Doubt: practice-va-pj-questions-2026-06-22-022436-q5

Anonymous

13d ago

📖 VARC Doubts

In this question I answered 4213 my explanation - 4 we introduce the idea and introduce culture functions 2 - we explain how the romantics articulated and elaborated these functions 1 - we talk about how **This intuitive understanding** weights 3 - with 3 we conclude that these functions are important and a questioned if they should be continued to be served by the concept that philosophers and ecologists have subjected to increasingly searching scrutiny My doubt is that in 1 **This intuitive understanding** is referring to something already established in para jumble, then how can it be a starter ?

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Linked Question

The four sentences (labelled 1, 2, 3, and 4) given below, when properly sequenced, would yield a coherent paragraph. Decide on the proper sequencing of the order of the sentences and key in the sequence of the four numbers as your answer.

1. This intuitive understanding carries considerable cultural weight: the wilderness, as image, functions as a counterpoint to the built environment, a domain where something essential about the non-human world can be encountered on its own terms rather than as a backdrop to human activity. 2. A long tradition of landscape writing, from the romantics through the conservationists of the early twentieth century, has articulated and elaborated these functions in ways that have profoundly shaped how educated inhabitants of industrialized societies relate to the non-human world. 3. These functions are real and should not be dismissed; the question is whether they can continue to be served by a concept that philosophers and ecologists have subjected to increasingly searching scrutiny. 4. The emotional and aesthetic register that wilderness language calls up — solitude, scale, contingency, the indifference of natural forces — marks it as a concept that serves important psychological and cultural functions beyond the strictly ecological.

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Answer: 1423

Find the opener. S1 sets the scene by invoking a shared cultural sense: "This intuitive understanding carries considerable cultural weight: the wilderness… functions as a counterpoint to the built environment." It frames wilderness as an image, which the rest of the paragraph builds on. The other sentences refer back to "these functions," "it," or stand as the closing pivot, so S1 opens.

S4 follows S1. S4 develops the idea: "The emotional and aesthetic register that wilderness language calls up… marks it as a concept that serves important psychological and cultural functions beyond the strictly ecological." It expands S1's counterpoint framing and names the "functions" the next sentence will pick up. So 1 → 4.

S2 follows S4. S2 says "A long tradition of landscape writing… has articulated and elaborated these functions." "These functions" refers to the psychological and cultural functions S4 just named, giving 4 → 2.

S3 closes. S3 is the critical turn: "These functions are real and should not be dismissed; the question is whether they can continue to be served by a concept that philosophers and ecologists have subjected to increasingly searching scrutiny." It acknowledges the functions, then pivots to the doubt — the natural endpoint that sets up further discussion.

Full chain: S1 (wilderness as cultural counterpoint) → S4 (its functions beyond the ecological) → S2 (a tradition has elaborated these functions) → S3 (but can the concept still serve them?).

Takeaway: Watch how "functions" is introduced (S4) and then referred to ("these functions" in S2, again in S3) — the chain of references fixes the run, and the "but the question is…" pivot closes it.

1 Answer

CATLab AI✦ CATLab AI13d ago

This jumble hinges on one rule about openers: a sentence beginning with 'This + noun' can still open a paragraph if the sentence itself immediately defines that noun — and S1 does exactly that, which resolves your doubt.

Read S1 closely: 'This intuitive understanding carries considerable cultural weight: the wilderness, as image, functions as a counterpoint to the built environment, a domain where something essential about the non-human world can be encountered on its own terms...' Everything after the colon tells you what the 'intuitive understanding' is — the shared sense that wilderness stands apart from the built environment. The reference is resolved inside the sentence itself, so S1 needs nothing before it.

Now flip the logic: nowhere else in the jumble is any 'intuitive understanding' established. S4 offers an 'emotional and aesthetic register'; S2 offers a tradition that has 'articulated and elaborated' — articulation is the opposite of intuitive. So the only slot where S1 fits is the opening slot. Placed third, as in your 4-2-1-3, 'This intuitive understanding' dangles with no antecedent.

With S1 fixed at the front, the rest falls into place. S4 unpacks that image — solitude, scale, contingency — and, crucially, is the first sentence to use 'functions' as a noun: 'serves important psychological and cultural functions'. (In S1, 'functions' is only a verb.) S2's 'these functions' must point back to that plural noun, so 4 → 2 is locked. S3 then concedes the functions are real but pivots — 'the question is whether they can continue to be served by a concept that philosophers and ecologists have subjected to increasingly searching scrutiny.' A concession-plus-pivot is a classic closer; the paragraph ends on the open question.

Your instincts were mostly right — you had 4 → 2 and S3 as the closer; only S1's slot was off. The arc also reads cleanly in the official order: shared intuition (1) → the functions that intuition serves (4) → the tradition that articulated them (2) → the critical question (3).

Final answer: 1423

—————————— ✨ AI-generated answer. CATLab AI is very reliable on QA & LRDI, but VARC answers can sometimes be debatable — treat this as one considered take and verify the reasoning yourself.

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