What do you think?

• Do you agree with the author’s choice of the most significant discoveries and inventions? Why?/Why not?

• Compare the lists of the breakthroughs you have made with that of the author’s.

• Do you think that scientific and technological achievements have really made the world a better place to live? Give reasons for your opinion.

Focus on language

Read the sentence from the text and decide what parts of speech the words in bold are.

• The first entirely synthetic plastic, Bakelite, was invented by American chemist Leo Baekeland in 1909.

Noun Suffixes

-ity	means condition or quality of sth; e.g. capability
-sion, -tion	means act of sth; state of sth; e.g. position
-er, -or	means one who; that/which; e.g. programmer
-ist	means one who; that/which; e.g. biologist
-ance, -ence	means act of sth; state of sth; quality of sth; e.g. assistance
-ness	means state of sth; e.g. toughness
-ment	means act of sth; state of sth; result of sth; e.g. placement
-dom	means: - state or condition; domain, position, rank; a group with position, rank; e.g. wisdom

Adjective Suffixes

-ic	means characteristic of sth; like sth e.g. heroic
-al	means relating to sth; e.g. manual
-able	means able; or giving; e.g. portable
-ous	means full of; having. e.g. gaseous
-ful	means full of; having. e.g. careful
-less	means without; e.g. useless
-en	means made of; e.g. wooden

Adverb Suffixes

-ly	at the end of a word almost always makes an adverb; occasionally it will make an adjective. e.g. quickly

Verb Suffixes

-en	means to make; e.g. soften
-ize	means to make; e.g. categorize
-ate	means to have or be characterized by; e.g. activate
-ify or -fy	means to cause to become or to make; e.g. simplify

Practice

1. Look back in the text and find the words with the suffixes given above. What part of speech are these words?

2. Using the suffixes from the box make different parts of speech with the words below. Make up the sentences of your own with the derived words.

wide	act	develop	design	create
theory	compute	identify	sharp	mystery

Speaking

Every discovery or invention has its downside. Work in teams. Choose one of the discoveries or inventions and write down two or more negative effects you can think of. Back up your opinion with real life examples. Share your ideas with the class.

Example: “I believe that invention of TV was one of the most important breakthroughs of the last century. However, I often find myself just glued to TV, not wanting to do anything else but watching my favorite reality shows or comedies. It’s such a waste of time … I wish I would spend more time reading books or going out with my friends, or …”

Writing

‘For’ and ‘Against’

1. Work in pairs. Think of the arguments in favor of or against the statement:

“Scientific and technological achievements have made the world a better place to live.”

2. Make brief notes under ‘for’ and ‘against’ headings.

Example:

For	Against
…has made our life more comfortable	…is used to kill people
…improves communication, etc…	…spoils nature, etc…

Write a composition of 200-250 words discussing the statement above. Make use of the Managing your learning and the Tool boxes.

Managing your learning: Outline Introduction Paragraph 1 - Introduce the subject of the composition. State why it is an important issue at the present time. Main body Paragraph 2 - Give the argument in favor of the statement. Paragraph 3 - Give the argument against the statement Conclusion Paragraph 4 - Conclude by giving a well-balanced opinion.

Tool box
It is often said that…	Firstly / Another point is that…
However, in my opinion, …	Also/ besides/ what is more, …
While it is true that…, on the other hand, …	As a result…
At the same time…	Finally, it is important to remember that…
For example, for instance, …	To sum up / All in all, …

Listening

Recording 4.2

1. You are going to listen to the radio programme about the Nobel Prize discoveries. Work in groups. Make a list of the facts you know about the Nobel Prize. Discuss as a class.

2. Check you know these words and phrases. Which field(s) of science

do they refer to?

worm	universe	messenger	RNA	creature
cell	DNA	molecule	orbit	stem
nucleus	explosion	interference	gene	Big Bang

3. Listen to the introductory part of the programme and answer the questions.

1. When and where are the Nobel Prizes awarded? Why?

2. What areas of science are they given in?

3. How was the Prize established?

4. How much is it?

5. What does it include?

6. What are the requirements to the Nobel Prize nominees?

7. How are scientists nominated for the Prize?

8. How many inventions did Alfred Nobel hold legal rights to?

9. What is his most famous invention?

4. Listen to the rest of the programme and complete the chart.

area of science
winners
country
period of time
research
significance

5. Write down the phrases and words with the noun prize as you hear them.

prize

6. Sum up the information about the prize-winning research you listened about. Use the phrases in the Tool box.

Tool box to develop treatment for to produce evidence to recognize work to cure diseases to carry out research to receive waves to measure temperature to be honoured for to confirm an idea to perform experiments with to show pictures of to give support to perform experiments with to control genes to open up an area to launch a satellite to solve a mystery

Get real

Search the Internet or popular science magazines. Find information about national and international awards in your field of science. Report back your findings to the class.

Reading

1. Look at the words below and say which field(s) of science they refer to:

polythene	molecule	pressure
plastic	explosive	atom
compound	benzaldehyde	waxy solid
ethylene

2. What do you know about polythene and its uses in our everyday life?

3. You are going to read a part of an interview with Anthony Willbourn about the discovery of polythene. As you read mark the statements below T for ‘true’ or F for ‘false’. Correct the false ones.

1. Anthony Willbourn is a journalist. ( )

2. He was lucky to meet and talk to people that discovered polythene. ( )

3. A team of researchers discovered polythene in 1939. ( )

4. The researchers were investigating the phenomena at high pressures. ( )

5. Their discovery was made by accident. ( )

6. The experiments were carried out in a well-equipped laboratory. ( )

7. Scientists failed to find practical applications of polythene at that time. ( )

8. The substance was launched into mass production the month after the war broke out. ( )

9. Radars helped the British aircraft, RAF, to contain Luftwaffe attacks. ( )

"My name is Anthony Willbourn and I am a chemist. I was really fortunate

to be able to meet and talk to the discoverers of polythene because many plastics, as they were developed, didn't have individuals you could point to and say, he or she was a discoverer. The discovery was made in 1933 by two men - Gibson and the other one was Eric Forsett, and he was trained as an organic chemist, and they were working in the field of the study of phenomena at high pressures.

They had no idea what they were going to find. And certainly didn't plan to

make a plastic. In fact, they were trying to react, at that very moment, ethylene with benzaldehyde, to make a very ordinary sort of compound, ethyl phenyl ketone. But they didn't make it. They made by accident a white, waxy solid, and the other problem was that, when they tried to repeat these experiments, they didn't produce anything at all. They had explosions, because the gases decomposed explosively. And all this was being done in an open laboratory, which today would be unthinkable, because the pressures were up at about two thousand atmospheres. And they reacted at about 180 degrees centigrade.

And finally they had produced a few grams of this white waxy solid, because

it was interesting of course, they had to stop the work because it was too dangerous, and they had to wait until a special building had been completed, into which they could put this equipment and work safely.

What was basically remarkable was that they made something they didn't

expect to make. Nobody knew that you could join together these atomic components and produce molecules of such enormous lengths, which gave it not only good solid state properties, but a sort of toughness that made it possible to

make cable covering, and to make films and so on.

The first plant which had a capacity of only making pounds per day came

into operation in September 1939, the day the war broke out. And that was very significant, because within several months it became clear that polythene was the ideal material for making radar and using it from aircraft, which had been impossible before polythene became available. The RAF, which was of course heavily outnumbered by the Luftwaffe, couldn't stay in the air long enough to find the enemy and engage them without some help. And radar provided that essential help that made it possible for the RAF to contain the attacks of the enemy.

So of course polythene had a tremendous practical effect on the war effort."

(Abridged and adapted from http://www.bbc.co.uk/worldservice/people/features/mycentury/transcript/wk37d2.shtml)