Explanation for Question 24 From the Reading Section on the 2017 May Sat
Question 24 says based on the passage, 2 which question are astronomers was unable to answer unless they know a particular exoplanets 3 mass. So since this question starts off with the phrase, 4 based on the passage, we know that the answer is going to come pretty 5 directly from text evidence. And so we can look back in the passage at 6 where mass is first introduced as kind of a factor here and answer 7 this question pretty well. So mass is first introduced in this second paragraph, 8 right along with the introduction of this new technique trend, 9 the timing variation. And we can see that it specifically says to know whether 10 it is Rocky gaseous or some mixture of the two astronomers also need its 11 mass. So very explicitly saying what the astronomers need the mass for in 12 this case. If we want to sum this up in one word, 13 it's composition, the composition of a planet, 14 Rocky gaseous, or a mixture. So if we look back at the answer choices 15 here and see which one talks about composition, 16 then we'll have some luck in choosing the correct answer. 17 So answer choice a says how similar to earth is that? 18 Sorry. Yes. How similar to earth is that planet and its ratio of rock 19 to gas? So we're talking about composition, 20 right? You have the rock and the gas element, 21 the similarity kind of throws a little bit of a wildcard in there because 22 that's not specifically outlined in the passage, 23 but it's still a question related to the composition of a planet....