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ACT English 5.11 Passage Drill 243 Views


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Description:

ACT English: Passage Drill 5, Problem 11. If the writer made the change described, what would the essay primarily lose?

Language:
English Language

Transcript

00:04

Here's your Shmoop du jour, brought to you by nearsighted spiders. Wow, imagine what

00:08

the optometrist bill would be like for a creature with eight eyes.

00:23

The writer is considering replacing the underlined phrase...

00:26

often have poor eyesight and weave using only their sense of touch

00:31

with...

00:33

do not see well

00:34

If the writer made this change, the essay would primarily lose what?

00:39

And here are the potential answers...

00:45

This question requires us to not only take a close look at the underlined portion, but

00:49

to also have a good idea of the information contained in the passage as a whole.

00:53

Thinking caps will be required. Luckily ours just got back from the dry cleaners.

00:58

Answer (A) claims that the writer would lose info about the many strands of thread that

01:02

go into the weaving of spiders' complex webs.

01:09

This is wrong on two levels...

01:10

1) the underlined portion says nothing about the makeup of spider webs

01:13

and...

01:14

2) this info is thoroughly covered earlier in the passage

01:18

(B) tells us that this substitution will eliminate confusion by cutting out a new term that's not explained.

01:24

Unless one considers "poor eyesight" a confusing concept, this is also incorrect.

01:30

The underlined segment doesn't throw anything too mind blowing at us, so we can nix choice (B).

01:36

Choice (D) says the article will no longer contain a comparison between spiders and other insects.

01:41

However, the underlined portion says absolutely nothing about other insects; its focus is

01:46

solely on spiders.

01:47

(Which can be unhealthy if taken too far...)

01:50

In any case, (D) is off the list. The correct answer is (C).

01:54

The main difference between the current phrase, "often have poor eyesight and weave using

01:58

only their sense of touch," and the new one, "do not see well," is that the first phrase

02:04

spells out the reason why the poor eyesight is relevant—spiders can't even see the complicated

02:10

webs they create.

02:13

The rumor is that a spider bit a witch many, many years ago, and ever since, spiders have

02:16

been cursed with the inability to see their own webs.

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