完形填空
A. Perhaps our most dangerous bias is that we naturally assume that everyone else is more susceptible to thinking errors, a tendency known as the 'bias blind spot.' This 'meta-bias' is rooted in our ability to spot systematic mistakes in the decisions of others—we excel at noticing the flaws of friends—and inability to spot those same mistakes in ourselves. In each instance, we readily forgive our own minds but look harshly upon the minds of other people. B. When people face an uncertain situation, they don't carefully evaluate the information or look up relevant statistics. Instead, their decisions depend on a long list of mental shortcuts, which often lead them to make foolish decisions. These shortcuts aren't a faster way of doing the math; they're a way of skipping the math altogether. Asked about the bat and the ball, we forget our arithmetic lessons and instead default to the answer that requires the least mental effort. C. What explains this result? One provocative hypothesis is that the bias blind spot arises because of a mismatch between how we evaluate others and how we evaluate ourselves. When considering the irrational choices of a stranger, for instance, we are forced to rely on behavioral information; we see their biases from the outside, which allows us to glimpse their systematic thinking errors. However, when assessing our own bad choices, we tend to engage in elaborate introspection. We scrutinize our motivations and search for relevant reasons; we lament our mistakes to therapists and ruminate on the beliefs that led us astray. D. For more than five decades, Daniel Kahneman, a Nobel Laureate and professor of psychology at Princeton, has been asking questions like this and analyzing our answers. His disarmingly simple experiments have profoundly changed the way we think about thinking. While philosophers, economists, and social scientists had assumed for centuries that human beings are rational agents, Kahneman demonstrated that we're not nearly as rational as we like to believe. E. Here's a simple arithmetic question: A bat and ball cost a dollar and ten cents. The bat costs a dollar more than the ball. How much does the ball cost? The vast majority of people respond quickly and confidently, insisting the ball costs ten cents. This answer is both obvious and wrong. (The correct answer is five cents for the ball and a dollar and five cents for the bat.) F. The problem with this introspective approach is that the driving forces behind biases—the root causes of our irrationality—are largely unconscious, which means they remain invisible to self-analysis and impermeable to intelligence. In fact, introspection can actually compound the error, blinding us to those primal processes responsible for many of our everyday failings. We spin eloquent stories, but these stories miss the point. The more we attempt to know ourselves, the less we actually understand. G. In many instances, smarter people are more vulnerable to these thinking errors. Although we assume that intelligence is a buffer against bias—that's why those with higher S. A. T. scores think they are less prone to these universal thinking mistakes—it can actually be a subtle curse. Order: 41 →D→ 42 → 43 → 44 →C→ 45
问答题
【正确答案】E。
【答案解析】第二段D项既然已定位,就先从它着手。根据D项第一句中的“...has been asking questions like this”,可以推断第一段必定提出过“类似这样的问题”。查看E项正是首次提出这个问题的段落,并且E项中的“answer”也与D项中的“our answers”照应。故E项就是正确答案。E项有问有答,首先提出一道数学问题,然后给出大多数人的错误答案,由此引出D项中的人物Daniel Kahneman对人们错误思维的研究。
问答题
【正确答案】B。
【答案解析】D项最后提及Kahneman用实验证明了“人类几乎不像我们愿意相信的那样理性”。浏览剩余选项,A项首句提到“most dangerous bias”,这里出现了最高级,故之前的段落理应提到其他的bias,而E项和D项均未出现,所以排除A项。B项首先提到人们面对不确定的情况时的错误做法,即“不会细心地评估信息或查阅相关统计数据。相反,他们的决定取决于一长串思想捷径”。这一点能很好地说明“人类几乎不像我们愿意相信的那样理性”。接下来的“the bat and the ball”更是例证了人类的非理性。因而B项续接D项,是对D项的具体阐述。F、G这两项首句分别出现了指示代词this和these。因为指示代词在上文必须有所指,而this和these在上文找不到对应的指代对象,所以排除这两项。
问答题
【正确答案】G。
【答案解析】B项已定位,接下来的一段,必和其相衔接。B项中说“Instead,their decisions depend on a long list of mental shortcuts, which often lead them to make foolish decisions”,这就是说人们犯了“thinking errors”。而G项中的第一句就说“smarter people are more vulnerable to these thinking errors”,这里的“these”就是指B项中的“foolish decisions”,形成了上下呼应,接着首次提出了“偏见”现象。
问答题
【正确答案】A。
【答案解析】这是因为A项第一句中的“Perhaps our most dangerous bias is that...”就是G项中“偏见”现象的承上启下论述的最好衔接;此外,A项的最后一句“we readily forgive our own minds but look harshly upon the minds of other people”是一个结论(或result),和已定位的C项中的第一句构成完美衔接。因此确定A项为正确答案。
问答题
【正确答案】F。
【答案解析】F项中的第一句说“The problem with this introspective approach is that...”,此处的“this introspective approach”和C项中的“elaborate introspection”上下呼应,是上下文衔接的关键词的复现。故F项为正确答案。