单选题Ms. Rowling's reading in London's Royal Albert Hall is mentioned to show______.

单选题A) due to B ) apt for C) all but D) prior to

单选题It is widely known that birds learn to fly through practice, gradually (1) their innate ability into a finely tuned skill. (2) , a recent study conducted by the University of Sheffield's Department of Psychology has discovered that the reason birds learn to fly so easily is because memories may have been left behind by their ancestors. These skills may be easy to enhance because of a (3) specified latent (4) for flying. The researchers used simple models of brains called (5) neural networks and computer (6) to test his theory. They discovered that learning in (7) generations (8) induces the formation of a latent memory in the current generation and (9) decreases the amount of learning required. These effects are especially pronounced if there is a large biological "fitness cost" to learning, where biological fitness is measured in terms of the number of (10) each individual has. The beneficial effects of learning also (11) the unusual form of information storage in neural networks. (12) computers, which store each item of information in a specific location in the computer's memory chip, neural networks store each item (13) over many neuronal connections. (14) information is stored in this way then (15) is accelerated, explaining how complex motor skills, such as nest building and hunting skills, are (16) by a combination of innate ability and learning over many generations. The researchers concluded that this new theory has its (17) in ideas (18) by James Baldwin in 1896, who firstly made the counter-intuitive argument that learning within each generation could guide evolution of innate behavior over future generations. Baldwin was right, (19) in ways less sophisticated than he could have imagined because concepts (20) artificial neural networks and distributed representations were not known in his time.

单选题According to the text, in relation to someone teaching his own language to foreigners, audio-visual aids can

单选题{{B}}Text 3{{/B}} Historically, the European Union has not bothered with funding much basic scientific research. Such activities have mainly remained the preserve of national governments, not least because giving scientists free rein can lead to discoveries that not only make money but ultimately enhance military might. That attitude is now changing. The European Commission proposes to establish a European Research Council(ERC) that would spend a maximum of 12 billion (＄14 billion) over seven years on" blue skies" research. While the plans are being generally welcomed by Europe's member states, their details are problematic. The proposed ERC is intended to make Europe more competitive. Europe has some first-class universities, scientific institutions and research organisations. But, the ERC's proponents argue, their activities are fragmented, so they are not reaching their full potential. In America, teams from across the country compete with each other for grants from the National Science Foundation. The proposed ERC is modelled on this scheme. It would award grants to individual research teams for a specific project, solely on the basis of scientific merit judged by peer review. If the ERC were created, scientists from across Europe would compete with each other for funds, rather than merely competing with their fellow countrymen, as happens at present. This compares with the limited funding for basic research that currently exists in the EU, which places its emphasis on collaboration between researchers. It is open only to researchers in a narrow range of disciplines chosen by the European Parliament and the commission. The ERC would be quite different, placing its emphasis on competition between researchers and leaving scientists themselves to decide which areas of science to pursue. Helga Nowotny, who chairs the European Research Advisory Board—an advisory body to the commission—says that winning a grant from the ERC could come to be seen as unmistakable recognition of research excellence. The quality of European research needs to be stepped up a notch. Between 1980 and 2003, Europe had 68 Nobel laureates in medicine, physics and chemistry compared with 154 in America. With competition from China and India, Europe's share could fall further. One of the reasons for Europe's relatively weak performance is thought to be a lack of genuine competition between Europe's researchers. Another is its poor ability to attract young people into a research career. Recent estimates suggest that Europe needs an extra 700,000 researchers if it is to meet its overall target of raising spending(private,national and EU) on research and development to 3% of GDP by 2010. Many young scientists leave Europe for America once they have finished their training. Dr Nowotny says the ERC could help here too. It could establish a scheme to give young researchers the opportunity to follow their own ideas and become independent at an earlier stage in their careers, encouraging talent to stay in Europe. The crucial issue now is whether the ERC will be able to set its own research agenda, free from the interference and bureaucracy of the commission and influence of member states. Last month, 22 leading European scientists charged with shaping the ERC' s scientific strategy met for the first time to start hammering out a charter and constitution. Serious concerns remain over the legal structure of the body. The final decision on the ERC' s legal form, on a date yet unspecified, rests with the European Parliament and member states in the European Council. If both are genuine in their support for the ERC and Europe's aim of becoming more competitive, then they must find a way of keeping the ERC free from political interference. Europe would benefit from a competition for its best researchers which rewards scientific excellence. A quasi-competition that recognizes how many votes each member state is allotted would be pointless.

单选题What reason does the text suggest when women remain the minority of Internet users?

单选题Euthanasia has been a topic of controversy in Europe since at least 1936. On an average of six times a day, a doctor in Holland practices "active" euthanasia: (1) administering a lethal drug to a (2) ill patient who has asked to be relieved (3) suffering. Twenty times a day, life prolonging treatment is withheld or withdrawn (4) there is no hope that it can (5) an ultimate cure. "Active" euthanasia remains a crime on the Dutch statute books, punishable (6) 12 years in prison. But a series of court cases over the past 15 years has made it clear that a competent physician who (7) it out will not be prosecuted. Euthanasia, often called "mercy killing", is a crime everywhere in Western Europe. (8) more and more doctors and nurses in Britain, Germany, Holland and elsewhere readily (9) to practicing it, most often in the "passive" form of withholding or withdrawing (10) The long simmering euthanasia issue has lately (11) into a sometimes fierce public debate, (12) both sides claiming the mantle of ultimate righteousness. Those (13) to the practice see themselves (14) sacred principles of respect for life, (15) those in favor raise the banner of humane treatment. After years (16) the defensive, the advocates now seem to be (17) ground. Recent polls in Britain show that 72 percent of British (18) favor euthanasia in some circumstances. An astonishing 76 percent of (19) to a poll taken late last year in France said they would like the law changed to (20) mercy killings. Obviously, pressure groups favoring euthanasia and "assisted suicide" have grown steadily in Europe over the years. (272 words)Notes: euthanasia安乐死。lethal致命的。statute book 法典。prosecute 起诉。simmering 处于沸腾的状态。mantle 重任，责任。

单选题With its cluster of high-rises known as the "Frankfurter Manhattan", its big banks and its bustling airport, this is a town with pretensions. Petra Roth, the mayor, sees it as a "global city providing hub functions for the Continent", a place that should be "as cosmopolitan as New York". Frankfurt is not just the city of foreign companies, but it is also home to 80,000 Muslims, most of them Turks of modest means. Foreigners, including a large contingent from the former Yugoslavia, make up 30% of the population, one of the highest ratios for any city in Europe troubled by immigration. But there is no blood on the streets. Quietly flows the Main River beneath that mock-New World skyline. As Germany goes these days, so goes Europe. And if Frankfurt, the headquarters for Europe's new central bank and so the capital of Europe's nascent shared currency, the euro, is comfortable being a part-Muslim city with 27 mosques, perhaps the so-called New Europe of one money and blurred borders can be a more tolerant place. "Xenophobia is very unusual in Frankfurt," said Francesco Rinaldi, an Italian banker. "Perhaps it's the 300 foreign banks, or the vast airport, or the long American presence. " Not until 1994 did 30,000 American troops pack up and go home—the Cold War ended and, so people here say, the city shaped in the soldiers' open, can-do spirit. But even here, at the heart of American-influenced Europe, far from the strained psyche of a former East German city like Dessau, where rightists this year killed an African immigrant, the ghost of xenophobia is not entirely absent. For Frankfurt—like Germany, like Europe—is struggling to define a shifting identity. As the departed U. S. soldiers suggest, this city is no longer part of a Cold War country living what Zafer Senocak, a German intellectual of Turkish descent, has called a " quasi a-national existence under the umbrella of the West". Far from it, This is now the financial center of a strong Germany seeking to define and express a new national pride. But Frankfurt is also the capital of a unique experiment in abolishing the nation-state through the voluntary abandonment of sovereignty involved in giving up national control of monetary policy and adopting a common currency. So the Continent's largest state, one reborn only in 1990, yet also one that is being abolished, veers this way and that in its mood, one minute nostalgic for a "proud Fatherland", the next in the vanguard of what Foreign Minister Joschka Fischer, himself a child of Frankfurt, calls a postnational era.

单选题It can be inferred that the 1967 Road Safety Act in Britain______

单选题 The past year or two has tested the idea that all publicity is good publicity, at least when it comes to business. Undeserved bonuses, plunging share prices and government bail-outs, among other ills, have aroused the anger of the media and public-and created a windfall for public-relations firms. The recession has increased corporate demand for PR, analysts say, and enhanced the industry's status. "We used to be the tail on the dog," says Richard Edelman, the boss of Edelman. But now, he continues, PR is "the organizing principle" behind many business decisions. PR has done well in part because it is often cheaper than mass advertising campaigns. Its impact, in the form of favorable coverage in the media or online, can also be more easily measured. Moreover, PR firms are beginning to expand into territory that used to be the domain of advertising firms, a sign of their increasing clout. They used chiefly to pitch story ideas to media outlets and try to get their clients mentioned in newspapers. Now they also dream up and organize live events, web launches and the like. "When you look at advertising versus public relations, it's not going to be those clearly different," says Christopher Graves, the boss of Ogilvy Public Relations Worldwide. "It may be indistinguishable at some point where one ends and the other begins." PR has also benefited from the changing media landscape. The withering of many traditional media outlets has left fewer journalists from fewer firms covering business. That makes PR doubly important, both for attracting journalists' attention, and for helping firms bypass old routes altogether and disseminate news by posting press releases on their websites, for example. The rise of the internet and social media has given PR a big boost. Many big firms have a presence on social-networking sites, such as Facebook and Twitter, overseen by PR staff. PR firms are increasingly called on to track what consumers are saying about their clients online and to respond directly to any negative commentary. Perhaps the best indication of PR's growing importance is the attention it is attracting from regulators. They are worried that PR firms do not make it clear enough that they are behind much seemingly independent commentary on blogs and social networks. In October America's Federal Trade Commission published new guidelines for bloggers, requiring them to disclose whether they had been paid by companies or received free merchandise. Further regulation is likely. But that will not hamper PR's growth. After all, companies that fall foul of the rules will need the help of a PR firm.

单选题Until recently, most American entrepreneurs (企业家)were men. Discrimination against women in business, the demands of caring for families, and lack of business training had kept the number of women entrepreneurs small. Now, however, businesses owned by women account for more than ＄40 billion in annual revenues, and this figure is likely to continue rising throughout the 1980s. As Carolyn Doppelt Gray, an official of the Small Business Administration, has noted, "The 1970s was the decade of women entering management, and the 1980s has turned out to be the decade of the woman entrepreneur." What are some of the factors behind this trend? For one thing, as more women earn advanced degrees in business and enter the corporate world, they are finding obstacles. Women are still excluded from most executive suites. Charlotte Taylor, a management consultant, had noted, "In the 1970s women believed if they got an MBA and worked hard, they could become chairman of the board. Now they've found out that isn't going to happen, so they go out on their own." In the past, most women entrepreneurs worked in "women's" fields—cosmetics and clothing, for example. But this is changing. Consider ASK Computer Systems, a ＄22-million-a-year computer software business. It was founded in 1973 by Sandra Kurtzig, who was then a housewife with degrees in math and engineering. When Kurtzig founded the business, her first product was software that let weekly newspapers keep tabs on their newspaper carriers—and her office was a bedroom at home, with a shoebox under the bed to hold the company's cash. After she succeeded with the newspaper software system, she hired several bright computer-science graduates to develop additional programs. When these were marketed and sold. ASK began to grow. It now has 200 employees, and Sandra Kurtzig owns ＄66.9 million of stock. Of course, many women who start their own businesses fail, just as men often do. They still face hurdles in the business world, especially problems in raising money; the Banking and finance world is still dominated by men, and old attitudes die hard. Most businesses owned by women are still quite small. But the situation is changing; there are likely to be many more Sandra Kurtzigs in the years ahead.

单选题It is a favorite pastime of older people to lament the defects of the young. Every generation seems to be convinced that in its day, standards were higher, schools were tougher and kids were smarter. But if I.Q. scores are any measure, and even their critics agree they measure something, people are getting smarter. Researchers who study intelligence say scores around the world have been increasing so fast that a high proportion of people regarded as normal at the turn of the century would be considered way below average by today's tests. Psychologists offer a variety of possible explanations for the increase, including better nutrition, urbanization, more experience with test taking, and smaller families. Some even say that television and video games have made children's brains more agile. But no explanation is without its critics, and no one can say with certainty what effects, if any, the change is having on how people lead their daily lives. It is all the more mysterious because it seems to be happening in the absence of a simultaneous increase in scores on achievement tests. One explanation for the rise is ruled out: genetics. Because the increase has taken place in a relatively short period of time, it cannot be due to genetic factors. The worldwide pattern of rising scores in industrialized nations was discovered by Dr. James R. Flynn, now a professor at the University of Otego, New Zealand. He began looking into the subject in the 1980's in an effort to rebut Dr. Arthur Jensen, the professor from the UC Berkeley who argued that even if the environments of blacks and whites were equalized, the 15-point gap in I. Q. scores between the races would only be partly eliminated. As Dr. Flynn investigated, he found that I. Q. scores were going up almost everywhere he looked. Although the gap remains, Dr. Flynn said the movement in scores suggests that the gap need not be permanent. If blacks in 1995 had the same mean I. Q. that whites had in 1945, he said, it may be that the average black environment of 1995 was equivalent in quality to the average white environment of 1945. "Is that really so implausible?" Dr. Flynn asked. Meanwhile, the kinds of intelligence that are promoted and respected vary from time to time, said Dr. Patricia Greenfield, a psychology professor at the UCLA. Playing computer games like Tetris promotes very different skills from reading novels. The new skills, she said, are manifested in the world. "Flynn will tell you we don't have more Mozarts and Beethovens," Dr. Greenfield said, "I say, look at the achievements of science, like DNA. Or look at all the technological developments of this century. /

单选题Why is acid rain little understood?______