full transcript

From the Ted Talk by Martin Rees: Can we prevent the end of the world?

Unscramble the Blue Letters


So we slruey, in view of those immense saetks, shouldn't accept even a one in a billion risk that human extinction would foreclose this immense pitaotenl. Some scenarios that have been envisaged may indeed be science fiction, but others may be disquietingly real. It's an important maxim that the unfamiliar is not the same as the ibabmrpole, and in fact, that's why we at Cambridge University are setting up a center to study how to mitigate these existential rskis. It seems it's worthwhile just for a few people to think about these potential disasters. And we need all the help we can get from others, because we are stewards of a piourecs pale blue dot in a vast cosmos, a planet with 50 million centuries ahead of it. And so let's not jeopardize that future.

Open Cloze


So we ______, in view of those immense ______, shouldn't accept even a one in a billion risk that human extinction would foreclose this immense _________. Some scenarios that have been envisaged may indeed be science fiction, but others may be disquietingly real. It's an important maxim that the unfamiliar is not the same as the __________, and in fact, that's why we at Cambridge University are setting up a center to study how to mitigate these existential _____. It seems it's worthwhile just for a few people to think about these potential disasters. And we need all the help we can get from others, because we are stewards of a ________ pale blue dot in a vast cosmos, a planet with 50 million centuries ahead of it. And so let's not jeopardize that future.

Solution


  1. improbable
  2. surely
  3. precious
  4. potential
  5. risks
  6. stakes

Original Text


So we surely, in view of those immense stakes, shouldn't accept even a one in a billion risk that human extinction would foreclose this immense potential. Some scenarios that have been envisaged may indeed be science fiction, but others may be disquietingly real. It's an important maxim that the unfamiliar is not the same as the improbable, and in fact, that's why we at Cambridge University are setting up a center to study how to mitigate these existential risks. It seems it's worthwhile just for a few people to think about these potential disasters. And we need all the help we can get from others, because we are stewards of a precious pale blue dot in a vast cosmos, a planet with 50 million centuries ahead of it. And so let's not jeopardize that future.

Frequently Occurring Word Combinations


ngrams of length 2

collocation frequency
question mark 2
science fiction 2


Important Words


  1. accept
  2. billion
  3. blue
  4. cambridge
  5. center
  6. centuries
  7. cosmos
  8. disasters
  9. disquietingly
  10. dot
  11. envisaged
  12. existential
  13. extinction
  14. fact
  15. fiction
  16. foreclose
  17. future
  18. human
  19. immense
  20. important
  21. improbable
  22. jeopardize
  23. maxim
  24. million
  25. mitigate
  26. pale
  27. people
  28. planet
  29. potential
  30. precious
  31. real
  32. risk
  33. risks
  34. scenarios
  35. science
  36. setting
  37. stakes
  38. stewards
  39. study
  40. surely
  41. unfamiliar
  42. university
  43. vast
  44. view
  45. worthwhile