THE GENERAL FINAL EXAMINATION

INSTRUCTIONS:  Read each question carefully.  Answer all questions.  Time
limit: 4 hours.  Begin immediately.

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HISTORY:
Describe the history of the papacy from its origins to the present day,
concentrating especially, but not exclusively, on its social, political,
economic, religious, and philosophical impact on Europe, Asia, America, and
Africa.  Be brief, concise, and specific.

MEDICINE:
You have been provided with a razor blade, a piece of gauze, and a bottle
of Scotch.  Remove your appendix. Do not suture until your work has been
inspected.  You have fifteen minutes.

PUBLIC SPEAKING:
2500 riot-crazed aborigines are storming the classroom. Calm them. You may
use any ancient language except Latin or Greek.  Your performance will be
videotaped.

BIOLOGY:
Create life.  Estimate the differences in subsequent human culture if this
form of life had developed 500 million years earlier, with special
attention to its probable effect on the English parliamentary system. Prove
your thesis.

MUSIC:
Write a piano concerto.  Orchestrate and perform it with flute and drum.
You will find a piano under your seat.

PSYCHOLOGY:
Based on your knowledge of their works, evaluate the emotional stability,
degree of adjustment, and repressed frustrations of each of the following:
Alexander of Aphrodisias, Rameses II, Gregory of Nicea, Hammurabi.  Support
your evaluation with quotations from each man's work, making appropriate
references.  It is not necessary to translate.

SOCIOLOGY:
Estimate the sociological problems which might accompany the end of the
world. Construct an experiment to test your theory.

ENGINEERING:
The disassembled parts of a high powered rifle have been placed on your
desk, along with an instruction manual, printed in Swahili.  In 10 minutes
a hungry Bengal tiger will be admitted to the room.  Take whatever action
you feel appropriate.  Be prepared to justify your decision.

ECONOMICS:
Develop a realistic plan for refinancing the national debt.  Trace the
possible effects of your plan in the following areas: Cubism, The Donatist
Controversy, the wave theory of light.  Outline a method for preventing
these effects.  Criticize this method from all possible points of view.
Point out the deficiencies in your point of view, as demonstrated in your
answer to the last question.

POLITICAL SCIENCE:
There is a red telephone on the desk beside you.  Start World War III.
Report at length on its socio-political effects, if any.

EPISTEMOLOGY:
Take a position for or against truth.  Prove the validity of your stand.

MATHEMATICS:
If nine-and-a-half chickens can lay nine-and-a-half eggs in nine-and-a-half
days, calculate how long it will take a grasshopper with one wooden leg to
kick all of the seeds out of a dill pickle, given that the pickle has a
length-to-girth ratio of 5:1.

PHYSICS:
Explain the nature of matter.  Include in your answer an evaluation of the
impact of the development of mathematics on science.

PHILOSOPHY:
Sketch the development of human thought, estimate its significance.
Compare with the development of any other kind of thought.

GENERAL KNOWLEDGE:
Describe in detail. Be objective and specific.  Use footnotes.