1. The following passage is followed by 5 questions. After carefully reading the passage, select the most appropriate answer for each question related to the ACT Reading section.
Feel free to review the passage as many times as needed to make your choices.
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The concept of wilderness is more complex than intuitively assumed. While certain locales appear pristine without human impact, objective criteria for true wilderness prove elusive. Across cultures and eras, perceptions diverge on where civilization ends and untamed nature begins. Even remote areas reflect long histories of inhabitation and landscape modification, whether intentional or incidental.
Indigenous peoples globally shaped ecosystems through practices like controlled burning centuries before contemporary notions of wilderness took hold. Their presence was nonetheless discreet compared to industrial uses transforming vast tracts into commoditized resources. By the late 19th century, romanticizing wilderness emerged amid rapid modernization as an antidote to perceived social ills. Writers like John Muir popularized appealing to untouched terrain for spiritual renewal, though sentiments varied on whether nature existed apart from or in tandem with people.
Legislating protection involved negotiations over human dominion versus custodial stances. The 1964 Wilderness Act established criteria of federal lands reflecting “primeval character and influence” with no permanent improvements or human habitation. However, this definition posed dilemmas, as many regions maintained significance for native traditions relying on managed habitats. Later amendments reflected growing consciousness that remote places were not truly untrammeled, but rather living interconnected systems enduring gradual changes through dynamic human-environment relations.
Continued research illuminates pre-contact landscapes as mosaic patterns blending open and closed habitats. For example, Pacific Northwest forests were historically park-like in structure owing to intentional burning by indigenous groups. This generated understories of berries and edible plants while curbing insect outbreaks and wildfire risks. Other evidence suggests human influences extending across North America, from cultivating diverse corn varieties in woodland clearings to intentionally igniting low-intensity fires maintaining coastal prairies.
Not only scientific but also cultural perspectives question Romantic ideals of wholly unmanaged wilderness as the sole measure of ecological integrity. While certain reserves aim to curb modern impacts, the concept of “undisturbed balance of nature” proves elusive. Recognizing long tenured shaping of landscapes underscores that humans need not be categorically apart from nature, but rather participants intimately tied to resilient habitats and biodiversity. Reframing wilderness as dynamic cultural heritage landscapes accommodates diverse worldviews and stewardship traditions spanning temporal and spatial scales.
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The primary purpose of the passage is to:
