Archaeologists working in the Andes Mountains recently excavated a buried 4,000-year-old temple containing structures that align

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问题 Archaeologists working in the Andes Mountains recently excavated a buried 4,000-year-old temple containing structures that align with a stone carving on a distant hill to indicate the direction of the rising sun at the summer solstice. Alignments in the temple were also found to point toward the position, at the summer solstice, of a constellation known in Andean culture as the Fox. Since the local mythology represents the fox as teaching people how to cultivate and irrigate plants, the ancient Andeans may have built the temple as a religious representation of the fox.
Which of the following is an assumption on which the argument is based?

选项 A、The constellation known as the Fox has the same position at the summer solstice as it did 4,000 years ago.
B、In the region around the temple, the summer solstice marks the time for planting.
C、The temple was protected from looters by dirt and debris built up over thousands of years.
D、Other structural alignments at the temple point to further constellations with agricultural significance.
E、The site containing the temple was occupied for a significant amount of time before abandonment.

答案A

解析 Argument Construction
Situation A recently excavated 4,000-year-old temple contains structures that point toward the positions at the summer solstice of both the rising sun and a constellation known in local culture as the Fox. Local mythology represents the fox as teaching people how to cultivate and irrigate plants.
Reasoning What must be true in order for the argument’s premises to suggest that the temple was built to religiously represent the fox? The argument’s premises are all observations about current conditions: the current alignment at the summer solstice of the temple relative to the sunrise and to the constellation known as the Fox, the current local name for a constellation, and current local mythology. To support the conclusion about the temple’s original purpose, the argument has to assume that all these conditions may still be essentially the same as they were 4,000 years ago when the temple was built.
A Correct. If the constellation’s position at the summer solstice relative to the temple is different from what it was 4,000 years ago, the temple must not have been aligned to point toward it when it was built. In that case, the argument’s justification for associating the temple with that constellation and with the fox is undermined.
B This does not have to be assumed for the argument to succeed, though if true, it might strengthen the argument by providing additional evidence associating the temple with the mythological fox as a teacher of agriculture. But the argument could be just as strong if the solstice were instead associated with agricultural activities other than planting.
C Even if the temple was not protected from looters, the conditions described in the argument’s premises may still be the same as they were 4,000 years ago.
D This is not assumed. Additional structural alignments pointing to different constellations associated with mythological beings other than the fox might weaken or even undermine the argument’s justification for associating the temple with the fox specifically.
E The argument makes no assumption regarding how long the temple was occupied, or even regarding whether the temple was ever occupied.
The correct answer is A.
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本试题收录于: GMAT VERBAL题库GMAT分类
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