andreeva_tia_nauchnyi_angliiskii_iazyk_vypusk_14_nauka

C.This leads to step three: organizing the facts and study­ ing the relationships that emerge.

D.Step four is the statement of an hypothesis or theory: that is, framing a general truth that has emerged, and that may be modified as new facts emerge.

E.Then follows the clearer statement of the theory.

F.And the final step is the practical test of the theory - the prediction of new facts.

This is essential, because from this flows the possibility of control by man of the forces of nature that are newly revealed.

♦ Answer the questions.

1.What is science?

2.How is knowledge obtained?

3.What is technology?

4.What are the steps in the method?

Text 21

Sonnet - to Science

Edgar Allan Poe (1809-1849)

Science! true daughter of Oid Tune thou art! Who altersst ali things with thy peering eyes. Why prayssi thou thus upon the post's heart, Vulture, whose wings are dull realities?

How should he love thes? or how deem thee wise, Who wouldst not leave him in his wandering

To seek for treasure in the jewelled skiss, Albeit he soared with an undaunted wing? Hast thou not dragged Diana from her car? And driven the Hamadryad from the wood To seek a shelter in some happier star?

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Hast thou not tom the Naiad from her flood,

The Elfin from the green grass, and from me

The summer dream beneath the tamarind tree?

♦ Read a sonnet. Preparefor a round table talk puttingfor­ wardyour arguments either infavour or against science.

Text 22

The Scientists'Responsibility

I think it may be reasonably maintained that neither the United States nor any other nation can, by itself, solve the im­ portant problems that plague the world now. The problems that count today - the steady population increase, the diminishing of our resources, the multiplication of our wastes, the damage to the environment, the decay of the cities, the declining quality of life-are all interdependent and are all global in nature.

No nation, be it as wealthy as the United States, as large as the Soviet Union, or as populous as China, can correct these problems without reference to the rest of the world. Though the United States for instance, brought its population to a firm plateau, cleaned its soil, purified its water, filtered its air, swept up its waste, and cycled its resources, all would avail it nothing as long as the rest of the world did none of these things.

These problems, left unsolved, will weight us down under a steady acceleration of increasing misery with each passing year; yet to solve them requires us to think above the level of nationalism. No amount of local pride anywhere in the world; no amount of patriotic ardor on a less-than-all-mankind scale; no amount of flag waving; no prejudice in favour of some spe­ cific regional culture and tradition; no conviction of personal or ethnic superiority, can prevail against the cold equations. The

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nations of the world must co-operate to seek, the possibility of mutual life, or remain separately hostile toface the certainty of mutual death.

Nor can the co-operation be the peevish agreement of haughty equals: each quick to resent slurs, eager to snuff out injustice to itself, and ready to profit at the expense of others. So little time is left and so high have become the stakes, that there no longer remains any profitable way of haggling over details, manoeuvring for position, or threatening at every mo­ ment to pick up our local marbles and go home.

The international co-operation must take the form, of a world government sufficiently effective to make and enforce the necessary decisions, and against which the individual nations would have neither the right nor the power to take up arms.

Tyranny? Yes, of course. Just about the tyranny of Wash­ ington over Albany, Albany over New York City, and New York City over me. Though we are each of us personally har­ ried by the financial demands and plagued by the endless or­ ders of the officialdom of three different levels of government, we accept it all, more or less stoically, under the firm convic­ tion that life would be worse otherwise. To accept a fourth level would be a cheap price to pay for keeping our planet viable.

But who on Earth best realizes the serious nature of the problems that beset us? As a class, the scientists, I should think. They can weigh, most accurately and most judiciously, the drain on the world's resources, the effect of global pollu­ tion, the dangers to a fragmenting ecology.

And who on Earth might most realistically bear a consider­ able share of responsibility for the problems that beset us? As a class, the scientists, I should think. Since they gladly accept the credit for lowering the death rate and for industrializing the

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world, they might with some grace accept a good share of re­ sponsibility for the less than desirable side effects that have ac­ companied those victories.

And who on Earth might be expected to lead the way in finding solutions to the problems that beset us? As a class, the scientists, I should think. On whom else can we depend for the elaboration of humane systems for limiting population, effec­ tive ways of preventing or reversing pollution, elegant methods of cycling resources? All this will clearly depend on steadily increasing scientific knowledge and on steadily increasing the wisdom with which this knowledge is applied.

And who on Earth is most likely to rise above the limita­ tions of national and ethnic prejudice and speak in the name of mankind as a whole? As a class, the scientists, I should think. The nations of the world are divided in culture: in language, in religion, in tastes, in philosophy, in heritage - but wherever science exists at all, it is the same science; and scientists from anywhere and everywhere speak the same language, profes­ sionally, and accept the same mode of thought.

It is not then as a class, to the scientists that we must turn to find leaders in the fight for world gevemment?

♦ Read the text to get the main idea as a whole. Then, read each paragraph carefully again tofind specific examples, reasons or details about the main idea. Discuss all branches of sci­ ence/technology that could have very dangerous effects, dangerous effects and not dangerous effects (Nuclear energy, Biotechnology and Genetic Engineering, National defense and armaments, Space exploration, Agriculture and plant science, Medical research, Control and reduction ofpollution, Robotics, Newforms of energy, Information technology and computers, Astrology).

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Text 23

Progress o f Science

In the last twenty years great advances have been made in the development of science and technology. Never before has world seen such development in science and technology as in our days. Never before has man commanded such power over nature. The laws of nature have been discovered of which man was once ignorant, new possibilities for the development of production have arisen of which no one had the slightest idea in the past. The discovery of nuclear chain reaction and ther­ monuclear reaction are good examples of this. Science has brought into being a new atomic technology, a new industry. Electrical engineering and radio engineering have been created in the same way. All this shows to what extent has increased the role of science in the industrial development of society.

One of the major factors of industrial development is the output of power, especially of electric power. Electric power may be utilized in practically all technical processes and turned into all other forms of energy. It may be transported over long distances, it may be divided into portions; of any size and hence utilized without appreciable losses. Electric engines have the highest efficiency. Electric power makes it possible to at­ tain high speeds, intensity and precision in various processes.

It must be bome in mind that so far most of the world's power plants are working on coal. However, the present-day sources of power - coal, oil, uranium and peat - are not unlim­ ited and the problem of new, practically inexhaustible sources therefore arises. There are three ways of solving this scientific and technical problem: by gaining control over thermonuclear

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fusion, by the commercial use of solar energy and by utilizing the heat of the magmatic layer.

So far we have not succeeded in producing controlled thermonuclear reaction and utilizing it on an industrial scale. The work of Russian, British and American physicists has shown that in principle this problem can be solved. There is every reason to expect that the problem of applying controlled thermonuclear reaction to the production of electric power will also be technically solved. When this will be achieved - to­ morrow or in many years' time - is hard to say, but according to the well-known Academician N. Semyonov, scientists and engineers will do it this century, because contemporary scien­ tific experience shows that what is possible in principle rapidly becomes possible in practice.

The practically unlimited reserves of raw material (water) for obtaining thermonuclear fuel, the possibility of direct trans­ formation of thermonuclear energy into electricity and the ab­ sence of dangerous radioactive substances in the released gases will make the thermonuclear process ideal method of power production. This will enable us to utilize this energy in any quantity, in any part of the world, and even, if needed, beyond its limits in the boundless spaces of the cosmos.

Wonderful prospects will be opened up to mankind when we learn to convert solar energy into electricity at high effi­ ciency. The sun is sending 40 million large calories towards the earth every second. The greater part of this energy disperses and some of it is absorbed by the atmosphere. On the average some 30 per cent of this energy reaches the land surface each year. Soviet scientists believe that the problem of using solar en­ ergy to obtain electricity will also' be settled this century.

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The third potential source of energy, a practically inex­ haustible one, is the heat of the magmatic layers of the earth, at an average depth of approximately 30 kilometres from the surface of the earth.

It is believed that by the end of this century these new power sources will be commercially exploited and as a result electricity will become available in any place and in practi­ cally any amount.

Our era may well be called the eve of the synthetics age. The problem now is to create new materials not existing in na­ ture and having required properties. The most widespread ma­ terials of the future will be polymers, new products of organic synthesis - plastics, synthetic fibre, rubber, fur, etc. When sci­ ence discovers how to make inorganic polymers with required mechanical properties there will be revolutionary developments in technology.

Particularly great prospects for saving man's labour are opened up by the rapid progress made in telemechanics, electronics and automation. High speed electronic comput­ ers are a good example of this.

Science and technology have achieved great progress in space research. There, have been space flights of the first Soviet cosmonauts, the launching of an interplanetary sta­ tion in the direction of Mars, radar contact with the planets Mercury and Venus.

The 19th and 20th centuries frequently called the age of steam and electricity. But what term can be applied to the 20th century? The age of atomic power or of the conquest of air and space, the age of polymers, the. age of radio, television and electronics, the age of cybernetics and computers, the age of chemistry? In our days science is continually producing un-

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precedented new types of technology, the sooner we learn the unlimited power of science for good, the sooner it will be able to serve society in a world of peace.

♦ Read the text and write down a summary.

Text 24

Science and Human Goals

What are human goals? Basically man seeks freedom from hunger and want adequate warmth and protection, and freedom from disease.

Added to these he wants reasonable leisure and recreation, and with these the freedom to seek an understanding of the workings of the universe in which he lives. I have no reason to doubt that they will still be goals of humanity in 1984, and they will still seem far off for many people. Progress towards them is, of course, being made in the next years, continuously and more will be made in the near twenty years, but the situation is rather like that in highjumping at an athletic meeting - each time the bar is cleared it is raised another inch.

The problem of food production on a scale adequate to meet the needs of an evergrowing world population is clearly facing us now and I would not expect it to be greatly mitigated by population control, which is unlikely to have a major effect in the course of twenty years, although the means whereby it could be achieved will certainly be available. There have been, during recent years, a variety of experimental studies on food production by cultivation of algae and yeasts or by extraction of leaf protein. Interesting as these methods are, the major de­ velopments are likely to be in more orthodox agriculture. I expect to see agricultural production doubled during the next twenty years mainly by improvements in practice based on ex-

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isting knowledge and by controlled use of pesticides, many of them new products with a high degree of species specificity. Another factor is likely to be a slow decline in the use of land for producing materials (for example, rubber and fibres) which can be replaced by products of the chemical industry...

Rising population and improved living standards associated with increasing industrialization are continually bringing fresh problems to both the "developed" and "underdeveloped" coun­ tries. In the former, at least, the enormous problems of in­ creasing urbanization - land use, building construction, trans­ portation and public health - will demand for their solution the help not only of the natural but also of the so-called social sci­ ences...

♦ Answer the questions.

1.What are the main goals of humanity?

2.Are they similar all over the world?

3.Is enough food produced in the world to meet the needs of the population?

4.What is to be done to resolve the problem of food shortage?

5.What are ecological problems facing humanity?

6.Is humanity faced with the problem of overpopulation?

7.What is the problem of modem big cities?

8.What are the prospects of the countryside?

9.How can scientific progress solve all these problems?

Text 25

Art and Science

...Both the arts and the sciences are activities that endeav­ our to discover and communicate truths about the world. The

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domain to which the artist addresses himself is the inner, sub­ jective world of the emotions. Artistic statements therefore pertain mainly to relations between private events of affective significance. The domain of the scientist, in contrast, is the outer, objective world of physical phenomena. Scientific statements pertain mainly о relations between or among public events. Thus the transmission of information and the percep­ tion of meaning in that information constitute the central con­ tent of both the arts and the sciences. A creative act on the part of either an artist or a scientist would mean his formulation of a new meaningful statement about the world, an addition to the accumulated capital of what is sometimes called "our cultural heritage". Let us therefore examine the proposition that only Shakespeare could have formulated the semantic structures represented by Timon, whereas people other than Watson and Crick might have made the communication represented by their paper "A Structure for Deoxyribonucleic Acid", published in Nature in the spring of 1953.

First, it is evident that the exact word sequence that Watson and Crick published in Nature would not have been written if the authors had not existed, any more than the exact word se­ quence of Timon would have been written without Shake­ speare... Both creations are from that point of view unique. We are not really concerned, however, with the exact word se­ quence. We are concerned with the content. Thus we admit that people other than Watson and Crick would eventually have de­ scribed a satisfactory molecular structure for DNA. But then the character of Timon and the story of his trials and tribula­ tions not only might have been written without Shakespeare but also were written without him. Shakespeare merely, re­ worked the story of Timon he had read in William Painter's col-

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