阅读理解 Passage Three There is a tale that straw is the worst material from which to build a house, particularly if you are a pig with a hungry wolf around. So the cards were stacked against Warren Brush when local officials learned that he had several buildings made of straw bales ( 大捆 ) on his land. They have tried to fine him a lot. But the case is still unresolved. The problem is that California's building codes make no provision for the use of straw. And Mr Brush has many defenders--among them several university scientists and David Eisenberg, the chairman of the United States Green Building Council's code connnittee. They would like to see the prejudice against straw houses eliminated, for straw is, in many ways, an ideal building material. It is, for one thing, a great insulator (绝缘体). That keeps down the heating bills in houses made from it. It is also a waste product that would otherwise be burned, and is therefore cheap, and very much to the point in a place like California, it is earthquake-resistant. Last year a test conducted at the University of Nevada showed that straw-bale constructions could' withstand twice the amount of ground motion recorded in the Northridge earthquake that hit LosAngeles in 1994. There are other straws in the wind: a post office in suburban Albuquerque, a school in Maryland, and an office complex in suburban Los Angeles have all been built from straw. Even California is having a rethink, and may change its rules to adapt to straw-bale construction. As Mr Eisenberg observes, "the lesson of the Three Little Pigs isn't to avoid straw. It's that you don't let a pig build your house."
单选题 By "the cards were stacked against Warren Brush, the author means that Brash
【正确答案】 C
【答案解析】[解析] 第一段第二句“So the cards...”。 词义猜测题。根据文章第一段第二句中短语“The cards were stacked against...”,的意思,用排除法选C。
单选题 David Eisenberg is mentioned
【正确答案】 B
【答案解析】[解析] 第二段第五句“And Mr. Brush...”。 细节判断题。文章第二段第五句“...many defenders...”其中之一提到David,由此可知B正确。
单选题 What is Paragraph 3 mainly about?
【正确答案】 D
【答案解析】[解析] 第三段。 主旨概括题。由第三段中“great insulator”,“cheap”,“earthquake-resistant”即可知道这些都是大捆草的优势。故选D。
单选题 It can be learned from the last paragraph that California
【正确答案】 D
【答案解析】[解析] 最后一段第二句“Even California...”。 逻辑推理题。文章最后一段第二句提到“having a rethink, and may change its rules...”,因此可知D符合题意。
单选题 The author's purpose in writing the passage is to
【正确答案】 B
【答案解析】[解析] 第一段和最后一段。 作者写作意图题。文章全文通过人们对用稻草建房子的偏见引入,讨论了草作为建筑材料的优势所在。最后又用三只小猪的故事强调,让人们去掉偏见,接受这种建筑材料,只有B项符合。