1 . Early fifth-century philosopher St.Augustine famously wrote that he knew what time was unless someone asked him.Albert Einstein added another wrinkle when he theorized that time varies depending on where you measure it.Today's state-of-the-art atomic(原子的) clocks have proven Einstein right.Even advanced physics can't decisively tell us what time is, because the answer depends on the question you're asking.
Forget about time as an absolute.What if,instead of considering time in terms of astronomy,we related time to ecology?What if we allowed environmental conditions to set the tempo(节奏) of human life?We're increasingly aware of the fact that we can't control Earth systems with engineering alone,and realizing that we need to moderate(调节)our actions if we hope to live in balance.What if our definition of time reflected that?
Recently,I conceptualized a new approach to timekeeping that's connected to circumstances on our planet,conditions that might change as a result of global warming.We're now building a clock at the Anchorage Museum that reflects the total flow of several major Alaskan rivers,which are sensitive to local and global environmental changes.We've programmed it to match an atomic clock if the waterways continue to flow at their present rate.If the rivers run faster in the future on average,the clock will get ahead of standard time.If they run slower,you'll see the opposite effect.
The clock registers both short-term irregularities and long-term trends in river dynamics.It's a sort of observatory that reveals how the rivers are behaving from their own temporal frame(时间框架),and allows us to witness those changes on our smartwatches or phones.Anyone who opts to go on Alaska Mean River Time will live in harmony with the planet.Anyone who considers river time in relation to atomic time will encounter a major imbalance and may be motivated to counteract it by consuming less fuel or supporting greener policies.
Even if this method of timekeeping is novel in its particulars,early agricultural societies also connected time to natural phenomena.In pre-Classical Greece,for instance,people“corrected”official calendars by shifting dates forward or backward to reflect the change of season.Temporal connection to the environment was vital to their survival.Likewise,river time and other timekeeping systems we're developing may encourage environmental awareness.
When St.Augustine admitted his inability to define time, he highlighted one of time 's most noticeable qualities:Time becomes meaningful only in a defined context.Any timekeeping system is valid,and each is as praiseworthy as its purpose.
1. What is the main idea of Paragraph 1?A.Timekeeping is increasingly related to nature. |
B.Everyone can define time on their own terms. |
C.The qualities of time vary with how you measure it. |
D.Time is a major concern of philosophers and scientists. |
A.present an assumption | B.evaluate an argument |
C.highlight an experiment | D.introduce an approach |
A.Those who do not go on river time will live an imbalanced life. |
B.New ways of measuring time can help to control Earth systems. |
C.Atomic time will get ahead of river time if the rivers run slower. |
D.Modern technology may help to shape the rivers’ temporal frame. |
A.It is crucial to improve the definition of time. |
B.A fixed frame will make time meaningless. |
C.We should live in harmony with nature. |
D.History is a mirror reflecting reality. |
2 . Why isn’t science better? Look at career incentives.
There are often substantial gaps between the idealized and actual versions of those people whose work involves providing a social good. Government officials are supposed to work for their constituents. Journalists are supposed to provide unbiased reporting and penetrating analysis. And scientists are supposed to relentlessly probe the fabric of reality with the most rigorous and skeptical of methods.
All too often, however, what should be just isn’t so. In a number of scientific fields, published findings turn out not to replicate (复制), or to have smaller effects than, what was initially claimed. Plenty of science does replicate — meaning the experiments turn out the same way when you repeat them — but the amount that doesn’t is too much for comfort.
But there are also ways in which scientists increase their chances of getting it wrong. Running studies with small samples, mining data for correlations and forming hypotheses to fit an experiment’s results after the fact are just some of the ways to increase the number of false discoveries.
It’s not like we don’t know how to do better. Scientists who study scientific methods have known about feasible remedies for decades. Unfortunately, their advice often falls on deaf ears. Why? Why aren’t scientific methods better than they are? In a word: incentives. But perhaps not in the way you think.
In the 1970s, psychologists and economists began to point out the danger in relying on quantitative measures for social decision-making. For example, when public schools are evaluated by students’ performance on standardized tests, teachers respond by teaching “to the test”. In turn, the test serves largely as of how well the school can prepare students for the test.
We can see this principle—often summarized as “when a measure becomes a target, it ceases to be a good measure”—playing out in the realm of research. Science is a competitive enterprise. There are far more credentialed (授以证书的) scholars and researchers than there are university professorships or comparably prestigious research positions. Once someone acquires a research position, there is additional competition for tenure (终身教授) grant funding, and support and placement for graduate students. Due to this competition for resources, scientists must be evaluated and compared. How do you tell if someone is a good scientist?
An oft-used metric (标准,度量) is the number of publications one has in peer-reviewed journals, as well as the status of those journals. Metrics like these make it straightforward to compare researchers whose work may otherwise be quite different. Unfortunately, this also makes these numbers susceptible to exploitation.
If scientists are motivated to publish often and in high-impact journals, we might expect them to actively try to game the system (钻空子). And certainly, some do—as seen in recent high-profile cases of scientific fraud (欺诈). If malicious (恶意的) fraud is the prime concern, then perhaps the solution is simply heightened alertness.
However, most scientists are, I believe, genuinely interested in learning about the world, and honest. The problem with incentives is that they can shape cultural norms without any intention on the part of individuals.
1. Which of the following is TRUE according to the passage?A.Scientists are expected to persistently devoted to exploration of reality. |
B.The research findings fail to achieve the expected effect. |
C.Hypotheses are modified to highlight the experiments’ results. |
D.The amount of science that does replicate is comforting. |
A.The public. | B.The incentive initiators. |
C.The peer researchers. | D.The high-impact journal editors. |
A.Good scientists excel in seeking resources and securing research positions. |
B.Competition for resources pushes researchers to publish in a more productive way. |
C.All the credentialed scholars and researchers will take up university professorships. |
D.The number of publication reveals how scientists are bitterly exploited. |
A.High-impact journals are encouraged to reform the incentives for publication. |
B.The peer-review process is supposed to scale up inspection of scientific fraud. |
C.Researchers are motivated to get actively involved in gaming the current system. |
D.Career incentives for scientists are expected to consider their personal intention. |
3 . During the initial stages of instructed L2 (the second language) acquisition students learn a couple thousand, mainly high frequency words. Functional language proficiency, however,
Acquisition of new words from authentic L2 reading texts by means of strategies such as contextual deduction (演绎) is also not a
Any suggestions on how to use this in educational contexts should be based on a systematic
A.inquires | B.requires | C.receives | D.inspires |
A.difficult | B.easy | C.possible | D.necessary |
A.copy | B.focus | C.find | D.clean |
A.however | B.moreover | C.because | D.nevertheless |
A.disturb | B.seem | C.occur | D.disappear |
A.solution | B.approach | C.problem | D.wonder |
A.official | B.annual | C.objective | D.alternative |
A.predicted | B.presented | C.postponed | D.preferred |
A.available | B.outstanding | C.attractive | D.evident |
A.by means of | B.moreover | C.in spite of | D.however |
A.focus | B.analysis | C.object | D.target |
A.describe | B.grasp | C.link | D.force |
A.conclusions | B.appointments | C.aspects | D.contents |
A.react | B.establish | C.memorize | D.leave |
A.enhanced | B.invented | C.contrasted | D.behaved |
4 . When it came to moral reasoning, we like to think our views on right and wrong are rational. But ultimately they are grounded in emotion. Philosophers have argued over this claim for a quarter of a millennium without
Harvard psychologist Joshua Greene does brainscans of people as they study the so-called trolley problem. Suppose a trolley is rolling down the track toward five people who will die unless you pull a lever (杠杆) that pushes it onto another track where,
But suppose the only way to save the five people is to push someone else onto the track — a bystander whose body will bring the trolley to a stop before it hits the others. It’s still a one-for-five
Princeton philosopher Peter Singer argues that we should
A.comprehension | B.hesitation | C.resolution | D.permission |
A.reliable | B.invisible | C.impressive | D.decisive |
A.unfortunately | B.obviously | C.surprisingly | D.inevitably |
A.regretting | B.minimizing | C.justifying | D.estimating |
A.struggle | B.deal | C.loss | D.mistake |
A.Likewise | B.However | C.Therefore | D.Moreover |
A.memory | B.reason | C.emotion | D.sensory |
A.enduring | B.obvious | C.acceptable | D.intense |
A.compete for | B.come from | C.take over | D.engage in |
A.self-reflecting | B.decision-making | C.problem-solving | D.attention-calling |
A.innocents | B.hostages | C.relatives | D.soldiers |
A.trust | B.apply | C.examine | D.ignore |
A.superior | B.stubborn | C.caring | D.selfish |
A.willingly | B.collectively | C.deliberately | D.cheaply |
A.master | B.advocate | C.slave | D.protester |
5 . Everyone knows what makes a good story. Our hero starts their journey as a flawed being. In scene after scene, they face challenges that push them down new paths. By the end of the talc, they overcome setbacks and become a better person in the process.
We love these plots in the novels we read but the principles of a good story offer much more than entertainment. Recent research shows that the narratives we tell ourselves about our lives can powerfully help us recover from stress. People who generate tales of struggling and turning over a new leaf from their own lives appear to have much better mental health. Professor Dan McAdams put forward this idea and discovered that whether someone can describe having had some control over events in their past is an important predictor of mental health. Another key theme involved is finding some kind of positive meaning after stressful events.
McAdams invited 14 and 15-year-olds to join in an experiment to write about their experiences of failure and success. Half of them were then given extra instructions to describe the ways they had made their success a reality and how the failure had changed them for the better. Eight weeks later, members of this group reported greater persistence and better grades in their schoolwork.
Exciting as these results are, some experts sound a few notes of caution. They worry that, hearing about the power of self-narratives, many people may feel they have to find a positive turning point in life. If they can’t, they could end up feeling guilty about having somehow “failed”.
Clearly, self-narratives aren’t the panacea. Nevertheless, if you hope for self-improvement, you can use the findings to good effect. By recognizing ourselves as the hero at the center of our own struggles, we can all become the author of our own destiny and change ourselves for the better.
1. What does the research focus on?A.The causes of stress. |
B.The principles of narrative. |
C.The connection between struggle and well-being. |
D.The link between mental health and self-narratives. |
A.To give proof. | B.To make predictions. |
C.To draw a conclusion. | D.To make comparisons. |
A.Attempt to get rid of worries. | B.Means of recognizing yourself. |
C.Solution to adolescent problems. | D.Guarantee to become better people. |
A.Embrace Life Struggles | B.Be Your Own Hero |
C.Ways to Make a Good Story | D.The Power of Self-improvement |
6 . London can be an expensive city to visit if you go unprepared. If you go sightseeing in London for the first time, it is suggested investing in a London Pass. The London Pass is a digital sightseeing credits package that gives you access to 80+attractions in the city with a relatively lower cost. For many attractions on the pass, there’s no need to pre-book. However, some may have limited capacity, so you’ll need to book in advance.
What do you get with The London Pass?
●Incredible savings.
●Access to more than 80 top London attractions.
●Fast entry at selected attractions and sights.
●90-day money-back guarantee.
Go to The London Pass booking page and choose a duration that suits your trip-The London Pass is available for one, two, three, four, five, six, seven or 10 consecutive days. Download the pass to your phone and plan your sightseeing tours with the app. When you get to the gate of any participating attraction, show your London Pass and head straight inside.
What are our bestsellers?
●2 Day Pass: Child £65.00 Adult £99.00
●3 Day Pass: Child £77.00 Adult £116.00
●5 Day Pass: Child £94.00 Adult £144.00
1. Why is The London Pass recommended to travelers?A.It offers money-saving tips. | B.It helps to visit London on a budget. |
C.It provides access to more attractions. | D.It promises to return money if unused. |
A.Sign up on the page. | B.Download the app. |
C.Book your tours. | D.Update your information. |
A.£.164. | B.£263. | C.£309. | D.£382. |
7 . Slowness has been a sweeping trend in sustainability. Slow food celebrates local produce and traditional cooking methods; slow fashion is made with a focus on people and the planet. You may have even heard of the slow city, a campaign to restore local cultures and turn cities back to their natural environments.
Slow design developed from the larger slow movement. Although the term was only recently introduced, the idea of thoughtful design looks back to a time when buildings and furniture were made with great craftsmanship (手艺) and by hand-before the mass-produced throwaway furniture took over. You can think of the term “slow” as a celebration of timelessness: both the timelessness of a piece and the timelessness of the relationship between that piece and its owner.
One example of slow design today is what’s been dubbed the brown furniture revival (复兴). Brown furniture refers to the heavy wooden furnishings that were popular in your grandparents’ day but suddenly fell out of style at the turn of the century. Brown furniture is often associated with dark woods, such as trees like mahogany, walnut, and teak, that take decades to reach maturity and true craftsmanship to transform into functional pieces.
Today’s furniture industry is dominated by the $13.1 billion-and-growing global ready-to-assemble(RTA) furniture market. RTA furniture is usually constructed from low-quality fiberboard, which lasts a small part of traditional furniture’s lifespan (寿命).The weight of furniture landfilled in 2018 was 9. 7 million tons, 4. 5 times what was landfilled in 1960.
In a less direct way, the idea of timelessness also lends itself to a lower environmental impact. Besides their demonstrated physical durability, slow materials and design are meant to outlive trends and never be thrown out simply because they’re out of style.
As second-hand shopping becomes more appealing to today’s young generation-because of its low environmental impact and affordability-the brown furniture of yesteryear is making a comeback.
1. Why is the first paragraph written?A.To explain a new term. |
B.To present the topic of the text. |
C.To provide background information. |
D.To highlight the importance of slowness. |
A.Known as. |
B.Mistaken for. |
C.Compared to. |
D.Connected with. |
A.It is out of date. |
B.It has a long lifespan. |
C.It is heavy and expensive. |
D.It has bad effects on the environment. |
A.Grandparents are buying new furniture. |
B.The brown furniture will soon be mass-produced. |
C.The young generation favors second-hand shopping. |
D.Materials for slow design furniture are more available. |
8 . It started with a bit of casual discomfort on the head, but after a week it had spread to the back of my neck, enough to lead me to my laptop. Annoying as it was, I was
As soon as I’d tapped in ‘online self-diagnosis’, the search engine provided me with over 11.5 million results. And during the time normally spent in the clinic’s waiting room reading the Women’s Weekly, I was able to find a site that would provide a free
I answered all the questions until I eventually reached a description exactly matching my
I headed off to the doctor for what I thought would be a blood test but which turned out to be a valuable lesson in not
I learnt my lesson, but for some the worry caused by
Once upon a time, hypochondria required time and effort: you had to go to the library to research your diseases and
A.reluctant | B.surprised | C.able | D.sure |
A.knowledge | B.association | C.evidence | D.medication |
A.sample | B.assessment | C.subscription | D.upgrade |
A.standards | B.arguments | C.definitions | D.symptoms |
A.fortunate | B.touched | C.alarmed | D.different |
A.believing | B.explaining | C.questioning | D.covering |
A.keeping | B.losing | C.drying | D.washing |
A.taking off | B.putting on | C.breaking away | D.looking up |
A.dropped | B.differed | C.increased | D.helped |
A.safety | B.health | C.access | D.money |
A.available | B.accurate | C.misleading | D.complex |
A.occasionally | B.automatically | C.painstakingly | D.literally |
A.bringing to light | B.taking into consideration | C.putting into practice | D.setting on top |
A.rare | B.hard | C.large | D.simple |
A.state | B.change | C.freedom | D.peace |
9 . Every decision we make is arrived at through hugely complex neurological processing. Although it feels as though you have a choice, the action that you ‘decide’ to take is entirely directed by automatic neural activity. Brain imaging studies show that a person’s action can be predicted by their brain activity up to 10 seconds before they themselves become aware they are going to act. Multiple neuroscientific studies show that even those important decisions that feel worked out are just as automatic as knee-jerk reactions (膝跳反应) (although more complex).
Decision-making starts with the amygdala: a set of two almond-shaped nuclei (杏仁状核) buried deep within the brain, which generate emotion. The amygdala registers the information streaming in through our senses and responds to it in less than a second, sending signals throughout the brain. These produce an urge to run, fight, freeze or grab, according to how the amygdala values various stimuli.
Before we act on the amygdala’s signals, however, the information is usually processed by other brain areas, including some that produce conscious thoughts and emotions. Areas concerned with recognition work out what’s going on, those concerned with memory compare it with previous experiences, and those concerned with reasoning, judging and planning get to work on constructing various action plans. The best plan—if we are lucky—is then selected and carried out. If any of this process goes wrong, we are likely to hesitate, or do something silly.
The various stages of decision-making are marked by different types of brain activity. Fast (gamma)waves, with frequencies of 25 to 100 Hz, produce a keen awareness of the multiple factors that need to be taken into account to arrive at a decision. If you are trying to choose a sandwich, for instance, gamma waves generated in various cells within the ‘taste’ area of the brain bring to mind and compare the taste of ham, hummus, wholemeal, sourdough, and so on. Although it may seem useful to be aware of the full range of choice, too much information makes decision-making more difficult, so irrelevant factors get dismissed quickly and unconsciously.
After this comparison stage, the brain switches to slow-wave activity (12 to 30 Hz). This extinguishes most of the gamma activity, leaving just a single ‘hotspot’ of gamma waves which marks the chosen option.
Although there is no ‘you’ outside your brain to direct what it’s doing, you can help it to make good decisions by placing yourself in a situation which is likely to make the process run more smoothly. Doing something that is physically or mentally stimulating before making a decision will help your brain produce the initial gamma waves that generate awareness of the competing options. Getting over-excited, on the other hand, will prevent the switch to the slow brainwaves, making it much harder to single out a choice.
1. Why does the writer mention “knee-jerk reactions” in the first paragraph?A.To introduce the finding of the latest brain imaging studies. |
B.To illustrate that decisions are not consciously thought out. |
C.To call attention to a kind of neural reaction that is not very complex. |
D.To show the difference between decision-making and other brain activity. |
A.It works out conscious thoughts and emotions. |
B.It selects the best action plan for a given situation. |
C.It dismisses factors that are irrelevant to the decision to be made. |
D.It processes sensory information and generates emotional responses. |
A.Slow-wave activity usually lasts longer than fast-wave activity. |
B.The brain prioritizes information before settling on a final choice. |
C.Decision-making is difficult when slow-wave activity occurs first. |
D.The brain needs as much information as possible to make a decision. |
A.By preparing the brain to single out the most reasonable choice. |
B.By helping the brain switch to slow-wave activity more quickly. |
C.By getting the brain to focus on those most relevant alternatives. |
D.By making the brain more aware of the factors and choices involved. |
10 . Koko the gorilla knew over 1,000 signs based on American Sign Language, and used them to do everything from asking for food to joking around. Her trainer and long-term companion, Penny Patterson, thought Koko went further still, signing in novel ways and showing complex emotions. According to Ms Patterson, when a cat that Koko loved was killed in an accident, Koko signed: “Cat, cry, have-sorry, Koko-love.” When Koko died last month, some of her obituaries (讣告) mourned the gorilla who had “mastered American sign language.”
Then came the backlash, from linguists and experts in sign languages. Sign languages have complex grammars, equivalent to spoken tongues in expressiveness. Koko’s ability, it was pointed out, fell well short of a fluent human signer. Moreover, Ms Patterson was her interpreter, a role that invited the question of how much she was inferring what Koko “must have meant,” and explaining away random signs. It was hard to be sure: Ms Patterson preferred speaking to journalists over sharing her video and raw data about Koko with fellow researchers.
There is no doubt that animals communicate. Animals from one region can share sounds that differ from groups in another, leading researchers to talk of animal “dialects.” Then there are the remarkable achievements of Koko and her primate predecessors, including a chimp delightfully named Nim Chimpsky. Yet there is an important distinction between communication and language. Take the misleading term “body language.” It is sometimes claimed that words convey just 7% of meaning, and that body language and tone of voice do the rest. This wildly overstretches an old study which found that most emotional messaging — as opposed to the propositional kind — comes from tone and body language, especially when a neutral word such as “maybe” was used. But try conveying a fact like “It will rain on Tuesday” with your eyebrows, and the difference becomes clear. Language allows for clear statements, questions and commands.
Nim Chimpsky’s near-namesake, Noam Chomsky, has argued that people have a kind of “universal grammar”, and that all humankind’s languages are mere variations on a theme. Mr Chomsky has changed his mind repeatedly on what constitutes the core of human language, but one obvious candidate is syntax — rules, not just words, which allow the construction of a huge variety of meaningful utterances (所说的话). This capacity may even be infinite. Any statement in English, for example, can be made longer by adding “He said that …” at the beginning. This property is called recursion: a simple statement (“It’s cold”) is embedded in a more complicated one (“He said that it’s cold”). Human syntax also allows for hypotheticals (“If she hadn’t arrived …”), talking precisely about events distant from the present, and so much more.
That gorillas lack syntax should not blind humans to their magnificence. But the fact that Koko could communicate should not mislead observers into thinking she possessed language.
1. Which statement about KOKO the gorilla is true?A.Koko’s ability was similar to a fluent human signer. |
B.Koko could ask for food using sign language. |
C.Koko was able to show complex feelings using sign language. |
D.Koko was killed in an accident. |
A.approval | B.bias | C.opposition | D.evidence |
A.Koko was not as expressive as a human signer |
B.Koko seldom needed an interpreter |
C.Koko was able to communicate with journalists |
D.Koko failed to speak several animal “dialects” |
A.Humans can express past events using language while apes cannot. |
B.Tone and body language play a dominant role in human communication. |
C.Words enable humans to convey clear meanings. |
D.Gorillas are still magnificent in terms of their ability to communicate. |
A.Nim Chimpsky and Noam Chomsky — Who Has the Upper Hand? |
B.Syntax — What Separates Humans and Apes. |
C.Koko the Gorilla — A Magnificent Communicator. |
D.Great Apes — Language and Communication Are Not the Same Thing. |