Question

The following passage is biologist Hope Jahren's prologue to her 2016 memoir Lab Girl. A prologue

Answer 1

Answer:

Jahren made some rhetorical statements in her prologue about the importance of trees and plants and why she refused calls by people to study the ocean since she lived in Hawaii.

She proceeds to talk about the life forms on land and in the water. She says that there are more life forms on land than there is in water. The biologist believes that people don't appreciate the importance of the plants and trees in our environment. It is her opinion that people live among plants but can't see them.

Jahren makes a rhetorical statement, asking her readers to look out their windows and asking what they see.

Do they see plants? Or do they see skyscrapers, buildings, industries, etc. It is her belief that people tend to notice such man made things to the detriment of plants.

The biologist Jahren worries about the rates at which plants are cut down each year without replanting. She estimates that for the past ten years, about five billion trees have been felled which she equates as the same land mass as France.

She stresses the urgency and importance of her message by saying that every ten years, people cut down one France after another and about one trillion trees have been lost forever through massive tree fellings.

Explanation:

A rhetorical question is a question which requires no answer. It's used for dramatic effect.