1 . If humans were truly at home under the light of the moon and stars, we would go in darkness happily, the midnight world as visible to us as it is to the vast number of nocturnal (夜间活动) species on this planet. Instead, we are diurnal creatures, with eyes adapted to living in the sun’s light. This is a basic evolutionary fact, even though most of us don’t think of ourselves as diurnal beings. Yet it’s the only way to explain what we’ve done to the night: We’ve engineered it to receive us by filling it with light.
The benefits of this kind of engineering come with consequences — called light pollution — whose effects scientists are only now beginning to study. Light pollution is largely the result of bad lighting design, which allows artificial light to shine outward and upward into the sky. Ill-designed lighting washes out the darkness of night and completely changes the light levels — and light rhythms — to which many forms of life, including ourselves, have adapted. Wherever human light spills into the natural world, some aspect of life is affected.
In most cities the sky looks as though it has been emptied of stars, leaving behind a vacant haze (霾) that mirrors our fear of the dark. We’ve grown so used to this orange haze that the original glory of an unlit night — dark enough for the planet Venus to throw shadows on Earth — is wholly beyond our experience, beyond memory almost.
We’ve lit up the night as if it were an unoccupied country, when nothing could be further from the truth. Among mammals alone, the number of nocturnal species is astonishing. Light is a powerful biological force, and on many species it acts as a magnet. The effect is so powerful that scientists speak of songbirds and seabirds being “captured” by searchlights on land or by the light from gas flares on marine oil platforms. Migrating at night, birds tend to collide with brightly lit tall buildings.
Frogs living near brightly lit highways suffer nocturnal light levels that are as much as a million times brighter than normal, throwing nearly every aspect of their behavior out of joint, including their nighttime breeding choruses. Humans are no less trapped by light pollution than the frogs. Like most other creatures, we do need darkness. Darkness is as essential to our biological welfare, to our internal clockwork, as light itself.
Living in a glare of our own making, we have cut ourselves off from our evolutionary and cultural heritage — the light of the stars and the rhythms of day and night. In a very real sense, light pollution causes us to lose sight of our true place in the universe, to forget the scale of our being, which is best measured against the dimensions of a deep night with the Milky Way — the edge of our galaxy — arching overhead.
1. According to the passage, human beings .A.prefer to live in the darkness |
B.are used to living in the day light |
C.were curious about the midnight world |
D.had to stay at home with the light of the moon |
A.The night. | B.The moon. | C.The sky. | D.The planet. |
A.provide examples of animal protection. |
B.show how light pollution affects animals. |
C.compare the living habits of both species. |
D.explain why the number of certain species has declined. |
A.The Magic Light. | B.The Orange Haze. |
C.The Disappearing Night. | D.The Rhythms of Nature. |
2 . Nuclear pollution is a serious global
When nuclear accidents occur in coastal areas, the
Following the Fukushima nuclear disaster in 2011, efforts to cool the reactors by pumping in seawater resulted in the
This
A.change | B.opportunity | C.concern | D.possibility |
A.caused | B.posed | C.created | D.increased |
A.resulted in | B.led to | C.brought about | D.caused |
A.terrestrial | B.aquatic | C.marine | D.atmospheric |
A.balancing | B.regulating | C.considering | D.stabilizing |
A.heightened | B.raised | C.decreased | D.lifted |
A.minor | B.slight | C.substantial | D.insignificant |
A.accumulation | B.storage | C.deposition | D.buildup |
A.Therefore | B.Despite | C.However | D.Hence |
A.from | B.by | C.of | D.in |
A.residents | B.citizens | C.inhabitants | D.dwellers |
A.issue | B.measure | C.release | D.disposal |
A.web | B.chain | C.network | D.system |
A.urgent | B.immediate | C.pressing | D.critical |
A.address | B.tackle | C.solve | D.resolve |
There are
4 . Ocean Noise Pollution
Some scientists say that animals in the ocean are increasingly threatened by noise pollution caused by human beings.
The noise that affects sea creatures comes from a number of human activities. It is caused mainly by industrial underwater explosions, ocean drilling, and ship engines. Such noises are added to natural sounds. These sounds include the breaking of ice fields, underwater earthquakes, and sounds made by animals themselves.
Decibels (分贝) measured in water are different from those measured on land. A noise of 120 decibels on land causes pain to human ears. In water, a decibel level of 195 would have the same effect.
Some scientists have proposed setting a noise limit of 120 decibels in oceans. They have observed that noises above that level can frighten and confuse whales.
A team of American and Canadian scientists discovered that louder noises can seriously injure some animals. The research team found that powerful underwater explosions were causing whales in the area to lose their hearing. This seriously affected the whales’ ability to exchange information and find their way. Some of the whales even died. The explosions had caused their ears to bleed (流血) and become infected (感染).
Many researchers whose work depends on ocean sounds object to a limit of 120 decibels. They say such a limit is a greater danger than they believed. They want to prevent noises from harming creatures in the ocean.
1. According to the passage, which of the following is increasingly dangerous to sea creatures?A.The sound of a car. |
B.The sound of voices. |
C.Manmade noise pollution. |
D.The sound of steps. |
A.sounds made by animals themselves |
B.ocean drilling |
C.underwater earthquakes |
D.the breaking of ice fields |
A.They won’t be confused by noises. |
B.They are deaf to noises. |
C.Their ability to reproduce will be lowered by high level noises. |
D.Their hearing will be damaged by high level noises. |
A.They will work hard to reduce ocean noise pollution. |
B.They will protect animals from harmful noises. |
C.They will try to set a limit of 120 decibels. |
D.They will study the effect of ocean noise pollution. |
5 . Most of us are used to the sound we hear in daily life, such as music, the middle of the night.
Too much noise pollution in working areas such as offices, construction sites, bars and even in our homes can influence psychological health. Studies show that the occurrence of aggressive behavior, sleep disturbance, and constant stress can be linked to excessive (过度的) noise levels.
Loud noises can certainly influence our sleeping pattern.
As of now, there do not exist many solutions to such pollution.
A.You’ll feel it hard to deal with others |
B.They may lead to problems related to tiredness |
C.But everybody can help to reduce the noise in their homes |
D.These, in turn, can cause more severe health problems later in life |
E.Many firm measures should be taken to remove loud noises in our life |
F.Our ears can take in a certain range of sounds without getting damaged |
G.All of these have become a part of the urban culture and rarely disturb us |
6 . You are welcome to our channel. An interest in the way ocean currents move led Dr. Erik van Sebille to track garbage. This Dutch scientist hopes that by making us aware of how much we litter our oceans, we’ll be motivated to better stash (存放) our garbage.
Question: Where does the garbage in our oceans come from ?Answer: It can come from litter people leave behind on beaches. Or from things falling off ships. Almost every river’s garbage will end up in the ocean too. Plastic garbage is the biggest problem, though. That’s because it doesn’t easily break down. It can stay in the ocean for thousands of years. Eventually, it arrives at the garbage patches (垃圾带).
Question: Does this mean that ocean garbage is worse than garbage on land ?
Answer: Litter in the ocean is probably just as bad as litter in a forest or a park. The main problem in either place is that, if animals eat plastic pieces, they can become very ill. But we know how to solve the problem: Just stop polluting!
Question: Many persons love tossing a message in a bottle into the ocean. Is that a bad idea ?
Answer: Finding a bottle with a message in it is awesome, very special! But most bottles will never end up on a beach. They’ll turn up in the garbage patches, where it’s unlikely that someone will find them. If you want to play with ocean currents, go to the website and release virtual bottles. That way, you’re not littering our oceans.
1. Animals can become very ill if they _______________.
A.turn up in the garbage patches. | B.arrive at the garbage patches. |
C.eat plastic pieces. | D.play with bottles. |
A.educative. | B.useful. | C.interesting. | D.meaningless. |
A.story. | B.poem. | C.scientific article. | D.television interview. |
Nowadays, our living conditions are becoming increasingly serious owing to the destruction of our environment. Many plants and
It is obvious that there are many reasons
Personally, I hold the view that effective measures must be taken
8 . The Dutch inventor Boyan Slat spends a lot of time thinking about the ocean.
After five and a half years of hard work, the 23-year-old Slat will watch from dry land as System 001 — a floating barrier nearly 2, 000ft long — snakes (曲折前行) its way out under the Golden Gate Bridge into the Pacific.
If all goes to plan, Slat says, a group of 60 systems could reduce the amount of plastic there by half by 2025. “I hope that this will be a turning point for the plastic pollution problem,” Slat tells TIME in a phone interview. “For sixty years it has only gotten worse and worse. Now hopefully we’re going to make a difference.”
Saving our oceans has been Slat’s single-minded goal ever since he was 16 years old, when a trip to Greece provided more plastic bag sightings than fish. Coming up with the idea for a floating barrier that could collect plastic using the power of ocean currents (洋流) alone, Slat founded his business, The Ocean Cleanup, aged just 18.
The idea caught people’s imagination around the world. In 2015, an early design of System 001 was featured on TIME’s list of the best inventions of 2015. The project has received millions of dollars of funding thanks to fast-changing public opinion on plastic.
Slat sees his mission as a race against time. Plastic gradually breaks down into smaller and smaller pieces called microplastics which can finally enter the food chain. “So the sooner we get it out, the better,” Slat says.
A big question that remains is what will happen to the plastic once it is brought back to land from The Ocean Cleanup’s systems. It’s possible that lots of the waste returned to land will be recycled into more single-use plastics that might one day return to the oceans again. “Big problems require big solutions,” he says. “If anyone has any better ideas, we’d love to know.”
1. What can Slat’s invention System 001 be used for?A.Cleaning up ocean plastic. |
B.Keeping a beach dry and clean. |
C.Transporting passengers by sea. |
D.Protecting living things in the Pacific. |
A.He has a good head for business. |
B.He is good at selling his idea to the media. |
C.He has a deep sense of social responsibility. |
D.He wants to change public opinion on the ocean. |
A.It received great technical support worldwide. |
B.It was unacceptable to fishermen. |
C.It came into use very soon. |
D.It was highly rated. |
A.Making his invention available to the public. |
B.How to deal with the collected plastic waste. |
C.Recycling the waste created by his invention. |
D.How to get more funding from the government. |
downtown | jam | suit | greenhouse gases |
public transport | complain | anger | get stuck in traffic |
Mary: Morning, Martin. Well, I cycle so I don’t
Martin: Well, I don’t cycle but I do take
Mary: Public transport is also a good way to help reduce the level of
Martin: I know so many people who
Mary. That kind of attitude is common but I think more and more people are beginning to do something which
10 . A Plastic Ocean is a film to make you think.Think,and then act.We need to take action on our dependence on plastic.We’ve been producing plastic in huge quantities.Drinking bottles,shopping bags and even clothes are made with plastic.
The film begins as a journey to film the largest animal on the planet,the blue whale.But during the journey the filmmakers make the shocking discovery of a huge,thick layer of plastic floating in the Indian Ocean.
In the film there are beautiful shots of the seas and marine life.
They present short-term and long-term solutions.These include avoiding plastic containers and recycling as much as you can.The filmmakers also stress the need for governments to work more on recycling programmes.
We make a shocking amount of plastic.Over 300 million tons of plastic are produced every year,and at least 8 million of those are dumped into the oceans.The results are disastrous,but it isn’t too late to change.
A.This causes them to travel around the world to look at other affected areas. |
B.Once you’ve seen the film,you’ll realize it is time to do our part. |
C.It has raised public concern all over the world. |
D.We live in a world full of plastic,and only a small amount is recycled. |
E.But the film doesn’t only present the negative side. |
F.In conclusion,we only have one earth to live on. |
G.These are contrasted with dumps of plastic rubbish. |