CAT 2021 Slot 3 — VARC Question 7
Direction for Reading Comprehension: The passages given here are followed by some questions that have four answer choices; read the passage carefully and pick the option whose answer best aligns with the passage.
Keeping time accurately comes with a price. The maximum accuracy of a clock is directly related to how much disorder, or entropy, it creates every time it ticks. Natalia Ares at the University of Oxford and her colleagues made this discovery using a tiny clock with an accuracy that can be controlled. The clock consists of a 50-nanometre-thick membrane of silicon nitride, vibrated by an electric current. Each time the membrane moved up and down once and then returned to its original position, the researchers counted a tick, and the regularity of the spacing between the ticks represented the accuracy of the clock. The researchers found that as they increased the clock's accuracy, the heat produced in the system grew, increasing the entropy of its surroundings by jostling nearby particles . . . "If a clock is more accurate, you are paying for it somehow," says Ares. In this case, you pay for it by pouring more ordered energy into the clock, which is then converted into entropy. "By measuring time, we are increasing the entropy of the universe," says Ares. The more entropy there is in the universe, the closer it may be to its eventual demise. "Maybe we should stop measuring time," says Ares. The scale of the additional entropy is so small, though, that there is no need to worry about its effects, she says.
The increase in entropy in timekeeping may be related to the "arrow of time", says Marcus Huber at the Austrian Academy of Sciences in Vienna, who was part of the research team. It has been suggested that the reason that time only flows forward, not in reverse, is that the total amount of entropy in the universe is constantly increasing, creating disorder that cannot be put in order again.
The relationship that the researchers found is a limit on the accuracy of a clock, so it doesn't mean that a clock that creates the most possible entropy would be maximally accurate - hence a large, inefficient grandfather clock isn't more precise than an atomic clock. "It's a bit like fuel use in a car. Just because I'm using more fuel doesn't mean that I'm going faster or further," says Huber.
When the researchers compared their results with theoretical models developed for clocks that rely on quantum effects, they were surprised to find that the relationship between accuracy and entropy seemed to be the same for both. . . . We can't be sure yet that these results are actually universal, though, because there are many types of clocks for which the relationship between accuracy and entropy haven't been tested. "It's still unclear how this principle plays out in real devices such as atomic clocks, which push the ultimate quantum limits of accuracy," says Mark Mitchison at Trinity College Dublin in Ireland. Understanding this relationship could be helpful for designing clocks in the future, particularly those used in quantum computers and other devices where both accuracy and temperature are crucial, says Ares. This finding could also help us understand more generally how the quantum world and the classical world are similar and different in terms of thermodynamics and the passage of time.
None of the following statements can be inferred from the passage EXCEPT that:
Answer & solution
- A
the arrow of time has not yet been tested for atomic clocks.
quantum computers are likely to produce more heat and, hence, more entropy, because of the emphasis on their clocks' accuracy.
- C
grandfather clocks are likely to produce less heat and, hence, less entropy, because they are not as accurate.
- D
a clock with a 50-nanometre-thick membrane of silicon nitride has been made to vibrate, producing electric currents.
Easy
This is a double-negative "cannot be inferred EXCEPT" question — i.e. exactly one option CAN be inferred; the other three cannot. Test each against the passage: reject anything reversed, contradicted, or unsupported, and keep the one that logically follows from the text.
Cannot be inferred. The passage links the "arrow of time" to entropy generally (paragraph 2) and separately notes the accuracy–entropy relation hasn't been tested for all clocks. But it never says "the arrow of time has not been tested for atomic clocks" — that specific claim is unsupported.
Can be inferred — this is the answer. The passage's central finding is that higher accuracy forces more entropy (and heat), and paragraph 4 notes quantum computers' clocks "push the ultimate quantum limits of accuracy" where "both accuracy and temperature are crucial." It follows that emphasising such accuracy would tend to produce more heat and hence more entropy.
Cannot be inferred. This reverses the passage. Paragraph 3 stresses that creating more entropy does NOT make a clock more accurate; the grandfather clock is "large, inefficient" (high entropy) yet less precise. So "less accurate, therefore less heat/entropy" contradicts the text.
Cannot be inferred. The causation is backwards: the membrane is "vibrated by an electric current," i.e. current causes the vibration. The option says vibration produces the current — the opposite of the passage.
Option B is correct: emphasising clock accuracy in quantum computers would tend to raise heat and entropy — the one statement that follows from the passage.