Is Survival Selfish?

Which is the best summary of the selection?

• It is better in moments of mortal danger to save one’s own life than to try to rescue others.

• In extreme crises, people either hold it together or fall apart, and there is no telling who the heroes will be until danger strikes.

• Heroes are admired when they risk or sacrifice their own lives to save others, but their actions go against accepted survival protocols, which prioritize personal safety.

• People who demonstrate the virtue of selfishness by putting their own lives before the lives of others in an emergency are often criticized in the press.

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CCSS.RI.9-10.2

CCSS.RL.9-10.2

Which is a synonym for the word protocol as the author uses it in paragraph 2?

• Treat

• Convention

• Law

• Procedure

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CCSS.L.9-10.4

CCSS.L.9-10.4A

CCSS.RI.9-10.4

CCSS.RL.9-10.4

In paragraph 3, the author states that every survival situation is different. If this is true, it follows that —

• each survivor is heroic in his or her own unique way

• it is impossible to make generalizations about survivors

• only a few survivors are selfish and uncivilized

• it is impossible to be smart and unselfish

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CCSS.RI.9-10.1

CCSS.RI.9-10.2

CCSS.RI.9-10.3

When the author writes in paragraph 5 that she and her friend walked quickly and calmly outside, how do you think the inclusion of this detail might affect her credibility?

• The author adds to her credibility as an expert on survival by demonstrating her ability to keep a cool head in an emergency.

• The author detracts from her credibility, because she fails to tell us why she or her friend chose to leave Grand Central Station at all.

• The author enhances her credibility as a survivor by reporting that she and her friend left Grand Central in an orderly manner, without a thought for the distress of anyone around them.

• The author undermines her credibility as a witness by drawing attention to herself and seeking to impress the reader with her cool, correct response to the event.

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CCSS.RI.9-10.1

CCSS.RL.9-10.1

CCSS.SL.9-10.3

According to the author, why do survivors often experience feelings of guilt?

• They believe they should have done more to help others even if they had died trying.

• They feel irrationally to blame for the deaths of other people.

• They are confused by the conflicting moral codes attached to survival.

• They feel that they have somehow escaped justice by surviving while others perished.

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CCSS.RL.9-10.1

CCSS.RL.9-10.2

CCSS.RL.9-10.3

Which two rhetorical devices does the author employ in paragraph 11?

• Hyperbole

• Irony

• Oxymoron

• Metaphor

• Rhetorical questions

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CCSS.L.9-10.5

CCSS.L.9-10.5A

CCSS.RL.9-10.4

In paragraph 14, the phrase a thousand cues is —

• a hasty generalization, intended to convey that people do not know what they will do in a crisis

• an overstatement, intended to convey that how people react depends on with which signals, out of the many they receive, they respond to

• an overstatement, intended to convey that survivors are able to respond to many signals at once

• a hasty generalization, intended to convey that survivors are never aware of the choices they make in the moment of crisis

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CCSS.L.9-10.4

CCSS.L.9-10.5

CCSS.RI.9-10.1

CCSS.RI.9-10.4

CCSS.RL.9-10.1

CCSS.RL.9-10.4

Which of the following is a statement of fact, and not an expression of opinion?

• But we still tend to laud those who risk or sacrifice themselves to save others in moments of danger or crisis and look less kindly on those who focus on saving themselves, instead.

• If she’d tried, she probably would have perished with them.

• But Yates was criticized by some for his survival decision, even though the alternative would have almost certainly led to both of their deaths.

• If survival is an instinct, it seems to me that there must be something equally instinctive that drives us, sometimes, to run into danger instead of away from it.

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CCSS.RI.9-10.6

CCSS.RI.9-10.8

“Is Survival Selfish?” describes different kinds of human response to mortal danger and their outcomes. Mark the box that shows which outcome results from each behavior.

• Self Sacrifice - Public Acclaim

• Self Sacrifice - Survival

• Self Preservation - Public Acclaim

• Self Preservation - Survival

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CCSS.RL.9-10.1

CCSS.RL.9-10.2

Which of these sentences requires a comma to distinguish and divide the main clause from the subordinate clause?

• A Yates cut the rope tying him to his friend because there was nothing else to be done.

• Carly put a first aid kit in her car in case of an emergency.

• Even though people have the instinct to survive they sometimes put themselves in danger to save others.

• People left the train station when they heard an explosion.

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CCSS.L.9-10.1

CCSS.L.9-10.2