The passage below is accompanied by four questions. Based on the passage, choose the best answer for each question.
The biggest challenge [The Nutmeg’s Curse by Ghosh] throws down is to the prevailing understanding of when the climate crisis started. Most of us have accepted . . . that it started with the widespread use of coal at the beginning of the Industrial Age in the 18th century and worsened with the mass adoption of oil and natural gas in the 20th.
Ghosh takes this history at least three centuries back, to the start of European colonialism in the 15th century. He [starts] the book with a 1621 massacre by Dutch invaders determined to impose a monopoly on nutmeg cultivation and trade in the Banda islands in today’s Indonesia. Not only do the Dutch systematically depopulate the islands through genocide, they also try their best to bring nutmeg cultivation into plantation mode. These are the two points to which Ghosh returns through examples from around the world. One, how European colonialists decimated not only indigenous populations but also indigenous understanding of the relationship between humans and Earth. Two, how this was an invasion not only of humans but of the Earth itself, and how this continues to the present day by looking at nature as a ‘resource’ to exploit. . . .
We know we are facing more frequent and more severe heatwaves, storms, floods, droughts and wildfires due to climate change. We know our expansion through deforestation, dam building, canal cutting – in short, terraforming, the word Ghosh uses – has brought us repeated disasters . . . Are these the responses of an angry Gaia who has finally had enough? By using the word ‘curse’ in the title, the author makes it clear that he thinks so. I use the pronoun ‘who’ knowingly, because Ghosh has quoted many non-European sources to enquire into the relationship between humans and the world around them so that he can question the prevalent way of looking at Earth as an inert object to be exploited to the maximum.
As Ghosh’s text, notes and bibliography show once more, none of this is new. There have always been challenges to the way European colonialists looked at other civilisations and at Earth. It is just that the invaders and their myriad backers in the fields of economics, politics, anthropology, philosophy, literature, technology, physics, chemistry, biology have dominated global intellectual discourse. . . .
There are other points of view that we can hear today if we listen hard enough. Those observing global climate negotiations know about the Latin American way of looking at Earth as Pachamama (Earth Mother). They also know how such a framing is just provided lip service and is ignored in the substantive portions of the negotiations. In The Nutmeg’s Curse, Ghosh explains why. He shows the extent of the vested interest in the oil economy – not only for oil-exporting countries, but also for a superpower like the US that controls oil drilling, oil prices and oil movement around the world. Many of us know power utilities are sabotaging decentralised solar power generation today because it hits their revenues and control. And how the other points of view are so often drowned out.
To illustrate how colonialism represented and perpetuated the mindset that has led to climate change.
The Banda islands massacre opens the book and introduces the two points Ghosh keeps returning to.
The Dutch both destroyed the islanders and forced nutmeg into plantation mode, showing how colonialists treated people and the Earth alike as things to exploit, a view that “continues to the present day” and drives the climate crisis.
So the story illustrates how colonialism represented and perpetuated the mindset that has led to climate change. It is not offered as the first instance of climate change processes, only as violence against the colonised, or as a point about one crop.
Hence, To illustrate how colonialism represented and perpetuated the mindset that has led to climate change.
All of the following can be inferred from the reviewer’s discussion of “The Nutmeg’s Curse”, EXCEPT:
academic discourses have always served the function of raising awareness about environmental preservation.
In an “EXCEPT” question, three statements can be inferred from the review; the required one cannot.
Ghosh traces the climate crisis back to European colonialism, so climate change is intertwined with colonialism. Colonialists imposed the view of nature as a “resource” to exploit, which persists today. The review stresses non-European ways of seeing Earth, from which policy makers could learn.
The review says the colonisers’ backers in economics, philosophy, science and other fields “dominated global intellectual discourse”, so academic discourse has not always raised awareness about preserving the environment.
Hence, academic discourses have always served the function of raising awareness about environmental preservation.
The decentralised characteristic of renewable energy resources like solar power.
The last paragraph explains why climate negotiations fail: non-European views like Pachamama get only “lip service”, there is a vested interest in the oil economy, and the US controls oil around the world.
Power utilities sabotage decentralised solar power “because it hits their revenues and control”, which is the greed of firms built on non-renewable energy.
The decentralised nature of solar power is not itself a reason for failure; it is the target of the sabotage. So it is not a reason the passage gives.
Hence, The decentralised characteristic of renewable energy resources like solar power.
Non-European societies have perceived the Earth as a non-living source of all resources.
The reviewer uses “who” for Gaia “knowingly, because Ghosh has quoted many non-European sources” that question the view of Earth as “an inert object”.
If non-European societies had in fact seen the Earth as a non-living source of resources, the basis for treating Gaia as a living “who” would disappear, making the pronoun inappropriate.
A different title, new Western scientific evidence, or a direct link between human activity and climate change would not remove the non-European view on which the reviewer relies.
Hence, Non-European societies have perceived the Earth as a non-living source of all resources.
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Identify the odd sentence out and key in the number of that sentence as your answer.
The last paragraph of the passage refers to “middle-class, white, professional men”. Which one of the following qualities best describes the connection among them?
Study the following sets of concepts and identify the set that is conceptually closest to the concerns and arguments of the passage.
According to the passage, who or what was an “alienist”?
“Conversely, when a defendant struck officials as unlike themselves, whether by dint of disease, gender, confession, or race, the precariousness of judgments about mental state was exposed.” Which one of the following best describes the use of the word “confession” in this sentence?
According to the incentive or moral hazard argument, which one of the designs below is most consistent with the claim that some inequality can raise growth?
Which one of the options below best summarises the passage?
The primary function of the three-part case for a positive income inequality–economic growth link in the first half of the passage is to show that:
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Important Questions from Non Grammar
- In formulating Principle VI (a), the ILC clarified the term "waging of a war of aggression" because:
- The author attributes the growing public frustration with the UN primarily to which pair of continuous failures?
- A primary point of divergence between the US Conservative position and the Secretary-General's Conservative position on security matters, according to the summary is:
- According to the critique's conclusion, the immediate, insurmountable barrier preventing the implementation of any reform, major or minor, is:
- The Secretary-General's 'Agenda for Peace' proposed a specific military capability intended to address the gap between traditional peace-keeping and full military action. This proposed unit was explicitly characterized by the summary as being:
