问答题No one can say exactly what it looks like when a planet looks ill, but it probably looks a lot like Earth. Never mind what you"ve heard about global warming as a slow-motion emergency that would take decades to play out. Suddenly and unexpectedly, the crisis is upon us. It certainly looked that way last week as the atmospheric bomb that was Cyclone Larry—a Category 5 storm with wind bursts that reached 180 m.p.h.—exploded through northeastern Australia. It certainly looked that way last year as curtains of fire and dust turned the skies of Indonesia orange, thanks to drought-fueled blazes sweeping the island nation. It certainly looks that way as the sodden wreckage of New Orleans continues to molder, while the waters of the Atlantic gather themselves for a new hurricane season just two months away. Disasters have always been with us and surely always will be. But when they hit this hard and come this fast— when the emergency becomes commonplace—something has gone grievously wrong. That something is global warming.

问答题Questions 4～6 When Dana Hale adopted her son four years ago, she says she had to "play hardball" with her boss to get the same paid leave granted colleagues who give birth. The Washington employment lawyer knew then that if she and her self-employed husband adopted again, it would be under new management. So Hale began researching adoption-friendly workplaces, and soon focused on Capital One. The big financial-services company, headquartered in McLean, Va., offers $ 5,000 in assistance per adopted child, plus six weeks of paid leave. More important to Hale, the company fosters a supportive culture for adoptive parents, who network through a corporate intranet site. "I specifically chose Capital One so I could adopt more children," says Hale, 44, on the eve of a trip to Ukraine to bring home two teenage sisters. Adoption has become an employment issue. Because more women delay parenthood to pursue careers during their prime childbearing years, some seek alternative avenues to build their families. With each adoption costing up to $ 30,000 and often demanding mounds of paperwork and weeks of travel, workers are asking their employers for help. They"re getting it, mainly from companies in competitive industries hungry to attract and keep talent. Google, JPMorgan Chase, Abbott Laboratories, Avon and Motorola have all added adoption assistance to their buffet of benefits. In 1990, only 12% of 1,000 companies surveyed by Hewitt Associates offered financial assistance for adoption. By 2006, 45% of companies did. Rita Sorensen, executive director of the Dave Thomas Foundation for Adoption, estimates that in 2007 fully half of employers provide adoption benefits and that within five years those offerings will be considered standard. Dave Thomas, founder of Wendy"s, may have kicked off the trend 15 years ago when he began urging other CEOs to assist employees with adoption. Himself an adoptee, Thomas started his foundation to help find permanent homes for children in the US foster-care system. (More than 140,000 currently await adoption, according to Sorensen.) This year the foundation began tracking corporations and ranking them according to the generosity of their benefits. Of companies that provide adoption assistance, it found that $ 4,700 is offered on average per adoption and about double that if a child has special needs or is from foster care. Companies are also giving workers an average of five weeks of paid parental leave. Even as employers retreat from providing expensive benefits like lifetime health coverage, they are finding that adoption assistance is relatively inexpensive—and yields disproportionately high rewards in employee loyalty, community goodwill and solid-gold p. r. Unlike maternity benefits, adoption assistance isn"t covered by medical or disability insurance, meaning the entire cost must come directly from an employer"s pocket. Still, only 0.5% of employees tap adoption benefits, but the assistance is so appreciated that workers gush about it to colleagues, spreading the warm, fuzzy corporate feelings. "Not to cheapen it, but it"s cost-effective goodwill," says Sorensen, "one that doesn"t hit the bottom line very hard. " Greg Rasin, a partner with Proskauer Rose who advises employers on benefits, points out that at the very least, the Families and Medical Leave Act compels employers with more than 50 workers to provide up to 12 weeks of unpaid leave. Legal bonus: offering adoption benefits might shield them from lawsuits by workers seeking parity with those who receive maternity leave. Offering adoption assistance was an easy call for Steve Steinour, CEO of Citizens Financial Group and the father of two adopted children. "We knew from experience that for most Americans, adoption is an unaffordable option," he says. Citizens—a bank based in Providence, R. I. , with 25,000 employees—provides up to $ 21,000 in aid, a sum that helped put it at the top of the Dave Thomas Foundation"s list of adoption-friendly workplaces. Though Steinour says retention is much greater among the 100 or so workers who have used the benefits, he admits that this impact is hard to quantify for shareholders. "You can"t translate everything into a direct payback," he says. Payback comes in the form of loyalty and gratitude from employees like Paula Cavallaro, a Citizens trust administrator. Already the parents of Amanda, 12, Cavallaro and her husband had "talked and talked" about adopting another child. The Cavallaros received $10,000 from Citizens to adopt Anny, 13, from Colombia last summer (employees receive more for special-needs adoptions). "We would still have done it, but having the benefit just made it so much easier," says Cavallaro, 48. "I will always, always, always be grateful for the help. "

问答题Directions: In this part of the test, you will hear 2 passages in English. You will hear the passages ONLY ONCE. After you have heard each passage, translate it into Chinese and write your version in the corresponding space in your ANSWER BOOKLET. You may take notes while you are listening.

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问答题"New Price"; "Just Reduced"; "Priced to Sell". Once unheard of, these tags are cropping up ever more often in the property sections of America's newspapers. They denote a shift that is becoming clearer in the national statistics, too: the fizz is going out of the once-bubbly housing market. Compared with last year, inventories of unsold houses are up and the pace of sales is down. Prices have slowed and in some areas have even fallen. Residential construction now makes up more than 6% of GDP. This suggests that a 10% drop would shave some 0.6 percentage points off economic growth. A bigger question, however, is how slower prices might affect consumer spending. Experts expect that America's house prices will have stopped rising by the end of the year. Mainly because a flat market will put a brake on residential building, this is expected to reduce GDP growth by about 1.5 percentage points. "Just Reduced" might soon be a fitting label for the whole economy.

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问答题中国赢得2010年世界博览会的举办权，靠的是国际社会对中国改革开放的支持和信心。这次博览会将是自1851年在英国伦敦第一次举办以来，首次在发展中国家举办的世界博览会，它表达了全世界人民对中国未来发展的期望。 2010年上海世博会的主题是“城市，让生活更美好”。未来的城市生活是全球关注的话题，与每一个国家及其人民息息相关。第一次以“城市”作为主题的2010世界博览会将吸引全球约 200个国家和国际组织参与盛会，国内外参访人数预计达7000万。

问答题Directions: In this part of the test, you will hear 2 passages in English. After you have heard each sentence or paragraph, interpret it into Chinese. Start interpreting at the signal...and stop it at the signal... You may take notes while you are listening. Remember you will hear the passages ONLY ONCE. Now, let us begin Part A with the first passage.

问答题The task of writing a history of our nation from Rome's earliest days fills me, I confess, with some misgivings, and even were I confident in the value of my work, I should hesitate to say so. I am aware that for historians to make extravagant claims is, and always has been, all too common, every writer on history tends to look down his nose at his less cultivated predecessors, happily persuaded that he will better them in point of style, or bring new facts to light. Countless others have written on this theme and it may be that I shall pass unnoticed amongst them; if so, I must comfort myself with the greatness and splendor of my rivals, whose work will rob my own of recognition. My task, moreover, is an immensely laborious one. I shall have to go back more than 700 years, and trace my story from its small beginnings up to these recent times when its ramifications are so vast that any adequate treatment is hardly possible. I shall find antiquity a rewarding study, if only because, while I am absorbed in it, I shall be able to turn my eyes from the troubles which for so long have tormented the modern world, and to write without any of that over-anxious consideration which may well plague a writer on contemporary life, even if it does not lead him to conceal the truth.

问答题If you"ve ever been on a jury, you might have noticed that a funny thing happens the minute you get behind closed doors. Everybody starts talking about themselves. They say what they would have done if they had been the plaintiff or the defendant. Being on a jury reminds me why I can"t tolerate talk radio. We Americans seem to have lost the ability to talk about anything but our own experiences. We can"t seem to generalize without stereotyping or to consider evidence that goes against our own experience. I heard a doctor on a radio show talking about a study that found that exercise reduces the incidence of Alzheimer"s. And caller after caller couldn"t wait to make essentially the opposite point: "Well, my grandmother never exercised and she lived to 95." We are in an age summed up by the saying: "I experience, therefore I"m right." Historically, the hallmarks of an uneducated person were the lack of ability to think critically, to use deductive reasoning to distinguish the personal from the universal. Now that seems an apt description of many Americans.

问答题After years of fierce lobbying and months of secrecy, Beijing unveiled five mascots for the 2008 Olympics on Friday, opening a marketing blitz that is expected to reap record profits. In an elaborate, nationally televised gala at a Beijing sports arena to mark the 1,000-day countdown until the Games, senior Chinese leaders introduced the mascots—cartoon renditions of a panda, fish, Tibetan antelope, swallow and the Olympic flame, each one the color of one of the Olympic rings. The animals were introduced as Bei Bei, Jing Jing, Huan Huan, Ying Ying and Ni Ni—which, put together, translates to "Beijing welcomes you!" A plethora of real and mythic creatures were among the candidates considered by Chinese leaders, Olympic officials and design specialists over the past year. Among those that didn't make the cut were the dragon and a magical monkey out of Chinese folklore. The choice, the subject of lively media speculation for months, has been a secret since it was finalized three months ago.

问答题Short messages have already become a prevailing way to send greetings which make us smile and eager to resend them to other friends. But many of us have been taken aback by some unintelligible short messages or some lottery messages from various service suppliers. Whether we need it or not, they come to our mobile phones frequently. Topic: Advantages and disadvantages of short messages Questions for Reference: 1. Do you mind receiving short messages from people you don"t know? 2. Sometimes we receive the messages which are regarded as " warming greetings" And we usually resend them. Sometimes we receive the messages which are "rubbish". What do you think of these unsolicited messages? 3. In the competitive field of telecommunication, what do you think the service suppliers should do to meet the needs of the consumers?

问答题Graduates from under-privileged backgrounds are to challenge the elitism of the barristers' profession, under plans outlined today. Reforms aimed at challenging the dominance of the rich and privileged classes which are disproportionately represented among the membership of the Bar will tackle the decline in students from poorer backgrounds joining the profession. They include financial assistance as well as measures to end the "intimidating environment" of the barristers' chambers which young lawyers must join if they want to train as advocates. The increasing cost of the Bar and a perception that it is run by a social elite has halted progress in the greater inclusion of barristers from different backgrounds. A number of high- profile barristers, including the prime minister's wife, Cherie Booth QC, have warned that without changes, the Bar will continue to be dominated by white, middle-class male lawyers. In a speech to the Social Mobility Foundation think tank in London this afternoon, Geoffrey Vos QC, Bar Council chairman, will say. The Bar is a professional elite, by which I mean that the Bar's membership includes the best-quality lawyers practicing advocacy and offering specialist legal advice in many specialist areas. That kind of elitism is meritocratic, and hence desirable. "Unfortunately, however, the elitism which fosters the high-quality services that the Bar stands for has also encouraged another form of elitism. That is elitism in the sense of exclusivity, exclusion, and in the creation of a profession which is barely accessible to equally talented people from less privileged backgrounds." Last month, Mr. Vos warned that the future of the barristers' profession was threatened by an overemphasis on posh accents and public school education. Mr. Vos said then that people from ordinary backgrounds were often overlooked in favour of those who were from a "snobby" background. People from a privileged background were sometimes recruited even though they were not up to the job intellectually, he added. In his speech today, Mr. Vos will outline the "barriers to entry," to a career at the Bar and some of the ways in which these may be overcome. The Bar Council has asked the law lord, Lord Neuberger of Abbotsbury, to examine how these barriers can be overcome, and he will publish his interim report and consultation paper before Easter. He is expected to propose a placement programme to enable gifted children from state schools to learn about the Bar, the courts and barristers at first hand. The Bar Council is also working towards putting together a new package of bank loans on favourable terms to allow young, aspiring barristers from poorer backgrounds to finance the Bar vocational course year and then have the financial ability to establish themselves in practice before they need to repay. These loans would be available alongside the Inns of Court's scholarship and awards programmes. Mr. Vos will say today: "I passionately believe that the professions in general, and the Bar in particular, must be accessible to the most able candidates from any background, whatever their race, gender, or socioeconomic group. The Bar has done well in attracting good proportions of women and racial minorities and we must be as positive in attracting people from all socioeconomic backgrounds./

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问答题伟大的抗战精神，蕴含着中华儿女和衷共济的团结精神。面对亡国灭种的民族危机，中华儿女，地无分南北，人无分老幼，有钱出钱，有力出力，举国上下，万众一心，用血肉筑成了一座侵略者不可逾越的新的长城。“富贵不能淫，贫贱不能移，威武不能屈”，在民族患难的时代，这种浩然之气概，不屈之节操，激励着中华儿女赴汤蹈火，殊死奋战，使救亡图存成为可歌可泣、英勇卓绝的斗争。今年是中国人民抗日战争暨世界反法西斯战争胜利60周年。重温那段血与火的悲壮历史，缅怀抗日先烈的丰功伟绩，弘扬中华民族伟大的抗战精神，在今天仍然具有十分重要的意义。

问答题西塘是一个具有一千多年历史的水乡古镇，保存完好的明清时期建筑群是其他旅游景点所无法相比的。倘佯古镇街头，游人们仿佛置身于一幅美丽的水墨画之中。河两岸高耸的粉墙和水中清晰的瓦房倒影，还有那在微风里婆娑摇曳的杨柳，似乎都在为这个古镇增添着异彩和生机。 在这个宁静的水镇里，生活的脚步似乎完全听命于那淌着潺潺流水的河流。西塘可以说是水的同义词。这里的河流是那样的蜿蜒曲折、波光粼粼，映射出一派宁静祥和的街景。夜幕降临，河岸边数千盏灯笼与晚霞一并点燃，把整个小镇映衬得灯火通明，为镇民们照亮了回家的路。

问答题中华文明历来注重社会和谐，强调团结互助。中国人早就提出厂“和为贵”的思想，追求天人和谐、人际和谐、身心和谐，向往“人人相亲，人人平等，天下为公”的理想社会。今天，中国提出构建和谐社会，就是要建设一个民主法治、公平正义、诚信友爱、充满活力、安定有序、人与自然和谐相处的社会，实现物质和精神、民主和法治、公平和效率、活力和秩序的有机统一。中国人民把维护民族团结作为自己义不容辞的职责，把维护国家主权和领土完整作为自己至高无上的使命。一切有利于民族闭结和国家统一的行为，都会得到中国人民真诚的欢迎和拥护。一切有损于民族团结和国家统一的举动，都会遭到中国人民强烈的反对和抗争。

问答题In 2005, the recruitment examination for state civil servants attracted more than 540,000 applicants with more than 8,400 positions in 103 departments. According to the statistics of the Ministry of Personnel from 1996 to 2003, only about 1.2 percent of civil servants changed jobs every year, while in business the figure was about 10 percent. Topic: Why is civil servant a sought-after job? Questions for Reference: 1. What motivates the college graduates to be civil servants? 2. Do you prefer to be a civil servant or a company clerk? Why? 3. What can we learn from the fact that undergraduates rush to be civil servants?

问答题WHAT makes an artist great? Brilliant composition, no doubt. Superb draughtsmanship, certainly. Originality of subject or of concept, sometimes. But surely true greatness means that the creator of a painting has brought a certain je ne sais quoi to the work as well. 是什么成就了一名伟大的画家？出色的构图？高超的画技？这两点毋庸置疑。有时也靠创作主题或理念的新颖性。但真正的伟大指的是画家为作品赋予一种难以描述的特质。 There is, however, a type of person who seems to sait perfectly well what that quoi is, and can turn it out on demand. In 1945, for example, a Dutchman named Han van Meegeren faced execution for selling a national art treasure, in the form of a painting by Vermeer, to Hermann G?ring, Hitler’s deputy. His defence was that it was a forgery he had painted himself. When asked to prove it by copying a Vermeer he scorned the offer. Instead he turned out a completely new painting, “Jesus Among the Doctors”, in the style of the master, before the eyes of his incredulous inquisitors. 然而，有这样一种人，他们似乎能准确把握这个难以名状的东西，并且能够按要求把它复制出来。例如，1945年，一位名叫汉·凡·米格伦（HanvanMeegeren）的荷兰人因将一幅国家艺术珍品，也就是维米尔（Vermeer）的一幅画作，卖给希特勒的副手赫尔曼·戈林（HermannG?ring）而面临死刑。他辩称这只是幅赝品，由他本人仿造。当被要求现场模仿一幅维米尔的画作来证明自己时，他表示十分不屑。在审判者怀疑的眼神下，他以维米尔的风格创作了一幅全新的作品《基督在博学者中间》。 此处例子功能题：作者为何提及荷兰画家？ G?ring, who was facing a little local difficulty at the time, did not sue van Meegeren. But that has not been the experience of Glafira Rosales, an art dealer in New York who admitted this week that she has, over the past 15 years, fooled two local commercial art galleries into buying 63 forged works of art for more than $30m. She is being forced to give the money back, and is still awaiting sentence. 戈林当时在本国遇到了点麻烦，所以就没有起诉凡·米格伦。但格拉菲拉·罗萨莱斯（GlafiraRosales）可没那么好运了。作为纽约的一位艺术品商人，罗萨莱斯于本周承认了在过去的十五年里曾向两个当地的商业艺术画廊卖出了63幅假画，总收益达三千多万美元。她被强制要求退还所有收入，目前仍在等待法院的判决。 此处细节题，考有关Rosales 的例子内容。 Ms Rosales is guilty of passing goods off as something they are not, and should take the rap for the fraud. But although art forgers do a certain amount of economic damage, they also provide public entertainment by exposing the real values that lie at the heart of the art market. 罗萨莱斯女士因出售赝品获罪，应承担相应的刑事责任。但虽然这些艺术品伪造者给他人造成了一定的经济损失，但他们也通过揭露艺术品市场上核心艺术品的真实价值而娱乐了大众。 此处词汇理解题：解释take the rap。 That art market pretends that great artists are inimitable, and that this inimitability justifies the often absurd prices their work commands. Most famous artists are good: that is not in question. But as forgers like van Meegeren and Pei-Shen Qian, the painter who turned out Ms Rosales’s Rothkos and Pollocks, show, they are very imitable indeed. If they were not, the distinction between original and knock-off would always be obvious. As Ms Rosales’s customers have found, no doubt to their chagrin, it isn’t. 艺术品市场称伟大的艺术家都是独一无二的，而这种不可模仿性使得他们的作品都贵得离谱。大多数著名的艺术家都很优秀，这一点毋庸置疑。但像伪造者凡·米格伦和为罗萨莱斯女士伪造罗斯科和波洛克画作的钱培琛，他们的存在证明了这些艺术家是可以被模仿的。如果不是的话，那真品和赝品之间的差别就会十分明显。罗萨莱斯女士的顾客就没有发现其中的区别，难怪事后他们懊恼不已。 此处句子理解题，解释黑体字部分。chagrin: 懊悔，懊恼。 If the purchasers of great art were buying paintings only for their beauty, they would be content to display fine fakes on their walls. The fury and embarrassment caused by the exposure of a forger suggests this is not so. 如果购买者纯粹是因为欣赏画作的美而去购买它，那么即使是把假画挂在自家墙上也会心满意足。但伪造者的曝光所引起的愤怒和尴尬说明了情况并非如此。 Expensive pictures are primarily what economists call positional goods—things that are valuable largely because other people can’t have them. The painting on the wall, or the sculpture in the garden, is intended to say as much about its owner’s bank balance as about his taste. With most kit a higher price reduces demand. But art, sports cars and fine wine invert the laws of economics. When the good that is really being purchased is evidence that the buyer has forked out a bundle, price spikes cause demand to boom. 名贵的画作被经济学家称为地位性商品——这类商品昂贵的价值很大程度是因为其他人无法拥有。不管是墙上的名画，还是花园里的雕塑，都彰显着其主人的品位和财富。大多数情况下，价格越高，需求就会越少。但是艺术品，跑车和名酒却打破了这一经济学定律。当真正被买下的商品能证明买家的确是花了大手笔时，那么价格的上涨反而会使需求猛增。 All this makes the scarcity and authenticity that underpin lofty valuations vital. Artists forget this at their peril: Damien Hirst’s spot pictures, for instance, plummeted in value when it became clear that they had been produced in quantities so vast nobody knew quite how many were out there, and when the market lost faith in a mass-production process whose connection with the original artist was, to say the least, tenuous. 这个现象说明了商品稀缺性和真实性的重要性。正因为此，艺术品的价格才会持续居高不下。艺术家若忽视这一点，便会自尝苦果。例如，当达明安·赫斯特（DamienHirst）的现场画作被大批量生产时，其价格直跌。市场对批量生产过程失去了信心，至少可以说，这样生产出来的作品和原创者的联系不再紧密。 Ms Rosales’s career is thus a searing social commentary on a business which purports to celebrate humanity’s highest culture but in which names are more important than aesthetics and experts cannot tell the difference between an original and a fake. Unusual, authentic, full of meaning—her life itself is surely art, even if the paintings were not. 罗萨莱斯女士的一生无非是对艺术行业的嘲讽。这个行业声称颂扬人类最崇高的文化，但艺术家的名字却比美感更重要，而专家却连真品和赝品都无法区别开来。即使罗萨莱斯女士出售的画作不是真正的艺术品，但她的一生，不同寻常、万般真实且意义深刻，充满了艺术性。

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