DAT Bootcamp RC Test #5

[fayevalentine]

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Hi, if this violates any rules I apologize and please remove the post.

On the RC Tets #5, the passage about quarks states:

"There are six “flavors”: up, down, strange, charmed, bottom, and top. The first three flavors were known since the 1960s, but the charmed quark was not discovered until 1974, the bottom in 1977, and the top in 1995. Each flavor comes in three “colors”: red, green, and blue. It should be emphasized that these terms are just labels: quarks are much smaller than the wavelength of visible light and so do not have any color in the normal sense of the term."

QUESTION: Each flavor quark is identified by its color because quarks are known for their colorful appearance.
ANSWER: The statement is correct but the reason is NOT.

Can someone please explain this answer to me? The passage states that the flavors are up, down, strange, etc. and the colors are just extra varieties to each flavor. How can the statement be correct? Thank you!

 

[Eefjin]

quarks don't have "colorful appearance" because "quarks are much smaller than the wavelength of visible light and so do not have any color in the normal sense of the term."

So in this case BC RC is correct. However, I actually found BC RC to be a dip in quality compared to other BC sections. There were a lot of suspect answers that I disagreed with. I scored ~23 on average on BC and 29 on the actual DAT.

EDIT: I realized you were asking how the statement is correct (not how the reason is incorrect). The passage says "Each flavor comes in three “colors”: red, green, and blue". Are you saying that you think the statement is incorrect because quarks cant be identified by its color? I think then it's a debate over the definition of "identified", because I think you took the term "identify" literally as you are able to tell the type of flavor quark using its color.

I think the question was just worded poorly in this case.

 

[fayevalentine]

quarks don't have "colorful appearance" because "quarks are much smaller than the wavelength of visible light and so do not have any color in the normal sense of the term."

So in this case BC RC is correct. However, I actually found BC RC to be a dip in quality compared to other BC sections. There were a lot of suspect answers that I disagreed with. I scored ~23 on average on BC and 29 on the actual DAT.

EDIT: I realized you were asking how the statement is correct (not how the reason is incorrect). The passage says "Each flavor comes in three “colors”: red, green, and blue". Are you saying that you think the statement is incorrect because quarks cant be identified by its color? I think then it's a debate over the definition of "identified", because I think you took the term "identify" literally as you are able to tell the type of flavor quark using its color.

I think the question was just worded poorly in this case.

Hi, thank you for your reply. The reason I am confused it because the passage states "There are six “flavors”: up, down, strange, charmed, bottom, and top". Therefore, I would think the flavors would be identified by up, down, strange, etc. and not by colors. The colors are extra info, but not the primary identifying info. Does that make sense?

I agree that BC RC is really lacking. I've never had trouble with reading before and the few questions I'm getting wrong seem really subjective. Nice RC score by the way! Yours is the highest I have seen, great job!

 

[Eefjin]

Ah I see what you're saying. However, the question says "Each flavor quark is identified by its color", not "Each quark is identified by its color". I see it as nested categories: Each quark can be a flavor, and each flavor quark can be a color.

Honestly I would just ignore this question, I wouldn't expect this sort of sleuthing to be important on the real thing.

Most RC resources for the DAT (I go so far as to say ALL of them) aren't great. I also studied for the MCAT and the quality of their RC resources was infinitely better. There's not much you can do about it but I ended up just reading an exorbitant amount and really focusing on reading FAST. To me, reading speed was the main factor in doing well.

 

[fayevalentine]

Thank you! That's good to know.

 

[DAT Destroyer]

Ah I see what you're saying. However, the question says "Each flavor quark is identified by its color", not "Each quark is identified by its color". I see it as nested categories: Each quark can be a flavor, and each flavor quark can be a color.

Honestly I would just ignore this question, I wouldn't expect this sort of sleuthing to be important on the real thing.

Most RC resources for the DAT (I go so far as to say ALL of them) aren't great. I also studied for the MCAT and the quality of their RC resources was infinitely better. There's not much you can do about it but I ended up just reading an exorbitant amount and really focusing on reading FAST. To me, reading speed was the main factor in doing well.

Excellent response and I agree 100 percent, focus on speed and comprehension!