COMPREHENSION TEST
652. 33 out of Australia’s 48 reefs have succumbed to          658. Biomimicry views the natural world as a
     (1) the impact of the Blue whale                                (1) mine for resources       (2) mine field of ideas
     (2) the impact of tourism                                       (3) mentor                   (4) source of inspiration
     (3) the destructive impact of white syndrome              659. What has helped solve many of the challeng-
     (4) the bleaching disease affecting the whales                  es encountered by man ?
653. The dying reefs acquired a                                      (1) Biomimicry               (2) Evolution
     (1) brilliant and multicolour                                   (3) Innovation               (4) Invention
     (2) kaleidoscopic hues                                    660. The two instances of biomimicry mentioned in the
     (3) brilliant blue colour like the whale                        passage are
     (4) sickly white pallor                                         (1) flora and fauna          (2) birds and burrs
654. Scientists’ main worry is that                                  (3) copying and innovating
     (1) there will be a fall in tourism with the reefs gone         (4) airplane and Velcro
     (2) the bleaching will make the water warmer                  Directions (661–670) : In the following questions, read
                                                              the passage carefully and choose the best answer to each
     (3) other endangered and undiscovered flora and
                                                              question out of the four alternatives.
          fauna will also be damaged
                                                                                         (SSC CGL Tier-II Exam. 12.04.2015)
     (4) future research on ‘white syndrome’ will stop
                                                                   The recent change to all-volunteer armed forces in the
655. The meaning of succumbing is
                                                              United States will eventually produce a gradual increase in
     (1) giving way to an underground passage                 the proportion of women in the armed forces and in the
     (2) giving way to something powerful                     variety of women’s assignments, but probably not the dra-
     (3) following order                                      matic gains for women that might have been expected. This
     (4) coming in the way of                                 is so even though the armed forces operate in an ethos of
                         PASSAGE- V                           institutional change oriented toward occupational equality
                                                              and under the federal sanction of equal pay for equal work.
    The Wright brothers did not have to look far for ideas
                                                              The difficulty is that women are unlikely to be trained for
when building their airplane, they studied birds. The act of
                                                              any direct combat operations.
copying from nature to address a design problem is not
new, but over the last decade the practice has moved from          A significant portion of the larger society remains un-
obscure scientific journals to the mainstream. The term       comfortable as yet with extending equality in this direction.
‘biomimicry’, popularized by American natural-sciences writ-  Therefore, for women in the military, the search for equal-
                                                              ity will still be based on functional equivalence, not identity
er Janine Benyus in the late 1990s, refers to innovation
                                                              or even similarity of task. Opportunities seem certain to
that take their inspiration from flora and fauna. Biomim-
                                                              arise. The growing emphasis on deterrence is bound to
icry advocates argue that with 3.8 billion years of research
                                                              offer increasing scope for women to become involved in
and development, evolution has already solved many of
                                                              novel types of noncombat military assignments.
the challenges humans now encounter. Although we often
see nature as something we mine for resources, biomim-                          SOME IMPORTANT WORDS
icry views nature as a mentor. From all around the globe,
                                                                 (1) ethos (N.) : the moral ideas and attitudes that belong
there are countless instances where natural sources have             to a particular group/society
served as inspiration for inventions that promise to trans-
                                                                 (2) deterrence (N.) : the fact of somebody less likely to
form every sector of society. One such instance occurred
                                                                     do something
in 1941 when Swiss engineer, George de Mestral was out
hunting with his dog one day when he noticed sticky burrs,       (3) combat (N.) : fighting/a fight, especially during a
                                                                     time of war
with their hundreds tiny hooks, had attached themselves
to his pants and his dog’s fur. These were his inspiration     661. Which sentence is an incorrect one ?
for Velcro.
                                                                     (1) The recent change to all voluntary armed forces in
                 SOME IMPORTANT WORDS                                    US will produce a gradual increase in the propor-
   (1) obscure (Adj.) : not well-known                                   tion of women.
   (2) burrs (N.) : the seed container of some plants which          (2) The difficulty is that women are likely to be trained
       is covered in very small hooks that stick to clothes/             for any direct combat operation.
       fur                                                           (3) Opportunities seem certain to arise
                                                                     (4) The difficulty is that women are unlikely to be
 656. The airplane was inspired by                                       trained for any direct combat operation
       (1) animals                 (2) plants                  662. A suitable title for the passage might be
       (3) birds                   (4) flies                         (1) Current status of women in US military.
 657. Biomimicry refers to designs that                              (2) Current status of women in US navy.
       (1) are inspired by natural things                            (3) Current status of women in US airforce.
       (2) transformed society                                       (4) Current status of women in US teaching service.
       (3) are based on scientific engineering                 663. According to the passage, despite the United States
       (4) arise out of man’s creativity                             armed forces’ commitment to occupational equality for
                                                          SEE–969