GED Section 4 Language Arts - Reading practice questions, page 3 of 3, with answer review and explanations.
Question 11
How Are Robots Different from Humans? [Helena is talking to Domain, the general manager of Rossums Universal Robots factory.] DOMAIN: Well, any one whos looked into anatomy will have seen at once that man is too complicated, and that a good engineer could make him more simply. So young Rossum began to overhaul anatomy and tried to see what could be left out or simplified. In short but this isnt boring you,Miss Glory? HELENA: No; on the contrary, its awfully interesting. DOMAIN: So young Rossum said to himself: A man is something that, for instance, feels happy, plays the fiddle, likes going for walks, and, in fact, wants to do a whole lot of things that are really unnecessary. HELENA: Oh! DOMAIN: Wait a bit. That are unnecessary when hes wanted, let us say, to weave or to count. Do you play the fiddle? HELENA: No. DOMAIN: Thats a pity. But a working machine must not want to play the fiddle, must not feel happy, must not do a whole lot of other things. A petrol motor must not have tassels or ornaments, Miss Glory. And to manufacture artificial workers is the same thing as to manufacture motors. The process must be of the simplest, and the product of the best from a practical point of view.What sort of worker do you think is the best from a practical point of view? HELENA: The best? Perhaps the one who is most honest and hard-working. DOMAIN: No, the cheapest. The one whose needs are the smallest. Young Rossum invented a worker with the minimum amount of requirements. He had to simplify him. He rejected everything that did not contribute directly to the progress of work. In this way he rejected everything that made man more expensive. In fact, he rejected man and made the Robot. My dear Miss Glory, the Robots are not people. Mechanically they are more perfect than we are, they have an enormously developed intelligence, but they have no soul. Have you ever seen what a Robot looks like inside? HELENA: Good gracious, no! DOMAIN: Very neat, very simple. Really a beautiful piece of work. Not much in it, but everything in flawless order. The product of an engineer is technically at a higher pitch of perfection than a product of nature. HELENA: Man is supposed to be the product of nature. DOMAIN: So much the worse. Karel C apek, from R.U.R. (1923, translated by P. Selver) Based on the passage, Rossum is most likely
a robot.
a part-time inventor.
a retired doctor.
a foreman in the factory.
a very intelligent engineer.
Question 12
Whats Wrong with Commercial Television? Kids who watch much commercial television ought to develop into whizzes at the dialect; you have to keep so much in your mind at once because a series of artificially short attention spans has been created. But this in itself means that the experience of watching the commercial channels is a more informal one, curiously more homely than watching BBC [British Broadcasting Corporation]. This is because the commercial breaks are constant reminders that the medium itself is artificial, isn’t, in fact, "real," even if the gesticulating heads, unlike the giants of the movie screen, are life-size. There is a kind of built-in alienation effect. Everything you see is false, as Tristan Tzara gnomically opined. And the young lady in the St. Bruno tobacco ads who currently concludes her spiel by stating categorically: "And if you believe that, you’ll believe anything," is saying no more than the truth. The long-term effect of habitually watching commercial television is probably an erosion of trust in the television medium itself. Since joy is the message of all commercials, it is as well they breed skepticism. Every story has a happy ending, gratification is guaranteed by the conventions of the commercial form, which contributes no end to the pervasive unreality of it all. Indeed, it is the chronic bliss of everybody in the commercials that creates their final divorce from effective life as we know it. Grumpy mum, frowning dad, are soon all smiles again after the ingestion of some pill or potion; minimal concessions are made to mild frustration (as they are, occasionally, to lust), but none at all to despair or consummation. In fact, if the form is reminiscent of the limerick and the presentation of the music-hall, the overall mood in its absolute and unruffled decorum is that of the uplift fables in the Sunday school picture books of my childhood. Angela Carter, from Shaking a Leg (1997) According to the author, what is the main difference between commercial channels and public television stations like the BBC?
Commercial television is very artificial.
Public television is more informal and uplifting.
Commercial television teaches viewers not to believe what they see on TV.
Commercial television is more like the movies than public television.
Commercial television portrays people in a more realistic manner.