1 . In February 1970, a group of activists gathered in Vancouver, Canada to discuss a planned nuclear test on the Alaskan island of Amchitka. They eventually agreed to sail to the test site and
Over the last 50 years, the
The human species, which emerged in the green forests and grasslands of Africa about 300, 000 years ago, has a special
With the rise of farming, we started to use green as a(n)
The ancient Egyptians, who were farming the banks of the Nile from about 8000 B.C.,
| A．bump | B．protest | C．compete | D．insure |
| A．objected | B．announced | C．responded | D．highlighted |
| A．curious about | B．familiar with | C．shocked at | D．fascinated by |
| A．environmental | B．revolutionary | C．multicultural | D．deliberate |
| A．results | B．origins | C．extremes | D．streams |
| A．identified | B．recognized | C．combined | D．illustrated |
| A．physical | B．artificial | C．biological | D．physiological |
| A．engaged | B．evolved | C．dominated | D．exchanged |
| A．pioneers | B．seniors | C．ancestors | D．inspectors |
| A．sensitive | B．available | C．equivalent | D．appropriate |
| A．approach | B．symbol | C．alternative | D．signal |
| A．crossing over | B．counting for | C．according to | D．dating back |
| A．described | B．reflected | C．interpreted | D．resembled |
| A．eventually | B．similarly | C．consequently | D．definitely |
| A．agriculture | B．vegetation | C．cultivation | D．generation |
2 . El Nino, a Spanish term for “the Christ child”, was named by South American fisherman who noticed that the global weather pattern, which happens every two to seven years, reduced the amount of fishes caught around Christmas. El Nino sees warm water, collected over several years in the western Pacific, flow back eastwards when winds that normally blow westwards weaken, or sometimes the other way round.
The weather effects both good and bad, are felt in many places. Rich countries gain more from powerful Nino, on balance, than they lose. A study found that a strong Nino in 1997 helped American’s economy grow by 15 billion, partly because of better agricultural harvest, farmers in the Midwest gained from extra rain. The total rise in agricultural in rich countries in growth than the fall in poor ones.
But in Indonesia extremely dry forests are in flames. A multi-year drought (干旱）in south-east Brazil is becoming worse. Though heavy rains brought about by El Nino may relieve the drought in California, they are likely to cause surface flooding and other disasters.
The most recent powerful Nino, in 1997-98, killed around 21,000 people and caused damage worth $36 billion around the globe. But such Ninos come with months of warning, and so much is known about how they happen that governments can prepare. According to the Overseas Development Institute (ODI), however, just 12% of disaster-relief funding in the past two decades has gone on reducing risks in advance, rather than recovery and rebuilding afterwards. This is despite evidence that a dollar spent on risk-reduction saves at least two on reconstruction.
Simple improvements to infrastructure (基础设施）can reduce the spread of disease. Better sewers (下水道）make it less likely that heavy rain is followed by an outbreak of the disease of bad stomach. Stronger bridges mean villages are less likely to be left without food and medicine after floods. According to a paper in 2011 by Mr Hsiang and co-authors, civil conflict is related to El Nino’s harmful effects—and the poorer the country, the stronger the link. Though the relationship may not be causal, helping divided communities to prepare for disasters would at least reduce the risk that those disasters are followed by killing and wounding people. Since the poorest are least likely to make up for their losses from disasters linked to El Nino, reducing their losses needs to be the priority.
1. What can we learn about El Nino in Paragraph 1?| A．It is named after a South American fisherman. |
| B．It takes place almost every year all over the world. |
| C．It forces fishermen to stop catching fish around Christmas. |
| D．It sees the changes of water flow direction in the ocean. |
| A．Agricultural harvests in rich countries fall. |
| B．Droughts become more harmful than floods. |
| C．Rich countries’ gains are greater than their losses. |
| D．Poor countries suffer less from droughts economically. |
| A．more investment should go to risk reduction |
| B．governments of poor countries need more aid |
| C．victims of El Nino deserve more compensation |
| D．recovery and reconstruction should come first |
| A．To introduce El Nino and its origin. |
| B．To explain the consequences of El Nino. |
| C．To show ways of fighting against El Nino. |
| D．To urge people to prepare for El Nino. |
Most of us know to stay low to the floor if we are caught in a fire, or head to the basement if a tornado’s coming, or board up the window in a hurricane. But, the massive earthquake that hit Haiti this month was a reminder that we are far
Given how many of us travel in quake-prone regions today, even folks
The most conventional and widely accepted by the disaster-response community, is the “drop, cover and hold on” approach,
Over the past decade, an agreement has been reached
4 . For the longest time, the predominant description about renewable energy featured awkward technologies, high costs, and burdensome allowance. In the
But now that these technologies have come of age, a new story is being written. Around the world, businesses, governments, and households are taking advantage of more cost-effective low-carbon technologies.
As in any rapid transition, a full understanding of what is happening has
To be sure,
As the green transition comes of age, it will offer solutions to all of humanity’s energy needs, placing a clean, prosperous and secure low-carbon future well within reach. Yet even as we hug
| A．license | B．absence | C．application | D．promotion |
| A．invisible | B．unbelievable | C．inevitable | D．unaffordable |
| A．Instead of | B．Owing to | C．In case of | D．According to |
| A．resources | B．revolutions | C．prospects | D．priorities |
| A．caught up with | B．compared with | C．taken place of | D．fallen behind |
| A．relevant | B．inferior | C．synthetic | D．experimental |
| A．mixture | B．caution | C．conflict | D．approval |
| A．in case | B．so that | C．even though | D．the moment |
| A．significance | B．invention | C．happiness | D．progress |
| A．dramatically | B．economically | C．independently | D．equivalently |
| A．interaction | B．modernization | C．motivation | D．transformation |
| A．natural | B．potential | C．positive | D．original |
| A．influence | B．optimism | C．estimation | D．extension |
| A．starting | B．failing | C．emerging | D．continuing |
| A．sustainable | B．traditional | C．available | D．industrial |
5 . Cuckoos don’t bother building their own nests—they just lay eggs that perfectly imitate those of other birds and take over their nests. But other birds are wishing up, evolving some seriously impressive tricks to spot the cuckoo eggs.
Cuckoos are often know as parasites, meaning that they hide their eggs in the nest of other species. To avoid detection, the cuckoos have evolved so that eggs seem reproduction of those of their preferred targets. If the host bird doesn’t notice the strange egg in its nest, the little cuckoo will actually take the entire nest for itself after it comes out, taking the other eggs on its back and dropping them out of the nest.
To avoid this unpleasant fate for their young, the other birds have evolved a few smart ways to spot the fakes, which we’re only now beginning to fully understand. One of the most amazing finds is that birds have an extra colour-sensitive cell in their eyes, which makes them far more sensitive to ultraviolet wavelengths and allows them to see a far greater range of colours than humans can. This allows cautious birds to detect a fake egg which might be exactly the same to our eyes.
Fascinatingly, we’re actually able to observe different bird species at very different points in their evolutionary war with the cuckoos. For instance, some cuckoos lay their eggs in the nests of the redstarts. The blue eggs these cuckoos lay are practically alike to those of the redstarts, and yet they are still sometimes rejected. Compare that with cuckoos who target dunnocks. While those birds lay perfectly blue eggs, their cuckoo invaders just lay white eggs with brown irregular shaped spots. And yet dunnocks barely ever seem to notice the obvious trick.
Biologists suspect these more easily fooled species like the dunnocks are on the same evolutionary path as the redstarts, but they have a long way to go until they evolve the same levels of suspicion. What’s remarkable is that the dunnocks fakes are so bad and the redstart ones so good, and yet cuckoos are still more successful with the former than the latter.
It speaks to just how thoroughly a species’ behavior can be changed by the pressures of natural selection, or it might just be a bit of strategic cooperation on the part of the dunnocks. Biologists have suggested that these birds are willing to tolerate a parasite every so often because they don’t want to risk accidentally getting rid of one of their own eggs.
1. This passage can be most likely found in a ________.| A．science survey | B．nature magazine |
| C．zoo advertisement | D．travel journal |
| A．Animals that work together to raise young. |
| B．Small harmful animals such as worms or mice. |
| C．Animals that can adapt to changing environments. |
| D．Animals which live on or inside other host animals. |
| A．It is colour-blind and therefore cannot identify foreign eggs in the nest. |
| B．It can easily remove cuckoo eggs from the nest because fakes are so bad. |
| C．It is a host bird that is more likely to raise a cuckoo chick than the redstart. |
| D．It is unable to evolve and hence accepts cuckoo eggs that appear in the nest. |
| A．Dunnocks may eventually learn to recognise foreign eggs. |
| B．Redstarts seem to be less suspicious compared to dunnocks. |
| C．Cuckoo birds are good at taking responsibility for their own young. |
| D．It is very easy for cuckoos to imitate the colouring of the dunnock’s egg. |
Saving the Planet is Kids’ Task Environmental problems plague every country, but where there’s energy and enthusiasm, there’s hope. Nowhere is energy and enthusiasm more boundless than amongst school-age children. Now thousands of Australian children can have fun while learning to develop a real passion for protecting the environment. Sponsored by Australia Post, the ‘Ollie Saves the Planet’ interactive CD-ROM and associated website (www.olliesworld.com) introduce children to the concept of conservation and encourage them to consider their actions in the areas of waste, water, energy, air, and bio-diversity. It is a great resource for classroom activities and school projects, with lots of games for hours of entertainment. A complimentary(免费赠送的) copy of the CD-ROM, which retails for $24.95, has been sent to every school throughout Australia to show young environmentalists how they can ‘reduce, reuse, recycle and rethink’. Order your CD-ROM today! Hours of easy-to-use edu-tainment Suitable for PC and Mac Project resource information Extensive teachers’ notes & lesson plans A range of interactive games and puzzles Real-life case studies Hurry, the environment needs your help! Call 1800 804 078 NOW! AUSTRALIA POST  |
| A．trouble | B．arouse | C．target | D．motivate |
| A．to draw the readers’ attention to bio-diversity |
| B．because they’re easy for students to remember the projects |
| C．to show the writer’s skill of using similar words |
| D．because they are the technical terms for environment protection |
| A．The CD-ROM product is fun for children to use. |
| B．Children must have certain skills to use this product. |
| C．It is important to act quickly to obtain this product. |
| D．The CD-ROM will help children become environmentally aware. |
| A．To command school to introduce the CD-ROM to students. |
| B．To provide a discount for the schools to buy the products. |
| C．To encourage Australian children to contribute to protecting environment. |
| D．To collect education resources for classroom activities and school projects. |
7 . There was a time when we thought humans were special in so many ways. Now we know better. We are not the only species that feels emotions, or follows a moral code. Neither are we the only ones with personalities, cultures and the ability to design and use tools. Yet we have all agree that one thing, at least, makes us unique: we alone have the ability of language.
It turns out that we are not so special in this aspect either. Key to the revolutionary reassessment of our talent for communication is the way we think about language itself. Where once it was seen as an unusual object, today scientists find it is more productive to think of language as a group of abilities. Viewed this way, it becomes apparent that the component parts of language are not as unique as the whole.
Take gesture, arguably the starting point for language. Until recently, it was considered uniquely human - but not any more. Mike Tomasello of the Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology in Leipzig, Germany, and others have collected a list of gestures observed in monkeys and some other animals, which reveals that gestures plays a large role in their communication. Ape(猿) gestures can involve touch, vocalising or eye movement, and individuals wait until they have another ape’s attention before making visual or auditory gestures. If their gestures go unacknowledged, they will often repeat them.
In an experiment carried out in 2006 by Erica Cartmill and Richard Byrne from the University of St Andrews in the UK, they got a person to sit on a chair with some highly desirable food such as banana to one side of apes and some undesirable food such as vegetables to the other. The apes, who could see the person and the food from their enclosures, gestured at their human partners to encourage them to push the desirable food their way. If the person showed incomprehension and offered the vegetables, the animals would change their gestures - just as a human would in a similar situation. If the human seemed to understand while being somewhat confused, giving only half the preferred food, the apes would repeat and exaggerate their gestures - again in exactly the same way a human would. Such findings highlight the fact that the gestures of the animals are not merely inborn but are learned, flexible and under voluntary control - all characteristics that are considered preconditions for human-like communication.
1. It is agreed that compared with all the other animals, only human beings ________.| A．own the ability to show their personalities |
| B．are capable of using language to communicate |
| C．have moral standards and follow them in society |
| D．are intelligent enough to release and control emotions |
| A．involve some abilities that can be mastered by animals |
| B．is a talent impossibly owned by other animals |
| C．can be divided into different components |
| D．are productive for some talented animals |
| A．Apes can use language to communicate with the help of humans. |
| B．Repeating and exaggerating gestures is vital in language communication. |
| C．Some animals can learn to express and communicate through some trials. |
| D．The preferred food stimulates some animals to use language to communicate. |
| A．Language involves gestures! | B．Animals language - gestures! |
| C．So you think humans are unique? | D．The similarity between humans and apes. |
Public Opinion Counts
Modbury is a typical small town of the south of England with a population of about 1,600. Typical, that is, apart from the fact that there are no plastic carrier bags in the town. None. Plastic bags have been well and truly dumped!
The removal of the plastic bags was the brainchild of Rebecca Hosking, Modbury resident and documentary-maker. Filming a documentary in the Pacific Ocean, Rebecca was horrified at the effects of plastic bags on the wildlife off Hawaii. Among other things, she saw seabirds fatally trapped in plastic bags that don’t biodegrade. When Rebecca returned to her hometown, she discussed this problem with people, including the shopkeepers and everyone supported her suggestion to make the town plastic bag free.
But for Rebecca’s concept, Modbury would still be an unremarkable little place. Now, however, shoppers take re-usable cotton bags shopping with them, or they buy biodegradable corn starch ones on the shops. The shopkeepers now wrap their goods in paper. To prove that the townsfolk are not only committed to reducing plastic waste, they organised a mass beach clean-up last year. Dozens of volunteers came to the beach on the appointed day to clean it up, taking the rubbish that visitors throw away and recycling it. And the greatest part of that rubbish was... no, not plastic bags, but plastic bottles.
Becoming the first town in Europe to ban plastic bags, Modbury is now harvesting the rewards of fame — reporters and camera crews from newspapers and TV channels across the world are coming to this mild town to find out its secret. And, contrary to some of the initial reports, it is a normal town, trying to live life in a slightly different way. As one resident put it. “We’re ordinary people, but we want to make just a little difference.”
| A．The hunting is to blame for the disappearance of the birds. |
| B．The cause of the decline in the ducks’ number is uncertain. |
| C．She is unhappy with the climate change throughout the world. |
| D．The man should find more scientific evidence for the birds’ extinction. |
| A．45% | B．54% | C．70% | D．74% |
| A．To make supportive policies to call on people to use water wisely. |
| B．To get more people to use water in environmental-friendly ways. |
| C．To develop more water recycling systems in poor countries. |
| D．To encourage people to save energy actively as much as possible. |
| A．Estimates about water use. | B．Importance of fresh water. |
| C．Concerns about water issues. | D．Lack of safe drinking water. |
