Part B：In the following article some paragraphs have been removed. For Questions 66 —— 70, choose the most suitableparagraph from the list A —— F to fit into each of the numbered gaps. There is one paragraph which does not fit in anyof the gaps. Mark your answers on ANSWER SHEET 1.
Periodically in history, there come periods of great transition in which work changes its meaning. There was atime, perhaps 10,000 years ago, when human beings stopped feeding themselves by hunting game and gatheringplants, and increasingly turned to agriculture. In a way, that represented the invention of "work".
Then, in the latter decades of the 18th century, as the Industrial Revolution began in Great Britain, there wasanother transition in which the symbols of work were no longer the hoe and the plow; they were replaced by the milland the assembly line.
66._____________________________________
With the Industrial Revolution, machinery--powered first by steam, then by electricity and internal combustion engines--took over the hard physical tasks and relieved the strain on human and animal muscles.
67. _____________________________________
And yet, such jobs have been characteristic of the human condition in the first three-quarters of the 20th centu-ry. They' ve made too little demand on the human mind and spirit to keep them fresh and alive, made too much de-mand for any machine to serve the purpose until now.
The electronic computer, invented in the 1940' s and improved at breakneck speed, was a machine that, for thefirst time, seemed capable of doing work that had until then been the preserve of the human mind. With the coming ofthe microchip in the 1970' s, computers became compact enough, versatile enough and (most important of all) cheapenough to serve as the brains of affordable machines that could take their place on the assembly line and in the office.
68._____________________________________
First, what will happen to the human beings who have been working at these disappearing jobs?
Second, where will we get the human beings that will do the new jobs that will appear--jobs that are deman-ding, interesting and mind-exercising, but that requires a high-tech level of thought and education?
69._____________________________________
The first problem, that of technological unemployment, will be temporary, for it will arise out of the fact thatthere is now a generation of employees who have not been educated to fit the computer age. However, (in advancednations, at least) they will be the last generation to be so lacking, so that with them this problem will disappear or,at least, diminish to the point of non-crisis proportions.
The second problem--that of developing a large enough number of high-tech minds to run a high-tech world-will be no problem at all, once we adjust our thinking.
70._____________________________________
Right now, creativity seems to be confined to a very few, and it is easy to suppose that that is the way it must be.
However, with the proper availability of computerized education, humanity will surprise the elite few once again.
A. There remained, however, the "easier" labor--the labor that required the human eyes, ears, judgment andmind but no sweating. It nevertheless had its miseries, for it tended to be dull, repetitious, and boring.And there is always the sour sense of endlessly doing something unpleasant under compulsion.
B. For one thing, much of human effort that is today put into "running the world" will be unnecessary. Withcomputers, robots and automation, a great dead of the daily grind will appear to be running itself. This isnothing startling. It is a trend that has been rapidly on its way ever since World War]I.
C. And now we stand at the brink of a change that will be the greatest of all, for work in its old sense will dis-appear altogether. To most people, work has always been an effortful exercising of mind or body--com-pelled by the bitter necessity of earning the necessities of life--plus an occasional period of leisure in whichto rest or have fun.
D. Clearly there will be a painful period of transition, one that is starting already, and one that will be in full swing as the 21st century begins.
E. In the first place, the computer age will introduce a total revolution in our notions of education, and is begin-ning to do so now. The coming of the computer will make learning fun, and a successfully stimulated mindwill learn quickly. It will undoubtedly turn out that the "average" child is much more intelligent and creativethan we generally suppose. There was a time, after all, when the ability to read and write was confined to avery small group of "scholars" and almost all of them would have scouted the notion that just about anyonecould learn the intricacies of literacy. Yet with mass education general literacy came to be a fact.
F. This means that the dull, the boring, the repetitious, the mind-stultifying work will begin to disappear fromthe job market--is already beginning to disappear. This, of course, will introduce two vital sets of prob-lem-is already introducing them.
