영어 모의고사 (자동 편성)

Economists traditionally measured a community's wealth in terms of factories, income, or infrastructure, yet sociologists increasingly point to a less visible resource: social capital, the networks of trust and reciprocity ①that allow people to cooperate for mutual benefit. Robert Putnam popularized the concept by ②documenting a decline in civic participation, noting that fewer Americans joined bowling leagues, parent associations, or local clubs even as bowling itself remained popular, a trend he ③captured in the phrase bowling alone. Communities rich in social capital tend to enjoy lower crime and more effective local government, because neighbors ④who know and trust one another can coordinate informally without relying entirely on formal institutions. However, social capital is not uniformly beneficial; tightly bonded networks can also exclude outsiders and ⑤reinforcing existing inequality.

Generative AI systems learn to write, draw, and compose by studying enormous collections of existing human work, much of ①which was created without the artists' knowledge or consent. Supporters of the technology argue that this process ②resembles how a human student learns by studying the masters, absorbing style and technique rather than copying specific pieces. Critics respond that the comparison ③breaks down at scale: a single AI model can absorb millions of works in days and then generate outputs that directly compete with the very artists whose work ④trained it. Courts around the world are now ⑤ask to decide whether training an algorithm on copyrighted material counts as fair use or as infringement.

Biodegradable plastics have been promoted as a promising solution to plastic waste, since they ①are designed to decompose into natural substances rather than persist for centuries. Manufacturers derive these materials from renewable resources such as corn starch, blending them with additives that ②accelerates microbial breakdown once discarded. However, their environmental benefits are often exaggerated, largely because decomposition depends on specific conditions rarely ③found outside industrial composting facilities. For example, a bag labeled biodegradable may take years, not the weeks advertised, to break down in a landfill or ocean, where temperature and microbial activity remain low. In addition, when mixed with conventional plastics in recycling streams, they can contaminate the process, ④weakening the quality of materials produced afterward. Some engineers therefore compare biodegradable plastics to a bridge that leads nowhere unless paired with infrastructure that completes the journey. Ultimately, realizing their genuine potential requires not only technological refinement but also facilities capable of ⑤providing the precise conditions decomposition demands.

Standard economic theory assumes that money is fungible, meaning that a dollar earned as salary is functionally identical to a dollar received as a tax refund or won in a lottery. In practice, however, people routinely sort their finances into separate mental accounts, treating money differently depending on its source or intended purpose, a process economists call mental accounting. The practice thus reveals that financial behavior is guided less by pure arithmetic than by ___________ that money's origin and purpose.

Sociologist Mark Granovetter challenged a common assumption when he found that job seekers were more likely to hear about new opportunities from casual acquaintances than from close friends and family. This finding, published as the strength of weak ties, rests on a structural insight: close friends tend to belong to the same tight social circle and therefore already share most of the same information, whereas casual acquaintances typically move in different circles and can act as bridges to information a person would otherwise never encounter. Weak ties, precisely because they connect otherwise separate networks, _______________. Granovetter's insight has since been applied well beyond job searches, informing research on how innovations spread and how epidemics travel through a population.

Desalination, the process of removing dissolved salts from seawater to produce fresh water, has increasingly been adopted by coastal regions facing chronic water scarcity. (A) Pumping seawater through membranes at high pressure also demands substantial electricity, so plants powered by fossil fuels can worsen the emissions that intensify drought. Therefore, engineers increasingly argue that desalination should be treated not as a stand-alone remedy but as one component of a broader conservation strategy. (B) Nevertheless, desalination remains an inherently costly and environmentally burdensome solution, a fact often overlooked amid enthusiasm for ending water shortages. For instance, the process generates a concentrated byproduct called brine, which, when discharged without adequate dilution, can raise local salinity to levels that harm marine life. (C) Most modern facilities rely on reverse osmosis, a technique in which seawater is forced through membranes whose microscopic pores block salt while letting water molecules pass. Because this method consumes far less energy than the thermal distillation once dominant in the industry, it has become the preferred choice for large-scale plants.

The software company, in turn, may argue that no algorithm can be expected to be perfect. Hospitals are increasingly adopting artificial intelligence tools that can scan medical images and flag potential tumors faster than experienced radiologists. ( ① ) When an AI system misses a diagnosis that a human doctor would likely have caught, responsibility becomes difficult to assign. ( ② ) The doctor may argue that they simply trusted a tool the hospital required them to use. ( ③ ) The hospital, meanwhile, may argue that the software company guaranteed its accuracy. ( ④ ) Until legal systems clarify this chain of responsibility, patients harmed by an algorithmic error may find themselves with no clear party to hold accountable. ( ⑤ )

Left undisturbed for several days, this arrangement of fibers slowly takes on the texture that consumers associate with real meat. A hamburger patty need not come from a slaughtered animal at all if a small sample of muscle cells can be persuaded to multiply inside a steel tank. ( ① ) Cultured meat begins with a biopsy of animal muscle tissue, from which scientists isolate cells capable of dividing repeatedly, then feed those cells a nutrient broth that supplies the sugars, proteins, and minerals an animal's bloodstream would normally provide. ( ② ) Inside a bioreactor, the cells multiply across scaffolding designed to encourage them to align into fibers. ( ③ ) This gradual process thickens the tissue into something that begins to resemble muscle rather than a shapeless clump of cells. ( ④ ) Supporters argue that because the process never requires raising and slaughtering a whole animal, it could shrink the land, water, and greenhouse gas emissions associated with conventional meat production. ( ⑤ ) Skeptics counter that producing the specialized broth at a large enough scale remains prohibitively expensive, meaning cultured meat is unlikely to compete with conventional meat in price until the technology matures considerably further.

This admission, however, is precisely what the sunk cost fallacy makes so difficult to accept. Consider a construction firm that has spent several years and a substantial budget building a bridge, only to discover partway through that a cheaper and safer alternative route has since become available. ( ① ) A purely forward-looking analysis would compare the remaining cost of finishing the original bridge against the total cost of switching to the new route, ignoring whatever has already been spent. ( ② ) If the new route is genuinely cheaper going forward, the rational choice is to abandon the original project regardless of how much money it has already consumed. ( ③ ) Abandoning the project, however, requires the firm's leadership to publicly acknowledge that a significant portion of the original investment produced no lasting value. ( ④ ) As a result, firms often continue projects long after the numbers clearly favor stopping, simply to avoid confronting this uncomfortable truth. ( ⑤ ) The bridge, in such cases, becomes less a matter of engineering than a monument to the difficulty of admitting a costly mistake.

In other words, no single app may intend to expose such sensitive information, but the combination of many small pieces can. Every time a smartphone connects to a cell tower or a Wi-Fi network, it quietly records a data point that can later be pieced together into a detailed map of where its owner has been. ( ① ) Most users agree to this tracking without reading the fine print, assuming that a single company's database poses little threat. ( ② ) The real danger, however, emerges when location data from multiple sources is combined. ( ③ ) A pattern that reveals a person's home, workplace, and daily route can expose far more than any single app ever intended to share, including medical visits or private relationships. ( ④ ) Companies often argue that anonymized data cannot be traced back to individuals, yet researchers have repeatedly shown otherwise. ( ⑤ )