1 . If scientists could create a pill that let you live twice as long while remaining free of diseases, would you take it?
If one considers only the personal benefits that longer life would bring, the answer might seem like a no-brainer: People could spend more time with loved ones; watch future generations grow up; learn new languages or try different careers.
But what about society as a whole? Would it be better off if life span were doubled? The question is of growing importance, and serious debate about it goes back a few years to the Kronos Conference on Longevity Health Sciences in Arizona. Gregory Stock, director of the Program on Medicine, Technology, and Society at UCLA5s School of Public Health, answered the question with a firm “Yes”. A doubled lifespan, Stock said, would “give us a chance to recover from our mistakes, lead us towards longer-term thinking and delay the start of expensive diseases of aging. It would also raise productivity through adding to our prime years.”
Callahan, a co-founder of the Hastings Center in New York, didn’t share Stocks enthusiasm. For one thing, he said, doubling life spans won’t solve any of our current social problems. ‘‘We have war, poverty, all sorts of issues around, and I don’t think any of them would be at all helped if people lived longer, Callahan said in a telephone interview, “The question is, ‘What will we get as a society?’ I suspect it won’t be a better society?”
Others point out that a doubling of the human lifespan will affect society at every level. Ideas about marriage and work will change in fundamental ways, they say, as will attitudes toward the young and the old.
1. In Paragraph 2, “a no-brainer” most probably refers to ________.| A．something coming to mind naturally | B．someone unwilling to think |
| C．something difficult to bear in mind | D．someone having a low IQ |
| A．thinking less frequently | B．having fewer diseases of aging |
| C．making more mistakes | D．working productively longer |
| A．Aging: Burden or Treasure | B．Base of Society: the Old or the Young |
| C．Longer Lives: For or Again | D．A Doubled Lifespan: Possible or Not |
2 . It was a ruling that had consumers seething with anger and many a free trader crying foul. On November 20th the European Court of Justice decided that Tesco, a British supermarket chain, should not be allowed to import jeans made by America’s Levi Strauss from outside the European Union and sell them at cut-rate prices without getting permission first from the jeans maker. Ironically, the ruling is based on an EU trademark directive that was designed to protect local, not American, manufacturers from price dumping. The idea is that any brand-owning firm should be allowed to position its goods and segment its markets as it sees fit: Levi’s jeans, just like Gucci handbags, must be allowed to be expensive.
Levi Strauss persuaded the court that, by selling its jeans cheaply alongside soap powder and bananas, Tesco was destroying the image and so the value of its brands-which could only lead to less innovation and, in the long run, would reduce consumer choice. Consumer groups and Tesco say that Levi’s case is specious. The supermarket argues that it was just arbitraging the price differential between Levi’s jeans sold in America and Europe-a service performed a million times a day in financial markets, and one that has led to real benefits for consumers. Tesco has been selling some 15,000 pairs of Levi’s jeans a week, for about half the price they command in specialist stores approved by Levi Strauss. Christine Cross, Tesco’s head of global non-food sourcing, says the ruling risks “creating a Fortress Europe with a vengeance”.
The debate will rage on, and has implications well beyond casual clothes (Levi Strauss was joined in its lawsuit by Zino Davidoff, a perfume maker). The question at its heart is not whether brands need to control how they are sold to protect their image, but whether it is the job of the courts to help them do this. Gucci, an Italian clothes label whose image was being destroyed by loose licensing and over-exposure in discount stores, saved itself not by resorting to the courts but by ending contracts with third-party suppliers, controlling its distribution better and opening its own stores. It is now hard to find cut-price Gucci anywhere.
Brand experts argue that Levi Strauss, which has been losing market share to hipper rivals such as Diesel, is no longer strong enough to command premium prices. Left to market forces, so-so brands such as Levi’s might well lade away and be replaced by fresher labels. With the courts protecting its prices, Levi Strauss may hang on for longer. But no court can help to make it a great brand again.
1. Which of the following is not true according to Paragraph 1?| A．Consumers and free traders were very angry. |
| B．Only the Levi’s maker can decide the prices of the jeans. |
| C．The ruling has protected Levi’s from price dumping. |
| D．Levi’s jeans should be sold at a high price. |
| A．responsible for oneself | B．having too many doubts |
| C．not as it seems to be | D．raising misunderstanding |
| A．Gucci has successfully saved its own image. |
| B．It has changed its fate with its own effort. |
| C．Opening its own stores is the key to success. |
| D．It should be the court’s duty to save its image. |
| A．Hie rivals are competitive |
| B．it fails to command premium prices |
| C．market forces have their own rules |
| D．the court fails to give some help |
| A．biased | B．indifferent |
| C．puzzling | D．objective |
3 . A Universal Greeting: Shaking Hands
A handshake seems to be a normal gesture. In fact, in the 9th century BC, an ancient site during the ruling of Shalmaneser III clearly shows two figures holding hands.The Iliad,usually dated to the 8th century BC, mentions that two characters “taking each other's hands and expressing their loyalty," Centuries later, Shakespeare once wrote of two characters who shook hands and swore to be brothers in the bookAs You Like It.Shaking hands seems to be an ancient custom whose roots have disappeared in the sands of time.
Historians who have studied ancient etiquette books note that the modern handshake did not appear until the middle of the 19th century, when it was considered a slightly inappropriate gesture that could only be used between friends. But what if Shakespeare had written about handshaking hundreds of years earlier?
According to author Torbjorn Lundmark in hisTales of Hi and Bye: Greeting and Parting Rituals Around the World,the problem comes in differing definitions of the handshake. The early handshakes mentioned above were part of making deals or peace; King Shalmaneser 111 referred to a rebellion in which he signed a treaty with the King of Babylon. In theIliad,Diomedes and Glaucus shook, hands when they realized they were guest-friends, and Diomedes declared: "Let's not try to kill each other." Shakespeare was similarly referencing settlement of a conflict.
The modern handshake as a form of greeting is harder to trace. As a Dutch sociologist Herman Roodenburg — the chief authority for the history of handshaking — wrote in a chapter of ananthologycalledA Cultural History of Gesture,“More than in any other field, that of the study of gesture is one in which the historian has to make the most of only a few clues”.
One of the earliest clues he cites is a 16th-century German translation of the French writer Rabelais'sGargantua and Pantagruel.When one character meets Gargantua, Rabelais writes, “He was greeted by countless hugs and countless good days." But according to Roodenburg, the 16th-century German translation added references to shaking hands.
A popular saying suggests that Cleland's statements against bowing were actually a wish to go back to a potentially traditional method of greeting in Europe. As the centuries progressed, handshaking was replaced by more hierarchical ways of greeting — like bowing. According to Roodenburg, handshaking survived in a few remote places, like in Dutch towns where some would use the gesture to make peace after disagreements. Around the same time, those who valued equality also made use of handshaking. Then, as the Continent's hierarchy was weakened, handshaking became a common practice among people of the same rank, as it is today.
1. Why does the author mention Shakespeare in the first two paragraphs?| A．To prove that the history of handshaking is hard to find. |
| B．To illustrate that handshaking is a very old custom. |
| C．To show readers that handshaking is common in fiction. |
| D．To explain the value of handshaking in communication. |
| A．The origin of handshaking as a form of greeting is easy to trace. |
| B．Citizens usually shake hands to show friendliness in Holland. |
| C．It was used only between friends and to reach an agreement. |
| D．It is a common practice between people of different social positions. |
| A．the science of mental ability | B．a collection of selected literary passages |
| C．a daily written record of experiences | D．all the living things of a particular region |
| A．The handshake has disappeared in some remote parts of the Netherlands. |
| B．Handshaking has different meanings in different European countries. |
| C．Most Europeans prefer to shake hands rather than bow. |
| D．Handshakes are now common between people of different positions. |
