The author's ideas, or his message, are his
characterization
opinions
theme

Synthesizing new ideas from a speaker with what one already knows about the subject to see if the information makes sense is an example of a) questioning and challenging b) identifying differences c) forming a statement d) seeing the broader context

According to stephen hawking in the "origin of the universe" lecture, "why are we here" and "where did we come from" are questions that

Itscome to our attention that someone has been taking extra supply out of the supply cabinet for some time now and this is not allowed the officer manager says if this continues to happen we will have to put up security cameras this will come out of the office budget there for our paychecks make sure that you're only using me budget for the for your department