Vocabulary to the text:

superpower	наймогутніша країна
anthrax	сибірська виразка
ally	союзник
sustainability	сталість
disruption	розколина, зруйнування
containment	стримування
implosion	внутрішній вибух
pro-choice (adj)	такий, що виступає за право жінки на аборт
pro-life (adj)	такий, що виступає за заборону абортів
dysgenics	виродження, деградація
to gain a profile	звертати до себе увагу
SARS	синдром атипової пневмонії
outbreak	спалах (хвороби)
nuclear proliferation	розповсюдження ядерної зброї
rogue	негідник, шахрай, пройдисвіт
pointed (adj)	такий, що викликає увагу до себе; загострений
peer-to-peer network	пірингова (однорангова) мережа
cybersquatting	кіберсквоттінг (реєстрація доменів в Інтернеті з метою їх майбутнього перепродажу)
generics	немарочні товари
augment, to	збільшувати, посилювати
singularity	незвичайність, оригінальність; своєрідність, особливість
fossil fuel	викопне паливо
viable	життєздатний
strained	напружений
square off, to	підготуватись до нападу

1. Questions to the text:

1. Give a brief account of major events in the beginning of the XXI century.

2. What are the major challenges of the present-day humanity?

2. Write short notes about the key issues raised in the text.

3. Compose and write a plan of the text.

4. Retell the text using new vocabulary.

5. Write a report (25-20 sentences) on major events in: politics and war; natural disasters; technology; medicine; space exploration; business and industry; pop-culture.

Topic 14. People who changed the world.

Genius always finds itself a century too early.

--Ralph Waldo Emerson

History is made by men and their actions. Billions of people lived on our planet in different epochs but quite a selected number is remembered up to present days because of significant contribution these people made into making mankind a free, healthy and secure biological community. Man is a fortunate species. The marvelous (and still largely mysterious) complexity of the human brain has gifted him with speech, language, and the power of creative, abstract thought. Over thousands of years our intelligence has given us tools and technology, art and science, society and civilization. We now possess a treasure house of intellectual achievements in which all of us can take a pride.

However, before technological progress, mankind was to a great extent shaped by people whose spiritual power and outstanding moral qualities forever inscribed their names into the tables of History. Spiritual leaders and divine figures like Jesus Christ, Allah, Buddha, Sri Krishna, Muhammed introduced the ideas of love, harmony, peace and kindness. Even if some of those names are mythological to an agnostic, it is hard to deny their role and influence into making mankind a caring species.

A good deal of people sacrificed their lives for the commitment to human rights: Martin Luther King and his anti-racist drive, Abraham Lincoln and emancipation of slaves, Mother Theresa with her dedication to serving the poor and destitute, Martin Luther with his fight for Protestant rights and against the religious hegemony of those times, Pope John Paul II with his strong positions on religious and spiritual unification, apartheid, moral issues, Rosa Parks - an African American civil rights activist and seamstress whom the U.S. Congress dubbed the "Mother of the Modern-Day Civil Rights Movement".

The peace of the mankind is very much dependent on the wisdom, democratic stand and morality of political leaders. With great respect we treat the figures of Thomas Jefferson – a symbol of free America, Nelson Mandela – a fighter against an apartheid regime of South Africa, Kind Arthur, Winston Churchill, Margaret Thatcher, Queen Elizabeth II – outstanding and honorable British leaders, Joan of Arc and Charles de Gaulle – motivated fighters for the free France, George Washington – called “the Father of American nation”, Konrad Adenauer – the great democrat and unifier of Germany, Indian independence fighter Mahatma Gandhi, the first female prime minister of a Muslim country – Benazir Bhutto and many others. Still disputed remains the role of Mikhail Gorbachev and his split of the Soviet Union and some defeated expectations have emerged as to the accomplishment of the reforms declared by the present Western leaders. Unfortunately, demonic figures like Adolf Hitler, Osama bin Laden, the disputed Joseph Stalin have also had their names written into the tables of history. And their actions give us a clear pathway which we should follow – a pathway of peace, political and religious tolerance. Something, these people tried to destroy.

At the foundation of present-day literature and science stand the figures of ancient philosophers who were raising the issues of existence, knowledge, values, reason, mind, and language. From the ancient well-known colossi like Socrates, Plato, Aristotle and a pleiad of other Chinese, Arabic, European philosophers to modern views of Edmund Husserl, Bertrand Russel, Ludwig Wittgenstein, Martin Heidegger, Rudolf Carnap, Karl Popper, Jean-Paul Sartre, Jacques Derrida and David Lewis the mankind was in the permanent search for the answers to what we are, where do we come from and where do we go. The interest in philosophy hasn’t ceased, as The New York Times surprisingly reported an increase in philosophy majors at United States universities in 2008.

With the emergence of writing and a new way of delivering and preserving the information, humanity opened an extraordinary chapter in its history – a chapter of literature. Clive Staples Lewis once aptly remarked that “You can't get a cup of tea big enough or a book long enough to suit me.” Myriad of authors populated the bookshelves but some of the works are critically important and may be referred to as stupendous achievements of mankind. We here remember the names of William Shakespeare, J.R.R. Tolkien, Voltaire, Leo Tolstoy, J.K. Rowling, Ernest Hemingway, W.S. Maugham, Oscar Wilde, George Orwell, Jules Verne, Fyodor Dostoevsky and many-many others. Undoubtedly influential is the role of artists, singers and composers: Mozart, Schubert, Beethoven, Pablo Picasso, Damien Hurst, Elvis Presley, John Lennon, Michael Jackson, Elton John and again, many others. And we can’t say that singing is pure entertainment and does not provide educatory function. Sometimes a three-minute song may change the world greater than volumes of academic research.

And finally we come to science, a tremendous achievement of mankind, which gave us the comfort of our homes and killed millions of people at the same time. Here it would be better to begin with the words of the living genius – paralyzed astrophysicist Stephen Hawking who formulated his own ambitions pretty simply: “My goal is simple. It is a complete understanding of the universe, why it is as it is and why it exists at all”. His another brilliant quotation perfectly describes the human nature: “I think computer viruses should count as life. I think it says something about human nature that the only form of life we have created so far is purely destructive. We've created life in our own image”. That said, we should pay our tribute to great explorers like Christopher Columbus, James Cook, Amerigo Vespucci, Ferdinand Magellan, Vasco de Gama, astronomers Galileo Galilei and Nikolai Copernicus, naturalist Charles Darwin, amazing physicists Isaac Newton, Albert Einstein, medical scientists Louis Pasteur (inventor of pasteurization, cures for rabies and anthrax), Alexander Fleming (the inventor of penicillin), Christiaan Barnard (performed the first heart transplant), Robert Jarvik (inventor of artificial heart), Anthony Atala (creator of the first lab-grown organ), Ian Donald (ultrasound pioneer), Ian Frazer (inventor of HPV vaccine against cervical cancer), multi-gifted intellectuals like Leonardo da Vinci and Nikola Tesla who had God-given talents, computer geniuses Bill Gates and Steve Jobs etc.

The world is rapidly changing now; it is changing every single second. With great scientific discoveries come great hazards for humanity. With Large Hadron Collider on the run, deadly bacteria like weaponized anthrax (developed in military labs and available to some terrorist groups) at hand; ongoing development of AI and military technology the humanity now faces many threats never faced before. The Chernobyl accident and bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki as first swallows, it is up to the leaders of the humanity to make correct decisions, to curb their ambitions and to turn out marvelous blue planet Earth into a happy home for humans, animals and their ecosystems. In this lies our hope.

Vocabulary to the text:

treasure house	скарбниця
take a pride, to	гордитися
the tables	скрижалі
Allah ['ælə]	Аллах
the species, mankind	людство
drive	кампанія
Mother Theresa [tɪ'rizə ], [tə'rizə] [tə'reɪzə]	Мати Тереза
destitute ['destɪtjut]	1) нужденний 2) позбавлений (чогось - of)
apartheid [ə'pɑthaɪd]	апартеїд, расова ізоляція (segregation, race discrimination)
seamstress ['simstrɪs]	швачка
Socrates ['sɒkrətiz]	Сократ
Aristotle ['arɪstɒt(ə)l]	Аристотель
pleiad ['plʌɪəd]	плеяда
Edmund Husserl ['edmənd] ['hʊsəl]	Едмунд Гуссерль
Jacques Derrida ['dɛrɪdə]	Жак Дерріда
stupendous achievements	колосальні досягнення
Ernest ['ɜnɪst]	Ернст
W.S. Maugham [mɔm]	У. С. Моем
Beethoven ['beɪt(h)əʊv(ə)n]	Бетховен
Ferdinand Magellan ['fɜdɪnænd] [mə'gelən]	Фернан Магеллан
Louis Pasteur ['lui] [pa'stə]	Луї Пастер
pasteurization [pæsʧ(ə)raɪ'zeɪʃ(ə)n]	пастеризація
rabies ['reɪbiz]	сказ
anthrax ['ænθræks]	сибірська виразка
penicillin [penə'silən]	пеніцилін
Barnard ['bärnərd]	Барнард; Бернард
weaponized anthrax	сибірська виразка, що має властивості біозброї
first swallow	перша ластівка
curb, to [kɜb]	приборкувати