Archeological Expedition to Arizona: Question Set 3

00:00 We kicked this off with a question. The passage indicates that the caves were what? Dug out by hand, carved out by rivers, formed by earthquakes, or created by falling rock.

00:12 Paragraph 3 states that the rock in which these caves have been hewn is very soft.

00:18 So, hewn indicates that it is possible to have carved these out by hand.

00:26 But do you think it leaves a little bit of latitude for possibly carved out by the rivers? We clarify this with paragraph 4 where we state there are abundant evidences from the marks of tools employed, that the greater part of each cave was pecked out by hand which would clearly be answer selection A.

00:48 Question 2 states summit refers to the what? Now, when we have something in quotes or italics on a CARS question, that can refer to a definition in context question.

01:01 So something that maybe has a different meaning than how we would use it in everyday life.

01:06 Paragraph 1 tells us that the summit of the cliffs above the caves, large rectangular ruins with fallen walls were discovered though it can't be C which would be the opposite base of each cave if this is in fact above the caves.

01:24 And D seems pretty clearly not to be the case the people who inhabited the caves.

01:29 That leaves us between A and B, top of the cliff and the rock material.

01:34 The rock material could possibly be the correct answer if we had really good context for that.

01:38 I don't think we do based on this context we've already read.

01:42 I think we can safely state that summit refers to the top of the cliff, answer selection A.

01:49 Question 3 then goes on to state "The authors claim these ruins are not unique because" what? Now, the passage states that there is a slightly reddish-brown stratum just below the line of entrances to the cavate chambers.

02:04 And that resembles answer selection C, they are made of reddish-brown stratum.

02:10 But it also states that the feature other similar ruins share is geographical position and archaeological remains, not necessarily that red-brown stratum.

02:22 That being said, we don't have geographical position and archaeological remains as an answer selection.

02:28 We have to dig a little bit further, no pun intended, to where the passage goes on to state these ruins are however in no respect peculiar but closely resemble those ordinarily found in a similar position throughout this region and elsewhere in Arizona and New Mexico.

02:45 The phrase "in no respect peculiar" I really like how it aligns to the phrase in the question stem "are not unique", it's not an exact synonym but these ideas are close enough to lead us to answer selection A, they resemble those found elsewhere in New Mexico and Arizona.

03:04 Question 4 then states "Based on the passage, the authors infer that the Verde dwelling had a large population based on" what? The large number of rooms, the size of the rooms, the large amount of debris left behind, or the written records found in the caves.

03:21 The final paragraph states that "The number of these troglodytic dwellings (it's kind of an older term for caveman) placed on the Verde is very large.

03:31 Indeed the mesas may be said to be fairly honeycombed with subterranean habitations." This kind of aligns with either answer selections A or C.

03:41 A because those honeycombed habitations could be the large number of rooms and C because the debris left behind could align with another growth that in paragraph 1 states "large rectangular ruins with fallen walls were discovered." I think we need to push forward to paragraph 4 to really seal the deal which states that "judging from the number of rooms, the cliffs on the left bank of the Verde must have had a considerable population when inhabited." We actually highlighted this in our first read just because it put a focus on the human population here and this best aligns to answer selection A, the large number of rooms.

04:19 Question 5 then states "These dwellings could best be described as" what.

04:23 Secure, insecure, easily invaded, or accessible.

04:29 Now, we've actually just been building up to how these habitations are what is accessible according to kind of a ledge in the cliff and we're told on a number of occasions that they're difficult to access so I think it could be implied that these are secure and a few points actually states so explicitly.

04:50 For example, question 4 states "These caverns, no doubt, swarmed with human beings and they're inaccessible position to furnish the inhabitants with a safe refuge from enemies.

05:00 I'm comfortable either answering these from a context perspective or from a big picture perspective just understanding the purpose of these dwellings.

05:08 Either of those approaches should lead us to answer selection A, secure.

05:14 Lastly, question 6 states "Which is not evidence for identifying the inhabitants?" Language comparisons, geographic location, archaeological remains, or type of ruins.

05:27 It's kind of a funny way to phrase a question right. How do you locate context that is not in a passage? Again, you can use your overall understanding of the passage here and then maybe just rule out a few answer selections that you didn't remember with context. We'll go through all of them just to be thorough.

05:45 So, we know that the people are referred to as the people of the Verde valley and that similar communities exist across Arizona and New Mexico.

05:55 So that rules out B where geographic location we see was discussed.

05:59 We know that the type of ruins can be distinguished between the caves where the people dwell and kind of a functional type of building on top of a promontory so that rules out answer choice D, type of ruins where we're discussing types of ruins.

06:14 Between A and C language comparisons and archaeological remains, we might rule out answer selection C just from kind of a big picture perspective, it's pretty clear that those were discussed whereas language comparisons did not show up in the passage and we can comfortably select answer selection A as correct.