BMAT 2006-S1

The ratio of seabirds to people on Gannet Island is 80:1. However, during the last twenty years the seabird population has fallen by 60 %, whilst the human population has increased by 25 %.

“Freedom of speech is generally considered to be a key element of a democracy. But when that freedom is used to incite hatred of minority groups, another key feature of democracy – tolerance – is lost. So while it is true to say that freedom of speech is very desirable, it has to have limits put upon it if democracy is to be sustained.”

A square conference table is made up of four smaller tables as shown below:

“The media have an important role to play in a democracy, since a democracy requires that voters are well informed about the political issues. However, whenever a government minister makes a serious mistake, journalists seize on it as the only topic worth reporting in the political sphere. They focus on it to the exclusion of all other important political issues. Moreover, the particular story itself has its own dramatic requirements, which means that every detail that supports claims of a minister’s incompetence is included, whereas details that would support an alternative view are omitted. A good story is not the same thing as the truth. So it is clear that political journalists are not doing their job properly.”

A railway tunnel is 615 metres long. There is a strict speed limit of 45 kilometres per hour inside the tunnel and within 500 metres of either end.

The front of a train, whose length is 80 metres, has just entered the tunnel. The front of another train, of length 120 metres and travelling towards the tunnel in the opposite direction on a parallel track, is 40 metres away from the other end.

“Despite a growing problem of eating disorders among young women, the print media still contribute to the problem by featuring photographs of models far thinner than most ‘ordinary’ people. On the one hand they publish articles about the dangers of anorexia and bulimia, but on the other hand they use images of excessively thin models to promote the latest fashions.”

The table below shows one measure of pupils’ achievements in all GCSE subjects in England broken down by ethnicity, gender and whether they have English as a first language. The measure shown is the percentage of pupils achieving 5 or more GCSE passes at grades A* to C. The columns labelled ‘KS 2-4 VA Measure’ give a measurement of the pupils’ improvement between Key Stage 2 (typically aged 11) and Key Stage 4 (typically aged 16). This is commonly known as ‘Value Added’.

Table 43: Achievements at GCSE at Equivalents for pupils at the end of Kay Stage 4, in maintained schools, in 2005, by ethnicity and English as a first Language

The table below shows one measure of pupils’ achievements in all GCSE subjects in England broken down by ethnicity, gender and whether they have English as a first language. The measure shown is the percentage of pupils achieving 5 or more GCSE passes at grades A* to C. The columns labelled ‘KS 2-4 VA Measure’ give a measurement of the pupils’ improvement between Key Stage 2 (typically aged 11) and Key Stage 4 (typically aged 16). This is commonly known as ‘Value Added’.

Table 43: Achievements at GCSE at Equivalents for pupils at the end of Kay Stage 4, in maintained schools, in 2005, by ethnicity and English as a first Language

The table below shows one measure of pupils’ achievements in all GCSE subjects in England broken down by ethnicity, gender and whether they have English as a first language. The measure shown is the percentage of pupils achieving 5 or more GCSE passes at grades A* to C. The columns labelled ‘KS 2-4 VA Measure’ give a measurement of the pupils’ improvement between Key Stage 2 (typically aged 11) and Key Stage 4 (typically aged 16). This is commonly known as ‘Value Added’.

Table 43: Achievements at GCSE at Equivalents for pupils at the end of Kay Stage 4, in maintained schools, in 2005, by ethnicity and English as a first Language

The table below shows one measure of pupils’ achievements in all GCSE subjects in England broken down by ethnicity, gender and whether they have English as a first language. The measure shown is the percentage of pupils achieving 5 or more GCSE passes at grades A* to C. The columns labelled ‘KS 2-4 VA Measure’ give a measurement of the pupils’ improvement between Key Stage 2 (typically aged 11) and Key Stage 4 (typically aged 16). This is commonly known as ‘Value Added’.

Table 43: Achievements at GCSE at Equivalents for pupils at the end of Kay Stage 4, in maintained schools, in 2005, by ethnicity and English as a first Language

“A recent study compared the mental abilities of cannabis smokers with those of people who had never smoked cannabis. There were three groups of subjects: group 1, those who had smoked cannabis for 15 years; group 2, those who had smoked cannabis for 7 years; group 3, those who had never smoked cannabis. Because it is known that smoking cannabis has an immediate effect on brain activity, none of the subjects had smoked for 24 hours before the test. All subjects were asked to memorise and recall a list of 15 words. On average, those in group 1 recalled 7 words, those in group 2 recalled 9 words, and those in group 3 recalled 12 words.”

1. Long-term smoking of cannabis impairs one’s ability to learn and remember.

2. Cannabis can affect brain activity for more than 24 hours after smoking it.

3. Before they started using cannabis, subjects in groups 1 and 2 had lower IQs than those in group 3.

A supermarket always makes 40% gross margin on its cereals. So if it sells a box for $1, it has paid the supplier 60 c. When items are sold at a special offer price, the suppliers are expected to reduce their prices so that the supermarket still makes the same percentage gross margin.

A particular cereal normally sells for $1.50 a box. This week there is a special offer which gives the customer 3 boxes for the price of 2.

The table below shows UK standard postal rates from April 2006.

Available stamp denominations (below £1) are as follows:

“According to scientists who have studied fingerprinting, no one knows whether it is reliable because its accuracy has never been measured, even though it has been used for over a hundred years. But we should not doubt its reliability because fingerprint examiners are the experts in using the technique, and they all agree that it is a completely reliable method of identifying criminals.”

The map below shows an area of Scotland and the relative positions of seven villages and towns. Unfortunately, on the map I have, none of them are named.

I am looking for Windyhill. I ask a local for help, but he can only give me the following information:

Clashandarran is south and east of Aultvaich.

Wellbank is due east of Ruilick.

Beauly is south and west of Windyhill.

Aultviach is due north of Ruilick.

Rheindown is due south of Clashandarran.

“Most scientists now agree that global warming is a major world threat, and that human activity in generating greenhouse gasses is at least a contributory factor, if not the whole explanation. Although many countries in the developed world have set targets to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, it is considered unrealistic to expect such restraint by the less developed countries as they attempt to improve their economies and thus reduce poverty. So we are left with a stark choice: is it a priority to act to reduce the long term problems of global warming, or to alleviate current levels of poverty in developing countries?” Which one or more of the following is an assumption of the above argument?

1. Less developed countries have not set targets to reduce greenhouse gas emissions.

2. Developed countries regard alleviating poverty as a higher priority than reducing global warming.

3. Levels of prosperity in the developing countries are not improving.

4. Developing countries can only improve their economies by activities which generate greenhouse gasses.

Mrs Watts took her grandson and nine of his school friends to a local theme park as a birthday treat. She had saved £125 to spend on rides, the prices of which are shown below.

All the children want to go on one of the main rides. Mrs Watts decided that the children could have two rides each. If they chose Apocalypse then they had to go on the Carousel for their other ride. If they chose Armageddon then they could choose between the Dodgems and Helter Skelter for their second ride. Two chose to go on Apocalypse.

When she had paid all their rides, she found that she had exactly enough left to buy each of them a 25 p packet of bubble gum.

“Farmers are often criticised for their heavy use of pesticides, which has had a harmful effect not only on many species of wildlife, but, it is alleged, on people who live near farms where pesticides have been sprayed. And yet the fault does not lie with farmers. People choose supermarkets according to price. Supermarkets compete for our business and so bring prices down to gain our business. Farmers are therefore forced to sell their produce at increasingly lower costs, and therefore need to maximise their yield or make a loss at the prices supermarkets demand. Therefore people do not have the right to complain about farmers’ use of pesticides.”

Ayesha swims 6 mornings a week, taking Saturday off. She knows that, for each scheduled session she misses, it will take three sessions before her fitness returns to its previous level.

Up to the beginning of April 2006, she had a long uninterrupted run of training and was as fit as she could expect to be. She then had a week’s holiday from 8^th April to 15^th April inclusive and did not swim while she was on holiday. Two weeks after coming back, she had a sore shoulder and missed four further sessions. The calendar for the relevant period is shown below.

The graphs below relate to the number of General Practitioners (GPs) in practices in England from 1994 to 2004.

The graphs below relate to the number of General Practitioners (GPs) in practices in England from 1994 to 2004.

The graphs below relate to the number of General Practitioners (GPs) in practices in England from 1994 to 2004.

Six friends went to their local agricultural show. They all decided to enter the ‘Guess the Weight of the Bull’ competition. The guesses of the six friends are shown below in hundredweight (cwt).

The average of their guesses was closer than any of their individual guesses. Suzie’s guess is nearer than Wally’s.

“The World Health Organisation has recorded 184 human cases of the H5N1 strain of bird flu, all of them caused by contact with infected birds. That 103 of these have resulted in death indicates how dangerous this virus is, and no vaccine has yet been developed. For there to be a worldwide epidemic of H5N1 amongst humans, it would have to be possible for the virus to be passed easily from one person to another. Unlike normal influenza, H5N1 can only bind to receptors deep in the lungs. As a result, it cannot multiply in the upper respiratory system and thereby be transmitted by sneezing and coughing. So it cannot be transmitted easily between people. Influenza viruses can mutate, and thus possibly change the way in which they infect victims.”

The minute hand of this clock is 8.4 cm long and the length of the hour hand is 6.3 cm.

For this clock, what is the value of the ratio:

area swept out by minute hand : area swept out by hour hand

During any particular period of time?

“There is no point in building new nuclear power stations, which would increase the amount of dangerous nuclear waste. The major reason for doing so would be to reduce reliance on fossil fuels as a means to generating electricity, and thereby to reduce carbon emissions.

New developments in green technologies such as wind power have resulted in a huge rise in the amount these technologies add to the worldwide electricity supply. Energy experts predict that by 2010 they will be contributing much more to that supply than will nuclear power. Although there will still be a need in 2010 for large scale fossil fuel generators, the future trend is clear. No new nuclear plants could be completed before 2020, and by then they will not be needed.”

1. In 2020 the worldwide demand for electricity may have increased.

2. The rate of increase in the amount of electricity contributed by green technologies may slow down.

3. By 2020, safe ways of storing nuclear waste may have been developed.

Bill and Asha are on a walking holiday. Today they will walk up a local mountain. This involves some walking on the flat, then a climb to the top. They will reverse their route on the way down. They looked at the map and found that the total distance they plan to walk is 20 km. They walk at 4 km/h on the flat, 3 km/h uphill and 6 km/h downhill.

The population of snaffers on a plain has been studied over a large number of years. The graph below shows the relationship between their numbers in successive years. An individual point on this graph would show, for example, the population in 2005 (along the horizontal axis) against the population in 2006 (along the vertical axis).

Acrylamide is a chemical produced in many foods – for example, potatoes, pastries, bread, toast – during normal cooking processes. Animal studies have shown that when ingested, acrylamide is broken down to produce glycidamide, which can damage DNA and cause cancer. In humans, less glycidamide is produced than in animals when acrylamide is broken down. The only way to avoid production of acrylamide in food during cooking is to cook the food at temperatures lower than 120 °C. However, roasting or frying potatoes at lower temperatures makes them absorb more fat, and eating more fat is bad for one’s health. Also, the lower the temperature during cooking, the more likely it is that bacteria will survive, thus increasing the risk of food poisoning.

1. Ingesting acrylamide may be less dangerous for humans than for animals.

2. To avoid health problems, it is best to cook food at temperatures higher than 120 °C.

3. Eating roast or fried potatoes inevitably involves some health risks.

This is a wooden puzzle. It consists of three different sizes of wooden cubes (with sides 1 cm, 2 cm and 3 cm respectively) packed together to make one solid cube.

All six faces of the puzzle are identical in appearance, and all of the cubes that lie completely below the surface of the puzzle are 2 cm cubes.

Internet companies are discovering, as billions of people have before them, that while growing up brings problems, maturity brings more.

For e-Bay, Google, Yahoo! and Microsoft, the internet’s commercial potential is proving bigger than even most early dreamers imagined. To keep expanding at sensational rates, however, players are encroaching on each other’s territory. Competition, which was once sharks against minnows, is becoming a battle of the giants. Corporate manoeuvring is reaching soap opera intensity.

Google, now the dominant online search engine, is making the pace. It snatched a long – term link with AOL Time Warner from under the nose of Microsoft. In the first quarter of 2006 it boosted revenue by 80% to more than $2 billion (£1.2 billion). That represents a lot of advertising, the common revenue all are chasing.

Yahoo! and Microsoft fret at losing market share. E-Bay, the auction and trading site, fears that Google is pushing its own new consumer trading facility and also threatening e-Bay’s PayPal online payments system with a rival system.

The three, who recently looked down on Google, wonder if they can forge alliances to combat it. Microsoft does not want anyone repeating on the internet what it achieved in computer systems. The jockeying offers rich entertainment and opportunities for consumers, so long as the players do not gang up against them.

Internet companies are discovering, as billions of people have before them, that while growing up brings problems, maturity brings more.

For e-Bay, Google, Yahoo! and Microsoft, the internet’s commercial potential is proving bigger than even most early dreamers imagined. To keep expanding at sensational rates, however, players are encroaching on each other’s territory. Competition, which was once sharks against minnows, is becoming a battle of the giants. Corporate manoeuvring is reaching soap opera intensity.

Google, now the dominant online search engine, is making the pace. It snatched a long – term link with AOL Time Warner from under the nose of Microsoft. In the first quarter of 2006 it boosted revenue by 80% to more than $2 billion (£1.2 billion). That represents a lot of advertising, the common revenue all are chasing.

Yahoo! and Microsoft fret at losing market share. E-Bay, the auction and trading site, fears that Google is pushing its own new consumer trading facility and also threatening e-Bay’s PayPal online payments system with a rival system.

The three, who recently looked down on Google, wonder if they can forge alliances to combat it. Microsoft does not want anyone repeating on the internet what it achieved in computer systems. The jockeying offers rich entertainment and opportunities for consumers, so long as the players do not gang up against them.

Internet companies are discovering, as billions of people have before them, that while growing up brings problems, maturity brings more.

For e-Bay, Google, Yahoo! and Microsoft, the internet’s commercial potential is proving bigger than even most early dreamers imagined. To keep expanding at sensational rates, however, players are encroaching on each other’s territory. Competition, which was once sharks against minnows, is becoming a battle of the giants. Corporate manoeuvring is reaching soap opera intensity.

Google, now the dominant online search engine, is making the pace. It snatched a long – term link with AOL Time Warner from under the nose of Microsoft. In the first quarter of 2006 it boosted revenue by 80% to more than $2 billion (£1.2 billion). That represents a lot of advertising, the common revenue all are chasing.

Yahoo! and Microsoft fret at losing market share. E-Bay, the auction and trading site, fears that Google is pushing its own new consumer trading facility and also threatening e-Bay’s PayPal online payments system with a rival system.

The three, who recently looked down on Google, wonder if they can forge alliances to combat it. Microsoft does not want anyone repeating on the internet what it achieved in computer systems. The jockeying offers rich entertainment and opportunities for consumers, so long as the players do not gang up against them.

Internet companies are discovering, as billions of people have before them, that while growing up brings problems, maturity brings more.

For e-Bay, Google, Yahoo! and Microsoft, the internet’s commercial potential is proving bigger than even most early dreamers imagined. To keep expanding at sensational rates, however, players are encroaching on each other’s territory. Competition, which was once sharks against minnows, is becoming a battle of the giants. Corporate manoeuvring is reaching soap opera intensity.

Google, now the dominant online search engine, is making the pace. It snatched a long – term link with AOL Time Warner from under the nose of Microsoft. In the first quarter of 2006 it boosted revenue by 80% to more than $2 billion (£1.2 billion). That represents a lot of advertising, the common revenue all are chasing.

Yahoo! and Microsoft fret at losing market share. E-Bay, the auction and trading site, fears that Google is pushing its own new consumer trading facility and also threatening e-Bay’s PayPal online payments system with a rival system.

The three, who recently looked down on Google, wonder if they can forge alliances to combat it. Microsoft does not want anyone repeating on the internet what it achieved in computer systems. The jockeying offers rich entertainment and opportunities for consumers, so long as the players do not gang up against them.

1. Google struck a corporate link which might otherwise have benefited Microsoft.

2. Google’s accelerating revenue indicates that it is winning a large share of the advertising market.

3. The internet’s potential is growing faster than even the optimists would have predicted.

Internet companies are discovering, as billions of people have before them, that while growing up brings problems, maturity brings more.

For e-Bay, Google, Yahoo! and Microsoft, the internet’s commercial potential is proving bigger than even most early dreamers imagined. To keep expanding at sensational rates, however, players are encroaching on each other’s territory. Competition, which was once sharks against minnows, is becoming a battle of the giants. Corporate manoeuvring is reaching soap opera intensity.

Google, now the dominant online search engine, is making the pace. It snatched a long – term link with AOL Time Warner from under the nose of Microsoft. In the first quarter of 2006 it boosted revenue by 80% to more than $2 billion (£1.2 billion). That represents a lot of advertising, the common revenue all are chasing.

Yahoo! and Microsoft fret at losing market share. E-Bay, the auction and trading site, fears that Google is pushing its own new consumer trading facility and also threatening e-Bay’s PayPal online payments system with a rival system.

The three, who recently looked down on Google, wonder if they can forge alliances to combat it. Microsoft does not want anyone repeating on the internet what it achieved in computer systems. The jockeying offers rich entertainment and opportunities for consumers, so long as the players do not gang up against them.