It’s a question that’s bothered cultural critics for decades: while we know more than ever, are we getting sillier and dumber as a result of the increasing amount of technology at our disposal?
The current debate about intelligence, sparked by Nicholas Carr’s recent The Shallows, asks what the Internet is doing to our brains? Like Susan Jacoby’s The Age of American Unreason, Mr. Carr addresses the sense of despair among American intellectuals about the country’s poor educational performance when compared with other countries. In reading, mathematics and science, American 15-year-olds suffer in the lower half of the rankings for the 30 wealthiest countries.
But things are rarely as they seem. E-books barely existed a decade ago, but have exploded in popularity since Amazon introduced its Kindle a few years back. E-books are now outselling hardcovers. Perhaps we are witnessing not a decline in book reading but a renaissance. The irony is that had computers been invented before books we would now.be anxious about the loss of multi-media, multi-tasking, computer-gaming skills as our children wasted their time burying themselves in single topic paper books.
“There is simply no experimental evidence to show that living with new technologies fundamentally changes brain organization in a way that affects one’s ability to focus,” says Daniel Simons, a psychologist at Union College, New York.
The danger, if there is one, is that the easy, on-demand access to lots of information from the Internet may delude us into mistaking the data we download for genuine wisdom worth acting upon. Only fools would venture into such a forest of information with anything less than their eyes wide open and their brains fully engaged .Fortunately,there are fewer fools around than some of the scaremongers(散布谣言者)like to think.
1. What makes American scholars upset?A.US kids’ weak academic performance. |
B.The ongoing debate about intelligence. |
C.The poor education in USA. |
D.America’s wealth ranking. |
A.To contrast with the popularity of Kindle. |
B.To highlight the benefits of high tech. |
C.To warn about a decline in reading. |
D.To stress the importance of books. |
A.terrify | B.argue | C.force | D.trick |
A.New technology changes our brains. |
B.Exposure to high tech should be reduced. |
C.Advanced technology won’t make us dumb |
D.Nicholas Carr released a book on intelligence. |
相似题推荐
【推荐1】More than half of the 1,000 consumers surveyed by Credit Karma said they have impulsively (冲动地) shopped to deal with feelings of stress, anxiety or depression. Twenty-three percent of respondents said they’ve maxed out (刷爆) a credit card in the past year.
As for age, 68 percent youngsters, responded by saying they have experienced it in the past, compared to 53 percent of the middle-aged and only 26 percent of the old.
In regards to genders, 48 percent of men and 31 percent of women who have stress spent said they had purchased alcohol when stressed. Eighty-two percent of women stress spent on clothing compared to 52 percent of men. Women also lead stress spending for jewellery, 42 percent, compared to 22 percent for men with men stress spending more for electronics 44 percent while 30 percent for women.
In fact, shopping to reduce stress can actually help you live a healthier life by making sure that your blood pressure is lowered. Shopping to relieve stress is also called shopping therapy (疗法) as a form of reducing stress.
The survey found that 82 percent had only positive feelings about their purchases and that the positive mood boost that followed those purchases was long-lasting.
However, the side effect of shopping therapy, for many, can start out as a relatively harmless mood booster but could possibly grow into a financial loss, cause conflict, and therefore add a large amount of stress to a person’s life.
1. How is the passage mainly developed?A.By giving numbers. | B.By stating arguments. |
C.By giving examples. | D.By giving explanations. |
A.Women were less likely to buy jewellery when stressed. |
B.Over half of men had purchased alcohol when stressed. |
C.More women preferred to buy clothes than men when stressed. |
D.The favourite goods for men to reduce pressure was electronics. |
A.Shopping therapy may increase pressure. |
B.Shopping therapy can totally relieve pressure. |
C.Shopping therapy’s positive effect can not last long. |
D.Shopping therapy is not suitable for someone whose blood pressure is low. |
A.Concerned. | B.Subjective. | C.Indifferent. | D.Objective. |
【推荐2】Hard work really does pay off. Scientists find that perseverance(坚持不懈)leads to better grades and higher achievements in school.
“Being passionate(热情的)is not enough to ensure academic success,” says researchers, who ought of "courage" as a key to success. This is also regarded as effort in reaching long-term goals, and determination to continue one's efforts in spite of hardships.
Researchers think that the finding could help create new training to help children develop the skill and help ensure their future success.
Researchers from the Academy of Finland studied more than 2,000 students from Helsinki. They were followed through their academic career from 12 to 16, the sixth grade until the ninth grade in local school years. Researchers found that the factor that best predicts courage was related to goals, with previous academic achievements playing no role in developing the skill.
Professor Katariina Salmela-Aro, who led the study, said, “Courage means a young person is really interested in his or her studies and does not give up easily. A key element of courage is high perseverance when facing difficulties and hardships. The important finding is that these factors are the key to success and well-being. Our study shows the power of courage.”
Professor Salmela-Aro also thinks it is important to develop new practices and qualities to improve courage in teenagers. She added, "Young people should see everyday school work as part of their life in a broader context and establish achievable goals for themselves. Schools must also serve as a place where it is safe to fail and learn to deal with setbacks. One must not be discouraged by setbacks, but draw strength and new energy from them.
1. What can we learn about the research?A.It takes at least three years | B.It helps students make progress. |
C.It meets many difficulties | D.It follows 2,000 students abroad. |
A.Focus on former grades | B.Achieve their dreams |
C.Try all their best | D.Forget sadness |
A.strengths. | B.difficulties. |
C.weaknesses. | D.efforts |
A.A picture book. | B.A literature book. |
C.A geography textbook. | D.An educational magazine |
【推荐3】As of 2020, the world’s biggest lithium-ion (锂离子) battery is hooked up to the Southern California power grid and can provide 250 million watts of power, or enough to power about 250,000 homes. But it’s actually not the biggest battery in the world: these lakes are.
Wait — how can a pair of lakes be a battery? To answer that question, it helps to define a battery: it’s simply something that stores energy and releases it on demand. The lithium-ion batteries that power our phones, laptops, and cars are just one type. They store energy in lithium-ions.
How do the two lakes store and release energy? First, one is 300 meters higher than the other. Electricity power pumps that move billions of liters of water from the lower lake to the higher one. This stores the energy by giving the water extra gravitational potential energy. Then, when there’s high demand for electricity, valves (阀门) open, releasing the stored energy by letting water flow downhill to power 6 giant turbines that can generate 3 billion watts of power for 10 hours.
Unfortunately, neither of the giant batteries we’ve talked about so far is big enough to power multiple cities. The two lakes setup requires specific geography, takes up a lot of land, and has high upfront costs to build. The giant lithium-ion battery in California can power about 250,000 homes, yes, but only for an hour. Lithium-ion batteries also require certain heavy metals to make. These resources are limited, and mining them causes environmental damage. Inventors all over the world are rising to the challenge of making batteries that can meet our needs — many of them even weirder than the two lakes.
1. Why is the world’s biggest lithium-ion battery mentioned in Paragraph 1?A.To make a comparison. | B.To introduce the topic. |
C.To stress its importance. | D.To declare a fact. |
A.With the help of the pumps, the two lakes store energy. |
B.The water flow by itself to release the stored energy. |
C.The two lakes setup is able to power multiple cities. |
D.Lithium-ion batteries are environmentally friendly. |
A.Inventors’ worries. | B.Inventors’ efforts. |
C.Stranger batteries. | D.New challenges. |
A.Battery Inventors Face New Challenges. |
B.The Biggest Battery Looks Nothing Like a Battery. |
C.Giant Batteries Fail to Meet People’s Needs. |
D.Newly-invented Batteries Power Various Cities. |
【推荐1】There have been few positives during the Covid pandemic (流行病) but British academics may have spotted one: People look more attractive in protective masks (口罩).
Dr Michael Lewis, an expert in faces, said research before the pandemic had found that medical face masks reduced attractiveness because they were related to illness.
“We wanted to test whether this had changed since face coverings became popular.” he said. “Our study suggests faces are considered most attractive when covered by medical face masks. This may be because we’re used to healthcare workers wearing blue masks and now we associate these with people in caring or medical professions.”
The first part of the research was carried out in February 2021 by which time the British population had become used to wearing masks in some places. Forty-three women were asked to rate on a scale of 1 to 10 — the attractiveness of images of male faces without a mask, wearing a plain cloth mask, a blue medical face mask, and holding a plain black book covering the area a face mask would hide.
The participants said those wearing a cloth mask were much more attractive than the ones with no masks or whose faces were partly covered by the book. But the surgical (外科的) mask made the wearer look even better. Lewis said it was also possible that masks made people more attractive because they directed attention to the eyes. He said other studies had found that covering the left or right half of a face also made people look more attractive, partly because the brain fills in the missing gaps and beautify the overall effect.
The results of the first study has been published in the journal Cognitive Research: Principles and Implications. A second study has been carried out, in which a group of men look at women in masks; it has yet to be published but Lewis said the results were probably the same.
1. Why were protective masks not welcome before the pandemic?A.Because they were related to disease. |
B.Because the masks wore uncomfortably. |
C.Because only doctors had the right to wear them. |
D.Because some wearers couldn’t take a smooth breath. |
A.Those with cloth masks. |
B.Those without any covering. |
C.Those with surgical masks. |
D.Those with “book” masks. |
A.Masks help during the pandemic. |
B.Men need to wear masks. |
C.Find ways to become charming. |
D.Face masks make you attractive. |
A.A book on biology. | B.A newspaper. |
C.A fashion magazine. | D.A guidebook. |
【推荐2】If you are reading this, you were probably born in the 2000s. The oh-ohs. The 21st century. That would make you young, creative, and no doubt smart. Maybe good-looking, too. Right? But what do other people think about your generation?
Some adults worry that you’re more interested in the screen in front of you than the world around you. They think of you as the “face-down generation” because you use your phone so much. They wonder how you will deal with school, friends and family. Are today’s teenagers too busy texting and taking selfies(自拍)to become successful in real life—or “IRL”, as you would say?
Other adults worry that today’s youth are spoilt (溺爱) and don’t want to face the challenges of adult life. Many children born in the 1990s and 2000s were raised by “helicopter parents” who were always there to guide and help their children with a busy schedule filled with homework and after-school activities such as dancing, drawing, or sports. With parents who do everything for them, today’s youth seem to prefer to live like teenagers even when they are in their 20s or 30s.
Does the face-down generation need a heads-up? Well, probably not. The fact is that many of today’s teenagers are better educated and more creative than past generations. They also seem to be willing to become leaders. More young people than ever volunteer to help their communities. There are also brave young people such as Malala Yousafzai, the teenager who won the 2014 Noble Peace Prize for pushing girls’ rights to go to school.
So if you’re one of the oh-ohs, there’s no reason to be worried about the future. Things are looking up for the face-down generation. Chances are that you do GR8(great)and LOL(laugh out loud).
1. Who is this passage written for?A.The teenagers | B.The teachers |
C.The parents | D.The oh-ohs |
A.Help and direct their children. | B.Do homework instead of children. |
C.Guide children to face challenges. | D.Plan a busy schedule for children. |
A.Anxious. | B.Confident. | C.Satisfied. | D.Helpless |
A.Parents should put down their phones. |
B.Young people should be better educated. |
C.The oh-ohs should be hopeful about the future. |
D.Face-down generation should raise their heads. |
Puffin Books, the publisher of UK writer Roald Dahl’s classic children’s books like Matila and The Witches, came under fire in February due to their choice to edit out hundreds of offensive or outdated words such as “fat” and “ugly” in the late author’s stories.
Although the publisher defended the changes, saying that they were meant to allow DahI’s books to continue to be enjoyed by all today, many were still angered by the move. Notable figures like writer Salman Rushdie called the changes “absurd censorship (荒谬的审查)” while UK Prime Minister Rishi Sunak said that “it’s important that works of literature and works of fiction are preserved”, noted Sky News.
DahI’s books and other children’s literature have a unique problem compared to literature for adults when it comes to preservation vs adaptation. Children can be vulnerable to influences which can shape the way they grow up and understand the world. According to The Conversation, “children’s literature implicitly(潜移默化地) shapes the minds of child readers by presenting particular social and culture values as normal and natural .[AKA] ‘socialization’.”
Personally, I believe in the intelligence of children to navigate and explore the world around them. It is the job of teachers, parents and other adult guardians to help children understand that books are products of their times and that authors – even the best among them – are ultimately human beings with their own flaws(缺点).
After all, just as Suzanne Nossel, CEO of PEN America, a nonprofit organization that protects writers and freedom of expression, wrote on her Twitter, “If we start down the path of trying to correct for perceived slights(自以为的鄙视) instead of allowing readers to receive and react to books as written, we risk distorting the work of great authors and clouding the essential lens that literature offers on society.”
With this kind of understanding in mind, we can empower children with the tools for critical thinking and improve their ability to judge and sort out the contexts of what they learn and are exposed to. This is a skill needed now more than ever in an era of “fake news” and the rapid spread of fakes.
1. Why did Puffin Books decide to edit Roald Dahl’s books?2. What is the unique problem with children’s literature, according to the text?
3. What does the underlined word “distorting” most probably mean?
4. What does the author believe is important when raising children?
【推荐1】There is something to be said for being a generalist, even if you are a specialist. Knowing a little about a lot of things that interest you can add to the richness of a whole, well-lived life.
Society pushes us to specialize, to become experts. This requires commitment to a particular occupation, branch of study or research. The drawback to being specialists is we often come to know more and more about less and less. There is a great deal of pressure to master one's field. You may pursue training, degrees, or increasing levels of responsibility at work. Then you discover the pressure of having to keep up.
Some people seem willing to work around the clock in their narrow specialty. But such commitment can also weaken a sense of freedom. These specialists could work at the office until ten each night, then look back and realize they would have loved to have gone home and enjoyed the sweetness of their family and friends, or traveled to exciting places, meeting interesting people. Mastering one thing to the exclusion (排 除)of others can hold back your true spirit.
Generalists, on the other hand, know a lot about a wide range of subjects and view the whole with all its connections. They are people of ability, talent, and enthusiasm who can bring their broad perspective (视角)into specific fields of expertise (专长).The doctor who is also a poet and philosopher is a superior doctor, one who can give so much more to his patients than just good medical skills.
Things are connected. Let your expertise in one field fuel your passions in all related areas. Some of your interests may not appear to be connected but, once you explore their depths, you discover that they are. My editor Toni, who is also a writer, has edited several history books. She has decided to study Chinese history. Fascinated by the structural beauty of the Forbidden City as a painter, she is equally interested to learn more about Chinese philosophy. "I don't know where it will lead, but I'm excited I'm on this pursuit."
These expansions into new worlds help us by giving us new perspectives. We begin to see the interconnectedness of one thing to another in all aspects of our life, of ourselves and the universe. Develop broad, general knowledge and experience. The universe is all yours to explore and enjoy.
1. To become a specialist, one may have to_____.A.narrow his range of knowledge |
B.avoid responsibilities at work |
C.know more about the society |
D.broaden his perspective on life |
A.treasure their freedom |
B.travel around the world |
C.spend most time working |
D.enjoy meeting funny people |
A.is fully aware of his talent and ability |
B.is a pure specialist in medicine |
C.should love poetry and philosophy |
D.brings knowledge of other fields to work |
A.Passion alone does not ensure a person's success. |
B.In-depth exploration makes discoveries possible. |
C.Everyone has a chance to succeed in their pursuit. |
D.Seemingly unrelated interests are in a way connected. |
A.Be More a Generalist Than a Specialist |
B.Specialist or Generalist: Hard to Decide |
C.Turn a Generalist into a Specialist |
D.Ways to Become a Generalist |
【推荐2】In a fast developing world, many old-fashioned skills seem to be disappearing. It’s hard to find people who know such skills as sewing, but a few decades ago, it was common for every person to learn them.
Now many would think sewing isn’t as useful today. The garment (服装) industry is producing clothing that is cheaper, faster and more fashionable than ever, making it possible to buy a suit for less than $10 at home.
However, that doesn’t mean clothing isn’t indestructible (破坏不了的). Garments with simple tears that could be fixed in seconds with a needle are just thrown away. This causes more than 26 billion pounds of garbage and millions of dollars wasted because of a tear. Even dirty or worn clothing that still has plenty of usable cloth is being thrown away.
The ability to create hand-made clothes doesn’t only reduce waste. It is also tailor-made just for you. Most buy clothes made for a general body type, and to get it tailored by a professional is expensive. So why not do it yourself?
Perhaps the greatest problem of sewing is simply the time involved. Buying a skirt online takes a few seconds. Making a skirt can take weeks. But learning to sew doesn’t always involve complicated projects. Instead they might just be simple adjustments to help the garments fit or match your style.
Schools could easily teach sewing. Yet, they focus more on college preparations, ignoring traditional skills. Actually sewing is a valuable skill to be used in daily life. It wouldn’t take much time to teach children how to sew.
So, instead of letting old things die in this new age of the Internet, how about learning some of the lost skills that helped us for so long?
1. Why do some people think the sewing skill is less useful?A.Because cloth is too expensive. |
B.Because sewing is a bit boring to learn. |
C.Because hand-made things are easily broken. |
D.Because clothes are cheaper and convenient to buy. |
A.It contributes to creativity. | B.It’s environmentally-friendly. |
C.It pushes the garment industry. | D.It gives costumers a typical look. |
A.They make the skills easy to learn. | B.They set the skills as basic subjects. |
C.They make every effort to teach the skills. | D.They fail to give the skills enough attention. |
A.Supportive. | B.Doubtful. | C.Uncaring. | D.Opposing. |
【推荐3】The Enigma (谜) of Beauty
The search for beauty spans centuries and continents. Paintings of Egyptians dating back over 4,000 years show both men and women painting their nails and wearing makeup. In 18th-century France, wealthy noblemen wore large wigs (假发) of long, white hair to make themselves attractive. Today, people continue to devote a lot of time and money to their appearance.
There is at least one good reason for the desire to be attractive: beauty is power. Studies suggest that good-looking people make more money, get called on more often in class, and are regarded as friendlier.
But what exactly is beauty? It’s difficult to describe it clearly, and yet we know it when we see it. And our awareness of it may start at a very early age. In one set of studies, six-month-old babies were shown a series of photographs. The faces on the pictures had been rated for attractiveness by a group of college students. In the studies, the babies spent more time looking at the attractive faces than the unattractive ones.
The idea that even babies can judge appearance makes perfect sense to many researchers. In studies by psychologists, men consistently showed a preference for women with larger eyes, fuller lips, and a smaller nose and chin while women prefer men with large shoulders and a narrow waist. According to scientists, the mind unconsciously tells men and women that these traits — the full lips, clear skin, strong shoulders — equal health and genetic well-being.
Not everyone thinks the same way, however. “Our hardwiredness can be changed by all sorts of expectations — mostly cultural,” says C. Loring Brace, an anthropologist at the University of Michigan. What is considered attractive in one culture might not be in another. Look at most Western fashion magazines: the women on the pages are thin. But is this “perfect” body type for women worldwide? Scientists’ answer is no; what is considered beautiful is subjective and varies around the world. They found native peoples in southeast Peru preferred shapes regarded overweight in Western cultures.
For better or worse, beauty plays a role in our lives. But it is extremely difficult to describe exactly what makes one person attractive to another. Although there do seem to be certain physical traits considered universally appealing, it is also true that beauty does not always keep to a single, uniform standard. Beauty really is, as the saying goes, in the eye of the beholder.
1. People’s ideas about beauty ________.A.have existed since ancient times |
B.can be easily described |
C.have little influence on a person’s success |
D.are based upon strict criteria |
A.were rated for their appearance |
B.were entered in a beauty contest |
C.were shown photos of a group of college students |
D.were able to tell attractive faces from unattractive ones |
A.qualities | B.measurements |
C.judgments | D.standards |
A.the ideas of beauty vary as people grow up |
B.the search for beauty is rooted in lack of confidence |
C.the standards for beauty are based on scientific researches |
D.the understanding of beauty depends on cultural backgrounds |