Questões de Inglês - Interpretação de texto
Vinicius Jr case opens wider racism debate in Spain
Insults aimed at Real Madrid soccer player Vinicius Jr have triggered a fierce debate about racism in sport and whether Spanish society has a problem with the issue.
Spanish police have arrested three people in connection with racist abuse directed at Vinicius Jr, who confronted fans of Valencia football club in the Mestalla stadium who he accused of directing monkey chants at him. After the match, the Brazilian international said the Spanish football league “belongs to racists”. […]
Disponível em: https//: bbc.com. Acesso em: 16 nov. 2023.
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Giordano Cipriani / Getty Images
Discoveries of aquifers — underground earth formations that hold water — often create excitement around their ability to ease water scarcity in a region. The United States recently announced the discovery of five aquifers in Niger, one of Africa’s most water scarce countries, containing over 600 billion cubic metres of water. To put it into perspective, Egypt’s current water demand is 114 billion cubic metres of water per year.
These are welcome announcements. Due to a changing climate and the increasing demands of a growing population, many of Africa’s surface water resources — such as dams and rivers — are facing serious risks. They’re being overused and slowly decreasing.
Alternative water sources, like aquifers, need to be explored. They are highly prevalent across the African continent, but they’re not always going to help address water scarcity. For instance, early research findings deemed Kenya’s Turkana aquifer water unfit for use due to high salinity. It’s important to bear these challenges in mind so that expectations can be managed. It is also useful for planners and governments, as they need to think of other ways around the water scarcity problem.
(Gaathier Mahed. https://theconversation.com, 21.03.2023. Adaptado.)
De acordo com o terceiro parágrafo, o aquífero localizado no Quênia
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Giordano Cipriani / Getty Images
Discoveries of aquifers — underground earth formations that hold water — often create excitement around their ability to ease water scarcity in a region. The United States recently announced the discovery of five aquifers in Niger, one of Africa’s most water scarce countries, containing over 600 billion cubic metres of water. To put it into perspective, Egypt’s current water demand is 114 billion cubic metres of water per year.
These are welcome announcements. Due to a changing climate and the increasing demands of a growing population, many of Africa’s surface water resources — such as dams and rivers — are facing serious risks. They’re being overused and slowly decreasing.
Alternative water sources, like aquifers, need to be explored. They are highly prevalent across the African continent, but they’re not always going to help address water scarcity. For instance, early research findings deemed Kenya’s Turkana aquifer water unfit for use due to high salinity. It’s important to bear these challenges in mind so that expectations can be managed. It is also useful for planners and governments, as they need to think of other ways around the water scarcity problem.
(Gaathier Mahed. https://theconversation.com, 21.03.2023. Adaptado.)
A frase do texto que expressa ideia de causa é:
Em uma visita a um museu de arte indígena, um estudante observou uma obra seguida de uma placa explicativa:
In some indigenous cultures, headdresses represent Native peoples’ right to govern themselves according to their own laws. The materials they are constructed with can vary greatly, including wood, iron, feathers, and ivory. Rather than using gridded designs (symbols of spiritual beliefs) or putting birds or mammals at center stage, as several others do, horns were attached to this headdress, an emblem of power reserved for those “whose exceeding worth and power is admitted by all the nation”.
(Imagens (nas alternativas) e texto (acima) adaptados de: https://americanindian.si.edu/ exhibitions/infinityofnations/introduction.html. Acesso em 31/05/2023.)
Qual das imagens corresponde à descrição da placa?
Leia a tirinha de Jim Davis.
(www.gocomics.com)
Na tirinha, o gato se mostra
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Some of the world’s leading artificial intelligence (AI) researchers are calling for a pause on research into AI, claiming that safety issues must first be urgently addressed. If not, the outcomes could be devastating for humanity. Others say any pause in development would not only be impractical to enforce on a global scale, but could also stand in the way of advances that could both improve and save lives.
The AI that is currently available already has the power to radically alter society, in new ways that we are seeing every day. So how might it progress over the coming years? Are we on the brink of an artificial intelligence-powered utopia or dystopia?
Firstly, technology has been automating jobs since the Industrial Revolution, though never before has it happened on this scale. Everyone from truck drivers to voice over artists are at risk of being replaced by AI. A recent study found that just over 30 jobs are considered safe from automation in the near future. They range from mechanics to athletes, though they represent just a sliver of the current labour market. While new jobs will be created, there is a significant chance that the majority of the population will be left jobless. This could either lead to:
Utopia: A new leisure class emerges, living off a universal basic income funded by taxes on robots and the companies that operate them.
Dystopia: Mass unemployment results in social unrest, similar to the way laid off factory workers trashed the machines that replaced them. With so many jobs at risk and the potential for huge wealth inequality, some fear it could ultimately result in societal collapse.
Secondly, artificial intelligence is already contributing to major scientific advances, dramatically accelerating the time it takes to make discoveries. It has been used to invent millions of materials that did not previously exist, find potential drug molecules 1,000 times faster than previous methods, and improve our understanding of the universe. This could either lead to:
Utopia: Cancer and all other life-threatening diseases are cured, leading to a new age of health and prosperity. Scientists are already using AI tools to make breakthroughs in longevity medicine, which aims to end or even reverse ageing.
Dystopia: The same AI-enabled technology could be used for malevolent purposes, creating entirely new diseases and viruses. These could be used as bioweapons, capable of devastating populations that don’t have access to cures or the tech needed to develop them.
(Anthony Cuthbertson. www.independent.co.uk, 03.05.2023. Adaptado.)
In the excerpt from the seventh paragraph “which aims to end or even reverse ageing”, the underlined word refers to