Högskoleprovet ELF

A silver twopenny coin, dated 1652, was found by a detectorist in the South Hams of Devon. It was not issued in 1652, however, nor minted in England. It was originally from the Massachusetts Bay Colony, an English settlement on the east coast of North America. It probably dates from the 1660s or 70s, when the colony understood it had no rights to mint coinage and backdated its issues. It is the sixth such coin to be recorded by the portable Antiquities Scheme, and the first from the south-west of England, all presumed to have been brought home by sailors and merchants.

What can be concluded here in relation to the 17th century silver coins?

• English merchants were directly involved in illegal activities.
• Settlers in North America found ingenious ways to bypass English laws.
• The coins were most likely produced in a remote part of southern England.
• The twopenny coins are apparently older than their markings suggest.

Avian interlopers cost the United States roughly $1.9 billion each year in crop losses and damage control. Now researchers have landed on a potential solution that uses speakers to send out a directional buzzing noise – a sonic shield – to keep feathered pests away from farm fields as well as tall buildings. Since birds vocalize to alert each other to predators and food sources, biologists hypothesized that interrupting the conversation would increase birds’ vigilance, leaving less time for loitering and dining. Indeed, in tests, food patches subjected to eight hours of the so-called sonic net saw a 46 percent drop in bird presence compared with control groups. It proved to be a more lasting and safer deterrent than other tactics, such as high-tech pyrotechnics and poisons.

What is said here about crop protection?

• Sending out recordings of birds’ own warning signals has proved to be highly effective.
• Using sound-based methods is about half as effective as using harmful pesticides.
• An effective method of protection is to disturb birds’ focus on communication.
• The use of bird calls has been shown to be effective for protection against insects.

A special aspect of sporting maturity is that it happens so early in life. An athlete’s career is played out in fast-forward, when they are still young. Professional and emotional maturity are wildly out of sync. Many sportsmen and sportswomen feel that their sporting careers were practically over before they felt at their most confident outside their special fields. By the time they’ve grown up, their careers are gone. The period of critical decision-making and the exercise of power arrive frighteningly early. Only when they retire do they become young again as they rejoin civilian time.

What is the main focus in this text?

• The attitude of society towards retired athletes.
• The mismatch between athletic and personal development.
• The difficulty of sportspeople to find alternative careers.
• The cult of youthfulness in the world of sports.

In popular legend, paper was invented in 105 C.E. by Cai Lun, a eunuch in the Chinese court, and over the next 2,000 years it spread ideas and changed the world, thanks largely to Gutenberg’s invention of the printing press. However, according to the American writer Mark Kurlansky, that is all wrong – and not just because paper predates Cai Lun. The notion that inventions create social change is what he calls a “technological fallacy.” In his view, the world changes first and tools stick if they meet its new needs. The same goes for the digital tools of a potentially paperless age.

What is Kurlansky’s basic point?

• Successful innovations reflect societal developments.
• The importance of Gutenberg’s invention has been overstated.
• Inventions like computers drive long-term global change.
• Paper is an older invention than often claimed by the Chinese