A few months back, the New York Times published this fascinating article on the subject of decision fatigue. The article became a big topic of conversation here in the Manhattan GRE office. If you don’t have time to read the full article, I will give a quick summary: the more decisions a human makes in a row, the less will-power that person will have after each successive decision—this phenomenon is called decision fatigue (note: this is a vast oversimplification of the article, so you should give it a read if you have time). The test subjects weren’t asked to make big decisions—no marriage proposals, no career changes, no forced choice between Kirk and Picard—just simple everyday choices, such as what color of china they would prefer, or what specifications they would like in a new computer. The study found that making decisions, even small inconsequential ones, can significantly deplete a person’s willpower.

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We find that there are some words that people never look up because they are “unknown unknowns” — that is, you don’t even know what you don’t know!

Did you know that even the simple word save has another meaning?
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Come GRE test day, there isn’t much left to do in the way of studying. Cramming new material on the day of your exam is stressful and won’t give you much of a positive return on time invested. However, there are some things that you can do on test day to further your GRE success. One thing that I found very useful when I took my GRE was performing a math warm-up. Read more

Take a sneak peek into Manhattan Prep’s 500 Essential Words and 500 Advanced Words GRE flashcard sets!

When writing these cards, we wanted to make sure that everyone could get something out of every card — even if you already know the word on the front. So, you may know martinet, but do you know doctrinaire, hawk and the real meaning of chauvinist? Read more

So, you made your New Year’s resolutions based on the fact that you are currently reading a GRE blog, I’m guessing that one of yours involved applying to graduate school. Let me be the first to say, excellent decision! Now what do you do?

I’ve looked at a number of online Graduate School Application Timelines, from a number of different sources, and one thing that nearly every timeline suggests, is a starting date that falls between May and September BUT WAIT! Don’t stop reading.

Yes, you could spend the next five months slogging through your Netflix instant queue waiting for those calendars to start, and you would still be able to complete you applications. However, I would recommend starting now by knocking out the GRE, and here is why.

1. Less to worry about in the fall

My biggest complaint about timelines that suggest a May-September start date is that they place Take the GRE on a single day in October. Most people, however, will spend more than one day on the GRE. Here at Manhattan GRE we recommend that students spend roughly three months on their preparation, but even students with a modest study plan will usually set aside two or three weeks to take some GRE practice tests and review their areas of weakness. Now, imagine these 2-10 weeks overlapping with the time you spend writing personals statements, requesting letters of recommendation, and refining your application. It sounds needlessly overwhelming.

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The practical applications of math in the real world, from intrepid U.S. Post Office employee James Wu.

“This is a wall panel for an apartment building in Boston. It has five floors, and each floor has the same number of apartments. I have a package for #49–the buzzer doesn’t work very well, but they tell me to go up. What floor do I go to?”

Work out a solution before clicking “More”.

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It’s been awhile since we’ve done a Visual Dictionary post, but let’s take on the word turgid:

Turgid (adj)
1. swollen; distended; tumid.
2. inflated, overblown, or pompous; bombastic: turgid language.

What would you describe as turgid (or its synonym, tumid)?

Reader Thomas M. writes:

“My withering tomato plants became turgid and vibrant after yesterday’s rain. An heirloom tomato becomes so turgid that it will split open with ripe juices … the best tomato you’ll ever taste. Isn’t it amazing how a succulent plant like the aloe vera plant stays turgid in the arid desert, while a plant native to our climate would wilt and wither in the desert?”
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The English language has a lot of words for being less than serious.

Some of those words describe smart, sarcastic people (Dorothy Parker had a mordant wit), and some describe silly, foolish people (I find most of the humor in Everybody Loves Raymond to be unbearably fatuous).

Jocular, jocose, and jocund are three very similar-sounding synonyms that just mean “joking around.”

Waggish means “roguish in merriment and good humor; jocular.”

Facetious means “not meant to be taken seriously or literally.”

When I said that that burned grilled cheese you made me was the most sophisticated meal I’d ever eaten, I was being facetious. I mean, Kraft singles?

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Take a sneak peek into Manhattan Prep’s 500 Essential Words and 500 Advanced Words GRE flashcard sets!

When writing these cards, we wanted to make sure that everyone could get something out of every card — even if you already know the word on the front. So, you may know whimsical, but do you know mercurial, capricious, and lark? Check it out:

Want to adopt 1,000 new flashcards? Visit our store here.

Via Flowingdata via Raymond Johnson, credit to Ryan Grover.

If a multiple choice question has four answers, your chance of randomly guessing the right answer is 1 in 4, or 25% … right?

You’d think that — until you see that 25% is written twice.

So, since the correct answer appears twice, your chance of guessing correctly is 2 in 4, or 50% … right?

EXCEPT that if the correct answer is 50%, which only appears once, then the correct answer is actually 25% (since only one in four answers says “50%.”)

That’s sort of satisying — until you see that 25% is written twice.

So … (wait, this is hurting our heads!) since the correct answer appears twice, your chance of guessing correctly is 2 in 4, or 50% … right?

EXCEPT that if the correct answer is 50%, which only appears once, then the correct answer is actually 25% (since only one in four answers says “50%.”)

Whoa. (We’re nonplussed, flummoxed, addlepated, and just generally making a Keanu Reeves expression right now.)

Let’s stop here.