Asteroid Impact | Science RC Practice

What happens when scientists desperately try to warn the world about an approaching catastrophe, but society remains fixated on celebrity gossip and social media trends? Can democratic societies effectively mobilize against threats that unfold gradually rather than dramatically? This week’s challenging RC passages explore how entertainment media reflects deeper societal challenges in addressing long-term existential risks, demanding nuanced reasoning about the gap between scientific expertise and public response.

Read these hard RC passage(s) in Science Technology and Environment and answer the question(s) that follows. You can choose the GMAT style Reading Passage and the question or the GRE RC variant and answer the GRE-style question. Even better, you could solve both.

GMAT RC | Difficult Passage | ~210 words

Contemporary scientific discourse regarding potentially hazardous celestial objects reveals significant disparities between empirical assessments and popular cultural representations. Astronomers acknowledge that asteroid detection represents an inevitable rather than hypothetical scenario, with objects ranging from relatively modest 150-meter bodies capable of devastating major metropolitan areas to even larger formations posing existential threats. At the same time, current scientific protocols maintain that there is no immediate danger from known objects while emphasizing preparedness given potential catastrophic consequences.

Conversely, entertainment industry portrayals consistently prioritize spectacle over scientific accuracy. Recent cinematic productions, exemplified by filmmaker Adam McKay’s satirical work “Don’t Look Up,” transform methodical astronomical research into sensationalized narratives featuring heroic individuals and dramatic governmental failures. These fictional accounts typically emphasize visual destruction and emotional responses while minimizing the collaborative, systematic nature of actual planetary defense research.

However, both domains converge on strategic preparation principles. Real-world initiatives like the Planetary Defense Initiative’s Double Asteroid Redirection Test demonstrate active intervention capabilities, paralleling fictional depictions of humanity’s technological responses to cosmic threats. While entertainment productions prioritize narrative engagement through heightened personal stakes and simplified solutions, underlying scientific concepts regarding orbital mechanics and deflection strategies maintain remarkable accuracy. This convergence suggests that popular media, despite dramatic embellishments, may inadvertently contribute to public awareness of legitimate astronomical concerns and potential mitigation technologies.

Question Type: CR Assumption | Question Difficulty: Medium-Hard

The passage suggests that popular media’s dramatic portrayals of asteroid threats may contribute to public awareness of legitimate astronomical concerns. This conclusion assumes which of the following?

1. Public understanding of complex scientific concepts can be enhanced even through sensationalized presentations
2. Scientific accuracy is less important than entertainment value in media productions about space threats
3. Collaborative research methods are more effective than individual heroic approaches to planetary defense
4. Government responses to cosmic threats are typically more systematic than entertainment media suggests
5. Visual destruction and emotional responses are necessary components of effective science communication

GRE Reading Practice | Challenging | ~180 words

Director Adam McKay’s satirical film “Don’t Look Up” depicts a scenario where astronomers discover an imminent comet collision while society remains preoccupied with trivial distractions. The narrative deliberately juxtaposes scientific urgency against public apathy, presenting researchers who struggle to communicate existential threats to audiences more invested in celebrity scandals than planetary survival. McKay employs this absurdist premise to illuminate a pervasive contemporary phenomenon: society’s demonstrable inability to mobilize effectively against gradual, long-term threats that lack immediate visceral impact.

This cinematic allegory reflects a broader epistemological crisis wherein institutional expertise confronts widespread skepticism and attention fragmentation. Modern societies exhibit remarkable proficiency in responding to acute, visible emergencies—natural disasters, economic crashes, military conflicts—yet consistently fail to address chronic, incremental dangers that require sustained collective action. Climate change, biodiversity loss, and indeed asteroid preparedness exemplify threats that demand proactive measures despite their temporal distance from immediate experience. McKay’s exaggerated scenario thus serves as a cogent critique of democratic societies’ structural predisposition toward reactive rather than preventative governance, highlighting how cognitive biases and media ecosystems conspire to undermine rational long-term planning.

Question Type: Title | Question Difficulty: Medium-Hard

Which of the following would be the most appropriate title for the passage?

1. The Satirical Genius of Contemporary Climate Cinema
2. When Democracy Fails: Cognitive Biases in Crisis Response
3. From Fiction to Reality: Society’s Blind Spot for Long-Term Threats
4. Media Distraction and the Decline of Scientific Authority
5. Preventative Governance in an Age of Information Overload