单选题Being good-looking is useful in so many ways. In addition to whatever personal pleasure it gives you, being attractive also helps you earn more money, f"amd a higher-earning spouse and get better deals on mortgages . Each of these facts has been demonstrated over the past 20 years by many economists and other researchers, The effects are not small: one study showed that an American worker who was among the bottom one-seventh in looks, as assessed by randomly chosen observers, earned 10 to 15 percent less per year than a similar worker whose looks were assessed in the top one-third — a lifetime difference, in a typical case, of about $ 230, 000. Most of us, regardless of our professed attitudes, prefer as customers to buy from better-looking salespeople, as jurors to listen to better-looking attorneys , as voters to be led by better-looking politicians, as students to learn from better-looking professors. This is not a matter of evil employers" refusing to hire the ugly: in our roles as workers, customers and potential lovers we are all responsible for these effects. How could we remedy this injustice? A radical solution may be needed: why not offer legal protections to the ugly, as we do with racial , ethnic and religious minorities, women and handicapped individuals? We actually already do offer such protections in a few places, including in some jurisdictions in California, and in the District of Columbia, where discriminatory treatment based on looks in hiring, promotions, housing and other areas is prohibited. The mechanics of legislating this kind of protection are not as difficult as you might think. Ugliness could be protected generally in the United States by small extensions of the Americans With Disabilities Act. Ugly people could be allowed to seek help from the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission and other agencies in overcoming the effects of discrimination. You might argue that people can"t be classified by their looks — that beauty is in the eye of the beholder . In one study, more than half of a group of people were assessed identically by each of two observers using a five-point scale ; and very few assessments differed by more than one point. There are possible other objections. "Ugliness" is not a personal trait that many people choose to embrace; those whom we classify as protected might not be willing to admit that they are ugly. But with the chance of obtaining extra pay and promotions amounting to $ 230, 000 in lost lifetime earnings, there"s a large enough incentive to do so . Bringing antidiscrimination lawsuits is also costly, and few potential plaintiffs could afford to do so. But many attorneys would be willing to organize classes of plaintiffs to overcome these costs, just as they now do in racial-discrimination and other lawsuits. Economic arguments for protecting the ugly are as strong as those for protecting some groups currently covered by legislation. So why not go ahead and expand protection to the looks-challenged? There"s one legitimate concern. With increasingly tight limits on government resources, expanding rights to yet another protected group would reduce protection for groups that have commanded our legislative and other attention for over 50 years. You might reasonably disagree and argue for protecting all deserving groups. Either way, you shouldn"t be surprised to see the United States heading toward this new legal frontier.

单选题选出应填入下面一段英语中______内的正确答案。 An Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) is built upon a commercial (1) that promises the seamless (2) of all the information flowing through the company (2) financial, accounting, human resources, supply chain and customer information. In implementation, all ERP systems include several features. The system is installed on a typical database management system. It requires initial setup according to the organizations process, but it may be (3) according to the organizations unique process requirements through a tool set contained within the ERP applications. Using ERP, (4) can be prescribed to automate approval processes through established chains of command. One of the methods used to effect rapid implementation ofthe ERP system is to conduct concurrent (5) sessions.

单选题I don't think there are several characteristics of the novel ______ special attention. A. worthwhile B. worth of C. worthy of D. worthless

单选题You ______ him so closely ; you should have kept your distance. A. shouldn't have been following B. mustn't follow C. couldn't have been following D. shouldn't follow

单选题From the text we can conclude that the robot race

单选题In Papusek's experiment babies make learned movements of the head in order to A. have the lights turned on B. be rewarded with milk C. please their parents D. be praised

单选题It is more ______ and healthful to live in the countryside than in town.

单选题In June of 1973, nine whales beached on the Florida coast. Beaching means swimming out of the ocean onto the beach, and usually dying there. No one knows why they do it, but a number of whales beach themselves every year. Some people think beaching is an accident. Perhaps the whales get confused. Scientists who studied the beaching of three dozen whales in Australia think the whales may have been confused by loud noises. Whales can tell where they are by sounds. They send out sounds and listen as they travel past or bounce off objects. Two days before these thirty-six whales beached, loud guns had been fired for two hours. The loud sounds may have confused the whales. Their confusion might have caused them to wander into low water. Whatever the reason whales beach, it is a sad event. People try to save them, but very few beached whales live. One whale that was rescued from beaching in Florida lived for forty-five days. That is the longest a beached whale has ever survived. And it lived that long only because it got attention from doctors. All over the world, scientists rush to whale beachings as soon as they hear about them. They hope to learn why whales beach, and how to save them.

单选题Nature constantly Uyields to/U man in New York: witness those fragile side walk trees gamely straggling against encroaching cement and petrol fumes.

单选题To cope with this problem, we should try to______ourselves______the traditions and customs of other nations.

单选题— I have two suggestions: one is to go to the cinema, the other is to have a drink. — Well, personally I prefer the ______ one. I don't like films very much.A. lateB. latterC. latestD. last

单选题At 18, Ashanthi DeSilva of suburban Cleveland is a living symbol of one of the great intellectual achievements of the 20th century. Born with an extremely rare and usually fatal disorder that left her without a functioning immune system (the "bubble-boy disease", named after an earlier victim who was kept alive for years in a sterile plastic tent), she was treated beginning in 1990 with a revolutionary new therapy that sought to correct the defect at its very source, in the genes of her white blood cells. It worked. Although her last .gene-therapy treatment was in 1992, she is completely healthy with normal immune function, according to one of the doctors who treated her, W. French Anderson of the University of Southern California. Researchers have long dreamed of treating diseases from hemophilia to cancer by replacing mutant genes with normal ones. And the dreaming may continue for decades more. "There will be a gene-based treatment for essentially every disease, " Anderson says, "within 50 years. " It's not entirely clear why medicine has been so slow to build on Anderson's early success. The National Institutes of Health budget office estimates it will spend $432 million on gene-therapy research in 2005, and there is no shortage of promising leads. The therapeutic genes are usually delivered through viruses that don't cause human disease. "The virus is sort of like a Trojan horse," says Ronald Crystal of New York Presbyterian/Weill Comell Medical College. "The cargo is the gene." At the University of Pennsylvania's Abramson Cancer Center, immunologist Carl June recently treated HIV patients with a gene intended to help their cells resist the infection. At Comell University, researchers are pursuing gene-based therapies for Parkinson's disease and a rare hereditary disorder that destroys children's brain cells. At Stanford University and the Children's Hospital of Philadelphia, researchers are trying to figure out how to help patients with hemophilia who today must inject themselves with expensive clotting drugs for life. Animal experiments have shown great promise. But somehow, things get lost in the translation from laboratory to patient. In human trials of the hemophilia treatment, patients show a response at first, but it fades over time. And the field has still not recovered from the setback it suffered in 1999, when Jesse Gelsinger, an 18-year-old with a rare metabolic disorder, died after receiving an experimental gene therapy at the University of Pennsylvania. Some experts worry that the field will be tarnished further if the next people to benefit are not patients but athletes seeking an edge. This summer, researchers at the Sulk Institute in San Diego said they had created a "marathon mouse" by implanting a gene that enhances running ability; already, officials at the World Anti-Doping Agency are preparing to test athletes for signs of "gene doping". But the principle is the same, whether you're trying to help a healthy runner run faster or allow a muscular-dystrophy patient to walk. "Everybody recognizes that gene therapy is a very good idea," says Crystal. "And eventually it's going to work".

单选题 The oceans are the main source of humidity, but plants also pour moisture into the air. In one day, a five - acre forest can release 20, 000 gallons of water, enough to fill an average swimming, pool. A dryer extracts moisture from wet clothes, adding to humidity. Even breathing contributes to this sticky business. Every time we exhale, we expel nearly one pint of moist air into the atmosphere. Using sophisticated measuring devices, science is learning more and more about the far - reaching and often surprising impact humidity has on all of us. Two summers ago angry callers phoned American Television and Communications Corp. ' s cable - TV operation in northeastern Wisconsin, complaining about fuzzy pictures and poor reception. "What happened," said the chief engineer, "was that the humidity was interfering with our signals. "When a blast of dry air invaded the state, the number of complaints dropped sharply. Humidity plays hob with our mechanical world as well. Water condensation on the playing beads and tapes of videocassette recorders produces a streaky picture. Humidity shortens the life of flashlight and smoke - detector batteries. When the weather gets sticky, the rubber belts that power the fan, air conditioner and alternator under the hood of our cars can get wet and squeak. Moisture also causes pianos to go out of tune, often in no time flat. At the Wolf Trap Farm Park for the Performing Arts in Vienna, Va. , pianos are tuned twice a day during the summer concert season. Often a tuner stands in the wings, ready to make emergency adjustments during performances. Humidity speeds the deterioration of treasured family photos and warps priceless antiques. Your home' s wooden support beams, doors and window framers absorb extra moisture and expand - swelling up to three percent depending on the wood, its grain and the setting. Too much moisture promotes blight that attacks potato and green - bean crops--adding to food costs. It also causes rust in wheat, which can affect grain- product prices. Humidity affects our health, as well. We get more migraine headaches, ulcer attacks, blood clots and skin rashes in hot, humid weather. Since 1987, the Health, Weight and Stress Clinic at Johns Hopkins Hospital in Baltimore has tested over 1700 patients for responses to high humidity. They have reported increased dizziness, stomachaches, chest pains, cramps, and visual disturbances such as double and blurred vision.

单选题He ______ his letter of application to the director of the Personnel Department of that company.

单选题The author tries to convince us that

单选题Music comes in many forms; most countries have a style of their own【C1】______the turn of the century when jazz was born, America had no prominent【C2】______of its own. No one knows exactly when jazz was【C3】______, or by whom. But it began to be【C4】______in the early 1900s. Jazz is America' s contribution to【C5】______music. In contrast to classical music, which【C6】______formal European traditions, jazz is spontaneous nod free-form. It bubbles with energy, 【C7】______the moods, interests, and emotions of the people. In the 1920s, jazz【C8】______like America. And【C9】______it does today. The【C10】______of this music are as interesting as the music【C11】______. American Negroes, or blacks, as they are called today, were the jazz【C12】______They were brought to the Southern states【C13】______slaves. They were sold to plantation owners and forced to work long【C14】______When a Negro died his friends and relatives【C15】______a procession to carry the body to the cemetery. In New Orleans, a band often accompanies the【C16】______. On the way to the cemetery the band played slow, solemn music suited to the occasion. 【C17】______on the way home the mood changed. Spirits fired. Death had removed one of their【C18】______, but the living were glad to be alive. The band played【C19】______music, improvising on both the harmony and the melody of the times【C20】______at the funeral. This music made everyone want to dance. It was an early form of jazz.

单选题When we credit the successful people with intelligence, physical strength or good luck we are making excuses for ourselves because we fall ______ in all three.(2002年中国人民大学考博试题)

单选题The National ______ contains many valuable pictures.