阅读理解Atmospheric pressure can support a column of water up to 10 meters high. But plants can move water much higher, the sequoia tree can pump water to its very top, more than 100 meters above the ground. Until the end of the nineteenth century, the movement of water in trees and other tall plants was a mystery. Some botanists hypothesized that the living cells of plants acted as pump. But many experiments demonstrated that the stems of plants in which all the cells are killed can still move water to appreciable heights. Other explanations for the movement of water in plants have been based on root pressure, a push on the water from the roots at the bottom of the plant. But root pressure is not nearly great enough to push water to the tops of tall trees. Furthermore, the conifers, which are among the tallest trees, have unusually low root pressures.If Water is not pumped to the top of a tall tree, and if it is not pushed to the top of a tall tree, then we may ask: How does it get there? According to the currently accepted cohesion-tension theory, water is pulled there. The pull on a rising column of water in a plant results from the evaporation of water at the top of the plant. As water is lost from the surface of the leaves, a negative pressure, or tension, is created. The evaporated water is replaced by water moving from inside the plant in unbroken columns that extend from the top of a plant to its roots. The same forces that create surface tension in any sample of water are responsible for the maintenance of these unbroken columns of water. When water is confined in tubes of very small bore, the forces of cohesion (the attraction between water molecules) are so great that the strength of a column of water compares with the strength of a steel wire of the same diameter. This cohesive strength permits columns of water to be pulled to great heights without being broken.

阅读理解Can the Internet help patients jump the line at the doctor’s office? The Silicon Valley EmployersForum, a sophisticated group of technology companies, is launching a pilot program to test online“virtual visits” between doctors at three big local medical groups and about 6,000 employees andtheir families. The six employers taking part in the Silicon Valley initiative, including heavy hitterssuch as Oracle and Cisco Systems, hope that online visits will mean employees won’t have to skipwork to tend to minor ailments or to follow up on chronic conditions. “With our long commutes andtraffic, driving 40 miles to your doctor in your hometown can be a big chunk of time,” says CindyConway, benefits director at Cadence Design Systems, one of the participating companies.Doctors aren’t clamoring to chat with patients online for free; they spend enough unpaid time on thephone. Only 1 in 5 has ever emailed a patient, and just 9 percent are interested in doing so, accordingto the research firm Cyber Dialog. “We are not stupid,” says Stirling Somers, executive of theSilicon Valley employers group. “Doctors getting paid in a critical piece is getting this to work.” Inthe pilot program, physicians will get $20 per online consultation, about what they get for a simpleoffice visit.Doctors also fear they’ll be swamped by rambling e-mails that tell everything but what’s needed tomake a diagnosis. So the new program will use technology supplied by Healinx, an Alameda,Calif-based start-up. Healinx’s “Smart Symptom Wizard” questions patents and turns answers into asuccinct message. The company has online dialogues for 60 common conditions. The doctor can thendiagnose the problem and outline a treatment plan which could include E-mailing a prescription or aface-to-face visit.Can E-mail replace the doctor’s office? Many conditions, such as persistent cough, require astethoscope to discover what’s wrong — and to avoid a malpractice suit. Even Larry Bonham, headof one of the doctor’s groups in the pilot, believes the virtual doctor’s visits offer a “very narrow”sliver of service between phone calls to an advice nurse and a visit to the clinic.The pilot program, set to end in nine months, also hopes to determine whether online visits will boostworker productivity enough to offset the cost of the service. So far, the internet’s record in the healthfield has been underwhelming. The experiment is “a huge roll of the dice for Healinx”, notesMichael Barrett, an analyst at Internet consulting firm Forester Research. If the “Web visits” succeed,expect some HMOS (Health Maintenance Organizations) to pay for online visits. If doctors,employers, and patients aren’t satisfied, figure on one more E-health start-up is to stand down.

阅读理解Passage Three: Questions are based on the following passage

阅读理解Recently, Congressional Democrats introduced legislation to make it easier for older workers to win age discrimination lawsuits. Age discrimination remains a significant workplace issue.In recent ten years, 15.79 percent of cases brought to the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, were described as successful claims. While this number is small given the number of workers covered by the Age Discrimination in Employment Act, many, if not most, instances of age discrimination are never sued, and cases hiring discrimination often go undetected.Most of those who do sue are white, male middle-managers who are likely to have lost a sizeable salary and pension. For the most part, other groups do not sue because the costs of a lawsuit outweigh the potential benefits. Age discrimination remains a significant workplace issue.There is strong experimental evidence for age discrimination in hiring, at least for entry-level jobs. Recently, I performed a labor market experiment in Boston in which I sent out thousands of resumes for fictitious (虚构的) entry-level female candidates and measured response rate based on date of high school graduation. Among this group, younger applicants, whose date of high school graduation indicated that they were less than 50 years old, were 40 percent more likely to be called back for an interview than were older applicants.It is difficult to tell whether employment problems are worse for older workers than for other workers when times are bad. The number of discrimination lawsuits increases during times of high unemployment, but this finding by itself does not indicate an increased level of age discrimination. In times of higher unemployment, the opportunity cost to a lawsuit is lower than it is when times are good.From the employer’s perspective, mass layoffs may seem like a good chance to remove a higher proportion of generally more expensive older workers without the worry of being sued. On the other hand, employers may be less likely to remove protected older workers because they still fear lawsuits. One thing we do know is that once an older worker loses a job, he or she is much less likely to find a new job than a younger worker is.Unfortunately, the effect of legislation prohibiting age discrimination is not easy to see and may actually be part of the reason it is so difficult for older workers to find employment. If it is more difficult to fire an older worker than a younger worker, a firm will be less likely to want to hire older workers. Indeed, my research finds that in states where workers have longer time to bring a lawsuit claim, older men work fewer weeks per year, are less likely to be hired, and less likely to be fired than men in states where they do not have as much.Not many people would suggest that we go back to a world prior to the Age Discrimination in Employment Act, in which advertisements specify the specific ages of people they are willing to hire. However, legislation prohibiting discrimination is no panacea (万灵药). The recent proposed congressional legislation could have both positive and negative effects on potential older workers

阅读理解Just over a decade into the 21st century, women’s progress can be celebrated across a range of fields.They hold the highest political offices from Thailand to Brazil, Costa Rica to Australia. A womanholds the top spot at the International Monetary Fund; another won the Nobel Prize in economics.Self-made billionaires in Beijing, tech innovators in Silicon Valley, pioneering justices in Ghana-inthese and countless other areas, women are leaving their mark.But hold the applause. In Saudi Arabia, women aren’t allowed to drive. In Pakistan, 1,000 womendie in honor killings every year. In the developed world, women lag behind men in pay and politicalpower. The poverty rate among women in the U.S. rose to 14.5% last year.To measure the state of women’s progress. Newsweek ranked 165 countries, looking at five areasthat affect women’s lives: treatment under the law, workforce participation, political power, andaccess to education and health care. Analyzing data from the United Nations and the WorldEconomic Forum, among others, and consulting with experts and academics, we measured 28 factorsto come up with our rankings.Countries with the highest scores tend to be clustered in the West, where gender discrimination isagainst the law, and equal rights are constitutionally enshrined (神圣化). But there were somesurprises. Some otherwise high-ranking countries had relatively low scores for politicalrepresentation. Canada ranked third overall but 26th in power, behind countries such as Cuba andBurundi. Does this suggest that a woman in a nation’s top office translates to better lives for womenin general? Not exactly. “Trying to quantify or measure the impact of women in politics is hardbecause in very few countries have there been enough women in politics to make a difference,” saysAnne-Marie Goetz, peace and security adviser for U.N. Women.Of course, no index can account for everything. Declaring that one country is better than another inthe way that it treats more than half its citizens means relying on broad strokes and generalities.Some things simply can’t be measured. And cross-cultural comparisons can’t account for differencesof opinion.Certain conclusions are nonetheless clear. For one thing, our index backs up a simple but profoundstatement made by Hillary Clinton at the recent Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation summit. “Whenwe liberate the economic potential of women, we elevate the economic performance of communities,nations, and the world,” she said. “There is a stimulative effect that kicks in when women havegreater access to jobs and the economic lives of our countries: Greater political stability. Fewermilitary conflicts. More food. More educational opportunity for children. By harnessing theeconomic potential of all women, we boost opportunity for all people.

阅读理解Just as there are teachers who simply go through the motions and drag us through the material inorder to complete a required course, there are companies and jobs and bosses that do the same. Thatdoesnt mean you have to live with it. Avoid those fear-run workplaces. Quit those jobs. Ask yourfriends about where they work, or about companies theyve read about or heard about where passion,excitement, and human energy are valued above all else. In those places, you will find that fear is notprimary motivator for getting to results.Although Ive found that most organizations do not focus on their culture, there are also a significantnumber of companies who are quite clear about what they are trying to achieve. Those companieshave a mission and a purpose in what they do. The people who work there are focused not onthemselves, but on those they serve. They are working on something much bigger than themselves. Ilearned to love my job by connecting it to joy: joy for our customers, joy for the end users of ourproducts, joy for my team, and personal joy in what we were doing.Many believe this kind of mission focus can only occur in the non-profit world. This couldnt befurther from the truth. There are successful purpose-driven private and public corporations, large andsmall. They are still rare, though, so it wont necessarily be easy to find them, but it is worth yourtime to pursue this search. Some of you will be inclined to do what I ultimately did and start yourown firm, with its own mission and purpose. Entrepreneurship for me was the enabler of a noble yetselfish pursuit: I wanted to create a company that I loved. I created my own fulfilling job, but itwould only be fulfilling to me if it were also rewarding for those who worked around me.To learn to love your job, its important to find a job where learning is a requirement to success.Learning produces joy, regardless of the industry youre in. Become a student again. Read books,study organizations, and stretch yourself to try new things. If you are in a technical or a support role,volunteer for sales support assignments and watch how your company interacts with its customers.Sign up for trade show booth duty and learn what others in the world are seeking from firms likeyours. Learn to present in front of others. Sign up to speak at conferences, and then go listen to otherspeakers. Find the ideas, the people and the companies that inspire you.

阅读理解Many things make people think artists are weird and the weirdest may be this: artists’ only job is toexplore emotions, and yet they choose to focus on the ones that feel bad.This wasn’t always so. The earliest forms of art, like painting and music, are those best suited forexpressing joy. But somewhere in the 19th century, more artists began seeing happiness as insipid,phony or, worst of all, boring as we went from Wordsworth’s daffodils to Baudelaire’s flowers ofevil.You could argue that art became more skeptical of happiness because modern times have seen suchmisery. But it’s not as if earlier times didn’t know perpetual war, disaster and the massacre ofinnocents. The reason, in fact, may be just the opposite: there is too much damn happiness in theworld today.After all, what is the one modern form of expression almost completely dedicated to depictinghappiness? Advertising. The rise of anti-happy art almost exactly tracks the emergence of massmedia, and with it, a commercial culture in which happiness is not just an ideal but an ideology.People in earlier eras were surrounded by reminders of misery. They worked until exhausted, livedwith few protections and died young. In the West, before mass communication and literacy, the mostpowerful mass medium was the church, which reminded worshippers that their souls were in periland that they would someday be meat for worms. Given all this, they did not exactly need their art tobe a bummer too.Today the messages your average Westerner is bombarded with are not religious but commercial,and forever happy. Fast-food eaters, news anchors, text messengers, all smiling, smiling. Ourmagazines feature beaming celebrities and happy families in perfect homes. And since thesemessages have an agenda — to lure us to open our wallets — they make the very idea of happinessseem unreliable. “Celebrate!” commanded the ads for the arthritis drug Celebrex, before we foundout it could increase the risk of heart attacks.But what we forget — what our economy depends on is forgetting — is that happiness is more thanpleasure without pain. The things that bring the greatest joy carry the greatest potential for loss anddisappointment. Today, surrounded by promises of easy happiness, we need someone to tell us asreligion once did, Memento mori: remember that you will die, that everything ends, and thathappiness comes not in denying this but in living with it. It’s a message even more bitter than a clovecigarette, yet, somehow, a breath of fresh air.

阅读理解Feminist sociolinguists, over the course of the last few decades, have conducted studies that they believe support the conclusion that women are routinely discriminated against in English-speaking society. They point to the words used to describe women, as well as the words used to describe society as a whole, as indications that the English language, and therefore the English-speaking culture, is slanted towards the advantage of males.The words used to describe women are used as instrument by feminist sociolinguists to denote an inherent sexism in the English language. Word pairs such as master and mistress and sir and madam, they claim, epitomize such sexism. All of the words in question once held positive connotations but, while the masculine forms have retained their respectable associations, the feminine forms have undergone pejoration and now imply sexual promiscuity (混杂) and other negative characteristics. Feminist researchers assume that such pejoration indicate that the status of women in English-speaking society is relatively low.These researchers also find fault with the use of masculine words to describe unisex entities. For example, they feel that there is nothing inherently mainly about mankind, the best man for the job, or the common man. Similarly, the use of such constructions as the “the average students is worried about his grades” indicate to these researchers an inherent sexism in English that is reflective of the cultures in which they are produced.Carolyn Jacobson, author of Non-sexist Language has proposed a solution to this conundrum (难题). She advocates the elimination of all sexed words in favor of gender-neutral terms. No longer should we refer to actors and actresses or waiters and waitresses, as such dichotomies (男女有别) allow for the possibility of negative connotations being associated with the feminine designation. Likewise, she believes that phrases such as mankind should give way to human kind and that the use of the masculine pronoun as the default should be abandoned in favor of neutral constructions. Thus, when sexism is eliminated from the English language, the culture will be more amenable to the deliverance of women as well.

阅读理解We’re in the middle of an epic battle for power in cyberspace. On one side are the traditional, organized, institutional powers such as governments and large multinational corporations. On the other are the distributed: grassroots movements, dissident groups, hackers, and criminals. Initially, the Internet empowered the latter. It gave them a place to coordinate and communicate efficiently, and made them seem invincible. But now, the more traditional institutional powers are winning, and winning big. How these two sides fare in the long term, and the fate of the rest of us who don’t fall into either group, is an open question — and one vitally important to the future of the Internet. In the Internet’s early days, there was a lot of talk about its “natural laws” — how it would transform traditional power blocks, empower the masses, and spread freedom throughout the world. The international nature of the Internet circumvented national laws. Anonymity was easy. Censorship was impossible. Police were clueless about cybercrime. And bigger changes seemed inevitable. Digital cash would undermine national sovereignty. Citizen journalism would topple traditional media, corporate PR, and political parties. The ease of digital copying would destroy the traditional movie and music industries. Web marketing would allow even the smallest companies to compete against corporate giants. It really would be a new world order. This was a Utopian vision, but some of it did come to pass. Internet marketing has transformed commerce. The entertainment industries have been transformed by things like MySpace and YouTube, and are now more open to outsiders. Mass media has changed dramatically, and some of the most influential people in the media have come from the blogging world. There are new ways to organize politically and run elections. Facebook and Twitter really did help disrupt governments. But that is just one side of the Internet’s disruptive character. The Internet has emboldened traditional power as well. On the corporate side, power is being consolidated, a result of two current trends in computing. First, the rise of cloud computing means that we no longer have control of our data. And second, we are increasingly accessing our data using devices that we have much less control over; iPhones, iPads, Android phones, Kindles, ChromeBooks. Unlike traditional operating systems, these devices are controlled much more tightly by the vendors, who limit what software can be run, what they can do, how they’re updated.

阅读理解Envy has become a drive wheel of our modern world. It is the passion that governs our economic life. Modern capitalism relies on its ability to create and increase scarcity and it therefore depends largely on the omnipresence of envy. In affluent societies the availability of material goods increases the demand for positional goods based on social scarcity. Most often it is “envy, emulation, or pride”creating this kind of scarcity, in which “satisfaction is derived from relative position alone, being in front, or from being behind.”As long as people desire what others desire scarcity will be the never-ending condition of our lives that keeps our economy running. Through envy nearly any object can turn into a desirable commodity promising unending happiness. Modern advertising is the best example to illustrate the importance of envy to keep our economy going. Advertising uses envy to make commodities desirable. Posters, announcements and TV-spots show us enviable people who have those things and goods we lack but nonetheless need to gain happiness. Advertisement sells products with the help of envious contagion. Most of the time envy itself remains hidden and is not directly mentioned in commercials. But even this may no longer be true. Envy seems to lose its traditional bad reputation. More and more commercials directly refer to envy to make their commodities more desirable. The most well known example of an open reference to envy is a perfume produced by the Italian company Gucci with the brand name “Envy”promising that you will not only be envied for some external object that belongs to you but for your very self embodied in a seductive fragrance. Those of you familiar with traditional definitions of envy and emulation may, however, question my thesis that our modern economy is driven by envy. Is it really envy that governs our economy or would not emulation be a more appropriate and less moralizing term? There is an easy answer to this question. In parallel with the emergence of our modern world and the rise of capitalism the traditional distinction between bad envy and good emulation has slowly lost its meaning. Where Immanuel Kant, for instance, refers to the passions nature uses to turn a sheepish, idle and inactive Arcadia into a prosperous culture he refers to an “enviously competitive vanity”that no longer allows a neat distinction between envy and emulation but mentions a form of human desire comprising both these traditionally distinguished emotions.

阅读理解Passage Two: Questions are based on the following passage

阅读理解Questions 11 to 15 are based on the following passage: It is the staff of dreams and nightmares

阅读理解Unless you are one of those fortunate few who met their soul-mate in grade school, married right out of high school, and spent the next 60 years in wedded bliss you are going to go through what millions before you have gone through, and what millions after you will go through — a broken heart. 【B6】______While some simply shake the dust off and get right back into the dating game, others are left so devastated that they never date again, spending the rest of their life in bitter solitude. Why the difference? For most of us who experience a breakup a normal grieving period will occur; Denial and Isolation, Anger, Bargaining, Depression, and finally Acceptance.【B7】______Others remain either bitter or so afraid of getting hurt that they never date again, closing off their hearts to just about everyone. 【B8】______ Why the variation? Well, a lot of it has to do with our loving style. 【B9】______While one person may love another in a supportive and healthy way, another person may cling onto their mate simply as a way to fix what they imagine to be wrong with themselves. They use their partner as a method of dealing with their own imagined inadequacies or feelings of unworthiness — feeling good only as long as they are in the relationship. Others simply like the “high”of being in love. This high becomes addictive to them and they hop from one relationship instantly into another — often times head-over-heels in love by the second date. Still others simply surrender themselves into their relationships quickly losing themselves and their own sense of individuality, becoming “the relationship.”【B10】______ A healthy view of oneself, one’s partner, and one’s relationship is essential to withstanding the ups, and downs, in our eternal search for that special someone to share our lives with. A. There are many loving styles ranging from the very healthy, to the desperately needy. B. The pain experienced during a breakup is as individual as the millions of people who go through it. C. But for some, the grief and devastation are so severe that they end up hospitalized, and even suicidal. D. They recklessly seek “love”much as an addict will seek a “fix,”and are often so in need of being in love that they imagine their partners to have all the qualities they are looking for in a mate — whether their partners actually possess these qualities or not. E. Should the relationship end, then shall they, too. F. Yet, some don’t even grieve at all, subconsciously choosing to simply transfer their feelings for one person immediately onto that of another person in what is called a rebound relationship.

阅读理解London’s Heathrow Airport is notorious for queues and delays. Why is this happening and what can you do to avoid the frustration?In the film Catch Me If You Can, Leonardo DiCaprio plays a dashing young con artist who fools an airline into believing he is one of their captains. He strolls through a sleek and futuristic air terminal flanked by a gaggle of stewardesses, his progress serene. The message is clear: Air travel is glamorous, sexy and a total breeze.Cut to Heathrow, 2007, and what is still the world’s largest airport (by passenger numbers) is stretched to breaking point, beset by delays and hampered by a creaking infrastructure. Ken Livingstone, London’s garrulous Mayor, says the airport is “shaming London”. How did it come to this?In a sense, Heathrow’s key role in the development of Britain’s (and the world’s) aviation industry has been its undoing. First opened to commercial fights in 1946, Heathrow has always been there first; consequently, it has inherited a legacy of aging terminal buildings. Then September 11 happened, and security protocols went through the roof. The 2005 London bombings didn’t help matters.The queues to clear Heathrow’s security can take hours to clear, especially when not all the X-ray machines are open. At the other end of the process, passengers have faced seemingly never-ending waits for luggage. A recent Association of European Airlines report showed that between April and June this year the luggage system at Heathrow broke down 11 times.The British government, spurred on by angry airlines, passenger groups and an increasingly vocal media, has announced an enquiry into how the airport is run. Heathrow, like seven other major airports in the UK, is run by the British Airports Authority (BAA), who has been accused of putting the profits from the vast shopping malls in each terminal before investment in security and staff. Ryanair, British Airways and the head of the International Air Transport Association have all criticized the running of the airport, blaming under-investment.A spokesman for Heathrow notes that all may not be lost quite yet. Ninety-seven per cent of passengers get through security after less than 10 minutes of queuing. The baggage rules for using UK airports have been the same for a while now, so travelers should be getting used to the plastic bags and one item of hand-luggage rule. And BAA is recommending that people don’t turn up earlier than they should—three hours for long-haul, two for short haul and 90 minutes for domestic should be fine. Heathrow has also employed 500 new security staff and opened nine new security lanes this year.And then there’s Terminal Five, the gleaming, light-filled Richard Rodgers creation, complete with a landscaped civic space, due to open in March 2008. It will be British Airways’ new home and should take the pressure off the rest of the airport. Far more suitable for a Leonardo-style sashay.

阅读理解Those who’ve heard of Zane Grey usually identify him as the author of best-selling westerns, but few realize that he was the commercially most successful American author of the 1920s. Each year from 1915 to 1924, he had a new novel on the annual list of top-10 bestsellers. Riders of the Purple Sage, The Light of Western Stars, and The Rainbow Trail are still popular, but Grey’s best story may be his own colorful and remarkably little-known life. Zane Grey was born in Zanesville, Ohio. Grey recalled his own youth as full of relentless conflicts with his stern, demanding father, a farmer’s son who had become a successful dentist in Zanesville. Grey’s delinquency and poor record in school exacerbated matters. Then, midway through his junior year, he had to drop out of high school to help his father who suddenly became poor by pulling teeth for needy locals. For diversion, Grey played baseball — with enough talent to earn scholarships to several universities. He chose the University of Pennsylvania not only for its accomplished team, but also for its dental school, which offered him immediate admission, sparing him the tough undergraduate program. After graduation, he concentrated more on baseball than dentistry, hoping to reach the major leagues, but to no avail. He retreated to a full-time practice in New York City, but quickly discovered that writing about ancestors whose lives were more distinguished and exciting than his was preferable to coping with decayed teeth and bad breath. During a summer escape in 1900 to rural Lackawaxen on the upper Delaware River, he met Lina “Dolly”Roth, 11 years younger, a New York doctor’s daughter who enthusiastically supported his yearning to become a writer. After their marriage in 1905, her substantial inheritance enabled him to quit dentistry and write full time. Their cross-country honeymoon trip carried them to the Grand Canyon at the dawn of its tourist appeal. Grey was captivated by the canyon’s natural splendor. He would return there twice more for mountain-lion hunts, which inspired Heritage of the Desert, his first western story, published in 1910 when he was 38. For the next 15 years, he returned annually to the Southwest to find new material for more books.

阅读理解The Internet, E-commerce and globalization are making a new economic era possible. In the future,capitalist markets will largely be replaced by a new kind of economic system based on networkedrelationships, contractual arrangements and access rights.Has the quality of our lives at work, at home and in our communities increased in direct proportionto all the new Internet and business-to-business Internet services being introduced into our lives? Ihave asked this question of hundreds of CEOS and corporate executives in Europe and the UnitedStates. Surprisingly, virtually everyone has said, “No, quite contrary.” The very people responsiblefor ushering in what some have called a “technological renaissance” say they are working longerhours, feel more stressed, are more impatient, and are even less civil in their dealings with colleaguesand friends—not to mention strangers. And whats more revealing, they place much of the blame onthe very same technologies they are so aggressively championing.The techno gurus promised us that access would make life more convenient and give us more time.Instead, the very technological wonders that were supposed to liberate us have begun to enslave us ina web of connections from which there seems to be no easy escape.If an earlier generation was preoccupied with the quest to enclose a vast geographic frontier,the .com generation, it seems, is more caught up in the colonization of time. Every spare moment ofour time is being filled with some form of commercial connection, making time itself the most scarceof all resources. Our e-mail, voice mail and cell phones, our 24-hour Interact news and entertainmentall seize for our attention.And while we have created every kind of labor-and time-saving device to service our needs, we arebeginning to feel like we have less time available to us than any other humans in history. That isbecause the great proliferation of labor-and-time-saving services only increases the diversity, paceand flow of commodified activity around us. For example, e-mail is a great convenience. However,we now find ourselves spending much of our day frantically responding to each other’s electronicmessages. The cell phone is a great time-saver. Except now we are always potentially in reach ofsomeone else who wants our attention.Social conservatives talk about the decline in civility and blame it on the loss of a moral compass andreligious values. Has anyone bothered to ask whether the hyper speed culture is making all of us lesspatient and less willing to listen and defer, consider and reflect?Maybe we need to ask what kinds of connections really count and what types of access really matterin the e-economy era. If this new technology revolution is only about hyper efficiency, then we risklosing something even precious than time—our sense of what it means to be a caring human being.

作文题 Directions: In this part there is an essay in Chinese. Read it carefully and then write a summary of 200 words in English on the ANSWER SHEET. Make sure that your summary covers the major points of the essay. 什么是健康? 人的健康包括身体健康和心理健康两个方面。一个人的身体和心理都健康才称得上真正的健康。联合国世界卫生组织对健康下的定义是：健康的人不但没有身体疾忠，而且有完整的生理、心理状态和社会适应能力。 日前在我们国家，无论在健康人与病人中，或者在医务人员中，大都在不同程度上忽略心理健康。这对提高人的健康水平与提高医疗效果都产生消极的影响。例如在现实生活中，人们往往重视营养，而忽视饮食时的心理因素作用。人们注意身体的锻炼，而不重视心理的锻炼。甚至不知道什么是心理健康以及如何锻炼。在临床实践中，有些医务人员在病因上，重视病毒、感染等因素，忽视疾病的心理因素的作用；在诊断上重视物理诊断等，忽视心理诊断；在治疗上重视药物治疗，忽视心理治疗。其实，身体健康与心理健康是同等重要的。二者是相互联系、相互制约的。身心两方面健康是相辅相成的。 随着21世纪的到来，人们更加专注自身的健康。追求长寿、健康已成为一种时尚。但是，如何才能健康，怎样才能长寿?健康与长寿的大敌又是什么呢?众多医学保健专家指出，介于疾病与健康之间的“第三状态”是人类健康与长寿的大敌。所谓第三状态，指人们经常感到自己身体难受不适的状态。主要表现为时常感觉身体很累，很疲倦，很想好好睡上一觉。此外，经常出现懒言、少气、食欲欠佳、对什么都不感兴趣、无精打采等症状，也就是人们常说的亚健康状态(sub-health condition)。如果说健康是人的第一状态，疾病是人的第二状态，那么亚健康则为人的第三状态。 有关调查表明，随着经济的高速发展，竞争日趋激烈，生活节奏逐渐加快，亚健康人群的增多已成为一种不可回避的现实。该人群以中年人居多，职业涉及很广。一般来讲，越是有成就、收入越高，亚健康状态的出现频率越高，如经理、秘书、管理人员等都是亚健康状态的高发职业。此外，记者、律师、医生、自由职业者出现亚健康状态的比例也比较高。 目前很“时髦”的“疲劳综合征”(exhaustion syndrome)就是亚健康状态的典型代表。疲劳综合症不仅在发达国家有相当高的发病率，在发展中国家也不少见。这类疾病表面看来对人体并无多大妨碍，仅仅表现为生理功能低下，但其潜伏的危险性却不容忽视，因为疲劳综合征往往就是某些慢性病的先兆。比如大家所熟悉的高血压、心脑血管疾病、肿瘤等，很多都继发于疲劳综合征。 对于亚健康状态，目前国内、国外尚无特效治疗方法，而学会自我调节，对于缓解、纠正人体的亚健康状态非常重要。这里提醒您注意以下几点：一是学会以轻松的心态对待学习、工作和生活，尽量不要故意给自己加压。二是要吃好。所谓吃好，不是指大吃大喝、大鱼大肉，而是指根据自己的实际情况选择饮食。三是一定要睡好，早睡早起。睡上一个好觉，精力、体力就容易恢复。

作文题 Directions: In this part there is an essay in Chinese. Read it carefully and then write a summary of 200 words in English on the ANSWER SHEET. Make sure that your summary covers the major points of the essay. 学会呼吸能长寿 生命离不开呼吸。人每分每秒都在进行呼吸运动，但你却未必呼吸得正确。英国一项研究显示，90%以上的成年人都不会有意识地调节呼吸。而据我国呼吸科专家统计，城市中一半以上人呼吸方式不正确，短浅的呼吸不仅让许多人大脑缺氧，容易疲惫，而且还容易诱发多种疾病! 深呼吸的几大好处 那么，做腹式深呼吸有哪些好处呢?首先，深呼吸能防治呼吸系统疾病。常见的呼吸系统疾病包括慢性支气管炎、哮喘、肺气肿等。这些病人的肺部都处于无弹性和扩张状态，影响肺活量。而进行深呼吸，能逐步增大肌肉收缩力，有利于胸、肺的有效扩张，增强肋间肌活力，可以逐步恢复其弹性和肺活量，从而达到治疗和缓解病情的目的。 再次，深呼吸能帮助人们减压，缓解失眠症状。北京体育大学运动医学教授陆一帆表示，人们主动调节呼吸的深度和频率，就能有效放松绷紧的神经，舒缓焦虑的心情。一些因为压力造成的颈部疼痛，通过瑜伽时的呼吸练习，疼痛感将会减弱。失眠的人也可用呼吸法来帮助入睡。通过降低呼吸节奏、平缓呼吸，能减轻失眠症状。 其次，深呼吸还可防治高血压。这是日本自治医科大学北村谕教授试验的一种深呼吸降血压法，其原理是人的肺部有被称为肺泡的小袋状物，大约有3亿个。在一般呼吸的情况下，只有其中的80%—90%能充分地工作，剩下的肺泡处于浪费状态。如果采用深呼吸，就可以使剩下的肺泡工作起来。当采用胸部深呼吸的时候，位于肺上部的肺泡开放；而在腹式深呼吸时，肺下部的肺泡也打开了。工作中所有的肺泡都在产生前列腺素，而且通过深呼吸还可使原来就在工作的80%—90%的肺泡产生比原来更多的前列腺素。这样，更多的前列腺素进入血管，从而使血管扩张，血压降低。每天早中晚三次，每次10分钟就有效果。 最重要的是，深呼吸能促进健康长寿。美国学者希尔在《从呼吸索取生命力》一文中指出：“有控制地深呼吸练习，可使大脑尽快消除疲劳，可以调节神经系统，使人轻松舒畅。深呼吸之所以有这样大的作用，在于正常人每次吸进与呼出的气体量只有400毫升—500毫升，而做一次最深的呼吸，男性可达到3500毫升，女性可达到2500毫升，相当于通常吸气的8倍，从而使生命获得大量的能源。” 如何学会正确呼吸 怎样才能学会正确呼吸呢?最关键的有两点，陆一帆指出，一是要缓和吸，也就是吸气的时候，要均匀缓慢，尽量深吸，让气体能充满肺泡；二是要用力吐，吐得干净，这样才能将废弃全部排出体外，保障交换的气体多一些。最科学的呼吸方法为：“吸——停(屏气10—20秒钟)——呼”的呼吸形式，可使副交感神经兴奋性增强，也可使肠鸣次数增加，有利于消化吸收，从而有益于健康长寿。 龙村修提倡的呼吸法，则是以深长的腹式呼吸为基础，逐步使肺、肋骨、横膈膜等肌肉群在呼吸时运动到最大幅度，让空气充满肺部的“全体呼吸法”。“刚开始虽要刻意练习，最终目标却是融入生活，各种姿势和动作都结合呼吸法去做。”龙村修表示，如此将更能掌握身体的力量和节奏，提高效率。例如用呼吸法攀登高山时，比较不会出现头痛等高山症状；打高尔夫挥杆能挥得更远。这种呼吸方法，在公车上、走路时、工作间隙，或者对着公园的树都能练习。尤其面对突如其来的负面情境时，呼吸法更能适时调节身心、稳定情绪。

作文题 Directions: In this part there is an essay in Chinese. Read it carefully and then write a summary of 200 words in English on the ANSWER SHEET. Make sure that your summary covers the major points of the passage. 走路与健康 “生命在于运动”。运动的种类举不胜举，走路大概是最简单易行的一种运动了。现代运动医学研究认为，一个人走路脚力的强弱，与这个人的健康状态的关系是非常密切的。的确，走路，不仅是饭后或睡前溜达溜达、随便走走，还是一种经济简便、不需要任何特殊设备、有益于身心、保持生命活力、延年益寿、绝妙且其乐无穷的运动。走路不同于跑步，跑步不论如何有益，并不是所有人任何时候都可以参加的，比如患病时或病愈不久，就不宜跑步。走路也不同于做操、跳舞，做操、跳舞需要一定的场地和技巧，走路只要能行动，可不拘一格，闲散地、随时随地，或急或缓地自由进行，而且特别适合中老年人，是中老年人延年益寿的良方。 走路对人体的保健作用是不可估量的。走路时，四肢自然而协调地运动，可使全身关节筋骨适度运动，加之轻松的情绪，可使人气血流通，经络畅达，利关节而养筋骨，畅神志而益五脏。最新研究资料表明，走路所带来的生理效应，首先是全身血液、骨骼、肌肉、韧带都活动起来，继而将呼吸、循环、消化、泌尿、内分泌、神经系统引入活跃状态中，调节内脏功能的生理平衡，促进正常的新陈代谢。走路可以增强下肢肌肉和韧带的活动能力，保持关节的灵活性，延缓骨质疏松的发展，保持骨骼的强度，能使全身柔软灵活，减少疼痛的发生；走路使全身震荡，可以防止血管壁沉淀物的沉积，而且对内脏器官起着按摩作用；走路可以活动血管平滑肌，使之受到生理机能的训练而变得坚强有力，改善心脏功能，增强心血管活力，提高呼吸功能，降低胆固醇，避免高血压的发生；走路还可以使身体发热，加速血液循环，成为智力劳动的良好催化剂，因为血液循环加快，产生更多的热量，供给大脑更多的养分，不仅增加生活乐趣，缓解过度紧张的生活，还有助于提高思绪，增加思想的敏锐度。一位美国生理学家说：“走路对于脑力劳动者，特别是对于创造性劳动的人来说，是一种生理活动的最好形式。”最近有人研究得出结论，走路提高了肌肉纤维的弹性，强化肢体的主要肌肉，促进血液循环，保持外貌的健美，还有人观察到，每天坚持走路45分钟，一年可减肥7公斤。 有人将走路分为5种，即普通行走法，其速度为每分钟60～90步，每次走20～40分钟，这种走路，适合于冠心病、高血压、脑出血后遗症以及有呼吸系统疾病的人；快速行走法，每分钟90～120步，每次30～60分钟，这种走路，适合于身体健康的中老年人和慢性关节炎、胃肠病及原发性高血压病的恢复期；反臂背向行走法，把两手臂背放在腰的命门穴上，缓步背向行走50步、再向前走100步，这种走路，适合有轻微老年痴呆症和患有神经系统疾病的人；摆臂行走法，每分钟60～90步，两臂做前后较大幅度的摆动，这种走路，适合于肩周炎、上下肢关节炎、慢性气管炎、肺气肿的病人；还有一种摩腹行走法，每分钟30～60步，每走一步，两手旋转按摩腹部，正反方向交替进行，这种走路适合患有胃肠疾病的老人。采取哪一种走路的方法，可根据自己的情况加以选择，量力而行。 走路必须掌握要领，循序渐进，身体自然放松，步履轻松，避免气乏喘吁，要注意姿势，不要垂着头、双腿晃动和抠胸驼背，这样会使人精神不振、消极和失去自信，要昂头、挺胸、步履轻盈地大步行走。如果以锻炼为目的，还应选择在公园或有树木花草的地方。锻炼的强度也宜逐步增加，一般经过3个月的走路锻炼，在自我感觉良好的情况下，可增加每分钟的步数和活动时间。科学家们还指出，走路锻炼最好在晚上进行，不宜在早晨，因为早晨起床后，经过一夜的睡眠，人体水分蒸发，血液浓稠，会增加血管栓塞的可能性，而晚上走路锻炼，因血液稀释，则减少了血管栓塞的危险。至于平时，应尽量少坐车，多走路，安步当车，日行万步，永葆健康。

作文题 Directions: In this part there is an essay in Chinese. Read it carefully and then write a summary of 200 words in English on the ANSWER SHEET. Make sure that your summary covers the major points of the essay. 健康处方帮你走出“第三状态” 激烈的竞争，需要我们全力以赴面对各种各样的挑战。但长时间精力充沛地工作和生活并非易事。相反，许多人都有过情绪低落、容易疲劳、不愿意运动、失眠、头痛、注意力不集中的经历，有人甚至长期或经常出现这种情况，可到医院检查没事，出了医院依旧难受。医学上将这种介于健康和疾病之间的边缘状态称之为“灰色状态”或“第三状态”。医学专家们对这种现代人的“通病”进行了大量研究，并开出了一系列简便可行的健康处方。 均衡营养，合理膳食。理想的食谱首先要保证营养均衡，像糖、蛋白质、脂类、矿物质、维生素等必需的营养物质在每天的膳食中一样也不能少。都市中有两种不良营养倾向，一种是营养干¨热量过剩，另一种是为了节食导致某些营养素和热量的不足。这两种倾向都足以引起“灰色状态”。一个健康的成年人每天需要1500卡路里的能量，工作量大者则需要2000卡路里的热量，不断补充营养是保持精力充沛的前提。此外还应注意：脂肪类食物不可多食亦不可不食，因为某些脂类是大脑运转所必需的。缺乏脂类将影响思维；但是若食用过多，则短期内会产生昏昏欲睡的感觉，长期则会在体内堆积，形成脂肪。 维生素作用大 从事文字工作或经常操作电脑者容易眼肌疲劳、视力下降，维生素A对于预防视力减弱有一定效果，所以要多吃鱼肉、猪肝、韭菜、鳗鱼等富含维生素A的食物；经常待在办公室里的人日晒机会少，容易缺乏维生素D，需多吃海鱼、鸡肝等富含维生素D的食物；当人承受巨大的心理压力时，所消耗的维生素C将显著增加，而维生素C是人体不可或缺的营养物质，应尽可能多吃新鲜蔬菜、水果等富含维生素C的食物。 让“心”放松 每个人的心理状态和精力充沛程度在一天中都会不断变化，有高峰也有低谷。大多数人在午后达到精力的高峰，但也不乏个人差异。你不妨连续记录自己一天的心理状态，觉醒程度、反应速度、和进行的活动，找出自己的精力变化曲线，然后合理安排每日的活动。美国科学家的一项训查显示，心理建康是所有精力充沛、事业有成者的标志，人生活在社会上难免有这样那样的痛苫和烦恼，要想应付各种挑战，重要的是通过心理调节维持心理平衡。日光照射可以改变大脑中某些信号物质的含量，使人情绪高涨，愿意从事富有挑战的活动。持续、高强度、快节奏的生活难免令人难以承受，疲劳、头痛、失眠等不适接踵而至。这些信号提醒你机体已经超负荷运转，该进行调整与休息了。每天抽出一段时间静坐，完全放松全身的肌肉，去掉脑中的一切杂念，将意念集中于丹田穴，可以调整全身的脏器活动。 让大自然帮助你 远离喧嚣的都市，到森林里。那里空气中负离子浓度较高，不仅能调节神经系统，而且可以促进胃肠消化、加深肺部的呼吸，在体力、脑力、心理等各方面起到良好的调节作用。办公室内勤等长时间坐着工作的人应该每隔1小时活动一下。可以作简单的保健操，也可以随便活动活动筋骨。虽然用时不多，却可有效防止由“静坐”生活方式导致的慢性疾病。 午后打盹事半功倍 现在国外一些公司规定职员必须午睡，以保证工作效率。午睡时间宜在半小时左右，关键是质量。睡时最好能平躺在床上或沙发上，将身体伸展开来。不要趴在桌上睡，这种体位容易使空气受限，颈项和腰部的肌肉紧张，醒后很不舒服，易发生慢性颈肩病。