SAT #9 Reading (Questions 22 & 23)

Question

In McKinnon's view, Ceres differs from other objects in the asteroid belt in which significant ways?

Answer 1

22.R.9 & 23.R.9

Answer Choice C and Answer D are the correct answers, because, on McKinnon’s view, Ceres and other objects in the asteroid belt differ because “a dip in Ceres’s light spectrum” suggests that it may have ammonium-rich clay on its surface, unlike other objects in the asteroid belt. This matches Answer Choice C for Question 22 — that “the surface composition of Ceres is dissimilar to the composition of the other objects.” Answer Choice A is wrong, because neither the texts nor the Passage mention the surface temperature of Ceres being lower than other objects in the belt. Answer Choice B is wrong because neither the texts nor the Passage mention Ceres’s changing dimensions over time and how they differ from other objects. Answer Choice D is wrong because it’s a dip in the spectrum of light reflected by Ceres, not a greater intensity, which demonstrates a possible difference between it and other objects in the belt. For Question 23, Answer Choice D is the best option, since while Lines 18-20 mention the fact that there may be ammonium-rich clay on the surface of Ceres, only Lines 20-23 tell us that this is different from the composition of other objects in the belt.

How to solve this? The Question asks how, in McKinnon’s view, Ceres differs from other objects in the asteroid belt. Because this is a Paired Question, we should begin by looking through the answer choices for Question 23, looking for a view that McKinnon has on the difference between Ceres and other objects in the belt. To begin, we should scan the text for the first instance of “McKinnon” and discount texts before then, since they’re very unlikely to express a view that he has. We should note that he’s introduced in Line 11, which should cause us to discount Answer Choice A and B. Sure enough, neither of those lines mention a view that McKinnon expresses, so we can eliminate those options. Answer Choice C says that a dip in Ceres’s light spectrum suggests the presence of ammonium-rich clay on its surface. This might express a feature that makes Ceres different from the other objects in the belt, so we can keep this option. Answer Choice D explains that the ammonium-rich clay found on Ceres has not been found on other objects from the asteroid belt that have fallen to Earth. This also explains a difference, so we should keep this option. At the point, the only two possible texts cite the fact that Ceres has ammonium-rich clay as a possible difference between it and other objects, so we should expect our answer to reference this as we move back to Question 22.

Answer Choice A says that, “the surface temperature of Ceres is lower than the temperature of the other objects.” Because none of the texts from Question 23 mention surface temperature, we can eliminate this option. Answer Choice B says that, “the dimensions of Ceres have varied more over time than the dimensions of the other objects have.” Because none of our texts mention this change in dimension over time, we should also eliminate this option. Answer Choice C says that, “the surface composition of Ceres is dissimilar to the composition of the other objects,” which does match our two texts, so we should keep this option. Answer Choice D says that, “the light reflected by Ceres is more intense than the light reflected by the other objects.” This answer choice does mention the difference in light reflected by Ceres, but says that it has greater intensity, whereas our texts mention a “dip in the spectrum of light,” so we should eliminate this option. This leaves only Answer Choice C for Question 22.

At this point, we still have to decide between Answer Choice C and D for Question 23. Both mention that Ceres shows signs of ammonium-rich clay, but, whereas Lines 18-20 mention that the light reflected by Ceres shows signs of ammonium-rich clay, only Lines 20-23 explain to us that this is significant because it differs from other objects in the asteroid belt. So we should choose Answer Choice D for Question 23.