Expositive Comprehension passage - Jamb English Language Past Questions and Answers

Question 76:

• JAMB 1987

Primitive man was probably more concerned with fire as a source of warmth and as a means of cooking food than as a source of light. Before the discovered less laborious ways of making fire, he had to preserve it and whenever he went on a journey he carried a firebrand with him. He discovered that the firebrand, from which the torch may well have developed, could be used for illumination was probably incidental to the primary purpose of preserving a flame.
Lamps too probably developed by accident. Early man may had his first conception of a lamp while watching a twing or fibre burning in the molten fat dropped from roasting carcass. All he had to do was to fashion a vessel to contain fat and float a lighted reed in it. Such lamps which were made of hollow stones or sea-shells have persisted in identical form up to quite recent times.


Primitive man was least concerned with fire as a

A. Means of cooking
B. Source of warmth
C. Source of light
D. Means of travelling

Question 77:

• JAMB 1987

So far I have been speaking of science in its universality, viewed from the perspective of the world at large. For the context of our own country and our sister developing countries, many of the factors mentioned earlier are not very important. For example, pollution, deterioration of the environment and population explosion are not yet serious problems for us in this country.
Let me now turn to a more specific area, namely the question of scientific choice for developing countries. There is no doubt that role which science s and technology have played in the upliftment of the material and economic well-being of the developed nation will, and does, influence the criteria that the Third World nations must choose in order to establish their science policies and priorities.
But the criteria to be used by this nation do not have the same as those which have brought the developed countries to their present stage of evolution. For while human beings have the same problems, their solutions, to be meaningful will have to be sought within some relevant frame of reference, such as the available resources and expertise, social values, place and time in the historical scale.


According to the passage, the basic consideration for developing science and technology should be three of the following.
1. Technical know-how
2. availability of raw material
3. atmospheric pollution
4. the people's tradition and beliefs
5. population
6. capital

A. 2,1 and 6 only
B. 3,2 and 4 only
C. 5,3 and 6 only
D. 6,5 and 4 only
E. 5,2 and 6 only

Question 78:

• JAMB 1987

So far I have been speaking of science in its universality, viewed from the perspective of the world at large. For the context of our own country and our sister developing countries, many of the factors mentioned earlier are not very important. For example, pollution, deterioration of the environment and population explosion are not yet serious problems for us in this country.
Let me now turn to a more specific area, namely the question of scientific choice for developing countries. There is no doubt that role which science s and technology have played in the upliftment of the material and economic well-being of the developed nation will, and does, influence the criteria that the Third World nations must choose in order to establish their science policies and priorities.
But the criteria to be used by this nation do not have the same as those which have brought the developed countries to their present stage of evolution. For while human beings have the same problems, their solutions, to be meaningful will have to be sought within some relevant frame of reference, such as the available resources and expertise, social values, place and time in the historical scale.


The main idea of this passage is that

A. There is a yawning gap between the have and the have-nots
B. There is need to rid his countrymen from the scourges of hunger , disease, ignorance, and want
C. There could be atmospheric pollution and population explosion
D. The concern of science and technology are the same in all countries
E. Each nation must plan its development according to its needs and resources

Question 79:

• JAMB 1987

So far I have been speaking of science in its universality, viewed from the perspective of the world at large. For the context of our own country and our sister developing countries, many of the factors mentioned earlier are not very important. For example, pollution, deterioration of the environment and population explosion are not yet serious problems for us in this country.
Let me now turn to a more specific area, namely the question of scientific choice for developing countries. There is no doubt that role which science s and technology have played in the upliftment of the material and economic well-being of the developed nation will, and does, influence the criteria that the Third World nations must choose in order to establish their science policies and priorities.
But the criteria to be used by this nation do not have the same as those which have brought the developed countries to their present stage of evolution. For while human beings have the same problems, their solutions, to be meaningful will have to be sought within some relevant frame of reference, such as the available resources and expertise, social values, place and time in the historical scale.


The term 'our sister developing countries' implies

A. Britain, Gambia and Canada
B. Ghana, Germany and Togo
C. Russia, Switzerland and America
D. Liberia, Sierra Leone and Gabon
E. China, India and Holland

Question 80:

• JAMB 1987

Developments in electronic science have transformed the art of record keeping to the modern age. Traditionally, records of events were kept only in people’s minds. It depends very much on the retentive power of the human memory. This was extremely dangerous as people either forgot events wholly or in part or deliberately falsified details to suit their various interests. Interminable arguments were thus order of the day. Even writing which replaced mental recording was not entirely free from these shortcomings as untruths could be written as true either willingly or inadvertently. With the advent of the electronic memory, however these dangers have been largely overcome. Recording on audio and video cassettes now show not what happened, but also who did or said what including how and when


The author believes that electronic recording is

A. Superior only to mental recording
B. Inferior to both mental recording and writing
C. Superior to both mental recording and writing
D. Inferior to only writing