In 1575--over 400 years ago the French scholar Louis Le Roy published a learned book in which he voiced despair over the changes caused by the social and technological innovations of his time, what we now call the Renaissance. We, also, feel that our times are out of joint; we even have reason to believe that our descendants will be worse off than we are.
The earth will soon be overcrowded and its resources exhausted. Pollution will ruin the environment, upset the climate and endanger human health. The gap in living standards between the rich and the poor will widen and lead the angry, hungry people of the world to acts of desperation including the use of nuclear weapons as blackmail. Such are the inevitable consequences of population and technological growth if present trends continue.
The future is never a projection of the past. Animals probably have no chance to escape from the tyranny of biological evolution, but human beings are blessed with the freedom of s
A. the reversal of trend caused by scientific advances is out of the question
B. nuclear weapons won’t play a prominent role in dealings among peoples
C. the public is aware of the future dangers and ready to take immediate action
D. the trend of rapid development of science and technology seems irresistible
Passage Two
Gene therapy and gene-based drugs are two ways we could benefit from our growing mastery of genetic science. But there will be others as well. Here is one of the remarkable therapies on the cutting edge of genetic research that could make their way into mainstream medicine in the coming years.
While it’s true that just about every cell in the body has the instructions to make a complete human, most of those instructions are inactivated, and with good reason: the last thing you want for your brain cells is to start churning out stomach acid or your nose to turn into a kidney. The only time cells truly have the potential to turn into any and all body parts is very early in a pregnancy, when so-called stem cells haven’t begun to specialize.
Yet this untapped potential could be a terrific boon to medicine. Most diseases involve the death of healthy cells--brain cells in Alzheimer’s, cardiac cells in heart disease, pancreati
A. there will inevitably be human cloning in the coming year
B. the potential to make healthy body tissues is undoubtedly a boon to human beings
C. it is illegal to clone any kind of creatures in the world
D. it is legal to clone any kind of creatures in the world except human
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