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UPSC CSE CSAT 2022 · Question 33 · Reading comprehension

With reference to the passage, the following assumptions have been made:

Directions for the following 4 (four) items: Read the following two passages and answer the items that follow the passages. Your answers to these items should be based on the passages only.

Passage—1

Natural selection cannot anticipate future environments on the earth. Therefore, the set of existing organisms can never be fully prepared for environmental catastrophes that await life. An outcome of this is the extinction of those species which cannot overcome environmental adversity. This failure to survive, in modern terms, can be attributed to the genomes which are unable to withstand geological vagaries or biological mishaps (infections, diseases and so on). In biological evolution on the earth, extinction of species has been a major feature. The earth may presently have up to ten million species, yet more than 90% of species that have ever lived on the earth are now extinct. Once again, the creationist doctrines fail to satisfactorily address why a divine creator will firstly bother to create millions of species and then allow them to perish. The Darwinian explanation for extinct life is once again simple, elegant and at once convincing—organisms go extinct as a function of environmental or biological assaults for which their inheritance deems them ill-equipped. Therefore, the so-called Darwinian theory of evolution is not a theory at all. Evolution happens—this is a fact. The mechanism of evolution (Darwin proposed natural selection) is amply supported by scientific data. Indeed, to date no single zoological, botanical, geological, paleontological, genetic or physical evidence has refuted either of the central two main Darwinian ideas. If religion is not taken into consideration, Darwinian laws are acceptable just like the laws proposed by Copernicus, Galileo, Newton and Einstein—sets of natural laws that explain natural phenomena in the universe.

CSAT 2022 · Q33

Reading comprehension Medium

With reference to the passage, the following assumptions have been made:

  1. 1.Only species that have the ability to overcome environmental catastrophes will survive and perpetuate.
  2. 2.More than 90% of the species on the earth are in the danger of getting extinct due to drastic changes in the environment.
  3. 3.Darwin’s theory explains all the natural phenomena.

Which of the above assumptions is/are valid?

Answer & explanation

Answer: (a) 1 only

The passage implies that only species able to overcome environmental adversity survive. The 90% figure is about species that ever lived and are now extinct, not present species at risk, and the passage never claims Darwin’s theory explains all natural phenomena.

  • ✓ 1. Extinction is “the extinction of those species which cannot overcome environmental adversity”; so only those that can overcome it survive and carry on.
  • ✗ 2. Misreads the figure: “more than 90% of species that have ever lived on the earth are now extinct” is about the past, not about present species being in danger.
  • ✗ 3. Overreach: Darwinian laws are compared with the laws of Copernicus, Galileo, Newton and Einstein that “explain natural phenomena”; the passage does not say Darwin’s theory explains all of them.

Remember · Check what a statistic actually counts; wrong options often shift its time frame or the group it covers.

Question and answer: UPSC's official GS Paper II (2022, Series A) — paper ↗ · answer key ↗. Explanation: Minimalist IAS, checked 30 Sept 2026 (how we verify). ·

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