marathon than it is like riding a bike — that is, it is more a matter of intellectual and emotional fitness than a technique one can learn and never forget. To think contradictory thoughts simultaneously and fruitfully, to question one’s own assumptions in a way that generates better alternatives, all while charitably entertaining the views of others, is hard to sustain. It requires a lot of instruction and regular practice. Students struggle to get in condition — and administrators removed from the day-to-day practice of teaching and scholarly exchange risk falling out of shape. Because critical thinking is rooted in the rigors of self-reflection, it is decidedly not an application of the managerial expertise that administrators often claim.