SSC CGL 2025 Tier-I · 21 September 2025, Shift 3 · English Comprehension · Question 3 of 100

We transcribed this text from the pictures on a candidate's response sheet for this shift; the answer is the key SSC colour-marked on that sheet. Solution last reviewed 11 September 2026.

Read the passage and answer the questions:
The annals of mountaineering history are adorned with figures whose daring transcended mere athleticism, embodying philosophical quests for transcendence against Earth's most formidable landscapes. Each mountaineer — whether treading the snows of Everest, the granite of Patagonia, or the arid heights of the Atlas Mountains — etched a distinct narrative of audacity and introspection.
“Tenzing Norgay” and “Sir Edmund Hillary’s” epochal 1953 Everest ascent immortalized human perseverance, but figures such as “Reinhold Messner” redefined the boundaries further. Rejecting supplemental oxygen, Messner’s minimalist ethos emphasized purity over conquest, portraying mountains not as trophies but as sentient entities commanding reverence. Similarly, “Junko Tabei”, the first woman to summit Everest, symbolized the intersection of resilience and quiet defiance in an era resistant to female adventurers.
The ethos of mountaineering diversified through the late 20th and early 21st centuries. Climbers like “Kilian Jornet”, blending ultra-marathon endurance with technical ascents, and “Nirmal Purja”, whose record-breaking summits shattered temporal assumptions, reveal a contemporary paradigm: mountains as arenas of rapid, almost transcendental athleticism. Meanwhile, indigenous climbers, long relegated to footnotes in expedition histories, increasingly assert their rightful place as stewards of sacred peaks.
Thus, the saga of mountaineering resists reduction to mere feats of strength. It weaves a tapestry of cultures, philosophies, and personal odysseys — each ascent a dialectic between human fragility and the immutable majesty of the mountains.

What does the word "dialectic" most nearly imply in the phrase: "...each ascent a dialectic between human fragility and the immutable majesty of the mountains"?

(a)A silent observation
(b)A hostile confrontation
(c)A dialogue or interplay between opposing forces
(d)A scientific measurement

Answer

Why

Correct — C. A dialectic is an interplay between opposing forces or ideas, each acting on the other. The word shares its Greek root, 'to converse', with dialogue.

The phrase names both sides: a dialectic between human fragility and the immutable majesty of the mountains. A frail climber meeting a changeless mountain is two opposites acting on each other → option (c).

Why the others are wrong

(a)
A silent observation — A silent observation is one-sided and passive. A dialectic needs two sides acting on each other, and the phrase supplies two: human fragility and the mountains' majesty.
(b)
A hostile confrontation — A hostile confrontation keeps the opposition but drops the interplay. The phrase pairs human fragility with the mountains' 'majesty', a word of awe, not enmity.
(d)
A scientific measurement — A scientific measurement has no link to the word. Dialectic belongs to argument and ideas, and nothing in the phrase is being measured.

Concept

Dialectic began as the art of reaching truth through discussion, question against answer. In later philosophy it came to mean ideas developing through the clash of opposites.

In general use it means a tension or interplay between opposing forces, and that is the sense here.

The frame settles it: 'a dialectic between X and Y' hands you two opposing forces. Silent observation and measurement need no second side, and confrontation adds a hostility the phrase does not carry.

Dialectic does involve opposition, which is why A hostile confrontation tempts. What the word adds is exchange: each side shapes the other, where a confrontation only sets them against each other.

Key facts

Dialectic means an interplay or tension between opposing forces or ideas.
It comes from Greek dialektikē, the art of discussion, from the same verb, 'to converse', that gives dialogue.
The adjective is dialectical.

Study next

Words for opposition and interplay: dichotomy, antithesis, paradox, tensionOther abstract nouns in this passage: ethos, paradigm, odyssey

Common traps

Choosing A hostile confrontation because dialectic involves opposites, when the word implies interplay, not hostility
Mixing up dialectic with dialect, a regional form of a language

The same idea is asked as a passage question at 15 Sep 2025, 12:30, English Q.21, where the dialectical nature of art is keyed as 'Art evolves through opposing forces of creation and criticism.'

Related PYQs

No directly related past PYQ was found.

Read the passage and answer the questions:
The annals of mountaineering history are adorned with figures whose daring transcended mere athleticism, embodying philosophical quests for transcendence against Earth's most formidable landscapes. Each mountaineer — whether treading the snows of Everest, the granite of Patagonia, or the arid heights of the Atlas Mountains — etched a distinct narrative of audacity and introspection.
“Tenzing Norgay” and “Sir Edmund Hillary’s” epochal 1953 Everest ascent immortalized human perseverance, but figures such as “Reinhold Messner” redefined the boundaries further. Rejecting supplemental oxygen, Messner’s minimalist ethos emphasized purity over conquest, portraying mountains not as trophies but as sentient entities commanding reverence. Similarly, “Junko Tabei”, the first woman to summit Everest, symbolized the intersection of resilience and quiet defiance in an era resistant to female adventurers.
The ethos of mountaineering diversified through the late 20th and early 21st centuries. Climbers like “Kilian Jornet”, blending ultra-marathon endurance with technical ascents, and “Nirmal Purja”, whose record-breaking summits shattered temporal assumptions, reveal a contemporary paradigm: mountains as arenas of rapid, almost transcendental athleticism. Meanwhile, indigenous climbers, long relegated to footnotes in expedition histories, increasingly assert their rightful place as stewards of sacred peaks.
Thus, the saga of mountaineering resists reduction to mere feats of strength. It weaves a tapestry of cultures, philosophies, and personal odysseys — each ascent a dialectic between human fragility and the immutable majesty of the mountains.