19. Read the dialogue and reproduce its contents:

Anna: The situation of the society’s attitude to nature is grave today.

What can you say to that?

Borys: The activities of man today must match the forces of nature. V.I.Vernadsky wrote: "Mankind taken as a whole is becoming a powerful geological force. And the question arising before it, before its intellect and labour, is one of rebuilding the biosphere in the interest of humanity as a freely-thinking race".

1. : What do you know about Vernadsky?

1. : Volodymyr Ivanovych Vernadsky (1863-1945), academician, an outstanding Ukrainian scientist and naturalist was the founder of geochemistry, biochemistry and radiogeology. It was largely due to his ideas that the concept of man’s absolute domination of nature gave the way to that of relations between equal partners. It was still in the 1950s that teachers of natural science lectured on the conquering of nature. Whereas Acad. Vernadsky taught that nature is not to be conquered, but rather cherished and cooperated with.: What education did he get and where?

2. :V.I.Vernadsky was born in St.Petersburg in the family of Prof. I.V. Vernadsky who was a relative of the well-known writer V.H.Korolenko. In 1885 he graduated from St. Petersburg University. In the years 1898-1911 he was professor of mineralogy and crystallography at Moscow University. In this period he studied the deposits of iron ores in Kryvy Rih and later, in 1915 the natural productive resources of Ukraine and Russia.

1. : How was his career built up during the next period of his life?

2. : The Ukrainian period of his life started after 1917. With a group of scientists Vernadsky organized the Ukrainian Academy of Sciences which was established in 1919. He became its first President. The Academy included sections of historical and philological, physical and mathematical, social and economic sciences. He was one of the main founders of the State Public Library in Kyiv. Vernadsky, a prolific scientist, became the most active organizer of scientific activity.

1. : What are the details of his organizational activities?

2. : On Vernadsky’s initiative and with his most active participation important scientific institutions were organized: the State Radium Institute (1922), the Commission on the History of Knowledge (1926), the Department of Living Matter (1927) later transformed into the Biogeochemical Laboratory, and others. Academician Vernadsky enriched our science with profound ideas in modern mineralogy, geology, hydrogeology etc. His works laid the basis for the theory of the feasibility of man’s transforming the biosphere into a sphere of reason, a science dealing with the interaction between nature and man. The new sphere involves a balanced relationship between man and the environment, the absence of pollution, the use of natural resources in ways harmless to nature, and the scientific management of ecosystems. Vernadsky stressed that the development of the new sphere was a common and the only intelligent way for the Earth dwellers to face their future.

1. : Was Vernadsky’s activity spreading beyond the borders of Ukraine?

2. : Yes, it was. He was Academician of the Russian Academy of Sciences since 1909 and the Academy of Sciences of Ukraine since 1919. He was elected an Honorary Member of the Czechoslovak and Paris Academies of Sciences, many domestic and foreign scientific societies.

1. : What about keeping memory about the scientist now?

2. : The scientist's merits are highly appreciated now. An avenue in Kyiv was named after him in 1973, where a monument to the great scientist was erected in 1981. The Central Scientific Library in Kyiv bears his name.