National Admissions Test for Law (LNAT)

Sample Test 2 (2010)

The test has 2 separate sections, A and B.

Section A: Multiple Choice

This section is divided into 12 sub sections; each sub section has between 3 and 4 questions. 

You should answer all 42 multiple choice questions in Section A, selecting one of the possible answers listed for each question.

Time allowed: 95 minutes

Section B: Essay

This section has 5 essay questions.

You should select and answer one question in Section B.

Time allowed: 40 minutes 

1 The Teaching of Literature

Is there, then, no better way? Yes there is a better way: for the French have it, with their language and literature. In France, as Matthew Arnold noted, a generation ago, the ordinary journey-man work of literature is done far better and more conscientiously than with us. In France a man feels it almost a personal stain to write even on a police-order anything so derogatory to the tradition of his language as our Cabinet Ministers read out as answers to our House of' Commons. I am told that many a Maire in a small provincial town in N.E. France, even when overwhelmed with the sufferings of his town-folk, has truly felt the iron enter into his soul on being forced to sign a document written out for him in the invaders French. 

Cannot we treat our noble inheritance of literature and language as scrupulously, and with as high a sense of their appertaining to our national honour, as a Frenchman cherishes his language, his literature? Cannot we study to leave our inheritance - as the old Athenian put it temperately, ‘not worse but a little better than we found it’? 

I think we can, and should. I shall close to-day, Gentlemen, with the most modest of perorations. In my first lecture before you, in January 1913, I quoted to you the artist in Don Quixote who, being asked what animal he was painting, answered diffidently ‘That is as it may turn out’.

The teaching of our language and literature is, after all, a new thing and still experimental. The main tenets of those who, aware of this, have worked on the scheme for a School of English in Cambridge, the scheme recently passed by your Senate and henceforth to be in operation, are three:

The first. That literature cannot be divorced from life: that (for example) you cannot understand Chaucer aright, unless you have the background, unless you know the kind of men for whom Chaucer wrote and the kind of men whom he made speak; that is the national side with which all our literature is concerned. 

The second. Literature being so personal a thing, you cannot understand it until you have some personal understanding of the men who wrote it. Donne is Donne; Swift, Swift; Pope, Pope; Johnson, Johnson; Goldsmith, Goldsmith; Charles Lamb, Charles Lamb; Carlyle, Carlyle. Until you have grasped those men, as men, you cannot grasp their writings. That is the personal side of literary study, and as necessary as the other. 

The third. That the writing and speaking of English is a living art, to be practised and (if it may be) improved. That what these great men have done is to hand us a grand patrimony; that they lived to support us through the trial we are now enduring, and to carry us through to great days to come. So shall our sons, now fighting in France, have a language ready for the land they shall recreate and repeople. 

1.	
Which of the following is an assertion of fact rather than opinion?

(a)	‘Yes there is a better way’

(b)	‘as Matthew Arnold noted’

(c)	‘literature cannot be divorced from life’

(d)	‘you cannot understand it until you have some personal understanding of the men who wrote it’

(e)	‘what these great men have done is to hand us a grand patrimony’

2.	This passage is an extract from a speech. To whom do you think it was originally delivered?
(a)	Students
(b)	Parents
(c)	Politicians
(d)	Lecturers
(e)	Writers

3.	Which of the following does the writer imply but not state?
(a)	The teaching of literature is new.
(b)	To understand literature properly you need to know about the people who wrote it.
(c)	Literature is created only by men.
(d)	We ought to emulate the French attitude to their language.
(e)	To understand literature properly you need to understand the context in which it was written.

4.	All of the following are reasons for the comparison with French language and literature except

	(a)	The French language is purer than English

	(b)	The French respect the traditions of their language

	(c)	The French cherish their language

	(d)	The French relate their language and literature to national honour

	(e)	French literature is generally better written than English literature 

2  Renewable Energy
Two significant pieces of research published today by the Renewable Energy Foundation (REF), a charity sponsoring research into the adoption of renewable technologies, for the first time clearly shows the successes and failures of the UK renewables sector.
In the first part of the work REF has published a ‘user-friendly’ analysis of the Ofgem Renewables Obligation Certificate (ROC) database, which has been previously criticised as difficult to use. Using the new research it is now possible to assess how renewable generators up and down the country are performing. This data, published in five online files; Biomass, Hydro, Landfill Gas, Sewage Gas and Windpower, shows that farm generators are producing high load factors with carefully designed resource use and load following.
However in the wind sector, far and away the most active of all the technologies at present, results vary enormously due to location. The capacities offshore are encouraging, whilst those onshore are generally only superior in locations very distant from the populations requiring the electrical energy. Although most sites were built on expected capacity factors of around 30%, results include; 19% (approx) capacity factor for the wind turbines at Dagenham, Essex, 9% (approx) capacity factor at the Barnard Castle plant, County Durham. The best performing wind sites are in the north of Scotland, and on Shetland the wind turbines are producing capacity factors of over 50%.
Using this analysis of the Ofgem data, researchers have also calibrated a model predicting how a large installed capacity of wind power built across the UK would actually perform. The project used Meteorological Office data to model output for every hour of every January from 1994-2006. The startling results show that, even when distributed UK wide, the output is still highly volatile. The average January power variation over the last 12 years is 94% of installed capacity. It is an uncontrolled variation decided by the weather. The average minimum output is only 3.7% or 0.9 GW in a 25 GW system. Power swings of 70% in 30 hours are the norm in January.
The government’s expectation is that three quarters of the 2010 renewables target, and the lion’s share of the ‘20% by 2020’ target will be made up of windpower. However, the new research offers predictions which are in keeping with Danish and German empirical experience and demonstrate the need for a broader spread of investment in the renewable sector.
Campbell Dunford, CEO of REF, said: “This important modelling exercise shows that even with best efforts a large wind carpet in the UK would have a low capacity credit, and be a real handful to manage. This isn’t the best way to encourage China and India to move towards the low-carbon economy. As a matter of urgency, for the planet’s sake, we need to bring forward a much broader range of low carbon generating technologies, including the full sweep of renewables. Wind has a place, but it must not be allowed to squeeze out other technologies that have more to offer”.

1. 	According to the article, what is the main disadvantage of windpower?
(a)   	It is variable in capacity.
(b)   	It works best in offshore locations.
(c)    	It is volatile in output.
(d)    	It can’t provide enough power.
(e)    	It works best in the north of Scotland. 

2.  	What is the main purpose of ‘this important modelling exercise’?
(a)   	Setting an example for others.
(b)   	Using the experience of Denmark and Germany.
(c)   	Predicting what would actually happen.
(d)   	Challenging government predictions.
(e)   	Calculating energy output. 

3.    	What are the ‘two significant pieces of research’?
(a)      	A comparison of windpower and other renewables.
(b)      	A comparison of different locations for wind turbines.
(c)      	An analysis of metereological data and of the ROC database.
(d)      	A comparison of the UK experience with those in Denmark and Germany.
(e)      	An analysis of the data base and the production of a windpower model.

3  On Memory  (1580)

There is no man so unsuited for the task of speaking about memory as I am, for I find scarcely a trace of it in myself, and I do not believe there is another man in the world so hideously lacking in it. All my other faculties are poor and ordinary, but in this I think I am most rare and singular, and deserve to gain name and fame thereby.

Besides the natural inconvenience that I suffer on this account – for assuredly, considering how necessary it is, Plato was right in calling memory a great and powerful goddess – in my country, when they want to say that a man has no sense, they say that he has no memory; and when I complain of the shortcomings of my own, people correct me and refuse to believe me, as if I were accusing myself of being a fool. They can see no difference between memory and intellect.

This makes me look much worse off.  But they wrong me, for experience shows that, on the contrary, excellent memories are often coupled with feeble judgements. They also wrong me in this, that the same words that indicate my infirmity, signify ingratitude as well – and I am nothing if I am not a good friend. They blame my affections instead of my memory, and turn an involuntary defect into a willful one.  ‘He has forgotten this request or that promise,’ they say.  ‘He doesn’t remember his friends.  He did not remember to do this, to say that, or to keep quiet about the other, for my sake.’ Certainly I am prone enough to forgetfulness, but as for neglecting, out of indifference, a service which a friend has asked of me, that I do not do. Let them be content with my misfortune and not turn it into a kind of ill-will, a kind quite foreign to my character.

But I find some consolation, first because I have derived from this evil my principal argument against a worse evil, which might have taken root in me: the evil of ambition. For lack of memory is an intolerable defect in anyone who takes on the burden of the world’s affairs.

Then, as several similar examples of nature’s workings show, she has generally strengthened other faculties in me in proportion as this one has grown weaker. I might easily have let my intelligence and judgement follow languidly in other men’s footsteps, as all the world does, without exerting their own power, if other people’s ideas and opinions had ever been present with me by favour of my memory. 

Again, my speech is consequently briefer, for the storehouse of the memory is generally better stocked with material than that of the invention. If my memory had been good, I should have deafened all my friends with my chatter, since any subject that calls out such powers as I have of argument and development warms and extends my eloquence. This would have been lamentable, as I have learned in the case of some of my intimate friends. In proportion as their memory gives them a complete and first-hand view of their subject, so they push their narrative back into the past and burden it with useless details. If the story is a good one, they smother its virtues: if it is not, you curse their fortunate powers of memory or their unfortunate lack of judgement.  

1.	Which quality in the passage is not used to characterise memory?
	
	(a)	good
	
	(b)	excellent
	
	(c)	feeble
	
	(d)	lacking
	
	(e)	necessary

2.	In which of these quotes from the passage does the writer use irony?
 	
	(a)	‘There is no man so unsuited to the task of speaking about memory as I am.’ 
	
	(b)	‘Plato was right in calling memory a great and powerful goddess.’
	
	(c)	‘… lack of memory is an intolerable defect in anyone who takes on the burden of the world’s affairs.’ 
	
	(d)	‘ … for the storehouse of the memory is generally better stocked with         material than that of the invention.’ 
	
	(e)	‘If my memory had been good, I should have deafened all my friends with my chatter’

3.	Which of the following are contrasted in the passage?
	
	(a)	complete and firsthand
	
	(b)	forgetfulness and indifference
	
	(c)	intelligence and judgement
	
	(d)	ideas and opinions
	
	(e)	argument and development

4 Maths

Soon after the first sudoku puzzles began to appear in newspapers a couple of years ago, there came hurried reassurances from worried editors. Sudoku might be a number grid, they soothed, but don't let all those nasty ones, twos and threes frighten you, because you don't need to be any good at maths to do it. 

It was a message that summed up the national attitude to maths. Numbers are something inherently difficult, to be feared and mistrusted. The subject carries a lasting memory of childhood shame and frustration from which we never recover. Maths is for geeks, nerds and misfits; the rest of us get by on a wing, a prayer and a calculator. 

Andrew Hodges, maths lecturer at Wadham College, Oxford, takes a different view of the addictive puzzle. “Sudoku may not require long multiplication or division,” he says, “but it is a very good puzzle that replicates the pattern of thinking required to solve quite complex logical problems in maths. But no one dares mention the association, for fear of putting off all those who like doing it.” 

Hodges has spent a lot of time thinking about these sorts of contradictions over the past year while writing One to Nine: The Inner Life of Numbers, his contribution to the growing catalogue of books that aim to make high-brow maths user-friendly for middle-brow arty types. It has to be said that, like many other authors before him, Hodges is only partially successful. You can be reading quite happily for several paragraphs, enjoying the feeling of a new world opening up, and then he loses you in a sentence. And no matter how often you re-read that sentence, you’re still none the wiser. You have come up against a barrier of understanding that language cannot easily transcend. In chapter nine, for example, Hodges states: “By about 20 [years old], it is possible to catch up with current knowledge in one small area - for instance, in the heartland of mystery and discovery to which elliptic functions are the doorway.”. 

Hodges laughs: “Even when I was writing the book, I knew that it was part folly because, for almost all readers, it was going to be an exercise in alienation just to pick it up.”. 

He explains: “Most people seem to remember maths as their worst subject and have developed a mental block about it. So there will be a lot of areas about which they know nothing. Everyone who tries to popularise maths understands they are going to come up against this, but most choose to ignore it and carry on regardless. I felt it was important to address this barrier between writer and reader head on.”.

Which is easier said than done, when you realise just how limited many people’s maths often is. Only last week, Camelot had to withdraw one of its scratchcards when loads of punters complained that they couldn't understand why − 9 was a lower number than − 8. For Hodges, the real battleground is the syllabus at key stages 3 and 4, where the ante gets upped from relatively straightforward maths to something altogether more  complicated: an uneasy hybrid of the Athenian Euclidian abstract logic that was so appealing to the Victorian gentry and  the relentless grind of long calculation that has its roots in the pre-computer era when bosses needed clerks to keep books and ledgers with metronomic accuracy.

“There still needs to be a syllabus that stretches the most able and provides them with a route on to A-level and university”; he says. “But I think we should consider abandoning it as a compulsory subject. What’s the point in a system that brands all those who don’t get a maths GCSE as lifelong failures? All it does is reinforce their sense that maths is boring and difficult which is the last thing we should be doing.” He would like to see a change of approach.  “We should be trying to find ways of equipping children with the basic maths they will need to function adequately in society. I’m sure there are wonderful examples of good teaching practice to be found in schools, but the curriculum is very prescriptive and most teachers don’t have the time to be creative. We should be looking at ways of teaching maths skills through other media such as electronic music and web design, that are more relevant to most students.”.

1.	
Which of the following is intended as the significant point about sudoku?

(a)	It isn’t mathematical.

(b)	It is mathematical.

(c)	It is addictive.

(d)	It requires logical skills.

(e)	You have to be good at maths to do it.

2.	Which of the following words is being used as a criticism in the passage?

(a)	‘battleground’

(b)	‘hybrid’

(c)	‘abstract’

(d)	‘grind’

(e)	metronomic 

3.	Which of the following is implied but not stated?

(a)	Maths is a changing subject.

(b)	People are afraid of maths.

(c)	Maths was most people’s worst subject.

(d)	Maths make people feel a failure.

(e)	Maths is for geeks. 

4.	The writer states that Hodges’ book is targeted at which of the following

	(a)	People who do puzzles like sudoku

	(b)	People who know more about the arts than about maths

	(c)	People who have a mental block about maths

	(d)	People who think maths is boring and difficult

	(e)	People who failed at maths at school 

5 Mechanics’ Institutions

In practically every town of any size an intelligent workman who wanted to improve and educate himself would find by the forties a Mechanics’ Institution, or some similar society. In England, in 1850, it was estimated that there were seven hundred of these societies with 107,000 members. The libraries connected with them contained over 690,000 books. But though the figures sound impressive, these institutions caused much searching of heart. They had failed to fulfil the expectations of their founders. Their rate of mortality was high, though their birth-rate was also high, and even in those that were comfortably established the membership was apt to fluctuate with alarming rapidity. To understand their position, it is necessary to glance back at their origins. 

These institutions were started by Brougham and Birkbeck in the twenties at a time when, as a writer described it, “there still prevailed in many quarters a strong jealousy of any political discussion by the people, and still more of any society which proposed to assemble periodically several hundreds of the labouring classes”. Hence their founders, in their desire to conciliate opposition, banned political or religious discussion or books, and forbade newspapers. Even so, the St James’ Chronicle could say of the London Mechanics’ Institution in 1825, “A scheme more completely adapted for the destruction of this empire could not have been invented by the author of evil himself than that which the depraved ambition of some men, the vanity of others, and the supineness of a third and more important class, has so nearly perfected.” Even their advocates felt a certain need for apology: “I am at a loss,” said Sir Benjamin Heywood, President of the Manchester Mechanics’ Institution, in 1827, “to see how we are disturbing the proper station of the working classes, and giving them an undue elevation; we do not alter their relative position; a spirit of intellectual activity, unequalled in any age or country, now prevails amongst us, and, if the superstructure be renewed and strengthened, it does not seem fitting that the foundation should be neglected.”.

Mechanics’ Institutions were established in the hope of popularizing scientific knowledge, and incidentally making the workman better at his work. The latter motive at first received the chief emphasis. At Manchester, for example, the preamble declared that “this society was formed for the purpose of enabling Mechanics and Artizans of whatever trade they may be, to become acquainted with such branches of science as are of practical application in the exercise of that trade, that they may possess a more thorough knowledge of their business, acquire a greater degree of skill in the practice of it, and be qualified to make improvements and even new inventions in the Arts which they respectively profess.”.

1.	
What comes closest to the meaning of ‘But though the figures sound impressive, these institutions caused much searching of heart.’?

(a)	Although there were many books, the workmen were not reading enough of them.

(b)	More societies were needed.

(c)	They did not help workmen to work better.

(d)	More institutions closed down than opened up.

(e)	Their stability was unpredictable.

2.	The writers suggest that the founders of the Mechanics’ Institutions banned political or religious discussion or books, and forbade newspapers because:

(a)	They wanted to forestall criticism of the institutions

(b)	They did not want to encourage political upheaval 

(c)	They wanted workmen to read improving books

(d)	They feared the destruction of the British empire

(e)	They wanted to encourage scientific knowledge

3.	What is the main argument made by Sir Benjamin Heywood in defence of Mechanics’ Institutions?

(a)	They make the workman better at his work.

(b)	They help the working classes to improve their status.

(c)	They do not alter the relative position of the working classes.

(d)	They help renew the superstructure.

(e)	They make England greater than any other country.

4.	What comes closest to the meaning of ‘jealousy’ as used in the second paragraph?

	(a)	Envy

	(b)	Suspicion

	(c)	Disapproval

	(d)	Fear

	(e)	Resentment

6  The future of work

‘So what do you do?’ The classic opening gambit almost everywhere in Western society. Rightly or wrongly work defines you.  It can give you status, encapsulate in a word your skills and knowledge, and even hint strongly about your predispositions and emotional make-up. Imagine then a society where jobs no longer exist. The notions of ‘workers’ and ‘management’ have long been consigned to history, as all the late 20th century dreams of the human resources industry have come to pass. Instead of a cumbersome crowd of biddable operatives, the workforce is comprised of flexible, curious, commercially savvy individuals who are fully aware of their own strengths and weaknesses. The paragons accordingly take responsibility for planning their own career paths. Everyone is an expert or specialist in something, and on the alert for lifelong retraining. On an almost daily basis these multi-module operatives will make instant, plug-in-and-play contributions to small, highly flexible companies with fluctuating daily needs.

Alternatively, the change in work patterns might throw into sharp focus the deep and terrifying question of your intrinsic worth as a person. Just think of the bleak prospect of an insecure, anxious society; most people feel inadequate, unable to keep up with the pace of change or cope with the uncertain nature of their employment. In times to come, far from a simplistic split according to colour of collar, there might be the more invidious distinction of the technological master class versus the − in employment terms − truly useless.

Which is it to be?  If the IT revolution is changing the way we view ourselves in relation to the outside world, then its influence on what we actually do there will be immediate and far reaching; within the workplace this cyber-upheaval will determine how we interact with other people and things, and hence how we see ourselves. The computer, more than any other single object, will drive the change in work patterns, and even redefine the concept of work itself.

Apparently it takes some fifty years to optimise a technology and only at fifty years old, did the ‘new’ computer technology become hyperproductive, delivering all its promises simultaneously. At last, at the turn of the century, IT has finally matured into adjectives such as ‘cheap’ and ‘easy to use’, with the tsunami of applications and knock-on implications it has for our lives. But just as IT has become of age, so it might be simultaneously doomed − at least in its familiar silicon guise, powered by fossil fuels. The big problem is that the workhorse components of the computer, its transistors and wiring, cannot shrink any smaller than the width of an atom. So, if computers are to be powerful enough to support and sustain the dramatic reality-changing devices that are otherwise technically feasible, then an alternative, fundamentally different type of computational system will soon be needed. The future of work is therefore tightly intertwined with that of the computer, or rather with the issue of what its successors might be, and what they will be able to do.

1.
	The writer implies rather than states that in the computer-dominated workplace of the future:
	
	(a)	what you do in Western society will define you   
	
	(b)	people of pensionable age will be unemployable
	
	(c)	heavy industrial plants will no longer exist
	
	(d)	specialisms will be of short and varying durations
	
	(e)	there will no longer be fossil fuels to power the economy

2.	Which of the following does not serve to develop the argument?
	
	(a)	‘… its transistors and wiring, cannot shrink any smaller than the width of an atom.’
	
	(b)	‘… all the late 20th century dreams of the human resources industry have come to pass.’ 
	
	(c)	‘IT has finally matured into adjectives such as ‘cheap’ and ‘easy to use, …’
	
	(d)	‘The computer, more than any other single object, will drive the change in work patterns, …’
	
	(e)	Each of (a) − (d) develops the argument.

3.	Whi   	Which of the following pairings does the writer not use or refer to in setting apart two groups of people?
	
	(a)	workers   /   management
	
	(b)	cumbersome crowd    /   the paragons 
	
	(c)	biddable operatives   /   flexible individuals
	
	(d)	master class   /   truly useless
	
	(e)	multi-module operatives   /   inadequate individuals

7 Thomas Aquinas

The five “proofs” asserted by Thomas Aquinas in the 13th century don’t prove anything, and are easily - though I hesitate to say so, given his eminence - exposed as vacuous. The first three are just different ways of saying the same thing, and they can be considered together. All involve an infinite regress - the answer to a question raises a prior question, and so on ad infinitum. 

1 The Unmoved Mover 

Nothing moves without a prior mover. This leads us to an infinite regress, from which the only escape is God. Something had to make the first move, and that something we call God. 

2 The Uncaused Cause 

Nothing is caused by itself. Every effect has a prior cause, and again we are pushed back into infinite regress. This has to be terminated by a first cause, which we call God. 

3 The Cosmological Argument 

There must have been a time when no physical things existed. But, since physical things exist now, there must have been something non-physical to bring them into existence, and that something we call God. 

All three of these arguments rely upon the idea of an infinite regress and invoke God to terminate it. They make the entirely unwarranted assumption that God himself is immune to the regress. Even if we allow the dubious luxury of arbitrarily conjuring up a terminator to an infinite regress and giving it a name, simply because we need one, there is absolutely no reason to endow that terminator with any of the properties normally ascribed to God; omnipotence, omniscience, goodness, creativity of design, to say nothing of such human attributes as listening to prayers, forgiving sins and reading innermost thoughts. 
	 
Edward Lear’s Nonsense Recipe for Crumboblious Cutlets invites us to “Procure some strips of beef, and having cut them into the smallest possible pieces, proceed to cut them still smaller, eight or perhaps nine times”. Some regresses do reach a natural terminator. Scientists used to wonder what would happen if you could dissect, say, gold into the smallest possible pieces. Why shouldn’t you cut one of those pieces in half and produce an even smaller smidgin of gold? The regress in this case is decisively terminated by the atom. The smallest possible piece of gold is a nucleus consisting of exactly 79 protons and a slightly larger number of neutrons, surrounded by a swarm of 79 electrons. If you “cut” gold any further than the level of the single atom whatever else you get it is not gold. The atom provides a natural terminator to the Crumboblious Cutlets type of regress. It is by no means clear that God provides a natural terminator to the regresses of Aquinas. 

Let’s move on down Aquinas’s list.

4 The Argument from Degree

We notice that things in the world differ. There are degrees of, say, goodness or perfection. But we judge these degrees only by comparison with a maximum. Humans can be both good and bad, so the maximum goodness cannot rest in us. Therefore there must be some other maximum to set the standard for perfection, and we call that maximum God.

That’s an argument? You might as well say, people vary in smelliness but we can make the comparison only by reference to a perfect maximum of conceivable smelliness. Therefore there must exist a pre-eminently peerless stinker, and we call him God. Or substitute any dimension of comparison you like and derive an equivalently fatuous conclusion.

1.	
Which of these best sums up the idea of ‘infinite regress’?

(a)	‘There must have been a time when no physical things existed.’
(b)	‘Something had to make the first move’
(c)	‘ad infinitum’
(d)	‘Nothing is caused by itself’
(e)	‘the only escape is God’

2.	What does the writer suggest is the main flaw in these first three arguments?
(a)	They are too similar.
(b)	They are arbitrary.
(c)	They only name the terminator because a name is needed.
(d)	There is no reason to endow the terminator with god-like qualities.
(e)	There is no evidence for the arguments.

3.	What does the writer suggest is the main difference between the ‘argument from degree’ and the first three arguments? 
(a)	The argument from degree deals with questions of morality.
(b)	The argument from degree relies on an invalid comparison.
(c)	The argument from degree assumes we understand divine qualities. 
(d)	The argument from degree has a fatuous conclusion.
(e)	The argument from degree doesn’t rely on infinite regression.

4.	What comes closest to the main argument in the paragraph which begins
‘Edward Lear’s Nonsense Recipe for Crumboblious Cutlets’?
(a)	The idea of infinite regress is nonsense.
(b)	The concept of God as a natural terminator is meaningless.
(c)	The concept of God as a natural terminator is unnecessary.
(d)	Aquinas’s ‘regresses’ are not really regresses at all.
(e)	The atom is the natural terminator of physical substances. 

          8  Evolutionary borderlines

The logical conclusion to the anti-abortionist’s ‘human potential’ argument is that we potentially deprive a human soul of the gift of existence every time we fail to seize any opportunity for sexual intercourse. Every refusal of any offer of copulation by a fertile individual is, by this dopey ‘pro-life’ logic, tantamount to the murder of a potential child! Even resisting rape could be represented as murdering a potential baby. Notice that ‘pro-life’ doesn’t exactly mean pro-life at all.  It means pro-human-life. The granting of uniquely special rights to cells of the species Homo sapiens is hard to reconcile with the fact of evolution. Admittedly, this will not worry those many anti-abortionists who don’t understand that evolution is a fact! But let me briefly spell out the argument for the benefit of anti-abortion activists who may be less ignorant of science.

The evolutionary point is very simple. The humanness of an embryo’s cells cannot confer upon it any absolutely discontinuous moral status. It cannot, because of our evolutionary continuity with chimpanzees and, more distantly, with every species on the planet. To see this, imagine that an intermediate species, say Australopithecus afarensis, had chanced to survive and was discovered in a remote part of Africa. Would these creatures ‘count as human’ or not? To a consequentialist like me, the question doesn’t deserve an answer, for nothing turns on it. It is enough that we would be fascinated and honoured to meet the new ‘Lucy’. The absolutist, on the other hand, must answer the question, in order to apply the moral principle of granting humans unique and special status because they are human. If it came to the crunch, they would presumably need to set up courts, like those of apartheid South Africa, to decide whether a particular individual should ‘pass for human’.

Even if a clear answer might be attempted for Australopithecus, the gradual continuity that is an inescapable feature of biological evolution tells us that there must be some intermediate who would be sufficiently close to the ‘borderline’ to blur the moral principle and destroy its absoluteness. A better way to say this is that there are no natural borderlines in evolution. The illusion of a borderline is created by the fact that the evolutionary intermediates happen to be extinct. Of course, it could be argued that humans are more capable of, for example, suffering than other species. This could well be true, and we might legitimately give humans special status by virtue of it. But evolutionary continuity shows that there is no absolute distinction. Absolutist moral discrimination is devastatingly undermined by the fact of evolution. An uneasy awareness of this fact might, indeed, underlie one of the main motives creationists have for opposing evolution: they fear what they believe to be its moral consequences. They are wrong to do so but, in any case, it is surely very odd to think that a truth about the real world can be reversed by considerations of what would be morally desirable.

1.	The tone of the writing in the first paragraph is:
	
	(a)	legalistic
	
	(b)	logical
	
	(c)	opinionated
	
	(d)	scientific
	
	(e)	sarcastic	

2.	Which of the following does not introduce a new argument?
	
	(a)	‘Notice that …’
	
	(b)	‘But let me …’
	
	(c)	‘To see this …’
	
	(d)	‘Even if …’
	
	(e)	‘Of course …’

3.	The most important fact which the writer seeks to convince the reader of is:  
	
	(a)	the truth of evolution 
	
	(b)	the continuous nature of evolution
	
	(c)	the wrongness of  the absolutist’s viewpoint
	
	(d)	the lack of absolutist moral discrimination
	
	(e)	the status of an intermediate ‘human’ species

       9 The Myth of Mars and Venus

John Gray’s Men Are From Mars, Women Are From Venus contains a chapter entitled  Speaking Different Languages. In it, Gray says that the “original” Martians and Venusians communicated without difficulty, because they knew their languages were mutually incomprehensible. Modern men and women, by contrast, are under the illusion that they speak the same language. But though the words they use may be the same, their meanings for each sex are different. The result is that men and women often do not understand one another. 

The idea that men and women metaphorically “speak different languages” is not, of course, popular or new, but the myth of Mars and Venus has given it new currency and legitimacy. What was once just a metaphor has acquired the status of literal, scientific truth. Today, it is widely believed that misunderstanding between men and women is a widespread and serious problem. But is our concern about it justified by the evidence, or is “male-female miscommunication” a myth?

Before the myth of Mars and Venus, the idea that women communicate less directly than men was associated with concerns about women’s alleged lack of assertiveness and confidence. The importance of speaking was a staple topic in assertiveness training, and advice based on the same principle was common in self-help books and women’s magazines, especially those addressed to professional women. For instance, a 1992 article in Options magazine on “10 classic career mistakes all women make” lists “using tentative language” as number nine.  “How many times have you heard someone say things like, ‘I’m not really sure if I’m right, but perhaps…’?” the article asked. “With all that kind of talk, who is going to believe we are confident in what we are saying?... Too often we make statements as if they were questions, such as, ‘We’ll bring the deadline forward, OK?’ ”

Options counsels women to avoid tentative language on the grounds that it makes them sound weak and indecisive – the argument put forward by Robin Lakoff in her influential 1970s text, Language and Woman’s Place. But, over time, a different argument has become more popular. The following tip comes from Glamour magazine: “Speak directly to male subordinates. Women tend to shy away from giving a blatant order, but men find the indirect approach manipulative and confusing.” Here women are told to speak directly to men, not because indirectness undermines their authority but because men find it “manipulative and confusing”. The substance of the advice has not changed, but the theory behind it has shifted from a “deficit model” of gender differences (women’s ways of speaking are inferior to men’s) to a “cross-cultural approach” (the two styles are equally valid, but the difference between them can lead to misunderstanding).

This raises two questions. First, if the male and female styles are equally valid, why does it always seem to be women who are told they must accommodate to men’s preferences – even, apparently, when men are their subordinates? Is avoiding male-female miscommunication an exclusively female responsibility? Second, though, why is it assumed that indirectness causes miscommunication in the first place? What is the evidence that men are confused by it?

(Source: Deborah Cameron, The Myth of Mars and Venus, Oxford University Press, 2007)
(published in The Guardian, 2 October, 2007)
Cameron argues persuasively that the Mars and Venus myth does threaten women. Consistently, as she shows, aspects of the way our society is currently structured are taken to be clues to some basic difference in the nature of men and women, which always turns out to be to women’s disadvantage, a “natural” reason to keep them in lower-status roles. Cameron discusses Simon Baron-Cohen’s book, The Essential Difference, which posits a distinction between the male and female brains and concludes that “people with the female brain”, supposedly more empathetic, are better at jobs such as nursing,…  and the male-brained, supposedly more analytical, make better lawyers. Cameron comments aptly that nurses also need to be analytical and lawyers need people skills: “These categorisations are not based on a dispassionate analysis of the demands made by the two jobs. They are based on the everyday common-sense knowledge that most nurses are women and most lawyers are men.” 
(Source: Steven Poole, The Guardian , 20 October 2007) 
1.	
Which of the following is Deborah Cameron’s main objection to John Gray’s theory about ‘miscommunication’?
(a)	Male and female brains are not different.
(b)	Women talk as well as men do.
(c)	There is insufficient evidence for Gray’s theory.
(d)	Women should not have to change the way they speak.  
(e)	Men can easily understand what women say.

2.	Which one of the following would agree that women speak less effectively than men?
(a)	Simon Baron-Cohen
(b)	Deborah Cameron
(c)	John Gray
(d)	Robin Lakoff
(e)	Glamour magazine

3.	Glamour magazine and Options magazine would agree on all of the following except:
(a)	women can be misunderstood by men
(b)	women’s speech affects their careers
(c)	women should speak directly to men 
(d)	women should be the ones to change the way they speak
(e)	there are gender differences in speech
4.	What is Deborah Cameron’s main objection to Simon Baron-Cohen’s views?
	(a)	It is not natural for women to be kept in lower-status roles
	(b)	Simon Baron-Cohen’s categories have no evidence to support them
	(c)	Men are not more analytical than women
	(d)	Simon Baron-Cohen’s job categories are incorrect
	(e)	Male and female brains are not different	

           10  Classic Books
A   The best ‘classic’ novels are an odd mixture. On the one hand, they tend to be written by people with strange names and are set in increasingly distant and peculiar ages, where the clothes are never dry-cleaned and the characters fight duels, go to balls, ride horses and take snuff. But they also pull off the miraculous feat of speaking to us more directly, more urgently than anything written in our own time. While seemingly engaged in her own love story in nineteenth-century rural France, Emma Bovary will continue to shed light on the romantic travails of people living in twenty-first-century space stations. 
B   My definition of a ‘classic’ novel is a book that has stood the test of time, remained in print, is esteemed by other writers and has provoked a degree of critical interest. The test of time is a hopelessly arbitrary standard; my barrier is twenty-five years. It could with equal reason be a bit more or less. Examples of writers who have attained this status are Patrick Hamilton and Henry Green. Their work has been frequently reissued and finds a small but renewed readership, other writers insist upon their achievements and they have positions in the history of twentieth-century English Literature, albeit as minor figures. Alternatively, their contemporary Joyce Cary has failed to make the cut despite enthusiasts and occasional reissues. 
I am not sure that the term is very useful anymore. The notion that the passage of time is relevant to the accuracy of the claim that something is a classic is ignored and the word has been appropriated into the vocabulary of marketing.
C   When I visited a school not so long ago, a teacher told me of the father of a little girl of eleven who had a simple rule as far as reading was concerned: only bona fide classics would be allowed in the family home. All non-classics were banned. The result, of course, was the child was utterly uninterested in reading. And who can blame her?
I loathe the snobbery and intellectual laziness behind the idea of the classic novel. For me, a book generally regarded as a classic ceases to be a personal friend and becomes something solid, socially acceptable and morally improving. It’s a school prefect, set up by my betters as a model of how to write. I want to thumb my nose at its pages.
D  The problem with the word ‘classic’ is the same as with the word ‘literature’. These are terms readily understood, admired and even loved by those who are in the professions of books and learning. In this age of political correctness, however, they smack of the most dreaded charge of all, namely that of elitism. To suggest that one thing is actually better than another is these days considered politically unacceptable. 

1.  	Which of the following writers would agree that a ‘classic’ novel can be easily categorised at the time of publication?
(a)     	A and B
(b)     	C
(c)     	D
(d)     	B and C
(e)     	A and D

2.  	Which of the following is not used by the writers to express approval of ‘classic’ books?
(a)    	Other writers have  a good opinion of them.
(b)    	They are morally improving.
(c)    	They stay in print. 
(d)    	They speak directly to the reader.
(e)    	They are better than other books.

3.   	Writer B contrasts the novels of Patrick Hamilton and Henry Green with those of Joyce Cary, mainly to
(a)    	suggest that distinctions between writers are entirely arbitrary
(b)   	argue that critical judgements are very subjective
(c)     	illustrate the application of her suggested criteria
(d)    	claim that Hamilton and Green are major writers but Cary is not
(e)    	suggest that Cary’s books also deserve to be read today

11 Traditional vs. Progressive Education

The history of educational theory is marked by opposition between the idea that education is development from within and that it is formation from without; that it is based upon natural endowments and that education is a process of overcoming natural inclination and substituting in its place habits acquired under external pressure. 

At present, the opposition, so far as practical affairs of the school are concerned, tends to take the form of contrast between traditional and progressive education. If the underlying ideas of the former are formulated broadly, without the qualifications required for accurate statement, they are found to be about as follows: The subject matter of education consists of bodies of information and of skills that have been worked out in the past; therefore, the chief business of the school is to transmit them to the new generation. In the past, there have also been developed standards and rules of conduct; moral training consists in forming habits of action in conformity with these rules and standards. Finally, the general pattern of school organization (by which I mean the relations of pupils to one another and to the teachers) constitutes the school a kind of institution sharply marked off from other social institutions. Call up in imagination the ordinary schoolroom, its time-schedules, schemes of classification, of examination and promotion, of rules of order, and I think you will grasp what is meant by “pattern of organization.” If then you contrast this scene with what goes on in the family, for example, you will appreciate what is meant by the school being a kind of institution sharply marked off from any other form of social organization.  

The three characteristics just mentioned fix the aims and methods of instruction and discipline. The main purpose or objective is to prepare the young for future responsibilities and for success in life, by means of acquisition of the organized bodies of information and prepared forms of skill which comprehend the material of instruction. Since the subject-matter as well as standards of proper conduct are handed down from the past, the attitude of pupils must, upon the whole, be one of docility, receptivity, and obedience. Books, especially textbooks, are the chief representatives of the lore and wisdom of the past, while teachers are the organs, through which pupils are brought into effective connection with the material. Teachers are the agents through which knowledge and skills are communicated and rules of conduct enforced. 

I have not made this brief summary for the purpose of criticizing the underlying philosophy. The rise of what is called new education and progressive schools is of itself a product of discontent with traditional education. In effect it is a criticism of the latter. When the implied criticism is made explicit it reads somewhat as follows: The traditional scheme is, in essence, one of imposition from above and from outside. It imposes adult standards, subject-matter, and methods upon those who are only growing slowly toward maturity. The gap is so great that the required subject-matter, the methods of learning and of behaving are foreign to the existing capacities of the young. They are beyond the reach of the experience the young learners already possess. Consequently, they must be imposed; even though good teachers will use devices of art to cover up the imposition so as to relieve it of obviously brutal features. 

But the gulf between the mature or adult products and the experience and abilities of the young is so wide that the very situation forbids much active participation by pupils in the development of what is taught. Theirs is to do - and learn, as it was the part of the six hundred to do and die. Learning here means acquisition of what already is incorporated in books and in the heads of the elders. Moreover, that which is taught is thought of as essentially static. It is taught as a finished product, with little regard either to the ways in which it was originally built up or to changes that will surely occur in the future. It is to a large extent the cultural product of societies that assumed the future would be much like the past, and yet it is used as educational food in a society where change is the rule, not the exception. 

1.	
Which of the following does the writer present as paradoxical?

(a)	There is a gulf between mature adults and children.
(b)	The teachers are older while pupils are young.
(c)	What is taught in schools is passive but should be active.
(d)	Pupils are prepared for the future by reliance on the past.
(e)	The rise of new education is a product of discontent with traditional education.

2.	Which one of the following is not suggested as a possible feature of the ‘general pattern of school organization’?
(a)	timetables
(b)	examinations
(c)	school uniform
(d)	school rules
(e)	a set curriculum

3.	Based on the passage, which of the following would not be characteristic of progressive education?
(a)	Active learning.
(b)	Devices of art.
(c)	Self-expression.
(d)	Learning through experience.
(e)	Self- discipline.

4.	What is the writer’s main objection to traditional education in the last paragraph?
	(a)	Pupils can’t participate actively in their own education
	(b)	Learning means acquiring information from others
	(c)	What is taught is static
	(d)	There is too big a gulf between adults and young people
	(f)	What is learnt will not prepare pupils for the future. 	

12  Business Intelligence

Before the recent branding changeover, management decided to improve a number of inefficient business processes that led to poor decision making. The project was not a technology driven assignment but a key operational overhaul. The foundation for the project was the need to analyse and understand existing business processes to identify inefficiencies and weaknesses.

As part of the programme, Zavvi has moved to store-specific ranging, with teams able to optimise product sales by monitoring how particular product categories perform – via real-time reporting. “This programme currently covers music and DVDs,” says Tony Johnson, IT Director at Zavvi Entertainment, “We can range on a far more micro level than ever before, building on a store-by-store basis to maximise sales and the business intelligence system for dynamic management. Feeding data during the day, instead of daily batch downloads, means inventory is updated in real time – with updates every five minutes, rather than the previous 24 hour delay,” explains Johnson. Ad hoc reports are also able to provide greater flexibility in monitoring new products. For example, release dates for new DVDs and CDs are different in the UK and Ireland. Previously, Zavvi monitored performance for both regions on the same day. UK reporting can now be matched to Monday release dates and Ireland’s to Friday release dates. This now gives merchandisers much more accurate information over initial performance and total sales for each new album.

“Suppliers of new games can often be constrained,” explains Johnson. “With this system we can see sales trends by mid-day on the day the product is released, allowing us to adapt orders to meet likely demand very quickly, resulting in competitive advantage. As part of its ongoing programme, Zavvi analyse inventory management, assortment planning, sales margin analysis and customer footfall analysis – to monitor conversion rate and average transaction value – all under their enterprise-wide BI platform for MicroStrategy. “We now have one version of the truth and we’ve reduced IT workloads so that our analysts have more time to develop, redesign and reconfigure systems instead of simply responding to business user requests,” says Johnson.

Additional applications to be deployed in the future include market basket analysis and better performance analysis of promotional campaigns. Zavvi are also planning to move their marketshare analysis away from a manually created spreadsheet process to a consolidated market share report into their MicroSrategy BI platform. “We were able to conceive and deliver a set of solutions that met key objectives,” says Johnson. “The project structure we created integrated seamlessly into our business processes and work culture. As a result we can look back on a year in which we’ve added real value to the business, and look forward to building on that success as Zavvi continues to win out in the challenging markets in which we operate.”

1.	By ‘performance’ the writer means:
	
	(a)	maximising a product’s total sales
	
	(b)	how a given item is selling 
	
	(c)	the value of the average transaction per store
	
	(d)	responding to requests from business users
	
	(e)	how successful promotional campaigns are	

2.	Which of the following has not contributed to innovation at Zavvi Entertainment?
	
	(a)	‘store-specific ranging’
	
	(b)	‘real-time reporting’
	
	(c)	‘inventory management’
	
	(d)	‘daily batch downloads’
	
	(e)	‘average transaction value’

3.	The writer maintains that the most important result of the new project structure was:
	
	(a)	better decision making 
	
	(b)	a BI system for dynamic management
	
	(c)	a customer service analysis 
	
	(d)	the BI platform for MicroStrategy
	
	(e)	the reduction of IT workloads

Section B: Essay

Answer ONE of the following questions.

Your answer should be a reasoned and substantiated argument which justifies your response to the question. 

1.	In a Western society arranged marriages should no longer be tolerated.  Discuss.

2.	‘Modern society is too dependent on debt: we should all pay our way.’ Do you agree?

3.	The Danish cartoons of the Prophet Mohammed should never have been published. Do you agree?   

4.	The internet and instant communication technologies are profoundly changing our world for the better.  Do you agree?

5.	What is your response to the view that the purpose of education is to prepare young people for the world of work?