TOLC-E (in English)
LOGIC QUIZ
1) In the municipality of Mouseton, the school rules stipulate that if a school has more than
300 pupils, then it must have a gym and also an infirmary. As the rules in Mouseton are
always obeyed, which of the following statements is certainly true?
(a) There is a school that has a gym and doesn't have an infirmary
(b) If a school doesn't have a gym then it has 300 pupils at the most
(c) If a school has a gym then it also has an infirmary
(d) If a school doesn't have a gym then it doesn't have an infirmary
(e) If a school has an infirmary then it has more than 300 pupils
2) If it is true that:
- Alma and Bice love the singer Jo-Jo
- the singer Jo-Jo loves Neapolitans
- Neapolitans love the sun
then it is certain that:
(a) Neapolitans love the singer Jo-Jo
(b) Neapolitans love Alma and Bice
(c) of these five answers at least two are false
(d) Alma and Bice don't love the sun
(e) the sun loves the singer Jo-Jo
3) Discussing their personal finances, four friends (Alisher, Bahodir, Elmurod e Rashid) state
that:
- Alisher has less money than Elmurod
- Bahodir has less money than Elmurod
- Elmurod has more money than Rashid
- Bahodir has more money than Alisher
Then, which of the following statements is NOT NECESSARILY correct?
(a) Alisher is the poorest among the friends
(b) Bahodir is not the poorest
(c) the richest among the friends is Elmurod
(d) Rashid has less money than Elmurod
(e) the alphabetical order of the names is not the same as the (increasing order) of the money
owned
4) The integer numbers , , , and satisfy the relations:
One of the following statements is true; which one?
(a)
(b) the order of the numbers is the same as the alphabetical order ( )
(c)
(d)
(e)
5) On the face of a rather strange clock the hours are numbered from 1 to 12; at this moment
in time both the short hand and the long hand are pointing to 12. The short hand moves 2
numbers every hour in a clockwise direction, while the long hand moves 3 numbers every
hour anticlockwise. What time will it be when the two hands indicate the same number again?
(a) 2 o'clock
(b) 10 o'clock
(c) 8 o'clock
(d) 12 o'clock
(e) 4 o'clock
6) Which of these diagrams illustrates the correct relationship between:
SQUARES - RECTANGLES - PARALLELOGRAMS?
(a) Figure 3
(b) Figure 5
(c) Figure 1
(d) Figure 2
(e) Figure 4
7) How can you insert the + (plus) or the - (minus) sign in the following sequence of
numbers:
in order to have as a result?
(Example: if I insert in the sequence the result is , if I
insert the result is )
(a)
(b)
(c)
(d)
(e)
8) Discussing their personal finances, four friends (Alan, Brian, Conan e Donald) state that:
- Alan has less money than Conan
- Brian has less money than Conan
- Conan has more money than Donald
- Brian has more money than Alan
Then, which of the following statements is NOT NECESSARILY correct?
(a) the alphabetical order of the names is not the same as the (increasing order) of the money
owned
(b) Donald has less money than Conan
(c) Alan is the poorest among the friends
(d) the richest among the friends is Conan
(e) Brian is not the poorest
9) Five books, identified by the abbreviations An-Bo-Ch-Di-El, are in a pile in descending
alphabetical order (so book An is at the top and book El is at the bottom). The last three
books from the bottom are simultaneously removed and put at the top, maintaining their
vertical order.
If this procedure is repeated two more times, which book will end up precisely at the bottom
of the pile?
(a) Book An
(b) Book El
(c) Book Di
(d) Book Bo
(e) Book Ch
10) If it is true that: - all those enrolled in the School of Engineering are diligent - Charlie
isn't diligent, while John is diligent - in the winter John and Charlie go to the mountains
together then it can be deduced that:
(a) Charlie isn't an Engineering student
(b) in the summer John and Charlie don't go to the mountains together
(c) Charlie isn't an Engineering student and John is an Engineering student
(d) John and Charlie don't study in the winter
(e) John is an Engineering student
11) Which series of + (plus) and - (minus) signs inserted in sequence before the following
numbers would give a result of +16 ? 14, 15, 13, 12, 10
(a) + + - - -
(b) - + + + -
(c) - - - + +
(d) + + - - +
(e) + - + - +
12) The product of 12 integer numbers is positive. From this information we can deduce that
it is necessarily true that:
(a) all factors are positive
(b) at least two factors are negative
(c) the number of positive factors is either zero or an even number
(d) 6 factors are positive and 6 factors are negative
(e) 2 factors are positive and 10 factors are negative
13) As it is true that:
- all sparrows are birds
- all sparrows are small
- all birds are animals
- some animals don't eat leaves
it can be deduced that:
(a) At least one species of bird doesn't eat leaves
(b) All sparrows are small animals
(c) Some small birds eat leaves
(d) Some sparrows don't eat leaves
(e) All small animals are sparrows
COMPREHENSION QUIZ
Supernovae
When supernovae explode they jettison matter into space at some 9,000 to 25,000 miles
(15,000 to 40,000 kilometers) per second. These blasts produce much of the material in the
universe -- including some elements, like iron, which make up our planet and even ourselves.
Heavy elements are only produced in supernovae, so all of us carry the remnants of these
distant explosions within our own bodies.
Supernovae add enriching elements to space clouds of dust and gas, further interstellar
diversity, and produce a shock wave that compresses clouds of gas to aid new star formation.
But only a select few stars become supernovae. Many stars cool in later life to end their days
as white dwarfs and, later, black dwarfs.
But massive stars, many times larger than our own sun, may create a supernova when their
core's fusion process runs out of fuel. Star fusion provides a constant outward pressure, which
exists in balance with the star's own mass-driven, inward gravitational pull. When fusion
slows, outbound pressure drops and the star's core begins to condense under gravity --
becoming ever denser and hotter.
To outward appearances, such stars begin growing, swelling into bodies known as red super
giants. But at their cores shrinking continues, making a supernova imminent.
When a star's core contracts to a critical point a series of nuclear reactions is unleashed. This
fusion staves off core collapse for a time -- but only until the core is composed largely of iron,
which can no longer sustain star fusion.
In a microsecond, the core may reach temperatures of billions of degrees Celsius. Iron atoms
become crushed so closely together that the repulsive forces of their nuclei create a recoil of
the squeezed core -- a bounce that causes the star to explode as a supernova and give birth to
an enormous, superheated, shock wave.
Supernovae also occur in binary star systems. Smaller stars, up to eight times the mass of our
own sun, typically evolve into white dwarfs. A star condensed to this size, about that of Earth,
is very dense and thus has strong enough gravitational pull to gather material from the
system's second star if it is close enough.
If a white dwarf takes on enough mass it reaches a level called the Chandrasekhar limit. At
this point the pressure at its center will become so great that runaway fusion occurs and the
star detonates in a thermonuclear supernova.
A supernova can light the sky up for weeks, and the massive transfer of matter and energy
leaves behind a very different star.
Typically only a tiny core of neutrons, a spinning neutron star, is left to evidence a supernova.
Neutron stars give off radio waves in a steady stream or, as pulsars, in intermittent bursts.
If a star was so massive (at least ten times the size of our sun) that it leaves behind a large
core, a new phenomenon will occur. Because such a burned-out core has no energy source to
fuse, and thus produces no outward pressure, it may become engulfed by its own gravity and
turn into a cosmic sinkhole for energy and matter -- a black hole.
1) Supernovae occur when
(a) stars as big as our sun run out of fuel
(b) star fusion creates a rise in pressure
(c) large stars have an excess of fuel
(d) the core of a star condenses and heats up
(e) the core of a star begins to cool down and expand
2) Supernovae from massive stars
(a) produce a large amount of pressure
(b) have very small cores
(c) leave only a small amount of neutrons
(d) can eventually give rise to black holes
(e) will provide new energy and matter
3) White dwarfs
(a) occur when a star reaches the Chandrasekhar limit
(b) can evolve from stars smaller than our sun
(c) can become red super giants
(d) can become supernovae when their pressure increases
(e) cannot attract material from another star
4) During the process in which a star is transformed into a supernova
(a) iron atoms expand rapidly
(b) a black hole usually occurs
(c) the core gradually heats up until it reaches an extremely high temperature
(d) a black dwarf usually occurs
(e) an extremely hot wave is produced as a result of the explosion
5) Supernovae
(a) produce the iron in our blood
(b) absorb matter from space clouds
(c) are found every 25,000 miles in space
(d) compress new stars
(e) often become white dwarfs
Advantages of public transport
A new study conducted for the World Bank by Murdoch University's Institute for Science and
Technology Policy (ISTP) has demonstrated that public transport is more efficient than cars.
The study compared the proportion of money poured into transport by thirty-seven cities
around the world. This included both the public and private costs of building, maintaining and
using a transport system.
The study found that the Western Australian city of Perth is a good example of a city with
minimal public transport. As a result, 17% of its wealth went into transport costs. Some
European and Asian cities, on the other hand, spent as little as 5%. As a consequence, these
more efficient cities were able to put the money saved into attracting industry and jobs or
creating a better place to live.
Professor Newman, ISTP Director describes Melbourne as two cities: "A European city
surrounded by a car-dependent one''. Melbourne's large tram network has greatly reduced car
use in the inner city, but the outer suburbs have the same car-based structure as most other
Australian cities. The increasing demand for accommodation in the inner suburbs of
Melbourne suggests that people now prefer to live there.
Newman believes there is a new, more general way of considering public transport issues. In
the past, environmental and social justice were considered before economics. Newman,
however, thinks the study demonstrates that "the auto-dependent city model is inefficient and
very inadequate in both economic and environmental terms''.
Supporters of the road networks often reject the models of cities with good public transport by
saying that these systems would not work in their particular city. One objection is climate.
Some people say their city could not make more use of public transport because it is either too
hot or too cold. Newman rejects this, pointing out that public transport has been successful in
both Toronto and Singapore and, in fact, checks have demonstrated no correlation between
the use of cars and the climate.
When it comes to other physical characteristics, road lobbies are in a stronger position. For
example, Newman accepts it would be hard for a city with a lot of hills like Auckland to
develop a really good rail network. However, he points out that both Hong Kong and Zurich
have managed to make a success of their rail systems, even if they have more hills than most
cities in the world.
In fact, Newman believes the main reason for choosing one sort of transport instead of
another is politics: "the more democratic the process, the more public transport is favored".
He considers Portland, Oregon, a perfect example of this. Some years ago, the central
government decided to finance the construction of a new road. However, local pressure
groups called for a referendum and the money was spent on a railway instead, which worked
extremely well. In the years that have followed, more and more rail systems have been put in,
dramatically changing the nature of the city.
In the UK, travel times to work had been stable for at least six centuries, and people generally
avoided spending more than half an hour travelling to work. Trains and cars initially allowed
people to live at greater distances without taking longer to reach their destination. However,
public infrastructure did not grow with the increase in urban areas, and this caused enormous
congestion problems and much longer commuting times.
Many think that if people have more money they want to live further from the city centre
where cars are the only practical means of transport. The example of European cities
contradicts that. People are often wealthier than their American counterparts but do not use
their cars as much. In Stockholm, car use has actually fallen in recent years as the city has
become larger and wealthier. New studies show that developing cities in Asia, such as Jakarta
and Bangkok, make more use of the car than wealthy Asian cities such as Tokyo and
Singapore. In cities that developed later, the World bank and Asian Development Bank
discouraged the building of public transport and people have been forced to depend on cars --
creating the massive traffic jams that characterize those cities.
An alternative proposal is to convert cities that have been built for cars to rail use, by creating
urban villages at hundreds of sites, mostly around railway stations.
6) In the case of Portland, the most significant aspect governing the choice of trains was
(a) the building of more roads
(b) government decisions
(c) dramatic changes in the city
(d) financial issues
(e) the demands of the inhabitants
7) The ISTP report showed that cities with well-developed public transport
(a) spent less money on transport
(b) offered people better jobs
(c) were less well-organized
(d) were a good example to other cities
(e) spent more money on transport
8) The use of private transport
(a) was supported in some Asian cities by banks
(b) has created hundreds of urban villages
(c) is more common among rich Europeans
(d) has caused enormous traffic problems in Singapore
(e) has increased recently in Stockholm
9) In the study Melbourne emerges as
(a) a European city
(b) a city with a growing demand for car parks
(c) a city with an efficient outer suburban tram system
(d) a place where people prefer to live
(e) a city where people use two opposing modes of transport
10) Some people who prefer travelling by car do not agree with an increase in public transport
because
(a) it is not compatible with typical weather conditions
(b) it didn't work in Toronto and Singapore
(c) it is bad for the environment
(d) there aren't enough hills in their cities
(e) it didn't work in Hong Kong and Zurich
MATH QUIZ
1) Consider the inequalities
where is a second degree polynomial. Which of the following statements is true?
(a) the three inequalities have the same set of solutions
(b) the inequalities A) and B) have the same set of solutions
(c) the inequalities B) and C) have the same set of solutions
(d) nothing can be said, since we do not know the polynomial
(e) the inequalities A) and C) have the same set of solutions
2) In the three-dimensional space, consider a cube and a plane passing through 4 vertices
of the cube that do not belong to the same face. If the measure of the edge of the cube is 2,
then the intersection between the cube and the plane is:
(a) a square whose sides have length
(b) a square whose sides have length
(c) a rectangle whose area is
(d) a segment that has length
(e) a rhombus (not a square)
3) The real number equals
(a)
(b)
(c)
(d)
(e)
4) In the interval the equation
(a) has an infinite number of solutions
(b) has two distinct solutions
(c) has four distinct solutions
(d) has no solutions
(e) has one (and only one) solution
5) Given the two circles
we can say that
(a) they do not intersect and the second is internal to the first
(b) they do not intersect and the first is internal to the second
(c) they intersect at four distinct points
(d) they intersect at two distinct points
(e) they are tangent (one point of intersection)
6) Which of the following equations is the equation of the line that passes through the
point and is perpendicular to the line ?
(a)
(b)
(c)
(d)
(e)
7) A woman has two children, Anna and Martino. The sum of the ages of the woman and
Anna is 60 years more than Martino’s age. The sum of the ages of the woman and Martino is
70 years more than Anna’s age. How old is the woman?
(a) 65 years old
(b) 68 years old
(c) 45 years old
(d) 54 years old
(e) 70 years old
8) The prime factorization of the number is:
(a)
(b)
(c)
(d)
(e)
9) The expression equals:
(a)
(b)
(c)
(d)
(e)
10) Let be a real number, different from zero. Simplifying the
expression , we get:
(a)
(b)
(c)
(d)
(e)
11) Arriving in the USA, an Italian tourist changes 10.000 euros (EUR) into dollars (USD);
the exchange rate is 1 EUR = 1,4 USD. During the vacation, he spends 12.800 USD. Back in
Italy, he changes the remaining USD back to EUR; the exchange rate is now 10 USD = 7,5
EUR. How much money has the tourist left?
(a) 1.200 EUR
(b) 950 EUR
(c) 900 EUR
(d) 1.800 EUR
(e) 850 EUR
12) The equation
(a) can not be solved, since its degree is six
(b) ha two distinct solutions and both are negative
(c) has one (and only one) real solution
(d) has six real distinct solutions
(e) has two (and only two) real distinct solutions
13)
In the figure, it is shown the graph of the function:
(a)
(b)
(c)
(d)
(e)
