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September 22nd, 2016, 10:15 AM
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Join Date: Mar 2012
Re: Paper Of CAT Exam

As you want the sample question paper of Common Admission Test CAT exam so here I am providing you.

CAT Exam question paper

Section 1 Verbal

Reading Comprehension

Language is not a cultural artifact that we learn the way we learn to tell time or how the federal
government works. Instead, it is a distinct piece of the biological makeup of our brains. Language is a
complex, specialized skill, which develops in the child spontaneously, without conscious effort or
formal instruction, is deployed without awareness of its underlying logic, is qualitatively the same in
every individual, and is distinct from more general abilities to process information or behave
intelligently. For these reasons some cognitive researchers have described language as a
psychological faculty, a mental organ, a neural system, and a computational module. But I prefer the
admittedly quaint term “instinct”. It conveys the idea that people know how to talk in more or less
the sense that spiders know how to spin webs. Web-spinning was not invented by some unsung
spider genius and does not depend on having had the right education or on having an aptitude for
architecture or the construction trades. Rather, spiders spin spider webs because they have spider
brains, which give them the urge to spin and the competence to succeed. Although there are
differences between webs and words, I will encourage you to see language in this way, for it helps to
make sense of the phenomena we will explore.
Thinking of language as an instinct inverts the popular wisdom, especially as it has been passed
down in the canon of the humanities and social sciences. Language is no more a cultural invention
than is upright posture. It is not a manifestation of a general capacity to use symbols: a three-yearold,
we shall see, is a grammatical genius, but is quite incompetent at the visual arts, religious
iconography, traffic signs, and the other staples of the semiotics curriculum. Though language is a
magnificent ability unique to Homo sapiens among living species, it does not call for sequestering
the study of humans from the domain of biology, for a magnificent ability unique to a particular
living species is far from unique in the animal kingdom. Some kinds of bats home in on flying insects
using Doppler sonar. Some kinds of migratory birds navigate thousands of miles by calibrating the
positions of the constellations against the time of day and year. In nature’s talent show, we are
simply a species of primate with our own act, a knack for communicating information about who did
what to whom by modulating the sounds we make when we exhale.
Once you begin to look at language not as the ineffable essence of human uniqueness hut as a
biological adaptation to communicate information, it is no longer as tempting to see language as an
insidious shaper of thought, and, we shall see, it is not. Moreover, seeing language as one of nature’s
engineering marvels — an organ with “that perfection of structure and co-adaptation which justly
excites our admiration,” in Darwin’s words - gives us a new respect for your ordinary Joe and the
much-maligned English language (or any language). The complexity of language, from the
researcher’s point of view, is part of our biological birthright; it is not something that parents teach
their children or something that must be elaborated in school — as Oscar Wilde said, “Education is
an admirable thing, but it is well to remember from time to time that nothing that is worth knowing
can be taught.” A preschooler’s tacit knowledge of grammar is more sophisticated than the thickest
style manual or the most state-of-the-art computer language system, and the same applies to all
healthy human beings, even the notorious syntax fracturing professional athlete and the, you know,
like, inarticulate teenage skateboarder. Finally, since language is the product of a well engineered
biological instinct, we shall see that it is not the nutty barrel of monkeys that entertainer columnists
make it out to be.

1. According to the passage, all of the following stem from popular wisdom on language Except?

(1) Language is a cultural artifact.

(2) Language is a cultural invention.

(3) Language is learnt as we grow.

(4) Language is a psychological faculty.

2. Which of the following can be used as parallel reasoning for the “spiders know how to spin webs”
analogy as used by the author?

(1) A kitten learning to jump over a wall

(2) Bees collecting nectar

(3) A donkey carrying a load

(4) A horse running a Derby

3. According to the passage, which of the following is unique to human beings?

(1) Ability to use symbols while communicating with one another.

(2) Ability to communicate with each other through voice modulation.

(3) Ability to communicate information to other members of the species.

(4) Ability to use sound as means of communication.

4. According to the passage, complexity of language cannot be taught by parents or at school to
children because

(1) children instinctively know language.

(2) children learn the language on their own.

(3) language is not amenable to teaching.

(4) children know language better than their teachers or parents.

5. Which of the following best summarizes the passage?

(1) Language is unique to Homo sapiens.

(2) Language is neither learnt nor taught.

(3) Language is not a cultural invention or artifact as it is made out.

(4) Language is instinctive ability of human beings.

6. Why author has referred to ‘preschooler’s tacit knowledge of grammar’

(1) To prove that Language is unique to Homo sapiens.

(2) Used as an analogy for healthy human beings

(3) To prove his point that language is not a cultural invention or artifact as it is made out.

(4) To compare children instinctively know language.
If American policy towards Europe in the postwar years had been a conspicuous success, and
towards Asia a disappointing balance between success and failure, it could be said that the most
conspicuous thing about relations with Latin America was the absence of any policy. Franklin
Roosevelt, to be sure, had launched a “Good Neighbour” policy, but being a good neighbour was, it
seemed, a negative rather than a positive affair, a matter of keeping hands off, of making the
Monroe Doctrine, in form at least, multilateral. All through the postwar years, the states of Latin
America - - Mexico and Chile were partial exceptions - - were in the throes of major economic and
social crises. Population was growing faster than in any other part of the globe, without a
comparable increase in wealth or productivity; the gap between the poor and the rich was widening;
and as the rich and powerful turned to the military for the preservation of order and privilege, the
poor turned to revolution.

For complete question paper here is the attachment
Attached Files
File Type: pdf CAT Exam question paper.pdf (1.34 MB, 44 views)


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