专家解析大学英语四级考试历年阅读真题(九)

　　本题问关于女性教育，作者说了什么。文章全篇均是对女性教育的论述，不能肯定问题的答案出自哪一个特别的自然段。因此需要使用排除法来把错误选项逐个排除。

　　A，它应比其他社会问题得到更多的关注。通读全篇可知，作者是从经济学角度来讨论女性教育问题，附带提到了它的社会效应(第三段)，但始终把它和其他社会问题进行对比。因此A的说法不对。

　　B，在许多发展中国家它正受到优先照顾。文中所表达的意思与B的说法恰好相反，在许多发展中国家，女性教育根本得不到重视。

　　C，它能比其他已知的投资产出更多的回报。这是文章论述的中心思想。

　　D，它已经引起越来越多的经济学家的兴趣。文中提到经济学家的地方只有第一段的一处：Women’s education may be unusual territory for economists，意思是女性教育问题对于经济学家来说或许是个陌生的领域。除此之外再无相关的论述，由此可见D的说法没有着落点。

　　30. The passage mainly discusses ________.

　　A) unequal treatment of boys and girls in developing countries

　　B) the potential earning power of well-educated women

　　C) the major contributions of educated women to society

　　D) the economic and social benefits of educating women(D)

　　题目问文章主要讨论的是什么。根据前文的分析，文章的主要讨论的问题应该是女性教育所带来的经济利益。

　　A， 发展中国家男孩和女孩受到不平等的对待。本文讨论的重心在于女孩，不能把男孩和女孩等量齐观。另外文章讨论的是女孩在教育上的不公平问题，这里没有把问题具体化。

　　B， 受过良好教育的女性的赚钱潜力。文章第三段提到An educated mother, on the other hand, has greater earning abilities outside the home，意思是受过教育的女性在社会上赚钱的能力较强。不过以此作为全文的论述核心则有不妥，因为这个说法所涵盖的范围过于狭窄，局限于赚钱能力本身，应当上升到女性教育问题的高度。

　　C， 受教育女性对社会的主要贡献。这一说法较为宽泛，文中所述的受教育女性对社会的贡献主要在于家庭内部，如少生孩子，重视孩子健康，重视下一代女性的教育问题，形成女性教育的良性循环等。C的说法是受教育女性对社会的“主要”贡献，按照常理，其主要贡献肯定绝不止于文中所述。

　　D， 女性教育所带来的经济和社会利益。女性教育所带来的经济利益，这一说法没有问题，它是全文论述的核心。而在文章第三段也附带说了重视女性教育所带来的社会效应，所以这一说法全面地概括了文章讨论的主要问题。

　　Passage Three

　　Questions 31 to 35 are based on the following passage.

　　Speeding off in a stolen car, the thief thinks he has got a great catch. But he is in for an unwelcome surprise. The car is fitted with a remote immobiliser (锁止器), and a radio signal from a control centre miles away will ensure that once the thief switches the engine off, he will not be able to start it again.

　　The idea goes like this. A control box fitted to the car contains a mini-cellphone, a micro-processor and memory, and a GPS (全球定位系统) satellite positioning receiver. If the car is stolen, a coded cellphone signal will tell the control centre to block the vehicle’s engine management system and prevent the engine being restarted.

　　In the UK, a set of technical fixes is already making life harder for car thieves. ‘The pattern of vehicle crime has changed,’ says Martyn Randall, a security expert. He says it would only take him a few minutes to teach a person how to steal a car, using a bare minimum of tools. But only if the car is more than 10 years old.

　　Modern cars are far tougher to steal, as their engine management computer won’t allow them to start unless they receive a unique ID code beamed out by the ignition (点火) key. In the UK, technologies like this have helped achieve a 31% drop in vehicle-related crime since 1997.

　　But determined criminals are still managing to find other ways to steal cars, often by getting bold of the owner’s keys. And key theft is responsible for 40% of the thefts of vehicles fitted with a tracking system.

　　If the car travels 100 metres without the driver confirming their ID, the system will send a signal to an operations centre that it has been stolen. The hundred metres minimum avoids false alarms due to inaccuracies in the GPS signal.

　　Staff at the centre will then contact the owner to confirm that the car really is missing, and keep police informed of the vehicle’s movements via the car’s GPS unit.