full transcript

From the Ted Talk by Clara Sousa-Silva: The fingerprints of life beyond Earth

Unscramble the Blue Letters

Either way, as much as I love phosphine, I don't think that's how we'll find life. The detection of life will likely not come from a sgilne molecule. No matter how special it is. We'll have to detect a whole biosphere producing a complex network of gases that together form a message that reads: “We’re alive!” As the Venus story shows, the detection of life will likely be uncertain, but Venus is the perfect lab for us to test our theories of bhisproees and how to intrpeert them. If we learn to udentansrd the atmosphere of vnues and the message it contains, then we can find out if we got it right by going there and chcinekg. And we'll do that at the end of the decade.

Open Cloze

Either way, as much as I love phosphine, I don't think that's how we'll find life. The detection of life will likely not come from a ______ molecule. No matter how special it is. We'll have to detect a whole biosphere producing a complex network of gases that together form a message that reads: “We’re alive!” As the Venus story shows, the detection of life will likely be uncertain, but Venus is the perfect lab for us to test our theories of __________ and how to _________ them. If we learn to __________ the atmosphere of _____ and the message it contains, then we can find out if we got it right by going there and ________. And we'll do that at the end of the decade.

Solution

  1. biospheres
  2. venus
  3. understand
  4. interpret
  5. single
  6. checking

Original Text

Either way, as much as I love phosphine, I don't think that's how we'll find life. The detection of life will likely not come from a single molecule. No matter how special it is. We'll have to detect a whole biosphere producing a complex network of gases that together form a message that reads: “We’re alive!” As the Venus story shows, the detection of life will likely be uncertain, but Venus is the perfect lab for us to test our theories of biospheres and how to interpret them. If we learn to understand the atmosphere of Venus and the message it contains, then we can find out if we got it right by going there and checking. And we'll do that at the end of the decade.

Frequently Occurring Word Combinations

ngrams of length 2

collocation frequency
alien astronomers 3
time thinking 2
large amounts 2
complex pollutants 2
unusual molecules 2
false positives 2
rocky planets 2
find life 2
biggest concern 2

Important Words

  1. atmosphere
  2. biosphere
  3. biospheres
  4. checking
  5. complex
  6. decade
  7. detect
  8. detection
  9. find
  10. form
  11. gases
  12. interpret
  13. lab
  14. learn
  15. life
  16. love
  17. matter
  18. message
  19. molecule
  20. network
  21. perfect
  22. phosphine
  23. producing
  24. shows
  25. single
  26. special
  27. story
  28. test
  29. theories
  30. uncertain
  31. understand
  32. venus