1 . Albert Einstein’s 1915 masterpiece “The Foundation of the General Theory of Relativity” is the first and still the best introduction to the subject, and I recommend it as such to students. But it probably wouldn’t be publishable in a scientific journal today.
Why not? After all, it would pass with flying colours the tests of correctness and significance. And while popular belief holds that the paper was incomprehensible to its first readers, in fact many papers in theoretical physics are much more difficult.
As the physicist Richard Feynman wrote, “There was a time when the newspapers said that only 12 men understood the theory of relativity. I do believe there might have been a time when only one man did, because he was the only guy who caught on, before he wrote his paper. But after people read the paper a lot understood the theory of relativity in some way or other, certainly more than 12.”
No, the problem is its style. It starts with a leisurely philosophical discussion of space and time and then continues with an exposition of known mathematics. Those two sections, which would be considered extraneous today, take up half the paper. Worse, there are zero citations of previous scientists’ work, nor are there any graphics. Those features might make a paper not even get past the first editors.
A similar process of professionalization has transformed other parts of the scientific landscape. Requests for research time at major observatories or national laboratories are more rigidly structured. And anything involving work with human subjects, or putting instruments in space, involves piles of paperwork.
We see it also in the Regeneron Science Talent Search, the Nobel Prize of high school science competitions. In the early decades of its 78-year history, the winning projects were usually the sort of clever but naive, amateurish efforts one might expect of talented beginners working on their own. Today, polished work coming out of internships(实习) at established laboratories is the norm.
These professionalizing tendencies are a natural consequence of the explosive growth of modern science. Standardization and system make it easier to manage the rapid flow of papers, applications and people. But there are serious downsides. A lot of unproductive effort goes into jumping through bureaucratic hoops(繁文缛节), and outsiders face entry barriers at every turn.
Of course, Einstein would have found his way to meeting modern standards and publishing his results. Its scientific core wouldn’t have changed, but the paper might not be the same taste to read.
1. According to Richard Feynman, Einstein’s 1915 paper ________.| A．was a classic in theoretical physics |
| B．turned out to be comprehensible |
| C．needed further improvement |
| D．attracted few professionals |
| A．Unrealistic. | B．Irrelevant. |
| C．Unattractive. | D．Imprecise. |
| A．The application of research findings. |
| B．The principle of scientific research. |
| C．The selection of young talents. |
| D．The evaluation of laboratories. |
| A．What makes Einstein great? |
| B．Will science be professionalized? |
| C．Could Einstein get published today? |
| D．How will modern science make advances? |
2 . To learn to think is to learn to question. Those who don't question never truly think for themselves. These are simple rules that have governed the advancement of science and human thought since the beginning of time. Advancements are made when thinkers question theories and introduce new ones. Unfortunately, it is often the great and respected thinkers who end up slowing the progress of human thought. Aristotle was a brilliant philosopher whose theories explained much of the natural world, often incorrectly. He was so esteemed by the scientific community that even 1，200 years after his death, scientists were still trying to build upon his mistakes rather than correct them!
Brilliant minds can intimidate upandcoming thinkers who are not confident of their abilities. They often believe they are inferior to the minds of giants such as Aristotle, leading many to accept current paradigms instead of questioning them.
I, like many thinkers of the past, once believed in my mental inferiority. I was certain that my parents, my teachers-adults in general-were always right. They were like a textbook to me; I didn't question what was written on those pages. I respected them, and accepted whatever they told me. But that attitude soon changed. My mind's independence was first stimulated in the classroom.
A stern, 65yearold elementaryschool science teacher once told me that light is a type of wave. I confidently went through years of school believing that light is a wave. One day，however I heard the German exchange student mention that light could be made up of particles. As the others laughed at his statement, I started to question my beliefs.
Maybe the teachers and textbooks hadn't given me the whole story. I went to the library, did some research and learned of the lightasawave versus lightasaparticle debate. I read about Einstein's discovery of the dual nature of light and learned the facts of a paradox(悖论) that puzzles the world's greatest thinkers to this day. Light behaves as both a particle and a wave, it is both at once. I realized I had gone through life accepting only half of the story as the whole truth.
Each new year brought more new facts, and I formulated even more questions. I found myself in the library after school, trying to find my own answers to gain a more complete understanding of what I thought I already knew. I discovered that my parents and teachers are incredible tools in my quest for knowledge, but they are never the final word. Even textbooks can be challenged. I learned to question my sources, I learned to be a thinker. I once believed that everything I learned at home and at school was certain, but I have now discovered to reexamine when necessary.
Questions are said to be the path to knowledge and truth, and I plan to continue questioning. How many things do we know for sure today that we will question in the future? At this moment, I know that our sun will burn for another five billion years, and I know nothing can escape the gravity of a black hole. This knowledge, however, may change in the next 20 years-maybe even in the next two. The one thing we can control now is our openness to discovery. Questions are the tools of open minds, and open minds are the key to intellectual advancement.
1. In the first paragraph, Aristotle is taken as an example to show that ______.| A．he is the greatest and respected philosopher of all time |
| B．huge influence of great thinkers may block human thought |
| C．advancements are made when thinkers question theories |
| D．great thinkers often make mistakes and then correct them |
| A．Frighten. | B．Encourage. | C．Strength. | D．Persuade. |
| A．what he learned from textbooks before turned out to be wrong |
| B．he was inspired by the different ideas from an exchange student |
| C．he was laughed at by other students for his unacceptable statement |
| D．he was not satisfied with his life and desperate to achieve success |
| A．looks down upon great thinkers all the time |
| B．never doubts what he has learned in the textbook |
| C．always throws himself into the laboratory |
| D．determines to be a thinker and questioner |
| A．the author is not quite sure about his future |
| B．we human beings don't dare to predict future |
| C．theory of black holes will change in two years |
| D．questioning is necessary to promote advancement |
| A．Following rules. | B．Challenging yourself. |
| C．Questioning giants. | D．Predicting future. |
3 . If your in-box is currently reporting unread messages in the hundreds or thousands, you might have a hard time believing the news: e-mail is on the decline.
At first thought, that might seem to be the case. The incoming generation, after all, doesn’t do e-mail. Oh, they might have an account. They use it only as we would use a fax machine: as a means to communicate with old-school folks like their parents or to fulfill the sign-up requirements of Web sites. They rarely check it, though.
Today’s instant electronic memos — such as texting and Facebook and Twitter messages — are more direct, more concentrated, more efficient. They go without the salutation (称呼语) and the signoff (签收); we already know the “to” and “from.” Many corporations are moving to messaging networks for exactly that reason: more signal, less noise and less time. This trend is further evidence that store-and-forward systems such as e-mail and voicemail are outdated. Instead of my leaving you a lengthy message that you pick up later, I can now send you an easily-read message that you can read — and respond to — on the go.
The coming of the mobile era is responsible for the decline of e-mail. Instant written messages bring great convince to people. They can deal with them at about any time: before a movie, in a taxi, waiting for lunch. And because these messages are very brief, they’re suitable for smart phone typing.
Does this mean e-mail is on its way to the dustbin of digital history? Not necessarily. E-mail still has certain advantages. On the other hand, tweets and texts feel ephemeral — you read them, then they’re gone, into an endless string, e-mail still feels like something you have and that you can file, search and return to later. It’s easy to imagine that it will continue to feel more appropriate for formal communications: agreements, important news, longer explanations.
So, e-mail won’t go away completely. Remember, we’ve been through a transition (过度) like this not so long ago: when e-mail was on the rise, people said that postal mail was dead. That’s not how it works. Postal mail found its smaller market, and so will e-mail. New technology rarely replaces old one completely; it just adds new alternatives.
1. What would the incoming generation like to do with their e-mail accounts?| A．Check bank accounts. | B．Send long messages. |
| C．Fill in some forms. | D．Communicate with their colleagues. |
| A．The possible reasons behind the decline of e-mail |
| B．The likes and dislikes of the young generation |
| C．The rapid development of e-communication channels |
| D．Evidence about the uncertain future of easily-consumed messages |
| A．Automatically-sending. | B．Randomly-written. |
| C．Hardly- recognized. | D．Shortly-appearing. |
| A．It’s too early to determine the decline of e-mail. |
| B．E-mail has reasons to exist with its own advantages. |
| C．E-mail, just like postal mail has come to its end. |
| D．We should feel sorry for the decline of e-mail. |
4 . Slowly but surely, we’re moving closer and closer to 5G world. From smart-home security to self-driving cars, all the internet-connected devices in your life will be able to talk to each other at lightning-fast speeds with reduced delay, Objectively speaking, the fastest 4G download speeds in the U. S. top out at an average of 19.42 Mbps. But by comparison 5G promises gigabit (千兆) speeds.
“5G is one of those signs, along with artificial intelligence, of this coming data age,” said Steve Koenig, senior director of market research for the Consumer Technology Association. “The self-driving vehicle is a great emblem of this data age, and that is to say, it is a sign of time, because with one single task, driving, you have massive amounts of data coming from the vehicle itself, and a variety of sensors are collecting a lot of information to model its environment as it moves. It’s pulling in data from other vehicles about road conditions down the lane. It could be weather information, but also connected infrastructure (基础设施) construction. There’s lots of data behind that task, which is why we need high speed.
Augmented reality glasses and virtual headset haven’t yet broken the mainstream, but tech companies are joyfully betting that these devices will eventually replace our smartphones. With 5G, that could actually happen. This is notable because companies such as Apple are reportedly developing AR glasses to assist — or perhaps even replace — smartphones.
Ericsson stated at February’s Mobile World Congress how smart glasses could become faster and lighter with a 5G connection, because instead of being weighed down with components, the glasses could rely on hardware for processing power.
But don’t get too excited. There’s still a lot of work to be done in the meantime, including various trials to make sure the radios play nicely with hardware and infrastructure construction so 5G isn’t concentrated only in big cities.
1. What does the author want to stress in Paragraph 1?| A．The lighting-fast speed of 5G. |
| B．The expectation of 5G world. |
| C．The difference between 4G and 5G. |
| D．The internet-connected devices in our life. |
| A．Exhibition. | B．Success. |
| C．Symbol. | D．Explanation. |
| A．5G world won’t come without AR glasses |
| B．5G helps to create the artificial intelligence vehicle |
| C．Apple company is developing AR glasses worldwide |
| D．Tech companies will face the fact that smartphones may be replaced |
| A．How to fully expand 5G coverage. |
| B．Smart glasses will become faster and lighter. |
| C．Why 5G isn’t concentrated in big cities. |
| D．The importance of infrastructure construction. |
5 . 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 |
6 . One of the best parts of the school day is the time spent in the playground. It’s a chance to be with friends, run around and have fun. However, at the Rudyard Kipling Primary School in Brighton, things were getting too hard, so the teachers decided something had to be done. The school’s new rules, which restrict（限制）physical activities and encourage pupils only to touch if they are playing friendlier games, have attracted a lot of attention.
Most people say that they are a bad restriction. Parents of children at the school, in Brighton, East Sussex, talked about the bizarre rule — saying their kids were now bored at playtime. A teacher for the school defended（辩护）the rules, saying, “We want to make sure the playground is a happy, safe and calm place where everyone can enjoy their lunchtime running around and getting the exercise that we know is important to them.”
Some people say that Rudyard Kipling Primary School’s decision is a good one because it makes the playground more fun for everyone. Not all children enjoy playing rough（剧烈的）games or sports at playtime. Friendlier games ensure everyone can join in. The teachers only have the pupils’ best interests at heart, so they should be trusted to make the right decision. Besides, if someone gets hurt in the playground, that could distract（分心）the teachers from other accidents.
However, some people think it’s an overreaction. Sometimes physical games can lead to injuries, but banning（禁止）such activities is unreasonable. In fact, it is only during physical games that you can build up your ability to recover quickly from falling over. Even if these physical activities aren’t your favorite way to spend break time, it’s difficult to see why they will be completely banned. Each pupil should be able to decide what they want to do. Besides, schools should be happy that their students want to exercise between classes as this will keep them fit and healthy, and teachers should encourage this, not prevent it.
1. What was the result of the tule made by the Rudyard Kipling Primary School?| A．It was made into law. | B．It was supported by parents. |
| C．It encouraged students to do sports. | D．It made the school widely discussed. |
| A．Simple. | B．Strange. |
| C．Important. | D．Reasonable. |
| A．It saves more lunchtime. |
| B．It helps students pay more attention to their study. |
| C．It brings more fun to every kid. |
| D．It makes students more independent. |
| A．Physical games can injure kids. |
| B．Physical games are good for students health. |
| C．Teachers should do sports with students. |
| D．Restricting physical activities is unreasonable. |
7 . What is technology doing to language? Many assume the answer is simple: ruining it. Kids can no longer write except in textspeak. Grammar is going to the dogs. The ability to compose thoughts longer than a post is disappearing. Language experts tend to resist it, noting that there is little proof that speech is really degenerating, nor is formal writing falling apart.A study by Cambridge Assessment found almost no evidence for textspeak in students’ writing.
Fortunately, the story of language and the Internet has attracted more serious analysts, too.Now Gretchen McCulloch, a journalist of the generation that grew up with the Internet, joins them with a new book, Because Internet, which focuses on what can be learned about language from the Internet. Biologists grow bacteria in a Petri dish partly because they are born and reproduce so quickly that studies over many generations can be done in a reasonably short period. Studying language online is a bit like that: trends appear and disappear, platforms rise and fall, and these let linguists observe changes that would otherwise take too much time.
For example, why do languages change? A thousand years ago, early English and Icelandic were closely related.English has since developed hugely, and Icelandic far less. Linguists have studied the relative effects of strong and weak ties(friends, family) in such patterns, concluding that small communities would host more stable languages. The Internet combines strong and weak ties—and sure enough, drives more language change.
In the end, Ms McCulloch’s book is about the birth of a new medium rather than a new language.Mass reading has now been joined by mass writing: frequent, errorfilled and quickfading.Little surprise that Internet users have created tools to give their writing the gesture, playfulness and even meaninglessness of chat. Mistaking it for the downfall of “real” writing is a category error. Anything that helps people enjoy each other’s company can only be a good thing.
1. What does the underlined word “degenerating” in Paragraph 1 refer to?| A．Strengthening. | B．Worsening. | C．Changing. | D．Refreshing. |
| A．To explain bacteria have a short lifetime. |
| B．To stress the difficulty of researching language online. |
| C．To reveal the relation between language and the Internet. |
| D．To show online language can be studied in limited time. |
| A．A large Englishspeaking population. | B．The lasting effect of mass media. |
| C．A stable languageusing community. | D．The wide application of the Internet. |
| A．Ambiguous. | B．Positive. | C．Objective. | D．Cautious. |
8 . It's good to share, right? Growing up as kids we are told to share our toys and not be selfish. We also live in an age where discussing our feelings is encouraged. But when does it all become too much? With new fashion trending all the time, such as dance challenges and wearing a pillow as a dress, the question is: when can sharing become oversharing on social media?
What is oversharing? The term has become associated with social media, but it doesn't only belong to this platform. Imagine you head to a party and you meet someone. Within five minutes they have given away details about their personal life. While some of us may try to escape these people, according to marriage therapist Carolyn Cole, this form of oversharing could come from a strong desire to connect with someone. But how does this translate to social media?
Dr. Christopher Hand, a lecturer in internet psychology, says the more details people disclose, the less sympathy we express when things go wrong. This could be due to a belief that we attract our own negative experiences the more we share them. It seems that the idea of searching for sympathy by oversharing, is generally viewed as negative rather than the cry for help it could actually be.
However, Dr Hand's research also seems to suggest that the more positive posts we share on a platform, the more socially attractive we become. Even back in 2015, Gwendolyn Seidman PhD, said that we should avoid complaining and being negative online. We are supposed not to show off, as it's now known—especially about our love lives. It makes sense—if your date is going 'that well', would you really have time to share a photo with text?
So, how can you know if you are oversharing? Well, why not ask your friends in real life. They would probably be more than happy to tell you if your posts about your breakfast or your complaint about your lack of money really are too much.
1. Why do some people try to overshare at parties?| A．Because they want to catch others' attention. |
| B．Because they just want to show off something. |
| C．Because they have a strong desire to pour out their emotions. |
| D．Because they may expect to make a connection with someone. |
| A．explore | B．expose | C．display | D．discuss |
| A．We will become more socially attractive if we post more on a platform. |
| B．We tend to show sympathy when things go wrong. |
| C．We may be considered negative when seeking for sympathy by oversharing. |
| D．We can show off something positive especially about our love lives. |
| A．To inform. | B．To inspire. | C．To advertise. | D．To condemn. |
9 . In modern society there is a great deal of argument about competition. Some value it highly, believing that it is responsible for social progress and prosperity. Others say that competition is bad; that it sets one person against another; that it leads to unfriendly relationship between people.
I have taught many children who held the belief that their selfworth relied on how well they performed at tennis and other skills. For them, playing well and winning are often lifeanddeath affairs. In their singleminded pursuit of success, the development of many other human qualities is sadly forgotten.
However, while some seem to be lost in the desire to succeed, others take an opposite attitude. In a culture which values only the winner and pays no attention to the ordinary players, they strongly blame competition. Among the most vocal are youngsters who have suffered under competitive pressures from their parents or society. Teaching these young people, I often observe in them a desire to fail. They seem to seek failure by not trying to win or achieve success. By not trying, they always have an excuse: “I may have lost, but it doesn't matter because I really didn't try.” What is not usually admitted by themselves is the belief that if they had really tried and lost, that would mean a lot. Such a loss would be a measure of their worth. Clearly, this belief is the same as that of the true competitors who try to prove themselves. Both are based on the mistaken belief that one's selfrespect relies on how well one performs in comparison with others. Both are afraid of not being valued. Only as this basic and often troublesome fear begins to dissolve can we discover a new meaning in competition.
1. What does this passage mainly talk about?| A．Competition helps to set up selfrespect. |
| B．Opinions about competition are different among people. |
| C．Competition is harmful to personal quality development. |
| D．Failures are necessary experiences in competition. |
| A．those who try their best to win |
| B．those who value competition most highly |
| C．those who are against competition most strongly |
| D．those who rely on others most for success |
| A．One's worth lies in his performance compared with others'. |
| B．One's success in competition needs great efforts. |
| C．One's achievement is determined by his particular skills. |
| D．One's success is based on how hard he has tried. |
| A．Every effort should be paid back. |
| B．Fear of failure should be removed in competition. |
| C．Winning should be a lifeanddeath matter. |
| D．Competition should be encouraged. |
10 . Micro plastics are tiny bits of plastic often too small to be seen. Plastic doesn't decompose like natural materials. Instead, it just breaks into smaller and smaller pieces. No one knows exactly how much plastic is in the oceans. Since the sea is so large and so deep, it s hard to get a good idea of how much plastic it contains. But in recent years, scientists have made greater efforts to get a more accurate idea.
Some studies have suggested that since 1950. about 17 million metric tons(公吨)of plastic have entered the Atlantic Ocean. Scientists believe that the plastic previously found on beaches and on the surface of the water is only about 1% of all the plastic in the oceans. Researchers from the United Kingdom (UK) want to find out where the other 99% was.
For two months in 2016 the researchers took samples at 12 different locations in the Atlantic Ocean from the UK to South America. They collect water samples from three different depths in the top 200 meters. By running the water through special fllters(过滤器),they were able to collect the micro plastics, which they could view and study with a microscope.
Based on their measurments. the researchers learned that just the top 200 meters of the Atlantic Ocean holds between 12 and 21 million metric tons of plastics. But the Atlantic Ocean is very deep, and the scientists only checked the top 200 meters. They say that if microplastics are spread through the rest of the Atlantic like they were in the top 200 meters, thin there are probably about 200 million metric tons of microplastics in the Atlantic Ocean.
Though the scientists only studied the Atlantic ocean the results suggest that there may be far more microplastic in all oceans than we realized. The problems go far beyond ocean pollution. Microplastic particles have been found just in everywhere around the world from Antarctica to the bottom of the sea.
Scientist predict that the amount of plastic entering our oceans is likely to triplet over the next 20 years. Having a good idea of how much plastic is already then might be a good first step to fighting the problem.
1. What does the underlined word “decompose” in Paragraph 1 mean?| A．turn up | B．break down |
| C．give off | D．bring out |
| A．Previous data of plastic consists of only a very small part. |
| B．There is only 17 million metric ton of plastic on the earth. |
| C．The amount of plastic in the seas is on the decrease in recent years. |
| D．The amount of plastic in the seas is increasing by 1 % yearly. |
| A．Pessimistic. | B．Confident. |
| C．Objective. | D．Conserved. |
| A．More pollutants will turn out in the future. |
| B．Measures will be taken to deal with plastic. |
| C．The oceans will be cleaned in the future. |
| D．More people will be aware of plastic pollution. |
