Cross-Text Connections

SAT Reading and Writing· difficulty 2/5

Text 1: Biologist Park argues that ants exhibit remarkable forms of collective intelligence. Without any central coordinator, an ant colony can build complex nests, coordinate food gathering, and rapidly reorganize after disruption — all through local interactions among simple individuals.

Text 2: Biologist Singh accepts that ant colonies behave impressively but cautions against the term "intelligence." The behaviors emerge from chemical signals and simple decision rules; no individual ant nor the colony as a whole "knows" anything in the cognitive sense. The phenomenon is striking, Singh contends, but better described in self-organization terms than in cognitive ones.

Both authors would most likely agree that

  • A

    individual ants make conscious plans.

  • B

    ant colonies are disorganized.

  • C

    ants have human-like reasoning.

  • D

    ant colonies produce sophisticated collective behaviors without a central coordinator.

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Explanation

Both accept ant colonies' sophistication and decentralization; they differ on terminology. A is shared. B, C, and D contradict at least one author.

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