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This quiz consists of 5 multiple choice and 5 short answer questions through Chapter 3, The Positive Aspect of Ambiguity, Sections 4-5, The Present and the Future, Ambiguity and Conclusion.

Multiple Choice Questions

1. According to Beauvoir, upon what do politicians rely to sustain their influence over individuals?
(a) The guile and persuasion of well constructed statements.
(b) The subjective use of history.
(c) The power and brutality of police.
(d) A utopian view of the future.

2. How does Beauvoir characterize the response of Western women when the structures that shelter them seem to be in danger?
(a) They drive themselves further into the subjection that makes them child like.
(b) They become detached and unemotional.
(c) They become harder, more bitter and even more furious or cruel than their masters.
(d) They become confused and bewildered to the point of despair.

3. What does Beauvoir seek to prove regarding man's mastery of the world?
(a) That the more widespread men attain mastery of the world, the more they find themselves crushed by it.
(b) With each gain to control his surroundings, man feels himself more insignificant within the immense collectivity on the earth.
(c) Man's mastery of the world is futile, because nature is constantly changing beyond man's ability to contain it.
(d) Man's journey to master the world is a quest to meet God.

4. What does Beauvoir claim a child can do due to his state of security?
(a) He can do with impunity whatever he likes.
(b) He can create the world he wants to exist.
(c) He can choose a direction in which he desires to remove his ignorance.
(d) He can have all his needs provided without labor.

5. How does human spontaneity give purpose to a human life, according to Beauvoir?
(a) By spontaneous acts have affects in a physical world.
(b) By spontaneity always projecting itself toward something.
(c) By the fact the spontaneous act of an individual draws a response from others.
(d) By spontaneous acts require conscious evaluation to determine their usefulness.

Short Answer Questions

1. What is the point at which existentialism is opposed to dialectic materialism according to Beauvoir?

2. Who does Beauvoir use as an example of moving through such obstacles?

3. What example does Beauvoir use to illustrate "...festivals (that) stop the movement of transcendence?"

4. How does Beauvoir consider stubbornness in the face of an obstacle that is impossible to overcome?

5. What possibility does Beauvoir claim the fundamental ambiguity of the human condition opens to men?

(see the answer key)

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