While most spiders hunt alone, there are a few hundred species of social spiders that live in colonies. A.studiosus is one of them. Up to 50 individuals gather together to spin large collective webs, which catch larger prey than each spider could trap on its own.
All the colony members look the same, but they don’t all behave in the same way. The females can be aggressive or docile (温驯的). It’s surprisingly easy to realize their personalities—just put two of them in a small box overnight and check on them the next morning. If they’re both docile, they will have built a joint web in one corner of the box. If one of them is aggressive, the pair will be at opposite corners.
Colin Wright from the University of Pittsburgh has now found that these personality types do different jobs within the web, creating a natural division of labor. They’re a little like ants, where small workers clean and look for food, and big soldiers guard and defend. But unlike these insects, the social spiders don’t have castes (社会阶层) with different builds. Instead, their roles are defined by their personalities.
When Wright’s team first started studying A.studiosus, they couldn’t work out what the docile spiders did. They didn’t seem to repair webs, keep enemies away, or catch prey. But when the researchers checked the fates of colonies in the wild, they found that those with a mix of docile and aggressive members were more likely to survive than those with just a single type. The docile members were clearly doing something important.
It turns out that they act as the colony’s babysitters. They spend most of their time standing watching over the eggs, or directly feeding the youngsters by regurgitating (反刍) food—just like a mother bird might. Meanwhile, the aggressive spiders generally avoid these tasks; instead, they spend most of their time building the web, catching prey, and defending their colonies. Compared to the docile spiders, the aggressive ones are better at those tasks, because the docile females rarely respond to enemies—and when they do respond, they do so slowly.
For now, it’s not clear why the spiders naturally fall into their respective careers, or even what drives their different personalities in the first place. The team are now trying to answer these questions. In the meantime, Wright suggests that biologists should pay more attention to personality types, when trying to understand how animal societies work.
1. According to the passage, what are the two personality types of female A.studiosus?2. What are the aggressive female spiders mainly responsible for?
3. Please decide which part is false in the following statement, then underline it and explain why.
In an A.studiosus colony, the division of labor is based on the different builds of the spiders.
4. Do you think personality traits influence human career choices? Why or why not? (In about 40 words)
| official；annoy ； treat；legal；impression；violent； motivated |
2. How
3. The president
4. Past history clearly shows that
5. We all know the story of Albert Einstein and his many
6. Recording how much you have improved every day can
7. The medical team believed that Traditional Chinese Medicine was an effective
5 . We all have weaknesses, and all know hardship. But it’s difficult, even on a good day, to admit we are struggling, to ask for help or to apologize when we are out of line. However, keeping problems to ourselves can create even more long-term complications. After all, unacknowledged feelings and frustrations rarely stay under the rug. That is why it is important to figure out how to openly express one’s feelings or thoughts even when that form of expression leaves us feeling exposed or uncomfortable.
Researchers Anna Bruk and Sabine Scholl at the University of Mannheim refer to this form of genuine, intentional emotional exposure, done in spite of one’s fears, as “showing vulnerability.” Unlike other forms of self-expression, this act always carries risk, such as the possibility that others may see someone as weak or even incompetent in consequence. The good news is that our worries about the negative evaluations of others may not be entirely reflected in the way people actually see us in difficult moments. The researchers conducted six experiments and revealed the results: Across a variety of situations, such as asking for help or admitting a mistake, people saw their own displays of vulnerability more negatively than others did. They refer to this pattern of conflicting perceptions as the “beautiful mess effect.”
It’s important to be aware of this mismatch, as it can prevent people from sharing their true feelings and needs. Then how can people overcome the beautiful mess effect? Actually, the concept of self-compassion can be of great help when it comes to finding beauty in the mess of one’s own shortcomings.
Self-compassion could influence how people see their own display of vulnerability. After all, vulnerable situations can cause a lot of shame and fear, and these moments are precisely when self-compassion is most helpful. For instance, consider admitting a mistake. People who treat themselves as they would treat a good friend wouldn’t shame themselves for being imperfect. Instead, they would remind themselves that imperfection is normal. In addition, a mindful approach to the mistake would lessen the need to either over exaggerate or deny its significance.
Such a compassionate reaction to one’s own vulnerability, in turn, could make it easier to be vulnerable with others. As a result, self-compassionate people see their own show of vulnerability in a more positive light—closer to the way they see the same behavior in others.
Luckily, our level of self-compassion can be intentionally cultivated. For example, journaling exercises can help people change the way they think about their own strengths and weaknesses by writing about one’s feelings with awareness and acceptance, offering oneself words of support, and reflecting on how others share difficult experiences. By developing a kind, mindful attitude towards ourselves we can become more comfortable with showing our vulnerabilities. This practice, in turn, can strengthen our close relationships.
1. The underlined phrase “stay under the rug” in Paragraph 1 is closest in meaning to _______.| A．remain hidden | B．become exposed | C．offer comfort | D．gain acceptance |
| A．cultivate self-compassion | B．have negative perceptions |
| C．express our feelings openly | D．display vulnerability in hardships |
| A．self-expression decreases the risks of negative evaluations of others |
| B．self-compassionate people are more likely to display their true feelings |
| C．the way people view their strengths and weaknesses can hardly be changed |
| D．developing a mindful attitude towards ourselves helps reduce our shortcomings |
| A．stress the importance of exposing our vulnerability |
| B．present a way to overcome the beautiful mess effect |
| C．discuss how to reflect on our strengths and weaknesses |
| D．analyze why we should find beauty in our shortcomings |
6 . A new study published in the National Academy of Sciences provides a measure of how far “deepfake” technology has progressed. The results suggest that real humans can easily fall for machine-generated faces. “We found that AI-generated faces are highly realistic,” says study co-author Hany Farid, a professor at the University of California, Berkeley. The result raises concerns that “these faces could be highly effective when used for criminal purposes.”
The synthetic (合成的) faces for this study were developed in back-and-forth interactions between two neural networks. One of the networks, called a generator, produced an evolving series of synthetic faces like a student working progressively through rough drafts. The other network, known as a discriminator, trained on real images and then graded the generated output by comparing it with data on actual faces. The generator began the exercise with random pixels (像素). With feedback from the discriminator, it gradually produced realistic humanlike faces. Ultimately, the discriminator was unable to tell a real face from a fake one.
After collecting 400 real faces matched to 400 synthetic versions, the researchers asked 315 people to separate real from fake among a selection of 128 of the images. Another group of 219 participants got some training and feedback about how to spot fakes as they tried to separate the faces.
The first group did not do better than a coin toss at telling real faces from fake ones, with an average accuracy of 48.2 percent. The second group failed to show dramatic improvement, receiving only about 59 percent, even with feedback about those participants’ choices.
The researchers were not expecting these results. The finding adds to concerns about the accessibility of technology that makes it possible for just about anyone to create misleading still images. Another concern is that such findings will create the impression that deepfakes will become completely undetectable and as a result, scientists might give up on trying to develop countermeasures (对策) to deepfakes.
The researchers end with a straightforward conclusion after emphasizing that misleading uses of deepfakes will continue to pose a threat: “We, therefore, encourage those developing these technologies to consider whether the associated risks are greater than their benefits. If so, then we discourage the development of technology simply because it is possible.”
1. What is the second paragraph mainly about?| A．The examples of deepfake technology. |
| B．The differences between the two networks. |
| C．The way to tell a real face from a fake one. |
| D．The process of producing the synthetic faces. |
| A．create real faces | B．spot fake images |
| C．commit various crimes | D．make detective tools |
| A．might inspire scientists to develop countermeasures to deepfakes |
| B．proved training could help participants to tell real from fake greatly |
| C．matched the researchers’ expectations of people’s ability to spot fakes |
| D．showed humans could easily be misguided by machine-generated faces |
| A．Excited. | B．Concerned. | C．Disappointed. | D．Confused. |
7 . Sports like figure skating, ice hockey, speed skating, and ski jumping have been part of Olympic history since the first Winter Olympics were hosted in France, in 1924. But the origins of many Olympic sports stretch back even further.
The ancient origins of skiing
Skiing has been around since early civilization, evidenced by a 5,000-year-old rock carving showing men on skis in Norway, and the discovery of a ski dating back to 6000 B.C. found in Russia. Modern skiing can be traced back to the Scandinavians, who primarily used skis as a means of travel or for other practical purposes. Some of the first official competitions began around 1850 in Norway, with the first recorded race in Sweden held outside Stockholm in 1879.
The British are the ones who transformed skiing from its Scandinavian roots into the highly competitive sport it is now. Alpine skiing or downhill skiing is the most popular form of skiing, and it first appeared in the Winter Olympics in 1936.
The development of snowboarding
Snowboarding originated as a backyard activity known as snurfing—invented by a father to entertain children.
In 1965, Sherman Poppen of Muskegon, Michigan, was looking for something his children could use as a sled. He tied together two skis—creating a toy he named “Snurfer”. Less than a year, the toy exploded into a national craze.
Although an annual championship in Muskegon was sponsored by the makers of the Snurfer, competitors began to create their own boards. Because Poppen had trademarked the term Snurfer, they began to call the sport snowboarding instead. By 1985, snurfing fell out of fashion, but snowboarding had caught on worldwide. It finally became an official Olympic sport for the 1998 Games.
The earliest evidence of curling
The predecessor (前身) of curling is a Scottish game in the 16th century played on frozen lakes and ponds, using smooth stones from riverbeds.
Centuries later, the first curling club was founded in Scotland and received the approval of Queen Victoria in 1843. In the sport, players slide the stones toward a target—earning more points the closer the stone lands to the center. By the 20th century, curling was so widespread that it was one of the few sports played in the first Olympic Games in 1924.
1. The first recorded skiing race was held in _______.| A．Sweden | B．Russia | C．Britain | D．Norway |
| A．It became well known before 1965. |
| B．It originated from the toy “Snurfer”. |
| C．It was invented as a means of travel. |
| D．It was named by the inventor Poppen. |
| A．Snurfing and ice hockey. | B．Skating and Alpine skiing. |
| C．Figure skating and curling. | D．Snowboarding and ski jumping. |
8 . I love my father. He’s the parent who I thought understood me. But when I was growing up, he was
One day my father was working at his desk. I
Moments later, he appeared at the top of the stairs,
My sense that I couldn’t reach my father stayed with me even when I was grown. Well into adulthood, I felt that I could never
The
I really cherish my father’s stories and will pass them on to the next generation.
1.| A．rarely | B．merely | C．frequently | D．gradually |
| A．watch | B．follow | C．share | D．support |
| A．impression | B．attention | C．explanation | D．presentation |
| A．approached | B．ignored | C．monitored | D．comforted |
| A．Concerned | B．Experienced | C．Disappointed | D．Absorbed |
| A．annoyed | B．depressed | C．scared | D．bored |
| A．crossed | B．spread | C．swung | D．moved |
| A．apologized | B．complained | C．hesitated | D．joked |
| A．view | B．message | C．voice | D．scene |
| A．cut back on | B．make up for | C．keep up with | D．look forward to |
| A．change | B．success | C．tradition | D．silence |
| A．but | B．or | C．for | D．so |
| A．proposed | B．discovered | C．recalled | D．predicted |
| A．serious | B．confident | C．eager | D．reasonable |
| A．reminding | B．pushing | C．requiring | D．inviting |
1、你在英语学习过程中遇到了哪些困难？
2、你尝试了哪些方法解决这些困难？效果如何？
注意：词数不少于80；
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Laughing Matters
Making people laugh connects us to one another. But what are laughing matters related to? For me, they are about personal life stories and experiences. Life will always change, and therefore laughing matters vary accordingly. While we may not have the same experiences, everyone can relate to observations on life, family, and the varieties of behavior we all encounter every day as we go about life.
Laughing matters are dedicated to making laughter a part of daily life and building a healthier and less stressful outlook. It can end tense situations. It always breaks the ice and brings people together. At home, it brings the family closer. A friend once told me how his dad collected jokes in a box and wrote them down on cards so he wouldn’t forget them and then told jokes at the dinner table. I could relate to that. My older brother used to bring home joke books and read them to me when I was 10 or 11 years old, which had a great impact on me.
Great comedians view life in different ways. Some of them can tell a relatable story about life and it will be funny, reminding the audience of similar situations and getting huge laughs. Others will look at a similar observation in life and tell a very different story from a very different angle with a very different delivery. The best of them keep working it out until they find the humor that suits them and strikes the right string and, hopefully, the laughter string of an audience.
People will always relate to the human story with all its challenges. One good thing about life is that it changes and develops. Life itself never gets old and is always feeding a laugh. As a result, comedians are constantly pushing the envelope because what the previous generation found funny becomes foreign to the new generation. As comedy adjusts to life changes, the edge keeps moving as well. That’s what time does to comedy. And now with a whole new generation the challenge is the same. Humorists must keep pushing that envelope, and we will.
1. For the author, what are laughing matters about? (不多于8个单词)2. How can the best comedians make people laugh? (不多于11个单词)
3. Why does comedy need to change? (不多于13个单词)
4. Based on your personal experience, does humor help you in your life? Why or why not? （单词数不限）
