1 . 听下面一段独白，回答以下小题。
1. What does the passage mainly tell us?

A．Inequality still exist globally.	B．Pollution is severe in wealthy countries.
C．The rich pollute the world more.	D．Governments are responsible for pollution.

2. How much percent of pollution do the richest 1 percent people produce?

A．52%.

B．8.5%.

C．10%.

D．15%.

3. How can governments of major polluters help reduce pollution?

A．By expecting a positive return from companies.

B．By greenlighting companies’ business practices.

C．By facilitating more investment in the stock market.

D．By forcing companies to stop using traditional fuels.

2 .

A．The electronic toy is unique.	B．The toy is safe for all users.
C．Plastic toys are of low quality.	D．The toy isn’t environmentally friendly.

3 . Clementine seemed to be missing apiece from her life’s puzzle for most of her life. Dropped off as a 3-year-old homeless dog near New Orleans, the dog stayed in the shelter for four months before being moved to Texas.

While living at an adoption center in Texas, the dog was adopted out twice to different families. Sadly, neither of those adoptions were successful. It turned out Clementine didn’t get along with smaller pets, and she had too much energy for the second family.

Meanwhile, Captain Robert Moree wanted to add a fire dog to the station. He’d just read a study about how dogs help firefighter scope with the pressure of their jobs, and he was eager to give the study a real life trial run! With the permission of the chief and other firefighters, he and a few colleagues visited the shelter. As soon as they met Clementine, they were smitten!

“They introduced us to Clementine,” Captain Moree recalled. “She started to like us, and we liked her instantly. Later that day, my driver, Bryan Wallen, and I decided to get her.”

Captain Moree officially adopted Clementine, but she definitely belonged to every person in the firehouse. She loved to hug the firefighters in between calls, and she was always nearby whenever anyone was preparing food. “She rides on the truck when we go out on calls” said Captain Moree. “She not only makes the station feel more like home during our 24-hour shifts but also keeps us excited to come to the station.”

Clementine has made such an amazing journey from a homeless dog to a hero dog. She was named Dog of the Year at the 2022 ASPCA Humane Awards!

1. Why did Clementine fail to stay in the second family?

A．She liked fire.

B．She was too active.

C．She ate too much.

D．She hated other pets.

2. What does the underlined word “smitten” probably mean?

A．moved

B．puzzled

C．attracted

D．surprised

3. What did Captain Moree expect a fire dog to do?

A．Help put out fires.	B．Guard the firehouse.
C．Stay excited day and night	D．Reduce stress of firefighters.

4. What can be inferred about Clementine from the last two paragraphs?

A．She risked her life as a fire dog.

B．She has got many important awards.

C．She did an excellent job as a fire dog.

D．She remained homeless in her whole life.

4 . Directions: Complete the following passages by-using the words in the box. Each word can only be used once. Note that there is one word more than you need.

A. typically          B. limited            C. markings             D. items            E. treated F. fenced             G. fear               H. packs                    I. gently            J. present          K.pair

Red foxes exist throughout much of the United States, with the exception of the southwest. In Chicago, they are not common in high numbers, but are still     1    in certain areas of the city. Coyotes(丛林狼) usually compete with red foxes, and the large coyote population and     2    living space in Chicago maybe related to the small number of red foxes.

Red foxes are     3    smaller than coyotes, weighing 7-15 pounds on average and standing up to 20 inches. Easily recognizable by their striking redcoats, red foxes also have black     4    on their feet, black-tipped ears, as well as along tail.

Generally living alone, red foxes do not form     5    like other dog-like animals. Adults    6    during the breeding(繁殖) season to raise their young in hidden places, such as fallen trees, or other natural or artificial structures. As omnivores(杂食动物), red foxes eat a variety of foods including rabbits, birds, insects and fruits. Red foxes may store food in buried locations where they pile up     7    to eat later. Sometimes they are killed by coyotes and humans. They are also easily affected by harmful skin diseases that can lead to death if not     8    .

When digging homes under buildings, red foxes may come into conflict with people. Sometimes foxes may hunt outdoor cats or chickens. Keep cats indoors and get these areas     9    to prevent foxes entering. As with any wild animal, it is important to never feed red foxes, as this may cause them to lose their natural     10    of humans and exhibit unusual behaviors.

5 . Man’s Existential Dilemma

We always knew that there was something peculiar about man, something deep down that characterized him and set him apart from the other animals.     1     For ages, when philosophers talked about the the core of man they referred to it as his “essence”, something fixed in his nature, deep down, some special quality or substance. But nothing like it was ever found and man’s peculiarity still remained a dilemma. The reason it was never found, as Erich Fromm (艾瑞克·弗洛姆，精神分析心理学家和人本主义哲学家) put it in an excellent discussion, was that there was no essence, that the essence of man is really his paradoxical(悖论的)nature, the fact that he is half animal and half symbolic.

We might call this existential paradox the condition of individuality within finitude (有限性). Man has a symbolic identity that brings him sharply out of nature. He is a symbolic self, a creature with a name, a life history.     2     He can place himself imaginatively at a point in space and contemplate bemusedly his own planet. This immerse expansion, this competence, this self-consciousness gives to man almost the status a small god in nature.

    3     This is the paradox: he is out of nature and hopelessly in it: he is dual, up in the stars’ and yet housed in a heart-pumping, breath-gasping body that once belonged to a fish and still carries the gill-marks to prove it. His body is a material fleshy casing that is alien to him in many ways - the strangest and most unpleasant way being that is aches and bleeds and will decay and die. Man is literally split in two: he has an awareness of his own splendid uniqueness in that he sticks out of nature with a towering majesty, and yet he goes back into the ground a few feet in order blindly and dumbly to rot and disappear forever.

The lower animals are, of course, spared this painful contradiction, as they lack a symbolic identity and the self-consciousness that goes with it. They merely act and move reflexively as they are driven by their instincts. They live in a world without time, pulsating, as it were, in a state of dumb beings. This is what has made it so simple to shoot down whole herds of buffalo or elephants. The animals don’t know that death is happening and continue gazing while others drop alongside them. The knowledge of death is reflective and conceptual, and animals are spared it. They live and they disappear with the same thoughtlessness: a few minutes of fear, a few seconds of anguish, and it is over.     4    

Quoted from Ernest Becker’s The Denial of Death

A．But to live a life with the fate of death haunting one’s dreams makes a huge difference.

B．He is a creator with a mind that soars out the speculate about atoms and infinity.

C．Man’s body was a curse of fate and culture was built upon repression not because he was a seeker of pleasure, but because he was primarily an avoider of death.

D．Yet at the same time, man is a worm and food for worms.

E．Man is born free, and everywhere he is in chains.

F．It was something that had to go right to his core, something that made him suffer his peculiar fate, that made it impossible to escape.

6 .

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.

7 . Directions: After reading the passage below. fill in the blanks to make the passage coherent and grammatically correct. For the blanks with a given word, fill in each blank with the proper form of the given word;for the other blanks, use one word that best fits each blank.

Wildlife Report Calls for Action

The World Wide Fund for Nature released its Living Planet Report, which found that the Earth’s wildlife populations have fallen by 69% in the past 50 years.

The report is produced every two years to show how the natural world is changing, so governments, businesses, and conservationists understand     1     needs to be done to protect the Earth. The team looks at several factors. One is the Living Planet Index (LPI),     2     examines how wildlife populations have changed over time. A total of 5, 268 species across the world have been tracked, including birds, fish, insects, and mammals.

The change in wildlife varies around the world. South America and the Caribbean are the most affected. In these areas, the average wildlife populations have dropped by 94% over 50 years. Central Asia and Europe have     3     (small) decline, with an 18% drop. The WWF says the changes are caused by human activity. One of the biggest threats     4     (face) wildlife is a number of acres of forest that are being chopped down     5     that theland can be used for farming instead. To find the best way to protect animals worldwide, the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) is studying how easy or hard     6     will be to help different species. It has so far found that the populations of several animals, including the pink pigeon and the Sumatran rhino,     7     be boosted.

While some news from the Living Planet Report is worrisome, there is good news, too. Up to now the numbers of many species     8     (rise) around the world because of people’s efforts to protect them. In India, the number of tigers has nearly doubled since 2009. And in 2020,   there were more than 50 sightings of the critically     9     (endanger) Antarctic blue whale.

In the US, conservation efforts in recent decades have helped to save several species, including the bald eagle, which     10     (remove) from the threatened species list in 2007.

8 . The cultivation of plants by ants is more widespread than previously realized, and has evolved on at least 15 separate occasions.

There are more than 200 species of ant in the Americas that farm fungi (真菌) for food, but this trait evolved just once sometime between 45 million and 65 million years ago. Biologists regard the cultivation of fungi by ants as true agriculture appearing earlier than human agriculture because it meets four criteria: the ants plant the fungus, care for it, harvest it and depend on it for food.

By contrast, while thousands of ant species are known to have a wide variety of interdependent relationships with plants, none were regarded as true agriculture. But in 2016, Guillaume Chomicki and Susanne Renner at the University of Munich, Germany, discovered that an ant in Fungi cultivates several plants in a way that meets the four criteria for true agriculture.

The ants collect the seeds of the plants and place them in cracks in the bark of trees. As the plants grow, they form hollow structures called domain that the ants nest in. The ants defecate (排便) at designated absorptive places in these domain, providing nutrients for the plant. In return, as well as shelter, the plant provides food in the form of fruit juice.

This discovery prompted Chomicki and others to review the literature on ant-plant relationships to see if there are other examples of plant cultivation that have been overlooked. “They have never really been looked at in the framework of agriculture,” says Chomicki, who is now at the University of Sheffield in the UK. “It’s definitely widespread.”

The team identified 37 examples of tree-living ants that cultivate plants that grow on trees, known as epiphytes (附生植物). By looking at the family trees of the ant species, the team was able to determine on how many occasions plant cultivation evolved and roughly when. Fifteen is a conservative estimate, says Campbell. All the systems evolved relatively recently, around 1million to 3 million years ago, she says.

Whether the 37 examples of plant cultivation identified by the team count as true agriculture depends on the definitions used. Not all of the species get food from the plants, but they do rely on them for shelter, which is crucial for ants living in trees, says Campbell. So the team thinks the definition of true agriculture should include shelter as well as food.

1. According to biologists, why is ant-fungus cultivation considered as a form of true agriculture?

A．Because it occurred earlier than human agriculture.

B．Because it fulfills the standards typical of agricultural practices.

C．Because it redefines the four criteria for true human agriculture.

D．Because it is less common than previously thought.

2. What motivated Chomicki and others to review the literature on ant-plant relationships?

A．They determined on new family trees of the ant species.

B．They overlooked some tree-living ants that provided nutrients for the plants.

C．They never studied the ant-plant relationships within the context of agriculture.

D．They never identified any an t species that engaged in cultivation of fungi.

3. Which of the following statements is supported by the team's findings according to the passage?

A．Ants’ cultivation of plants is limited to a few specific species.

B．The cultivation of fungi by ants is considered the earliest form of agriculture.

C．True agriculture in ants involves only food-related interactions with plants.

D．Ants have independently cultivated plants on at least 15 distinct occasions.

4. What is the passage mainly about?

A．The evolution of ants in the plant kingdom.

B．The widespread occurrence of ant-plant cultivation.

C．The discovery of a new ant species engaging in agriculture.

D．The contrast between ant agriculture and human agriculture.

9 . Reducing the workweek to four days could have a climate benefit. In addition to improving the well-being of workers, cutting working hours may reduce carbon emissions. But those benefits would depend on a number of factors, experts emphasize, including how people choose to spend nonworking time.

Commuting and travel

Transportation is the biggest contributor to greenhouse emissions. A November 2021 survey of 2,000 employees and 500 business leaders in the United Kingdom found that if all organizations introduced a four-day week, the reduced trips to work would decrease travel overall by more than 691 million miles a week.

But the climate benefits of less commuting could be eliminated, experts said, if people choose to spend their extra time off traveling, particularly if they do so by car or plane.

Energy usage

Shorter working hours could lead to reductions in energy usage, experts said. According to a 2006 paper, if the United States adopted European work standards, the country would consume about 20 percent less energy.

Energy could also be conserved if fewer resources are needed to heat and cool large office buildings, reducing demands on electricity. For example, if an entire workplace shuts down on the fifth day, that would help lower consumption — less so if the office stays open to accommodate employees taking different days off.

Lifestyle changes

It’s possible that fewer working hours may lead some people to have a larger carbon footprint, but experts say research suggests that most people are likely to shift toward more sustainable lifestyles.

One theory is that people who work more and have less free time tend to do things in more carbon-intensive ways, such as choosing faster modes of transportation or buying prepared foods. Convenience is often carbon-intensive and people tend to choose convenience when they're time-stressed. Meanwhile, some research suggests that those who work less are more likely to engage in traditionally low-carbon activities, such as spending time with family or sleeping.

“When we talk about the four-day workweek and the environment, we focus on the tangible, but actually, in a way, the biggest potential benefit here is in the intangible,” experts said.

1. What is identified as the leading cause of greenhouse emissions according to the passage?

A．The well-being of employees.

B．The conservation of energy.

C．Commuting and travel.

D．The European work standard.

2. What can be inferred from the underlined sentence “the biggest potential benefit here is in the intangible” in the last paragraph?

A．People will have big potential in achieving intangible benefits while working.

B．People are more likely to engage in carbon-intensive activities due to time constraints.

C．People may shift toward more sustainable lifestyles and lower carbon footprints.

D．People may travel more frequently by car or plane during their extra time off.

3. The passage is mainly written to       .

A．highlight the importance of shortening working time in the context of well-being

B．provide an overview of transportation emissions worldwide

C．analyze the impact of reduced working hours on mode of business

D．illustrate factors affecting the climate benefits of a shorter workweek

10 . Global surface temperatures last month were 2.25 degrees warmer than the 20th century average of 60.1 degrees, breaking previous records, from August 2016, by more than half a degree, according to NOAA researchers. “That to me is a really huge _______ from one record to the next,” said Ellen Bartow, a physical scientist with NOAA’S National Centers for Environmental Information.

The report _______ what millions of people have experienced in recent months, including record-breaking heatwaves that have touched almost every corner of the globe. Asia, Africa, North America and South America had their warmest August on record, as did the Arctic, Europe and Oceania — a region that _______ Australia - had their second-warmest August on record, the report said.

It wasn’t just the land that _______ : August set a record for the highest monthly sea surface temperature abnormally—1.85 degrees above average. The warming oceans _______experiencing its fourth continuous month with the _______ shrinking sea ice, with Antarctica sea ice extent on record. Globally, sea ice extent in August was about 550,000 square miles less than the previous record low, set in August 2019.

“We’ve seen unheard-of warmth in the global ocean, and that’s definitely alarming because its effects _______ beyond just the scope of the ocean,” Bartow-Gillies said. “Not only are you _______ marine habitats, but you’re affecting storm creation, you’re creating more instability in some areas, and you’re creating flooding events in other areas. There’s a whole host of _______ that come along with these warmer ocean surface temperatures that we’re seeing.”

In fact, the report comes after a series of severe natural ________ that span the globe. This week, a Mediterranean storm caused serious flooding in Libya, killing more than 11,000 people. In Canada, wildfires burned through more than 42 million acres of forests this summer, and several are still burning. ________ global warming was not the singular cause of any of these disasters, heating of the Earth continues to ________ the likelihood of extreme weather events and wildfire worldwide.

“The scientific evidence is ________ —we will continue to see more climate records and more intense and frequent extreme weather events impacting society and ecosystems, until we stop ________ greenhouse gases,” read a statement from Samantha Burgess, deputy director of the European Union’s Copernicus Climate Change Service, which also ________ that this summer was the hottest on record.

1.

A．distance

B．jump

C．travel

D．flight

2.

A．confirms

B．emerges

C．quotes

D．argues

3.

A．holds

B．touches

C．surrounds

D．includes

4.

A．boiled

B．cooled

C．stricken

D．disappeared

5.

A．contributed to

B．suffered from

C．resulted from

D．devoted to

6.

A．slowest

B．lowest

C．highest

D．fastest

7.

A．enlarge

B．discharge

C．extend

D．undertake

8.

A．creating

B．saving

C．remaining

D．disturbing

9.

A．issues

B．debates

C．events

D．proposals

10.

A．floods

B．disasters

C．storms

D．earthquakes

11.

A．Though

B．Because

C．Unless

D．When

12.

A．damage

B．destroy

C．decrease

D．increase

13.

A．irresistible

B．unchangeable

C．inaccessible

D．unbearable

14.

A．conveying

B．releasing

C．relieving

D．dismissing

15.

A．predicted

B．expected

C．doubted

D．determined