Reading Comprehension Test 74

[passage-header]Read the passage given below and answer the question it follows:[/passage-header]The idea of the brain as an information processor- a machine manipulating blips of energy according to fathomable rules- has come to dominate neuroscience. However, one enemy of (5) the brain-as-computer metaphor is John R. Searle, a philosopher who argues that since computers simply follow algorithms, they cannot deal with important aspects of human thought such as meaning and content. Computers are syntactic, (10) rather than semantic creatures. People, on the other hand, understand meaning because they have something, Searle obscurely calls the causal powers of the brain.
Yet how would a brain work if not by reducing (15) what it learns about the world to information-some kind of code that can be transmitted from neuron to neuron? What else could meaning and content be? If the code can be cracked, a computer should be able to simulate it, at least in principle. But (20) even if a computer could simulate the workings of the mind, Searle would claim that the machine would not really bethinking; it would just be acting as if it were. His argument proceeds thus: if a computer were used to simulate a stomach, with (25) the stomach's churnings faithfully reproduced on a video screen, the machine would not be digesting real food. It would just be blindly manipulating the symbols that generate the visual display. Suppose, though, that a stomach were simulated (30) using plastic tubes, a motor to do the churning, a supply of digestive juices, and a timing mechanism. If food went in one end of the device, what came out the other end would surely be digested food. Brains, unlike stomachs, are information processors, and if (35) one information processor were made to simulate another information processor, it is hard to see how one and not the other could be said to think. Simulated thoughts and real thoughts are made of the same element: information. The representations (40) of the world that humans carry around in their heads are already simulations. To accept Searle's argument, one would have to deny the most fundamental notion in psychology and neuroscience: that brains work by processing information.

[passage-header]Read the passage given below and answer the question that follows:[/passage-header]A small number of the forest species of Lepidoptera (moths and butterflies, which exist as caterpillars during most of their life cycle) exhibit regularly recurring patterns of population growth and decline-such fluctuations in population are known as population cycles. Although many different variables influence population levels, a regular pattern such as a population cycle seems to imply a dominant, driving force. Identification of that driving force, however, has proved surprisingly elusive despite considerable research. The common approach of studying causes of population cycles by measuring the mortality caused by different agents, such as predatory birds or parasites, has been unproductive in the case of Lepidoptera. Moreover, population ecologists' attempts to alter cycles by changing the caterpillars' habitat and by reducing caterpillar populations have not succeeded. In short, the evidence implies that these insect populations, if not self-regulating, may at least be regulated by an agent more intimately connected with the insect than are predatory birds or parasites. Recent work suggests that this agent may be a virus. For many years, viral disease had been reported in declining populations of caterpillars, but population ecologists had usually considered viral disease to have contributed to the decline once it was underway rather than to have initiated it. The recent work has been made possible by new techniques of molecular biology that allow viral DNA to be detected at low concentrations in the environment. Nuclear polyhedrosis viruses are hypothesized to be the driving force behind population cycles in Lepidoptera in part because the viruses themselves follow an infectious cycle in which, if protected from direct sunlight, they may remain virulent for many years in the environment, embedded in durable crystals of polyhedrin protein. Once ingested by a caterpillar, the crystals dissolve, releasing the virus to infect the insect's cells. Late in the course of the infection, millions of new virus particles are formed and enclosed in polyhedrin crystals. These crystals re-enter the environment after the insect dies and decomposes, thus becoming available to infect other caterpillars. One of the attractions of this hypothesis is its broad applicability. Remarkably, despite significant differences in habitat and behavior, many species of Lepidoptera have population cycles of similar length, between eight and eleven years. Nuclear polyhedrosis viral infection is one factor that these disparate species share.

[passage-header]Read the passage and answer the question that follows:[/passage-header]

[passage-header]Read the passage given below and answer the question that follows:[/passage-header]ROMAN: I know you well, sir, and you know me.
Your name, I think, is Adrain.
VOLSCE: It is so, sir. Truly, I have forgotten you.

[passage-footer]
[/passage-footer]

[passage-header]Read the passage given below and answer the question that follows:[/passage-header]ROMAN: I know you well, sir, and you know me.
Your name, I think, is Adrain.
VOLSCE: It is so, sir. Truly, I have forgotten you.

[passage-footer]
[/passage-footer]

[passage-header]Read the passage given below and answer the question that follows:[/passage-header]Jon Clark's study of the effect of the modernization of a telephone exchange on exchange maintenance work and workers is a solid contribution to a debate that encompasses two lively issues in the history and sociology of technology: technological determinism and social constructivism. 
Clark makes the point that the characteristics of a technology have a decisive influence on job skills and work organization. Put more strongly, technology can be a primary determinant of social and managerial organization. Clark believes this possibility has been obscured by the recent sociological fashion, exemplified by Braverman's analysis, that emphasizes the way machinery reflects social choices. For Braverman, the shape of a technological system is subordinate to the manager's desire to wrest control of the labor process from the workers. Technological change is construed as the outcome of negotiations among interested parties who seek to incorporate their own interests into the design and configuration of the machinery. This position represents the new mainstream called social constructivism.
The constructivists gain acceptance by misrepresenting technological determinism: technological determinists are supposed to believe, for example, that machinery imposes appropriate forms of order on society. The alternative to constructivism, in other words, is to view technology as existing outside society, capable of directly influencing skills and work organization.
Clark refutes the extremes of the constructivists by both theoretical and empirical arguments. Theoretically, he defines "technology" in terms of relationships between social and technical variables. Attempts to reduce the meaning of technology to Theoretically he defines "technology" in terms of relationships between social and technical variables. Attempts to reduce the meaning of technology to cold, hard metal are bound to fail, for machinery is just scrap unless it is organized functionally and supported by appropriate systems of operation and maintenance. At the empirical level Clark shows how a change at the telephone exchange from maintenance-intensive electromechanical switches to semi-electronic switching systems altered work tasks, skills, training opportunities, administration, and organization of workers. Some changes Clark attributes to the particular way management and labor unions negotiated the introduction of the technology, whereas others are seen as arising from the capabilities and nature of the technology itself. Thus Clark helps answer the question: "When is social choice decisive and when are the concrete characteristics of technology more important?"

[passage-header]Read the passage given below and answer the question that follows:[/passage-header]ROMAN: I know you well, sir, and you know me.
Your name, I think, is Adrain.
VOLSCE: It is so, sir. Truly, I have forgotten you.

[passage-footer]
[/passage-footer]

[passage-header]Read the passage and answer the question that follows:[/passage-header]The principal object of this Work is to remove the erroneous and discreditable notions current in England concerning this City, in common with everything else connected with the Colony. We shall endeavor to represent Sydney as it really is- to exhibit its spacious Gas-lit Streets, crowned by an active and thriving population- its Public Edifices, and its sumptuous shops, which boldly claim a comparison with those of London itself: and to shew that 62994 the Colonists have not been inattentive to matters of higher import, we shall display to our Readers the beautiful and commodious buildings raised by piety and industry for the use of Religion. 64643 It is true, all are not yet in a state of completion; but, be it remembered, that what was done gradually in England, in the course of many centuries, has been here affected in the comparatively short period of sixty years 65329. Our object, in setting forth this work, is one of no 26593 mean moment; and we trust that every Australian, whether this is his native or adopted country, will heartily bid us "God speed!"
   It became necessary, after the rebellion of those Colonies now known as the United States, for Britain to send her convicts elsewhere; and the wide, distant, and almost totally unknown regions of Australia were adjudged most suitable for the purpose. Accordingly, eleven ships, since known in Colonial History as the "First Fleet," sailed for New Holland on the 15th of May, 1787, under the command of Captain Arthur Phillip, and arrived in Botany Bay on the 20th day of January in the following year. Finding the spot in many respects unfit for an infant settlement, and but scantily supplied with water, Captain Phillip determined to explore the coast; and proceeded northward, with a few officers and marines, in three open boats. After passing along a rocky and barren line of the shore for several miles, they entered Port Jackson, which they supposed to be of no great dimensions, it having been marked in the chart of Captain Cook as a boat harbor. Their astonishment may be easily imagined when they found its waters gradually expand, and the full proportions of that magnificent harbor (capable of containing the whole navy of Britain) burst upon their view. The site of the intended settlement was no longer a matter of doubt; and, after first landing at Manly Beach, they eventually selected a spot on the banks of a small stream of fresh water, falling into a Cove on the southern side of the estuary.
  Sydney, the capital, is situated on the southern shore of Port Jackson, at the distance of seven miles from the Pacific Ocean. It is built at the head of the far-famed "Cove"; and, with Darling Harbor as its general boundary to the west, extends, in an unbroken succession of houses, for more than two miles in a southerly direction. As a maritime city, its site is unrivaled, possessing at least three miles of water frontage, at any part of which vessels of the heaviest burden can safely approach the wharves. The stratum on which it stands is chiefly sandstone; and, as it enjoys a considerable elevation, it is remarkably healthy and dry. The principal thoroughfares run north and south, parallel to Darling Harbor, and are crossed at right angles by shorter streets. This, at first, gives the place an air of unpleasing sameness and formality, to those accustomed to the winding and romantic streets of an ancient English town; but the eye soon becomes reconciled to the change, and you cease to regret the absence of what is in so many respects undesirable.
[passage-footer]
[/passage-footer]

[passage-header]Read the passage given below and answer the question that follows:[/passage-header]ROMAN: I know you well, sir, and you know me.
Your name, I think, is Adrain.
VOLSCE: It is so, sir. Truly, I have forgotten you.

[passage-footer]
[/passage-footer]

[passage-header]Read the passage given below and answer the question that follows:[/passage-header]Jon Clark's study of the effect of the modernization of a telephone exchange on exchange maintenance work and workers is a solid contribution to a debate that encompasses two lively issues in the history and sociology of technology: technological determinism and social constructivism. 
Clark makes the point that the characteristics of a technology have a decisive influence on job skills and work organization. Put more strongly, technology can be a primary determinant of social and managerial organization. Clark believes this possibility has been obscured by the recent sociological fashion, exemplified by Braverman's analysis, that emphasizes the way machinery reflects social choices. For Braverman, the shape of a technological system is subordinate to the manager's desire to wrest control of the labor process from the workers. Technological change is construed as the outcome of negotiations among interested parties who seek to incorporate their own interests into the design and configuration of the machinery. This position represents the new mainstream called social constructivism.
The constructivists gain acceptance by misrepresenting technological determinism: technological determinists are supposed to believe, for example, that machinery imposes appropriate forms of order on society. The alternative to constructivism, in other words, is to view technology as existing outside society, capable of directly influencing skills and work organization.
Clark refutes the extremes of the constructivists by both theoretical and empirical arguments. Theoretically, he defines "technology" in terms of relationships between social and technical variables. Attempts to reduce the meaning of technology to Theoretically he defines "technology" in terms of relationships between social and technical variables. Attempts to reduce the meaning of technology to cold, hard metal are bound to fail, for machinery is just scrap unless it is organized functionally and supported by appropriate systems of operation and maintenance. At the empirical level Clark shows how a change at the telephone exchange from maintenance-intensive electromechanical switches to semi-electronic switching systems altered work tasks, skills, training opportunities, administration, and organization of workers. Some changes Clark attributes to the particular way management and labor unions negotiated the introduction of the technology, whereas others are seen as arising from the capabilities and nature of the technology itself. Thus Clark helps answer the question: "When is social choice decisive and when are the concrete characteristics of technology more important?"