Thomas Huxley (""Darwin"s bulldog") is said to have come up with the most famous defense of the atheist belief that life was created by chance. In a debate at Oxford, he is reported to have stated that if enough monkeys randomly pressed typewriter keys for a long enough time, sooner or later Psalm 23 would emerge. Not all atheists use this argument, but it accurately represents the atheist belief that with enough time and enough solar systems, you"ll get you, Bach"s cello suites, and me. This belief has always struck me as implausible, and although I fully acknowledge the great challenge to theism—the rampant and seemingly random unfairness built into human life, no intellectually honest atheist should deny the great challenge to atheism—the existence of design and intelligence. Scientists have taken up Huxley"s proposition and found from experiments with monkeys near a typewriter that very few even ended up hitting any key. After the experiment, mathematicians then calculated that each monkey typed a steady 120 characters a minute it would take 10 to the 813th power (10 followed by 813 zeros) monkeys about five years to knock out a decent version of Shakespeare"s Sonnet. The finite number of years in the universe"s existence would not come close to producing a few sentences, let alone a Shakespeare play. Professor Robert Jastrow, one of the greatest living astronomers, head of the Mount Wilson Observatory, and an agnostic, best explained the atheism of many scientists. Jastrow tells of his surprise when so many fellow astronomers refused to accept the Big Bang hypothesis for the origins of the universe. In fact, Jastrow writes, many astronomers were actually unhappy about it. Why? Because the Big Bang implied a beginning to the universe, and a beginning implies a Creator, something many scientists passionately reject. This led Jastrow to the sobering conclusion that many scientists have vested, nonscientific interests in some of their beliefs, especially the non-existence of a Creator. Neither maths nor science argues that all came about randomly, without a Creator. Only a keen desire to deny one explains such a belief, a belief that should be laid to rest.
单选题 Atheists seem to believe that
【正确答案】 A
【答案解析】解析:细节题。文章开始介绍了无神论者认为生命的产生属于偶然这一观点,然后通过赫胥黎的论证—如果有足够数量的猴子敲击键盘,时间足够长,《圣经:诗篇》第23篇迟早会出现—来进一步论述这种观点并重新总结这一观点;如果有足够的时间和太阳系统,一切都会出现。由此可知,无神论者的观点是偶然在足够长的时间中可创造一切,所以答案选项项正确。"生命太复杂而无法解释","并不是生活中的每件事都能够解释"和"存在构思和智力"均不是无神论者的观点。
单选题 The scientific experiment about monkeys indicates that the author thinks
【正确答案】 C
【答案解析】解析:细节题。文章第二段是对实验的描述,并未指出这一实验说明了什么。从全文看,这个实验是用来说明第一段的。文章第一段后半部分中作者表明了自己要论述的观点:赫胥黎这一观点难以令人信服,实验证明了作者的观点。因此,答案选项符合文意。"教会猴子打字要花很长一段时间"和"几乎没有几只猴子能敲出字母"都只是实验的细节,而不是实验说明的问题;"这一实验是对有神论的回应"不正确,应为"对这种无神论观点的回应"。
单选题 We can infer from the text that the author believes
【正确答案】 D
【答案解析】解析:推理题。文章最后一段中作者引用不可知论者的观点对无神论者的观点进行批驳,由此可以推出作者认为不可知论是可以理解的,而无神论是不可理解的,所以答案选项符合文意。"无神论是逻辑且合理的","不可知论在理论上是完美的"和"无神论和神创论是没有逻辑的"都不能从文中推出来。
单选题 What does Jastrow think of many scientists?
【正确答案】 D
【答案解析】解析:观点题。文章最后一段指出,Jastrow认为许多科学家在自己的一些观点上,尤其是不存在造物主的观点上,有非科学的既得利益。科学并不认为万物随意而生,没有造物主。由此可知,Jastrow对他们所持的态度是"他们的无神论并非建立在科学的基础之上"。"他们乐于接受无神论","他们部分接受神创论"和"他们的固执使其目空一切"都不是文中提到的Jastrow对他们所持的态度。
单选题 The last paragraph indicates that
【正确答案】 C
【答案解析】解析:推理题。文章最后一句话指出:否认造物主的观点应该废除。这表明作者反对无神论,认为神创论更为科学、合理,所以答案选项符合文意。"创世大爆炸假说是杜撰的","科学和数学否认一个造物主"和"神创论应该被废除"都不能从文中推出来。