1 . “Few articles change owners more frequently than clothes. They travel downwards from grade to grade in the social scale with remarkable regularity,” wrote the journalist Adolphe Smith in 1877 as he traced a coat’s journey in the last century: cleaned, repaired and resold repeatedly; cut down into a smaller item; eventually recycled into new fabric. But with the improvement in people’s living standards, that model is mind-boggling in the era of fast fashion. The average British customer buys four items a month. And it is reported that 350,000 tonnes of used but still wearable clothes go to landfills in the UK each year.
Yet the gradual revival of the second-hand trade has gathered pace in the past few years. At fashion website Asos, sales of vintage clothes (古董衫) have risen by 92%. Clothing was once worn out of necessity, and now it is simply a way of life. Busy families sell used items on eBay, teenagers trade on Depop and some fashion people offer designer labels on Vestiaire Collective. Strikingly, it has become big enough business that mainstream retailers (零售商) want a slice of the action.
For some buyers and sellers, the switch to the second-hand is born of financial difficulties. Only a few have become worried about the impact of their shopping habit on the planet. But the shift is only a partial solution. Some people worry that some mainstream brands may “greenwash” — using second-hand goods to improve their image, rather than engaging more seriously with sustainability.
However, the biggest concern may be that people keep buying because they know they can resell goods, still chasing the pleasure of the next purchase but with an eased conscience (愧疚). Boohoo, a powerful fast fashion company, has seen sales and profits rise, despite concerns about environmental problems in its supply chain that led to an investigation last year.
A new Netflix series, Worn Stories, documents the emotional meanings that clothes can have: Each old item is full of memories. Actually, a handbag from a grandmother and a scarf passed on by a father are both valuable for us. A love of style is not a bad or an unimportant thing. But a committed relationship is better than a quick flash. Can we learn to appreciate our own old clothes as well as others’?
1. What does the word “mind-boggling” underlined in paragraph 1 probably mean?| A．Unbelievable. | B．Popular. | C．Reasonable. | D．Influential. |
| A．old clothes are more popular than new pieces |
| B．the online second-hand markets are booming |
| C．the fashion world begins to favor vintage clothes |
| D．many clothing brands are innovative in their new products |
| A．It makes people feel free to pursue fast fashion. |
| B．It makes people more cautious about their budgets. |
| C．It encourages people to choose eco-friendly clothes. |
| D．It pushes people to be more engaged with sustainability. |
| A．Old items have lost favor with the public. |
| B．Old items are worthy of being long cherished. |
| C．Older generations attach great importance to old items. |
| D．Older generations care about the quality of their clothes. |
2 . A vast majority of people usually argue that cycling can make a significant contribution to our world. In reality, there is a gap between desired and actual numbers. In Germany, for instance, only 20% of the everyday short-distance trips are covered by bicycle. When enquiring about the causes, researchers found one point repeatedly tops the list: the perceived or potential risk on the bike routes used. Increasing the share of cycling trips thus depends crucially on well-developed bike paths.
However, designing efficient bike path networks is a complex task that involves balancing a variety of limitations while meeting overall demand. In addition, many districts are confronted with a shortage of funds available for improving the infrastructure. Researchers propose a new approach to generating efficient bike path networks. This considers demand distribution and the route option of cyclists based on preferences for secure outings. Typically, minimizing the travel distance is far from the solely goal. Aspects such as attractiveness of a route are also taken into account.
Under real conditions, a bike path network is created by constantly adding bike paths to more streets. This time, researchers start with an ideal, complex network, in which all streets in a city are equipped with a bike path. In a virtual process, they gradually remove less used bike path sections from this network. The route selection of cyclists is continuously updated. Thus, a series of bike path networks is created and is always adapted to the current usage. Each stage of it corresponds to a variant that could be carried out with less financial support.
“We illustrate the applicability of this demand-driven planning for crowded urban areas of Dresden and Hamburg,” explains researcher Christoph Steinacker. “We are approaching a real-life issue here using the theoretic toolbox of network dynamics and compare efficient bike path networks under different conditions.”
1. Why do people rarely cycle?| A．They think of cycling as inefficient. | B．They usually take long-distance trips. |
| C．They’re concerned about the security. | D．They’re unable to find special bike roads. |
| A．Tight budgets. | B．Complex routes. |
| C．Maximized travel distance. | D．Decreasing cycling demand. |
| A．It will be updated once in a while. | B．It is contrary to the real-life design. |
| C．It ensures every street has a bike path. | D．It serves as a model for other districts. |
| A．Good Planning Gets the Bike Rolling | B．A good Network Benefits More People |
| C．Cycling Paths Change Crowded Urban Areas | D．A New Concept Contributes to a Better World |
3 . At some point in the stretch of days between the start of the pandemic’s third year and the feared launch of World War III, a new phrase unfolded itself before us, a mysterious foretell of an age to come: people were going “goblin mode”.
The term embraces the comforts of depravity(堕落): spending the day in bed scrolling endlessly through social media; pouring the end of a bag of chips in your mouth; leaving the house in your pajamas and socks only to get a single Diet Coke from the store.
First appearing on Twitter as early as 2009, “goblin mode” represents a direct departure from the “cottagecore” influence of early pandemic days, a standout trend of 2020 that thrived under the wistful ethos of making the best of what many people assumed would be only a few boring weeks at home in 2020.
But as the pandemic wears on endlessly, and the chaos of current events worsens, people feel cheated by the system and have rejected such goals. “The trend sets an unrealistic standard for people to think that if they aren’t waking up early to exercise, their lives are not put together”, one blog indicting “cottagecore” culture reads.
Most people tweeting about goblin mode characterize it as an almost spiritual-level embrace of our most debased tendencies and call it a logical progression into nihilism(虚无主义)after years of disappointment. However, Marnell, an author who has been tweeting extensively in recent weeks about entering goblin mode, says there is “healthy goblin mode and destructive goblin mode”. For her, it represents a certain air of harmless mischief. “It is cool to be a goblin,” Marnell says. “Everyone is so perfect all the time online, it is good to get in touch with the strange little creature that lives inside you.”
1. Which of the following does not belong to “cottagecore” culture?| A．Organizing refrigerators full of freshly cut vegetables. |
| B．Wearing makeup and doing elaborate skincare routines. |
| C．Making organic food and putting them in a delicate plate. |
| D．Wearing nothing but a long T-shirt to make a weird snack. |
| A．The financial crisis. | B．The endless pandemic. |
| C．The comforts of depravity. | D．The worsening system. |
| A．Accuse. | B．Praise. | C．Credit. | D．Destroy. |
| A．Positive. | B．Neutral. | C．Negative. | D．Favorable. |
4 . The time a person spends on different smartphone apps is enough to identify them from a larger group in more than one in three cases, say researchers.
Researchers analyzed smartphone data from 780 people. They fed 4,680 days of app usage data into statistical models. Each of these days was paired with one of the 780 users so that the models learned people’s daily app use patterns.
The researchers then tested whether models could identify an individual when provided with only a single day of smartphone activity that was anonymous (匿名的). The models, which were trained on only six days of app usage data per person, could identify the correct person from a day of anonymous data one third of the time.
That might not sound like much, but when the models predict who the data belonged to, it could also provide a list of the most to the least likely candidates. It was possible to view the top 10 most likely individuals that a specific day of data belonged to. Around 75% of the time, the correct user would be among the top 10 most likely individuals.
In practical terms, a law enforcement (执法机构) investigation seeking to identify a criminal’s new phone with these models could reduce a candidate pool of approximately 1,000 phones to 10 phones, with a 25% risk of missing them.
Consequently, the researchers warn that software given access to a smartphone’s standard activity logging could make a reasonable prediction about a user’s identity even when they were logged-out of their account. An identification is possible without monitoring conversations or behaviors within apps themselves.
Therefore, it is important to acknowledge that app usage data alone, which is often collected by a smartphone automatically, can potentially reveal a person’s identity. While providing new opportunities for law enforcement, it also poses risks to privacy if this type of data is misused.
1. What is the purpose of the passage?| A．To explain an development. |
| B．To present a research finding. |
| C．To show a research process. |
| D．To confirm an assumption. |
| A．By recording app use time. |
| B．By comparing different apps. |
| C．By studying app usage data. |
| D．By changing app use patterns. |
| A．Locating criminals. |
| B．Tracking usage of apps. |
| C．Predicting trends of apps. |
| D．Recognizing phone users. |
| A．Supportive | B．Cautious. | C．Doubtful. | D．Uninterested. |
5 . In a video from Visit Iceland, a crew is seen working on making a horse-sized keyboard out of massive blocks of wood. The keyboard is then put outside against the gorgeous scenery for the typing horses to reply to emails. Unsurprisingly, the replies are nonsense, with examples listed as “bpnisi. // hihaihf＝. sf”. “OutHorse Your Email” is Iceland’s latest stunt (噱头) to promote tourism. Visitors can choose a trained horse to type responses to their work emails when they are on holiday.
Due to the pandemic, many workers have transitioned to remote working, finding that the lines between their work and personal lives have become blurred. A survey conducted by Visit Iceland revealed that 59% of people globally now feel as if their boss, colleagues, and customers expect them to reply when on holiday and 41% of people check their work emails between one and four times a day when on holiday. That’s why Iceland is assigning emails to its horses, asking them to make replies.
“When visitors travel to Iceland, we want them to fully experience everything our nation has to offer, from breathtaking surroundings to endless landscapes," said the head of Visit Iceland. "Our OutHorse Your Email service lets them do just that. With our world-first service, we hope to appeal to people to disconnect and take a well-deserved, uninterrupted break.”
Since “OutHorse Your Email” service was launched, it has got a lot of attention from the Internet. “Is it a ridiculous tourism stunt? Sure. But it indeed encourages me to enjoy my trip wholeheartedly,” said Thom Dunn, an online user from Canada. Hunter Boyce from the USA also made a comment, “The service sounds interesting, but I don’t want to drive my boss mad or be fired.”
1. What can we know about the typing horses?| A．They are trained to reply to emails. |
| B．They type meaningful emails. |
| C．They reply to emails in famous scenic spots. |
| D．They work with a common keyboard. |
| A．Unclear. |
| B．Unimportant. |
| C．Controllable. |
| D．Adjustable. |
| A．To reduce people’s pressure. |
| B．To fight against the pandemic. |
| C．To encourage undisturbed trips. |
| D．To improve visitors’ work efficiency. |
| A．Ambiguous. |
| B．Negative. |
| C．Favourable. |
| D．Indifferent. |
