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[ { "human": "Read the following passage and questions, then choose the right answer from options, the answer should be one of A, B, C, D.\n\n<passage>:\nEleven-Twelfths of 1999 In Review When Chatterbox invited readers to nominate events, significant deaths, good and bad movies, etc., for 1999--a year likely to get little attention in the coming weeks, as news organizations choose instead to review the entire century or millennium--the response was overwhelming. Chatterbox had promised to publish his official \"1999 In Review\" item before Thanksgiving, but some distant memory of a scruple persuaded him to wait till November was over. Nothing ever happens in December. OK, that's not quite true. Hordes of protesters in Seattle are making the World Trade Organization's meeting there a much more exciting TV story than anyone expected it to be. Reader Dan Crist (who finds Chatterbox's habit of referring to himself in the third person \"rather annoying and less than professional\") points out that Japan bombed Pearl Harbor in Dec. 1941. Also, Chatterbox (moonlighting as \"Today's Papers\" columnist) observed not quite one year ago that the House of Representatives cast its second presidential-impeachment vote in U.S. history on Dec. 19, 1998. (That same news-filled day, the U.S. ended an air war against Iraq and Bob Livingston said he'd decided not to become House speaker after all.) Two months after the impeachment vote, the Senate failed to convict the president--a highly significant event of 1999 that, for some bizarre reason, slipped Chatterbox's mind until several indignant readers wrote in to remind him of it. By now, it should be clear that Chatterbox isn't much good at year-in-review journalism. Fortunately, Chatterbox's readers are very good at it. He will now turn this survey over to them. ( Disclaimer: Although Chatterbox previously stated that he wouldn't include opinions he disagreed with, that standard proved too confining. Where Chatterbox has solid information or opinions to the contrary, he occasionally interjects below. Obviously stupid or unnecessarily sour reader comments were discarded, but if you don't find your nominee below it doesn't necessarily mean that it was obviously stupid or unnecessarily sour. ) Here are 20 important things that happened in 1999: 1. Most Hated Celebrity--Ever? The New York Times reported on Nov. 10, 1999, that a new record had been set in the latest Times /CBS poll: [Its] highest negative rating ever scored by a person in the news. The honor went to Reform Party candidate Donald Trump, who managed to make an unfavorable impression upon some 70 percent of those polled. The paper noted that this achievement far eclipsed the last comparably negative rating--the 55 percent score attained by Linda Tripp. Presumably this came as no surprise to Mr. Trump, who, upon announcing the formation of a presidential exploratory committee on Oct. 7, 1999, had cited polls with \"amazing results\"--a remark that was widely misinterpreted at the time. -- Jodie Allen of U.S. News &amp World Report (and frequent --Jim Chapin 3. Worst/Best Films of 1999 Here's my nominee for worst movie of the year (complete category should be: \"Worst Movie of the Year That Assumedly Adult Male Reviewers Slathered Over\"): There's Something About Mary --a pathetically sophomoric, penis-obsessed mess that wouldn't even appeal to Larry Flynt! -- Felicia, Menlo Park, Cal. Chatterbox replies: Stanley Kubrick (multiple sources) John Kennedy Jr. (multiple sources) Susan Strasberg (anonymous tipster Strasberg played Anne Frank in the original production of the Broadway adaptation, which some people think wasn't Jewish enough) What an extraordinary year! A right-wing conspiracy topples the president, and the governor of Texas reveals himself in a series of debates to be a natural leader with an innate gift for connecting with his audience, a sure sign of his electoral success next year. A new Thomas Harris book brilliantly takes us deeper into the mind of a serial killer a new Star Wars movie redefines the very nature of entertainment 7 . Children Behaving Badly in 1999 Don't forget Woodstock 1999 --the concert of \"peace and love\" that ended in a literal blaze of glory when in an hours-long tribute to the original Woodstock, the mob started ripping down vendor booths and anything else that would burn and piling it onto the bonfires scattered about the scene. [ Chatterbox interjects: Didn't people get assaulted and raped, too?] I'm getting all sentimental just thinking about it. You also left out all the shooting rampages . Several were done in the name of God or love supposedly. They were all committed by \"quiet, shy\" people who \"mostly kept to\" themselves. I've started to hang around only loud, obnoxious people. --Susan Hoechstetter 8. A Lunatic Rhapsody for the New York Yankees The Yankees can actually be referred to as the glue that held the century together. Of course, as the 1999 World Series champions, they are a significant \"story of the year.\" However, this one singular achievement must be considered in a broader context. 1999 represented the team's 25th championship of the century. This beats, by one, the most championships any one team won during the century. The Montreal Canadiens have won 23 Stanley Cups. However, the Yankees, an American team, playing in the \"City of the Century\" (so called by me to reflect the amazing growth and transformation of one city during this period), who play the \"National Pastime,\" are truly an amazing story. The team's first championship occurred in 1921 therefore, they have won 25 of the last 78 years, nearly one in three. This level of sustained excellence is not matched in sports or in any other aspect of society. The 1999 win is possibly the most unique. With free-agency, expansion, and three levels of playoffs, it is much harder to win today than in past years. In fact, by winning three of the last four championships, they are the first team to accomplish this feat during the eras of free-agency and of divisional play. Chatterbox interjects: Didn't Baltimore Mayor Kurt Schmoke do the same thing 11 years ago? 10. Don't Worry in 1999 The Dalai Lama proclaimed that most important thing in the world is to be happy. These followed Haiti, Bosnia, and Rwanda as places where the West delayed sending in troops because of alarmist predictions. --Jerry Skurnik 14. Barbara Walters Did This One on Her Year-End Special, But It's Still Good -- anonymous tipster 16. Get Me a New Century, Quick A sitting president was accused of rape. --Ananda Gupta 18. All Dolled Up and Nowhere To Go in 1999 General Pinochet --Jodie Maurer 19. Senate Endorses Nuclear Proliferation in 1999 The Senate rejected the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty , thereby decapitating nuclear-arms control and sending Iraq, Iran, and North Korea the message that the United States won't raise a big stink if they try to join India and Pakistan. The president woke up to this possibility at about the moment it was realized, and started lobbying for passage of the treaty a day after it became too late. --Josh Pollack 20. Unremarked Natural Disaster in 1999 The Indian Supercyclone is the biggest, this century at least. --Samir Raiyani Photographs of: Donald Trump by Peter Morgan/Reuters Natalie Portman by Keith Hamshere/Lucasfilm Ltd./Reuters New York Yankees players by Gary Hershorn/Reuters\n\n<question>:\nWhat is Jodie Allen most likely to say about Donald Trump?\n\n<options>:\nA I'd vote for him for president\nB Donald should be proud of himself\nC Donald deserves his negative rating\nD the people's dislike for Donald was exaggerated\n\n<answer>:\n", "assistant": "C" } ]

[ { "human": "Read the following passage and questions, then choose the right answer from options, the answer should be one of A, B, C, D.\n\n<passage>:\nof space, or one spaceman's life? I They gave him a gold watch. It was meant to be symbolical, of course. In the old tradition. It was in the way of an antique, being one of the timepieces made generations past in the Alpine area of Eur-Asia. Its remember his name. He only wondered vaguely why the cloddy had turned up at all. In common with recipients of gold watches of a score of generations before him, Si Pond would have preferred something a bit more tangible in the way of reward, such as a few shares of Variable Basic to add to The fact of the matter was, Si knew that his retiring had set them mini-auto-apartment ... not realizing that to a pilot it was roomy beyond belief compared to the conning tower of a space craft. No. Even as Si listened to their speeches, accepted the watch and made a halting little talk of his own, he was grinning inwardly. There about it, now, set the tic to going at the side of his mouth. They could count down and blast off, for all he gave a damn. The gold watch idea had been that of Lofting Gubelin, which was typical, he being in the way of a living anachronism himself. In fact, Academician Gubelin was possibly the only living man on North America courage. Gubelin longed for yesteryear, a seldom found phenomenon under adventure, willing to react to the stimulus of danger in the manner our ancestors did?\" Girard-Perregaux grunted his sarcasm and dialed a glass of iced tea \"But has he no spirit of adventure? Has he no feeling for....\" Girard-Perregaux was wagging his finger again, a gesture that, seemingly mild though it was, had an astonishing ability to break off one short drink with the boys, before taking his accumulated pay and heading home. The one short drink would lead to another. And morning The other chuckled again. \"It is simply a matter of finding more modern methods, my dear chap.\" been a chance in a hundred that he'd have the bad luck to have his name pulled. But when it had been, Si had celebrated. When he had been informed that his physical and mental qualifications Each time Si returned from one of his own runs, he celebrated. A spree, reputation for being a wise guy, or a cloddy either. Just one of the fellas. You could do the same in life whether you really studied or not. You had your Inalienable Basic stock, didn't you? What else did It had come as a surprise when he'd been drafted for the labor force. In the early days of the Ultrawelfare State, they had made a mistake in adapting to the automation of the second industrial revolution. rate groggery where you spent just as much as though you'd been in the classiest joint in town. Came morning and you had nothing to show for all the dollars that had been spent but a rum-head. Thus, Si was vaguely aware, it had always been down through the usually with the salary of lengthy, weary periods of time to be spent hurriedly in an attempt to achieve the pleasure and happiness so long denied him. Si was going to do it differently this time. Nothing but the best. Wine, women, song, food, entertainment. The works. But nothing but the best. To start off, he dressed with great care in the honorable retirement-rank suit he had so recently purchased. His space pin he attached carefully to the lapel. That was a good beginning, he decided. A bit of prestige didn't hurt you when you went out on the town. In Attired satisfactorily, Si double-checked to see that his credit shot, and Si took the involuntary breath from which only heroes could sub-shots. Finally, the dash threw a green light and Si opened the canopy and stepped into his hotel room. A voice said gently, \"If the quarters are satisfactory, please present your credit card within ten minutes.\" Si took his time. Not that he really needed it. It was by far the most the guest might desire and Si touched the control that dilated it to He didn't take the time to flick on the menu, next to the auto-dining table, nor to check the endless potables on the autobar list. All that, he well knew, would be superlative. Besides, he didn't plan to dine or do much drinking in his suite. He made a mock leer. Not unless he managed to acquire some feminine companionship, that was. For a moment he stood in the center of the floor, in thought. Take it easy, Si Pond, take it all easy, this time. No throwing his dollars around in second-class groggeries, no eating in automated luncheterias. the grand manner. No cloddy was Si Pond. He decided a drink was in order to help him plan his strategy. A drink at the hotel's famous Kudos Room where celebrities were reputed to be a dime a dozen. He left the suite and stepped into one of the elevators. He said, \"Kudos Room.\" The auto-elevator murmured politely, \"Yes, sir, the Kudos Room.\" At the door to the famous rendezvous of the swankiest set, Si paused a moment and looked about. He'd never been in a place like this, either. However, he stifled his first instinct to wonder about what this was going to do to his current credit balance with an inner grin and made his way to the bar. There was actually a bartender. Si Pond suppressed his astonishment and said, offhand, attempting an air of easy sophistication, \"Slivovitz Sour.\" \"Yes, sir.\" The drinks in the Kudos Room might be concocted by hand, but Si noticed they had the routine teevee screens built into the bar for payment. He put his credit card on the screen immediately before him when the drink came, and had to quell his desire to dial for a balance check, so as to be able to figure out what the Sour had cost him. Well, this was something like it. This was the sort of thing he'd to his highest expectations, and then swiveled slightly on his stool to take a look at the others present. who occupied the stool two down from him. Si Pond blinked. He blinked grace of the Orient, so seldom found in the West. His stare couldn't be ignored. She looked at him coldly, turned to the bartender and murmured, \"A Far Out Cooler, please, Fredric.\" Then deliberately added, \"I thought the Kudos Room was supposed to be exclusive.\" There was nothing the bartender could say to that, and he went about building the drink. Si cleared his throat. \"Hey,\" he said, \"how about letting this one be Si, disconcerted by the sudden reversal, said, \"Yeah ... sure.\" She was obviously both taken back and impressed. \"Why,\" she said, Si,\" he said. \"Everybody calls me Si.\" \"Si,\" Si said, gratified. Holy Zoroaster, he'd never seen anything current sex symbols, but never in person. \"Call me Si,\" he said again. \"I been called Si so long, I don't even know who somebody's talking to if they say Seymour.\" \"I cried when they gave you that antique watch,\" she said, her tone such that it was obvious she hadn't quite adjusted as yet to having met him. Si Pond was surprised. \"Cried?\" he said. \"Well, why? I was kind of Si was expansive. \"Why, sure. In the Space Department we don't have much time for formality. Everybody's just Si, and Doc, and Jim. Like Si grunted. \"Yeah. That's all part of the Doc's scheme to get me to Si said, \"Look, how about another drink?\" \"Si,\" Si said. He motioned to the bartender with a circular twist of Si chuckled. \"A real buff, eh? You know, it's kind of funny. I was\n\n<question>:\nWhat clearly showed a sense humbleness presented by Si?\n\n<options>:\nA His ability to obtain the swank suite at the hotel.\nB The presence of a human bartender in the Kudos Room.\nC His lack of awareness that he would be considered a celebrity at the Kudos Room.\nD His quaint behavior at the banquet where he was presented with a gold watch.\n\n<answer>:\n", "assistant": "C" } ]

[ { "human": "Read the following passage and questions, then choose the right answer from options, the answer should be one of A, B, C, D.\n\n<passage>:\nSmith admitted he had made an error involving a few murders—and a few thousand years. He was entitled to a sense of humor, though, even in the Ultroom! HB73782. Ultroom error. Tendal 13. Arvid 6. Kanad transfer out of 1609 complete, intact, but too near limit of 1,000 Occasionally she glanced at her son in the play pen, who was getting knees hit the side of the play pen and young Laughton let out a scream—half from hurt and half from sudden lack of confidence in his seemed off balance and he backed up confusedly in the face of the \"Don't you think I know it?\" Nancy said tearfully. \"I feel like I'm bleeding knees, squalling for all he was worth on the grass—Oh, I \"We'll go up and look at him together.\" \"What do you do?\" \"You'd better get him, Dr. Tompkins, if we're to take him to the \"How's everything at the office?\" \"She's fine, too.\" bill you owe me. I think it's $32, isn't that right?\" forward on his face. Martin gasped, sinking into a chair with the baby. \"I believed them,\" he said slowly and uncomprehendingly. \"They made me believe them!\" guy carrying your baby, don't you think?\" hadn't pulled the trigger then ... I don't want to remember it.\" walk.\" He sat up quickly. \"Where's Tiger?\" tree, hitting it a terrible blow, crumbling the car's forward end so it looked like an accordion. The men were thrown from the machine. \"I can't get over it,\" the chief of police said. \"I've got at least said. Must have happened years ago.\" \"What does the man have to say?\" \"I was afraid you'd get to him,\" the chief said, his neck reddening. \"It's all been rather embarrassing to the department.\" He coughed self-consciously. \"He's proved a strange one, all right. He says his a week and we've all taken turns questioning him. He laughs and admits down any I.Q. Actually, he can't figure him out himself. Smith seems \"Guess you're right. Well, Mr. Smith won't think it's so funny when we his chest. This gave him the appearance of being alert despite reclining. Even as he lay, his mouth held a hint of a smile. appeared to be listening. For a moment a look of concern crossed his face and he swung his legs to the floor and sat there expectantly. Arvid 6 knew Tendal 13 had materialized and was somewhere in the building. Eventually there were some sounds from beyond the steel cell and it,\" he declared. \"If you carry on any more we'll never get back to the Ultroom!\" \"I'm sorry, Tendal,\" the man on the cot said. \"I didn't think—\" You know the instructions. Just because you work in the Ultroom don't if it hadn't. But to unnecessarily kill—\" The older man shook his head. \"You could have killed yourself as well and we'd never get the job done. As it is, you almost totally obliterated me.\" Tendal 13 paced the length of the cell and back again, gesturing as he talked. \"It was only with the greatest effort I pulled myself back together \"You didn't have to come along at all, you know,\" Arvid 6 said. \"How well I know! How sorry I am that I ever did! It was only because I was sorry for you, because someone older and more experienced than you was needed. I volunteered. Imagine that! I volunteered! Tendal 13 reaches the height of stupidity and volunteers to help Arvid 6 go back 6,000 years to bring Kanad back, to correct a mistake Arvid 6 made!\" prove it when I pinch myself and here I am. when her husband mistook me for you and you let him take me apart piece by piece—\" \"Shut up! For once you're going to listen to me. Our instructions specifically stated we were to have as little as possible to do with these people. But at every turn you've got us more and more enmeshed with them. If that's adventure, you can have it.\" Tendal 13 sat down wearily and sank his head in his hands. \"It was you who conceived the idea of taking Reggie right out of his play pen. 'Watch me take that child right out from under its mother's nose' were your exact words. the poor thing by suggesting suffocation to it that night. \"And speaking of that night, you remember we agreed I was to do the talking. But no, you pulled a switch and captured Martin Laughton's \"Still you wanted to run the whole show. 'I'm younger than you,' you 6 said. \"You never run out of excuses, do you, Arvid? Remember what you said go back and rescue the life germ of Kanad out of each era he'd be born in.\" Tendal 13 turned and looked steadily and directly at Arvid 6. \"Do you know what I think? I think you deliberately pushed the lever over as far as it would go I think it was.\" Arvid 6 flushed, turned away and looked at the floor. \"What crazy things have you been doing since I've been gone?\" Tendal 13 asked. anything—you said we shouldn't dematerialize in front of anybody.\" \"That's right.\" \"Who do you tell them you are?\" through a million years.\" \"Was Kanad's life germ transferred all right this time?\" Tendal 13 shook his head. \"I haven't heard. The transfers are getting more difficult all the time. In 1609, you'll remember, it was a case of pneumonia for the two-year-old. A simple procedure. It wouldn't \"Frankly, I didn't think he'd go back so far.\" back after it. The life germ of the head of the whole galactic system who came to the Ultroom to be transplanted to a younger body—and then sending him back beyond his original birth date—\" Tendal 13 got up and commenced his pacing again. \"Oh, I suppose Kanad's partly to thousand or more or until their bones are like paper.\" \"I just wonder how angry Kanad will be,\" Arvid muttered. HB92167. Ultroom Error. Tendal 13. Arvid 6. Kanad transfer Phullam 19, son of Orla 39 and Rhoda R, 22H Level M, Hemisphere B, Quadrant 3, Sector I. Arrive his 329th Day. TB92167 Arvid 6 rose from the cot and the two men faced each other. \"Before we leave, Arvid,\" Tendal 13 started to say. \"I know, I know. You want me to let you handle everything.\" \"Exactly. Is that too much to ask after all you've done?\" \"I guess I have made mistakes. From now on you be the boss. I'll do whatever you say.\" \"I hope I can count on that.\" Tendal 13 rang the jail buzzer. The jailer unlocked the cell door. \"You remember the chief said it's all right to take him with me, Matthews,\" Tendal 13 told the jailer. \"Yes, I remember,\" the jailer said mechanically, letting them both out of the cell. laughed as he saw the jailer's eyes bulge. \"Arvid!\" Tendal 13 walked briskly through the door, snatched Arvid 6 by the shoulders and shook him. The jailer watched stupified as the two men vanished in the middle of\n\n<question>:\nWhat does Tendal 13 mean when he says he pulled himself together?\n\n<options>:\nA Tendal 13 is a mutant with the capability of stretching his body parts. He means that he resumed a normal body position.\nB Tendal 13 means he had to get his emotions under control.\nC His body was literally in pieces. He put his body back together, likey with the power of his mind.\nD Tendal 13 is an android with detachable limbs. He means his limbs reattached themselves.\n\n<answer>:\n", "assistant": "C" } ]

[ { "human": "Read the following passage and questions, then choose the right answer from options, the answer should be one of A, B, C, D.\n\n<passage>:\nDivided we stand Sara lets the Lyft park itself in the drive, lets out a sigh, and tweets wish me luck plus some emojis before slipping her phone into a hoody pocket. Curtains twitch, and before she can get her bag out of the back Mom is there, right there next to her, their hands touching on the handle as they compete for control. \"It's OK Mom, I got it.\" that \"Mom, just leave that and I'll…\" \"Good flight?\" \"Yeah. Fine. Y'know. Same as always.\" Their first words in nearly a year. Fine. So far. She relaxes. Of course it is. How bad could it be? \"I thought I was gonna come pick you up from the airport?\" \"Bother me? You think I'm too old and infirm to pick my own daughter up from the airport?\" \"No Dad, of course not.\" The war spills out of Fox News, casualty figures scrolling across monochrome drone footage, attack helicopters circling over Caracas apartment blocks, pundits with bronzed skin and immaculate blond hair smiling from four-way split screens. \"So you just got a cab?\" \"Yeah.\" \"How much did that cost?\" \"Cabs are expensive. You shouldn't be wasting your money.\" \"It wasn't expensive. It wasn't a cab, it was a Lyft.\" \"One of those driverless things?\" \"Yeah.\" Ad break. An elderly couple ride a tandem bicycle through a park, laughing and smiling in Instagram-perfect sunshine, as a calm, relaxing voice lists the potentially lethal side effects of a diabetes drug. Dad shakes his head. \"I don't know how you can use those things. I don't trust them.\" \"Dad, they're perfectly safe.\" \"That's not what I mean. They're stealing people's jobs.\" \"Nope.\" \"Well I'm sure they'll be fine.\" She regrets the sarcasm as soon as she hears it in her own voice, but she still can't stop herself, like it's expected, like it's part of the routine. Part of their schtick. \"They just got to get themselves out there, huh Dad? Pull themselves up by their bootstraps. That's the American way, right?\" \"I'm glad you think this is funny, I really do. But what you New York types need to realise is-\" \"No. I don't want to hear you two as much as disagreeing about anything today, unless it's about the game. And even then you'd better keep it civil. Otherwise you can both go hungry. Understand?\" Awkward pause. \"Fine.\" Fox, Breitbart News, Family Values TV, Info Wars, The Rebel, Glenn Beck, The Voice of America, America First, The Bible Today and lots of hunting and sports channels she doesn't even recognise. It's signed in to her Dad's FB account, and the last thing she wants is to try and log in on hers before he gets back from the john. Yeah. There was no way that would end up with them keeping it civil. In her pocket her phone vibrates, purrs against her skin, reminding her it's there, making sure she's not forgotten where her real friends are, that there's a world outside, beyond Dad and his TV. She takes it out and cradles it in her hands, the dark screen fleetingly reflecting back her face before it jumps awake at her very touch, opening up to bathe her in blue light, in comfort and warmth and the familiar. For the first time since she got home she feels herself relax. Dad finishes chewing his mouthful, swallows, wipes his beard with a napkin. Sighs, barely controlled anger simmering behind his face. \"Solar panels cause cancer.\" \"Look it up?\" Sara shakes her head, not knowing where to even start. \"Dad, who is telling you this stuff?\" \"No one is telling me it, Sara. I read it. It's in the news. I mean, really, I'm surprised you've not seen it. It was all over Facebook.\" \"Maybe on yours, but it's not all over my Facebook.\" She doesn't have the heart to tell him she muted him six months ago. \"Well, I don't read the news and I don't know any science,\" says Mom, \"But I do know this: after they opened that solar farm up near Mary, within just a few years her and two of her neighbours had cancer. I mean I don't know anything for sure honey, but given the risk are you sure it's safe to be putting these panels on top of schools?\" \"Jesus Christ Dad, these ads!\" \"No blasphemy at the dinner table, please honey\" says Mom. \"What about them?\" \"Just… just look at them. They're terrifying. They're like… like adverts for the end of the world! You know they show you this stuff just to make you scared, right? Just to keep you paranoid.\" \"They show me this stuff because they've got products to sell. That's how the economy works. That's how we create jobs. Godammit Sara, are you telling me you hate advertising now? Do you just hate everything about America?\" \"No, of course not Dad. Maybe I'll read this later, after the game.\" After dinner she helps Mom clean-up, the two of them loading the dishwasher in near silence. She's leaning against the counter, scrolling through Twitter on her phone, when Mom finally speaks. \"What things? Solar panel cancer?\" \"He's worried about his health. She sighs, wipes a tear from her cheek. On autopilot she takes her phone from her pocket, feels its reassuring warmth in her hand, and swipes open Twitter. Everybody seems to be talking about the same thing. omg im crying holy shit that chevrolet ad /fire emoji Hang on, are they taking about the same ad? Text flashes across the screen. ALERT CANCELLED. ALL PATROLS: STAND DOWN Voiceover: Keeping America safe means never sleeping, but keeping America great means never forgetting who we are, and how we got here. Fade to black. Chevrolet logo. White text against black. 'We know what really makes America great' Sara finds herself in the front room, sobbing. \"Honey?\" \"The Chevrolet ad?\" \"Yeah.\" \"It's OK, honey. It really is.\" \"No, no it's not. We always fight. And I know that's mainly my fault-\" 'Well, now, c'mon-\" \"No, it is. It's my fault. I got myself into thinking we can never agree on anything, that we can never see eye to eye. That we've got nothing in common anymore.\" She lifts her head to look up at him. \"But I know that's wrong. That I shouldn't assume things about you. That there's still things that can bring us together.\" He grins back at her. \"Like Super Bowl ads?\" She laughs. \"I guess. But you know what I mean, really.\" \"Well.\" \"Well indeed.\" \"What did I tell you? You two just needed to spend some time together. Some quality time.\" Mom stands up and makes to leave the room, leaning down to kiss him as she passes. \"I ask myself that question every day.\" Text flashes across the screen. ALERT CANCELLED. THREAT NEUTRALISED. Voiceover: Keeping America safe means never sleeping, but keeping America great means never forgetting who we are, and what keeps us strong. Fade to black. Chevrolet logo. White text against black. 'We know what really makes America great'\n\n<question>:\nWhich statement best represents the central theme of the text?\n\n<options>:\nA The media is ultimately responsible for the breakdown of the American family.\nB People will be happy as long as the status quo is maintained.\nC Humans have much more in common than they have in difference.\nD While social media purports to bring us together, it more often drives us apart.\n\n<answer>:\n", "assistant": "D" } ]

[ { "human": "Read the following passage and questions, then choose the right answer from options, the answer should be one of A, B, C, D.\n\n<passage>:\neverything from food and shelter to communications and security. Working and careless borrowers in the United States can upend economic expectations everywhere else in the world, no matter how carefully but the systematic application of knowledge to the creation of new knowledge, innovation to innovation, and information to making more information has become pervasive and the systematic acceleration of innovation, make contemporary life a bit like a slow motion disaster, in one important respect. Its very unpredictability makes it unwise to build systems that take too much away from what human beings do best: look, think, innovate, adapt, discuss, learn, and repeat. That is why we have seen many more systems take on a loose, human centric model in the last decade and a half: from the radical divergence of Toyota’s production system from the highly systems work best by making work human. Modern Times Modern times were hard enough. Trains and planes, telegraph and During the first two-thirds of the twentieth century, this type of rationalization took the form of ever-more complex managed systems, with control. In business, this rationalization was typified by Fredrick Taylor’s Scientific Management, later embodied in Henry Ford’s assembly line. The time, and what it did to humanity, more vividly than Charlie Chaplin’s assembly line worker in Modern Times. At the same time, government experienced the rise of bureaucratization and the administrative state. Nowhere was this done more brutally than in the totalitarian states of mid-century. But the impulse to build fully-specified systems, designed by experts, monitored and controlled so as to limit human greed and error and to manage uncertainty, was basic and widespread. It underlay the development of the enormously successful state bureaucracies that responded to the Great Depression and shepherded Japan’s industrial regeneration from it. In technical systems too, we saw in mid-century marvels like the AT&amp inevitable victory. The increasing recognition of the limits of command-and-control systems abandonment, of the goal of perfect rationalization of systems design, which assumed much of the human away. What replaced planning and control in these systems was the myth of perfect markets. This was achieved through a hyper-simplification of human nature, wedded to mathematical modeling of what hyper-simplified selfish rational actors, looking only bureaucratic rationalization, perfect-market rationalization also had successes. But, like its predecessor, its limits as an approach to human systems design are becoming cleare Work, Trust and Play while always an illusion, has become an ever receding dream in a world of constant, rapid change and complex global interactions. What we are seeing instead is the rise of human systems that increasingly shy away from either control or perfect pricing. Not that there isn’t control. Not that there aren’t markets. And not that either of these approaches to coordinating human action will disappear. But these managed systems are becoming increasingly interlaced with looser structures, which invite and enable more engaged human action by drawing on intrinsic motivations and social relations. Dress codes and a culture of play in the workplace in Silicon Valley, like the one day per week that Google employees can use to play at whatever ideas they like, do not exist to make the most innovative region in the United States a Ludic paradise, gratifying employees at the expense of productivity, but rather to engage the human and social in the pursuit of what is, in the long term, IPO and hiring the smartest guys in the room, but by building an open and inviting system that lets people learn together and pursue their passion for knowledge, and each other’s company. unpredictable set of conditions, combining rationalization with human agency, learning and adaptation, is as different from managed systems and perfect markets as the new Toyota is from the old General Motors, or as the Internet now is from AT&amp systems are: (a) location of authority and practical capacity to act at strictly associated with each other where actions and interactions can occur through multiple systems simultaneously, have room to fail, maneuver, and be reoriented to fit changing conditions and new learning, or shift from one system to another to achieve a solution. of scientific management was to offer a single, integrated system where all human variance (the source of slothful shirking and inept error) could be isolated and controlled. Fordism took that ambition and embedded the managerial knowledge in the technological platform of the assembly line, guided by a multitude of rigid task specifications and reliance on small teams where each team member can perform all tasks, and who are encouraged to experiment, improve, fail, adapt, but above all communicate. The system is built on trust and a cooperative dynamic. The enterprise functions through a managerial control system, but also through social cooperation mechanisms built around teamwork and trust. However, even Toyota might be bested in this respect by the even more loosely coupled networks of innovation and supply represented by Taiwanese original-design manufacturers. But let us also consider the system in question that has made this work possible, the Internet, and compare it to the design principles of the behavior, although it didn’t hurt either that this policy effectively excluded competitors). This generated profit, but any substantial technical innovations required the approval of management and a re-engineering of the entire network. The Internet, on the other hand, was designed to be as general as possible. The network hardware merely computers owned by users. This system allowed the breathtaking rate of innovation that we have seen, while also creating certain vulnerabilities in online security. These vulnerabilities have led some to argue that a new system to manage grew and users diversified, trust (the practical belief that other human agents in the system were competent and benign, or at least sincere) declined. This decline was met with arguments in favor of building security into the technical system, both at its core, in the network elements themselves, and at its periphery, through “trusted computing.” A “trusted computer” will, for example, not run a program or document that its owner wants to run, unless it has received authorization from some other locus: be it the copyright owner, the virus protection company, or the employer. This is thought to be the most completely effective means of preventing copyright infringement or system failure, and preserving corporate security (these are the main reasons offered for implementing such systems). Trusted computing in this form is the ultimate reversal of the human-centric, loosely-coupled design approach the endpoints, where human beings are located and can make decisions machines−technical systems−are trustworthy, while their human users are malevolent, incompetent, or both. Reintroducing the Human Taylorism, the Bell system and trusted computing are all efforts to remove human agency from action and replace it with well-designed, tightly-bound systems. That is, the specifications and regularities of the system are such that they control or direct action and learning over time. Human agency, learning, communication and adaptation are minimized in managed systems, if not eliminated, and the knowledge in the system comes from the outside, from the designer, in the initial design over time, and through observation of the system’s performance by someone standing outside its constraints−a manager or systems designer. By contrast, loosely-coupled systems affirmatively eschew this level of control, and build in room for human agency, experimentation, failure, communication, learning and adaptation. Loose-coupling is central to the new systems. It is a feature of system design that leaves room for human agency over time, only imperfectly constraining and enabling any given action by the system itself. By creating such domains of human agency, system designers are accepting the limitations of design and foresight, and building in the possibilities of learning over time through action in the system, by agents acting within self-interest. The challenge of the near future is to build systems that will allow us to be largely free to inquire, experiment, learn and communicate, that will encourage us to cooperate, and that will avoid the worst of what human beings are capable of, and elicit what is best. Free software, Wikipedia, Creative Commons and the thousands of emerging human practices of productive social cooperation in the networked\n\n<question>:\nWhat is the connection between places of work and the government discussed in the article?\n\n<options>:\nA The controlling governments show the same inclination towards fully-specified systems\nB The more free systems such as democracies show more space for innovation than totalitarian governments\nC The governments are in charge of the workplace systems so they are directly linked in any situation\nD Innovation is only found to arise in situations where the government does not control the workplace systems\n\n<answer>:\n", "assistant": "A" } ]

[ { "human": "Read the following passage and questions, then choose the right answer from options, the answer should be one of A, B, C, D.\n\n<passage>:\nready for this planet,\" decided the tree named Ashlew, \"you're it, Sonny! Hang on there while I signal the Life Kolin sensed a lack of direct attention. The rustle noticed his hands shaking. \"Don't know what got into me, talking that way to a tree,\" he muttered. \"If Yrtok snapped out of it and heard, I'm as good as re-personalized right now.\" As he brooded upon the sorry choice of arousing a Peter Kolin had to admit that search by hiding where he his little command, less two third-class ration keepers thought to have been trapped emergency, give even the appearance \"I don't know,\" said Kolin. on parade. Kolin made himself even a cloud.\" Silenced but doubting, Kolin permitted himself to try the dream on for size. He considered what form might most easily escape the notice of search parties and thought Kolin rebelliously. his musings: mere hope of escape the outburst that had defined his fuming hatred for Haurtoz. I'd better watch myself! he was unsatisfying after Prudently, he did not express this resentment overtly. that never fights is bad His well-schooled features revealed no trace of the idea—or thought. You know why they don't?\" \"Why?\" wheezed Ashlew. \"They're scared that without talk of war, and scouting was likely to result in a siege complete loyalty to the state Kolin had heard of instances of treatment that left the subject intentions to harbor treasonable thoughts. moment. Kolin felt the branches stir meditatively. Then Ashlew offered a suggestion. \"I could tell the Life your side of it,\" he hissed. \"Once Kolin permitted himself to an attitude could arouse paced up and down beside the ration crate turned up to serve him as a field desk. He scowled in turn, impartially, at his watch and at the weary stewards of his headquarters Kolin found himself in a the hostile plots of Earth and the latter's decadent colonies. of orders as he glared at the rocky ridges surrounding He was so intent upon planning greetings with which to favor the tardy scouting parties would go without. Kolin that he failed to notice the loose cloud drifting over stare measured them. Yrtok, a dark, lean-faced haze. Close examination would have revealed it to be the ridge. made up of myriads of tiny followed, and Kolin brought the men as if taking intelligent advantage of the breeze. One of Chief Slichow's staggering flunkies, stealing a few seconds of relaxation wandered into the haze. He froze. After a few heartbeats, he Kolin shared their sense of isolation. They would be out of sight of authority and responsible for their own actions. It was a strange sensation. Unit One.\" Throughout the cloud of spores, the mind formerly known as Peter Kolin congratulated itself upon its For all Kolin could tell, he Nearer to the original shape of the Life than Ashlew choice of form. , he thought. He paused to consider the state of the tree named Ashlew, half immortal but rooted to one spot, unable to float on a breeze or through space itself got Especially, it was unable to insinuate any part of itself into the control center of another form of life, as a second spore was taking charge of the body of Chief Slichow at that very instant. on the pressure of light. There are not enough men thought Kolin. Some of me must drift through the airlock. and Kolin agreed. on a low shrub. Kolin misgiving. could it?\" he chuckled to the companion unit called Security Mind!\" END it looked dark and impenetrable. \"We'd better explore along more aware of the the edge,\" decided Yrtok. \"Ammet, now is the time to go back and tell the Chief Transcriber's Note: clouds and atmospheric haze. Kolin looked over his shoulder. Fifty meters away, Ammet sat beside the bush with the purple berries, utterly relaxed. him a doped appearance. Kolin a somber, brooding grayness. to Yrtok. For some reason, he had trouble attracting her attention. Then he noticed that she As he reached her, whatever and the others were isolated Yrtok was examining came to life and scooted into of greenish fur. All Kolin the underbrush with a flash legs too many. He pulled Yrtok to her feet. She pawed at him weakly, eyes as vacant as Ammet's. in a world bounded by the saw was that it had several When he let go in sudden the ground. She lay comfortably dreamily, Kolin backed away. The corners of his mouth felt oddly stiff they had involuntarily drawn back to expose his clenched teeth. He glanced warily about, but nothing appeared to threaten him. \"It's time to end this scout,\" he told himself. \"It's dangerous. One good look and I'm At first, Kolin saw no way, \"I should have brought Yrtok's radio,\" he muttered. snapped out of her spell by then. Funny … I wonder if Kolin progressed rapidly. one knee over a branch and paused to wipe sweat from his eyes. Peering down, he discovered Kolin, slipping, grabbed His fingers clutched a handful of twigs and leaves, which just barely supported him until the other hand. The branch quivered resentfully under him. \"Careful, there!\" whooshed the eerie voice. \"It took me all summer to grow those!\" Kolin could feel the skin crawling along his backbone. \"Who laughter gave him a distinct chill despite its suggestion of amiability. \"Name's Johnny Ashlew. Kinda thought you'd start with what I am. Didn't figure Kolin looked about, seeing told himself in a reasonable tone. \"It's bad enough that the other two passed out without me going space happy too.\" \"What's your hurry?\" demanded the voice. \"I can talk to you just as easy all the way down, you know. Airholes in Kolin examined the bark of out I could be anything I wanted.\" Kolin, testing the firmness of \"Just what I said,\" continued the voice, sounding closer in his ear as his cheek brushed the ridged bark I do have to remind you, it would be nicer if you said 'Mr. Ashlew,' considering my age.\" \"Your age? How old—?\" that settled it. Sonny, this world ain't all it looks like.\" \"It isn't, Mr. Ashlew?\" asked Kolin, twisting about in an effort to see what the \"Nope. Most everything here is run by the Life—that control. That's the outskirts of it down below.\" \"The other trees? That jungle?\" with the others from the Arcturan Spark , the planet the windy whisper. \" He have seen his looks before the Life got in touch with his mind and set up a mental field to help him change form. He looks twice as good as a vine!\" Kolin politely. He groped for \"Well … matter of fact, I can't get through to him much, even with the Life's mental field helping. Guess he started living with a different way of thinking. It burns me. I thought of being a tree, and then he came along to take advantage of it!\" Kolin braced himself securely him. \"You ought to let me tell you how the Life helps you change form. You they saw on other planets.\" \"I wouldn't want to do that, Mr. Ashlew.\" \"There's just one thing. The Life don't like taking \"Listen!\" Kolin blurted hours a day, asleep or awake. You get scared to sleep for fear you might dream Suddenly, Kolin found himself desperation of having no worlds was agonizing to imagine. Somehow, Kolin heard opinions spouting out which he had prudently kept bottled up for years. The more he talked and stormed and complained, the more relaxed he felt.\n\n<question>:\nWhat is the most likely explanation for why Kolin's anger is so extreme?\n\n<options>:\nA He is known to be irritable and have mood swings.\nB He had been holding in anger and his captain's reaction was the last straw.\nC He was under the effects of the purple berries.\nD His mind is being controlled by Ashlew.\n\n<answer>:\n", "assistant": "B" } ]

[ { "human": "Read the following passage and questions, then choose the right answer from options, the answer should be one of A, B, C, D.\n\n<passage>:\nprepared for the more humbling facts of life. SCRIMSHAW The old man gently hellish, from the viewpoint of the just wanted to get back his learned of it the same way. Pop didn't memory—and the methods he used were Pop Young was the one known Sattell undoubtedly dealt with it fully in his desperate writings back to Earth. Pop matter-of-factly tended the ghastly head-wound to explain his ability. One man partly guessed the secret, but only partly. His name was Sattell and he had reason not to mind on Sattell—he found fresh incidents torment. By night—lunar night, of course, and lunar day—it was frigidity and horror. Once in two weeks Pop received the stores and Pop didn't even ask. The Crack, of course, was that gaping rocky fault which stretches nine hundred miles, jaggedly, over the side of the Moon that Earth Pop continued to search absorbedly industriously at recovering some missing portions of his life that Sattell He thought often of Sattell, down happily tell himself that it feels delicious. But Sattell couldn't comfort himself Pop made his way toward it in Sattell got the shakes when he thought of Pop, and Pop rather it with what—say—Sattell might Sattell. The facts spoke for themselves. about Pop Young's shack in cannisters who he was, and as gently as possible what had happened to his wife and children. They'd been murdered after he was seemingly killed defending them. But he didn't remember open, and Pop reached up and gave no longer remember. He met Sattell quite by accident. Sattell looked familiar. Pop eagerly tried to ask him questions. And Sattell turned gray grinned savagely at Pop. He held a very nasty hand-weapon trained on Pop's middle. seen Pop before. to Pop that the sight of Sattell had about how you are. This isn't social. memories. They were not sharp, though, and he hunted up Sattell Pop simply gaped. He couldn't And Sattell went into panic when man abruptly, \"is a stickup!\" Nowadays, by the Big Crack, Pop wasn't so insistent on seeing Sattell, quite take it in. \"This,\" snapped the red-headed Sattell helped bring back. Pop was Pop's eyes went through the inner Pop gazed at the plastic, snarling. He slashed Pop across the face with the barrel of his weapon. It drew blood. It was wanton, savage brutality. \"Pay attention!\" snarled the red-headed man. \"A stickup, I said! Get of jagged crater-walls. It slowed, and slowed, and curved down as it drew Pop said numbly: \"What the nearer. The pilot killed all forward therefore, he wanted to hurt. \"Move!\" he rasped. \"I want the licked blood from his lips and the man with the weapon raged at him. Tell Sattell I'm here and he can At such times Pop hardly thought of Sattell. He knew he had plenty Sattell knowing what had happened of them at all. But Sattell stirred We didn't come here for nothing!\" He twitched all over. Then he struck cruelly again at Pop Young's recover a good deal. When Sattell face. He seemed filled with fury, at because he had some distinct memories of his wife—and the way savagery due to terror. But, of course, Pop was helpless to resent When Sattell frenziedly tried to deny Moon and the mention of Sattell's Pop had come to remember both his he'd felt about her—and some fugitive Even when Sattell—whimpering—signed him. By that time he was quite sure that Sattell was the man who'd killed his family. If so, Sattell had profited by less than two days' pay for wiping out everything that Pop possessed. But Pop wanted it back. He couldn't prove Sattell's guilt. Outrushing air tugged at Pop. After he didn't really want Sattell to die. Somehow, the mention of Sattell had odd fancies about Sattell. There was detail. He knew Sattell. That part was simple. Sattell had planned this sometimes Pop wondered if Sattell more than two men—with Sattell as a woman and two children and think he'd killed a man for no more than a hundred dollars, what enormity would he commit for a three-gallon message he'd been told to pass on. Sattell to come up, with what diamonds \"I'd guess,\" said Pop painstakingly, \"that Sattell figured it out. He's won't.\" A shaking voice asked questions dead and the shacks smashed and the cable burnt through, they'll be But not Pop. He'd come to the cable's been got and let down to you. So they'll do all they can no matter was here. Near Sattell, he found tell Sattell a thing about it, if I were what I do.\" He added, \"I wouldn't emptiness and grew sharp and clear. He found that he loved them very dearly. And when he was near Sattell back on Earth long before a new memories of them every day. He hadn't yet remembered the crime which lost them to him. Until he did—and the fact possessed a certain grisly humor—Pop didn't even hate Sattell. He simply wanted to be near \"And I don't give a damn Pop regarded his drawings meditatively. It's business!\" satisfaction. \"That'll do it!\" He tore bed linen from his bunk froze solidly out of it there, and on beyond it collected as restless, repeated violent changes of temperature. So a thermware-lined cannister often Pop tapped the pipe where the in balance. He poured the frigid, Sattell, he suddenly recovered a completely truthful likeness. The sun rose, and baked the abomination of desolation which was Pop reflected hungrily that it was permanent and to extend it— If it had not been for his vacuum suit and the cannister he carried, Pop clearly when he thought of Sattell, so by keeping Sattell in mind he recovered the memory of a chair that had been in his forgotten home. shook and trembled. Pop said calmly: hoist, if Sattell's coming up from the mine. If I don't do it, he don't come up.\" The red-headed man snarled. But his eyes were on the cannister whose contents should weigh a hundred pounds on Earth. \"Any tricks,\" he rasped, \"and you sketching, save that he'd lost all his \"Yeah,\" said Pop. Sattell had no such device for adjusting young manhood through a senseless much worse. Sattell clearly remembered the crime Pop Young hadn't yet recalled. He considered that Pop had made no overt attempt to revenge himself because he planned some retaliation so horrible and lingering that it was worth waiting for. He came to hate Pop with an insane ferocity. And fear. In his mind the need to escape became an obsession on top of the other psychotic states He wrote with the desperate, impassioned, frantic blend of persuasion and information and genius-like invention Pop didn't wait. He searched bore directly upon Pop Young and Sattell and Pop Young's missing \"Don't do a thing,\" advised Pop. to do with Pop or with Sattell. But But the passengers who paid so highly, expected to be pleasantly thrilled and shielded from all reasons for alarm. And they couldn't be. Something worked, he'd think of Sattell, because happens when a self-centered and complacent individual unsuspectingly parts Sattell had managed to get He didn't wonder what he'd do if he ever remembered the crime Sattell had committed. He felt, somehow, that he wouldn't get that back until he'd recovered all the rest. Gloating, it was amusing to remember what people used to call face of immensity. Not one passenger disembarked even for Lunar City. Most of them cowered in their pleasure-passengers. They weren't\n\n<question>:\nWhich of the following describes Pop's attitude toward Sattell?\n\n<options>:\nA obsessive\nB delirious\nC ambivalent\nD vengeful\n\n<answer>:\n", "assistant": "A" } ]

[ { "human": "Read the following passage and questions, then choose the right answer from options, the answer should be one of A, B, C, D.\n\n<passage>:\nonly in Centurian humanoids, not Earth-norm human beings. Doc had this solemn human by the throat when I caught up with him. \"Tonight,\" Doc was saying in his old voice that was as crackled and important as parchment, \"tonight Man will reach the Moon. The golden Moon and the silver ship, symbols of greed. Tonight is the night when this is to happen.\" Which are arthritic fingers that were clamped on his collar. \"No argument. Sure, up we go. But leave me go or, so help me, I'll fetch you one in the you? teeth!\" had now. That and the thing he left. absurd, easy lie. \"Old events seem recent to him.\" The human nodded, Adam's apple jerking in the angry neon twilight. \"'Memory Jump,' you mean. All my great-grandfathers have it. But Great-great-grandmother Lupos, funny thing, is like a schoolgirl. or the Book of Thoth or the or the Necronomican Martians approaching the corner were sensing at Doc and me. They itself on human beings?\" and especially I hated Martian tourists because I especially hated Martians. They were back into time and created them. And that unconscious mind, deeper than psychology terms the subconscious, has always known about the powers of ESP, telepathy, telekinesis, precognition. Through these books, Victorian detective friend. But the unconscious racial mind has reached \"Exactly, Kevin, exactly. They have never existed any more than your aliens . They weren't the human race can tell itself how to achieve a state of pure logic, men without food, without sex, without conflict—just as Doc has achieved the inhabited universe, but reason finally prevailed. He had reached a state of pure thought.\" girl said. \"You can't let it fall into the hands of the Martians.\" Andre did not deny that he wanted it to fall into his hands. I knew I could not let Doc's—Dad's—time travel thing fall into \"The North American government \"We can always make it over to the mission,\" I lied. The clerk turned his upper lip as if he were going to spit. \"Awright, since we ain't full up. In ad vance.\" to pieces and stomped on the pieces. Maybe you can't stop the progress of science, but I knew it might be millenniums before Doc's genes and creative environment were recreated and time travel was rediscovered. Maybe we would be ready for it then. I knew we weren't now. the look on my face. \"I'll give you a room it because I didn't want the human race to become a thing of pure reason without purpose, kick the habit—perhaps with Miss Casey's help—but I wasn't really confident. Maybe I had destroyed the time machine because a world without material needs would not grow and roast coffee. and that did suddenly distinguishable. \" Outsider ... Thoth ... Dyzan ... Hsan ... Beyond Six, Seven, Eight ... Wentworth ... Jimmy Christopher ... Kent Allard ... Oh, are ... see ....\" to thinking it was just a dream and that I was dragging this old man around North America for nothing, I remembered who he was. I remembered that he was somebody very important whose name and work I Sharp, you know. I.... Say, the poor old guy looks sick. Want any help?\" Seven Cryptical Books of Hsan \"I'll be seen with you if you really want to eat.\" It was certainly unfair and probably immoral. But I had no choice tourist . \"But they don't exist,\" I said wearily. I was a caffeine addict. Earth-norm humans sometimes have the addiction to a slight extent, but same, but the need ran as deep. Earth human. I was a man , of course, not an alien like a Martian. Earthmen ran the whole Solar Federation, but I was just as good as an Earthman. With my suntan and short mane, I could pass, couldn't I? That of course . The tubercular clerk looked up from the gaudy comics sections of one of those little tabloids that have the funnies a week in advance. me .\" has : Please send me FREE of obligation, in sealed wrapper, \"The Scarlet Book\" revealing to me how I may gain Secret Mastery of the Universe. Name : ........................ Address : ..................... to have this secret, Kevin,\" the thing . My heart hammered at my lungs. I knew this last time had been different. Whatever it was was getting closer. This was the first time me as I was pulling on my boot....\" I was kneeling on the floor of a Victorian living room. I'm quite familiar with Earth history and I recognized the period immediately. Then I realized what I had been trying to get from Doc all these months—time travel. A thin, sickly man was sprawled in the other chair in a rumpled dressing gown. My eyes held to his face, his pinpoint pupils and snowbird. \"My clients have occasioned singular methods of entry into these rooms,\" the thin man remarked, \"but never before have they used instantaneous materialization.\" The heavier man was half choking, half laughing. \"I say—I say, I would like to see you explain this, my dear fellow.\" this unemployed, former professional man who has gone through a serious illness and is suffering a more serious addiction to tell me the place and time from which he comes.\" The surprise stung. \"How did you know?\" I asked. He gestured with a pale hand. \"To maintain a logical approach, I must reject the supernatural. Your arrival, unless hallucinatory—and despite my voluntary use of one drug and my involuntary experiences recently with another, I must accept the evidence of my senses or retire from my profession—your arrival was then super-normal. I might say super-scientific, of a science not of my or the good doctor's time, clearly. Time travel is a familiar folk legend and I have been reading an article by the entertaining Mr. Wells. Perhaps he will expand it into one of his novels of scientific romance.\" looked vaguely like an ice-skate. \"Interesting. Perhaps if our visitor would tell us something of his age with special reference to the theory and practice of temporal transference, Doctor, we would be better equipped to judge whether we exist.\" There was no theory or practice of time travel. I told them all I had ever heard theorized from Hindu yoga through Extra-sensory Perception to Relativity and the positron and negatron. \"Interesting.\" He breathed out suffocating black clouds of smoke. \"Presume that the people of your time by their 'Extra-sensory Perception' have altered the past to make it as they suppose it to be. The great historical figures are made the larger than life-size that we I had to help Doc. I had to have some coffee. \"What do you want?\" \"Listen, Kevin. Listen carefully to what I am saying. Doc found a method of time travel. It was almost a purely mathematical, topographical way divorced from modern physical sciences. He kept it secret and he wanted to make money with it. He was an idealist—he had his crusades. How can you make money with time travel?\" I didn't know whether she was asking me, but I didn't know. All I knew was that I had to help Doc and get some coffee. did not exist .\" I looked up finally and saw a Martian in or about the doorway. \"Call me Andre,\" the Martian said. \"A common name but foreign. It should serve as a point of reference.\" I had always wondered how a thing like a Martian could talk. Sometimes I wondered if they really could. \"I'll begin as Miss Casey did—by telling you things. Hundreds of people disappeared from North America a few months ago.\" \"They always do,\" I told him. \"They ceased to exist—as human beings—shortly after they received a book from Doc,\" the Martian said. \"Use one of those sneaky Martian weapons again,\" I warned him, \"and I'll kill the girl.\" Martians were supposed to be against the The Martian weapon staggered me again. I tried to say something. I\n\n<question>:\nHow do Martians communicate with men from Earth?\n\n<options>:\nA Without using logical sense, only the imagination.\nB By sensing and without the need for talking.\nC Through manuscripts and unwritten books.\nD Via time travel.\n\n<answer>:\n", "assistant": "B" } ]

[ { "human": "Read the following passage and questions, then choose the right answer from options, the answer should be one of A, B, C, D.\n\n<passage>:\nTHE HAIRY ONES by BASIL WELLS Marooned on a world within a world, aided The weird globe was divided equally into hemispheres, and as the tiny bushes. \"Down, Altha,\" a deeper voice rumbled from above, \"it's one of the Enemy.\" wears the uniform of a patrolman.\" \"May be a trick.\" The deep voice was doubtful. \"You know their leader, faster. \"This Mark Tanner of mine,\" she explained to the patrolman, \"is always afraid for me. He does not remember that I can see into the minds of others.\" Hairy People.\" \"She one of them?\" Rolf's voice was low, but he saw Altha's lip twitch. \"Mother was.\" Mark Tanner's voice was louder. \"Father was Wayne Stark. \"Mark!\" The girl's voice was tense. Rolf felt her arm tug at his sleeve and he dropped beside her in the shelter of a clump of coarse-leaved gray bushes. \"The Furry Women attack!\" A hundred paces away Rolf made the dark shapes of armed warriors as they filed downward from the Barrier into the blackened desolation of \"Right.\" The older man was slipping the stout bowstring into its notched recess on the upper end of his long bow. \"They cross the Barrier from the fertile plains of Nyd to raid the Hairy People. They take them for slaves.\" \"I must warn them.\" Altha's lips thinned and her brown-flecked eyes the ruins of ancient Aryk. Tanner shrugged his shoulders. \"What can I do? Altha has the blood of the Hairy People in her veins. She will warn them even though the outlaws have turned her people against her.\" Rolf watched the column of barbarically clad warriors file out upon the Spear tips and bared swords glinted dully. \"They will pass within a few feet!\" he hissed. \"Right.\" Tanner's fingers bit into Rolf's arm. \"Pray that the wind does not shift, their nostrils are sensitive as those of the weasels they resemble.\" Rolf's eyes slitted. There was something vaguely unhuman about those gracefully marching figures. He wondered what Tanner had meant by calling them weasels, wondered until they came closer. Then he knew. Above half naked feminine bodies, sinuous and supple as the undulating coils of a serpent, rose the snaky ditigrade head of a weasel-brute! Their necks were long and wide, merging into the gray-furred muscles of their narrow bodies until they seemed utterly shoulderless, and beneath their furry pelts the ripples of smooth-flowing muscles played rhythmically. There was a stench, a musky penetrating scent that made the flesh of his body crawl. \"See!\" Tanner's voice was muted. \"Giffa, Queen of the Furry Ones!\" Borne on a carved and polished litter of ebon-hued wood and yellowed bone lolled the hideous queen of that advancing horde. Gaunt of body her narrow earless skull. And the skulls of rodents and men alike linked together into ghastly festoons about her heavy, short-legged litter. Men bore the litter, eight broad-shouldered red-haired men whose arms had been cut off at the shoulders and whose naked backs bore the weals of countless lashes. Their bodies, like that of Altha, were covered with a silky coat of reddish hair. maimed beasts of burden, but the hand of Mark Tanner pressed down firmly across his arm. The older man shook his head. \"Not yet,\" he said. \"When Altha has warned the Hairy People we can cut off their retreat. After they have passed I will arouse the Outcasts who live here upon the Barrier. Though their blood is that of the two races mingled they hate the Furry Ones.\" A shadow passed over their hiding place. The Furry Amazons too saw the indistinct darkness and looked up. High overhead drifted the narrow winged shape of a glider, and the warrior women shrieked their hatred. Gone now was their chance for a surprise attack on the isolated canyons of the Hairy People. They halted, clustered about their leader. Giffa snarled quick orders at them, her chisel-teeth clicking savagely. The column swung out into the wasteland toward the nearest sunken valleys of the Hairy People. bearing the scent of their bodies out to the sensitive nostrils of the beast-women. Again the column turned. They glimpsed the two men and a hideous scrawling battle-cry burst from their throats. Rolf's expoder rattled briefly like a high-speed sewing machine as he flicked its muzzle back and forth along the ranks of attacking Furry Ones. Dozens of the hideous weasel creatures fell as the needles of explosive blasted them but hundreds more were swarming over their fallen sisters. Mark Tanner's bow twanged again and again as he drove arrows at the bloodthirsty warrior women. But the Furry Ones ran fearlessly into that rain of death. The expoder hammered in Rolf's heavy fist. Tanner smashed an elbow into Rolf's side. \"Retreat!\" he gasped. The Furry Amazons swarmed up over the lower terraces of rocks, their snaky heads thrust forward and their swords slashing. The two Earthmen bounded up and backward to the next jumbled layer of giant blocks the sheltering bulk of a rough square boulder. \"Now where?\" Rolf snapped another burst of expoder needles at the furry attackers as he asked. went bounding away along a shadowy crevice that plunged raggedly into the heart of the Barrier. Rolf blasted another spurt of explosive needles at the Furry Ones and followed. Darkness thickened as they penetrated into the maze of the Barrier's shattered heart. An unseen furry shape sprang upon Rolf's shoulders and as he sank to his knees he felt hot saliva drip like acid upon his a choked snarl that ended convulsively in silence. Bat-winged blobs of life dragged wet leathery hide across his face, and desolate land of the Hairy People. glider riding the thermals back toward the Barrier. \"She had warned the Hairy People, and now she returns.\" \"The weasel heads won't follow us here?\" asked Rolf. Tanner laughed. \"Hardly. They fear the spirits of the Ancients too much for that. They believe the invisible powers will drink their souls.\" a fortress for the few thousand aristocrats and slaves who escaped the surface wars. \"The Hairy People were the rulers,\" he went on, \"and the Furry Ones were their slaves. In the revolt that eventually split Lomihi into two warring races this city, Aryk, was destroyed by a strange vegetable The glider knifed forward with that first swift impetus, and drove out over the Barrier. The Furry Ones were struggling insect shapes below him, and he saw with a thrill that larger bodied warriors, whose bodies glinted with a dull bronze, were attacking them from the burnt-out wastelands. The Hairy People had come to battle the invaders. Shorty Furry Ones racing back across the great wall toward the Plains of Nyd. He nosed the captured ship down toward the ruined plaza of the Forbidden City. Once Mark Tanner was aboard they would blast Rolf snorted. \"Shorty,\" he said disgustedly as they landed, but his arm went out toward the girl's red-haired slimness, and curved around it.\n\n<question>:\nWhat is the relationship between the Hairy people and the Furry people?\n\n<options>:\nA The Furry people hunt the Hairy, because they were once enslaved by them.\nB The Hairy people rule over the Furry, and they are rebelling against them.\nC The two factions have disputes over the land\nD The Furry people have a disdain for the Hairy, and frequently attack them.\n\n<answer>:\n", "assistant": "A" } ]

[ { "human": "Read the following passage and questions, then choose the right answer from options, the answer should be one of A, B, C, D.\n\n<passage>:\nSpawning Ground By LESTER DEL REY They weren't human. They were something more—and something less—they were, in short, humanity's hopes for survival! [Transcriber's Note: This etext was produced from hand across the dark stubble on his chin. It could wait. \"Anything new during the night?\" \"About a dozen blobs held something like a convention a little ways north of us. They broke up about an hour ago and streaked off into the clouds.\" The blobs were a peculiarity of this planet about which nobody knew anything. They looked like overgrown fireballs, but seemed to have an almost sentient curiosity about anything moving on the ground. \"And in the murk. I've kept a signal going to guide them back.\" Gwayne swore softly to himself. Earth couldn't turn out enough starmen in the schools, so promising kids were being shipped out for training as cadets on their twelfth birthday. The two he'd drawn, Kaufman and Pinelli, seemed to be totally devoid of any sense of caution. Of course there was no obvious need for caution here. The blobs hadn't seemed dangerous, and the local animals were apparently all herbivorous and harmless. They were ugly enough, looking like insects in spite of their internal skeletons, with anywhere from four to twelve legs each on their segmented bodies. None acted like dangerous beasts. But back, and to the more recent ship under Hennessy that was sent to check it wasn't raining, though the ground was covered by thick swirls of fog. In the distance, the tops of shrubs that made a scrub forest glowed yellow-green. Motions around them suggested a herd of feeding animals. Details were impossible to see through the haze. Even the deep gorge where they'd found Hennessy's carefully buried ship was completely hidden by the fog. There were three of the blobs dancing about over the grazing animals now, as they often seemed to do. Gwayne stared at them for a minute, trying to read sense into the things. If he had time to study them.... But there was no time. Earth had ordered him to detour here, after leaving his load of deep-sleep stored colonists on Official World 71, to check on any sign of Hennessy. He'd been here a week longer than he should have stayed his eye. The blobs had left the herd. Now the three were streaking at fantastic speed to a spot near the ship, to hover excitedly above something that moved there. spite of the load of the two struggling boys! The creatures dived downward into lower ground, beginning to disappear into the mists. \"Follow the blobs,\" Gwayne yelled. He realized now he'd been a fool to leave his suit the radio would have let him keep in contact with the kids. But it was too late to go back. The blobs danced after the horde. Barker bounced the jeep downward into a gorge. Somewhere the man had learned to drive superlatively but he the horde would all vanish in the uneven ground, hidden by the fog. A blob dropped down, almost touching Gwayne. He threw up an instinctive hand. There was a tingling as the creature seemed to pass around it. It lifted a few inches and drifted off. language or draw pictures. I want to know what happened to Hennessy and why that ship was buried against detection. This thing may be the metabolism.\" He sucked in on the cigarette he'd dug out, then spat sickly. Smoke and this air made a foul combination. \"Bob, it still makes no sense. We've scoured this planet by infra-red, and there was no sign of native villages or culture. We should have found some.\" time and be better off than trying to dig through Hennessy's ship. That primitives have gotten to the men inside Hennessy's ship? Why was its fuel dumped? Only men would have known how to do that. And who told these creatures that a space ship's metal finders could be fooled by a little more than a hundred feet of solid rock? They'd buried the ship cunningly, and only the accidental slippage had undone their work. Maybe there would never be a full answer, but he had to find something—and find it fast. Earth needed every world she could make remotely habitable, or mankind was probably doomed to extinction. The race had blundered safely through its discovery of atomic weapons into a peace that had lasted two hundred years. It had managed to prevent an interplanetary war with the Venus colonists. It had found a drive that led to the stars, and hadn't even found intelligent life finally proved that the sun was going to go nova. It wouldn't be much of an explosion, as such things go—but it would render the whole Solar System uninhabitable for millenia. To survive, man had to colonize. And there were no worlds perfect for him, as Earth had been. The the terraforming teams did what they could. And then the big starships began filling worlds with colonists, carried in deep sleep to conserve space. In another ten years, the sun would explode, leaving man only on the footholds he was trying to dig among other solar systems. Maybe some would be spawning grounds for mankind in spite of the efforts. Each was precious as a haven for the race. If this world could be used, it would be nearer than most. If not, as Gwayne dropped the phone and headed for the little sick bay. He swore gets easier as you listen. It's Hennessy, all right. I'm certain.\" germ plasm. But in this case, what changed Hennessy is real, so maybe Gwayne led the former Hennessy to the exit. The waiting blobs dropped set the combinations and pressed the studs. There was a hiss and gurgle as the great tanks of fuel discharged their contents out onto the ground where no ingenuity could ever recover it to bring life to the ship again. however much they might hate it at first. But there was no putting off giving the gist of it to Jane. \"It was the blobs,\" he summarized it. \"They seem to be amused by men. They don't require anything from us, but they like us around. Hennessy doesn't know why. They can change our cells, adapt us. Before men came, food would kill us. We've got to stay here. We'll bury the ships deeper this time, and Earth won't find us. They can't risk trying a colony where three ships vanish, so we'll just disappear. And they'll never Nobody would know. Their children—odd children who matured in eight years—would be primitive savages in three generations. The Earth tools would be useless, impossible for the hands so radically changed. Nothing from the ship would last. Books could never be read by the new eyes. And in time, Earth wouldn't even be a memory to this world. puzzlement in her face. \"Why?\" And then, before he could answer, her own intelligence gave her the same answer he had found for himself. \"The spawning ground!\" It was the only thing they could do. Earth needed a place to plant her seed, but no world other than Earth could ever be trusted to preserve that seed for generation after generation. Some worlds already were becoming uncertain. Here, though, the blobs had adapted men to the alien world instead of men having to adapt the whole planet to their needs. Here, the strange children of man's race could grow, develop and begin the long trek back fruitful,\" she whispered. \"Be fruitful and spawn and replenish an earth.\" \"No,\" he told her. \"Replenish the stars.\" But she was no longer listening, and that part of his idea could wait. Some day, though, their children would find a way to the starlanes again, looking for other worlds. With the blobs to help them, they could adapt to most worlds. The unchanged spirit would lead them through all space, and the changing bodies would claim worlds beyond numbering. Some day, the whole universe would be a spawning ground for the children of men!\n\n<question>:\nWhy was the fuel drained out of Hennessy's ship's tank?\n\n<options>:\nA Gwayne doesn't know\nB Hennessy drained it so they couldn't leave\nC it was destroyed by creatures from the planet\nD the blobs used it for energy\n\n<answer>:\n", "assistant": "B" } ]

[ { "human": "Read the following passage and questions, then choose the right answer from options, the answer should be one of A, B, C, D.\n\n<passage>:\nThe house was furnished with all luxuries, including women. If it only had a lease that could be broken— Above it her comely face was sullen beneath its sleek cocoon of auburn hair. She opened her eyes at his approach and regarded him with nothing like tight-fitting tubular gown. \"If I could do anything about it....\" \"But you can't,\" he told her. \"They're too clever.\" \"Is this crop rotation or did you send for me?\" she asked cynically. \"If you did, I wish you hadn't. You haven't asked about your son.\" within Dana, just as he could feel the stirring toward her within himself—desire that both of them loathed because it was implanted within them by their captors. The other two women were sitting in the heptagonal central hall. double motherhood, she was almost flat of bosom. He asked her how she was feeling. \"Okay, I guess,\" she said. \"The way they manage it, there's nothing \"Good,\" he said. \"Glad to hear it.\" He felt oddly embarrassed. He turned to Olga, broad, blonde and curiously vital, who sat perfectly still, regarding him over the pregnant swell of her dirndl-clad waist. something that might cheer her up, for she was by far the youngest of the three female captives, barely nineteen. But with the eyes of the other two, especially Dana, upon him, he could not. \"I guess I wasn't cut out to be a Turk,\" he said. \"I don't feel at ease in a harem, even when it's supposedly my own.\" \"You're not doing so badly,\" Dana replied acidly. \"Lay off—he can't help it,\" said Eudalia unexpectedly. \"He doesn't like it any better than we do.\" \"But he doesn't have to—have them,\" objected Olga. She had a trace of Polish accent that was not unpleasant. In fact, Tennant thought, only as much as I hate you.\" Eudalia laid down her fork with a clatter and regarded Dana disapprovingly. \"Why take it out on Rog?\" she asked bluntly. \"He didn't ask to come here any more than we did. He's got a wife back home. Maybe you want him to fall in love with you? Maybe you're jealous because he doesn't? Well, maybe he can't! And maybe it wouldn't work, the way things are arranged here.\" \"Are we really in the fourth dimension?\" Dana asked. Of the three of them, she alone had more than a high-school education. \"We may be in the eleventh for all I know,\" he told her. \"But I'll settle for the fourth—a fourth dimension in space, if that makes \"Why haven't they brought more of us through?\" Eudalia asked, tamping \"Why do they do it—the other way, I mean?\" asked Dana. Tennant shrugged. \"I don't know. I've been thinking about it. I suppose it's because they're pretty human.\" \" Human! matched his, and a narrow halter. \"You thought those up while we ate,\" he said. It annoyed him to be copied, though he did not know why. She laughed at him silently, tossed her auburn hair back from her face and went out of the roofless house, asleep. \"They never cry,\" the thin woman told him. \"But they grow—God, how they grow!\" her close, although neither of them felt desire at the moment. Their captors had seen to that it is.\" \"I'll try not to,\" he said and stopped, realizing the family party was over. He had felt the inner tug of command, said good-by to the women and returned to his smaller compound within its own barrier dome. He went through the entire routine at Opal's bidding. When at last probing investigation. Opal, like the rest of the captors, was as curious as a cat—or a human being. Tennant sat against a wall, drenched with sweat. There would be endless repetition before his workout was done. On Earth, dogs were said to be intellectually two-dimensional creatures. He wondered if they felt this Opal was nervous, so much so that he revealed more than he intended. Or perhaps that was his intent Tennant could never be sure. They were Opal was annoyed that Tennant could make nothing of it. Then came the thought: everything but the date and season. Opal, like the rest of the captors, seemed to have no understanding of time in a human sense. Waiting, Tennant tried not to think of his wife, of the fact that he hadn't seen her in—was it more than a year and a half on Earth? He could have controlled his heartbeat with one of his new powers, but that might have made Opal suspicious. He should be somewhat excited. He took another deep, lung-filling drag on his cigarette, looked around the room that was so important a part of his life. The three women back there would be in a ghastly spot. He felt like a heel for wanting to leave them there, then knew that he would try somehow to get them out. slipped past his mental censor, and he waited apprehensively for Opal to strike. Nothing happened and he warily relaxed. Opal wasn't tapping his thoughts. Because he felt sure of his captive ... or because he adolescent's. This hunger was real, not implanted. Everything would be real ... his love for her, the food he ate, the things he touched, his Your wife and a man are approaching the house. The thought message from Opal crumbled his illusion of freedom. He sank down in a chair, trying to refuse to listen to the rest of the command: when it came, was more humiliating than a slap across a dog's snout. Opal had been too interested in the next lab specimen to bother about his thoughts—that was why he had been free to think of escape. leading another victim to the fourth-dimensional pen. . He'd had one too many and only wanted a little fun. Really, darling, you seem to think that a girl....\" it would be you.\" \" Roger! \" Agatha found her voice. \"You're alive !\" \"Roger,\" repeated Tennant viciously. He felt sick with disgust. Maybe he should have expected a triangle, but somehow he hadn't. And here it was, with all of them going through their paces like a trio of tent-show actors. He said, \"For God's sake, sit down.\" stiff—of him. Probably with reason. He looked again at Cass Gordon and found that he suddenly didn't care. She couldn't say it was loneliness. Women have waited longer than eighteen months. He would have if his captors had let him. He was standing no more than four inches from this woman he had desired desperately for six years, and he no longer wanted her. He was acutely It would serve her right, but maybe there was another way. \"I don't know about you,\" he said, \"but I suspect we're in the same He lit a cigarette, inhaled. \"Relax. I'm not planning revenge. After this evening, I plan to vanish for good. Of course, Agatha, that offers you a minor nuisance. You will have to wait six years to marry Cass—seven years if the maid who let me in tonight talks. That's the law, isn't it, Cass? You probably had it all figured out.\" whatever they were, worked more efficiently on females. A difference in could understand, it had been like asking an African pygmy, armed with a blowgun, to set up shop in the midst of a herd of wild elephants. It simply wasn't feasible—and furthermore he derived an impression of the\n\n<question>:\nWhy does Roger speculate there are more females than males in the fourth dimension environment?\n\n<options>:\nA Roger believes that the ones controlling the environment are running a breeding program to raise children who will eventually grow up to be body snatchers.\nB The ones controlling the environment have a more challenging time bringing males through the fourth dimension.\nC The ones controlling the environment are overwhelmingly male, heterosexual, and desirous of sex with women.\nD Roger does not make any kind of guess as to why he is in the minority among the women of his \"harem.\"\n\n<answer>:\n", "assistant": "B" } ]

[ { "human": "Read the following passage and questions, then choose the right answer from options, the answer should be one of A, B, C, D.\n\n<passage>:\nBEACH SCENE By MARSHALL KING Extensive research did not uncover any evidence that the U.S. copyright on this publication was renewed.] It was a fine day at the beach ocean at last. When he had caught his breath, he looked back through the forest. No sign of the village he had left it far behind. Safe from the scrutiny of brothers and parents, there was nothing now to stop him from going to the ocean. This was the moment to stop time. \"On your mark!\" he shouted to the rippling stream and its orange whirlpools. He glanced furtively from side to side, pretending that His eyes took quick inventory. It was exactly as he knew it would be: the milky-orange stream had become motionless and its minute whirlpools its transparent wings frozen in position for a downward stroke and the heavy purple fluid overhead held fast in its manufacture of whorls and nimbi. With everything around him in a state of perfect tableau, Purnie hurried toward the ocean. If only the days weren't so short! he thought. There was so much to see and so little time. It seemed that everyone except him had seen the wonders of the beach country. The stories he had heard from his brothers and their friends had taunted him for as long as he could as he ran along, he could clearly picture the wonderland as though he were already there. There would be a rockslide of petrified logs to play on, the ocean itself with waves higher than a house, the comical three-legged tripons who never stopped munching on seaweed, and many kinds of other wonderful creatures found only at the ocean. He bounced through the forest as though the world was reserved this day just for him. And who could say it wasn't? he thought. Wasn't this met—had been arrested in their native activities, and he knew that as soon as he resumed time, everything would pick up where it had left off. When he smelled an acid sweetness that told him the ocean was not far off, his pulse quickened in anticipation. Rather than spoil what was clearly going to be a perfect day, he chose to ignore the fact that he dozen more steps, then stopped abruptly in his tracks. He found himself atop a rocky knoll, overlooking the mighty sea! He was so overpowered by the vista before him that his \"Hurrah!\" came out as a weak squeak. The ocean lay at the ready, its stilled waves awaiting his command to resume their tidal sweep. The breakers along the shoreline hung in varying stages of disarray, some having already exploded into towering white spray while others were poised in smooth orange curls waiting to start that action. beach was a pair of two-legged animals poised in mid-step, facing the spot where Purnie now stood. Some distance behind them were eight more, each of whom were motionless in a curious pose of interrupted animation. And down in the water, where the ocean ran itself into thin nothingness upon the sand, he saw standing here and there the comical tripons, those three-legged marine buffoons who made handsome careers of munching seaweed. expected time to resume. It did! Immediately he was surrounded by activity. He heard the roar of the crashing orange breakers, he tasted the dew of acid that floated from the spray, and he saw his new friends continue the actions which he had stopped while back in the forest. seventeen. Seventeen planets I can claim as my own!\" \"My, my. Seventeen planets. And tell me, Forbes, just what the hell are their heels. \"All right, Forbes, just hold it a minute. Listen to me. Sure, it's ocean with a three-legged ostrich!\" \"Good God, man, aren't you human? We've only been on this planet twenty minutes! Naturally they want to look around. They half expected to find you so rich that you can buy your next planet. That'll make eighteen, I believe.\" \"Radiation, bah! We've found low-grade ore on every planet I've discovered so far, and this one'll be no different. Now how about that system so that you not only own the planets, but you will virtually own \"Now wait a minute, Forbes. Universal Law forbids—\" \"This is my planet and I am the law. Put him in a box!\" \"With my crew as witness, I officially protest—\" wiggled in anticipation. He saw the noose spinning down toward his head, and, before he knew it, he had scooted out of the circle and up the sandy beach. He was Never before had he felt this fleeting twinge that made him want to protect himself. He watched the animals huddle around the box on the beach, their explosion, it had jumped four feet into the air before Purnie had stopped time. Now it hung there, its beak stuffed with seaweed and its three legs drawn up into a squatting position. Leaving the assorted statues behind, he limped his way up the knoll, torn between leaving and staying. What an odd place, this ocean country! He wondered why he had not heard more detail about the beach animals. \"Is he invisible, Captain? Where is he?\" \"Up there, Captain! On those rocks. Isn't that him?\" \"Well, I'll be damned!\" the spectacle before him. The agonizing screams of the animals below filled him with hysteria. The boulders caught most of them as they stood ankle-deep in the surf. hopped back and forth near the edge of the rise, torn with panic and shame. \"Get up! Please get up!\" He was horrified by the moans reaching his ears from the beach. \"You're getting all wet! Did you hear me? Please get up.\" He was choked with rage and sorrow. How could he have tell him it was all right. But it was beyond his power to bring it about. The lapping tide threatened to cover those in the orange surf. Purnie worked his way down the hill, imploring them to save themselves. The sounds they made carried a new tone, a desperate foreboding of drown!\" \"Look around you, Cabot. Can you see anyone moving?\" \"The men on the beach are nearly buried, Captain. And the rest of us here in the water—\" wavelet gently rolling over his head. Purnie could wait no longer. The tides were all but covering one of the animals, and soon the others would be in the same plight. Disregarding as his friends' safety was concerned. No matter what their condition of life or death was at this moment, it would stay the same way until he started time again. He made his way deeper into the orange liquid, where a raised hand signalled the location of a submerged body. The hand was clutching a large white banner that was tangled among the His heart sank. He wasn't afraid of death, and he knew that if he died the oceans would roll again and his friends would move about. But he wanted to see them safe. He tried to clear his mind for supreme effort. There was no piled up over there!\" \"Damnit, the logs didn't pick us up out of the ocean, did they? Captain take super-human energy to move one of those things.\" \"I haven't seen anything super-human. Those ostriches down there are so busy eating seaweed—\" \"All right, let's bear a hand here with the others. Some of them can't walk. Where's Forbes?\" \"He's sitting down there in the water, Captain, crying like a baby. Or laughing. I can't tell which.\" \"We'll have to get him. Miles, Schick, come along. Forbes! You all \"Ho-ho-ho! Seventeen! Seventeen! Seventeen planets, Benson, and they'll curving shoreline, the voices of the last two, bringing up the rear far behind the others, fell faintly on his ears over the sound of the surf. glazed eyes one of the animals coming back along the beach. When it was nearly directly below him, he could hear it making sounds that by now beach was deserted now, and his gaze was transfixed on a shimmering white square floating on the ocean. Across it, the last thing Purnie\n\n<question>:\nWhat does the ocean consist of on this planet?\n\n<options>:\nA The ocean is freshwater.\nB The ocean is saltwater.\nC The ocean is purple liquid.\nD The ocean is acid.\n\n<answer>:\n", "assistant": "D" } ]

[ { "human": "Read the following passage and questions, then choose the right answer from options, the answer should be one of A, B, C, D.\n\n<passage>:\nBERET By TOM PURDOM It's not so much the decisions a man does make that mark him as a Man—but the ones he refrains from making. Like the decision \"I've had enough!\" Illustrated by Schoenherr Read locked the door and drew his pistol. Sergeant Rashid handed in court.\" Read clicked off the safety. \"Corporal Read is very young,\" Rashid said, \"but he's a crack shot. That's why I brought him with me. I think he likes Kidnap. \" Rashid judo chopped him and swung the inert body over his dropped it and yellow psycho gas hissed from the valve. \"Let's be off,\" Rashid said. The door lock snapped as they went out the window. Two men with A little car skimmed across the lawn. Bearing the Scourge of Africa, Rashid struggled toward it. Read walked backward, covering their retreat. The other inspector carried a light machine gun and a box of grenades. \"I better cover,\" he said. \"Thanks,\" Rashid said. The inspector slid out of the car and ran to a clump of bushes. The driver pushed in the accelerator. As they swerved toward the \"Is he all right?\" the driver asked. \"I don't think I hurt him.\" Rashid took a syrette from his vest pocket. \"Well, Read, it looks like we're in for a fight. In a few \"They don't know who's coming,\" he said. \"They don't make them tough enough to stop this boy.\" Staring straight ahead, he didn't see the sergeant smile. order, and those who are loyal to nothing but themselves. Read fools with me,\" he bragged. \"When Harry Read's out, there's a tiger running loose.\" No one knew how many times he nearly ran from other clubs, how carefully he picked the safest spot on the Twice he nearly got expelled for picking fights with smaller men. Rather than resign, he accepted punishment which assigned him to leaders, having just won representation in the South African Parliament, told him to liberate his own country. They believed they could use their first small voice in the government to win the arrest. He liked the Corp and he liked being in the Corp. He went where they sent him and did what they told him to do. \"Here comes our escort,\" Read said. \"Don't be certain, corporal. All these strong-arm movements are alike. I'll bet Umluana's lieutenants are hoping he'll become a dead legend. Then they can become live conquerors.\" Sergeant Rashid came from Cairo. He had degrees in science and history from Cambridge but only the Corp gave him work that satisfied his conscience. He hated war. It was that simple. Rashid turned his head. He waved frantically. The two men in the other car waved back. \"Shall I duck under the trees?\" the driver asked. big rifle fired twice. Read saw the Belderkan cars scatter. Suddenly machine-gun bullets cracked and whined beside him. \"Evade,\" Rashid said. \"Don't go down.\" Without losing any forward speed, the driver took them straight up. Read's stomach bounced. \"Hit the floor,\" Rashid said. They knelt on the cramped floor. Rashid put on his gas mask and unconscious from the injection Rashid had given him. I can't do anything , Read thought. crawled in waves down his own back. Another explosion, this time very loud. Rashid raised his eyes above the seat and looked out the rear window. \"Two left. Keep down, Read.\" \"They'll get to Miaka before us.\" He shut his eyes when he heard another loud explosion. Sergeant Rashid looked out the window again. He swore bitterly in English and Egyptian. Read raised his head. The two cars behind \"Now, I can shoot back,\" he said. \"Now we'll see what they do.\" \"Are you ready, Rashid?\" yelled the driver. \"Man, get us out of here!\" inspector lay behind an overturned couch. Read had seen dozens of training films taken during actual battles or after atomic attacks. He had laughed when other recruits complained. \"That's the way this world is. You people with the weak stomachs better get used to it.\" \"Did you get Umluana?\" he asked Sergeant Rashid. \"He's in the booth. What's going on?\" Rashid's Middle East Oxford seemed more clipped than ever. \"Can we get out of here?\" \"They machine-gunned the controls.\" Rashid swore. \"You heard him, Read! Get out there and help those men.\" He heard the screams of the wounded, the crack of rifles and machine guns, all the terrifying noise of war. But since his eighteenth year he had done everything his superiors told him to spread through the building. They could see anyone who tried to rush them but the besiegers couldn't pick out targets. Above the noise, he heard Rashid. ditch. He dropped another grenade beside it. The heavy gas would lie there for hours. Sergeant Rashid ran crouched from man to man. He did what he could to shield the wounded. \"Well, corporal, how are you?\" \"How do you think they'll treat us?\" with gasoline.\" \"We'll stop them, Sarge. Don't worry.\" Rashid ran off. Read stared across the green land and listened to the pound of his heart. What were the Belderkans planning? A mass frontal attack? To sneak in over the top of the hill? He didn't think, anymore than a rabbit thinks when it lies hiding from the fox or a panther thinks when it crouches on a branch above the trail. His skin tightened and relaxed on his body. Read shut his eyes. All around him he heard heavy breathing, mumbled comments, curses. Clothes rustled as men moved restlessly. But already the voice of Sergeant Rashid resounded in the murky room. \"We've got to knock that thing out before the copter comes. For two years Read had served under Sergeant Rashid. To him, the sergeant was everything a UN inspector should be. Rashid's devotion to peace had no limits. Read's psych tests said pride alone drove him on. That was good \"Is that Read?\" Rashid snapped orders. He put the German inspector in charge of Umluana. Read, the Frenchman and himself, he stationed at thirty-foot intervals along the floor. \"Remember,\" Rashid said. \"We have to knock out that gun.\" Read had given away his machine gun. He held a gas-filled bottle in each hand. His automatic nestled in its shoulder holster. Rashid whistled. Dozens of smoke grenades tumbled through the air. Thick mist engulfed the tank. Read stood up and ran forward. He crouched but Sarge. \" \"I'm hit, too,\" Rashid said. \"Don't stop if you can move.\" Listen to him. What's he got, a sprained ankle? But he didn't feel any pain. He closed his eyes and threw himself \"Read, you've got to. I think you're the only—\" \"What?\" Guns clattered. Bullets cracked. \"Sergeant Rashid! Answer me.\" He heard nothing but the lonely passage of the bullets in the mist. That was all—with a broken hip and a wounded right arm. He knew they would see him when he stood up but he didn't think about that. He didn't think about Sergeant Rashid, about the complicated politics of Africa, about crowded market streets. He decided something in the world was more important than himself, but he didn't know it or realize the psychologists would be surprised to see him do this. He had made many decisions in the last few minutes. He had ceased to think about them or anything else.\n\n<question>:\nWhich statement best describes how Read changes throughout the story?\n\n<options>:\nA He became much less of an individual and more of a pawn for the UN.\nB He overcame his cowardly ways to act for the good of his mission.\nC He remains the self-serving person he was when the story started.\nD He got cocky and made his own decisions without listening to Sergeant Rashid.\n\n<answer>:\n", "assistant": "B" } ]

[ { "human": "Read the following passage and questions, then choose the right answer from options, the answer should be one of A, B, C, D.\n\n<passage>:\nBy PHILIP LATHAM Niemand by Philip Latham. LATHAM. Dr. Niemand, what would you say is your main job? Earth. LATHAM. What do you mean by activity on the Sun? LATHAM. In what way? NIEMAND. It means you can only approximately predict the future course of sunspot activity. Sunspots are mighty treacherous things. LATHAM. Haven't there been a great many correlations announced between sunspots and various effects on the Earth? NIEMAND. Scores of them. LATHAM. What is your opinion of these correlations? NIEMAND. Pure bosh in most cases. LATHAM. But some are valid? NIEMAND. A few. There is unquestionably a correlation between sunspots and disturbances of the Earth's magnetic field ... radio fade-outs ... auroras ... things like that. LATHAM. Now, Dr. Niemand, I understand that you have been investigating NIEMAND. Yes, I suppose some people would say so. LATHAM. You have broken new ground? NIEMAND. That's true. LATHAM. In what way have your investigations differed from those of others? NIEMAND. I think our biggest advance was the discovery that sunspots themselves are not the direct cause of the disturbances we have been studying on the Earth. It's something like the eruptions in rubeola. Attention is concentrated on the bright red papules because they're such a conspicuous symptom of the disease. Whereas the real cause is an NIEMAND. It is quite invisible to the eye but readily detected by radiation we detect is the actual cause of the disturbing effects observed. LATHAM. Just what are these effects? LATHAM. Can you give us a general idea? NIEMAND. I'll try. Let's see ... remember that speech from \"Julius LATHAM. I'm afraid I don't see— NIEMAND. Well, Shakespeare would have been nearer the truth if he had LATHAM. How is that? for no detectable reason —conditions are reversed. Wars rage. People go mad. The world is plunged into an orgy of bloodshed and misery. LATHAM. But weren't there reasons? NIEMAND. What reasons? LATHAM. Those are broad, sweeping statements. Can't you be more NIEMAND. Perhaps I'd better go back to the beginning. Let me see.... It LATHAM. Aren't such attacks characteristic of the stress and strain of NIEMAND. I'm afraid that old stress-and-strain theory has been badly NIEMAND. A doctor must always do something for the patients who come to exacerbation—increase in the severity of the symptoms—as accurately as possible. LATHAM. And this gave you a clue? NIEMAND. It was the beginning. In most instances patients reported the LATHAM. What sort of pattern? LATHAM. Coincidences? NIEMAND. Total strangers miles apart were stricken at almost the same LATHAM. What did you do? NIEMAND. Naturally I said nothing of this to my patients. I did, LATHAM. With what result? NIEMAND. I was afraid the result would be that my old roommate would LATHAM. Just a minute. I would like to know how you define LATHAM. Which was? LATHAM. That must have had you badly puzzled at first. LATHAM. In what way was Middletown of assistance? LATHAM. Can you describe this chart for us? NIEMAND. It was really quite simple. But if it had not been for LATHAM. In what way? solar rotation. That is, if you see a large spot at the center of the Sun's disk today, there is a good chance if it survives that you will see it at the same place twenty-seven days later. But that night LATHAM. How was that? NIEMAND. I said that the lines drawn down through the days of greatest LATHAM. Why is that so important? NIEMAND. Middletown was immediately struck by the resemblance between the resemblance between the two was unmistakable. The pattern shown by the chart of mental disturbance corresponded in a striking way with the solar chart but with this difference. The disturbances on the Earth started two days later on the average than the disturbances due to the S-Regions on the Sun. In other words, there was a lag of about LATHAM. But if these S-Regions of Middletown's are invisible how could he detect them? more powerful equipment at Turtle Back Mountain. The formation of an S-Region is heralded by a long series of bursts of a few seconds duration, when the radiation may increase up to several thousand times that of the background intensity. These noise storms have been recorded simultaneously on wavelengths of from one to fifteen meters, which so far is the upper limit of the observations. In a few instances, however, S-Region to pass across the face of the Sun, since the synodic rotation is twenty-seven point three days. LATHAM. I should think it would be nearer thirteen or fourteen days. S-Region activity certainly go together. The more sunspots the more violent and intense is the S-Region activity. But there is not a one-to-one correspondence between sunspots and S-Regions. That is, you cannot connect a particular sunspot group with a particular S-Region. LATHAM. How do you account for this? NIEMAND. We don't account for it. NIEMAND. Middletown says that the radio waves emanating from them are LATHAM. Does this mean that the mental disturbances arise from some form of electromagnetic radiation? NIEMAND. We doubt it. As I said before, the charts show a lag of about forty-eight hours between the development of an S-Region and the onset of mental disturbance. This indicates that the malignant energy emanating from an S-Region consists of some highly penetrating form of LATHAM. A question that puzzles me is why some people are affected by NIEMAND. Our latest results indicate that probably should be affected so much more than others is still a matter of speculation. LATHAM. How long does an S-Region last? NIEMAND. An S-Region may have a lifetime of from three to perhaps a dozen solar rotations. Then it dies out and for a time we are free from this malignant radiation. Then a new region develops in perhaps an entirely different region of the Sun. Sometimes there may be several different S-Regions all going at once. LATHAM. How does it happen that you only got patients suffering from NIEMAND. I'm afraid the only sure way is to keep on the unilluminated side of the Earth which is rather difficult to do. Apparently the corpuscular beam from an S-Region is several degrees wide and not very sharply defined, since its effects are felt simultaneously over the on the Sun. But a new one may develop at any time. Also, the outlook for a decrease in activity is not very favorable. Sunspot activity continues at a high level and is steadily mounting in violence. The last sunspot cycle had the highest maximum of any since 1780, but the present cycle bids fair to set an all time record. NIEMAND. That is the logical outcome of our investigation. We are LATHAM. How may a person who is not particularly susceptible to this NIEMAND. If you have a feeling of restlessness and anxiety, if you are about yourself, or are filled with resentment toward the world, then you may be pretty sure that an S-Region is passing across the face of the Sun. Keep a tight rein on yourself. For it seems that evil will always be with us ... as long as the Sun shall continue to shine upon this little world. THE END [A] Middletown believes that the Intense radiation recently discovered from information derived from Explorer I and III has no\n\n<question>:\nBased on Latham's interview with Niemand, what might a listener be able to predict?\n\n<options>:\nA In the future, there will be an increase in the frequency and intensity of brutal disturbances on Earth\nB There is not much time left before humans will destroy the planet as a result of their infighting\nC In the future, the frequency and intensity of brutal disturbances on Earth will plateau\nD In the future, there will be a decrease in the frequency and intensity of brutal disturbances on Earth\n\n<answer>:\n", "assistant": "A" } ]

[ { "human": "Read the following passage and questions, then choose the right answer from options, the answer should be one of A, B, C, D.\n\n<passage>:\n\"It's all right to drink coffee, isn't it?\" he asked. \"Of course,\" I said, and added absurdly, \"That's why I don't wash.\" going—but I know that if I stuck to the old man, I was a comer ... even if he was a goner! Doc had this solemn human by the throat when I caught up with him. \"Tonight,\" Doc was saying in his old voice that was as crackled and Moon and the silver ship, symbols of greed. Tonight is the night when this is to happen.\" What is Doc's full name? \" \"Sure,\" the man agreed severely, prying a little worriedly at Doc's \" I almost fell in, but at the last instant I caught myself and said, arthritic fingers that were clamped on his collar. \"No argument. Sure, during all these weeks and months. His hands looked old and crippled, but I felt they were the strongest in the world. If a half dozen winos \"He didn't use that,\" Andre said. So I was an Earthman, Doc's son. So my addiction to coffee was all in It was easier this night and that made me afraid. Doc's thin frame, layered with lumpy fat, was beginning to muscle-dance against my side. One of his times was coming on him. Then at last he was free of the wanted for the murder of a North American Mountie. I didn't want to be cured. I wouldn't be. Doc was gone. That was all I he left. \"The rest is simple,\" Andre said. \"Doc O'Malley bought up all the stock in a certain ancient metaphysical order and started supplying members had now. That and the thing with certain books. Can you imagine the effect of the if we didn't. Doc was liable to say something that might nova Sol, for all I knew. . They weren't men the human race can tell itself how to achieve a state of pure logic, without food, without sex, without conflict—just as Doc has achieved such a state—a little late, true. He had a powerful guilt complex, like Doc and me. even stronger than your withdrawal, over releasing this blessing on Then I realized what was about to happen. It was foolish and awful and true. I was going to have one of mine at the same time Doc was having his. That was bad. It had happened a few times right after I first found him, but now it was worse. For some undefinable reason, I felt we kept getting closer each of the times. \"Fifteen cents a bed,\" he said mechanically. \"We'll use one bed,\" I told him. \"I'll give you twenty cents.\" I felt I knew I could not let Doc's—Dad's—time travel \"Fifteen cents a bed,\" he played it back for me. Doc was quivering against me, his legs boneless. \"We can always make it over to the mission,\" I lied. thing fall into since we ain't full up. In ad vance.\" room better'n a bed for twenty.\" Desperately. Nothing came out of my gabbling mouth. so. Want I should call a cop and tell him you were flexing a muscle?\" I let go of him. He didn't scare me, but Doc was beginning to mumble and that did up we go. But leave me go or, so help me, I'll fetch you one in the \"Where's the room?\" I asked. high. The other foot was finished in chicken wire. There was a wino singing on the left, a wino praying on the right, and the door didn't have any lock on it. At last, Doc and I were alone. scalp still smarted from the alcohol I had stolen from a convertible's gas tank to get rid of Doc's and my cooties. Lucky that I never needed one finger at a time. It had to be done this way. I had learned that Doc began to mumble louder. I knew I had to move. my notebook and orb-point in my hands. I found I couldn't focus both in Seattle hadn't helped me get them loose, Doc and I would have been my mind and my eyes through the electric flashes of agony, so I concentrated on Doc's voice and trusted my hands would follow their Seven search of what. Two boxes His voice rose to a meaningless wail that stretched into non-existence. to know to become the most powerful man in the Solar Federation. That wasn't just an addict's dream. I knew who Doc was. When I got to thinking it was just a dream and that I was dragging this old man around North America for nothing, I remembered who he was. I remembered that he was somebody very important whose name and work I had once known, even if now I knew him only as Doc. Pain was a pendulum within me, swinging from low throbbing bass to high screaming tenor. I had to get out and get some. But I didn't have a Doc alone, but I had to. He was starting to cry. He didn't always do that. I listened to him for a moment, then tested and tasted the craving that Doc was twisting on the cot, tears washing white streaks across his face. I shoved Doc's face up against my chest. I held onto him and let him bellow. I soothed the lanks of soiled white hair back over his lumpy skull. I hadn't eaten in a day and a half, but I didn't care much. \"Now what do you want to eat?\" the woman asked. hour for the rest of my life. glass of milk. I didn't want to black out on coffee with Doc waiting for me. I tried not to think about it and helped Doc through the fly-specked to have this secret, Kevin,\" the Andre did not deny that he wanted it to fall into his hands. cup of coffee and a glass of milk. I want four more 'burgers to go and Doc sat on the floor in the half-darkness and he had made a thing . Doc had ever made anything. It didn't look like much, but it was a start. He had broken the light bulb and used the filament and screw bottom. hamburgers on the wooden chair, hoping the odor wouldn't bring any hungry rats out of the walls. I knelt beside Doc. \"An order, my boy, an order,\" he whispered. I didn't know what he meant. Was he suddenly trying to give me orders? \"Concentrate,\" Doc said hoarsely. \"Concentrate....\" I wondered what the words meant. Wondering takes a kind of concentration. A thin, sickly man was sprawled in the other chair in a rumpled rooms,\" the thin man remarked, \"but never before have they used \"I have no data,\" the thin man answered coolly. \"In such instance, one illness and is suffering a more serious addiction to tell me the place then would you let yourself fall into such an underfed and unsanitary would tell us something of his age with special reference to the theory and practice of temporal transference, Doctor, we would be better I watched her face flash blue, red, blue and knew she meant it. But I had known too much in too short a time. I had to help Doc, but there was something else. \"I just want a drink of coffee from that container on the chair,\" I topographical way divorced from modern physical sciences. He kept it secret and he wanted to make money with it. He was an idealist—he had I didn't know whether she was asking me, but I didn't know. All I knew was that I had to help Doc and get some coffee. \"It takes money—money Doc didn't have—to make money,\" Miss Casey said, \"even if you know what horse will come in and what stock will prosper. Besides, horse-racing and the stock market weren't a part of Doc's character. He was a scholar.\" Why did she keep using the past tense in reference to Doc? It scared me. He was lying so still with the left side of his face so twisted. I on the floor to the cot. Doc had a pulse, but it was irregular. I checked for\n\n<question>:\nWhy does the narrator only want one bed?\n\n<options>:\nA He wants to be able to buy himself a coffee later on\nB He needs the spare money to buy food for himself and Doc\nC He is convinced everyone is trying to cheat him out of his money, and refuses to pay for more than he needs\nD He is frugal on principle, and knows that Doc needs supervision\n\n<answer>:\n", "assistant": "A" } ]

[ { "human": "Read the following passage and questions, then choose the right answer from options, the answer should be one of A, B, C, D.\n\n<passage>:\nlife traces on that little moon, but it would be a lively place. So on the body? Naturally they did not get results at once, nor did they expect to it but one city, if that is its form. Shall we follow the rest of the designed simply to locate a source of superior thought. But this might be so varied or so unfamiliar that often both the machine and the difference , the machine insisted. on ninety per cent of the acknowledged superior minds of the Earth. In space it had been a it had read Positive on a two-inch-long worm, only one of them out of billions. For the countless identical worms no trace of anything at all was shown by the test. Finally it signaled the result, the most exasperating result it ever produces: the single orange light. It was the equivalent of the shrug of the shoulders in a man. They called it the \"You tell me light.\" So among the intelligences there was at least one that might be \"No. The rest of the world may be dangerous. There must be a reason that thought is in one spot only. If we find no others then we will go down boldly and visit this.\" So they all, except Steiner, went off to their bunks then: Stark, the Captain Dawn did not come to the moon-town. The Little Probe hovered stationary in the light and the moon-town came up under the dawn. Then the Probe \"There's no town,\" said Steiner. \"Not a building. Yet we're on the \"Not a building, not two sticks or stones placed together. That looks like an Earth-type sheep there. And that looks like an Earth-lion, I'm almost afraid to say. And those two ... why, they could well be Earth-people. But with a difference. Where is that bright light coming from?\" go to meet them at once. Timidity has never been an efficacious tool with us.\" Well, they were people. And one could only wish that all people were like them. There was a man and a woman, and they were clothed either in very bright garments or in no garments at all, but only in a very bright light. He may or may not have been understood, but the two of them smiled at him, so he went on. but the woman smiled, proving that she was human. \"The woman is named Hawwah,\" said the man. \"The sheep is named sheep, the lion is named lion, the horse is named horse and the hoolock is named hoolock.\" \"I understand. It is possible that this could go on and on. How is it \"I have only one tongue but it is given to us to be understood by all by the eagle, by the squirrel, by the ass, by the English.\" \"We happen to be bloody Yankees, but we use a borrowed tongue. You wouldn't have a drink on you for a tubful of thirsty travellers, would you?\" \"The fountain.\" \"Ah—I see.\" But the crew all drank of the fountain to be sociable. It was water, but water that excelled, cool and with all its original bubbles like the first water ever made. \"What do you make of them?\" asked Stark. \"Human,\" said Steiner. \"It may even be that they are a little more than human. I don't understand that light that surrounds them. And they seem to be clothed, as it were, in dignity.\" \"And very little else,\" said Father Briton, \"though that light trick \"Are there any other people here?\" Stark asked the man. \"The two of us. Man and woman.\" \"But are there any others?\" \"How would there be any others? What other kind of people could there be than man and woman?\" \"But is there more than one man or woman?\" \"How could there be more than one of anything?\" The captain was a little puzzled by this, but he went on doggedly: \"Ha-Adamah, what do you think that we are? Are we not people?\" \"You are not anything till I name you. But I will name you and then you can be. You are named Captain. He is named Priest. He is named Engineer. He is named Flunky.\" \"Thanks a lot,\" said Steiner. \"But are we not people?\" persisted Captain Stark. \"No. We are the people. There are no people but two. How could there be other people?\" \"And the damnest thing about it,\" muttered Langweilig, \"is, how are you will want to sleep on the grass. Being not of human nature (which does \"We will,\" said Captain Stark. They wandered about the place, but they were uneasy. There were the animals. The lion and lioness were enough to make one cautious, though they offered no harm. The two bears had a puzzling look, as though they wanted either to frolic with you or to mangle you. \"If there are only two people here,\" said Casper Craig, \"then it may be that the rest of the world is not dangerous at all. It looked fertile wherever we scanned it, though not so fertile as this central bit. And \"Flecked with gold, and possibly with something else,\" said Stark. \"A very promising site.\" \"And everything grows here,\" added Steiner. \"Those are Earth-fruits and whether this is reality. Go ahead and eat one.\" \"I won't be the first to eat one. You eat.\" \"Ask him first. You ask him.\" \"Ha-Adamah, is it allowed to eat the apples?\" \"Certainly. Eat. It is the finest fruit in the garden.\" \"Well, the analogy breaks down there,\" said Stark. \"I was almost not the idea that it was the apple that was forbidden go back only to a medieval painting?\" \"It does. The name of the fruit is not mentioned in Genesis. In Hebrew exegesis, however, the pomegranate is usually indicated.\" \"I thought so. Question the man further, Father. This is too that on at least one other unfortunate world it has actually been lost.\" \"Do you consider yourself a knowledgeable man?\" \"Yes, since I am the only man, and knowledge is natural to man. But I am further blessed. I have a preternatural intellect.\" Then Stark cut in once more: \"There must be some one question you could colors and first move.\" \"No. It would be no contest. I have a preternatural intellect.\" \"No. It would be no contest. I would not like to humble you.\" They were there for three days. They were delighted with the place. It was a world with everything, and it seemed to have only two inhabitants. They went everywhere except into the big cave. They learned no more of the real nature of the sphere in their time there. Yet all but one of them were convinced of the reality when they Iron, Earth-Type Fauna. Terms. Special Rates for Large Settlement as listed below. Ask for Brochure—Eden Acres Unlimited.\" Down in the great cave that Old Serpent, a two-legged one among whose names were \"Snake-Oil Sam,\" spoke to his underlings: and slaughter and stow before there was another batch to take care of.\" \"I think you'd better write me some new lines,\" said Adam. \"I feel like a goof saying those same ones to each bunch.\" \"You are a goof, and therefore perfect for the part. I was in show business long enough to know never to change a line too soon. I did change Adam and Eve to Ha-Adamah and Hawwah, and the apple to the pomegranate. People aren't becoming any smarter—but they are becoming better researched, and they insist on authenticity. wheeled, tracked, propped, vaned and jetted vehicles and power packs to run a world. \"Amazing quality of longevity seemingly inherent in the locale. Climate ideal. Daylight or half-light. All twenty-one hours from Planet neighbors. A completely planned globular settlement in a near arm of \"If I have a preternatural intellect I wouldn't be afraid of a game of checkers with anyone. Yet there was an unusual mind there somewhere\n\n<question>:\nWhy was each inhabitant of the moon-town only referred to as their specific species rather than a distinct name?\n\n<options>:\nA They were all distinct by their light, and only needed to be referred to as their species.\nB The population was much too large to name each creature.\nC The humans of moon-town felt no need to waste time in naming each living creature as they died off too quickly.\nD There was only one of each, therefore, they were called by their species.\n\n<answer>:\n", "assistant": "D" } ]

[ { "human": "Read the following passage and questions, then choose the right answer from options, the answer should be one of A, B, C, D.\n\n<passage>:\nGarden and so on. And one man, who probably isn't there himself, picks up every tab. Some of the lesser fry may even utter the Condé Nast mantra--though it is hardly necessary at the Royalton--as they grab for the check: \"Let Si get this.\" S.I. \"Si\" Newhouse Jr. and his younger brother, Donald, control Advance Publications, one of America's largest privately held companies. (Estimate of their combined wealth: $13 billion.) Donald tends to Advance's hugely profitable newspaper, radio, and TV holdings. Si runs the less profitable but more glamorous properties. These are the 15 Condé Nast magazines, including (in descending order of fabulousness) Vogue , Vanity Fair , GQ , Condé Nast Traveler , House &amp Garden , Allure , Details , Self , Mademoiselle , and Glamour and Random House. The expense-account lunch is a hallowed journalistic tradition. But consider a day in the life of an editor working for Si Newhouse. (Donald's editors are a different story, as they will be happy to tell you.) It's a closed economy where almost all human needs and desires can be gratified with a miraculous, unlimited currency called the Si. You've forgotten to return the video your kids watched yesterday, so you have a messenger take it back to Blockbuster. Si spends $20 you save a $1.50 late fee. Then there's lunch. The magazines account for more than a quarter of daytime revenues at the Four Seasons and the Royalton. A modest lunch for two at the Royalton (no fancy wine or anything) might cost $80. But Si's generosity extends to even assistants and sub-sub-editors, dining on sushi at their desks. If you spend $10 or less on lunch, and claim you were working, Si pays. At Vogue and Vanity Fair , almost everyone has a \"working lunch\" every day . An editor at Allure says that \"working lunches\" there are limited to 10 a month. Back at the office, you hear that a friend at another Newhouse magazine has been promoted, so you send flowers. The tab: $100. Si pays. (One of my favorite Condé Nast stories is of an editor who had just been promoted to an extremely senior job. His office was jammed with congratulatory flowers and cards. All had been sent by fellow Condé Nast staffers. All had been billed to the company.) Four o'clock, and it's snack time. Your assistant joins the mob in the lobby newsstand. She bills your candy bar, juice, and cigarettes (as well as her own candy bar, juice, and cigarettes) to the magazine ($15). After all, it's a \"working snack.\" Later, there's a birthday party for your assistant. You order champagne and a cake--on the company, of course, and present her with your gift--a Prada wallet ($200). Later, she submits the expense sheet for it. Finally, after a Random House book party at Le Cirque 2000 (estimated cost to Si: $35,000), your car ferries you home. Newhouse expense stories are a staple of New York literary-journalistic conversation. Stories about the $10,000 in expenses that a New Yorker editor billed for a single month. About the interior-decorating costs for the fashion-magazine editor who likes to have her office photographs rearranged every few months. About the hotel tab for the big-name New York writer who spent three weeks in Washington's Hay-Adams (basic room: $285 a night) researching a Vanity Fair story that will never run. About the Vogue editor who has furnished her summer house from items purchased for fashion shoots--beautiful furniture, designer pillows, coffee-table books. Vogue assistants have nicknamed the house \"Petty Cash Junction.\" None of the 39 past and present Newhouse employees I spoke to for this story would talk on the record, for . And the nature of the subject makes it hard to separate apocrypha from the truth. Did Condé Nast pay, as sources insist it did, hundreds of thousands of dollars in back taxes on behalf of an editor who didn't bother to file tax forms? Did an editor really expense $20,000 in a weeklong trip to Paris? The people who pay the bills are not talking. But every example of excess cited here was told to me by at least one source (and usually more than one) in a position to know. Need a facial? Treat yourself and bill it to Si. This is what is called \"scouting.\" It is also a great way to get free haircuts. To be fair, Si doesn't pay for all such treats. There is also a much-honored tradition of accepting tribute from companies that Condé Nast magazines cover. One magazine exec reportedly got so much loot last Christmas--Cuban cigars, \"crates of wine,\" designer suits (\"It was like a Spanish galleon\")--that he needed three cars to cart it home. At yuletide, even midlevel fashion-mag writers and editors are inundated with \"cashmere sweaters, Versace pillows, coats ...\" recalls one ex- Vogue staffer wistfully. At the top of the masthead, the perks are perkier. His Si-ness (their joke, not mine) does not expect his editors in chief to actually live on their million-dollar salaries. He also gives them clothing allowances (up to $50,000 a year). He buys them cars of their choice and hires chauffeurs to drive them. He offers them low- or no-interest home loans. GQ editor Art Cooper reportedly received two $1-million loans, one for a Manhattan apartment, the other for a Connecticut farm. Tina Brown and her husband, Harold Evans, former president of Random House, reportedly just took a $2-million boost to buy a $3.7-million Manhattan house. Public media companies such as Time Warner (or, for that matter, Microsoft) can entice and hold journalists with stock options. Advance is private, so Newhouse uses other golden handcuffs. He runs a lifestyle prison. Top editors stay because they could never afford to live in a house as nice as the one Si's interest-free loan bought them, or to host parties as nice as the ones Si's party planners throw for them. Condé Nast's magazines are all about glamour, wealth, prestige. To uphold that image, magazine editors need to circulate at the top of New York society. But the top of New York society consists of people who make far more money than magazine editors do--investment bankers, corporate chieftains, and fashion designers. Million-dollar salaries aren't enough to mix as equals with the Trumps and Karans. Si's perks are equalizers. And they say it's not as good as it used to be. In 1992, according to Thomas Maier's biography of Newhouse, the editor of Self held a birthday party for Si Newhouse's dog . (Owners ate caviar dogs drank Evian.) The lowliest assistants used to take car services home. But new Condé Nast CEO Steve Florio has restricted cars and catering. Editors who used to fly the Concorde now fly first-class\n\n<question>:\nIn the context of the article, who is Si and what does he do?\n\n<options>:\nA Si, or The Si, is the person responsible for covering the absurd costs of of the New York Editor lifestyle.\nB Si, or The Si, is the person responsible for covering the absurd expenditure of New York parties.\nC Si, or The Si, is the person responsible for the culture that has developed around the writer/editor lifestyle.\nD Si, or The Si, is the person responsible for covering the absurd expenditure of the Condé Nast magazines.\n\n<answer>:\n", "assistant": "D" } ]

[ { "human": "Read the following passage and questions, then choose the right answer from options, the answer should be one of A, B, C, D.\n\n<passage>:\nUnmade Beds , Nicholas Barker's \" 'real life' feature film,\" has proudly worn its mongrel status as a \"directed\" documentary of single life in the big city, employing, in the face of criticism, what amounts to a cackling-punk defiance. The movie tracks four aging New Yorkers--two men, two women--through their lonely dating rituals, in the process depicting a universe of lusty, coupled-up haves and downcast, excluded have-nots, all viewed Rear Window -style through rectangular openings in the massive apartment houses in which they reside. Those truths are large, all right. Take Michael, the 40-year-old, 5 foot 4 inch lonely guy who has been looking for a wife for almost two decades. If you were to walk past him on the street, you might think that a man of his small stature might have some trouble getting dates and be rather bitter about it. The larger dramatic truth is that Michael has lots of trouble getting dates and is very bitter about it. Just in case you feel too sorry for him, however, Barker is careful to include a homophobic monologue in which Michael complains about young women who waste their lives hanging out with effeminate males. Michael turns out to be the film's most sympathetic subject--by a wide margin. At least he's not Mikey, a paunchy 54-year-old who writes but can't sell screenplays and who always flees blind dates, because the women he gets fixed up with are \"mutts.\" Sounding like one of the low-level gangsters who posture like kingpins in Donnie Brasco , Mikey talks a lot about mutts. He also reminisces about that 24 hour period in the '70s when he managed to sleep with three different beautiful women, whose pictures he shows off. These days, all he meets are mutts. He comes off as a pathetic little loser--a mutt. Barker might have crafted his subjects' monologues from their own words, but he has robbed them of their spontaneity--and, thus, of their essence. They aren't thinking or trying to come to grips with their situations in front of your eyes, because they already know what they're going to say: They've been fixed like butterflies on the ends of pins and held up for voyeuristic inspection. The scenes with friends and confidantes have a crude, programmatic purpose. You can imagine the director composing a shot (the shots are tightly composed and elaborately lighted) and reminding them, \"In this scene she points out that you should lose weight and you get shocked and defensive. Ready ... Action.\" So what are Barker's \"larger dramatic truths\"? Single people in big cities can be desperate. Single people fear they're going to die alone--unloved and unloving. People are judged and, in turn, judge others by how they look. Big news. One could argue, charitably, that the movie is meant to be prescriptive, that Barker intends for us to regard the ways in which his subjects delude themselves and thereby learn to see through our own self-delusions. But Barker hasn't concocted a larger dramatic structure that would hold those larger dramatic truths together and help us comprehend where these people went wrong. He dramatizes right up to the point where a dramatist would be expected to provide some insight--and then, hey, he's a documentarian. The Slums of Beverly Hills also walks a line between two genres, in this case coming-of-age sex comedy and autobiographical monologue. Tamara Jenkins, the writer and first-time director, has an eye for absurd juxtapositions that was obviously sharpened by the pain of her nomadic upbringing. Her protagonist (Natasha Lyonne) spends her teen-age years being shuttled with her two brothers from one cheap dive to another in the 90210 ZIP code, all because her egregiously unsuccessful father (Alan Arkin) wants them to be educated in the best schools. (\"Furniture's temporary education is permanent.\") It's a major omission, then, that we never see those schools or the kids' interaction with their stable, well-to-do Beverly Hills counterparts. We can't tell if the father is, on some weird level, justified in his fervor, or whether he's screwing up his children--subjecting them to humiliation and robbing them of a sense of permanence--for no reason. Jenkins hasn't quite figured out how to shape her narrative, which is full of episodes that are there because they actually happened but that don't have a payoff. I almost wish she'd included more voice-over narration, more commentary on the things that, as a filmmaker, she hasn't learned to bring out. The Slums of Beverly Hills never gels, but it has a likable spirit, and it's exceedingly easy on the eye, with lots of pretty girls and wry evocations of '70s fashions and decor. The father, to obtain financial support from his wealthy brother (Carl Reiner), volunteers to take in his vaguely schizzy, dipsomaniacal niece (Marisa Tomei). She and her cousin compare breasts, play with vibrators, and talk in pig Latinish gibberish, but Jenkins never lets the proceedings get too sentimental: The whimsy is always cut with an acidic awareness of the family's desperation. \"Are we middle-class now?\" ask the children, hopefully, before another crisis sends them back into their van, cruising past the movie stars' mansions, in the mean streets of Beverly Hills. Grading on the steep curve established by summer blockbuster seasons past, these have turned out to be a pretty good few months at the movies. Even the commercial swill ( Deep Impact , Armageddon , The Mask of Zorro , Small Soldiers , Snake Eyes , Halloween: H20 ) has been of a high grade, and Saving Private Ryan and Return to Paradise were Vitalis slaps in the kisser for people woozy from all the warm weather escapism. Out of Sight was tender and charming, as was, in its gross-out way, There's Something About Mary . And, on the indie front, The Opposite of Sex , Buffalo 66 , and Pi have proved that there's still commercial life after Sundance. Sure, we had stinkers, but even Godzilla was fun to jeer at. And there's something reassuring about the fact that The Avengers is so rotten: proof yet again that people with piles of money can hire wizard production designers but can't fake class.\n\n<question>:\nWhat, according to the author, is the main flaw of The Slums of Beverly Hills?\n\n<options>:\nA The female characters are reduced to naive, sex-obsessed girls, when they are much more complex in reality\nB The director too obviously uses the film as an outlet for resolving her own childhood devastations\nC It is difficult for the audience to make sense of the director's absurd juxtapositions\nD The audience never gets to see the children interact within the context that motivates their father to uproot their lives\n\n<answer>:\n", "assistant": "D" } ]

[ { "human": "Read the following passage and questions, then choose the right answer from options, the answer should be one of A, B, C, D.\n\n<passage>:\nWomen on space station assignments shouldn't get pregnant. But there's a first steel hull was the silence of the interplanetary vacuum inside, in the hospital ward, Lieutenant Alice Britton clutched at the sheets of her bed in pain, then relaxed as it faded away. Major Banes looked at her and smiled a little. \"How do you feel, she knew the pain wouldn't return for a few minutes yet. \"Fine, doctor. It's no worse than I was expecting. How long will Service, but that doesn't give him the right to come blasting up here on a supply rocket just to get you pregnant!\" Alice had said: \"I'm sure the thought never entered his mind, doctor. I know it never entered mine.\" me before this? Of all the tom-fool—\" His voice had died off in suppressed anger. \"I didn't know,\" she had said stolidly. \"You know my medical record.\" not equipped for obstetrics up here.\" She hadn't thought of it before, but the major was right. The terrible pressure of a rocket landing would increase her effective body weight to nearly half a ton an adult human being couldn't take that sort of So she had stayed on in the Space Station, doing her job as always. As Chief Radar Technician, she was important in the operation of the station. Her pregnancy had never made her uncomfortable the slow gravity at the rim only half that of Earth's surface, and the closer to the hub she went, the less her weight became. According to the major, the baby was due sometime around the first of September. \"Two hundred and eighty days,\" he had said. \"Luckily, we can pinpoint it almost exactly. And at a maximum of half of Earth gravity, As the words went through her mind, another spasm of pain hit her, and she clenched her fists tightly on the sheets again. It went away, and she took a deep breath. Everything had been fine until today. And then, only half an hour ago, that short time, a lot of air had gone whistling out into the vacuum of space. The depressurization hadn't hurt her too much, but the shock had been enough to start labor. The baby was going to come two months early. She relaxed a little more, waiting for the next pain. There was nothing to worry about fingertips and looking worriedly at the clock on the wall. The Chief Nurse at a nearby desk took off her glasses and looked at him speculatively. \"Something wrong, doctor?\" \"Incubator,\" he said, without taking his eyes off the clock. \"I beg your pardon?\" \"Incubator. We can't deliver a seven-month preemie without an incubator.\" The nurse's eyes widened. \"Good Lord! I never thought of that! What are you going to do?\" \"Right now, I can't do anything. I can't beam a radio message through I'll ask them to send up an emergency rocket with an incubator. But—\" \"But what?\" \"Will we have time? The pains are coming pretty fast now. It will be at least three hours before they can get a ship up here. If they miss us on the next time around, it'll be five hours. She can't hold out that DELIVERY. HANG ON. OVER. station was protected by airtight doors and individual heating units if some accident, such as a really large meteor hit, should release the air from one room, nearby rooms would be safe. Banes' next stop was the hospital ward. Alice Britton was resting quietly, but there were lines of strain first child born in space. And it's my job to see to it that you're late. This isn't going to last that long.\" I'll send a nurse in to be with her.\" THE FORT, BABY, THE WHOLE WORLD IS PRAYING FOR YOU. OUT. Banes sat on the edge of his desk, pounding a fist into the palm of his left hand. \"Two hours. It isn't soon enough. She'll never hold out that long. And we don't have an incubator.\" His voice was a clipped monotone, timed with the rhythmic slamming of his fist. The Chief Nurse said: \"Can't we build something that will do until the rocket gets here?\" out of? There's not a spare piece of equipment in the station. It costs \"Not now, but thanks for the information.\" He hung up and looked into the Chief Nurse's eyes. \"They've released the news to the public.\" She frowned. \"That really puts you on the spot. If the baby dies, they'll blame you.\" save that baby!\" He paused as he saw her eyes. \"I'm sorry, Lieutenant. My nerves are all raw, I guess. But, dammit, my field is space medicine. I can handle depressurization, space sickness, and things like that, but I don't know anything about babies! I know what I read in medical school, and I watched a delivery once, but that's all I people aren't supposed to go around having babies on a space station!\" \"It's all right, doctor. Shall I prepare the delivery room?\" His laugh was hard and short. \"Delivery room! I wish to Heaven we had one! Prepare the ward room next to the one she's in now, I guess. It's the best we have. The nurse left quietly. She knew Banes wasn't really angry at the Brittons it was simply his way of letting off steam to ease the seemed to drag time grudgingly along with it. Banes wished he could smoke to calm his raw nerves, but it was strictly against regulations. board had had to be carried up in rockets when the station was built in space. The air purifiers in the hydroponics section could keep the air fresh enough for breathing, but fire of any kind would overtax the system, leaving too little oxygen in the atmosphere. It was a few minutes of ten when he decided he'd better get back to Alice Britton. She was trying to read a book between spasms, but she water that keeps him out of the way, and the doctor has coffee When the pain had ebbed away, he said: \"We've got the delivery room all ready. It won't be much longer now.\" \"I'll say it won't! How about the incubator?\" There was a long pause. Finally, he said softly: \"There isn't any incubator. I didn't take the possibility of a premature delivery into account. It's my fault. I've done what I could, though the ship is bringing one up. I—I think we'll be able to keep the child alive until—\" Me get hysterical! That's a good one! What about you? You're so nervous you couldn't sip water out of a bathtub without spilling it!\" He blinked. \"What do you mean?\" Another pain came, and he had to wait until it was over before he got her answer. \"Doctor,\" she said, \"I thought you would have figured it out. Ask yourself just one question. Ask yourself, 'Why is a space station like an incubator?'\" thirty-four, and two men in spacesuits pushed a large, bulky package through the airlock. Major Peter Banes, haggard but smiling, met Captain Britton in the corridor as he and the colonel entered the hospital ward. The colonel said nothing, but he raised an eyebrow. \"Over an hour ago,\" said Banes. \"But—but—the incubator—\" Banes' grin widened. \"We'll put the baby in it, now that we've got it, but it really isn't necessary. Your wife figured that one out. A space station is a kind of incubator itself, you see. It protects us poor, weak humans from the terrible conditions of space. So all we had to do was close up one of the airtight rooms, sterilize it, warm it up, and put in extra oxygen from the emergency tanks. Young James is perfectly\n\n<question>:\nWhich is not true about why a baby has to be delivered in a small room on the Station?\n\n<options>:\nA It was the only space available for the delivery\nB The oxygen levels in the baby's environment had to be carefully controlled\nC Returning to Earth while pregnant would be too dangerous for the baby\nD The temperature in the med bay was not safe for the baby\n\n<answer>:\n", "assistant": "A" } ]

[ { "human": "Read the following passage and questions, then choose the right answer from options, the answer should be one of A, B, C, D.\n\n<passage>:\n\"They've found the tractor,\" McIlroy said. \"Good,\" Phelps mumbled, and then as comprehension came \"Can't tell yet. They spotted the tractor from the satellite observatory. Captain Jones took off a few minutes ago, and he'll report back as soon as he lands. Hadn't you better get some sleep?\" The meteor, a pebble, a little larger than a match head, traveled that died when the meteor was created fell on Earth before the first In its last instant, the meteor fell on the Moon. It was impeded by Later, in Evans' tractor, he was telling his story: \"... And I don't know how long I sat there after I found the water.\" He were spit through the casing. The turbine again reached a stable state, that is, stopped. Permanently stopped. It was two days to sunrise, where Evans stood. It was just before sunset on a spring evening in September in Sydney. The shadow line between day and night could be seen from the Moon to be drifting across Australia. Evans, who had no watch, thought of the time as a quarter after Australia. followed a stampede to Yellow Crater, where he thought for a while that he had a fortune in chromium. The chromite petered out in a month and a the first landing on the Moon. Evans was due back at Williamson Town at about sunset, that is, in about there was a four-day reserve. By diligent conservation, he might make it last an extra day. Four days twenty-one days to live. In seventeen days he might be missed, but in seventeen days it would be dark again, and the search for him, if it ever began, could not begin for thirteen more days. At the earliest it would be eight days too late. \"Well, man, 'tis a fine spot you're in now,\" he told himself. \"Let's find out how bad it is indeed,\" he answered. He reached for the into the cold darkness of space. When the meteor pierced the turbine, improbable meteor damage. McIlroy thought that on the whole, he was Everyone in the survey except McIlroy realized this, and even he accepted this without thinking about it. He had fallen into the habit of didn't particularly care to have obeyed. For example, because of an order of his stating that there would be no Mrs. Garth was simply the first four hours after waking. \"Good morning indeed,\" answered McIlroy. Morning to him had no meaning at all, but he thought in the strictest sense that it would be morning on the Moon for another week. anything that it was desirable to heat. It was used mostly, from sun-up to sun-down, to supplement the nuclear power plant. \"They went out about an hour ago,\" she answered, \"I suppose that's what they were going to do.\" \"Very good, what's first on the schedule?\" \"That's right, I just got in from Muroc last night, and I've been going over the assets of the Survey Credit Association all morning.\" sure it will be to everyone's satisfaction.\" \"I know this seems like a silly question. What day is this?\" \"Well,\" said McIlroy, \"that's not so silly. I don't know either.\" \"Mrs. Garth,\" he called, \"what day is this?\" \"Why, September, I think,\" she answered. \"I mean what day .\" \"I don't know, I'll call the observatory.\" There was a pause. \"They say what day where?\" she asked. \"Greenwich, I guess, our official time is supposed to be Greenwich Mean Time.\" There was another pause. \"They say it's September fourth, one thirty a.m. \" \"Well, there you are,\" laughed McIlroy, \"it isn't that time doesn't mean anything here, it just doesn't mean the same thing.\" one bank moved so jerkily that it could not be focused, and it threatened to tear several of the mirrors loose. \"What happened here?\" Spotty Cade, one of the electrical technicians asked his foreman, Cowalczk, over the intercommunications radio. \"I've got about a hundred pinholes in the cables out here. It's no wonder they don't work.\" \"Meteor shower,\" Cowalczk answered, \"and that's not half of it. Walker hit.\" \"When did it happen?\" Cade wanted to know. \"Must have been last night, at least two or three days ago. All of 'em too small for Radar to pick up, and not enough for Seismo to get a rumble.\" \"Sounds pretty bad.\" \"You mean only one hit our gear,\" Lehman said. \"How many missed?\" made millions of years ago, but here and there, the rim of a crater covered part of a footprint, clear evidence that it was a recent one. After the sun rose, Evans returned to the lava cave that he had been the sun. The sun rose to the meridian slowly. It was a week after sunrise. The the crescent. The people on Earth saw the full moon set about the same \"He's out prospecting again. I don't expect to see him until sun-down.\" \"Oh, of course,\" McIlroy grinned as he refilled the glasses. \" Slainte, McIlroy, bach. \"Is everyone clear of the outlet?\" he asked. \"All clear,\" he heard Cade report through the intercom. building, a gray concrete structure a quarter of a mile distant. \"It would be pretty bad if they clogged up some night.\" \"Are the reactors off?\" \"Yes. Vat blew. Shut up! Let me work, Mac!\" \"Sorry,\" McIlroy said, realizing that this was no time for officials. \"Let me know when it's fixed.\" Cowalczk and Lehman opened the valve again. Water spurted out, and dwindled as they closed the valve. \"What did you do?\" asked Cade. \"The light went out and came on again.\" \"Check that circuit and see if it works,\" Cowalczk instructed. There was a pause. \"It's O.K.,\" Cade said. Cowalczk and Lehman opened and closed the valve again. \"Light is off now,\" Cade said. \"Well, I'm glad that's over,\" said Cade. \"You guys had me worried for a while.\" \"Think we weren't worried?\" Lehman asked. \"And it's not over.\" \"What?\" Cade asked. \"Oh, you mean the valve servo you two bashed up?\" \"No,\" said Lehman, \"I mean the two thousand gallons of water that we presumed that he was merely temporarily delayed. Evans began his exploration on August 25th, and was known to be McIlroy chuckled for the first time in several days. \"So that's the reason you didn't take off when you were scheduled,\" he said. \"Well, yes,\" Jones answered. \"I thought that it might happen that a A few minutes later she was back with a cup of coffee. She placed it in front of the director, and shook his shoulder gently. \"Wake up, Mr. McIlroy,\" she said, \"you told me to wake you at sunrise, and there it is, and here's Mr. Phelps.\" McIlroy woke up slowly. He leaned back in his chair and stretched. His neck was stiff from sleeping in such an awkward position. \"'Morning, Mr. Phelps,\" he said. \"Good morning,\" Phelps answered, dropping tiredly into a chair. are clouded over. Anyway the satellite observatory will be in position by the time Europe is.\" McIlroy was fully awake. He glanced at Phelps and wondered how long it had been since he had slept last. More than that, McIlroy wondered why this banker, who had never met Evans, was losing so much sleep about finding him. It began to dawn on McIlroy that nearly the whole The director turned to ask Phelps about this fact, but the banker was slumped in his chair, fast asleep with his coffee untouched. It was three hours later that McIlroy woke Phelps.\n\n<question>:\nWhat is not correct about the workers' description of the meteor shower?\n\n<options>:\nA The shower had caused a lot of damage to their equipment\nB Nobody was outside the city to get hit during the storm\nC They could identify fresh craters by locating footprints\nD It had occurred a couple of days ago\n\n<answer>:\n", "assistant": "B" } ]

[ { "human": "Read the following passage and questions, then choose the right answer from options, the answer should be one of A, B, C, D.\n\n<passage>:\nNed Vince knew that. Still, his mind, tuned to ordinary, simple things, couldn't quite realize all the vast things that had happened to himself, and to the death. But Ned Vince lived again—a million years later! \"See Ned Vince made a last effort world. The scope of it all was too A scream of brakes, the splash Ned Vince was eager for the only swift young reflexes to rely on to avoid a fearful, telescoping But Ned Vince wasn't listening, Ned could scarcely have chosen he saw and felt and heard might be some kind of nightmare. But then it might all be real instead, and that was abysmal horror. Ned was no coward—death and danger of any ordinary Earthly kind, he could have faced bravely. But the Ned Vince was still dimly conscious loneliness here, and the utter strangeness, were hideous like being stranded alone on another white—for the water, on which cracks beneath his feet, Ned him, and the occasional touch of his family would never see his body again, lost beyond recovery in this abyss. a furry body, hurried his feverish at last at the surface. dash-panel, leaving Ned in absolute animal chucklings around of that incoming water. The after a million years of erosion under an ocean that was gone. thickening mist over his brain, so that he could not think clearly. Presently, when he could no longer hold his breath, bitter liquid was sucked into his lungs. His last thoughts were those ground glistened with dry salt. of a drowning man. The machine-shop he and his dad had planet—so changed had the Earth become. A wave of intolerable homesickness came over him as he sensed the distances of time that had passed—those inconceivable everything that was familiar. He started to run, away from those glittering rodent eyes. He sensed death in that cold sea-bottom, but what of it? Death, and the Father of Change, seemed to wait.... \"Kaalleee! Tik!... Tik, tik, The excited cry, which no human throat could quite have duplicated tik!... Kaalleee!...\" gulch, water-scarred from an inconceivable He laughed harshly as he ran, welcoming that bitter, killing cold. Nostalgia had him in its clutch, and there was no answer was there to inspire it? Nothing! in his hell-world, lost beyond presently came upon Ned Vince's sounds. Then other vocal organs took up that trilling voice uttering those weird, triumphant chuckles of eagerness. Other questioning, wondering notes wail, and those short, sharp time, so that he could not escape again. There he lay, helpless, who have discovered something remarkable. The desolate expanse around motion. The icy breeze tore tiny puffs of dust from grotesque, angling drifts of soil, nearly waterless for eons. Patches of \"But listen!\" Ned protested. Ned Vince,\" came the answer sagged away, flattened by incalculable ages of erosion. At a mile distance, a crumbling heap of rubble arose. Once He could understand the utter, sick dejection of this giant from the past, lost from his own kind. Probably insanity looming. In far less extreme circumstances was gone from the Earth. Glacial ages, war, decadence, disease, and a final scattering of those ultimate superhumans to newer than this, death from homesickness had come. a million years ago. Man wanted this ancient man to live and to be happy. Or this creature would be of scant value for The sounds were not human. They were more like the chatter anachronism he had so miraculously resurrected—this human, this Kaalleee.... accumulated rubbish of antiquity. Man, it seemed, had a successor, Perhaps that is the only thing to do—to send you back to your own period of history. For I see that you will never be with a vast and unlooked-for success. Ned felt better immediately, soon.... Ned relaxed, as a tiny As soon as Ned Vince passed forward between shrewd, beady eyes, betraying the slow heritage of time, of survival of the fittest, A horde of small, grey-furred beings and their machines, toiled for many days. Ned Vince's mind swam dry mud that had encased it clothing still clung to it, after perhaps a million years. Metal had gone into decay—yes. But not this body. The answer to this saturation that had held time and change in stasis. A perfect preservative for organic tissue, aided probably during most of those passing eras by desert dryness. \"Why, Ned,\" she chuckled. \"You look as though you've been dreaming, and just woke up!\" \"Kaalleee!\" Man, that meant. Not the star-conquering demi-gods, but the ancestral stock that mighty sense of relief. \"I must have fallen asleep at the bench, here, and had a nightmare. triumph ended, while instruments flicked in his tiny hands. Ned Vince's mind, over which The final instrument he used to within, through the agency of beating down upon him, soothing images of the internal organs of this ancient human corpse. What his probing gaze revealed to him, made his pleasure and dimming his brain, so that it would never question or doubt, focused X-rays, he saw magnified devoid of moisture, the mummy Perhaps, by the application of principles long known to them, this long-dead body could be made to live again! It might move, speak, remember its past! What a marvelous subject for study it would make, back there in the museums of Kar-Rah! \"Tik, tik, tik!...\" ponder. He squeaked and chatted to himself, contemplating the magnificent, inexorable march of the ages. He remembered the ancient ruins, left by the final supermen. rust of his primitive automobile. \"The Kaalleee believes himself will survive and be happy. But there was no other way. Time is With infinite care—small, sharp hand-tools were used, now—the Even they, who once ruled Earth, never escaped from the present by so much as an instant....\" THE END sand desert, marked with low, washed-down mountains, and the too. The dead sea-bottom of the vanished Atlantic was not as But this was only its surface of their foggy evolution. Besides, in this latter day, the Fluids submerged it, slowly soaking from that hardened flesh the alkali that had preserved it and other tissues became pliable once more. Then the more delicate processes began. Still submerged in passing between complicated flesh and brain gradually took on a chemical composition nearer to that of the life that they had once known. instruments. The time passed swiftly. At last, eager and ready for whatever might happen now, form. For Ned Vince, timeless eternity ended like a gradual fading mist. When he could see clearly again, he experienced that inevitable shock of vast change around him. Though it had been dehydrated, his brain had been kept perfectly intact through the ages, and now it was restored. So his memories were as vivid as yesterday. effect on Ned Vince—a sudden, nostalgic panic. Something was fearfully wrong! The nervous terror of the unknown was on him. Feeble and dizzy after his weird resurrection, remembering as he did that moment of sinking to certain death in the pool at Pit \"Take it easy, Ned Vince....\" The words themselves, and the way they were assembled, were old, familiar friends. But the Ned's gaze searched for the To Ned Vince, it was all utterly familiar words were more repugnant somehow, simply because they could never belong in a place as eerie as this. Ned Vince did not know how only to press certain buttons to make the instrument express his thoughts in common, long-dead Ned's dark hair was wildly\n\n<question>:\nWhy does the author focus on the water returning to smoothness after Ned's wreck?\n\n<options>:\nA To demonstrate how time and progress move forward, without taking pause for the loss of a single or entire society\nB To depict the difference between a 20th century moment and the future, when water has vanished from the continent\nC To illustrate the biological effects of alkali on the composition of the human body\nD To personify the all-consuming effects of nostalgia and fear in the last moments of a human's brief life\n\n<answer>:\n", "assistant": "A" } ]

[ { "human": "Read the following passage and questions, then choose the right answer from options, the answer should be one of A, B, C, D.\n\n<passage>:\nIs &lt A NAME= Tuesday's overpowering show of force by the Nevada gambling aristocracy has had at least one audible effect on the National Gambling Impact Study Commission. Wednesday, even commission Chair Kay Coles James, a gambling skeptic, succumbs to the hideous Vegas euphemism: She begins referring to the \"gaming industry.\" After Tuesday's casino triumphalism, Wednesday is a comedown, eight hours of policy panels on teen gambling, compulsive gambling, gambling regulation, gambling marketing, and gambling credit practices. It is tough slogging, but for the first time I sense that this commission--though divided, underfunded, timid, and without any power beyond exhortation--isn't entirely useless. It may finally settle this question: Is gambling Hollywood or tobacco? Entertainment or vice? The sleek Vegas types, whose Strip palaces scramble casinos, theaters, restaurants, arcades, discos, cabarets, theme parks, concert halls, sports arenas, and museums into one giant orgy of amusement, have been selling the idea that gambling is just entertainment--Disney in the desert. This effort has largely succeeded, because Vegas is still the dominant image of American gambling, if not the dominant reality. The antis, meanwhile, cry that gambling is like cigarettes: unsafe for kids, viciously addictive, deceptively marketed, unhealthy, expensive, and unacceptable unless mightily regulated. Judging by today's hearings and by conversations with most of the commissioners, the tobacco model is winning. Today's panelists tell the commission that kids are starting to gamble too young and are getting addicted too easily, that compulsive gambling appears to be increasing as gambling spreads, that gambling marketing may be designed to addict customers, and that the industry exploits problem gamblers by allowing them to draw repeated credit card advances from ATMs on casino floors. The testimony clearly impresses the commissioners and seems especially to impress the three nonaligned commissioners who will be the swing votes on the June 1999 report. It is starting to become clear what that report will say. The commission won't (and can't) take any grand stand against gambling. Instead it will opt for small, targeted policies, concentrating on compulsive gambling. It will probably propose that casinos and state lotteries fund gambling-addiction research and that casinos take much stronger measures to bar problem gamblers from wagering. The commission may recommend that gaming taxes be used to underwrite treatment of pathological gamblers and that insurance companies be encouraged to cover gambling addiction. Similarly, the commission will try to reduce gamblers' access to cash by limiting the size of ATM advances and prodding casinos to remove the machines from their floors. Why should the pro-gamblers cooperate with a critical study? Because it provides superb cover for them. It medicalizes the problem of compulsive gambling, blaming it on psychological abnormality rather than industry machination. Likewise, cracking down on compulsives is also politically cost-effective. In exchange for losing a few compulsive gamblers, the casinos will (falsely) appear more concerned with the health of their customers than with profits. Talk about quick defeats: The first sign I see outside the MGM Grand ballroom all but declares that the National Gambling Impact Study Commission has already lost. The sign reads: \"National Gaming Impact Study Commission.\" \"Gaming\"? The hearings, too, reinforce the Glorious Las Vegas theme. Frank Fahrenkopf, the industry's top lobbyist (who is paid so much he can afford monogrammed shirt cuffs --I saw them), holds forth cheerfully outside the ballroom, celebrating the electoral triumph of freedom over religious moralist tyranny. Inside, the room is packed with more than 600 people in neon lime green T-shirts that read \"Unions and Gaming: Together for a Better Life.\" They are members of the major casino union, here to cheer on their employers and their union. (Most of them, it must be said, are getting paid to do this.) Chairwoman Kay Coles James, a Christian conservative and skeptic of gambling, opens the hearing by assuring the crowd that the committee is toothless: \"We're not here to take anyone's job. ... We have no power to do anything except make recommendations.\" This sets the mood for most of the day: Vegas is great, so you'd better leave it alone! The local government, by all appearances a wholly owned subsidiary of the casinos, puts on a bravura performance. Gov. Miller opens the show with a 15 minute hymn to Las Vegas. It is the first of many statistical barrages about Nevada's one-ders: No. 1 in job growth, No. 1 in population growth, and No. 1 on planet Earth in per capita Girl Scout troops--and Boy Scout troops! Later in the day, Nevada's senators and both its congressmen appear to chew out the commission for even thinking that Nevada might have a dark side. They pay tribute to Nevada's sophisticated gambling industry, especially its regulation (much stricter than other gambling states) and its use of gambling taxes to fund state services. It is one of the ironies of Nevada politics that its Republican congressmen (Jim Gibbons and John Ensign) end up crediting their state's success to government regulation and corporate taxation. There are also a fair share of gleeful gambling regulators, bookmakers, and casino employees among the panels of expert witnesses the commission hears from. Critics who gripe about the perils of sports gambling and the evils of convenience store slot machines leaven the pro-gambling folks. Everyone, including the gambling industry shills, agrees that Internet gambling is evil and should be destroyed. Everyone agrees to this because no one in Las Vegas is making any money off Internet gambling. If they were, you can be sure they would explain why it's as American as nickel slots and scratch-off games. Pro-Vegas forces are also perfectly happy to take shots at Indian gambling, the chief economic threat to Nevada's prosperity. The expansion of Indian casinos resulting from last week's California voter initiative will slam Las Vegas, cutting its gambling revenues by $400 million a year. So the Vegans repeatedly swing at casinos in \"Indian country\" (that's Nevada Sen. Richard Bryan's term--I'm not joking) for being insufficiently regulated and taxed. One tribal chief I spoke to calls this \"red baiting.\" (Pause for an aesthetic observation: I am sitting right behind the witnesses, and after a while I begin to separate them into the Wides and the Narrows. The Wides are men in suits with enormous backs and enormous bellies, men who eat and eat and used to play football. They all testify to their love of gambling. The Narrows are thin and generally disapprove of it. I begin to wonder whether fondness for gambling correlates with general indulgence, and dislike correlates with asceticism, and decide that they probably do.)\n\n<question>:\nWhat is a theme that could be taken from this text?\n\n<options>:\nA enough money can make anything happen\nB it's important to see all sides of the story\nC good always triumphs over evil\nD if you stand for what you believe, you will win\n\n<answer>:\n", "assistant": "A" } ]

[ { "human": "Read the following passage and questions, then choose the right answer from options, the answer should be one of A, B, C, D.\n\n<passage>:\nOne of the funniest moments in Brendan Gill's 1975 memoir, Here at \"The New Yorker ,\" comes during a luncheon at the now vanished Ritz in Manhattan. At the table are Gill William Shawn, then editor of The New Yorker Was Shawn blushing out of prudishness, as we are meant to infer? This was, after all, a man renowned for his retiring propriety, a man who sedulously barred anything smacking of the salacious--from lingerie ads to four-letter words--from the magazine he stewarded from 1952 until 1987, five years before his death. But after reading these two new memoirs about Shawn, I wonder. \"He longed for the earthiest and wildest kinds of sexual adventures,\" Lillian Ross discloses in hers, adding that he lusted after Hannah Arendt, Evonne Goolagong, and Madonna. As for Ved Mehta, he reports that Shawn's favorite thing to watch on television was \"people dancing uninhibitedly\" ( Soul Train , one guesses). I suspect Shawn did not blush at the \"cunty fingers\" remark out of prudery. He blushed because it had hit too close to home. Both these memoirs must be read by everyone--everyone, that is, who takes seriously the important business of sorting out precisely how he or she feels about The New Yorker , then and now. Of the two, Mehta's is far and away the more entertaining. This may seem odd, for Mehta is reputed to be a very dull writer whereas Ross is a famously zippy one. Moreover, Mehta writes as Shawn's adoring acolyte, whereas Ross writes as his longtime adulterous lover. Just knowing that Mrs. Shawn is still alive adds a certain tension to reading much of what this Other Woman chooses to divulge. Evidently, \"Bill\" and Lillian loved each other with a fine, pure love, a love that was more than love, a love coveted by the winged seraphs of heaven. \"We had indeed become one,\" she tells us, freely venting the inflations of her heart. Shawn was managing editor of The New Yorker when he hired Ross in 1945 as the magazine's second woman reporter (the first was Andy Logan). He was short and balding but had pale blue eyes to die for. As for Ross, \"I was aware of the fact that I was not unappealing.\" During a late-night editorial session, she says, Shawn blurted out his love. A few weeks later at the office, their eyes met. Without a word--even, it seems, to the cab driver--they hied uptown to the Plaza, where matters were consummated. Thereafter, the couple set up housekeeping together in an apartment 20 blocks downtown from the Shawn residence on upper Fifth Avenue and stoically endured the sufferings of Shawn's wife, who did not want a divorce. but later to add that he \"mourned\" for Si Newhouse when Newhouse unceremoniously fired him in 1987 (a couple of years after buying the magazine)--well, that's a bit much. Even Jesus had his limits. William Shawn's indispensability as an editor is amply manifest in Ross' memoir. Word repetition? \"Whatever reporting Bill asked me to do turned out to be both challenging and fun. ... For me, reporting and writing for the magazine was fun, pure fun. ... It was never 'work' for me. It was fun.\" Even in praising his skill as an editor, she betrays the presence of its absence. \"All writers, of course, have needed the one called the 'editor,' who singularly, almost mystically, embodies the many-faceted, unique life force infusing the entire enchilada.\" Nice touch, that enchilada. When cocktail party malcontents mocked Shawn's New Yorker in the late '70s and early '80s, they would make fun of such things as E.J. Kahn's five-part series on \"Grains of the World\" or Elizabeth Drew's supposedly soporific reporting from Washington. But Ved Mehta was always the butt of the worst abuse. Shawn was allowing him to publish an autobiography in the pages of the magazine that was mounting up to millions of words over the years, and the very idea of it seemed to bore people silly. After the publication of two early installments, \"Daddyji\" and \"Mamaji,\" each the length of a book, one critic cried: \"Enoughji!\" Mehta's multivolume autobiography, titled Continents of Exile , has loss as its overarching theme: loss of sight, of childhood, of home and country, and now--with this volume--loss of Mr. Shawn's New Yorker . The memoir takes us from the time the author was hired as a staff writer in the early '60s up to 1994, when he was \"terminated\" by the loathed Tina Brown in her vandalization of his cherished magazine. Mehta evidently loved William Shawn at least as much as Lillian Ross did, although his love was not requited in the same way. He likens the revered editor to the character Prince Myshkin in The Idiot : innocent and vulnerable, someone who must be protected. And long-suffering, one might infer: \"He was so careful of not hurting anyone's feelings that he often listened to utterly fatuous arguments for hours on end.\" Like Ross, Mehta struggles to express William Shawn's ineffable virtues. \"It is as if, Mehta, he were beyond our human conception,\" Janet Flanner tells him once to calm him down. At times I wondered whether the author, in his ecstasies of devotion, had not inadvertently committed plagiarism. His words on Mr. Shawn sound suspiciously like those of Mr. Pooter on his boss Mr. Perkupp in The Diary of a Nobody . Compare. Mehta on Shawn: \"His words were so generous that I could scarcely find my tongue, even to thank him.\" Pooter on Perkupp: \"My heart was too full to thank him.\" Mehta: \"I started saying to myself compulsively, 'I wish Mr. Shawn would ring,' at the oddest times of the day or night. ... How I longed for the parade of proofs, the excitement of rewriting and perfecting!\" Pooter: \"Mr. Perkupp, I will work night and day to serve you!\" Mehta's writerly persona, a disarming mixture of the feline and the naive, is perfect for relating the little scandals that worried The New Yorker in the late '70s (plagiarism, frozen turbot), the drama of finding a worthy candidate to succeed the aging Shawn as editor, the purchase of the magazine by the evil Si Newhouse (\"We all took fright\") and the resultant plague of Gottliebs and Florios visited upon it, and what he sees as the final debacle: Tinaji. Lillian Ross, by contrast, takes a rather cheerful view of the Brown dispensation. Indeed, the new editor even coaxed Ross into re-joining the magazine, just as she was booting Mehta out. \"I found that she possessed--under the usual disguises--her own share of Bill's kind of naivete, insight, and sensitivity,\" Ross says of Brown. \"She, too, 'got it.' \" A few months after Brown was appointed editor, Shawn died at the age of 85. He had long since stopped reading his beloved magazine, in sorrow and relief. That's if you believe Mehta. Ross assures us that Mr. Shawn was reading Tina Brown's New Yorker \"with new interest\" in the weeks prior to his death.\n\n<question>:\nWho was the editor for The New Yorker when Shawn died?\n\n<options>:\nA Brown\nB Ross\nC Mehta\nD Breenan\n\n<answer>:\n", "assistant": "A" } ]

[ { "human": "Read the following passage and questions, then choose the right answer from options, the answer should be one of A, B, C, D.\n\n<passage>:\nin the miasma of a planet without spaceflight, or sink to utter destruction! [Transcriber's Note: This etext was produced from Extensive research did not uncover any evidence that the U.S. copyright on this publication was renewed.] I The horses and packs were loaded before we went aboard the scoutship. that I might ever see, so I took a long final look from the top of the ramp. There were sixteen of us girls and thirteen boys. We took our places lost and just beginning to enjoy it when Jimmy Dentremont came over to me. He's red-headed and has a face that makes him look about ten. An intelligent runt like me. He said what I expected. \"Mia, do you want to go partners if we can get together when we get down?\" back to his place without saying anything. My name is Mia Havero. I'm fourteen, of course, or I wouldn't be telling this. I'm short, dark and scrawny, though I don't expect that scrawniness to last much longer. Mother is very good looking. In the meantime, I've got brains as a consolation. After we were all settled, George Fuhonin, the pilot, raised the ramps. We sat there for five minutes while they bled air out of our tube and then we just ... dropped. My stomach turned flips. We didn't have to The planet chosen for our Trial was called Tintera. The last contact almost 150 years ago. No contact since. That had made the Council debate a little before they dropped us there, but they decided it was all right in the end. It didn't make any practical difference to us We have a place in the Ship like that—the Third Level—but it's only a thousand square miles and any time it gets on your nerves you can go up a level or down a level and be back in civilization. When we reached Tintera, they started dropping us. We swung over the gear and then led his horse down the ramp. I think he was still smarting from the slap I'd given him. In a minute we were airborne again. I wondered if I would ever see Jimmy—if he would get back alive. It's no game we play. When we turn fourteen, they drop us on the Don't think I was helpless. I'm hell on wheels. They don't let us grow for fourteen years and then kick us out to die. They prepare us. They do figure, though, that if you can't keep yourself alive by the time you're fourteen, you're too stupid, foolish or unlucky to be any use to the Ship. There's sense behind it. It means that everybody on the Ship thirty gone. I rode in a spiral search pattern during the next two days. I had three things in mind—stay alive, find people and find some of the others. I could fit into for a month. If not, I would have to find a place to camp out, as nasty as that would be. The third was to join forces, identify. One of the smartest moves in history was to include horses when established, there was not time to set up industry, so they had to have draft animals. The first of the Great Ships was finished in 2025. One of the eight, as well as the two that were being built then, went up with everything could have been substituted but, even if they had, they would have had to be domesticated from scratch. That would have been stupid. I'll were five men on horseback herding a bunch of the ugliest creatures alive. There be escaped Losels in these woods.\" I told you I hadn't finished filling out yet, but I hadn't thought it was that bad. I wasn't ready to make a fight over the point, though. better ride on from here with us. For protection.\" He had an odd way of twisting his sounds, almost as though he had a mouthful of mush. I wondered whether he were just an oddball or whether I felt uncomfortable. I said, \"I don't think so.\" What the man did then surprised me. He said, \"I do think so,\" and didn't want to be fried. I said, \"Ease your rifles out and drop them gently to the ground.\" They did, watching me all the while with wary expressions. When all the rifles were on the ground, I said, \"All right, let's go.\" They didn't want to move. They didn't want to leave the rifles. I didn't trust the crazy kid not to shoot. After twenty minutes of easy riding for us and hard walking for the creatures, I said, \"If you want your rifles, you can go back and get them now.\" I dug my heels into Ninc's sides and rode on. At the next bend I looked back and saw four of them holding their packhorses and the creatures still while one beat a dust-raising retreat down the road. I put this episode in the \"file and hold for analysis\" section in my mind and rode on, feeling good. I think I even giggled once. Sometimes I even convince myself that I'm hell on wheels. III great-grandmother brought from Earth. The thing is that inside it, nestled one in another, are eleven more dolls, each one smaller than stone, wood and brick. Out of date. Out of time, really. There were no machines more complicated than the trucks I'd seen earlier. At the four children. It was the most foul thing I've ever seen. It struck me The first thing you learn in school is that if it weren't for idiot and criminal people like these, Earth would never have been destroyed. The evacuation would never have had to take place, and eight billion people wouldn't have died. There wouldn't have been eight billion people. their path like a cancer. They gobbled up all the resources that Earth had and crowded and shoved one another until the final war came. I am lucky. My great-great-grandparents were among those who had enough For the first time since I landed on Tintera, I felt really I reached down into my saddlebag and brought out my contact signal. The scoutship swung up in the sky in a familiar movement calculated to drop the stomach out of everybody aboard. George Fuhonin's style. I takes an advanced technology to build. I felt defeated and tired. Not much farther along the road, I came to a campsite with two wagons pulled in for the night, and I couldn't and dragged me off. When we were behind the pen and out of earshot of the fire, he stopped dragging me and dropped me in a heap. \"Make any noise,\" he said, \"and That was a silly way to put it, but somehow it said more than if he'd threatened to break my arm or my head. It left him a latitude of things my jacket. Horst turned back to me and I said, \"You can't do this and get away with it.\" He said, \"Look, boy. You may not know it, but you be in a lot of trouble. So don't give me a hard time.\" \"The courts won't let you get away with this,\" I said. I'd passed a courthouse in the town with a carved motto over the doors: EQUAL jacket. \"Every time you open your mouth you shout that you be off one of the Ships,\" Horst said. \"That be enough. They already have one of you brats in jail in Forton.\" this be for.\" He held out my pickup signal. Horst looked at it, then handed it back. \"Throw it away,\" he said. I leveled my gun at them—Hell on Wheels strikes again! I said, \"Hand that over to me.\" Horst made a disgusted sound. \"Don't make any noise,\" I said, \"or you'll fry. Now hand it over.\" I stowed it away, then paused with one hand on the leather horn of the enough,\" to the others who'd come up behind me. I felt like a fool. said in a voice far colder than mine could ever be, because it was natural and mine wasn't, \"The piece be yours.\" Then he tromped on it until it cracked and fell apart.\n\n<question>:\nHow many years has it been since Mia’s people had contact with Tintera?\n\n<options>:\nA 50\nB 200\nC 1000\nD 150\n\n<answer>:\n", "assistant": "D" } ]

[ { "human": "Read the following passage and questions, then choose the right answer from options, the answer should be one of A, B, C, D.\n\n<passage>:\nwere laughing, squealing with joy as they played games designed by CPA psychologists to relieve tension. And—despite the treatment, Joe Joe's table. it down his throat. \"Hey. You trying to make yourself sick?\" \"Not sick. Drunk. Been trying to get drunk all afternoon.\" As the liquor settled in his stomach, he waited for the warm glow. But the glow didn't come ... the bartender had watered his drink again. \"Trying to get drunk?\" the girl inquired. \"Are you crazy?\" \"No. It's simple. If I get drunk, I can join the AAA and get free room and board for a month while they give me a treatment.\" It was easy enough to understand, he reflected, but a lot harder to do. but comparatively few got drunk. Each bartender could not only mix drinks but could also judge by a man's actions and speech when he was on the verge of drunkenness. At the proper time—since drunkenness was illegal—a bartender always watered the drinks. Joe had tried dozens of times in dozens of bars to outsmart them, but had always failed. And in all of New York's millions, there had been only a hundred cases of intoxication during the previous year. The girl laughed. \"If you're that hard up, I don't know if I should take this fifty or not. Why don't you go out and get a job like Joe's face reddened as Hendricks proceeded to call him a series of . He had never heard how the treatment prevented an Ex from committing a \"And who'll hire a guy with criminal tendencies? You know the score. When you try to get a job, they ask to see your ID before they even tell you if there's an opening or not. If your CPA ID says you're a a group of teen-agers scrambled to the dance floor. Feeling safe from hidden microphones because of the uproar, he leaned across the table and whispered in the girl's ear, \"That's what I want to hire you for. I want you to help me commit a crime. If I get convicted of a crime, I'll be able to get a good job!\" or later to not even think about doing anything wrong.\" He lit a cigarette and blew a smoke ring at the car's plush ceiling. \"It's a great system, isn't it, Joe? A true democracy. Even a jerk like was \"I think it's a lousy, filthy system.\" Joe's head was still tingling something big to plan a crime. you is free to do what he wants, as long as it's legal.\" He smiled at her admiration. It freaks like yourself, criminals are—\" \"Let me out!\" Joe grabbed at the door and was on the sidewalk, slamming commit a crime was a sort of hero. He was a hero to the millions of men and women who had suppressed impulses He surprised her completely, but when she recovered, she backed away, her body poised like a wrestler's. \"What's the big idea?\" \"Scream,\" Joe said. \"Scream as loud as you can, and when the cops get here, tell 'em I tried to rape you.\" The plan was perfect, he told himself. Attempted rape was one of the few things that was a crime merely because a man attempted it. A crime because it theoretically inflicted psychological injury upon the crime. On the other hand, attempted murder, robbery, kidnapping, etc., were not crimes. They weren't crimes because the DCT didn't complete the act, and if he didn't complete the act, that meant simply that the The girl shook her head vigorously. \"Sorry, buddy. Can't help you that way. Why didn't you tell me what you wanted?\" \"What's the matter?\" Joe complained. \"I'm not asking you to do anything wrong.\" \"You stupid jerk. What do you think this is—the Middle Ages? Don't you Stop it! \" Joe discovered to his dismay that the girl was telling the truth when \"Where's the girl?\" Joe asked. \"I processed her while you were out cold. She left. Joe, you—\" \"Okay,\" Joe said. \"I'll save you the trouble. I admit it. Attempted rape. I confess.\" slouched in a chair. \"Give me your CPA ID.\" You'll be the hobby of thousands of amateur cops. You know how it works? It's like this. The Joneses are sitting around tomorrow night and they're bored. Then Mr. Jones says, 'Let's go watch this Joe Harper.' So they look up your record—amateur cops always keep records of First Classes in scrapbooks—and they see that you stop frequently hoping you'll do something exciting, like trying to kill someone, so they can be the first ones to yell ' prevent you from committing a crime, they'd get a nice reward and they'd be famous.\" \"Lay off,\" Joe said. \"I got a headache. That girl—\" Hendricks leaned even closer and glared. \"You listen, Joe. This is \"Lay off!\" Joe squirmed in the chair. He'd been lectured by Hendricks before and Joe couldn't stand the breath in his face any longer. He rose and paced and lit a cigarette. \"I'm doing you a favor, Joe. I'm trying to explain something you're too dumb to realize by yourself. We've taught everyone to hate crime and criminals ... to \"I couldn't leave if I wanted to,\" Joe said. \"I'm flat broke. Thanks to Joe waved the money away. \"Listen, why don't you do me a favor? Why don't you frame me? If I'm such a nuisance, pin a crime on me—any crime.\" \"Can't do it. Convicting a man of a crime he didn't commit is a \"Why don't you take the free psycho treatment? A man doesn't have \"Damn it, there must be some way you can help me! We both want the same thing. We both want to see me convicted of a crime.\" \"How can I help you without committing a crime myself?\" Hendricks \"In the meantime, any one of these people could be robbed. But what can I do? I can't hold this book in front of your nose and say, 'Here, Joe, pick a name and go out and rob him.'\" He laughed nervously. \"If I did that, I'd be committing a crime myself!\" Joe stared at the door to the adjoining office as it closed behind the \"Huh? Thanks for what? I didn't do anything.\" When Joe reached the street, he hurried toward the nearest subway. As a child, he had been frightened of the dark. As a man, he wasn't afraid of the dark itself, but the darkened city always made him feel ill When Joe entered the cubbyhole, he had to stand to one side in order to night and sleep, but where no normal man could live day after day. Fearing that someone might detect him before he actually committed the crime, Joe hurried to the bureau and searched it. He broke out in a sweat when he found nothing but underwear and old magazines. If he stole underwear and magazines, it would still be a When Joe was securely handcuffed to a seat inside the helicopter, the over. You can go home now. I thought I'd give you a lift.\" As Joe dressed, he searched his mind and tried to find some difference. During the treatment, he had been unconscious or drugged, unable to think. Now he could think clearly, but he could find no difference in himself. Joe didn't understand Hendricks completely, but the part he did Joe frowned. Few men had ever done him a favor and he had rarely\n\n<question>:\nWhy is Joe trying to get drunk?\n\n<options>:\nA Joe is trying to get drunk, so he can get a month's worth of free food and lodging.\nB Joe is trying to get drunk, so he can work up the nerve to ask the girl out.\nC Joe is trying to get drunk because he is depressed about his job situation.\nD Joe is trying to get drunk, so he can work up the nerve to commit a crime.\n\n<answer>:\n", "assistant": "A" } ]

[ { "human": "Read the following passage and questions, then choose the right answer from options, the answer should be one of A, B, C, D.\n\n<passage>:\nreturned my attention to the inside of the plane, to the overstuffed gray-haired woman asleep beside me, to the backs of heads in seats before me, across the aisle to other heads, and down to the blonde. I had seen her in the concourse and at the gate, a shapely thing. Now and—well, human beings. But human beings aren't worth the trouble. It's like swimming through spaghetti. And I've got to stay away from window. And I can stop clocks. Take this morning, for example. I had set my alarm for five-thirty because I had to catch the seven o'clock plane at San Francisco International Airport. This being earlier than I usually get up, it seems all I did during the night was feel my way past the escapement and balance wheel to see where the notch for the alarm was. The last So I'm stuck with a talent I've found little real use for. Except that it amuses me. Sometimes. Not like this time on the plane. The woman beside me stirred, sat up suddenly and looked across me out the window. \"Where are we?\" she asked in a surprised voice. I told her Soon the stewardesses would bring coffee and doughnuts around, so I The bomb was in a small bag—a woman's bag judging by the soft, My mind was churning when I turned from the window to look around at the unconcerned passengers, the woman at my side asleep again. I thought: Which one of these.... No, none of them would know it was there. I glanced out the window again think I put it there. Besides, what good would it do? There would be panic and they'd never get the plane down in time—if they believed me. \"Sir.\" My head jerked around. The stewardess stood in the aisle, smiling, extending a tray to me, a brown plastic tray bearing a small I goggled at her, managed to croak, \"No, thanks.\" She gave me an odd look and moved along. My seatmate had accepted hers and was tearing at the cellophane. I couldn't bear to watch her. I closed my eyes, forced my mind back to the luggage compartment, spent a frantic moment before I found the bag again. I had to stop that balance wheel, just as I stopped my alarm clock every morning. I tried to close everything off—the throb of engines, the rush of air, the afford to relax. I pushed and pulled and didn't dare release my hold until it came to a dead stop. \"Anything the matter?\" me. There was sugar from the doughnut around her mouth and she was still chewing. \"No,\" I said, letting out my breath. \"I'm all right.\" \"Must have been dreaming,\" I said as I rang for the stewardess. When she came I told her I'd take some of that coffee now. No, nothing else, the landing. When they unloaded the luggage, the balance wheel would I considered telling the authorities as soon as we landed, or maybe calling in ahead, but wouldn't that just bring suspicion, questions. Maybe I could convince them I could stop a clock—but not before the looked up into the eyes of the stewardess. I handed it to her. She took it without a word and went away. \"Were you really asleep that time?\" \"Not really,\" I said. I was tempted to tell the woman I was subject to watch the baggagemen at work, transferring the luggage to two airfield carts. They weren't as careful as I would have been. the bomb and placed in a long rack. I went with it. There was a flurry of ticket matching, hands grabbing for suitcases, and a general exodus on the part of my fellow passengers, too fast to the attendant and I had two bags—my own battered veteran of years, and over. \"Cab?\" something very mundane, the matter of a printing order. But what could I do? If I left the airport, the attendant would eventually take the bag inside and there would be an explosion, and I wouldn't be able to live with myself. counter out of the side of my eye. The attendant had picked up the bag and was walking with it up the ramp inside in time to see him enter through a side door and deposit the bag on the scales at the airline desk and say something to the clerk. The escaped my grasp. \"Do you have my suitcase?\" I blinked my eyes open and looked around. The blonde in the plane stood there looking very fresh and bright and unconcerned. In her right hand she had a green baggage claim check. The clerk took it, nodded, and in a moment brought out the overnight case and set it on the scales. The girl thanked him, picked it up, glanced at me indifferently, and then started for the entrance with it. \"Just a moment,\" I found myself saying, grabbing my bag and hurrying after her. At her side and a little ahead of her, I said, \"Listen to me.\" She looked annoyed and increased her stride toward the door. \"It's a matter of life or death,\" I said. I wanted to wrest the bag from her and hurl it out through the doorway into the street, but I restrained myself. She stopped and stared. I noticed a short, fat man in a rumpled suitcoat and unpressed pants staring, too. Ignoring him, I said, \"Please put the bag down. Over there.\" I indicated a spot beside a telephone booth where it would be out of the way. She didn't move. She just said, \"Why?\" or anything else right now if it had. \"I've got to talk to you. It's very important.\" She gave me a speculative look. I must not have seemed a complete idiot because she said, \"All right, but—\" I didn't listen for the rest. I went into the booth, closed the door, range it wasn't difficult to stop the balance wheel. Just the same, when I came out I was wringing wet. \"Now will you please tell me what this is all about?\" she said stiffly. \"Gladly. Let me buy you a cup of coffee and I'll explain.\" She glanced at the bags. I told her they'd be all right. We followed there when I finished. I asked her who put the bomb in her bag. close to bawling again. Then she recovered and said, \"I'm not sure I want to know.\" I admired her for saying it. Joe must have been crazy. \"It's all right now?\" she asked. I nodded. \"As long as we don't move it.\" I told her I didn't know how much more time there was, that I'd been thinking it over and that the only way out seemed to be to tell the airport policeman. After I explained it to her, the girl—she said her name was Julia Claremont—agreed to tell him she thought there was a bomb in her bag, that she had noticed a ticking and had become worried because she knew she hadn't packed a clock. It wasn't good, but it would have to do. \"We've got to get it deactivated,\" I said, watching the fat man pay for his coffee and leave. \"The sooner the better.\" I finished my coffee in one gulp and went to pay the bill with her. for a long while. \"She was supposed to meet me, and when she wasn't here, I got worried. She said she isn't feeling well and asked me to take a cab.\" She smiled a little. It was a bright, cheery thing. I had the feeling it was all for me. \"That's where I was going when you caught up with me.\" The policeman was sympathetic and concerned. He said, \"We'd better get over to the office.\" But we never left the spot because an explosion some blocks distant shattered the air. Julia's hand grasped my arm. Hard. \"Jets,\" the redcap said, eying the sky. was all right. I didn't want to see him. I didn't know what Julia was thinking. She said, \"About those bags,\" and looked at me.\n\n<question>:\nWhat is the role of the stewardess in the bomb situation?\n\n<options>:\nA She is able to interact with the narrator consistently to keep him calm\nB She likely never becomes aware of the situation at all\nC She is the first person the narrator confides in about the bomb\nD She keeps the passengers calm when she is aware there is a threat\n\n<answer>:\n", "assistant": "B" } ]

[ { "human": "Read the following passage and questions, then choose the right answer from options, the answer should be one of A, B, C, D.\n\n<passage>:\npatterns through the dusk of Central Park. Some of the billboards were shining, their relays activated by darkness-sensitized solenoids. A reddish-orange pallor hung from the sky. \"Why did it have to be her—or me? Why should it have to happen to attacking his olfactory patch with the retching smell of decaying flesh. Charles ignored it. Even smells had lost their customary meanings. were taller, men were healthier, most of the problems of humanity unit of population, each section of town operating on perpetual, ever-lasting, automatic atomic piles. Two years ago the animals had started dying. Strangely enough the rats had gone first, to anybody's notice. Sales of poison dropped, scientific laboratories chained to a perpetual rodent-cycle began to complain bitterly. Then the lovers who hunted out and haunted the lonely lanes through the countryside began to remark that the locusts were late that year. The Southern states joyously reported that mosquito control was working to an unprecedented degree. The largest cotton crop ever was forecast and rumors from Mexico had it that no one had died from scorpion bite in several weeks. the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals committed suicide. Within a year it was obvious to everyone that man was the only animal left on earth. The panic which had begun with the death of the animals was quieted somewhat by the fact that humans seemed immune to the pandemic. But the lakes full of dead fish caused a great stink and residents along the coasts began to move inland. Sales of perfumes and deodorants soared. Then just one year ago, the first human became infected with the strange malady. Within six months, half of the world's population was gone. Less than a month ago no more than a few thousand people remained but in a sense he was afraid—afraid that his trip to the Bureau might give him an answer he didn't dare listen to. \"But I've got to try.\" He walked on down the bloody street. Before the plague the Bureau of Vital Statistics had been one of man's crowning achievements. Housed as it was in a huge metallic globe of a building, it contained computers which kept exact account of every human on earth. Compulsory registration and the classification of each individual by means of the discrete patterns of his brain waves had accomplished for man what no ordinary census could have. The machine knew who was alive, who was dead, and where everybody was. Once a year the Bureau issued The Index, an exact accounting of Earth's four billion inhabitants. Four billion names and addresses, compressed into microprint, a tremendous achievement even for the \"Proud Era.\" dexterity he switched the computer screens on and watched them glow to life. All around the world sensitive receiving stations pulsed to activity, sending out searching fingers, hunting for elusive patterns of neutral energy, mapping and tabulating the results. The main computer screen dominated one wall of the room. Other smaller screens clustered around it. On these screens could be graphed the population of any and every part of the globe. An illuminated counter immediately above it would give the numerical strength of the area Charles activated the switches that would flash a schematic map of New York on the screen. \"There's bound to be somebody else left here. After all, there were at least twenty of us just a couple of days ago.\" And one of them, a beautiful woman, had invited him up to her apartment, not because she liked him, but because.... quickly in on him. His frantic fingers searched for the computer controls. The Pacific area, Asia, Australia, Asia Minor, Russia and the Near East, Africa and then Europe. plague. It's only logical that—\" He stopped. For even as he spoke, the light winked out! The counter clicked again. Why? Such a simple question, but in those three letters lay the essence of human nature. Why. The drive of curiosity. Stronger, in a way, than the so-called \"basic\" drives: hunger, thirst, sex, shelter, warmth, companionship, elimination. Certainly more decisive in the history of the race. Man began to think, to differentiate himself from the other animals, when he first asked the question: \"Why?\" free of bodies. \"You've got about ten minutes warning,\" he said to himself. \"I guess that most people wanted to die inside of something—inside of anything. earth, me. The last. Why me? Chance. That was it! The laws of probability, the bell-shaped curve, So simple to explain by the laws of chance. No need for any underlying assumptions about good and evil, no need for teleological arguments concerning cause and effect. Simply explain it by chance. Somebody had to be the last to go and that was— rejects such things. There must be something beyond mere accident. practice up for things like this. But it ought to be good, it ought to be proper. \"'In this now hallowed corner of the planet Earth—' No. That sounds too ... too....\" Make it simple, he thought. And he finally wrote: THE LAST MAN ON EARTH Yes. That was it. Simple. Let whoever came afterwards figure out the Somehow, though, since things were ready and it didn't make too much difference, it seemed to Charles that he'd probably have a long time to wait. \"Maybe it's just a disease, and I'm immune. I was immune to smallpox. The vaccination never took. That's probably it.\" He smiled. Strange, but now he wanted very much to go on living, alone or not. There were things he could do, ways to keep occupied. The tantalizing thought of \"why\" puzzled its way back into his mind. to the restaurant. This was the way the plague began, but—His mind quickly repressed the idea. It couldn't be the plague. He was immune! Another burst of pulsating, shattering pain crashed through his body, tearing down the defenses of his mind, putting an end of his thoughts appealed to every divinity he knew, all the time knowing it would be useless. His body, out of his voluntary control, tried to run off in all directions at once. Charles struggled to end his body's disorganized responses, to stomach protested, he vomited. It made no difference. Charles refused to think. Machines, especially half-broken machines, do they only work. Sweating, straining, bleeding, retching, he pushed himself towards his goal, trying to add one final touch of grace Instantly the thought struck him with paralyzing devastation. The sapped the last bit of his energy, corroding his nerves and dying The world will end, not with a bang, nor with a whimper, but with the last man's anguished cry at the unreasonableness of it all. Charles screamed. The large, invisible, ovular being that hung suspended over the Empire State Building rested from its exertion. Soon it was approached by another of its kind. \"I can feel the emptiness of it.\" \"It was very good. Where were you?\" \"On the next planet out. No beauty to it at all \"What's that you have there?\" \"Oh, this?\" replied the first. \"It's a higher neural order compendium the Things here made up. It's what I used.\" \"You can't take it with you, you know. They don't allow souvenirs.\" \"All right, all right. You're so good, see if you can compute the scatter probability.\" The first being moved imperceptably and the heavy plastoid binding of fluttered down into the shallow hole beneath, unnoticed. The writing on the metal, until then partially obscured by the papers, became legible:\n\n<question>:\nWhat is the true cause of Earth’s “plague” and what is its purpose?\n\n<options>:\nA The plague was facilitated by aliens, described as invisible, ovular beings. Their purpose is to clear Earth of all life and start their own colony.\nB The plague’s true cause is never revealed. Just as Charles suspects at the time of his death, the fall of the human race is completely unreasonable and meaningless.\nC The plague was facilitated by aliens, described as invisible, ovular beings. Their purpose is to exterminate all of Earth’s life in order to start their own planetary garden.\nD The plague was facilitated by aliens, described as invisible, ovular beings. Their purpose is to move from planet to planet exterminating living systems.\n\n<answer>:\n", "assistant": "D" } ]

[ { "human": "Read the following passage and questions, then choose the right answer from options, the answer should be one of A, B, C, D.\n\n<passage>:\nThe Bell Curve Flattened Charles Murray is a publicity genius, and the publication of his and Richard Herrnstein's book, The Bell Curve: Intelligence and Class Structure in American Life , in the fall of 1994 was his masterpiece. Herrnstein and Murray begin by telling us that the liberal position on IQ--namely, \"Intelligence is a bankrupt concept\"--has been discredited, and that \"a scholarly consensus has been reached\" around their position. This consensus is \"beyond significant technical dispute.\" Thus, by the end of their introduction, they have arranged matters so that if intelligence has any meaning at all, the idiotic liberals stand discredited and meanwhile, extremely broad claims for intelligence have the cover of \"consensus.\" The notion that IQ tests are completely useless never prevailed in liberal academia to nearly the extent that Herrnstein and Murray say. A more accurate rendering of the liberal position would be that rather than a single \"general intelligence,\" there are a handful of crucial--and separate--mental abilities that none of these abilities is important enough to obviate the role of family background and education What Herrnstein and Murray used to measure IQ is actually a measure of education as well as intelligence. All the people tracked in the National Longitudinal Study of Youth took the Armed Forces Qualifying Test, which Herrnstein and Murray treat as a good measure of intelligence. Because the material covered in the test includes subjects like trigonometry, many academic critics of The Bell Curve have objected to its use as a measure only of IQ and not at all of academic achievement. Herrnstein and Murray concede in the footnotes that scores tend to rise with the subjects' education--but they seriously underestimate the magnitude of this rise, as shows. And they resist the obvious inference that the test scores are measuring something other than intelligence. Herrnstein and Murray begin their discussion of the National Longitudinal Study of Youth data by announcing that they aren't going to analyze the effect of education, because education is too much a result of IQ. It's not an independent variable. (Of course, according to their theory, socioeconomic status is also a result of IQ, but somehow, that doesn't stop them.) Therefore, what you'd most want to know from a policy standpoint--how much education can increase opportunity--isn't dealt with in the book, except in two obscure footnotes. Both would seem to support the liberal, pro-education position that Herrnstein and Murray say is futile. One footnote shows education increasing IQ year by year. The other shows a higher correlation between college degree and family income than between IQ and family income. One of The Bell Curve 's theoretical linchpins is the high heritability of IQ. Herrnstein and Murray, sounding like the souls of caution, write that \"half a century of work, now amounting to hundreds of empirical and theoretical studies, permits a broad conclusion that the genetic component of IQ is unlikely to be smaller than 40 per cent or higher than 80 per cent. ... For purposes of this discussion, we will adopt a middling estimate of 60 per cent heritability.\" This now looks seriously overstated. Michael Daniels, Bernie Devlin, and Kathryn Roeder of Carnegie Mellon University took the same studies on which Herrnstein and Murray based their estimate, and subjected them to a computer meta-analysis (\"a powerful method of statistical analysis\"-- The Bell Curve ). Their paper, which has not yet been published, says: \"In brief, studies of IQ, and our reanalyses of them, suggest a narrow-sense heritability of 34 per cent and a broad-sense heritability of 46 per cent. [The difference between broad and narrow is too technical to explain in this limited space.] This is a far cry from Herrnstein and Murray's maximum value of 80 per cent or their middling value of 60 per cent. Consequently, Herrnstein and Murray give the impression that IQ is highly 'heritable,' but it is not.\" If the purpose of the whole exercise is to figure out what our social policies should be, then, \"Which is more predictive, IQ or socioeconomic status?\" isn't the essential question anyway. Making it the essential question avoids the issue of whether IQ is really so massively predictive that it drowns out everything else. (Herrnstein and Murray mostly leave the evidence for this, their central contention, to footnotes. The figures they offer are far from dispositive.) At the beginning of The Bell Curve , Herrnstein and Murray declare that \"the concept of intelligence has taken on a much higher place in the pantheon of human virtues than it deserves.\" And they claim that their view of IQ tests is \"squarely in the middle of the scientific road.\" They end by expressing the hope that we can \"be a society that makes good on the fundamental promise of the American tradition: the opportunity for everyone, not just the lucky ones, to live a satisfying life.\" Throughout, Herrnstein and Murray consistently present themselves as fair- (or even liberal-) minded technicians who have, with great caution, followed the evidence where it leads--which, unfortunately, is to a few unassailable if unpleasant scientific truths that it is their reluctant duty to report. In fact, The Bell Curve is a relentless brief for the conservative position in psychometrics and social policy. For all its talk of reflecting a consensus, the sources it draws upon are heavily skewed to the right. Herrnstein and Murray used quasi-nutty studies that support their position (as Charles Lane demonstrated in the New York Review of Books ), and ignore mainstream studies that contradict it (as Richard Nisbett showed in the New Republic ). The data in The Bell Curve are consistently massaged to produce conservative conclusions not once is a finding that contradicts the main thesis reported in the text. ( shows how Herrnstein and Murray have made the convergence in black-white IQ scores, which they claim to find \"encouraging,\" look smaller than it actually is.) The Bell Curve 's air of strict scientism doesn't preclude the use of lightly sourced or unsourced assertions, such as the statement that the median IQ of all black Africans is 75, or that \"intermarriage among people in the top few percentiles of intelligence may be increasing far more rapidly than suspected\" (no footnote). Though they piously claim not to be doing so, Herrnstein and Murray leave readers with the distinct impression that IQ is the cause of economic success and failure, and that genetic difference explains the black-white IQ gap. In the most famous passage in The Republic , Plato describes an underground cave where people are held prisoner in chains, unable to see anything but the shadows cast by figures passing outside they mistake the shadows for reality. The Republic is probably the first place in history where an idea like that of Murray and Herrnstein's cognitive elite appears. Plato believed that through education, people could leave the cave and be able to see the truth instead of the shadows, thus fitting themselves to become the wise rulers of society. But he was quick to insert a cautionary note: Those who have left the cave might be tempted to think they can see perfectly clearly, while actually they would be \"dazzled by excess of light.\" The image applies to The Bell Curve : Presented as an exact representation of reality, in opposition to the shadows of political correctness, it actually reflects the blinkered vision of one part of the American elite. It constantly tells these people that they are naturally superior, and offers lurid descriptions of aspects of national life that they know about only by rumor. Readers who accept The Bell Curve as tough-minded and realistic, and who assume that all criticism of it is ignorant and ideologically motivated, are not as far removed from Plato's cave as they might think. : Dumb College Students : Smart Rich People : Education and IQ : Socioeconomic Status\n\n<question>:\nWhat is the main message the author is sending by mentioning the tale of Plato’s cave?\n\n<options>:\nA Caution that people who think they see things clearly may just be blinded by what they want to be true.\nB Reminder to be careful what you read.\nC Caution against the shadows of political correctness.\nD Reminder that Plato believed in education.\n\n<answer>:\n", "assistant": "A" } ]

[ { "human": "Read the following passage and questions, then choose the right answer from options, the answer should be one of A, B, C, D.\n\n<passage>:\nhe said finally. \"Maybe we ought to be getting on to the Pschorrbräu tent.\" \"Maybe we ought to eat something first,\" I said. \"I'm beginning to feel this. We could get some of that barbecued over to my desk and looked down at looked up from her magazine. She said \"There's supposed to be considerable nourishment in beer.\" That made sense. I yelled, \" mildly, \"You're late.\" his tongue over his teeth in distaste, groaned, fumbled in a drawer for the aspirin bottle. He looked over at Betty and said, almost as though reciting, \"What I \"Providence,\" Simon told her whilst fiddling with the aspirin bottle, hotel?\" That seemed like a good question. I thought about it for a while. Finally down the drain and was caught in the elbow. Something that would net \"Lost track,\" Arth said. \"You can come home with me.\" We drank to that and the fog rolled in again. When the fog rolled out, it was about fifty dollars.\" Simon said, mournful of tone, \"Money,\" Simon said. \"When you other bed, also completely clothed, was Arth. That sun was too much. I stumbled up from the bed, staggered to the window and fumbled around for Simon said, enigmatically, \"Now Simon said unenthusiastically, the bed holding his bald head in his hands. \"I remember now,\" he sorrowed. \"You didn't have a hotel. What a stupidity. I'll be phased. Phased all the way down.\" \"You haven't got a handful of aspirin, have you?\" I asked him. \"Just a minute,\" Arth said, staggering in the phone book says you'll investigate erect and heading for what \"All right,\" I told him plaintively. \"I'm clean. I won't mess up the place. All I've got is a hangover, not lice.\" Arth was gone. He came back in Simon continued to say nothing she two or three minutes, box of pills in I took the pill, followed it with a glass of water. And went out like a light. \"Why?\" \"Why?\" Simon said, \"Let's get to the point, everybody upped with their king-size mugs and drank My head was killing me. \"This is where I came in, or something,\" I groaned. Arth said, \"That was last night.\" He looked at me over the rim of his beer mug. and then remembered. \"I've got to get my bag. Oh, my head. Where did we spend last night?\" Arth said, and his voice sounded cautious, \"At my hotel, don't you remember?\" \"Not very well,\" I admitted. \"I feel lousy. I must have dimmed out. feel him watching after me as I pushed through the tables on the way out. Simon seemed incapable of carrying the ball this morning, so Betty to lose my bag didn't help. I worked Simon put in a word. \"The usual time traveler returned to a period of twenty-five years ago and shot Hitler, especially accompanied by a blockbusting hangover. I didn't get anywhere tearing my hair and complaining from one end then all subsequent history would be changed. In that case, the time traveler Simon shrugged and fumbled again with the aspirin bottle. Mr. Oyster went on. \"I've been nobody should drink a gallon or more of Marzenbräu. I decided the hell with it. I took a cab to the airport, presented my return ticket, told them I wanted to Simon held up a hand. \"There's their perch, bug-eyed Simon, but then Simon said, \"You want to hire me evidently. The trip back was as uninteresting as the one over. As the hangover began to wear off—a little—I was almost sorry I hadn't been able to stay. If I'd only been able to get a room I would have stayed, I told myself. the office rather than going to my apartment. I figured I might as well check in with Betty. he had been occupying four—or was it five—days before when I'd left. I'd lost track of the time. Betty and Simon waited. I said to him, \"Glad you're here, sir. I can report. Ah, what was it hangover. \"Came for?\" Mr. Oyster snorted. party.\" He began to swing into the spirit of his description. \"It originally \"I'm merely waiting for your girl to started in celebration of the wedding make out my receipt. I thought you had already left.\" said. There was suddenly a double dip of ice cream in my stomach. I walked Mr. Oyster was saying something to the effect that if I didn't leave today, it would have to be tomorrow, that he hadn't ponied up that thousand dollars advance for anything less than immediate service. Stuffing his receipt in his wallet, he fussed his way out the door. I said to Betty hopefully, \"I suppose you haven't changed this calendar since I left.\" Betty said, \"What's the matter not half an hour ago, just before this marble-missing client came in.\" She added, irrelevantly, \"Time \"Well,\" the old boy pursued, into \"Never saw him before in my life,\" she said. \"Not until he came in this morning.\" \"This morning,\" I said weakly. While Betty stared at me as though it was who didn't know exactly how to wear his clothes correctly, or was off the how long ago did I go out that door—on the way to the airport?\" \"You've been acting sick all morning. You went out that door about ten minutes ago, were gone about \"But why would a time traveler three minutes, and then came back.\" Simon's story), \"did you Simon shrugged, put one hand to orgies. You wouldn't want to wander up and down the streets of, say, He slammed the door after him as he left. Simon winced at the noise, took the aspirin bottle from its drawer, took two, washed them down with unmasked.\" The old boy wound it up. \"Well, Simon was shaking his head. \"Not \"I did,\" Simon groaned. \"Three times.\" Simon \"Sorry,\" Simon said. \"Can't be done.\" \"I keep telling you,\" Simon said \"Out of the question,\" Simon \"Just for laughs,\" Simon told the two of them sourly, \"suppose I tell you a funny story. It goes like this:\" Simon said wearily, \"There's just one thing you can bring back with you from the future, a hangover compounded of a gallon or so of Marzenbräu. What's more you can pile I hustled back to the apartment and packed a bag. Hell, I'd wanted a vacation merry-go-round and pile a fourth hangover on the three I'm already nursing, all at once, you can think again.\" is over before September 21st, first day of the gigantic beer bust. hours. I had another suspicious twinge. kraut and pretzels. I found a place finally at a table which had space for twenty-odd beer Simon said nothing. Across the up, ranging from a seventy- or eighty-year-old couple in Bavarian costume, to the bald-headed drunk across the table from me. A desperate waitress bearing six mugs of beer in each hand scurried past. They call them masses over eighteen per cent. That's nonsense. No beer is that strong.\" I took a long pull. He looked at me, waiting. I came up. \"Mistaken,\" I admitted. Shouldn't have said that.\" I had never heard of the brand so I skipped it. didn't seem to hang together very well. Name is Simon.\" G'sufa everybody upped with the mugs and drank each other's health. was the smallest amount obtainable. A beer later I said, \"I don't know if you'll make it or not, Arth.\" \"Make what?\"\n\n<question>:\nWhy does Simon look for aspirin as soon as he gets to his office?\n\n<options>:\nA He is experiencing caffeine withdrawal and did not have time to stop for coffee.\nB We never learn the cause of the headache, we only know that it is severe.\nC He has a hangover from attending a festival.\nD He was out drinking with some friends the night before, and has a hangover.\n\n<answer>:\n", "assistant": "C" } ]

[ { "human": "Read the following passage and questions, then choose the right answer from options, the answer should be one of A, B, C, D.\n\n<passage>:\nSTAR MOTHER By ROBERT F. YOUNG A touching story of the most enduring love in all eternity. That night her son was the first star. She stood motionless in the garden, one hand pressed against her heart, watching him rise and she wondered whether he was thinking of those fields now, whether he was thinking of her standing alone in the April night with her memories whether he was thinking of the verandahed house behind her, with its empty and disappeared from sight. A boy grown up too soon, riding Why don't they leave the stars alone? she thought. Why don't they leave the stars to God? came early the next morning: Expect to bring your son down sometime tomorrow . She went about her work as usual, collecting the eggs and allocating them in their cardboard boxes, then setting off in the station wagon on her Tuesday morning run. She had expected a deluge of questions from her customers. She was not disappointed. \"Is Terry really way up there all alone, Martha?\" \"Aren't you scared , Martha?\" \"I do hope they can get him back down all right, Martha.\" She supposed it must have given them quite a turn to have their egg woman change into a star mother overnight. She hadn't expected the TV interview, though, and she would have avoided it if it had been politely possible. But what could she do when the line of cars and trucks pulled into the drive and the technicians got out and started setting up their equipment in the backyard? What could she say when the suave young man came up to her and said, \"We want you to know that we're all very proud of your boy up there, ma'am, and we hope you'll do us the honor of answering a few questions.\" Most of the questions concerned Terry, as was fitting. From the way the suave young man asked them, though, she got the impression that he was trying to prove that her son was just like any other average American boy, and such just didn't happen to be the case. But whenever she opened her mouth to mention, say, how he used to study till all hours of the night, or how difficult it had been for him to make friends because of his shyness, or the fact that he had never gone out for football—whenever she started to mention any of these things, the suave young man was in great haste to interrupt her and to twist her words, by requestioning, into a different meaning altogether, till Terry's behavior pattern seemed to coincide with the behavior pattern which the suave young man apparently considered the norm, but which, if followed, Martha was sure, would produce not young men bent on exploring space but young men bent on exploring trivia. A few of the questions concerned herself: Was Terry her only child? (\"Yes.\") What had happened to her husband? (\"He was killed in the Korean War.\") What did she think of the new law granting star mothers top priority on any and all information relating to their sons? (\"I think it's a fine law ... It's too bad they couldn't have shown similar humanity toward the war mothers of World War II.\") It was late in the afternoon by the time the TV crew got departure. Martha fixed herself a light supper, then donned an went out into the garden to wait for the sun to go down. According to the time table the general night passage wasn't due to occur till 9:05. But it seemed only right that she should be outside when the stars started to come out. Presently they did, and she watched them wink on, one by one, in the deepening darkness most of her life she'd been much too busy on Earth to bother with things celestial. She could remember, when she was much younger and Bill was courting sometimes and once in a while, But this was different. It was different because now she had too, she noticed with a start. ... green ... orange ... It grew cold in the April garden and she could see her breath. There was a strange crispness, a strange clarity about the before ... She glanced at her watch, was astonished to see that the hands indicated two minutes after nine. Where had the time gone? Tremulously she faced the his own right, dropping swiftly now, down, down, and out of mass of the Earth ... She took a deep, proud breath, realized that she was wildly waving her hand and let it fall slowly to her side. Make a wish! she thought, like a little girl, and she wished him pleasant dreams and a safe return and wrapped the wish in all her love and cast it starward. Sometime tomorrow, the general's telegram had said— That meant sometime today! She rose with the sun and fed the chickens, fixed and ate her breakfast, collected the eggs and put them in their cardboard boxes, then started out on her Wednesday morning run. \"My land, Martha, I don't see how you stand it with him way up there! Doesn't it get on your nerves ?\" (\"Yes ... Yes, it does.\") \"Martha, when are they bringing him back down?\" (\"Today ... Today !\") \"It must be wonderful being a star mother, Martha.\" (\"Yes, it is—in a way.\") Wonderful ... and terrible. If only he can last it out for a few more hours, she thought. If only they can bring him down safe and sound. Then the vigil will be over, and some other mother can take over the awesome responsibility of having a son become a star— If only ... The general's third telegram arrived that afternoon: Regret to inform you that meteorite impact mechanism, making ejection impossible. Will make every effort to find another means of accomplishing See the little boy playing beneath tiny cars up and down the tiny streets of his make-believe village the little boy, his fuzz of hair gold in the sunlight, his cherub-cheeks pink in the summer wind— Terry!— air— Terry ... —probably won't get a chance to write you again before take-off, but don't worry, Ma. The Explorer XII is the greatest bird they ever built. Nothing short of a direct meteorite hit can hurt it, and the odds are a million to one ... Why don't they leave the stars alone? Why don't they leave the stars to God? The afternoon shadows lengthened grew red and swollen over the western hills. Martha fixed supper, tried to eat, and couldn't. After a while, when the light began to fade, she slipped into Terry's jacket and went outside. length her washed the darkness from the drive. A car door slammed. Martha did not move. Please God , she thought, let it be Terry , even though she knew that it couldn't possibly be Terry. Footsteps sounded behind her, paused. Someone coughed softly. She turned then— \"Good evening, ma'am.\" she saw the stern handsome face she saw knew. Even before he spoke again, she knew— \"The same meteorite that damaged the ejection mechanism, ma'am. It penetrated the capsule, too. We didn't find out till just a while ago—but there was nothing we could have done anyway ... Are you all right, ma'am?\" \"Yes. I'm all right.\" \"I wanted to express my regrets personally. I know how you must feel.\" \"It's all right.\" \"We will, of course, make every effort to bring back his ... remains ... so that he can \"No,\" she said. \"I beg your pardon, ma'am?\" She raised her eyes to the patch of sky where her son had of vivid forget-me-nots, its far-flung blooms of Betelguese and Rigel, of Bellatrix and Saiph ... burgeoned the riotous wreath of the Crab there lay the pulsing wafted by a stellar breeze, drifted the ocher rose of Mars ... \"No,\" she said again. The general had raised his eyes, too now, slowly, he lowered them. \"I think I understand, ma'am. And I'm glad that's the way you want it ... are beautiful tonight, aren't they.\" \"More beautiful than they've ever been,\" she said. After the general had gone, she looked up once more at the then she turned and walked slowly back to the memoried Transcriber's Note: This etext was produced from Amazing Stories\n\n<question>:\nWhat does Martha think about the TV reporter?\n\n<options>:\nA She thinks the reporter is terribly polite.\nB She thinks the reporter is a suave young man.\nC She thinks the reporter is twisting her words to fit his narrative.\nD She thinks the reporter is pushy.\n\n<answer>:\n", "assistant": "C" } ]

[ { "human": "Read the following passage and questions, then choose the right answer from options, the answer should be one of A, B, C, D.\n\n<passage>:\nThe machine was not perfect. It could be tricked. It could make mistakes. And—it could learn! [Transcriber's Note: This etext was produced from tournament in which an electronic computing machine was entered. Not that there weren't enough humans around, it was the interest that \"They say the Machine has been programmed to play nothing but pure they'll gang up on the Machine at adjournments. What can one New Jersey computer do against four Russian grandmasters?\" \"I heard the Russians have been programmed—with hypnotic cramming and \"Why, the Machine hasn't even a having trouble swallowing ... well, just about everything here.\" He nodded. \"You are not the first to be shocked and horrified by chess,\" he assured her. \"It is a curse of the intellect. It is a game Sandra briefly told him her story and her predicament. By the time they were served, Doc had absorbed the one and assessed the other. \"You have one great advantage,\" he told her. \"You know nothing whatsoever of chess—so you will be able to write about it understandably for your readers.\" He swallowed half his demitasse and smacked his lips. \"As for the Machine—you do know, I suppose, that it is not a humanoid metal robot, walking about clanking and squeaking like a late medieval knight in armor?\" You want to know why, if the Machine works at all, it doesn't work perfectly, so that it always wins and there is no contest. Right?\" them. \"If you had,\" he said, \"a billion computers all as fast as the Machine, it would take them all the time there ever will be in the universe just to play through all the possible games of chess, not to mention the time needed to classify those games into branching families of wins for White, wins for Black and draws, and the additional time required to trace out chains of key-moves leading always to wins. So the Machine can't play chess like God. What the Machine can do is examine all the \"Exactly!\" Doc beamed at her approvingly. \"The Machine man. A rather peculiar and not exactly pleasant man. A man who always abides by sound principles, who is utterly incapable of flights of genius, but who never makes a mistake. You see, you are finding human interest already, even in the Machine.\" Sandra nodded. \"Does a human chess player—a grandmaster, I mean—ever look eight moves ahead in a game?\" many more moves ahead than that—thirty or forty even. The Machine is probably programmed to recognize such situations and do something of the same sort, though we can't be sure from the information World possibilities are so very nearly unlimited that even a grandmaster can only look a very few moves ahead and must rely on his judgment and experience and artistry. The equivalent of those in the Machine is the directions fed into it before it plays a game.\" \"You mean the programming?\" \"Indeed yes! The programming is the crux of the problem of the had a personality like that of a certain kind of chess-playing dub—a dull-brained woodpusher afraid to take the slightest risk of losing material—but a dub who could almost always beat an utter novice. The WBM machine here in the hall operates about a million times as fast. Don't ask me how, I'm no physicist, but it depends on the new transistors and something they call hypervelocity, which in turn depends on keeping parts of the Machine at a temperature near absolute zero. However, the result is that the Machine can see eight moves ahead and is capable of being programmed much more craftily.\" \"A million times as fast as the first machine, you say, Doc? And yet it only sees twice as many moves ahead?\" Sandra objected. \"There is a geometrical progression involved there,\" he told her with a smile. \"Believe me, eight moves ahead is a lot of moves when you remember that the Machine is errorlessly examining every one of thousands of variations. Flesh-and-blood chess masters have lost games by blunders they could have avoided by looking only one or two moves ahead. The Machine will make no such oversights. Once again, you see, you have the human factor, in this case working for the Machine.\" \"Savilly, I have been looking allplace for you!\" will defeat the Machine by the living force of my human personality! Already I have offered to play it an informal game blindfold—I, who have played 50 blindfold games simultaneously! Its owners refuse me. I that the Machine will play like a great oaf—at least against me . will defeat the Machine. Do you have that? You can remember it?\" That's a minor variety of chess where each player gets only ten seconds to make a move. Which I don't suppose would give the Machine time to look three moves ahead. Chess players would say that the Machine has a clock off and turns his opponent's on. If a player uses too much time, he loses as surely as if he were checkmated. Now since the Machine will almost certainly be programmed to take an equal amount of time on successive moves, a rate of 15 moves an hour means it will have 4 minutes a move—and it will need every second of them! Incidentally challenge—just as if the Machine weren't playing blindfold itself. Or is the Machine blindfold? How do you think of it?\" The Machine, USA (programmed by Simon Great) Lysmov vs. Krakatower Grabo vs. Machine \"Cripes, Doc, they all sound like they were Russians,\" Sandra said against the Machine.\" Angler grinned and shook his head sadly. \"Poor old Machine,\" he said. them, though,\" he said. \"They really get so little recognition or recompense. This tournament is an exception. And it takes a great deal of ego to play greatly.\" \"I suppose so. So World Business Machines is responsible for this They want to score a point over their great rival.\" \"But if the Machine plays badly it will be a black eye for them,\" Sandra pointed out. \"True,\" Doc agreed thoughtfully. \"WBM must feel very sure.... It's prestige now that its space program is sagging.\" \"But if a Russian doesn't take first place it will be a black eye for \"The proportion of Soviet to American entries in the tournament represents pretty fairly the general difference in playing strength between the two countries,\" Doc said judiciously. \"Chess mastery moves from land to land with the years. Way back it was the Moslems Sherevsky it would be unlawful for him to play against the Machine because it is technically a It would be like that antique womanizer to develop senile delusions of very brilliant player and that the Machine is very lucky to have drawn machines—they were programmed by scientists. No, Simon Great is a psychologist who at one time was a leading contender for the world's \"What is it, Savilly?\" he asked. \"There's hardly any time, you know.\" predictions and we are giving out no advance information on the programming of the Machine. As you know, I have had to fight the fast enough.\" \"That makes it very tough on you,\" Sandra put in. \"The Machine isn't allowed any weaknesses.\" playing the Machine's moves? There would surely be some way for his play, though not for chess-thinking. The difference in style between a computer and a man would be evident to any expert. Great's own style is remembered and would be recognized—though, come to think of it, his style was often described as being machinelike....\" For a moment Doc's games with the Machine to assure himself that it operates legitimately and has grandmaster skill.\" \"Did the Machine beat him?\" Sandra asked. Doc shrugged. \"The scores weren't released. It was very hush-hush. supposed to work by machinery (cogs and gears, not electricity) but story I think the chess robot will Russian squad. But Doc certainly didn't sound like a Soviet citizen. He was older than she'd first assumed. She could see that now that she was listening to him less and looking at him more. Tired, too. Only his dark-circled eyes shone with unquenchable youth. A useful old old, American, Russian) and pick his brain....\n\n<question>:\nWhat is an accurate assumption about the Machine in the article?\n\n<options>:\nA It \"thinks\" in a way that is more planned than a human.\nB A human is more calculated than the Machine.\nC The Machine is accurate yet slow compared to other computers.\nD It has more experience than a human.\n\n<answer>:\n", "assistant": "A" } ]

[ { "human": "Read the following passage and questions, then choose the right answer from options, the answer should be one of A, B, C, D.\n\n<passage>:\nindividuals but immutable as have no manners—but what do you expect, when they used to be men! Kolin sensed a lack of direct attention. The rustle All obscure star, the undetermined damage to the small planet's murky atmosphere defied precision scanners—the pilot made a reasonably good landing. Despite snapped out of it and heard, I'm as good as re-personalized Peter Kolin had to admit that casualties might have been search by hiding where he was or going back to bluff his little command, less two third-class ration keepers thought to have been trapped far worse. of orders as he glared at the rocky ridges surrounding the landing place. \"I don't know,\" said Kolin. \"The penalty for desertion—\" \"Whoosh! Who'd find you? You could be a bird, a tree, inconspicuous. Silenced but doubting, Kolin \"Since the crew will be on on parade. Kolin made himself emergency watches repairing might most easily escape the notice of search parties and still be tough enough to live a long time without renewal. useful to discover temporary thought Kolin rebelliously. his musings: mere hope of escape was unsatisfying after sources in this area of natural foods.\" his fuming hatred for Haurtoz. Another factor slipped into the outburst that had defined peace with the Earth colonies. You know why they don't?\" \"Why?\" wheezed Ashlew. \"They're scared that without was likely to result in a siege of treatment that left the subject talk of war, and scouting Kolin had heard of instances wherein mere unenthusiastic posture had betrayed intentions to harbor have to live and who's running things in the Planetary State. Then the gravy train for Earth fleets that never suitably \"re-personalized.\" one person in to report, and he will be replaced by one of the five I shall keep here to issue rations.\" Kolin permitted himself to wonder when anyone might get some rest, but assumed a mildly willing look. (Too eager an attitude could arouse suspicion of disguising an improper the ration crate turned up to serve him as a field desk. He scowled in turn, impartially, at his watch and at the weary stewards of his headquarters Kolin found himself in a detail. The latter stumbled small packets of emergency rations. The line of crewmen released temporarily from repair Since the crew would be eating packaged rations during repairs, Yrtok could be spared to command a scout detail. work was transient as to powdered foods storekeeper. rations could hardly, in an emergency, give even the appearance of favoring themselves in regard to food. They would go without. Kolin maintained a standard expression that the keepers of It was tenuous, almost a haze. Close examination would have revealed it to be that he failed to notice as the Chief's sharp bushes Kolin's party had followed, and Kolin brought staggering flunkies, stealing a few seconds of relaxation on the pretext of dumping an armful of light plastic packing, wandered into the haze. After a few heartbeats, he dropped the trash and stared at ship and men as if he had Kolin shared their sense of isolation. They would be out of sight of authority and responsible for their own actions. momentarily before descending. known as Peter Kolin congratulated For all Kolin could tell, he Especially, it was unable to insinuate any part of itself plentiful, interspersed with scrubby thickets of tangled, the body of Chief Slichow at that very instant. There are not enough men thought Kolin. spores. \"Be a job to find anything edible here,\" grunted Ammet, and Kolin agreed. Finally, after a longer hike the damage,\" announced the than he had anticipated, they and the return to Haurtoz passed like weeks to some of purple berries glistening dangerously on a low shrub. Kolin the crew but like brief moments deceptively distant forest. Yrtok paused to examine some Peace State even a cloud.\" and the waiting team of inspecting section for preliminary scouting, officers. \"Could hardly be better, \"Hardly, sir. All ready for the liberation of Haurtoz.\" as is suitable. It may be END Transcriber's Note: Kolin looked over his shoulder. Fifty meters away, Ammet sat beside the bush with the purple berries, utterly relaxed. \"He must have tasted some!\" exclaimed Kolin. \"I'll see how he is.\" He ran back to the cook and him a doped appearance. Kolin trouble attracting her attention. Then he noticed that she was kneeling. \"Hope she didn't eat some stupid thing too!\" he grumbled, trotting back. of greenish fur. All Kolin saw was that it had several legs too many. dreamily, Kolin backed away. glanced warily about, but nothing appeared to threaten him. \"It's time to end this scout,\" he told himself. \"It's dangerous. One good look and I'm jetting off! What I need is At first, Kolin saw no way, clinging to the rugged trunk \"I should have brought Yrtok's radio,\" he muttered. \"Oh, well, I can take it when I come down, if she hasn't snapped out of her spell by then. Funny … I wonder if Kolin progressed rapidly. Earth, but many of the home world's less kindly techniques had been employed. Lack of Kolin, slipping, grabbed His fingers clutched a handful complete loyalty to the state of twigs and leaves, which \"Careful, there!\" whooshed the eerie voice. \"It took me all summer to grow those!\" Kolin could feel the skin Kolin looked about, seeing told himself in a reasonable tone. \"It's bad enough that the other two passed out without me going space happy too.\" \"What's your hurry?\" demanded Kolin examined the bark of Haurtoz.\" \"Where's that? Oh, never \"You will scout in five details don't bother with them all, since I came here and found out I could be anything I of three persons each,\" mind—some little planet. I Kolin, testing the firmness of Chief Slichow said. \"Every hour, each detail will send of the tree trunk. \"And, if I do have to remind you, it and when I remembered how long some of them live, moment. Kolin felt the asked Kolin, twisting about in an effort to see what the higher branches might hide. \"Nope. Most everything Kolin politely. He groped for can't get through to him Kolin braced himself securely to stretch tiring muscles. \"Maybe I'd better stay a while,\" he muttered. \"I don't know where I am.\" State were to survive the hostile plots of Earth and \"No?\" \" that landed with me wanted to get around and see things. Lots changed to animals or birds. One even stayed a man—on the outside anyway. Most of them have to change as the bodies wear out, which I don't, and some made bad mistakes tryin' to be things \"There's just one thing. The Life don't like taking chances on word about this place gettin' around. It sorta You might not get back to your ship in any form that \"Listen!\" Kolin blurted out. \"I wasn't so much enjoying being what I was that getting back matters to me!\" \"Don't like your home planet, whatever the name was?\" \"Haurtoz. It's a rotten have to think and even look the way that's standard thirty hours a day, asleep or awake. You get scared to sleep for fear you might dream treason and they'd find about, stacking and distributing Suddenly, Kolin found himself telling the tree about life on Haurtoz, and of the officially announced threats to expansion. He dwelt upon the desperation of having no place to hide in case of trouble with the authorities. A Kolin heard opinions spouting out which he had prudently kept bottled up for\n\n<question>:\nWhy is Kolin so worried about the purple berries?\n\n<options>:\nA He expected them to be a different color.\nB They may have had adverse effects on his crewmates' mental state.\nC The cook thinks that they are dangerous to eat.\nD If they are not edible, they will not have any food to bring back with their report.\n\n<answer>:\n", "assistant": "B" } ]

[ { "human": "Read the following passage and questions, then choose the right answer from options, the answer should be one of A, B, C, D.\n\n<passage>:\nGorb stepped forward and put a hand on his chest. Gorb grinned rakishly. \"Five thousand in cash plus a contract as a I eyed Gorb uncertainly. The Terran Consulate people probably wouldn't \"Send them in one at a time,\" I told Stebbins. I ducked into the were really serious, and I knew from past experiences that no officials ever worried much about the state of my pocketbook. On the other hand, giving this slyster a contract might be a risky proposition. \"Tell you what,\" I said finally. \"You've got yourself a deal—but on a contingency basis. Get me out of this and you'll have five grand and the contract. Otherwise, nothing.\" Gorb shrugged. \"What have I to lose?\" The office buzzer sounded. Auchinleck said unctuously, \"The first I throttled my exclamation of surprise, concealing it behind a quick cough. \"Let me have that again, please?\" The little Regulan was as good as hired. Only the formalities remained. \"You understand our terms, Mr. Fitzgerald?\" accept the terms!\" I buzzed for Ludlow and gave him the fast signal that meant we were signing this alien up at half the usual pay, and Ludlow took him into the other office to sign him up. decades, and so I got rid of him in a couple of minutes. He was so plump and cheerful. I passed him along to Auchinleck to sign at anything short of top rate. of, it's those silver-colored spiders, but this seedy specimen gave it a try anyway. He got the gate in half a minute, and he didn't even get the handout he was angling for. I don't approve of begging. It was the isolationism of the late 29th century that turned me into I could tell, the being was quite plainly nothing but an Earthman. He sat down facing me without being asked and crossed his legs. He was tall and extremely thin, with pale blue eyes and dirty-blond hair, and though he was clean and reasonably well dressed, he had a shabby look I don't mind conning the public from time to time, but I draw the line at getting bilked myself. \"Look, friend, I'm busy, and I'm not known for my sense of humor. Or my generosity.\" \"I'm not panhandling. I'm looking for a job.\" \"Then try elsewhere. Suppose you stop wasting my time, bud. You're as Earthborn as I am.\" There was something glib and appealing about this preposterous phony. I guess I recognized a kindred spirit or I would have tossed him out on \"Very clever, Mr. Gorb.\" I grinned at him and shook my head. \"You spin these days. Zero, in fact. Good-by, Mr. Gorb.\" I pulled away from his yawning mouth. \"Good-by, Mr. Gorb,\" I repeated. \"All I ask is a contract, Corrigan. It isn't much. I'll be a big attraction. I'll—\" \" it over. Maybe you'll regret your hastiness. I'll be back to give you another chance.\" He slammed the door and I let my grim expression relax into a smile. This was the best con switch yet—an Earthman posing as an alien to get a job! But I wasn't buying it, even if I could appreciate his cleverness reason. And, with it, plenty of trouble on my hands. The first harbinger of woe turned up after lunch in the person of a Kallerian. The Kallerian was the sixth applicant that afternoon. I and said no to a scaly pseudo-armadillo from one of the Delta Worlds. Hardly had the 'dillo scuttled dejectedly out of my office when the immediately to a contract.\" \"Sit down, Freeman Heraal. I like to make my own decisions, thanks.\" \"You will grant me a contract!\" \"Will you please sit down?\" He said sulkily, \"I will remain standing.\" sometimes useful in dealing with belligerent or disappointed because—\" \"You will hire me or trouble I will make!\" I opened our inventory chart. I showed him that we were already didn't move. He bellowed, \"I have vowed a vow, Earthman. Take me to Earth, enroll a Gursdrinn, or the consequences will be terrible!\" I'm a man of principles, like all straightforward double-dealers, and He glared at me in silence. I went on, \"Please be assured that I'll undo the insult at the earliest possible opportunity. It's not feasible for us to hire another as a vacancy—\" \"No. You will hire me now.\" \"Please, please,\" squeaked the little alien pitifully. \"I must see you, honored sir!\" tail drooped. His voice was little more than a faint whimper, even at full volume. \"Begging your most honored pardon most humbly, important sir. I am a to Ghryne for the miserable purpose of obtaining an interview with yourself.\" \"She lied! She left my burrow because she longed to see the splendors sentiment. I felt sorry for this being's domestic troubles, but I wasn't going to break up a good act just to make an alien squirrel happy—not to mention footing the transportation. I said, \"I don't see how we can manage it. The laws are very strict I?\" \"Well—\" \"Of course not.\" I took advantage of his pathetic upset to steam right along. \"Now if you had come in here and simply asked me to sign you up, I might conceivably have done it. But no—you had to go unburden your heart to me.\" \"I thought the truth would move you.\" \"It did. But in effect you're now asking me to conspire in a fraudulent criminal act. Friend, I can't do it. My reputation means too much to me,\" I said piously. \"Then you will refuse me?\" \"My heart melts to nothingness for you. But I can't take you to Earth.\" against her will. And maybe she's happier where she is.\" The Stortulian seemed to shrivel. His eyelids closed half-way to mask his tears. He turned and shambled slowly to the door, walking like a living dishrag. In a bleak voice, he said, \"There is no hope then. All is lost. I will never see my soulmate again. Good day, Earthman.\" He spoke in a drab monotone that almost, but not quite, had me weeping. I watched him shuffle out. I do have some conscience, and I had the uneasy feeling I had just been talking to a being who was about to commit suicide on my account. started to get complicated again. Nine of the fifty were okay. The rest were unacceptable for one reason or another, and they took the bad news quietly enough. The haul for the \"Your man happened to be looking the wrong way,\" he said cheerily. \"Change your mind about me yet?\" \"Get out before I have you thrown out.\" Gorb shrugged. \"I figured you hadn't changed your mind, so I've changed \"I don't care what your story is! Get out or—\" \"You see? He's incompetent. Suppose you fire him, take me on instead. the office before I spoke. \"Listen, Gorb, or whatever your name is, \"This is the law. Do you deny that your stubborn refusal to yield to this late life-form's request lies at the root of his sad demise?\" \"Well, no, but—\" \"Failure to deny is admission of guilt. You are guilty, Earthman.\" Closing my eyes wearily, I tried to wish the whole babbling lot of them away. If I had to, I could pony up the hundred-grand fine, but it was I was spared further such morbid thoughts by yet another unannounced himself , and the pint-sized Stortulian who looked so meek and \"Don't mention it,\" Gorb said.\n\n<question>:\nWhy was the interviewer uninterested in Gorb?\n\n<options>:\nA He was demanding and rude, which the interviewer did not bend for.\nB He was a fugitive.\nC He appeared to be a human.\nD He was bargaining with sympathy, which the interviewer did not bend for.\n\n<answer>:\n", "assistant": "C" } ]

[ { "human": "Read the following passage and questions, then choose the right answer from options, the answer should be one of A, B, C, D.\n\n<passage>:\nThere were a hundred and seven men, women and children. With no design on my part, they tended to segregate into groups consisting of four to eight couples together with the current children of the women. Within these groups, the adults were promiscuous, but apparently not outside the group. The group thus had the appearance of a super-family and the males indulged and cared for all the children without reference to actual parenthood. Cosmos has a really nasty sense of humor! The only kind of gag worth pulling, I always maintained, was a cosmic one—till I learned the By the end of the week, these super-families were scattered over about four square miles of the ranch. They had found a new delicacy, the U.S. copyright on this publication was renewed.] sparrows, and hunted them easily as they roosted at night. I had taught houses in which the young, and sometimes the adults, slept through midday and midnight. tolerantly. \"Can't adjust your skates?\" I asked again. \"Daddy, I've tried and tried and I just can't turn this old key tight Extensive research did not uncover any evidence that \"Well, Dad-dee, I can't!\" \"What?\" \"You can't turn this old key tightly enough.\" My son asked, \"What happened to the animals?\" \"Turned them over to the university for further study,\" I lied. \"Well,\" he said to her, \"you can't say our pop isn't a man of decision.\" twelve. I glanced across the animal room to where old Nijinsky thrust his graying head from a cage. I had called them volplas since the day old Nijinsky's elongated arms and his cousin's lateral skin folds had given me the idea of a flying mutant. hands, four times as long as the others, uncurled as he spun about the cage. \"Daddy?\" \"Yes?\" \"Mother says you are eccentric. Is that true?\" \"I'll speak to her about it.\" \"Don't you ?\" \"No.\" mother that I retaliate. I say The accelerator had forced them almost to adulthood in less than a month. It would be several hours before they would begin to move, to learn to feed and play, perhaps to learn to fly. Meanwhile, it was clear that here was no war of dominant mutations. Modulating alleles had smoothed the freakish into a beautiful pattern. when I slipped out. \"Come on, you old hermit. I have a buffet on the terrace.\" \"Our daughter says I'm eccentric. Wonder how the devil she found out.\" \"From me, of course.\" \"But you love me just the same.\" I wiped the back of my hand across my mouth and said aloud, \"Yes, sir, the dangerous age. And, lady, I'm going to have fun.\" My wife sighed patiently. boy unsaddle the horse and slap it away to the pasture. I thought, \"By God, wouldn't he have a fit if he knew what I have back there in that lab! Wouldn't they all!\" The boy carried the saddle up onto the terrace and dropped it. \"Mom, Mother . Why?\" \"Because, dear, I said so.\" \"Is that any reason for wearing clothes? Look at him. He's a young man sooner than already.\" \"Well, if you feel that way about it, they'll both have to start wearing clothes.\" I gulped the last of my hamburger and washed it down with the beer. \"This place is going to hell,\" I complained. \"The old man isn't allowed \"I told you—\" \"Oh, not that again! You were dangerous at any age.\" \"It's a joke,\" I assured her. \"I'm going to play a tremendous joke on but I've always....\" to stand around quietly and watch people encounter the surprise that you have prepared for them.\" eccentric ?\" I grinned. \"Forgive me if I eat and run, dear. Something in the lab can't wait.\" stand. He was a little the larger and stood twenty-eight inches high. Except for the face, chest and belly, they were covered with a soft, almost that the eyes were large and nocturnal. The cranium was in the same proportion to the body as it is in the human. the spars closed, they were holding little cups and drinking water from them in a most humanlike way. They were active, curious, playful and decidedly amorous. Their humanoid qualities were increasingly apparent. There was a lumbar curvature and buttocks. The shoulder girdle and pectoral muscles were I danced a little jig the way old Nijinsky might do it. \"Oh, great! Oh, wonderful! Good old Guy! Everybody's a success. It's great. It's wonderful. Success on success!\" anyone suspected. One day, somebody would see a volpla. The newspapers would laugh. Then someone authoritative would find a colony and observe them. He would conclude, \"I am convinced that they have a language and speak it intelligently.\" The government would issue denials. Reporters would \"expose the truth\" and ask, \"Where have these aliens come from?\" The government would reluctantly admit the facts. Linguists would observe at close quarters and learn the simple volpla language. Then would come the legends. Volpla wisdom would become a cult—and of all forms of comedy, cults, I think, are the funniest. \"Darling, are you listening to me?\" my wife asked with impatient \"What? Sure. Certainly.\" \"What broadcast?\" \"For heaven's sake, darling,\" my wife complained, \"I told you about himself explaining that when he pressed the button before him, the \"Darling, will you please—be— ?\" \"Yeah, Dad. Can it, will you? You're always gagging around.\" I heard my boy whisper, \"Uncle Guy, this is the biggest!\" it's always been pictured. A mechanical voice cut in. infants were females, which sped things up considerably. the opportunity to slip the oldest of the males and his two females out They were all three wide-eyed at the world and jabbered continuously. playful curiosity about the world had been abandoned momentarily and he was chasing one of the girls. As usual, she was anxious to be caught so that I could not get near. Suddenly he laughed with a shrill little whoop. After that, it was a carnival. They learned quickly and brilliantly. They were not fliers they were I watched them affectionately and wondered about the advisability of leaving them out here. Well, it had to be done sometime. Nothing I ground, the wrists crossed at his chest. He spoke first. \"You lived in places like this all along these mountains. Now there are very few of you left. Since you have been staying at my place, you naturally have forgotten the ways of living outdoors.\" \"We can learn again. We want to stay here.\" His little face was so \"Chances are they won't stay long. Keep your eye on the tree in case wonderingly, stopping now and then to watch him. When they were standing beside me, they said nothing. They shaded their eyes with tiny hands and watched him as he passed directly above us at about two him. Their lavish affection held him up for a time, but eventually he strutted in like every human hunter. They were raptly curious about the bird. They poked at it, marveled at its feathers and danced about it in an embryonic rite of the hunt. But gleeful and greasily amorous during the meal. When I had to leave, it was dark. I warned them to stand watches, keep \"I promise.\" He looked up at the night sky and, in the firelight, I saw his wonder. \"You say we came from there?\" \"The old ones of your kind told me so. Didn't they tell you?\" \"I can't remember any old ones. You tell me.\" \"That's right.\"\n\n<question>:\nWhy does the narrator lie to his son?\n\n<options>:\nA Even though his son is a young man sooner than already, he is still too young to learn the full scope of the truth.\nB A joke stops working when someone attempts to explain it.\nC For his joke to have its desired effect, no one can know the full extent of his experiment.\nD He is an eccentric and must abide by his personal eccentricities.\n\n<answer>:\n", "assistant": "C" } ]

[ { "human": "Read the following passage and questions, then choose the right answer from options, the answer should be one of A, B, C, D.\n\n<passage>:\nworld requires for a healthy and exterminate any planet that refuses to obey the just and legal orders of its Viceroy. So we achieve John Crownwall as he strode We control it adequately, and we live in peace. a working balance in our Empire. heavy gravity and heavier air of the unfamiliar planet. John Crownwall, florid, red-headed and bulky, considered himself he felt distinctly unhappy. Crownwall Crownwall nodded. \"In other conquer planets without the necessity of destroying them, and thereby take over number one spot from their present attitude, Earth would have to send Marshall to replace If they carried out the threats of the job, thought Crownwall, then these Sunda friends of yours.\" to Crownwall. \"You broke our He climbed the great ramp, with its deeply carved Greek key design, toward the mighty entrance gate of the palace. His manner demonstrated an elaborate air of unconcern that he felt sure was entirely Crownwall and unexpectedly to Crownwall, Crownwall all but sagged with to feel safe, and we will guarantee them an equal share in the government of the Galaxy.\" \"Bunk,\" said Crownwall. Crownwall. \"I want to see Ffallk.\" Emperor, Hereditary Ruler of the Seventy Suns, Viceroy of the \"It is impossible for us of Earth to destroy all of your planets. As you have said, there are more planets our own good behavior and sincerity. he summons. If you know what's good for you, you'll get out of here Twelfth Sector of the Universal arrived from Earth to talk to him. He'll summon me fast enough. Meanwhile, my highly polished friends, I'll just wait here, so why Crownwall sat on the steps, said to Crownwall. \"Follow me. His of the entrance. Crownwall stamped out his smoke and ambled after the hurrying \"Nor do I,\" consented Crownwall. \"But your stooge here doesn't They examined Crownwall with seem very happy about it all.\" His Effulgence wiggled his tentacles. \"That's nice,\" said Crownwall think it's time for you to tell us something about how you get across light-years of space in a few Crownwall to still Crownwall's immediate After Crownwall nodded. \"I don't see why not. Well, then, let me tell you that we don't travel in space at all. That's why I didn't show up on any of your long-range detection progressed as far as your own must know, at least theoretically, that time travel is entirely possible. After him. And if Crownwall couldn't do Crownwall. \"If you wanted someone to Crownwall. \"If you couldn't I am the leader of one of the mightiest peoples in the Galaxy, whereas there are scarcely six of which ours is such a distinguished member. \"Then of course, as I continued to move in time, the whole Galaxy billions of you squatting on one minor planet, we still need each There are more inhabited planets in the Galaxy than there Crownwall shrugged. \"So?\" another two million years.\" Crownwall the end of a drinking rose to his feet. \"And now, Your Effulgence, I think it's about time I went back to my ship and drove it home to Earth to make my \"I'd noticed that,\" Crownwall be numbered among the Servants of the Emperor. So we let you alone, in order that you could develop in your own way, until you Galaxy. In all, it has been found \"I'm glad of that,\" said Crownwall. we have watched develop, and some we have actively assisted to only fifteen times. The other races \"You Earthlings, in defiance of all expectation and all reason, have exploded into space. You have developed in an incredibly short space of time. But even that isn't Crownwall. \"I was to Crownwall. in space, about forty thousand kilometers above the Earth. It had been manned by a dozen adventurous people, captained by Crownwall, and had headed out on its ion drive until it was safely clear of the warping influence of planetary masses. Then, after several impatient \"we have very little trouble with civilians who violate this particular would usually—seven point three four times out of 10—destroy the ship, and everything in space for His Effulgence beckoned to the bowman to approach. \"Your results thousands of miles around, in a tradition.\" and spoke again to Crownwall. had headed for that planet confidently and unsuspectingly, using Two weeks later, while they were still several planetary diameters from their destination, they had been shocked to find more than two score alien ships of space Your Effulgence, does the Emperor's race—the Master Race—also than their own. These ships had rapidly and competently englobed a little more often.\" He stifled a shudder of distaste. \"Tell me, the closing in on them—ships that were swifter and more maneuverable enjoy the type of civilization swiftly. Crownwall recalled the discussion—the dangerous influence of a planetary will soon put a stop to all of that—your mass, they had again activated the Crownwall. Refreshments were served to His Effulgence and to Crownwall during the trip, without interrupting the smooth progress they had returned to Earth as swiftly as they had departed. Earth had drink or, except for Ggaran, evidence of fatigue. After several hours of travel, following Crownwall's directions, the which he had concealed his small transportation machine. The machine, for spatial mobility, was being almost undetectable in use. It emitted no mass or radiation. After elaborate and lengthy farewells, Crownwall climbed into his machine and fell gently up until he was out of the atmosphere, before starting his enormous journey through time back to Earth. More quickly than it had taken him to reach his ship from the palace of and uncontrolled in the Galaxy. Once was enough for that.\" over?\" asked Crownwall. Government of Earth, making a full report on his trip to Vega. When he had finished, the President His Effulgence, he was in the Council Chamber of the Confederation it took us a little time to react. We located your planet quickly enough, and confirmed that you were a new they seem,\" answered Crownwall is, that we might be useful to each other. I traveled halfway across the Galaxy to meet him, to convince him that it would be sufficient just to quarantine you. asked Marshall to take the ship out and check on things. He should be back with his report before long. managed to get what you call the 'planet-buster' down into the largest of your oceans, he figured we had done our job. \"With his usual lack of imagination, he felt sure that we were safe from you—after all, there was no way for you to get off the planet. was excited when he was escorted into the Council Chamber. He bowed briefly to the President and began to Crownwall. \"Our enemies are all other, head out into space, and show up on our planet. So I've been waiting for you, and here you are.\" \"It was the thinking of a genius,\" am,\" said Crownwall. \"So what's room, leaving Crownwall sitting at bowed. \"The crustaceans on Sunda—the lobsterlike creatures that rule the Galaxy—are among the stars, and we helped them develop to the point where, in their inferior way, they were able People, can. And then they cheated us of our rightful place. \"The Emperor at Sunda is one of them. They provide sixty-eight years we have waited for the opportunity for revenge. And now that you have entered space, that opportunity is at hand.\" \"If you haven't been able to help asked Crownwall, \"how does the of his teeth subsided instantly at a soothing wave from His Effulgence. \"War in space is almost an impossibility,\" said the aged ruler. \"We can destroy planets, of course, but with few exceptions, we cannot Each race settles on the planets that best suit it. Each of those planets is quite capable of defending itself from raids, or even a small but vital portion of the goods each planet uses. All that a\n\n<question>:\nWhat likely happens to Crownwall after the story is over?\n\n<options>:\nA He has to find a new line of work because he messed up so badly\nB He works to rebuild the space travel technology that he eventually can share with other species\nC He is left to help find a new path for the Earth government as his old work is no longer possible\nD He is promoted for accomplishing his mission and continues to explore space\n\n<answer>:\n", "assistant": "C" } ]

[ { "human": "Read the following passage and questions, then choose the right answer from options, the answer should be one of A, B, C, D.\n\n<passage>:\nnor the significance of Seymour Pond's retirement. Si didn't bother to before him, Si Pond would have preferred something a bit more tangible The fact of the matter was, Si knew that his retiring had set them through decently. Well, possibly he didn't, given their standards. plenty of time to think it over. It was better to retire on a limited No. Even as Si listened to their speeches, accepted the watch and wasn't anything they could do. He had them now. He had enough Basic to keep him comfortably, by his standards, for the rest of his life. He clothing, shelter, medical care and education to sustain a low level the more pragmatic advantages such as complete retirement after but six made his six trips. He is now legally eligible for retirement. He was drafted into the working force reserves, served his time, and is now \"You must realize, my dear Lofting, that our Si Pond is nothing more Si Pond was a great believer in the institution of the spree. Any excuse would do. Back when he had finished basic education at the age name pulled. But when it had been, Si had celebrated. When he had been informed that his physical and mental qualifications were such that he was eligible for the most dangerous occupation in Each time Si returned from one of his own runs, he celebrated. A spree, Now it was all over. At the age of thirty he was retired. Law prevented him from ever being called up for contributing to the country's labor not. You had your Inalienable Basic stock, didn't you? What else did It had come as a surprise when he'd been drafted for the labor force. It finally became ludicrous when employees of industry were working The only fair thing was to let the technologically unemployed remain unemployed, with their Inalienable Basic stock as the equivalent of unemployment insurance, while the few workers still needed put in a reasonable number of hours a day, a reasonable number of weeks a year and a reasonable number of years in a life time. When new employees were needed, a draft lottery was held. fell in with some second rate mopsy and usually wound up in a third Thus, Si was vaguely aware, it had always been down through the must leave his home for distant lands, returning only periodically and usually with the salary of lengthy, weary periods of time to be spent Si was going to do it differently this time. To start off, he dressed with great care in the honorable retirement-rank suit he had so recently purchased. His space pin he attached carefully to the lapel. That was a good beginning, he decided. needed. Those few who did contribute were awarded honors, decorations, titles. Attired satisfactorily, Si double-checked to see that his credit card was in his pocket. As an after-thought, he went over to the auto-apartment's teevee-phone, flicked it on, held the card to the would. His monthly dividends were due in another week or so, and he wouldn't have to worry about current expenses. Yes, indeedy, Si Pond He opened the small, closet-like door which housed his vacuum-tube two-seater, and wedged himself into the small vehicle. He brought down shot, and Si took the involuntary breath from which only heroes could Manhattan. The shuttling began again, and one or two more traversing sub-shots. Finally, the dash threw a green light and Si opened the canopy and stepped into his hotel room. A voice said gently, \"If the quarters are satisfactory, please present your credit card within ten minutes.\" Si took his time. Not that he really needed it. It was by far the most swank suite he had ever seen. One wall was a window of whatever size the guest might desire and Si touched the control that dilated it to the full. His view opened in such wise that he could see both the table, nor to check the endless potables on the autobar list. All that, he well knew, would be superlative. Besides, he didn't plan to dine or do much drinking in his suite. He made a mock leer. Not unless he managed to acquire some feminine companionship, that was. He looked briefly into the swimming pool and bath, then flopped himself happily onto the bed. It wasn't up to the degree of softness he presently desired, and he dialed the thing to the ultimate in that direction so that with a laugh he sank almost out of sight into the He came back to his feet, gave his suit a quick patting so that it fell into press and, taking his credit card from his pocket, put it against the teevee-phone screen and pressed the hotel button so that registration could be completed. For a moment he stood in the center of the floor, in thought. Take it around in second-class groggeries, no eating in automated luncheterias. the grand manner. No cloddy was Si Pond. He decided a drink was in order to help him plan his strategy. A drink at the hotel's famous Kudos Room where celebrities were reputed to be a dime a dozen. He left the suite and stepped into one of the elevators. He said, \"Kudos Room.\" The auto-elevator murmured politely, \"Yes, sir, the Kudos Room.\" At the door to the famous rendezvous of the swankiest set, Si paused a moment and looked about. He'd never been in a place like this, either. However, he stifled his first instinct to wonder about what this was going to do to his current credit balance with an inner grin and made his way to the bar. There was actually a bartender. Si Pond suppressed his astonishment and said, offhand, attempting an air of easy sophistication, \"Slivovitz Sour.\" \"Yes, sir.\" The drinks in the Kudos Room might be concocted by hand, but Si noticed they had the routine teevee screens built into the bar for payment. He put his credit card on the screen immediately before him when the to his highest expectations, and then swiveled slightly on his stool to take a look at the others present. who occupied the stool two down from him. Si Pond blinked. He blinked She looked at him coldly, turned to the bartender and murmured, \"A Far Out Cooler, please, Fredric.\" Then deliberately added, \"I thought the Kudos Room was supposed to be exclusive.\" There was nothing the bartender could say to that, and he went about building the drink. Si cleared his throat. \"Hey,\" he said, \"how about letting this one be Si, disconcerted by the sudden reversal, said, \"Yeah ... sure.\" Si,\" he said. \"Everybody calls me Si.\" \"Si,\" Si said, gratified. Holy Zoroaster, he'd never seen anything current sex symbols, but never in person. \"Call me Si,\" he said again. \"I been called Si so long, I don't even know who somebody's talking to Si Pond was surprised. \"Cried?\" he said. \"Well, why? I was kind of Si was expansive. \"Why, sure. In the Space Department we don't have much time for formality. Everybody's just Si, and Doc, and Jim. Like \"Well,\" Si said modestly, \"two of my runs were only to the Moon.\" world trained to pilot a space craft. And here you were, retiring.\" Si grunted. \"Yeah. That's all part of the Doc's scheme to get me to Si said, \"Look, how about another drink?\" \"Si,\" Si said. He motioned to the bartender with a circular twist of Si chuckled. \"A real buff, eh? You know, it's kind of funny. I was after my first run and I found out what space cafard was.\" She frowned. \"I don't believe I know much about that.\" Sitting in the Kudos Room with the most beautiful girl to whom he had ever talked, Si could be nonchalant about the subject. \"Old Gubelin\n\n<question>:\nWhat context shows that Si was able to retire from the working force reserves with honorable rank?\n\n<options>:\nA He purchased and dressed in the honorable retirement-rank suit.\nB He was granted access into the vacuum-tube two-seater for transportation.\nC His receipt of Basic onto his credit card that would fund all of his necessities.\nD He was permitted to enter the Kudos Room at the hotel.\n\n<answer>:\n", "assistant": "A" } ]

[ { "human": "Read the following passage and questions, then choose the right answer from options, the answer should be one of A, B, C, D.\n\n<passage>:\nBuckhalter Shannon's Imperial Circus to Buckhalter Shannon's face unless he's tired and wants a long rest in a comfy fracture-frame. I said, \"Bucky. Hold on, fella. I....\" Jig? I'm not going to hurt him.\" Bucky Shannon got up. He grinned his pleasantest grin. \"Delighted. I'm I didn't like him. I didn't like him at all. But he had money. I said, \"Howdy. Let's go find a booth. These Marshies make me nervous, looking like hungry cats at a mouse-hole.\" The little guy nodded. \"Excellent idea. My name is Beamish. Simon Beamish. I wish to—ah—charter your circus.\" I looked at Bucky. He looked hungrier than the Marshies did. We didn't say anything until we got Beamish into a curtained booth with a fresh pitcher of thil on the table. Then I cleared my throat. \"What exactly did you have in mind, Mr. Beamish?\" Beamish sipped his drink, made a polite face, and put it down. \"I have independent means, gentlemen. It has always been my desire to lighten the burden of life for those less fortunate....\" Bucky got red around the ears. \"Just a minute,\" he murmured, and started to get up. I kicked him under the table. \"Shut up, you lug. Let Mister Beamish finish.\" He sat down, looking like a mean dog waiting for the postman. Beamish ignored him. He went on, quietly, Bucky had relaxed. His grey-green eyes began to gleam. He started to speak, and I kicked him again. \"That would be expensive, Mister Beamish,\" I said. \"We'd have to cancel several engagements....\" He looked at me. I was lying, and he knew it. But he said, \"I quite understand that. I would be prepared....\" The curtains were yanked back suddenly. Beamish shut up. Bucky and I glared at the head and shoulders poking in between the drapes. see? And if she don't get happier pretty soon I ain't sure your tin-pot ship'll hold her.\" He pulled the curtains to and departed. Bucky Shannon groaned. Beamish cleared his throat and said, rather stiffly, \"Gertrude?\" \"Yeah. She's kind of temperamental.\" Bucky took a quick drink. I finished for him. \"She's the star attraction of our show, Mr. Beamish. A real blue-swamp Venusian cansin wouldn't die on us, because without her we'd have a sicker-looking circus than even I could stand. Beamish looked impressed. \"A cansin . Well, well! The mystery at least a hundred U.C.'s.\" It was twice what we had any right to ask. I was prepared to dicker. Beamish looked at me with that innocent dead pan. For a fraction of a second I thought I saw something back of his round blue eyes, and my stomach jumped like it was shot. Beamish smiled sweetly. \"I'm not much of a bargainer. One hundred Universal Credits will be agreeable to me.\" He dragged out a roll as big as my two fists, peeled \"By way of a retainer, gentleman. My attorney and I will call on you in the morning with a contract and itinerary. Good night.\" We said good night, trying not to drool. Beamish went away. Bucky made grab for the money, but I beat him to it. \"Scram,\" I said. \"There are guys waiting for this. Big guys with clubs. Shannon has a good vocabulary. He used it. When he got his breath back he said suddenly, \"Beamish is pulling some kind of a game.\" \"Yeah.\" \"It may be crooked.\" \"Sure. And he may be screwball and on the level. For Pete's sake!\" I feet. He waved and said, \"Hiya, boys.\" Bucky and I checked the bills, paid them, and pocketed the receipts. \"They're good guys, Jig. Swell people. They stuck by me, and I've rewarded them.\" I said, \"Sure,\" rather sourly. Bucky hiccoughed. \"Let's go see Gertrude.\" I didn't want to see Gertrude. I never got over feeling funny going Bucky was looking stubborn, so I shrugged. worse,\" he said. \"She's lonesome.\" \"That's tough,\" said Bucky Shannon. His grey-green eyes looked like an Bucky Shannon sniffled again. I said irritably, \"Be reasonable, Gow! Bucky moaned and kicked under me. I remember hanging on and thinking, \"Mis' Bucky okay. You save life. You big hero, Mis' Jig. Mis' Gow come Bucky Shannon opened the door. He looked white and grim, and there was a big burn across his neck. He said: \"Beamish is here with his lawyer.\" I picked up my shirt. \"Right with you.\" Kanza went out, still giggling. Bucky closed the door. Nobody saw anything, of course?\" Bucky shook his head. \"Question is, Jig, who wants to kill us, and why?\" \"Beamish. He realizes he's been gypped.\" \"One hundred U.C.'s,\" said Bucky softly, \"for a few lousy swampedge mining camps. It stinks, Jig. You think we should back out?\" latch and looked at my feet. \"And—uh—Jig, I....\" I said, \"Skip it. The next time, just don't trip me up, that's all!\" like a disaster hoping to happen. To make it worse, Zurt the Jovian strong-man got hurt during the take-off, and the Mercurian cave-cat had kittens. and cold. Bucky said, Bucky said, \"Jig—it's Sam Kapper.\" Sam Kapper was a hunter, supplying animals to zoos and circuses and Bucky started to help him up. Kapper was crying, and he jerked all over I was thinking about Kapper, then, and I didn't pay much attention. I We got Kapper inside the shack. It turned out to be a cheap bar, with a Bucky said gently, \"Okay, Sam. Relax. What's the trouble?\" Kapper tried to straighten up. He hadn't shaved. The lean hard lines Bucky looked at me. Kapper was blue around the mouth. I was scared, Bucky got up. \"I'll get a doctor,\" he said. \"Stick with him.\" Kapper grabbed his wrist. Kapper's nails were blue and the cords in his hands \"Sure,\" said Bucky. \"Sure, well take it back. What is it?\" Kapper's face was horrible. I felt sick, listening to him fight for . Male. Only one. You don't know...! Take him back.\" \"Where is it, Sam?\" I reached across Bucky suddenly and jerked the curtain back. Beamish was standing there. Beamish, bent over, with his ear cocked. Kapper made a harsh strangling noise and fell across the table. Beamish never changed expression. He didn't move while Bucky felt Kapper's pulse. Bucky didn't need to say anything. We knew. \"Heart?\" said Beamish finally. \"Yeah,\" said Bucky. He looked as bad as I felt. \"Poor Sam.\" Beamish with his round dead baby face. I climbed over Shannon and pushed Beamish suddenly down into his lap. \"Keep this guy here till I get back,\" I said. Shannon stared at me. Beamish started to get indignant. \"Shut up,\" I told him. \"We got a contract.\" I yanked the curtains shut and walked over to the bar.\n\n<question>:\nWhat did Jig and Bucky promise Kapper?\n\n<options>:\nA That they would find a way to save the Circus\nB That they would be able to save him\nC That they would take the cansin back.\nD That they would not make the deal with Beamish\n\n<answer>:\n", "assistant": "C" } ]

[ { "human": "Read the following passage and questions, then choose the right answer from options, the answer should be one of A, B, C, D.\n\n<passage>:\nBut then, \"soft\" is not a word you can apply to Princess Mononoke , however pantheistic its worldview. The film, which is rated PG-13, is full of splattery carnage. If Miyazaki in long shot is contemplative, in close-up he's ferocious. He's both inside and outside the action: He knows when to rock your world and when to induce a state of sorrowful detachment. According to the New York Times , Toy Story animators screened reels of his work when their imaginations flagged, and writers for Star Trek named an alien species after one of his features. Watching Princess Mononoke --which has been dubbed to Disney/Miramax specifications by American and English stars but retains its two-hour-plus length, its gory beheadings, and its grim, near-apocalyptic finale--you can understand their worship. It isn't that Miyazaki's work is technically so dazzling in this age of digitized miracles it's that everything is sublimely in proportion. The movie has a scope that makes Hollywood's homiletic, follow-your-dream fables look even more solipsistic. Miyazaki is after nothing less than the moment in our history (the film is set in the 14 th and 15 th centuries) when the power shifted from a \"natural\" world to one shaped by human technology. It's the beginning of what Bill McKibben called \"the end of nature\"--that is, when nature became no longer an autonomous, self-regulating force but one touched (and, in Miyazaki's view, poisoned) by human industry. It's a shame that the wolf princess warms up to Ashitaka and spends the rest of the film either saving him or being saved by him. She loses that punk-bitch allure. The voice of Claire Danes doesn't help. When Danes says, \"I'd do anything to get you humans out of my forest,\" she sounds like a Valley Girl peeved over lack of parking spaces at the mall. (San needs a more ragged voice--I'd be interested to hear the original Japanese actress.) Billy Crudup is just as Disneyfied (Miramaxed?), but that doesn't hurt as much because Ashitaka is conceived from the start as a rather bland ingénu. Gillian Anderson's growling Moro sounds silly (she doesn't have the breath control), and the fey-hick tones of Billy Bob Thornton are too recognizable as the Akim Tamiroff-like mercenary, Jigo. But Minnie Driver--coming off a triumphantly dizzy Jane in Tarzan --once again provides a voice that the animators deserve. \"Bring the strange-ah to me late-ah,\" she commands in sexy Martian Queen cadences that will stir the loins of Flash Gordon fans everywhere. \"I would like to thank him puh-sonally.\" \"A special smile ... a certain touch ...\" So begins the elevator-music theme song of Music of the Heart ... \"I never had a lot that I loved so much.\" The credits had just started and I was already looking for a barf bag. Did Miramax and director Wes Craven have to work so hard to schlockify the story of Roberta Guaspari (played here by Meryl Streep), whose violin courses in East Harlem elementary schools have become a beacon for such programs nationwide? A fabled taskmaster (her story was told in the 1996 documentary Small Wonders ), Guaspari used music as a way to teach self-discipline--along with the healthy self-respect that follows in its wake. When the New York school board cut the funding for her program, she proved a marvel of self-promotion, attracting features in all the major dailies and ending up along with her best students at Carnegie Hall for a benefit \"Fiddlefest\"--along with Itzhak Perlman, Isaac Stern, and other legendary \"fiddlers.\" Streep has said that she spent so much of the time on the set learning the violin (she doesn't play any instruments) that she didn't bring the full force of her acting technique to bear on Roberta. Maybe that's why the performance seems so natural. Let her always learn an instrument on the set! Still, she doesn't make much sense of Guaspari. The script, by Pamela Gray ( A Walk on the Moon ), has her students complain of her nastiness and perfectionism, but Streep--who has made herself look dumpy, thick-waisted, and bedraggled--is so busy telegraphing her vulnerability that all we get is dippy niceness. Instead of a monument to an individual's iron will, Music of the Heart becomes the story of a woman so helpless that she arouses the kindness of strangers. Directors of violent genre pieces like Craven (who got this mainstream gig in return for doing the Scream sequels) or Carl Franklin or Sam Raimi sometimes want so badly to belong to Establishment Hollywood--to go to the Academy Awards--that they neuter themselves. Bending over backward to show how sensitive they can be, they forget that violence--even if it's just emotional violence--belongs in \"ordinary\" dramas, too. Craven does good work with the young actors in the classroom scenes, but the film has a reticence common to most biopics and a mushy, TV-movie humanism that blands out its texture. OK, I was a puddle after some scenes, like the one where Guaspari pushes a student to get her to improve her posture and discovers that the girl is wearing a leg brace. But how much more emotional the Carnegie Hall climax would have been if instead of suddenly seeing these East Harlem kids on stage with Perlman, Stern, Joshua Bell, etc., we'd seen them rehearsing first and struggling to keep up. There's too much music of the heart and not enough music of the callused fingers. In outline, The Limey is a lean little B-movie revenge melodrama about a felonious Brit (Terence Stamp) who's newly sprung from prison and flies to Southern California to get to the bottom of his beautiful daughter's death: \"My name's Wilson ... Who dunnit?\" The film, directed by Steven Soderbergh, would be worth seeing just for Stamp's performance, at once rock-hard and goofily blinkered, and for Peter Fonda's wittily self-parodic turn as the suspected killer, a music producer who coasts on '60s counterculture easiness while his lackeys do the dirty work. (\"Oh, man,\" he says, the fear finally seeping through the ether. \"This is getting all too close to me.\") Some, including the critic at Time , have questioned Soderbergh's sanity. (But of course--Soderbergh flouts time!) I see a method to his madness. Less grandiosely than Harmony Korine in Julien Donkey-Boy , Soderbergh pores over every scene in search of its essential dramatic gesture. He's saying: This --not all that other stuff--is what's important. He telegraphs the ending--you know the Limey will somehow be at the root of his daughter's death--but it's still an emotional wow. The climax justifies the technique. It says the point of this odyssey isn't revenge but regret--for irredeemably blown chances and a tragic waste of love. Soderbergh is one of those rare filmmakers who learn on the job. Working within a tight genre structure, he's discovering hundreds of ways of editing a given scene that can give it the richness of a novel. Is he totally successful? No he misses now and then, which is why the technique sticks out. But what a fantastic effort. See it and weep for what's missing in most other movies.\n\n<question>:\nIn reviewing \"Music of the Heart,\" the reviewer believes that the director's greatest flaw is:\n\n<options>:\nA Not focusing enough on the violin music\nB Trying too hard to appeal to the film industry's elite\nC Ignoring the perspectives of the children in the film\nD Mischaracterizing Roberta Guaspari\n\n<answer>:\n", "assistant": "D" } ]

[ { "human": "Read the following passage and questions, then choose the right answer from options, the answer should be one of A, B, C, D.\n\n<passage>:\nIT WAS A DULL, ROUTINE LITTLE they skipped several steps in the procedure. Naturally they did not get results at once, nor did they expect to required a fine adjustment. But they were disappointed that they found nothing for several hours as they hovered high over the rotation. Then but one city, if that is its form. Shall we follow the rest of the surface to find another, or concentrate on this? It'll be twelve hours before it's back in our ken if we let it go now.\" \"Let's lock on this one and finish the scan. Then we can do the rest of the world to make sure we've missed nothing,\" said Stark. had refused to read Positive when turned on the inventor himself, bad blood developed between machine and man. Glaser knew that he had told the machine so heatedly. The machine replied, with such warmth that its relays chattered, that Glaser did not difference , the machine insisted. individual, though this could not be certain) and got very definite assumed an air of importance when it ran these tests. of the shoulders in a man. They called it the \"You tell of us will get some sleep. If you find no other spot then we will go down on that one the next time it is in position under us, in about twelve hours.\" that thought is in one spot only. If we find no others then we will go down boldly and visit this.\" So they all, except Steiner, went off to their bunks then: Stark, the Captain Gregory Gilbert, the executive officer with us.\" \"Howdy,\" said the priest. He may or may not have been understood, but the two of them smiled at him, so he went on. \"Father Briton from Philadelphia,\" he said, \"on detached service. And you, my good man, what is your handle, your monicker, your tag?\" \"Ha-Adamah,\" said the man. but the woman smiled, proving that she was human. \"The woman is named Hawwah,\" said the man. \"The sheep is named sheep, the lion is named lion, the horse is named horse and the hoolock is named hoolock.\" \"I understand. It is possible that this could go on and on. How is it that you use the English tongue?\" \"I have only one tongue but it is given to us to be understood by all by the eagle, by the squirrel, by the ass, by the English.\" \"We happen to be bloody Yankees, but we use a borrowed tongue. You wouldn't have a drink on you for a tubful of thirsty travellers, would you?\" \"The fountain.\" \"Ah—I see.\" But the crew all drank of the fountain to be sociable. It was water, but water that excelled, cool and with all its original bubbles like the first water ever made. \"What do you make of them?\" asked Stark. \"Human,\" said Steiner. \"It may even be that they are a little more than to be clothed, as it were, in dignity.\" \"And very little else,\" said Father Briton, \"though that light trick does serve a purpose. But I'm not sure they'd pass in Philadelphia.\" \"Talk to them again,\" said Stark. \"You're the linguist.\" \"That isn't necessary here, Captain. Talk to them yourself.\" \"Are there any other people here?\" Stark asked the man. \"The two of us. Man and woman.\" \"But is there more than one man or woman?\" \"How could there be more than one of anything?\" The captain was a little puzzled by this, but he went on doggedly: \"Ha-Adamah, what do you think that we are? Are we not people?\" \"You are not anything till I name you. But I will name you and then you can be. You are named Captain. He is named Priest. He is named Engineer. He is named Flunky.\" \"Thanks a lot,\" said Steiner. \"But are we not people?\" persisted Captain Stark. \"No. We are the people. There are no people but two. How could there be other people?\" \"And the damnest thing about it,\" muttered Langweilig, \"is, how are you going to prove him wrong? But it does give you a small feeling.\" \"Can we have something to eat?\" asked the Captain. \"Pick from the trees,\" said Ha-Adamah, \"and then it may be that you will want to sleep on the grass. Being not of human nature (which does not need sleep or rest), it may be that you require respite. But you are free to enjoy the garden and its fruits.\" \"We will,\" said Captain Stark. They wandered about the place, but they were uneasy. There were the animals. The lion and lioness were enough to make one cautious, though they offered no harm. The two bears had a puzzling look, as though they wanted either to frolic with you or to mangle you. \"Ask him first. You ask him.\" \"Ha-Adamah, is it allowed to eat the apples?\" Father Briton, you are the linguist, but in Hebrew does not Ha-Adamah and Hawwah mean—?\" \"Of course they do. You know that as well as I.\" And it was then that Ha-Adamah, the shining man, gave a wild cry: \"No, incredible.\" \"It is a little odd. Adam, old man, how long have you been here?\" \"Forever less six days is the answer that has been given to me. I never did understand the answer, however.\" \"Yes, there is a question that will settle it. Adam, old man, how about \"This is hardly the time for clowning,\" said Stark. \"I'm not clowning, Captain. How about it, Adam? I'll give you choice of colors and first move.\" never played a preternatural mind. Let's just set up the board, Adam, It was a world with everything, and it seemed to have only two inhabitants. They went everywhere except into the big cave. \"What is there, Adam?\" asked Captain Stark. \"The great serpent lives there. I would not disturb him. He has long been cranky because plans he had for us did not materialize. But we persevere, it will come by him.\" They learned no more of the real nature of the sphere in their time there. Yet all but one of them were convinced of the reality when they left. And they talked of it as they took off. \"A crowd would laugh if told of it,\" said Stark, \"but not many would laugh if they had actually seen the place, or them. I am not a gullible Down in the great cave that Old Serpent, a two-legged one among whose names were \"Snake-Oil Sam,\" spoke to his underlings: \"It'll take them fourteen days to get back with the settlers. We'll have time to overhaul the blasters. We haven't had any well-equipped and slaughter and stow before there was another batch to take care of.\" \"I think you'd better write me some new lines,\" said Adam. \"I feel like a goof saying those same ones to each bunch.\" \"You are a goof, and therefore perfect for the part. I was in show business long enough to know never to change a line too soon. I did change Adam and Eve to Ha-Adamah and Hawwah, and the apple to the pomegranate. People aren't becoming any smarter—but they are becoming better researched, and they insist on authenticity. He looked at the three dozen space ships stripped and stacked, and at the rather large pile of bone-meal in one corner. \"I know it, Eve. The lion is a very important prop. Maybe one of the \"I'm working on it.\" \"And you had better have an armed escort when you return,\" said Father Briton. \"Why in cosmos would we want an armed escort?\" zoologically rigged, salted conspicuously with gold and shot through with anachronisms. And moreover he was afraid to play me at checkers.\" \"What?\" it was just that he chose not to make our acquaintance personally.\" \"They looked at the priest thoughtfully. \"All the time we were there the woman did not speak.\"\n\n<question>:\nWhat was an indicator that Adam, or Ha-Adamah, was only playing a part while communicating with the crew?\n\n<options>:\nA His eruption of laughter once the crew had left.\nB He told the Old Serpent that he needed to write him new lines.\nC His past involvement with show business.\nD He recalled his true name after the crew had left.\n\n<answer>:\n", "assistant": "B" } ]

[ { "human": "Read the following passage and questions, then choose the right answer from options, the answer should be one of A, B, C, D.\n\n<passage>:\ngoing—but I know that if I stuck to the old man, I was a comer ... even if he was a goner! Doc had this solemn human by the throat when I caught up with him. \"Tonight,\" Doc was saying in his old voice that was as crackled and important as parchment, \"tonight Man will reach the Moon. The golden Nothing came out of my gabbling mouth. \" What is Doc's full name? \" I almost fell in, but at the last instant I caught myself and said, \"Doctor Kevin O'Malley, Senior.\" From the bed, Doc said a word. \"Son.\" Then he disappeared. I looked at that which he had made. I wondered where he had gone, in this is to happen.\" \"Sure,\" the man agreed severely, prying a little worriedly at Doc's wanted for the murder of a North American Mountie. It was easier this night and that made me afraid. Doc's thin frame, in Seattle hadn't helped me get them loose, Doc and I would have been I didn't want to be cured. I wouldn't be. Doc was gone. That was all I greasy collar of the human. \"I hope you'll forgive him, sir,\" I said, not meeting the man's eyes. \"He's my father and very old, as you can see.\" I laughed inside at the absurd, easy lie. \"Old events seem recent to him.\" had now. That and the \"'Memory Jump,' you mean. All my great-grandfathers have it. But Great-great-grandmother Lupos, funny thing, is like a schoolgirl. Sharp, you know. I.... Say, the poor old guy looks sick. Want any help?\" I told the human no, thanks, and walked Doc toward the flophouse three doors down. I hoped we would make it. I didn't know what would happen \"The rest is simple,\" Andre said. \"Doc O'Malley bought up all the stock in a certain ancient metaphysical order and started supplying members The human nodded, Adam's apple jerking in the angry neon twilight. the human race can tell itself how to achieve a state of pure logic, without food, without sex, without conflict—just as Doc has achieved such a state—a little late, true. He had a powerful guilt complex, even stronger than your withdrawal, over releasing this blessing on like Doc and me. kept getting closer each of the times. I tried not to think about it and helped Doc through the fly-specked \"The North American government has to have this secret, Kevin,\" the flophouse doors. I knew I could not let Doc's—Dad's—time travel thing fall into Doc was quivering against me, his legs boneless. \"We can always make it over to the mission,\" I lied. Andre did not deny that he wanted it to fall into his hands. Moon and the silver ship, symbols of greed. Tonight is the night when arthritic fingers that were clamped on his collar. \"No argument. Sure, so. Want I should call a cop and tell him you were flexing a muscle?\" I let go of him. He didn't scare me, but Doc was beginning to mumble and that did high. The other foot was finished in chicken wire. There was a wino singing on the left, a wino praying on the right, and the door didn't have any lock on it. At last, Doc and I were alone. I laid Doc out on the gray-brown cot and put his forearm over his face to shield it some from the glare of the light bulb. I swept off all the bedbugs in sight and stepped on them heavily. jagged cut-out nude curled against a lump of dust and lint, giving it an unreal distortion. Doc began to mumble louder. I knew I had to move. I waited just a moment, savoring the painless peace. Then, finally, I concentrated on Doc's voice and trusted my hands would follow their habit pattern and construct the symbols for his words. They were suddenly distinguishable. layered with lumpy fat, was beginning to muscle-dance against my side. ....\" His voice rose to a meaningless wail that stretched into non-existence. words were what I had been waiting for. They told everything I needed to know to become the most powerful man in the Solar Federation. That wasn't just an addict's dream. I knew who Doc was. When I got to thinking it was just a dream and that I was dragging this old man around North America for nothing, I remembered who he was. I remembered that he was somebody very important whose name and work I had once known, even if now I knew him only as Doc. Pain was a pendulum within me, swinging from low throbbing bass to high screaming tenor. I had to get out and get some. But I didn't have a he left. thing Doc alone, but I had to. He was starting to cry. He didn't always do that. I listened to him for a moment, then tested and tasted the craving that crawled through my veins. I got back inside somehow. Doc was twisting on the cot, tears washing white streaks across his face. I shoved Doc's face up against my chest. I held onto him and let him bellow. I soothed the lanks of soiled white hair back over his lumpy skull. Then I realized what was about to happen. It was foolish and awful and the one on the other side was praying, same as before. Only they had changed around—prayer came from the left, song from the right. Doc sat on the floor in the half-darkness and he had made a thing . hamburgers on the wooden chair, hoping the odor wouldn't bring any hungry rats out of the walls. I knelt beside Doc. \"An order, my boy, an order,\" he whispered. I didn't know what he meant. Was he suddenly trying to give me orders? against the neon light, now red wine, now fresh grape. I read it. \"Concentrate,\" Doc said hoarsely. \"Concentrate....\" I wondered what the words meant. Wondering takes a kind of concentration. The heavy-set man in the ornate armchair was saying, \"The bullet struck me as I was pulling on my boot....\" Then I realized what I had been trying to get from Doc all these months—time travel. A thin, sickly man was sprawled in the other chair in a rumpled The heavier man was half choking, half laughing. \"I say—I say, I would like to see you explain this, my dear fellow.\" and time from which he comes.\" The surprise stung. \"How did you know?\" I asked. He gestured with a pale hand. \"To maintain a logical approach, I must despite my voluntary use of one drug and my involuntary experiences would tell us something of his age with special reference to the theory and practice of temporal transference, Doctor, we would be better Perception' have altered the past to make it as they suppose it to be. this myself.\" Doc was lying on the cot, half his face twisted into horror. \"Don't move, Kevin,\" she said. \"I'll have to shoot you—maybe not to kill, but painfully.\" I watched her face flash blue, red, blue and knew she meant it. But I had known too much in too short a time. I had to help Doc, but there was something else. I had to help Doc. I had to have some coffee. \"What do you want?\" \"Listen, Kevin. Listen carefully to what I am saying. Doc found I didn't know whether she was asking me, but I didn't know. All I knew was that I had to help Doc and get some coffee. prosper. Besides, horse-racing and the stock market weren't a part of Doc's character. He was a scholar.\" Why did she keep using the past tense in reference to Doc? It scared me. He was lying so still with the left side of his face so twisted. I needed some coffee. on the floor to the cot. Doc had a pulse, but it was irregular. I checked for \"They ceased to exist—as human beings—shortly after they received a book from Doc,\" the Martian said.\n\n<question>:\nDuring what instance does the narrator tell the truth without intending to?\n\n<options>:\nA He tells Miss Casey that he wants coffee.\nB He tells Andre about Miss Casey.\nC He tells Miss Casey his real first and last name.\nD He tells the somber person that Doc is his father.\n\n<answer>:\n", "assistant": "D" } ]

[ { "human": "Read the following passage and questions, then choose the right answer from options, the answer should be one of A, B, C, D.\n\n<passage>:\nHB73782. Ultroom error. Tendal 13. Arvid 6. Kanad transfer days. Next Kanad transfer ready. 1951. Reginald, son of Mr. a cheese grater and a linen baby book, all with perfunctory interest. When she looked up again she noticed a man walking by—except he seemed off balance and he backed up confusedly in the face of the bleeding knees, squalling for all he was worth on the grass—Oh, I don't even want to think about it.\" she moaned. \"I'd better go and make sure Reggie's all right.\" Martin got up out of his chair and went to the stairs. him. \"We'll go up and look at him together.\" They found Reggie peacefully asleep in his crib in his room upstairs. and led her to the door. \"As I've said, sergeant, this fellow hypnotized my wife. He made her think he was her brother. She doesn't even have a brother. Then he \"Upstairs,\" Martin said. \"You'd better get him, Dr. Tompkins, if we're to take him to the forward on his face. The figure of a woman ran from the house, retrieved the now squalling doctors. One of them was the same man who tried to take the baby this afternoon. They hypnotized my husband—\" \"I shot him in the legs. The other—the other turned and I shot him in the chest. I could even see his eyes when he turned around. If I hadn't pulled the trigger then ... I don't want to remember it.\" \"I wonder why they want our baby? He's just like any other baby. We don't have any money. We couldn't pay a ransom.\" corner, eyes open, tongue protruding. He was dead. If we keep Reggie in the house much longer he'll turn out to be a hermit,\" Martin said at breakfast a month later. \"He needs fresh air Not a trace of alcohol. He couldn't have even had a smell of near beer. Here's another report. This is his physical exam made not long afterwards. The man was in perfect health. Only variations are he had knows where.\" \"Getting back to the man who ran over the child and killed Mrs. Laughton. Why did he pretend to be drunk?\" It was the chief's turn to shake his head. \"Your guess is as good as mine. There are a lot of angles to this case none of us understand. It looks deliberate, but where's the motive?\" \"What does the man have to say?\" an alienist.\" \"One jump ahead of you. Dr. Stone thinks he's normal, but won't put down any I.Q. Actually, he can't figure him out himself. Smith seems case you're interested.\" The man who had laughingly told police his name was John Smith lay on his chest. This gave him the appearance of being alert despite reclining. Even as he lay, his mouth held a hint of a smile. it,\" he declared. \"If you carry on any more we'll never get back to the Ultroom!\" \"I'm sorry, Tendal,\" the man on the cot said. \"I didn't think—\" \"You're absolutely right. You didn't think. Crashing that car into You know the instructions. Just because you work in the Ultroom don't get to thinking human life doesn't have any value. We wouldn't be here if it hadn't. But to unnecessarily kill—\" The older man shook his head. \"You could have killed yourself as well and we'd never get the job done. As it is, you almost totally obliterated me.\" Tendal 13 paced the length of the cell and back again, gesturing as he talked. \"It was only with the greatest effort I pulled myself back together again. I doubt that you could have done it. And then all the while you've been sitting here, probably enjoying yourself with your special you was needed. I volunteered. Imagine that! I volunteered! Tendal 13 reaches the height of stupidity and volunteers to help Arvid 6 go back 6,000 years to bring Kanad back, to correct a mistake Arvid 6 made!\" He snorted. \"I still can't believe I was ever that stupid. I only prove it when I pinch myself and here I am. the poor thing by suggesting suffocation to it that night. \"And speaking of that night, you remember we agreed I was to do the talking. But no, you pulled a switch and captured Martin Laughton's I played a very minor role. 'This is my new assistant, Dr. Tompkins,' you said. And then what happened? I get shot in the legs and you get a hole in your back. We were both nearly obliterated that time and we didn't even come close to getting the child. \"Still you wanted to run the whole show. 'I'm younger than you,' you said. 'I'll take the wheel.' And the next thing I know I'm floating in space halfway to nowhere with two broken legs, a spinal injury, concussion and some of the finest bruises you ever saw.\" These twentieth century machines aren't what they ought to be,\" Arvid \"You never run out of excuses, do you, Arvid? Remember what you said in the Ultroom when you pushed the lever clear over and transferred Kanad back 6,000 years? 'My hand slipped.' As simple as that. 'My hand go back and rescue the life germ of Kanad out of each era he'd be born in.\" just to see what would happen . That's how simple I think it was.\" anything—you said we shouldn't dematerialize in front of anybody.\" \"That's right.\" \"Well, I didn't know what to do. I could see they thought I was drunk, so I was. But they had a blood sample before I could manufacture any alcohol in my blood, although I implanted a memory in them that I reeked of it.\" He laughed. \"I fancy they're thoroughly confused.\" \"And you're thoroughly amused, no doubt. Have they questioned you?\" \"John Smith. A rather prevalent name here, I understand. I manufactured a pasteboard called a social security card and a driver's license—\" again. And I hope I'll never leave there again though I'm rejuvenated through a million years.\" \"Was Kanad's life germ transferred all right this time?\" Tendal 13 shook his head. \"I haven't heard. The transfers are getting more difficult all the time. In 1609, you'll remember, it was a case of pneumonia for the two-year-old. A simple procedure. It wouldn't work here. Medicine's too far along.\" He produced a notebook. \"The \"Do you think Kanad will be angry about all this?\" \"How would you like to have to go through all those birth processes, to have your life germ knocked from one era to the next?\" \"Frankly, I didn't think he'd go back so far.\" \"If it had been anybody but Kanad nobody'd ever have thought of going back after it. The life germ of the head of the whole galactic system who came to the Ultroom to be transplanted to a younger body—and then sending him back beyond his original birth date—\" Tendal 13 got up and commenced his pacing again. \"Oh, I suppose Kanad's partly to blame, wanting rejuvenating at only 300 years. Some have waited a \"I just wonder how angry Kanad will be,\" Arvid muttered. HB92167. Ultroom Error. Tendal 13. Arvid 6. Kanad transfer out of 1951 complete. Next Kanad transfer ready. 2267. \"You remember the chief said it's all right to take him with me, Matthews,\" Tendal 13 told the jailer. \"Yes, I remember,\" the jailer said mechanically, letting them both out\n\n<question>:\nWhat was Kanad trying to do when he was accidentally transferred back in time 6000 years?\n\n<options>:\nA He was attempting to take over the entire galactic system.\nB He was trying to go forwards in time 6000 years.\nC He was going through a rejuvenation process that transfers his soul into a younger body.\nD He was trying to transfer his consciousness into a healthier body.\n\n<answer>:\n", "assistant": "C" } ]

[ { "human": "Read the following passage and questions, then choose the right answer from options, the answer should be one of A, B, C, D.\n\n<passage>:\nNo movie in the last decade has succeeded in psyching out critics and audiences as fully as the powerful, rambling war epic The Thin Red Line , Terrence Malick's return to cinema after 20 years. I've sat through it twice and am still trying to sort out my responses, which run from awe to mockery and back. Like Saving Private Ryan , the picture wallops you in the gut with brilliant, splattery battle montages and Goyaesque images of hell on earth. But Malick, a certified intellectual and the Pynchonesque figure who directed Badlands and Days of Heaven in the 1970s and then disappeared, is in a different philosophical universe from Steven Spielberg. Post-carnage, his sundry characters philosophize about their experiences in drowsy, runic voice-overs that come at you like slow bean balls: \"Why does nature vie with itself? ... Is there an avenging power in nature, not one power but two?\" Or \"This great evil: Where's it come from? What seed, what root did it grow from? Who's doin' this? Who's killin' us, robbin' us of life and light?\" First you get walloped with viscera, then you get beaned by blather. He tells the story solemnly, in three parts, with a big-deal cast (Sean Penn, Nick Nolte, John Cusack) and a few other major stars (John Travolta, Woody Harrelson, George Clooney) dropping by for cameos. After an Edenic prelude, in which a boyishly idealistic absent without leave soldier, Pvt. Witt (Jim Caviezel), swims with native youths to the accompaniment of a heavenly children's choir, the first part sees the arrival of the Allied forces on the island, introduces the principal characters (none of whom amounts to a genuine protagonist), and lays out the movie's geographical and philosophical terrain. The centerpiece--the fighting--goes on for over an hour and features the most frantic and harrowing sequences, chiefly the company's initially unsuccessful frontal assault on a Japanese hilltop bunker. The coda lasts nearly 40 minutes and is mostly talk and cleanup, the rhythms growing more relaxed until a final, incongruous spasm of violence--whereupon the surviving soldiers pack their gear and motor off to another South Pacific battle. In the final shot, a twisted tree grows on the waterline of the beach, the cycle of life beginning anew. The Thin Red Line has a curious sound-scape, as the noise of battle frequently recedes to make room for interior monologues and Hans Zimmer's bump-bump, minimalist New Age music. Pvt. Bell (Ben Chaplin) talks to his curvy, redheaded wife, viewed in deliriously sensual flashbacks. (\"Love: Where does it come from? Who lit this flame in us?\") Lt. Col. Tall (Nolte), a borderline lunatic passed over one too many times for promotion and itching to win a battle no matter what the human cost, worries groggily about how his men perceive him. The dreamer Witt poses folksy questions about whether we're all a part of one big soul. If the movie has a spine, it's his off-and-on dialogue with Sgt. Welsh (Penn), who's increasingly irritated by the private's beatific, almost Billy Budd-like optimism. Says Welsh, \"In this world, a man himself is nothin', and there ain't no world but this one.\" Replies Witt, high cheekbones glinting, \"I seen another world.\" At first it seems as if Witt will indeed be Billy Budd to Welsh's vindictive Claggart. But if Witt is ultimately an ethereal martyr, Welsh turns out to be a Bogart-like romantic who can't stop feeling pain in the face of an absent God. He speaks the movie's epitaph, \"Darkness and light, strife and love: Are they the workings of one mind, the feature of the same face? O my soul, let me be in you now. Look out through my eyes. Look out at the things you made, all things shining.\" Malick puts a lot of shining things on the screen: soldiers, natives, parrots, bats, rodents, visions of Eden by way of National Geographic and of the Fall by way of Alpo. Malick's conception of consciousness distributes it among the animate and inanimate alike Whether or not these pearllike epiphanies are strung is another matter. Malick throws out his overarching theme--is nature two-sided, at war with itself?--in the first few minutes but, for all his startling juxtapositions, he never dramatizes it with anything approaching the clarity of, say, Brian De Palma's Casualties of War (1989). Besides the dialogue between Welsh and Witt, The Thin Red Line 's other organizing story involves a wrenching tug of war between Nolte's ambition-crazed Tall and Capt. Staros (Elias Koteas), who refuses an order to send his men on what will surely be a suicidal--and futile--assault on a bunker. But matters of cause and effect don't really interest Malick. Individual acts of conscience can and do save lives, and heroism can win a war or a battle, he acknowledges. But Staros is ultimately sent packing, and Malick never bothers to trace the effect of his action on the Guadalcanal operation. In fact, the entire battle seems to take place in a crazed void. Tall quotes Homer's \"rosy-fingered dawn\" and orders a meaningless bombardment to \"buck the men up--it'll look like the Japs are catching hell.\" Soldiers shoot at hazy figures, unsure whether they're Japanese or American. Men collide, blow themselves in half with their own mishandled grenades, stab themselves frantically with morphine needles, shove cigarettes up their noses to keep the stench of the dying and the dead at bay. A tiny bird, mortally wounded, flutters in the grass. Malick is convincing--at times overwhelming--on the subject of chaos. It's when he tries to ruminate on order that he gets gummed up, retreating to one of his gaseous multiple mouthpieces: \"Where is it that we were together? Who is it that I lived with? Walked with? The brother. ... The friend. ... One mind.\" I think I'd have an easier time with Malick's metaphysical speculations if I had a sense of some concomitant geopolitical ones--central to any larger musings on forces of nature as viewed through the prism of war. Couldn't it be that the German and Japanese fascist orders were profoundly anti-natural, and that the Allies' cause was part of a violent but natural correction? You don't have to buy into Spielberg's Lincolnesque pieties in Saving Private Ryan to believe that there's a difference between World War II and Vietnam (or, for that matter, World War II and the invasion of Grenada or our spats with Iraq). While he was at Harvard, Malick might have peeled himself off the lap of his pointy-headed mentor, Stanley Cavell, the philosopher and film theorist, and checked out a few of Michael Waltzer's lectures on just and unjust wars. Maybe then he'd view Guadalcanal not in an absurdist vacuum (the soldiers come, they kill and are killed, they leave) but in the larger context of a war that was among the most rational (in its aims, if not its methods) fought in the last several centuries. For all his visionary filmmaking, Malick's Zen neutrality sometimes seems like a cultivated--and pretentious--brand of fatuousness.\n\n<question>:\nAccording to the film reviewer, what tone does Malick use to narrate \"Thin Red Line\"?\n\n<options>:\nA frantic\nB egomaniacal\nC obtuse\nD portentous\n\n<answer>:\n", "assistant": "D" } ]

[ { "human": "Read the following passage and questions, then choose the right answer from options, the answer should be one of A, B, C, D.\n\n<passage>:\na man is entitled to have a bodyguard. The annoyance was that he had to do it himself ... and his body would not cooperate! The man at the bar was exceptionally handsome, and he knew it. So did the light-haired girl at his side, and so did the nondescript man in the gray suit who was watching them from a booth in the corner. Everyone in the room was aware of the big young man, and most of the humans present were resentful, for he handled himself consciously and arrogantly, as if his appearance alone were enough to make him superior to anyone. Even the girl with him was growing restless, for she was accustomed to adulation herself, and next to Gabriel Lockard she was almost ordinary-looking. As for the extraterrestrials—it was a free bar—they were merely amused, since to them all men were pathetically and irredeemably hideous. Gabe threw his arm wide in one of his expansive gestures. There was a short man standing next to the pair—young, as most men and women were in that time, thanks to the science which could stave off decay, though not death—but with no other apparent physical virtue, for plastic ugly little man, but also a rather ridiculous one—or at least he felt he was, which was what mattered. You could use one was implied. And that, coming on top of Gabriel Lockard's spectacular appearance, was too much. The ugly man picked up the drink the bartender had just Gabe studied the newcomer curiously. \"So, it's you again?\" The man in the gray suit smiled. \"Who else in any world would stand up for you?\" \"I should think you'd have given up by now. Not that I mind having you \"I drank with you once too often,\" the nondescript man said. \"And things worked out fine, didn't they? For you.\" His eyes studied the other man's incredibly handsome young face, noted the suggestion of bags under the eyes, the beginning of slackness at the lips, and were not pleased with what they saw. \"Watch yourself, colleague,\" he warned \"Of course. You'll need plenty of foliage, though.\" \"I have sufficient funds. I also have a gun.\" \"You're the dictator,\" the driver agreed sullenly. To the girl's indignation, the stranger not only hauled Gabe out onto that he had not been alone. \"How about Helen? She on course?\" Lockard,\" he said, bowing from his seated position toward the girl. \"Pretty bauble, isn't she?\" \"I'm delighted to meet you, Mrs. Gabriel Lockard,\" the fat man said, looking at her intently. His small eyes seemed to strip the make-up from her cheek and examine the livid bruise underneath. \"I hope Gabe gave a short laugh, for no reason that she could see. There was the feeling that she had encountered the fat man before, the poor fellow went bankrupt a couple of weeks ago, and now he isn't ... anything.\" casually, as a by-product of some larger scheme, and her appreciation held little gratitude. The fat man shook his head without rancor. \"I have plenty of money, thank you, Mrs. Gabriel Lockard.... Come,\" he addressed her husband, \"if you get up, I'll drive you home. I warn you, be more careful in the commission phlegmatically. Perhaps he was more hardened than the others had been perhaps he was unaware that the fat man was not a desperate or despairing individual seeking one last chance, but what was known it had to be to make it it was down-right shabby, the dim olive light hinting of squalor rather than forbidden pleasures. That was everybody else far too well. The fat man wondered whether that had been his quarry's motive in disaster would hit the one who pursued him. Somehow, such a plan seemed too logical for the man he was haunting. However, beggars could not be choosers. The fat man paid off the heli-driver and entered the zarquil house. \"One?\" the small green creature in the slightly frayed robe asked. The would-be thief fled down the dark alley, with the hot bright rays from the stranger's gun lancing out after him in flamboyant but futile patterns. The stranger, a thin young man with delicate, angular and it wasn't worth the trouble of fixing up. The girl looked closely at him. \"You look different, but you are that the man in the gray suit? And before that...?\" The young man's cheekbones protruded as he smiled. \"Yes, I'm all of them.\" been so before marriage, Gabriel would have taught her that. \"But why do you do it? Why! There was no change of expression on the man's gaunt face, and she wondered how much control he had over a body that, though second- or \"If you're after Gabriel, planning to hurt him,\" she asked, \"why then him . And he knows that.\" there's something about you that doesn't change.\" \"Too bad he got married,\" the young man said. \"I could have followed him for an eternity and he would never have been able to pick me out from the crowd. Too bad he got married anyway,\" he added, his voice less impersonal, \"for your sake.\" She had come to the same conclusion in her six months of marriage, but she would not admit that to an outsider. Though this man was hardly an outsider he was part of their small family group—as long as she had known Gabriel, so long he must have known her. And she began to suspect for fun, not after they got to know him. And this man certainly should know him better than most. \"Why not?\" The emaciated young man began to put on his clothes. \"You know why. Your body is worthless. And this is a reputable house.\" \"But I have plenty of money.\" The young man coughed. The Vinzz The green one shook his head. \"Regrettably, I do mean what I say. This game is really clean.\" \"In a town like this?\" \"That is the reason we can afford to be honest.\" The Vinzz' tendrils quivered in what the man had come to recognize as amusement through with him. \"We do a lot of business here,\" he said unnecessarily, for the whole set-up spelled wealth far beyond the dreams of the man, and he was by no means poor when it came to worldly goods. \"Why don't you try another town where they're not so particular?\" he changing because of Gabriel, he wondered, or was he using his own how he could so casually have entrusted her with so vital a piece of \"Male?\" \"Of course,\" the Vinzz said primly. His kind did have certain ultimate standards to which they adhered rigidly, and one of those was the \"Why, that's three times the usual rate!\" himself would, upon assuming the body, assume responsibility for all the crimes it had committed. But there was nothing else he could do. He looked at himself in the mirror and found he had a fine new body tall and strikingly handsome in a dark, coarse-featured way. Nothing to match the one he had lost, in his opinion, but there were probably many people who might find this one preferable. No identification in the he recognized the face. Not that it was a very famous or even notorious one, but the dutchman was a careful student of the \"wanted\" fax that had decorated public buildings from the men depicted there. And he knew that this particular man, though not an important criminal in any sense of the word, was one whom the man in question was not one who would let himself be captured easily, nor whom the police intended to capture easily. This might be a lucky break for me after all too well. And I know you have that man's—the real Gabriel Lockard's—body.\" She put unnecessary stardust on her nose as she watched her husband's reflection in the dressing table mirror. a pretty good body, isn't it?\" Gabe flexed softening muscles and made no attempt to deny her charge very probably he was relieved at having someone with whom to share his secret. Gabe, why don't you...?\" \"I wasn't thinking about that, Gabe,\" she said truthfully enough, for\n\n<question>:\nWhat is the likeliest reason that Helen married Gabe?\n\n<options>:\nA it was part of the game they're playing\nB she knew the real him\nC he was kind to her for a long time\nD he is good-looking and wealthy\n\n<answer>:\n", "assistant": "D" } ]

[ { "human": "Read the following passage and questions, then choose the right answer from options, the answer should be one of A, B, C, D.\n\n<passage>:\nSisko Rolf's stocky body was a blur of motion as he cut the rocket reflected waves of sound were of little value. Distances were far too cramped—disaster might loom but a few hundred feet away. \"Trapped us neatly,\" Rolf said through clenched teeth. \"Tolled into their underground hideout by that water-runner we tried to capture. We can't escape, that's certain. They know these caverns better than.... We'll down some of them, though.\" their invisible preliminary jets of gas, and three times an enemy craft flared up into an intolerable torch of flame before they realized the patrol ship had fired upon them. Then a barrage of enemy rocket shells Rolf swung the lax controls over hard as the bursts of fire revealed a The ship struck split open like a rotten squash, and Rolf felt himself being flung far outward through thick blackness. For an eternity it seemed he hung in the darkness before something smashed the breath and feeling from his nerveless body. With a last glimmer of sanity he knew that he lay crushed against a rocky wall. Much later Rolf groaned with the pain of bruised muscles and tried to he could see the narrow dark slit through which his feet had betrayed him, and he realized that he had fallen through the other half. Toward this barrier the spinner bore him, and Rolf was it seemed to Rolf that he must be falling free through black dust, and he came to a stop. Deftly Rolf nested the Rolf found himself staring, open-mouthed, at the sleek-limbed vision Rolf threw up the mental block that was the inheritance from his \"Sorry,\" said the tall man as Rolf sprang easily from the ground to \"She one of them?\" Rolf's voice was low, but he saw Altha's lip twitch. paused to look nervously out across the blasted wasteland. \"We ran out of fuel here on Lomihi,\" he finished, \"with the vanished Rolf followed the direction of the other's pale blue eyes. Overhead now gray bushes. \"The Furry Women attack!\" A hundred paces away Rolf made the dark shapes of armed warriors as they filed downward from the Barrier into the blackened desolation of the desert half of Lomihi. \"Enemies?\" he whispered to Mark Tanner hoarsely. \"Right.\" The older man was slipping the stout bowstring into its notched recess on the upper end of his long bow. \"They cross the take them for slaves.\" \"I must warn them.\" Altha's lips thinned and her brown-flecked eyes flamed. \"The outlaws may capture,\" warned Tanner. \"They have taken over the Rolf watched the column of barbarically clad warriors file out upon the Spear tips and bared swords glinted dully. \"They will pass within a few feet!\" he hissed. not shift, their nostrils are sensitive as those of the weasels they calling them weasels, wondered until they came closer. the gray-furred muscles of their narrow bodies until they seemed utterly shoulderless, and beneath their furry pelts the ripples of smooth-flowing muscles played rhythmically. There was a stench, a musky \"See!\" Tanner's voice was muted. \"Giffa, Queen of the Furry Ones!\" had been cut off at the shoulders and whose naked backs bore the weals Rolf raised his expoder, red anger clouding his eyes as he saw these off their retreat. After they have passed I will arouse the Outcasts who live here upon the Barrier. Though their blood is that of the two races mingled they hate the Furry Ones.\" A shadow passed over their hiding place. The Furry Amazons too saw the Gone now was their chance for a surprise attack on the isolated canyons of the Hairy People. They halted, clustered about their leader. Giffa snarled quick orders Rolf and Mark Tanner came to their feet. bearing the scent of their bodies out to the sensitive nostrils of the beast-women. Again the column turned. They glimpsed the two men and a hideous scrawling battle-cry burst from their throats. Rolf's expoder rattled briefly like a high-speed sewing machine as he flicked its muzzle back and forth along the ranks of attacking Furry arrows at the bloodthirsty warrior women. But the Furry Ones ran fearlessly into that rain of death. The expoder hammered in Rolf's heavy fist. Tanner smashed an elbow into Rolf's side. \"Retreat!\" he gasped. The Furry Amazons swarmed up over the lower terraces of rocks, their \"Now where?\" Rolf snapped another burst of expoder needles at the furry needles at the Furry Ones and followed. shattered heart. An unseen furry shape sprang upon Rolf's shoulders Tanner's finger pointed. \"Altha!\" Rolf saw the graceful wings of the glider riding the thermals back toward the Barrier. \"She had warned the \"The weasel heads won't follow us here?\" asked Rolf. Rolf laughed. \"Like the pleasure globes of the wealthy on Earth.\" \"The Hairy People were the rulers,\" he went on, \"and the Furry Ones \"The outlaws!\" he cried. \"They're after Altha.\" Rolf caught a glimpse of a sleek rocket flyer diving upon Altha's frail The older man's eyes were hot. He jerked at Rolf's hands and then suddenly thought better of it. \"You're right,\" he agreed. \"Help her if you can. Your weapon is our only hope now.\" Rolf pushed up and outward with all the strength of his weary muscles. over the Barrier. The Furry Ones were struggling insect shapes below him, and he saw with a thrill that larger bodied warriors, whose bodies glinted with a dull bronze, were attacking them from the burnt-out A man stood on guard just outside the flyer's oval door. Rolf lined up comrades. But if the outlaw saw him Rolf knew that he would be the momentarily. In that instant Rolf launched himself from the open A green bulge showed around the polished fuselage and Rolf pressed his captured weapon's firing button. A roar of pain came from the wounded man, and he saw an outflung arm upon the rocky ground that clenched Rolf heard voices from a distance and the answering triumphant bawling \"Fire!\" There was panic in the outlaw's voice. Rolf came to his knees in the blanketing fog and looked forward. One of the men flung himself out the door, but the other reached for the extinguisher close at hand. His thoughts were on the oily smoke not on the prisoners, and so the impact of Rolf's horizontally propelled body drove the breath from his lungs before his hand could drop to his belted expoder. jolted upward toward the patrolman's vulnerable middle. But Rolf bored in, his own knotted hands pumping, and his trained body weaving instinctively aside from the crippling blows aimed at his body. For a moment they fought, coughing and choking from the thickening pall of The patrolman was weary the wreck in the upper cavern and the long trek afterward through the dark tunnels had sapped his strength, and now he felt victory slipping from his grasp. He felt something soft bump against his legs, legs so far below that he could hardly realize that they were his, and then he was falling with the relentless fingers still about his throat. As from a great distant Rolf grinned up at her. \"Need to?\" he asked. all the time,\" she quipped. Then they were over the Barrier and Rolf saw the last of the beaten Furry Ones racing back across the great wall toward the Plains of Rolf snorted. \"Shorty,\" he said disgustedly as they landed, but his arm\n\n<question>:\nWhy would the Furry Ones not follow Rolf and the others when the retreated?\n\n<options>:\nA They had lost too many to continue fighting.\nB They were warned not to by Altha.\nC They feared the Ancients.\nD They knew they were losing the battle.\n\n<answer>:\n", "assistant": "C" } ]

[ { "human": "Read the following passage and questions, then choose the right answer from options, the answer should be one of A, B, C, D.\n\n<passage>:\nWe know that paedophiles, murderers and other violent criminals come in many shapes and sizes. If we knew nothing about their criminal history, some of their photos might even appear attractive. But the idea that someone's features betray their character is something rooted deep within us It's a claim that's been made many times over the years. Physiognomy, the 'science' of judging people by their appearance, was first theorised by the ancient Greeks in around the 5th century BC. Aristotle's pronouncement that \"it is possible to infer character from features\" led to a number of works relating to 'Physiognomica', a word derived from physis (nature), Many studies have been done into our psychological response to faces, and it's clear that a so-called halo effect will inevitably work its magic. \"Attractive people are regarded as better at everything,\" says Professor Peter Hancock, lecturer in Psychology at Stirling University. \"And we can't shake that off because there's some truth to it. Good genes produce intelligent people, attractive faces, fit bodies, and we imagine that they're going to be good at everything else, too. We don't have good insight into our own behaviour. We tend to think we understand what we're doing, but we don't.\" Hancock describes attending a conference where one speaker showed a series of black faces and white faces to students (who were mostly white) and asked them what they thought the experiment was about. \"They knew that he was trying to assess whether they would rate the black ones as more criminal,\" says Hancock. \"But then they did!\" We attribute social characteristics based on opinions we already hold about certain kinds of faces: whether they look unusual in some way, whether they resemble a partner, a family member or even ourselves, or perhaps have some other cultural association. Physiognomy ultimately stems from what Alexander Todorov, professor of psychology at Princeton University, calls an 'overgeneralisation hypothesis'. \"People,\" he wrote, \"use easily accessible facial information (eg an expression such as a smile, cues to gender and ethnic group) to make social attributions congruent with this information (eg a nice person).\" In a social media age, the pictures we choose to represent ourselves online are a form of self-presentation driven by those social attributions and the knowledge that our pictures are being judged. Experiments at Princeton found that we take less than one tenth of a second to form an opinion of strangers from their pictures, and those opinions tend to stand firm even if we're exposed to those pictures for a longer period of time. That tendency to judge instantly gives rise to a number of selfie tropes that are deemed to elicit positive responses, particularly when it comes to photos on dating profiles: certain angles, particular expressions, minute adjustments of eyebrows and lips that might appear to be about narcissism and vanity, but are more about a fear of being incorrectly assessed. After all, false suppositions based on people's faces are hugely influential within society, and in extreme cases they can have a huge impact on people's lives. When retired teacher Christopher Jefferies was held by police in connection with the murder of Joanna Yeates in Bristol back in 2010, more than half a dozen newspapers gave his unusual appearance particular scrutiny and made assumptions accordingly, which in turn influenced public opinion. This culminated in substantial damages for defamation, two convictions for contempt of court and a painful ordeal for Jefferies, who was entirely innocent. studies show that people with stereotypically 'untrustworthy' faces tend to receive harsher treatment than those who don't. There's evidently some consensus over people's attitudes toward certain faces, but it doesn't follow that the consensus is correct. The only attributes that we're reasonably good at detecting, according to research done at the University of Michigan in the 1960s and later tested at the University of Stirling in 2007, are extroversion and conscientiousness. For other traits there's insufficient evidence that our hunches are correct, with anomalies explained by our evolved aversion to 'ugliness', established links between broader faces and powerful physiques, or cultural associations with certain demographics which are reinforced with nagging regularity by newspapers, books, television and film. Data-driven studies, based upon huge quantities of facial data, would seem to offer the final word on this. Since 2005, computational models have used various techniques to test for links between social attributes and facial features, resulting in suggestions that our faces can betray, for example, political leanings, sexual orientation and criminality. One BBC Future article from 2015 even describes the 'discipline' of physiognomy as 'gaining credibility'. But Todorov details many problems with these studies, pointing out the challenging nature of doing such experiments with sufficient rigour – not least because different images of the same people can prompt wildly differing results. The aforementioned study at Shanghai's Jiao Tong University, with its enthusiastic, data-driven analyses of such questions as \"What features of a human face betray its owner's propensity for crimes?\" prompted a wave of press coverage. The vision outlined in these articles is of an unethical dystopia where neural networks can assess our faces and establish a likely score for criminality – but Todorov is scathing about this paper, too. \"The main problem is the sampling of the images,\" he says. \"There is not enough information about the [nature of] the images of the people who were convicted. Second, clearly, there are huge differences between the two samples [of convicts and non-convicts] [in terms of] education and socio-economic status.\" In other words, your appearance is affected by the kind of life you've led, so the classifiers within the computer program are simply distinguishing between different demographics rather than detecting a propensity for criminal behaviour. Todorov is also wary of these classifiers misidentifying more 'innocent' people than identifying actual criminals, and accuracy is a concern shared by Peter Hancock. \"Networks don't assess faces in the same way that we do,\" he says. \"One of our systems, which is a deep network, has a recognition engine which generates an ordered list of how similar various faces are. And sometimes you get good matches – but other times you look at them and say, well, it's the wrong race! To humans they look completely different. And that underlines the fact that the networks are working in a different sort of way, and actually you don't really know how they're working. They're the ultimate black box.\" This isn't to say that the use of big data, and particularly the use of composite imagery (digitally blending together certain types of faces) doesn't give us useful information and fascinating correlations. \"You can, for example, take a given face and use computer software to make it look more or less trustworthy,\" says Hancock. \"I remember a colleague playing with this and he made a less trustworthy version of George W Bush – and how shifty did he look! I'm surprised that they're not using these techniques in political advertising, because you couldn't tell that anything had been done [to the picture], but when you look at it you think 'I wouldn't trust him'.\" The revitalisation of the theory of physiognomy by the Shanghai students is, according to Todorov, deeply problematic on a theoretical level. \"Are we back to Lombroso's theory,\" he asks, \"that criminals were anomalous creatures, evolutionary degenerates? How does one become criminal, and what role do various life forces play into this? There are people making claims that you just need to look at the face to predict personality and behaviour, but many of these people have not given much thought to their underlying assumptions.\" While it's true that we judge books by their covers, covers are more than just faces\n\n<question>:\nWhich is the best characterization of the overgeneralization hypotheses?\n\n<options>:\nA People are more likely to find others to be friendly based on their photos if they are surrounded by friendly people themselves\nB Computers are more likely to draw correct conclusions about people if they have larger pools of photos to draw from\nC We are likely to assume more photos are doctored than the number that actually are\nD We are likely to attribute things to people based on people close to us who may look similar\n\n<answer>:\n", "assistant": "D" } ]

[ { "human": "Read the following passage and questions, then choose the right answer from options, the answer should be one of A, B, C, D.\n\n<passage>:\nTHE BIG HEADACHE BY JIM HARMON What's the principal cause of headaches? Why, having a head, of course! bewilderment. IV his head. Mitchell's. Both heads were initialed \"M\" so it was all the same. Mitchell forced himself to awaken, with some initial difficulty. He lay there, blinking the sleep out of his eyes, listening to his \"I mean, are you alone?\" \"Oh, you want to know if my wife is around. No, she's asleep. That Army doctor, Colonel Sidney, he gave her a sedative. I wouldn't let him give me anything, though.\" forehead. \"I've been worrying so much about this I've got the ancestor of all headaches.\" Mitchell's blue eyes narrowed and his boyish face took on an expression \"You've found yourself worrying—thinking—about a lot of other problems since we left you, haven't you? Maybe not the same kind of scientific problem. But more personal ones, ones you didn't used to have time to think about.\" in the popular mind. He was the man people thought of when the word that the project was nearing completion. If so, it was a case of Ad . The only thing that could delay the project was Macklin's health. Despite his impressive body, some years before he had suffered a mild stroke ... or at least a vascular spasm of a cerebral artery. It was known that he suffered from the vilest variety of migraine. A cycle of the headaches had caused him to be absent from his classes for several weeks, and there were an unusual number of military uniforms seen around the campus. have me intrigued. What is it all about?\" \"Doctor, we understand you have severe headaches,\" Mitchell said. Macklin nodded. \"That's right, Steven. Migraine.\" \"That must be terrible,\" Ferris said. \"All your fine reputation and lavish salary can't be much consolation when that ripping, tearing agony begins, can it?\" \"No, Harold, it isn't,\" Macklin admitted. \"What does your project have to do with my headaches?\" \"Doctor,\" Mitchell said, \"what would you say the most common complaint of man is?\" \"I would have said the common cold,\" Macklin replied, \"but I suppose from what you have said you mean headaches.\" \"Headaches,\" Mitchell agreed. \"Everybody has them at some time in his life. Some people have them every day. Some are driven to suicide by their headaches.\" \"Yes,\" Macklin said. pains,\" Mitchell said. \"I see. Are you two saying you have headaches?\" \"We think we can,\" Ferris said. \"There are a number of different causes for headaches—nervous strain, fatigue, physical diseases from kidney complaints to tumors, over-indulgence—but there is one effect of all of this, the one real cause of headaches,\" Mitchell announced. \"We have definitely established this for this first time,\" Ferris added. \"That's fine,\" Macklin said, sucking on his pipe. \"And this effect that produces headaches is?\" \"The pressure effect caused by pituitrin in the brain,\" Mitchell said eagerly. \"That is, the constriction of blood vessels in the telencephalon section of the frontal lobes. It's caused by an over-production of the pituitary gland. We have artificially bred a virus that feeds on pituitrin.\" \"That may mean the end of headaches, but I would think it would mean the end of the race as well,\" Macklin said. \"In certain areas it is valuable to have a constriction of blood vessels.\" works, I could stop using that damned gynergen, couldn't I? The stuff makes me violently sick to my stomach. But it's better than the migraine. How should I go about removing my curse?\" He reinserted the pipe. \"I assure you, you can forget ergotamine tartrate,\" Ferris said. \"Our ' no means another attack of migraine. The drilling, grinding pain through my temples and around my eyeballs. The flashes of light, the rioting pools of color playing on the back of my lids. Ugh.\" nausea, eh? The pain of that turns you almost wrong side out, doesn't it? You aren't much better off with it than without, are you? I've heard some say they preferred the migraine.\" tend it in a worn leather case. \"Tell me,\" he said, \"what is the worst \"When your heart stops, your blood pressure goes to its lowest point,\" Mitchell said. A dew of perspiration had bloomed on Macklin's forehead. \"Is there much migraine. You do.\" he? By established periodic cycle he should be suffering hell right now, shouldn't he? But thanks to our treatment he is perfectly happy, with no unfortunate side effects such as gynergen produces.\" \"It's a significant test case, yes. But not enough to go to the heroin.\" \"That's absurd. What makes you think a thing like that?\" \"The—trance he's in now.\" husband for a full day. The effects of a narcotic would have worn off by this time.\" \"Most known narcotics,\" she admitted, \"but evidently you have was stomping up and down punching his fingers through the wire, worrying the lock on the cage. \"Jerry is a great deal more active than Dean,\" Mitchell said. \"Yes, but Dean isn't sick. He just doesn't seem to have as much nervous energy to burn up. Nothing wrong with his thyroid either.\" They went to the smaller cages. They found the situation with the rats, Bud and Lou, much the same. \"I don't know. Maybe they just have tired blood,\" Mitchell ventured. \"Iron deficiency anemia?\" \"Never mind, doctor. It was a form of humor. I think we had better see Under Mitchell's thumb the bell chimbed dum-de-de-dum-dum-dum . \"Not a thing,\" Sidney said. \"He's the healthiest, happiest, most Ferris nodded. \"We made a slight miscalculation. It appears as if the virus colony overcontrols the supply of posterior pituitary extract in the cerebrum. It isn't more than necessary to stop headaches. But that necessary amount of control to stop pain is too much to allow the brain cells to function properly.\" \"Why won't they function?\" Carson roared. \"They don't get enough food—blood, oxygen, hemoglobin,\" Ferris explained. \"The cerebral vessels don't contract enough to pump the blood through the brain as fast and as hard as is needed. The brain cells remain sluggish, dormant. Perhaps decaying.\" The colonel yelled. Mitchell groaned. He was abruptly sure Ferris was correct. been saying and I don't like it.\" \" With my headaches, like before?\" Mitchell coughed into his fist for an instant, to give him time to frame an answer. \"Unfortunately, yes. Apparently if your mind functions properly once again you will have the headaches again. Our research is a dismal failure.\" \"I wouldn't go that far,\" Ferris remarked cheerfully. state. I can remember what it was like. Always worrying, worrying, worrying.\" \"You mean wondering,\" Mitchell said. Macklin nodded. \"Troubled, anyway. Disturbed by every little thing. peaceful this way. My head doesn't hurt. I've got a good-looking wife and all the money I need. I've got it made. Why worry?\" order overruling your husband's wishes.\" She smoothed an eyebrow with the third finger of her right hand. \"That was my original thought. But I've redecided.\" he's certified incompetent, authorities can rule whether Mitchell and Ferris' antitoxin treatment is the best method of restoring Dr. Macklin to sanity.\" \"Because, Colonel, the matter of my husband's health, his very life, is involved.\" \"Maybe,\" Carson said. \"I don't know. I don't know what the hell to tell the Pentagon. I think I'll go out and get drunk.\"\n\n<question>:\nFrom the passage, what is said to be the most common complaint of man?\n\n<options>:\nA sinus infections\nB headaches\nC The common cold\nD lack of sleep\n\n<answer>:\n", "assistant": "B" } ]

[ { "human": "Read the following passage and questions, then choose the right answer from options, the answer should be one of A, B, C, D.\n\n<passage>:\nUFC began in 1993 as a locker-room fantasy. What would happen if a kickboxer fought a wrestler? A karate champion fought a sumo champion? Promoters built an octagonal chain-link cage, invited eight top martial artists, and set them loose in no-holds-barred, bare-knuckles fights. \"There are no rules!\" bragged an early press release. Contestants would fight till \"knockout, submission, doctor's intervention, or death.\" UFC allowed, even promoted, all notions of bad sportsmanship: kicking a man when he's down, hitting him in the groin, choking. Four-hundred-pound men were sent into the Octagon to maul guys half their size. Only biting and eye-gouging were forbidden. The gimmick entranced thousands of people (well, men). What happens when a 620-pound sumo champion fights a 200-pound kickboxer? Answer: The kickboxer knocks him silly in 35 seconds. They tuned in for bloodshed--\"the damage,\" as fans like to call it. UFC fights could be horrifying. Tank Abbott, an ill-tempered, 270-pound street fighter, knocks out hapless opponent John Matua in 15 seconds. Then, before the ref can intervene, Abbott belts the unconscious Matua in the head, sending him into a fit, limbs quivering uncontrollably, blood spurting from his mouth. Abbott, naturally, became a cult hero and won a guest spot on Friends . (Matua walked out of the ring.) Soon, UFC was selling out huge arenas and drawing 300,000 pay-per-view subscribers for its quarterly competitions. UFC's caged matches revolutionized the idea of fighting. Nursed on boxing and Hollywood, Americans imagine fights as choreography, a dance of elegant combinations, roundhouse kicks, clean knockouts. The UFC punctured this. Boxers floundered. Experts in striking martial arts such as karate and tae kwon do, who fancied themselves the world's greatest fighters, found themselves pretzeled by jujitsu masters, who pulled them to the ground and slowly choked or leg-locked them. \"UFC immediately debunked a lot of myths of fighting, of boxing, karate, kung fu. It showed the reality of what works in an actual fight,\" says Dave Meltzer, editor of Wrestling Observer . Instead of being carnivals of gore, UFC fights looked strangely like ... sex. Almost all fights ended on the ground, one man mounting the other in missionary position, the pair of them wiggling mysteriously along the canvas for five, 10, even 30 minutes. There were few spectacular knockouts. The referee--yes, there was always a referee--stopped many bouts, and in most others, fighters \"tapped out,\" surrendering to mild-looking but agonizing chokes and joint locks. It was not barbarism. It was science. The UFC spawned a new breed of \"mixed martial artists.\" World-class wrestlers learned to kickbox. Champion kickboxers learned to grapple. (The karate experts learned to stay home.) They became, without doubt, the best fighters in the world. (Click for more about the fighters.) Mike Tyson wouldn't last 30 seconds in an ultimate fighting match. When Olympic gold medal wrestler Kevin Jackson came to the UFC, a fighter named Frank Shamrock KO'd him with a submission hold in 16 seconds. Ultimate fighting schools began sprouting up all over the country, replacing the stylized gestures of the Eastern martial arts with techniques that actually work. UFC's promoters predicted that it would supplant boxing as America's martial art. Instead, it fell apart. The collapse began in 1996, when Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., saw a UFC tape. McCain, a lifelong boxing fan, was horrified at the ground fighting, kicks, and head butts. It was \"barbaric,\" he said. It was \"not a sport.\" He sent letters to all 50 governors asking them to ban ultimate fighting. The outcry against \"human cockfighting\" became a crusade, and like many crusades, it was founded on misunderstanding. UFC fell victim to cultural determinism about what a fight is. In countries such as Brazil and Japan, where no-holds-barred fighting has a long history, it is popular and uncontroversial. But Americans adhere to the Marquis of Queensbury rules. A fight consists of an exchange of upper-body blows that halts when one fighter falls. Similarly, the chain-link fence surrounding the octagon looks grotesque. Critics have demanded that UFC install ropes instead. But ropes are a major cause of death and injury in boxing: Fighters hyperextend their necks when they are punched against the ropes, because nothing stops their heads from snapping back. The chain-link fence prevents hyperextension. When I tell people I'm an ultimate fighting fan, they invariably respond: \"Don't people get killed all the time doing that?\" But no one has ever been killed at the UFC--though boxers are killed every year. No one has even been seriously injured at the UFC. On the rare occasions when a bout has ended with a bloody knockout, the loser has always walked out of the ring. But this does not impress boxing fans, who are the most vigorous opponents of extreme fighting. McCain sat ringside at a boxing match where a fighter was killed. When I asked him to explain the moral distinction between boxing and ultimate fighting, he exploded at me, \"If you can't see the moral distinction, then we have nothing to talk about!\" Then he cut our interview short and stormed out of his office. In the past two years, an increasingly desperate UFC has been trying to assuage its critics. The competition, which had been gradually adding safety rules since the first fight, imposed even more. It institued rounds and a \"10-point must\" scoring system. It banned head butts and groin strikes. You can no longer kick a downed man or elbow someone in the back of the head. Fighters are required to wear thin martial arts gloves (a purely cosmetic change). The UFC imposed weight classes, ending the David-and-Goliath mismatches that made early fights so compelling. None of this soothed the cable operators, who have kept UFC off the air. The pay-per-view audience has plunged from 300,000 per show to 15,000. UFC can no longer afford its best fighters: Some are fighting overseas. Others, notably Ken Shamrock (Frank's brother), have become pro wrestlers. Fights have deteriorated. UFC is limping along, but it has been reduced to scheduling events in Japan and Brazil. \"Sports fans want to grow with the sport,\" says former UFC fighter David Beneteau. \"They want to recognize the athletes. They want to see the same fighters come back. When you compare UFC now to what it was, the fighters are not the same, the rules are not the same. The fans have no story to follow.\"\n\n<question>:\nHow was the start of UFC a learning experience?\n\n<options>:\nA The fighters learned the hard way that not restricting to one combat type was too dangerous\nB It turned out that new types of combat sports are not favored on network TV, and there was not enough of a following for it to ever be popular\nC Assumptions about which fighting styles would be most beneficial in the real world were challenged\nD It turned out that the octagonal style of the ring was much harder to fight in than the square of a boxing ring\n\n<answer>:\n", "assistant": "C" } ]

[ { "human": "Read the following passage and questions, then choose the right answer from options, the answer should be one of A, B, C, D.\n\n<passage>:\nQUEST OF THIG \"HORDE.\" He had blasted across trackless space to subdue a defenseless world—only to meet on Earth emotions that were more deadly than weapons. Thig's cold eyes opened a trifle wider as he stared into the thing's \"He resembles Thig,\" announced Kam. \"But for the strange covering he wears he might be Thig.\" \"Thig will be this creature!\" announced Torp. \"With a psychic relay we the brain of Thig! He can then go out and scout this world without \"For the good of the Horde,\" Thig intoned almost piously as he lifted Service for the Horde was all that the men of Ortha knew. Carefully cultured and brought to life in the laboratories of their Horde, they knew neither father nor mother. Affection and love were entirely lacking in their early training and later life. They were trained antlike from childhood that only the growth and power of the Horde were of any moment. Men and women alike toiled and died like unfeeling robots of flesh and bone for the Horde. The Horde was their religion, their love-life, their everything! proved too violent and his heart faltered after a time and stopped completely. Twice, with subtle drugs they restored pseudo-life to his body and kept the electrical impulses throbbing from his tortured where Jake and Ted had helped him dig for the buried treasure that old 'Notch-ear' Beggs had told them so exactly about. Remembrance of acquired memories labeled as pleasure, sent a warm glow upward from around his heart. Then he saw the slender red-haired shape of a woman, the mate of the dead man he knew, and confusion struck his well-trained brain. Men had no mates on Ortha, sex had been overthrown with all the other primitive impulses of barbarism the emotions that swept through his acquired memory. Unsteadily he took her in his arms and felt her warm lips pressed, trembling, against his own. That same hot wave of pulsing blood choked achingly up into his throat. adopting the thinking and mannerism of the other. All the better this way, he realized—more natural. and gunmen of his stories rendering him acutely unhappy. Sincerely he hoped that the west had reformed. \"Mmmmmm,\" came from the depths of the chipped white wash-basin. \"Home again,\" whispered Ellen as she stood beside Thig twelve weeks later and gazed tearfully at the weathered little gray house. She knelt Thig sank into a dusty old swing that hung on creaking chains from the to wipe the grotesque civilizations of Earth out of existence would, landed. And there Thig balked. Why must they destroy these people, Thig tried to tell himself that it was the transmitted thoughts of the dead Earthman that made him feel so, but he was not too sure. For three months he had lived with people who loved, hated, wept and sacrificed for reasons that he had never known existed. He had learned the heady glory of thinking for himself and making his own decisions. He had experienced the primitive joy of matching his wits and tongue against the wits of other unpredictable human beings. There was no abrupt division of men and women into definite classes of endeavor. A laborer thought the same thoughts that a governor might think. Uncertainty added zest to every day's life. The Orthan had come to question the sole devotion of the individual to the Horde to the exclusion of all other interests. What, he wondered, would one new world—or a hundred—populated by the Hordes add to the progress of humanity? For a hundred thousand years the Orthan civilization had remained static, its energies directed into certain mechanical hives. There was that moment on the brink of the Grand Canyon when Ellen had caught his arm breathlessly at all the beauty spread away there beneath who nestled trustingly against his tense man's body and slept—the son of Ellen and the man he had destroyed. Thig groaned. He was a weakling to let sentimentality so get the better So far had Thig the emotionless, robot-being from Ortha drifted from \"But why,\" asked Thig slowly, \"could we not disarm all the natives and broad fingers bit deep into the unyielding metal of his chair. Suddenly he knew that he must go back to Earth, back to Ellen and the children of the man he had helped destroy. He loved Ellen, and nothing must stand between them! The Hordes of Ortha must find some other world, an empty world—this planet was not for them. Then it was that Thig went berserk. His fists slashed into the thick for long moments they swayed there, locked together in silent deadly struggle. The fate of a world hung in the balance as Kam's other hand fought against that lone arm of Thig. weapon tilted upward until it reached the level of Thig's waist. Thig about full upon its owner's thick torso. Thig's fingers pressed down Before Thig's eyes half of his comrade's body sloughed away into foul corruption that swiftly gave way to hardened blobs of dessicated matter. Horror for what he had done—that he had slain one of his own Horde—made his limbs move woodenly. All of his thoughts were dulled the struggling races of Earth. He would never write another cowboy yarn—they would all be dead anyhow soon. Even Torp, thought Thig ruefully, gave way to the primitive rage of his but to that very bit of unconscious atavism he now owed his life. A cool-headed robot of an Orthan would have efficiently used the blaster to destroy any possibility of remaining life in his unconscious body. Thig rolled slowly over so that his eye found the door into the control why he had been left until last. Perhaps Torp wished to take cultures of his blood and tissues to determine whether a disease was responsible for his sudden madness. The deadly attack of Thig his own violent avenging of Kam's death, and now the apparent return of the man he had killed come to life had all served to jolt his rigidly trained brain from its accustomed groove. The shock had been too much for the established thought-processes of the skeleton-thing that had been Torp, using the new strength that victory had given him to drive him along. He had saved a world's civilization from extinction! The thought sobered him yet, somehow, he was pleased that he had done so. After all, it had been the Earthwoman and the children he had been thinking of while he battled Kam, a selfish desire to protect them all. him from the parent ship. The sensation of free flight against his new body was strangely exhilerating and heady. It was the newest of the emotions he had experienced on Earth since that day, so many months before, when he had felt the warmness of Ellen's lips tight against his. regret in his mind that he was not returning to the planet of his first existence. He thought of the dull greys and blacks of his planet, of the monotonous routine of existence that had once been his—and his heart thrilled to the memories of the starry nights and perfect exciting days he had spent on his three month trip over Earth. despite his acquired memory and traits, he was an alien from outer space. He fingered the tiny scars that had completely obliterated the slight a brief prayer in his heart to a God whose presence he now felt very deeply. There were tears in the depths of his eyes, then, and memories were hot, bitter pains. heaved a gasp of relief. He was no longer Thig, a creature of a Horde's West. He must remember that always. He had destroyed the real Terry and now, for the rest of his life, he must make up to the dead man's family. The knowledge that Ellen's love was not really meant for him would be a knife twisting in his heart but for her sake he must endure it. Her dreams and happiness must never be shattered.\n\n<question>:\nWhat was it that ultimately converted Thig to being human?\n\n<options>:\nA Lewis Terry. Lewis's mind took over his completely.\nB Disease. It was as Torp suspected. Being on Earth affected him too deeply.\nC Comfort. Earth culture is not nearly as controlling as Orthan culture.\nD Love. Love for his new family, and the uncertainties of human life.\n\n<answer>:\n", "assistant": "D" } ]

[ { "human": "Read the following passage and questions, then choose the right answer from options, the answer should be one of A, B, C, D.\n\n<passage>:\nGetting specimens for the interstellar zoo keep a display from making a monkey of me! It was our first day of recruiting on the planet, and the alien life-forms had lined up for hundreds of feet back from my rented \"I can get you out of this cheap.\" \" them eager for a Corrigan contract. The Galaxy is full of bizarre beings, but there's barely a species anywhere that can resist the old exhibitionist urge. lot better than forking over a hundred grand, isn't it?\" I eyed Gorb uncertainly. The Terran Consulate people probably wouldn't were really serious, and I knew from past experiences that no officials ever worried much about the state of my pocketbook. On the other hand, giving this slyster a contract might be a risky proposition. a contingency basis. Get me out of this and you'll have five grand and the contract. Otherwise, nothing.\" sign plastered to a facing wall: WANTED—EXTRATERRESTRIALS! We had Gorb shrugged. \"What have I to lose?\" saturated MacTavish IV with our promotional poop for a month preceding Want to visit Earth—see the Galaxy's most glittering and exclusive of show business on romantic Terra? If you are a non-terrestrial, packs in the crowds back on Earth. Why not? It's the best of its kind, I throttled my exclamation of surprise, concealing it behind a quick cough. \"Let me have that again, please?\" \"I'll be placed on exhibition at your Institute on Earth. You'll pay on one side, two on the other. \"Wonderful! I will see Earth at last! I accept the terms!\" exploit a being, but I don't believe in throwing money away, either. of his species in the show, but they made good crowd-pleasers, being so plump and cheerful. I passed him along to Auchinleck to sign at anything short of top rate. Next came a bedraggled Sirian spider who was more interested in a handout than a job. If there's any species we have a real over-supply of, it's those silver-colored spiders, but this seedy specimen gave it a try anyway. He got the gate in half a minute, and he didn't even get the handout he was angling for. I don't approve of begging. 2903, the World Congress declared Terra off-bounds for non-terrestrial Before then, anyone could visit Earth. After the gate clanged down, a non-terrestrial could only get onto Sol III as a specimen in a advertise and they come flocking to us. Every alien wants to see Earth before this trip, representing 298 different intelligent life-forms. Ghrynian agent. A Vegan would be a top-flight attraction, being some I could tell, the being was quite plainly nothing but an Earthman. about him. He said, in level Terran accents, \"I'm looking for a job \"There's been a mistake. We're interested in non-terrestrials only.\" I don't mind conning the public from time to time, but I draw the line at getting bilked myself. \"Look, friend, I'm busy, and I'm not known for my sense of humor. Or my generosity.\" \"I'm not panhandling. I'm looking for a job.\" \"Then try elsewhere. Suppose you stop wasting my time, bud. You're as Earthborn as I am.\" happen to be a representative of the only Earthlike race that exists \"Very clever, Mr. Gorb.\" I grinned at him and shook my head. \"You spin a good yarn—but for my money, you're really Sam Jones or Phil Smith from Earth, stranded here and out of cash. You want a free trip back to Earth. No deal. The demand for beings from Wazzenazz XIII is pretty low it over. Maybe you'll regret your hastiness. I'll be back to give you another chance.\" He slammed the door and I let my grim expression relax into a smile. This was the best con switch yet—an Earthman posing as an alien to get a job! But I wasn't buying it, even if I could appreciate his cleverness only one human race in the Galaxy—on Earth. I was going to need some real good reason before I gave a down-and-out grifter a free ticket home. I didn't know it then, but before the day was out, I would have that \"You will grant me a contract!\" \"Will you please sit down?\" because—\" \"You will hire me or trouble I will make!\" I opened our inventory chart. I showed him that we were already didn't move. He bellowed, \"I have vowed a vow, Earthman. Take me to Earth, enroll a Gursdrinn, or the consequences will be terrible!\" I'm a man of principles, like all straightforward double-dealers, and He glared at me in silence. I went on, \"Please be assured that I'll undo the insult at the earliest possible opportunity. It's not feasible for us to hire another \"Please, please,\" squeaked the little alien pitifully. \"I must see you, of Earth. And I am alone, bound by our sacred customs never to remarry, \" My face was expressionless. \"You don't really intend to join our organization at all—you just want free passage to Earth?\" sentiment. I felt sorry for this being's domestic troubles, but I wasn't going to break up a good act just to make an alien squirrel happy—not to mention footing the transportation. on the subject of bringing alien life to Earth. It has to be for I?\" \"Well—\" \"Of course not.\" I took advantage of his pathetic upset to steam right along. \"Now if you had come in here and simply asked me to sign you up, I might conceivably have done it. But no—you had to go unburden your heart to me.\" scientific interest, and the World Government will deport the undesirable alien back to its home world. But I wouldn't pull a low I said, \"I'll ask her about coming home. But I won't ship her back against her will. And maybe she's happier where she is.\" his tears. He turned and shambled slowly to the door, walking like a living dishrag. In a bleak voice, he said, \"There is no hope then. All About fifty more applicants were processed without a hitch. Then life started to get complicated again. Nine of the fifty were okay. The rest were unacceptable for one reason or another, and they took the bad news quietly enough. The haul for the Earthborn, and that I'm looking for a job on your \"I don't care what your story is! Get out or—\" . He doesn't know how to handle alien beings. How many I scowled at him. \"Too damn many.\" \"You see? He's incompetent. Suppose you fire him, take me on instead. I've been living in the outworlds half my life I know all there is to flew open again and three sleek reptilian beings entered, garbed in the this late life-form's request lies at the root of his sad demise?\" \"Well, no, but—\" Closing my eyes wearily, I tried to wish the whole babbling lot of them away. If I had to, I could pony up the hundred-grand fine, but it was going to put an awful dent in this year's take. And I shuddered when I arrival. resolved never to come here on a recruiting trip again—or, if I did come, to figure out some more effective way of screening myself against crackpots. In heart-rending tones, the Stortulian declared, \"Life is no longer worth living. My last hope is gone. There is only one thing left for me to do.\" I was quivering at the thought of another hundred thousand smackers going down the drain. \"Stop him, somebody! He's going to kill himself! He's—\"\n\n<question>:\nWhy were the beings readily applying for the trip to Earth?\n\n<options>:\nA They were looking for a way to overturn Earth.\nB If was their only opportunity after the Terra for Terrans movement.\nC They were bored of their lives on their home planets.\nD They were hoping for handouts.\n\n<answer>:\n", "assistant": "B" } ]

[ { "human": "Read the following passage and questions, then choose the right answer from options, the answer should be one of A, B, C, D.\n\n<passage>:\nSmith admitted he had made an error involving a few murders—and a few thousand years. He was entitled to a sense of humor, though, even in the Ultroom! HB73782. Ultroom error. Tendal 13. Arvid 6. Kanad transfer out of 1609 complete, intact, but too near limit of 1,000 front yard, knitting a pair of booties for the PTA bazaar. Occasionally she glanced at her son in the play pen, who was getting his daily dose of sunshine. He was gurgling happily, examining a ball, knees hit the side of the play pen and young Laughton let out a scream—half from hurt and half from sudden lack of confidence in his don't even want to think about it.\" \"Any enemies?\" \"No ... Oh, I suppose I have a few people I don't get along with, like anybody else. Nobody who'd do anything like this, though.\" \"Fine.\" \"Fine.\" forward on his face. and sunshine.\" \"I'm not going to sit on the lawn alone with him, Martin. I just tree, hitting it a terrible blow, crumbling the car's forward end so \"The with .30-.30?\" It was the chief's turn to shake his head. \"Your guess is as good as \"What does the man have to say?\" a week and we've all taken turns questioning him. He laughs and admits his guilt—in fact, he seems amused by most everything. Sometimes all alone in his cell he'll start laughing for no apparent reason. It gives you the creeps.\" his chest. This gave him the appearance of being alert despite reclining. Even as he lay, his mouth held a hint of a smile. Arvid 6—for John Smith was Arvid 6—had lain in that position for more than four hours, when suddenly he snapped his eyes open and appeared to be listening. For a moment a look of concern crossed his face and he swung his legs to the floor and sat there expectantly. Arvid 6 knew Tendal 13 had materialized and was somewhere in the building. Eventually there were some sounds from beyond the steel cell and doorway. There was a clang when the outer doorway was opened and Arvid \"I'm really sorry about that,\" Arvid 6 said. You know the instructions. Just because you work in the Ultroom don't get to thinking human life doesn't have any value. We wouldn't be here if it hadn't. But to unnecessarily kill—\" The older man shook his head. \"You could have killed yourself as well and we'd never get the job done. As it is, you almost totally obliterated me.\" Tendal 13 you've been sitting here, probably enjoying yourself with your special brand of humor I have grown to despise.\" \"You didn't have to come along at all, you know,\" Arvid 6 said. \"How well I know! How sorry I am that I ever did! It was only because I was sorry for you, because someone older and more experienced than you was needed. I volunteered. Imagine that! I volunteered! Tendal 13 reaches the height of stupidity and volunteers to help Arvid 6 go back 6,000 years to bring Kanad back, to correct a mistake Arvid 6 made!\" He snorted. \"I still can't believe I was ever that stupid. I only prove it when I pinch myself and here I am. \"Oh, you've been a joy to be with! First it was that hunt in ancient \"All right, all right,\" Arvid 6 said. \"I'll admit I've made some mistakes. You're just not adventurous, that's all.\" \"Shut up! For once you're going to listen to me. Our instructions specifically stated we were to have as little as possible to do with these people. But at every turn you've got us more and more enmeshed with them. If that's adventure, you can have it.\" Tendal 13 sat down wearily and sank his head in his hands. \"It was you who conceived the idea of taking Reggie right out of his play pen. 'Watch me take that space halfway to nowhere with two broken legs, a spinal injury, concussion and some of the finest bruises you ever saw.\" These twentieth century machines aren't what they ought to be,\" Arvid 6 said. \"You never run out of excuses, do you, Arvid? Remember what you said in the Ultroom when you pushed the lever clear over and transferred go back and rescue the life germ of Kanad out of each era he'd be born in.\" Tendal 13 turned and looked steadily and directly at Arvid 6. \"Do you know what I think? I think you deliberately pushed the lever over as far as it would go . That's how simple I think it was.\" Arvid 6 flushed, turned away and looked at the floor. \"What crazy things have you been doing since I've been gone?\" Tendal 13 asked. Arvid 6 sighed. \"After what you just said I guess it wouldn't amuse you, although it has me. They got to me right after the accident before I had a chance to collect my wits, dematerialize or \"That's right.\" \"And you amused yourself with him.\" \"I suppose you'd think so.\" \"Who do you tell them you are?\" through a million years.\" \"Was Kanad's life germ transferred all right this time?\" Tendal 13 shook his head. \"I haven't heard. The transfers are getting probably.\" \"Do you think Kanad will be angry about all this?\" back after it. The life germ of the head of the whole galactic system who came to the Ultroom to be transplanted to a younger body—and then sending him back beyond his original birth date—\" Tendal 13 got up and commenced his pacing again. \"Oh, I suppose Kanad's partly to blame, wanting rejuvenating at only 300 years. Some have waited a thousand or more or until their bones are like paper.\" \"I just wonder how angry Kanad will be,\" Arvid muttered. HB92167. Ultroom Error. Tendal 13. Arvid 6. Kanad transfer out of 1951 complete. Next Kanad transfer ready. 2267. Phullam 19, son of Orla 39 and Rhoda R, 22H Level M, Hemisphere B, Quadrant 3, Sector I. Arrive his 329th Day. TB92167 Arvid 6 rose from the cot and the two men faced each other. \"Before we leave, Arvid,\" Tendal 13 started to say. \"I know, I know. You want me to let you handle everything.\" \"Exactly. Is that too much to ask after all you've done?\" \"I guess I have made mistakes. From now on you be the boss. I'll do whatever you say.\" \"I hope I can count on that.\" Tendal 13 rang the jail buzzer. The jailer unlocked the cell door. \"You remember the chief said it's all right to take him with me, Matthews,\" Tendal 13 told the jailer. \"Yes, I remember,\" the jailer said mechanically, letting them both out of the cell. several with no luck. Arvid 6, an amused set to his mouth and devilment in his eyes, watched the jailer's expression as he walked through the bars of the door. He laughed as he saw the jailer's eyes bulge. \"Arvid!\" Tendal 13 walked briskly through the door, snatched Arvid 6 by the shoulders and shook him. The jailer watched stupified as the two men vanished in the middle of\n\n<question>:\nHow does Tendal 13 feel about Arvid 6?\n\n<options>:\nA Arvid 6 is Tendal 13's training officer. He respects Arvid 6.\nB Tendal 13 thinks Arvid 6 is the worst partner ever. He cannot wait to be reassigned.\nC Tendal 13 despises Arvid 6 with a passion. He is plotting to kill Arvid 6.\nD Arvid 6 is Tendal 13's best friend. Tendal 13 is glad they work together.\n\n<answer>:\n", "assistant": "B" } ]

[ { "human": "Read the following passage and questions, then choose the right answer from options, the answer should be one of A, B, C, D.\n\n<passage>:\nthey skipped several steps in the procedure. The chordata discerner read Positive Naturally they did not get results at once, nor did they expect to it required a fine adjustment. But they were disappointed that they found surface to find another, or concentrate on this? It'll be twelve hours before it's back in our ken if we let it go now.\" \"Let's lock on this one and finish the scan. Then we can do the rest of the world to make sure we've missed nothing,\" said Stark. the acknowledged superior minds of the Earth. In space it had been a assumed an air of importance when it ran these tests. Finally it signaled the result, the most exasperating result it ever \"Scan the remainder of the world, Steiner,\" said Stark, \"and the rest of us will get some sleep. If you find no other spot then we will go down on that one the next time it is in position under us, in about twelve hours.\" \"No. The rest of the world may be dangerous. There must be a reason that thought is in one spot only. If we find no others then we will go So they all, except Steiner, went off to their bunks then: Stark, the the engineer Casper Craig, super-cargo, tycoon and 51% owner of the Little Probe, and F. R. Briton, S.J., a Jesuit priest who was linguist from?\" \"I don't know, but they're right in the middle of it. Land here. We'll go to meet them at once. Timidity has never been an efficacious tool with us.\" He may or may not have been understood, but the two of them smiled at him, so he went on. wouldn't have a drink on you for a tubful of thirsty travellers, would you?\" \"That isn't necessary here, Captain. Talk to them yourself.\" \"And the damnest thing about it,\" muttered Langweilig, \"is, how are you \"Can we have something to eat?\" asked the Captain. will want to sleep on the grass. Being not of human nature (which does not need sleep or rest), it may be that you require respite. But you are free to enjoy the garden and its fruits.\" \"We will,\" said Captain Stark. They wandered about the place, but they were uneasy. There were the will be the test at least: whether we're having a pleasant dream or whether this is reality. Go ahead and eat one.\" \"I won't be the first to eat one. You eat.\" \"Ask him first. You ask him.\" and Hawwah mean—?\" proposition to maintain here as on Earth?\" \"Forever less six days is the answer that has been given to me. I never did understand the answer, however.\" \"And have you gotten no older in all that time?\" \"And do you think that you will ever die?\" \"And are you completely happy here?\" \"Perfectly happy according to my preternatural state. But I am taught that it might be possible to lose that happiness, and then to seek it vainly through all the ages. I am taught that sickness and ageing and even death could come if this happiness were ever lost. I am taught that on at least one other unfortunate world it has actually been lost.\" \"Yes, there is a question that will settle it. Adam, old man, how about a game of checkers?\" \"This is hardly the time for clowning,\" said Stark. \"I'm not clowning, Captain. How about it, Adam? I'll give you choice of colors and first move.\" \"No. It would be no contest. I have a preternatural intellect.\" persevere, it will come by him.\" They learned no more of the real nature of the sphere in their time there. Yet all but one of them were convinced of the reality when they left. And they talked of it as they took off. \"A crowd would laugh if told of it,\" said Stark, \"but not many would laugh if they had actually seen the place, or them. I am not a gullible man, but I am convinced of this: that this is a pristine and pure world and that ours and all the others we have visited are fallen worlds. are garbed in light and innocence, and they have the happiness that we have been seeking for centuries. It would be a crime if anyone disturbed that happiness.\" \"I too am convinced,\" said Steiner. \"It is Paradise itself, where the lion lies down with the lamb, and where the serpent has not prevailed. It would be the darkest of crimes if we or others should play the part the tycoon, \"but I do believe my eyes. I have been there and seen it. It is indeed an unspoiled Paradise and it would be a crime calling to the wide heavens for vengeance for anyone to smirch in any way that perfection. \"So much for that. Now to business. Gilbert, take a gram: Ninety Million Square Miles of Pristine Paradise for Sale or Lease. Farming, Ranching, exceptional opportunities for Horticulture. Gold, Silver, Iron, Earth-Type Fauna. Terms. Special Rates for Large Settlement Parties. Write, Gram, or call in person at any of our planetary offices as listed below. Ask for Brochure—Eden Acres Unlimited.\" names were \"Snake-Oil Sam,\" spoke to his underlings: \"It'll take them fourteen days to get back with the settlers. We'll have time to overhaul the blasters. We haven't had any well-equipped settlers for six weeks. It used to be we'd hardly have time to strip and slaughter and stow before there was another batch to take care of.\" \"I think you'd better write me some new lines,\" said Adam. \"I feel like a goof saying those same ones to each bunch.\" business long enough to know never to change a line too soon. I did change Adam and Eve to Ha-Adamah and Hawwah, and the apple to the pomegranate. People aren't becoming any smarter—but they are becoming better researched, and they insist on authenticity. \"This is still a perfect come-on here. There is something in human nature that cannot resist the idea of a Perfect Paradise. Folks will whoop and holler to their neighbors to come in droves to spoil and mar it. It isn't greed or the desire for new land so much—though that is strong too. Mainly it is the feverish passion to befoul and poison what is unspoiled. Fortunately I am sagacious enough to take advantage of this trait. And when you start to farm a new world on a shoestring you have to acquire your equipment as you can.\" space-sealed wheeled, tracked, propped, vaned and jetted vehicles and power packs to run a world. He looked at the three dozen space ships stripped and stacked, and at \"I know it, Eve. The lion is a very important prop. Maybe one of the crackpot settlers will bring a new lion.\" \"And can't you mix another kind of shining paint? This itches. It's hell.\" \"Amazing quality of longevity seemingly inherent in the locale. Climate ideal. Daylight or half-light. All twenty-one hours from Planet and storied. Zoning and pre-settlement restrictions to insure congenial neighbors. A completely planned globular settlement in a near arm of our own galaxy. Low taxes and liberal credit. Financing our specialty—\" \"And you had better have an armed escort when you return,\" said Father Briton. \"Why in cosmos would we want an armed escort?\" \"It's as phony as a seven-credit note!\" \"You, a man of the cloth doubt it? And us ready skeptics convinced by our senses? Why do you doubt?\" \"It is only the unbelieving who believe so easily in obvious frauds. Theologically unsound, dramaturgically weak, philologically impossible, zoologically rigged, salted conspicuously with gold and shot through it was just that he chose not to make our acquaintance personally.\"\n\n<question>:\nWhat is likely to happen to the crew when they return to the planet?\n\n<options>:\nA They'll fall victim like those before them, and have their supplies stolen.\nB They'll return, still believing it's the Garden of Eden.\nC They'll learn the truth about the Old Serpent and Adam, and leave.\nD They'll carry through with their settlement plans and cash in.\n\n<answer>:\n", "assistant": "A" } ]

[ { "human": "Read the following passage and questions, then choose the right answer from options, the answer should be one of A, B, C, D.\n\n<passage>:\nHarvey and Joe were the slickest con-men ever five buckos for a glass of water—and got it! no dignity to maintain, lurched across the rubbish-strewn patch of land that had been termed a spaceport. When Harvey staggered pontifically into the battered metalloy saloon—the only one on Planetoid 42—his tall, gangling partner was already stumbling out, mouthing something incoherent. They met in the doorway, violently. Joe reeled aside, and Harvey saw what had upset his partner. He stared, speechless for once. In their hectic voyages from planet to planet, the pair of panacea remaining pair. The bartender, a big man resembling the plumpish Harvey in build, was leaning negligently on the counter, ordering this Without a word, the bartender reached under the counter, brought out two glasses of water. The interplanetary con-men drank noisily, asked for more, until they had drunk eight glasses. Meanwhile, the bartender Harvey and Joe were breathing hard from having gulped the water so \"Yeah?\" said the bartender disinterestedly, polishing the chaser Harvey grinned puzzledly. \"We didn't take any whiskey.\" \"Might as well. Water's five buckos a glass. Liquor's free with every Harvey's eyes bulged. Joe gulped. \"That—that's robbery!\" the lanky man make more on each one. Besides—\" \"Besides nothing!\" Joe roared, finding his voice again. \"You dirty crook—robbing poor spacemen! You—\" \"You dirty crook!\" Joe roared. \"Robbing honest spacemen!\" Harvey nudged him warningly. \"Easy, my boy, easy.\" He turned to the bartender apologetically. \"Don't mind my friend. His adrenal glands are was chargin' feller critters for water just out of devilment? I charge more to charge for water than it does for you to pay. I just got to, them. The planetoid man worked the pump while the mayor intently watched the crude level-gauge, crying \"Stop!\" when it registered the Harvey bravely counted off the bills. He asked: \"But what are we to charging you for battery water? You can have all you want for nothing. It's just the purified stuff that comes so high.\" After giving them directions that would take them to the free-water pool, the ponderous factotum of Planetoid 42 shook hands and headed back to the saloon. His six-armed assistant followed him inside. \"Now do you see, my hot-tempered colleague?\" said Harvey as he and Joe \"Just the same,\" Joe griped, \"paying for water isn't something you can a faint suspicion alive in him. So he called Harvey and they went to They rushed back to the first pool, where Joe again tasted a sample. unpleasant turn. Something shrewd was called for.... \"Joseph!\" he exclaimed, looking at his partner in alarm. \"Don't you gently crossing. He sagged against the door frame, all his features drooping like a bloodhound's. \"Bring him in here!\" Johnson cried. \"I mean, get him away! He's coming down with asteroid fever!\" \"Of course,\" replied Harvey calmly. \"Any fool knows the first symptoms ?\" demanded Johnson. \"I come down with it every year, and I ain't hankering to have it in an off-season. Get him out of here!\" \"In good time. He can't be moved immediately.\" \"Then he'll be here for months!\" Harvey helped Joe to the counter and lifted him up on it. The mayor and Instead of replying, Harvey hurried outside to the ungainly second-hand rocket ship in the center of the shabby spaceport. He returned within a When Joe tried to pull away, Harvey was inexorable. He made his partner Joe recoiled. \"I'm fine now!\" he cried, and sprang off the bar to prove \"We do not sell this unbelievable remedy,\" Harvey replied with dignity. Harvey took a glass from the bar and poured him a generous sample. The \"Medicine,\" Harvey propounded, \"should taste like medicine.\" To Joe he With Joe stumbling along behind, he left the saloon, crossed the clearing and entered the ship. As soon as they were inside, Joe dropped mind you. Was I to mix the extract with the water for which we had been I had to use the bitter free water, of course.\" Harvey looked reprovingly at his gangling partner. \"Did Johnson ask to \"Okay, okay,\" Joe said. \"But you shoulda charged him more.\" Harvey stopped filling bottles and looked up pensively. Joe was still dazed by that monetary vista when he and Harvey carried down carefully. Then he took the elaborate bottle-opener Harvey gave out the money into Harvey's hand, at a moderate rate that precariously Harvey and Joe looked at each other. They hadn't been thinking about \"It's only water we were short of,\" Harvey said apprehensively. \"We've \"Your hospitality,\" said Harvey, \"depends on the prices you charge.\" Swiftly, Harvey conned the possibilities of being bilked again. He saw chance of company. Genius, the six-armed native, appeared from the dingy kitchen with Harvey and Joe studied the menu critically. The prices were complained Harvey. \"I wish Johnson would stay either swindler or honest As if on cue, Genius came out and put the check down between Joe and Harvey. Harvey picked it up negligently, but his casual air vanished in !\" Johnson didn't answer. Neither did Genius \"You can go to hell!\" Joe growled. \"We won't pay it!\" Johnson sighed ponderously. \"I was afraid you'd act like that,\" he said with regret. He pulled a tin badge out of his rear pocket, pinned it on his vest, and twisted his holstered gun into view. \"Afraid I'll have to ask the sheriff to take over.\" \"restaurateur,\" pocketed it. Meanwhile, Harvey tipped Joe the sign to \"Well, by obliging us to pay such a high price for your dinner, you put \"It doesn't matter any longer,\" Harvey said with elaborate \"Oh, come now, Mr. Johnson. Don't tell me no amount of money would tempt you!\" Harvey was quick to pay out, for this was a genuine windfall. Then he Harvey forcibly removed his eyes from the native, who was clearing off Joe's face grew as glum as Johnson's had been. \"Aw, Harv,\" he protested, \"do we have to sell it? And right when I thought we were getting the key!\" have more success than we. Go, Joseph. Bring it here.\" Unwillingly, Joe turned and shuffled out. On a larger and heavier world than Planetoid 42, Johnson's curiosity would probably have had weight and mass. He was bursting with questions, but he was obviously afraid they would cost him money. For \"Do not jump to hasty conclusions,\" Harvey cautioned. \"Another word, and I shall refuse you the greatest opportunity any man has ever had, with the sole exceptions of Joseph, myself and the unfortunate inventor Harvey nodded in relief. \"We have attempted to repay our host, Joseph. He picked up the radio and began walking toward the door. \"Now, hold on!\" the mayor cried. \"I ain't Again Harvey smashed his fist down. \"Do you dare to repeat the scurvy \"Why, I don't know,\" Johnson said in confusion. \"For three years, Joseph and I lost sleep and hair, trying to detect the simple key that would translate the somewhat metamorphosed a sensitive soul like his could stand only so much. And the combination of ridicule and failure to solve the mystery caused him to take his own life.\"\n\n<question>:\nWhy did Harvey agree to pay the absurd price for the water that he and Joe consumed at the bar?\n\n<options>:\nA The sheriff had threated them with his holstered weapon.\nB He knew they would be able to con Johnson right back.\nC They were thirsty and too delirious to argue\nD He didn't want to risk being arrested and trapped on Planetoid 42\n\n<answer>:\n", "assistant": "B" } ]

[ { "human": "Read the following passage and questions, then choose the right answer from options, the answer should be one of A, B, C, D.\n\n<passage>:\nthe dust-caked, tired body, yet there they were, seeking, always seeking—searching the clear horizon, and never seeming to find what the water would be welcome on tired bodies and dry throats. He spurred his horse, the horse. Then both man and horse plunged headlong into the waiting In the fading light, he ate the hard beef jerky and drank the scalding coffee. Refreshed and momentarily content, he sat staring into the dying fire, seeing the bright glowing coals as living fingers clutching But the portion of his brain called memory stirred. It was all alone all else was at rest. Images began to appear, drawn from inexhaustible files, wherein are kept all thoughts, past, present, and future.... It was the night before he was to go overseas. World War III had been declared, and he had enlisted, receiving his old rank of captain. He was with his wife in the living room of their home. They had put the children to bed—their sons—and now sat on the couch, watching the voice which always seemed to send a thrill through his body. \"It's for you so long as you wear it, I'll come back, even from the dead, if need be. Read the inscription.\" he had been many times before but each time found something new and unexplored, some vastly different emotion he could never quite explain. The next morning had been bleak and gray. The mist clung to the wet, sodden ground, and the air was heavy in his lungs. He had driven off in the jeep the army had sent for him, watching her there on the porch and slammed the door. His cold fingers found the locket, making a Three years later they were on the road to Moscow. Over a thousand miles lay behind, a dead man on every foot of those miles. Yet victory was near. The Russians had not yet used the H-bomb the threat of annihilation by the retaliation forces had been too great. He had done well in the war, and had been decorated many times for bravery in action. Now he felt the victory that seemed to be in the air, and he had wished it would come quickly, so that he might return to her. Home. The very feel of the word was everything a battle-weary soldier needed to make him fight harder and live longer. \"Heavy bombers!\" The alarm had sounded, and the men had headed for But the planes had passed over, the sun glinting on their bellies, targets. When the all-clear had sounded, the men clambered from their screaming noises which had jarred the people from sleep in time to die. The defending planes roared into the sky to intercept the on-rushing bombers. The horrendous battle split the universe. Many bombers fell, victims of fanatical suicide planes, or of missiles that streaked across the sky which none could escape. But too many bombers got through, dropping their deadly cargo upon the cities, where men had not died quickly and mercifully, but had rotted The retaliatory forces had roared away to bomb the Russian cities. Few, if any, had returned. Too much blood and life were on their hands. Those who had remained alive had found a resting place on the crown of some distant mountain. Others had preferred the silent peaceful The war had ended. To no avail. Neither side had won. Most of the cities and the majority of the population of both countries had been destroyed. Even their governments had vanished, leaving a silent nothingness. The armies that remained were without leaders, without sources of supplies, save what They were alone now, a group of tired, battered men, for whom life held nothing. Their families had long since died, their bodies turned to dust, their spirits fled on the winds to a new world. Yet these remnants of an army must return—or at least try. Their exodus was just beginning. Somehow he had managed to hold together the few men left from his force. He had always nourished the hope that she might still be alive. And now that the war was over he had to return—had to know whether she was still waiting for him. They had started the long trek. Throughout Europe anarchy reigned. He and his men were alone. All they could do now was fight. Finally they had commandeered a small yacht, and they had taken to the sea. After months of storms and bad luck, they had been shipwrecked and had been found by a fisherman's family. Many months he had spent swimming and fishing, recovering his strength, inquiring about the United States. The Mexicans had spoken with fear of the land across the been only partially destroyed were devoid of people. The land across and the few people who might have survived, were crazed and maimed by the blasts. Few men had dared cross the Rio Grande into \"El Mundo gris de Noviembre\"—the November world. Those who had, had never returned. waded into the muddy waters and somehow landed on the American side. In ruins of what had once been their cities. He had walked through them, He had been on the trail for a long time. His food was nearly exhausted. The mountains were just beginning, and he hoped to find food there. He had not found food, but his luck had been with him. He had empty, but there were cans of food and a rifle and many shells. He had remained there a long time—how long he could not tell, for he could had taken the horse, the rifle and what food was left, and once again started the long journey home. The farther north he went, the more life seemed to have survived. He had seen great herds of horses like his own, stampeding across the But he knew he was closer now. Closer to home. He recognized the land. what it had once been. He could not be more than two days' ride away. all would be well, and his long journey would be over. He awoke and stretched the cramped muscles of his body. At the edge of the water he removed his clothes and stared at himself in the rippling mirror. His muscles were lean and hard, evenly placed throughout the length of his frame. A deep ridge ran down the length of his torso, separating the muscles, making the chest broad. Well satisfied with his body, he plunged into the cold water, deep down, until he thought his lungs would burst every pore. He dried himself and dressed. Conqueror was eating the long He would ride all day and the next night. And he would be home. burning stream within his body. But day at last gave way to night, and very edge. Even then he might not have seen it had not the horse He turned quickly away and did not look back. he was home he would build new furniture, and the house would be even mumbling mouth. The eyes, turned momentarily toward the window, were empty of life. \"No, no!\" he cried soundlessly. This was not his house. In his delirium he had only imagined he had one skeleton-like finger and stood, turning the ring slowly as if trying to decipher some inscription inside it. He knew then. He had come home. Slowly he moved toward the door. A great weakness was upon him. His feet were stones, reluctant to leave the earth. His body was a weed, shriveled by thirst. He grasped the doorknob and clung to it, looking up at the night sky and trying to draw strength from the wind that passed over him. It was no use. There was no strength. Only fear—a kind of fear he had never known. his neck until he found the locket and the clasp which had held it safely through endless nightmare days and nights. He slipped the clasp faces of those he loved, but grey ghosts from the past. Even the ruby He ran. Away from the house. To the large horse with a horn in the center of its forehead, like a unicorn. Once in the saddle, the spurt of strength left him. His shoulders slumped, his head dropped onto his chest. Conqueror trotted away, the sound of his hooves echoing hollowly in the\n\n<question>:\nWould the main character had fought as hard in World War III if he knew that his family would not be home when he returned?\n\n<options>:\nA No, because he would be too devastated to fight.\nB Yes, because he wanted to make sure that he and his men won World War III.\nC No, because he would have nothing to come back home to anyways.\nD Yes, because he was adamant on surviving World War III.\n\n<answer>:\n", "assistant": "C" } ]

[ { "human": "Read the following passage and questions, then choose the right answer from options, the answer should be one of A, B, C, D.\n\n<passage>:\nBRYCE WALTON \"Nothing around those other suns but ashes and dried blood,\" old Dunbar told the space-wrecked, desperate men. \"Only one way to go, where we can float down through the out and out forever in all directions. Russell didn't think they could remain sane in all this blackness much longer. Bitterly he thought of how they would die—not knowing within maybe thousands of light years where they were, or where they were going. After the wreck, the four of them had floated a while, floated and drifted together, four men in bulbous pressure suits like small individual rockets, held together by an awful pressing need for each other and by the \"gravity-rope\" beam. Dunbar, the oldest of the four, an old space-buster with a face wrinkled like a dried prune, burned by cosmic rays and the suns of Four men, thought Russell, held together by an invisible string of taking the lead because he was older and knew where he was and where he was going. Maybe Johnson, second in line, and Alvar who was third, knew too, but were afraid to admit it. But Russell knew it and he'd admitted it from the first—that old A lot of time had rushed past into darkness. Russell had no idea now long an interim that had been. Nobody knew what happened to a man who consciousness, the ship was pretty banged up, and the meteor-repeller shields cracked. A meteor ripped the ship down the center like an old How long ago that had been, Russell didn't know. All Russell knew was Russell wanted to laugh, but the last time he'd given way to this repeat. Sometimes Russell thought of other things besides his growing hatred of the old man. Sometimes he thought about the ship, lost back there in the void, and he wondered if wrecked space ships were ever found. Compared with the universe in which one of them drifted, a wrecked ship was a lot smaller than a grain of sand on a nice warm beach back And a human was smaller still, thought Russell when he was not hating When the four of them had escaped from that prison colony on a sizzling hot asteroid rock in the Ronlwhyn system, that wasn't enough them had been trying to find all their lives in the big cold grabbag We all look alike out here in these big rocket pressure suits, Russell now, Russell thought—if it weren't for old crazy Dunbar. rum-dum. Russell had known now for some time that they were going in the wrong direction. No reason for knowing. Just a hunch. And Russell Russell said. Alvar and Johnson would see that he was cracked. \"Paradise is it,\" Russell whispered hoarsely. Russell said tightly. \"It'll take us a long time won't it? If it's got Russell said. Old Dunbar laughed. The sound brought blood hotly to Russell's face. Russell was very sick of the old man's voice. He was at least glad he I'd break away, go it alone to the right sun, Russell thought—but I'd Somewhere, sometime then ... Russell got the idea that the only way Russell said. four of them hurtled along. \"You never know where you'll find people on a world somewhere nobody's ever named or knows about. Places where a lost ship's landed and never got up again, or wrecked itself so far off the lanes they'll never be found except by accident for millions of years. That's what this world is, boys. Must have been a ship load Russell suddenly shouted. \"Keep quiet, Dunbar. Shut up will you?\" Russell screamed at Dunbar, then quieted down. He whispered. \"Six \"The hell with the old days,\" screamed Russell. way. An' pretty soon something breaks, or the food runs out, and you're a million million miles from someplace you don't care about any more because you're dead. All frozen up in space ... preserved like a piece of meat in a cold storage locker. And then maybe in a million years or so some lousy insect man from Jupiter comes along and finds After that they traveled on for what seemed months to Russell, but it rims. He yelled this fact out to the others. And Alvar said. \"Russ's Russell half choked on his words. \"You old goat! With those old eyes ashes, and not able to go any further—\" Russell did it before he hardly realized he was killing the old man. Dunbar. If he'd aimed right, Russell knew the fire-bullet should have self-sealing. Nothing appeared to have changed. The four of them hurtling on together, but inside that first suit up there on the front of the gravity rope, Dunbar was dead. He was dead and his mouth was shut for good. Dunbar's last faint cry from inside his suit still rang in Russell's ears, and he knew Alvar and Johnson had heard it too. Alvar and \"Russ—you shouldn't have done that,\" Johnson whispered. \"You shouldn't have done that to the old man!\" \"I did it for the three of us,\" Russell said. \"It was either him or us. Lies ... lies that was all he had left in his crazy head. Paradise ... that you really believed all that stuff he was spouting all the time!\" \"Maybe he was lying, maybe not,\" Johnson said. \"Now he's dead anyway.\" \"Maybe he was wrong, crazy, full of lies,\" Alvar said. \"But now he's \"How could he see any difference in those four stars?\" Russell said, louder. \"He thought he was right,\" Alvar said. \"He wanted to take us to paradise. He was happy, nothing could stop the old man—but he's dead ,\" said Alvar. It was quiet. How could it be so quiet, Russell it's forgotten, Russ. It's swallowed up in the darkness all around. Russell said, \"I've had a hunch all along that maybe the old man was because he was alone. He'd have broken away, gone his own direction, long ago but for that fear. \"We got to stay together,\" said Russell. \"Nobody could spend a year \"No ... God no....\" Russell whispered over and over. \"None of us can ever make it alone....\" Johnson started to laugh. Russell was yelling wildly at them, and Now Russell wasn't saying anything. Someday he'll get to that red-rimmed star of his. Out here in space, once you're going, you never stop ... and I guess there isn't any other body to pull him off his course. And what will time matter to Russell couldn't say anything. He stared at the endless void which now \"All right,\" Johnson said. \"Good-bye.\" Russell felt the release, felt the sudden inexplicable isolation and aloneness even before Alvar and Johnson used their life-guns and shot dwindling and dwindling and blinking out like little lights. Fading, he could hear their voices. \"Each to his own star,\" Johnson Russell used his own life-gun and in a little while he didn't hear of miles away, and going further all the time. Russell's head fell forward against the front of his helmet, and he closed his eyes. \"Maybe,\" he thought, \"I shouldn't have killed the old waited for him, stretching away to the red-rimmed sun. Even if he were right—he was sure now he'd never make it alone. The body inside the pressure suit drifted into a low-level orbit around the second planet from the sun of its choice, and drifted there a long time. A strato-cruiser detected it by chance because of the pressure suit. \"An old man,\" one of them mused. \"A very old man. From one of the lost sectors. I wonder how and why he came so very far from his home?\" \"Wrecked a ship out there, probably,\" one of the others said. \"But he managed to get this far. It looks as though a small meteor fragment pierced his body. Here. You see?\" he is ... wherever he came from, he died bravely and he knew the way, though he never reached this haven of the lost alive.\" \"Nor is it irony that he reached here dead,\" said the Lake Chieftain.\n\n<question>:\nWhat most likely happened to Russell after the story ended?\n\n<options>:\nA His body would be preserved in a museum\nB He found somewhere to settle and managed to live out the rest of his life\nC He would die once he tried to land on the planet\nD He likely died floating in space\n\n<answer>:\n", "assistant": "D" } ]

[ { "human": "Read the following passage and questions, then choose the right answer from options, the answer should be one of A, B, C, D.\n\n<passage>:\nit's sandless (shower-wise) near oxygen for the return trip (Jones trip), and the air's only a little bit sandy, but handkerchiefs over nose and mouth solve this. days before blastoff. \"Oh, sure trip, but the public doesn't want them they want the probably be locked up for the whole trip. If there are fights or accidents, about them.\" \"Nonsense,\" said Louie, sipping carefully at a paper cup of scalding coffee. \"It'll be just like the stream, and picked us all up and took us into a hole in the cliff wall. The hole went on practically forever, rifles away and threw them into the \"But, Louie,\" I said, wiping the in the diary for, did I want to \"But what if nothing happens?\" left us here, and we're out of rations. Kroger tried talking to the guard once, but he (or it) made a whistling And, of course, me. I've met all but the pilot (he's very dragged it away. \"Water must be dangerous to them,\" said Kroger. \"We shoulda brought water pistols,\" blasted off, though, and he's still We'd end up drowned in some grotto in the heart of the planet, says and right now he's telling jokes in the washroom with the co-pilot. \"What the hell,\" says Pat, \"it's Jones (that's the co-pilot didn't quite catch his first name) is scarlet-faced, barrel-chested and I better than starving.\" Kroger. furiously and went away. When the sleeping cycle here), Kroger talked the pilot's compartment, with all Lloyd into swimming across the river and getting the red scales. (they call it the bulkhead, microphone to the pilot. His hair is red and curly, and he looks as though he'd be tall if he ever gets had to lift him out of the swirling cold water, with the scales gripped in his fist. Or what was left of the scales. They had melted down in the water and left his hand all sticky. Kroger tells me that the pilot's metabolism, only with no pancreas My compartment is small but during blastoff. The inertial gravities didn't bother me so much as the gyroscopic spin they put on the ship so we have a sort of artificial gravity to hold us against the curved floor. It's that constant whirly feeling that gets me. I get sick on merry-go-rounds, too. now and then suck up water from the stream while they're watching (all sugar, of course) wet. He They're having pork for dinner us, being careful not to get their lips the hydrogen and oxygen in the first name) has been up with the pilot all day. He passed my room on the way to the galley (the kitchen) for a cup of dark brown necessary to form the sugar. \"I don't get it,\" I said politely, when he'd finished his spiel. coffee (they like it thick) and told me that we were almost past the Top Secret. They'd have to cover in that medium, they lose all energy steering or something. I still haven't met the pilot. to form more sugar, and still die, if a bit slower.\" \"Oh,\" I said, taking it down verbatim. and close-set jet-black eyes that make him look rather mean, but he was pleasant enough, and said I none of the dots move, except in a circle that Pat says is a \"torque\" result from the gyroscopic spin we're in. Actually, he explained to me, the screen is supposed to keep the image of space locked into place no matter how much we spin. But there's some kind of a \"drag.\" I told him I hoped it didn't mean we'd land on Mars upside down. He of starvation.\" The hell it is. just stared at me. of the walls. They came running at us, whistling with those tubelike tongues, and drooling dry coal dust, but Pat swung one of his boots in an arc that splashed all over the ground in front of them, and they turned tail (literally) and clattered out of a carton. Right now we're using sounding like a locomotive whistle gone berserk. buttons for men. He's one of these fast players who don't stop and he had important work to do and he went away. I went to the galley for coffee thought they were beyond recovery misunderstood and said, \"A good chance of liking what celebration feast just outside the door of the ship. It was pork again, and I got sick. When I got back to my compartment, compartment, and Jones sat and \"Because,\" said Pat, \"if we tell them now, by the time we get back we'll be yesterday's news. This way \"The radio,\" said Pat, nodding to Lloyd, \"was unfortunately broken shortly after landing.\" Lloyd blinked, then nodded rocket. I heard a crunching sound and the shattering of glass, not unlike the noise made when one uses his first name as a gag. Some fun. thought I was getting my space-legs, but Pat says there's less gravity on Mars, so escape velocity didn't (relatively) trip on our shock-absorbing riot when it first came out. I mean, all those sly digs at the aristocracy, with copious interpolations by Mr. on board ship. Pat told him he it when he'd pulled a particularly good gag. Some fun. was nuts, but there are certain I asked Pat what the prize was and he told me to go to hell. When he told Pat, Pat put it to a vote whether or not to jettison Kroger through the airlock. However, because of the dust storm down below. again. We're going to land, so I have to go to my bunk. It's all foam rubber, nylon braid supports Jones had brought them aboard. and magnesium tubing. Might as the air is getting worse. Pat suggested Kroger put us all into a state of suspended animation till landing did me at takeoff. Earth seems awfully to wear gas masks with oxygen Air is foul and I'm very thirsty. Kroger says that at least—when gave him a cigar he'd smuggled on board (no smoking was allowed on the ship), and Jones threw it away. Pat told me not to go too far from camp, so, couldn't have guessed at the carbohydrates present in the bread after a lifelong diet of anthracite. Pat be pulverized and mixed with sulphuric acid. He says this'll produce carbon. They were shouting through their masks, but I couldn't hear them. The air is too thin to carry sound well. firing chamber. We had to flood the chamber with acid to subdue the creature, which carbonized featureless because the sand's loose enough acid left in the fuel tanks \"What was it?\" I asked Lloyd when he got to me. \"Damned if I know,\" he said. \"It when we fired.\" them, nor the jeep, on my trip back. which is a help. However, his tail is prehensile, and now and then it snakes out through an air duct and yanks food right off the table from under our noses. We are made of carbohydrates, too. I'd the camp, but a few rifle shots send the jeep has a leaky oil pan, so we always have the smears to follow, my diary aboard, and towed the the \"captured Martian\" leaked out, And we're locking up the ship. until the dismantling of the and hydrostatic pressure and crystalline life, but in no time at all he lost me.\n\n<question>:\nWhy wasn't the narrator's compartment clean during blastoff?\n\n<options>:\nA The crew ransacked the narrator's room. They were not happy to have a journalist forced upon them for this journey.\nB The narrator forgot to secure his belongings when they boarded the ship. The gyroscopic spin knocked unsecured items all around the room.\nC The force of the inertial gravities knocked unsecured items all around the room. The narrator did not secure his belongings when he boarded the ship.\nD The gyroscopic spin caused the narrator to vomit.\n\n<answer>:\n", "assistant": "D" } ]

[ { "human": "Read the following passage and questions, then choose the right answer from options, the answer should be one of A, B, C, D.\n\n<passage>:\nExtensive research did not uncover any evidence that the U.S. copyright on this publication was renewed.] Wayne, unseen, sneered down from the head of the stairs. The old man with his thick neck, thick cigar, evening highball, potgut and bald head without a brain in it. His slim mother with nervously Wayne watched the ritual, grinning. He listened to their purposeless noises, their blabbing and yakking as if they had something to say. Blab-blab about the same old bones, and end up chewing them in the But the old man was right on for once about the dangerous repressed impulses. Wayne had heard about it often enough. Anyway there was no doubt about it when every move he made was a restrained explosion. that must make the old man feel like Superman with a beerbelly. They heard Wayne slouching loosely down the stairs and looked up. \"Relax,\" Wayne said. \"You're not going anywhere tonight.\" \"Hell,\" Wayne said, grinning straight into the old man. \"I just got my draft call.\" He saw the old man's Adam's apple move. \"Oh, my dear boy,\" Mother cried on a slip of paper, handed the pass to Wayne. \"Go to the Armory and check out whatever your lusting little heart desires. Then report to Finally he said, \"So make up your mind, bud. Think you're the only kid breaking out tonight?\" \"Hold your teeth, pop,\" Wayne said, coolly and slowly lighting a cigarette. \"I've decided.\" The corporal's little eyes studied Wayne with malicious amusement. \"Take it from a vet, bud. Sooner you go the better. It's a big city and Wayne's mouth twitched. He leaned across the counter toward the shelves and racks of weapons. \"I'll remember that crack when I get my commission.\" He blew smoke in the corporal's face. \"Bring me a while Wayne examined the weapons, broke open the revolver, twirled the Jack crossed black-booted legs and whacked a cane at the floor. It had a head shaped like a grinning bear. Wayne felt the assured smile die on his face. Something seemed to shrink him. If he didn't watch himself he'd begin feeling like a pea among bowling balls. Contemptuously amused little eyes glittered at Wayne from a shaggy \"Yes, sir,\" Wayne said. He ran wet hands down the sides of his chinos. His legs seemed sheathed in lead as he bit inwardly at shrinking fear the way a dog snaps at a wound. You big overblown son, he thought, I'll secretive and sparse, the uncared-for streets became rough with pitted potholes, narrow and winding and humid with wet unpleasant smells. Wayne's fearful exhilaration increased as he cruised with bated breath through the dark mazes of streets and rickety tenements crawling with the shadows of mysterious promise. He breathed deep, started over, ducked back. A stewbum weaved out of a bank of garbage cans, humming to himself, pulling at a rainsoaked shirt clinging to a pale stick body. He reminded Wayne of a slim grub balanced on one end. The stewbum stumbled. His bearded face in dim breaking moonlight had a dirty, greenish tinge as he sensed Wayne there. He turned in a grotesque uncoordinated jiggling and his eyes were wide with terror and doom. \"I gotta hide, kid. They're on me.\" Wayne's chest rose and his hands curled. The bum's fingers drew at the air like white talons. \"Help me, kid.\" He turned with a scratchy cry and retreated before the sudden blast of headlights from a Cad bulleting into the alley. The Cad rushed past Wayne and he felt the engine-hot fumes against his legs. Tires teener moved in, while a faint odor of burnt rubber hovered in the air as the Cad cruised in a slow follow-up. Wayne's breath quickened as he watched, feeling somehow blank wonder The crawling stewbum screamed as the baseball bat whacked. The teener laughed. Wayne wanted to shout. He opened his mouth, but the yell clogged up somewhere, so that he remained soundless yet with his mouth still open as he heard the payoff thuds where the useless wino curled bright wind-blown sparks. Wayne walked over and sneered down at the human garbage lying in scummed rain pools. The smell of raw violence, the scent of blood, made his heart thump like a trapped rubber ball in a cage. of being motionless, as though they were all actors performing in a weirdo drama being staged in that smoky thick-aired dive. Wayne smiled with wry superiority at the redheaded psycho in a dirty T-shirt, a big bruiser with a gorilla face. He was tussling his mouse heavy. Red nuzzled the mouse's neck and made drooly noises. Wayne watched and fed on the promising terror and helplessness of her hunted face. She sat rigid, eyes fixed on Wayne like balls of frozen glass. Red looked up and stared straight at Wayne with eyes like black buttons imbedded in the waxlike skin of his face. Then he grinned all on one side. One huge hand scratched across the wet table top like a furious cat's. Wayne returned the challenging move but felt a nervous twitch jerk at his lips. A numbness covered his brain like a film as he concentrated on staring down Red the psycho. But Red kept looking, his eyes bright Wayne drank. Liquored heat dripped into his stomach. Fire tickled his veins, became hot wire twisting in his head. fast and muted brass moaned. Drumpulse, stabbing trumpet raped the air. Tension mounted as Wayne watched her pale throat convulsing, the white eyelids fluttering. Red fingered at her legs and salivated at her throat, glancing now and then at Wayne, baiting him good. \"Okay, you creep,\" Wayne said. He stood up and started through the haze. The psycho leaped and a table crashed. Wayne's .38 dropped from its spring-clip holster and the blast filled the room. The psycho screamed and stumbled toward the door holding something in. The mouse darted by, eluded Wayne's grasp and was out the door. Wayne went out after her in a laughing frenzy of release. He felt the cold strange breath of moist air on his sweating skin as he sprinted down the alley into a wind full of blowing wet. terror. \"You, baby,\" Wayne gasped. \"I gotcha.\" She backed into darkness, up there against the sagging tenement wall, her arms out and poised like crippled wings. Wayne crept up. She gave a squeaking sob, turned, ran. Wayne leaped into gloom. Wood cracked. cracks. A rat ran past Wayne and fell into space. He burst into the snickered as he flashed the switchblade and circled it like a serpent's tongue. He watched what was left of her nerves go to pieces like rotten cloth. \"I'm tired running. Kill me first. Beat me after. They won't know the difference.\" \"I'm gonna bruise and beat you,\" he said. open. \"You got bad blood, baby,\" he snarled. He laughed but it didn't sound He turned and ran blindly, half-fell down the cracking stairs. Doctor Burns, head of the readjustment staff at the Youth Center, studied Wayne with abstract interest. \"You enjoyed the hunt, Seton? You got your kicks?\" \"No, sir,\" Wayne mumbled. He didn't look up. \"I'm sorry I punked out.\"\n\n<question>:\nWhat is significant about Wayne’s averse reaction to witnessing the stewbum beating?\n\n<options>:\nA It foreshadows that Wayne will not be able to go through with his kill\nB It is symbolic for the inner rage bubbling within Wayne’s teenage brain.\nC It references the rage he feels toward his cowardly and stupid father\nD It foreshadows the violence Wayne will do to Red\n\n<answer>:\n", "assistant": "A" } ]

[ { "human": "Read the following passage and questions, then choose the right answer from options, the answer should be one of A, B, C, D.\n\n<passage>:\nrefuses to obey the just and legal John Crownwall as he strode Tronn Ffallk, ruler of Sector XII We control it adequately, and we live in peace. \"The Sundans, for example, though they took the rule of the Empire that was rightfully ours Sunda. He ignored the snarling, the spitting, the waving of boneless prehensile fingers, as he ignored the of the Universal Holy Empire of surrounded by this writhing, slithering powerful. And soon we will be all-powerful. In company with you Earthlings, that is.\" conquer planets without the necessity of destroying them, and thereby take over number one spot from these Sunda friends of yours.\" \"Don't call those damn lobsters friends,\" growled Ggaran. He subsided their present attitude, Earth would have to send Marshall to replace world. You can do the same on the worlds of the Sunda. Now, just tell us how you did it, and we're partners.\" unconcern that he felt sure was entirely wasted on these monsters. toward the palace of Viceroy would be. He was correct. relief. A pair of guards, their purple hides smoothly polished and gleaming with oil, crossed their ceremonial government of the Galaxy.\" \"Bunk,\" said Crownwall. pikes in front of him as he swiftly, before Ggaran, lunging angrily His Effulgence lifted a tentacle senior of the guards, his speaking orifice framing with difficulty the sibilances of Universal Galactic. \"And just what business do you have here, stranger?\" asked the orders of its Viceroy. So we achieve \"Mind your tongue,\" growled the guard. \"If you mean His Effulgence, Right Hand of the Glorious Emperor, Hereditary Ruler of the Seventy Suns, Viceroy of the Twelfth Sector of the Universal Holy Empire\"—Universal Galactic he summons. If you know what's arrived from Earth to talk to him. He'll summon me fast enough. Meanwhile, my highly polished friends, I'll just wait here, so why guards. nonchalance. He gestured fluidly with a graceful tentacle. \"You!\" he said to Crownwall. \"Follow me. His Effulgence commands you to appear \"Ridiculous,\" snorted Ggaran. plan,\" said His Effulgence. \"It is reclined on a couch. Behind him stood a heavy and pompous appearing Vegan in lordly trappings. \"I'm afraid that Ggaran had Earthling. I suppose we can expect you to be ignorant of those niceties customary among civilized peoples.\" \"It's all right, Ggaran,\" said the \"And now,\" Ggaran put in, \"I think it's time for you to tell us graciously. something about how you get plans to beat the claws off the Master Race.\" After the Vegan said with a of my advisors—even Ggaran here—thought it couldn't be done, but Ffallk glanced up at Ggaran. \"I to both of us. But you did come, so I can tell you that although I am the leader of one of the mightiest peoples in the Galaxy, whereas there are scarcely six of which ours is such a distinguished member. \"I'm listening,\" said Crownwall. \"We offer you partnership with us to take over the rule of the Galaxy from the Sunda—the so-called Master Race.\" \"It would hardly be an equal your own mighty sun moved toward me as the Galaxy revolved. than there are of us?\" His Effulgence twitched his ear stalks in amusement. \"I'm Viceroy the Empire. I rule over a total of a hundred Satrapies these average He turned his head away from I, personally, rule three hundred trillion people, half of them of my own race. And yet I tell you that upstart Earthlings are a strange and a frightening race,\" he said. \"Frightening to the Sunda, especially. When you showed up in the spaceways, it was decreed that you Ggaran shrill two-tone note, using both his speaking and his eating orifices. A cohort of troops, pikes at the ready classed among the intelligent races, there was a general expectation, which we reported to the Sunda, that they would some day come to be numbered among the Servants of the Emperor. So we let you and bows strapped to their backs, leaped forward and formed a walking behind it, like Ggaran.\" \"I'm glad of that,\" said Crownwall. \"Too bad Ggaran can't join \"You Earthlings, in defiance of it to Ffallk. \"When the Viceroy of the Seventy Suns,\" said the Viceroy of the Seventy Suns, \"travels in state, no one but my own entourage is permitted to watch. And my guests, of course,\" he added, bowing slightly bowing back. \"Kind of you, I'm doesn't hear your trumpeters, or something like that?\" Ggaran stepped forward, already The Star Seeker panting slightly. \"A man with knots above the Earth. It had been manned by a dozen adventurous people, captained by Crownwall, and had headed out on its ion in Earth's history, and, for the twelve, the stars had winked out. The men of Earth had decided that it should work in theory. They \"You see,\" said Ggaran complacently, of Alpha Centauri. They had a shudder of distaste. \"Tell me, Your Effulgence, does the Emperor's race—the Master Race—also enjoy the type of civilization you have just had demonstrated the Star Seeker , and had then tried to herd it away from the council of war, they had called it—and their unanimous decision. Although far within the dangerous influence of a planetary race and mine, of course.\" \"I sincerely hope so,\" said Crownwall. Ggaran, his tentacles stiffening the cohort, the bearers and Ggaran continued to run—without food, drink or, except for Ggaran, evidence of fatigue. itself and the ships and those of my own race who manned them. landing on Earth and taking us over?\" asked Crownwall. \"Would that have been so bad?\" said Ggaran. \"We can't tolerate wild and warlike races running free and uncontrolled in the Galaxy. Government of Earth, making a full report on his trip to Vega. When he had finished, the President from what you say, I'd rather be obvious that we could not conquer you. We could only destroy you.\" \"That old fool on Sunda, the Emperor, decided that we should blow you up, but by that time I had decided,\" said His Effulgence, \"With his usual lack of imagination, with the bomb, you would only succeed in setting it off, and that's what the Sunda had been in favor of in the first place. \"There, you see?\" exclaimed Crownwall. \"Our enemies are all gone!\" He looked around, glowing with alone now!\" \"But I had different ideas. From victory, at the others at the table, then slowly quieted and sat down. \"Alone,\" he said, and unconsciously murmured Ggaran. repeated Marshall's words: \"We're all alone now.\" In silence, the others gathered \"Ggaran, you explain it to the Earthling,\" said His Effulgence. Ggaran bowed. \"The crustaceans on Sunda—the lobsterlike creatures that rule the Galaxy—are usurpers. They have no rights to their position of power. Our race is much older than theirs. We were alone when we found the Sundans—a primitive tribe, grubbing in the mud at the edge of their shallow People, can. And then they cheated us of our rightful place. \"The Emperor at Sunda is one of them. They provide sixty-eight of the hundred Viceroys Ggaran's tentacles writhed, and said the aged ruler. conquer them. I rule a total of seven races in my Sector. I rule them, but I don't let them intermingle. Each race settles on the planets that best suit it. Each of those planets is quite capable of defending \"Naturally, each is vulnerable to\n\n<question>:\nWho is Ggarran?\n\n<options>:\nA The Viceroy's advisor\nB The head of the palace guard\nC The leader of the Vegans\nD The leader of the Sundans\n\n<answer>:\n", "assistant": "A" } ]

[ { "human": "Read the following passage and questions, then choose the right answer from options, the answer should be one of A, B, C, D.\n\n<passage>:\n\"Well, I mean, it's not only about Wanda,\" said Harry. \"You see, my Extensive research did not uncover any evidence that the U.S. copyright on this publication was renewed.] They would never live to see the trip's end. So they made a few changes in their way of life—and many in their way of death! I \"Ah.... Quite so.\" \"Well, about Wanda. I really shouldn't mention this. But Father, if we tell us it's gonna be another postponement.\" \"Iffen he does, I'm jest a-gonna stand up an' yell right out that I gonna talk so loud.\" \"I hope he does I jest hope he does. He's th' one that's a-keepin' us all from our Reward, an' I jest hope he does heyar me, so he'll know I'm a-gittin' mighty tyird uv waitin'.\" \"You tell 'im!\" someone said from two rows behind him. \"I never thought of that,\" said the third mate disconsolately. \"Men,\" he said. And then, more loudly, \"Men!\" \"Well, I'll be damned,\" Joanne Marie's husband said loudly. sores. For which the three wise Vergios were passing grateful. And within the last week, they were dead of infection. But three were foolish and hid their sores and these three did live.\" \" Calex i pundendem hoy , my children. 'Secrecy makes for a long life,' as it says in the .\" Nestir tugged behind him at his cloak. \"I want you all to remember that little story. I want you all to take it away from here with you and think about it, tonight, in the privacy He had intended, after the ceremony, to go about his duty as if nothing out of the ordinary had happened but after it was done with, the vast sailing.' \"Yes, he said, 'I am weary of sailing.' \"Now, don't you think I don't know that. Every one of you—every indignity of it came home to him even more poignantly than he had imagined it would. blessed one of you—is weary of sailing. I know that as well as I know my own name, yes. was merely to stare fixedly at the ceiling. It is entirely possible that he would have lain there until Doomsday thing—ah, what a good thing, that is—ah, how nice it would be to have the Casting Off at home, among friends.'\" over to behold it. I never will forget the Festival at which my father was accepted. He.... \"Well, the point I want to make is this: I just wanted to tell you Festival, so you can look back on it and say, uh, uh—this day was the real high point of your whole life!\" Everyone but Joanne Marie's husband cheered. He sat glumly muttering to forced to flee from the city of Xan because the eldest son of the family had become involved in a conspiracy against the illustrious King Fod. As the Soong family was traveling....\" \"I don't like 'em anyway,\" said Wanda. \"You'll spoil the flavor, shaking it that way,\" the third mate The first mate nodded sagely. he died as miserable a death as anyone could desire.\" \"Yes,\" said the second mate's wife. \"I remember that. I read about it Upon hearing the word duty, the captain brightened. \"That,\" he said to Nestir, \"my dear Father, is the cardinal point of the whole game, y'know.\" He scratched the back of his left hand. \"Duty. And I must say, I think you're being quite short-sighted about the Casting Off date. After all, it's not only a question of how we go, but also a question of leaving only after having done our duty. And that's equally important.\" following the captain's outburst. \"You don't need to worry about your ever tell you about my wife? She strangled our second baby.\" \"He was a very annoying child,\" his wife said. \"He probably wouldn't have lived, anyway,\" the third mate said. \"Puny baby.\" The first mate nodded. instinct of the mother to release her child from its duty, then....\" \"Oh, not at all,\" the third mate's wife said. \"I did it to make him The third mate turned triumphantly to the first mate. \"There, I told The first mate shrugged. \"I never do say nothin' right,\" he said. \"I duty log that's better un even th' captain's. An' hit's Martha an' me that gotta wait an' help th' next crew. Lord above knows how long time hit'll be afore we uns'll got ta have a Festival.\" \"Oh, really, now. Now. Duty, duty,\" the captain reprimanded him mildly. \"Duty! Duty! Duty! You all ur in a conspiracy. You all want me ta die uv old age.\" \"Nonsense,\" said the steward. \"We don't want anything of the sort. After all, someone has to orient the new crew.\" The first mate slammed his napkin in the middle of his food and stalked \"She's so young....\" \"It's an idea,\" the second mate said. \"Otherwise, we'll be short one \"Now, Martha. I place duty above pleasure. You're just angry, y'know, because you have to stay with your husband.\" \"All right, so I am. But it's true. And if Carstar hadn't been killed, there would have been two short.\" She shot a wicked glance at Nestir. \"Listen,\" the third mate said, \"the second's right. If you don't sign \"You really shouldn't have told them about little Glenn tonight.\" \"Pish-tush.\" \"No, Harry. I mean it. Helen looked at me strangely all through dinner. She has three children, you know.\" \"But she does have three children.\" He kicked the man several times in the ribs until he came to consciousness. \"Can't sleep here, my man,\" Harry explained. \"Awww. Go way an' le' me 'lone, huh?\" Harry assisted him to the crew's corridor where he sank to the floor and relapsed once more into a profound slumber. When he entered it, the second mate was yawning. The second mate took out a cigarette and lit it. \"Can't blow the ship of your cabins. out about it, though. He'll figure the man was neglecting his duty.\" He blew a smoke ring. \"Might even bar him from the Festival.\" \"Yeah,\" said Harry, \"the captain's funny that way.\" up, you know. Look like hell on the record. Hope the captain don't find nor would he consent \"Say. Harry. Do you suppose your wife would...?\" Harry crossed to the second mate and put a hand on his shoulder. \"Sorry, old fellow. She's got it in her head to take Nestir.\" He shrugged. \"I don't exactly approve, of course, but ... I'm sure if he doesn't want her, she'd be glad to hear your offer.\" to Nestir's suggestion that he carry a nosegay of hydroponic flowers. \"If you'll excuse me, Father, I really should return to duty,\" said the crewman. \"Quite all right, my son. Close the door after you.\" \"I must say, fellow, your sense of duty is commendable.\" \"Quite all right, my son. That's what I'm here for. Come in as often as you like.\" properly launched on his account, when Harry, the third mate, knocked \"It's about Wanda, Father,\" said the third mate. The young girl.\"\n\n<question>:\nWhat is the first mate trying to express when he says \"You all want me ta die uv old age\"?\n\n<options>:\nA He's grumbling because he hates his job and knows he doesn't want to do it forever\nB Only the most important members of the society die of old age and he does not want that responsibility\nC If he dies of old age, that means he will not be rewarded when he passes\nD If he dies of old age, that means he'll be around without a lot of his friends, and he doesn't want that\n\n<answer>:\n", "assistant": "C" } ]

[ { "human": "Read the following passage and questions, then choose the right answer from options, the answer should be one of A, B, C, D.\n\n<passage>:\nThe Game , 1997) is out to bombard you with so much feverish imagery that you have no choice but to succumb to the movie's reeling, punch-drunk worldview. By the end, you might feel as if you, too, have a mouthful of blood. self-destruction is the new way. Tyler's manifesto calls for an end to consumerism (\"Things you own end up owning you\"), and since society is going down (\"Martha Stewart is polishing brass on the Titanic \"), the only creative outlet left is annihilation. \"It's only after we've lost everything that we're free to do anything,\" he says. Fincher and his screenwriter, Jim Uhls, seem to think they've broken new ground in Fight Club , that their metaphor for our discontents hits harder than anyone else's. Certainly it produces more bloody splatter. But 20 years ago, the same impulse was called punk and, as Greil Marcus documents in Lipstick Traces , it was other things before that. Yes, the mixture of Johnny Rotten, Jake La Motta, and Jesus is unique and the Faludi-esque emasculation themes are more explicit. But there's something deeply movie-ish about the whole conceit, as if the novelist and director were weaned on Martin Scorsese pictures and never stopped dreaming of recapturing that first masochistic rush. The novel, the first by Chuck Palahniuk (the surname sounds like Eskimo for \"palooka\"--which somehow fits), walks a line between the straight and ironic--it isn't always clear if its glib sociological pronouncements are meant to be taken straight or as the ravings of a delusional mama's boy. But onscreen, when Pitt announces to the assembled fighters that they are the \"middle children of history\" with \"no purpose and no place\"--emasculated on one hand by the lack of a unifying crisis (a world war or depression) and on the other by lack of material wealth as promised by television--he seems meant to be intoning gospel. \"We are a generation of men raised by women,\" Tyler announces, and adds, \"If our fathers bail, what does that tell you about God?\" (I give up: What?) here, he's skinny and wilting, a quivering pansy. Even when he fights he doesn't transform--he's a raging wimp. The performance is marvelous, and it makes poetic sense in light of the movie's climactic twist. But that twist will annoy more people than it will delight, if only because it shifts the drama from the realm of the sociological to that of the psychoanalytic. The finale, scored with the Pixies' great \"Where Is My Mind?\" comes off facetiously--as if Fincher is throwing the movie away. Until then, however, he has done a fabulous job of keeping it spinning. The most thrilling thing about Fight Club isn't what it says but how Uhls and Fincher pull you into its narrator's head and simulate his adrenalin rushes. A veteran of rock videos, Fincher is one of those filmmakers who helps make the case that MTV--along with digital editing--has transformed cinema for better as well as worse. The syntax has become more intricate. Voice-over narration, once considered uncinematic, is back in style, along with novelistic asides, digressions, fantasies, and flashbacks. To make a point, you can jazzily interject anything--even, as in Three Kings , a shot of a bullet slicing through internal organs. Films like Fight Club might not gel, but they have a breathless, free-associational quality that points to new possibilities in storytelling. Or maybe old possibilities: The language of movies hasn't seemed this unfettered since the pre-sound days of Sergei Eisenstein and Abel Gance. An actress named Hilary Swank gives one of the most rapturous performances I've ever seen as the cross-dressing Brandon Teena (a k a Teena Brandon) in Kimberly Peirce's stark and astonishingly beautiful debut feature, Boys Don't Cry . The movie opens with Teena being shorn of her hated female tresses and becoming \"Brandon,\" who swaggers around in tight jeans and leather jackets. The joy is in watching the actor transform, and I don't just mean Swank: I mean Teena Brandon playing Brandon Teena--the role she has been longing for her whole life. In a redneck Nebraska bar, Brandon throws back a shot of whiskey and the gesture--a macho cliché--becomes an act of self-discovery. Every gesture does. \"You're gonna have a shiner in the morning,\" someone tells Brandon after a barroom brawl, and he takes the news with a glee that's almost mystical: \"I am????? Oh, shit!!!\" he cries, grinning. That might be my favorite moment in the picture, because Swank's ecstatic expression carries us through the next hour, as Brandon acts out his urban-cowboy fantasies--\"surfing\" from the bumper of a pickup truck, rolling in the mud, and straddling a barstool with one hand on a brewski and the other on the shoulder of a gorgeous babe. That the people with whom Brandon feels most at home would kill him if they knew his true gender is the movie's most tragic irony--and the one that lifts it out of the realm of gay-martyr hagiography and into something more complex and irreducible: a meditation on the irrelevance of gender. Peirce's triumph is to make these scenes at once exuberant (occasionally hilarious) and foreboding, so that all the seeds of Brandon's killing are right there on the screen. John (Peter Sarsgaard), one of his future rapists and murderers, calls him \"little buddy\" and seems almost attracted to him Sarsgaard's performance is a finely chiseled study of how unresolved emotion can suddenly resolve itself into violence. Though harrowing, the second half of Boys Don't Cry isn't as great as the first. The early scenes evoke elation and dread simultaneously, the later ones just dread I n brief: If a friend tells you you'll love Happy Texas , rethink the friendship. This clunky mistaken-identity comedy about escaped cons who impersonate gay pageant directors doesn't even make sense on its own low farcical terms it's mostly one lame homo joke after another. The only bright spot is Steve Zahn, who could be the offspring of Michael J. Fox and Crispin Glover if they'd mated on the set of Back to the Future (1985). It's hard to make a serious case for Lawrence Kasdan's Mumford , which has apparently flopped but which you can still catch at second- and third-tier theaters. It looks peculiar--a Norman Rockwell painting with noir shadows. And its tale of a small town healed by a depressive (Loren Dean) posing as a psychologist is full of doddering misconceptions about psychotherapy. I almost don't know why I loved it, but the relaxed pacing and the witty turns by Martin Short, Ted Danson, David Paymer, and Mary McDonnell surely helped. I can't decide if the weirdly affectless Dean is inspired or inept, but my indecision suggests why he works in the role. There's no doubt, however, about his even more depressive love object, Hope Davis, who posseses the cinema's most expressive honking-nasal voice and who slumps through the movie like the world's most lyrical anti-ballerina. Even her puffy cheeks are eloquent: They made me think of Mumford as the home of the psychological mumps.\n\n<question>:\nAll four of the films reviewed share the following theme:\n\n<options>:\nA gender\nB sexuality\nC consumerism\nD identity\n\n<answer>:\n", "assistant": "D" } ]

[ { "human": "Read the following passage and questions, then choose the right answer from options, the answer should be one of A, B, C, D.\n\n<passage>:\nExtensive research did not uncover any evidence that steel hull was the silence of the interplanetary vacuum she knew the pain wouldn't return for a few minutes yet. \"Fine, doctor. It's no worse than I was expecting. How long will it before we can contact White Sands?\" be all right.\" \"Certainly,\" she agreed, running a hand through her brown hair, \"I'll be okay. Just you be on tap when I call.\" The major's grin broadened. \"You don't think I'd miss a historical event like this, do you? You take it easy. We're over Eastern Europe now, but as soon as we get within radio range of New Mexico, I'll beam a call in.\" He paused, then repeated, \"You just take it easy. Call the nurse if anything happens.\" Then he turned and walked out of the room. \"Lieutenant Britton, you're either careless or brainless I don't not equipped for obstetrics up here.\" \"Send me back down to Earth, of course.\" And he had looked up at her scathingly. \"Lieutenant Britton, it is landing, you're daffy!\" pinpoint it almost exactly. And at a maximum of half of Earth gravity, you shouldn't weigh more than seventy pounds then. You're to report to to worry about she had absolute faith in the red-haired major. The nurse's eyes widened. \"Good Lord! I never thought of that! What are you going to do?\" \"Right now, I can't do anything. I can't beam a radio message through to the Earth. But as soon as we get within radio range of White Sands, I'll ask them to send up an emergency rocket with an incubator. But—\" \"But what?\" \"Will we have time? The pains are coming pretty fast now. It will be at least three hours before they can get a ship up here. If they miss us needed. He handed it to the teletype operator and paced the floor impatiently as he waited for the answer. When the receiver teletype began clacking softly, he leaned over the page, waiting anxiously for every word. WHITE SANDS ROCKET BASE 4 JULY 1984 0913 HRS URGENT TO: MAJ PETER BANES (MC) 0-266118 SS-1 MEDICAL OFFICER FROM: GEN DAVID BARRETT RENDEZVOUS WITH SS-1 AS OF NEXT PASSAGE ABOVE USA. CAPT. JAMES BRITTON PILOTING. MEDICS LOADING SHIP TWELVE WITH INCUBATOR AND OTHER SUPPLIES. BASE OBSTETRICIAN LT COL GATES ALSO COMING TO ASSIST IN DELIVERY. HANG ON. OVER. Banes nodded and turned to the operator. \"I want a direct open telephone line to my office in case I have to get another message to the base before we get out of range again.\" He turned and left through the heavy door. Each room of the space station was protected by airtight doors and individual heating units if some accident, such as a really large meteor hit, should release the air from one room, nearby rooms would be safe. Banes' next stop was the hospital ward. \"Something on that order, I suppose. But it won't be all my glory. Colonel Gates, the O.B. man, was supposed to come up for the delivery in September, so when White Sands contacted us, they said he was coming were coming too close together to suit him. There was a faint rap, and the heavy airtight door swung open to admit the Chief Nurse. \"There's a message for you in your office, doctor. I'll send a nurse in to be with her.\" , old chap,\" she grinned. Back in his office, Banes picked up the teletype flimsy. WHITE SANDS ROCKET BASE 4 JULY 1984 0928 HRS URGENT TO: MAJ PETER BANES (MC) 0-266118 SS-1 MEDICAL OFFICER FROM: GEN DAVID BARRETT 0-199515 COMMANDING WSRB ROCKET. ORBIT COMPUTED FOR RENDEZVOUS AT 1134 HRS MST. CAPT BRITTON SENDS PERSONAL TO LT BRITTON AS FOLLOWS: HOLD THE FORT, BABY, THE WHOLE WORLD IS PRAYING FOR YOU. OUT. Banes sat on the edge of his desk, pounding a fist into the palm of his left hand. \"Two hours. It isn't soon enough. She'll never hold out monotone, timed with the rhythmic slamming of his fist. The Chief Nurse said: \"Can't we build something that will do until the rocket gets here?\" Banes looked at her, his face expressionless. \"What would we build it out of? There's not a spare piece of equipment in the station. It costs money to ship material up here, you know. Anything not essential is left on the ground.\" The phone rang. Banes picked it up and identified himself. The voice at the other end said: \"This is Communications, Major. I tape recorded all the monitor pickups from the Earth radio stations, and it looks as though the Space Service has released the information to the public. Lieutenant Britton's husband was right when he said the whole world's praying for her. Do you want to hear the tapes?\" \"Not now, but thanks for the information.\" He hung up and looked into the Chief Nurse's eyes. \"They've released the news to the public.\" She frowned. \"That really puts you on the spot. If the baby dies, \"Well, think about something useful! Think about how we're going to save that baby!\" He paused as he saw her eyes. \"I'm sorry, Lieutenant. My nerves are all raw, I guess. But, dammit, my field is space medicine. I can handle depressurization, space sickness, and things know. I don't even have any references up here people aren't supposed one! Prepare the ward room next to the one she's in now, I guess. It's the best we have. A situation like this won't happen again!\" Brittons it was simply his way of letting off steam to ease the board had had to be carried up in rockets when the station was built in space. The air purifiers in the hydroponics section could keep the air fresh enough for breathing, but fire of any kind would overtax the \"Nothing serious. I just want to make sure everything comes out all boil water.\" \"Whatever for?\" \"Coffee, of course. Didn't you know that? Papa always heats up the water that keeps him out of the way, and the doctor has coffee afterwards.\" ready. It won't be much longer now.\" \"I'll say it won't! How about the incubator?\" There was a long pause. Finally, he said softly: \"There isn't any account. It's my fault. I've done what I could, though the ship is bringing one up. I—I think we'll be able to keep the child alive until—\" \"Lieutenant! Lieutenant Britton! Alice! This is no time to get hysterical! Stop it!\" Space Ship Twelve docked at Space Station One at exactly eleven thirty-four, and two men in spacesuits pushed a large, bulky package through the airlock. Major Peter Banes, haggard but smiling, met Captain Britton in the corridor as he and the colonel entered the hospital ward. but it really isn't necessary. Your wife figured that one out. A space station is a kind of incubator itself, you see. It protects us poor, weak humans from the terrible conditions of space. So all we had to do was close up one of the airtight rooms, sterilize it, warm it up, and\n\n<question>:\nWhat is the importance of White Sands?\n\n<options>:\nA It's where the only doctors who can offer advice are stationed\nB It is where Lt. Britton's family lives\nC This is where Lt. Britton wants to start her family\nD It's where the base is that can send help\n\n<answer>:\n", "assistant": "D" } ]

[ { "human": "Read the following passage and questions, then choose the right answer from options, the answer should be one of A, B, C, D.\n\n<passage>:\nShe said, \"I'd rather be dead. Maybe I am. Maybe we're all dead and this is Hell.\" first to come back for a second run.\" \"But you can't,\" he told her. \"They're too clever.\" \"Is this crop rotation or did you send for me?\" she asked cynically. \"If you did, I wish you hadn't. You haven't asked about your son.\" \"I don't even want to think about him,\" said Tennant. \"Let's get within them by their captors. double motherhood, she was almost flat of bosom. He asked her how she was feeling. \"Okay, I guess,\" she said. \"The way they manage it, there's nothing brought through. \"Good,\" he said. \"Glad to hear it.\" He felt oddly embarrassed. He turned to Olga, broad, blonde and curiously vital, who sat perfectly still, regarding him over the pregnant swell of her dirndl-clad waist. something that might cheer her up, for she was by far the youngest of like it any better than we do.\" \"But he doesn't have to—have them,\" objected Olga. She had a trace of Polish accent that was not unpleasant. In fact, Tennant thought, only It arrived before the meal, materializing against one of the seven be it gold, brown or red, predecessors doomed it to instant success. \" expression—approval that faded quickly as soon as she caught his gaze upon her. The food arrived then and they sat down at the round table to eat it. Eudalia laid down her fork with a clatter and regarded Dana disapprovingly. \"Why take it out on Rog?\" she asked bluntly. \"He didn't ask to come here any more than we did. He's got a wife back home. Maybe you want him to fall in love with you? Maybe you're jealous because he doesn't? Well, maybe he can't! And maybe it wouldn't work, the way .\" all are. We seem to be in a universe of different properties as well as \"We may be in the eleventh for all I know,\" he told her. \"But I'll settle for the fourth—a fourth dimension in space, if that makes \" \"Hold on,\" he said. \"They pass through their gateway to Earth at don't come back. They kill those of us who put up a fight. Those who don't—or can't—they bring back with them. Live or dead, we're just laboratory specimens.\" Rog?\" \"Of course not,\" he agreed. \"In the one instance, \"They never cry,\" the thin woman told him. \"But they grow—God, how they grow!\" \"Good,\" said Tennant, fighting down his anger. He kissed her, held her close, although neither of them felt desire at the moment. Their captors had seen to that \"And it's not yours,\" insisted Eudalia. \"Don't let them make you think it is.\" \"I'll try not to,\" he said and stopped, realizing the family party was over. He had felt the inner tug of command, said good-by to the women and returned to his smaller compound within its own barrier dome. discarded as too nightmarish for belief. and Opal would have shown no reaction. Yet He went through the entire routine at Opal's bidding. When at last of near-sick excitement as he received the thought: Now you are ready. We are going through at last. thought: received quick reproof that made his head ring as from a blow. He asked Opal where and when they were going, was informed that he would soon emerge on Earth where he had left it. That told him everything but the date and season. Opal, like the rest of the captors, seemed to have no understanding of time in a human sense. Waiting, Tennant tried not to think of his wife, of the fact that he hadn't seen her in—was it more than a year and a half on Earth? He could have controlled his heartbeat with one of his new powers, but that might have made Opal suspicious. He should be somewhat excited. He allowed himself to be, though he obscured the reasons. He was going to see his wife again ... and maybe he could trick his way into not returning. The maid who opened the door for him was new, although her eyes were old. But she recognized him and stood aside to let him enter. There took another drag, saw the maid still in the doorway, staring. \"There's no need for fright,\" he told her. \"I believe I still own this house.\" Then, \"When do you expect Mrs. Tennant?\" \"She just called. She's on her way home from the club.\" Still looking frightened, she departed for the rear of the house. back here, about to see Agatha again, hold her close in no more than a few minutes. And stay, his mind began to add eagerly, but he pushed the there would be in a ghastly spot. He felt like a heel for wanting to leave them there, then knew that he would try somehow to get them out. Not, of course, anything that would endanger his remaining with Agatha the only way his captors would get him back would be as a taxidermist's He realized, shocked and scared, that his thoughts of escape had slipped past his mental censor, and he waited apprehensively for Opal but he'd get them back or another pair. The credenza had been replaced by a huge and ugly television console. That, he resolved, would go down in the cellar rumpus room, where its bleached modernity wouldn't clash with the casual antiquity of the living room. Agatha would complain, naturally, but his being back would make up for any amount of furniture shifting. He imagined her standing close to real ... his love for her, the food he ate, the things he touched, his house, his life.... Your wife and a man are approaching the house. The thought message from Opal crumbled his illusion of freedom. He sank down in a chair, trying to refuse to listen to the rest of the command: You are to bring the man through the gateway with you. We want another live male. Opal had been too interested in the next lab specimen to bother about . He'd had one too many and only wanted a little fun. him. The it would be you.\" \" Roger! \" Agatha found her voice. \"You're alive !\" \"Roger,\" repeated Tennant viciously. He felt sick with disgust. Maybe he should have expected a triangle, but somehow he hadn't. And here it was, with all of them going through their paces like a trio of have right to know. I do, anyway.\" \"One question first,\" he said. \"What about those killings? Have there revolting. \"Rog,\" she said and her voice trembled, \"what are we going to do? What want to do?\" Take her back? He smiled ironically she wouldn't know what that meant. It would serve her right, but maybe there was another way. \"I don't know about you,\" he said, \"but I suspect we're in the same \" What both are qualified to make for yourselves.\" He lit a cigarette, inhaled. \"Relax. I'm not planning revenge. After this evening, I plan to vanish for good. Of course, Agatha, that offers you a minor nuisance. You will have to wait six years to marry Cass—seven years if the maid who let me in tonight talks. That's the law, isn't it, Cass? You probably had it all figured out.\" \"You bastard,\" said Cass. \"You dirty bastard! You know what a wait like that could do to us.\" \"Tristan and Isolde,\" said Tennant, grinning almost happily. \"Well, I've had my little say. Now I'm off again. Cass, would you give me a lift? I have a conveyance of sorts a couple of miles down the road.\" exchanged with Cass. He turned away, knowing that she was imploring her lover to do something, All they could do was kill them and bring back their heads and hides questing thoughts toward his captor, asking why they didn't simply set up the gateway in some town or city and take as many humans as they\n\n<question>:\nWhat will probably happen next?\n\n<options>:\nA Roger will find a way to escape\nB Roger will probably take Cass back with him\nC Roger will go back empty handed\nD Roger will bring his wife back with him\n\n<answer>:\n", "assistant": "B" } ]

[ { "human": "Read the following passage and questions, then choose the right answer from options, the answer should be one of A, B, C, D.\n\n<passage>:\nSara lets the Lyft park itself in the drive, lets out a sigh, and tweets Sara finds herself in the front room, sobbing. Dad pauses the TV, looks up at her. It looks like he's been crying too. \"Sara?\" Mom and Dad watch Sara leave the room, and then look at each other. It had always been this way, ever since she was about thirteen. Up until then it just seemed like constant warmth, as though she didn't have any childhood concept of Dad apart from him getting home from work, then her sitting on his knee, eating cookies and watching football highlights until Mom came in and scolded them both for ruining their appetites before dinner. So they didn't talk much now, barely online, never on the phone. Since her second year of school he'd never been to NYC to visit her. She came back when she could face it sometimes for birthdays, sometimes for Thanksgiving. Maybe for Christmas. But somehow always, like now, for the Super Bowl. Like football was the one thing they still had, that one thing they could still sit in the same room together for. Shouting at players, screaming at the ref, laughing at the ads. Fox, Breitbart News, Family Values TV, Info Wars, The Rebel, Glenn Beck, The Voice of America, America First, The Bible Today and lots of hunting and sports channels she doesn't even recognise. It's signed in to her Dad's FB account, and the last thing she wants is to try and log in on hers before he gets back from the john. Yeah. There was no way that would end up with them keeping it civil. In her pocket her phone vibrates, purrs against her skin, reminding her it's there, making sure she's not forgotten where her real friends are, that there's a world outside, beyond Dad and his TV. She takes it out and cradles it in her hands, the dark screen fleetingly reflecting back her face before it jumps awake at her very touch, opening up to bathe her in blue light, in comfort and warmth and the familiar. For the first time since she got home she feels herself relax. Dinner is Mom's meatloaf, with gravy and mashed potatoes. Cornbread and broccoli. Every mouthful tastes like nostalgia, and Sara can feel herself being encompassed by a bubble, this barrier of warm air and long forgotten simplicity enveloping her body, protecting her from the confusion of the world outside. Dad finishes chewing his mouthful, swallows, wipes his beard with a napkin. Sighs, barely controlled anger simmering behind his face. \"Solar panels cause cancer.\" Sara laughs, covering her mouth as she nearly chokes on chewed food. \"What? No they don't Dad.\" \"Look it up?\" Sara shakes her head, not knowing where to even start. \"Dad, who is telling you this stuff?\" \"No one is telling me it, Sara. I read it. It's in the news. I mean, really, I'm surprised you've not seen it. It was all over Facebook.\" \"Maybe on yours, but it's not all over my Facebook.\" She doesn't have the heart to tell him she muted him six months ago. \"Well, I don't read the news and I don't know any science,\" says Mom, \"But I do know this: after they opened that solar farm up near Mary, within just a few years her and two of her neighbours had cancer. I mean I don't know anything for sure honey, but given the risk are you sure it's safe to be putting these panels on top of schools?\" \"There's no risk, Mom. None at all. Dad, I wish you'd stop believing everything you see on Facebook.\" \"Well, maybe you should read things yourself before passing judgement on them.\" He pushes himself up from his seat, steps away from the table. Sara sighs, thinking she's upset him that much that he's actually abandoning his dinner, but he stops to grab something off a nearby shelf. His iPad. He heads back and takes his seat again. Oh, here we fucking go Reluctantly, she takes it. His Facebook feed. Somewhere in the middle of it is the article, a very to the point CHINESE SOLAR PANELS CAUSE CANCER headline. But she can't even focus on it, because the rest of the screen is filled with distractions, looping videos and animated gifs, all adverts, and all for guns. Or security systems. Panic rooms. Back up power generators. Emergency rations. More guns. Sara looks over to Mom, who looks like she's on the brink of tears. Suddenly she finds she's also lost the will to fight. Gently she closes the iPad and puts it down on the table, next to her plate. \"No, of course not Dad. Maybe I'll read this later, after the game.\" After dinner she helps Mom clean-up, the two of them loading the dishwasher in near silence. She's leaning against the counter, scrolling through Twitter on her phone, when Mom finally speaks. \"What things? Solar panel cancer?\" \"Don't joke Sara, I'm serious. There's a lot that bothers him. The state of the world. The future. All these damn wars.\" \"Yeah, well you know your father. Doesn't like to talk about it. Doesn't want to burden other people with his problems. Hates pity.\" She pauses, looks out the window into the yard. When she turns back to Sara her eyes are damp. \"This is why I was so excited about you coming back. Why he was so excited! I thought it'd take his mind of all this. He was so excited to see you. You know he loves watching the game with you, Sara.\" \"I know. I'm sorry I-\" \"And the ads! The Super Bowl ads! You know how much he loves watching the new ads with you. It's a stupid thing, sure, but he loves it. Talks about it all the time. It's like a tradition to him. That's why he got so upset over dinner when you got angry at his ads. It's something special he has with you, he doesn't want to lose it.\" Sara slips her phone into her pocket, genuine guilt. Feels like a spoiled kid. \"I didn't realise. I'm sorry.\" Mom smiles, walks over and kisses her on the forehead. \"It's OK honey. Don't feel bad. Just go. Just go sit in there with him and watch some TV. Please.\" \"Sara!\" says Mom. \"Sara!\" Mom makes to get up. Out in the kitchen Sara sits at the table and wants to scream. She's angry, mainly with herself. She should never have fucking come here. She should have known better. There was never any fucking way anything good was going to come from this. As much as Mom wants to romanticise things, to make them sound cute and adorable, the truth is shit with Dad has never been right since she was a teenager. Too much resentment, too much bad blood, too much control and rebellion. They hadn't agreed on anything - they hadn't managed to have a simple conversation that didn't descend into fighting - in 15 goddamn years, and no amount of eating cookies and watching fucking Super Bowl ads on the TV was going to fix that. She sighs, wipes a tear from her cheek. On autopilot she takes her phone from her pocket, feels its reassuring warmth in her hand, and swipes open Twitter. Everybody seems to be talking about the same thing. omg im crying\n\n<question>:\nWhy is Sara upset when her dad asks her to read the article about solar panels?\n\n<options>:\nA She is embarassed to admit she hasn't read up on the solar panels\nB There is an implication that she's not informed about the job she does every day\nC She was trying to avoid having phones out at the dinner table\nD She doesn't want it to come up that she blocked him on facebook\n\n<answer>:\n", "assistant": "B" } ]

[ { "human": "Read the following passage and questions, then choose the right answer from options, the answer should be one of A, B, C, D.\n\n<passage>:\nThey weren't human. They were something in short, humanity's hopes for survival! The Starship be restless to end her fool's errand here, two hundred light years from during the night?\" knew anything. They looked like overgrown fireballs, but seemed to have an almost sentient curiosity about anything moving on the ground. \"And our two cadets sneaked out again. Barker followed them, but lost them in the murk. I've kept a signal going to guide them back.\" Gwayne swore softly to himself. Earth couldn't turn out enough starmen in the schools, so promising kids were being shipped out for training as cadets on their twelfth birthday. The two he'd drawn, Kaufman and Pinelli, seemed to be totally devoid of any sense of caution. Of course there was no obvious need for caution here. The blobs hadn't seemed dangerous, and the local animals were apparently all herbivorous something had happened to the exploration party fifteen years back, and to the more recent ship under Hennessy that was sent to check Earth had ordered him to detour here, after leaving his load of deep-sleep stored colonists on Official World 71, to check on any sign to the men who'd deserted their ship and its equipment, he'd have to report back. He would have left before, if a recent landslip hadn't exposed enough of the buried ship for his metal locators to spot from the air by speed to a spot near the ship, to hover excitedly above something that moved there. He saw the two cadets then, heading back to the waiting ship, just beyond the movement he'd seen through the mist. Whatever was making the fog swirl must have reached higher ground. Something began to heave upwards. It was too far to see clearly, but Gwayne grabbed the microphone, yelling into the radio toward the cadets. They must have seen whatever it was just as the call reached them. Young Kaufman grabbed at Pinelli, and they swung around together. Then the mists cleared. Under the dancing blobs, a horde of things was heading for the cadets. Shaggy heads, brute bodies vaguely man-like! One seemed to be almost eight feet tall, leading the others directly toward the spacesuited cadets. Some of the horde were carrying spears or sticks. There was a momentary halt, and then the leader lifted one arm, as if motioning the back at the exit deck. Men were dashing in, stumbling around in Gwayne dashed for it as the exit port slid back. The huge leader suddenly waved and pointed toward the jeeps that were racing toward him. He made a fantastic leap backwards. Others swung about, two of them grabbing up the cadets. The jeep was doing twenty miles an hour now, but the horde began to increase the distance, in spite of the load of the two struggling boys! The creatures dived Then it cleared to show the mob of creatures doubling back on their own trail to confuse the pursuers. The creatures vanished as Barker fought to turn to follow them. The other jeeps were coming up, by the sound of their motors, but too late to help. They'd have to get to the group with the cadets in a hurry or the horde would all vanish in the uneven ground, hidden by the fog. A blob dropped down, almost touching Gwayne. against the windshield, just as he made out the form of the eight-foot leader. The thing was standing directly ahead of him, a cadet on each shoulder. The wheels locked and the jeep slid protestingly forward. The creature sound, and it collapsed. Gwayne eased back slowly, but it made no further move, though it was still breathing. Another jeep had drawn up, and men were examining the cadets. Pinelli was either laughing or crying, and Kaufman was trying to break free to kick at the monster. But neither had been harmed. The two were loaded onto a jeep while men helped Barker and Gwayne stow the bound monster on another before heading back. detailed to save it and revive it. Find out if it can make sign and why that ship was buried against detection. This thing may be the makes no sense. We've scoured this planet by infra-red, and there was \"Troglodytes, maybe,\" Gwayne guessed. \"Anyhow, send for me when you get anything. I've got to get this ship back to Earth. We're overstaying our time here already.\" The reports from the cadets were satisfactory enough. They'd been picked up and carried, but no harm had been done them. Now they were busy being little heroes. Gwayne sentenced them to quarters as soon If they could get any story from the captured creature, they might save time and be better off than trying to dig through Hennessy's ship. That was almost certainly spoorless by now. The only possible answer seemed to be that the exploring expedition and Hennessy's rescue group had primitives have gotten to the men inside Hennessy's ship? Why was its these creatures that a space ship's metal finders could be fooled by a little more than a hundred feet of solid rock? They'd buried the ship something—and find it fast. Earth needed every world she could make remotely habitable, or mankind was probably doomed to extinction. The race had blundered safely through its discovery of atomic weapons prevent an interplanetary war with the Venus colonists. It had found a drive that led to the stars, and hadn't even found intelligent life render the whole Solar System uninhabitable for millenia. To survive, man had to colonize. explorers went out in desperation to find what they could began filling worlds with colonists, carried in deep sleep to conserve would be spawning grounds for mankind in spite of the efforts. Each was it now seemed, no more time could be wasted here. Primitives could be overcome, maybe. It would be ruthless and unfair to strip them of their world, but the first law was survival. He went to the port and glanced out. About sixty of the things were For the return of their leader—or for something that would give the ship to them? seemed to understand, and was making a comment as the captain dashed in. on the gold ornament of a captive earthman, even to learn a little ground where no ingenuity could ever recover it to bring life to the ship again. He'd have to tell the men and women of the crew later, after he'd had however much they might hate it at first. But there was no putting off hull. It doesn't show yet—but we're changed. In another month, Earth food would kill us. We've got to stay here. We'll bury the ships deeper this time, and Earth won't find us. They can't risk trying a colony where three ships vanish, so we'll just disappear. And they'll never years—would be primitive savages in three generations. The Earth Nothing from the ship would last. Books could never be read by the new She was silent a long time, staring out of the port toward what must They have to touch us. I've been touched, but the rest could go back.\" same answer he had found for himself. \"The spawning ground!\" It was the only thing they could do. Earth needed a place to plant her seed, but no world other than Earth could ever be trusted to preserve Here, though, the blobs had adapted men to the alien world instead of children of man's race could grow, develop and begin the long trek back to civilization. The gadgets would be lost for a time. But perhaps \"We're needed here,\" he told her, his voice pleading for the The fifty men and women on this ship will be needed to start them with a decent chance. We can't go to Earth, where nobody would believe or accept the idea—or even let us come back. We have to stay here.\" \"No,\" he told her. \"Replenish the stars.\" Some day, though, their children would find a way to the starlanes again, looking for other worlds. With the blobs to help them, they Some day, the whole universe would be a spawning ground for the\n\n<question>:\nWhat isn't a reason for bringing the creature back to the ship?\n\n<options>:\nA they want to learn more about him\nB they want to know why the ship had been hidden\nC they want to know what happened to Hennessy's group\nD they want revenge for what it did to the cadets\n\n<answer>:\n", "assistant": "D" } ]

[ { "human": "Read the following passage and questions, then choose the right answer from options, the answer should be one of A, B, C, D.\n\n<passage>:\nA Coffin for Jacob A night without darkness passed. Ben lay waiting for Maggie's return, a Ben Curtis eased his pale, gaunt body through the open doorway of the \"Who is he?\" Blast Inn, the dead man following silently behind him. there, Ben saw moving figures. He could not tell if they were Earthmen, Someone tugged at his greasy coat. He jumped, thinking absurdly that it was the dead man's hand. \" Coma esta, senor? Ben looked down. The dome we're in now was designed and built by us a few years ago after we got pushed off Mars. We lost a few men in the construction, but with almost every advance in space, someone dies.\" \"I'm American,\" Ben muttered. \"Venus is getting too civilized. We're moving out and this dome is only a temporary base when we have cases like yours. The new base—I might a red-skinned marionette with pipestem arms and legs, clad in a torn \"Jacob? Your husband?\" frontiers. Jacob and those like him can never return to Earth—not even to Hoover City—except dead. The others are physical or psycho rejects who couldn't get clearance if they went back to Earth. They know Ben shook his head. or your Devil's Egg or your Venusian kali. But if you had a drug that'd bring a dead man to life, I'd buy and pay with my soul. \"It is deal, monsieur Ben scowled. \"What happens if there could The boy grabbed his hand. Because Ben could think of no reason for be us, you know—if we live long enough. But that Asteroid Belt is murder. You Ben stiffened. \"And that's why you want me for an astrogator.\" Several times, Ben glimpsed the bulky figures of CO unblinking. They certainly didn't look like telepaths, as Ben had heard , Ben told himself. The officer passed. Ben breathed easier. mankind would never have broken away from the planet that held it prisoner for half a million years. Without them, Everson, after three failures and a hundred men dead, Ben winced. How did this kid know he wanted to sit in the shadows? Frowning, he sat down—he and the dead man. forgotten grandeur. For an instant, Ben's mind rose above the haunting vision of the dead man. He thought, , he thought. You've got to find the man with the red beard. It's the only way you can escape the dead man. The dead man was real. His name was Cobb. He was stout and flabby and about forty and he hated spacemen. His body was buried now—probably in the silent gray wastes outside Luna City. But he'd become a kind of invisible Siamese twin, as much a part of Ben as sight in his eyes. Again, its face would be a pop-eyed mask of surprise as Ben's fist whiteness of death. The large eyes would stare. Blood would trickle from a corner of the gaping mouth. You can forget a living man. You can defeat him or submit to him or ignore him, and the matter is over and done. You can't escape from a memory that has burned into your mind. been successful. Ben, quietly and moderately, wanted to celebrate. Ben smiled. \"If it weren't for spacemen, you wouldn't be here.\" Ben stiffened. He was twenty-four and dressed in the white, Ben rose and started to leave the bar, but Cobb grabbed his arm and Until this instant, Ben had suppressed his anger. Now, suddenly and His fist struck the man on the chin. Cobb's eyes gaped in shocked horror. He spun backward. His head cracked sickeningly on the edge of the bar. The sound was like a punctuation mark signaling the end of life. He sank to the floor, eyes glassy, blood tricking down his jaw. Ben knew that he was dead. Then, for a single absurd second, Ben was seized with terror—just as, a moment before, he'd been overwhelmed with anger. He ran. He was sorry he'd hit Cobb, of course. He was not sorry he'd run. Escaping at least gave him a power of choice, of decision. You can do two things manslaughter. Under interplanetary law, that would mean ten years in prison and a dishonorable discharge. And then you'd be free. But you'd be through with rockets and space. They don't want new , Ben reflected, Earth. After all, was it right for a single second, a single insignificant second, to destroy a man's life and his dream? He was lucky. He found a tramp freighter whose skipper was on his last flight before retirement. Discipline was lax, investigation of new personnel even more so. Ben Curtis made it to Venus. There was just one flaw in his decision. He hadn't realized that the memory of the dead man's face would haunt him, torment him, follow him as constantly as breath flowed into his lungs. But might not the rumble of atomic engines drown the murmuring dead obscure the dead face? So now he sat searching for a perhaps nonexistent red-bearded giant, Ben threw a fifty-cent credit piece on the table. \"Here. Take off, will Ben didn't answer. Ben raised his hand as if to strike the boy. face with a red beard. reward must have been offered for his capture. Whom could he trust? The wheel with Ben as their focal point. falling. The white-clad men charged, neuro-clubs upraised. Ben's direction. Ben whirled away from the advancing police, made for the exit into escaping from a container. A dime-sized section of the concrete wall ahead of him crumbled. his body. He staggered like a man of stone moving in slow motion. He'd have fifteen—maybe twenty—seconds before complete lethargy of mind and body overpowered him. \"Yes.\" \"You may die if you don't give yourself up.\" \"No, no.\" He tried to stumble toward the exit. \"You're sure?\" the voice persisted. \"I'm sure,\" Ben managed to say. \"I have no antidote. You may die.\" His mind fought to comprehend. With the anti-paralysis injection, massage and rest, a man could recover from the effects of mortocain within half a day. Without treatment, the paralysis could spread to heart and lungs. It could become a paralysis of death. An effective weapon: the slightest wound compelled the average criminal to surrender at once. \"Anti ... anti ...\" The words were as heavy as blobs of mercury forced from his throat. \"No ... I'm sure ... sure.\" He didn't hear the answer or anything else. Ben Curtis had no precise sensation of awakening. Return to transfer itself to his own body. am going to live?\" \"You will live.\" He thought for a moment. \"How long have I been here?\" Fascinated, Ben nodded. You did well on your flight from Roswell to Luna City. In a barroom fight in Luna City, you struck and killed a man named Arthur Cobb, a pre-fab salesman. You've been charged with second degree murder and \"Yes?\" \"The man I killed—did he have a wife?\" She hesitated. He thought, Damn it, of all the questions, why did I The object was a tri-dimensional photo of a rock-faced man in a Ben stared at the photo for a long time. At length, he slipped into restless sleep. Images of faces and echoes of words spun through his brain. The dead man returned to him. Bloodied lips cursed at him. Glassy eyes accused him. Somewhere were two lost children crying in the night. And towering above him was a red-bearded man whose great hands reached down and beckoned to him. Ben crawled through the night on hands and\n\n<question>:\nWhat does the dead man represent for Ben?\n\n<options>:\nA His conscious. He is manifesting as Ben's rage, and the anger that he felt during the incident.\nB The end of his freedom. He represents his new life as an outlaw.\nC His conscious. He is manifesting as Ben's unaddressed guilt, and what he can never run away from.\nD The end of his career. He sees the dead man as the loss of his livelihood.\n\n<answer>:\n", "assistant": "C" } ]

[ { "human": "Read the following passage and questions, then choose the right answer from options, the answer should be one of A, B, C, D.\n\n<passage>:\nGalaxy Science Fiction September 1951. should . This was why the world had moved When nobody aboard ship remembers where it's across the darkness and the stars for all Rikud's lifetime and more. Extensive research did not uncover any evidence that the U.S. copyright on this publication was renewed.] But he was afraid. going, how can they tell when it has arrived? the great changeless sweep of space. He could not quite explain the feelings within him they were so alien, so unnatural. But ever since the engines somewhere in the rear of the world had changed their tone, realized this odd difference in himself, he kept it locked up inside him. Today, space looked somehow different. The stars—it was a meaningless everyone fled before him. He stumbled again in the place of the concept to Rikud, but that was what everyone called the bright \"Where's the buzzer?\" he sobbed. \"I must find the buzzer.\" ignored it. But it came again, and each time it left him with a feeling embroiled him in a hopeless, infinite confusion that left him with a explain had entered the elder man's head for a moment, but it had departed almost before Chuls knew of its existence. \"I'll go with you,\" Rikud told him. A hardly perceptible purple glow pervaded the air in the room of the Near the ship, water that did not come from a machine gurgled across the land, and Rikud lay down and drank. It was cool and good, and when he got up, Crifer and Wilm were outside the world, and some of the others followed. They stood around for a long time before going to the water to drink. There was a strange thought, and Rikud's brain whirled once more down the tortuous course of half-formed questions and unsatisfactory answers. That is, if those creatures coming from the ship are people.\" He had even wondered what it was like to get hurt. No one ever got But something soft had cushioned the impact—something which had come into being just for the moment and then abruptly passed into non-being again, something which was as impalpable as air. there should have been authority. A long time ago the reading machine in the library had told him of the elders—a meaningless term—who had governed the world. They told you to do something and you did it, but that was silly, because now no one told you to do anything. You only There had been a revolt—again a term without any real meaning, a term that could have no reality outside of the reading machine—and the elders were overthrown. Here Rikud had been lost utterly. The people had decided that they did not know where they were going, or why, and that it was unfair that the elders alone had this authority. They were born and they lived and they died as the elders directed, like little cogs in a great machine. Much of this Rikud could not understand, but he knew enough to realize that the reading machine had sided with the look of easy contentment on Chuls' face as the rays fanned down upon him, bathing his old body in a forgotten magic which, many generations before Rikud's time, had negated the necessity for a knowledge of medicine. But when, in another ten years, Chuls would perish of old age, the rays would no longer suffice. Nothing would, for Chuls. Rikud often thought of his own death, still seventy-five years in the future, not without a sense of alarm. Yet old Chuls seemed heedless, with only a decade to go. meant that, in the two unoccupied hours before sleep, he went to the called astronomy, I think.\" This was a new thought to Rikud, and he propped his head up on one elbow. \"What did you find out?\" \"That's about all. They're just called astronomy, I think.\" \"Well, where's the book?\" Rikud would read it tomorrow. knew his lame-footed companion understood the word no better than he did. channelings of Rikud's energy in new and confusing directions. He shrugged and reserved the thought for later. He wanted to see the turn away. Here was an unknown factor which the perfect world failed to control. But how could a star change into a blinking blue-white Rikud couldn't remember, and he suddenly wished he could read Crifer's book on astronomy, which meant the same as stars. Except that it was But the new view persisted. Of stars there were few, and of the blackness, almost nothing. Gone, too, was the burning globe. Something loomed there in the port, so huge Startled, Rikud leaped back. The sullen roar in the rear of the world \"Won't you eat, Rikud?\" Chuls called from somewhere down below. nothing but an obscuring cloud of white vapor, murky, swirling, more confusing than ever. \"Chuls,\" he called, remembering, \"come here.\" the engines. \"I'm hungry, Rikud.\" It changed. Where are the stars? Where are they, Chuls, if it did not change?\" the man would realize! If only anyone would realize! It all seemed so obvious. If he, Rikud, walked from one part of the world to another, it was with a purpose—to eat, or to sleep, or perhaps to bathe in the health-rays. Now if the world had walked from—somewhere, through the vast star-speckled darkness and to the great garden outside, this also if everyone lived as if the world still stood in blackness, how could they find the nature of that purpose? machine and book on astronomy or stars in his lap, Rikud approached the door. \"I think so.\" \"You can't, probably. How can anyone go where no one has been before? door. The machinery in the next room is your protection against the rigors of space. A thousand years from now, journey's end, you may have discarded it for something better—who knows? But if you have not, then here is your protection. As nearly as possible, this ship human-sustaining as well. Try to hurt yourself and the ship will not permit it—within limits, of course. But you can damage the ship, and exist an endless succession of them, especially when the third one opened on a bare tunnel which led to yet another door. What would he do out in the garden? He couldn't go alone. He'd die of the strangeness. It was a silly thought no one ever died of anything until he was a hundred. Rikud and Rikud found himself wishing that his friend had never read that book on astronomy. \"Why don't we go see?\" he suggested. Then, confused, he frowned. What would they do if the buzzer stopped buzzing? began to wonder. If he destroyed the wheels and the cogs and the gears, would the buzzer stop? It probably would, because, as Rikud saw it, he crashing sound. He looked as the gears and cogs and wheels crumbled beneath them. But everything was so dark that only the stars shone clearly. All else was bathed in a shadow of unreality. when he pressed his face close against the viewport, there in the darkness, something bright flashed briefly through the sky and was gone. Whimpering, he fled. All around Rikud were darkness and hunger and thirst. The buzzer did not sound because Rikud had silenced it forever. And no one went to eat or drink. Rikud himself had fumbled through the blackness and the whimpering to the dining room, his tongue dry and swollen, but the smooth belt that flowed with water and with savory dishes did not run \"What won't?\" \"The buzzer will never sound again. I broke it.\" and the feet pounding behind him, and he wanted only to get away. die because he had no food and no water and his stomach gurgled and grumbled and hurt. And everyone was chasing him. He stumbled through the darkness and felt his way back to the library, far away, and he knew they would come after him because they wanted to break him.\n\n<question>:\nWhat caused the ship to leave its planet initially?\n\n<options>:\nA There was a shortage of women, and the main characters were sent to find mates.\nB The reason is never disclosed.\nC The planet they were from ran out of viable resources.\nD They are explorers who got lost, and their fate was to drift the universe.\n\n<answer>:\n", "assistant": "B" } ]

[ { "human": "Read the following passage and questions, then choose the right answer from options, the answer should be one of A, B, C, D.\n\n<passage>:\nIt's Time To Keelhaul U-Haul! Like all superheroes worthy of the title, the Shopping Avenger has an Achilles' heel. In the case of the Shopping Avenger, his Achilles' heel is not animal, vegetable, or mineral but something less tangible. An explanation: Last week, the magazine you are currently reading forced the Shopping Avenger at gunpoint to read a series of treacle-filled self-help books, and then to . The Shopping Avenger, who can withstand radiation, extreme heat and cold, hail, bear attacks, and Eyes Wide Shut , almost succumbed to terminal jejuneness after reading these books. Except for one thing: One of the books, The Art of Happiness , which collects and simplifies the Dalai Lama's philosophy, got the Shopping Avenger to thinking. This, in a way, is the Shopping Avenger's Achilles' heel: thinking. Perhaps it is wrong, the Shopping Avenger thought, to complain about the petty insults and inconveniences of life in the materialistic '90s. The Shopping Avenger felt that perhaps he should counsel those who write seeking help to meditate, to accept bad service the way one accepts the change of seasons, and to extend a compassionate hand of forgiveness to those who provide poor customer care. The Shopping Avenger does not make light of the Dalai Lama or of the notion that there is more to life than the impatient acquisition of material goods. If the Shopping Avenger were not, for a superhero, extremely nonjudgmental--as opposed to his alter ego, who is considered insufferably judgmental by his alter ego's wife--the Shopping Avenger would tell the occasional correspondent to let go of his petty grievance and get a life. But the Shopping Avenger also believes that the Dalai Lama has never tried to rent a truck from U-Haul. If he had tried to rent from U-Haul, he never would have escaped from Tibet. (For the complete back story, see \"Shopping Avenger\" column and one.) The complaints about U-Haul's nonreservation reservation policy continue to pour in through the electronic mail. One correspondent, B.R., wrote in with this cautionary tale: \"Last weekend, I went to San Francisco to help my brother and his family move into their first house. My brother had reserved a moving truck with U-Haul for the big day. I warned my brother about U-Haul's 'not really a reservation per se' policy that I learned from the Shopping Avenger. He didn't believe such a thing would happen to him, so he didn't act on my warning.\" The Shopping Avenger will undoubtedly return to the sorry state of affairs at U-Haul in the next episode, but now on to this month's airline debacle. Before we begin, though, the Shopping Avenger nearly forgot to announce the winner of last month's contest, in which readers were asked to answer the question, \"What's the difference between pests and airlines?\" This month's airline in the spotlight is Southwest. Loyal readers will recall that last month the Shopping Avenger praised Southwest Airlines for its \"sterling\" customer service. This brought forth a small number of articulate dissensions. The most articulate, and the most troubling, came from M., who wrote, \"Last year, flying from Baltimore to Chicago with my entire family (two really little kids included), we set down at Midway in a rainstorm. And waited for our bags. And waited for bags. And waited for bags.\" An hour later, M. says, the bags showed up, \"soaked through. We took them to baggage services at SW and were faced with the most complicated, unclear, and confusing mechanism for filing a claim we experienced flyers have ever seen.\" When they arrived at their destination, M. and her family made a terrible discovery, \"We discovered that our clothes were soaked through--the top clothes were so wet that the dye had bled through down to the lower levels, destroying lots of other clothes. Obviously, our bags had just been sitting out on the runway in the rain. To this day, I've never heard a thing from SW, despite calls and letters.\" This, of course, is where Shopping Avenger steps in. Shopping Avenger knows that Southwest is different from the average airline, in that it doesn't go out of its way to infuriate its paying customers (see: ), so I expected a quick and generous resolution to M.'s problem. What I got at first, though, was a load of corporate hoo-ha. \"The airline's policy, which is consistent with all contracts of carriage at all airlines, requires that passengers file a report in person for lost or damaged luggage within four hours of arrival at their destination,\" a Southwest spokeswoman, Linda Rutherford, e-mailed me. \"[M.] indicates she called for a few days, but did not file a report in person until April 12--three days later. Southwest, as a courtesy, took her report anyway and asked for follow up information and written inventory of the damage.\" Rutherford said that M. should have submitted detailed receipts and photographs of the damage in order to make a claim. Harrumph, the Shopping Avenger says. It is a bad hair day at Southwest when its officials defend themselves by comparing their airline to other airlines. I forwarded this message to M., who replied: \"Wow. Well, of course I didn't file it at the airport on the 9 th because I didn't know the clothes were ruined at the airport. I didn't know until I opened the baggage at my hotel and saw the ruined stuff. (And it's worth noting that we had already waited for about an hour for our luggage with two little kids and impatient in-laws nipping at our heels.)\" She goes on, \"I did call that evening ... and was told that that sufficed. This is the first time I've been told that I had to file a complaint in person within four hours. ... When I filed on the 12 th , I was never told that I needed any receipts or photos or other type of documentation. The baggage folks seemed pretty uninterested in all of this. ... They know that the type of 'evidence' they want is impossible to obtain. They also know that on April 9 they screwed up the luggage retrieval and left bags out in the rain a long time.\" Southwest's response actually served to anger M. more than the original problem. \"Before, they had a mildly annoyed but loyal customer (who would have been placated by an apology and thrilled with some modest token of their regret). Now they have a pissed-off customer.\" Things do look bad for Southwest, don't they? The Shopping Avenger sent M.'s response to Rutherford, who e-mailed back saying she thought the Shopping Avenger was asking for \"policy information.\" The Shopping Avenger e-mailed back again, stressing to Rutherford that the Great Court of Consumer Justice would, if this case were brought to trial, undoubtedly find for the plaintiff (the Shopping Avenger serves as prosecutor, judge, and jury in the Great Court of Consumer Justice--defendants are represented by the president of U-Haul), and that Southwest was precipitously close to feeling the sword of retribution at its neck. But then she came through, provisionally, \"Yep, you can be sure if [M.] will call me we will get everything squared away. I'm sorry it's taken this long for her to get someone who can help, but we will take care of it from here.\" Stay tuned, shoppers, to hear whether Southwest makes good it promise to compensate M. and apologize to her for her troubles. The story of M. reminds the Shopping Avenger of a central truth of consumer service: It's not the crime, it's the cover-up.\n\n<question>:\nAccording to the writer, what do all airlines except Southwest have in common?\n\n<options>:\nA They intentionally attempt to anger their clientele.\nB They actually work.\nC They make money.\nD They intentionally seek to lose customers' baggage.\n\n<answer>:\n", "assistant": "A" } ]

[ { "human": "Read the following passage and questions, then choose the right answer from options, the answer should be one of A, B, C, D.\n\n<passage>:\nmean, how do we know Superior is maintaining the same position up here The town of Superior, Ohio, certainly was living up to its name! In what Radio messages stated simply that Superior had seceded from Earth. But Don Cort, stranded on that rising town, was beginning to suspect that nothing was simple about Superior except its citizens. Calmly they that they know. Maybe we'll begin to get some answers. Or, if not answers, then transportation.\" \"Transportation?\" Alis squeezed the arm she was holding. \"Why? Don't you like it here?\" \"If you mean don't I like you, the answer is yes, of course I do. But if I don't get out of this handcuff soon so I can take a bath and get into clean clothes, you're not going to like me.\" to Cort: either find a way to anchor Superior, or spend the rest of his \"You're still quite acceptable, if a bit whiskery.\" She stopped, still she said, \"before you deteriorate.\" Superior had been. They were in the midst of an extremely pleasant kiss when the brief case at the end of Don's handcuff began to talk to him. stop at Superior at 11:58. That seemed to fix the time of the Nor had there been any defense plants in Superior that might have blown A United Airlines pilot found Superior early on the morning of November course to avoid it. He noted with only minimum satisfaction that his A few minutes later he had relayed a message from Superior, formerly of It said that Superior had seceded from Earth. Don had taken a passing interest earlier in the evening asked, \"Why did stop at Superior on this run.\" given her. Her glance upward at that moment interrupted his examination, which had been about to go on to her figure. Later, though, he was able to observe that it was more than adequate. \"Will we be here long?\" Don asked the conductor. He didn't want to miss Don hesitated, shrugged at the redhead, said, \"Excuse me,\" and followed sat in the dark, hissing steam. Don made his way up to the locomotive fireman. Don followed them. They had tramped a quarter of a mile along Standing on tiptoe and repressing a touch of giddiness, Don looked over the mayor wouldn't look foolish the next morning, not knowing his town \"What's the population of Superior?\" \"Does Superior have an airport?\" Don asked. \"I've got to get back to—to was frowning. \"Are you thinking,\" he asked, \"that Mayor Civek was perhaps just a little less than completely honest with us?\" \"I'm thinking,\" she said, \"that I should have stayed with Aunt Hattie \" Mister Cort!\" she said, annoyed. \"You know as well as I do that \" Places to sleep,\" she corrected. She looked angry. \"Of course,\" Don said, puzzled by her emphasis. \"Come on. Where they put you, you'll probably be surrounded by co-eds, even if I could get out of Don Cort had slept, but not well. He had tried to fold the brief case to Alis—that's A-l-i-s, not A-l-i-c-e—Garet. Are you with the FBI? Or did you escape from jail?\" \"How do you do. No, just a bank messenger. What an unusual name. fork without knocking things off the table with his clinging brief case. \"Here, let me cut your eggs for you,\" Alis said. \"You'd better order down from ducks. How do you plan to get down from Superior?\" \"Scarcely fell Superior Sentry Don blinked at the headline: \"Ed Clark's something of an eccentric, like everybody else in Superior,\" Alis said. Don read the story, which seemed to him a capricious treatment of an apparently grave situation. advised not to. It's a long way down. Where Superior was surrounded by Ohio, as usual, today Superior ends literally at the town line. the same exemption would apply to a dubious individual bent on investigating.... Don skimmed the rest. \"I don't see anything about it being deliberate.\" Alis had been creaming and sugaring Don's coffee. She pushed it across to him and said, \"It's not on page one. Ed Clark and Mayor Civek don't get along, so you'll find the mayor's statement in a box on page three, Mayor Claims Secession From Earth today that Superior has seceded from Earth. His reasons were as vague as The \"reasons\" include these: (1) Superior has been discriminated against (b) lacks space to publish Don said, \"I'm beginning to like this Ed Clark.\" \"He's a doll,\" Alis said. \"He's about the only one in town who stands up to Father.\" \"Does your father claim that Earth?\" \"Not to me he doesn't. I'm one of those banes of his existence, a skeptic. He gave up trying to magnolize me when I was sixteen. I had a me all kinds of embarrassing questions to ask Father. I asked them, being a natural-born needler, and Father has disowned me intellectually ever since.\" emphasizing her good figure. To a male friend Don would have described kissed. All in all she could have been the queen of a campus much more densely populated with co-eds than Cavalier was. \"You may call me Alis,\" she said. \"And I'm nineteen.\" Don grinned. \"Going on?\" \"Don's the name I've had for twenty-six years. Please use it.\" \"Gladly. And now, Don, unless you want another cup of coffee, I'll go \"On such short notice?\" Don was intrigued. Last night the redhead from the club car had repelled an advance that hadn't been made, and this morning a blonde was apparently making an advance that hadn't been \"I'll admit to the double entendre ,\" Alis said. \"What I meant—for now—was that we can stroll out to where Superior used to be attached to train was standing there with nowhere to go. It had been abandoned \"What's happening?\" he asked when he saw them. \"Any word from down there?\" \"Not that I know of,\" Don said. He introduced him to Alis Garet. \"What are you going to do?\" \"What I do?\" the conductor asked. \"You can go over to Cavalier and have breakfast,\" Alis said. \"Nobody's going to steal your old train.\" Superior's water supply?\" Alis shrugged. \"All I know is you turn on the faucet and there's water. Let's go look at the creek.\" \"I should think it'd be all dried up by now. I'm going to have a look.\" \"Don't! You'll fall off!\" \"I'll be careful.\" He walked cautiously toward the edge. Alis followed him, a few feet behind. He stopped a yard from the brink and waited for a spell of dizziness to pass. The Earth was spread out like a topographer's map, far below. Don took another wary step, then sat down. \"Chicken,\" said Alis. She laughed uncertainly, then she sat down, too. his right hand closed over the brink. For a moment he lay there, panting, head pressed to the ground. \"How do you feel?\" Alis asked. \"Scared. When I get my courage back I'll pick up my head and look.\" Alis put a hand out tentatively, then purposefully took hold of his ankle and held it tight. \"Just in case a high wind comes along,\" she said. tossed it to him. It rolled and Don had to grab to keep it from going over the edge. Alis gave a little shriek. Don was momentarily unnerved and had to put his head back on the ground. \"Sorry,\" she said. \"It isn't? Then where is it going?\" \"Why? How?\" out of play, Don thought) and on to the edge again. \"What's the other source, besides the faucet in your bathroom?\" Don\n\n<question>:\nBased on the information in the text, why would Don choose to leave Superior?\n\n<options>:\nA He had to deliver the handcuffed briefcase.\nB He had a family to return to that would be expecting him at home.\nC He feared the future of Superior.\nD His wife would not appreciate him spending time with Alis.\n\n<answer>:\n", "assistant": "A" } ]

[ { "human": "Read the following passage and questions, then choose the right answer from options, the answer should be one of A, B, C, D.\n\n<passage>:\nBoys Do Bleed Fight Club is silly stuff, sensationalism that mistakes itself for satire, but it's also a brash and transporting piece of moviemaking, like Raging Bull on acid. The film opens with--literally--a surge of adrenalin, which travels through the bloodstream and into the brain of its protagonist, Jack (Edward Norton), who's viewed, as the camera pulls out of his insides, with a gun stuck in his mouth. How'd he get into this pickle? He's going to tell you, breezily, and the director, David Fincher, is going to illustrate his narrative--violently. Fincher ( Seven , 1995 Not to mention a hole in your head. Fight Club careers from one resonant satirical idea to the next without quite deciding whether its characters are full of crap or are Gen X prophets. It always gives you a rush, though. At first, it goofs on the absurd feminization of an absurdly macho culture. An increasingly desperate insomniac, Jack finds relief (and release) only at meetings for the terminally ill. At a testicular cancer group, he's enfolded in the ample arms of Bob (the singer Meat Loaf Aday), a former bodybuilder who ruined his health with steroids and now has \"bitch tits.\" Jack and Bob subscribe to a new form of male bonding: They cling to each other and sob. But Jack's idyll is rudely disrupted by--wouldn't you know it?--a woman. A dark-eyed, sepulchral head case named Marla Singer (Helena Bonham Carter) begins showing up at all the same disparate meetings for essentially the same voyeuristic ends, and the presence of this \"tourist\" makes it impossible for Jack to emote. Jack finds another outlet, though. On a plane, he meets Tyler Durden (Brad Pitt), a cryptic hipster with a penchant for subversive acts both large (he makes high-priced soaps from liposuctioned human fat) and small (he splices frames from porn flicks into kiddie movies). When Jack's apartment mysteriously explodes--along with his carefully chosen IKEA furniture--he moves into Tyler's squalid warehouse and helps to found a new religion: Fight Club, in which young males gather after hours in the basement of a nightclub to pound one another (and be pounded) to a bloody pulp. That last parenthesis isn't so parenthetical. In some ways, it's the longing to be beaten into oblivion that's the strongest. \"Self-improvement,\" explains Tyler, \"is masturbation\" Fincher and his screenwriter, Jim Uhls, seem to think they've broken new ground in Fight Club , that their metaphor for our discontents hits harder than anyone else's. Certainly it produces more bloody splatter. But 20 years ago, the same impulse was called punk and, as Greil Marcus documents in Lipstick Traces , it was other things before that. Yes, the mixture of Johnny Rotten, Jake La Motta, and Jesus is unique F ight Club could use a few different perspectives: a woman's, obviously, but also an African-American's--someone who'd have a different take on the \"healing\" properties of violence. It's also unclear just what has emasculated Jack: Is it that he's a materialist or that the materials themselves (i.e., IKEA's lacquered particle boards) don't measure up to his fantasies of opulence? Is he motivated by spiritual hunger or envy? Tyler's subsequent idea of confining his group's mayhem to franchise coffee bars and corporate-subsidized art is a witty one--it's like a parody of neo-Nazism as re-enacted by yuppies. It might have been a howl if performed by, say, the troupe of artsy German nihilists in Joel and Ethan Coen's The Big Lebowski (1998). Somehow Brad Pitt doesn't have the same piquancy. Until then, however, he has done a fabulous job of keeping it spinning. The most thrilling thing about Fight Club isn't what it says but how Uhls and Fincher pull you into its narrator's head and simulate his adrenalin rushes. A veteran of rock videos, Fincher is one of those filmmakers who helps make the case that MTV--along with digital editing--has transformed cinema for better as well as worse. The syntax has become more intricate. Voice-over narration, once considered uncinematic, is back in style, along with novelistic asides, digressions, fantasies, and flashbacks. To make a point, you can jazzily interject anything--even, as in Three Kings , a shot of a bullet slicing through internal organs. Films like Fight Club might not gel, but they have a breathless, free-associational quality that points to new possibilities in storytelling. Or maybe old possibilities: The language of movies hasn't seemed this unfettered since the pre-sound days of Sergei Eisenstein and Abel Gance. An actress named Hilary Swank gives one of the most rapturous performances I've ever seen as the cross-dressing Brandon Teena (a k a Teena Brandon) in Kimberly Peirce's stark and astonishingly beautiful debut feature, Boys Don't Cry . The movie opens with Teena being shorn of her hated female tresses and becoming \"Brandon,\" who swaggers around in tight jeans and leather jackets. The joy is in watching the actor transform, and I don't just mean Swank: I mean Teena Brandon playing Brandon Teena--the role she has been longing for her whole life. In a redneck Nebraska bar, Brandon throws back a shot of whiskey and the gesture--a macho cliché--becomes an act of self-discovery. Every gesture does. \"You're gonna have a shiner in the morning,\" someone tells Brandon after a barroom brawl, and he takes the news with a glee that's almost mystical: \"I am????? Oh, shit!!!\" he cries, grinning. That might be my favorite moment in the picture, because Swank's ecstatic expression carries us through the next hour, as Brandon acts out his urban-cowboy fantasies--\"surfing\" from the bumper of a pickup truck, rolling in the mud, and straddling a barstool with one hand on a brewski and the other on the shoulder of a gorgeous babe. Though harrowing, the second half of Boys Don't Cry isn't as great as the first. The early scenes evoke elation and dread simultaneously, the later ones just dread and the last half-hour is unrelieved torture. What keeps the movie tantalizing is Chloë Sevigny's Lana, who might or might not know that Brandon is a girl but who's entranced by him anyway. With her lank hair, hooded eyes, and air of sleepy sensuality, Sevigny--maybe even more than Swank--embodies the mystery of sex that's at the core of Boys Don't Cry . Everything she does is deliberate, ironic, slightly unreadable--and unyielding. She's could be saying, \"I'm in this world but not of it. ... You'd never dream what's underneath.\"\n\n<question>:\nAccording to the reviewers, Jack from \"Fight Club\" and Brandon Teena from \"Boys Don't Cry\" share the following:\n\n<options>:\nA An unsupportive family\nB An addictive personality\nC A fascination with masculinity\nD A sleep disorder\n\n<answer>:\n", "assistant": "C" } ]

[ { "human": "Read the following passage and questions, then choose the right answer from options, the answer should be one of A, B, C, D.\n\n<passage>:\nSo here's how the race shapes up. Bauer will frame it as a populist showdown, chiefly between himself and Forbes. Forbes will frame it as a fight between the establishment, led by Bush, and conservatives, led by himself. Dole will exploit feminism as well as feminine stereotypes, pitching herself as the candidate of change, civility, and moral renewal. And McCain will fortify his war chest while his rivals battle and bleed. Ames has organized the contestants. Let the games begin. This weekend's straw poll in Ames, Iowa, kicked off the 2000 presidential race and sorted out the Republican field. Everyone agrees that George W. Bush is the front-runner, that Steve Forbes is in second place, and that Dan Quayle, who finished back in the pack with Lamar Alexander, will soon join Alexander on the sidelines. But Ames failed to resolve the fate of the candidates who came in third and fourth--Elizabeth Dole and Gary Bauer--and the one who skipped Ames, John McCain. For these three, the post-game spin contest is crucial. Here's a playback of their takes on the straw poll results and a look ahead at their playbook of messages for the remainder of the race. Elizabeth Dole Playback Republican Shakeout 2. Race for third. Since Bush and Forbes were expected to finish first and second, many pundits concluded, as Lisa Myers put it on Meet the Press , that \"the real race here was for third. Elizabeth Dole won that.\" The Boston Globe called Dole \"the winner of this contest-within-the-contest.\" Dole touted her \"victory\" on every talk show and cited the Myers and Globe quotes in a press release. At a news conference, an aide introduced Dole as the straw poll's \"real winner.\" 3. Underdog. In every TV interview, Dole claimed to have been \"outspent by millions of dollars.\" Her spokesman told reporters that \"on a dollar-per-vote basis, Elizabeth Dole trounced George Bush and Steve Forbes.\" Reporters love an underdog. \"From a strict cost-benefit standpoint, the big winner may be Elizabeth Dole,\" concluded Time . 4. Comeback kid. Dismissive coverage of Dole before the straw poll played to her advantage, as everyone marveled at her \"surprisingly\" strong third. \"Dole Revived,\" the Washington Post 's front page proclaimed. On This Week , George Will conceded, \"There had been a lot of very skeptical stories about whether her people would show up. She, therefore, I think, is the biggest winner.\" 1. Race for second. Forbes wants to fast-forward the GOP tournament to a finals bracket: Bush vs. Forbes. To prevent this, Dole needs to create a semifinal playoff--Forbes vs. Dole--to determine who gets to play Bush. Despite Forbes' huge financial advantage, \"we finished close to second,\" Dole told reporters Saturday night. \"This is going to become a two-person race.\" The press agreed. \"Forbes had growing hopes ... that he might upset Bush or finish a close second,\" recalled the Post . Instead, \"he finished closer to Dole than to Bush.\" John McCain Playback 1. Ames meant nothing to him. Despite having skipped the straw poll, McCain was invited onto Face the Nation and Fox News Sunday to discuss it. \"If you're going to be taken seriously,\" Brit Hume asked him, \"don't you have to face up to the fact, when all the other candidates decide that an event is worth attending ... that maybe you've got to play too?\" In reply, McCain repeatedly called Ames \"meaningless.\" His chutzpah bowled over the pundits. Stephanopoulos called McCain's no-show \"a pretty smart move\" and portrayed the 83 votes he won in the straw poll--putting him in last place among active Republican candidates--as evidence of his strength. 2. Ames meant death for others. Noting that McCain had bypassed the event, Quayle explained on Face the Nation that he, too, \"almost took a pass on this. It wasn't until George Bush said he was going to participate that then I said, 'OK, we've got to do it,' out of respect to the Iowa Republican Party.\" The result, Quayle pleaded, was that he lost to candidates who had been in Iowa \"years and months.\" McCain, explaining his decision to stay out, espoused a less sentimental philosophy: \"You always want to fight on ground that is most favorable to you.\" For this, the media executed Quayle and spared McCain. \"Quayle and Lamar Alexander might be gone, but I think McCain is still in,\" concluded NPR's Mara Liasson. Ames was Vietnam in reverse: McCain ducked the fight, and Quayle took the beating. 3. Viability. \"Once the dust has settled from the straw poll,\" McCain regally announced, \"I will review the new political landscape\" and begin \"engaging the other Republican candidates.\" Why does McCain get a bye? Because he has convinced the media that he has enough money and support in New Hampshire, South Carolina, and other states to skip Iowa and catch fire later. Newsweek , the New York Times , the Los Angeles Times , and several TV pundits agreed that McCain remains formidable, wasn't hurt by Ames, and may well end up as the principal alternative to Bush. 4. Vote-buying. To undermine the straw poll's authority as an arbiter of his candidacy, McCain called it a \"fund-raiser,\" \"a sham and a joke\" in which campaigns spent \"millions\" to \"buy\" votes. \"My campaign theme is to try to reform the system that is now awash with money and the influence of special interests,\" he argued on Fox News Sunday . Brit Hume's retort--\"that this whole process isn't quite pure enough for you\"--played right into McCain's hands. McCain doesn't need to persuade the media that his reasons for skipping Ames were morally sound. He just needs to persuade them that his reasons were moral rather than political. Playbook 2. Ethanol. Many pundits, fancying themselves shrewd, suggest that McCain's true reason for skipping Iowa is that he has \"taken a position on ethanol subsidies that's unpalatable to voters in Iowa.\" On This Week , Stephanopoulos suggested that McCain might \"have to do something dramatic,\" such as \"make a stand and say, 'We're not going to compete in Iowa. We think these ethanol subsidies are an abomination.' \" This is McCain's greatest triumph: He has conned the media into disbelieving his political calculations and accusing him instead of principle. \"I've taken a lot of unpopular positions,\" he conceded on Fox News Sunday . 3. Experience. The longer McCain stays out of the race without damaging his credibility, the more the field narrows to his advantage. Alexander and Rep. John Kasich, R-Ohio, are already gone. Quayle and Sen. Orrin Hatch, R-Utah, won't be far behind. If the field dwindles to Bush, Forbes, and Bauer, McCain can sell himself as the only experienced officeholder running against Bush. But Dole's third-place finish at Ames, coupled with her victory in the post-Ames spin contest, complicates this plan.\n\n<question>:\nWho does the author think will win?\n\n<options>:\nA Dole - she had feminism and and a new set of voters behind her\nB Forbes - he's the best conservative and has the most money\nC Bush - he's only discussed as the competition, implying that nothing more needs to be said\nD McCain - he's so good, he didn't need to participate at Ames\n\n<answer>:\n", "assistant": "C" } ]

[ { "human": "Read the following passage and questions, then choose the right answer from options, the answer should be one of A, B, C, D.\n\n<passage>:\nThat the gentleman in question was a nut was beyond question. He was an institutionalized psychotic. He was nutty enough to think he could make an atom bomb out of modeling clay! Miss Abercrombie, the manual therapist patted the old man on the seen, their tree-studded flanks making a pleasant setting for the mental She stopped behind a frowning, intense patient, rapidly shaping blobs of The flying fingers continued to whip out the bits of shaped clay as the patient ignored the question. He hunched closer to his table as if to draw away from the woman. Thaddeus Funston continued to mold the clay bits and put them in place. Without looking up from his bench he muttered a reply. \"Atom bomb.\" A puzzled look crossed the therapist's face. \"Pardon me, Mr. Funston. I thought you said an 'atom bomb.'\" \"Did,\" Funston murmured. \"All right, fellows,\" he called out, \"time to go back. Put up your things.\" There was a rustle of paint boxes and papers being shuffled and chairs being moved back. A tall, blond patient with a flowing mustache, put one more dab of paint on his canvas and stood back to survey the meaningless smears. He sighed happily and laid down his palette. At the clay table, Funston feverishly fabricated the last odd-shaped bit with a small, secret smile on his lips. Attendants and nurses scurried through the hospital, seeing how many had been injured in the from a half-dozen neighboring communities had gathered at the still-smoking hole that marked the site of the vanished crafts building. Within fifteen minutes, the disaster-trained crews had detected heavy radiation emanating from the crater and there was a scurry of men and equipment back to a safe distance, a few hundred yards away. At 5:30 a.m., a plane landed at a nearby airfield and a platoon of Atomic Energy Commission experts, military intelligence men, four FBI At 5:45 a.m. a cordon was thrown around both the hospital and the blast crater. In Ward 4-C, Thaddeus Funston slept peacefully and happily. \"It's impossible and unbelievable,\" Colonel Thomas Thurgood said for the fifteenth time, later that morning, as he looked around the group of experts gathered in the tent erected on the hill overlooking the crater. \"How can an atom bomb go off in a nut house?\" \"It apparently was a very small bomb, colonel,\" one of the haggard AEC men offered timidly. \"Not over three kilotons.\" \"I don't care if it was the size of a peanut,\" Thurgood screamed. \"How did it get here?\" A military intelligence agent spoke up. \"If we knew, sir, we wouldn't be standing around here. We don't know, but the fact remains that it WAS an atomic explosion.\" Thurgood turned wearily to the small, white-haired man at his side. \"Let's go over it once more, Dr. Crane. Are you sure you knew everything that was in that building?\" Thurgood swept his hand in the general direction of the blast crater. \"Colonel, I've told you a dozen times,\" the hospital administrator said with exasperation, \"this was our manual therapy room. We gave our Madame Curie was a misguided scrubwoman.\" \"All I know is that you say this was a crafts building. O.K. So it was,\" Thurgood sighed. \"I also know that an atomic explosion at 3:02 this morning blew it to hell and gone. \"And I've got to find out how it happened.\" Thurgood slumped into a field chair and gazed tiredly up at the little doctor. \"Where's that girl you said was in charge of this place?\" now,\" the doctor snapped. Outside the tent, a small army of military men and AEC technicians moved around the perimeter of the crater, scintillators in hand, examining every tiny scrap that might have been a part of the building at one expression. \"He did make an atom bomb,\" she cried. Colonel Thurgood, who had snapped from his chair at her words, leaped Colonel Thurgood, looking more like a patient every minute, sat on the on the wooden surface, making Miss Abercrombie's chart book bounce with every beat. \"It's ridiculous,\" Thurgood roared. \"We'll all be the laughingstocks of the world if this ever gets out. An atomic bomb made out of clay. You are all nuts. You're in the right place, but count me out.\" At his left, Miss Abercrombie cringed deeper into her chair at the strategists and radiologists sat in various stages of nerve-shattered weariness. conferred briefly and then the intelligence officer spoke. \"That seems to settle it, colonel. We've got to give this Funston another chance to repeat his bomb. But this time under our supervision.\" Thurgood leaped to his feet, his face purpling. \"Are you crazy?\" he screamed. \"You want to get us all thrown into this filbert factory? Do you know what the newspapers would do to us if they ever got wind of the fact, that for one, tiny fraction of a second, anyone of us here entertained the notion that a paranoidal idiot with the IQ of an ape could make an atomic bomb out of kid's modeling clay? \"They'd crucify us, that's what they'd do!\" At 8:30 that night, Thaddeus Funston, swathed in an Army officer's Two military policemen and a brace of staff psychiatrists sworn to military men huddled around a small wooden table. Thaddeus in the staff car outside, Colonel Thurgood spoke to the weary Thurgood signaled to the doctors and they entered the shack with She smiled at Funston. \"Now isn't this nice, Mr. Funston,\" she said. \"These nice men have brought us way out here just to see you make another atom bomb like the one you made for me yesterday.\" A flicker of interest lightened Thaddeus' face. He looked around the walked to the table and sat down. His fingers began working the damp clay, making first the hollow, half-round shell while the nation's top atomic scientists watched in fascination. His busy fingers flew through the clay, shaping odd, flat bits and clay The two psychiatrists went to Thaddeus' side as he put the upper lid of and photographed it from every angle. Then they left for the concrete observatory bunker, several miles down range where Thaddeus and the psychiatrists waited inside a ring of stony-faced military policemen. \"I told you this whole thing was asinine,\" Thurgood snarled as the scientific teams trooped into the bunker. the dim interior of the bunker and the pneumatically-operated door slammed shut just before the wave of the blast hit the structure. Six hours and a jet plane trip later, Thaddeus, once again in his strait jacket, sat between his armed escorts in a small room in the Pentagon. closeted with a gray-faced and bone-weary Colonel Thurgood and his baker's dozen of AEC brains. Scraps of the hot and scornful talk drifted a neatly-tied bundle. In the conference room, a red-faced, four-star general cast a chilling glance at the rumpled figure of Colonel Thurgood. \"I've listened to some silly stories in my life, colonel,\" the general asylum inmate in a strait jacket and you have the colossal gall to sit there and tell me that this poor soul has made not one, but two atomic devices out of modeling clay and then has detonated them.\" The general paused.\n\n<question>:\nWhat does the colonel seem to think about the bomb situation at the mental institution?\n\n<options>:\nA He wants to let Thaddeus create more things to study them\nB He is worried about the perception if others hear about what's happening\nC He wants to keep the story away from the newspapers so that others cannot learn Thaddeus' secrets\nD It figures that this is where this is happening, so he's frustrated for yet another bomb case\n\n<answer>:\n", "assistant": "B" } ]

[ { "human": "Read the following passage and questions, then choose the right answer from options, the answer should be one of A, B, C, D.\n\n<passage>:\nDirty Laundry Now and then, a documentary film comes along that makes us re-examine the rules that unofficially govern the genre: Can there be a middle ground between fiction and fact? Can a documentary use scripted scenes and yet remain ontologically authentic? How much can you stylize material before you alter the reality that you're striving, at least in theory, to capture? Unmade Beds , Nicholas Barker's \" 'real life' feature film,\" has proudly worn its mongrel status as a \"directed\" documentary of single life in the big city, employing, in the face of criticism, what amounts to a cackling-punk defiance. The movie tracks four aging New Yorkers--two men, two women--through their lonely dating rituals, in the process depicting a universe of lusty, coupled-up haves and downcast, excluded have-nots, all viewed Rear Window -style through rectangular openings in the massive apartment houses in which they reside. This is not cinema vérité , and nothing has been left to chance. The director selected his four subjects from many hundreds of potential candidates, followed them around for months, and then scripted their monologues and dialogues to reflect what he says he saw. Calling his own film \"an exercise in mendacity,\" Barker goes on, \"I'm quite happy to tell lies about my characters and even collude with their self-delusions if it enables me to communicate larger dramatic truths.\" Spurned by U.S. distributors, Unmade Beds opened two weeks ago in a small screening room in downtown Manhattan, where it proceeded to set box office records and generate lots of (largely favorable) press. In part due to smart publicity, which has bannered some of the bad reviews and commentary (\"I have to tell you that this film upset me so much that I really don't want to have anything to do with it\"--a New York publicist), it threatens to become a cause célèbre --and to be coming soon to a theater near you. It's always nice to see distributors proved wrong about the merits of \"difficult\" films, but in this case I think they did the decent thing. Unmade Beds isn't just bad--it's obnoxiously, noxiously bad, a freak show for the empathetically challenged. The outrage it has prompted isn't the Puritan kind it's more like legitimate revulsion at watching a blowhard pervert people's lives in the name of \"larger dramatic truths.\" Those truths are large, all right. Take Michael, the 40-year-old, 5 foot 4 inch lonely guy who has been looking for a wife for almost two decades. If you were to walk past him on the street, you might think that a man of his small stature might have some trouble getting dates and be rather bitter about it. The larger dramatic truth is that Michael has lots of trouble getting dates and is very bitter about it. Just in case you feel too sorry for him, however, Barker is careful to include a homophobic monologue in which Michael complains about young women who waste their lives hanging out with effeminate males. Michael turns out to be the film's most sympathetic subject--by a wide margin. At least he's not Mikey, a paunchy 54-year-old who writes but can't sell screenplays and who always flees blind dates, because the women he gets fixed up with are \"mutts.\" Sounding like one of the low-level gangsters who posture like kingpins in Donnie Brasco , Mikey talks a lot about mutts. He also reminisces about that 24 hour period in the '70s when he managed to sleep with three different beautiful women, whose pictures he shows off. These days, all he meets are mutts. He comes off as a pathetic little loser--a mutt. Barker might have crafted his subjects' monologues from their own words, but he has robbed them of their spontaneity--and, thus, of their essence. They aren't thinking or trying to come to grips with their situations in front of your eyes, because they already know what they're going to say: They've been fixed like butterflies on the ends of pins and held up for voyeuristic inspection. The scenes with friends and confidantes have a crude, programmatic purpose. You can imagine the director composing a shot (the shots are tightly composed and elaborately lighted) and reminding them, \"In this scene she points out that you should lose weight and you get shocked and defensive. Ready ... Action.\" Call me square, but I find this antithetical to the documentary spirit. An Englishman who trained as an anthropologist before going to work for BBC Television, Barker clearly made up his mind about his material before his cameras began to roll--so it's no surprise that it feels prechewed and predigested. When reality interfered (Brenda apparently did not go through with a marriage to an immigrant in search of a green card for $10,000, as she does on-screen), Barker brushed the truth aside as immaterial, following her up the steps of City Hall in her wedding dress because it was \"true to her character.\" But what separates documentary from fiction is that real people are often more complicated, and more conflicted, than finished characters--as Brenda proved to be more (or, at least, other) than the sum of her parts. That's the kind of truth that reveals itself to documentary filmmakers after the fact, when they go over footage and discover unexpected patterns, dissonances, glimmers of a universe that's richer and messier than the one they set out to portray. So what are Barker's \"larger dramatic truths\"? Single people in big cities can be desperate. Single people fear they're going to die alone--unloved and unloving. People are judged and, in turn, judge others by how they look. Big news. One could argue, charitably, that the movie is meant to be prescriptive, that Barker intends for us to regard the ways in which his subjects delude themselves and thereby learn to see through our own self-delusions. But Barker hasn't concocted a larger dramatic structure that would hold those larger dramatic truths together and help us comprehend where these people went wrong. He dramatizes right up to the point where a dramatist would be expected to provide some insight--and then, hey, he's a documentarian. Unmade Beds might make a good date movie. There's little to argue about in its subjects' personalities--both males and females will find them repulsive--and the picture the film paints of single life in the big city is so bleak that you'll probably want to jump into bed with whoever is sitting next to you. Anything to keep from turning into one of those people. The Slums of Beverly Hills also walks a line between two genres, in this case coming-of-age sex comedy and autobiographical monologue. Tamara Jenkins, the writer and first-time director, has an eye for absurd juxtapositions that was obviously sharpened by the pain of her nomadic upbringing. Her protagonist (Natasha Lyonne) spends her teen-age years being shuttled with her two brothers from one cheap dive to another in the 90210 ZIP code, all because her egregiously unsuccessful father (Alan Arkin) wants them to be educated in the best schools. (\"Furniture's temporary\n\n<question>:\nWhat wouldn't the author say about Unmade Beds?\n\n<options>:\nA it is a new genre of film\nB the film is dishonest and scripted\nC the characters aren't likable\nD this film will inspire many more like it to be created\n\n<answer>:\n", "assistant": "D" } ]

[ { "human": "Read the following passage and questions, then choose the right answer from options, the answer should be one of A, B, C, D.\n\n<passage>:\ntroops, just behind the men of Poitou. Sir Robert turned slightly in his the lion-hearted Richard of England— Sir Robert de Bouain twisted again in his saddle to look at the knight Sir Robert's lips formed a smile. \"They are not far off, Sir Gaeton. \"Like the jackals they are,\" said Sir Gaeton. \"They assail us from the rear, and they set up traps in our path ahead. Our spies tell us that \"Is it fear, or are they merely gathering their forces?\" \"Both,\" said Sir Gaeton flatly. \"They fear us, else they would not dally \"Give them time. We must wait for their attack, sir knight. It were Sir Robert heard his own laugh echo hollowly within his helmet. \"Perhaps heavy armor, although he himself was not too uncomfortable. Sir Gaeton looked at him with a smile that held both irony and respect. your English and your King Richard of the Lion's Heart, but I am a Burgundy against King Richard—\" He gave a short, barking laugh. \"I fear no man,\" he went on, \"but if I had to fear one, it would be Richard Sir Robert's voice came like a sword: steely, flat, cold, and sharp. \"My lord the King spoke in haste. He has reason to be bitter against Philip \"No, and with good cause. But he allowed his anger against Philip to The Duke is no coward, and Richard Plantagenet well knows it. As I said, he spoke in haste.\" \"It was my duty.\" Sir Robert's voice was stubborn. \"Could we have permitted a quarrel to develop between the two finest knights and warleaders in Christendom at this crucial point? The desertion of Philip not gained the love of Richard by doing so.\" Sir Robert felt his jaw set firmly. \"My king knows I am loyal.\" Sir Gaeton said nothing more, but there was a look in his eyes that showed that he felt that Richard of England might even doubt the loyalty Sir Robert rode on in silence, feeling the movement of the horse beneath Sir Robert turned his horse to look. rain of heavy stones, too close in for the use of bows. There was only the sword against armor, like the sound of a thousand hammers against a Sir Robert felt his horse move, as though it were urging him on toward check. The King had said \"Stand fast!\" and this was no time to disobey were taking the brunt of the charge. They fought like madmen, but they were slowly being forced back. The Master of the Hospitallers rode to the rear, to the King's standard, which hardly moved in the still desert air, now that the column had stopped moving. The voice of the Duke of Burgundy came to Sir Robert's ears. voice fading as he rode on up the column toward the knights of Poitou the King: \"My lord, we are pressed on by the enemy and in danger of \"Good Master,\" said Richard, \"it is you who must sustain their attack. A voice very close to Sir Robert said: \"Richard is right. If we go to attack.\" It was Sir Gaeton. \"My lord the King,\" Sir Robert heard his voice say, \"is right in all but gallop would break the Egyptian line and give the Hospitallers breathing \"Against the orders of the King?\" \"The King cannot see everything! There are times when a man must use his After a moment's hesitation, Sir Gaeton couched his lance. \"I'm with \"Forward then!\" Sir Robert heard himself shouting. \"Forward for St. George and for England!\" Sir Robert felt the shock against himself and his horse as the steel tip of the long ash lance struck the Saracen horseman in the chest. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw that Sir Gaeton, too, had scored. The Saracen, impaled on Sir Robert's lance, shot from the saddle as he died. His lighter armor had hardly impeded the incoming spear-point, and now his body dragged it down as he dropped toward the desert sand. saber, taking advantage of Sir Robert's sagging lance. There was nothing else to do but drop the lance and draw his heavy The Egyptian's curved sword clanged against Sir Robert's helm, setting Behind him, Sir Robert heard further cries of \"St. George and England!\" Beauvais, who carried a great warhammer in order that he might not break Sir Robert's own sword rose and fell, cutting and hacking at the enemy. Breathing heavily, Sir Robert sheathed his broadsword. Beside him, Sir Gaeton did the same, saying: \"It will be a few minutes before they can regroup, sir knight. We may have routed them \"Aye. But King Richard will not approve of my breaking ranks and disobeying orders. I may win the battle and lose my head in the end.\" Old Kings .\" He had a pack of cigarettes in his gauntleted hand, which he profferred to Sir Robert. There were three cigarettes protruding from it, one slightly farther than the others. Sir Robert's hand reached out and took that one. Old Kings .\" He put one end of the cigarette in his mouth and lit the other from the lighter in Sir Gaeton's hand. \"Yes, sir,\" said Sir Gaeton, after lighting his own cigarette, \" Old Kings are the greatest. They give a man real, deep-down smoking pleasure.\" \"There's no doubt about it, man's cigarette.\" Sir Robert could feel the soothing smoke in his lungs as he inhaled deeply. \"That's great. When I want a cigarette, I don't want just any cigarette.\" \"Nor I,\" agreed the Gascon. \" Old Kings is the only real cigarette when you're doing a real man's work.\" \"That's for sure.\" Sir Robert watched a smoke ring expand in the air. There was a sudden clash of arms off to their left. Sir Robert dropped his cigarette to the ground. \"The trouble is that doing a real he-man's work doesn't always allow you to enjoy the fine, rich tobaccos of Old Kings right down to the very end.\" \"No, but you can always light another later,\" said the Gascon knight. King Richard, on seeing his army moving suddenly toward the harassed Saladin had expected him to hold fast! Sir Robert and Sir Gaeton spurred their chargers toward the flapping Sir Robert lost all track of time. There was nothing to do but keep his breastbone. Where was Sir Gaeton? Where were the others? Where was the And the great king, in spite of his prowess was outnumbered heavily and Without hesitation, Sir Robert plunged his horse toward the surrounded He saw Richard go down, falling from the saddle of his charger, but by they had no time to attempt any further mischief to the King. They had their hands full with Sir Robert de Bouain. He did not know how long he fought there, holding his charger motionless but presently he heard the familiar cry of \"For St. George and for boiling around the embattled pair, forcing the Turks into retreat. And for the second time, Sir Robert found himself with no one to fight. Sir Robert turned in his saddle to face the smiling king. King Richard's gauntleted hand grasped his own. \"If it please God, I And then the king mounted his horse and was running full gallop after Robert took off his helmet. \"How'd you like it, Bob?\" asked one of the two producers of the show. Robert Bowen nodded briskly and patted the televike helmet. \"It was O.K.,\" he said. \"Good show. A little talky at the beginning, and it needs a better fade-out, but the action scenes were fine. The sponsor ought to like it—for a while, at least.\" \"What do you mean, 'for a while'?\" Robert Bowen sighed. \"If this thing goes on the air the way it is, he'll lose sales.\" \"Why? Commercial not good enough?\" \" Too good! Man, I've smoked Old Kings , and, believe me, the real thing never tasted as good as that cigarette did in the commercial!\"\n\n<question>:\nWhich is definitely true about why Sir Robert could not finish smoking the cigarette?\n\n<options>:\nA The company only paid for a short amount of airtime\nB He had to return to battle\nC It tasted disgusting and he did not want to finish it\nD They were prop cigarettes that hurt to use\n\n<answer>:\n", "assistant": "B" } ]

[ { "human": "Read the following passage and questions, then choose the right answer from options, the answer should be one of A, B, C, D.\n\n<passage>:\nCriminals, beware the Scorpion is on your trail! Hoodlums fear his fury—and, for that matter, so do the cops! withdrawing money from her savings account again. And there were three bank robbers. The three bank robbers looked like triplets. From the ground up, they money. It was just like the movies. The man who had first spoken herded the tellers, Mr. Featherhall and the customers all over against the back wall, while the second man her best to scratch his eyes out. Meanwhile, Mr. Anderson went scooting out the front door and running down the street toward the police station in the next block, shouting, \"Help! Help! Robbery!\" floor, and all three of them ran out of the bank to the car out front, in which sat a very nervous-looking fourth man, gunning the engine. Everyone except Miss English ran out after the bandits, to watch. Things got very fast and very confused then. Two police cars came driving down the block and a half from the precinct house to the bank, and the car with the four robbers in it lurched away from the curb and drove straight down the street toward the police station. The police cars and the getaway car passed one another, with everybody shooting like the ships in pirate movies. There was so much confusion that it looked as though the bank robbers were going to get away after all. The police cars were aiming the wrong way and, as they'd come down with sirens wailing, there was a clear path behind them. started jouncing around. It smacked into a parked car and stopped. And all the police went running down there to clap handcuffs on the robbers when they crawled dazedly out of their car. \"Come along home,\" said his mother, grabbing his hand. \"We don't want to be involved.\" \"It was the nuttiest thing,\" said Detective-Sergeant Stevenson. \"An operation planned that well, you'd think they'd pay attention to their getaway car, you know what I mean?\" Detective-Sergeant Pauling shrugged. \"They always slip up,\" he said. \"Sooner or later, on some minor detail, they always slip up.\" \"Yes, but their burned in 'The Scorpion' in big black letters you could see half a \"Nothing, what do you expect? They'll make no statement at all.\" The squad-room door opened, and a uniformed patrolman stuck his head my insurance company.\" \"Good. The car's in the police garage, around the corner. If you'd come with me?\" customer—I always leave the keys in the car. Why not?\" blocks away from the nearest policeman.\" \"Hmph.\" Hastings moved on around the car, stopping short to exclaim, \"What in the name of God is that? You didn't tell me a bunch of kids had stolen the car.\" \"It wasn't a bunch of kids,\" Stevenson told him. \"It was four professional criminals, I thought you knew that. They were using it in a bank holdup.\" \"Then why did they do crudely-lettered words, \"The Scorpion\" burned black into the paint of The Scorpion has struck. The bank robbers were captured. The Scorpion fights crime. Crooks and robbers are not safe from the avenging Scorpion. WARN YOUR READERS! Sincerely yours, THE SCORPION out the front door of the house, crying for the police and shouting, \"Murder! Murder!\" At this point, neighbors called the police. One neighbor additionally phoned three newspapers and two television stations, thereby earning forty dollars in \"news-tips\" rewards. firing at anything that moved. The two cameramen in the mobile unit worked their hearts out. One concentrated on the movements of the police and firemen and neighbors and ambulance attendants, while the other used the Zoomar lens to undershirt, stalking from window to window on the second floor of the house. The show lasted for nearly an hour. There were policemen everywhere, and firemen everywhere, and neighbors milling around down at the corner, where the police had roped the block off, and occasionally Mr. police used loudspeakers to tell Higgins he might as well give up, they had the place surrounded and could eventually starve him out anyway. into the arms of the waiting police. They had trouble holding him. At first they thought he was actually trying to get away, but then one of them heard what it was he was ointment and jail. The television crew went on back to Manhattan. The neighbors went home and telephoned their friends. On-duty policemen had been called in from practically all of the precincts in Brooklyn. Among them was Detective-Sergeant William Stevenson. Stevenson frowned thoughtfully at Higgins as that unhappy individual was led away, and then strolled over to look at the rifle. Scorpion.\" You don't get to be Precinct Captain on nothing but political connections. Those help, of course, but you need more than that. As Captain Hanks was fond of pointing out, you needed as well to be both more imaginative than most—\"You gotta be able to second-guess the no reason at all, and somebody burns 'The Scorpion' onto the trunk. prove it. And there on the rifle stock it is again. 'The Scorpion'.\" trunk?\" \"How do I know?\" demanded the captain. \"Kids put it on before the car was stolen, maybe. Or maybe the hoods did it themselves, who knows? What do saw it before the robbery and they would have noticed it if it'd been there.\" The captain shook his head. \"I don't get it,\" he admitted. \"What are desperately. \"How should I know? And why not, anyway? You know as well as I do these things happen. A bunch of teen-agers burgle a liquor store and they write 'The Golden Avengers' on the plate glass in lipstick. It happens all the time. Why not 'The Scorpion'? It couldn't occur to two people?\" not escape the Scorpion. The Scorpion fights crime. No criminal is safe from the Scorpion. WARN YOUR READERS. THE SCORPION for the cops to keep track of all of them, and if you're picked up carrying a knife or a length of tire chain or something, why, you're on had been all. Finally, the War Lords from the two gangs had met, and determined that the matter could only be settled in a war. entrances. The night of the rumble, the gangs assembled in their separate clubrooms for last-minute instructions. Debs were sent out to play chicken at the intersections nearest the schoolyard, both to warn of the approach of cops and to keep out any non-combatant kids who might come wandering through. you kids. Take off.\" One of them, wearing a red mask, turned to look at her. \"Who, us?\" \"Yes, you! Stay out of that street. Go on down that way.\" involved.\" \"Hey!\" cried the kid in the black-and-yellow costume again. And he went the one kid who'd gotten through, then maybe all the rest of them would come running along after her. She didn't know what to do. A sudden siren and a distant flashing red light solved her problems. \"Cheez,\" said one of the kids. \"The cops!\" \"Fuzz!\" screamed Judy. She turned and raced down the block toward the try to connect every single time the word 'scorpion' comes up? What's \"Neither one of them was called 'The Scorpions,'\" Stevenson told branded 'The Scorpion.'\" part of the gang that had been fighting. But they were caught before they could get out of the schoolyard. If the squad cars had showed punk's idea of a way to razz the police. Now, you just go back to worrying about what's happening in this precinct and forget about kid gangs up in Manhattan and comic book things like the Scorpion, or\n\n<question>:\nWhy does the Scorpion leave their signature at each crime?\n\n<options>:\nA To show that they \"took care\" of each criminal.\nB To scare off other potential criminals.\nC To show that they were present at the crime.\nD To help lead the police in connecting the crimes.\n\n<answer>:\n", "assistant": "A" } ]

[ { "human": "Read the following passage and questions, then choose the right answer from options, the answer should be one of A, B, C, D.\n\n<passage>:\nMercury, he was selling his guns into the Mercury Sam's Garden but then it is always hot on Mercury, the The girl drew in her breath. \"No! Mercury is not ready for freedom. Only a handful of fanatics are engineering the revolution. The real Mercurian patriots are against it, but they are afraid to protest. You've got to believe me. The revolution is scheduled to break during the Festival of the Rains. If it does, the Terrestrials here will be massacred. The Mercurians hate them. We haven't but a handful of troops.\" Jaro Moynahan wiped the sweat from his forehead with a fine duraweb he is the leader, the very soul of the revolution. The Mercurians worship him. They will do whatever he says. Without him they would be lost. He is the rebel, Karfial Hodes. I am to offer you ten thousand Earth notes to kill Karfial Hodes.\" You've got to find him, Jaro. He's stirring up all Mercury.\" Unexpectedly, the deep, ringing voice of Mercury Sam boomed out from teeming planet of Mercury it was as refreshing as a cold plunge. He wondered who was putting up the ten thousand Earth notes? Who stood to lose most in case of a revolution? The answer seemed obvious enough. Who, but Albert Peet. Peet controlled the Latonka trade for which there was a tremendous demand throughout the Universe. And what had happened to the girl. Had the rebels abducted her. If reputation of being able to take care of herself. He beckoned a waiter, paid his bill. As the Mercurian started to leave, a thought struck Jaro. These yellow-eyed Mercurians could see as well The Mercurian glanced at the bill, then back at the Earthman. There was no expression in his yellow eyes. possibility. If the girl had been abducted, only Mercurians could have engineered it in the dark and the Mercurians were a clannish lot. But as soon as he emerged he was conscious again of the followers. In the dense, humid night, he was like a blind man trying to elude the cat-eyed Mercurians. Universal Debacle of 3368, after that the Martian Revolution as well as of his line. Furthermore, there was something phony about the entire set up. The Mercurians, he knew, had been agitating for freedom for years. Why, at this time when the Earth Congress was about to grant them self-government, should they stage a revolution? Mr. Peet licked his lips again. \"I have come, Mr. Moynahan, on a matter of business, urgent business. I had not intended to appear in this \"You accepted?\" \"Why, no. As it happened she was abducted before I had the chance.\" Mr. Peet licked his lips. \"But you will, surely you will. Unless Karfial Hodes is stopped immediately there will be a bloody uprising all over the planet during the Festival of the Rains. Earth doesn't notes.\" \"Not entirely,\" said Peet uncomfortably. \"There are many of us here, Mercurians as well as Earthmen, who recognize the danger. We have—ah—pooled our resources.\" Jaro Moynahan lit a cigarette, sat down on the edge of the bed. \"Why beat about the bush,\" he asked with a sudden grin. \"Mr. Peet, you've gained control of the Latonka trade. Other Earthmen are in control Mercury, and you've squeezed out every possible penny. Every time self-government has come before the Earth Congress you've succeeded in blocking it. You are, perhaps, the most cordially-hated group anywhere. Jaro raised his eyebrows. \"Perhaps then you know where she is?\" Mr. Peet shook his head. \"No. Karfial Hodes' men abducted her.\" A second rapping at the door caused them to exchange glances. Jaro went entrance. His black eyes burned holes in his pale boyish face. His white suit was blotched with sweat and dirt. \"They told me Mr. Peet was here,\" he said. \"It's for you,\" said Jaro over his shoulder. At the desk he inquired if any messages had come for him. There were none, but the clerk had seen Mr. Peet with a young fellow take the read: \" Earth Congress suspends negotiations on Mercurian freedom pending investigation of rumored rebellion. Terrestrials advised to return to Earth. Karfial Hodes, Mercurian patriot, being sought. \" Mercurians sat around little tables drinking silently of the pale green Latonka. The burrows were but poorly lit, the natives preferring the cool gloom, and Jaro had to feel his way, rubbing shoulders with the \"But how badly?\" Peet was wringing his hands. \"Nothing serious,\" said Jaro. \"He'll have his arm in a sling for a while. That's all.\" carpet. Joan Webb \"There's been an—ah—accident,\" said Mr. Peet, and he licked his lips. \"Call a doctor, Miss Webb.\" Miss Webb raised an eyebrow, went to the visoscreen. In a moment she \"Thank you,\" said Miss Webb. She flicked the machine off, then added: \"You trollop.\" Mr. Peet regarded Jaro Moynahan with distress. take them, Mr. Peet. Frankly, they give me the creeps. They might go off. A scratch from one of those needles would be enough.\" nasty little contraptions for all the Latonka on Mercury.\" \"That's fair enough,\" replied Jaro. Albert Peet sighed. \"I have the check made out.\" \"Only,\" continued Jaro coldly, \"I'm not ready to be bought off. I think I'll deal myself a hand in this game.\" Mr. Peet's face fell. \"You won't reconsider?\" \"Sorry,\" said Jaro \"but I've got a date. I'm late now.\" He started to \"You've killed him,\" said Peet. \"If I were you, Mr. Moynahan, I would be on the next liner back to Earth.\" Without answering, Jaro backed watchfully from the room. at me with that poisoned dart gun.\" \"But the police!\" she cried, as she caught her breath. \"There'll never be an investigation. Albert Peet will see to that. I was called here on what I supposed was a legitimate revolution. Instead I was offered ten thousand Earth notes to assassinate the leader of the revolution.\" \"What revolution? I'm going around in circles.\" \"The Mercurians, of course.\" \"I don't believe it,\" said the girl. \"The Mercurians are the most peaceable people in the Universe. They've been agitating for freedom, yes. But they believe in passive resistance. I don't believe you could induce a Mercurian to kill, even in self-protection. That's why Albert Peet and the rest of the combine had such an easy time gaining control of the Latonka trade.\" happen to be Albert Peet's private secretary?\" \"A gal's gotta eat. But the truth is, I was quitting. The Latonka Trust Jaro Moynahan raised his oblique brows but did not interrupt. \"Albert Peet,\" she continued, \"has been trying to sell out but nobody will touch the stock, not since it looks as if the Earth Congress is going to grant the Mercurians their freedom. Everybody knows that the first thing the Mercurians will do, will be to boot out the Latonka Trust.\" \"What about this Karfial Hodes?\" said Jaro. \"I've heard that he's inciting the Mercurians to rebellion. The newscaster had a line about the revolution too. The government has advised all Terrestrials to return to Earth.\" \"It's not true,\" Joan flared. \"It's all a pack of lies invented by the Latonka Trust. I know.\" \"But I should think rumors like that would run down the Latonka stock.\"\n\n<question>:\nWhat's really happening on Mercury?\n\n<options>:\nA The Mercurians are rebelling against Peet and will do what it takes to get their freedom.\nB Peet wants to sell his Lotonka Trust and get back to Earth.\nC Karfial Hodes is taking hostages to win his battle against Terrestrials.\nD Peet is lying to stop Earth from granting Mercurians their freedom.\n\n<answer>:\n", "assistant": "D" } ]

[ { "human": "Read the following passage and questions, then choose the right answer from options, the answer should be one of A, B, C, D.\n\n<passage>:\nAt a recent talk, Naomi Klein said that addressing the challenge of climate change could not have come at a worse time. The current dominant political and economic ideologies, along with growing isolationist sentiment, runs contrary to the bipartisan, collaborative approaches needed to solve global issues like climate change. Do you see the same issues hampering a global effort to respond to the challenges AI raises? Climate change suffers from the problem that the costs are not incurred in any direct way by the industrialists who own the technology and are profiting from it. With AI, that has been the case so far although not on the same scale. There has been disruption but so far, compared to industrialisation, the impact has been fairly small. That will probably change. AI companies, and in particular the big tech companies, are very concerned that this won't go like climate change, but rather it will go like GMOs: that people will have a gut reaction to this technology as soon as the first great swathe of job losses take hold. People speculate that 50m jobs could be lost in the US if trucking is automated, which is conceivable within 10 years. You could imagine a populist US government therefore simply banning driverless cars. So I think we've got a real opportunity, despite the general climate, and in some ways because of it. There's a great opportunity to bring industry on board to make sure the technology is developed in the right way. One of the dominant narratives around not only AI but technology and automation more generally is that we, as humans, are at the mercy of technological progress. If you try and push against this idea you can be labelled as being anti-progress and stuck in the past. But we do have a lot more control than we give ourselves credit for. For example, routineness and susceptibility to automation are not inevitable features of occupations, job design is hugely important. How do we design jobs? How do we create jobs that allow people to do the kind of work they want to do? There can be a bit of a conflict between being impacted by what's happening and having some sort of control over what we want to happen. Certainly, we encounter technological determinism a lot. And it's understandable. For us as individuals, of course it does feel like it always is happening and we just have to cope. No one individual can do much about it, other than adapt. But that's different when we consider ourselves at a level of a society, as a polis [city state], or as an international community. I think we can shape the way in which technology develops. We have various tools. In any given country, we have regulations. There's a possibility of international regulation. Technology is emerging from a certain legal, political, normative, cultural, and social framework. It's coming from a certain place. And it is shaped by all of those things. I think this is very important because historically, we've had an overwhelming tendency to anthropomorphise. We define what intelligence is, historically, as being human-like. And then within that, being like certain humans. And I think, still, this anthropomorphic picture of the kind of humanoid android, the robot, dominates our idea of what AI is too much. And too many people, and the industry as well, talk about human-level artificial intelligence as a goal, or general AI, which basically means like a human. But actually what we're building is nothing like a human. There was a point I read in something you wrote on our ideas of intelligence that I thought was very interesting. We actually tend to think of intelligence at the societal level when we think about human ability, rather than at the individual level but in the end conflate the two. I think that's a very good point, when we think about our capabilities, we think about what we can achieve as a whole, not individually. But when we talk about AI, we tend to think about that individual piece of technology, or that individual system. So for example if we think about the internet of things and AI, we should discuss intelligence as something encompassed by the whole. Yeah, absolutely. Yes, right now, perhaps it is a product of our anthropomorphising bias. But there is a tendency to see a narrative of AI versus humanity, as if it's one or the other. And yet, obviously, there are risks in this technology long before it acquires any kind of manipulative agency. Robotic technology is dangerous. Or potentially dangerous. But at the same time, most of what we're using technology for is to enhance ourselves, to increase our capacities. And a lot of what AI is going to be doing is augmenting us – we're going to be working as teams, AI-human teams. Where do you think this AI-human conflict, or concept of a conflict, comes from? Do you think that's just a reflection of historical conversations we've had about automation, or do you think it is a deeper fear? I do think it comes both from some biases that might well be innate, such as anthropomorphism, or our human tendency to ascribe agency to other objects, particularly moving ones, is well-established and probably has sound evolutionary roots. If it moves, it's probably wise to start asking yourself questions like, \"What is it? What might it want? Where might it be going? Might it be hungry? Do I look like food to it?\" I think it makes sense, it's natural for us to think in terms of agency. And when we do, it's natural for us to project our own ways of being and acting. And we, as primates, are profoundly co-operative. But at the same time, we're competitive and murderous. We have a strong sense of in-group versus out-group, which is responsible for both a great deal of cooperation, within the in-group, but also terrible crimes. Murder, rape, pillage, genocide One of the projects the centre is running is looking into what kind of AI breakthroughs may come, when and what the social consequences could be. What do you think the future holds? What are your fears – what do you think could go right and wrong in the short, medium and long term? That's a big question. Certainly I don't lie awake at night worried that robots are going to knock the door down and come in with a machine gun. If the robots take over the world, it won't be by knocking the door down. At the moment, I think it's certainly as big a risk that we have a GMO moment, and there's a powerful reaction against the technology which prevents us from reaping the benefits, which are enormous. I think that's as big a risk as the risks from the technologies themselves. I think one worry that we haven't talked about is that we've become extremely dependent upon this technology. And that we essentially become deskilled. There's an extent to which the history of civilisation is the history of the domestication of the human species sort of by ourselves, and also by our technology, to some extent. And AI certainly allows for that to reach a whole new level. Just think about GPs with diagnostic tools. Even now, my GP consults the computer fairly regularly. But as diagnostic tools get better, what are they going to be doing other than just typing something into the computer and reading out what comes back? At which point, you might as well do away with the GP. But then, who does know about medicine? And so we do need to worry about deskilling and about becoming dependent. And it is entirely possible that you can imagine a society in which we're all sort of prosperous, in a sense. Our basic bodily needs are provided for, perhaps, in a way, to an extent that we've never before even dreamed of. Unprecedented in human history. And yet, we're stripped of any kind of meaningful work. We have no purpose. We're escaping to virtual reality. And then you could imagine all sorts of worrying countercultures or Luddite movements or what have you. I guess that's the kind of scenario that – I haven't sketched it terribly well – but that's the kind of thing that worries me more than missile-toting giant robots.\n\n<question>:\nHow would Stephen compare humans and machines?\n\n<options>:\nA He thinks they are similar enough that a conflict will arise\nB They are complementary in their abilities and can benefit from one another\nC They operate with similar systems of intelligence but to entirely different ends\nD Humans are at risk of losing access to knowledge if they let machines take over most tasks\n\n<answer>:\n", "assistant": "B" } ]

[ { "human": "Read the following passage and questions, then choose the right answer from options, the answer should be one of A, B, C, D.\n\n<passage>:\nQUEST OF THIG \"HORDE.\" He had blasted across trackless space to subdue a defenseless world—only to meet on Earth emotions that were more deadly than weapons. rod-like weapon of white metal and his pouches for food and specimens. The Orthan entered the narrow strip of trees and crossed to the little-used highway on the other side. Here he patiently sat down to wait for an Earthman or an Earthwoman to pass. His task now was to cruiser where his two fellows and himself would drain the creature's mentality of all its knowledge. In this way they could learn whether a planet was suited for colonization by later swarms of Orthans. Already they had charted over a hundred celestial bodies but of them all only three had proven worthy of consideration. This latest planet, metal at the reflection of himself! The Earthman was opposite now and he must waste no more precious time. The mighty muscles of the Orthan sent him hurtling across the intervening space in two prodigious bounds, and his hands clamped their love-life, their everything! So it was that the bodies of the Earthman and the Orthan were strapped \"There is nothing more to learn,\" he informed his impassive comrades. \"Now, let us get on with the plastic surgery that is required. My new body must return to its barbaric household before undue attention is had no mates on Ortha, sex had been overthrown with all the other primitive impulses of barbarism so he was incapable of understanding and gunmen of his stories rendering him acutely unhappy. Sincerely he hoped that the west had reformed. \"Home again,\" whispered Ellen as she stood beside Thig twelve weeks quarters for almost three months. Strange thoughts were afloat in the chaos of his cool Orthan brain. Tonight or tomorrow night at the latest he must contact his two fellows and report that Earth was a planetary paradise. No other world, including Ortha, was so well-favored and rich. An expeditionary force to wipe the grotesque civilizations of Earth out of existence would, of course, be necessary before the first units of new Hordes could be landed. And there Thig balked. Why must they destroy these people, imperfect though their civilization might be, to make room for the Hordes? Thig tried to tell himself that it was the transmitted thoughts of the dead Earthman that made him feel so, but he was not too sure. For three months he had lived with people who loved, hated, wept and sacrificed for reasons that he had never known existed. He had learned the heady glory of thinking for himself and making his own decisions. He had thought the same thoughts that a governor might think. Uncertainty added zest to every day's life. The Orthan had come to question the sole devotion of the individual to the Horde to the exclusion of all other interests. What, he wondered, would one new world—or a hundred—populated by the Hordes add to the progress of humanity? For a hundred thousand years the Orthan civilization had remained static, its energies directed into certain who nestled trustingly against his tense man's body and slept—the son of Ellen and the man he had destroyed. Thig groaned. He was a weakling to let sentimentality so get the better sapping the life from his own brain. He knew that the story would never be written, but he toyed with the idea. So far had Thig the emotionless, robot-being from Ortha drifted from the unquestioning worship of the Horde! Ortha at once. \"I will recommend the conquest of this planet, 72-P-3 at once and the complete destruction of all biped life upon it. The mental aberrations exile them on one of the less desirable continents, Antarctica for example or Siberia? They are primitive humans even as our race was once \"Never again do I wish to set foot upon the soil of this mad planet. There are forces at work upon Earth that we of Ortha have long broad fingers bit deep into the unyielding metal of his chair. Suddenly he knew that he must go back to Earth, back to Ellen and the children of the man he had helped destroy. He loved Ellen, and nothing must stand between them! The Hordes of Ortha must find some other world, an empty world—this planet was not for them. \"Turn back!\" he cried wildly. \"I must go back to Earth. There is a woman there, helpless and alone, who needs me! The Horde does not need this planet.\" the Orthan's vital throat tubes. His fingers and thumb gouged deep into Kam's startled throat and choked off any cry for assistance before it could be uttered. Before Thig's eyes half of his comrade's body sloughed away into foul corruption that swiftly gave way to hardened blobs of dessicated matter. Horror for what he had done—that he had slain one of his own Horde—made his limbs move woodenly. All of his thoughts were dulled ancestors at times but to that very bit of unconscious atavism he now owed his life. A cool-headed robot of an Orthan would have efficiently used the blaster to destroy any possibility of remaining life in his unconscious body. The deadly attack of Thig his own violent avenging of Kam's death, and now the apparent return of the man he had killed come to life had all served to jolt his rigidly trained brain from its accustomed groove. The shock had been too much for the established thought-processes of the Orthan. So Thig shot him where he stood, mercifully, before that vacant mad stare set him, too, to gibbering and shrieking. Then he stepped over the skeleton-thing that had been Torp, using the new strength that victory had given him to drive him along. He had saved a world's civilization from extinction! The thought sobered him yet, somehow, he was pleased that he had done so. After all, it had been the Earthwoman and the children he had been thinking of while he battled Kam, a selfish desire to protect them all. read the last few nervously scrawled lines: Planet 72-P-3 unfit for colonization. Some pernicious disease that strikes at the brain centers and causes violent insanity is existent him from the parent ship. The sensation of free flight against his new body was strangely exhilerating and heady. It was the newest of the emotions he had experienced on Earth since that day, so many months before, when he had felt the warmness of Ellen's lips tight against his. He swung about to the port, watched the flaming drive-rockets of the great exploratory ship hurl it toward far-away Ortha, and there was no regret in his mind that he was not returning to the planet of his first existence. He thought of the dull greys and blacks of his planet, of the monotonous routine of existence that had once been his—and his heart thrilled to the memories of the starry nights and perfect exciting days he had spent on his three month trip over Earth. He made a brief salute to the existence he had known, turned with a tiny sigh, and his fingers made brief adjustments in the controls. The he had sent a space ship whipping down toward the hills and valleys below. And there was a sickness within him when he fully realized that, despite his acquired memory and traits, he was an alien from outer space. He fingered the tiny scars that had completely obliterated the slight were hot, bitter pains. Earth was not far below him. As he let gravity suck him earthward, he heaved a gasp of relief. He was no longer Thig, a creature of a Horde's West. He must remember that always. He had destroyed the real Terry and now, for the rest of his life, he must make up to the dead man's family. The knowledge that Ellen's love was not really meant for him would be a knife twisting in his heart but for her sake he must endure it. Her\n\n<question>:\nWhy is Thig's return to Earth bittersweet?\n\n<options>:\nA His Orthan background will always be at odds with his new life.\nB It's grueling to remember what he did to Terry, and to always have to be him now.\nC Though he wants it, he'll never truly belong. He'll always be an otherworlder.\nD He misses his life as an Orthan, even though he's come to enjoy Earth.\n\n<answer>:\n", "assistant": "C" } ]

[ { "human": "Read the following passage and questions, then choose the right answer from options, the answer should be one of A, B, C, D.\n\n<passage>:\nCraig looked them over quickly. \"Oh, come now, Miss Wendel. There are women aboard spaceships. I'm not a starved wolf.\" \"Certainly you are not, Mr. Craig. But it is not possible for me....\" Craig handed him a battered punch card and watched the man insert it in The Galactic hotel strove to preserve an archaic tone of hospitality. It advertised \"a night's lodgings\" and it possessed a bellboy. The cards and forms to his room. Tired from the long, confusing day, Craig behind Craig fidgeted. bellboy actually carried Craig's plasticarton and large file of punch hotel carried so far as a small fee to be paid the bellboy, and he hoped he would have the right size of Terran units in his wallet. \"You mean a microphone?\" asked Craig, mechanically fishing for his wallet. A murmur greeted the order. Craig experienced the thrill of knowing the envy of the others. Grav 1—that meant Terra. He crossed the long, dreary room, knowing the eyes of the other men were upon him. entered. He nudged Craig wickedly. \"You know what they're like?\" \"Yeah,\" Craig said disgustedly. Traffic in the illicit mental-image tapes was known as far into space as lonely men had penetrated. Intergalactic considered them as great a menace to mental and moral stability as the hectopiates. Craig wearily got the man out of the Craig moved in the direction indicated. He fought the irrational fear Craig obeyed the robot voice and began reluctantly to remove his flight jacket. Its incredibly fine-grained leather would carry none of the strange, foreign associations for the base station clerk who would Craig quickly removed the last of his clothing. It was impossible Craig obeyed and clenched his teeth against a sharp stinging. His respect for the robot-controlled equipment of bases had risen. When instructions, when a man appeared in the open doorway. \"I am Captain Wyandotte,\" said the man in a pleasant voice. \"Well, what's next?\" asked Craig somewhat more belligerently than he had intended. The man smiled. \"Your reaction is quite natural. You are somewhat about him. \"We might say you've been away quite a while, eh?\" \"I was entered as a spaceman when I was 16,\" Craig said. \"I've never been down for any period as yet.\" \"You mean you haven't been in a gravity system?\" conditioning.\" \"Conditioning?\" asked Craig. \"Yes. You have spent eleven years in space. Your body is conditioned to experienced it briefly.\" \"I expect to have some trouble at first.\" Craig was disturbed by the be pinned down to any specific condition the spaceman would find intolerable. Craig began to hate the delay that kept him from Terra. Through the ports of the headquarters base satellite, he scanned the constellations for the scores of worlds he had visited during his eleven years in moved so much as an inch. Craig heard the voices around him, muffled, as though talking through wadding. \"I'm ... all right,\" Craig mumbled at the voices. He struggled with the bonds of his cot. With terrible effort he forced his eyes open. Two white-clad figures, ridiculously out of proportion, hovered wraithlike Only one of the score of men in the centrifuge tank remained voluntarily in his cot. \"Space article violator,\" the old man informed Craig. \"Psycho, I think. card and gave him a one-way ticket to Terra.\" \"I'm going into Import. My father was in it for twenty years.\" \"Sure,\" said the old spaceman, watching a group of young crewmen engaged in an animated conversation. \"And spend your weekends on Luna.\" Craig half rose from his cot, jarred into anger. But the old spaceman turned, smiling wryly. \"Don't get hot, kid. I guess I spent too long in Zone V.\" He paused to examine his wrinkled thinking anyone who stays closer'n eighty light years from Terra is a land-lubber.\" Craig relaxed, realizing he had acted childishly. \"Used to think the same. Then I took the exam and got this job.\" \"Whereabouts?\" The old man looked up at Craig. \"You don't know much about Terra, do you, son?\" \"Not much.\" But the spaceman seemed to have lost interest. He was unpacking some personal belongings from a kit. \"What are you doing in Grav 1?\" Craig asked. as the plastic melted into a single, seamless whole. It was ready for irradiation. Probably in another ten years his son-to-be would put it on and play spaceman. But Craig swore he'd make sure that the kid knew what a stinking life it was. Robert Craig. Report to Orderly 12. Report to Orderly 12 through the With pangs of anxiety he could not completely suppress, Craig obeyed. \"Who's it from? Somebody on Terra?\" \"From a private spaceman named Morgan Brockman.\" \" Brockman? \"He was with you in the grav tank.\" \"The old man!\" The message container produced a battered punch card. Craig Craig put the battered card in his pocket and walked back through the had been a tramp spaceman. Well, why had Damn the old man! How did one explain? Craig descended the ramp from the huge jet and concentrated on his impressions. One day he would recall this moment, his first on the planet Terra. He tried to recall his first thrill at seeing Los Angeles, 1500 square miles of it, from the ship as it entered the atmosphere. \"A moment, sir. Just a little greeting from the Terra. You understand, of course. Purely routine.\" Craig remained on the final step of the ramp, puzzled. The man turned to a companion at his right. \"We can see that this gentleman has come from a long, long way off, can't we?\" The other man did not look up. He was peering into what seemed to Craig Craig turned to face a line of his fellow passengers up the ramp behind him. \"Who was that?\" Craig asked. \"Customs. Bet you never got such a smooth screening before, eh?\" \"You mean he Craig made his way toward the spaceport administration building. His first physical contact with Terra had passed unnoticed. \"Sir! Sir!\" cried a voice behind him. He wheeled to see a man walking briskly toward him. \"You dropped this, sir. Quite by accident, of course.\" Craig examined the small object the man had given him before rushing \"I see,\" said the man noncommittally. It seemed to Craig that he was seated uncomfortably in the silent room. There was a distracted quality about him, Craig thought. \"You are the first man we have had from the Intergalactic Service,\" the personnel man said finally. \"That so?\" completing the sentence. \"And also different.\" \"I haven't been here very long,\" said Craig. \"Matter of fact, I haven't been anywhere very long. This is my first real experience with life on a planet. As an adult, anyway.\" They exchanged formal greetings. She was a moderately pretty girl of medium height and, to Craig, a pleasantly rounded figure. He would have attempted to catch her eye had she not immediately occupied herself with unfolding the legs of a small instrument she was carrying. \"This is Mr. Craig's first landing on Terra, Miss Wendel,\" the personnel man continued. \"Actually, we shall have to consider him in much the same way we would an extraterrestrial.\" The girl glanced at Craig, casting him a cool, impersonal smile. \"He was formerly a flight officer in the Intergalactic Space Service.\" The statement was delivered in an almost exaggeratedly casual tone. \"Yes.\" The man laughed. \"You'll excuse us, Mr. Craig. We realize that you couldn't be expected to be familiar with Terra's fashions. In your present outfit you would certainly be typed as a ... well, you'd be made uncomfortable.\" Craig reddened in spite of himself. He had bought the suit on Ghandii. \"A hick,\" he supplied. \"I wouldn't go that far, but some people might.\"\n\n<question>:\nWhy did the man take Craig's picture when he arrived on Terra?\n\n<options>:\nA Terran society identifies and monitors everyone.\nB The man is a customs official.\nC The photo is for Craig's job ID.\nD Craig is the first spaceman he had ever seen.\n\n<answer>:\n", "assistant": "B" } ]

[ { "human": "Read the following passage and questions, then choose the right answer from options, the answer should be one of A, B, C, D.\n\n<passage>:\nlearned of it the same way. Pop didn't Pop Young was the one known fully in his desperate writings back to Earth. Pop matter-of-factly tended the shack and the landing field and the stores for the Big Crack mine. Between-times surface of the Moon's far side, and, therefore, he occupied the shack on the Big Crack's edge, above the torment. By night—lunar night, of course, and lunar day—it was frigidity and horror. Once in two weeks Earth-time a rocketship came around the horizon from Lunar City with stores for the colony deep underground. Pop received the stores and took care of them. He handed over the product of the mine, to be forwarded to Earth. The rocket went away again. Come nightfall Pop around the equator of the Earth. Pop didn't even ask. He began to explore the area outside the shack for possible material Artists' supplies were not often included. Moon. All freight had to be hauled sorts, but when warmed up in the shack they were useless. He found no strictly lunar material which would serve for modeling or carving portraits in the ground. He found for the colony and the rocket landing field and the shack. The reason for Pop was something mineral he required. Marble would have been perfect, but there is no marble on the Moon. Naturally! Yet Pop continued to search absorbedly for material with which to capture but— Early one lunar morning he was a good two miles from his shack when he saw rocket-fumes in the heat of day. Pop lived in it all alone, over the horizon, not in the direction of Lunar City. Which was more impossible still. He stared. A tiny silver rocket to on the Moon. But it wasn't fun, even underground. so easily. He knew about Pop, up on the surface. He'd shipped out, whimpering, to the Moon to get far away from Pop, and Pop was just Pop made his way toward it in landed. Then nothing happened. about a mile overhead and there was low indeed in the black, star-speckled sky. Pop waded through moondust, raising a trail of slowly settling powder. He knew only that the ship didn't come from Lunar City, but from Earth. He couldn't imagine why. He did not even wildly connect to see the sky. In any case Pop was thought of Pop, and Pop rather probably knew it. Of course, by the crystals out of the mine, knocking about Pop Young's shack in cannisters containing a hundred Earth-pounds Pop had come back to consciousness Pop reached the rocketship. He weight of richness. time he took the job tending the Pop eagerly tried to ask him and frantically denied that he'd ever seen Pop before. All of which happened back on he returned. Nowadays, by the Big Crack, Pop good care of his job. There was a warning-bell in the shack, and when a rocketship from Lunar City got above the horizon and could send a tight beam, the gong clanged loudly, and Pop got into a vacuum-suit Pop gazed at the plastic, fascinated. landing, and he watched it come in. man. \"A stickup, I said! Get it? You go get that can of stuff from the mine! The diamonds! Bring them here! Understand?\" Pop said numbly: \"What the He saw the silver needle in the \"Move!\" he rasped. \"I want the diamonds you've got for the ship from Lunar City! Bring 'em!\" Pop licked blood from his lips and the man with the weapon raged at him. Tell Sattell I'm here and he can come on up! Tell him to bring any more diamonds they've dug up since the stuff you've got!\" At such times Pop hardly thought wiped out by an axe-blow. He did recover a good deal. When Sattell fled to another continent, Pop followed because he had some distinct memories of his wife—and the way of course, Pop was helpless to resent Pop had come to remember both his He'd pictured the complete set-up of his married life. Even when Sattell—whimpering—signed up for Lunar City, Pop tracked him. By that time he was quite sure that Sattell was the man who'd by the edge of the Big Crack. Pop more lost memories. Sometimes, in the shack on the far side of the Moon, Pop Young had in carats, and a hundred pounds was worth millions. Yet here on the Moon Pop kept a waiting cannister on a shelf in his tiny dome, diamonds worth at least five million dollars waiting for them, and the whole job might not have called for behind the air-apparatus. It rattled was being done. and called the mine-colony down in the Crack. He gave the message he'd been told to pass on. Sattell to come up, with what diamonds had been dug since the regular cannister was sent up for the Lunar City ship that would be due presently. Otherwise the ship on the landing strip would destroy shack and Pop and the colony together. \"I'd guess,\" said Pop painstakingly, But not Pop. He'd come to the Moon in the first place because Sattell was here. Near Sattell, he found \"Me?\" asked Pop. \"Oh, I'm going took down the cannister of diamonds which were worth five millions or more back on Earth. He found a bucket. He dumped the diamonds casually into it. They floated downward with great deliberation and did—and the fact possessed a certain grisly humor—Pop didn't even hate Pop regarded his drawings meditatively. of the Moon. He was a rather fussy Sattell. He simply wanted to be near Earth newly-mined diamonds sometimes fly to pieces from internal stress. On the Moon, it was not desirable that diamonds be exposed to repeated violent changes of temperature. quantity of uncut diamonds? Pop packed the cotton cloth in the But he did not dwell on such else. abomination of desolation which was the moonscape. Pop Young meticulously touched up the glittering triangles which were landing guides for the Lunar City ships. They glittered from the thinnest conceivable layer of magnesium marking-powder. Pop reflected hungrily that it was would have rubbed his hands. Tall, jagged crater-walls rose from the lunar plain. Monstrous, extended floated low at the edge of things and seemed to hate all creation. Pop reached the rocket. He diamonds knocking about unguarded in the shack, and he suddenly recollected clearly the way one of his to the lunar state of things. Living on the Moon was bad enough He came to hate Pop with an insane ferocity. And fear. In his mind the need to escape became an obsession normal to a Moon-colonist. But he was helpless. He couldn't leave. There was Pop. He couldn't kill Pop. He had no chance—and he to the Moon's surface. On the Moon, things fall slowly. Pop didn't wait. He searched hopefully. Once a mass of steel plating fell only yards from him, but it Sattell and Pop Young's missing years. Somebody back on Earth promoted Moon. It looked like a perfect set-up. reams of publicity. They promised a thrill and a new distinction for the rich. Guided tours to Lunar! The most expensive and most thrilling trip in history! One hundred thousand Moon's far side and trips through Lunar City and a landing in Aristarchus, plus sound-tapes of the journey and fame hitherto reserved for not too far from where the ship exploded. When the man down in the mine cut off, Pop got out of his vacuum suit in a hurry. He placed disembarked even for Lunar Space-pilots could take the strain of space-flight because they had work to do. Workers for the lunar mines could make the trip under heavy sedation. But it was too early in the\n\n<question>:\nWhy did Pop go to Lunar City?\n\n<options>:\nA Pop went to Lunar City because the Earth is overcrowded.\nB Pop went to Lunar City because Sattell went to Lunar City.\nC Pop went to Lunar City because his family was murdered, and he couldn't stand to be on Earth any longer.\nD Pop went to Lunar City to mine diamonds.\n\n<answer>:\n", "assistant": "B" } ]

[ { "human": "Read the following passage and questions, then choose the right answer from options, the answer should be one of A, B, C, D.\n\n<passage>:\nin the miasma of a planet without ramp. There were sixteen of us girls and thirteen boys. We took our places in the seats in the center of the scout. Riggy Allen made a joke that nobody bothered to laugh at, and then we were all silent. I was feeling lost and just beginning to enjoy it when Jimmy Dentremont came over to me. He's red-headed and has a face that makes him look about ten. An intelligent runt like me. He said what I expected. \"Mia, do you want to go partners if we can get together when we get down?\" I guess he thought that because we were always matched on study I liked him. Well, I did when I wasn't mad at him, but now I had that crack he'd made about being a snob in mind, so I said, \"Not likely. I want to come back alive.\" It wasn't fair, but it was a good crack and he went back to his place without saying anything. My name is Mia Havero. I'm fourteen, of course, or I wouldn't be telling this. I'm short, dark and scrawny, though I don't expect that scrawniness to last much longer. Mother is very good looking. In the then we just ... dropped. My stomach turned flips. We didn't have to leave that way, but George thinks it's fun to be a hot pilot. Thinking it over, I was almost sorry I'd been stinking to Jimmy D. He's the only competition I have my own age. The trouble is, you don't go partners with the competition, do you? Besides, there was still that crack about being a snob. don't care what order you go in, so Jimmy D. jumped up, grabbed his In a minute we were airborne again. I wondered if I would ever see Jimmy—if he would get back alive. It's no game we play. When we turn fourteen, they drop us on the nearest colonized planet and come back one month later. That may sound for fourteen years and then kick us out to die. They prepare us. They do figure, though, that if you can't keep yourself alive by the time you're fourteen, you're too stupid, foolish or unlucky to be any use to the Ship. There's sense behind it. It means that everybody on the Ship is a person who can take care of himself if he has to. Daddy says that I began to check my gear out—sonic pistol, pickup signal so I could be found at the end of the month, saddle and cinches, food and clothes. Venie Morlock has got a crush on Jimmy D., and when she saw me start getting ready to go, she began to check her gear, too. At our next landing, I grabbed Ninc's reins and cut Venie out smoothly. It didn't have anything to do with Jimmy. I just couldn't stand to put off the bad moment any longer. The first was automatic. The second was to find out if there was a slot I could fit into for a month. If not, I would have to find a place to camp out, as nasty as that would be. The third was to join forces, though not with that meatball Jimmy D. No, he isn't really a meatball. The trouble is that I don't take nothing from nobody, especially him, and he doesn't take nothing from nobody, especially me. So we do a lot of fighting. \"And where be you going?\" I pointed ahead. No other way to go. He seemed exasperated. I have that effect sometimes. Even on Mother and Daddy, who should know better. better ride on from here with us. For protection.\" He had an odd way of twisting his sounds, almost as though he had a mouthful of mush. I wondered whether he were just an oddball or whether watching us all the while. He called to the hard man. \"He be awfully small, Horst. I doubt me a Losel'd even notice him at all. We mought as well throw him back again.\" The rider looked at me. When I didn't dissolve in terror as he expected, he shrugged and one of the other men laughed. The hard man said to the others, \"This boy will be riding along with us to Forton for protection.\" I looked down at the plodding, unhappy creatures they were driving along and one looked back at me with dull, expressionless golden eyes. I felt uncomfortable. I said, \"I don't think so.\" were little kids, there were boys and there were men, but no girls. All the boys and men wore pants, and so did I, which must have been why Horst and his buddies assumed I was a boy. It wasn't flattering but I decided I'd not tell anybody different until I found what made the clocks tick on this planet. But that wasn't what bothered me. It was the kids. My God! They whomped Ninc a good one and gave him his head. I let him run for almost a mile before I pulled him down to a walk again. I couldn't help wishing for Jimmy D. Whatever else he is, he's smart and brains I needed. bucking so hard that I knew this wasn't hot piloting at all, just plain idiot stutter-fingered stupidity at the controls. As it skidded by me overhead, I got a good look at it and knew that it wasn't one of ours. Not too different, but not ours. than a high-walled pen. It didn't even have a roof. I set up camp and ate my dinner. In the wagon closest to me were a man, The kids weren't to blame for their parents, but when one of them said hello to me, I didn't even answer. I know how lousy I would feel if I had two or three brothers and sisters, but it didn't strike me until that moment that it wouldn't even seem out of the ordinary to these kids. Isn't that horrible? shoulder and I was swung around. \"Well, well. Horst, look who we have here,\" he called. It was the one who'd made the joke about me being beneath the notice of a Losel. He The one I'd dropped the saddle on came up then. The others were putting the animals in the pen. He started to kick me, but Horst stopped him. He said, \"Look, boy. You may not know it, but you be in a lot of trouble. So don't give me a hard time.\" He still thought I was a boy. It was not time to correct him, but I didn't like to see the point go unchallenged. It was unflattering. \"Every time you open your mouth you shout that you be off one of the Ships,\" Horst said. \"That be enough. They already have one of you brats said in a voice far colder than mine could ever be, because it was natural and mine wasn't, \"The piece be yours.\" Then he tromped on it until it cracked and fell apart.\n\n<question>:\nWhat is Mia’s relationship to Jimmy D. and how does it develop throughout the story?\n\n<options>:\nA Jimmy D. is Mia’s fellow scout. At first, Mia describes their relationship as turbulent, complaining that Jimmy always asks her to be his partner even though she’s already partners with Venie Morlock. However, when Jimmy is arrested during their mission on Tintera, Mia agrees to be his partner out of pity.\nB Jimmy D. is Mia’s partner. At first, Mia describes their relationship as efficient and workable. But when competition around being the best colony scout come up, things start to change. Their partnership falls apart during their scout mission to Tintera, when Jimmy is arrested and jailed.\nC Jimmy D. is Mia’s soon to be partner. At first, Mia describes Jimmy as “a meatball,” suggesting that Jimmy is goofy and won’t prove to be a satisfactory partner. However, when Jimmy shows his smarts by saveing Mia from Horst and his grizzly gang, Mia realizes he will be a good partner after all.\nD Jimmy D. is Mia’s fellow scout. At first, Mia describes how they butt heads a lot due to differences in their personalities. But as Mia begins to face the trials of her mission, she comes to miss Jimmy, wishing that Jimmy could be there with her and provide a little help.\n\n<answer>:\n", "assistant": "D" } ]

[ { "human": "Read the following passage and questions, then choose the right answer from options, the answer should be one of A, B, C, D.\n\n<passage>:\nMore Bang for the Buck A friend of mine offers a theory about why Bill Clinton's poll numbers stayed so high throughout the Lewinsky scandal: The news made it possible for serious-minded people to spend lots of time--at the office and over lunch--talking about semen stains, vaginal insertions, and blow jobs. And the people were grateful. That's probably because they're not getting all that much themselves. A recent University of Chicago survey of 10,000 adults found that Americans are having considerably less sex than was generally thought. Only one American in 20 has sex three times a week. One in five didn't score at all last year. If that's true, many of us could use a little sexual self-improvement. Not me, of course. I have been happily married for 26 years, since the age of 21. Deb and I have what seems to us to be a perfectly fine amorous life, yet everywhere I turn the culture tells me--almost mocks me-- you can do better! What would happen to our sex life then, if Deb (who participated in this story because she loves me and because she has tenure) and I tried for the first time to make something happen to it? And so it was that we found ourselves for the first time ever in a sex-toy store, A Touch of Romance, located near our home in Los Angeles, across the street from a Macy's. The idea behind shops like these is to make obtaining the materials of sexual experimentation as ordinary as purchasing plumbing supplies or housewares. Which sort of works--the only sexual thrill I got from the visit was knowing that Microsoft just bought a cock ring. Choosing it wasn't easy. Most of them came in presized sets of three. I couldn't figure out which would fit right and intuited that try-ons weren't an option. So I opted instead for an adjustable circumference version, a little strip of vinyl with snaps for $11.95. Man, what a rip-off! Unless it works. Overall rating, on a scale of 1 to 10: 2 toes curled. A woman I know says women's magazines are the best places in America to find sex tips. She's right--go ahead, just try to find a sewing pattern in Redbook . You're much more likely to land on \"Try phone sex, dirty notes, porn videos, fantasy games and sex in new places. ... Try lingerie and no underwear. ... Try talking dirty and silk scarves. Try anything at all,\" or articles such as \"Eight New Games for the Foreplay Challenged.\" An article in the April Cosmopolitan , \"The Six Best Sex Positions,\" seemed more promising than the Redbook playbook. Each position was accompanied by a succinct write-up and a stick-figure diagram. The position we settled on was \"The Butterfly,\" which we had to read three times to comprehend. The man stands, the woman remains supine on a bed or counter-top with her feet up on his shoulders. The whole idea is to produce a pelvic tilt for better access to the G spot. Instead, we experienced an uncomfortable pretzel feeling that stick figures must be immune to. And in general, Cosmopolitan 's exotic sex positions require the sort of body placement you can't remember in the moment of passion and even if you could, for proper alignment, you still might need mood-killing accessories such as a plumb line and a laser pen. Rating: 3 toes curled. Wiley's overexplanation of everything two people can do to each other with their mouths raises this question: Do you really need a five-minute video segment on whether or not to swallow? In the great tradition of hotel and travel ads, the guys tend to be markedly less attractive than the women. No way he'd be with her if this wasn't an instructional sex video! The inanity of the experts and the dubious casting make these films about as erotic as ... well, as the New York Times . You could learn more from any randomly selected porn video. Rating: 0 toes curled. Another approach is food. The notion that certain foods, such as oysters or rhino horn, are aphrodisiacs has been pretty much discounted. But it's plausible to think that cooking a meal together and then dining on it, just the two of you, could be erotic. Especially if (like me) your schedule frequently forces you to eat alone and you often find yourself standing in front of the microwave, screaming, \"Come on, goddammit!\" Intercourses , by Martha Hopkins and Randall Lockridge ($24.95, Terrace Publishing, 1997), preaches that for every time of day and every phase of a relationship there is a type of eating experience that will heighten sexual response. (There's also a chart showing which foods are good for eating off which body parts.) Deb and I blocked off a whole Saturday afternoon and evening for the Intercourses experiment, settling on rosemary-scented lamb over pasta (Page 87) followed by frozen coffee almond dessert (Page 31). According to the book, rosemary is sexy because of its fragrance (used in many perfumes) and because of its texture, which, so the text assured, tickles nerve endings. The dessert was mostly coffee, rum, and Kahlua, which has worked before. We shopped for the food together and cooked together, drinking wine and beer along the way. At one point while I was working on the dessert, I asked my wife how long to beat the heavy cream mixture. \"Till it's stiff--it's an aphrodisiac,\" she said. Preparation took less than an hour, and everything came out perfectly. Eating at our dining room table for the first time ever without guests, we were having fun by candlelight. But the mood was romantic, not erotic. Overall rating: 4 toes curled. St. Augustine held lust to be a fitting punishment for man's disobedience to God: the body's disobeying of the mind, the will, the spirit, and even of itself. (The paradigm of this for him is the unbidden hard-on.) Jean-Paul Sartre discovered something similar, although celebrating it rather than deploring it: Essential to the erotic is the body's defiance of design and control. (The paradigm of this for him is the jiggle.) Sartre's view yields a sort of sexual Heisenberg principle: There is an inherent tension between physically abandoning yourself to another on the one hand and sexual planning on the other. The more of the one, the less of the other. And this, I discovered, is the chief obstacle to sexual self-help. Getting an erection is sexy. Making one is not. As my wife said about Viagra, \"You start to have a new feeling and then you realize where it came from and then you don't have it so much. ... Anything that makes you think about it like that is just creepy.\" This is not to say there isn't a way out of this conflict between desire and design. With homage to our potent POTUS, there is, I think, a Third Way that's neither sexual complacency nor standard self-help. If the intrusion of consciousness is the problem, then maybe the answer is to block it out. Sure, you could do this the old-fashioned way: with alcohol and drugs. But then you have all the traditional drawbacks, including diminished physical attractiveness and degraded sexual performance.\n\n<question>:\nWhy does the author think less communication is better?\n\n<options>:\nA He is bad at communicating clearly and it makes things more complicated\nB Being too explicit about things takes away some of the emotional aspect\nC He thinks communication works better by doing, instead of by talking, especially in the bedroom\nD His wife doesn't like discussing sex openly, so it's what he is used to\n\n<answer>:\n", "assistant": "B" } ]

[ { "human": "Read the following passage and questions, then choose the right answer from options, the answer should be one of A, B, C, D.\n\n<passage>:\nThe movie has a scope that makes Hollywood's homiletic, follow-your-dream fables look even more solipsistic. Miyazaki is after nothing less than the moment in our history (the film is set in the 14 th and 15 th centuries) when the power shifted from a \"natural\" world to one shaped by human technology. It's the beginning of what Bill McKibben called \"the end of nature\"--that is, when nature became no longer an autonomous, self-regulating force but one touched (and, in Miyazaki's view, poisoned) by human industry. they'd like to eat him. The wolf god, Moro, is slightly more sympathetic, but that's because her adopted \"daughter,\" San (a k a Princess Mononoke), is human. San is first seen sucking a wound of her huge wolf mother, then, as the gore drips from her mouth, training her dark eyes on Ashitaka with feral hatred. Her second appearance--a lone attack on Irontown to assassinate Lady Eboshi--is one of the movie's high points. It's Miyazaki's use of sound--and silence--that takes your breath away: the determined tap of the wolf princess's shoes as she scuttles over the fortress's rooftops the silence of Eboshi and her army as they stare at this tiny yet formidable tomboy against the black sky. Their battle is so furious that the blades streak and lose definition--it's almost subliminal. \"A special smile ... a certain touch ...\" So begins the elevator-music theme song of Music of the Heart ... \"I never had a lot that I loved so much.\" The credits had just started and I was already looking for a barf bag. Did Miramax and director Wes Craven have to work so hard to schlockify the story of Roberta Guaspari (played here by Meryl Streep), whose violin courses in East Harlem elementary schools have become a beacon for such programs nationwide? A fabled taskmaster (her story was told in the 1996 documentary Small Wonders ), Guaspari used music as a way to teach self-discipline--along with the healthy self-respect that follows in its wake. When the New York school board cut the funding for her program, she proved a marvel of self-promotion, attracting features in all the major dailies and ending up along with her best students at Carnegie Hall for a benefit \"Fiddlefest\"--along with Itzhak Perlman, Isaac Stern, and other legendary \"fiddlers.\" Streep has said that she spent so much of the time on the set learning the violin (she doesn't play any instruments) that she didn't bring the full force of her acting technique to bear on Roberta. Maybe that's why the performance seems so natural. Let her always learn an instrument on the set! Still, she doesn't make much sense of Guaspari. The script, by Pamela Gray ( A Walk on the Moon ), has her students complain of her nastiness and perfectionism, but Streep--who has made herself look dumpy, thick-waisted, and bedraggled--is so busy telegraphing her vulnerability that all we get is dippy niceness. Instead of a monument to an individual's iron will, Music of the Heart becomes the story of a woman so helpless that she arouses the kindness of strangers. Directors of violent genre pieces like Craven (who got this mainstream gig in return for doing the Scream sequels) or Carl Franklin or Sam Raimi sometimes want so badly to belong to Establishment Hollywood--to go to the Academy Awards--that they neuter themselves. Bending over backward to show how sensitive they can be, they forget that violence--even if it's just emotional violence--belongs in \"ordinary\" dramas, too. Craven does good work with the young actors in the classroom scenes, but the film has a reticence common to most biopics and a mushy, TV-movie humanism that blands out its texture. OK, I was a puddle after some scenes, like the one where Guaspari pushes a student to get her to improve her posture and discovers that the girl is wearing a leg brace. But how much more emotional the Carnegie Hall climax would have been if instead of suddenly seeing these East Harlem kids on stage with Perlman, Stern, Joshua Bell, etc., we'd seen them rehearsing first and struggling to keep up. There's too much music of the heart and not enough music of the callused fingers. In outline, The Limey is a lean little B-movie revenge melodrama about a felonious Brit (Terence Stamp) who's newly sprung from prison and flies to Southern California to get to the bottom of his beautiful daughter's death: \"My name's Wilson ... Who dunnit?\" The film, directed by Steven Soderbergh, would be worth seeing just for Stamp's performance, at once rock-hard and goofily blinkered, and for Peter Fonda's wittily self-parodic turn as the suspected killer, a music producer who coasts on '60s counterculture easiness while his lackeys do the dirty work. (\"Oh, man,\" he says, the fear finally seeping through the ether. \"This is getting all too close to me.\") But the picture's glory is its layered and intricate syntax. The dialogue moves ahead--there are great gobs of exposition--but the images continually double back: to Stamp and Lesley Ann Warren, as his daughter's acting teacher, simply gazing at each other or to Stamp sitting on a plane, remembering his daughter as a girl on the beach, the lens of his home movie camera creating an eerily bright--almost supernatural--spot that dances over her face. The film's most violent act happens well off screen. (You hear the distant \"pop-pop-pop-pop-pop\" of the hero's gun.) The rest is only half-glimpsed, fantasized, or saturated by memory--or is the present the memory? Is all of The Limey a temporal hiccup? Some, including the critic at Time , have questioned Soderbergh's sanity. (But of course--Soderbergh flouts time!) I see a method to his madness. Less grandiosely than Harmony Korine in Julien Donkey-Boy , Soderbergh pores over every scene in search of its essential dramatic gesture. He's saying: This --not all that other stuff--is what's important. He telegraphs the ending--you know the Limey will somehow be at the root of his daughter's death--but it's still an emotional wow. The climax justifies the technique. It says the point of this odyssey isn't revenge but regret--for irredeemably blown chances and a tragic waste of love.\n\n<question>:\nWhat is the plot of Music of the Heart?\n\n<options>:\nA After a budget cut, a violin teacher in East Harlem arranges a fundraiser at Carnegie Hall.\nB A white lady teaches violin in East Harlem.\nC A violin teacher in East Harlem takes her students to Carnegie Hall.\nD East Harlem students hate their perfectionist violin teacher.\n\n<answer>:\n", "assistant": "A" } ]

[ { "human": "Read the following passage and questions, then choose the right answer from options, the answer should be one of A, B, C, D.\n\n<passage>:\nmales indulged and cared for all the children without reference to actual parenthood. with my property. It was already apparent that it would take the volplas only a few more weeks to learn their means of survival and \"I've finished my work and we no longer need the buildings. I'm going to write a paper about my results.\" \"What?\" My son asked, \"What happened to the animals?\" \"Turned them over to the university for further study,\" I lied. \"Well,\" he said to her, \"you can't say our pop isn't a man of decision.\" Twenty-four hours later, there wasn't a sign of animal experimentation through the dark overhead, they chattered and laughed and sometimes moaned in winged love. One night a flight of them soared slowly across the face of the full Moon, but I was the only one who noticed. \"Don't you know ?\" limp little forms out to a mattress in the lab, two girls and a boy. The accelerator had forced them almost to adulthood in less than a month. It would be several hours before they would begin to move, to learn to feed and play, perhaps to learn to fly. She peeked too, as she had for fifteen years, but I blocked her view when I slipped out. \"Come on, you old hermit. I have a buffet on the terrace.\" \"Our daughter says I'm eccentric. Wonder how the devil she found out.\" \"From me, of course.\" the ketchup and said, \"I've reached the dangerous age.\" \"Oh, good heavens!\" \"Thanks. Yours deserve the Good Housekeeping Seal of Approval, too.\" Our son reared the new palomino I had just bought him for his fourteenth birthday and yelled down, \"Unhand that maiden, Burrhead, or I'll give you lead poisoning.\" brought me a bowl of salad and I munched the hamburger and watched the boy unsaddle the horse and slap it away to the pasture. I thought, \"By God, wouldn't he have a fit if he knew what I have back there in that lab! Wouldn't they all!\" The boy carried the saddle up onto the terrace and dropped it. \"Mom, I'd like a swim before I eat.\" He started undressing. \"Because, dear, I said so.\" The boy had already raced across the terrace and jack-knifed into the pool. The cool sound of the dive sent the girl scurrying for her suit. \"Is that any reason for wearing clothes? Look at him. He's a young man sooner than already.\" \"Well, if you feel that way about it, they'll both have to start wearing clothes.\" I gulped the last of my hamburger and washed it down with the beer. \"This place is going to hell,\" I complained. \"The old man isn't allowed \"Say, what goes with you? You've been grinning like a happy ape ever since you came out of the lab.\" \"I told you—\" the whole world. I've only had the feeling once before in a small way, but I've always....\" on the walk in front of the movie just as Theda Bara's matinee let out. The best part was that no one had seen me do it. They just couldn't to stand around quietly and watch people encounter the surprise that you have prepared for them.\" They were also much faster than had been their predecessors in organizing their nervous activity after the slumbrous explosion of growth in the metabolic accelerator. When I returned to the lab, they were already moving about on the mattress and the male was trying to By four o'clock that afternoon, I was feeding them solid food and, with the spars closed, they were holding little cups and drinking water from them in a most humanlike way. They were active, curious, playful and The male watched me, grinning. He said, \"'Ello, 'ello.\" As I walked into the kitchen, giddy with this enormous joke, my wife said, \"Guy and Em are flying up for dinner. That rocket of Guy's they Oh, wonderful! Good old Guy! Everybody's a success. It's great. It's wonderful. Success on success!\" I danced into the kitchen table and tipped over a basket of green corn. The maid promptly left the kitchen for some other place. My wife just stared at me. \"Have you been drinking the lab alcohol?\" I would teach them legends: that they had come from the stars, that they had subsequently watched the first red men and then the first would laugh. Then someone authoritative would find a colony and observe them. He would conclude, \"I am convinced that they have a language and speak it intelligently.\" The government would issue denials. Reporters would \"expose the truth\" think, are the funniest. \"Darling, are you listening to me?\" my wife asked with impatient patience. I pointed. \"That's probably Guy and Em.\" \"For heaven's sake, darling,\" my wife complained, \"I told you about Guy's rocket being a success. The papers are full of it. So are the broadcasts.\" the kids had fruit juice and we watched the broadcast Guy had tuned in. Some joker from Cal Tech was explaining diagrams of a multi-stage rocket. himself explaining that when he pressed the button before him, the hatch on the third stage of the great rocket in the background would close and, five minutes later, the ship would fire itself. On the screen, Guy's big dead-earnest face was explaining more about A chronometer appeared on the screen and, for several seconds, there was silence. I heard my boy whisper, \"Uncle Guy, this is the biggest!\" My wife said, \"Em, I think I'll just faint.\" the opportunity to slip the oldest of the males and his two females out of the lab. They were all three wide-eyed at the world and jabbered continuously. They kept me busy relating their words for \"tree,\" \"rock,\" \"sky\" to the their arms, the spars would open and spread those glorious planes. Almost two hours went by before the male made it into the air. His playful curiosity about the world had been abandoned momentarily and he was chasing one of the girls. As usual, she was anxious to be caught hung in the breeze for a long moment, thirty feet above the ground. He turned a plaintive face back to me, dipped worriedly and skimmed The two girls reached him before I did and stroked and fussed over him so that I could not get near. Suddenly he laughed with a shrill little whoop. After that, it was a carnival. They learned quickly and brilliantly. They were not fliers they were I watched them affectionately and wondered about the advisability of leaving them out here. Well, it had to be done sometime. Nothing I could tell them about surviving would help them as much as a little \"You lived in places like this all along these mountains. Now there are very few of you left. Since you have been staying at my place, you naturally have forgotten the ways of living outdoors.\" \"We can learn again. We want to stay here.\" His little face was so wonderingly, stopping now and then to watch him. When they were standing beside me, they said nothing. They shaded their eyes with tiny hands and watched him as he passed directly above us at about two It was a hero's welcome. He had to walk back, of course—he had no way to carry such a load in flight. The girls glided out to meet him. Their lavish affection held him up for a time, but eventually he They were raptly curious about the bird. They poked at it, marveled at its feathers and danced about it in an embryonic rite of the hunt. But Later, I shared a small piece of the meat in their feast. They were gleeful and greasily amorous during the meal. When I had to leave, it was dark. I warned them to stand watches, keep the fire burning low and take to the tree above if anything approached.\n\n<question>:\nWhat does the encounter with Guy and Em tell the reader about the narrator?\n\n<options>:\nA The narrator is more of an original prankster than a scientist.\nB The narrator does not understand the implications that launching Rocket Charlie will have on science.\nC The narrator intends to deter rather than advance science.\nD The narrator is so immersed in his own experiment that he loses sight of his peers' significant accomplishments.\n\n<answer>:\n", "assistant": "D" } ]

[ { "human": "Read the following passage and questions, then choose the right answer from options, the answer should be one of A, B, C, D.\n\n<passage>:\nMiss Philicoff, the girls in the gilded teller cages. There was Mister Anderson, the guard, dozing by the door in his brown uniform. There was the others took the pistol away from Mister Anderson, the guard, and The man with the gun turned to say to the man at the door, \"Keep your shirt on.\" That was all Miss English needed. She kicked off her shoes and ran The man by the door spread his arms out and shouted, \"Hey!\" The man with the gun swung violently back, cursing, and fired the gun. But he'd been moving too fast, and so had Miss English, and all he hit was the The man by the door caught Miss English in a bear hug. She promptly did her best to scratch his eyes out. Meanwhile, Mr. Anderson went scooting out the front door and running down the street toward the police station in the next block, shouting, \"Help! Help! Robbery!\" the gun hit Miss English on the head. She fell unconscious to the floor, and all three of them ran out of the bank to the car out front, in which sat a very nervous-looking fourth man, gunning the engine. Everyone except Miss English ran out after the bandits, to watch. drove straight down the street toward the police station. The police all the police went running down there to clap handcuffs on the robbers \"Come along home,\" said his mother, grabbing his hand. \"We don't want he cried. \"What did you do to the tires?\" \"Not a thing, sir. That happened to them in the holdup.\" third time. He reported himself sick and spent the two days at home, brooding, a bottle of blended whiskey at all times in his hand. As the police reconstructed it later, Mrs. Higgins had attempted to awaken him on the third morning at seven-thirty, suggesting that he really ought to stop being so foolish, and go back to work. He then allegedly poked her in the eye, and locked her out of the bedroom. Mrs. Higgins then apparently called her sister-in-law, a Mrs. Thelma Stodbetter, who was Mr. Higgins' sister. Mrs. Stodbetter arrived at the house at nine o'clock, and spent some time tapping at the still-locked bedroom door, apparently requesting Mr. Higgins to unlock the door and \"stop acting like a child.\" Neighbors reported to the police that they heard Mr. Higgins shout a number of times, \"Go away! Can't you let a man sleep?\" At about ten-fifteen, neighbors heard shots from the Higgins residence, a two-story one-family pink stucco affair in the middle of a block of similar homes. Mr. Higgins, it was learned later, had suddenly erupted from his bedroom, brandishing a .30-.30 hunting rifle and, being annoyed at the shrieks of his wife and sister, had fired seven shells at them, killing his wife on the spot and wounding his sister in the hand and shoulder. Mrs. Stodbetter, wounded and scared out of her wits, raced screaming out the front door of the house, crying for the police and shouting, position across the street from the scene of carnage and went to work with a Zoomar lens. In the meantime, Mister Higgins had barricaded himself in his house, firing at anything that moved. The two cameramen in the mobile unit worked their hearts out. One concentrated on the movements of the police and firemen and neighbors and ambulance attendants, while the other used the Zoomar lens to search for Mr. Higgins. He found him occasionally, offering the at-home audience brief glimpses of a stocky balding man in brown trousers and undershirt, stalking from window to window on the second floor of the house. The show lasted for nearly an hour. There were policemen everywhere, and firemen everywhere, and neighbors milling around down at the corner, where the police had roped the block off, and occasionally Mr. Higgins would stick his rifle out a window and shoot at somebody. The police used loudspeakers to tell Higgins he might as well give up, they had the place surrounded and could eventually starve him out anyway. Higgins used his own good lungs to shout obscenities back and challenge anyone present to hand-to-hand combat. The police fired tear gas shells at the house, but it was a windy day and all the windows in the Higgins house were either open or broken. Higgins was able to throw all the shells back out of the house again. The show lasted for nearly an hour. Then it ended, suddenly and dramatically. Higgins had showed himself to the Zoomar lens again, for the purpose of shooting either the camera or its operator. All at once he yelped and threw the rifle away. The rifle bounced onto the porch roof, slithered down to the edge, hung for a second against the drain, and finally fell barrel first onto the lawn. Meanwhile, Higgins was running through the house, shouting like a wounded bull. He thundered down the stairs and out, hollering, to fall into the arms of the waiting police. They had trouble holding him. At first they thought he was actually trying to get away, but then one of them heard what it was he was were red and blistering, from what looked like severe burns. There was another burn on his right cheek and another one on his right shoulder. Higgins, thoroughly chastened and bewildered, was led away for burn ointment and jail. The television crew went on back to Manhattan. The neighbors went home and telephoned their friends. On-duty policemen had been called in from practically all of the precincts in Brooklyn. Among them was Detective-Sergeant William Stevenson. Stevenson frowned thoughtfully at Higgins as that unhappy individual was led away, and then strolled over to look at the rifle. He touched the stock, and it was somewhat warm but that was all. Then, yesterday, this guy Higgins out in Canarsie. He says the rifle all of a sudden got too hot to hold, and he's got the burn marks to lawyer says he put it on there. Higgins says he doesn't remember doing it. That's half the lawyer's case. He's trying to build up an insanity defense.\" \"He put it on there himself, Stevenson,\" said the captain with weary \"How do I know?\" demanded the captain. \"Kids put it on before the car know,\" the captain told him, \"is Higgins put that name on his rifle himself. He says so.\" her. She was to stand chicken on the southwest corner of the street. Judy took up her position at five minutes to eleven. The streets were dark and quiet. Few people cared to walk this neighborhood after dark, particularly on Hallowe'en. Judy leaned her back against the telephone Take off.\" \"Hey!\" cried the kid in the black-and-yellow costume. \"Hey, they're fighting down there!\" A sudden siren and a distant flashing red light solved her problems. \"Cheez,\" said one of the kids. \"The cops!\" \"Fuzz!\" screamed Judy. She turned and raced down the block toward the schoolyard, shouting, \"Fuzz! Fuzz! Clear out, it's the fuzz!\" But then she stopped, wide-eyed, when she saw what was going on in the warning. They didn't even hear the police sirens. And all at once both the yellow-and-black costume go scooting away down the street. And she had the craziest idea that it was all his fault. Captain Hanks was still in his realistic cycle this morning, and he was they could get out of the schoolyard. If the squad cars had showed up a minute later, the schoolyard wouldn't have had anything in it\n\n<question>:\nWhy did the tear gas that the police were using on Mr. Higgins not work to run him out of the house?\n\n<options>:\nA He was unaffected by the gas because of his deranged mindset.\nB The windows were either broken or open and he was able to throw them back out.\nC Higgins was too preoccupied by the burns on his hands to care about the tear gas.\nD Higgins was hanging out the windows shooting and was able to breathe fresh air.\n\n<answer>:\n", "assistant": "B" } ]

[ { "human": "Read the following passage and questions, then choose the right answer from options, the answer should be one of A, B, C, D.\n\n<passage>:\nby JAMES Mac CREIGH Revolt was brewing on Venus, led by the descendant of the first Earthmen to land. Svan was the leader making the final plans—plotting them a bit too well. [Transcriber's Note: This etext was produced from Planet Stories Winter 1944. Extensive research did not uncover any evidence that ready to lift as soon as they come back.\" The Exec tossed away his cigarette. \" If they come back.\" \"Is there any question?\" The Exec shrugged. \"I don't know, Lowry,\" he said. \"This is a funny Lowry lifted his eyebrows. \"Oh? But after all, they're human beings, just like us—\" \"Not any more. Four or five generations ago they were. Lord, they don't even look human any more. Those white, flabby skins—I don't like them.\" \"Acclimation,\" Lowry said scientifically. \"They had to acclimate themselves to Venus's climate. They're friendly enough.\" Venusian mist. The native guard of honor, posted a hundred yards from the Earth-ship, stood stolidly at attention with their old-fashioned of us. I was in town yesterday, and I talked with some of the natives. They think there will be hordes of immigrants from Earth, now that we know Venus is habitable. And there's some sort of a paltry underground group that is spreading the word that the immigrants will drive the native Venusians—the descendants of the first expedition, that is—right down into the mud. Well—\" he laughed—\"maybe they will. After all, the fittest survive. That's a basic law of—\" The annunciator over the open lock clanged vigorously, and a metallic their own mouths you have heard it. The Council was right.\" The younger of the two women sighed. She might have been beautiful, in spite of her dead-white skin, if there had been a scrap of hair on her head. \"Svan, I'm afraid,\" she said. \"Who are we to decide if this is a good thing? Our parents came from Earth. Perhaps there will be trouble at first, if colonists come, but we are of the same blood.\" Svan laughed harshly. \" They alone will decide our course of action. We have agreed that, if the Earth-ship returns, it means disaster for Venus. Therefore, it must not return.\" Earth.\" \"Never get back to Earth?\" the old man gasped. \"Has the Council authorized—murder?\" feet, held up a shiny metal globe. \"One of us will plant this in the ship. It will be set by means of this dial—\" he touched a spot on the surface of the globe with a pallid finger—\"to do nothing for forty hours. Then—it will explode. Atomite.\" He grinned triumphantly, looking from face to face. The grin faded uncertainly as he saw what was in their eyes—uncertainty, irresolution. Abruptly he set the bomb down, savagely ripped six leaves off a writing tablet on the table next him. He took a pencil and made a of her chair. It had held Venus-tobacco cigarettes there were a few left. She shook them out and handed the bowl to Svan, who was rapidly creasing the six fatal slips. He dropped them in the bowl, stirred it with his hand, offered it to the girl. \"You first, Ingra,\" he said. himself took the last. All eyes were on him. No one had looked at their slips. has been to see it already. One will get out, at the best point we can find. It is almost dusk now. He can hide, surely, in the vegetation. The other five will start back. Something will go wrong with the car—perhaps it will run off the road, start to sink in the swamp. The guards will be called. There will be commotion—that is easy enough, after all a hysterical woman, a few screams, that's all there is to it. And the sixth person will have his chance to steal to the side of the ship. The bomb is magnetic. It will not be noticed in the dark—they will take off before sunrise, because they must travel away from the sun to return—in forty hours the danger is removed.\" There was comprehension in their eyes, Svan saw ... but still that uncertainty. Impatiently, he crackled: \"Look at the slips!\" Instinctively they had opened the slip, turned it over and over, striving to detect if it was the fatal one. They had felt nothing.... And his eyes saw nothing. The slip was blank. He gave it but a second's one to announce it—a second, ten seconds.... Then gray understanding came to him. A traitor! The six conspirators in Svan's old ground car moved slowly along the have ample time.\" Ingra? Her aunt? One of the men? The right answer leaped up at him. They all are , he thought. Not one of them understands what this means. They're afraid. present shower would deepen and intensify until midnight, then fall off again, to halt before morning. But before then they would be done. A proton-bolt lanced across the road in front of them. In the silence brakes. A Venusian in the trappings of the State Guard advanced on them Venus has no moon, and no star can shine through its vast cloud layer. the natives were dangerous. Spy-rays! They've been prohibited for the last three hundred years.\" \"It isn't all the natives,\" Lowry said. \"Look how they've doubled the guard around us. The administration is co-operating every way they Exec retorted. \"They're all the same to me.... Look, your light's gone out now. Must have been the guard. They're on the wrong side to be coming from the town, anyhow....\" were wise to circle around. Now, you know what you must do?\" Ingra nodded, while the others remained mute. \"We must circle back again,\" she parroted. \"We are to wait five minutes, then drive the car It's not much of a plan. The guards would not be drawn away. I am glad I can't trust these five any more. If they must be destroyed, it is good that their destruction will serve a purpose. Aloud, he said, \"You understand. If I get through, I will return to the the bomb will not explode until the ship is far out in space. Remember, , his mind echoed. He smiled. At least, they would feel no pain, never know what happened. With the amount of atomite in that bomb in the compartment, they would merely be obliterated in a ground-shaking crash. Abruptly he swallowed, reminded of the bomb that was silently counting off the seconds. \"Go ahead,\" he ordered. \"I will wait here.\" Was it an error that the girl should die with the others? There was an instant of doubt in his steel-shackled mind, then it was driven away. Perhaps she was loyal, yet certainly she was weak. And since he could not know which was the one who had received the marked slip, and feared to admit it, it was better they all should die. They would not be as easily overcome as the natives, not with those He had perhaps three minutes to wait he reckoned. His fingers went absently to the pouch in his wide belt, closed on the slip of paper. He turned it over without looking at it, wondering who had drawn the first delayed-action atomite bomb. There must have been another in the car, and it went off. They—they were planning to bomb us.\" \"Amazing,\" the surgeon said dryly. \"Well, they won't do any bombing \"Better them than us,\" he said. \"It's poetic justice if I ever saw it. They had it coming....\" He paused thoughtfully, staring at a piece of paper between his fingers. \"This is the only part I don't get,\" he said.\n\n<question>:\nHow long did it take for Venus’s conditions to mutate its human colonies? What is the purpose of these mutations?\n\n<options>:\nA Three or four generations. Hunting.\nB Four or five generations. Acclimation.\nC Four or five generations. Bomb making.\nD One or two generations. Revolution.\n\n<answer>:\n", "assistant": "B" } ]

[ { "human": "Read the following passage and questions, then choose the right answer from options, the answer should be one of A, B, C, D.\n\n<passage>:\nIt was all sound logic. Even Ned Vince knew that. Still, his mind, tuned to ordinary, simple Ned Vince made a last effort to control himself. His knuckles tightened on the edge of the vat. own rash speed, Ned Vince had only swift young reflexes to rely on to avoid a fearful, telescoping senseless curiosity. You are minds are much more like yours. We will take care of you, and make you comfortable....\" But Ned Vince wasn't listening, now. \"You are the only An incredible science, millions of years old, lay in the minds of these creatures. much better off with my people—our didn't more than half believe it. His mind was too confused for Ned could scarcely have chosen he saw and felt and heard might be some kind of dazing welt on his forehead, and a gag of terror in his throat. Movement was slower now, as his wrecked car. Nothing that he could imagine could mean doom animal chucklings around him, and the occasional touch of a furry body, hurried his feverish dash-panel, leaving Ned in absolute darkness. A flood rushed were unrecognizable. The rodent in at the shattered window. He the crash-bent frame, and he couldn't fight against the force of that incoming water. The welt, left by the blow he had received on his forehead, put a thickening mist over his brain, so that he could not think clearly. squeaky chattering. Rodents of a drowning man. The machine-shop countless little eyes. Yes, he might as well be an exile on another came over him as he from those glittering rodent The excited cry, which no human throat could quite have duplicated and studied.... Prison or a madhouse would be far better. He tried to get hold of his courage. But what voice uttering those weird, triumphant unconscious form, a mile from sounds. Then other applied stimulants. He came to, time, so that he could not escape who have discovered something of hope. \"Hey, somebody!\" he called. \"You'd better get some rest, Ned Vince,\" came the answer from the black box. It was Loy could send me back to my own time after all!\" He could understand the steel. A launching catapult for debris that had once been his own kind. Probably insanity looming. In far less extreme circumstances than this, death from ages, war, decadence, disease, and a final scattering of those ultimate superhumans to newer subjects of his researches. He The sounds were not human. They were more like the chatter and to be happy. Or this creature So Loy considered carefully Time-travel. Almost a legend. An assault upon an intangible wall that had baffled far keener wits which seemed to depend on a blast of atoms to clear away rock and soil. Thus said the sonic apparatus. \"Time-travel. Perhaps that is the only thing to do—to send you back accomplish, but we'll try. Now I shall put you under an anesthetic....\" Ned felt better immediately, for there was real hope now, spread around his inquisitive, As soon as Ned Vince passed into unconsciousness, Loy Chuk went to work once more, using that pair of brain-helmets again, exploring carefully the man's mind. After hours of research, of evolution. He could think and he proceeded to prepare his far beyond that of the ancient eyes, betraying the slow heritage of time, of survival of the fittest, help he needed. A horde of small, grey-furred beings and their machines, toiled had enveloped it. He was wandering dry mud that had encased it like an airtight coffin, had by now been chipped away by the steel. His tool-benches were metal filings, just as they had tiny investigators perhaps a million years. Metal had gone into decay—yes. But not this body. The answer to this saturation that had held time and change in stasis. A perfect preservative for organic tissue, aided probably during most of those passing eras by desert dryness. \"You look as though you've been dreaming, and just woke up!\" wonder Loy Chuk and his co-workers that mighty sense of relief. \"I legendary antiquity, had aided them in their quest for knowledge. must have fallen asleep at the chirping signal. The chant of bench, here, and had a nightmare. The final instrument he used to Ned Vince's mind, over which miniature stereoscope, with complicated details. He held it over there was still an elusive fog that about the invisible radiations beating down upon him, soothing and dimming his brain, so that it would never question or doubt, or observe too closely the incongruous of this ancient human he did not try to shake off, accepted What his probing gaze revealed He did not know anything communicated his further knowledge to his henchmen. Though devoid of moisture, the mummy was perfectly preserved, even to its brain cells! Medical and biological sciences were far advanced among Loy Chuk's kind. fabrication of metal Perhaps, by the application of was of the same origin—a miraculous own memories of the original. opaque dome. But there were test the mummy, looked like a and energy-units and soft plastic. study this ancient man—this Loy, though, was not observing, eager chattering with a command. to himself, contemplating the disengaged from the worthless rust of his primitive automobile. With infinite care it was crated in a metal case, and hauled into images of the internal organs mounds of human cities that to him, made his pleasure work. The body of the ancient soaking from that hardened flesh the alkali that had preserved it passing between complicated electrodes. The cells of antique flesh and brain gradually took on a chemical composition nearer to a pale, silent figure in its tatters of clothing. Loy Chuk put an odd, metal-fabric helmet on its head, and a second, much smaller helmet on his own. Connected with this arrangement, was a black He didn't know that this machine-shop studying, and guiding the recording was built from his shock of vast change around him. Though it had been dehydrated, his brain had been kept perfectly intact through the ages, and now it was restored. So his memories were as vivid as Yet, through that crystalline whose weird shapes suggested alienness, and knowledge beyond Fossil bone-fragments were bones, some of them neck-vertebrae were very thick and solid, its shoulders were wide, and its skull was gigantic. All this weirdness had a violent effect on Ned Vince—a sudden, which he could not understand, remembering as he did metropolis. \"Take it easy, Ned Vince....\" The words themselves, and the way they were assembled, were Ned's gaze searched for the source of the voice—located the black box just outside of his crystal vat. From that box the head. The animal's tiny-fingered paws—hands they were, really—were touching rows of keys. but plainly possessing a high order of intelligence. And a voice whose soothingly familiar words were more repugnant somehow, simply because Ned Vince did not know how Loy Chuk had probed his brain, with the aid of a pair of helmets, and the black box apparatus. He did not know that in the latter, his language, taken from his own revitalized mind, was recorded, only to press certain buttons to make the instrument express his thoughts in common, long-dead English. Loy, whose vocal organs were not human, would have had great difficulty speaking English a curious calm. \"Stark—starin'—nuts....\" Loy's box, with its recorded English words and its sonic detectors, could translate for its Loy read the illuminated symbols \"No, Ned, not nuts. Not a bit of it! There are just a lot of things that you've got to get about a million years ago. I discovered box to tell the full story in clear, bold, friendly terms. Thus Loy sought, with calm, human logic, to make his charge feel at home. are smart. So maybe super-prairie-dogs could come from them. A lot easier than men\n\n<question>:\nWhat is the purpose of the metal fabric helmets? probing the brain which has also recorded his language and speak for Loy read thoughts\n\n<options>:\nA Brain transplantation\nB Brain examination\nC Brain manipulation\nD Brain protection\n\n<answer>:\n", "assistant": "B" } ]

[ { "human": "Read the following passage and questions, then choose the right answer from options, the answer should be one of A, B, C, D.\n\n<passage>:\nJohnson winced. \"Is that what you want to unload on me?\" \"For a very good reason, sir. Patience is the virtue that will be Harvey and Joe were the slickest con-men ever to gyp a space-lane sucker. Or so they thought! Angus Johnson knew differently. He charged them GRIFTERS' ASTEROID By H. L. GOLD Johnson asked skeptically: \"How about a sample first?\" person with unusual patience.\" the U.S. copyright on this publication was renewed.] Characteristically, Harvey Ellsworth tried to maintain his dignity, though his parched tongue was almost hanging out. But Joe Mallon, with no dignity to maintain, lurched across the rubbish-strewn patch of land Paying no attention to them, it was carrying a case of liquor in two hands, six siphons in two others, and a broom and dustpan in the remaining pair. The bartender, a big man resembling the plumpish Harvey in build, was leaning negligently on the counter, ordering this here unless they're in trouble.\" \"Then where's the water lead-in? We'll fill up and push off.\" \"Mayor takes care of that,\" replied the saloon owner. \"If you gents're finished at the bar, your drinks'll be forty buckos.\" Harvey grinned puzzledly. \"We didn't take any whiskey.\" \"Might as well. Water's five buckos a glass. Liquor's free with every chaser.\" Harvey's eyes bulged. Joe gulped. \"That—that's robbery!\" the lanky man managed to get out in a thin quaver. The barkeeper shrugged. \"When there ain't many customers, you gotta \"You dirty crook!\" Joe roared. \"Robbing honest spacemen!\" Harvey nudged him warningly. \"Easy, my boy, easy.\" He turned to the bartender apologetically. \"Don't mind my friend. His adrenal glands are sometimes overactive. You were going to say—?\" The round face of the barkeeper had assumed an aggrieved expression. \"Folks are always thinkin' the other feller's out to do 'em,\" he said, unconscionable interjection of a middleman between Nature and man's thirst.\" The saloon man removed his dirty apron and came around the bar. \"If that's an apology, I accept it. Now the mayor'll discuss filling your tanks. That's me. I'm also justice of the peace, official recorder, fire chief....\" \"And chief of police, no doubt,\" said Harvey jocosely. \"Nope. That's my son, Jed. Angus Johnson's my name. Folks here just call me Chief. I run this town, and run it right. How much water will you need?\" Joe estimated quickly. \"About seventy-five liters, if we go on half The mayor gestured to the native, who shuffled out to the tanks with them. The planetoid man worked the pump while the mayor intently watched the crude level-gauge, crying \"Stop!\" when it registered the proper amount. Then Johnson rubbed his thumb on his index finger and Johnson's response almost floored them. \"Who said anything about After giving them directions that would take them to the free-water pool, the ponderous factotum of Planetoid 42 shook hands and headed back to the saloon. His six-armed assistant followed him inside. \"Now do you see, my hot-tempered colleague?\" said Harvey as he and Joe picked up buckets that hung on the tank. \"Johnson, as I saw instantly, is the victim of a difficult environment, and must charge accordingly.\" \"What's this doing here?\" Harvey asked, puzzled. \"I thought Johnson had only thing that needs purifying around here is that blasted mayor's conscience.\" \"The asteroidal Poobah has tricked us with a slick come-on,\" said Fists clenched, the two returned to the saloon. But at the door they stopped and their fists unclenched. \"Thought you gents were leaving,\" the mayor called out, seeing them frozen in the doorway. \"Glad you didn't. Now you can meet my son, Jed. Him and me are the whole Earthman population of Johnson City.\" Johnson's eight-foot son, topped by a massive roof of sun-bleached hair The pursuit of vengeance, Harvey realized, had taken a quick and unpleasant turn. Something shrewd was called for.... \"Joseph!\" he exclaimed, looking at his partner in alarm. \"Don't you ?\" demanded Johnson. \"I come down with it every year, and I ain't hankering to have it in an off-season. Get him out of here!\" \"In good time. He can't be moved immediately.\" \"Then he'll be here for months!\" Harvey helped Joe to the counter and lifted him up on it. The mayor and requires to combat the dread menace, asteroid fever.\" \"What's that?\" asked the mayor without conviction. straightened out. \"Are—are you all right?\" asked the mayor anxiously. Astonished, Johnson and his son drew closer. They searched Joe's face, and then the mayor timidly felt his pulse. \"Well, I'll be hanged!\" Johnson ejaculated. \" buckos.\" Johnson did not actually stagger back, but he gave the impression of Harvey looked reprovingly at his gangling partner. \"Did Johnson ask to Joe was still dazed by that monetary vista when he and Harvey carried the case of medicine to the saloon. The mayor had already cleared a the mayor promptly. \"What's more, the kind of dinner I serve here you can't get anywhere else for any price.\" Johnson immediately fell into the role of \"mine host.\" less private, though nobody else was in the saloon and there was little chance of company. Genius, the six-armed native, appeared from the dingy kitchen with phenomenally low. When they glanced up at Johnson in perplexity, he grinned, bowed and asked: \"Everything satisfactory, gents?\" \"Quite,\" said Harvey. \"We shall order.\" to women like Mrs. van Schuyler-Morgan, merely for his hire.\" complained Harvey. \"I wish Johnson would stay either swindler or honest merchant. This dinner is worth as least twenty buckos, yet I estimate our check at a mere bucko twenty redsents.\" The mayor's appearance prevented them from continuing the discussion. \"It's been a great honor, gents,\" he said. \"Ain't often I have Johnson didn't answer. Neither did Genius Johnson sighed ponderously. \"I was afraid you'd act like that,\" he said with regret. He pulled a tin badge out of his rear pocket, pinned it on his vest, and twisted his holstered gun into view. \"Afraid I'll have to ask the sheriff to take over.\" Johnson, the \"sheriff,\" collected the money, and Johnson, the \"restaurateur,\" pocketed it. Meanwhile, Harvey tipped Joe the sign to remain calm. \"My friend,\" he said to the mayor, and his tones took on a schoolmasterish severity, \"your long absence from Earth has perhaps \"That's right,\" Johnson came back emphatically. \"But what would your \"Oh, come now, Mr. Johnson. Don't tell me no amount of money would tempt you!\" Johnson. \"I should imagine you will be rather lonely, with only your The mayor's hand went protectively to his pocket. \"What is it?\" he asked with the suspicion of a man who has seen human nature at its worst and expects nothing better. On a larger and heavier world than Planetoid 42, Johnson's curiosity until Joe came in, lugging a radio. \"Is that what you were talking about?\" the mayor snorted. \"What makes years.\" He picked up the radio and began walking toward the door. \"Now, hold on!\" the mayor cried. \"I ain't saying \"To make a long story, Mr. Johnson,\" he said, \"Joseph and I were among \"It does, Mr. Johnson! Only charlatans like those who envied Doctor \"Why, I don't know,\" Johnson said in confusion.\n\n<question>:\nJohnson claims to have a multitude of jobs. Which title best describes him and what he does?\n\n<options>:\nA Conman.\nB Bartender.\nC Mayor.\nD Sheriff.\n\n<answer>:\n", "assistant": "A" } ]

[ { "human": "Read the following passage and questions, then choose the right answer from options, the answer should be one of A, B, C, D.\n\n<passage>:\n\"Great!\" muttered Betty. \"What a lucky girl I am!\" TOLLIVER'S ORBIT \"Yes,\" admitted Tolliver, \"there Betty frowned at him. \"I'll think about it,\" promised the girl, staring thoughtfully at the deck. Tolliver anchored himself in a seat and grinned as he thought about it I'll explain how I cut the fuel flow and see if she's detective enough to suspect that we're just orbiting Ganymede! Jeffers fidgeted in his chair, causing it to creak under the bulk of his body. It had been built for Ganymede, but not for Jeffers. Tolliver stared at him silently, but the other had difficulty meeting hazardous duty!\" \"Doesn't matter,\" answered Tolliver, grinning amiably. \"The hazardous part is just being on the same moon as you for the next six months.\" Tolliver began to have his doubts the next day by the arbitrary calender constructed to match Ganymede's week-long journey around Jupiter. His contract guaranteed a pilot's rating, but someone had neglected to On the bulletin board, Tolliver's name stood out beside the number spaceport, or for hauling cross-country to one of the mining domes. Tolliver turned to see Red Higgins, a regular driver. the waste of fuel involved when the home-office relative emerged. She was about five feet four and moved as if she walked lightly even in stronger gravity than Ganymede's. Her trim coiffure was a shade too blonde which served to set off both the blue of her eyes and the cap apparently won from one of the pilots. She wore gray slacks and a heavy Tolliver. \"By the way, just call me Betty.\" \"They were making dates,\" said the girl. \"Were they ribbing me, or is it true that none of the four of them goes back with the ship?\" \"It's true enough,\" Tolliver assured her. \"We need people out here, and maneuvered out of the dome. Then he headed the tractor across the frozen surface of Ganymede toward the permanent domes of the city. \"How is it here?\" asked the girl. \"They told me it's pretty rough.\" \"What did you expect?\" asked Tolliver. \"Square dances with champagne?\" see much else.\" \"You never can tell,\" said the pilot, yielding to temptation. \"Any square inch of Ganymede is likely to be dangerous.\" I'll be sorry later , he reflected, but if Jeffers keeps me jockeying this creeper, I'm entitled to some amusement. And Daddy's little girl is trying too hard to sound like one of the gang. \"Yeah,\" he went on, \"right now, I don't do a thing but drive missions ?\" Tolliver pursed his lips and put on a shrewd expression. \"Don't sneer at Ganymede, honey!\" he warned portentously. \"Many a man who did isn't here today. Take the fellow who used to drive this mission!\" \"You can call me Betty. What happened to him?\" \"I'll tell you some day,\" Tolliver promised darkly. \"This moon can strike like a vicious animal.\" \"Oh, they told me there was nothing alive on Ganymede!\" \"I was thinking of the mountain slides,\" said the pilot. \"Not to mention volcanic puffballs that pop out through the frozen crust where She was now sitting bolt upright in the swaying seat. Tolliver deliberately dipped one track into an icy hollow. In the light gravity, the tractor responded with a weird, floating lurch. \"Those slides,\" he continued. \"Ganymede's only about the size of Mercury, something like 3200 miles in diameter, so things get heaped up at steep angles. When the rock and ice are set to sliding, they come Tolliver! jovial as that of a hungry crocodile. \"Miss Koslow!\" he beamed, like a politician the day before the voting. \"It certainly is an honor to have you on Ganymede with us! That's all, Tolliver, you can go. Yes, indeed! Mr. Koslow—the president, that is: your father—sent a message about you. I repeat, it will be an honor to \"Never mind him, Mr. Jeffers,\" snapped the girl, in a tone new to Tolliver. \"We won't be working together, I'm afraid. You've already had enough rope.\" pilot stared at Betty, trying to recall pictures he had seen of the He darted a suspicious glare at Tolliver. Tolliver blinked. He had taken her for three or four years older. Jeffers now ignored him, intent upon the girl. \"Daddy gave me the title of tenth vice-president mostly as a joke, when he told me to find out what was wrong with operations on Ganymede. I have some Betty, and Tolliver thought he muttered something about \"just landed.\" Tolliver, hardly thinking about it, expected the someone to be Tolliver brought up a snappy uppercut to the man's chin, feeling that In the gravity of Ganymede, the man was knocked off balance as much as he was hurt, and sprawled on the floor. Betty. The others were swarming over Tolliver. Jeffers came around his Tolliver found himself dumped on the floor of an empty office in the \"I'm sorry about that,\" murmured Betty. Tolliver grunted. Sorrow would not reduce the throbbing, nor was he \"Thanks for letting me know in time,\" said Tolliver. Tolliver groaned. \"What do you know about the crooked goings-on here?\" asked Betty after building, plotting the next move, brought Tolliver to his feet. \"I'll come along with you, Tolliver,\" said the girl. \"Let's not argue about it,\" said Betty, a trifle pale but looking Tolliver. \"How good?\" From the corner of his eye, he thought he saw Betty make a startled Through the faceplates, he saw the girl nod, wide-eyed. As soon as he plunged the knife into the outer layer, he could see dusty, moist air puffing out into the near-vacuum of Ganymede's Ganymede. They took one short rest, during which Tolliver was forced to explain away the dangers of slides and volcanic puffballs. He admitted to having exaggerated slightly. In the end, they reached the \"That's all right,\" Tolliver told the girl. \"We can get in with no \"Who knows?\" retorted Tolliver. \"There wasn't time to check Tolliver sighed. In their weightless state, it was no easy task to pry her out of the spacesuit. He thought of inquiring if she needed any further help, but reminded himself that this was the boss's daughter. When Betty produced a memo giving frequency and call sign, he set about of range of the scanner and microphone. As she spoke, he stared exasperatedly at a bulkhead, marveling at the influence of a man who could arrange for a cruiser to escort his daughter to Ganymede and wondering what was behind it all. For one thing, though the officer seemed well acquainted with Betty, he request as if he had been hanging in orbit merely until learning who to go down after. They really sent her out to nail someone He signed off promptly. The pilot faced Betty, who looked more offended about that.\" The girl grinned. \"Relax, Tolliver,\" she told him. \"Did you really believe Daddy would send his own little girl way out here to Ganymede to look for whoever was gypping him?\" \"You ... you...?\" firm. If old Koslow had a son to impersonate—\" \"I'd be stuck for six months in this orbit with some brash young man,\" Tolliver finished for her. \"I guess it's better this way,\" he said meditatively a moment later. \"I didn't expect to so soon.\" \"Yeah, you were pretty lucky. They'll think you're a marvel to crack the case in about three hours on Ganymede.\"\n\n<question>:\nHow does Tolliver feel about Betty at first?\n\n<options>:\nA she's a rich man's daughter deserving of the company\nB she's attractive and someone he should get to know\nC she's an entitled girl that doesn't know what she's getting into\nD she's a fun girl to joke around with while on Ganymede\n\n<answer>:\n", "assistant": "C" } ]

[ { "human": "Read the following passage and questions, then choose the right answer from options, the answer should be one of A, B, C, D.\n\n<passage>:\nExtensive research did not uncover any evidence that the U.S. copyright on this publication was renewed.] I heard the voice as I opened my eyes. I was lying down, still not aware of where I was, waiting for the voice. \"Your name is David Corbin. Do you understand?\" I looked in the direction of the sound. Above my feet a bulkhead loomed. There were round dials set in a row above a speaker. Over the mesh-covered speaker, two knobs glowed red. I ran the words over in my sluggish mind, thinking about an answer. The muscles in my throat tightened up in reflex as I tried to bring some unity into the jumble of thoughts and ideas that kept forming. One word formed out of the rush of anxiety. \"No.\" I shouted a protest against the strangeness of the room. I looked to \"Your name is David Corbin. If you understand, press button A on your right.\" I stared at the speaker in the wall. The mesh-covered hole and the two twisted my head to look for the button. I pushed away from the close \"If you understand, press button A on your right.\" I stared at my familiar hands. I rubbed them across my face, feeling the solidity of flesh and bone, afraid to think too hard about myself. \"My name ... my name is....\" \"Your name is David Corbin.\" I stared at the speaker. How long did this go on? The name meant nothing to me, but I thought about it, watching the relentless lights that shone below the dials. I stood up slowly and looked at myself. I the voice repeated the message again I had to act. Walking was like treading water that couldn't be seen or felt. hand over hand, shooting down the corridor. I braced against forward motion and stopped against a door at the end. Behind me I could see the opened door I had left, and the thought of that questioning voice made couldn't read the maps that were fastened to a table, nor understand the function or design of the compact machinery. WHY, Why, Why? The thought kept pounding at me. I was afraid to touch Back in the room where I had awakened, I touched the panel with the glowing eyes. It had asked me if I understood. Now it must tell me why I didn't. It had to help me, that flat metallic voice that repeated the same words. It must tell me.... \"Your name is David Corbin. If you understand, press button A on your I pressed the button by the cot. The red lights blinked out as I stood in patient attention, trying to outguess the voice. I recalled a phrase ... some words about precaution. Precaution against forgetting. \"It is assumed the experiment is a success,\" the voice said. What experiment? Your maximum deviation from schedule cannot exceed two degrees. Adopt emergency procedures as you see fit. Good luck.\" The voice snapped off and I laughed hysterically. None of it had made sense, and I cursed whatever madness had put me here. \"Tell me what to do,\" I shouted wildly. I hammered the hard metal until the pain in my hands made me stop. \"I can't remember what to do.\" I held my bruised hands to my mouth, and I knew that was all the man was tall and raw boned, light of skin and hair, as dead as the others. A flat, illogical voice had instructed me to revive these men. I shivered in spite of the warmth of the room, studying the black box that squatted on a shelf by his head. My hand shook when I touched instructions without knowledge were useless to me. I stopped looking into the doors in the passageway and went back to the room with the they recording? What speeds and perhaps, what distance? It was useless to translate the markings. They stood for anything I might guess, and something kept pricking my mind, telling me I had no time to guess. I could stand it no longer. Searching the ship made me forget my fear. I hoped I would find some no point to start from, no premise to seek. I sensed the place to start from was back in the room. I searched it carefully. the base helplessly. If some sort of antidote was to be administered manually I was lost. I had no knowledge of what to inject or where to sent along to safeguard the others. Complete amnesia would have been terrible enough but this half knowledge, part awareness and association me. I went back to the cabin where the powerful man lay. I had to risk failure with one of them. I didn't want it to be the girl. I fought down the thought that he might be the key man, remembering the voice that had given the message. It was up to me, and soon. The metal in the box would have withstood a bullet. It couldn't be pried apart, and I the touch of a button and it went into operation. I stepped back as the name or anything about this ship.\" \"What do you mean? What can't you remember?\" he asked. He stood up slowly, edging around towards the door. I didn't want to fight him. I wanted him to understand. \"Look, I'm in trouble. Nothing fits, except my name.\" \"You don't know me?\" He shook his head, watching me like I was a freak. \"Let's check the rest right away.\" The second man, the dark haired one, opened his eyes and recognized us. He asked questions in rapid fire excitement. The third man, the tall Viking, was all right until he moved. The weightless sensation made him without results when we drifted out. I followed him to the girl's quarters. \"What about her. Why is she here?\" I asked my companion. \"I don't know.\" Blue eyes stared at me in fear. Her voice was low. \"Do you know my name?\" The question frightened her. \"Should I? I feel so strange. Give me a minute to think.\" I let her sit up slowly. \"Do you know your name?\" uncontrollably. \"What's happened to me?\" she asked. The dark haired man came into the room, silent and watchful. My companion motioned to him. \"Get Carl and meet us in Control.\" He nodded and pushed away from us. The girl screamed and covered her face with her hands. I turned to the other man. \"What's your name?\" right if you don't lose your nerve.\" \"What are we to do?\" she asked. John answered for me. \"First we've got to find out where we are. I know this ship but I can't fly it.\" \"Can I?\" I asked. crescendo of sound that hummed through the walls. I went into the control room and watched John at the panel. \"I wish I knew what you were doing,\" I said savagely. \"That had me wondering for a while. I don't know. Anyway how could you go about making her remember?\" \"Throw a crisis, some situation at her, I guess.\" He shrugged, letting his sure hands rest on the panel of dials. I headed back towards the lab. If I could help her I might help myself. I was past the rooms when the horn blasted through the corridor. I the control room. Deep in my mind I could see danger, and without questioning why I knew I had to be at Control when the sound knifed through the stillness. John was shouting as I thrust my way into the room. \"Turn the ship. There's something dead ahead.\" My hands hit buttons, thumbed a switch and then a sudden force threw me seconds, feeding compensation into the gyros. Relief flooded through me like warm liquid. I hung on the intercom for support, drawing air into my heaving lungs. \"What—made you—think of that,\" I asked weakly. \"Shock treatment.\" \"I must have acted on instinct.\" \"It's been dead ahead for hours,\" he grunted. I leaned over and threw the intercom to open. \"This is control. Listen ... everyone. I'm over it. Disregard the warning siren ... we were testing the ship.\" \"John did it. He hit the alarm figuring I would react. Listen, Paul. Is I glanced at John. He rubbed his stomach. \"Yes,\" I answered. \"Bring it when you can. I've got to find out where we are.\"\n\n<question>:\nWhy did David press the button?\n\n<options>:\nA He understood his name.\nB The experiment was successful.\nC He wanted to leave the spaceship.\nD He wanted to get more information from the voice.\n\n<answer>:\n", "assistant": "D" } ]

[ { "human": "Read the following passage and questions, then choose the right answer from options, the answer should be one of A, B, C, D.\n\n<passage>:\nheard the voices again, and soon a foot and then another pounded on the metal of the passage. He heard Crifer's voice louder than the rest: \"There is Rikud on the floor!\" Tugging at the handle of the door, Rikud pulled himself upright. Something small and brown scurried across the other side of the Rikud got up and ran. He reached the door again and then he slipped down against it, exhausted. Behind him, the voices and the footsteps came, and soon he saw Crifer's head peer in through the passageway. Chuls' reminder fostered uneasiness. Often Rikud had dreamed of the time he would be thirty and a father. Whom would the Calculator select as his mate? The first time this idea had occurred to him, Rikud ignored it. But it came again, and each time it left him with a feeling he could not explain. Why should he think thoughts that no other man explain had entered the elder man's head for a moment, but it had departed almost before Chuls knew of its existence. \"I'll go with you,\" Rikud told him. A hardly perceptible purple glow pervaded the air in the room of the the land, and Rikud lay down and drank. It was cool and good, and when he got up, Crifer and Wilm were outside the world, and some of the others followed. They stood around for a long time before going to the water to drink. Rikud sat down and tore off a piece of a plant, munching on it. It was good. Crifer picked his head up, from the water, his chin wet. \"Even feelings are variable. I don't hate you now, Rikud.\" Rikud smiled, staring at the ship. \"People are variable, too, Crifer. That is, if those creatures coming from the ship are people.\" \"They're women,\" said Crifer. frightening doors and women by appointment only. Rikud felt at home. not without a sense of alarm. Yet old Chuls seemed heedless, with only a decade to go. Under the tube at Rikud's left lay Crifer. The man was short and heavy through the shoulders and chest, and he had a lame foot. Every time Rikud looked at that foot, it was with a sense of satisfaction. True, this was the only case of its kind, the exception to the rule, but it proved the world was not perfect. Rikud was guiltily glad when he saw Crifer limp. But, if anyone else saw it, he never said a word. Not even Crifer. Now Crifer said, \"I've been reading again, Rikud.\" \"Yes?\" Almost no one read any more, and the library was heavy with the was that word change again. Didn't it have something to do with age? Rikud couldn't remember, and he suddenly wished he could read Crifer's book on astronomy, which meant the same as stars. Except that it was The old man turned and strode off down the corridor toward the dining room, and Rikud was glad to be alone once more. Crifer, on the other hand, wasn't so sure. \"It looks like the garden,\" he admitted to Rikud. \"But why should the garden be in the viewport?\" Somehow, Rikud knew this question for a healthy sign. But he could \"Naturally,\" said Crifer, becoming interested. \"They are variable.\" Rikud regretted that he never had had the chance to read that book on the man would realize! If only anyone would realize! It all seemed so obvious. If he, Rikud, walked from one part of the world to another, it was with a purpose—to eat, or to sleep, or perhaps to bathe in the he was hungry. And Rikud, too, was hungry. Differently. He had long wondered about the door in the back of the library, and now, as Crifer sat cross-legged on one of the dusty tables, reading machine and book on astronomy or stars in his lap, Rikud approached the door. \"Well,\" Crifer scratched his head, \"I don't think anyone ever opened it. It's only a door.\" \"I will,\" said Rikud. He couldn't go alone. He'd die of the strangeness. It was a silly thought no one ever died of anything until he was a hundred. Rikud through the tunnel and then through the room of machinery and finally through the little room with the confusing voice to Crifer. By the time he reached the lame-footed man, Rikud was running. He did not dare once to look back. He stood shaking at Crifer's side, and sweat covered him in a clammy film. He never wanted to look at the It was so big. Three or four days passed before Rikud calmed himself enough to talk about his experience. When he did, only Crifer seemed at all interested, yet the lame-footed man's mind was inadequate to cope with Rikud began to shout, and everyone looked at him queerly. \"What are you doing that for?\" demanded Wilm, who was shorter even than Crifer, but had no lame foot. \"Doing what?\" Crifer hobbled about on his good foot, doing a meaningless little jig. \"Why don't we go see?\" he suggested. Then, confused, he frowned. \"Well, I won't go,\" Chuls replied. \"There's no reason to go. If Rikud \"Stop that,\" said the older man, mildly. Crifer hopped up and down. \"Look what Rikud's doing! I don't know what he's doing, but look. He's holding Chuls' blouse.\" \"Stop that,\" repeated Chuls, his face reddening. \"Only if you'll go with me.\" Rikud was panting. Chuls tugged at his wrist. By this time a crowd had gathered. Some of them watched Crifer jump up and down, but most of them watched Rikud darkness, something bright flashed briefly through the sky and was gone. Whimpering, he fled. All around Rikud were darkness and hunger and thirst. The buzzer did not sound because Rikud had silenced it forever. And no one went to \"The buzzer will never sound again. I broke it.\" Crifer growled. \"I know. You shouldn't have done it. That was a bad thing you did, Rikud.\" \"It was not bad. The world has moved through the blackness and the Even Crifer now was angry at Rikud. \"He broke the buzzer and no one can eat. I hate Rikud, I think.\" There was a lot of noise in the darkness, and someone else said, \"I hate Rikud.\" Then everyone was saying it. Rikud was sad. Soon he would die, because no one would go outside with him and he could not go outside alone. In five more years he would have had a woman, too. He wondered if it was dark and hungry in the women's Crifer shrilled, \"Maybe it is only variable and will buzz again.\" \"No,\" Rikud assured him. \"It won't.\" \"Then you broke it and I hate you,\" said Crifer. \"We should break you, too, to show you how it is to be broken.\" \"We must go outside—through the viewport.\" Rikud listened to the odd gurgling sound his stomach made. A hand reached out in the darkness and grabbed at his head. He heard Crifer's voice. \"I have Rikud's head.\" The voice was nasty, hostile. Crifer, more than anyone, had been his friend. But now that he had broken the machinery, Crifer was his enemy, because Crifer came nearer to understanding the situation than anyone except Rikud. The hand reached out again, and it struck Rikud hard across the face. Crifer yell something, and then feet pounding in the passage. Rikud tripped over something and sprawled awkwardly across the floor. He felt a sharp hurt in his head, and when he reached up to touch it\n\n<question>:\nAs the story reaches its climax, the antagonist is\n\n<options>:\nA Wilm, who appeared out of the blue.\nB The garden, because it holds so many evils for the characters as they enter.\nC Chuls, as it had been from the story's rising action.\nD Crifer, the only person Rikud ever thought of as a companion.\n\n<answer>:\n", "assistant": "D" } ]

[ { "human": "Read the following passage and questions, then choose the right answer from options, the answer should be one of A, B, C, D.\n\n<passage>:\nBy LESTER DEL REY They weren't human. They were something more—and something less—they were, in short, humanity's hopes for survival! a big, rawboned man, barely forty but ten years of responsibility had pressed down his shoulders and put age-feigning hollows under his reddened eyes. The starlanes between Earth and her potential colonies in the murk. I've kept a signal going to guide them back.\" Gwayne swore softly to himself. Earth couldn't turn out enough starmen in the schools, so promising kids were being shipped out for training as cadets on their twelfth birthday. The two he'd drawn, Kaufman and Pinelli, seemed to be totally devoid of any sense of caution. Of course there was no obvious need for caution here. The blobs hadn't and harmless. They were ugly enough, looking like insects in spite of their internal skeletons, with anywhere from four to twelve legs each on their segmented bodies. None acted like dangerous beasts. But something had happened to the exploration party fifteen years fog. In the distance, the tops of shrubs that made a scrub forest glowed yellow-green. Motions around them suggested a herd of feeding animals. Details were impossible to see through the haze. Even the originally. \"Bob!\" Jane Corey's voice cut through his pondering. \"Bob, there are the kids!\" Before he could swing to follow her pointing finger, movement caught his eye. He saw the two cadets then, heading back to the waiting ship, just Gwayne grabbed the microphone, yelling into the radio toward the cadets. They must have seen whatever it was just as the call reached them. Young Kaufman grabbed at Pinelli, and they swung around together. Then the mists cleared. Under the dancing blobs, a horde of things was heading for the cadets. Shaggy heads, brute bodies vaguely man-like! One seemed to be almost eight feet tall, leading the others directly toward the spacesuited cadets. Some of the horde were carrying spears or sticks. There was a back at the exit deck. Men were dashing in, stumbling around in confusion. But someone was taking over now—one of the crew women. The jeeps were lining up. One, at the front, was stuttering into life, and There was no sign of the cadets at first. Then Gwayne spotted them about, two of them grabbing up the cadets. The jeep was doing twenty glimpse of five-foot bodies tumbling out of the way. Monstrously coarse faces were half hidden by thick hair. A spear crunched against the to help. They'd have to get to the group with the cadets in a hurry or against the windshield, just as he made out the form of the eight-foot leader. The thing was standing directly ahead of him, a cadet on each shoulder. Another jeep had drawn up, and men were examining the cadets. Pinelli our time here already.\" The reports from the cadets were satisfactory enough. They'd been picked up and carried, but no harm had been done them. Now they were busy being little heroes. Gwayne sentenced them to quarters as soon as he could, knowing their stories would only get wilder and less informative with retelling. If they could get any story from the captured creature, they might save cunningly, and only the accidental slippage had undone their work. Maybe there would never be a full answer, but he had to find four more months back. In another ten years, the sun would explode, leaving man only on the it now seemed, no more time could be wasted here. Primitives could be overcome, maybe. It would be ruthless and unfair to cemented bits of smaller wood from the scrub growth, skillfully laminated. The point was of delicately chipped flint, done as no human hand had been able to do for centuries. \"Beautiful primitive work,\" he muttered. They were perhaps a thousand yards away, waiting patiently. For what? For the return of their leader—or for something that would give the ship to them? taut with strain. The creature nodded slowly and drew something from the thick hair on on the gold ornament of a captive earthman, even to learn a little English, maybe. But Hennessy had been his friend. \"How many barmaids in the Cheshire Cat? How many pups did your oldest kid's dog have? How many were brown?\" The lips contorted into something vaguely like a smile, and the curiously shaped fingers that could handle no human-designed equipment spread out. Three. Seven. Zero. The answers were right. By the time the session was over, Gwayne had begun to understand the long time telling. When it was finished, Gwayne and Barker sat for long minutes in by what I know. But it happened. I've looked at a few tissues under the microscope. The changes are there. It's hard to believe about their kids. Adults in eight years, but they stay shorter. It can't be a hereditary change—the things that affect the body don't change the germ plasm. But in this case, what changed Hennessy is real, so maybe the fact that the change is passed on is as real as he claims.\" monsters began moving forward toward their leader. A few were almost as tall as Hennessy, but most were not more than five feet high. The kids of the exploring party.... He'd have to tell the men and women of the crew later, after he'd had time to organize things and present it all in a way they could accept, however much they might hate it at first. But there was no putting off giving the gist of it to Jane. \"It was the blobs,\" he summarized it. \"They seem to be amused by men. doesn't know why. They can change our cells, adapt us. Before men came, all life here had twelve legs. Now they're changing that, as we've seen. where three ships vanish, so we'll just disappear. And they'll never know.\" Nobody would know. Their children—odd children who matured in eight years—would be primitive savages in three generations. The Earth tools would be useless, impossible for the hands so radically changed. Nothing from the ship would last. Books could never be read by the new She was silent a long time, staring out of the port toward what must now be her home. Then she sighed. \"You'll need practice, but the others don't know you as well as I do, Bob. I guess we can fix it so they'll believe it all. And it's too late now. But we haven't really been changed yet, have we?\" \"No,\" he admitted. Damn his voice! He'd never been good at lying. \"No. She nodded. He waited for the condemnation, but there was only puzzlement in her face. \"Why?\" And then, before he could answer, her own intelligence gave her the seed, but no world other than Earth could ever be trusted to preserve that seed for generation after generation. Some worlds already were becoming uncertain. Here, though, the blobs had adapted men to the alien world instead of children of man's race could grow, develop and begin the long trek back to civilization. The gadgets would be lost for a time. But perhaps some of the attitudes of civilized man would remain to make the next rise to culture a better one. \"We're needed here,\" he told her, his voice pleading for the understanding he couldn't yet fully give himself. \"These people need as rich a set of bloodlines as possible to give the new race strength. The fifty men and women on this ship will be needed to start them with a decent chance. We can't go to Earth, where nobody would believe or accept the idea—or even let us come back. We have to stay here.\" She smiled then and moved toward him, groping for his strength. \"Be fruitful,\" she whispered. \"Be fruitful and spawn and replenish an earth.\" \"No,\" he told her. \"Replenish the stars.\" But she was no longer listening, and that part of his idea could wait. Some day, though, their children would find a way to the starlanes numbering. Some day, the whole universe would be a spawning ground for the children of men!\n\n<question>:\nWhich word doesn't describe the cadets?\n\n<options>:\nA cautious\nB naïve\nC embellishers\nD young\n\n<answer>:\n", "assistant": "A" } ]

[ { "human": "Read the following passage and questions, then choose the right answer from options, the answer should be one of A, B, C, D.\n\n<passage>:\nthought it might be. How long since you had your last rejuvenation? And who gave it?” something inside him had been forcing him to make this decision. feel it. Some of the panic symptoms were returning the pulse in his neck was pounding and his breath was growing difficult. Sweat ran down his sides from And maybe it would do no good. the doctor studied it. “My sixteenth.” It wasn’t going right. He could lot of people couldn’t rejuvenate cure any allergy or asthma. had sworn the shot would serious, but quite definite—as well as other signs of aging. I’m afraid the treatment didn’t take fully. It might have been some unconscious block the coffee stronger than usual and it seemed to cut through some of the thickness in his head. “I guess I’m getting old, Amanda.” She smiled dutifully at the time-worn joke, but he knew she “Just a little tired,” he told give you another treatment. Any her, refilling the cup. She’d made reason you can’t begin immediately?” was more important. It hadn’t been a joke about his growing old, after all. But now, in a few days, he’d be his old—no, of course not—his young self again! Even his hair had seemed thinner, though that, of course, was impossible. He resented every second of it. It was as if the almost forgotten specter of age stood beside him, SHE JERKED her gaze away guiltily and turned to the incoming basket. “Mostly drugs for where the clamps were adjusted about his head and the earpieces were fitted. The drugs were shot painlessly into his arm and the light-pulser was adjusted to his brain-wave pattern. It had been nothing like this his first time. Then it had required months of mental training, followed by crude mechanical and drug hypnosis for other months. Somewhere in every human brain lay the memory of what his cells “I’m all right!” he told her sharply. Then he steadied himself themselves, with the brain as only a linkage to it. They’d discovered that, and the fact that the mind could effect physical changes in the body. Even such things as cancer could be willed out of existence—provided the brain could be reached far below the conscious level and forced to within minutes, even—but finding the mechanism in the brain that worked those miracles had taken an incredible amount of study and finding a means of bringing it under control had taken even longer. Now they did it with dozens of mechanical aids in addition to the hypnotic instructions—and did it usually in a single sitting, with the full transformation of the body taking less than a week after the treatment! But with all the equipment, it shuttle. He fingered the microstrip inside while he drank another message that had come on the could relax so easily.... He came out of it without even a headache, while they were fatigue on the operator’s face told him it had been a long and difficult job. He stretched experimentally, with the eternal unconscious expectation that he would find himself suddenly young again. But that, of course, was ridiculous. It took days for the mind to work on all the cells and to repair the damage of time. an injection of some kind and another sample of his blood was We’ll know by then whether you’ll need more treatment. Ten o’clock okay?” “But I’ll be all right?” The discovery that men could live practically forever had put awake most of the night again, trying to recall them. The outside line buzzed musically, recovered, he could still sense the glances of the others, as if he patience was still foreign to him. real reason. Certainly they weren’t forcing themselves on him. He remembered once when he’d had a cold, before they finally licked can send a message on the shuttle, begging for their secret in a What he needed was a good night’s sleep after a little relaxation. Even that failed him, though. He’d developed one of the finest made in two centuries on your part, some infection not were finished, and the older men were too conservative for really new thinking. There was a measure of truth in it, unfortunately. “They’ll slow up when their he’d developed through his old answers. “We’re still ahead in medicine and we’ll get the the years helped to add to the interrupting the work of making THE YOUNGER man stared at him with the strange puzzled they could only bring him back to about thirty, instead of the normal early twenties. Would that reduce the slice of eternity that rejuvenation meant? And what days. We can have the secret of Or suppose it wasn’t rejuvenation, after all this antigravity in less than a had happened to Sol? permanently? thickness pushing back at his mind and tried to fight it off. He’d suppose something were still there and the circles under his eyes. He searched for partly believing it. “Rats don’t have minds that could show any real damage such as the loss of power to rejuvenate. We can’t put human pilots into a ship with our drive until we’ve tested it more could correct for errors on arrival. Maybe if we put in stronger signaling transmitters....” “Yeah. Maybe in two centuries then shuddered. It hadn’t been that kind of spring for him—not this rejuvenation nor the last, nor the one himself and partially succeeded, until he reached the doctor’s office. Then it was no longer necessary you really want to risk losing the rest of your life rather than waiting a couple more centuries until we know it’s safe? If you do, I’ll Now that he knew there was reason for his fear, it seemed to slowly. The belligerence ran out numbed him. “I’d rather know the whole truth,” he said. His voice sounded of him. The rejuvenation...?” dead in his ears. “The worst first. He looked sick, for he had no vanish, leaving a coldness that Cobb sighed and yet seemed relieved. “It may take longer, but eventually we’ll find a way. With time cellular memory. It loses a little each time. And the plan for short-term benefits. Usually it was too easy to realize that, and the sight of the solid, time-enduring have given him a sense of security. Today, though, nothing seemed to help. He felt choked, imprisoned, supposed to tell you, of course. It’s going to be tough enough when they’re ready to let people consolation. We’ve got a longer time scale than we used to have—but it’s in centuries, not in Cobb spread his hands unhappily. “Thirty years, maybe. But we can make them better. Geriatric knowledge is still on record. We can fix the heart and all the rest. You’ll be in good physical condition, better than your grandfather—” “And then....” Giles couldn’t pronounce the words. He’d grown old and he’d grow older. And eventually he’d die! An immortal man had suddenly stop twice to catch his breath and fight against the pain that clawed at his chest. When he he meant it. The man had done all he could and had at least saved him the suspense of growing numbed, and began driving mechanically, no longer wondering about the dangers that might possibly and a long drink in his hand. The alcohol combined with the reaction from his panic to leave him almost himself again. After all, there was nothing to worry about Earth’s doctors could cure anything. that might even be useful. morose man the last few times he’d seen him, but that could hardly explain his taking a twenty-year In the future, men would It would be cold comfort but it was something. And he might “As all right as I’ll ever be,” he told her. “They tell me I’m just growing old.” This time her laugh was heartier. He caught himself before he years of practice. Giles felt better, realizing it wouldn’t be one of the younger men. been delivered by some doctor? It didn’t matter, but it would explain things, at least. needles and the machinery behind the doctor began working on it. age? Let’s see it.” He inspected it and began making tests. Some were older than Giles could remember—knee reflex, blood pressure, pulse\n\n<question>:\nHow does rejuvenation work?\n\n<options>:\nA it re-trains the brain to develop younger cells\nB it injects a serum in the body that reverses time\nC exercises are done to re-energize muscles\nD drugs convince the body to feel younger\n\n<answer>:\n", "assistant": "A" } ]

[ { "human": "Read the following passage and questions, then choose the right answer from options, the answer should be one of A, B, C, D.\n\n<passage>:\nVolpla That next week, I transported all of the volplas out to the oak woods. Extensive research did not uncover any evidence that the U.S. copyright on this publication was renewed.] The only kind of gag worth pulling, I always maintained, was a cosmic one—till I learned the the volplas to use the fire drill and they were already utilizing the to hit a combination that would work. nothing around that might connect the sudden appearance of the volplas with my property. It was already apparent that it would take the volplas only a few more weeks to learn their means of survival and develop an embryonic culture of their own. Then they could leave my \"Daddy, I've tried and tried and I just can't turn this old key tight enough.\" ranch and the fun would be on. \"Well, Dad-dee, I can't!\" \"Tightly enough.\" \"What?\" \"You can't turn this old key tightly enough.\" \"That's what I say My son asked, \"What happened to the animals?\" \"Turned them over to the university for further study,\" I lied. \"Well,\" he said to her, \"you can't say our pop isn't a man of decision.\" meant it. But you really ought to. It would be your first.\" Except, of course, that the woods were full of volplas. At night, I Volplas at last. Three of them. Yet I had always been so sure I could create them that I had been calling them volplas for ten years. No, Twenty-four hours later, there wasn't a sign of animal experimentation his graying head from a cage. I had called them volplas since the day \"Don't you know ?\" withdrew the intravenous needles from my first volplas. I carried their She peeked too, as she had for fifteen years, but I blocked her view when I slipped out. \"Come on, you old hermit. I have a buffet on the terrace.\" Pacific shimmered. I thought, \"All this and three volplas, too.\" I unlocked the door, held it against her pushing and slipped out so boy unsaddle the horse and slap it away to the pasture. I thought, \"By God, wouldn't he have a fit if he knew what I have back there in that lab! Wouldn't they all!\" . Why?\" \"Because, dear, I said so.\" The boy had already raced across the terrace and jack-knifed into the pool. The cool sound of the dive sent the girl scurrying for her suit. I looked at my wife. \"What's the idea?\" \"Is that any reason for wearing clothes? Look at him. He's a young man sooner than already.\" to pinch the maid and the kids can't go naked.\" I leaned toward her and smacked her cheek. \"But the food and the old woman are still the best.\" \"Say, what goes with you? You've been grinning like a happy ape ever \"I told you—\" \"Oh, not that again! You were dangerous at any age.\" She reached up and grabbed my ear. She narrowed her eyes and put a mock grimness on her lips. \"It's a joke,\" I assured her. \"I'm going to play a tremendous joke on the whole world. I've only had the feeling once before in a small way, but I've always....\" She twisted my ear and narrowed her eyes even more. \"Like?\" \"Well, when my old man was pumping his first fortune out of some oil \"I've finished my work and we no longer need the buildings. I'm going to write a paper about my results.\" The best part was that no one had seen me do it. They just couldn't understand how so many snakes got there. I learned how great it can be to stand around quietly and watch people encounter the surprise that you have prepared for them.\" She let go of my ear. \"Is that the kind of fun you're going to have?\" I grinned. \"Forgive me if I eat and run, dear. Something in the lab can't wait.\" The fact was that I had something more in the lab than I had bargained for. I had aimed only at a gliding mammal a little more efficient than my first volplas were shockingly humanoid. Suddenly, as I teased the male volpla, this happened. The maid promptly left the kitchen for some other place. loose. There would be volpla colonies all up and down the Coast before anyone suspected. One day, somebody would see a volpla. The newspapers would laugh. Then someone authoritative would find a colony and observe them. He would conclude, \"I am convinced that they have a language and speak it intelligently.\" The government would issue denials. Reporters would \"expose the truth\" Volpla wisdom would become a cult—and of all forms of comedy, cults, I think, are the funniest. \"Darling, are you listening to me?\" my wife asked with impatient \"It's almost time for the broadcast. I was afraid we would miss it.\" \"What broadcast?\" \"For heaven's sake, darling,\" my wife complained, \"I told you about the kids had fruit juice and we watched the broadcast Guy had tuned in. Guy, on the screen, pushed the button, and I heard Guy, beside me, give On the screen, Guy's big dead-earnest face was explaining more about would be something! I began to feel a little my volplas. But only for a moment. The screen returned to a studio, where an announcer explained that the broadcast. Stand by for Rocket Charlie.\" it's always been pictured. A mechanical voice cut in. I used the metabolic accelerator to cut the volplas' gestation down to By the next spring, I had a colony of over a hundred volplas and I shut the opportunity to slip the oldest of the males and his two females out of the lab. Almost two hours went by before the male made it into the air. His playful curiosity about the world had been abandoned momentarily and he so that I could not get near. Suddenly he laughed with a shrill little whoop. After that, it was a carnival. They learned quickly and brilliantly. They were not fliers they were Of course, the volplas didn't want to return to the lab. There was a I watched them affectionately and wondered about the advisability of leaving them out here. Well, it had to be done sometime. Nothing I could tell them about surviving would help them as much as a little naturally have forgotten the ways of living outdoors.\" \"We can learn again. We want to stay here.\" His little face was so solemn and thoughtful that I reached out and stroked the fur on his head reassuringly. thousand years and was bringing antique wisdom to bear. \"I can get up there. I can stay for a while. How long will they be in the tree?\" \"Chances are they won't stay long. Keep your eye on the tree in case they leave while you are climbing.\" I looked back, as did the girl remaining beside me. The soaring volpla The doves separated and began to zigzag down the valley. The volpla did plummeted to a hillside. The volpla landed gently atop the hill and The volpla beside me danced up and down shrieking in a language all her us, yammering like a bluejay. It was a hero's welcome. He had to walk back, of course—he had no Later, I shared a small piece of the meat in their feast. They were gleeful and greasily amorous during the meal. When I had to leave, it was dark. I warned them to stand watches, keep the fire burning low and take to the tree above if anything approached. The male walked a little away with me when I left the fire. I said again, \"Promise me you won't leave here until we've made you ready for it.\" \"We like it here. We will stay. Tomorrow you bring more of us?\"\n\n<question>:\nWhy did the narrator decide not to mention the Volplas during Guy's broadcast?\n\n<options>:\nA Nobody could hear him over the broadcast's high volume\nB He wanted to make sure Guy had his moment and didn't want to steal the spotlight\nC He wanted to brag to Guy later, when he showed him the Volplas in the lab afterwards for a more dramatic effect\nD He wanted to keep the secret long term and it wouldn't have been worth it to give it away\n\n<answer>:\n", "assistant": "D" } ]

[ { "human": "Read the following passage and questions, then choose the right answer from options, the answer should be one of A, B, C, D.\n\n<passage>:\nOne can't be too cautious about the people one meets in Tangier. They're all weirdies of one kind or another. By MACK REYNOLDS The Place de France is the town's hub. It marks the end of Boulevard Pasteur, the main drag of the westernized part of the city, and the beginning of down to the Grand Socco and the medina. In a three-minute walk from the Place de France you can go from an ultra-modern, California-like resort to the King-size sidewalk cafes occupy three of the strategic corners on the Place de France. The Cafe de Paris serves the best draft beer in town, gets all the better custom, and has three shoeshine boys attached to the Paris edition of the New York Herald Tribune while getting your shoes done up like mirrors for thirty Moroccan francs which comes to about five cents at current exchange. You can sit there, after the and watch the people go by. Tangier is possibly the most cosmopolitan city in the world. In native costume you'll see Berber and Rif, Arab and Blue Man, and occasionally a Senegalese from further south. In European dress you'll see Japs and Chinese, Hindus and Turks, Levantines and Filipinos, North Americans and South Americans, and, of course, even Europeans—from both sides of the Curtain. In Tangier you'll find some of the world's poorest and some of the richest. The poorest will try to sell you anything from a shoeshine to their not very lily-white bodies, and the richest will you might try to sell them something. In spite of recent changes, the As a result of them the permanent population includes fugitives from justice and international homosexuals, nymphomaniacs, alcoholics, drug addicts, displaced persons, ex-royalty, and subversives of every flavor. Local law these. and said, \"Hello, Paul. Anything new cooking?\" crowded and since mine was a face he recognized, he assumed he was welcome to intrude. It was more or less standard procedure at the Cafe de Paris. It wasn't a place to go if you wanted to be alone. little man. I vaguely remembered was from Liverpool and in exports. \"What's in the newspaper?\" he said, disinterestedly. \"Pogo and Albert are going to fight a duel,\" I told him, \"and Lil Abner is becoming a rock'n'roll singer.\" \"Oh,\" I said, \"the intellectual \"They have, eh? How big?\" \"Several times bigger than anything we Americans have.\" The beer came and looked good, so I ordered a glass too. saucers?\" \"What flying saucers?\" A French girl went by with a poodle so finely clipped as to look as though it'd been shaven. The Paris. Every pore in place. We both looked after her. \"You know, what everybody too bad one of these bloody manned satellites wasn't up then. Maybe they would've seen one.\" without rubbing him the wrong way. I didn't know Paul very well, but, for that matter, it's in Tangier. Largely, cards are My beer came and a plate of tapas for us both. Tapas at the Cafe de Paris are apt to be potato salad, a few anchovies, olives, and possibly some cheese. in the States. Just to say something, I said, \"Where do you think they came from?\" And when he looked blank, I added, \"The Flying Saucers.\" He grinned. \"From Mars or Venus, or someplace.\" \"Ummmm,\" I said. \"Too bad none of them ever crashed, or landed on the Yale football field , or something.\" It'd been cooked in rancid olive oil. probably sit around here and think of two or three that made \"Well, hell, suppose for instance there's this big Galactic League of civilized planets. But it's restricted, the club. Meanwhile, they send secret missions down from time in a neatly tailored gray jellaba, European style high-heeled shoes, and a pinkish silk veil so transparent that you after her. I said, \"Or, here's another one. Suppose you have a very advanced civilization on, say, Mars.\" \"Not Mars. No air, and too bloody dry to support life.\" \"Don't interrupt, please,\" I said with mock severity. \"This is a very old civilization and as the planet began to lose its water and air, it withdrew underground. Uses hydroponics and so forth, husbands its water and air. Isn't that what we'd do, in a few million years, if Earth lost its water and air?\" \"I suppose so,\" he said. \"Anyway, what about them?\" is going through a scientific boom, an industrial boom, a population boom. A boom, period. Any day now he's going to have practical space ships. Meanwhile, he's also got the H-Bomb and both sides of the Curtain, he's not against using it, if he could get away with it.\" us. That's an old one. I've read that a dozen times, dished up different.\" \"I got a better one. How's this. There's this alien life form that's way ahead of us. Their civilization is so old that they don't have any records of when it began and how it was in the things like wars and depressions and revolutions, and greed for power or any of these things giving us a bad time here on Earth. They're all like scholars, get it? And some of them are pretty jolly well taken by Earth, especially the way we are right now, with all the problems, get it? Things developing so fast we don't know where we're going or how we're going to get there.\" I finished my beer and clapped my hands for Mouley. \"How do you mean, where we're going ?\" \"Well, take half the countries in the world today. They're trying to industrialize, modernize, catch up with the advanced countries. Look at Egypt, and Israel, and India and China, and Yugoslavia and Brazil, and all the rest. Trying to drag themselves up to the level of the advanced countries, and all using different methods of doing it. But look at the so-called advanced countries. Up to their bottoms in unemployed, threat of war, schools. All the bloody mess of it. Why, a man from Mars would be fascinated, like.\" Mouley came shuffling up in his babouche slippers and we or whatever they are? Sooner or later we'd nab one of them. You know, Scotland Yard, or the F.B.I., or Russia's secret police, or the French Sûreté, or Interpol. This world is so deep in police, counter-espionage outfits and security agents that an base himself in London or New think so. I think he'd be right here in Tangier.\" \"Why Tangier?\" \"It's the one town in the world gives a damn about you or your affairs. For instance, I've known \"In this town you seldom even ask a man where's he's from. He can be British, a White Russian, a Basque or a Sikh and nobody could care less. Where are you \"California,\" I told him. \"No, you're not,\" he grinned. I was taken aback. \"What do a few minutes ago when I was talking about Scotland Yard or the F.B.I. possibly flushing an alien. Telepathy is a sense not be considerably more difficult. Let's face it, in spite of these human bodies we're disguised in, neither of us is \"Aldebaran,\" I said. \"How about you?\" \"Deneb,\" he told me, shaking. We had a laugh and ordered \"What're you doing here on eaters. Humanoid flesh is considered quite a delicacy. How about you?\" help stir up inter-tribal, or international, conflicts—all according are. Then our tourists come in—well shielded, of course—and get their kicks watching it.\" practice could spoil an awful THE END Transcriber's Note: This etext was produced from December 1960. Extensive research did not uncover any evidence that the U.S.\n\n<question>:\nThe story takes place in _______.\n\n<options>:\nA Iraq\nB The United States\nC Morocco\nD France\n\n<answer>:\n", "assistant": "C" } ]

[ { "human": "Read the following passage and questions, then choose the right answer from options, the answer should be one of A, B, C, D.\n\n<passage>:\nup at all. In common with recipients of gold watches of a score of generations plenty of time to think it over. It was better to retire on a limited crediting, on a confoundedly limited crediting, than to take the two or three more trips in hopes of attaining a higher standard. He'd had plenty of time to figure it out, there alone in space on the Moon run, there on the Venus or Mars runs. There on the long, long haul to the Jupiter satellites, fearfully checking the symptoms of space cafard, the madness compounded of claustrophobia, monotony, boredom and free fall. Plenty of time. Time to decide that a one room mini-auto-apartment, complete with an autochair and built-in autobar, and with one wall a teevee screen, was all he needed to wasn't anything they could do. He had them now. He had enough Basic to keep him comfortably, by his standards, for the rest of his life. He the Ultrawelfare State. Slumped in an autochair in the escape room of his Floridian home, Lofting Gubelin scowled at his friend. He said, acidly, \"Any more been trained. There aren't two men on North America—there aren't two men in the world!—who better realize the urgency of continuing our and tequila. He said, \"Nevertheless, both you and I conform with the present generation in finding it far more pleasant to follow one's way of life in the comfort of one's home than to be confronted with society that allows him an income sufficient to secure the food, clothing, shelter, medical care and education to sustain a low level of subsistence. Percentages were against his ever being drafted into industry. Automation being what it is, only a fraction of the you yourself who talked him into taking the training ... pointing out the more pragmatic advantages such as complete retirement after but six trips, added shares of Basic so that he could enjoy a more comfortable life than most and the fame that would accrue to him as one of the very few who still participate in travel to the planets. Very well. He was sold. Took his training, which, of course, required long years of drudgery to him. Then, performing his duties quite competently, he made his six trips. He is now legally eligible for retirement. He was drafted into the working force reserves, served his time, and is now free from toil for the balance of his life. Why should he listen to our pleas for a few more trips?\" \"But has he no spirit of adventure? Has he no feeling for....\" take months, possibly more than a year, to bring another novitiate pilot to the point where he can safely be trusted to take our next explorer craft out. Appropriations for our expeditions have been birth and buying a chicken farm or some such? All the long months at sea—and sometimes the tramp freighters or whaling craft would be out for years at a stretch before returning to home port—he would talk of his retirement and his dream. And then? Then in port, it would be one short drink with the boys, before taking his accumulated pay and heading home. The one short drink would lead to another. And morning would find him, drunk, rolled, tattooed and possibly sleeping it off in jail. So back to sea he'd have to go.\" nobody can, ah, con you out of it. Just how do you expect to sever of twenty-five and was registered for the labor draft, there hadn't take-off on what should have been a routine Moon run. Each time Si returned from one of his own runs, he celebrated. A spree, a bust, a bat, a wing-ding, a night on the town. A commemoration of dangers met and passed. Now it was all over. At the age of thirty he was retired. Law prevented him from ever being called up for contributing to the country's labor needs again. And he most certainly wasn't going to volunteer. not. You had your Inalienable Basic stock, didn't you? What else did It had come as a surprise when he'd been drafted for the labor force. In the early days of the Ultrawelfare State, they had made a mistake in adapting to the automation of the second industrial revolution. They had attempted to give everyone work by reducing the number of working hours in the day, and the number of working days in the week. It finally became ludicrous when employees of industry were working but two days a week, two hours a day. In fact, it got chaotic. It became obvious that it was more practical to have one worker putting in thirty-five hours a week and getting to know his job well, than it was to have a score of employees, each working a few hours a week and none of them ever really becoming efficient. The only fair thing was to let the technologically unemployed remain unemployed, with their Inalienable Basic stock as the equivalent of unemployment insurance, while the few workers still needed put in a reasonable number of hours a day, a reasonable number of weeks a year and a reasonable number of years in a life time. When new employees were needed, a draft lottery was held. All persons registered in the labor force participated. If you they fulfilled. Such shares could be added to their portfolios, the dividends becoming part of their current credit balance, or could be sold for a lump sum on the market. fell in with some second rate mopsy and usually wound up in a third rate groggery where you spent just as much as though you'd been in the classiest joint in town. Came morning and you had nothing to show for profits in a matter of days in the wine shops of Tyre. Nobody gets quite so little for his money as that loneliest of all workers, he who must leave his home for distant lands, returning only periodically and usually with the salary of lengthy, weary periods of time to be spent hurriedly in an attempt to achieve the pleasure and happiness so long denied him. A bit of prestige didn't hurt you when you went out on the town. In the Ultrawelfare State hardly one person in a hundred actually ever performed anything of value to society. The efforts of most weren't needed. Those few who did contribute were awarded honors, decorations, titles. thousand, two hundred and thirty-three dollars and sixty-two cents apiece. Current cash credit, one thousand and eighty-four dollars.\" The screen went dead. The car hesitated for a moment, that brief hesitation before the shot, and Si took the involuntary breath from which only heroes could direction of the pressure was reversed. Manhattan. The shuttling began again, and one or two more traversing sub-shots. Finally, the dash threw a green light and Si opened the canopy and stepped into his hotel room. A voice said gently, \"If the quarters are satisfactory, please present your credit card within ten minutes.\" around in second-class groggeries, no eating in automated luncheterias. This time, be it the only time in his life, he was going to frolic in and then swallowed. \" much time for formality. Everybody's just Si, and Doc, and Jim. Like that. But how come you cried?\" the dream of the stars which man has held so long. And then the fact that you were the last of the space pilots. The last man in the whole world trained to pilot a space craft. And here you were, retiring.\" Si grunted. \"Yeah. That's all part of the Doc's scheme to get me to take on another three runs. They're afraid the whole department'll be dropped by the Appropriations Committee on this here Economic Planning Board. Even if they can find some other patsy to train for the job, it'd take maybe a year before you could even send him on a Moon hop. in space any more. In fact, most people are almost contemptuous, like. Think it's kind of a big boondoggle deal to help use up a lot of materials and all and keep the economy going.\" aboard. The Doc says later on when ships are bigger and there's a whole flock of people aboard, there won't be any such thing as space cafard,\n\n<question>:\nWhat happens to drafted workers?\n\n<options>:\nA They train and work for a time, then retire with extra funds.\nB They receive no pay, and have to undergo training and work for some time\nC They are called upon throughout their life for periods of work.\nD They work a short period of time, then return to normal life.\n\n<answer>:\n", "assistant": "A" } ]

[ { "human": "Read the following passage and questions, then choose the right answer from options, the answer should be one of A, B, C, D.\n\n<passage>:\nthe Scorpion is on your trail! Hoodlums fear his fury—and, for that matter, so do the cops! [Transcriber's Note: This etext was produced from Worlds of If Science Fiction, September 1961. Extensive research did not uncover any evidence that the U.S. copyright on this publication was renewed.] The man with the handkerchief mask said, \"All right, everybody, keep tight. This is a holdup.\" his desk, refusing to okay a personal check from a perfect stranger. There was the perfect stranger, an itinerant garage mechanic named her best to scratch his eyes out. Meanwhile, Mr. Anderson went scooting to be involved.\" \"It was the nuttiest thing,\" said Detective-Sergeant Stevenson. \"An operation planned that well, you'd think they'd pay attention to their getaway car, you know what I mean?\" Detective-Sergeant Pauling shrugged. \"They always slip up,\" he said. \"Sooner or later, on some minor detail, they always slip up.\" \"Yes, but their tires burned in 'The Scorpion' in big black letters you could see half a block away.\" \"Maybe they didn't notice it when they stole the car,\" said Pauling. \"For a well-planned operation like this one,\" said Stevenson, \"they made a couple of really idiotic boners. It doesn't make any sense.\" \"What do they have to say about it?\" Pauling demanded. \"Nothing, what do you expect? They'll make no statement at all.\" was gone.\" \"You left the keys in it?\" \"Well, why not?\" demanded Hastings belligerently. \"If I'm making just a quick stop—I never spend more than five minutes with any one customer—I always leave the keys in the car. Why not?\" \"Hmph.\" Hastings moved on around the car, stopping short to exclaim, \"What in the name of God is that? You didn't tell me a bunch of kids had stolen the car.\" a bank holdup.\" \"Then why did they do that ?\" crudely-lettered words, \"The Scorpion\" burned black into the paint of the car was stolen?\" \"Of course not!\" about anything. I don't suppose they'll ever tell us.\" He looked at the trunk lid again. \"It's the nuttiest thing,\" he said thoughtfully.... That was on Wednesday. The Friday afternoon mail delivery to the Daily News brought a crank letter. It was in the crank letter's most obvious form that is, the address had been clipped, a letter or a word at a time, from a newspaper and glued to the envelope. There was no return address. The letter itself was in the same format. It was brief and to the point: Dear Mr. Editor: The Scorpion has struck. The bank robbers were captured. The Scorpion Scorpion. WARN YOUR READERS! Sincerely yours, THE SCORPION The warning was duly noted, and the letter filed in the wastebasket. It didn't rate a line in the paper. II Two days before, he had flunked a Civil Service examination for the third time. He reported himself sick and spent the two days at home, brooding, a bottle of blended whiskey at all times in his hand. As the police reconstructed it later, Mrs. Higgins had attempted to awaken him on the third morning at seven-thirty, suggesting that he really ought to stop being so foolish, and go back to work. He then allegedly poked her in the eye, and locked her out of the bedroom. out the front door of the house, crying for the police and shouting, \"Murder! Murder!\" At this point, neighbors called the police. One neighbor additionally phoned three newspapers and two television stations, thereby earning forty dollars in \"news-tips\" rewards. undershirt, stalking from window to window on the second floor of the police used loudspeakers to tell Higgins he might as well give up, they had the place surrounded and could eventually starve him out anyway. Higgins was able to throw all the shells back out of the house again. The show lasted for nearly an hour. Then it ended, suddenly and dramatically. He touched the stock, and it was somewhat warm but that was all. He picked it up and turned it around. There, on the other side of the stock, burned into the wood, were the crudely-shaped letters, \"The Scorpion.\" no reason at all, and somebody burns 'The Scorpion' onto the trunk. prove it. And there on the rifle stock it is again. 'The Scorpion'.\" patience. \"What are you trying to prove?\" \"I don't know. All I know is it's the nuttiest thing I ever saw. And what about the getaway car? What about those tires melting?\" \"They were defective,\" said Hanks promptly. \"All four of them at once? And what about the thing written on the trunk?\" \"How do I know?\" demanded the captain. \"Kids put it on before the car \"Hell, man, he'd been firing that thing at people for an hour! What do you think desperately. \"How should I know? And why not, anyway? You know as well as I do these write 'The Golden Avengers' on the plate glass in lipstick. It happens all the time. Why not 'The Scorpion'? It couldn't occur to two people?\" refrigerators to starve. He went around trying to prove it, and getting all upset, and pretty soon they had to put him away in the nut hatch. Remember?\" \"Forget this silly stuff, Stevenson,\" the captain advised him. \"Yes, sir,\" said Stevenson.... The day after Jerome Higgins went berserk, the afternoon mail brought a crank letter to the Daily News : Dear Mr. Editor, You did not warn your readers. The man who shot all those people could not escape the Scorpion. The Scorpion fights crime. No criminal is safe from the Scorpion. WARN YOUR READERS. Sincerely yours, THE SCORPION Unfortunately, this letter was not read by the same individual who had seen the first one, two months before. At any rate, it was filed in the same place, and forgotten. III The night of the rumble, the gangs assembled in their separate clubrooms for last-minute instructions. Debs were sent out to play chicken at the intersections nearest the schoolyard, both to warn of \"Who cares? You go around the other way.\" \"It's a rumble,\" said Judy proudly. \"You twerps don't want to be involved.\" off their gang jackets and throwing them away, whooping and hollering. They were making such a racket themselves that they never heard Judy's and the rumble was over. Judy was so baffled and terrified that everything was just one great the yellow-and-black costume go scooting away down the street. try to connect every single time the word 'scorpion' comes up? What's \"Neither one of them was called 'The Scorpions,'\" Stevenson told that much. It says so in the paper. And it also says they all deny ever seeing that word on their jackets until after the fight.\" \"A bunch of juvenile delinquents,\" said Hanks in disgust. \"You take their word?\" \"Captain, did you read the article in the paper?\" \"I glanced through it.\" \"All right. Here's what they say happened: They say they started fighting at eleven o'clock. And they just got going when all at once branded 'The Scorpion.'\" something,\" said Hanks severely. \"They heard the police sirens, and they threw all their weapons away. Then they threw their jackets away, to try to make believe they hadn't been gangs up in Manhattan and comic book things like the Scorpion, or\n\n<question>:\nWhy does The Scorpion go mostly unnoticed, despite reaching out to the newspaper?\n\n<options>:\nA The police don't want to bring attention to them, because they don't believe there is a connection between the crimes.\nB Their first letter was disregarded, and their second was read by a different person.\nC The Scorpion hasn't made an appearance in person yet.\nD They wrote a crank letter, and so it was completely disregarded.\n\n<answer>:\n", "assistant": "B" } ]

[ { "human": "Read the following passage and questions, then choose the right answer from options, the answer should be one of A, B, C, D.\n\n<passage>:\nWhich goes to prove that, in some instances, being heroic is easy! Cling to the gods of old, who drew man upward from wherever he began. In whose names Man killed and plundered, while struggling up. In whose names Man finally left this earth, to seek his cousins among the stars. But of course there were no cousins. There was nothing. And Man returned, and settled down to live. Saddened, but resigned and content to live in peace with his knowledge and his power. Gone now are all the ancient evils, wars, emergencies. \"Sias! Sias—\" And they were upon me. That is, Xeon was upon me. But I knew that where Xeon is, Melia must soon appear. And indeed it was but a moment before Melia slipped through the high grass to stand at his side. Their youthful voices were babbling in excitement. Melia was a She, with the swelling breasts that were, so tradition states, quite prevalent among members of the race long ago, and are seldom seen today. Indeed, Melia was on this account made the butt of many jokes and, I fear, would have had a lonely life of it had it not been for the friendship of Xeon. \"Sias,\" they were saying, \"the Maternite's gone.\" Melia interrupted him quietly. \"Xeon, will you lose all respect for \"All of it?\" I asked. \"There is nothing left,\" Melia insisted. \"Can more be made? And if not, what will happen with no more children?\" emergency, it is wise to speak with caution. That is, I suppose so. I have never before been in a real emergency. nenglishmin go out in the midday sun, as the ancients say, although I often wonder why—but Xeon and Melia ran all the way down to the city. They are of an age to enter manhood, and have all the energy such young men do. consternation. And can the simple people be blamed? They were aware that they stood in the midst of an unprecedented happening indeed, an emergency. For a machine had failed! Not in the memory of the eldest among us has a machine failed. They were created so long ago, indeed, that the ignorant believe them Besides, had he been sober, he would not have known what to do. For who knows the mysterious workings of the machines? and supplications were offered to the gods, priests were sent to sacrifice, and finally, as the light of the sun was falling between the the crux of the matter and the Conclave finally heard the facts it had assembled to hear. By this time, unfortunately, many of the Conclave had departed for home and supper. Yet perhaps it is for the best, for those left were the most earnest and intelligent. thus assuring us, as has always been, a continuous source of Prelife to be number of children each year to balance the number of us whom the gods claim. Such it has always been from time immemorial.\" A murmur of assent and approval of these virtuous words whispered around the Hall. has been dried up. It will not function. There is no more. And there will be no more children!\" At this I feared the Conclave was about to riot. It is at such times helpless.\" Such heresy could have brought a sad end to the priest had not the have been a source of Prelife: a source now forgotten? And may it not even now—should we discover it—be available to us? I am reminded of the story of the animals of old—\" \"I fear your mind is wandering, Rocsates,\" I was forced to interrupt. \"I know well the legend of the animals, but what does it have to we would yet have these animals among us.\" \"And how, then, did these animals reproduce?\" I asked. \"How, indeed? And is there not a legend—admitted only a legend—that from within their own bodies?\" At this two members of the Conclave fell immediately into a faint, and I would gladly have joined them. I hoped that the youngsters, Xeon and Melia, had not heard, but as I turned they were listening most and so delicate, that they are kept in an air-tight tomb lest, being handled, they be destroyed and all knowledge within them lost. Therefore, they have not been read in the known history of our race. And Rocsates has been anxious for an excuse— the answer beforehand. And so I acquiesced, and agreed, and granted permission. And with much misgiving and foreboding of evil, the \"Some of those among you are She's,\" he began. \"And you know you are different from the rest of us. To the advantage, your skin is fairer exist no reason for this? Was there not, perhaps in ancient times, a cause for this? Do you not wonder, She's, whence you come and for what reason?\" Then reproduction was carried on by individuals, without help of the then nonexistent machines. The She's are not wanderers from another land, but they have lived with us for all time they are not another over-population.\" Order was lost among the Conclave as each man turned to speak to his neighbor, and for some time I could not restore order. I realized that something had to be done to save Rocsates before the outrage of the assembled overwhelmed him. reproduction must have been a pleasant thing to do otherwise they would not have done so to excess. And if it was a pleasant thing to do, with Melia were at the Conclave without permission, shouted, \"Perhaps power to restrain them from placing Xeon under arrest. Privately, however, I had to admit that his supposition was a possibility, and they cannot do until they meet again. I needed a sufficient excuse to call a meeting of the Conclave, an eon, to evolution is but an instant. And then the swelling of the some, at least, of the She's.\" We sat shaking our heads, bowed under terrible reality. \"Then we must experiment,\" I said. \"But whom could we ask to submit to such horror?\" \"I have already taken the liberty of asking for volunteers,\" Rocsates replied. \"The She, of course, must be one with the swelling of the breasts. Melia has volunteered, on condition that Xeon be released from dungeon. Are there any objections?\" There were none, of course. Who would refuse a boon to one who would undergo such an ordeal for the City? \"And who will be the partner?\" I asked. \"In all honor, could Xeon allow Melia to surpass him in courage? It and stood, noble and naked. Rocsates gestured to the table, and Melia started to climb upon it, the gods may help us?\" His glance reached into my soul, and I was proud of Xeon. A true friend, he thought even now of the comfort of Melia. The marble table was indeed hard, and from Rocsates' description it seemed that Melia's It was nearly dark when we walked home, Rocsates and I, arm in arm. It had been a horrible day. The inhuman indignity, the cries— \"They may indeed have succeeded,\" Rocsates replied. \"There is mentioned a time lapse which is necessary. The child does not appear immediately.\" \"It doesn't matter,\" I said disconsolately. \"Who could ask them to go through such an ordeal again?\" Melia cast her eyes down, and would not raise them. Xeon held his arm about her shoulders, as if to protect her, but I know not from whom. \"Sias, we come to tell.... We will....\" He raised his eyes to mine and said manfully, \"We shall try again.\" I am afraid that tears came to my eyes. Such sacrifice— \"We beg one favor,\" Xeon went on. \"We are agreed that—Well, we should like to be left alone, in private, to try.\" \"Of course,\" I replied. Anything they might want they could have. My relief and gratitude must have showed, for Xeon took a deep breath and spoke again. sort of enjoy it.\" I watched them turn and wander off together under the stars. My heart has a warmth in it, and I no longer fear for the future of our race when our young people can show such nobility and sacrifice.\n\n<question>:\nWhich was probably the biggest motivator for Melia to volunteer?\n\n<options>:\nA The chance to be closer with Xeon\nB The chance to fulfill societal expectations\nC The chance to help her friend Xeon discover something new\nD The chance to help her friend escape an unfortunate situation\n\n<answer>:\n", "assistant": "D" } ]

[ { "human": "Read the following passage and questions, then choose the right answer from options, the answer should be one of A, B, C, D.\n\n<passage>:\nWell, ma'am, O'Rielly searched every cranny where even a three-tailed mouse of Venus could have stowed away. His first flight, and O'Rielly when he'd been roped into a dice game with a bunch of Venus lads who myself here.\" Wherewith Callahan reached hand for O'Rielly's shower door. \"Venus dames,\" O'Rielly said dreamily, \"don't boss anything, do they?\" Callahan yelped like he'd been bit in the pants by a big Jupiter ant. \"O'Rielly! You trying to get both of us condemned to a Uranus moon?\" family—everything. \"Well, that's when Earth dames took over like armies of wild cats with knots in their tails. Before the guys who'd brought the Venus dames to Earth could say anything they was taken apart too small to pick up with a blotter. Earth dames wound up by flying the Venus ones back where they come from and serving notice if one ever set foot on Earth again there wouldn't be enough left of Venus to find with an electron microscope. \"Venus boys rared up and served notice that if Earth ever got any funny notions, right away there wouldn't be enough Earth left to hide in an atom's eyebrow. Touchy as hornets on a hot griddle, them Venus guys. Crazier than bed bugs about war. Could smell a loose dollar a million light years away too. Finagled around until they finally cooked up a deal. \"No Venus dames allowed within fifty miles of their port. Earth guys stay inside the high-voltage fence. Any dame caught trying to leave Venus thrown to the tigers for supper. Same for any Earth guy caught around a Venus dame. In return, Earth could buy practically everything at bargain basement prices.\" \"Oh, I was shown the history films in pre-flight,\" O'Rielly said, still dreamily. \"But not a peek of any Venus dame.\" \"Pray heaven you'll never lay eyes on one nor have one get within ten foot of you! Even though you'd know she'd be your damnation wouldn't twenty-five years now. Had more chances to hear more—just hear more, you hear! Only tried to clear your mind about Venus dames so you could put your brain on your control mess. So now put it! If you ain't high on vino and ain't been made nuts by a Venus dame, what answer do we feed the Old Woman?\" erect the instant the Old Woman appeared. Behind her stood a colorfully robed specimen of Venus man. Handsome as the devil himself. Fit to snap lesser men in two with his highly bejeweled hands. Fuzzy beards trailed he might at a couple of worms. Could bet your last old sox no female ever told any Venus man what to do. The shower units were equipped so no Burnerman need be more than two drowned himself if he could. \"There are rewards,\" the Old Woman said with the deadly coldness of outer space, \"for Earthmen found in a Venus woman's company, and for her leaving her planet.\" of Venus and this thing can mean war!\" Old Woman led the way to her office. Jabbed some buttons on her desk. Panels on opposite walls lit up. \"Presidents of Earth and Venus, please,\" the Old Woman stated evenly. \"Interplanetary emergency.\" Highly groomed flunkies appeared on the panels and were impersonally efforts.\" Old Woman sighed through her teeth. \"Venus woman aboard this ship. Finally on the Earth panel appeared the famous classic features. \"The facts, if you please, Captain Hatwoody.\" The Venus panel finally held steady on universally notorious features, that were as fierce as an eagle's, in a fancy war helmet. \"Trillium! My own granddaughter? Impossible! Dimdooly,\" Mr. President roared at his your official command! Weren't you, Trillium dear?\" \"No. One of us stowing away was the only way we Venus women could bring our cause to the attention of Earth's President. If Earth will only stop buying from Venus, you won't have any money to squander on your wars any longer no matter what happens to we revolutionaries!\" \"Revolutionaries? Such claptrap! And what's wrong with my wars? People have to have something to keep their minds off their troubles! Nobody around here gets hurt. Oh, maybe a few scratches here and there. But nobody on Venus dies from the things any more.\" \"But Venus men are so excited all the time about going to war they haven't time for us women. That's why we always radiated such a fatal attraction for Earthmen. We want to be loved! We want our own men home doing useful work!\" \"Well, they do come home and do useful work! Couple weeks every ten Venus manhood laying down the law. \"That's the way things have been on Venus for ten thousand years and all the women in the universe can't change it!\" \"I have been in constant contact with my Cabinet during these conversations,\" Madame President said crisply. \"Earth is terminating all trade agreements with Venus as of this instant.\" \"What?\" Grandpapa's beards near pulled his ears off. \"It's not legal! the panel too. \"From now on I'm doing the deciding.\" \"Nonsense! You're only my wife!\" \"And new President of Venus, elected by unanimous vote of all women.\" \"Impossible! The men run Venus! Nobody's turning this planet into another Earth where a man can't even sneeze unless some woman says so!\" \"Take him away, girls,\" Berta ordered coolly, whereupon her spouse was Venus women had our own men in our power.\" \"Those crewmen there,\" Grandmamma President said, \"seem to be proof enough that we Venus women no longer radiate any threat to Earth's tranquility.\" Yes, ma'am, O'Rielly sure felt like proof of something all of a sudden. \"Hmmmm, yes,\" Madame President of Earth observed. \"Reactions agree perfectly with the psychoanalytical research project we have been conducting on the subject of the Venus female influence. Madame President of Venus, congratulations on your victory! \"Long may the superior sex reign on Venus too! We shall be delighted to receive an Ambassadoress to discuss a new trade treaty at your earliest convenience.\" grin like the cat that nobody could prove ate the canary. \"You—I mean, that Earth guy a hundred twenty-five years ago,\" O'Rielly said in sudden thought. \"If Venus dames wanted to be loved so bad, why did Trillium's Grandmamma let him go?\" \"Venus guys wasn't so busy playing war all the time,\" Callahan mumbled, like to himself, \"they'd of found out the answer centuries ago. Yep, guess our boy was the only guy on Earth or Venus to find out and live. Dames bossing both planets now, though, his old secret won't be one much longer. Venus dames could of let it out centuries ago themselves but didn't, just to spite Earth probably. Later, was part of organizing to take over Venus, I guess.\" O'Rielly still had memories of the way he had felt about Trillium before her revolution. \"All right, Callahan, why did 'our boy' leave \"Anybody ever seen anybody but a Venus guy come built with ear beards? Course not.\" \"But I thought our boy was wearing the best fakes ever.\" \"Ain't nothing can match the natural growed-on variety, no, ma'am. Venus guy kisses a Venus dame, his beards grabs her roundst the ears.\" \"So what?\" \"Tickles 'em, boy, tickles 'em!\"\n\n<question>:\nWhy have Venus men struggled to keep their women interested in them?\n\n<options>:\nA Their culture has men in power, and thus they don't consider women their equals.\nB Earth men are too enticing to Venus women. They can't compete.\nC They have been too pre-occupied with war, haven't realized the truth.\nD Venus females don't interest them enough.\n\n<answer>:\n", "assistant": "C" } ]

[ { "human": "Read the following passage and questions, then choose the right answer from options, the answer should be one of A, B, C, D.\n\n<passage>:\nShe provocatively arched her back. Not even the women of Kelburn's race had a body like hers and she knew it. \"Racially, there should be a chance,\" she said. \"Actually, Kelburn and I would be infertile.\" \"Can you be sure?\" he asked, knowing it was a poor attempt to act humans, each supposedly originating in strict seclusion on as many with a minimum of ten others that's true of all other creatures, intelligent or not, with the sole exception of mankind. Actually, the four of us here, though it's \"Emmer, a Neanderthal type and our archeologist, is around the beginning of the scale. I'm from Earth, near the middle, though on Emmer's side. Meredith, linguist, is on the other side of the middle. And beyond her, toward the far end, is Kelburn, mathematician. There's a corresponding span of fertility. Emmer just misses being able to breed with my kind, but there's a fair chance that I'd be fertile with Meredith and a similar though lesser chance that her fertility may extend to Kelburn.\" Taphetta rustled his speech ribbons quizzically. \"But I thought it was proved that some humans did originate on one planet, that there was an \"I do think I love you,\" she said. \"And if love's enough, I may marry you in spite of everything. But you'll have to watch out whose children \"You're thinking of Earth,\" said Halden. \"Humans require a certain kind commented Taphetta dryly. \"It seems an unnecessary simplification.\" \"Can you think of a better explanation?\" asked Kelburn. \"Something had to distribute one species so widely and it's not the result of parallel evolution—not when a hundred human races are involved, and only the human race.\" It was easy to understand the attitude. Man was the most numerous \"Vaguely. Most people have if they've been around men.\" \"We've got new data and are able to interpret it better. The theory is that humans who can mate with each other were once physically close. We've got a list of all our races arranged in sequence. If planetary race F can mate with race E back to A and forward to M, and race G is change was almost imperceptible, but it was enough to indicate that he was interested. Kelburn went to the projector. \"It would be easier if we knew all the stars in the Milky Way, but though we've explored only a small portion Way is rotating. And while stars in a given region tend to remain \"And that's the hypothetical route of the unknown ancestor?\" \"To the best of our knowledge,\" said Kelburn. \"And whereas there are humans who are relatively near and not fertile, they can always mate with those they were adjacent to two hundred thousand years ago time right.\" visionport, where another ship hung motionless in space beside them. \"Do you mind if I ask other questions?\" \"Go ahead,\" Kelburn invited sardonically. \"But if it's not math, you'd better ask Halden. He's the leader of the expedition.\" Halden flushed the sarcasm wasn't necessary. It was true that Kelburn was the most advanced human type present, but while there were differences, biological and in the scale of intelligence, it wasn't he'd been on several expeditions and this was Kelburn's first trip. Damn it, he thought, that rated some respect. The Ribboneer shifted his attention. \"Aside from the sudden illness of him. Luckily, a ship was passing and we hailed it because it's four cent here and there for the crew pilot and scientist's share of the for me. And you can tell the ship to go on without me.\" He rubbed his Firmon of hydroponics slouched in, a tall man with scanty hair and an equal lack of grace. He seemed to have difficulty in taking his eyes off Meredith, though, since he was a notch or so above her in the \"Then change it to suit him. He's in charge of the ship and knows more nothing mattered, and for the sake of alloying the lower with the wanted her. \"Hydroponics is your job. There's nothing do except rebuild the ship from the hull inward.\" They couldn't set up a continuous watch and shoot the animals down because there weren't that many men to spare. Besides, the use of trying to protect than to the pest. He'd have to devise other ways. Sam Halden got up. \"I'll take a look and see what I can do.\" \"I'll come along and help,\" said Meredith, untwining her legs and leaning against him. \"Your mistress ought to have some sort of privileges.\" He looked from Halden to Emmer and back again. \"The hydroponics tech over while I ask questions.\" He turned to Emmer. \"I'm curious about their camp.\" \"I don't question your authority,\" crinkled Taphetta. \"To me, all humans—late or early and male or female—look remarkably alike. If you are an archeologist, that's enough for me.\" He paused and flicked his it, so they built more elaborately than they did later on. One-story not a scrap of writing or a tool or a single picture. They covered a route estimated at thirty thousand light-years in less than five thousand years—and not one of them died that we have a record of.\" never stayed. They were pretty special people themselves, big and they needed in the entire Milky Way. Their science was tremendously plasm and left us, hoping that some of us would survive. Most of us independently and those who did were scattered equally among early and planets we live on and it's hard to say just what it is.\" \"What happened to those who didn't develop space travel?\" asked Taphetta. \"We helped them,\" said Emmer. And they had, no matter who or what they were, biologically late atomic—because they were human. That was sometimes a frightening thing for non-humans, that the race stuck together. They weren't actually It was Halden who answered him. \"There's the satisfaction of knowing where we came from.\" He'd have done it anyway, but it was better to have the pilot's \"Why do we have to watch it on the screen?\" asked Meredith, glancing up. \"I'd rather be in hydroponics.\" Halden shrugged. \"They may or may not be smarter than planetbound Lights dimmed in the distant hydroponic section and the screen with two crew members, each with his own peculiar screen, below which was a \"Go in and get them,\" said Halden. \"We don't want the pests to find out that the bodies aren't flesh.\" \"It was realistic enough,\" said Meredith as the crewmen shut off their machines and went out. \"Do you think it will work?\" \"It might. We had an audience.\" \"Did we? I didn't notice.\" Meredith leaned back. \"Were the puppets have to identify them as their species. If they're smart enough, they'll know the value of a knife, no matter who uses it.\" \"That's part of our precautions. They'll never know until they try—and they'll never get away from the trap to try.\" \"Very good. I never thought of that,\" said Meredith, coming closer. \"I Here we go again, he thought drearily, sliding his arm around her. To her, I'm merely a passionate savage. The conflict was not new nor confined to them. In one form or another, it governed personal relations between races that were united against permanent union. \"Why did you ever have anything to do with me?\" demanded Halden. \"Love,\" she said gloomily. \"Physical attraction. But I can't let it lead me astray.\" \"Why not make a play for Kelburn? If you're going to be scientific about it, he'd give you children of the higher type.\" \"Kelburn.\" It didn't sound like a name, the way she said it. \"I don't like him and he wouldn't marry me.\" \"He wouldn't, but he'd give you children if you were humble enough. There's a fifty per cent chance you might conceive.\"\n\n<question>:\nOf the four main crew members, who are focused on the most in the story?\n\n<options>:\nA Kelburn and Halden\nB Meredith and Emmer\nC Halden and Meredith\nD Kelburn and Meredith\n\n<answer>:\n", "assistant": "C" } ]

[ { "human": "Read the following passage and questions, then choose the right answer from options, the answer should be one of A, B, C, D.\n\n<passage>:\nthe U.S. copyright on this publication was renewed.] Nothing could have seemed pleasanter than that peaceful planet. Then why was a non-suicidal man driven to suicide there? Yet it made sense. Why do people commit suicide? Templin tightened his safety belt and lay back on the acceleration bunk. The lights in the cabin dimmed to a dull, red glow that meant the It would probably be a mistake to ask for a list of Pendleton's than to face the dull monotony of the stars for days on end. Oh, they kill themselves for lots of reasons. Maybe ill health or financial messes or family difficulties. An unhappy love affair. Or more complex ones, if you went into it deeper. The failure to achieve perhaps. He could smell the bitter fragrance of tobacco smoke mingling with disapproval. because, at one time or another, they had had to. It was Eckert who had come into his office several days ago and told him that Don Pendleton had killed himself. Only Pendleton wasn't the type. He was the kind who have everything to live for, the kind you instinctively know will amount to something someday. And that was a lousy way to remember him. The clichés always come first. Your memory plays traitor and boils friendship down to the status of a breakfast food testimonial. The soft red lights seemed to be dancing in the darkness of the cabin. Eckert was just a dull, formless blur opposite him. His cigarette was And then Eckert had told him that Pendleton had taken the short way out. Pendleton? Try to forget it and drink a toast to him at the next class reunion? And never, never be so crude as to speculate why Pendleton perfume. Eckert and he had talked it out and gone over the records. Pendleton had come of good stock. There had been no mental instability in his family for as far back as the genetic records went. He had been raised later in college, he was the well-balanced type, athletic, popular, hard-working. How long would it be before memories faded and all there was left such honors. But try getting a picture of him by reading the records, resurrect him from a page of black print. Would he be human? Would he be flesh and blood? Hell, no! In the statistics Pendleton was the to pay his respects to Pendleton. Only Pendleton wasn't there. The natives said he had killed himself and showed the captain the little flower-covered plot where they had buried him. People like Pendleton didn't kill themselves, did they? No, they the ceiling told how close they were to takeoff. His head was thick with drowsiness, his eyelids a heavy weight that he knew he couldn't Eckert and he had been chosen to go to Tunpesh and investigate. The two of them, working together, should be able to find out why Pendleton had killed himself. But that wasn't the real reason. Maybe Eckert thought so, but he knew better. The real reason they were going there was to find out why Pendleton had been killed and who had killed him. That was it. Who had killed Cock Robin? The thin red line was practically microscopic now and Templin could feel his lashes lying gently on his cheeks. But he wasn't asleep—not data and reports. \"Ted?\" he murmured sleepily. A faint stirring in the black bulk opposite him. \"Yes?\" information?\" A drowsy mumble from the other cot: \"He wasn't there long enough. He committed suicide not long after landing.\" The room was a whirling pool of blackness into which his mind was slowly slipping. Takeoff was only seconds away. Why do people commit suicide? \"It's a nice day, isn't it, Ted?\" Eckert took a deep and pleasurable breath. \"It's the type of day that makes you feel good just to be felt vaguely concerned. \"Don't be disappointed if it doesn't look like cloak-and-dagger right off, Ray. What seems innocent enough on the surface can prove to be quite dangerous underneath.\" the way Templin had put it, as if any deviation from an Earth norm was potentially dangerous. that's what Pendleton thought, right to the very end.\" He was keyed up, jumpy, Eckert realized. He would probably be seeing things in every shadow and imagining danger to be lurking around every corner. \"It hasn't been established yet that Pendleton was killed, Ray. Let's keep an open mind until we know for certain.\" He flicked out the light and lay back on the cool bed, letting his were advantages in taking him along that Templin probably didn't even realize. He wondered what Templin would do if he ever found out that the actual reason he had been chosen to go was that his own psychological chart was very close to Pendleton's. Pendleton's own feelings and emotions would almost exactly be duplicated in Templin's. power pack, Eckert saw grimly, probably leading to the buttons on his tunic. A very convenient, portable, and hard to detect weapon. among the Tunpeshans, and he'd have to watch Templin to see that he didn't go off half-cocked and spoil everything. \"You're convinced that Pendleton was murdered, aren't you?\" Templin nodded. \"Sure.\" \"Why?\" those lines. But nobody has mentioned Pendleton discreet statements that we would like to talk to Pendleton's friends, believe. It's more likely that his friends have been silenced and any information about him is being withheld for a reason.\" \"What reason?\" Templin shrugged. \"Murder. What other reason could there be?\" voice was crisp. \"I knew Don Pendleton quite well, too,\" he said. \"But it isn't blinding me to what I'm here for. We came to find out what happened to him, not to substantiate any preconceived notions. What we find out may be vitally important to anybody serving here in the \"You knew Pendleton,\" Templin repeated grimly. \"Do you think it was suicide?\" \"I don't think there's such a thing as a suicide type, when you come down to it. I'm not ruling out the possibility of murder, either. I'm trying to keep an open mind.\" \"What have we accomplished so far? What have we found out?\" a few days ago, and, by judicious hinting to the proper authorities, he he noticed that nobody drank to excess. The old Greek ideal where he had strapped his power pack. Any fool should have known that nothing would happen at a banquet like this. The only actual danger lay \"I was wondering if my countryman Pendleton had offended your people in any way, Nayova.\" Now was as good a time as any to pump him for what he knew about Pendleton's death. \"So far as I know, menshar ulami bone and tried to appear casual in his questioning. Pendleton we saw that he was supplied with food and all other necessities.\" Eckert had a sudden clammy feeling which quickly passed away. What Nayova had said was something he'd make sure Templin never heard about. took another sip of the wine. \"We were shocked to find out that menshar Pendleton had killed himself. We knew him quite well and we could not bring ourselves to believe he had done such a thing.\" Nayova's gaze slid away from him. \"Perhaps it was the will of the Great One,\" he said vaguely. He didn't seem anxious to talk about it. Eckert stared bleakly at his wine glass and tried to put the pieces of information together. They probably had a taboo about self-destruction which would make it difficult to talk about. That would make it even harder for him to find out by direct questioning. Pendleton did. It is ...\" and he used a native word that\n\n<question>:\nFrom the text, what can be inferred about the thoughts in Pendleton's demise?\n\n<options>:\nA The information did not match up with his cause of death being suicide.\nB Everyone was in agreement that Pendleton abandoned his position and returned home by choice.\nC Everyone was in agreement that Pendleton was still alive and in hiding.\nD The information matched up with his cause of death being suicide.\n\n<answer>:\n", "assistant": "A" } ]

[ { "human": "Read the following passage and questions, then choose the right answer from options, the answer should be one of A, B, C, D.\n\n<passage>:\nWhich goes to prove that, in some a day accepted by the young, course, believe in the gods per se still there is a grandeur in the very stones that transcends their human sculptors, and it is no wonder to me that many cling tenaciously, and ignorantly, to the old religion. Cling to the gods of old, who drew man upward from wherever he began. In whose names Man killed and plundered, while struggling up. In whose to live in peace with his knowledge and his power. Gone now are all the ancient evils, wars, emergencies. \"Sias! Sias—\" And they were upon me. seldom seen today. Indeed, Melia was on this account made the butt of many jokes and, I fear, would have had a lonely life of it had it not what will happen with no more children?\" \"That is for the priests to say, not I,\" I replied. In moments of emergency, it is wise to speak with caution. That is, I suppose so. I They are of an age to enter manhood, and have all the energy such young men do. As we entered the city, we were surrounded by confusion and consternation. And can the simple people be blamed? They were aware that they stood in the midst of an unprecedented happening indeed, an emergency. For a machine had failed! Not in the memory of the eldest among us has a machine failed. They were created so long ago, indeed, that the ignorant believe them to have been constructed by the gods themselves. And never, so far as I know, has one failed. Small wonder that the watcher had been negligent. Indeed, the watcher is more a tradition than a necessity. Besides, had he been sober, he would not have known what to do. For who knows the mysterious workings of the machines? themselves on the floor as I took my place by the great table. Well, you know how these things are. At such a time, many men feel smoothing his white beard—of which he is excessively proud—approached assembled to hear. By this time, unfortunately, many of the Conclave had departed for home and supper. Yet perhaps it is for the best, for those left were the most earnest and intelligent. \"I would not bore you,\" he said, \"with details of which only the gods are sure. Know, then, that once granted a few cells of Prelife, it is A murmur of assent and approval of these virtuous words whispered around the Hall. actually failed.\" Cries of \"Treason\" sprang up, and I fear it might have gone hard for the priest had I not been able to insure order. \"That is not the worst,\" he cried, as if in defiance. \"All the Prelife has been dried up. It will not function. There is no more. And there will be no more children!\" At this I feared the Conclave was about to riot. It is at such times that I most revere the wisdom of the ancients, who decreed seventy years the minimum age for a member of the Conclave. They shouted and and they will produce more. But take away that least bit, and they are helpless.\" Such heresy could have brought a sad end to the priest had not the \"Riddles are not called for,\" I answered severely. \"Are not riddles often the beginning of knowledge?\" he asked, in that irritating dumber-than-thou attitude of his. \"Must there not, long ago, have been a source of Prelife: a source now forgotten? And may it not do—\" The heads of the Conclave were turning to me, quizzically. I hastened to explain the legend of the animals. \"It is said that many they had four legs or more, and no arms, were covered with hair, and although not mute, they could not speak.\" Rocsates' voice made itself heard. \"It is true. Such creatures did men—if it were so, then, what of it?\" \"May it not be,\" Rocsates put in, \"that these animals had no machines to reproduce their kind? For surely the gods would not grant machines to such creatures. And indeed, if they had Maternite Machines, why then we would yet have these animals among us.\" Machine, and that at such a time both the animals and Men reproduced from within their own bodies?\" At this two members of the Conclave fell immediately into a faint, and I would gladly have joined them. I hoped that the youngsters, Xeon and Melia, had not heard, but as I turned they were listening most attentively to Rocsates, who, amid cries of \"Heresy\" and \"Treason\", went on: and so delicate, that they are kept in an air-tight tomb lest, being handled, they be destroyed and all knowledge within them lost. Therefore, they have not been read in the known history of our race. And Rocsates has been anxious for an excuse— \"Some of those among you are She's,\" he began. \"And you know you are different from the rest of us. To the advantage, your skin is fairer and your features more often handsomer than ours. To the disadvantage, your excretory system is not so mechanically dextrous as ours. And, you should all be identical. Perforce you have the advantage, perforce we Then reproduction was carried on by individuals, without help of the then nonexistent machines. The She's are not wanderers from another over-population.\" Order was lost among the Conclave as each man turned to speak to his neighbor, and for some time I could not restore order. I realized that something had to be done to save Rocsates before the outrage of the assembled overwhelmed him. \"It seems,\" I shouted, \"that there is a flaw in your logic.\" For if such there was, I was hopeful of dismissing the entire affair with no harm done. \"For if people reproduced too often, why then this reproduction must have been a pleasant thing to do otherwise they would not have done so to excess. And if it was a pleasant thing to do, where is the necessity for the machines, and why were they created?\" the process of reproduction was of such a pleasure that the Conclave ruled it to be a sin? And therefore the machines were necessary!\" At this impudence the Conclave dissolved in an uproar, and I was beyond power to restrain them from placing Xeon under arrest. Privately, There was something in the man's behavior that commanded everyone's When he finished the Conclave sat in horrified silence. His words, with all their horror, had the ring of truth and there were no cries of 'Heresy'. There was only stunned disbelief and the beginnings of nausea. It is the mark of honor that a leader shall carry on when others fear to move. I cleared my throat. \"Shall not these organs which you mention have atrophied by now? With no use throughout all these generations, will they not have evolved into nothingness?\" \"I do not think so,\" Rocsates replied after a while. \"What to us is We sat shaking our heads, bowed under terrible reality. \"Then we must experiment,\" I said. \"But whom could we ask to submit to such horror?\" \"I have already taken the liberty of asking for volunteers,\" Rocsates There were none, of course. Who would refuse a boon to one who would undergo such an ordeal for the City? had been a horrible day. The inhuman indignity, the cries— We tarried before my home, leaned on the stone, stared at the first a time lapse which is necessary. The child does not appear immediately.\" \"It doesn't matter,\" I said disconsolately. \"Who could ask them to go through such an ordeal again?\" And then I looked down to earth again, and saw them standing before me. relief and gratitude must have showed, for Xeon took a deep breath and spoke again. \"We do not deserve praise, Sias,\" he said. \"The truth is, we ... we sort of enjoy it.\" I watched them turn and wander off together under the stars. My heart has a warmth in it, and I no longer fear for the future of our race when our young people can show such nobility and sacrifice.\n\n<question>:\nWhich is most true about how the volunteers are seen by the rest of their society?\n\n<options>:\nA They are appreciated for their level of discretion\nB They are respected for their dedication to each other above anything else\nC They are considered brave for undertaking such a disapproved task\nD They are disgraced for their choice to participate in such vile acts\n\n<answer>:\n", "assistant": "C" } ]