1 . Sometime in the early 1960s, a significant thing happened in Sydney, Australia. The city discovered its harbor. Then, one after another, Sydney discovered lots of things that were just sort of there — broad parks, superb beaches, and a culturally diverse population. But it is the harbor that makes the city.

Andrew Reynolds, a cheerful fellow in his early 30s, pilots Sydney ferryboats for a living. I spent the whole morning shuttling back and forth across the harbor. After our third run Andrew shut down the engine, and we went our separate ways — he for a lunch break, I to explore the city.

“I’ll miss these old boats,” he said as we parted.

“How do you mean?” I asked.

“Oh, they’re replacing them with catamarans. Catamarans are faster, but they’re not so elegant, and they’re not fun to pilot. But that’s progress, I guess.”

Everywhere in Sydney these days, change and progress are the watchwords (口号), and traditions are increasingly rare. Shirley Fitzgerald, the city’s official historian, told me that in its rush to modernity in the 1970s, Sydney swept aside much of its past, including many of its finest buildings. “Sydney is confused about itself,” she said. “We can’t seem to make up our minds whether we want a modern city or a traditional one. It’s a conflict that we aren’t getting any better at resolving (解决).”

On the other hand, being young and old at the same time has its attractions. I considered this when I met a thoughtful young businessman named Anthony. “Many people say that we lack culture in this country,” he told me. “What people forget is that the Italians, when they came to Australia, brought 2000 years of their culture, the Greeks some 3000 years, and the Chinese more still. We’ve got a foundation built on ancient cultures but with a drive and dynamism of a young country. It’s a pretty hard combination to beat.”

He is right, but I can’t help wishing they would keep those old ferries.

1. What does Shirley Fitzgerald think of Sydney?

A．It is losing its traditions.	B．It should speed up its progress.
C．It should expand its population.	D．It is becoming more international.

2. Which statement will the author probably agree with?

A．A city can be young and old at the same time.

B．A city built on ancient cultures is more dynamic.

C．Modernity is usually achieved at the cost of elegance.

D．Compromise should be made between the local and the foreign.

3 . Recently, the magazine Big Think asked top minds from a variety of fields to comment on what the future holds 40 years from now. The result is as follows.

It’s likely that by 2050 the majority of the people in the world will live in urban (城市的) areas, and will have a much higher average age than people today. Cities theorist Richard Florida thinks urbanization will reinvent the education system of the United States, making our economy less real estate (房地产) driven and erasing(消除) the divisions between home and work.

And rapidly advancing technology will continue ever more rapidly. Cities of the future won’t look like “some sort of science-fiction fantasy”, but it’s likely that technological advances and information overlays (VR and AR) will greatly change how we live. Self-driving cars will make the roads safer and provide faster transports. A larger version of driverless cars－driverless trucks － may make long-distance drivers out of date.

Some long view predictions are completely dire. Environmentalist Bill McKibben says that if we don’t make great progress in fighting global warming, it’s likely we could see out-of-control rises in sea levels, huge crop shortfalls, and wars over limited freshwater resources.

In terms of how we will eat, green markets founder and “real food” supporter Nina Planck believes that there will be more small milk processing plants, and more regional food operations and we’ll be healthier as a result. New York Times feature writer Mark Bittman thinks that people will eat fewer processed foods, and eat foods grown closer to where they live. And Anson Mills farmer Glenn Roberts thinks that more people will be aware of the “ethical(道德的) responsibility” to grow and preserve land-raised farm systems.

1. What may happen by 2050?

A．Most people will live in cities.	B．The aging population will drop.
C．Home education will become a trend.	D．The economy will be driven by real estate.

2. What do we know about technology in the future?

A．It will give cities a science-fiction appearance.

B．It will greatly change the way people live.

C．It will lead to an increase in the number of cars.

D．It will ensure faster transports with fast cars.

3. What does the underlined word “dire” in the fourth paragraph mean?

A．Interesting.

B．Daring.

C．Terrible.

D．Creative.

4. What does Mark Bittman think of foods in the future?

A．People will eat healthier and fresher foods.

B．Land-raised farm systems will be improved.

C．There will be more regional food operations.

D．Food supplies will become more limited than before.

4 . If you had asked me then if I would accept a job as a restaurant critic for The New York Times or others, I would have replied, “Definitely not! ” This was partly because I did not want to think of myself as an ambitious sort. Working in restaurants was honest labor, and anyone could see that. Writing about them for the mainstream press was not.

However, the renewing was fun, so much fun that when mainstream publishers started paying me for my opinions, I didn’t do the decent (体面的) thing, and before I knew it, I had stopped cooking professionally. Then I stopped cooking altogether. “She’s joined the leisure class.” my friend said.

I disarmed my critics by inviting them along; nobody I knew could afford to eat out and nobody refused. We went with equal amounts of guilt and pleasure, with a feeling that we were stepping onto the playgrounds of the rich.

We knew we didn’t belong to these grand restaurants. We always got the worst table, and since I didn’t own a credit card, I had to pay in cash. The year turned into two and three, and more. Then, I got a credit card as well as good clothes. I was writing for increasingly prestigious (声誉高的) publications. Meanwhile, a voice inside me kept whispering, “How could you?”

The voice is still there, never coming to a stop. When I receive weekly letters from people who think it is unacceptable to write about $100 meals while half the world is hungry, the voice rings right along, “They’re absolutely right, you elitist (精英) pig is not”. When it asks, “When are you going to grow up and get a real job?”, it sounds a lot like my mother.

It is just at that moment that I tell the voice to shut up because I realize all I’m doing with my life is telling rich people where to eat and how much the world has changed.

Yes, there are still restaurants where rich people go to remind themselves that they are different from you and me, but there are fewer and fewer of them. Going out to eat used to be like going to the opera; today, it is more like going to the movies.

Therefore, everyone has become a critic and I couldn’t be happier with this. The more people pay attention to what and how they eat, the more accustomed they become to their own senses and the world around them. As A. J. Liebling once said, all it really takes to be a restaurant critic is a good appetite.

1. What can we know from the first two paragraphs?

A．The author was too honest to work as a restaurant critic.

B．The author found it hard to work for the mainstream press.

C．The author didn’t think highly of the job as a restaurant critic.

D．The author wasn’t able to renew the work as a professional cook.

2. How did the author feel about eating out?

A．She felt like eating out with the rich.

B．She refused to eat out with the critics.

C．She had a mixed feeling about eating out.

D．She got much fun from being invited to eat out.

3. What does the author want to tell us by saying “The year turned into two, and three, and more.”?

A．She stayed in the career as a professional cook for years.

B．She took up the job of writing as a restaurant critic for years.

C．It took a long time for the publications to increase their prestige.

D．It was years before her application for a credit card got approved.

4. What changes have taken place to American restaurants?

A．Restaurants make people confused about their social status.

B．Rich people can get special treat in some restaurants.

C．Ordinary people have become accustomed to fancy restaurants. o

D．Restaurants have become affordable to common people.

5. Which of the following statements will the author probably agree with?

A．Eating out is not a privilege of the rich.

B．There is no need for restaurant critics at all.

C．The writer is getting tired of her current job.

D．Good appetite makes a good restaurant critic.

6 . Lidar, short for “light detection and ranging”, involves directing a rapid series of laser pulses- between 100,000 and 400,000 per second—at the ground from an airplane or a drone. Software captures the time and wavelength of the pulses reflected from the surface and combines it with GPS and other data to produce a precise three-dimensional(三维的)map of the landscape below. These high-tech explorations have revealed long-buried Mayan cities, including Tikal, in the dense jungle of Guatemala, and Caracol, in Belize.

In recent years, lidar exposed an ancient city in western Mexico called Angamuco. The discovery of this long-lost Mexican city is especially significant. Built by the Purepecha, who were enemies of the Aztecs, Angamuco was a major civilization in the early 16th century, before Europeans arrived.

“To think that this massive city existed in the heartland of Mexico for all this time and nobody knew it was there is kind of amazing,” says Chris Fisher, an archaeologist(考古学家)at Colorado State University who led the exploration.

The city extended over ten square miles before it was covered by a lava(岩浆)flow. “That is a huge area with a lot of people,” says Fisher. “You are talking about 40,000 building foundations, which is [about] the same number of building foundations that are on the island of Manhattan.”

Archaeologists were surprised when they saw Angamuco’s city plan. The Purepecha’s monuments were largely concentrated in eight zones around the edges rather than being located in one large center. Why this almost Los Angeles-type sprawl(随意)? Historians want to know the answer to that too.

The revelation of Angamuco is an example of the power and promise of lidar. Archaeologists discovered signs of the buried city in 2007 and initially attempted to explore it using a traditional “boots on the ground” approach. But the team soon realized that with the rugged terrain(畸岖的地形)，it would take at least a decade to outline the entire metropolis.

In 2011, they began using lidar to map nearly 14 square miles, revealing some astonishing features, from pyramids and temples to road systems, garden areas, and even ball courts. This gave them the “map” they needed to know where to explore further. So far, Fisher and his team have verified more than 7,000 architectural features over a 1.5-square-mile area, with digging undertaken at seven locations.

All told, researchers now believe that more than 100,000 people lived in Angamuco from about AD 1000 to AD 1350. That makes it the biggest city in western Mexico at the time―or at least the biggest city we know about so far

“Everywhere you point the lidar instrument, you find new stuff,” says Fisher. ”Right now, every textbook has to be rewritten, and two years from now, they’re going to have to be rewritten again.“

1. Which of the following statements is true of Angamuco?

A．It was constructed by Aztecs.

B．It is a major civilization of Mexico.

C．It was destroyed in the early 16th century.

D．It came into existence before Europeans arrived.

2. What has helped archaeologists find that Angamuco is a large area with a large population?

A．Its long history.

B．Its being unknown for long.

C．The number of building foundations in it.

D．The competition between Aztecs and it.

3. Which of the following is still a mystery to historians?

A．The reason for Angamuco’s city plan.

B．The reason why Angamuco disappeared.

C．The role Angamuco played in history.

D．The role Angamuco played in archeology.

4. What does the revelation of Angamuco illustrate?

A．Mexican history is worth exploring.

B．Lidar is a useful tool for archeologists.

C．Maps are important in exploring historical sites.

D．More time needs to be devoted to studying Angamuco.

7 . 2050 seems a long way away, but it is not impossible to predict the future though. With the speed we are moving now so many amazing things are going to happen in the future.    1    ? Let’s start our predictions.

◆The Internet will be free for everyone.

The Internet is really a key driver these days. But it is not free for everyone yet. There have already been attempts like Facebook’s Free Basics.    2    , there is a very strong possibility that the Internet will be free for everyone in the future.

◆    3    

With the increasing population, it is not very hard to predict that common methods of transportation will not be enough. There will be much heavier traffic on the road. So in this case personal airplanes will be a handy method of transportation for common people.

Of course, there will be proper air traffic control for these personal airplanes.

◆Most cancers will be treated successfully.

    4    . It will be a huge achievement in the history of medical science. Many studies are already showing a trend towards this.

◆Humans will live on other planets.

There will be great achievements in space research. In the year 2050, humans will be able to live on Mars. We will receive more intelligent signals from space.    5    .

A．Though it hasn’t happened yet

B．So where is technology going in the future

C．The world’s population will cross 9.6 billion

D．What do you think of my predictions of 2050

E．Chances are we will be able to find the next Earth-like planet

F．Personal airplanes will be used widely for short journeys

G．The number of deaths caused by cancers will be greatly reduced

9 . Space tourism is the term used to describe space travel for recreational or leisure purposes. What was once only a dream, as described in A Space Odyssey by Arthur C. Clarke, is now becoming a reality.

Futurologists attempt to make predictions of what life will be like in the future. After the first man landed on the moon, they thought that hotels would be built on the moon by the year 2000. They also considered the possibility that, in the 21st century, families might go for a holiday on the moon. Neither of these predictions have come true yet-but the rapid development of technology may mean these predictions are possible in the years to come.

Space Adventures is currently the only company to have succeeded in sending paying passengers into space. It worked with the Federal Space Agency of Russia and Rocket and Space Corporation Energia to provide flights for the world’s first private space explorers. Each paid over $20 million for their 10-day trip to the International Space Station.

Following successful explorations into space, other companies are now considering the possibility of enabling tourists to visit space. To make it affordable, suborbital space travel is being considered by some companies, like Virgin Galactic. Passengers would be transported to a height of between 100 and 160 km above earth, experience 3 — 6 minutes of weightlessness and a view of the stars before back to earth. This is expected to cost around $200, 000 per person.

Whilst it could be an enriching experience, there are some disadvantages. Many critics say that a huge growth in the spaceflight industry could drastically speed up the process of global warming. The ozone layer would be damaged further and the polar regions would suffer. In addition, space travel is only really affordable for the super-rich, though Virgin Galactic claims to be ‘opening space to the rest of us’.

1. What do you know about space tourism?

A．It is nothing but a dream.	B．It’s only in some fairy tales.
C．It’s a sightseeing tour in space.	D．It’s a scientific expedition.

2. What is Paragraph 2 mainly about?

A．The future life on the moon.	B．Landing on the moon in 1969.
C．Predictions about trips to the moon.	D．The history of the moon exploration.

3. Why is suborbital space travel considered possible?

A．It’s cheaper.

B．It’s safer.

C．It’s greener.

D．It’s convenient.

4. What is some critics’ major concern about space tourism?

A．Its safety.	B．Environmental effect.
C．Social equality.	D．Its expense.