INFERENCE QUESTIONS

A heliograph is a semaphore device used for sending optical communications—usually in the form of Morse code—by reflecting flashes of sunlight off a mirror. Heliographs were used for rapid communication across expansive distances for military, surveying, and forestry purposes during the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, but they were largely effective only during the daytime, and the range of the device depended on factors such as the opacity of the air and line of sight. Therefore, heliographs were eventually replaced by technology that ______

Which choice most logically completes the text?

• A. was not so constrained by environmental circumstances.

• B. could be used for more than military, surveying, or forestry purposes.

• C. enabled communication that didn’t require knowledge of Morse code.

• D. worked on similar principles but was easier to produce and maintain.

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Researchers Suchithra Rajendran and Maximilian Popfinger modeled varying levels of passenger redistribution from short-haul flights (flights of 50 to 210 minutes, from takeoff to landing) to high-speed rail trips. Planes travel faster than trains, but air travel typically requires 3 hours of lead time for security, baggage handling, and boarding that rail travel doesn't, so short-haul routes take similar amounts of time by air and by rail. However, the model suggests that as rail passenger volumes approach current capacity limits, long lead times emerge. Therefore, for rail to remain a viable alternative to short-haul flights, ______

Which choice most logically completes the text?

• A. rail systems should offer fewer long-haul routes and airlines should offer more long-haul routes.

• B. rail systems may need to schedule additional trains for these routes.

• C. security, baggage handling, and boarding procedures used by airlines may need to be implemented for rail systems.

• D. passengers who travel by rail for these routes will need to accept that lead times will be similar to those for air travel.

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As the name suggests, dramaturges originated in theater, where they continue to serve a variety of functions: conducting historical research for directors, compiling character biographies for actors, and perhaps most importantly, helping writers of plays and musicals to hone the works' stories and characters. Performance scholar Susan Manning observes that many choreographers, like playwrights and musical theater writers, are concerned with storytelling and characterization. In fact, some choreographers describe the dances they create as expressions of narrative through movement; it is, therefore, unsurprising that ______

Which choice most logically completes the text?

• A. some directors and actors rely too heavily on dramaturges to complete certain research tasks.

• B. choreographers developing dances with narrative elements frequently engage dramaturges to assist in refining those elements.

• C. dramaturges can have a profound impact on the artistic direction of plays and musicals.

• D. dances by choreographers who incorporate narrative elements are more accessible to audiences than dances by choreographers who do not.DDR

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Off-off-Broadway theaters emerged in the late 1950s as a rebellion against mainstream Broadway theaters in New York, freeing artists to create productions that were more experimental than typical Broadway shows. One such artist was playwright María Irene Fornés. Working with off-off Broadway theaters enabled Fornés not only to direct her own plays but also to direct them exactly as she intended them to be staged, regardless of how strange the results might have seemed to audiences accustomed to Broadway shows. In this way, Fornés ______

Which choice most logically completes the text?

• A. would have been more famous if she had created plays that were mainstream instead of experimental.

• B. recognized that staging an off-off-Broadway play was more complicated than staging a Broadway play.

• C. wrote plays that would have been too expensive to produce if someone else had directed the production.

• D. illustrates the artistic opportunity offered by off-off Broadway theaters.

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Gestures in painting are typically thought of as bold, expressive brushstrokes. In the 1970s, American painter Jack Whitten built a 12-foot (3.7-meter) tool he named the "developer" to apply paint to an entire canvas in one motion, resulting in his series of "slab" paintings from that decade. Whitten described this process as making an entire painting in "one gesture," signaling a clear departure from the prevalence of gestures in his work from the 1960s. Some art historians claim this shift represents "removing gesture" from the process. Therefore, regardless of whether using the developer constitutes a gesture, both Whitten and these art historians likely agree that ______

Which choice most logically completes the text?

• A. any tool that a painter uses to create an artwork is capable of creating gestures.

• B. Whitten's work from the 1960s exhibits many more gestures than his work from the 1970s does.

• C. Whitten became less interested in exploring the role of gesture in his work as his career progressed.

• D. Whitten's work from the 1960s is much more realistic than his work from the 1970s is.

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In their book Smart Pricing, Jagmohan Raju and Z. John Zhang consider musicians' use of the nontraditional "pay as you wish" pricing model. This model generally offers listeners the choice to pay more or less than a suggested price for a song or album—or even to pay nothing at all. As the authors note, that's the option most listeners chose for an album by the band Harvey Danger. Only about 1% opted to pay for the album, resulting in earnings below the band's expectations. But the authors also discuss musician Jane Siberry, who saw significant earnings from her "pay as you wish" online music store as a result of many listeners choosing to pay more than the store's suggested prices. Hence, the "pay as you wish" model may ______

Which choice most logically completes the text?

• A. hold greater financial appeal for bands than for individual musicians.

• B. cause most musicians who use the model to lower the suggested prices of their songs and albums over time.

• C. prove financially successful for some musicians but disappointing for others.

• D. more strongly reflect differences in certain musicians' popularity than traditional pricing models do.

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