首页
外语
计算机
考研
公务员
职业资格
财经
工程
司法
医学
专升本
自考
实用职业技能
登录
外语
How does Ausubel feel about the scientific progress made every day?
How does Ausubel feel about the scientific progress made every day?
admin
2022-03-28
68
问题
How does Ausubel feel about the scientific progress made every day?
W: What makes you such an optimist?
M: Working in The Rockerfeller University here in New York, I am overwhelmed every week by what people are learning. Genetics offers the most dramatic example, but in materials science and so many fields it’s almost as astonishing. Modern science is very young. Even if you go back to Galileo, it’s only 400 years old. Large-scale organized research is less than 100 years old. The chance to do things much better is enormous. Take energy. It’s a big cause for environmental concern. If you look at the whole system from mining fuel to powering my desk lamp, right now it is about 5 percent efficient. The other 95 percent of the energy in the fuel gets wasted along the way. We can’t jump quickly to 50 percent. But we have centuries of opportunity ahead of us. Whether you look at transport or energy or food systems, they all look juvenile to me. I mean that in a positive sense; they have great potential.
W: You began your career as an environmental scientist. Do you think environmentalists are part of the problem or part of the solution now?
M: The Greens themselves are part of a dynamic ecology, raising the alarms. Functionally, they are earth-sensing instruments. They are absolutely necessary. I started my career in the mid-1970s in marine pollution, and then in 1977 I became one of the first people to work full-time on global warming. I felt my main job was raising the alarm. That’s important. But after seven or eight years, I thought if I’m going to have a long career in the environment, I’d like to provide solutions too. So I spent five years as director of programmes at National Academy of Engineering. Engineers have a different way of thinking from Greens. They like machines that work, and they do enormously important environmental work. A problem is that the two groups don’t talk to each other much. Greens are not very good at taking a long view. They see that forests are disappearing or emissions are rising, and they see disaster looming. But I have an enthusiasm for history, especially the history of technology. My father was a historian of the 19th century industrial revolution in Britain. History is very powerful at showing that things fall as well as rise, including technologies. In fact, the history of technology is largely the history of substitution.
W: For example?
M: Here in New York, the density of horses a century ago was environmentally disastrous. Their replacement by automobiles had a huge environmental benefit. But of course every system has fallout. Cars were dangerous. If they had stayed as dangerous as they were in the 1930s, the automotive system could not have grown. They needed headlights and windshield wipers and seat belts. Then other problems grew, like urban air pollution. So we developed catalytic converters. And as pollution gets worse, there are hybrid vehicles and hydrogen fuel cells. They might allow the world with, say, two billion cars, compared with the 600 million we have right now. It’s not so much that there are limits to growth, in the famous phrase, but rather that any technology, like any empire, contains the seeds of its end. Instead of the technology growing exponentially and destroying everything around it, some other technology will generally take over that is superior. At one billion people in the world there might have been an alternative way of living. But at 6.4 billion and with 4 or 5 billion who don’t have much but want more, then you have no choice but to get better at providing the services people want. I don’t think my green colleagues have enough faith in their own scientific and technical peers.
W: So what do you say to people who think that climate change will overwhelm us? Even if a solution is technically achievable, can we make the changes?
M: The climate change problem is very simple. It requires favoring natural gas, nuclear and energy efficiency, as well as some adaptations. Intellectually the problem was solved in the early to mid-1980s. But making the necessary social change is different. And we shouldn’t be surprised at the problems. Quite a few of my friends who were involved in the international Millennium Ecosystem Assessment, whose report came out last spring, were furious because they felt it received inadequate media attention. But the newspapers were covering the death of the pope and the wedding of Prince Charles and Camilla Parker-Bowles. Social status and sexuality are what interest us. That’s not going to change. The trick is to come up with technologies that are digestible, that slip into the way we live, the way iPods and laptops do.
选项
答案
raise the alarms
解析
转载请注明原文地址:https://kaotiyun.com/show/CdWd777K
本试题收录于:
公共英语五级笔试题库公共英语(PETS)分类
0
公共英语五级笔试
公共英语(PETS)
相关试题推荐
Whatisthistextmainlyabout?Energyisrequiredinallofthefollowingexcept______.
Whatisthistextmainlyabout?Whichofthefollowingstatementsisnottrue?
ThepassagementionsallofthefollowingasfactorsimportanttothesuccessofanewfoodcropEXCEPTthe______.
Answerquestionsbyreferringtothefollowingbookreviews. Whichbook...A Changecanbeablessingoracurse,dependi
In1490orso,themainprogressmentionedinthispassagewas______.TheGerman,AugustusSiebe,inventedthe"hard-hatsuit"
Theestimatesofthenumbersofhome-schooledchildrenvarywidely.TheU.S.DepartmentofEducationestimatesthereare250,000
What’sthemainobjectiveofastudentwhoattendsacertainnumberofcourses?
Throughouthistorytherehavebeenmanyunusualtaxesleviedonsuchthingsashats,beds,baths,marriages,andfunerals.Atonetim
NoteveryPresidentisaleader,buteverytimeweelectaPresidentwehopeforone,especiallyintimesofdoubtandcrisis.I
Amongtheraftofbooks,articles,jokes,romanticcomedies,self-helpguidesandotherwritingsdiscussingmarriage,somefamil
随机试题
氢氧化钙性能如下,除外
行气与利水法并用的理论依据是
甲向乙、丙各借款40万元,并以其价值80万元的一处房屋作抵押。甲与乙于1月1日签订抵押合同.2月1日办理抵押登记;与丙于1月30日签订抵押合同,1月31日办理抵押登记。后因甲无力还款,乙、丙行使抵押权拍卖此房屋,得60:万元。对于此60万元的分配,正确的是
代理人没有代理权、超越代理权限范围或代理权终止后进行活动,属于( )。
首次公开发行的股票,应当通过向询价对象询价的方式确定股票发行价格。( )
根据出口退(免)税制度的相关规定,下列关于出口退(免)税的表述中,正确的有()。
可能导致企业资本成本上升的因素有()。
城市因水而生,因水而兴,因水而美。我们可以列举湖泊给城市带来的一系列好处,比如人工湖的修建对于改善人居环境,改善生态环境,治水治内涝等方面都能起到积极作用。但是,人工湖是不是越多越好、越大越好,大规模开挖人工湖是否会加重财政负担,政府这样大手笔的投入,到底
在高架桥上用绳子测量高架桥的高度,把绳子对折垂到地面时尚余10米,把绳子三折垂到地面时尚余2米,则高架桥高度和绳长分别是:
函数重载要求重载的函数必须有和原函数一样的【】。
最新回复
(
0
)