PrepTest 147, Section 2, Question 17
It is generally accepted that woodland clearings were(434 more words not shown)
Which one of the following(22 more words not shown)
- AMesolithic artwork that(7 more words not shown)
- Bthe ubiquity of(9 more words not shown)
- Cmaps showing pathways(7 more words not shown)
- Dsurvey results showing(10 more words not shown)
- Erituals performed by(12 more words not shown)
Reading the passage
The next-to-last paragraph proposes a motive for establishing paths: fear of the woods, whether from wildlife, spirits, or getting lost. Evidence that paths existed would not establish why people made them. We want evidence of that fear, especially in populations that help us assess whether it could have motivated earlier people.
Working the answers
- A
A picture of paths and clearings would show that those features were recognized. It would not show that fear motivated people to establish the paths.
- B
Roads being common in densely populated places doesn't identify fear as their motive. People could establish routes for many reasons, including ordinary convenience. Ubiquity doesn't supply the psychological connection the proposal needs.
- C
Maps could establish where a recent premodern population traveled. They would not, by themselves, tell us that the travelers feared the surrounding forest.
- D
This supports fear among modern urban people, but that is precisely the setting we might already associate with wilderness anxiety. It gives less help in extending the proposed motive to earlier, nonurban populations.
- ECorrect
Protection rituals directed at the forest suggest that these premodern people regarded it as a source of danger. That supplies the kind of evidence the author's explanation needs: fear outside modern urban life. It doesn't prove that Mesolithic paths had this motive, but it makes the proposed comparison more plausible.
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