CAT 2018 Question Paper Slot 2
Read the passage carefully and answer the given questions
The complexity of modern problems often precludes any one person from fully understanding them. Factors contributing to rising obesity levels, for example, include transportation systems and infrastructure, media, convenience foods, changing social norms, human biology and psychological factors. . . . The multidimensional or layered character of complex problems also undermines the principle of meritocracy: the idea that the âbest personâ should be hired. There is no best person. When putting together an oncological research team, a biotech company such as Gilead or Genentech would not construct a multiple-choice test and hire the top scorers, or hire people whose resumes score highest according to some performance criteria. Instead, they would seek diversity. They would build a team of people who bring diverse knowledge bases, tools and analytic skills. . . .
Believers in a meritocracy might grant that teams ought to be diverse but then argue that meritocratic principles should apply within each category. Thus the team should consist of the âbestâ mathematicians, the âbestâ oncologists, and the âbestâ biostatisticians from within the pool. That position suffers from a similar flaw. Even with a knowledge domain, no test or criteria applied to individuals will produce the best team. Each of these domains possesses such depth and breadth, that no test can exist. Consider the field of neuroscience. Upwards of 50,000 papers were published last year covering various techniques, domains of enquiry and levels of analysis, ranging from molecules and synapses up through networks of neurons. Given that complexity, any attempt to rank a collection of neuroscientists from best to worst, as if they were competitors in the 50-metre butterfly, must fail. What could be true is that given a specific task and the composition of a particular team, one scientist would be more likely to contribute than another. Optimal hiring depends on context. Optimal teams will be diverse.
Evidence for this claim can be seen in the way that papers and patents that combine diverse ideas tend to rank as high-impact. It can also be found in the structure of the so-called random decision forest, a state-of-the-art machine-learning algorithm. Random forests consist of ensembles of decision trees. If classifying pictures, each tree makes a vote: is that a picture of a fox or a dog? A weighted majority rules. Random forests can serve many ends. They can identify bank fraud and diseases, recommend ceiling fans and predict online dating behaviour. When building a forest, you do not select the best trees as they tend to make similar classifications. You want diversity. Programmers achieve that diversity by training each tree on different data, a technique known as bagging. They also boost the forest âcognitivelyâ by training trees on the hardest cases - those that the current forest gets wrong. This ensures even more diversity and accurate forests.
Yet the fallacy of meritocracy persists. Corporations, non-profits, governments, universities and even preschools test, score and hire the âbestâ. This all but guarantees not creating the best team. Ranking people by common criteria produces homogeneity. . . . Thatâs not likely to lead to breakthroughs.
Which of the following conditions would weaken the efficacy of a random decision forest?
On the basis of the passage, which of the following teams is likely to be most effective in solving the problem of rising obesity levels?
For the following questions answer them individually
The four sentences (labelled 1,2,3,4) given in this question, when properly sequenced, form a coherent paragraph. Each sentence is labelled with a number. Decide on the proper sequence of order of the sentences and key in this sequence of four numbers as your answer:
1. In the era of smart world, however, âUniversal Basic Incomeâ is an
ineffective instrument which cannot address the potential breakdown of
the social contract when large swathes of the population would
effectively be unemployed.
2. In the era of industrial revolution, the abolition of child labour,
poor laws and the growth of trade unions helped families cope with the
pressures of mechanised work.
3. Growing inequality could be matched by a creeping authoritarianism
that is bolstered by technology that is increasingly able to peer into
the deepest vestiges of our lives.
4. New institutions emerge which recognise ways in which workers could
contribute to and benefit by economic growth when, rather than if, their
jobs are automated.
789
456
123
0.-
Clear All
The passage given below is followed by four summaries. Choose the option that best captures the authorâs position.
The early optimism about sport's deterrent effects on delinquency was premature as researchers failed to find any consistent relationships between sports participation and deviance. As the initial studies were based upon cross-sectional data and the effects captured were short-term, it was problematic to test and verify the temporal sequencing of events suggested by the deterrence theory. The correlation between sport and delinquency could not be disentangled from class and cultural variables known. Choosing individuals to play sports in the first place was problematic, which became more acute in the subsequent decades as researchers began to document just how closely sports participation was linked to social class indicators.
The four sentences (labelled 1, 2, 3, and 4) given in this question, when properly sequenced, form a coherent paragraph. Decide on the proper order for the sentences and key in this sequence of four numbers as your answer.
1. Self-management is thus defined as the âindividualâs ability to manage the symptoms, treatment, physical and psychosocial consequences and lifestyle changes inherent in living with a chronic conditionâ.
2. Most people with progressive diseases like dementia prefer to have control over their own lives and health-care for as long as possible.
3. Having control means, among other things, that patients themselves perform self-management activities.
4. Supporting people in decisions and actions that promote self-management is called self-management support requiring a cooperative relationship between the patient, the family, and the professionals.
789
456
123
0.-
Clear All
A Japanese government panel announced that it recommends regulating only genetically modified organisms that have had foreign genes permanently introduced into their genomes and not those whose endogenous genes have been edited. The only stipulation is that researchers and businesses will have to register their modifications to plants or animals with the government, with the exception of microbes cultured in contained environments. Reactions to the decision are mixed. While lauding the potential benefits of genome editing, an editorial opposes across-the-board permission. Unforeseen risks in gene editing cannot be ruled out. All genetically modified products must go through the same safety and labeling processes regardless of method.
Five sentences related to a topic are given below. Four of them can be put together to form a meaningful and coherent short paragraph. Identify the odd one out.
1. Much has been recently discovered about the development of songs in birds.
2. Some species are restricted to a single song learned by all individuals, others have a range of songs.
3. The most important auditory stimuli for the birds are the sounds of other birds.
4. For all bird species there is a prescribed path to development of the final song,
5. A bird begins with the subsong, passes through plastic song, until it achieves the species song.
789
456
123
0.-
Clear All
The four sentences (labelled 1, 2, 3, and 4) given in this question, when properly sequenced, form a coherent paragraph. Decide on the proper order for the sentences and key in this sequence of four numbers as your answer.
1. It was his taxpayers who had to shell out as much as $1.6bn over 10 years to employees of failed companies.
2. Companies in many countries routinely engage in such activities which means that the employees are left with unpaid entitlements
3. Deliberate and systematic liquidation of a company to avoid liabilities and then restarting the business is called phoenixing.
4. The Australian Minister for Revenue and Services discovered in an audit that phoenixing had cost the Australian economy between $2.9bn and $5.1bn last year.
789
456
123
0.-
Clear All
