Writing Test 1...

The Consolations of Philosophy
Long viewed by many as the stereotypical useless major, philosophy is now being seen by many students and prospective employers as in fact a very useful and practical major, offering students a host of transferable skills with relevance to the modern workplace. [34] In broad terms, philosophy is the study of meaning and the values underlying thought and behavior. But [35] more pragmatically, the discipline encourages students to analyze complex material, question conventional beliefs, and express thoughts in a concise manner. Because philosophy [36] teaching students not what to think but how to think, the age-old discipline offers consistently useful tools for academic and professional achievement. [37] A 1994 survey concluded that only 18 percent of American colleges required at least one philosophy course. [38] Therefore, between 1992 and 1996, more than 400 independent philosophy departments were eliminated from institutions.
More recently, colleges have recognized the practicality and increasing popularity of studying philosophy and have markedly increased the number of philosophy programs offered. By 2008 there were 817 programs, up from 765 a decade before. In addition, the number of four-year graduates in philosophy has grown 46 percent in a decade. Also, studies have found
that those students who major in philosophy often do better than students from other majors in both verbal reasoning and analytical [39] writing. These results can be measured by standardized test scores. On the Graduate Record Examination (GRE), for example, students intending to study philosophy in graduate school [40] has scored higher than students in all but four other majors.
These days, many [41] students majoring in philosophy have no intention of becoming philosophers; instead they plan to apply those skills to other disciplines. Law and business specifically benefit from the complicated theoretical issues raised in the study of philosophy, but philosophy can be just as useful in engineering or any field requiring complex analytic skills.
[42] That these skills are transferable across professions [43] which makes them especially beneficial to twenty-first-century students. Because today's students can expect to hold multiple jobs--some of which may not even exist yet--during [44] our lifetime, studying philosophy allows them to be flexible and adaptable. High demand, advanced exam scores, and varied professional skills all argue for maintaining and enhancing philosophy courses and majors within academic institutions.

The Consolations of Philosophy
Long viewed by many as the stereotypical useless major, philosophy is now being seen by many students and prospective employers as in fact a very useful and practical major, offering students a host of transferable skills with relevance to the modern workplace. [34] In broad terms, philosophy is the study of meaning and the values underlying thought and behavior. But [35] more pragmatically, the discipline encourages students to analyze complex material, question conventional beliefs, and express thoughts in a concise manner. Because philosophy [36] teaching students not what to think but how to think, the age-old discipline offers consistently useful tools for academic and professional achievement. [37] A 1994 survey concluded that only 18 percent of American colleges required at least one philosophy course. [38] Therefore, between 1992 and 1996, more than 400 independent philosophy departments were eliminated from institutions.
More recently, colleges have recognized the practicality and increasing popularity of studying philosophy and have markedly increased the number of philosophy programs offered. By 2008 there were 817 programs, up from 765 a decade before. In addition, the number of four-year graduates in philosophy has grown 46 percent in a decade. Also, studies have found
that those students who major in philosophy often do better than students from other majors in both verbal reasoning and analytical [39] writing. These results can be measured by standardized test scores. On the Graduate Record Examination (GRE), for example, students intending to study philosophy in graduate school [40] has scored higher than students in all but four other majors.
These days, many [41] students majoring in philosophy have no intention of becoming philosophers; instead they plan to apply those skills to other disciplines. Law and business specifically benefit from the complicated theoretical issues raised in the study of philosophy, but philosophy can be just as useful in engineering or any field requiring complex analytic skills.
[42] That these skills are transferable across professions [43] which makes them especially beneficial to twenty-first-century students. Because today's students can expect to hold multiple jobs--some of which may not even exist yet--during [44] our lifetime, studying philosophy allows them to be flexible and adaptable. High demand, advanced exam scores, and varied professional skills all argue for maintaining and enhancing philosophy courses and majors within academic institutions.

The Consolations of Philosophy
Long viewed by many as the stereotypical useless major, philosophy is now being seen by many students and prospective employers as in fact a very useful and practical major, offering students a host of transferable skills with relevance to the modern workplace. [34] In broad terms, philosophy is the study of meaning and the values underlying thought and behavior. But [35] more pragmatically, the discipline encourages students to analyze complex material, question conventional beliefs, and express thoughts in a concise manner. Because philosophy [36] teaching students not what to think but how to think, the age-old discipline offers consistently useful tools for academic and professional achievement. [37] A 1994 survey concluded that only 18 percent of American colleges required at least one philosophy course. [38] Therefore, between 1992 and 1996, more than 400 independent philosophy departments were eliminated from institutions.
More recently, colleges have recognized the practicality and increasing popularity of studying philosophy and have markedly increased the number of philosophy programs offered. By 2008 there were 817 programs, up from 765 a decade before. In addition, the number of four-year graduates in philosophy has grown 46 percent in a decade. Also, studies have found
that those students who major in philosophy often do better than students from other majors in both verbal reasoning and analytical [39] writing. These results can be measured by standardized test scores. On the Graduate Record Examination (GRE), for example, students intending to study philosophy in graduate school [40] has scored higher than students in all but four other majors.
These days, many [41] students majoring in philosophy have no intention of becoming philosophers; instead they plan to apply those skills to other disciplines. Law and business specifically benefit from the complicated theoretical issues raised in the study of philosophy, but philosophy can be just as useful in engineering or any field requiring complex analytic skills.
[42] That these skills are transferable across professions [43] which makes them especially beneficial to twenty-first-century students. Because today's students can expect to hold multiple jobs--some of which may not even exist yet--during [44] our lifetime, studying philosophy allows them to be flexible and adaptable. High demand, advanced exam scores, and varied professional skills all argue for maintaining and enhancing philosophy courses and majors within academic institutions.

The Consolations of Philosophy
Long viewed by many as the stereotypical useless major, philosophy is now being seen by many students and prospective employers as in fact a very useful and practical major, offering students a host of transferable skills with relevance to the modern workplace. [34] In broad terms, philosophy is the study of meaning and the values underlying thought and behavior. But [35] more pragmatically, the discipline encourages students to analyze complex material, question conventional beliefs, and express thoughts in a concise manner. Because philosophy [36] teaching students not what to think but how to think, the age-old discipline offers consistently useful tools for academic and professional achievement. [37] A 1994 survey concluded that only 18 percent of American colleges required at least one philosophy course. [38] Therefore, between 1992 and 1996, more than 400 independent philosophy departments were eliminated from institutions.
More recently, colleges have recognized the practicality and increasing popularity of studying philosophy and have markedly increased the number of philosophy programs offered. By 2008 there were 817 programs, up from 765 a decade before. In addition, the number of four-year graduates in philosophy has grown 46 percent in a decade. Also, studies have found
that those students who major in philosophy often do better than students from other majors in both verbal reasoning and analytical [39] writing. These results can be measured by standardized test scores. On the Graduate Record Examination (GRE), for example, students intending to study philosophy in graduate school [40] has scored higher than students in all but four other majors.
These days, many [41] students majoring in philosophy have no intention of becoming philosophers; instead they plan to apply those skills to other disciplines. Law and business specifically benefit from the complicated theoretical issues raised in the study of philosophy, but philosophy can be just as useful in engineering or any field requiring complex analytic skills.
[42] That these skills are transferable across professions [43] which makes them especially beneficial to twenty-first-century students. Because today's students can expect to hold multiple jobs--some of which may not even exist yet--during [44] our lifetime, studying philosophy allows them to be flexible and adaptable. High demand, advanced exam scores, and varied professional skills all argue for maintaining and enhancing philosophy courses and majors within academic institutions.

The Consolations of Philosophy
Long viewed by many as the stereotypical useless major, philosophy is now being seen by many students and prospective employers as in fact a very useful and practical major, offering students a host of transferable skills with relevance to the modern workplace. [34] In broad terms, philosophy is the study of meaning and the values underlying thought and behavior. But [35] more pragmatically, the discipline encourages students to analyze complex material, question conventional beliefs, and express thoughts in a concise manner. Because philosophy [36] teaching students not what to think but how to think, the age-old discipline offers consistently useful tools for academic and professional achievement. [37] A 1994 survey concluded that only 18 percent of American colleges required at least one philosophy course. [38] Therefore, between 1992 and 1996, more than 400 independent philosophy departments were eliminated from institutions.
More recently, colleges have recognized the practicality and increasing popularity of studying philosophy and have markedly increased the number of philosophy programs offered. By 2008 there were 817 programs, up from 765 a decade before. In addition, the number of four-year graduates in philosophy has grown 46 percent in a decade. Also, studies have found
that those students who major in philosophy often do better than students from other majors in both verbal reasoning and analytical [39] writing. These results can be measured by standardized test scores. On the Graduate Record Examination (GRE), for example, students intending to study philosophy in graduate school [40] has scored higher than students in all but four other majors.
These days, many [41] students majoring in philosophy have no intention of becoming philosophers; instead they plan to apply those skills to other disciplines. Law and business specifically benefit from the complicated theoretical issues raised in the study of philosophy, but philosophy can be just as useful in engineering or any field requiring complex analytic skills.
[42] That these skills are transferable across professions [43] which makes them especially beneficial to twenty-first-century students. Because today's students can expect to hold multiple jobs--some of which may not even exist yet--during [44] our lifetime, studying philosophy allows them to be flexible and adaptable. High demand, advanced exam scores, and varied professional skills all argue for maintaining and enhancing philosophy courses and majors within academic institutions.

The Consolations of Philosophy
Long viewed by many as the stereotypical useless major, philosophy is now being seen by many students and prospective employers as in fact a very useful and practical major, offering students a host of transferable skills with relevance to the modern workplace. [34] In broad terms, philosophy is the study of meaning and the values underlying thought and behavior. But [35] more pragmatically, the discipline encourages students to analyze complex material, question conventional beliefs, and express thoughts in a concise manner. Because philosophy [36] teaching students not what to think but how to think, the age-old discipline offers consistently useful tools for academic and professional achievement. [37] A 1994 survey concluded that only 18 percent of American colleges required at least one philosophy course. [38] Therefore, between 1992 and 1996, more than 400 independent philosophy departments were eliminated from institutions.
More recently, colleges have recognized the practicality and increasing popularity of studying philosophy and have markedly increased the number of philosophy programs offered. By 2008 there were 817 programs, up from 765 a decade before. In addition, the number of four-year graduates in philosophy has grown 46 percent in a decade. Also, studies have found
that those students who major in philosophy often do better than students from other majors in both verbal reasoning and analytical [39] writing. These results can be measured by standardized test scores. On the Graduate Record Examination (GRE), for example, students intending to study philosophy in graduate school [40] has scored higher than students in all but four other majors.
These days, many [41] students majoring in philosophy have no intention of becoming philosophers; instead they plan to apply those skills to other disciplines. Law and business specifically benefit from the complicated theoretical issues raised in the study of philosophy, but philosophy can be just as useful in engineering or any field requiring complex analytic skills.
[42] That these skills are transferable across professions [43] which makes them especially beneficial to twenty-first-century students. Because today's students can expect to hold multiple jobs--some of which may not even exist yet--during [44] our lifetime, studying philosophy allows them to be flexible and adaptable. High demand, advanced exam scores, and varied professional skills all argue for maintaining and enhancing philosophy courses and majors within academic institutions.

This passage was written in 1996 after the discovery of a meteorite that appeared to contain fossil evidence of microscopic life on Mars.
      The rock that sprang to Martian "life" late last summer did not shock me by offering up apparent fossils of an extinct alien form of life. I had long believed that the universe teems Line with life elsewhere, and that our failure to find it simply (5) results from a lack of exploration. What did amaze me about the potato-size rock that fell from Mars was that it had traveled millions of miles across space to land here, blasted from world to world by a planetary collision of the sort that purportedly killed off our dinosaurs, and had lain waiting (10) for millennia upon an Antarctic ice field, until an observant young woman travelling in an expedition party picked it up, because she figured that it had come from another world. How could she know such a thing? The composition of ALH 84001, as the much scrutinized (15) rock is designated, closely matches the makeup of Martian matter that was analyzed on site in 1976 by miniature chemistry laboratories aboard two Viking Mars lenders. As a result of this positive identification, no astronomer seriously doubts the meteorite's Martian (20) origin. Researchers think they have pinpointed its former resting place to just two possible sites: a region called Sinus Sabaeus, fourteen degrees south of the Martian equator, or a crater east of the Hesperia Planitia region. The bold precision of this assessment is for me the most (25) stunning surprise dealt by the rock from Mars, even more mind-boggling than the suggestive traces of something that might once have lived and died in its microscopic fissures. 
       I cannot resist comparing this new intimacy with our solar system to the shoe box diorama of the planets I designed for (30) my grade-school science fair. I used marbles, jack balls, and Ping-Pong balls, all hanging on strings and painted different colors, all inside a box representing our solar system. This crude assortment of materials allowed a reasonable representation of what was known 40 years (35) ago about the nine planets: Mars was red and had two moons; Jupiter dwarfed the other planets (I should have used a basketball but it wouldn't fit in the box); Saturn had rings. If my school-age daughter were to attempt such a construction today, she'd need handfuls of jelly beans (40) and gum balls to model the newly discovered satellites of the giant planets. She'd want rings around Jupiter, Uranus, Neptune, too, not to mention a moon for Pluto. 
       Similarly, our solar system, once considered unique, now stands as merely the first known example of a (45) planetary system in our galaxy. Since October of 1995, astronomers at ground-based observatories in Europe and the United States have announced that they've found evidence of at least seven alien planets orbiting other stars. As yet, not one of these large planets, some of which (50) are many times the mass of Jupiter has actually been seen through a telescope; we know about them indirectly through the gravitational effects they exert on their parent stars. Yet, even though we have no picture of what they look like, enough information has been deduced about (55) their atmospheric conditions to grant the nickname Goldilocks to a planet attending the star 70 Virginis, an appellation suggesting that the cloud-top temperature is "just right," as the storybook Goldilocks would say, for the presence of liquid water. Liquid water, not known to (60) exist anywhere in our solar system now except on Earth, is thought crucial to biological life; thus, only a short leap of faith is needed to carry hopeful scientists from the presence of water to the existence of extraterrestrial life. To raise the specter of the Mars rock once again, (65) the primitive life-forms that pressed their memory inside it likewise suggest an era when dry-as-dust Mars was a wet world, where rivers flowed. 

The following passage is from a 1994 collection of essays about animals, written by a poet, philosopher, and animal trainer. 
    
       The question that comes first to my mind is this: What would it mean to say that an animal has the right to the pursuit of happiness? How would that come about, and in relationship to whom? 
       (5)In speaking of "animal happiness," we often tend to mean something like "creature comforts." The emblems of this are the golden retriever rolling in the grass, the horse with his nose deep in the oats, kitty by the fire. Creature comforts are important to animals: "Grub first, then ethics" (10) is a motto that would describe many a wise Labrador retriever, and I have a bull terrier named Annie whose continual quest for the perfect pillow inspires her to awesome feats. But there is something more to animals, something more to my Annie, a capacity for satisfactions (15) that come from work in the full sense something approximately like what leads some people to insist that they need a career (though my own temperament is such that I think of a good woodcarver or a dancer or a poet sooner than I think of a business executive when I (20) contemplate the kind of happiness enjoyed by an accomplished dressage' horse). This happiness, like the artist's, must come from something within the animal, something trainers call talent, and so cannot be imposed on the animal. But at the same time it does not arise in a (25) vacuum; if it had not been a fairly ordinary thing in one part of the world at one point to teach young children to play the harpsichord, it is doubtful that Mozart's music would exist. There are animal versions, if not equivalents, of Mozart, and they cannot make their spontaneous (30) passions into sustained happiness without education, any more than Mozart could have. 

The following passage is from a 1994 collection of essays about animals, written by a poet, philosopher, and animal trainer. 
    
       The question that comes first to my mind is this: What would it mean to say that an animal has the right to the pursuit of happiness? How would that come about, and in relationship to whom? 
       (5)In speaking of "animal happiness," we often tend to mean something like "creature comforts." The emblems of this are the golden retriever rolling in the grass, the horse with his nose deep in the oats, kitty by the fire. Creature comforts are important to animals: "Grub first, then ethics" (10) is a motto that would describe many a wise Labrador retriever, and I have a bull terrier named Annie whose continual quest for the perfect pillow inspires her to awesome feats. But there is something more to animals, something more to my Annie, a capacity for satisfactions (15) that come from work in the full sense something approximately like what leads some people to insist that they need a career (though my own temperament is such that I think of a good woodcarver or a dancer or a poet sooner than I think of a business executive when I (20) contemplate the kind of happiness enjoyed by an accomplished dressage' horse). This happiness, like the artist's, must come from something within the animal, something trainers call talent, and so cannot be imposed on the animal. But at the same time it does not arise in a (25) vacuum; if it had not been a fairly ordinary thing in one part of the world at one point to teach young children to play the harpsichord, it is doubtful that Mozart's music would exist. There are animal versions, if not equivalents, of Mozart, and they cannot make their spontaneous (30) passions into sustained happiness without education, any more than Mozart could have. 

This passage was written in 1996 after the discovery of a meteorite that appeared to contain fossil evidence of microscopic life on Mars.
      The rock that sprang to Martian "life" late last summer did not shock me by offering up apparent fossils of an extinct alien form of life. I had long believed that the universe teems Line with life elsewhere, and that our failure to find it simply (5) results from a lack of exploration. What did amaze me about the potato-size rock that fell from Mars was that it had traveled millions of miles across space to land here, blasted from world to world by a planetary collision of the sort that purportedly killed off our dinosaurs, and had lain waiting (10) for millennia upon an Antarctic ice field, until an observant young woman travelling in an expedition party picked it up, because she figured that it had come from another world. How could she know such a thing? The composition of ALH 84001, as the much scrutinized (15) rock is designated, closely matches the makeup of Martian matter that was analyzed on site in 1976 by miniature chemistry laboratories aboard two Viking Mars lenders. As a result of this positive identification, no astronomer seriously doubts the meteorite's Martian (20) origin. Researchers think they have pinpointed its former resting place to just two possible sites: a region called Sinus Sabaeus, fourteen degrees south of the Martian equator, or a crater east of the Hesperia Planitia region. The bold precision of this assessment is for me the most (25) stunning surprise dealt by the rock from Mars, even more mind-boggling than the suggestive traces of something that might once have lived and died in its microscopic fissures. 
       I cannot resist comparing this new intimacy with our solar system to the shoe box diorama of the planets I designed for (30) my grade-school science fair. I used marbles, jack balls, and Ping-Pong balls, all hanging on strings and painted different colors, all inside a box representing our solar system. This crude assortment of materials allowed a reasonable representation of what was known 40 years (35) ago about the nine planets: Mars was red and had two moons; Jupiter dwarfed the other planets (I should have used a basketball but it wouldn't fit in the box); Saturn had rings. If my school-age daughter were to attempt such a construction today, she'd need handfuls of jelly beans (40) and gum balls to model the newly discovered satellites of the giant planets. She'd want rings around Jupiter, Uranus, Neptune, too, not to mention a moon for Pluto. 
       Similarly, our solar system, once considered unique, now stands as merely the first known example of a (45) planetary system in our galaxy. Since October of 1995, astronomers at ground-based observatories in Europe and the United States have announced that they've found evidence of at least seven alien planets orbiting other stars. As yet, not one of these large planets, some of which (50) are many times the mass of Jupiter has actually been seen through a telescope; we know about them indirectly through the gravitational effects they exert on their parent stars. Yet, even though we have no picture of what they look like, enough information has been deduced about (55) their atmospheric conditions to grant the nickname Goldilocks to a planet attending the star 70 Virginis, an appellation suggesting that the cloud-top temperature is "just right," as the storybook Goldilocks would say, for the presence of liquid water. Liquid water, not known to (60) exist anywhere in our solar system now except on Earth, is thought crucial to biological life; thus, only a short leap of faith is needed to carry hopeful scientists from the presence of water to the existence of extraterrestrial life. To raise the specter of the Mars rock once again, (65) the primitive life-forms that pressed their memory inside it likewise suggest an era when dry-as-dust Mars was a wet world, where rivers flowed.