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Passage One Money may not be flowing much in Thailand’s capital these days, but something more unlikely is traffic. Motorists like to joke that it took the International Monetary Fund to unclog Bangkok’s notoriously jammed thoroughfares. Before the economy crashed last summer, Bangkok was famous for its round-the-clock gridlock. Stories of how people coped became urban lore. Thais bought custom-made vans equipped with TVs and microwave ovens. On the endless trips home after school and work, parents would serve family dinners, then the kids would do their homework and change into pajamas before finally arriving. One company did a booming business in plastic disposable toilets. Consumers could get just about anything, from McDonald’s hamburgers to prescription medicine, delivered via motorbike. The solution for easing congestion turned out to be simple: economic catastrophe. Rising fuel costs, coupled with lost jobs and declining incomes, mean people are making fewer trips. About 20,000 cars have been repossessed, while new-car buying has dwindled from about 900 a day a year ago to just 300 now. Bus rider ship is up; taxi trips are down. So many cabbies are having trouble making enough fares to cover gas and car rental that hundreds of taxis are sitting idle every day. Thinner wallets also mean people are spending less time in bars, restaurants, movie theaters and shopping malls. Instead, they’re staying home. The government, much maligned in the past for botching up mass transit construction, deserves credit as well. New expressways have opened, and some of the construction that has blocked traffic lanes for years has been cleared. The good times may not last, however, at least for motorists. If traffic flow is in fact a reliable economic indicator, Thailand may be on the rebound. "The last few days," says taxi driver Boonlarb Srikam, "I’ve noticed the traffic getting busy again." Bring out those portable toilets. By saying that the good times may not last "at least for motorists," the author suggests that______.
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The potential of computers for increasing the control of organizations or society over their members and for invading the privacy of those members has caused considerable concern. The privacy issue has been raised most insistently with respect to the creation and maintenance of data files that assemble information about persons from a multitude of sources. Files of this kind would be highly valuable for many kinds of economic and social research, but they are bought at too high a price if they endanger human freedom or seriously enhance their opportunities of blackmailers. While such dangers should not be ignored, it should be noted that the lack of comprehensive data files has never before been the limiting barrier to the suppression of human freedom. Making the computer the villain in the invasion of privacy or encroachment on civil liberties simply divers attention from the real dangers. Computer data bank files can and must be given the highest degree of protection from abuse. But we must be careful also, that we do not employ such crude methods of protection as to deprive our society of important data it needs to understand its down social processes and to analyze its problems. Perhaps the most important question of all about the computer is what it has come and will do to man’s view of himself and his place in the universe. The most heated attacks on the computer are not focused on its possible economic effects, its presumed destruction of job satisfaction, or its threat to privacy and liberty, but upon the claim that it causes people to be viewed, and to view themselves, as machines. What the computer and progress in artificial intelligence challenge are an ethic that rests on man’s apartness from the rest of nature. An alternative ethic, of course, views man as a part of nature, governed by nature law, subject to the forces of gravity and the demands of his body. The debate about artificial intelligence and the simulation of man’s thinking is, in considerable part, a confrontation of these two views of man’s place in the universe. What lessons can be learned from the past in this decade
Passage One The biggest problem facing Chile as it promotes itself as a tourist destination to be reckoned with, is that it is at the end of the earth. It is too far south to be a convenient stop on the way to anywhere else and is much farther than a relatively cheap half-day’s flight away from the big tourist markets, unlike Mexico, for example. Chile, therefore, has to fight hard to attract tourists, to convince travelers that it is worth coming halfway round the world to visit. But it is succeeding, not only in existing markets like the U.S.A and Western Europe but in new territories, in particular the Far East. Markets closer to home, however, are not being forgotten. More than 50% of visitors to Chile still come from its nearest neighbor, Argentina, where the cost of living is much higher. Like all South American countries, Chile sees tourism as a valuable earner of foreign currency, although it has been far more serious than most in promoting its image abroad. Relatively stable politically within the region, it has benefited from the problems suffered in other areas. In Peru, guerrilla warfare in recent years has dealt a heavy blow to the tourist industry and fear of street crime in Brazil has reduced the attraction of Rio de Janeiro as a dream destination for foreigners. More than 150,000 people are directly involved in Chile’s tourist sector, an industry which earns the country more than U.S. $950 million each year. The state-run National Tourism Service, in partnership with a number of private companies, is currently running a world-wide campaign, taking part in trade fairs and international events to attract visitors to Chile. Chile’s great strength as a tourist destination is its geographical diversity. From the parched Atacama Desert in the north to the Antarctic snowfields of the south, it is more than 5,000 km long. With the Pacific on one side and the Andean mountains on the other, Chile boasts natural attractions. Its beaches are not up to Caribbean standards but resorts such as Vina del Mar are generally clean and unspoilt and have a high standard of services. But the trump card is the Andes mountain range. There are a number of excellent ski resorts within one hour’s drive of the capital, Santiago, and the national parks in the south are home to rare animals and plant species. The parks already attract specialist visitors, including mountaineers, who come to climb the technically difficult peaks, and fishermen, lured by the salmon and trout in the region’s rivers. However, infrastructure development in these areas is limited. The ski resorts do not have as many lifts as their European counterparts and the poor quality of roads in the south means that only the most determined travelers see the best of the national parks. Air links between Chile and the rest of the world are, at present, relatively poor. While Chile’s two largest airlines have extensive networks within South America, they operate only a small number of routes to the United States and Europe, while services to Asia are almost non-existent. Internal transport links are being improved and luxury hotels are being built in one of its national parks. Nor is development being restricted to the Andes. Easter Island and Chile’s Antarctic Territory are also on the list of areas where the Government believes it can create tourist markets. But the rush to open hitherto inaccessible areas to mass tourism is not being welcomed by everyone. Indigenous and environmental groups, including Green peace, say that many parts of the Andes will suffer if they become over-developed. There is a genuine fear that areas of Chile will suffer the cultural destruction witnessed in Mexico and European resorts. The policy of opening up Antarctica to tourism is also politically sensitive. Chile already has permanent settlements on the ice and many people see the decision to allow tourists there as a political move, enhancing Santiago’s territorial claim over part of Antarctica. The Chilean Government has promised to respect the environment as it seeks to bring tourism to these areas. But there are immense commercial pressures to exploit the country’s tourism potential. The Government will have to monitor developments closely if it is genuinely concerned in creating a balanced, controlled industry and if the price of an increasingly lucrative tourist market is not going to mean the loss of many of Chile’s natural riches. The objection to the development of Chile’s tourism might be all EXCEPT that it ______.
Passage One The biggest problem facing Chile as it promotes itself as a tourist destination to be reckoned with, is that it is at the end of the earth. It is too far south to be a convenient stop on the way to anywhere else and is much farther than a relatively cheap half-day’s flight away from the big tourist markets, unlike Mexico, for example. Chile, therefore, has to fight hard to attract tourists, to convince travelers that it is worth coming halfway round the world to visit. But it is succeeding, not only in existing markets like the U.S.A and Western Europe but in new territories, in particular the Far East. Markets closer to home, however, are not being forgotten. More than 50% of visitors to Chile still come from its nearest neighbor, Argentina, where the cost of living is much higher. Like all South American countries, Chile sees tourism as a valuable earner of foreign currency, although it has been far more serious than most in promoting its image abroad. Relatively stable politically within the region, it has benefited from the problems suffered in other areas. In Peru, guerrilla warfare in recent years has dealt a heavy blow to the tourist industry and fear of street crime in Brazil has reduced the attraction of Rio de Janeiro as a dream destination for foreigners. More than 150,000 people are directly involved in Chile’s tourist sector, an industry which earns the country more than U.S. $950 million each year. The state-run National Tourism Service, in partnership with a number of private companies, is currently running a world-wide campaign, taking part in trade fairs and international events to attract visitors to Chile. Chile’s great strength as a tourist destination is its geographical diversity. From the parched Atacama Desert in the north to the Antarctic snowfields of the south, it is more than 5,000 km long. With the Pacific on one side and the Andean mountains on the other, Chile boasts natural attractions. Its beaches are not up to Caribbean standards but resorts such as Vina del Mar are generally clean and unspoilt and have a high standard of services. But the trump card is the Andes mountain range. There are a number of excellent ski resorts within one hour’s drive of the capital, Santiago, and the national parks in the south are home to rare animals and plant species. The parks already attract specialist visitors, including mountaineers, who come to climb the technically difficult peaks, and fishermen, lured by the salmon and trout in the region’s rivers. However, infrastructure development in these areas is limited. The ski resorts do not have as many lifts as their European counterparts and the poor quality of roads in the south means that only the most determined travelers see the best of the national parks. Air links between Chile and the rest of the world are, at present, relatively poor. While Chile’s two largest airlines have extensive networks within South America, they operate only a small number of routes to the United States and Europe, while services to Asia are almost non-existent. Internal transport links are being improved and luxury hotels are being built in one of its national parks. Nor is development being restricted to the Andes. Easter Island and Chile’s Antarctic Territory are also on the list of areas where the Government believes it can create tourist markets. But the rush to open hitherto inaccessible areas to mass tourism is not being welcomed by everyone. Indigenous and environmental groups, including Green peace, say that many parts of the Andes will suffer if they become over-developed. There is a genuine fear that areas of Chile will suffer the cultural destruction witnessed in Mexico and European resorts. The policy of opening up Antarctica to tourism is also politically sensitive. Chile already has permanent settlements on the ice and many people see the decision to allow tourists there as a political move, enhancing Santiago’s territorial claim over part of Antarctica. The Chilean Government has promised to respect the environment as it seeks to bring tourism to these areas. But there are immense commercial pressures to exploit the country’s tourism potential. The Government will have to monitor developments closely if it is genuinely concerned in creating a balanced, controlled industry and if the price of an increasingly lucrative tourist market is not going to mean the loss of many of Chile’s natural riches. Many of Chile’s tourists used to come from EXCEPT ______.
Many people invest in the stock market hoping to find the next Microsoft and Dell. However, I know from personal experience how difficult this really is. For more than a year, I was 1 hundreds and sometimes thousands of dollars a day investing in the market. It seemed so easy, I dreamed of 2 my job at the end of the year, of buying a small apartment in Paris, of traveling around the world. But these dreams came to a sudden and dramatic end when a stock I 3 , Texas cellular pone wholesaler, fell by more than 75 percent 4 a one year period. On the worst day, it plunged by more than $15 a share. There was a rumor the company was exaggerating sales figures. That was when I learned how quickly Wall Street punishes companies that misrepresent the 5 In a panic, I sold all my stock in the company, paying off margin debt with cash advances from my credit card. Because I owned so many shares, I 6 a small fortune, half of it from money I borrowed from the brokerage company. One month, I am a winner, the next, a loser. This one big loss was my first lesson in the market. My father was a stockbroker, as was my grandfather 7 him.(In fact, he founded one of Chicago’s earliest brokerage firms.) But like so many things in life, we don’t learn anything until we experience it for ourselves. The only way to really understand the inner 8 of the stock market is to invest your own hard-earned money. When all your stocks are doing 9 and you feel like a winner, you learn very little. It’s when all your stocks are losing and everyone is questioning your stock-picking 10 that you find out if you have what it takes to invest in the market.
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