▶ Your Answer :
Both
the reading passage and the lecture deal with a rare weather phenomenon known
as red rain. In the lecture, the speaker asserts that theories suggested in the
reading are groundless. This casts doubt on the reading’s claim that there are
rational explanations for the phenomenon.
To
begin with, the lecturer points out that it is absurd to believe that the red
rain contained the blood of bats. Experts said that in the Indian state of
Kerala, bats had been destroyed at that time. They were hardly able to discover
wings and bones of bats. Thus, a large amount of bat blood would not have been
dispersed through the atmosphere. This counters the reading’s insistence that
the red rain was originated from the blood of bats.
Secondly,
according to the speaker, the explanation that the red rain resulted from a
volcanic eruption in the Philippines is not proved. If the volcanic eruption
was the main cause of the red rain, the red rain would have been observed by
those who lived in the Philippines too. However, this is not supported by the
fact that it was hard to observe the phenomenon in the nations near the
Philippines. This rebuffs the reading passage’s assertion that a volcanic
eruption in the Philippines resulted in the red rain.
Lastly,
the lecturer maintains that the red rain phenomenon were caused by chemical
pollution which generated from local factories. Pollutants would not have
combined with moisture in the atmosphere since there were very few factories in
the state. Furthermore, the red rain was rarely observed in the area where unchimney
factories concentrated. This is contradictory to the reading’s point that
chemical pollution from local factories without filters could be responsible
for the red rain phenomenon. |