单选题Addiction is such a harmful behavior, in fact, that evolution should have long ago weeded it out of the population: if it's hard to drive safely under the influence, imagine trying to run from a saber-toothed tiger or catch a squirrel for lunch. And yet, says Dr. Nora Volkow, director of NIDA and a pioneer in the use of imaging to understand addiction, "the use of drugs has been recorded since the beginning of civilization. Humans in my view will always want to experiment with things to make them feel good. " That's because drugs of abuse co-opt the very brain functions that allowed our distant ancestors to survive in a hostile world. Our minds are programmed to pay extra attention to what neurologists call salience--that is, special relevance. Threats, for example, are highly salient, which is why we instinctively try to get away from them. But so are food and sex because they help the individual and the species survive. Drugs of abuse capitalize on this ready-made programming. When exposed to drugs, our memory systems, reward circuits, decision-making skills and conditioning kick in--salience in overdrive--to create an all consuming pattern of uncontrollable craving. "Some people have a genetic predisposition to addiction," says Volkow. "But because it involves these basic brain functions, everyone will become an addict if sufficiently exposed to drugs or alcohol. " That can go for nonchemical addictions as well. Behaviors, from gambling to shopping to sex, may start out as habits but slide into addictions. Sometimes there might be a behavior-specific root of the problem. Volkow's research group, for example, has shown that pathologically obese people who are compulsive eaters exhibit hyperactivity in the areas of the brain that process food stimuli--including the mouth, lips and tongue. For them, activating these regions is like opening the floodgates to the pleasure center. Almost anything deeply enjoyable can turn into an addiction, though. Of course, not everyone becomes an addict. That's because we have other, more analytical regions that can evaluate consequences and override mere pleasure seeking. Brain imaging is showing exactly how that happens. Paulus, for example, looked at drug addicts enrolled in a VA hospital's intensive four-week rehabilitation program. Those who were more likely to relapse in the first year after completing the program were also less able to complete tasks involving cognitive skills and less able to adjust to new rules quickly. This suggested that those patients might also be less adept at using analytical areas of the brain while performing decision-making tasks. Sure enough, brain scans showed that there were reduced levels of activation in the prefrontal cortex, where rational thought can override impulsive behavior. It's impossible to say if the drugs might have damaged these abilities in the relapsers--an effect rather than a cause of the chemical abuse--but the fact that the cognitive deficit existed in only some of the drug users suggests that there was something innate that was unique to them. To his surprise, Paulus found that 80% to 90% of the time, he could accurately predict who would relapse within a year simply by examining the scans. Another area of focus for researchers involves the brain's reward system, powered largely by the neurotransmitter dopamine. Investigators are looking specifically at the family of dopamine receptors that populate nerve cells and bind to the compound. The hope is that if you can reduce the effect Of the brain chemical that carries the pleasurable signal, you can loosen the drug's hold.

单选题The Lakers' forward Kobe Bryant has scored 50 or more points in four straight games, second in the NBA only to Wilt Chamberlain's seven. He also now is tied with Michael Jordan for second with four behind Chamberlain's 32 in most 60-point games. "He's doing something I've never seen," Lakers coach Phil Jackson said in an e-mail Saturday. "This has been historic." He should know because he coached Jordan and played against Chamberlain. Bryant is not going to win the MVP award, which likely will go to Dirk Nowitzki or Steve Nash. But his scoring brilliance again seems to answer the question of who's the best player in the league and it also provides more evidence in the similarity of Bryant and Jordan in their talent and approach to the game. In any ease, Bryant is the player now firmly holding that mythical torch of greatness, sporting celebrity and creativity that Jordan once took from Julius "Dr. J" Erring. "Kobe has the verdant green light to hoist it up until he cools down," Jackson said. "Wonders never cease in this game." Certainly, Bryant has been wonderful in the four games, averaging 56.3 points with two games of at least 60. Moreover, he hardly has been selfish or working outside the offense because most of his field goals have come on long jumpers, including 17 of 33 on three-pointers. Bryant is shooting 54 percent. "It's phenomenal. It's incredible," Jackson told Los Angeles reporters. "He's shooting [outside] more than Michael was. Michael was probably doing more post-up, more penetration, more at-the-basket kind of stuff. But Kobe's doing a whole range of things. I think his shooting has just been remarkable, the way he is raising up over people and knocking the ball down." It's still a long way off, but because he started in the NBA when he was 18, Bryant, 28, can pass Kareem Abdul-Jabbar as the league's all-time scorer if he can stay healthy and average 25 points until he is 38. "The best part of it all is that we're winning," Bryant said. "The second is that this generation of players who might not have ever heard of the Elgin [Baylors] or Wilts [and their] greatness will now take notice so the legacy of their brilliance will live on. "As far as myself, I can't explain it. All is in slow motion all the time. I don't know why or how, but it's trippy." That's probably what Chamberlain said during his record run.

单选题One reason many politicians behave badly these days is that we spend less time thinking about what it means to behave well. This was less of a problem in past centuries when leaders, teachers and clergy held detailed debates over what it meant to have good character. In the 18th century, for example, Edmund Burke composed a long, famous passage defining the standards of political excellence. In the 19th century, Anthony Trollope wrote a series of popular novels fussing over what it means to behave well in political life. Trollope's view was different than ours. Many Americans today assume that people are born with a good Inner Self but get corrupted by politics. American voters are always looking for the Innocent Outsider who can come in and bring sweeping change. Trollope admired Prudent Insiders, not Innocent Outsiders. His most admirable characters have been educated by long experience. They have grown mature by exercising responsibility. They have been ennobled by custom and civilization. In his books, powerless outsiders often behave self-indulgently and irresponsibly. Those who are in government have to grapple with the world as it really is. Trollope's ideal politicians—who have names like Plantagenet Palliser, Joshua Monk and the Duke of St. Bungay put service before independence. Their party and their country have asked them to accept certain duties and face certain problems, and they just get on with it. They are more weighty, but also more boring. Trollope's ideal politicians share certain traits. They are reserved, prudent and scrupulous. They immerse themselves in dull practical questions like, say, converting the currency system. They are not sweeping thinkers, but they make sensitive discriminations about the people and the circumstances around them. They learn to operate within the constraints imposed by their idiom, and they don't whine or complain about those constraints. They develop delicate understandings of what is required in a given place in time. Trollope's ideal leaders are not glamorous celebrities of the sort we have come to long for since J. F. Kennedy. They are more like seamen or carpenters. They are judged by their professional craftsmanship. They are thin-skinned about any moral transgression they might commit and rigorously honest when judging themselves. They try to make things better but are acutely aware that everything they do might make things worse. Trollope's leaders don't embrace change quickly but have to be dragged into embracing it after much interrogation, and the change they prefer is incremental. Trollope praises one of his prime ministers, Plantagenet Palliser, for "that exquisite combination of conservatism and progress which is his country's present strength and her best security for the future. " Trollope's readers would have come away from his books with a certain model for how practical people should behave, which they could either copy or argue with. I'm not sure his exemplars could thrive amid the TV politics of today, which calls for grand promises and bold colors. But there are prudent, reserved people in government even now.

单选题Which of the following advantages doesn't the TRAM have?

单选题Most worthwhile careers require some kind of specialized training. Ideally, therefore, the choice of an (1) should be made even before choice of a curriculum in high school. Actually, (2) , most people make several job choices during their working lives, (3) because of economic and industrial changes and partly to improve. (4) position. The "one perfect job" does not exist. Young people should (5) enter into a broad flexible training program that will (6) them for a field of work rather than for a single (7) . Unfortunately many young people have to make career plans (8) benefit of help from a competent vocational counselor or psychologist. Knowing (9) about the occupational world, or themselves for that matter, they choose their lifework on a hit-or-miss (10) . Some drift from job to job. Others (11) to work in which they are unhappy and for which they are not fitted. One common mistake is choosing an occupation for (12) real or imagined prestige. Too many high school students or their parents for them choose the professional field, (13) both the relatively small proportion of workers in the professions and the extremely high educational and personal (14) . The imagined or real prestige of a profession or a "white-collar" job is (15) good reason for choosing it as life's work. (16) , these occupations are not always well paid. Since a large proportion of jobs are in mechanical and manual work, the (17) of young people should give serious (18) to these fields. Before making an occupational choice, a person should have a general idea of what he wants (19) life and how hard he is willing to work to get it. Some people desire social prestige, others intellectual satisfaction. Some want security; others are willing to take (20) for financial gain. Each occupational choice has its demands as well as its rewards.

单选题Hart cited a case in an Australian court to indicate that______.

单选题{{B}}Text 3{{/B}} No blueprint exists for transforming an economy from one with a great deal of government control to one based almost solely on free market principles. Yet the experience of the United Kingdom since 1979 clearly shows one approach that works: privatization, in which under-performing state-owned are sold to private companies. By 1979, the total amount of debt, liabilities, and losses for state-controlled enterprises in the UK topped 3 billion annually. By selling off many of these companies, particularly those in the depressed industrial sector, the government decreased its debt burden and ceased pumping public funds into money losing enterprises. According to government spokesperson Alistair McBride, "Far from past practice of throwing good money after bad, the Queen's government this year expects to take in 34 billion from the proceeds of the sale." That, say some analysts, may only be the beginning. Privatization has not only been credited with rescuing whole industries but the nation's economy to boot. Due to increased tax revenues from the newly privatized companies along with a rebound in the overall economy, economic forecasters predict that Britain will be able to repay nearly 12.5% of the net national debt within two years. That is good news indeed for the economy as a whole at a time when many sectors are desperate for any ray of sunshine. British Airways this week announced a 20% jump in overall ticket sales and profits over this quarter a year ago. British Gas announced its first profitable quarter in nine years. At Associated British Ports, a new labor contract was finalized, the first union contract signed at the port without a work stoppage in twelve years. Closer to home for most Britons, the nation's phone service, British Telecom, no longer puts new subscribers on a waiting list. Prior to privatization, new customers would sometimes have to wait months before phone service could be installed in their home. Now, according to a company press release, British Telecom is promising 24-hour turnaround for all new customers. Part of this improved productivity has to do with new efforts to allow employees to hold a stake in the company's future. Companies now give their employees stock options that allow employees to share in the company's success (and profits). The response has been enthusiastic to say the least. At British Aerospace; 89% of those eligible to buy company shares did so. At British Telecom nearly 92% of eligible employees took part. Finally, at Associated British Ports, long synonymous with union disagreements, walkouts, and labor strife, almost 90% of employees now can call themselves owners of the company. "When people have a personal stake in something," said Henry Dundee of Associated British Ports, "they think about it, they care about, they work to make it prosper." At the National Freight Consortium, itself no stranger to labor problems, the new employee-owners actually voted down an employee pay-increase and, pressured union representatives to relax demands for increased wages and expanded benefits. "Privatization was only the start," says one market analyst, "what we may have here is a new industrial revolution."

单选题It can be inferred from the passage that one way in which traditional history can be distinguished from psychohistory is that traditional history usually______

单选题A best title for this passage is ______.

单选题It is an astonishing fact that there are laws of nature, rules that summarize conveniently- (1) qualitatively but quantitatively-how the world works. We might (2) a universe in which there are no such laws, in which the 1080 elementary particles that (3) a universe like our own behave with utter and uncompromising abandon. To understand such a universe we would need a brain (4) as massive as the universe. It seems (5) that such a universe could have life and intelligence, because being and brains (6) some degree of internal stability and order. But (7) in a much more random universe there were such beings with an intelligence much (8) than our own, there could not be much knowledge, passion or joy. (9) for us, we live in a universe that has at least important parts that are knowable. Our common-sense experience and our evolutionary history have (10) us to understand something of the workaday world. When we go into other realms, however, common sense and ordinary intuition (11) highly unreliable guides. It is stunning that as we go close to the speed of light our mass (12) indefinitely, we shrink toward zero thickness (13) the direction of motion, and time for us comes as near to stopping as we would like. Many people think that this is silly, and every week (14) I get a letter from someone who complains to me about it. But it is virtually certain consequence not just of experiment but also of Albert Einstein's (15) analysis of space and time called the Special Theory of Relativity. It does not matter that these effects seem unreasonable to us. We are not (16) the habit of traveling close to the speed of light. The testimony of our common sense is suspect at high velocities. The idea that the world places restrictions on (17) humans might do is frustrating. Why shouldn't we be able to have intermediate rotational positions? Why can't we (18) faster than the speed of light? But (19) we can tell, this is the way the universe is constructed. Such prohibitions not only (20) us toward a little humility; they also make the world more knowable.

单选题Those of us hurrying to finish our taxes by tomorrow's deadline will probably be subjected to thoughts of the I.R.S. (Internal Revenue Service) as an all-powerful bully. But the truth is, the government is not always a match for the tax advisors of wealthy people, so a lot of taxes will go unpaid at the top of the income scale. Lawyers who represent high-income taxpayers earn more than 10 times what senior government lawyers do—an obvious disadvantage for the government agencies in attracting and retaining top talent. The lawyers who write our tax rules are overworked and sometimes inexperienced, so that they leave loopholes that are exploited by more experienced private lawyers. And the government always loses cases which it should win, and provides private lawyers with precedents. As this vicious cycle shows, skimping (节约) on tax administration is a false economy. Instead, if we substantially increase government salaries and staffing levels, we can raise more revenue, with lower tax rates and less waste. Four reforms should be adopted immediately. First, the government should focus on hiring talented young lawyers, since the pay disparity with the private sector is narrower for them. These efforts will be more effective if Congress helps new graduates repay student loans, which often are more than $100,000. A loan repayment program would be a powerful recruiting device. Second, the government should tap another promising talent pool—recent retirees from private practice—to mentor young lawyers. The salary gap is less of an issue for retirees, and the opportunity to give back to the tax system can be quite appealing. Third, the government should retain a small team of a dozen top tax lawyers at salaries closer to the market rate. They can serve as a rapid reaction force, deciding whether to shut down a new aggressive strategy immediately or to let it be evaluated through usual government channels. Fourth, the government should retain private lawyers to help with high-priority projects. An important constraint is that lawyers who represent private clients may view it as a conflict to help the government. But this is not always true. Through bar associations, private lawyers already volunteer to review proposed changes in the tax law and offer ways to improve them. Tax academics can also be a valuable and conflict-free source of expertise, since they ordinarily do not represent clients. And some tax litigators (诉讼律师) may view it as a prestigious opportunity and a patriotic service to represent the government in a tax case that could set an important precedent. The tax system can be only as strong as the people who run it, so the government has to recruit and retain the most promising talent. A tax system can be fair and efficient only when it is administered soundly.

单选题The China boom is by now a well-documented phenomenon. Who hasn't (1) the Middle Kingdom's astounding economic growth (8 percent annually), its mesmerizing (2) market (1.2 billion people), the investment ardor of foreign suitors ($40 billion in foreign direct investment last year (3) )? China is an economic juggernaut. (4) Nicholas Lardy of the Brookings Institution, a Washington D. C.-based think tank, " No country has (5) its foreign trade as fast as China over the last 20 years. Japan (6) its foreign trade over a 20-year period; China's foreign trade as quintupled. They've become the pre-eminent producer of labor-intensive (7) goods in the world " . But there's been (8) from the dazzling China growth story—namely, the Chinese multinational. No major Chinese companies have (9) established themselves, or their brands, (10) the global stage. But as Haier shows, that is starting to change. (11) 100 years of poverty and chaos, of being overshadowed by foreign countries and multinationals, Chinese industrial companies are starting to (12) on the world. A new generation of large and credible firms has (13) in China in the electronics, appliance and even high-tech sectors. Some have reached critical mass on the mainland and are now (14) new outlets for their production—through exports and by building Chinese factories abroad, chiefly in Southeast Asia. One example: China's investment in Malaysia (15) from $8 million in 2000 to $766 million in the first half of this year. (16) China's export prowess, it will be years (17) Chinese firms achieve the managerial and operational expertise of Western and Japanese multinationals. For one thing, many of its best companies are still at least partially state-owned. (18) , China has a shortage of managerial talent and little notion of marketing and brand-building. Its companies are also (19) by the country's long tradition of central planning, inefficient use of capital and antiquated distribution system, (20) makes building national companies a challenge.

单选题{{B}}Text 4{{/B}} Computer brain games may not offer the big mental boost many were hoping for, suggests new research, but brain scientists and brain-game experts don't all agree on the findings. The study, out this week in Nature, is the largest of its kind, say scientists from England's Medical Research Council Cognition and Brain Sciences Unit and the Alzheimer's Society, UK. They said in a Tuesday press briefing that brain-training games, used by millions, may not increase general brain power on other tasks or increase IQ "Participants did get better at games they practiced. The more they trained, the better they got. But there was still no translation to any general improvement in cognitive function," said lead author Adrian Owen, assistant director of Medical Research Council. The online experiment was sponsored by the BBC and involved more than 11 000 people between the ages of 18 and 60. They were split into three groups, including two groups that played different brain-training games that are similar to commercially available games, and a control group that was asked to go online and find answers to questions about topics such as music. Participants trained for at least 10 minutes a day, three times a week, for up to six weeks, Owen said. All took standard cognitive assessment tests at the start and finish of the study. While players increased their skills the more they played a specific game, that improvement didn't transfer to other activities or to a higher score on intelligence tests, said Owen and colleagues. Duke psychiatrist and Alzheimer's expert Murali Doraiswamy said it's the best study done to date and a good reality check. "There was so much hype surrounding brain games," he said. But it's not a death knell for gaming, Doraiswamy said. "I still think brain games offer tremendous potential for helping people with conditions such as ADHD and learning disabilities, but this study puts the burden of proof now on game manufacturers to show that they really offer meaningful benefits. " Study shortcomings include the fact that it didn't focus on the aging population, a group targeted by brain-game makers, experts said. And it did not look at benefits of more intense training, said Alvaro Fernandez, CEO and cofounder of Sharp Brains, a San Francisco market research firm that specializes in cognitive science. "This study shows random brain exercise doesn't transfer, but it does not deny that transfer can work if a person engages in more intense and targeted brain-training," Fernandez said.

单选题The American central bank was reluctant to raise interest rates because