阅读理解 Since the dawn of human ingenuity, people have devised ever more cunning tools to cope with work that is dangerous, boring, burdensome, or just plain nasty. That compulsion has resulted in robotics-the science of conferring various human capabilities on machines. And if scientists have yet to create the mechanical version of science fiction, they have begun to come close.
As a result, the modern world is increasingly populated by intelligent gizmos whose presence we barely notice but whose universal existence has removed much human labor. Our factories hum to the rhythm of' robot assembly arms. Our banking is done at automated teller terminals that thank us with mechanical politeness for the transaction. Our subway trains are controlled by tireless robot-drivers. And thanks to the continual miniaturization of electronics and micro-mechanics, there are already robot systems that can perform some kinds of brain and bone surgery with submillimeter accuracy-far greater precision than highly skilled physicians can achieve with their hands alone.
But if robots are to reach the next stage of laborsaving utility, they will have to operate with less human supervision and be able to make at least a few decisions for themselves-goals that pose a real challenge. "While we know how to tell a robot to handle a specific error", says Dave Lavery, manager of a robotics program at NASA, "We can't yet give a robot enough common sense to reliably interact with a dynamic world".
Indeed the quest for tree artificial intelligence has produced very mixed results. Despite a spell of initial optimism in the 1960s and 1970s when it appeared that transistor circuits and microprocessors might be able to copy the action of the human brain by the year 2010, researchers lately have begun to extend that forecast by decades if not centuries.
What they found, in attempting to model thought, is that the human brain's roughly one hundred billion nerve cells are much more talented-and human perception far more complicated-than previously imagined. They have built robots that can recognize the error of a machine panel by a fraction of a millimeter in a controlled factory environment. But the human mind can glimpse a rapidly changing scene and immediately disregard the 98 percent that is irrelevant, instantaneously focusing on the monkey at the side of a winding forest road or the single suspicious face in a big crowd. The most advanced computer systems on Earth can't approach that kind of ability, and neuroscientists still don't know quite how we do it.

单选题 15.The word "gizmos" (Line 1, Paragraph 2) most probably means ______.

【正确答案】 C

【答案解析】本题测试考生根据上下文判断词意的能力。文中第二段提到："As a result，the modern world is increasingly populated by intelligent gizmos whose presence we barely notice but whose universal existence has removed human labor"，"gizmos"之后的定语从句即解释了它的确切含义："whose presence…whose universal existence has removed human labor"．"…它的永久存在已转移到了劳动中"。那么，可以设想：能转移劳动力的，一定是某种设备或装置了。故devices(设备，装置)是正确答案，而programs(项目)，experts(专家)，creatures(生物)均不合题意。

单选题 16.According to the text, what is beyond man's ability now is to design a robot that can ______.

单选题 17.Besides reducing human labor', robots can also ______.

单选题 18.The author uses the example of a monkey to argue that robots are ______.

【正确答案】 C

【答案解析】本题考查考生对细节的综合思维能力。最后一段提到："But the human mind can glimpse a rapidly changing scene and immediately disregard the 98 percent that is irrelevant，instantaneously focusing on the monkey at the side of a winding forest road…"．(人的大脑能够瞥见快速变幻的场景，快速排除98%不相关的东西，能瞬间在起风的林间小路上将目光集中在猴子身上…"。句子中"monkey"和"forest"是相关的事物，换言之，也就是说"人们有能快速将相关的事物集中在一起的能力"。接下来，文中也谈到："The most advanced computer systems on Earth can't approach that kind of ability…"(世界上最先进的计算机也不具备这种能力…)故，机器人不能将相关事物集中一起"。那么答案选项正确。