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Are We Moving to a Cashless Society?
Given the advantages of electronic money, you might think that we would move quickly to the cashless society in which all payments are made electronically. However, a true cashless society is probably not around the corner. Indeed, predictions of such asociety have been around for two decades but have not yet come to fruition. For example, Business Week predicted in 1975 that electronic means of payment would soon “revolutionize the very concept of money itself,” only to reverse itself several years later. Why has the movement to a cashless society been so slow in coming?
Although electronic means of payment may be more efficient than a payments system based on paper, several factors work against the disappearance of the paper system.
First, it is very expensive to set up the computer, card reader, and telecommunications networks necessary to make electronic money the dominant form of payment. Second, paper checks have the advantage that they provide receipts, something that many consumers are unwilling to give up. Third, the use of paper checks gives consumers several days of “float”-it takes several days before a check is cashed and funds are withdrawn from the issuer's account, which means that the writer of the check can earn interest on the funds in the meantime. Because electronic payments are immediate, they eliminate the float for the consumer. Fourth, electronic means of payment may raise security and privacy concerns. We often hear media reports that an unauthorized hacker has been able to access a computer database and to alter information stored there. The fact that this is not an uncommon occurrence means that unscrupulous persons might be able to access bank accounts in electronic payments systems and steal funds by moving them from someone else's accounts into their own. Indeed, this happened in 1995, when a Russian computer programmer got access to Citibank's computers and moved funds electronically into his and his conspirators' accounts. The prevention of this type of fraud is no easy task, and a whole new field of computer science is developing to cope with security issues. A further concern is that the use of electronic means of payment leaves an electronic trail that contains a large amount of personal data on buying habits. There are concerns that government, employers, and marketers might be able to access these data, thereby encroaching on our privacy.
The conclusion from this discussion seems to be that we are moving more rapidly to a payments system in which the use of paper will diminish, although it is likely to be a gradual process that may not reach fruition for 10 to 20 years.
Would a Work-Free World Be So Bad?
People have speculated for centuries about a future without work, and today is no different, with academics, writers, and activists once again warning that technology is replacing human workers. Some imagine that the coming work-free world will be defined by inequality: A few wealthy people will own all the capital, and the masses will struggle in an impoverished wasteland.
A different, less paranoid, and not mutually exclusive prediction holds that the future will be a wasteland of a different sort, one characterized by purposelessness: Without jobs to give their lives meaning, people will simply become lazy and depressed. Indeed, today’s unemployed don’t seem to be having a great time. One Gallup poll found that 20 percent of Americans who have been unemployed for at least a year report having depression, double the rate for working Americans. Also, some research suggests that the explanation for rising rates of mortality, mental-health problems, and addiction among poorly-educated, middle-aged people is a shortage of well-paid jobs. Another study shows that people are often happier at work than in their free time. Perhaps this is why many worry about the agonizing dullness of a jobless future.
But it doesn’t necessarily follow from findings like these that a world without work would be filled with malaise. Such visions are based on the downsides of being unemployed in a society built on the concept of employment. In the absence of work, a society designed with other ends in mind could yield strikingly different circumstances for the future of labor and leisure. Today, the virtue of work may be a bit overblown. “Many jobs are boring, degrading, unhealthy, and a squandering of human potential,” says John Danaher, a lecturer at the National University of Ireland in Galway who has written about a world without work. “Global surveys find that the vast majority of people are unhappy at work.”
These days, because leisure time is relatively scarce for most workers, people use their free time to counterbalance the intellectual and emotional demands of their jobs. “When I come home from a hard day’s work, I often feel tired,” Danaher says, adding, “In a world in which I don’t have to work, I might feel rather different”―perhaps different enough to throw himself into a hobby or a passion project with the intensity usually reserved for professional matters.
Having a job can provide a measure of financial stability, but in addition to stressing over how to cover life’s necessities, today’s jobless are frequently made to feel like social outcasts. “People who avoid work are viewed as parasites and leeches,” Danaher says. Perhaps as a result of this cultural attitude, for most people, self-esteem and identity are tied up intricately with their job, or lack of job.
Plus, in many modern-day societies, unemployment can also be downright boring. American towns and cities aren’t really built for lots of free time: Public spaces tend to be small islands in seas of private property, and there aren’t many places without entry fees where adults can meet new people or come up with ways to entertain one another.
The roots of this boredom may run even deeper. Peter Gray, a professor of psychology at Boston College who studies the concept of play, thinks that if work disappeared tomorrow, people might be at a loss for things to do, growing bored and depressed because they have forgotten how to play. “We teach children a distinction between play and work,” Gray explains. “Work is something that you don’t want to do but you have to do.” He says this training, which starts in school, eventually “drills the play” out of many children, who grow up to be adults who are aimless when presented with free time.
“Sometimes people retire from their work, and they don’t know what to do,” Gray says. “They’ve lost the ability to create their own activities.” It’s a problem that never seems to plague young children. “There are no three-year-olds that are going to be lazy and depressed because they don’t have a structured activity,” he says.
But need it be this way? Work-free societies are more than just a thought experiment―they’ve existed throughout human history. Consider hunter-gatherers, who have no bosses, paychecks, or eight-hour workdays. Ten thousand years ago, all humans were hunter-gatherers, and some still are. Daniel Everett, an anthropologist at Bentley University, in Massachusetts, studied a group of hunter-gathers in the Amazon called the Pirah? for years. According to Everett, while some might consider hunting and gathering work, hunter-gatherers don’t. “They think of it as fun,” he says. “They don’t have a concept of work the way we do.”
“It’s a pretty laid-back life most of the time,” Everett says. He described a typical day for the Pirah?: A man might get up, spend a few hours canoeing and fishing, have a barbecue, go for a swim, bring fish back to his family, and play until the evening. Such subsistence living is surely not without its own set of worries, but the anthropologist Marshall Sahlins argued in a 1968 essay that hunter-gathers belonged to “the original affluent society,” seeing as they only “worked” a few hours a day; Everett estimates that Pirah? adults on average work about 20 hours a week (not to mention without bosses peering over their shoulders). Meanwhile, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, the average employed American with children works about nine hours a day.
Does this leisurely life lead to the depression and purposelessness seen among so many of today’s unemployed? “I’ve never seen anything remotely like depression there, except people who are physically ill,” Everett says. “They have a blast. They play all the time.” While many may consider work a staple of human life, work as it exists today is a relatively new invention in the course of thousands of years of human culture. “We think it’s bad to just sit around with nothing to do,” says Everett. “For the Pirah?, it’s quite a desirable state.”
Gray likens these aspects of the hunter-gatherer lifestyle to the carefree adventures of many children in developed countries, who at some point in life are expected to put away childish things. But that hasn’t always been the case. According to Gary Cross’s 1990 book A Social History of Leisure Since 1600, free time in the U.S. looked quite different before the 18th and 19th centuries. Farmers―which was a fair way to describe a huge number of Americans at that time―mixed work and play in their daily lives. There were no managers or overseers, so they would switch fluidly between working, taking breaks, joining in neighborhood games, playing pranks, and spending time with family and friends. Not to mention festivals and other gatherings: France, for instance, had 84 holidays a year in 1700, and weather kept them from farming another 80 or so days a year.
This all changed, writes Cross, during the Industrial Revolution, which replaced farms with factories and farmers with employees. Factory owners created a more rigidly scheduled environment that clearly divided work from play. Meanwhile, clocks―which were becoming widespread at that time―began to give life a quicker pace, and religious leaders, who traditionally endorsed most festivities, started associating leisure with sin and tried to replace rowdy festivals with sermons.
As workers started moving into cities, families no longer spent their days together on the farm. Instead, men worked in factories, women stayed home or worked in factories, and children went to school, stayed home, or worked in factories too. During the workday, families became physically separated, which affected the way people entertained themselves: Adults stopped playing “childish” games and sports, and the streets were mostly wiped clean of fun, as middle- and upper-class families found working-class activities like cockfighting and dice games distasteful. Many such diversions were soon outlawed.
With workers’ old outlets for play having disappeared in a haze of factory smoke, many of them turned to new, more urban ones. Bars became a refuge where tired workers drank and watched live shows with singing and dancing. If free time means beer and TV to a lot of Americans, this might be why.
At times, developed societies have, for a privileged few, produced lifestyles that were nearly as play-filled as hunter-gatherers’. Throughout history, aristocrats who earned their income simply by owning land spent only a tiny portion of their time minding financial exigencies. According to Randolph Trumbach, a professor of history at Baruch College, 18th-century English aristocrats spent their days visiting friends, eating elaborate meals, hosting salons, hunting, writing letters, fishing, and going to church. They also spent a good deal of time participating in politics, without pay. Their children would learn to dance, play instruments, speak foreign languages, and read Latin. Russian nobles frequently became intellectuals, writers, and artists. “As a 17th-century aristocrat said, ‘We sit down to eat and rise up to play, for what is a gentleman but his pleasure?’” Trumbach says.
It’s unlikely that a world without work would be abundant enough to provide everyone with such lavish lifestyles. But Gray insists that injecting any amount of additional play into people’s lives would be a good thing, because, contrary to that 17th-century aristocrat, play is about more than pleasure. Through play, Gray says, children (as well as adults) learn how to strategize, create new mental connections, express their creativity, cooperate, overcome narcissism, and get along with other people. “Male mammals typically have difficulty living in close proximity to each other,” he says, and play’s harmony-promoting properties may explain why it came to be so central to hunter-gatherer societies. While most of today’s adults may have forgotten how to play, Gray doesn’t believe it’s an unrecoverable skill: It’s not uncommon, he says, for grandparents to re-learn the concept of play after spending time with their young grandchildren.
When people ponder the nature of a world without work, they often transpose present-day assumptions about labor and leisure onto a future where they might no longer apply; if automation does end up rendering a good portion of human labor unnecessary, such a society might exist on completely different terms than societies do today.
So what might a work-free U.S. look like? Gray has some ideas. School, for one thing, would be very different. “I think our system of schooling would completely fall by the wayside,” says Gray. “The primary purpose of the educational system is to teach people to work. I don’t think anybody would want to put our kids through what we put our kids through now.” Instead, Gray suggests that teachers could build lessons around what students are most curious about. Or, perhaps, formal schooling would disappear altogether.
Trumbach, meanwhile, wonders if schooling would become more about teaching children to be leaders, rather than workers, through subjects like philosophy and rhetoric. He also thinks that people might participate in political and public life more, like aristocrats of yore. “If greater numbers of people were using their leisure to run the country, that would give people a sense of purpose,” says Trumbach.
Social life might look a lot different too. Since the Industrial Revolution, mothers, fathers, and children have spent most of their waking hours apart. In a work-free world, people of different ages might come together again. “We would become much less isolated from each other,” Gray imagines, perhaps a little optimistically. “When a mom is having a baby, everybody in the neighborhood would want to help that mom.” Researchers have found that having close relationships is the number-one predictor of happiness, and the social connections that a work-free world might enable could well displace the aimlessness that so many futurists predict.
In general, without work, Gray thinks people would be more likely to pursue their passions, get involved in the arts, and visit friends. Perhaps leisure would cease to be about unwinding after a period of hard work, and would instead become a more colorful, varied thing. “We wouldn’t have to be as self-oriented as we think we have to be now,” he says. “I believe we would become more human.”
新题型
The surprising truth about American manufacturing
The decline in American manufacturing is a common refrain, particularly from Donald Trump. “We don’t make anything anymore,” he told Fox News last October, while defending his own made-in-Mexico clothing line.
On Tuesday, in rust belt Pennsylvania, he doubled down, saying that he had “visited cities and towns across this country where a third or even half of manufacturing jobs have been wiped out in the last 20 years.” The Pacific trade deal, he added, “would be the death blow for American manufacturing.”
Without question, manufacturing has taken a significant hit during recent decades, and further trade deals raise questions about whether new shocks could hit manufacturing.
But there is also a different way to look at the data.
In reality, United States manufacturing output is at an all-time high, worth $2.2 trillion in , up from $1.7 trillion in . And while total employment has fallen by nearly a third since 1970, the jobs that remain are increasingly skilled.
Across the country, factory owners are now grappling with a new challenge: Instead of having too many workers, as they did during the Great Recession, they may end up with too few. Despite trade competition and outsourcing, American manufacturing still needs to replace tens of thousands of retiring boomers every year. Millennials may not be that interested in taking their place. Other industries are recruiting them with similar or better pay. And those industries don’t have the stigma of 40 years of recurring layoffs and downsizing.
“We’ve never had so much attention from manufacturers. They’re calling and saying: ‘Can we meet your students?’ They’re asking, ‘Why aren’t they looking at my job postings?' ” says Julie Parks, executive director of workforce training at Grand Rapids Community College in western Michigan.
The region is a microcosm of the national challenge. Unemployment here is low (around 3 percent, compared with a statewide average of 5 percent). There aren’t many extra workers waiting for a job. And the need is high:1 in 5 people work in manufacturing, churning out auto parts, machinery, plastics, office furniture, and medical devices. Other industries, including agribusiness and life sciences, are vying for the same workers.
For factory owners, it all adds up to stiff competition for workers C and upward pressure on wages. “They’re harder to find and they have job offers,” says Jay Dunwell, president of Wolverine Coil Spring, a family-owned firm. “They may be coming [into the workforce], but they’ve been plucked by other industries that are also doing as well as manufacturing,”
Mr. Dunwell has begun bringing high school juniors to the factory so they can get exposed to its culture. He is also part of a public-private initiative to promote manufacturing to students that includes job fairs and sending a mobile demonstration vehicle to rural schools. One of their messages is that factories are no longer dark, dirty, and dangerous; computer-run systems are the norm and recruits can receive apprenticeships that include paid-for college classes.
At RoMan Manufacturing, a maker of electrical transformers and welding equipment that his father cofounded in 1980, Robert Roth keeps a close eye on the age of his nearly 200 workers. Five are retiring this year. Mr. Roth has three community-college students enrolled in a work-placement program, with a starting wage of $13 an hour that rises to $17 after two years.
At a worktable inside the transformer plant, young Jason Stenquist looks flustered by the copper coils he’s trying to assemble and the arrival of two visitors. It’s his first week on the job; this is his first encounter with Roth, his boss. Asked about his choice of career, he says at high school he considered medical school before switching to electrical engineering.
“I love working with tools. I love creating,” he says.
But to win over these young workers, manufacturers have to clear another major hurdle: parents, who lived through the worst US economic downturn since the Great Depression, telling them to avoid the factory. Millennials “remember their father and mother both were laid off. They blame it on the manufacturing recession,” says Birgit Klohs, chief executive of The Right Place, a business development agency for western Michigan.
These concerns aren’t misplaced: Employment in manufacturing has fallen from 17 million in 1970 to 12 million in 2015. The steepest declines came after , when China gained entry to the World Trade Organization and ramped up exports of consumer goods to the US and other rich countries. In areas exposed to foreign trade, every additional $1,000 of imports per worker meant a $550 annual drop in household income per working-age adult, according to a study in the American Economic Review. And unemployment, Social Security, and other government benefits went up $60 per person.
The -09 recession was another blow. And advances in computing and robotics offer new ways for factory owners to increase productivity using fewer workers.
When the recovery began, worker shortages first appeared in the high-skilled trades. Electricians, plumbers, and pipefitters are in in short supply across Michigan and elsewhere; vocational schools and union-run apprenticeships aren’t keeping pace with demand and older tradespeople are leaving the workforce. Now shortages are appearing at the mid-skill levels.
“The gap is between the jobs that take no skills and those that require a lot of skill,” says Rob Spohr, a business professor at Montcalm Community College an hour from Grand Rapids. “There’s enough people to fill the jobs at McDonalds and other places where you don’t need to have much skill. It’s that gap in between, and that’s where the problem is.”
Ms. Parks of Grand Rapids Community College points to another key to luring Millennials into manufacturing: a work/life balance. While their parents were content to work long hours, young people value flexibility. “Overtime is not attractive to this generation. They really want to live their lives,” she says.
Roth says he gets this distinction. At RoMan, workers can set their own hours on their shift, choosing to start earlier or end later, provided they get the job done. That the factory floor isn’t a standard assembly line C everything is custom-built for industrial clients C makes it easier to drop the punch-clocks.
“People have lives outside,” Roth says. “It’s not always easy to schedule doctors’ appointments around a ‘punch-in at 7 and leave at 3:30’ schedule.”
While factory owners like Roth like to stress the flexibility of manufacturing careers, one aspect is nonnegotiable: location. Millennials looking for a job that allow them to work from home are not likely to get a callback. “I'm not putting a machine tool in your garage,” says Roth.
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)
Given the advantages of electronic money, you might think that we would move quickly to the cashless society in which all payments are made electronically. 1 a true cashless society is probably not around the corner. Indeed, predictions have been 2 for two decades but have not yet come to fruition. For example, Business Week predicted in 1975 that electronic means of payment would soon “revolutionize the very 3 of money itself,” only to 4 itself several years later. Why has the movement to a cashless society been so 5 in coming?
Although electronic means of payment may be more efficient than a payments system based on paper, several factors work 6 the disappearance of the paper system. First, it is very 7 to set up the computer, card reader, and telecornmunications networks necessary to make electronic money the 8 form of payment Second, paper checks have the advantage that they 9 receipts, something thai many consumers are unwilling to 10 . Third, the use of paper checks gives consumers several days of “float” - it takes several days 11 a check is cashed and funds are 12 from the issuer's account, which means that the writer of the check can cam interest on the funds in the meantime. 13 electronic payments arc immediate, they eliminate the float for the consumer.
Fourth, electronic means of payment may 14 security and privacy concerns. We often hear media reports that an unauthorized hacker has been able to access a computer database and to alter information 15 there. The fact that this is not an 16 occurrence means that dishonest persons might be able to access bank accounts in electronic payments systems and 17 from someone else's accounts. The 18 of this type of fraud is no easy task, and a new field of computer science is developing to 19 security issues. A further concern is that the use of e lectronic means of payment leaves an electronic 20 that contains a large amount of personal data. There are concerns that government, employers, and marketers might be able to access these data, thereby violating our privacy.
1. [A] However [B] Moreover [C] Therefore [D] Otherwise
2. [A] off [B] back [C] over [D] around
3. [A] power [B] concept [C] history [D] role
4. [A] reward [B] resist [C] resume [D] reverse
5. [A] silent [B] sudden [C] slow [D] steady
6. [A] for [B] against [C] with [D] on
7. [A] imaginative [B] expensive [C] sensitive [D] productive
8. [A] similar [B] original [C] temporary [D] dominant
9. [A] collect [B] provide [C] copy [D] print
10. [A] give up [B] take over [C] bring back [D] pass down
11. [A] before [B] after [C] since [D] when
12. [A] kept [B] borrowed [C] released [D] withdrawn
13. [A] Unless [B] Until [C] Because [D] Though
14. [A] hide [B] express [C] raise [D]ease
15. [A] analyzed [B] shared [C] stored [D] displayed
16. [A] unsafe [B] unnatural [C] uncommon [D] unclear
17. [A] steal [B] choose [C] benefit [D] return
18. [A] consideration [B] prevention [C] manipulation [D] justification
19. [A] cope with [B] fight against [C] adapt to [D] call for
20. [A] chunk [B] chip [C] path [D] trail
Directions:
Read the following text。Choose the best word(s)for each numbered blank and markA，B，C or D on ANSWER SHEET 1(10 points)
In our contemporary culture，the prospect of communicating with-or even looking at-a stranger is virtually unbearable Everyone around us seems to agree by the way they fiddle with their phones，even without a 1 underground
It's a sad reality-our desire to avoid interacting with other human beings-because there's 2 to be gained from talking to the strange r standing by you. But you wouldn't know it， 3 into your phone. This universal armor sends the 4 ：“Please don't approach me.”
What is it that makes us feel we need to hide 5 our screens?
One answer is fear, according to Jon Wortmann, executive mental coach We fear rejection，or that our innocent social advances will be 6 as“creep,”We fear we'II be 7 We fear we'II be disruptive Strangers are inherently 8 to us，so we are more likely to feel 9 when communicating with them compared with our friends and acquaintances To avoid this anxiety, we 10 to our phones.“Phones become our security blanket，”Wortmann says.“They are our happy
glasses that protect us from what we perceive is going to be more 11 .”
But once we rip off the bandaid，tuck our smartphones in our pockets and look up，it doesn't 12 so bad. In one experiment，behavioral scientists Nicholas Epley and Juliana Schroeder asked commuters to do the unthinkable: Start a 13 . They had Chicago train commuters talk to their fellow 14 . “When Dr.Epley and Ms. Schroeder asked other people in the same train station to 15 how they would feel after talking to a stranger, the commuters thought their 16 would be more pleasant if they sat on their own,” the New York Times summarizes. Though the participants didn't expect a positive experience, after they 17 with
the experiment, “not a single person reported having been snubbed.”
18 , these commutes were reportedly more enjoyable compared with those sans communication, which makes absolute sense, 19 human beings thrive off of social connections. It's that 20 : Talking to strangers can make you feel connected.
1. [A] ticket [B] permit [C]signall [D] record
2. [A] nothing [B] link [C]another [D] much
3. [A] beaten [B] guided [C]plugged [D] brought
4. [A] message [B] cede [C]notice [D] sign
5. [A] under [B] beyond [C] behind [D] from
6. [A] misinterprete [B] misapplied [C] misadjusted [D] mismatched
7. [A] fired [B] judged [C] replaced [D] delayed
8. [A] unreasonable [B] ungreatful [C] unconventional [D] unfamiliar
9. [A] comfortable [B] anxious [C] confident [D] angry
10. [A] attend [B] point [C] take [D] turn
11. [A] dangerous [B] mysterious [C] violent [D] boring
12. [A] hurt [B] resis [C] bend [D] decay
13. [A] lecture [B] conversation [C] debate [D] negotiation
14. [A] trainees [B] employees [C] researchers [D] passengers
15. [A] reveal [B] choose [C] predictl [D] design
16. [A] voyage [B] flight [C] walk [D] ride
17. [A] went through [B] did away [C] caught up [D] put up
18. [A] In turn [B] In particular [C]In fact [D] In consequence
19. [A] unless [B] since [C] if [D] whereas
20. [A] funny [B] simple [C] Iogical [D] rare
Directions:
Read the following text. Choose the best word(s) for each numbered blank and mark A, B, C or D on ANSWER SHEET. (10 points)
Thinner isn’t always better. A number of studies have __1___ that normal-weight people are in fact at higher risk of some diseases compared to those who are overweight. And there are health conditions for which being overweight is actually ___2___. For example, heavier women are less likely to develop calcium deficiency than thin women. ___3___ among the elderly, being somewhat overweight is often an ___4___ of good health.
Of even greater ___5___ is the fact that obesity turns out to be very difficult to define. It is often defined ___6___ body mass index, or BMI. BMI ___7__ body mass divided by the square of height. An adult with a BMI of 18 to 25 is often considered to be normal weight. Between 25 and 30 is overweight. And over 30 is considered obese. Obesity, ___8___,can be divided into moderately obese, severely obese, and very severely obese.
While such numerical standards seem 9 , they are not. Obesity is probably less a matter of weight than body fat. Some people with a high BMI are in fact extremely fit, 10 others with a low BMI may be in poor 11 .For example, many collegiate and professional football players 12 as obese, though their percentage body fat is low. Conversely, someone with a small frame may have high body fat but a 13 BMI.
Today we have a(an) _14 _ to label obesity as a disgrace.The overweight are sometimes_15_in the media with their faces covered. Stereotypes _16_ with obesity include laziness, lack of will power,and lower prospects for success.Teachers,employers,and health professionals have been shown to harbor biases against the obese. _17_very young children tend to look down on the overweight, and teasing about body build has long been a problem in schools.
1. [A] denied [B] conduced [C] doubled [D] ensured
2. [A] protective [B] dangerous [C] sufficient [D]troublesome
3. [A] Instead [B] However [C] Likewise [D] Therefore
4. [A] indicator [B] objective [C] origin [D] example
5. [A] impact [B] relevance [C] assistance [D] concern
6. [A] in terms of [B] in case of [C] in favor of [D] in of
7. [A] measures [B] determines [C] equals [D] modifies
8. [A] in essence [B] in contrast [C] in turn [D] in part
9. [A] complicated [B] conservative [C] variable [D] straightforward
10. [A] so [B] unlike [C] since [D] unless
11. [A] shape [B] spirit [C] balance [D] taste
12. [A] start [B] quality [C] retire [D] stay
13. [A] strange [B] changeable [C] normal [D] constant
14. [A] option [B] reason [C] opportunity [D] tendency
15. [A] employed [B] pictured [C] imitated [D] monitored
16. [A] [B] combined [C] settled [D] associated
17. [A] Even [B] Still [C] Yet [D] Only
18. [A] despised [B] corrected [C] ignored [D] grounded
19. [A] discussions [B] businesses [C] policies [D] studies
20. [A] for [B] against [C] with [D] without
Directions:
Read the following text. Choose the best word (s) for each numbered blank and mark A, B, C or D on the ANSWER SHEET. (10 points)
Why do people read negative Internet comments and do other things that will obviously be painful? Because humans have an inherent need to 1 uncertainty, according to a recent study in Psychological Science. The new research reveals that the need to know is so strong that people will 2 to satisfy their curiosity even when it is clear the answer will 3 .
In a series of four experiments, behavioral scientists at the University of Chicago and the Wisconsin School of Business tested. Student’s willingness to 4 themselves to unpleasant stimuli in an effort to satisfy curiosity. For one 5 each participant was shown a pile of pens that the researcher claimed were from a previous experiment. The twist? Half of the pens would 6 an electric shock when clicked.
Twenty-seven students were told which pens were electrified, another twenty-seven were told only that some were electrified 7 left alone in the room, the students who did not know which ones would shock them clicked more pens and incurred more shocks than the students who knew what would 8 subsequent experiments reproduced, this effect with other stimuli 9 the sound of finger nails on a chalkboard and photographs of disgusting insects.
The drive to_10_is deeply rooted in humans. Much the same as the basic drives for_11_or shelter, says Christopher Hsee of the University of Chicago Curiosity is often considered a good instinct-it can _12_New Scientific advances, for instance-but sometimes such_13_can backfire, the insight that curiosity can drive you to do _14_things is a profound one.
Unhealthy curiosity is possible to 15 , however, in a final experiment, participants who were encouraged to 16 how they would feel after viewing an unpleasant picture were less likely to 17 to see such an image. These results suggest that imagining the 18 of following through on one’s curiosity ahead of time can help determine 19 it is worth the endeavor. ” Thinking about long-term 20 is key to reducing the possible negative effects of curiosity. Hsee says “in other words, don’t read online comments”.
1. [A]Protect [B] resolve [C] discuss [D] ignore
2. [A]refuse [B] wait [C] regret [D] seek
3. [A]hurt [B] last [C]mislead [D] rise
4. [A]alert [B] tie [C] treat [D] expose
5. [A]message [B] review [C] trial [D] concept
6.[A] remove [B] weaken [C] interrupt [D] deliver
7.[A]when [B] if [C] though [D] unless
8.[A] continue [B] happen [C] disappear [D] change
9.[A] rather than [B] regardless of [C] such as [D] owing to
10.[A] discover [B] forgive [C] forget [D] disagree
11.[A] pay [B] marriage [C] schooling [D] food
12.[A] lead to [B]rest on [C] learn from [D] begin with
13.[A] withdrawal [B] persistence [C] inquiry [D] diligence
14.[A] self-reliant [B] self-destructive [C] self-evident [D] self-deceptive
15.[A] define [B] resist [C]replace [D] trace
16.[A] overlook [B] predict [C] design [D] conceal
17.[A] remember [B] promise [C] choose [D] pretend
18.[A] relief [B] plan [C] duty [D] outcome
19.[A] why [B] whether [C] where [D] how
20.[A] consequences [B] investments [C] strategies [D] limitations
I.考试性质
英语(二)考试主要是为高等院校和科研院所招收专业学位硕士研究生而设置的具有选拔性质的全国统一入学考试科目。其目的是科学、公平、有效地测试考生对英语语言的运用能力，评价的标准是高等学校非英语专业本科毕业生所能达到的及格或及格以上水平，以保证被录取者具有一定的英语水平，并有利于各高等学校和科研院所在专业上择优选拔。
II.考查内容
考生应掌握下列语言知识和技能：
(一)语言知识
1.语法知识
考生应能熟练地运用基本的语法知识，其中包括：
(1)名词、代词的数和格的构成及其用法;
(2)动词时态、语态的构成及其用法;
(3)形容词与副词的比较级和最高级的构成及其用法;
(4)常用连接词的词义及其用法;
(5)非谓语动词(不定式、动名词、分词)的构成及其用法;
(6)虚拟语气的构成及其用法;
(7)各类从句(定语从句、主语从句、表语从句等)及强调句型的结构及其用法;
(8)倒装句、插入语的结构及其用法。
2.词汇
考生应能较熟练地掌握5500个左右常用英语词汇以及相关常用词组(详见附录相关部分)。考生应能根据具体语境、句子结构或上下文理解一些非常用词的词义。
(二)语言技能
1.阅读
考生应能读懂不同题材和体裁的文字材料。题材包括经济、管理、社会、文化、科普等，体裁包括说明文、议论文和记叙文等。
根据阅读材料，考生应能：
(1)理解主旨要义;
(2)理解文中的具体信息;
(3)理解语篇的结构和上下文的逻辑关系;
(4)根据上下文推断重要生词或词组的含义;
(5)进行一定的判断和推理;
(6)理解作者的意图、观点或态度。
2.写作
考生应能根据所给的提纲、情景或要求完成相应的短文写作。短文应中心思想明确、切中题意、结构清晰、条理清楚、用词恰当、无明显语言错误。
III.考试形式、考试内容与试卷结构
(一)考试形式
考试形式为笔试。考试时间为180分钟。满分为100分。
试卷包括试题册和1张答题卡。考生应将英语知识运用和阅读理解部分的答案按要求涂写在答题卡相应题号的选项上，将英译汉和写作部分的答案书写在答题卡指定位置的边框区域内。
(二)考试内容
试题分四部分，共48题，包括英语知识运用、阅读理解、英译汉和写作。
第一部分英语知识运用
主要考查考生对英语知识的综合运用能力。共20小题，每小题0.5分，共10分。
在一篇约350词的文章中留出20个空白，要求考生从每题给出的4个选项中选出最佳答案，使补全后的文章意思通顺、前后连贯、结构完整。
第二部分阅读理解
主要考查考生获取信息、理解文章、猜测重要生词词义并进行推断等方面的能力。该部分由A、B两节组成，共25小题，每小题2分，共50分。
A节(20小题)
本部分为多项选择题。共四篇文章，总长度为1500词左右。要求考生阅读文章并回答每篇文章后面的问题。考生需要在每小题所提供的选项(A、B、C、D)中选出唯一正确或是最合适的答案。
每篇文章设5题，共20题。每小题2分，共40分。
B节(5小题)
本部分有两种备选题型。每次考试从这两种题型中选择其中的一种形式，或者两种形式的组合进行考查。
本节文章设5小题，每小题2分，共10分。
备选题型包括：
1)多项对应
本部分为一篇长度为450~550词的文章，试题内容分为左右两栏，左侧一栏为5道题目，右侧一栏为7个选项。要求考生在阅读后根据文章内容和左侧一栏中提供的信息从右侧一栏中的7个选项中选出对应的5项相关信息。
2)小标题对应
在一篇长度为450~550词的文章前有7个概括句或小标题。这些文字或标题分别是对文章中某一部分的概括或阐述。要求考生根据文章内容和篇章结构从这7个选项中选出最恰当的5个概括句或小标题填入文章空白处。
第三部分英译汉
考查考生理解所给英语语言材料并将其译成汉语的能力。要求译文准确、完整、通顺。
要求考生阅读、理解长度为150词左右的一个或几个英语段落，并将其全部译成汉语。共15分。
第四部分写作
该部分由A、B两节组成，主要考查考生的书面表达能力。共2题，25分。
A节
考生根据所给情景写出约100词(标点符号不计算在内)的应用性短文，包括私人和公务信函、备忘录、报告等。共10分。
B节
要求考生根据所规定的情景或给出的提纲，写出一篇150词左右的英语说明文或议论文。提供情景的形式为图画、图表或文字。共15分。
★ 考研英语二复习
