The Birmingham University. Mechanical Engineering Department

There are at least a couple of useful questions to explore in relation to our moral values:

• Is it even possible to have shared moral values in a society that does not have a shared framework of beliefs? It seems unlikely. If this is so, then as our shared beliefs disintegrate even further, things which are morally unthinkable today will become all too thinkable in the next few years.
• Do we really believe that there are no moral absolutes? That the Nazis were OK to kill six million Jews? That it was OK for widows in India to be burned on the funeral pyres of their husbands? That pedophilia is an acceptable lifestyle choice? No, we do not. All of us have some things which we do regard as moral absolutes. Yet, if we have no belief system, what reason do we really have to think that some things are right and others are wrong?

American morality

The latest stats in American morality. I think it is pretty interesting and fairly accurate. Gallup does this poll every year in May. It is always interesting to see the results.

 

Moscow Higher Technical School

The founders of a trade school in 1830 in Moscow could not have imagined that it would become the cradle of many outstanding engineering ideas in Russia, it’s education, even in the middle of the last century, provided practical skills combined with a high theoretical standard.

According to the programme of the school, the theoretical study at the institute was accompanied by practical training in industrial enterprises and research institutions. This was the so called “Russian method of teaching trade”, and it formed the basis of the current system training in many civil engineering specialities.

That close cooperation of the School with industrial enterprises and research institutions has become a tradition. It is of great importance for the development of the national economy.

Moscow Bauman Higher Technical School is one of the country’s leading institutes, the alma mater of many of today’s industries: aircraft and automobile building, instrument making, and locomotive construction. It is where the theory of mechanisms and machines originated.

The students of the School are active members of the Students’ Scientific Technical Society (SSTS). The SSTS includes various scientific groups, design departments, computing centres and specialized laboratories. The task of the SSTS is to develop students’ creative abilities, to organize their activity in accordance with individual interests, and to assist in the practical application of the results of their research.

In 1989 the School was reorganized into Moscow State Technical University named after Bauman.

 

The Birmingham University. Mechanical Engineering Department

The courses given in the Department are designed primarily to provide abroad education in the fundamental mechanical engineering sciences and in economics and business studies. The advanced courses in the Mechanical Engineering Department lead to careers (in technical management) in the fields of design, research, development and production in industry; the government service; the national research laboratories and institutions of higher learning; and to those in some branches of teaching.

One group of courses serves the Industrial Engineering stream and the other serves the Engineering Science stream. The former is intended for students whose interests lie mainly in the design and production side of mechanical engineering, the latter is meant for those who are analytically minded and who wish to study in depth the theoretical techniques used by engineers. After following a common first year and before entering the second year, students are divided into two streams on the basis of their own choice. The courses of study include mechanical, production and electronic and electrical engineering, metallurgy, mathematics and economics. They are supported by laboratory and drawing office exercises. The former includes electronic instrumentation, stress analysis, analogue and digital computation, metrology, etc. The latter culminates in design projects in the final year which are manufactured by second-year students during their second vacation course in industry. In both cases students are engaged in practical work with engineering firms during the summer vacation. Information:

Birmingham is one of the largest industrial cities of Great Britain.

Steam engines, gas engines, motor cars, railway carriages, bicycles, agricultural implements and other articles are manufactured in its factories.

The University of Birmingham was founded in 19th century. It has more than 7,000 students.

The main faculties of the University are:

Faculty of Science and Engineering,

Faculty of Arts,

Faculty of Medicine,

Faculty of Commerce and Social Studies and

Faculty of Law.

The Faculty of Science and Engineering consists of about 30 different departments. Mechanical Engineering is one of them.

 

PRE-TEXT SECTION

Practice 1. Зная значение выделенных слов, а) догадайтесь о значении следующих словосочетаний.

trade ремесло, профессия: trade school, methed of teaching trade; to compute вычислять: computing centre; to create создавать, творить: creative abilities

b) назовите следующие отрасли машиностроения.

aircraft самолет: aircraft building; automobile авто-мобиль: automobile building; instrument прибор: instru­ment making; locomotive локомотив: locomotive con­struction

Practice 2. Прочитайте следующие слова н словосочетания. Ohи по­могут вам полнее понять содержание текста.

cradle колыбель, current system современная систе­ма, civil engineering гражданское строительство, to ori­ginate брать начало, возникать, in accordance with в cоответствии с