Volcanoes-earth-shattering news

When Mount Pinatubo suddenly erupted on 9 June 1991, the power of volcanoes past and
present again hit the headlines
A
Volcanoes are the ultimate earth-moving machinery. A violent eruption can blow the top few kilometres
off a mountain, scatter fine ash practically all over the globe and hurl rock fragments into the
stratosphere to darken the skies a continent away.
But the classic eruption - cone-shaped mountain, big bang, mushroom cloud and surges of molten lava
- is only a tiny part of a global story. Vulcanism, the name given to volcanic processes, really has
shaped the world. Eruptions have rifted continents, raised mountain chains, constructed islands and
shaped the topography of the earth. The entire ocean floor has a basement of volcanic basalt.
Volcanoes have not only made the continents, they are also thought to have made the world's first
stable atmosphere and provided all the water for the oceans, rivers and ice-caps. There are now about
600 active volcanoes. Every year they add two or three cubic kilometres of rock to the continents.
Imagine a similar number of volcanoes smoking away for the last 3,500 million years. That is enough
rock to explain the continental crust.
What comes out of volcanic craters is mostly gas. More than 90% of this gas is water vapour from the
deep earth: enough to explain, over 3,500 million years, the water in the oceans. The rest of the gas is
nitrogen, carbon dioxide, sulphur dioxide, methane, ammonia and hydrogen. The quantity of these
gases, again multiplied over 3,500 million years, is enough to explain the mass of the world's
atmosphere. We are alive because volcanoes provided the soil, air and water we need.
B
Geologists consider the earth as having a molten core, surrounded by a semi-molten mantle and a
brittle, outer skin. It helps to think of a soft-boiled egg with a runny yolk, a firm but squishy white and a
hard shell. If the shell is even slightly cracked during boiling, the white material bubbles out and sets
like a tiny mountain chain over the crack - like an archipelago of volcanic islands such as the Hawaiian
Islands. But the earth is so much bigger and the mantle below is so much hotter.
Even though the mantle rocks are kept solid by overlying pressure, they can still slowly 'flow' like thick
treacle. The flow, thought to be in the form of convection currents, is powerful enough to fracture the
'eggshell' of the crust into plates, and keep them bumping and grinding against each other, or even
overlapping, at the rate of a few centimetres a year. These fracture zones, where the collisions occur,
are where earthquakes happen. And, very often, volcanoes.
C
These zones are lines of weakness, or hot spots. Every eruption is different, but put at its simplest,
where there are weaknesses, rocks deep in the mantle, heated to 1,350°C, will start to expand and rise.
As they do so, the pressure drops, and they expand and become liquid and rise more swiftly.
Sometimes it is slow: vast bubbles of magma - molten rock from the mantle - inch towards the surface,
cooling slowly, to snow through as granite extrusions (as on Skye, or the Great Whin Sill, the lava dyke
squeezed out like toothpaste that carries part of Hadrian's Wall in northern England). Sometimes - as in
Northern Ireland, Wales and the Karoo in South Africa - the magma rose faster, and then flowed out
horizontally on to the surface in vast thick sheets. In the Deccan plateau in western India, there are
more than two million cubic kilometres of lava, some of it 2,400 metres thick, formed over 500,000
years of slurping eruption.
Sometimes the magma moves very swiftly indeed. It does not have time to cool as it surges upwards.
The gases trapped inside the boiling rock expand suddenly, the lava glows with heat, it begins to froth,
and it explodes with tremendous force. Then the slightly cooler lava following it begins to flow over the
lip of the crater. It happens on Mars, it happened on the moon, it even happens on some of the moons
of Jupiter and Uranus. By studying the evidence, vulcanologists can read the force of the great blasts of
the past. Is the pumice light and full of holes? The explosion was tremendous. Are the rocks heavy, with
huge crystalline basalt shapes, like the Giant's Causeway in Northern Ireland? It was a slow, gentle
eruption.
The biggest eruptions are deep on the mid-ocean floor, where new lava is forcing the continents apart
and widening the Atlantic by perhaps five centimetres a year. Look at maps of volcanoes, earthquakes
and island chains like the Philippines and Japan, and you can see the rough outlines of what are called
tectonic plates - the plates which make up the earth's crust and mantle. The most dramatic of these is
the Pacific 'ring of fire' where there have been the most violent explosions - Mount Pinatubo near
Manila, Mount St Helen's in the Rockies and El Chichon in Mexico about a decade ago, not to mention
world-shaking blasts like Krakatoa in the Sunda Straits in 1883.
D
But volcanoes are not very predictable. That is because geological time is not like human time. During
quiet periods, volcanoes cap themselves with their own lava by forming a powerful cone from the
molten rocks slopping over the rim of the crater; later the lava cools slowly into a huge, hard, stable
plug which blocks any further eruption until the pressure below becomes irresistible. In the case of
Mount Pinatubo, this took 600 years.
Then, sometimes, with only a small warning, the mountain blows its top. It did this at Mont Pelee in
Martinique at 7.49 a.m. on 8 May, 1902. Of a town of 28,000, only two people survived. In 1 815, a
sudden blast removed the top 1,280 metres of Mount Tambora in Indonesia. The eruption was so fierce
that dust thrown into the stratosphere darkened the skies, cancelling the following summer in Europe
and North America. Thousands starved as the harvests failed, after snow in June and frosts in August.
Volcanoes are potentially world news, especially the quiet ones.
Questions 1-4

Reading Passage has four sections A-D.

Choose the correct heading for each section from the list of headings below.

Write the correct number i-vi in boxes 1-4 on your answer sheet.

List of Headings

i Causes of volcanic eruption

vi The unpredictability of volcanic eruptions

Questions 5-8

Answer the questions below using NO MORE THAN THREE WORDS AND/OR A NUMBER from the passage
for each answer.
Write your answers in boxes 5-8 on your answer sheet.

5 What are the sections of the earth’s crust, often associated with volcanic activity,

called? 5

6 What is the name given to molten rock from the mantle?6

7 What is the earthquake zone on the Pacific Ocean called?7

8 For how many years did Mount Pinatubo remain inactive?8

Questions 9-13

Complete the summary below.

Choose NO MORE THAN TWO WORDS from the passage for each answer.

Write your answers in boxes 9-13 on your answer sheet.

Volcanic eruptions have shaped the earth’s land surface. They may also have produced the world’s

atmosphere and 9 . Eruptions occur when molten rocks from the earth’s mantle rise and
expand. When they become liquid, they move more quickly through cracks in the surface. There are

different types of eruption. Sometimes the 10 moves slowly and forms outcrops of granite
on the earth’s surface. When it moves more quickly it may flow out in thick horizontal sheets. Examples of

this type of eruption can be found in Northern Ireland, Wales, South Africa and 11 . A third

type of eruption occurs when the lava emerges very quickly and 12 violently. This happens

because the magma moves so suddenly that 13 are emitted.

Neuroscientist Jonah Lehrer considers the emotional power of music

Why does music make us feel? On the one hand, music is a purely abstract art form, devoid of language or
explicit ideas. And yet, even though music says little, it still manages to touch us deeply. When listening to
our favourite songs, our body betrays all the symptoms of emotional arousal. The pupils in our eyes dilate,
our pulse and blood pressure rise, the electrical conductance of our skin is lowered, and the cerebellum, a
brain region associated with bodily movement, becomes strangely active. Blood is even re-directed to the
muscles in our legs. In other words, sound stirs us at our biological roots.

A recent paper in Neuroscience by a research team in Montreal, Canada, marks an important step in
repealing the precise underpinnings of ‘the potent pleasurable stimulus’ that is music. Although the study
involves plenty of fancy technology, including functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) and ligand-
based positron emission tomography (PET) scanning, the experiment itself was rather straightforward.
After screening 217 individuals who responded to advertisements requesting people who experience ‘chills’
to instrumental music, the scientists narrowed down the subject pool to ten. They then asked the subjects
to bring in their playlist of favourite songs - virtually every genre was represented, from techno to tango -
and played them the music while their brain activity was monitored. Because the scientists were combining
methodologies (PET and fMRI), they were able to obtain an impressively exact and detailed portrait of
music in the brain. The first thing they discovered is that music triggers the production of dopamine - a
chemical with a key role in setting people’s moods - by the neurons (nerve cells) in both the dorsal and
ventral regions of the brain. As these two regions have long been linked with the experience of pleasure,
this finding isn’t particularly surprising.

What is rather more significant is the finding that the dopamine neurons in the caudate - a region of the
brain involved in learning stimulus-response associations, and in anticipating food and other ‘reward’
stimuli - were at their most active around 15 seconds before the participants’ favourite moments in the
music. The researchers call this the ‘anticipatory phase’ and argue that the purpose of this activity is to help
us predict the arrival of our favourite part. The question, of course, is what all these dopamine neurons are
up to. Why are they so active in the period preceding the acoustic climax? After all, we typically associate
surges of dopamine with pleasure, with the processing of actual rewards. And yet, this cluster of cells is
most active when the ‘chills’ have yet to arrive, when the melodic pattern is still unresolved.

One way to answer the question is to look at the music and not the neurons. While music can often seem
(at least to the outsider) like a labyrinth of intricate patterns, it turns out that the most important part of
every song or symphony is when the patterns break down, when the sound becomes unpredictable. If the
music is too obvious, it is annoyingly boring, like an alarm clock. Numerous studies, after all, have
demonstrated that dopamine neurons quickly adapt to predictable rewards. If we know what’s going to
happen next, then we don’t get excited. This is why composers often introduce a key note in the beginning
of a song, spend most of the rest of the piece in the studious avoidance of the pattern, and then finally
repeat it only at the end. The longer we are denied the pattern we expect, the greater the emotional
release when the pattern returns, safe and sound.

To demonstrate this psychological principle, the musicologist Leonard Meyer, in his classic book Emotion
and Meaning in Music (1956), analysed the 5th movement of Beethoven’s String Quartet in C-sharp minor,
Op. 131. Meyer wanted to show how music is defined by its flirtation with - but not submission to - our
expectations of order. Meyer dissected 50 measures (bars) of the masterpiece, showing how Beethoven
begins with the clear statement of a rhythmic and harmonic pattern and then, in an ingenious tonal dance,
carefully holds off repeating it. What Beethoven does instead is suggest variations of the pattern. Me wants
to preserve an element of uncertainty in his music, making our brains beg for the one chord he refuses to
give us. Beethoven saves that chord for the end.

According to Meyer, it is the suspenseful tension of music, arising out of our unfulfilled expectations, that is
the source of the music’s feeling. While earlier theories of music focused on the way a sound can refer to
the real world of images and experiences - its ‘connotative’ meaning - Meyer argued that the emotions we
find in music come from the unfolding events of the music itself. This ‘embodied meaning’ arises from the
patterns the symphony invokes and then ignores. It is this uncertainty that triggers the surge of dopamine
in the caudate, as we struggle to figure out what will happen next. We can predict some of the notes, but
we can’t predict them all, and that is what keeps us listening, waiting expectantly for our reward, for the
pattern to be completed.

Questions 1-5

Complete the summary below.

Choose NO MORE THAN TWO WORDS from the passage for each answer.

Write your answers in boxes 1-5 on your answer sheet.

The Montreal Study

Participants, who were recruited for the study through advertisements, had their brain activity monitored
while listening to their favourite music. It was noted that the music stimulated the brain’s neurons to

release a substance called 1 in two of the parts of the brain which are associated with

feeling 2 .

Researchers also observed that the neurons in the area of the brain called the 3 were
particularly active just before the participants’ favourite moments in the music - the period known as

the 4 . Activity in this part of the brain is associated with the expectation of ‘reward’ stimuli

such as 5 .

Questions 6-10

Choose the correct letter, A, B, C or D.

Write the correct letter in boxes 6-10 on your answer sheet

6 What point does the writer emphasise in the first paragraph?

A how dramatically our reactions to music can vary

C how little we know about the way that music affects us

D how much music can tell us about how our brains operate

7 What view of the Montreal study does the writer express in the second paragraph?

A Its aims were innovative.

B The approach was too simplistic.

C It produced some remarkably precise data.

D The technology used was unnecessarily complex.

8 What does the writer find interesting about the results of the Montreal study?

A the timing of participants’ neural responses to the music

B the impact of the music on participants’ emotional state

C the section of participants’ brains which was activated by the music

D the type of music which had the strongest effect on participants’ brains

9 Why does the writer refer to Meyer’s work on music and emotion?

A to propose an original theory about the subject

B to offer support for the findings of the Montreal study

C to recommend the need for further research into the subject

D to present a view which opposes that of the Montreal researchers

10 According to Leonard Meyer, what causes the listener’s emotional response to music?

A the way that the music evokes poignant memories in the listener

B the association of certain musical chords with certain feelings

C the listener’s sympathy with the composer’s intentions

D the internal structure of the musical composition

Complete each sentence with the correct ending, A-F, below.

Write the correct letter, A-F, in boxes 11-14 on your answer sheet.

11 The Montreal researchers discovered that

12 Many studies have demonstrated that

13 Meyer’s analysis of Beethoven’s music shows that

14 Earlier theories of music suggested that

A our response to music depends on our initial emotional state.

B neuron activity decreases if outcomes become predictable.

C emotive music can bring to mind actual pictures and events.

D experiences on our past can influence our emotional reaction to music.

E emotive music delays giving listeners what they expect to hear.

F neuron activity increases prior to key points in a musical piece.

A Ecotourism is often regarded as a form of nature-based tourism and has become an important
alternative source of tourists. In addition to providing the traditional resort-leisure product, it has been
argued that ecotourism resort management should have a particular focus on best-practice environmental
management, an educational and interpretive component, and direct and indirect contributions to the
conservation of the natural and cultural environment (Ayala, 1996).

B Couran Cove Island Resort is a large integrated ecotourism-based resort located south of Brisbane on
the Gold Coast, Queensland, Australia. As the world’s population becomes increasingly urbanised, the
demand for tourist attractions which are environmentally friendly, serene and offer amenities of a unique
nature, has grown rapidly. Couran Cove Resort, which is one such tourist attractions, is located on South
Stradbroke Island, occupying approximately 150 hectares of the island. South Stradbroke Island is
separated from the mainland by the Broadwater, a stretch of sea 3 kilometers wide. More than a century
ago, there was only one Stradbroke Island, and there were at least four aboriginal tribes living and hunting
on the island. Regrettably, most of the original island dwellers were eventually killed by diseases such as
tuberculosis, smallpox and influenza by the end of the 19th The second ship wreak on the island in 1894,
and the subsequent destruction of the ship (the Cambus Wallace) because it contained dynamite, caused a
large crater in the sandhills on Stradbroke Island. Eventually, the ocean broke through the weakened land
form and Stradbroke became two islands. Couran Cove Island Resort is built on one of the world’s few
naturally-occurring sand lands, which is home to a wide range of plant communities and one of the largest
remaining remnants of the rare livistona rainforest left on the Gold Coast. Many mangrove and rainforest
areas, and Malaleuca Wetlands on South Stradbroke Island (and in Queensland), have been cleared,
drained or filled for residential, industrial, agricultural or urban development in the first half of the 20th
century. Farmer and graziers finally abandoned South Stradbroke Island in 1939 because the vegetation
and the soil conditions there were not suitable for agricultural activities.

SUSTAINABLE PRACTICES OF COURAN COVE RESORT

Being located on an offshore island, the resort is only accessible by means of water transportation. The
resort provides hourly ferry service from the marina on the mainland to and from the island. Within the
resort, transport modes include walking trails, bicycle tracks and the beach train. The reception area is the
counter of the shop which has not changed in 8 years at least. The accommodation is an octagonal “Bure”.
These are large rooms that are clean but! The equipment is tired and in some cases just working. Our
ceiling fan only worked on high speed for example. Beds are hard but clean, there is television, radio, an old
air conditioner and a small fridge. These “Bures” are right on top of each other and night noises do carry so
be careful what you say and do. The only thing is the mosquitos but if you forget to bring mosquito
repellant they sell some on the island.

As an ecotourism-based resort, most of the planning and development of the attraction has been
concentrated on the need to co-exist with the fragile natural environment of South Stradbroke Island to
achieve sustainable development.

WATER AND ENERGY MANAGEMENT

C South Stradbroke Island has groundwater at the centre of the island, which has a maximum height of 3
metres above sea level. The water supply is recharged by rainfall and is commonly known as an unconfined
freshwater aquifer. Couran Cove Island Resort obtains its water supply by tapping into this aquifer and
extracting it via a bore system. Some of the problems which have threatened the island’s freshwater supply
include pollution, contamination and over-consumption. In order to minimise some of these problems, all
laundry activities are carried out on the mainland. The resort considers washing machines as onerous to the
island’s freshwater supply, and that the detergents contain a high level of phosphates which are a major
source of water pollution. The resort uses LPG-power generation rather than a diesel-powered plant for its
energy supply, supplemented by wind turbine, which has reduced greenhouse emissions by 70% of diesel-
equivalent generation methods. Excess heat recovered from the generator is used to heat the swimming
pool. Hot water in the eco-cabins and for some of the resort’s vehicles are solar-powered. Water efficient
fittings are also installed in showers and toilets. However, not all the appliances used by the resort are
energy efficient, such as refrigerators. Visitors who stay at the resort are encouraged to monitor their water
and energy usage via the in-house television system, and are rewarded with prizes (such as a free return
trip to the resort) accordingly if their usage level is low.

CONCLUDING REMARKS

D We examined a case study of good management practice and a pro-active sustainable tourism stance of
an eco-resort. In three years of operation, Couran Cove Island Resort has won 23 international and national
awards, including the 2001 Australian Tourism Award in the 4-Star Accommodation category. The resort
has embraced and has effectively implemented contemporary environmental management practices. It has
been argued that the successful implementation of the principles of sustainability should promote long-
term social, economic and environmental benefits, while ensuring and enhancing the prospects of
continued viability for the tourism enterprise. Couran Cove Island Resort does not conform to the
characteristics of the ResortDevelopmentSpectrum, as proposed by Prideaux (2000). According to Prideaux,
the resort should be at least at Phase 3 of the model (the National tourism phase), which describes an
integrated resort providing 3-4 star hotel-type accommodation. The primary tourist market in Phase 3 of
the model consists mainly of interstate visitors. However, the number of interstate and international
tourists visiting the resort is small, with the principal visitor markets comprising locals and residents from
nearby towns and the Gold Coast region. The carrying capacity of Couran Cove does not seem to be of any
concern to the Resort management. Given that it is a private commercial ecotourist enterprise, regulating
the number of visitors to the resort to minimize damage done to the natural environment on South
Stradbroke Island is not a binding constraint. However, the Resort’s growth will eventually be constrained
by its carrying capacity, and quantity control should be incorporated in the management strategy of the
resort.

Questions 1-5

Choose the correct letter, A, B, C or D.

Write your answers in boxes 27-31 on your answers sheet.

1 The Stradbroke became two islands

A by an intended destruction of the ship of the Cambus Wallace

C by the movement sandhills on Stradbroke Island

D by the volcanic eruption on island

2 Why are laundry activities for the resort carried out on the mainland

A In order to obtain its water supply via a bore system

B In order to preserve the water and anti-pollution

C In order to save the cost of installing onerous washing machines

D In order to reduce the level of phosphates in water around

3 What is the major water supplier in South Stradbroke Island is by

A desalinizing the sea water

B collecting the rainfall

C transporting from the mainland

D boring ground water

4 What is applied for heating water on Couran Cove Island Resort

A the LPG-power

B a diesel-powered plant

C the wind power

D the solar-power

5 What does, as the managers of resorts believe, the prospective future focus on

A more awards of for resort’s accommodation

B sustainable administration and development in a long run

C Economic and environmental benefits for the tourism enterprise

D successful implementation the Resort Development Spectrum

Complete the following summary of the Reading Passage, using NO MORE THAN TWO WORDS from the
Reading Passage for each answer.

Write your answers in boxes 6-10 on your answer sheet.

Being located away from the mainland, tourists can attain the resort only by 6 in a regular

service. Within the resort, transports include trails for walking or tracks for both 7 and the
beach train. The on-island equipment is old-fashioned which is barely working such as

the 8 overhead. There is television, radio, an old 9 and a small fridge. And

you can buy the repellant for 10 if you forget to bring some.

Questions 11-13

Choose THREE correct letters among, A-E.

Write your answers in boxes 11-13 on your answer sheet.

What is true as to the contemporary situation of Couran Cove Island R in the last paragraph

A Couran Cove Island Resort goes for more eco-friendly practices.

B The accommodation standard only conforms to the Resort Development Spectrum of Phase 3.

C Couran Cove Island Resort should raise the accommodation standard and build more facilities.

D The principal group visiting the resort is international tourists.

E Its carrying capacity will restrict the future business’ expansion.