1 . Imagine a world where you move around in front of a personal computer in your own sound space. You listen to your favorite songs, play loud computer games or watch a movie — all without other people hearing the sound and without headphones.
That is the possibility presented by “sound beaming”, a new technology from Noveto Systems, an Israeli company. On Friday, the company introduced a desktop device that sends sound directly to a listener without the need for headphones or a special receiver.
Noveto Systems gave The Associated Press (AP) a chance to test its SoundBeamer 1.0 before its introduction. The AP’s Louise Dixon writes that listening to the device is like something from a science fiction movie.The sound seems so close that it feels like it is inside your ears while also in front, above and behind them.
Noveto expects the device will have many uses. Office workers could listen to music or conference calls without others hearing. People could play a game, a movie or music without waking up others in the same room. Because the device does not use headphones, it is possible to hear other sounds in the room clearly.
The device uses a 3-D sensing module that finds and follows the ear position of the listener. It sends ultrasonic waves (超声波) to create sound pockets by the user’s ears. The 3-D method creates sound on all sides of the listener, therefore the listeners feel completely transported into the scene.
By changing a setting, the sound can follow a listener around when he moves his head. It is also possible to move out of the sound beam's path and hear nothing at all.
While the idea of sound beaming is not new, Noveto was the first to launch the technology.
According to the chief executive officer Christophe Ramstein, a “smaller” version of the device will be ready for release to consumers next year.
1. What does the underlined word “possibility” in Paragraph 2 refer to?| A．The listener may put on music to block out other sounds. |
| B．The listener may hear sound only for him or her without using headphones. |
| C．The listener may enjoy songs or movies without being interrupted by others. |
| D．The listener may have the ability to pick up some special sounds. |
| A．Amazing. | B．Impossible. |
| C．Strange. | D．Meaningful. |
| A．It places the listener on the scene to hear the sound. |
| B．It fixes a sound beam’s path which can not be changed. |
| C．It follows the listeners around to send and receive sounds. |
| D．With 3-D tracking technology, it sends ultrasonic waves to the target listener. |
| A．To promote the SoundBeamer. | B．To introduce a new sound device. |
| C．To recommend new headphones. | D．To explain a technical phenomenon. |
2 . Binge-watching is when a person watches more than one episode of a show in quick succession(一连串，连续）". With developments in the speed and connectivity of the internet, increases in technology and the rise of on-demand entertainment companies, people can now have their favorite shows streamed directly to their television at their convenience.
This behavior is nothing new. In fact, " binge-watching" has been officially listed in dictionaries since 2015. The entertainment companies recognize this behavior and many take steps to encourage it. Often, instead of releasing each episode on a week-by-week basis, an entire series will become available concurrently. Once the episode finishes many platforms will display pop-ups with “you might like suggestions, or will automatically play the next episode”.
However, recent research suggests that out of the more than half of British adults who watch more than one episode of a show back-to-back, almost a third have admitted missing sleep or becoming tired as a result; and one quarter have neglected their household chores. Next we’ll be missing work!
Bingeing has other connections-binge eating, binge drinking and binge smoking. All of them are often associated with a lack of control and a possible route to addiction. Lindsey Fussell, consumer group director, said: “The days of waiting a week for the next episode are largely gone, with people finding it hard to resist watching multiple episodes around the house or on the move.” If people find binge-watching hard to resist, coupled with the fact that it has shown to lead to negligence in many, are we witnessing the birth of a new type of addiction?
The countless of information and entertainment that television and online media can bring us is, many would say, a good thing. However, when the activity begins to bleed into other areas, causing us to stop functioning then it becomes a problem. So, what's the answer? Moderation! Neither a tiny amount, nor too much. After all, as the old proverb says, “A little of what you fancy does you good.”
1. How did the writer develop the first paragraph?| A．Listing some examples |
| B．Telling a story. |
| C．Giving a definition |
| D．Analyzing the cause and effect |
| A．similarly | B．gradually | C．naturally | D．necessarily |
| A．people have no patience to do work |
| B．people can’t control their movements |
| C．people are delighted to watch television |
| D．people can’t resist the temptation |
| A．To watch episodes in a moderate way. |
| B．To draw life lessons from the episodes. |
| C．To enjoy entertainment as much as possible. |
| D．To keep online media from stopping functioning. |
3 . Members of a native community in the arctic (北极的)areas of Sweden say their reindeer (驯鹿)are facing possible hunger from unusual weather related to climate change. The local Sami community takes care of about 8,000 reindeer throughout the year. The animals are moved between traditional feeding areas in high mountains close to Norway in the summer and forests farther east in the winter.
A community member, Inga, is worried about his reindeer. He said climate change has affected the area's weather activity and created food shortages. "If we don't find better areas for them where they can feed themselves and find food, the reindeer will die from hunger,” Inga said. He verified the problem by reaching down into the snow and pulling up a hard piece of ice close to the soil.
The area received unusual snowfall early in the fall, followed by rain that froze. Inga said this traps the plants that reindeer eat under a thick cover of ice. Some of the hungry reindeer have now moved away from their traditional feeding areas in search of food.
Community members say half the reindeer moved towards the east as planned. But the rest headed back to the mountains, where they face the risk of attacks by other animals or being caught in an avalanche (雪崩). Older members of the Sami community say that in the past, they only remember bad winters about once every ten years. But now, Inga says “extreme and strange weather are appearing more and more often,“ happening several times a year.
Snowfall is common for the area. But as temperatures increase, rain can also fall, creating a “rain-on-snow” effect. When this happens, food remains trapped under the ice where the reindeer cannot reach it. This causes the animals to grow weaker and struggle to make it through the winter. Weather changes have hit the Sami community hard.
“We don't want money because we can’t buy better weather with money. We need the EU to take action and they need to do it now,“ said Inga.
1. What problem do reindeer meet with at present?| A．Cold weather. | B．Risk of hunger. |
| C．Long march for food. | D．Polluted environment. |
| A．Proved. | B．Solved. | C．Ignored. | D．Answered. |
| A．Traps under the snow. | B．Hunt from human beings. |
| C．Rocks falling down the mountain. | D．Threat from other animals. |
| A．Flood. | B．Drought. |
| C．Rain-on-snow effect. | D．Snowfall. |
4 . On November 27, 2020, two giant pandas, “Da Mao” and “Er Shun,” arrived in Chengdu, capital of Sichuan province, after finishing their stay at a Canadian zoo ahead of schedule, as the COVID-19 pandemic made their bamboo supply difficult to continue.
The two pandas were shipped from China to Canada on March 25, 2013. The original plan was that the two, Da Mao, a 4-year-old male from the Chengdu Research Base of Giant Panda Breeding in Sichuan, and Er Shun, a 5-year-old female from Chongqing Zoo, would stay in Canada for 10 years under a conservation agreement between the two countries, the first five years at Toronto Zoo followed immediately by another five years at Calgary Zoo.
At present, “Da Mao” and “Er Shun” have been sent to Chongqing Municipality for quarantine, according to the Chengdu Research Base of Giant Panda Breeding.
As we know, on average, each giant panda consumes about 40 kilograms of bamboo daily. The Calgary Zoo had been importing fresh bamboo from China because of the climate in Canada, but struggled to meet the pandas needs when the coronavirus grounded most flights in March.
The zoo said staff worked with the San Diego Zoo and Suncoast Nursery to arrange weekly shipments of fresh bamboo, but the process of finding the right bamboo has been expensive and time-consuming.
In May, the zoo announced it would have to return the two animals earlier than planned so that they could enjoy China’s abundant supply of fresh bamboo instead.
The zoo said on Friday that after months and months of hard work it had secured international permits to get their beloved pandas home to China.
Throughout their trip home, each panda has about 100 kilograms of bamboo to consume along with pears, apples and biscuits.
After spending five years at the Toronto Zoo, the two moved to the Calgary Zoo in March 2018 with twin babies, “Jia Panpan” and “Jia Yueyue,” which had traveled home to China in January.
Times Nov.30, 2020
1. How many years earlier did the two pandas return to China?| A．More than two years | B．Less than two years |
| C．About four years | D．More than three years |
| A．the two giant pandas come from China | B．Canada wanted to be grateful for China |
| C．pandas eat nothing but bamboo from China | D．the climate in Canada is unfit for bamboo to grow |
| A．being based on something | B．stopping a child from going out |
| C．connecting something to the ground | D．preventing the flights from taking off |
| A．The two giant pandas are both 12 years old now. |
| B．Throughout their trip home, the two pandas only ate bamboo. |
| C．The two pandas’ twin babies came back to China earlier than them. |
| D．The two pandas are from the same Chinese zoo and stayed together in Canada. |
5 . Smoking in your own home in Thailand may now be considered a crime, if the smoke is considered harmful to other people in the house.
The new law, Family Protection and Development Promotion Act, was initiated (启动) by the Ministry of Social Development and Human Security and was announced in the Royal Gazette on May 22, 2019. The law aims at limiting smoking at home which might be hazardous for others’ health living under the same roof. In that case, it will be considered as “domestic violence”. The new law came into force on August 20.
According to the center for research and knowledge management for tobacco control, at the Faculty of Medical Science of Mahidol University, there are about 4.9 million households where one or more family members smoke. An average of 10.3 million people have unconsciously become passive smokers because they’ve been breathing in smoke at home. Scientific studies show that passive smokers are at greater risk of being affected by cancer.
Of 75 child patients from houses where smoking is practiced, 76% of them were found to have nicotine traces in their urine (尿液), with 43% of them having nicotine content going beyond permitted levels. Smoking at home also may lead to physical or emotional violence because of aggressiveness (攻击性) when there is a lack of smoking, and might as well ruin relationships between smokers and non-smoker family members.
According to the new law, anyone who thinks they are affected by domestic smoking can report to officials concerned so that inspectors will be sent to investigate and take legal action against the smokers. Once confirmed, the court may order a person to receive treatment to quit smoking in an attempt to protect the person’s family. In February in 2019, Thailand had banned smoking at six of its airports along with a ban in public places.
1. What do we know about the new law in Thailand?| A．It came into effect on May 22. |
| B．It aimed at protecting the health of non-smokers. |
| C．It regarded smoking at home as a kind of domestic violence. |
| D．It clearly claimed that smoking at home is a crime. |
| A．Anxious. | B．Harmful. |
| C．Beneficial. | D．Essential. |
| A．The purpose of initiating the law. |
| B．Responses to the new law. |
| C．Actions to quit smoking. |
| D．Bad consequences of smoking at home. |
| A．Smoking is illegal anywhere in Thailand. |
| B．Passive smokers are not likely to suffer from cancer. |
| C．People tend to be more aggressive when they are smoking. |
| D．Thailand is making efforts to create a smoke-free environment. |
6 . Starman, the dummy(仿真人) riding a cherry-red Tesla Roadster(特斯拉敞篷车) through space, has made his closest approach ever to Mars. The electric roadster and its passenger were attached to the top of a Falcon Heavy rocket during the SpaceX rocket’s first test launch on 6 February 2018.
Two years later, the Falcon Heavy rocket and the vehicle at its tip are making their second trip around the Sun. Mr. McDowell, a Harvard astrophysicist, found that Starman passed 7.4 million kilometers from Mars at 06:25 GMT 7 October, 2020.
The closest recent approach between the Earth and Mars was 56 million kilometers in 2003, though the planets are often hundreds of millions of miles apart depending on where they are in their orbits. No one can see the Falcon Heavy rocket at its current distance, but orbits over periods of a few years are fairly straightforward to predict, and Mr. McDowell used data about how the rocket was moving when it left the Earth’s gravity behind to locate its recent movements exactly.
Last time Starman circled the Sun, McDowell said, it crossed Mars’ orbit while the Red Planet was quite far away. But this time the crossing lined up with a fairly close approach, though still not close enough to feel a strong tug from Mars.
At this point in time, if you were able to go look at the Roadster, it would probably look pretty different. The strong solar radiation environment between the planets would probably have destroyed all the exposed organic materials.
Without the Earth’s atmospheric and magnetic(磁场的) protection, even the plastics and carbon-fibre materials would start to break up. Over the course of decades or centuries, the car will end up with its aluminium(铝) frame and hard glass parts----that’s assuming that none of them get destroyed in impacts with passing space rocks.
1. What can we infer from the first two paragraphs?| A．Starman is now circling around the Earth in its orbit. |
| B．Starman has set out on its second trip around the Sun. |
| C．Starman has traveled 7.4 million kilometers after launch. |
| D．Starman still has a long way to go before getting to Mars. |
| A．By keeping Starman under visual observation. |
| B．By predicting its future orbit around the earth. |
| C．By seeking professional help from SpaceX. |
| D．By analyzing data about the rocket’s movement. |
| A．pull | B．drive | C．resistance | D．pressure |
| A．It is circling around Mars and will finally crash onto it. |
| B．It will finish its mission and return to SpaceX on earth. |
| C．Starman is likely reduced to at most its frame and glass. |
| D．SpaceX will try to recover it during its next space mission. |
7 . As people get older, the types of friends they have tend to change. As young adults, humans have a lot of friends. With age, they often prefer to spend their time with just a few close, positive individuals. Researchers long believed that this change was unique to humans, but a new study finds that chimps also have similar tendencies.
One explanation for the humans to get picky about social connections has to do with awareness of our limited life span. “People monitor how much time we have left in our life and choose emotionally-fulfilling relationships in old age,” says one of the study's lead authors Alexandra G. Rosati, a psychologist at the University of Michigan. As people age, they don’t want to be surrounded by a large group of negative friends, but would prefer to be near a handful of optimistic individuals.
Rosati and her colleagues were curious whether chimps would show similar features even though they don’t seem to be aware of their upcoming death. Researchers used 78, 000 hours of observations made over 20 years from the Kibale Chimpanzee Project in Uganda. The data looked at the social interactions of 21 male chimps between 15 and 58 years old. The researchers only studied male chimps because they show stronger social bonds and have more social interactions than female chimps.
Researchers found that wild chimpanzees share a similar pattern. “They interact with others in more positive ways as they get older. Younger adults, in contrast, show more aggression and were more likely to form one-sided relationships where their partner did not reciprocate. ”says Rosati. For example, the older chimpanzees would sit close to their long-time companions and groom (给……梳毛) each other, while younger chimps had more one-sided relationships where they would groom a friend, but the action wasn't returned. The study was published in the journal Science.
“This aging pattern may be the result of shared changes in our abilities to manage our emotions with age,” Rosati says. “This shared pattern between chimpanzees and humans could represent an adaptive response where older adults focus on important social relationships that provide benefits and avoid interactions that have negative consequences as they lose competitive fighting ability.”
1. Why do humans change their preference for friends in old age?| A．They don’t like making new friends. |
| B．Their friends pass away one by one. |
| C．They adapt to the changes in nature. |
| D．They know their life is running out. |
| A．To show the study was done scientifically. |
| B．To show how scientists tried to prove their assumption. |
| C．To show how hard it was to observe the chimps. |
| D．To show male chimps are unaware of upcoming death. |
| A．Repay their kindness. | B．Take care of them. |
| C．Get along well with them. | D．Sit close to them. |
| A．People Prefer Positive Partners in Old Age |
| B．Positive Bonds Benefit Chimps in Many Ways |
| C．Aging Chimps like Us Get Picky About Friends |
| D．Chimps Share Similar Tendencies with Humans |
8 . “WHAT IS CIVILIZATION?” asked Kenneth Clark 50 years ago in the BBC series on the subject. “I don’t know, and I can’t define it in abstract terms, yet. But I think I can recognize it when I see it, and I’m looking at it now.” And he turned to gesture behind him, at the soaring Gothic towers and flying buttresses of Notre Dame（巴黎圣母院）.
It seems inhuman to care more about a building than about people. That the sight of Notre Dame going up in flames has attracted so much more attention than floods in southern Africa which killed over 1,000 arouses understandable feelings of guilt. Yet the widespread, intense grief at the sight of the cathedral’s collapsing tower is in fact profoundly human—and in a particularly 21st-century way.
It is not just the economy that is global today, it is culture too. People wander the world in search not just of jobs and security but also of beauty and history. Familiarity breeds affection. A building on whose sunny steps you have rested, in front of which you have taken a photo with your loved one, becomes a warm part of your memories and thus of yourself. That helps explain why China is in mourning—WeChat, young China’s principal means of talking to itself, has been throbbing with the story, and Xi Jinping, the country’s president, sent a message of condolence to Emmanuel Macron, his French counterpart—while India was largely indifferent. Tourism from India to the West is a trickle(细流) compared with the flood from China.
This visual age has endowed beauty with new power, and social media have turned great works of art into superstars. Only a few, though, have achieved this status. Just as there is only ever a handful of world-famous actors, so the pantheon（万神殿）of globally recognizable cultural symbols is tiny: the Mona Lisa, Michelangelo’s David, the Taj Mahal, the Great Pyramid—and Notre Dame. Disaster, too, is visual. In the 24 hours after the fire started videos on social media of the burning cathedral were viewed nearly a quarter of a billion times.
Yet the emotions the sight aroused were less about the building itself than about what losing it might mean. Notre Dame is an expression of humanity at its collective best. Nobody could look up into that ceiling without wondering at the genius of the thousands of anonymous craftsmen who, over a century and a half, realized a vision so grand in its structural ambition and so delicate in its detail. Its survival through 850 years of political turbulence—through war, revolution and Nazi occupation—binds the present to the past.
The fire also binds people to each other. The outpouring of emotion it has brought forth is proof that, despite the dark forces of division now abroad, we are all in it together. When nationalism is a rising threat, shared sadness makes borders suddenly irrelevant. When politics is polarized, a love of culture has the power to unite. When extremism divides Muslim from Christian and religious people from atheists, those of all faiths and none are mourning together. An building built for the glory of God also represents the unity of the human spirit.
And it will be rebuilt. The morning after the fire, the many Parisians who went to the cathedral to mourn its destruction found comfort instead. Although the spire is gone, the towers are still standing and it seems likely that the whole building can be reconstructed. The effort to rebuild it, like the fire, will bring people together. Within 24 hours, €600m ($677m) had been raised from businesses and rich people, and a rash of crowd funding campaigns started. A high-resolution laser scan of the building, carried out recently, should help.
It will never be the same, but that is as it should be. As Victor Hugo wrote in “The Hunchback of Notre Dame”, a three-volume love-letter to the cathedral: “Great buildings, like great mountains, are the work of centuries. Art is often transformed as it is being made…Time is the architect, the nation is the builder.”
1. The underlined word “condolence” in Paragraph 3 means __________.| A．sympathy | B．compliment | C．gratitude | D．suspicion |
| A．Because Indians care more about jobs and security. |
| B．Because Indians have no access to social media like WeChat. |
| C．Because Indians have less familiarity with Notre Dame. |
| D．Because Indians are not fond of travelling. |
| A．People’s sadness at the misfortune mainly lies in the building itself. |
| B．People wondered who contributed to such an artistic achievement. |
| C．Notre Dame is a witness to Nazi invasion and French revolution. |
| D．Fortunately we are blessed with countless splendid works of art. |
| A．the high-resolution laser scan of the building helps but far from enough |
| B．it’s impossible to replicate (复制) it for lack of the genius of craftsmen |
| C．dark forces, nationalism and extremism are barriers to replicating it |
| D．time has changed and the rebuilding will change accordingly |
| A．What is civilization? |
| B．Why do people care about Notre Dame? |
| C．What binds people together? |
| D．How should we rebuild Notre Dame? |
9 . Germans have a word “wanderlust” which translated into English would be “the desire to wander”. Nowadays the chance to travel is endless. Thanks to cheap air tickets, travelling abroad is very easy and sometimes it's even cheaper to fly out of the country than to travel within your own. So, yes, travelling is cheap but there have to be other reasons to travel and you're right. There are plenty of reasons!
I have always had this feeling of wanderlust. It started from me wanting to explore my local woods at the back of my garden as a young girl and as I have grown, so has my sense of adventure. And I found my local woods being replaced with the Brazil wetland, Pantanal, where I went last summer in search of jaguars, snakes and crocodiles. The thing with travelling is that it's always different. Even if you went to the same country, to the same town and stayed in exactly the same hotel, it would be a completely different experience. The people you meet will be different, and they will tell you their own travelling stories: stories of holiday romances, holiday worries and stories that seem so outrageous that you can hardly believe them until something similar happens to you.
Or maybe the difference is you? Maybe you have changed since last time you were there? And that's the thing with travelling—it changes you. When you travel you are forced to experience a new culture. Whether it's eating a guinea pig, or staying with a family where neither of you speak a common language and you have to communicate through hand actions and smiles, the experience gives me itchy feet to do it all again. And although wanderlust is a German word, the English idiom “to have itchy feet” has a similar idea. Someone who has itchy feet needs to leave or travel. This desire to explore is found not only in language but in us.
1. According to Paragraph 2, what is the most important part of travelling?| A．Having different experiences. |
| B．Hearing many travelling stories. |
| C．Experiencing holiday romances. |
| D．Taking more adventures. |
| A．interesting | B．surprising | C．moving | D．disappointing |
| A．Staying with a family without common languages. |
| B．Communicating through hand actions and smiles. |
| C．Eating a guinea pig with a family. |
| D．Experiencing a different culture. |
| A．give various reasons for travelling |
| B．encourage people to travel abroad |
| C．explain the German word “wanderlust” |
| D．share the writer's travelling experiences |
10 . Since 2008, the leaders of Brazil, Russia, India and China—the BRIC countries—have met every year to discuss topics of global importance. At their third summit (峰会) in China in 2011, the leaders invited South Africa to join, thus becoming the BRICS. The four foreign ministers met on the fringes of the United Nations General Assembly in the fall of 2016. Their leaders’ first meeting was held in Sapporo on the eve of the G8 Toyako-Hokkaido Summit in 2008, and their first standalone (单独的) summit was the following year in Yekaterinburg, Russia. Since then, the BRICS ministers responsible for foreign affairs, finance and the economy, trade, agriculture and health have met. At the official’s level, there have been meetings held to discuss science and technology, national security, competition and statistics.
While the concept “BRICS” was first created by Jim O’Neill of Goldman Sachs to refer to the investment opportunities of the rising economies, the leaders’ meetings transcend the financial topics to involve many different summit-level topics relating to global governance, such as development, peace and security, energy and climate change and social topics.
The mission of the BRICS Information Center is to serve as a leading independent source of information and analysis on the BRICS interaction and institutions. Documentation from the BRICS and research and reports will be published on this website as they become useable.
Special attention will be paid to the interaction (合作) and each other’s influence of the BRICS with the world, and including the BRICS relationship with the Group of Eight (G8), Group of Twenty (G20), and other different summit institutions and broadly many-sided organizations.
1. We can learn about BRICS from the passage that _______________| A．South Africa refused to join it in 2008. |
| B．It was first called the Group of Eight in 2008. |
| C．Its leaders held the first standalone summit in 2009. |
| D．Its ministers have met every year since 2008. |
| A．pay attention to | B．go beyond | C．turn to | D．replace |
| A．can deal with all kinds of information |
| B．is an independent organization |
| C．doesn’t have its own website |
| D．has a lot of researchers |
| A．BRICS has specially stressed the interaction. |
| B．BRICS has built good relationship with other organizations. |
| C．BRICS will build closer relationship with G20. |
| D．BRICS will make much difference to the world. |
