PASAGGE 13

George Berkeley defends idealism by attacking the materialist alternative. What exactly is the doctrine that he's attacking?
Readers should first note that ―materialism‖ is here used to mean ―the doctrine that material things exist‖. This is in
contrast with another use, more standard in contemporary discussions, according to which materialism is the doctrine that
only material things exist. Berkeley contends that no material things exist, not just that some immaterial things exist. Thus,
he attacks Cartesian and Lockean dualism, not just the considerably less popular (in Berkeley's time) view, held by
Hobbes, that only material things exist. But what exactly is a material thing? Interestingly, part of Berkeley's attack on
matter is to argue that this question cannot be satisfactorily answered by the materialists, that they cannot characterize
their supposed material things. However, an answer that captures what exactly it is that Berkeley rejects is that material
things are mind-independent things or substances. Berkeley holds that there are no such mind-independent things, that,
in the famous phrase, esse est percipi (aut percipere) — «to be is to be perceived (or to perceive)».

Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy. [September 10, 2004]

61. As used in the passage, VIEW can be replaced by

A) judgment.
B) pattern.
C) value.
D) doctrine.

62. The main purpose of the author is to

A) advocate the dualism of Berkeley.
B) illustrate the materialism of Berkeley.
C) explain the idealism of Berkeley.
D) highlight the notion of perception.

63. Which of the following statements is not compatible with the development of the passage?
A) Berkeley agrees with Hobbes‘s thinking.
B) Berkeley demolishes the materialist position.
C) Locke agrees something with Descartes.
D) Berkeley‘s point of view is polemical.

64. From the passage it is inferred that, according to Berkeley, an entity mind-independent is
A) precarious.
B) impossible.
C) plausible.
D) unlikely.

65. If a thinker could clearly characterize what matter is,

A) he could validly refute Berkeley.
B) he would be a radical Cartesian.
C) he would refute Locke‘s thesis.
D) he would object to the Hobbes‘s view.

PASAGGE 14

About 65 million years ago, dinosaurs, along with three-quarters of other species, perished suddenly. The cause is still
debated, but many scientists believe that this mass extinction was the result of a meteorite colliding with Earth. Today's
species are disappearing at a rate that, if this continues, will exceed that of that last great extinction. The cause is not
some cosmic catastrophe. As Lovelock says, it is a plague of people.
The random play that brought the human species to its present power has brought about the ruin of countless other forms
of life. When humans arrived in the New World about twelve thousand years ago, mammoths, mastodons, camels, giant
ground sloths, and dozens of other similar species were abundant on the continent. Most of these indigenous species
were hunted to extinction.
The destruction of the natural world is not the result of global capitalism, industrialization, "Western civilization" or some
failure of human institutions. It is a consequence of the evolutionary success of an exceptionally voracious primate.
Throughout all of history and prehistory, human progress has coincided with ecological devastation.

66. What is the main idea of the text?

A) Most of the native species of the New World have disappeared some twelve thousand years ago.
B) The current rate of disappearance of species far exceeds that of the last great extinction.
C) The cause of the mass extinction of dinosaurs is still a matter of debate among scientists.
D) The development of the human species necessarily entails the destruction of the environment.

67. The word PERISHED implies

A) evolution.
B) voracity.
C) death.
D) asthenia.

68. It is inferred from the passage that man's desire for destruction is
A) contingent.
B) rational.
C) conditioned.
D) consubstantial.

69. What is the statement not compatible with what is argued in the passage?
A) Despite his progress, mankind has not managed to establish a balanced relationship with his environment.
B) The variety of the fauna of the New World greatly diminished with the arrival of being humans.
C) At no time in the history of the Earth has mass extinction reached the levels it presents today.
D) After a rigorous analysis of the facts, man is the main factor that acts for the extinction of species.

70. In Lovelock's logic, if humanity radically changed its form of political, social and economic organization,
A) ecological devastation would continue to increase.
B) there would be an awareness about the environment.
C) the preservation of species will be guaranteed.
D) no one would talk about the extinction of dinosaurs.

PASAGGE 15

Scientists have gathered enough information about other planets in our solar system to know that none can support life as
we know it. Life is not possible without a stable atmosphere containing the right chemical ingredients for living organisms:
hydrogen, oxygen, nitrogen, and carbon. These ingredients must be balanced—not too thick or too thin. Life also depends
on the presence of water.
Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus, and Neptune all have atmospheres made mostly of hydrogen and helium. These planets are
called gas giants, because they are mostly made of gas and do not have a solid outer crust.
Mercury and Mars have some of the right ingredients, but their atmospheres are far too thin to support life. The
atmosphere of Venus is too thick—the planet's surface temperature is more than 460 degrees Celsius (860 degrees
Fahrenheit).
Jupiter's moon Europa has a thin atmosphere rich with oxygen. It is likely covered by a huge ocean of liquid water. Some
astrobiologists think that if life will develop elsewhere in the solar system, it will be near vents at the bottom of Europa's
ocean.

National Geographic. (October 7, 2011). Atmosphere.

 71. The passage primarily focuses on the
A) composition and characteristics of the atmospheres of the planets in the Solar System.
B) possibility that Europa, a satellite of Jupiter, could harbor life, according to astrobiologists.
C) appropriate conditions that an atmosphere of a planet must have to support life as we know it.
D) differences that exist between planets in the Solar System that cannot host living things.

72. The word RICH is closest in meaning to

A) inundated.
B) abundant.
C) productive.
D) saturated.

73. According to the passage, the possible non-existence of water on Venus

A) would be the product of the elevated temperatures on its surface.
B) would be because there is no hydrogen, oxygen, nitrogen and carbon.
C) has a directly proportional relationship with the proximity of the Sun.
D) is due to the fact that its atmosphere resembles that of the gas giants.

74. We can hypothesize that Europa would have aquatic life forms in the depths of its ocean because
A) there would be hydrogen, oxygen, nitrogen and carbon.
B) its thin atmosphere would not allow life on its surface.
C) we know that life on Earth began in the depths of the sea.
D) excess oxygen in its thin atmosphere would be harmful.

75. If scientists discovered that Saturn has a solid outer crust, then
A) an ocean containing aquatic living things also could exist there.
B) life on that planet would be powered by hydrogen and helium.
C) there would be a greater chance that there is life on that planet.
D) life as we know it would not exist by the nature of its atmosphere.

PASAGGE 16

Imagine you come across a message that could contain life-saving information. But there's a problem: you don't
understand a word. You're not even sure which of the world's thousands of languages it is written in. What do you do?
If the message is in French or Spanish, typing it into an automatic translation engine will instantly solve the mystery and
produce a solid answer in English. But many other languages still defy machine translation, including languages spoken
by millions of people, such as Wolof, Luganda, Twi and Ewe in Africa. That's because the algorithms that power these
engines learn from human translations – ideally, millions of words of translated text.
There is an abundance of such material for languages like English, French, Spanish and German, thanks to multilingual
institutions like the Canadian parliament, the United Nations and the European Union. Their human translators churn out
streams of translated transcripts and other documents.
No such data mountain exists, however, for languages that may be widely spoken but not as prolifically translated. They
are known as low-resource languages. The fallback machine-training material for these languages consists of religious
publications, including the much-translated Bible. But this amounts to a narrow dataset, and is not enough to train
accurate, wide-ranging translation robots.
That language barrier can pose a problem for anyone who needs to gather precise, global information in a hurry –
including intelligence agencies.

Hardach, S. (22nd march 2021). ―The languages that defy auto-translate‖. In BBC Future

76. The passage is mainly about

A) how correctly translating certain messages in languages with little data can save many lives around the world.
 B) how automatic translation engines have barriers that prevent them from addressing the full range of the
world's languages.
C) how the cultural domination of certain languages such as English over languages such as Twi and Luganda is
evident.
D) how international organizations are working to overcome the language barriers in automatic translation
engines.

77. The word BARRIER means

A) wall.
B) danger.
C) gate.
D) obstacle.

78. It is possible to infer that the automatic translation engines

A) basically translate four languages.
B) have very simple algorithms.
C) can translate all types of content.
D) depend mainly on humans.

79. It is compatible to affirm that languages such as Wolof, Luganda, Twi and Ewe
A) are spoken by millions of people, especially in Africa.
B) have only one use: to encrypt messages of life and death.
C) have multiple written registers but very few oral ones.
D) are languages covered by automatic translation engines.

80. If a person comes across a message with life-saving information written in German,
A) they would have no trouble quickly uncovering the mystery.
B) they will take the message to the authorities to save mankind.
C) they would have to travel to Germany in order to translate it.
D) they must study to become a polyglot and be able to translate it.

PASAGGE 17

If the history of creativity teaches us anything, it is that great ideas often come when we‘re least expecting them. Consider
Agatha Christie reported that ideas for her crime stories often came while washing up or having a bath. ―I don‘t think
necessity is the mother of invention, ―she wrote in her autobiography. ―Invention, in my opinion, arises directly from
idleness, possibly also from laziness.‖
Psychologists would seem to agree, with strong evidence that creative insights are much more likely to occur after a
period of ―incubation‖ – in which you focus on something entirely different from the job at hand, while your brain works
away behind the scenes. Even our procrastination at work – such as watching funny YouTube videos – may be helpful for
our problem solving, provided it is done in moderation.
Just as importantly, a period of incubation allows us to gain some psychological distance from our task. A period of
incubation should help you to widen your mental focus so that you can make connections and come back to the problem
with a new perspective. Intriguingly, incubation may work best when your mind is distracted with an engaging but
relatively easy task, so that it is given just enough room to wander freely.

Heracleous. L. & Robson, D. (31st March 2021). ―Why procrastination can help fuel creativity‖. In

81. Mainly, the passage is about

A) the incubation process that stimulates creativity.
B) the evolution of creativity throughout history.
C) the incubation process for a better mental focus.
D) distraction as a useful tool towards creativity.