问答题Since Darwin, biologists have been firmly convinced that nature works without plan or meaning, pursuing no aim by the direct road of design. But today we see that this conviction is a fatal error. Why should evolution, exactly as Darwin knew it and described it, be planless and irrational? Do not aircraft design engineers work, at precisely that point where specific calculations and plans give out, according to the same principle of evolution, when they test the serviceability of a great number of statistically determined forms in the wind tunnel, in order to choose the one that functions best? Can we say that there is no process of natural selection when nuclear physicists, through thousands of computer operations, try to find out which materials, in which combinations and with what structural form, are best suited to the building of an atomic reactor? They also practise no designed adaptation, but work by the principle of selection. But it would never occur to anyone to call their method planless and irrational.

问答题Many European countries have devoted a high proportion of their GDP to public spending and many governments cannot wait to get out of their new-found business of running banks and car companies. But the past decade has clearly produced changes which, taken cumulatively, have put the question of the state back at the centre of political debate. The obvious reason for the change is the financial crisis. As global markets collapsed, governments intervened on an unprecedented scale, injecting liquidity into their economies and taking over, or otherwise rescuing, banks and other companies that were judged "too big to fail". A few months after Lehman Brothers had collapsed, the American government was in charge of General Motors and Chrysler, the British government was running high street banks. The crisis upended conventional wisdom about the relative merits of governments and markets. Where government was once the problem, today the default villain is the market. Yet even before Lehman Brothers collapsed the state was on the march.

问答题英国是最先开始探索代议制的国家。早在13世纪，英国议会就初具雏形，成为世界上最古老的议会。在中国，以民为本和依法治国的思想自古有之。约四千年前，夏禹时期就有“民惟邦本，本固邦宁”的说法。中国古人认为：“国无常强，无常弱，奉法者强则国强，奉法者弱则国弱。”两千多年前，中国就有了成文的法典。现在，中国人民正在全面推进依法治国，既吸收中华法制的优良传统，也借鉴世界各国法治的有益做法，目标就是坚持法律面前人人平等，加快建设中国特色社会主义法治体系。在这方面，两国的立法机关可以加强交流互鉴。

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问答题What are the reasons for greater mobility in the Nordic countries?

问答题Questions 4～6 It is too early to say whether the recent declines in global stock markets signal anything out of the ordinary. Though large, they are hardly unprecedented: 8 percent for the Dow, 19 percent for Japan's Nikkei, 21.7 percent for Brazil's Bovespa (all changes are measured from recent highs, in April or May, until yesterdays closes). But the fact that they've occurred simultaneously suggests herd behavior. Spoiled by years of cheap credit, global investors seem to be reacting to the prospect of higher interest rates by fleeing stock markets almost everywhere. There is danger of a broader financial and economic setback. The riskiest and most mysterious aspect of the present situation is the increasingly global nature of investment capital. Once, capital was largely compartmentalized by nation Americans saved and invested in the United States; Germans saved and invested in Germany. This world is disappearing. It is now routine for pension funds, mutual funds and many wealthy investors to move money in and out of American, European, Asian and Latin American stocks and bonds. The magnitudes are immense. For 2004 the International Monetary Fund reports that. Americans invested $ 856 billion abroad, while foreigners invested $1.44 trillion in the United States. Some flows represented "foreign direct investment": buying factories, real estate or entire companies. But most flows involved corporate stocks and bonds, government bonds or international bank loans. The Japanese invested $ 414 billion abroad, and foreigners invested $ 273 billion in Japan. "Emerging market" countries (China, India, Brazil and many developing nations) received $ 570 billion in foreign investment and made $ 935 billion of investments abroad. About $ 515 billion of the outflow came from governments—dominated by China and other Asian nations—that reinvested their trade surpluses, often in U. S. Treasury bonds. Thirty years ago, these massive global money movements didn't exist. Most countries had extensive "capital controls" restricting how much (or whether) their citizens could invest abroad and how much (or whether) foreigners could invest in their countries. The United States was a major exception. A turning point was France's decision in the early 1980s to relax controls, says Rawi Abdelal of the Harvard Business School and author of the forthcoming Capital Rules: The Construction of Global Finance. The French concluded that controls were so widely evaded by the wealthy that they were impractical, he says. Once France changed, Europe moved to liberalize capital flows. Many other countries gradually joined for fear of losing in the worldwide chase for investment funds. In theory, liberalization benefits everyone. Capital flows to the most productive investments. Savers earn higher returns. Countries with good investment opportunities expand more rapidly. Huge capital inflows have dearly helped China by financing new factories with modern technology. In many ways, the world economy seems healthy. In 2006, the IMF predicts the fourth consecutive year of growth exceeding 4 percent. But there's a rub: Global finance has created new risks. At least two stand out. First, huge trade imbalances. The United States is running massive deficits, counterbalanced by big surpluses in China, Japan and other Asian countries. These imbalances occur in part because countries with trade surpluses can recycle their export earning—heavily in dollars—rather than buying imports or selling dollars for other currencies, leading to a dollar depreciation. That would lower the American trade deficit by making U. S. imports more expensive and U. S. exports less expensive. Most economists consider today's massive imbalances unsustainable. Second, worldwide financial crises. Global investors may move in herds, first pouring money into some countries—or investments—and then withdrawing abruptly. That's what happened in the 1997-98 Asian financial crisis. Capital flight plunged countries into deep recessions; investors suffered large losses. There are now fears that hedge funds and others may be similarly overexposed in some markets. (Hedge funds are lightly regulated pools of money, mostly from big and wealthy investors. They are estimated to control more than $1 trillion in financial assets.) Some economists, most prominently Stephen Roach of Morgan Stanley, consider the recent stock market declines a healthy sign. They signal a retreat from blatantly speculative behavior. A prolonged period of cheap credit pushed too much money into risky investments. Some investors put money into emerging-market stocks and bonds; others preferred commodities (gold, copper). Housing was the small investor's favorite. The result: a series of "bubbles" that are best punctured sooner rather than later.1.What is the present situation of global stock markets? What may be the consequences it lead to?

问答题Why are CEOs "slowly becoming a threat to the very system they claim to represent"?

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.

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." East 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Room 101, the infamous "torture chamber" in George Orwell"s novel 1984, is to be preserved as a work of art by the BBC. Orwell, whose real name was Eric Blair, worked for the BBC"s Eastern Service during the second world war. He later described his time there as "futile" and likened the BBC to "a mixture of a whorehouse and a lunatic asylum". Room 101 of Broadcasting House, thought to have held bad memories for Orwell, featured in 1984 as the place where disloyal citizens face their innermost fears. "The thing that is in room 101 is the worst thing in the world," Orwell"s hero, Winston Smith, is told by his interrogator as a cage full of hungry rats is placed over his head. "When I press this ... lever the door of the cage will slide up. These starving brutes will shoot out of it like bullets ... They will leap onto your face and bore straight through it." Room 101, at the end of a first-floor corridor in Broadcasting House, is due to be demolished in the summer as part of a massive refurbishment. The BBC has asked Rachel Whiteread, who is best known for producing casts of objects such as the unused fourth plinth in Trafalgar Square, to tackle the room, which is now packed with pipes, shafts and boilers. "I"ve been to see it," said Whiteread last week. "I"d like to do something. " The BBC plans to display Whiteread"s replica of room 101 in one of several new public spaces in the new-look Broadcasting House. It has already begun to gut the inside of the building as part of a ￡400m plan to turn it into a huge radio and television newsroom, and a new home for the BBC World Service. About ￡5m has been set aside by John Smith, the BBC"s finance director, to spend on art and design. Alan Yentob, coordinator of the public art project, said. "We"ve been scandalous over the past 40 years in not concerning ourselves with art and design in our own buildings." Other leading artists, designers and photographers including Anish Kapoor, Fiona Rae, Cornelia Parker, Nick Danziger, and Richard Wentworth have agreed to produce work for the art scheme, although the replica of room 101 is likely to cause most interest. "It sounds fun, all the more so because Orwell hated the BBC," said his biographer Sir Bernard Crick. This June is the 100th anniversary of Orwell"s birth in India. Once in England, the former public-school boy and policeman took up left-wing causes and wrote books such as Coming Up for Air, Animal Farm and Down and Out in Paris and London. However, some experts ask if the BBC has got the right room. "Room 101 was at another BBC building—55 Portland Place," said Peter Davison, who has published two volumes of Orwell"s works, letters and documents. "Portland Place is where they held meetings of the Eastern Service and that, I"m sure, is how he came to name the room in 1984." Whatever the truth of room 101, the BBC plans to continue with Whiteread"s cast replica, not least because of the intriguing shapes of its pipes and tubes. The BBC has made other uses of Orwell"s room 101. Its name is the title of the television programme in which the comedian Paul Merton asks guests to identify and destroy their pet hates. The Broadcasting House refurbishment is due to be completed in 2006. When it was built 70 years ago, the building, with its many art deco touches, was hailed as a masterpiece of design. Two Eric Gill sculptures—one of Prospero and Ariel outside and another in the foyer—will be kept because they, like the BBC"s Council Chamber, are listed. The public art project will begin in May, with temporary works on the scaffolding and tarpaulin outside Broadcasting House. The permanent works will not be ready until 2006. "I"ll be working on some big space project to go inside," said Kapoor, whose enormous trumpet-like Marsyas sculpture is at Tate Modern. Parker, whose reworking of Rodin"s The Kiss is at Tate Britain, plans a work based on sound or pictures.

问答题Directions: In this part of the test, you will hear 5 sentences in English. You will hear the sentences ONLY ONCE. After you have heard each sentence, translate it into Chinese and write your version in the corresponding space in your ANSWER BOOKLET.

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问答题A former colleague relished telling me last week about two forthcoming new additions to the population. His wife is fit to pop with identical twin girls. He and our sister publication, The Times, got me thinking: could the twins live to be 1507Times2 posed this very question alongside a photograph of a thumb-sucking newborn. Decrepitude is no longer inevitable, it said. Science will help us to stop the rot. There is, some scientists say, are al Dorian Gray among us--someone who, through a mixture of good genes, healthy lifestyle and timely medical interventions, will give the impression of staying young throughout an extra ordinarilylong life. I was still pondering the likelihood of living to 150 when I was presented with another big question: just how did Derren Brown do it? In a television stunt, he claimed to have predicted the six winning Lotto numbers, sparking an online guessing game about how it was achieved. Indeed," Derren Brown" and "lottery" were the two top searched-for keywords on the web that led users to times on line, co. uk. Dozens of theories were offered--from camera trickery to simple sleight of hand. Even actuaries were speaking about it. Clive Grimley, a partner at Barnett Waddingham,bought into the most popular theory. "According to someone on You Tube, he used split-screentechnology to give the impression that the balls were in the live shot, when in fact they were a staticimage," he mused. "The left-hand side of the screen, which showed the numbered balls in a row, was a frozen image. In reality, an assistant was putting the balls in place during the 30-second delay between them being drawn and Brown revealing his numbers. Like Edward Norton in The Illusionist, it's all a trick. " Just as illusory, he says, are projections of retirement in come. Pensioners today can expect to spend a third of their lives in retirement--a figure that could grow to half our life or more, as we all die later. It may sound good in theory, but Grimley has some sobering views: the state pension age will have to rocket, a growing number of people will be forced to take "the glide path—gradually winding down into retirement rather than stopping work altogether immediately--and the onus for funding our latter years will increasingly fall on our own shoulders. The NHS will crumble under the pressure, with 100-plus pensioners battering down the doors at doctors-- surgeries. Early evidence stacks up his argument. It is already proposed that the state pension age for women will rise to 65 by 2020, making it equal to that of men. For both sexes, it will rise to 68 by2046. That will be far from sufficient, though. "Increases to state retirement age are going to have to be fairly radical--I don't think anyone wants to admit just how radical," said Grimley. When you reach the magic age--whatever that may be--you could be sorely disappointed. The Institute of Directors said last week that the government should freeze the state pension to help cut its growing budget deficit, and freezes--or cuts--could soon become the norm. How much you stand to get from personal pension savings could be a shock, too. Annuity rates have dropped almost 10% since last summer, pushed down by the government's attempts to reflate the economy. It has pumped $175 billion into the financial system by buying up gilts. This has pushed gilt prices up and yields down by as much as 50 to 100 basis points, and it is these that determine annuity rates. Moreover, the sort of income you can expect from your pension pot is also determined by life expectancy. Clearly, the longer you're expected to live, the lower the annuity rate. Three decades ago, in 1980, benchmark annuity rates for a 65-year-old man were almost 16%. Today, they' re less than half that at 7%--knocking $ 9,000 a year off what you'd get for a $100,000 pot. What if in another 30 years they're just 3%? That would knock off another $ 4,000, giving you a pitiful $ 3,000 a year for every $100,000 of pension savings. Never mind the twins. I'd better get on with cracking the code for predicting the numbers of those Lotto balls.1.Why does the author introduce the topic of the likelihood of living to 150 at the beginning of the passage?

问答题What we forget—what our economy depends on us forgetting—is that happiness is more than pleasure without pain. The things that bring the greatest joy carry the greatest potential for loss the disappointment. Today, surrounded by promises of easy happiness, we need someone to tell us that it is ok not to be happy, that sadness makes happiness deeper. As the wine-connoisseur movie Sideways tells us, it is the kiss of decay and mortality that makes grape juice into Pinot Noir. We need art to tell us, as religion once did, Memento mori: remember that you will die, that everything ends, and that happiness comes not in denying this but in living with it. It's a message even more bitter than a clove cigarette, yet somehow, a breath of fresh air.

问答题上海合作组织成员国能够超越彼此在地缘，文化等方面的巨大差异，紧密团结在一起，共同应对国际和地区风云变幻的考验，最根本的一点就是，上海合作组织的宗旨和原则符合各成员国的切身利益。它们是：第一，致力于发展成员国之间的睦邻友好关系；第二，致力于发展成员国在经济、文化、教育各个具体领域的合作，照顾各成员国的利益；第三，致力于打击恐怖主义、分裂主义和极端主义，维护地区的和平与稳定；第四，致力于促进建立公正和平文明的政治经济新秩序。这4个方面完全符合成员国的现实和长远利益。因此，尽管在过去5年国际上和本地区发生不少事情，但都没能动摇上海合作组织的基础。上海合作组织显示出强大的生命力，正蓬勃向前发展。