Catch's SAT Journey

catchtwentythree
Tue, 18 Sep 2012 23:22:19 +0000

^Thanks! :D

^^ TheNexus: Aww, don’t get discouraged. Here- what is your goal score for October? We can aim high together and beat this test. Seriously.

OK, since I don’t know which questions you got wrong, I’ll just explain a few random ones from the Pasteur section:

The focus of the lecture is on how Pasteur
(A) disproved an erroneous theory
(B) documented and published his experiments
(C) developed a process for killing microbes
(D) applied his findings on spontaneous generation to new problems
(E) contributed to the improvement of laboratory
research standards

It’s A. He disproved the erroneous-aka wrong-theory of life from spontaneous generation by proving that the growth on the broth came from bacteria, not from some magical place in the life-giving air. B- he did explain his experiments, and obviously publish and document them, but this wasn’t the focus of the lecture. The passage doesn’t even mention C, D, or E.


In the lecture, Pasteur concludes that the answer to the question “Where and how did they arise?” (lines 1-2) is
(A) spontaneously
(B) from airborne bacteria
(C) from impurities in the original broth
(D) from the curved neck of a flask
(E) from a broken flask


It’s not A, because that’s the very theory he was suspicious of the entire time, and eventually disproved; not C, because he boiled the impurities out of the original broth; not D or B, because the microbes don’t come from the flasks (otherwise all of the broths would be contaminated); it’s B because his experiments proved that bacteria existed in the air.

Pasteur’s pronouncement about preparation and chance in lines 20-23 implies that
(A) only projects that have an immediate application are important
(B) practice improves a scientist’s chances of making a significant discovery
(C) few scientists are lucky enough to devise useful theories
(D) work on projects that have no immediate application prepares scientists to exploit chance discoveries
(E) most scientific discoveries that have no immediate application are the result of good luck and timing

This one was tricky.
So Pasteur’s famous quote is “chance favors the prepared mind.” I eliminated A, C, and E (ask me if you want me to explain my reasoning) and was left was B and D.

Let’s look at B: “practice improves a scientist’s chances of making a significant discovery”

That might be true. After all, Pasteur does “practice” a lot by repeatedly making more and more convincing flask experiments. However, look again at the question- it asks about BOTH preparation AND chance. What does “B” say about chance? …Nothing.

Now let’s look at D: “work on projects that have no immediate application prepares scientists to exploit chance discoveries”

This is also true. What’s more, it talks about both practice and chance, and it’s supported by the passage. So the best answer (between B and D) is D.