考研前30天英语成功试卷试卷2

Section I Use of English
Directions:
Read the following text. Choose the best word (s) for each numbered blank and mark A, B, C or D on ANSWER SHEET 1. (10 points)

　　What’s your earliest childhood memory? Can you remember learning to walk? Or talk? The first time you 21 thunder or watched a television program? Adults seldom 22 events much earlier than the year or so before entering school, just as children younger than three of four 23 retain any specific, personal experiences. A variety of explanations have been 24 by psychologists for this “Childhood amnesia” (儿童失忆症). One argues that the hippocampus, the region of the brain which is responsible for forming memories, does not mature 25 about the age of two. But the most popular theory 26 that, since adults do not think like children, they cannot 27 childhood memories. Adults think in words, and their life memories are like stories or 28 –one event follows 29 as in a novel or film. But when they search through their mental 30 for early childhood memories to add to this verbal life story, they don’t find any that fits the 31 . It’s like trying to find a Chinese word in an English Dictionary.

　　Now psychologist Annette Simmons of the New York State University offers a new 32 for childhood amnesia. She argues that there simply 33 any early childhood memories to recall. According to Dr. Simms, children need to learn to use 34 spoken description of their personal experiences in order to turn their own short–term, quickly 35 impressions of them into long-term memories. In other 36 , children have to talk about their experiences and hear others talk about 37 ——Mother talking about the afternoon 38 looking for seashells at the beach or Dad asking them about their day at Ocean Park. Without this 39 reinforcement, says Dr. Simms, children cannot form 40 memories of their personal experiences.

1. A. listened B. felt C. touched D. heard

2. A. involve B. interpret C. recall D. resolve

3. A. largely B. rarely C. merely D. really

4. A. canceled B. figured C. proposed D. witnessed

5. A. until B. once C. after D. since

6. A. magnifies B. intervenes C. contains D. maintains

7. A. reflect B. attain C. access D. refer

8. A. narratives B. forecasts C. regulations D. descriptions

9. A. the rest B. another C. the other D. others

10. A. outputs B. dreams C. flashes D. files

11. A. footstep B. pattern C. frame D. landscape

12. A. emphasis B. arrangement C. explanation D. factor

13. A. aren’t B. weren’t C. isn’t D. wasn’t

14. A. anyone else B. anyone else’s C. some else D. someone else’s

15. A. forgotten B. remembered C. forgetting D. remembering

16. A. senses B. cases C. words D. means

17. A. him B. theirs C. it D. them

18. A. used B. chosen C. taken D. spent

19. A. habitual B. verbal C. pretty D. mutual

20. A. permanent B. conscious C. subordinate D. spiritual

Section II Reading Comprehension
Part A
Directions:
Read the following four texts. Answer the questions below each text by choosing A, B, C or D. Mark your answers on ANAWER SHEET 1 (40 points)

Text 1

　　St. Paul didn’t like it. Moses warned his people against it. Hesiod declared it “ mischievious” and “ hard to get rid of it,” but Oscar Wilder said, “ Gossip is charming.”

　　“ History is merely gossip,” he wrote in one of his famous plays. “ But scandal is gossip made tedious by morality.”

　　In times past, under Jewish law, gossipmongers might be fined or flogged. The Puritans put them in stocks or ducking stools, but no punishment seemed to have the desired effect of preventing gossip, which has continued uninterrupted across the back fences of the centuries.

　　Today, however, the much-maligned human foible is being looked at in a different light. Psychologists, sociologists, philosophers, even evolutionary biologists are concluding that gossip may not be so bad after all.

　　Gossip is “ an intrinsically valuable activity,” philosophy professor Aaron Ben-Ze’ev states in a book he has edited, entitled Good Gossip. For one thing, gossip helps us acquire information that we need to know that doesn’t come through ordinary channels, such as: “ What was the real reason so-and-so was fired from the office?” Gossip also is a form of social bonding, Dr. Ben-Ze’ev says. It is “ a kind of sharing” that also “ satisfies the tribal need---namely, the need to belong to and be accepted by a unique group.” What’s more, the professor notes, “ Gossip is enjoyable.”

　　Another gossip groupie, Dr. Ronald De Sousa, a professor of philosophy at the University of Toronto, describes gossip basically as a form of indiscretion and a “saintly virtue”, by which he means that the knowledge spread by gossip will usually end up being slightly beneficial. “ It seems likely that a world in which all information were universally available would be preferable to a world where immense power resides in the control of secrets,” he writes.

　　Still, everybody knows that gossip can have its ill effects, especially on the poor wretch being gossiped about. And people should refrain from certain kinds of gossip that might be harmful, even though the ducking stool is long out of fashion.

　　By the way, there is also an interesting strain of gossip called medical gossip, which in its best form, according to researchers Jerry M. Suls and Franklin Goodkin, can motivate people with symptoms of serious illness, but who are unaware of it, to seek medical help.

　　So go ahead and gossip. But remember, if ( as often is the case among gossipers) you should suddenly become one of the gossipees instead, it is best to employ the foolproof defense recommended by Plato, who may have learned the lesson from Socrates, who as you know was the victim of gossip spread that he was corrupting the youth of Athens: When men speak ill of thee, so live that nobody will believe them. Or, as Will Rogers said, “ Live so that you wouldn’t be ashamed to sell the family parrot to the town gossip.” (500 words )

21. Persons’ remarks are mentioned at the beginning of the text to ____.
[ A ] show the general disapproval of gossip
[ B ] introduce the topic of gossip
[ C ] examine gossip from a historical perspective
[ D ] prove the real value of gossip

22. By “Gossip also is a form of social bonding” (Para. 5), Professor Aaron Ben-Ze’ev means gossip ____.
[ A ] is a valuable source of social information
[ B ] produces a joy that most people in society need
[ C ] brings people the feel of being part of a group
[ D ] satisfies people’s need of being unusual

23. Which of the following statements is true according to the text?
[ A ] everyone involved will not benefit from gossip
[ B ] philosophers may hold different attitudes toward gossip
[ C ] Dr. Ronald De Sousa regards gossips as perfectly advantageous
[ D ] people are generally not conscious of the value of medical gossip

24. We learn from the last paragraph that ____.
[ A ] gossipers will surely become gossipees someday
[ B ] Socrates was a typical example of a gossiper becoming a gossipee
[ C ] Plato escaped being a victim of gossip by no gossiping
[ D ] an easy way to confront gossip when subjected to it is to live as usual

25. The author’s attitude toward “ gossip” can be best described as ____.
[ A ] neutral [ B ] positive
[ C ] negative [ D ] indifferent

Text 2

　　SoBig.F was the more visible of the two recent waves of infection because it propagated itself by e-mail, meaning that victims noticed what was going on. SoBig.F was so effective that it caused substantial disruption even to those protected by anti-virus software. That was because so many copies of the virus spread (some 500,000 computers were infected) that many machines were overwhelmed by messages from their own anti-virus software. On top of that, one common counter-measure backfired, increasing traffic still further. Anti-virus software often bounces a warning back to the sender of an infected e-mail, saying that the e-mail in question cannot be delivered because it contains a virus. SoBig.F was able to spoof this system by “harvesting” e-mail addresses from the hard disks of infected computers. Some of these addresses were then sent infected e-mails that had been doctored to look as though they had come from other harvested addresses. The latter were thus sent warnings, even though their machines may not have been infected.

　　Kevin Haley of Symantec, a firm that makes anti-virus software, thinks that one reason SoBig.F was so much more effective than other viruses that work this way is because it was better at searching hard-drives for addresses. Brian King, of CERT, an internet-security centre at Carnegie-Mellon University in Pittsburgh, notes that, unlike its precursors, SoBig.F was capable of “multi-threading”: it could send multiple e-mails simultaneously, allowing it to dispatch thousands in minutes.

　　Blaster worked by creating a “buffer overrun in the remote procedure call”. In English, that means it attacked a piece of software used by Microsoft's Windows operating system to allow one computer to control another. It did so by causing that software to use too much memory.
Most worms work by exploiting weaknesses in an operating system, but whoever wrote Blaster had a particularly refined sense of humour, since the website under attack was the one from which users could obtain a program to fix the very weakness in Windows that the worm itself was exploiting.

　　One way to deal with a wicked worm like Blaster is to design a fairy godmother worm that goes around repairing vulnerable machines automatically. In the case of Blaster someone seems to have tried exactly that with a program called Welchi. However, according to Mr Haley, Welchi has caused almost as many problems as Blaster itself, by overwhelming networks with “pings”—signals that checked for the presence of other computers.

　　Though both of these programs fell short of the apparent objectives of their authors, they still caused damage. For instance, they forced the shutdown of a number of computer networks, including the one used by the New York Times newsroom, and the one organising trains operated by CSX, a freight company on America's east coast.

　　Computer scientists expect that it is only a matter of time before a truly devastating virus is unleashed.

26. SoBig.F damaged computer programs mainly by ____.
[A] sending them an overpowering number of messages
[B] harvesting the addresses stored in the computers
[C] infecting the computers with an invisible virus
[D] destroying the anti-virus software of the computers

27. Which of the following best defines the word “ doctored” (line , para. 1) ?
[A] falsified [B] cured
[C] deceived [D] diagnosed

28. Compared with SoBig.F, Blaster was a virus that was _____.
[A] more destructive
[B] more humorous
[C] less vulnerable
[D] less noticeable

29. From the text we learn that Welchi ____.
[A] is a wicked worm causing as many damages as Blaster did
[B] is a program designed by Haley to detect worms like Blaster
[C] is a program intended to fix the infected machines
[D] is a worm meant to defeat the virus with “ pings”

30. The tone of the text can best described as _____.
[A] optimistic and humorous
[B] analytical but concerned
[C] passionate but pessimistic
[D] scholarly and cautious

Text 3

　　European farm ministers have ended three weeks of negotiations with a deal which they claim represents genuine reform of the common agricultural policy(CAP). Will it be enough to kickstart the Doha world trade negotiations?

　　On the face of it, the deal agreed in the early hours of Thursday June 26th looks promising. Most subsidies linked to specific farm products are, at last, to be broken—the idea is to replace these with a direct payment to farmers, unconnected to particular products. Support prices for several key products, including milk and butter, are to be cut—that should mean European prices eventually falling towards the world market level. Cutting the link between subsidy and production was the main objective of proposals put forward by Mr Fischler, which had formed the starting point for the negotiations.

　　The CAP is hugely unpopular around the world. It subsidises European farmers to such an extent that they can undercut farmers from poor countries, who also face trade barriers that largely exclude them from the potentially lucrative European market. Farm trade is also a key feature of the Doha round of trade talks, launched under the auspices of the World Trade Organisation (WTO) in November 2001. Developing countries have lined up alongside a number of industrial countries to demand an end to the massive subsidies Europe pays its farmers. Several Doha deadlines have already been missed because of the EU’s intransigence, and the survival of the talks will be at risk if no progress is made by September, when the world's trade ministers meet in Cancùn, Mexico.

　　But now even the French seem to have gone along with the deal hammered out in Luxembourg. Up to a point, anyway. The package of measures gives the green light for the most eager reformers to move fast to implement the changes within their own countries. But there is an escape clause of sorts for the French and other reform-averse nations. They can delay implementation for up to two years. There is also a suggestion that the reforms might not apply where there is a chance that they would lead to a reduction in land under cultivation.

　　These let-outs are potentially damaging for Europe’s negotiators in the Doha round. They could significantly reduce the cost savings that the reforms might otherwise generate and, in turn, keep European expenditure on farm support unacceptably high by world standards. More generally, the escape clauses could undermine the reforms by encouraging the suspicion that the new package will not deliver the changes that its supporters claim. Close analysis of what is inevitably a very complicated package might confirm the sceptics' fears.

31. The deal agreed on Thursday looks promising in that _____.
[A] European farm ministers finally reached a consensus
[B] the link between farm products and subsidies is removed
[C] farmers would definitely accept the direct payment to them
[D] European farm products will reach a lower price level than the world

32. It can be inferred from the third paragraph that ____.
[A] farmers from poor countries were put at a disadvantage by CAP
[B] the deal will be a key subject of debate in Doha round of trade talks
[C] the deal was probably a result of pressure from other countries
[D] the world’s trade ministers will resist the new deal reached recently

33. In what case might the escape clauses apply in reform-averse nations ?
[A] Farmers lose their interest in farming.
[B] Reforms have to be delayed for up to two years.
[C] Implementation of the measures goes too eagerly.
[D] The measures damage the reformers’ confidence.

34. The new package of measures is inevitably a complicated one due to ____.
[A] Europe’s negotiators’ loss of confidence
[B] European expenditure on farm support
[C] escape clauses for some European countries
[D] suspicion of the new package

35. What is the passage mainly about ?
[A] a promising new deal
[B] Doha world trade negotiations
[C] world’s anger against Europe
[D] doomed reforms of CAP

Text 4

　　Perhaps only a small boy training to be a wizard at the Hogwarts school of magic could cast a spell so powerful as to create the biggest book launch ever. Wherever in the world the clock strikes midnight on June 20th, his followers will flock to get their paws on one of more than 10m copies of “Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix”. Bookshops will open in the middle of the night and delivery firms are drafting in extra staff and bigger trucks. Related toys, games, DVDs and other merchandise will be everywhere. There will be no escaping Pottermania.

　　Yet Mr Potter's world is a curious one, in which things are often not what they appear. While an excitable media (hereby including The Economist, happy to support such a fine example of globalisation) is helping to hype the launch of J.K. Rowling's fifth novel, about the most adventurous thing that the publishers (Scholastic in America and Britain's Bloomsbury in English elsewhere) have organised is a reading by Ms Rowling in London's Royal Albert Hall, to be broadcast as a live webcast.

　　Hollywood, which owns everything else to do with Harry Potter, says it is doing even less. Incredible as it may seem, the guardians of the brand say that, to protect the Potter franchise, they are trying to maintain a low profile. Well, relatively low.

　　Ms Rowling signed a contract in 1998 with Warner Brothers, part of AOL Time Warner, giving the studio exclusive film, licensing and merchandising rights in return for what now appears to have been a steal: some $500,000. Warner licenses other firms to produce goods using Harry Potter characters or images, from which Ms Rowling gets a big enough cut that she is now wealthier than the queen—if you believe Britain's Sunday Times rich list. The process is self-generating: each book sets the stage for a film, which boosts book sales, which lifts sales of Potter products.

　　Globally, the first four Harry Potter books have sold some 200m copies in 55 languages; the two movies have grossed over $1.8 billion at the box office.

　　This is a stunning success by any measure, especially as Ms Rowling has long demanded that Harry Potter should not be over-commercialised. In line with her wishes, Warner says it is being extraordinarily careful, at least by Hollywood standards, about what it licenses and to whom. It imposed tough conditions on Coca-Cola, insisting that no Harry Potter images should appear on cans, and is now in the process of making its licensing programme even more restrictive. Coke may soon be considered too mass market to carry the brand at all.

　　The deal with Warner ties much of the merchandising to the films alone. There are no officially sanctioned products relating to “Order of the Phoenix”; nor yet for “Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban”, the film of the third book, which is due out in June 2004. Warner agrees that Ms Rowling's creation is a different sort of commercial property, one with long-term potential that could be damaged by a typical Hollywood marketing blitz, says Diane Nelson, the studio's global brand manager for Harry Potter. It is vital, she adds, that with more to come, readers of the books are not alienated. “The evidence from our market research is that enthusiasm for the property by fans is not waning.”

36. When the author says “there will be no escaping Pottermania”, he implies that ____.
[A] Harry Potter’s appeal for the readers is simply irresistible
[B] it is somewhat irrational to be so crazy about the magic boy
[C] craze about Harry Potter will not be over in the near future
[D] Hogwarts school of magic will be the biggest attraction world over

37. Ms Rowling’s reading in London's Royal Albert Hall is mentioned to show ____.
[A] publishers are really adventurous in managing the Potter’s business
[B] businesses involved with Potter are moving along in an unusual way
[C] the media are promoting Pottermania more actively than Hollywood
[D] businesses are actually more credible than media in Potter’s world

38. The author believes that ____.
[A] Britain's Sunday Times rich list is not very convincing as it sounds
[B] Time Warner’s management of licenses is a bit over-commercialised
[C] other firms may produce goods using Harry Potter images at will
[D] what Ms Rowling got in return for her offering to Warner is a real bargain

39. Paragraph 5 intends mainly to show Warner’s ____.
[A] determination to promote Potter
[B] consistence in conducting business
[C] high regard for Ms Rowling’s request
[D] careful restrictions on licensing to Coco-Cola

40. It can be concluded from the last paragraph that ____.
[A] products of Potter films have brought enormous profits to Warner
[B] current Hollywood’s marketing of Potter may damage its potential
[C] readers could get tired of Ms Rowling’s writings sooner or later
[D] Warner will maintain the same strategy with Potter in future

Part B

Directions:
In the following article, some sentences have been removed. For Questions 41—45, choose the most suitable one from the list A—G to fit into each of the numbered blank. There are two extra choices, which do not fit in any of the gaps. Mark your answers on ANSWER SHEET 1. (10 points)

　　The place is a lovely meadow surrounded by deep woods on a hilltop overlooking a beautiful lake in the Catskill Mountains 120 miles from New York. It is quarter past eight in the morning, and you are about to commute to your office in the city. Yet there is no paved highway nearer than fifteen miles, and it is fifty to a railroad station.

　　41) __________________________________________. The aircraft, looking oddly like a horizontal electric fan, drones toward you. When the pilot is directly overhead, all forward movement of the machine ceases and it descends vertically until the cabin door is within a foot of the ground. On the machine’s gray side is painted Helicopter Express to New York. The door opens and you step inside.

　　Fifty minutes later the helicopter bus hovers over a midtown New York building, descends slowly to alight on a roof space some sixty yards square. You go into the building, take the elevator to the street below, and walk half a block to your office. Not quite an hour has elapsed since you drank your morning coffee in your home.

42) ______________________________________.

　　In the air age of tomorrow, the manufacture, sale, and upkeep of the direct—lift machine will become a billion—dollar industry just as the automobile industry. There will be many startling changes in our way of life.

　　43) ________________________________________________. A cheap, swift helicopter bus service will ferry these people to and from their work. Suburbs will include ten thousand or more square miles. Real estate values will come within the reach of average incomes, and the people will literally return to the good earth.

　　44) _________________________________________________. But the short haul of less than 1000 miles is equally the task of the helicopter, which can do it with the greatest efficiency.

　　Express and air mail will be carried from the airports to final destination by helicopter. There will be a direct—lift machine service to take airliner passengers from the airport to the city in a few minutes. There will be special delivery of perishable food to your door.

　　The winter growth of fresh vegetables such as beans and tomatoes, celery and lettuce, in the warm South and the Far West has been hitherto restricted because of cost and time or transportation to market. The airline and helicopter freight service will speed such healthy foods to the ends of the nation.

45) __________________________________________________________..

　　[A] Most important is that hundreds of thousands of people can return to the health and beauty of the countryside. Millions of acres of hitherto inaccessible land will be developed with small homes for medium-or low-income groups.

　　[B] And a new type of architecture-perhaps a house with a flat roof and a pleasantly designed helicopter hangar to one side of it, so that you have only to wheel the machine a few feet to take off.

　　[C] Does this sound like a fantasy imagined by science fiction writers? If so, I can assure you, as a practical aeronautical engineer, that such a trip is neither fantastic nor impractical. I am convinced that a helicopter bus service is not only practicable but, in fact, inevitable.

　　[D] Hence our eating habits will change perhaps more than we realize. Strawberries in January, as it were, available for all. The airline and helicopter freight service render all this possible.

　　[E] Private and bus helicopters will make possible vacations at seashore or mountain for countless thousands. The helicopter will destroy space for millions of people. Nothing is more delightful than touring in a helicopter. To hover and fill one’s eyes with an enchanting vista is to bring joy to the soul.

　　[F] Now you hear a low hum, and over the horizon appears a flying machine. You press the button of a box nearby and a radio signal flashes to the machine.

　　[G] Long-distance transportation of passengers and freight over land and sea will definitely remain the job for the large airplane.

Part C
Directions:
Read the following text carefully and then translate the underlined segments into Chinese. Your translation should be written clearly on ANSWER SHEET 2.

　　The “standard of living” of any country means the average persons share of the goods and services which the country produces. A country’s standard of living, therefore, depends first and foremost on its capacity to produce wealth. 46) “Wealth” in this sense is not money, for we do not live on money but on things that money can buy: “goods” such as food and clothing, and “services” such as transport and entertainment.

　　A country’s capacity to produce wealth depends upon many factors, most of which have an effect on one another. Wealth depends to a great extent upon a country’s natural resources, such as coal, gold, and other minerals, water supply and so on. 47) Some regions of the world are well supplied with coal and minerals, and have a fertile soil and a favorable climate; other regions possess none of them.

　　Next to natural resources comes the ability to turn them to use. 48) Some countries are perhaps well off in natural resources, but suffered for many years from civil and external wars, and for this and other reasons have been unable to develop their resources. Sound stable political conditions, and freedom from foreign invasion, enable a country to develop its natural resources peacefully and steadily, and to produce more wealth than another country equally well served by nature but less well ordered. Another important factor is the technical efficiency of a country’s people. Industrialized countries that have trained numerous skilled workers and technicians are better placed to produce wealth than countries whose workers are largely unskilled.

　　49) A country’s standard of living does not only depend upon the wealth that is produced and consumed within its own borders, but also upon what is indirectly produced through international trade. For example, Britain’s wealth in foodstuffs and other agricultural products would be much less if she had to depend only on those grown at home. Trade makes it possible for her surplus manufactured goods to be traded abroad for the agricultural products that would otherwise be lacking. 50) A country’s wealth is, therefore, much influenced by its manufacturing capacity, provided that other countries can be found ready to accept its manufactures.

Section III Writing
Part A

51. Directions:

You have stayed with your friend Cathy for a whole week. Now you are going home. Write a message to her to
1) express your gratitude
2) show your appreciation of the good days you’ve had together
3) say goodbye

You should write about 100 words on Answer Sheet 2. Do not sign your own name at the end of the letter. Use “Susan” instead. You do not need to write the address. ( 10 points )

Part B
52. Directions:

　　Assuming that a manager is going to interview some job applicants and one of his friends gives him a piece of advice that the first impression is not a reliable basis for judgment. This manager wants to hear more from others and decides to have a wall newspaper put up for more views on that topic.

　　1. You are going to write an article to offer your opinion about it.
　　2.You should write about 160-200 words neatly on ANSWER SHEET 2.( 20 points )

考研前30天成功试卷(英语)试卷二答案详解