单选题Our enthusiasm differs from that of young men only _______ it is less demonstrative—still, we would have its existence acknowledged.A but that B so that C in that D provided that

When we discuss the English language,we illuminate our weaknesses,prejudices and ambitions.Language creates communities,and some of these are solidarities of complainers and pedants.A statement about proper English is a statement not only about the language,but also about people-about who the proper English are,or just about who the proper users of English are.Typically,the celebrants and defenders of proper English are celebrating or defending something other than language.Where does our sense of the sproper'come from?In arguing about what is right and what wrong in any language,we appeal to authority.This authority is embodied in academies,the Ministry of Education（or its equivalent）and universities,as well as in the pronouncements of people who have appointed themselves authorities and have become known as such.We commonly accept these judges'pronouncements.There are also geographical criteria.These are evident in statements such as'Natives of Perugia speak the best Italian'or'People in Alsace have funny accents'.Typically,we feel that there are certain environments in which our language is decently used,and we favour the usage that obtains there.（48）Sometimes,too,we defer to the example of a significant literary figure,saying that so-and-so is a model of correctness.A broader view is that'correct English is that which is used by the best writers',but who are they,and what are the criteria for their being so esteemed?The definition tends to be circular:the best writers are the ones who best use the resources of English.When we appeal to aesthetics,our arguments become vague.The aesthetically sensitive arbiter will argue that whatever is beautiful in language is good.（49）The problem here would seem to be that the desire for beautiful language concentrates on language as an object-on the sensory pleasure it affords rather than on what it signifies.Besides,as we know from our observation of others,the constant pursuit of beauty can be embarrassing.Alternatively,we may claim that the most elegant usage is that of the social elite.Perhaps this now seems an absurd position,but not long ago it would have been perfectly normal.The democratic option is to say that all doubtful matters should be decided by ballot,or just to say that the majority is right.We also appeal to logic.（50）Although there are discrepancies between logic and the ways we use language,we frequently use arguments from logic（or from what we imagine to be logic）in order to justify our choice of words or find fault with others'choices.In practice we tend to find our usual practices logical and anything else illogical.'Logic'is often a mask for arrogance and extreme patriotism.

Text 3 Up until a few decades ago,our visions of the future were largely-though by no means uniformly-glowingly positive.Science and technology would cure all the ills of humanity,leading to lives of fulfillment and opportunity for all.Now utopia has grown unfashionable,as we have gained a deeper appreciation of the range of threats facing us,from asteroid strike to epidemic flu and to climate change.You might even be tempted to assume that humanity has little future to look forward to.But such gloominess is misplaced.The fossil record shows that many species have endured for millions of years-so why shouldn't we?Take a broader look at our species'place in the universe,and it becomes clear that we have an excellent chance of surviving for tens,if not hundreds,of thousands of years.Look up Homo sapiens in the"Red List"of threatened species of the International Union for the Conversation of Nature（IUCN）,and you will read:"Listed as Least Concern as the species is very widely distributed,adaptable,currently increasing,and there are no major threats resulting in an overall population decline."So what does our deep future hold?A growing number of researchers and organisations are now thinking seriously about that question.For example,the Long Now Foundation has its flagship project a medical clock that is designed to still be marking time thousands of years hence.Perhaps willfully,it may be easier to think about such lengthy timescales than about the more immediate future.The potential evolution of today's technology,and its social consequences,is dazzlingly complicated,and it's perhaps best left to science fiction writers and futurologists to explore the many possibilities we can envisage.That's one reason why we have launched Arc,a new publication dedicated to the near future.But take a longer view and there is a surprising amount that we can say with considerable assurance.As so often,the past holds the key to the future:we have now identified enough of the long-term patterns shaping the history of the planet,and our species,to make evidence-based forecasts about the situations in which our descendants will find themselves.This long perspective makes the pessimistic view of our prospects seem more likely to be a passing fad.To be sure,the future is not all rosy.But we are now knowledgeable enough to reduce many of the risks that threatened the existence of earlier humans,and to improve the lot of those to come.31.Our vision of the future used to be inspired by

A.our desire for lives of fulfillment
B.our faith in science and technology
C.our awareness of potential risks
D.our belief in equal opportunity

One day a man found a cocoon （茧） of a butterfly in the forest. He sat there for several
hours and watched the butterfly. Suddenly a small opening appeared, and the butterfly made its great effort to force its body through that little hole. Then it seemed to stop making any progress. It appeared as if it had gotten as far as it could and it could go no further.
So the man decided to help the butterfly. He cut off the remaining bit of the cocoon so that the butterfly could come our easily. But to his surprise, the butterfly got a heavy body and very small wings when it came out of the cocoon.
The man continued to watch the butterfly because he expected that the body would grow smaller at any moment and the wings would become larger and be able to fly. But neither happened! In fact, the butterfly spent the rest of its life crawling （爬） around with a heavy body and small wings. It was never able to fly.
The man was in his kindness, but he did not understand the nature rules.
Before the butterfly came out of the cocoon, fluid （流体） from its body must be forced into its wings, and then it would be ready for flying. It must have a hard struggle （拼搏） to get through the small opening to get its freedom from the cocoon.
Sometimes struggles are exactly what we need in our life. If God allowed us to go through our life without any difficulties, it would make us fail. We would not be as strong as we could have been; we could never fly.

What do you think of the man?

A. Patient but cruel.
B. Careful and wise.
C. Kind but unwise.
D. Brave and funny.

One day a man found a cocoon （茧） of a butterfly in the forest. He sat there for several
hours and watched the butterfly. Suddenly a small opening appeared, and the butterfly made its great effort to force its body through that little hole. Then it seemed to stop making any progress. It appeared as if it had gotten as far as it could and it could go no further.
So the man decided to help the butterfly. He cut off the remaining bit of the cocoon so that the butterfly could come our easily. But to his surprise, the butterfly got a heavy body and very small wings when it came out of the cocoon.
The man continued to watch the butterfly because he expected that the body would grow smaller at any moment and the wings would become larger and be able to fly. But neither happened! In fact, the butterfly spent the rest of its life crawling （爬） around with a heavy body and small wings. It was never able to fly.
The man was in his kindness, but he did not understand the nature rules.
Before the butterfly came out of the cocoon, fluid （流体） from its body must be forced into its wings, and then it would be ready for flying. It must have a hard struggle （拼搏） to get through the small opening to get its freedom from the cocoon.
Sometimes struggles are exactly what we need in our life. If God allowed us to go through our life without any difficulties, it would make us fail. We would not be as strong as we could have been; we could never fly.

What is the best title for the story?

A. The Love for the Cocoon
B. The Joy of Helping Each Other
C. The Lesson of the Cocoon
D. The Expectation for the Butterfly

共用题干
Who Want to Live Forever?
If your doctor could give you a drug that would let you live a healthy life for twice as long,would you take it?
The good news is that we may be drawing near to that date.Scientists have already extended the lives of flies,worms and mice in laboratories.Many now think that using genetic treatments we will soon be able to extend human life to at least 140 years.
This seems a great idea.Think of how much more time we could spend chasing our dreams,spending time with our loved ones,watching our families grow and have families of their own.
"Longer life would give us a chance to recover from our mistakes and promote long term thinking," says Dr.Gregory Stock of the University of California School of Public Health."It would also raise productivity by adding to the year we can work."
Longer lives don't just affect the people who live them.They also affect society as a whole."We have war,poverty,all sorts of issues around,and I don't think any of them would be at all helped by having people live longer,"says US bioethicist Daniel Callahan."The question is‘What will we get as a society?'I suspect it won't be a better society."
It would certainly be a very different society.People are already finding it more difficult to stay married.
Divorce rates are rising.What would happen to marriage in a society where people lived for 140 years?And what would happen to family life if 9 or 10 generations of the same family were all alive at the same time? Research into ageing may enable women to remain fertile for longer.And that raises the prospect of having 100-year-old parents,or brothers and sisters born 50 years apart.We think of an elder sibling as someone who can protect us and offer help and advice.That would be hard to do if that sibling came from a completely different generation.
Working life would also be affected,especially if the retirement age was lifted.More people would stay in work for longer.That would give us the benefits of age-skill,wisdom and good judgment.
On the other hand,more people working for longer would create greater competition for jobs.It would make it more difficult for younger people to find a job.Top posts would be dominated by the same few individuals,making career progress more difficult.And how easily would a 25 -year-old employee be able to communicate with a 1 25 -year-old boss?
Young people would be a smaller part of a society in which people lived to 140.It may be that such a society would place less importance on guiding and educating young people,and more on making life comfortable for the old.
And society would feel very different if more of its members were older.There would be more wisdom, but less energy.Young people like to move about.Old people like to sit still.Young people tend to act without thinking.Old people tend to think without acting.Young people are curious and like to cxperience different things.Old people are less enthusiastic about change.In fact,they are less,enthusiastic about everything.
The effect of anti一ageing technology is deeper than we might think.But as the science advances,we need to think about these changes now.
"If this could ever happen,then we'd better ask what kind of society we want to get,"says Daniel Callahan."We had better not go anywhere near it until we have figure those problems out."

Which of the following is implied in the sixth paragraph?
A:Marriages in the US today are quite unstable.
B:More and more people in the US today want to get married.
C:Living longer would make it easier for people to maintain their marital ties.
D:If people live longer,they would stay in marriage longer.

共用题干
第一篇

If your doctor could give you a drug that would let you live a healthy life for twice as long, would you take it?
The good news is that we may be drawing near to that date.Scientists have already extended the lives of flies,worms and mice in laboratories. Many now think that using genetic treatments we will soon be able to extend human life to at least 140 years.This seems a great idea. Think of how much more time we could spend chasing our dreams,spending time with our loved ones,watching our families grow and have families of their own.
"Longer life would give us a chance to recover from our mistakes and promote long term thinking,"says Dr Gregory Stock of the University of California School of Public Health."It would also raise productivity by adding to the year we can work."
Longer lives don't just affect the people who live them. They also affect society as a whole. "We have war,poverty,all sorts of issues around,and I don't think any of them would be at all helped by having people live longer,"says US bioethicist Daniel Callahan,"The question is what we will get as a society?I suspect it won't be a better society."
It would certainly be a very different society. People are already finding it more difficult to stay married. Divorce rates are rising. What would happen to marriage in a society where people lived for 140 years? And what would happen to family life if 9 or 10 generations of the same family were all alive at the same time?
Research into ageing may enable women to remain fertile for longer. And that raises the prospect of having 100-year-old parents,or brothers and sisters born 50 years apart. We think of an elder sibling as someone who can protect us and offer help and advice. That would be hard to do if that sibling came from a completely different generation.
Working life would also be affected,especially if the retirement age was lifted.More people would stay in work for longer. That would give us the benefits of age一skill,wisdom and good judgment.
On the other hand,more people working for longer would create greater competition for jobs. It would make it more difficult for younger people to find a job. Top posts would be dominated by the same few individuals,making career progress more difficult. And how easily would a 25-year-old employee be able to communicate with a 125-year-old boss?
Young people would be a smaller part of a society in which people lived to 140.It may be that such a society would place less importance on guiding and educating young people,and more on making life comfortable for the old.
And society would feel very different if more of its members were older. There would be more wisdom,but less energy.Young people like to move about. Old people like to sit still.Young people tend to act without thinking.Old people tend to think without acting.Young people are curious and like to experience different things.Old people are less enthusiastic about change.In fact,they are less enthusiastic about everything.
The effect of anti-ageing technology is deeper than we might think.But as the science advances,we need to think about these changes now."If this could ever happen,then we'd better ask what kind of society we want to get,"says Daniel Callahan."We had better not go anywhere near it until we have figure those problems out."

Which of the following best describes Callahan's attitude to anti-ageing technology?
A:Optimistic.
B:Pessimistic.
C:Reserved.
D:Negative.

共用题干
The Need to Remember
Some people say they have no memory at all:"I just can't remember a thing!"But of course we all have a memory.Our memory tells us who we are.Our memory helps us to make use in the present of what we have learnt in the past.
In fact we have different types of memory.For example,our visual memory helps us recall facts and places.Some people have such a strong visual memory that they can remember exactly what they have seen,for example,pages of a book,as a complete picture.
Our verbal（言语的）memory helps us remember words and figures we may have heard but not seen or written:Items of a shopping list,a chemical formula,dates,or a recipe.
With our emotional（情感的）memory, we recall situations or places where we had; strong feelings,perhaps of happiness or unhappiness. We also have special memories for smell,taste, touch and sound,and for performing physical movements.
We have two ways of storing any of these memories. Our short-term memory stores items for up to thirty seconds-enough to remember a telephone number while we dial.Our long-term mem-ory,on the other hand,may store items for a lifetime. Older people in fact have a much biter long-term memory than short-term .They may forget what they have done only a few hours ago,but have the clearest remembrance（记忆）of when they were very young.
Psychologists tell us that we only remember a few facts about our past,and that we invent the rest. It is as though we remember only the outline of a story.We then make up the details. We of-ten do this in the way we want to remember them,usually so that we appear as the heroes of our own past , or maybe victims needing sympathy（同情）.

Visual memory helps us recall a place we have been to.
A: Right
B: Wrong
C: Not mentioned

共用题干
Weight on and off the Earth We are so used to.our life on the surface of the earth that it can be quite an effort for our mind to break free of all the ideas that we take for granted.Because we can feel that things are heavy,we think of "weight"as being a fixed quality in an object,but it is not really fixed at all.If you could take a one-pound packet of butter 4,000 miles out from the earth,it would weigh only a quarter of a pound. Why would things weigh only a quarter as much as they do at the surface of the earth if we took them 4,000 miles out into space?The reason is this:all objects have a natural attraction for all other objects;this is called gravitational attraction.But this power of attraction between two obects gets weaker as they get farther apart.When the butter was at the surface of the earth,it was 4,000 miles from the center.When we took the butter 4,000 miles out,it was 8,000 miles from the center,which is twice the distance.If you double the distance between two objects,their gravitational attraction decreases two times two.If you treble the distance, it gets nine times weaker(three times three)and so on. So this is one of the first things we need to remember that the weight of an object in space is not the same as its weight on the surface of the earth. What about the weight of our pound of butter on the surface of the moon?At the distance the puii of the earth is about 4,000 times smaller than it is here on the surface,so we can forget all about the earth-pull on our butter. On the other hand,on the moon there will be an attraction between the butter and the moon,but the butter will weigh only about one-sixth as much as it does on the earth.This is because the moon is so much smaller than the earth.The amount of gravitational pull that a body produces depends on the amount of material in it.A packet of butter has a gravitational pull of its own;but this is very small in relation to the pull of something as large as the moon,or the earth,or the sun.

How much would four pounds of tea weigh if it was taken 4,000 miles out from the surface of the earth?
A:1 pound.
B:2 pounds.
C:3 pounds.
D:4 pounds.

共用题干
The Need to Remember
Some people say they have no memory at all:"I just can't remember a thing!"But of course we all have a memory.Our memory tells us who we are.Our memory helps us to make use in the present of what we have learnt in the past.
In fact we have different types of memory.For example,our visual memory helps us recall facts and places.Some people have such a strong visual memory that they can remember exactly what they have seen,for example,pages of a book,as a complete picture.
Our verbal（言语的）memory helps us remember words and figures we may have heard but not seen or written:Items of a shopping list,a chemical formula,dates,or a recipe.
With our emotional（情感的）memory, we recall situations or places where we had; strong feelings,perhaps of happiness or unhappiness. We also have special memories for smell,taste, touch and sound,and for performing physical movements.
We have two ways of storing any of these memories. Our short-term memory stores items for up to thirty seconds-enough to remember a telephone number while we dial.Our long-term mem-ory,on the other hand,may store items for a lifetime. Older people in fact have a much biter long-term memory than short-term .They may forget what they have done only a few hours ago,but have the clearest remembrance（记忆）of when they were very young.
Psychologists tell us that we only remember a few facts about our past,and that we invent the rest. It is as though we remember only the outline of a story.We then make up the details. We of-ten do this in the way we want to remember them,usually so that we appear as the heroes of our own past , or maybe victims needing sympathy（同情）.

Animals do not have a long-term memory.
A: Right
B: Wrong
C: Not mentioned

共用题干
Weight on and off the Earth We are so used to.our life on the surface of the earth that it can be quite an effort for our mind to break free of all the ideas that we take for granted.Because we can feel that things are heavy,we think of "weight"as being a fixed quality in an object,but it is not really fixed at all.If you could take a one-pound packet of butter 4,000 miles out from the earth,it would weigh only a quarter of a pound. Why would things weigh only a quarter as much as they do at the surface of the earth if we took them 4,000 miles out into space?The reason is this:all objects have a natural attraction for all other objects;this is called gravitational attraction.But this power of attraction between two obects gets weaker as they get farther apart.When the butter was at the surface of the earth,it was 4,000 miles from the center.When we took the butter 4,000 miles out,it was 8,000 miles from the center,which is twice the distance.If you double the distance between two objects,their gravitational attraction decreases two times two.If you treble the distance, it gets nine times weaker(three times three)and so on. So this is one of the first things we need to remember that the weight of an object in space is not the same as its weight on the surface of the earth. What about the weight of our pound of butter on the surface of the moon?At the distance the puii of the earth is about 4,000 times smaller than it is here on the surface,so we can forget all about the earth-pull on our butter. On the other hand,on the moon there will be an attraction between the butter and the moon,but the butter will weigh only about one-sixth as much as it does on the earth.This is because the moon is so much smaller than the earth.The amount of gravitational pull that a body produces depends on the amount of material in it.A packet of butter has a gravitational pull of its own;but this is very small in relation to the pull of something as large as the moon,or the earth,or the sun.

We find it hard to break free from ideas connected with living on the earth because______.
A:it demands too great an effort for us to do so
B:we are too familiar with the way things are to question the ideas
C:we have proved that those ideas are correct
D:we are so sure of ourselves that we never doubt anything on the earth

共用题干
Weight on and off the Earth We are so used to.our life on the surface of the earth that it can be quite an effort for our mind to break free of all the ideas that we take for granted.Because we can feel that things are heavy,we think of "weight"as being a fixed quality in an object,but it is not really fixed at all.If you could take a one-pound packet of butter 4,000 miles out from the earth,it would weigh only a quarter of a pound. Why would things weigh only a quarter as much as they do at the surface of the earth if we took them 4,000 miles out into space?The reason is this:all objects have a natural attraction for all other objects;this is called gravitational attraction.But this power of attraction between two obects gets weaker as they get farther apart.When the butter was at the surface of the earth,it was 4,000 miles from the center.When we took the butter 4,000 miles out,it was 8,000 miles from the center,which is twice the distance.If you double the distance between two objects,their gravitational attraction decreases two times two.If you treble the distance, it gets nine times weaker(three times three)and so on. So this is one of the first things we need to remember that the weight of an object in space is not the same as its weight on the surface of the earth. What about the weight of our pound of butter on the surface of the moon?At the distance the puii of the earth is about 4,000 times smaller than it is here on the surface,so we can forget all about the earth-pull on our butter. On the other hand,on the moon there will be an attraction between the butter and the moon,but the butter will weigh only about one-sixth as much as it does on the earth.This is because the moon is so much smaller than the earth.The amount of gravitational pull that a body produces depends on the amount of material in it.A packet of butter has a gravitational pull of its own;but this is very small in relation to the pull of something as large as the moon,or the earth,or the sun.

The main idea of this passage is
A:different weight systems in different places
B:freedom from traditional ideas
C:traveling from the earth to the moon
D:the effect of gravitation on weight

Up until a few decades ago,our visions of the future were largely-though by no means uniformly-glowingly positive.Science and technology would cure all the ills of humanity,leading to lives of fulfillment and opportunity for all.Now utopia has grown unfashionable,as we have gained a deeper appreciation of the range of threats facing us,from asteroid strike to epidemic flu and to climate change.You might even be tempted to assume that humanity has little future to look forward to.But such gloominess is misplaced.The fossil record shows that many species have endured for millions of years-so why shouldn't we?Take a broader look at our species'place in the universe,and it becomes clear that we have an excellent chance of surviving for tens,if not hundreds,of thousands of years.Look up Homo sapiens in the"Red List"of threatened species of the International Union for the Conversation of Nature（IUCN）,and you will read:"Listed as Least Concern as the species is very widely distributed,adaptable,currently increasing,and there are no major threats resulting in an overall population decline."So what does our deep future hold?A growing number of researchers and organisations are now thinking seriously about that question.For example,the Long Now Foundation has its flagship project a medical clock that is designed to still be marking time thousands of years hence.Perhaps willfully,it may be easier to think about such lengthy timescales than about the more immediate future.The potential evolution of today's technology,and its social consequences,is dazzlingly complicated,and it's perhaps best left to science fiction writers and futurologists to explore the many possibilities we can envisage.That's one reason why we have launched Arc,a new publication dedicated to the near future.But take a longer view and there is a surprising amount that we can say with considerable assurance.As so often,the past holds the key to the future:we have now identified enough of the long-term patterns shaping the history of the planet,and our species,to make evidence-based forecasts about the situations in which our descendants will find themselves.This long perspective makes the pessimistic view of our prospects seem more likely to be a passing fad.To be sure,the future is not all rosy.But we are now knowledgeable enough to reduce many of the risks that threatened the existence of earlier humans,and to improve the lot of those to come.
Which of the following would be the best title for the text?

A.Uncertainty about Our Future
B.Evolution of the Human Species
C.The Ever-bright Prospects of Mankind
D.Science,Technology and Humanity

One day a man found a cocoon （茧） of a butterfly in the forest. He sat there for several
hours and watched the butterfly. Suddenly a small opening appeared, and the butterfly made its great effort to force its body through that little hole. Then it seemed to stop making any progress. It appeared as if it had gotten as far as it could and it could go no further.
So the man decided to help the butterfly. He cut off the remaining bit of the cocoon so that the butterfly could come our easily. But to his surprise, the butterfly got a heavy body and very small wings when it came out of the cocoon.
The man continued to watch the butterfly because he expected that the body would grow smaller at any moment and the wings would become larger and be able to fly. But neither happened! In fact, the butterfly spent the rest of its life crawling （爬） around with a heavy body and small wings. It was never able to fly.
The man was in his kindness, but he did not understand the nature rules.
Before the butterfly came out of the cocoon, fluid （流体） from its body must be forced into its wings, and then it would be ready for flying. It must have a hard struggle （拼搏） to get through the small opening to get its freedom from the cocoon.
Sometimes struggles are exactly what we need in our life. If God allowed us to go through our life without any difficulties, it would make us fail. We would not be as strong as we could have been; we could never fly.

The man cut off the remaining bit of the cocoon ____.

A. to take the butterfly home
B. to help the butterfly come out easily
C. to kill the butterfly
D. to stop the butterfly growing bigger

One day a man found a cocoon （茧） of a butterfly in the forest. He sat there for several
hours and watched the butterfly. Suddenly a small opening appeared, and the butterfly made its great effort to force its body through that little hole. Then it seemed to stop making any progress. It appeared as if it had gotten as far as it could and it could go no further.
So the man decided to help the butterfly. He cut off the remaining bit of the cocoon so that the butterfly could come our easily. But to his surprise, the butterfly got a heavy body and very small wings when it came out of the cocoon.
The man continued to watch the butterfly because he expected that the body would grow smaller at any moment and the wings would become larger and be able to fly. But neither happened! In fact, the butterfly spent the rest of its life crawling （爬） around with a heavy body and small wings. It was never able to fly.
The man was in his kindness, but he did not understand the nature rules.
Before the butterfly came out of the cocoon, fluid （流体） from its body must be forced into its wings, and then it would be ready for flying. It must have a hard struggle （拼搏） to get through the small opening to get its freedom from the cocoon.
Sometimes struggles are exactly what we need in our life. If God allowed us to go through our life without any difficulties, it would make us fail. We would not be as strong as we could have been; we could never fly.

What was the butterfly doing at the beginning of the story?

A. It was trying to make a cocoon for itself.
B. It was struggling to get out of its cocoon.
C. It was flying among the trees in the forest.
D. It was crawling around quietly on the ground.

共用题干
Who Want to Live Forever?
If your doctor could give you a drug that would let you live a healthy life for twice as long,would you take it?
The good news is that we may be drawing near to that date.Scientists have already extended the lives of flies,worms and mice in laboratories.Many now think that using genetic treatments we will soon be able to extend human life to at least 140 years.
This seems a great idea.Think of how much more time we could spend chasing our dreams,spending time with our loved ones,watching our families grow and have families of their own.
"Longer life would give us a chance to recover from our mistakes and promote long term thinking," says Dr.Gregory Stock of the University of California School of Public Health."It would also raise productivity by adding to the year we can work."
Longer lives don't just affect the people who live them.They also affect society as a whole."We have war,poverty,all sorts of issues around,and I don't think any of them would be at all helped by having people live longer,"says US bioethicist Daniel Callahan."The question is‘What will we get as a society?'I suspect it won't be a better society."
It would certainly be a very different society.People are already finding it more difficult to stay married.
Divorce rates are rising.What would happen to marriage in a society where people lived for 140 years?And what would happen to family life if 9 or 10 generations of the same family were all alive at the same time? Research into ageing may enable women to remain fertile for longer.And that raises the prospect of having 100-year-old parents,or brothers and sisters born 50 years apart.We think of an elder sibling as someone who can protect us and offer help and advice.That would be hard to do if that sibling came from a completely different generation.
Working life would also be affected,especially if the retirement age was lifted.More people would stay in work for longer.That would give us the benefits of age-skill,wisdom and good judgment.
On the other hand,more people working for longer would create greater competition for jobs.It would make it more difficult for younger people to find a job.Top posts would be dominated by the same few individuals,making career progress more difficult.And how easily would a 25 -year-old employee be able to communicate with a 1 25 -year-old boss?
Young people would be a smaller part of a society in which people lived to 140.It may be that such a society would place less importance on guiding and educating young people,and more on making life comfortable for the old.
And society would feel very different if more of its members were older.There would be more wisdom, but less energy.Young people like to move about.Old people like to sit still.Young people tend to act without thinking.Old people tend to think without acting.Young people are curious and like to cxperience different things.Old people are less enthusiastic about change.In fact,they are less,enthusiastic about everything.
The effect of anti一ageing technology is deeper than we might think.But as the science advances,we need to think about these changes now.
"If this could ever happen,then we'd better ask what kind of society we want to get,"says Daniel Callahan."We had better not go anywhere near it until we have figure those problems out."

An important feature of a society in which people live a long life is that______.
A:it places more emphasis on educating the young
B:it is both wise and energetic
C:it lacks the curiosity to experiment what is new
D:it welcomes changes

共用题干
Who Want to Live Forever?
If your doctor could give you a drug that would let you live a healthy life for twice as long,would you take it?
The good news is that we may be drawing near to that date.Scientists have already extended the lives of flies,worms and mice in laboratories.Many now think that using genetic treatments we will soon be able to extend human life to at least 140 years.
This seems a great idea.Think of how much more time we could spend chasing our dreams,spending time with our loved ones,watching our families grow and have families of their own.
"Longer life would give us a chance to recover from our mistakes and promote long term thinking," says Dr.Gregory Stock of the University of California School of Public Health."It would also raise productivity by adding to the year we can work."
Longer lives don't just affect the people who live them.They also affect society as a whole."We have war,poverty,all sorts of issues around,and I don't think any of them would be at all helped by having people live longer,"says US bioethicist Daniel Callahan."The question is‘What will we get as a society?'I suspect it won't be a better society."
It would certainly be a very different society.People are already finding it more difficult to stay married.
Divorce rates are rising.What would happen to marriage in a society where people lived for 140 years?And what would happen to family life if 9 or 10 generations of the same family were all alive at the same time? Research into ageing may enable women to remain fertile for longer.And that raises the prospect of having 100-year-old parents,or brothers and sisters born 50 years apart.We think of an elder sibling as someone who can protect us and offer help and advice.That would be hard to do if that sibling came from a completely different generation.
Working life would also be affected,especially if the retirement age was lifted.More people would stay in work for longer.That would give us the benefits of age-skill,wisdom and good judgment.
On the other hand,more people working for longer would create greater competition for jobs.It would make it more difficult for younger people to find a job.Top posts would be dominated by the same few individuals,making career progress more difficult.And how easily would a 25 -year-old employee be able to communicate with a 1 25 -year-old boss?
Young people would be a smaller part of a society in which people lived to 140.It may be that such a society would place less importance on guiding and educating young people,and more on making life comfortable for the old.
And society would feel very different if more of its members were older.There would be more wisdom, but less energy.Young people like to move about.Old people like to sit still.Young people tend to act without thinking.Old people tend to think without acting.Young people are curious and like to cxperience different things.Old people are less enthusiastic about change.In fact,they are less,enthusiastic about everything.
The effect of anti一ageing technology is deeper than we might think.But as the science advances,we need to think about these changes now.
"If this could ever happen,then we'd better ask what kind of society we want to get,"says Daniel Callahan."We had better not go anywhere near it until we have figure those problems out."

All of the following are possible effects living longer might have on working life EXCEPT______.
A:communication between employers and employees would be more difficult
B:more money would be used by employers in payment of their employees
C:the job market would be more competitive
D:it would be more difficult for young people to be promoted to top positions

There are two types of death:the kind that comes so soon,and the kind that,though lamentable,at least feels age-appropriate.When someone young passes away,the blow is made worse by all the might-have-beens-what the deceased could have done,seen,and accomplished if only given more time.When the very old die,however,the loss-while still terrible for their loved ones-doesn't come with the same sense of unfulfillcd potential."It was his time"is the phrase that so ofien applies,or,"She lived a full life."But the definition of"a full life"is expanding,and the line dividing the two types of death is retreating.As life expectancies continue to change,so too will our collective ideas about death and its time-not just for talents who generation-defining songs,but also the rest of us who still have unfinished business of our own.

共用题干
Weight on and off the Earth We are so used to.our life on the surface of the earth that it can be quite an effort for our mind to break free of all the ideas that we take for granted.Because we can feel that things are heavy,we think of "weight"as being a fixed quality in an object,but it is not really fixed at all.If you could take a one-pound packet of butter 4,000 miles out from the earth,it would weigh only a quarter of a pound. Why would things weigh only a quarter as much as they do at the surface of the earth if we took them 4,000 miles out into space?The reason is this:all objects have a natural attraction for all other objects;this is called gravitational attraction.But this power of attraction between two obects gets weaker as they get farther apart.When the butter was at the surface of the earth,it was 4,000 miles from the center.When we took the butter 4,000 miles out,it was 8,000 miles from the center,which is twice the distance.If you double the distance between two objects,their gravitational attraction decreases two times two.If you treble the distance, it gets nine times weaker(three times three)and so on. So this is one of the first things we need to remember that the weight of an object in space is not the same as its weight on the surface of the earth. What about the weight of our pound of butter on the surface of the moon?At the distance the puii of the earth is about 4,000 times smaller than it is here on the surface,so we can forget all about the earth-pull on our butter. On the other hand,on the moon there will be an attraction between the butter and the moon,but the butter will weigh only about one-sixth as much as it does on the earth.This is because the moon is so much smaller than the earth.The amount of gravitational pull that a body produces depends on the amount of material in it.A packet of butter has a gravitational pull of its own;but this is very small in relation to the pull of something as large as the moon,or the earth,or the sun.

According to the passage,"weight"should be understood in the sense that
A:it is fixed if it is outside the earth's gravitational puli
B:it decreases four times when it is 4,000 miles from the earth's center
C:it varies with the change of the gravitational attraction between two objects
D:things increase in amount as they are closer to the earth's surface

共用题干
Weight on and off the Earth We are so used to.our life on the surface of the earth that it can be quite an effort for our mind to break free of all the ideas that we take for granted.Because we can feel that things are heavy,we think of "weight"as being a fixed quality in an object,but it is not really fixed at all.If you could take a one-pound packet of butter 4,000 miles out from the earth,it would weigh only a quarter of a pound. Why would things weigh only a quarter as much as they do at the surface of the earth if we took them 4,000 miles out into space?The reason is this:all objects have a natural attraction for all other objects;this is called gravitational attraction.But this power of attraction between two obects gets weaker as they get farther apart.When the butter was at the surface of the earth,it was 4,000 miles from the center.When we took the butter 4,000 miles out,it was 8,000 miles from the center,which is twice the distance.If you double the distance between two objects,their gravitational attraction decreases two times two.If you treble the distance, it gets nine times weaker(three times three)and so on. So this is one of the first things we need to remember that the weight of an object in space is not the same as its weight on the surface of the earth. What about the weight of our pound of butter on the surface of the moon?At the distance the puii of the earth is about 4,000 times smaller than it is here on the surface,so we can forget all about the earth-pull on our butter. On the other hand,on the moon there will be an attraction between the butter and the moon,but the butter will weigh only about one-sixth as much as it does on the earth.This is because the moon is so much smaller than the earth.The amount of gravitational pull that a body produces depends on the amount of material in it.A packet of butter has a gravitational pull of its own;but this is very small in relation to the pull of something as large as the moon,or the earth,or the sun.

We do not feel the gravitational pull of a packet of butter because
A:it is too small to have a gravitational pull of its own
B:its puil is so small that we tend to ignore it
C:its pui1 disappears in the presence of the earth's gravitation
D:it tends to melt and loses its gravitational puli

共用题干
The Need to Remember
Some people say they have no memory at all:"I just can't remember a thing!"But of course we all have a memory.Our memory tells us who we are.Our memory helps us to make use in the present of what we have learnt in the past.
In fact we have different types of memory.For example,our visual memory helps us recall facts and places.Some people have such a strong visual memory that they can remember exactly what they have seen,for example,pages of a book,as a complete picture.
Our verbal（言语的）memory helps us remember words and figures we may have heard but not seen or written:Items of a shopping list,a chemical formula,dates,or a recipe.
With our emotional（情感的）memory, we recall situations or places where we had; strong feelings,perhaps of happiness or unhappiness. We also have special memories for smell,taste, touch and sound,and for performing physical movements.
We have two ways of storing any of these memories. Our short-term memory stores items for up to thirty seconds-enough to remember a telephone number while we dial.Our long-term mem-ory,on the other hand,may store items for a lifetime. Older people in fact have a much biter long-term memory than short-term .They may forget what they have done only a few hours ago,but have the clearest remembrance（记忆）of when they were very young.
Psychologists tell us that we only remember a few facts about our past,and that we invent the rest. It is as though we remember only the outline of a story.We then make up the details. We of-ten do this in the way we want to remember them,usually so that we appear as the heroes of our own past , or maybe victims needing sympathy（同情）.

Visual memory may be used when we read a story.
A: Right
B: Wrong
C: Not mentioned

共用题干
The Need to Remember
Some people say they have no memory at all:"I just can't remember a thing!"But of course we all have a memory.Our memory tells us who we are.Our memory helps us to make use in the present of what we have learnt in the past.
In fact we have different types of memory.For example,our visual memory helps us recall facts and places.Some people have such a strong visual memory that they can remember exactly what they have seen,for example,pages of a book,as a complete picture.
Our verbal（言语的）memory helps us remember words and figures we may have heard but not seen or written:Items of a shopping list,a chemical formula,dates,or a recipe.
With our emotional（情感的）memory, we recall situations or places where we had; strong feelings,perhaps of happiness or unhappiness. We also have special memories for smell,taste, touch and sound,and for performing physical movements.
We have two ways of storing any of these memories. Our short-term memory stores items for up to thirty seconds-enough to remember a telephone number while we dial.Our long-term mem-ory,on the other hand,may store items for a lifetime. Older people in fact have a much biter long-term memory than short-term .They may forget what they have done only a few hours ago,but have the clearest remembrance（记忆）of when they were very young.
Psychologists tell us that we only remember a few facts about our past,and that we invent the rest. It is as though we remember only the outline of a story.We then make up the details. We of-ten do this in the way we want to remember them,usually so that we appear as the heroes of our own past , or maybe victims needing sympathy（同情）.

Generally we remember only a few facts about the past.
A: Right
B: Wrong
C: Not mentioned

The water we drink and use is running short in the world.We all have to learn how to stop wasting our limited water.One of the steps we should take is to find ways of reusing it.Experiments have already been done in this field.
Today in most large cities,fresh water is used only once,then it runs into waste system.But it is possible to pipe the used water to a purifying factory.There it can be filtered and treated with chemicals so that it can be used again,just as it were fresh from a spring.
But even if every large city purified and reused its water,we still would not have enough.Then we could turn to the oceans.All we’d have to do to make use of the seawater on earth is to get rid of the salt.This process is called desalinization,and it is already in use in many parts of the world.
The way to stop wasting our limited water is to________.

A.do experiments with water
B.purify the used water and reuse it
C.use fresh water once again
D.make use of seawater