单选题William Shakespeare described old age as "second childishness" — sans teeth, sans eyes, sans taste. In the case of taste he may, musically speaking, have been even more perceptive than he realized. A paper in Neurology by Giovanni Frisoni and his colleagues at the National Centre for Research and Care of Alzheimer's Disease in Brescia, Italy, shows that one form of senile dementia can affect musical desires in ways that suggest a regression, if not to infancy, then at least to a patient's teens. Frontotemporal dementia is caused, as its name suggests, by damage to the front and sides of the brain. These regions are concerned with speech, and with such "higher" functions as abstract thinking and judgment. Frontotemporal damage therefore produces different symptoms from the loss of memory associated with Alzheimer's disease, a more familiar dementia that affects the hippocampus and amygdala in the middle of the brain. Frontotemporal dementia is also rarer than Alzheimer's. In the past five years the centre in Brescia has treated some 1,500 Alzheimer's patients; it has seen only 46 with frontotemporal dementia. Two of those patients interested Dr. Frisoni. One was a 68-year-old lawyer, the other a 73-year-old housewife. Both had undamaged memories, but displayed the sorts of defect associated with frontotemporal dementia—a diagnosis that was confirmed by brain scanning. About two years after he was first diagnosed, the lawyer, once a classical music lover who referred to pop music as "mere noise", started listening to the Italian pop band "883". As his command of language and his emotional attachments to friends and family deteriorated, he continued to listen to the band at full volume for many hours a day. The housewife had not even had the lawyer's love of classical music, having never enjoyed music of any sort in the past. But about a year after her diagnosis she became very interested in the songs that her 11-year-old granddaughter was listening to. This kind of change in musical taste was not seen in any of the Alzheimer's patients, and thus appears to be specific to those with frontotemporal dementia. And other studies have remarked on how frontotemporal dememia patients sometimes gain new talents. Five sufferers who developed artistic abilities are known. And in another lapse of musical taste, one woman with the disease suddenly started composing and singing country and western songs. Dr. Frisoni speculates that the illness is causing people to develop a new attitude towards novel experiences. Previous studies of novelty-seeking behavior suggest that it is managed by the brain's right frontal lobe. A predominance of the right over the left frontal lobe, caused by damage to the latter, might thus lead to a quest for new experience. Alternatively, the damage may have affected some specific neural circuit that is needed to appreciate certain kinds of music. Whether that is a gain or a loss is a different matter. As Dr. Frisoni puts it in his article, De Gustibus Non Disputandum Est. Or, in plainer words, there is no accounting for taste.

单选题Why don"t birds get lost on their long flights from one place to another? Scientists have puzzled over this question for many years. Now they"re beginning to fill in the blanks. Not long ago, experiments showed that birds rely on the sun to guide them during daylight hours. But what about birds that fly by night? Tests with artificial stars have proved that certain night-flying birds are able to follow the stars in their long-distance flights. A dove (鸽子) had spent its lifetime in a cage and had never flown under a natural sky. Yet it showed an inborn ability to use the stars for guidance. The bird"s cage was placed under an artificial star-filled sky. The bird tried to fly in the same direction as that taken by his outdoor cousins. Any change in the position of the artificial stars caused a change in the direction of his flight. But the stars are apparently their principal means of navigation (航行) only. When the stars are hidden by clouds, they seemingly find their way by such landmarks as mountain ranges, coast lines, and river courses. But when it"s too dark to see these, the doves circle helplessly, unable to find their way.

单选题Over the past century, all kinds of unfairness and discrimination have been condemned or made illegal. But one insidious form continues to thrive: alphabetism. This, for those as yet unaware of such a disadvantage, refers to discrimination against those whose surnames begin with a letter in the lower half of the alphabet. It has long been known that a taxi firm called AAAA cars has a big advantage over Zodiac cars when customers thumb through their phone directories. Less well known is the advantage that Adam Abbott has in life over Zoe Zysman. English names are fairly evenly spread between the halves of the alphabet. Yet a suspiciously large number of top people have surnames beginning with letters between A and K. Thus the American president and vice-president have surnames starting with B and C respectively; and 26 of George Bush"s predecessors (including his father) had surnames in the first half of the alphabet against just 16 in the second half. Even more striking, six of the seven heads of government of the G7 rich countries are alphabetically advantaged (Berlusconi, Blair, Bush, Chirac, Chretien and Koizumi). The world"s three top central bankers (Greenspan, Duisenberg and Hayami) are all close to the top of the alphabet, even if one of them really uses Japanese characters. As are the world"s five richest men (Gates, Buffett, Allen, Ellison and Albrecht). Can this merely be coincidence? One theory, dreamt up in all the spare time enjoyed by the alphabetically disadvantaged, is that the ret sets in early. At the start of the first year in infant school, teachers seat pupils alphabetically from the front, to make it easier to remember their names. So shortsighted Zysman junior gets stuck in the back row, and is rarely asked the improving questions posed by those insensitive teachers. At the time the alphabetically disadvantaged may think they have had a lucky escape. Yet the result may be worse qualifications, because they get less individual attention, as well as less confidence in speaking publicly. The humiliation continues. At university graduation ceremonies, the ABCs proudly get their awards first; by the time they reach the Zysmans most people are literally having a ZZZ. Shortlists for job interviews, election ballot papers, lists of conference speakers and attendees: all tend to be drawn up alphabetically, and their recipients lose interest as they plough through them.

单选题There is a popular belief among parents that schools are no longer interested in spelling. No School I have taught in has ever ignored spelling or considered it unimportant as a basic skill. There are, however, vastly different ideas about how to teach it, or how much prioritize(优先) it must be given over general language development and writing ability. The problem is, how to encourage a child to express himself freely and confidently in writing without holding him back with the complexities of spelling. If spelling becomes the only focal point of his teacher"s interest, clearly a bright child will be likely to "play safe". He will tend to write only words within his spelling range, choosing to avoid adventurous language. That"s why teachers often encourage the early use of dictionaries and pay attention to content rather than technical ability. I was once shocked to read on the bottom of a sensitive piece of writing about a personal experience: "This work is terrible! There are far too many spelling errors and your writing is illegible (难以辨认的)." It may have been a sharp criticism of the pupil"s technical abilities in writing, but it was also a sad reflection on the teacher who had omitted to read the essay, which contained some beautiful expressions of the child"s deep feelings. The teacher was not wrong to draw attention to the errors, but if his priorities had centered on the child"s ideas, an expression of his disappointment with the presentation would have given the pupil more motivation(动力) to seek improvement.

单选题Why did the depletion of rain forests result from the world’s growing population.'?

单选题The dairy industry has taken great pains to increase the number of products from which the butterfat has been ______. A. revived B. removed C. excluded D. isolated

单选题{{B}}Passage 3{{/B}} In former times doctors in Taiwan, who were considered saviors, were greatly admired. This is not only because they were able to relieve sick people of their pain and save their lives, but because they demonstrated admirable willingness to help the sick. Now in this industrialized world people are inclined to choose material possessions. This is true of doctors, too. The high income of doctors is the envy of other people. Many high school graduates are eager to get into medical colleges, and countless girls consider doctors to be their best choice of husbands. For many years the public has charged that doctors in public hospitals demand money from patients. The amount of money the patients give determines the kind of treatment they receive. It has also been said that drug companies have to pay the doctors so that the latter will use their products. Recently a large medicine factory set up by the U.S. Investors declared that it will stop giving "kickbacks" to doctors as the factory bas spent too much to promote sales over the years. This declaration has caused quite a stir in our society. We wonder what the officials who have denied the dealings mentioned above will say about this.

单选题The past ages of man have all been carefully labeled by anthropologists. Descriptions like "Palaeolithic Man", "Neolithic Man", etc. , neatly sum up whole periods. When the time comes for anthropologists to turn their attention to the twentieth century, they will surely choose the label "Legless Man". Histories of the time will go something like this. "In the twentieth century, people forgot how to use their legs. Men and women moved about in cars, buses and trains from a very early age. There were lifts and escalators in all large buildings to prevent people from walking. This situation was forced upon earth dwellers of that time because of their extraordinary way of life. In those days, people thought nothing of traveling hundreds of miles each day. But the surprising thing is that they didn"t use their legs even when they went on holiday. They built cable railways, ski-lifts and roads to the top of every huge mountain. All the beauty spots on earth were marred by the presence of large car parks." The future history books might also record that we were deprived of the use of our eyes. In our hurry to get from one place to another, we failed to see anything on the way. Air travel gives you a bird"s-eye view of the world—or even less if the wing of the aircraft happens to get in your way. When you travel by car or train a blurred image of the countryside constantly smears the windows. Car drivers, in particular, are forever obsessed with the urge to go on and on: they never want to stop. Is it the lure of the great motorways, or what? And as for sea travel, it hardly deserves mention. The typical twentieth-century traveler is the man who always says "I"ve been there." When you travel at high speeds, the present means nothing: you live mainly in the future because you spend most of your time looking forward to arriving at some other place. But actual arrival, when it is achieved, is meaningless. You want to move on again. By traveling like this, you suspend all experience~ the present ceases to be a reality: you might just as well be dead. The traveler on foot, on the other hand, lives constantly in the present. For him traveling and arriving are one and the same thing: he arrives somewhere with every step he makes. He experiences the present moment with his eyes, his ears and the whole of his body. At the end of his journey he feels a delicious physical weariness. He knows that sound. Satisfying sleep will be his: the just reward of all true travellers.

单选题This Agreement is ______ into between the parties concerned on the basis of equality and mutual benefit to develop business on terms and conditions mutually agreed upon as follows: A．entered B．become C．come D．turned

单选题When we conduct foreign trade, the importance of understanding the language of a country cannot be underestimated. The successful marketer must achieve export communication which requires a thorough understanding of the language as well as the ability to speak it. Those who deal with advertising should be concerned less with obvious differences between languages and more with the exact meanings expressed. A dictionary translation is not the same as an idiomatic interpretation, and seldom will the dictionary translation meet the needs. A national producer of soft drinks had the company's brand name impressed in Chinese characters which were phonetically (按照发音 ) accurate. It was discovered later, however, that the translation's literal meaning was "female horse fattened with wax," hardly the image the company sought to describe. So carelessly translated advertising statements not only lose their intended meaning but can suggest something very different including something offensive or ridiculous. Sometimes, what was translated was not an image the companies had in mind for their products. Many people believe that to fully appreciate the hue meaning of a language it is necessary to live with the language for years. Whether or not this is the case, foreign marketers should never take it for granted that they are affectively communicating in another language.

单选题One of the main reasons is that the university's______attracts students and faculty staff all over the world.

单选题Although it seemed to take all her strength ,the patient ______ up a smile to her morn.

单选题The manager tried to wave aside these issues as______details that would be settled later.

单选题I wish to apply for the position ______ in yesterday's newspaper. A．to advertise B．advertised C．to be advertised D．advertising

单选题All the words in a language can be used to refer to, but only some have senses.

单选题The laser is a very useful means for long-distance communications, the great accuracy in the direction of its beams ______ effective use of small amount of power.

单选题She was barred from the golf club for refusing to______with the request.