My explanation might be a little poor but I'll give it a shot. When you first read it, you get that it is a comparison between two different things. This is important for understanding what word to choose.

The misconception that (i) _________ work strains the mind less than physical work strains the body has been proven wrong by scientific investigation as well as by anecdotal evidence.


For the first blank, it compares the mind to the body. While intense is a good word, it doesn't have the meaning that we want to portray, since intense work can strain the mind as well as the body. If you're like me and don't know what actuarial meant, you can look at cerebral, plug it into the sentence and realize that it is a better word choice, since cerebral is a part of the brain and is a great adjective when discussing the work of the mind in comparison to the work of the body.

Answer: A)cerebral

It is simply not true that the (ii) _________ musings of a mathematician are necessarily easier than the physical labor of, say, a carpenter.

I used the same process of elimination for the second blank as well. While extraordinary, like intense, is a good word choice, it doesn't do a good job in describing the sentence as well as we would like. Again, I did not know what quotidian meant, so I choose intellectual first to see how it would sound. It turned out to be a pretty good fit and made the sentence flow when you read everything together.

Answer: (F) intellectual

(D) quotidian
(E) extraordinary
(F) intellectual