GMAT综合阅读精解之三十

2022-06-04 01:18:27

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  Increasingly, historians are blaming diseases imported

  from the Old World for the staggering disparity between

  the indigenous population of America in 1492—new esti-

  mates of which soar as high as 100 million, or approxi-

  (5) mately one-sixth of the human race at that time—and

  the few million full-blooded Native Americans alive at

  the end of the nineteenth century. There is no doubt that

  chronic disease was an important factor in the precipi-

  tous decline, and it is highly probable that the greatest

  (10) killer was epidemic disease, especially as manifested in

  virgin-soil epidemics.

  Virgin-soil epidemics are those in which the popula-

  tions at risk have had no previous contact with the

  diseases that strike them and are therefore immunologi-

  (15) cally almost defenseless. That virgin-soil epidemics were

  important in American history is strongly indicated by

  evidence that a number of dangerous maladies—small-

  pox, measles, malaria, yellow fever, and undoubtedly

  several more—were unknown in the pre-Columbian

  (20) New World. The effects of their sudden introduction

  are demonstrated in the early chronicles of America,

  which contain reports of horrendous epidemics and steep

  population declines, confirmed in many cases by recent

  quantitative analyses of Spanish tribute records and

  (25) other sources. The evidence provided by the documents

  of British and French colonies is not as definitive

  because the conquerors of those areas did not establish

  permanent settlements and begin to keep continuous

  records until the seventeenth century, by which time the

  (30) worst epidemics had probably already taken place.

  Furthermore, the British tended to drive the native

  populations away, rather than enslaving them as the

  Spaniards did, so that the epidemics of British America

  occurred beyond the range of colonists’ direct

  (35) observation.

  Even so, the surviving records of North America do

  contain references to deadly epidemics among the indige-

  nous population. In 1616-1619 an epidemic, possibly of

  bubonic or pneumonic plague, swept coastal New

  (40) England, killing as many as nine out of ten. During the

  1630’s smallpox, the disease most fatal to the Native

  American people, eliminated half the population of the

  Huron and Iroquois confederations. In the 1820’s fever

  devastated the people of the Columbia River area,

  (45) killing eight out of ten of them.

  Unfortunately, the documentation of these and other

  epidemics is slight and frequently unreliable, and it is

  ecessary to supplement what little we do know with

  evidence from recent epidemics among Native Ameri-

  (50) cans. For example, in 1952 an outbreak of measles

  among the Native American inhabitants of Ungava Bay.

  Quebec, affected 99 percent of the population and killed

  7 percent, even though some had the benefit of modern

  medicine. Cases such as this demonstrate that even

  (55) diseases that are not normally fatal can have devastating

  consequences when they strike an immunologically

  defenseless community.

  1. The primary purpose of the passage is to

  (A) refute a common misconception

  (B) provide support for a hypothesis

  (C) analyze an argument

  (D) suggest a solution to a dilemma

  (E) reconcile opposing viewpoints

  2. According to the passage, virgin-soil epidemics can be

  distinguished from other catastrophic outbreaks of

  disease in that virgin-soil epidemics

  (A) recur more frequently than other chronic diseases

  (B) affect a minimum of one-half of a given population

  (C) involve populations with no prior exposure to a

  disease

  (D) usually involve a number of interacting diseases

  (E) are less responsive to medical treatment than are

  other diseases

  3. According to the passage, the British colonists

  wereunlike the Spanish colonists in that the British

  colonists

  (A) collected tribute from the native population

  (B) kept records from a very early date

  (C) drove Native Americans off the land

  (D) were unable to provide medical care against

  epidemic disease

  (E) enslaved the native populations in America

  4. Which of the following can be inferred from the passage

  concerning Spanish tribute records?

  (A) They mention only epidemics of smallpox.

  (B) They were instituted in 1492.

  (C) They were being kept prior to the seventeenth

  century.

  (D) They provide quantitative and qualitative evidence

  about Native American populations.

  (E) They prove that certain diseases were unknown in

  the pre-Columbian New World.

  5. The author implies which of the following about

  measles?

  (A) It is not usually a fatal disease.

  (B) It ceased to be a problem by the seventeenth century.

  (C) It is the disease most commonly involved in virgin-

  soil epidemics.

  (D) It was not a significant problem in Spanish colonies.

  (E) It affects only those who are immunologically

  defenseless against it.

  6. Which of the following can be inferred from the passage

  about the Native American inhabitants of Ungava Bay?

  (A) They were almost all killed by the 1952 epidemic.

  (B) They were immunologically defenseless against

  measles.

  (C) They were the last native people to be struck by a

  virgin- soil epidemic.

  (D) They did not come into frequent contact with white

  Americans until the twentieth century.

  (E) They had been inoculated against measles.

  7. The author mentions the 1952 measles outbreak most

  probably in order to

  (A) demonstrate the impact of modern medicine on

  epidemic disease

  (B) corroborate the documentary evidence of epidemic

  disease in colonial America

  (C) refute allegations of unreliability made against the

  historical record of colonial America

  (D) advocate new research into the continuing problem

  of epidemic disease

  (E) challenge assumptions about how the statistical

  evidence of epidemics should be interpreted

  8. Which of the following, if newly discovered, would

  most seriously weaken the author’s argument

  concerning the importance of virgin-soil epidemics in

  the depopulation of Native Americans?

  (A) Evidence setting the pre-Columbian population of

  the New World at only 80 million

  (B) Spanish tribute records showing periodic population

  fluctuations

  (C) Documents detailing sophisticated Native American

  medical procedures

  (D) Fossils indicating Native American cortact with

  smallpox prior to 1492

  (E) Remains of French settlements dating back to the

  sixteenth century

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