영어 모의고사 (자동 편성)

The ecological footprint, a widely cited measure of how much biologically productive land and water a population ①require to sustain its consumption, has become one of the most familiar tools for communicating humanity's environmental impact. By ②converting diverse activities, from driving to eating meat, into a single unit of land area, the measure allows policymakers to grasp whether a lifestyle exceeds what the planet can regenerate. This simplicity, however, is also the source of its most persistent criticism. Because the footprint aggregates dissimilar impacts, such as carbon emissions and water scarcity, into one composite figure, it can obscure important differences among problems ③that require distinct policy responses. A region might reduce its footprint by lowering carbon emissions while simultaneously ④depleting a local aquifer, yet the aggregate number could still appear to improve, concealing damage that demands urgent attention. Furthermore, the method assumes that all bio-productive land is roughly interchangeable, ⑤treating a hectare of forest as equivalent to a hectare of farmland, even though the two provide markedly different ecological functions.

A plastic bag that fully decomposes within months rather than lingering for centuries sounds almost too convenient to be real, yet certain bioplastics on the market ①do exactly that under the right conditions. Unlike conventional plastic, derived almost entirely from petroleum, many bioplastics are ②synthesized from renewable feedstocks such as corn starch or sugarcane, sometimes with the help of bacteria engineered to produce plastic-like polymers as a byproduct of their metabolism. Not every bioplastic biodegrades quickly, however, and some marketed as eco-friendly break down only in industrial composting facilities ③that reach conditions rarely found in a backyard compost heap or the open ocean. Critics point out that growing crops for bioplastic production can compete with food crops for farmland and water, ④complicating the assumption that a biological origin automatically makes a material more sustainable. Researchers are now exploring bioplastics made from agricultural waste and algae instead of dedicated crops, hoping to ⑤sidestepping this competition for land while preserving the benefits that first made bioplastics appealing.

When people look back on a multi-day journey, they rarely ①recall every hour with equal clarity; instead, memory tends to compress the entire experience into just a few representative moments. Psychologists have found that two points carry disproportionate weight in this process: the single moment when emotion, whether joy or discomfort, ②reached its highest intensity, and whatever happened right before the experience concluded. Consider two hikers who complete an identical five-day trek. The first finishes with a grueling, rain-soaked final climb, while the second enjoys a calm, scenic descent on the last afternoon despite having ③endure an equally difficult ascent earlier in the trip. Even though both hikers faced comparable hardship overall, the second is far more likely to remember the journey fondly, simply because the trip ④ended pleasantly. This pattern reveals that overall satisfaction is not calculated as an average of every experienced moment; rather, it is shaped disproportionately by whichever moments ⑤felt most intense and by however the experience happened to end.

Factories that once employed hundreds of workers on an assembly line now run with a fraction of that staff, as robotic arms handle tasks ①that used to require human hands. Economists have long debated whether this shift destroys jobs or simply ②transforms them. Historical evidence offers some comfort: previous waves of automation eventually created new categories of work that no one ③had predicted. However, critics point out that earlier transitions unfolded over generations, ④given workers time to retrain, whereas today's robots are being deployed at a pace that leaves little room for adjustment. For this reason, many economists argue that the real challenge is not the robots themselves, but the speed at which society ⑤is expected to adapt to them.

A cotton plant that manufactures its own insecticide sounds like science fiction, yet it has been ①growing in fields around the world for decades. Scientists achieved this by isolating a gene from a soil bacterium that produces a protein toxic to specific insect pests but harmless to humans, then ②inserting that gene into the plant's own genome so that every cell manufactures the protective protein. Other genetically modified crops carry a gene that allows them ③survive direct exposure to a particular herbicide, letting farmers spray a field to kill weeds without harming the crop growing among them. Supporters point to yield increases and reduced pesticide spraying documented across millions of hectares, while critics worry about weeds and insects ④evolving resistance to these built-in defenses over time, much as bacteria evolve resistance to antibiotics. Regulatory agencies in most countries now require extensive testing before a genetically modified crop reaches the market, ⑤evaluating everything from its nutritional content to its potential effects on nearby ecosystems.

Over the past two decades, insights drawn from behavioral economics have moved beyond academic journals and into the machinery of government itself, reshaping how numerous public programs are designed and implemented. Tax authorities in several countries, for example, discovered that simply informing citizens how many of their neighbors had already paid overdue taxes on time substantially ①increased subsequent compliance rates, outperforming letters that merely threatened legal penalties for continued nonpayment. Public health agencies have applied similar principles to encourage preventive care, finding that appointment reminders phrased to emphasize the personal cost of a missed visit proved more ②ineffective than neutral reminders listing only the date and time. Employment offices redesigned job-seeking assistance programs around specific, actionable steps rather than general encouragement, discovering that participants who were asked to write down a concrete plan for the following week were considerably more likely to follow through than those who received only ③general advice. What unites these disparate interventions is a shared recognition that small, carefully tested adjustments to how choices are presented can produce measurable improvements in outcomes, often at a fraction of the cost required by traditional programs involving substantial financial incentives or extensive ④enforcement. This accumulated evidence has encouraged many governments to establish dedicated units tasked with applying behavioral insights ⑤systematically to policy problems across an increasingly broad range of domains.

When consumers compare two products and assume that the one labeled "eco-friendly" is automatically the more sustainable choice, they often overlook the complexity involved in verifying such a claim. Life cycle assessment, commonly abbreviated as LCA, _______________. This method examines raw material extraction, manufacturing, transportation, use, and disposal, compiling data on energy consumption and emissions generated at each stage. By tracing a product from its origin to its disposal, this approach reveals impacts that might otherwise remain hidden from consumers who see only the finished item on a shelf. For example, an electric vehicle may produce no emissions while being driven, yet the mining of metals for its battery can generate substantial environmental costs elsewhere. Without accounting for these earlier stages, a superficial comparison could mistakenly present the vehicle as entirely emission-free. Therefore, researchers increasingly rely on life cycle assessment to make informed decisions rather than trusting labels alone.

Imagine two travelers preparing for the same trip: one refuses to fly after watching news coverage of a recent plane crash, while the other books a flight without hesitation. Statistically, air travel remains far safer than driving the same distance by car, yet vivid, emotionally charged images tend to dominate human judgment more powerfully than dry statistics ever could. This tendency, in which people estimate how likely an event is based on _______________, quietly shapes countless everyday decisions. News broadcasts that repeatedly feature rare disasters can leave viewers convinced that such events are common, even though official records clearly show the opposite. Advertisers and politicians alike exploit this pattern, knowing that a single striking anecdote often persuades audiences more effectively than pages of careful statistics ever manage to.

A biosensor works by pairing a biological component, such as an enzyme or antibody, with an electronic device that converts a biological reaction into a signal a computer can read. When the target molecule binds to the biological component, it triggers a small measurable change that the device translates into a readable number. This design has already transformed diabetes management, letting patients monitor blood sugar continuously through a small sensor worn under the skin rather than pricking a finger several times a day. Engineers are now racing to extend the same principle to detect subtler targets, from cancer cells circulating in the bloodstream to trace contaminants in drinking water. _______________.

As cities have expanded across landscapes once covered with absorbent soil, impervious surfaces have turned stormwater from a resource that recharges groundwater into a hazard that floods streets and carries pollutants into waterways. (A) For example, cities that replaced pavement with permeable alternatives have reported notable reductions in flooding during storms that once overwhelmed sewers. However, engineers caution that green infrastructure cannot entirely replace conventional pipes in dense cores, where heavy runoff still requires structural reinforcement. Consequently, municipalities now regard green and gray infrastructure as complementary systems, each compensating for the other's limitations. (B) Green infrastructure, which mimics the hydrological functions that natural landscapes once performed, offers planners a way to treat the city as a sponge rather than a rigid drainage pipe. (C) Rain gardens, shallow depressions planted with deep-rooted vegetation, are designed to capture runoff from rooftops, allowing it to filter slowly through soil before reaching underground aquifers. Permeable pavement, made of porous materials that let water pass directly through, serves a similar purpose along sidewalks, where asphalt would remain impenetrable.