Solved paper of PCS 2009 & TEHSILDAR's General Knowledge

[atif jamil]

Q: what causes earthquakes?

Ans: Earthquakes occur when energy stored within the Earth, usually in the form of strain in rocks, suddenly releases. This energy is transmitted to the surface of the Earth by earthquake waves.

Q: What is Galaxy?

Ans: Galaxy, a massive ensemble of hundreds of millions of stars, all gravitationally interacting, and orbiting about a common center. Astronomers estimate that there are about 125 billion galaxies in the universe. All the stars visible to the unaided eye from Earth belong to Earth’s galaxy, the Milky Way.

Q: Where is the deepest ocean and how deep?

Ans: Pacific Ocean, largest and deepest of the world's four oceans, covering more than a third of the earth's surface and containing more than half of its free water. Apart from the marginal seas along its irregular western rim, it has an area of 166 million sq km (64 million sq mi), substantially larger than the entire land surface of the globe.

Q: what is a tornado?

Ans: Tornado, violently rotating column of air extending from within a thundercloud (see Cloud) down to ground level. The strongest tornadoes may sweep houses from their foundations, destroy brick buildings, toss cars and school buses through the air, and even lift railroad cars from their tracks.

Q: Where are the World’s Rains Forests?

Ans: In South America, a vast, forested area of the Amazon River basin in Brazil and neighboring countries is by far the largest rain forest in the world. It encompasses more than 3.5 million sq km (about 1.4 million sq mi)—about half of the total global rain forest cover.

Q: what is an anemometer?

Ans: Anemometer (Greek anemos, “wind”; metron, “measure”), an instrument that measures wind speed.

Q: How does photosynthesis?

Ans: Photosynthesis is a very complex process, and for the sake of convenience and ease of understanding, plant biologists divide it into two stages. In the first stage, the light-dependent reaction, the chloroplast traps light energy and converts it into chemical energy contained in nicotinamide adenine dinucleotide phosphate (NADPH) and adenosine triphosphate (ATP), two molecules used in the second stage of photosynthesis. In the second stage, called the light-independent reaction (formerly called the dark reaction), NADPH provides the hydrogen atoms that help form glucose, and ATP provides the energy for this and other reactions used to synthesize glucose.

Q: what is paleontology?

Ans: Paleontology, study of prehistoric animal and plant life through the analysis of fossil remains.

Q:how far is the sun from earth?

Ans: the average distance from Earth is 150 million km (93 million mi).

Q: how many vertebrae does a giraffe have?

Ans: A giraffe’s neck can be over 1.5 m (5 ft) in length, but it contains only seven vertebrae.

Q:what was the first creature to travel in space?

Ans: The Soviet Union also launched the first living creature, a dog named Laika, into space on November 3, 1957.

Q: Is matter or energy destructible?
Ans: No.

Q: How do insect breath?

Ans: For oxygen circulation, insects rely on a set of branching, air-filled tubes called tracheae. These airways connect with the outside through circular openings called spiracles, which are sometimes visible as tiny "portholes" along the abdomen. From the spiracles, the tracheae tubes reach deep inside the body, supplying oxygen to every cell.

Q: what is dry ice?

Ans: Solid carbon dioxide, known as dry ice, is widely used as a refrigerant. Its cooling effect is almost twice that of water ice; its special advantages are that it does not melt as a liquid but turns into gas, and that it produces an inert atmosphere that reduces bacterial growth.

Q: what is royal water?

Ans: Aqua Regia (Latin, “royal water”), mixture of concentrated hydrochloric and nitric acids, containing one part by volume of nitric acid (HNO3) to three parts of hydrochloric acid (HCl). its name is derived from its ability to dissolve the so-called noble metals, particularly gold, which are inert to either of the acids used separately.

Q: how does physical and chemical change differ?

Ans: physical changes are those changes which do not alter the fundamental nature of the components of the mixture but do modify their physical condition. changes alter the fundamental nature of the components of the mixture and do not modify their physical condition, are called chemical changes.

Q: what is Forbidden City?

Ans: Forbidden City, sacred, walled enclosure in Beijing, China, containing the imperial court of former Chinese rulers. The city was forbidden to ordinary citizens until 1912.

Q: what is SCHIZOPHRENIA?

Ans: Schizophrenia, severe mental illness characterized by a variety of symptoms, including loss of contact with reality, bizarre behavior, disorganized thinking and speech, decreased emotional expressiveness, and social withdrawal.

Q: what is the most poisonous snake?

Ans: One of the world’s most poisonous snakes is the inland taipan (also known as the fierce snake) of central Australia. Members of one taipan species can deliver enough venom in a single bite to kill nearly 100 people or 250,000 mice.

Q: what is BALANCE OF POWER?

Ans: Balance of Power, theory and policy of international relations that asserts that the most effective check on the power of a state is the power of other states. In international relations, the term state refers to a country with a government and a population. The term balance of power refers to the relatively equal power capabilities of rival states or alliances. For example, the United States and the Soviet Union maintained equivalent arsenals of nuclear weapons in the 1970s and 1980s, which helped sustain a military balance of power.

Q: who discovered law of floating bodies?

Ans: Archimedes.

Q: what are four freedom?

Ans: Four Freedoms, human rights principals formulated by United States president Franklin D. Roosevelt on January 6, 1941, in his annual message to the Congress of the United States. President Roosevelt made his “Four Freedoms” speech almost a year before the United States entered World War II (1939-1945). In his address Roosevelt envisioned a postwar world in which four freedoms would be guaranteed: freedom of speech and expression, freedom of worship, freedom from want, and freedom from fear.

Raman, Sir Chandrasekhara Venkata

Raman, Sir Chandrasekhara Venkata (1888-1970), Indian physicist best known for his research on the molecular scattering of light. For his discovery of this effect, known as the Raman effect, he was awarded the 1930 Nobel Prize in physics.
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GENERAL KNOWLEDGE
September 23, 2001

1. (a) Answer the following questions.(any ten)

(I) What is bloodless revolution?
Called also the Glorius Revolution in England, it marked the end of the despotic rule of the Stuarts and gave way to parliamentary rule there in 1688.

(II) Which is the city of sky scrappers?
New York.

(III) Which language is written from top to bottom and from left to right?
Japanese.

(IV) What is drindle?
A kind of dress.

(V) What is a planlmeter?
An instrument of measuring area, used by engineers.

(VI) What is a concordance?
An index of words or topics in a book.

(VII) Who discovered Law of Floating bodies?
Archimedes.

(VIII) What is the significance of the Corsica Island in history?
Birthplace of Napoleon Bonaparte.

(IX) Who is Hercule Poirot?
The famous detective character in the novels of Agatha Christie.

(X) What is Durand cup?
Trophy for football matches instituted by Sir Mortimer Durand.

(b) Name the authors of (any ten)

(1) War and peace: Leo Tolstoy
(2) Dr Zhivago: Boris Pasternak
(3) Shahnama: Firdausi
(4) Return of the native: Thomas Hardy
(5) The Prince: Machiavelli
(6) Pride and Prejudice: Jane Austen
(7) Faust: J.W. Goethe
(8) Apple Cart: G.B. Shaw
(9) Don Quixote: Migenl De Cerventes
(10) India wins freedom: Maulana Abul Kalam Azad
(11) Les Miserable: Victor Hugo
(12) The Prologue: Geoffery Chaucer
(13)The Odyssey: Homer
(14) For whom the bell tolls: Ernest Hemingway
(15) Good earth: Pearl S. Buck

2. What do you understand by the following terms? (do any ten)

1. blockade: Blockade, naval operation conducted by a country at war, with the object of closing to foreign commerce the vital ports of an enemy country and thereby aiding in the military defeat of that country by denying it access to supplies and communications from without.

2. bourgeoisie: The term was first applied to those inhabitants of medieval towns in France who occupied a position somewhere between the peasants and the landowning nobility; soon it was extended to the middle class of other nations.

3. buffer state: Small State between two larger ones, regarded as reducing friction.

4. détente: Détente, policy toward a rival nation or bloc of nations characterized by increased diplomatic, commercial, and cultural contact and a desire to reduce tensions, as through negotiations or talks.

5. Gentelman’s agreement: Agreement binding in honour but not enforceable.

6. Fillbustering: Filibuster, in legislative procedure, term denoting the means employed by members of a legislative assembly to delay or prevent action on a measure to which they are opposed. Such means may include the introduction of dilatory motions, intentional absence from the assembly in order to prevent the existence of a quorum, or the presentation of abnormally long, often meaningless speeches.

7. deflation: Deflation involves a sustained decline in the aggregate level of prices, such as occurred during the Great Depression of the 1930s; it is usually associated with a prolonged erosion of economic activity and high unemployment. Widespread price declines have become rare, however, and inflation is now the dominant variable affecting public and private economic planning.

8. tout: Spy out the movements and conditions of racehorses in training.

9. Camouflage: Camouflage (military) (French camoufler, ”to disguise”), word introduced by the French at the beginning of World War I to designate scientific disguise of objects through imitation of natural surroundings.

10. Palliative: Aiming to make the patient as comfortable as possible for as long as possible.

11. Caucus: Caucus, meeting of members of a political party at which the party conducts its business, discusses policies, and begins the process of nominating candidates for public office. The caucus method of choosing candidates is usually contrasted with the primary election. In most primary elections, voters select the party’s candidates directly at polling places.

12. Ammesia: Amnesia, loss or impairment of memory. Amnesia is usually associated with some form of brain damage, but it may also be caused by severe psychological trauma.

13. lynching: Lynching, hanging or other types of executions, in punishment of a presumed criminal offense, carried out by self-appointed commissions or mobs, without due process of law. The term lynching is generally believed to be derived from the name of a Virginia justice of the peace, Charles Lynch, who ordered extralegal punishment for Tory acts during the American Revolution (1775-1783).

14. Ignition point: Ignition, process or means of igniting a combustible substance. Ignition occurs when the temperature of a substance is raised to the point at which its molecules will react spontaneously with oxygen, and the substance begins to burn. This temperature is called the ignition temperature or ignition point.

i've taken the materials from EVERLATEST general knowledge, & ENCARTA ENCYCLOPEDIA.