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consider, evidence for the existence of alien life forms is far (14) ______
conclusive. Who knows, perhaps somewhere in this cosmos, another species
(15)______deliberating on the existence of the Earthling.

34 DANGERS OF TECHNOLOGY

Much has been heard recently about possible health hazards, including
memory loss and brain tuxnours, from the use of mobile phones. With the
possible half a billion mobile phones in (1 )______ throughout the world, in
Britain (2) ______ , one person in four owns one, (3) ______ is worrying
enough, even if, so far, no concrete evidence has come to (4) ______ . One
study hy Dr. Alan Preece and his team at Bristol University has shown,
however, in a report in the International Journal of Radiation Biology, that
tests on volunteers demonstrated no effect on (5 )______ short-term memory
or attention span. Subjects (6 )______ exposed to microwave radiation for (7)
______to thirty minutes, but the one noticeable effect was positive (8 )_______
than negative; the subjects reacted more rapidly in one test (9) ______ a
visual choice. One explanation of (10) ______ is that following the
transmissions, a warming of the blood led to increased bloodflow. For the
experiment, places were chosen where the signal was good and the
microxvave dose light, and then where the signal was poor and the dose (11)
______higher. The subjects were tested for rec£dl and mental alertness (12)
______ exposure to microwaves characteristic of analogue phones, digital
phones or no phones at all, without knowing (1 3 )______ they were exposed
to. It is, of course, early days (14) ______and the sample may not be large
(15)______ to generalise from. More research needs to be done.

35 SIGNS OF THE TIMES
We are íamiliar with the sa3Õng “a picture paints a thousand words” and in
the global village the world has become, iníormation in pictorial form is (1)
______ we turn. Much communication takes (2) ______ through symbols
rather than words, a case in point (3 )______airports, where you can see the
majority of the thirty-four symbols devised (4 )______ the American Institute
of Graphic Arts in the 1970s. (5) ______ signs as a knife and fork for a
restaurant or a telephone for a phone booth are a boon for (6) ______ a
traveller who does not speak English or use the Latin alphabet. (7) ______
worldwide “languages” of (8) ______ kind are musical and mathematical
notation, Circuit diagrams, road signs and Computer icons, (9) , again,
bypass the need for words. Even a label on a garment will carry, in symbols,
washing and ironing instructions. All these (10) ______ to be sufficient to
their (11) ______ restricted worlds but would it (12) ______ be possible to
devise a universal symbolic System of communication independent of (13)
______ spoken language, culture-free and value-free, as dreamt of by the
seventeenth-century philosopher Leibniz? It would seem (14) ______ .

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