UNITS 8 and 9

Date: 2015-10-07; view: 1388.

1. Look through the following text and entitle it.

Once came into being from inorganic environment, the living matter has deeply altered the lifeless Earth, step by step changing the composition of the atmosphere, the sea, and the upper layers of the solid crust both on land and under the ocean. Since then, were one to find out a single objective to evolution it would be the perpetuation of life.

Though there are more than 100 chemical elements in the Periodic Table, only four prove to be essential for the biosphere. They are: hydrogen, carbon, nitrogen and oxygen. Ecologists define the biosphere as the part of the world where life can exist and as the point of interaction of these four essential elements. While the elements mentioned above go wonderfully with much of the chemistry life, the definition turns out to be a little too limited, ignoring as it does, the role of sulphur and phosphorus.

Consequently, it is a fact, that most of the problems of the environmental disturbance arise from the extraordinary reactivity of these six elements, with the first four actually building protein molecule, sulphur being the "fastening" in protein, and phosphorus supplying "high-energy bond" which is known to be universal fuel for biochemical work within the cell.

If the biosphere continues in running order, biologically important materials must undergo cyclic changes so that after utilization they are put back, at the expense of some solar energy, into a form in which they can be reused. So far nature itself saw to the whole arrangement go on smoothly, and all the cycles be governed by complex mechanisms that were fitted together and held the whole in balance. Yet during the few last decades the man's intervention into the natural cycling

of the living matter has been going on on an unprecedented scale and at an unprecedented rate. Never before has nature been treated in such a drastic and often irreversible way, with both immediate consequences and ultimate incineration, not even vaguely foreseeable. For too little do we know for certain about the way nature has been self-regulating for millions of years since life began and too many variables are involved, to be able to foresee the final aftermath of our rapid technological development on the biosphere as the home of life.

Thus, what is now recognized as a threat to our environment is caused first of all by disturbances either in natural cycles of the six essentials, or in the energy cycle of the biosphere, energy being the driving force of all life processes.

2. Read the text thoroughly with a dictionary and answer the following questions:

1. How did all living matter appear?

2. What is the objective of evolution?

3. What four elements are essential for biosphere?

4. What are the roles of sulphur and phosphorus in the biosphere?

5. What changes must the biologically important materials undergo?

3. Entitle each paragraph of the text, write out the sentence(s) expressing the main idea(s) of each of them and translate these sentences into Russian.

4. Write a summary and an abstract to the text.

5. Revise grammar and lexical material to Units 8 and 9 and translate the following sentences into Russian:

1. Not only is man replacing the Earth's major ecosystems with cities and land devoted to agriculture, but leakage of toxic substances from man-dominated provinces of the Earth is reducing the structure and self-regulation of the remaining natural ecosystems.

2. Important as these conditions for the existence of a biosphere may be in terms of historical evolution, it is not the history that we are concerned with now but rather what the future developments are likely to be.

3. It would seem not unlikely that we are approaching a crisis comparable to the one that occurred when free oxygen began to accumulate in the atmosphere.

4. Presumably, if we do want to continue living in the biosphere, we must introduce unprecedented processes.

5. It is the industrial fixation of nitrogen that far exceeds all the others in magnitude.

6. We do know that excessive гиіі-^оп~ nitrogen compounds in streams and rivers can result in "blooms" of algae and intensified biological activity that deplete the available oxygen and destroy fish and other oxygen-dependent organisms, the process known today as eutrophi-cation.

7. Different as the world might b^^{come from tne} present one, there is no reason a priori why it would be necessarily unpleasant.

6. Translate the following text into Eng^,isn making use of grammar and lexical material you've revised. Pay special attention to the italicized parts: С первых шагов своего существования человек стремится увеличить господство (domination) над природой, но только в последнее время глобальный xapat^meP воздействия человеческой деятельности на природные условия ^стал бесспорной реальностью.

Несомненно, человечество сумело значительно расширить свои знания о природе и поставить себе на службу ряд ее новых сил, явлений и ресурсов, но никогда прежде человек не был свидетелем таких успехов, достигнуть¹* ^в наше время.

Однако, наряду с успехами, изменяется и сам характер вмешательства человека в развитие природы. Огромных масштабов достигает загрязнение окружаю ш^еи среды химическими веществами. Согласно имеющимся данным, необычайно усилилась связь между загрязнением средь? ^и состоянием ряда природных ресурсов. Так, увеличение в атмс?^сФ^еР^е загрязнителей, содержащихся в промышленных дыма>£ ^и газах, приводит к повышению кислотности почв, сброс в в одные системы жидких отходов (wastes) уменьшает ресурсы чисГ^ои пресной воды. Загрязнение атмосферы фреонами и углеводсРР°Дами вызывает разрушение тонкого озонового слоя в верхн ^еи атмосфере, выполняющего роль защитного экрана против избыточной ультрафиолетовой радиации.

Проведенный экологический о^³°Р состояния планеты неоспоримо свидетельствует о появлени и важной черты во взаимодействии человека и природы — о гл:°^{бальном} характере вносимых

человеком изменений в природные условия на Земле. Теперь стало ясно, что, если процесс загрязнения окружающей среды не будет прекращен немедленно, он может стать необратимым.

Выяснилось, что современный этап отношений между обществом и природой характеризуется появлением экологических проблем, которых ранее либо просто не существовало, либо они существовали в неявном виде. И какими бы частными ни казались на первый взгляд новые проблемы окружающей среды, их решение в конечном счете зависит от объединенных усилий ученых разных наук и разных стран.

7. Listen to the communication made by a participant of the radio programme Late Night Report devoted to the problems of the world's limited energy resources andsay whatthe position of thespeaker is andwhat organization he represents. The notes andwords below will helpyou to understandthe speech better:

NOTES

1. emotional warning— эмоциональное предупреждение

2. harmful use— опасное использование

3. by the way— между прочим

4. there's no cause for concern— нет причин для беспокойства

5. as far as fossil fuels are concerned— что касается природного топлива

6. letme assure you— позвольте заверить вас

7. in the short run— сейчас, в настоящее время

WORDS

announcer— диктор position— должность

campaign— кампания power— энергия

communication— сообщение to rely on— полагаться на

conservation— сохранение representative— представительfairly— достаточно, довольно

ANNOUNCER: Our final speaker in the studio on the subject of energy is Joseph Huang, Under-Secretary of Energy.

/. HUANG: Thank you very much for the opportunity to join the

discussion.

First, I should like to thank Professor William White of the New England Institute of Technology for his valuable contribution to the discussion. It's also a pleasure to express my thanks to Jane Black, the representative of CANE, the Campaign Against Nuclear Energy for her emotional warning on the harmful use of nuclear energy. I also acknowledge with gratitude and affection the brilliant proposals on the use of alternative sources expressed by Dr. Catalina Burgos, the author of several books on alternative technology. I've been listening to them all with great interest. By the way, I don't agree with some of the estimates of the world energy resourses. There's no cause for concern as far as fossil fuels are concerned. Let me assure you that more oil and gas is being discovered all the time. If we listened to the pessimists (and there are a lot of them around), none of us would sleep at night. In the short run, we must continue to rely on the fossil fuels — oil, coal and gas. Wouldn't you agree that we must look to the future? It would be in our own interests if our policy were flexible. Unless we - thought new research was necessary, we wouldn't be spending money on it. After all, we wouldn't have a Department of Energy unless most people thought it was important. The big question is where to spend the money — on conservation of present resources or on research into new forms of power. But I'm fairly optimistic. I wouldn't be in this job unless I were an optimist. I can't help feeling that under no circumstances should we come to a hasty decision on that.

8. Listen to the talk again, make notes and answer the following questions:

1. Who is the last to speak?

2. Why does Joseph Huang thank Prof. White?

3. Why is he thankful to Jane Black?

4. Why does he highly appreciate Dr. Burgos' work?

5. How does he estimate the world's energy resources?

6. What, to his mind, must people do in the short run?