英語(yǔ)四級(jí)閱讀訓(xùn)練

1、v1.0可編輯可修改 Section BDirections: In this section, you are going to read a passage with ten statements attached to it. Each statement contains information given in one of the paragraphs. Identify the paragraph from which the information is derived.You may choose a paragraph more than once. Each paragr

2、aph is marked with a letter. Answer the questions by marking the corresponding letter on Answer Sheet 2.A University Degree No Longer Confers Financial SecurityMillions of school-leavers in the rich world are about to bid a tearful goodbye to their parents and start a new life at university. Some ar

3、e inspired by a pure love of learning. But most also believe that spending three or four years at university-and accumulating huge debts in the process-willboost their chances of landing a well-paid and securejob.Their elders have always told them that education is the best way to equip themselves t

4、o thrive in a globalised world. Blue-collar workers will see their jobs outsourced and automated, the familiar argument goes. School dropouts will have to cope with a life of cash-strapped （資金緊張的）insecuhty. But the graduate elite will have the world at its feet. There is someevidence to support this

5、 view. A recent study from Georgetown Universitys Centre on Education and the Workforce argues thatobtaining a post-secondary credential （ 證書）is almost always worth it. Educational qualifications are tightly correlated with earnings: an American with a professional degree can expect to pocket $ over

6、 a lifetime; one with merely a high- school diploma can expect only $. The gap between more- and less-educated earners may be widening. A study in 2002 found that someone with a bachelors degree could expect to earn 75% more over a lifetime than someone with only a high-school diploma. Today the dis

7、parity is even greater.But is the past a reliable guide to the future Or are we at the beginning of a new phase in the relationship between jobs and education There are good reasons for thinking that old patterns are about to change-and that the current recession-driven downturn （衰退）in thedemandfor

8、Western graduates will morph （改變）into something structural. The strong wind of creative destruction that has shaken so many blue-collar workers over the past few decades is beginning to shake the cognitive elite as well.The supply of university graduates is increasing rapidly. The Chronicle of Highe

9、r Education calculates that between 1990 and 2007 the number of students going to university increased by 22%in North America, 74%in Europe, 144%in Latin America and 203%in Asia. In 2007 150mpeople attended university around the world, including 70m in Asia. Emerging economies specially China-are po

10、uring resources into building universities that can compete with the elite of America and Europe. They are also producing professional- services firms snch as Tata Consulting Services and Infosys that take fresh graduates and turn them into world-class computer programmers and consultants. The best

11、and the brightest of the rich world must increasingly compete with the best and the brightest from poorer countries who are willing to work harder for less money.At the same time, the demand for educated labor is being reconfigured （ 重新酉己置）by technology, in much the same way that the demand for agri

12、cultural labor was reconfigured in the 19th century and that for factory labor in the 20th. Computers can not only perform repetitive mental tasks much faster than human beings. They can also empower amateurs to do what professionals once did: why hire a flesh-and-blood accountant to complete your t

13、ax return when Turbotax （a software package ） will do the job at a fraction of the cost And the variety of jobs that computers can do is multiplying as programmers teach them to deal with tone and linguistic ambiguity.economists, including Paul Krugman, have begun to argue that post-industrial socie

14、ties will be characterized not by a relentless rise in demand for the educated but by a great hollowing out, as mid-level jobs are destroyed by smart machines and high-level job growth slows. David Autor, of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), points out that the main effect of automati

15、on in the computer era is not that it destroys blue-collar jobs but that it destroys any job that can be reduced to a routine. Alan Blinder of Princeton University, argues that the jobs graduates have traditionally performed are if anything more offshorable than low-wage ones. A plumber or lorry-dri

16、vers job cannot be outsourced to India. A computer programmers can.G. A university education is still a prerequisite for entering some of the great industries, such as medicine, law and academia (學(xué)術(shù)界)，that provide secure and well-paying jobs. Over the 20th century these industries did a wonderful jo

17、b of raising barriers to entry-sometimes for good reasons (nobody wants to be operated on by a barber) and sometimes for self-interested ones. But these industries are beginning to bend the roles. Newspapers are fighting a losing battle with the blogosphere. Universities are replacing tenure-track p

18、rofessors with non-tenured staff. Law firms are contracting out routine work such asdiscovery (digging up documents relevant to a lawsuit) to computerized-search specialists such as Blackstone Discovery. Even doctors are threatened, as patients find advice online and treatment in Walmarts new health

19、 centers.Malone of MIT argues that these changes-automation, globalizafion and deregulation-may be part of a bigger change: the application of the division of labor to brain-work.AdamSmiths factory managers broke theproduction of pins into 18 components. In the same way, companies are increasingly b

20、reaking the production of brain-work into ever tinier slices. TopCoder chops up IT projects into bite-sized chunks and then serves them up to a worldwide workforce of freelance coders.changes will undoubtedly improve the productivity of brain-workers. They will allow consumers to sidestep (規(guī)避)the pr

21、ofessional industries that have extracted high rents for their services. And they will empower manybrain-workers to focus on what they are best at and contract out more tedious tasks to others. But the reconfiguration of brain-work will also make life far less cozy and predictable for the next gener

22、ation of graduates.The creative destruction that has happened to blue-collar workers in the past also starts to affect the cognitive elite.For the next generation of graduates, life will be far less comfortable and predictable with brain-work reconfigured.After computers are taught by programmers to

23、 deal with tone and linguistic ambiguity, the variety of jobs they can do will increase dramatically.Most school-leavers believe that, despite the huge debts they owe, going to university will increase their chances of getting secure jobs with high salaries.Modern companies are more likely to break

24、the production of intellectual work into ever tinier slices.A scholar of Princeton University claims that the jobs traditionally taken by graduates are more likely to be offshored than low-wage ones.The income gap between an American professional degree holder and an American high-school graduate sh

25、ows income is closely related to educational qualifications.The changes in the division of brain-work will save consumers some high service fees the professional organizations charge.Some students have always been told that. to achieve success in a globalised world, it is most advisable to equip the

26、mselves with education.Emerging economies are providing a lot of resources to build universities to compete with the elite of America and Europe.Section CDirections: There are 2 passages in this section. Each is followed by some questions or unfinished statements. For each of them there are four cho

27、ices marked A ）,B . , C. and D ）. You should decide on the best choice and mark the corresponding letter on Answer Sheet 2 with a single line through the centre.Section BDirections: In this section, you are going to read a passage with ten statements attached to it. Each statement contains informati

28、on given in one of the paragraphs. Identify the paragraph from which the information is derived.You may choose a paragraph more than once. Each paragraph is marked with a letter. Answer the questions by marking the corresponding letter on Answer Sheet 2.Addicted, Really ?Mental-health specialists di

29、sagree over whether to classify compulsive online behaviour as addictionand how to treat it. Craig Smallwood, a disabled American war veteran, spent more than 20,000 hours over five years playing an online role-playing gamecalled Lineage II. WherNCsoft, the South Korean firm behind the game, accused

30、 him of breaking the games rules and banned him, he was plunged into depression, severe paranoia （ 偏執(zhí)）and hallucinations （ 幻想）.He spent three weeks in hospital. After that, he sued NCsoft for fraud and negligence （過(guò)失）,demanding over $ 9m in damages and claiming that the company acted negligently by

31、failing to warn him of the danger that he would become addicted to the game.But does it make sense to talk of addiction to online activity Mental-health specialists say three online behaviors can become problematic for many people: video games, pornography （色情作品）andmessaging via e-mail and social ne

32、tworks. But there is far less agreement about whether any of this should be called Internet addiction-or how to treat it.Some mental-health specialists wanted Internet addiction to be included in the fifth version of psychiatrys bible, the”Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, known

33、 as DSM-V, which is currently being overhauled （全面修訂）.The American Medical Association endorsed （贊成）the idea in 2007, only to backtrack（放棄）days later.The American Journal of Psychiatry called Internet addiction a common disorder and supported its recognition. Last year the DSM-V drafting group made

34、its decision: lnteruet addiction would not be included as a behavioral addiction-only gambling made the cut-but it said further study was necessary.Skeptics say there is nothing uniquely addictive about the Internet. Back in 2000, Joseph Walther, a communications professor at Michigan State Universi

35、ty, co-wrote an article in which he suggested, tongue in cheek, that the criteria used to call someonean Internet addict might also show that most professors were addicted to academia （學(xué)術(shù)活動(dòng)）.He argued that other factors, such as depression, are the real problem.He stands by that view today. No scien

36、tific evidence has emerged to suggest that lnternet use is a cause rather than a consequence of some other sort of issue, he says. Focusing on and treating people for Internet addiction, rather than looking for underlying clinical issues, is definitely unwise.Others disagree. That would be wrong, sa

37、ys Kimberly Young, a researcher and therapist who has worked on Interact addiction since 1994. She insists that the Internet, with its powerfully immersive environments, creates new problems that people must learn to navigate（應(yīng)對(duì)）.Otherwise, the changing lifestyle will affect the development of the s

38、ociety.one disputes that online habits can turn toxic. Take South Korea, where widespread broadband means that the average high-school student plays video gamesfor 23 hours each week. In 2007 the government estimated that around 210,000 children needed treatment for Internet addiction. In 2010 newsp

39、apers around the globe carried the story of a South Korean couple who fed their infant daughter so little that she starved to death. Instead of caring for the child, the couple spent most nights at an Internet cafe, sinking hours into a role- playing gamein which they raised, fed and cared for a vir

40、tual daughter. And several South Korean men have died from exhaustion after marathon, multi-day gaming sessions.The South Korean government has since asked game developers to adopt a gaming curfew （宵禁）for children, to prevent them playing between midnight and 8 . At the sametime, it has also opened

41、more than 100 clinics for Internet addiction and sponsored an Internet rescue camp for serious cases.But compulsive behaviour is not limited to garners. E-mail or web-use behaviours can also show signs of addiction. Getting through a business lunch in which no one pulls out a phone to check their me

42、ssagesnow counts as a minor miracle in many quarters. A deluge （ 泛濫）of self-help books, most recently Alone Together by Sherry Turlde, a social scientist at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, offer advice on how to unplug （去除障礙）.is hardly new, either, but the Internet makes accessing it much

43、 easier than ever before. Whensomething can be summonedn an instant via broadband, whether it is a game world, an e-mail inbox or pornographic material, it is harder to resist. New services lead to new complaints.Whenonline auction sites first becamepopular, talk of eBay addiction soon followed. Dr.

44、 Young says women complain to her now about addiction to Facebook-or even to FarmVille, a gameplayable only within Facebook.centres have popped up around the world with the popularity of online games. In 2006 Amsterdams Smith & Jones facility billed itself as the first and, currently, the only resid

45、ential video-game treatment programin the world. In America the reSTARTInternet Addiction Recovery Program claims to treat Internet addiction, gaming addiction, and even texting addiction. In China, meanwhile, military-style boot camps are the preferred way to treat Internet problems.K. Yet many peo

46、ple like feeling permanently connected. As ArikiaMillikan, an American blogger, once put it, If I could be jacked in at every waking hour of the day, I would, and I think a lot of my peers would do the, same. Bob LaRose, an Internet specialist at Michigan StateUniversity, doesnt believe her. In his

47、research on college students, he found that most sense when they are going overboard and restore self-control. Less than1% have a pathological（ 病態(tài)的）problem, he adds. For most people, Internet use is just a habit-and one that brings us pleasure.According to Joseph Walther, it is unwise to emphasize t

48、he treatment of Internet addiction instead of seeking for potential clinical issues.As online gamesbecomepopular, treatment centres have sprung up all over the world.After playing online gamescontinuously for days, several South Korean men were exhausted to death.Smallwood sued NCsoft and claimed a

49、huge compensation for fraud and its negligence of warning him of the danger of game addiction.In South Korea, a gaming curfew for children was adopted to prevent children playing after midnight.Internet addiction still needs to be further studied though the DSM-V did not categorize it as a behaviora

50、l addiction.An lnternet specialist found that most college students could realize when they are going too far and restore self-control.According to mental-health specialists, for manypeople, video games, pornography and messaging via e-mail and social networks can become problematic online behaviors

51、.People regard it as a small miracle if nobody takes out a phone to read the messages at a business lunch.Kimberly Younginsists that people must learn to deal with newproblems brought about by the Interact.Section BDirections: In this section, you are going to read a passage with ten statements atta

52、ched to it. Each statement contains information given in one of the paragraphs. Identify the paragraph from which the information is derived.You may choose a paragraph more than once. Each paragraph is marked with a letter. Answer the questions by marking the corresponding letter on Answer Sheet 2.G

53、reen GrowthA. The enrichment of previously poor countries is the most inspiring development of our time. It is also worrying. The environment is already under strain. What willhappen when the global population rises from 7 billion today to billion in 2050, as demographers(人 口統(tǒng)計(jì)學(xué)家)expect, and a growi

54、ng proportion of these people canafford goods that were once reserved for the elite Can the planet support so mucheconomic activity ?B .Many policymakers adopt a top-down and Western-centfic approach to such planetary problems. They discuss ambitious regulations in global forums, or look to giant mu

55、ltinationals and well-heeled (富有的)NGOsto set an example. But since most people live in the emerging world, it makes sense to look at what successful companies there are doing to makegrowth more sustainable.A new study by the World Economic Forum (WEF) and the Boston Consulting Group (BCG) identifies

56、 16 emerging-market firms that they say are turning eco-consciousness into a source of competitive advantage.These highly profitable companies (which the study calls the new sustainability champions) are using greenery to reduce costs, motivate workers and forge relationships. Their home-grown ideas

57、 will probably be easier for their peers to copy than anything cooked up in the West.The most outstanding quality of these companies is that they turn limitationsof resources, labor and infrastructure） into opportunities.Thus, Indias Shree Cement, which has tong suffered from water shortages, develo

58、ped the worlds most water-efficient method for making cement, in part by using air-cooling rather than water-cooling. Manila Water, a utility in the Philippines, reduced the amount of water it was losing, through wastage and illegal tapping, from 63% in 1997 to 12% in 2010 by making water affordable

59、 for the poor.Broad Group, a Chinese maker of air conditioners, taps the waste heat from buildings to power its machines. Zhangzidao Fishery Group, a Chinese aquaculture （ 水產(chǎn)養(yǎng)殖）company, recycles uneaten fish feed to fertilize crops.green goals is a commorpractice.Sekem, an Egyptian food producer,set

60、 itself the task of reclaiming （開(kāi)墾）desert land through organicfarming. Florida Ice & Farm, a Costa Rican food and drink company, has adopted strict standards for the amount of water it can consume in producing drinks.firms measure themselves by their greenery, too. Florida Ice & Farm, for example, l