1 . I was born with eye disease. At school I even couldn’t read the blackboard. By the time I got to university, I couldn’t really see images(图像) at all. I just can tell the difference between light and dark. In the first year of my PHD, I was almost 100% blind.
When I was young I used to get very angry if I encountered something I found difficult or couldn’t do because of my eyes. But over time I learned that wasn’t a helpful response. There’s no point getting wound up by the fact that I can’t see, because it won’t change it.
I started climbing when I was young. My dad took me up my first rock route(路线) when I was two. All my early climbing was outdoor traditional climbing. My dad had been in the Mountain Rescue and was part of Mountaineering Club, so we would go for weekends away climbing throughout the UK.
He taught me everything I know and I led my first route outside when I was 11. At this time I could just about see well enough to place rock gear（齿轮）, but not well enough to pick out the routes from the ground. People are usually amazed when they discover that not only do I climb, but I also lead climbs.
At university I joined the Mountaineering Club and was able to climb much more frequently. We had regular trips to indoor walls and weekends away outdoors. I developed a great circle of climbing friends and went on multiple trips to Europe. On these I started Alpine climbing and ice climbing too.
There was a time when I thought I might have to give up leading as my eyesight got worse. But I never thought I would stop climbing. I just learnt to adapt myself to the eye disease with the support of my friends. It’s quite possible that I wouldn’t be as good a climber if I weren’t blind — if I didn’t have these challenges. That concentration and determination is built through my disability.
1. How did the author eventually respond to his eye problem?| A．He ended up feeling annoyed. | B．He accepted it and faced it bravely |
| C．He sought help from others | D．He quit his study at university. |
| A．He was a professional climber at university. |
| B．He ran his own mountaineering club. |
| C．He taught his son to do outdoor climbing. |
| D．He introduced his son to a love of rocks. |
| A．His disability. | B．His university. |
| C．His father. | D．The Mountaineering Club. |
| A．A Blind Man’s Life Struggle. | B．Mountain Climbing Experience. |
| C．Courses on Rock Climbing. | D．Determination and Experience. |
2 . A robot with a sense of touch may one day feel “pain”, both its own physical pain and sympathy for the pain of its human companions. Such touchy-feely robots are still far off, but advances in robotic touch-sensing are bringing that possibility closer to reality.
Sensors set in soft, artificial skin that can detect both a gentle touch and a painful strike have been hooked up to a robot that can then signal emotions, Asada reported February 15 at the annual meeting of the American Association for the Advancement of Science. This artificial “pain nervous system,” as Asada calls it, may be a small building block for a machine that could ultimately experience pain. Such a feeling might also allow a robot to “sympathize” with a human companion’s suffering.
Asada, an engineer at Osaka University, and his colleagues have designed touch sensors that reliably pick up a range of touches. In a robot system named Affetto, a realistic looking child’s head, these touch and pain signals can be converted to emotional facial expressions.
A touch-sensitive, soft material, as opposed to a rigid metal surface, allows richer interactions between a machine and the world, says neuroscientist Kingson Man of the University of Southern California. Artificial skin “allows the possibility of engagement in truly intelligent ways”.
Such a system, Asada says, might ultimately lead to robots that can recognize the pain of others, a valuable skill for robots designed to help care for people in need, the elderly, for instance.
But there is an important distinction between a robot that responds in a predictable way to a painful strike and a robot that’s able to compute an internal feeling accurately, says Damasio, a neuroscientist also at the University of Southern California. A robot with sensors that can detect touch and pain is “along the lines of having a robot, for example, that smiles when you talk to it,” Damasio says. ‘It’s a device for communication of the machine to a human.” While that’s an interesting development, “it’s not the same thing” as a robot designed to compute some sort of internal experience, he says.
1. What do we know about the “pain nervous system”?| A．It is named Affetto by scientists. | B．It is a set of complicated sensors. |
| C．It is able to signal different emotions. | D．It combines sensors and artificial skin. |
| A．Delivered. | B．Translated. | C．Attached. | D．Adapted. |
| A．Robots can smile when talked to. |
| B．Robots can talk to human beings. |
| C．Robots can compute internal feelings |
| D．Robots can detect pains and respond accordingly. |
| A．Machines Become Emotional | B．Robots Inch to Feeling Pain |
| C．Human Feelings Can Be Felt | D．New Devices Touch Your Heart |
3 . When I was a kid, my sister and I would fight all the time over nearly everything. But as we grew older, our bond strengthened by sharing secrets, offering advice and trading clothes. Having a sister by my side while growing up taught me many lessons about the unique bond.
And now, thanks to an 8-year long study that’s making the rounds on the Internet again, science is confirming what I know is true. In the study, researchers discovered that having an older or younger sister can help ease the anxiety for kids between the ages of 10 and 14 years. They also found that people with sisters can “learn how to make up and to have control over their emotions again, which are skills that undoubtedly serve children well.
The revival of this study actually comes on the heels of another newer study, which shows that it’s not just the older kids and parents who influence and shape children as they grow. It turns out that younger siblings(兄弟姐妹) do too, and what’s more, they may also give their older siblings a greater chance of developing empathy (同情).
The Canadian study followed 452 pairs of siblings, all between a year-and-a-half and 4 years old. The researchers found that having a younger sibling increased the older sibling's level of empathy.
This research confirms that sisters are pretty amazing in making the world a much lovely place. As the mom of two boys, I often wonder what kinds of lessons they will learn from their younger sister. Perhaps they will be the same lessons I learned from mine that cooler heads always win. This study gives me hope that all those endless arguments between my kids may actually be laying the groundwork for conflict-settlement skills.
1. What can we learn from the study?| A．Children under four develop empathy fastest. |
| B．It is normal for siblings to quarrel. |
| C．Having siblings is not always a headache. |
| D．Having sisters is helpful to mental health. |
| A．Result | B．Beginning. |
| C．Reappearance. | D．Significance. |
| A．They love their mom very much. |
| B．They have a higher level of empathy. |
| C．They often quarrel with one another. |
| D．They have learned the same lessons as the the author. |
| A．Siblings have a unique bond. |
| B．Siblings have something in common. |
| C．Having siblings is good to children. |
| D．Children having siblings are considerate. |
4 . Is there anybody out there? For centuries humans have wondered although the ways in which we have gone about this have varied. As we have gained a greater understanding of the universe, our searches have taken on more concrete(具体的) forms. Questions about aliens(外星人) have become a subject for science rather than science fiction.
Now new cooperation between the Very Large Array (VLA) observatory in New Mexico and the SETI Institute in California means that our curiosity about whether aliens exist can be closer than ever before to being satisfied. Data from the VLA’S 28 radio telescopes, used to scan a vast area of sky, will be fed through a special supercomputer that will search for distant signals.
How likely it is that a signal will be found, and what this might mean, are hard questions to answer. SETI’s existing projects have not discovered any signals from other planets so far. But recent discoveries in space and Earth sciences have provided some encouragement for those who are enthusiastic about the possibility, however remote, of detecting other civilizations.
Once it was thought that our solar system could be unique. Since the discovery of the first exoplanet (a planet beyond the solar system) in the 1990s, thousands more have been located. Around one in five stars is now thought to have a planet in their orbit(运行轨道) in a so-called “habitable(适合居住的) zone”—that is, at a distance from the star where the temperature means that life is theoretically possible.
Are Earth’s 7.5 billion humans, along with billions of other animals and plants they share their home with, on their own in the universe? If there is another life form somewhere, could it be as intelligent as humans? Or could it threaten them? I think all of these need further exploration. As explorations of Mars continue, and a new set of observations from the James Webb Space Telescope are set to begin, our interest in the possibility of alien life appears as much as before.
1. Why does the VLA work with SETI?| A．To develop new radio telescopes | B．To find evidence of aliens’ existence |
| C．To build a special supercomputer | D．To search for distant signals |
| A．Life does indeed exist on exoplanets |
| B．New technologies are employed to find aliens |
| C．Some exoplanets may have habitable zones |
| D．Signals have been discovered from other planets |
| A．Uncertain | B．Positive | C．Unacceptable | D．Worried |
| A．Space: the unknown place | B．Finding aliens: possible or not? |
| C．Receiving signals: aliens appear again? | D．Exoplanets: home of aliens |
5 . Three days earlier, a super typhoon attacked a coastal country, cutting off all communication with the outside. Thousands of people died in the storm.
Whether the destruction (破坏) caused by extreme weather events can be related to human emissions (排放物) of greenhouse gases is most discussed in climate science. If this relation is established, extreme weather can be the severest result of climate change that threatens a range of human rights, including the rights to life, food, health, housing, development and self-determination.
Felix Pretis of the University of Victoria has shown even 1. 5℃ of global warming will reduce economic growth in some regions, and that the tropics (热带) will feel this impact more than other areas. Some studies predict that the number of heat-related deaths in many parts, South-East Asia among them, will be far more than the number of cold-related deaths.
And then there’re negative effects of extreme weather events, which have the potential to kill thousands. Myles Allen, a climate modeler at the University of Oxford, has led research into whether specific weather events can be owed to broader climate trends (趋势). He used climate models to model the super typhoon with and without greenhouse gas emissions. The former accurately reproduced the actual events, in terms of the weather patterns (模式), wind speeds and so on. In 15 out of 16 times without industrial emissions, the storm was weaker.
The study shows human emissions are likely to increase wind speeds, which results in a storm move that is 20% higher than it might be in the absence of climate change. It is this move that proves particularly destructive, “It’s not true that without human influence this event could never have happened,” Dr Allen said. “But through this study you can see this impact.”
1. What is the purpose of the first paragraph?| A．To show the mass destruction of super typhoons. |
| B．To give an example of the extreme weather event. |
| C．To introduce discussion on such events and human emissions. |
| D．To warn people about possible results of climate change. |
| A．Studies on harm of climate change are needed. |
| B．Global warming will damage human rights. |
| C．Both high and low temperatures are dangerous. |
| D．Some areas are affected by global warming. |
| A．By making comparisons. | B．By analyzing examples. |
| C．By collecting data. | D．By analyzing causes and results. |
| A．The storm resulted from greenhouse gas emissions. |
| B．Human behavior increases the frequency of storms. |
| C．Wind speeds are determined by industrial emissions. |
| D．Human influence worsens extreme weather events. |
6 . Research has shown that disrupting one's natural “morning lark” (早起鸟) or “night owl” (夜猫子) tendency can result in immoral behavior at work.
Who doesn't love a flexible work schedule? Being able to make your own hours, come in when you're ready and leave when you're done, step out to attend a child's presentation at school, have a midday appointment, or even squeeze in a quick workout or nap as a guaranteed pick-me-up — flexibility greatly improves one's quality of life.
The benefits don't stop there, however. Research has shown that having flexible work hours actually makes one a better person. How so? It's been found that disrupted sleep patterns —in the form of having to act outside of your normal inclination to be a morning “lark” or a night “owl” — can result in strange, unethical, and out-of-line behavior.
Science journalist Linda Geddes said, “If you don't get enough sleep, research suggests you are more likely to have unethical behavior, such as being mean, bullying your fellow employees or falsifying receipts. But it's not just owls: the larks tend to behave more unethically in the evening, and owls in the morning. So ideally, you want to introduce flexible working."
Employers would be wise to allow their employees to start whenever they feel ready — whether it's at the crack of dawn or at 11 a.m., and to allow breaks or pauses in the day as needed — because that would mean better productivity, performance, and behavior.
This shift is already happening, with the New York Times recently reporting that 27 percent of US employers now offer the flexibility to work outside normal business hours, up from 22 percent in 2014; and 68 percent allow telecommuting as needed (up from 54 percent in 2014). With the national unemployment rate at its lowest in 50 years, employers are having to become more competitive in what they offer workers, and flex-hours seem like a no-brainer, highly beneficial to all.
1. What is mainly talked about in Paragraph 2?| A．Ways to improve life quality. |
| B．People's activities in their free time. |
| C．Methods to get a flexible work schedule. |
| D．The advantages of flexibility in work time. |
| A．Judgment. | B．Tendency. | C．Reaction. | D．Choice. |
| A．They will show their nature more easily. |
| B．They tend to suffer from sleep problems. |
| C．They tend to behave immorally in their work. |
| D．They will get more flexibility in working time. |
| A．The unemployment rate is increasing. |
| B．Employers are getting more free time. |
| C．Flexible working has been creating more jobs. |
| D．More employers adopt a flexible work schedule. |
7 . A seismic（地震的；重大的）shift in climate science might be heating up.
New research shows that sound waves, produced by earthquakes can be used to measure temperatures in the ocean which traps 90% of the heat Earth absorbs from the sun，making long-term changes in ocean warmth, a major factor in how the world might respond to global warming.
For years the main approach of measuring ocean temperature has been Argo, an array（阵列）of 4000 automatic floats, which drifts the globe, sampling ocean water and measuring its temperature. Yet Argo measurements stop at 2000 meters.
The new technique called “Seismic Ocean Thermometry”, would be especially useful in detecting long-term changes in ocean temperatures deeper than Argo’s reach.
“Ocean Acoustic Tomography”, the basis for the current research, was first tested nearly 30 years ago. The initial studies created sound waves artificially, basically increasing the volume on giant underwater speakers. Scientists measured the sound’s travel time from the speakers to receivers thousands of kilometers away. Because ocean temperatures affect the speed of the waves, the researchers could calculate average temperatures along their paths. But some believed the noise was a threat to ocean life and the technique never took off.
The new study instead uses a natural sound source for investigation：earthquakes making a low, continuous noise beneath the seafloor off the coast of Sumatra that drum up sound waves in the ocean. On the shores of the Chagos Islands in the East Indian Ocean, between 2005 and 2016 Seismic Station Diego Garcia recorded seismic waves produced by those earthquakes. Some of those waves created physical changes in land and sea as they traveled. Others were sound waves or T waves that moved through the deep ocean, delivering valuable data about ocean temperature.
12 years of data coupled with mathematical models pointed to a temperature change of roughly 0.044 degrees per decade, a trend larger than those predicted by Argo. The findings suggest that Seismic Ocean Thermometry is a feasible method to measure changes in ocean temperature. Further data from other regions of the globe and other timeframes would help improve the warning models and predictions.
And in future studies the researchers plan to listen directly for sound waves, using a network of hydrophones, microphones which detect sound waves under water. Sound waves set the tone for a deep dive into our warming oceans even if they fail to reach 60000 miles under the sea?
1. What disadvantage does Argo have?| A．Its reach is limited. | B．It takes long to collect samples. |
| C．It doesn’t work globally. | D．Its prediction isn’t reliable at all. |
| A．was tested many times but never succeeded |
| B．remained unpopular for fear of potential harm |
| C．was assumed to be too complicated to be controllable |
| D．measured ocean temperature just as the new research does |
| A．some warming is working its way deeper into the ocean |
| B．ocean temperature is rising faster owing to earthquakes |
| C．sound travels faster in colder water than in hotter water |
| D．sound waves will slow down the warming of the ocean |
| A．Sound Waves First Applied to Climate Science. |
| B．New Factors Found to Be Heating up the Ocean. |
| C．A Natural Approach Holding Back Global Warming. |
| D．Ocean’s Hidden Heat Measured with Earthquake Sounds. |
8 . Physical activity is important in preventing cardiovascular(心血管的) disease in young people so long as they don’t undertake very intense activity on days when air pollution levels are high, according to a recently released study.
Until now, little has been known about the relationships between the health benefits of physical activity taking place outdoors and the potentially harmful effects of air pollution. Previous research by the authors of the current study had investigated the question in middle-aged people at a single point in time, but this is the first time that it has been investigated in young adults aged between 20—30 years over a period of several years. In addition, the researchers wanted to see what happens when people increase or decrease their physical activity over time.
At each health check-up, the participants completed a questionnaire asking about their physical activity in the past seven days and this information was changed into units of metabolic equivalent task(MET, 代谢当量任务) minutes per week(MET-mins/week). The participants were divided into four groups: 0, 1—499, 500—999 and 1000 or more MET-mins/week. People are recommended to do 500—999 MET-mins/week and this can be achieved by; for example, running, cycling or hiking for 15—30 minutes five times a week, or brisk walking, doubles tennis or slow cycling for 30—60 minutes five times a week.
The researchers used data to calculate annual average levels of air pollution, in particular the levels of small particulate matter that are less than or equal to 10 or 2.5 microns in diameter, known a PM10 and PM25.
Overall, the results show that physical activity is associated with a lower risk of developing cardiovascular disease among young adults. However, when air pollution levels are high, exercising beyond the recommended amount may offset or even reverse the beneficial effects. The study cannot show that air pollution causes the increased cardiovascular risk, only that it is associated with it.
1. What can we know from Paragraph 2?| A．Outdoor physical activity harms our health. |
| B．Exercising isn’t advised on serious air pollution days. |
| C．A first in-depth survey has been done on young adults. |
| D．Middle-aged people have been the ideal research target. |
| A．By doing research on young adults. |
| B．By collecting PM10 and PM2.5 data. |
| C．By making experiments on middle-aged people. |
| D．By studying a questionnaire on physical activity. |
| A．Air pollution leads to cardiovascular disease. |
| B．Cardiovascular disease relates to air pollution. |
| C．More physical exercise benefits young people. |
| D．Young adults seldom develop cardiovascular disease. |
| A．Physical activity & air pollution: when to do more or less physical activity. |
| B．Physical activity & health benefit: how to prevent cardiovascular disease |
| C．Physical activity & air pollution: what to do with high air pollution levels |
| D．Physical activity & health benefit: how to maximize the health benefits of exercising |
9 . I’m a standup comic. One day, a woman from The Daily News called and said she wanted to do an article on me. When she had finished interviewing me for the article, she asked, “What are you planning to do next?” Well, at the time, there was absolutely nothing I was planning on doing next, so I asked her what she meant, pausing for a moment. She told me she was interested in me! So I thought I’d better tell her something. What came out was, “I’m thinking about breaking the Guinness Book of World Records for Fastest-Talking Female.”
The newspaper article came out the next day, and the writer had included my parting remarks about trying to break the world’s Fastest-Talking Female record. At about 5: 00 p.m. that afternoon I got a call from Larry King Live, which I had never heard of, asking me to go on the show. They wanted me to try to break the record, and they told me they would pick me up at 8: 00---because they wanted me to do it that night!
Then I sat down to figure out what on earth I was going to do on the show. I called Guinness to find out how to break a fast-talking record. They told me I would have to recite something either Shakespeare or the Bible. Shakespeare and I had never really gotten along, so 1 figured the Bible was my only hope. I began practicing and practicing, over and over again. I was both nervous and excited at the same time.
Then I decided just to give it my best shot, and I did. I broke the record, becoming the World’s Fastest-talking Female by speaking 585 words in one minute in front of a national television audience. I broke it again two years later, with 603 words in a minute. My career took off.
People often ask me how I did that. I tell them I live my life by this simple philosophy: I always say yes first; then I ask, “Now, what do I have to do to accomplish that?” Then I ask myself, “What is the worst thing that can happen if I don’t succeed? The answer is, I simply don’t succeed! And what’s the best thing that can happen? I succeed!
What more can life ask of you? Be yourself, and have a good time!
1. Why did the author pause before telling her next plan?| A．She took little interest in the topic. |
| B．She refused to share it with others. |
| C．She didn’t have any plan in her mind. |
| D．She needed time to think over the plan. |
| A．She was persuaded to set a Guinness record. |
| B．She was invited to give comic performances. |
| C．She succeeded in making a fortune overnight. |
| D．She finally agreed to make her parting remarks. |
| A．She could recite the Bible. |
| B．She received an interview. |
| C．She broke the record twice. |
| D．She developed her philosophy. |
| A．Do nothing by halves |
| B．Practice for perfection |
| C．Just say yes to yourself |
| D．Always hope for the best |
10 . I believe in the power of science fiction, not just for its capacity to turn dreams into reality, but also for its power to bond together those who share a common view of the future. For me, that’s true for my relationship with my dad. Some fathers and sons bond over sports, fishing or hunting, but my dad and I bond over Star Trek. We tried a trip to Disney World, but one of my earliest memories wasn’t Mickey, but a Klingon battle cruiser on the screen.
Over the years, nearly every setting and situation has become far away for my dad and me. When it’s warm at night, we’re not driving along some dark streets in Indiana, but going at a slow speed with stars dimly shining. Both of us are thinking of them, without needing to say a word. All these imaginations of other universes have together created a private universe for my dad and me.
Gene Roddenberry, creator of Star Trek, once said, “Science fiction is a way of thinking, a way of logic that bypasses a lot of nonsense. It allows people to look directly at important subjects.” A lifetime of science fiction has influenced more than just my relationship with my dad, but has also helped me shape my own hopes for the future. I’m now a science writer.
Yes, science fiction has made me into a “nerd” and it also has been a source of joy for my family, making me an optimist while enabling me to think critically about the danger of technology. Thank those authors who have shared their visions: the world and my family are better for it. Thank my dad, who is both the best storyteller and the best man I have ever known because he helped me realize the truth of Tennyson’s words, “For I dipped into the future, far as human eye could see, saw the vision of the world, and all the wonder that would be.”
1. What contributes to the bond between the author and his father?| A．Their similar dream. | B．Their love for each other. |
| C．Their common interest. | D．Their hobby of fishing. |
| A．His deep impression of his dad. | B．His feeling of staying with his dad. |
| C．His earliest memory of his dad. | D．His good relationship with his dad. |
| A．It leads him to pursue a desirable career. | B．It brings him the courage to live better. |
| C．It inspires him to face the danger of technology. | D．It makes him a source of his family’s joy. |
| A．The Wonders Science Brings | B．The Power of Science Fiction |
| C．The Stories About Science Fiction | D．The Time Together with My Father |
