Class 20 - Revision

Composition

Belief in “the green light, the orgiastic future that year by year recedes
before us,” as F. Scott Fitzgerald wrote in The Great Gatsby, is a
characteristic American trait. But hope in a better future is not uniquely
American, even if it has long been a more potent secular faith in the
United States than elsewhere. The belief has older roots. It was the
product of a shift in the temporal location of the golden age from a long-
lost past to an ever-brighter future.

That shift was conceived and realized with the Enlightenment and then
the Industrial Revolution. As human beings gained ever-greater control of
the forces of nature and their economies became ever more productive,
they started to hope for lives more like those of the gods their ancestors
had imagined.

People might never be immortal, but their lives would be healthy and
long. People might never move instantaneously, but they could transport
themselves and their possessions swiftly and cheaply across great
distances. People might never live on Mount Olympus, but they could
enjoy a temperate climate, 24-hour lighting, and abundant food. People
might never speak mind to mind, but they could communicate with as
many others as they desired, anywhere on the planet. People might never
enjoy infinite wisdom, but they could gain immediate access to the
knowledge accumulated over millennia.

All of this has already happened in the world’s richest countries. It is what
the people of the rest of the world hope still to enjoy.

Is a yet more orgiastic future beckoning? Today’s Gatsbys have no doubt

that the answer is yes: humanity stands on the verge of breakthroughs in
information technology, robotics, and artificial intelligence that will dwarf
what has been achieved in the past two centuries. Human beings will be
able to live still more like gods because they are about to create machines
like gods: not just strong and swift but also supremely intelligent and even
self-creating.
Yet this is the optimistic version. Since Mary Shelley created the
cautionary tale of Frankenstein, the idea of intelligent machines has also
frightened us. Many duly point to great dangers, including those of soaring
unemployment and inequality.
The tecno-optimists are wrong – Martin Wolf – Foreign Affairs Magazine

Taking due consideration of the above text, write a 400-450 words

composition on the impact of technology on 21st century international
relations.
1 – Increased productivity and economic efficiency – greater standards of
living, global supply chains, UE, US and China,
2 – In terms of international security – greater destructive power, atomic
bombs, missiles X MAD
3 – Globalization – improved connection between cultures VS. backlash
againt foreigners – rise of populism, far right parties, etc etc Social media

At the dawn of the 20th century, the international community’s main

preoccupations included hunger and tuberculosis. Today, technology has
rendered those worries obsolete, and the challenge becomes how to make
use of these resources in order to benefit all peoples. Thus, issues such as
climate change and structural unemployment become central. In this
sense, technology affects 21st century international relations mainly in
three realms: the increased productivity that results from technological
advances, the impacts on international security and globalization itself.

Translate the following into English

Divino emplasto, tu me darias o primeiro lugar entre os homens, acima da
ciência e da riqueza, porque eras a genuína e direta inspiração do céu. O
acaso determinou o contrário; e ai vos ficais eternamente hipocondríacos.
Este último capítulo é todo de negativas. Não alcancei a celebridade do
emplasto, não fui ministro, não fui califa, não conheci o casamento.
Verdade é que, ao lado dessas faltas, coube-me a boa fortuna de não
comprar o pão com o suor do meu rosto. Mais; não padeci a morte de
Dona Plácida, nem a semidemência do Quincas Borba. Somadas umas
coisas e outras, qualquer pessoa imaginará que não houve míngua nem
sobra, e, conseguintemente que saí quite com a vida. E imaginará mal;
porque ao chegar a este outro lado do mistério, achei-me com um
pequeno saldo, que é a derradeira negativa deste capítulo de negativas: —
Não tive filhos, não transmiti a nenhuma criatura o legado da nossa
miséria.
Machado de Assis – Memórias Póstumas de Brás Cubas, Capítulo 160, “Das negativas”
(adapted)