Part Ⅲ Reading Comprehension
Directions:
Each of the passages below is followed by some questions. For each question
there are four answers marked [A],[B],[C] and [D].Read the passages carefully
and choose the best answer to each of the questions. Then mark your answer on
ANSWER SHEET 1 by blackening the corresponding letter in the brackets with a
pencil.(40 points)
Passage 1
Specialization can be seen as a response to the problem of an increasing accumulation
of scientific knowledge. By splitting up the subject matter into smaller units,
one man could continue to handle the information and use it as the basis for
further research. But specialization was only one of a series of related developments
in science affecting the process of communication. Another was the growing professionalisation
of scientific activity.
No clear-cut distinction can be drawn between professionals and amateurs in
science: exceptions can be found to any rule. Nevertheless, the word 'amateur'
does carry a connotation that the person concerned is not fully integrated into
the scientific community and, in particular, may not fully share its values.
The growth of specialization in the nineteenth century, with its consequent
requirement of a longer, more complex training, implied greater problems for
amateur participation in science. The trend was naturally most obvious in those
areas of science based especially on a mathematical or laboratory training,
and can be illustrated in terms of the development of geology in the United
Kingdom.
A comparison of British geological publications over the last century and a
half reveals not simply an increasing emphasis on the primacy of research, but
also a changing definition of what constitutes an acceptable research paper.
Thus, in the nineteenth century, local geological studies represented worthwhile
research in their own right; but, in the twentieth century, local studies have
increasingly become acceptable to professionals only if they incorporatel, and
reflect on, the wider geological picture. Amateurs, on the other hand, have
continued to pursue local studies in the old way. The overall result has been
to make entrance to professional geological journals harder for amateurs, a
result that has been reinforced by the widespread introduction of refereeing,
first by national journals in the nineteenth century and then by several local
geological journals in the twentieth century. As a logical consequence of this
development, separate journals have now appeared aimed mainly towards either
professional or amateur readership. A rather similar process of differentiation
has led to professional geologists coming together nationally within one or
two specific societies, whereas the amateurs have tended either to remain in
local societies or to come together nationally in a different way.
Although the process of professionalisation and specialization was already well
under way in British geology during the nineteenth century, its full consequences
were thus delayed until the twentieth century. In science generally, however,
the nineteenth century must be reckoned as the crucial period for this change
in the structure of science.
51.The growth of specialization in the 19th century might be more clearly seen
in sciences such as _________.
[A]sociology and chemistry
[B]physics and psychology
[C]sociology and psychology
[D]physics and chemistry
52.We can infer from the passage that _________.
[A] there is little distinction between specialization and
professionalisation
[B]amateurs can compete with professionals in some areas of science
[C]professionals tend to welcome amateurs into the scientific community
[D]amateurs have national academic societies but no local ones
53.The author writes of the development of geology to demonstrate _________.
[A]the process of specialization and professionalisation
[B]the hardship of amateurs in scientific study
[C]the change of policies in scientific publications
[D]the discrimination of professionals against amateurs
54.The direct reason for specialization is _________.
[A]the development in communication
[B]the growth of professionalisation
[C]the expansion of scientific knowledge
[D]the splitting up of academic societies
Passage 2
A great deal of attention is being paid today to the so called digital divide-the
division of the world into the info(information) rich and the info poor. And
that divide does exist today. My wife and I lectured about this looming danger
twenty years ago. What was less visible then, however, were the new, positive
forces that work against the digital divide. There are reasons to be optimistic.
There are technological reasons to hope the digital divide will narrow. As the
Internet becomes more and more commercialized, it is in the interest of business
to universalize access-after all, the more people online, the more potential
customers there are. More and more governments, afraid their countries will
be left behind, want to spread Internet access. Within the next decade or two,
one to two billion people on the planet will be netted together. As a result,
I now believe the digital divide will narrow rather than widen in the years
ahead. And that is very good news because the Internet may well be the most
powerful tool for combating world poverty that we've ever had.
Of course, the use of the Internet isn't the only way to defeat poverty. And
the Internet is not the only tool we have. But it has enormous potential.
To take advantage of this tool, some impoverished countries will have to get
over their outdated anti-colonial prejudices with respect to foreign investment.
Countries that still think foreign investment is an invasion of their sovereignty
might well study the history of infrastructure (the basic structural foundations
of a society) in the United States. When the United States built its industrial
infrastructure, it didn't have the capital to do so. And that is why America's
Second Wave infrastructure-including roads, harbors, highways, ports and so
on-were built with foreign investment. The English, the Germans, the Dutch and
the French were investing in Britain's former colony. They financed them. Immigrant
Americans built them. Guess who owns them now? The Americans. I believe the
same thing would be true in places like Brazil or anywhere else for that matter.
The more foreign capital you have helping you build your Third Wave infrastructure,
which today is an electronic infrastructure, the better off you're going to
be. That doesn't mean lying down and becoming fooled, or letting foreign corporations
run uncontrolled. But it does mean recognizing how important they can be in
building the energy and telecom infrastructures needed to take full advantage
of the Internet.
55.Digital divide is something _________.
[A]getting worse because of the Internet
[B]the rich countries are responsible for
[C]the world must guard against
[D]considered positive today
56.Governments attach importance to the Internet because it _________.
[A]offers economic potentials
[B]can bring foreign funds
[C]can soon wipe out world poverty
[D]connects people all over the world
57.The writer mentioned the case of the United States to justify the policy
of _________.
[A]providing financial support overseas
[B]preventing foreign capital's control
[C]building industrial infrastructure
[D]accepting foreign investment
58.It seems that now a country's economy depends much on _________.
[A]how well developed it is electronically
[B]whether it is prejudiced against immigrants
[C]whether it adopts America's industrial pattern
[D]how much control it has over foreign corporations
Passage 3
Why do so many Americans distrust what they read in their newspapers? The American
Society of Newspaper Editors is trying to answer this painful question. The
organization is deep into a long self-analysis known as the journalism credibility
project.
Sad to say, this project has turned out to be mostly low-level findings about
factual errors and spelling and grammar mistakes, combined with lots of head-scratching
puzzlement about what in the world those readers really want.
But the sources of distrust go way deeper. Most journalists learn to see the
world through a set of standard templates (patterns) into which they plug each
day's events. In other words, there is a conventional story line in the newsroom
culture that provides a backbone and a ready-made narrative structure for otherwise
confusing news.
There exists a social and cultural disconnect between journalists and their
readers, which helps explain why the "standard templates" of the newsroom
seem alien to many readers. In a recent survey, questionnaires were sent to
reporters in five middle-size cities around the country, plus one large metropolitan
area. Then residents in these communities were phoned at random and asked the
same questions.
Replies show that compared with other Americans, journalists are more likely
to live in upscale neighborhoods, have maids, own Mercedeses, and trade stocks,
and they're less likely to go to church, do volunteer work, or put down roots
in a community.
Reporters tend to be part of a broadly defined social and cultural elite, so
their work tends to reflect the conventional values of this elite. The astonishing
distrust of the news media isn't rooted in inaccuracy or poor reportorial skills
but in the daily clash of world views between reporters and their readers.
This is an explosive situation for any industry, particularly a declining one.
Here is a troubled business that keeps hiring employees whose attitudes vastly
annoy the customers. Then it sponsors lots of symposiums and a credibility project
dedicated to wondering why customers are annoyed and fleeing in large numbers.
But it never seems to get around to noticing the cultural and class biases that
so many former buyers are complaining about. If it did, it would open up its
diversity program, now focused narrowly on race and gender, and look for reporters
who differ broadly by outlook, values, education, and class.
59.What is the passage mainly about?
[A]needs of the readers all over the world
[B]causes of the public disappointment about newspapers
[C]origins of the declining newspaper industry
[D]aims of a journalism credibility project
60.The results of the journalism credibility project turned out to
be .
[A]quite trustworthy
[B]somewhat contradictory
[C]very illuminating
[D]rather superficial
61.The basic problem of journalists as pointed out by the writer lies in
their _________.
[A]working attitude
[B]conventional lifestyle
[C]world outlook
[D]educational background
62.Despite its efforts, he newspaper industry still cannot satisfy the
readers owing to its _________.
[A]failure to realize its real problem
[B]tendency to hire annoying reporters
[C]likeliness to do inaccurate reporting
[D]prejudice in matters of race and gender
Passage 4
The world is going through the biggest wave of mergers and acquisitions ever
witnessed. The process sweeps from hyperactive America to Europe and reaches
the emerging countries with unsurpassed might. Many in these countries are looking
at this process and worrying:"Won't the wave of business concentration
turn into an uncontrollable anti-competitive force?"
There's no question that the big are getting bigger and more powerful. Multinational
corporations accounted for less than 20% of international trade in 1982.Today
the figure is more than 25% and growing rapidly. International affiliates account
for a fast-growing segment of production in economies that open up and welcome
foreign investment. In Argentina, for instance, after the reforms of the early
1990s,multinationals went from 43% to almost 70% of the industrial production
of the 200 largest firms. This phenomenon has created serious concerns over
the role of smaller economic firms, of national businessmen and over the ultimate
stability of the world economy.
I believe that the most important forces behind the massive M&A wave are
the same that underlie the globalization process: falling transportation and
communication costs, lower trade and investment barriers and enlarged markets
that require enlarged operations capable of meeting customer's demands. All
these are beneficial, not detrimental, to consumers. As productivity grows,
the world's wealth increases.
Examples of benefits or costs of the current concentration wave are scanty.
Yet it is hard to imagine that the merger of a few oil firms today could re-create
the same threats to competition that were feared nearly a century ago in the
U.S., when the Standard Oil trust was broken up. The mergers of telecom companies,
such as WorldCom, hardly seem to bring higher prices for consumers or a reduction
in the pace of technical progress. On the contrary, the price of communications
is coming down fast. In cars, too, concentration is increasing-witness Daimler
and Chrysler, Renault and Nissan-but it does not appear that consumers are being
hurt.
Yet the fact remains that the merger movement must be watched. A few weeks ago,
Alan Greenspan warned against the megamergers in the banking industry. Who is
going to supervise, regulate and operate as lender of last resort with the gigantic
banks that are being created? Won't multinationals shift production from one
place to another when a nation gets too strict about infringements to fair competition?
And should one country take upon itself the role of "defending competition"
on issues that affect many other nations, as in the U.S. vs. Microsoft case?
63.What is the typical trend of businesses today?
[A]to take in more foreign funds
[B]to invest more abroad
[C]to combine and become bigger
[D]to trade with more countries
64.According to the author, one of the driving forces behind M&A wave is
_________.
[A]the greater customer demands
[B]a surplus supply for the market
[C]a growing productivity
[D]the increase of the world's wealth
65.From paragraph 4 we can infer that _________.
[A]the increasing concentration is certain to hurt consumers
[B]WorldCom serves as a good example of both benefits and costs
[C]the costs of the globalization process are enormous
[D]the Stanard Oil trust might have threatened competition
66.Toward the new business wave, the writer's attitude can be said to be _________.
[A]optimistic
[B]objective
[C]pessimistic
[D]biased
Passage 5
When I decided to quit my full time employment it never occurred to me that
I might become a part of a new international trend. A lateral move that hurt
my pride and blocked my professional progress prompted me to abandon my relatively
high profile career although, in the manner of a disgraced government minister,
I covered my exit by claiming "I wanted to spend more time with my family".
Curiously, some two-and-a-half years and two novels later, my experiment in
what the Americans term "downshifting" has turned my tired excuse
into an absolute reality. I have been transformed from a passionate advocate
of the philosophy of "having it all",preached by Linda Kelsey for
the past seven years in the page of She magazine, into a woman who is happy
to settle for a bit of everything.
I have discovered, as perhaps Kelsey will after her much-publicized resignation
from the editorship of She after a build up of stress, that abandoning the doctrine
of "juggling your life",and making the alternative move into "downshifting"
brings with it far greater rewards than financial success and social status.
Nothing could persuade me to return to the kind of life Kelsey used to advocate
and I once enjoyed:12 hour working days, pressured deadlines, the fearful strain
of office politics and the limitations of being a parent on "quality time".
In America, the move away from juggling to a simpler, less materialistic lifestyle
is a well-established trend. Downshifting-also known in America as "voluntary
simplicity"-has, ironically, even bred a new area of what might be termed
anticonsumerism. There are a number of best-selling downshifting self-help books
for people who want to simplify their lives; there are newsletters, such as
The Tightwad Gazette, that give hundreds of thousands of Americans useful tips
on anything from recycling their cling-film to making their own soap; there
are even support groups for those who want to achieve the mid-'90s equivalent
of dropping out.
While in America the trend started as a reaction to the economic decline-after
the mass redundancies caused by downsizing in the late'80s-and is still linked
to the politics of thrift, in Britain, at least among the middle-class down-shifters
of my acquaintance, we have different reasons for seeking to simplify our lives.
For the women of my generation who were urged to keep juggling through the'80s,downshifting
in the mid-'90s is not so much a search for the mythical good life-growing your
own organic vegetables, and risking turning into one-as a personal recognition
of your limitations.
67.Which of the following is true according to paragraph 1?
[A]Full-time employment is a new international trend.
[B]The writer was compelled by circumstances to leave her job.
[C]"A lateral move" means stepping out of full-time employment.
[D]The writer was only too eager to spend more time with her family.
68.The writer's experiment shows that downshifting _________.
[A]enables her to realize her dream
[B]helps her mold a new philosophy of life
[C]prompts her to abandon her high social status
[D]leads her to accept the doctrine of [WTBX]she magazine
69."Juggling one's life" probably means living a life characterized
by _________.
[A]non-materialistic lifestyle
[B]a bit of everything
[C]extreme stress
[D]anti-consumerism
70.According to the passage, downshifting emerged in the U.S. as a result
of _________.
[A]the quick pace of modern life
[B]man's adventurous spirit
[C]man's search for mythical experiences
[D]the economic situation
Part Ⅳ English-Chinese Translation
Directions:
Read the following passage carefully and then translate the underlined sentences
into Chinese. Your translation must be written neatly on ANSWER SHEET 2.(15
points)
In less than 30 year's time the Star Trek holodeck will be a reality. Direct
links between the brain's nervous system and a computer will also create full
sensory virtual environments, allowing virtual vacations like those in the film
Total Recall.
71)There will be television chat shows hosted by robots, and cars with pollution
monitors that will disable them when they offend. 72) Children
will play with dolls equipped with personality chips, computers with in-built
personalities will be regarded as workmates rather than tools, relaxation will
be in front of smell-television, and digital age will have arrived.
According to BT's futurologist, Ian Pearson, these are among the developments
scheduled for the first few decades of the new millennium(a period of 1,000
years), when supercomputers will dramatically accelerate progress in all areas
of life.
73)Pearson has pieced together to work of hundreds of researchers around the
world to produce a unique millennium technology calendar that gives the latest
dates when we can expect hundreds of key breakthroughs and discoveries to take
place. Some of the biggest developments will be in medicine, including an extended
life expectancy and dozens of artificial organs coming into use between now
and 2040.
Pearson also predicts a breakthrough in computer human links. "By linking
directly to our nervous system, computers could pick up what we feel and, hopefully,
simulate feeling too so that we can start to develop full sensory environments,
rather like the holidays in Total Recall or the Star Trek holodeck," he
says. 74)But that, Pearson points out, is only the start of man-machine integration:"It
will be the beginning of the long process of integration that will ultimately
lead to a fully electronic human before the end of the next century."
Through his research, Pearson is able to put dates to most of the breakthroughs
that can be predicted. However, there are still no forecasts for when faster-than-light
travel will be available, or when human cloning will be perfected, or when time
travel will be possible. But he does expect social problems as a result of technological
advances. A boom in neighborhood surveillance cameras will, for example, cause
problems in 2010, while the arrival of synthetic lifelike robots will mean people
may not be able to distinguish between their human friends and the droids. 75)And
home appliances will also become so smart that controlling and operating them
will result in the breakout of a new psychological disorder-kitchen rage.
Part Ⅴ Writing
76.Directions:
Among all the worthy feelings of mankind, love is probably the noblest, but
everyone has his/her own understanding of it.
There has been a discussion recently on the issue in a newspaper. Write an essay
to the newspaper to
1) show your understanding of the symbolic meaning of the picture below,
2) give a specific example, and
3) give your suggestion as to the best way to show love.
You should write about 200 words on ANSWER SHEET 2. (20 points)
2001年考研英语试题
评分标准及参考答案
Part ⅠStructure and Vocabulary (15 points)
Section A
1.C 2.B 3.D 4.A 5.B
6.D 7.D 8.A 9.C 10.A
Section B
11.B 12.A 13.B 14.C 15.C
16.C 17.D 18.A 19.C 20.B
21.D 22.C 23.B 24.A 25.C
26.A 27.D 28.B 29.B 30.D
Part Ⅱ Cloze Text(10 points)
31.D 32.A 33.D 34.B 35.A
36.C 37.D 38.B 39.B 40.A
41.B 42.C 43.B 44.A 45.C
46.A 47.D 48.C 49.D 50.C
Part Ⅲ Reading Comprehension (40 points)
51.D 52.B 53.A 54.C 55.C
56.A 57.D 58.A 59.B 60.D
61.C 62.A 63.C 64.A 65.D
66.B 67.B 68.B 69.C 70.D
Part Ⅳ English-Chinese Translation(15 points)
71.届时,将出现由机器人主持的电视谈话节目以及装有污染监控器的汽车,一旦
这些汽车排污超标(违规),监控器就会使其停驶。
72.儿童将与装有个性化芯片的玩具娃娃玩耍,具有个性内置的计算机将被视为工
作伙伴而不是工具,人们将在气味电视机前休闲,届时数字体时*代就来到了。
73.皮尔森汇集世界各地数百位研究人员的成果,编制了一个独特的新技术千年历,它列出了人们有望看到数百项重大突破和发现的最迟日期。
74.但皮尔森指出,这个突破仅仅是人机一体化的开始:"它是人机一体化慢长之
路的第一步,最终会使人们在下世纪末之前就研制出完全电子化的仿真人。"
75.家用电器将会变得如此智能化,以至于控制和操作它们会引发一种新的心理疾
病-厨房狂躁。
Part ⅤWriting (20 points)
76.(略)