TASK DEFINITION: In this task, you're given a question, along with a context passage. The passage will not have a direct answer to the question, but can include some information and a clue for the answer. Assuming you can only obtain information about one entity in the passage, your job is to determine whether information from the passage can be used to answer the question. Indicate your choice as `a` for Yes or `b` for No.
PROBLEM: Question: What year did New Netherland become New York? Passage:In the early seventeenth century, individual Danish immigrants became established in North America. Scandinavians—Danes and Norwegians in particular—made up a large portion of the settlers in the Dutch colony of New Netherland, now New York. After 1750, Danish families in the Protestant Moravian Brethren denomination immigrated to Pennsylvania, where they settled in the Bethlehem area alongside German Moravians. Until 1850, most Danes who emigrated to North America were unmarried men. During this period, some Danes achieved notability and recognition. Among them were Hans Christian Febiger (1749–1796), one of George Washington's most trusted officers during the American Revolution, Charles Zanco (1808–1836) who died at the Alamo in March 1836 in the struggle for Texan independence, and Peter Lassen (1800–1859), a blacksmith from Copenhagen who led a group of adventurers from Missouri to California in 1839. The trail established by Lassen was followed by the "forty-niners" during the California Gold Rush. Lassen is considered one of the most important early settlers of California.


SOLUTION: b

PROBLEM: Question: Were either of the men that Slater accompanied aboard the  HMS Shearwater born in Scotland? Passage:In 1874 he accompanied the botanist Isaac Bayley Balfour and George Gulliver aboard HMS Shearwater on an expedition to observe the transit of Venus on Rodrigues. In addition to studies of the flora and fauna, Slater excavated the subfossil bones of extinct birds, including the Rodrigues solitaire (Pezophaps solitaria) and Rodrigues starling (Necropsar rodericanus). His records were used by the zoologists Albert Günther and Alfred Newton to write the first scientific description of the Rodrigues starling in 1879. During a stay in Mauritius in 1875 he and George Gulliver explored the flora, the herpetofauna, and the aquatic avifauna. In 1885 he traveled with Thomas Carter to Iceland. Based partly on his work there, he wrote the Manual of the Birds of Iceland, published in 1901. In 1897 Slater described the short-tailed parrotbill (Paradoxornis davidianus) and the sulphur-breasted warbler (Phylloscopus ricketti). Together with William Bernhardt Tegetmeier and Frederick William Frohawk, he wrote the fifth volume of British Birds With Their Nests and Eggs (1898). In 1877 Slater was elected a Fellow of the Zoological Society of London (FZS). He was also a member of the British Ornithologists' Union.


SOLUTION: b

PROBLEM: Question: What country did Shauder write his feature film in? Passage:Till Schauder wrote and directed his first feature film, Strong Shit, at age 25 while still enrolled at the University for Television and Film Munich. The film, which stars German actor Sebastian Bezzel, tells the story of four drifting youngsters after the fall of the Berlin Wall. Strong Shit won the Max Ophuels Film Festival Jury Award in 1997. His second film, Santa Smokes, which he co-wrote, co-directed, and stars in won the Best Director Award at the Tokyo International Film Festival in 2003 and was nominated for the Grand Prix at the Tokyo International Film Festival in 2003. The film’s female co-star Kristy Jean Hulslander won the Best Actress Award at the Tokyo International Film Festival in 2003. His third film, Duke’s House, starring Lars Rudolph, is a docu-drama about Duke Ellington’s former Harlem home, premiered at the Tribeca Film Festival in 2003. After his acting debut in Santa Smokes Schauder appeared as an actor in the HBO series Mildred Pierce, which was directed by Todd Haynes and stars Kate Winslet. He also appeared in a nationwide American Express commercial in 2008.


SOLUTION:
b