Comprehension Test Questions and Answers Practice Question and Answer

Q:

Read the following passage carefully and give the answer of following questions.

The cyber–world is ultimately ungovernable. This is alarming as well as convenient; sometimes, convenient because alarming. Some Indian politicians use this to great advantage. When there is an obvious failure in governance during a crisis they deflect attention from their own incompetence towards the ungovernable. So, having failed to prevent nervous citizens from fleeing their cities of work by assuring them of proper protection, some national leaders are now busy trying to prove to one another, and to panic-prone Indians, that a mischievous neighbour has been using the internet and social networking sites to spread dangerous rumours. And the Centre's automatic reaction is to start blocking these sites and begin elaborate and potentially endless negotiations with Google, Twitter and Facebook about access to information. If this is the official idea of prompt action at a time of crisis among communities, then Indians have more reason to fear their protectors than the nebulous mischief-makers of the cyber world. Wasting time gathering proof, blocking vaguely suspicious websites, hurling accusations across the border and worrying about bilateral relations are ways of keeping busy with inessentials because one does not quite known what to do about the essentials of a difficult situation. Besides, only a fifth of the 245 websites blocked by the Centre mention the people of the Northeast or the violence in Assam. And if a few morphed images and spurious texts can unsettle an entire nation, then there is something deeply wrong with the nation and with how it is being governed. This is what its leaders should be addressing immediately, rather than making a wrongheaded display of their powers of censorship.
 It is just as absurd, and part of the same syndrome, to try to ban Twitter accounts that parody despatches from the Prime Minister's Office. To describe such forms of humour and dissent as "misrepresenting" the PMO–as if Twitter would take these parodies for genuine despatches from the PMO — makes the PMO look more ridiculous than its parodists manage to. With the precedent for such action set recently by the chief minister of West Bengal, this is yet another proof that what Bengal thinks today India will think tomorrow. Using the cyber–world for flexing the wrong muscles is essentially not funny. It might even prove to be quite dangerously distracting.

The passage suggests different ways of keeping the public busy with ‘inessentials’. Pick the odd one out.

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    By blocking websites which are vaguely suspicious.
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    By blaming neighbouring countries across the border.
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    By turning the attention of the people to violence in Assam.
    Correct
    Wrong
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    By getting involved in a discourse on bilateral relations.
    Correct
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Answer : 2. "By blaming neighbouring countries across the border."

Q:

Read the following passage carefully and give the answer of following questions.

Art both reflects and interprets the notion that produced it. Portraiture was the dominant theme of British painting up to the end of the eighteenth century because of a persistent demand for it. It would be unfair to say that human vanity and pride of possessions were the only reasons for this persistent demand, but certainly these motives played their part in shaping the course of British painting. Generally speaking, it is the artist's enthusiasm that accounts for the vitality of the picture, but it is the client who dictates its subject-matter. The history of national enthusiasms can be pretty accurately estimated by examining the subject-matter of a nation's art.
 There is one type of subject which recurs again and again in British painting of the late eighteenth century and the jart half of the nineteenth and which is hardly met with in the jart of any other country ---- the sporting picture, or rather the picture in which a love of outdoor life is directed into the channel of sport. The sporting picture is really an extension of the conversation piece. In it the emphasis is even more firmly based on the descriptive side of painting. It made severe demands on the artist and it must be-confessed that painters capable of satisfying these demands were rare. The ability to paint a reasonably convincing landscape is not often combined with the necessary knowledge of horses and dogs in movement and the power to introduce a portrait when necessary. To weld such diverse elements into a satisfactory aesthetic unity requires exceptional ability. It is not surprising, therefore, that while sporting pictures abound in England, especially in the private collections of country squires, not many of them are of real importance as works of art. What makes the sporting picture worth noting in, a history of British painting is the fact that it is as truly indigenous and as truly popular a form of art in England as was the religious ikon in Russia.

British painting of the late eighteenth century and the first halt of the nineteenth century chiefly deals with

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    a love of outdoor life directed into the channel of sport
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    a love of country life which cannot be found in any other country
    Correct
    Wrong
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    love in the open directed into a sporting channel
    Correct
    Wrong
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    love out of doors with enough life in it
    Correct
    Wrong
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Answer : 1. "a love of outdoor life directed into the channel of sport"

Q:

Read the following passage carefully and give answer the following questions.
Two hundred years after Malthus predicted that population growth would overtake food production by a margin of 256 to 9, the simple fact is that food production had always been ahead of the population growth. Malthus’ doomsday prediction simply did not come true due to two major reasons: first, population did not grow geometrically and birth rates in all Western countries fell during the 20- Century, resulting in very slow population growth. Over the past quarter century, birth rates have been falling in the developing countries too. Second, modern agricultural practices and better irrigation have resulted in tremendous growth in food production in almost all parts of the globe, with the notable exception of sub-Saharan Africa. Therefore, at the global level, the Malthusian doomsday never befell on us.
India’s population grew by about two and a half times in the past 45 years — from 361 million in 1951 to an estimated 916 million in 1995. But during the same period, India’s food grain production grew by nearly four times — from 51 million tonnes in 1951 to 191 million tonnes in 1995. As a result, the per capita food grain availability in India has gone up considerably since the Independence. That is, the Malthusian prediction has not come true even in India.

Malthus doomsday prediction did not come true due to two major reasons. They are

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    rapid growth in population and industrial development
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    increase in per capital income and economic progress
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    very slow growth in population and modern agricultural practices and better irrigation
    Correct
    Wrong
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    better facilities in health and hygiene
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Answer : 3. "very slow growth in population and modern agricultural practices and better irrigation"

Q:

In the following passage there are blanks each of which has been numbered. These numbers are printed below the passage and against each four words have been suggested, one of which fits the blanks appropriately. Find out the appropriate word in each case.

The empty ‘Chyawanprash’ containers near the makeshift kitchen at the elephant camp say it all – that the elephants have been having a healthy, nutritious diet as (1) by the veterinary doctors.  The camp managers say that the elephants get to have the nutritious (2) twice a day – morning before bath and early evening, walk eight to 1 km on the walking track twice a day and have loads of green fodder. A few of these elephants also undergo special medication, if necessary. ‘Valli’, a female elephant from the Koodal Azhagar Perumal Koil, Madurai, and ‘Vedanayagi’ another female elephant from Bhavani, Erode, are two such elephants. Based on the veterinarians’ prescription, the managers are treating the two for foot rot disease.
 The elephants get to (3) their legs in a decoction of seven chemicals, a traditional formula, to get over the problem. The foot rot sets in when the elephants are obese, or stand on hard surface or bitumen-topped roads for long with very little movement.
 Likewise, two other elephants are also undergoing eye treatment to overcome the ‘watery eye’ problem. This occurs when the elephants’ living (4) is hot. The managers say that the ingredients of the food and the quantity given to the elephants (5) from one to another and are dependent on the age and gender.
 Based on the two, a body-mass-index of sorts is derived and that determines the food and the quantity. Right at the start of the camp, the managers have noted down the weight of each elephant.
 This will be compared to the (6) that they will record when the elephants exit the camp around the second week of January. The managers say that one important factor in the camp is giving green fodder, which the elephants (7) in plenty in the camp. For the weak elephants, the camp managers give twigs of ‘aal’, ‘arasu’ ‘athi’ trees and also ‘koondapanai’. They add that the managers are also (8) the mahouts and those accompanying the elephants on the ways to keep the animal healthy. This is (9) the mahouts are with the elephants 24x7. And also because the animal should continue to live in a (10) environment.

Choose the correct option for (6). 

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    substance
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    weight
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    Wrong
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    gravity
    Correct
    Wrong
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    load
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    Wrong
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Answer : 2. "weight "

Q:

You have eight brief passages with 10 questions following each passage. Read the passages carefully and choose the best answer to each question out of the four alternatives 

Time was when people looked heavenward and prayed, “Ye Gods, give us rain, keep drought away.” Today there are those who pray. “Give us rain, keep El Nino away.” 

El Nino and its atmospheric equivalent, called the Southern Oscillation, are together referred to as ENSO, and are household words today. Meteorologists recognize it as often being responsible for natural disaster worldwide. But this wisdom dawned only after countries suffered, first from the lack of knowledge, and then from the lack of coordination between policy making and the advances in scientific knowledge. 

Put simply, El Nino is a weather event restricted to certain tropical shores, especially the Peruvian coast. The event has diametrically opposite impacts on the land and sea. The Peruvian shore is a desert. But every few years, an unusually warm ocean current - El Nino - warms up the normally cold surface-waters off the Peruvian coast, causing very heavy rains in the early half of the year, 

And then, miraculously, the desert is matted green. Crops like cotton, coconuts and banana grow on the otherwise stubbornly barren land. These are the Peruvians’ anos de abundencia or years of abundance. The current had come to be termed El Nino, or the Christ Child because it usually appears as an enhancement if a mildly warm current that normally occurs here around every Christmas. 

But this boon on land is accompanied by oceanic disasters. Normally, the waters off the South American coast are among the most productive in the world because of a constant upwelling of nutrient rich cold waters from the ocean depths. During an El Nino, however waters are stirred up only from near the surface. The nutrient-crunch pushes down primary production, disrupting the food chain. Many marine species, including anchoveta (anchovies) temporarily disappear. 

This is just one damning effect of El Nino. Over the years its full impact has been studied and what the Peruvians once regarded as manna, is now seen as a major threat. 

What are the two types of landscapes that are effected by El Nino ?  

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    Coastal areas and sea.
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    Tropical shores and land.
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    Deserts and oceans.
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    All of the above
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Answer : 4. "All of the above "

Q:

Select the most appropriate option to fill in the blank.

The committee will ________________ a survey on the government schemes.

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    conduct
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    fight
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    hold
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    originate
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Answer : 1. "conduct"

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Answer : 1. "Witnessed"

Q:

Directions: Read the following passage and answer the questions as directed.

Artificial intelligence (AI) is all the rage these days. A recent article noted that ‘robots’ — shorthand for AI in the tabloids — will be able to write a fiction bestseller within 50 years. I suppose that would be shocking to me as a novelist if most fiction bestsellers were not already being written by ‘robots’. Or so one feels, keeping publishing and other vogues in mind: a bit of this, a bit of that, a dash of something else, and voila you have a bestseller! In that sense, perhaps the rise of AI will make us reconsider what we mean by human intelligence. This discussion has been neglected for far too long. Take my field: literature. The Chinese company, Cheers Publishing, lately offered a collection of poems written by a computer program. So, are poets, generally considered to be suicidal in any case, jumping off the cliffs in droves as a consequence?
 Well, this is a selection from one of the AI poems I found online: “The rain is blowing through the sea / A

bird in the sky / A night of light and calm / Sunlight / Now in the sky / Cool heart / The savage north wind

/ When I found a new world.”
 Yes, there are aspiring poets — and sometimes established ones — who write like this, connecting words centripetally or centrifugally to create an effect. I think they should have been pushed off literary cliffs a long time ago. Because this is not poetry; this is just the technique of assembling words like poetry. There is a difference between the intelligence required to write poetry and the skills required to write it. That poetic intelligence is lost without the required poetic skills, but the skills on their own do not (A)suffice either. The fact that lines like this, written by AI, can be considered poetry does not reflect on the intelligence of AI. It reflects on the intelligence of those readers, writers, critics, editors, publishers and academics who have not yet distinguished between gimmickry and mimicry on the one side and the actual freshness of a chiselled line on the other. But this is a small example. Surely, AI might also make (B)_____________, including that of considering something like IQ to be a sufficient index of human mental capacity! Because if we think that AI can replace human intelligence, then we are simply not thinking hard enough. (C) One of the major (1) activity here is that of considering (2) intelligence to be something (3) different from and raised above the (4) failures of living. This leads to the misconception that intelligence can be (D)___ to something else — say, a robot — without becoming something else. Human intelligence cannot be passed on to something else: What is “passed on” is always a different kind of ‘intelligence’. Even the arguments that AI — or, as in the past, robots — can enable human beings to lead a gloriously workless existence is based on a similar misconception. Because human intelligence is embedded in human existence, ‘work’ as human activity in the world is not something human beings can do without.

Which of the following words can replace the word given in bold in (A) without changing the meaning of the sentence?

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    disperse
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    squander
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    dissipate
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    serve
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    Wrong
  • 5
    spread
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    Wrong
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Answer : 4. "serve"

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