单选题Passages 5 Every group has a culture, however uncivilized it may seem to us. To the professional anthropologist, there is no intrinsic superiority of one culture over another, just as to the professional linguist, there is no intrinsic hierarchy among languages. People once thought of the languages of back groups as undeveloped. While it is possible that language in general began as a series of grunts and groans, it is a fact established by the study of "backward" languages that no spoken tongue answers that description today. Most languages of uncivilized groups are, by our most severe standards, extremely complex. They differ from Western languages not in their sound patterns or grammatical structures, which usually are fully adequate for all language needs, but only in their vocabularies, which reflect the objects and activities known to their speakers. Even in this aspect, two things are to be noted. First, all languages seen to possess the machinery for vocabulary expansion, either by putting together words already in existence of by borrowing them from other languages or adapting them to their own system. Second, the objects and activities requiring names and distinctions in "backward" languages, while different from the West, are often surprisingly numerous and complicated. A Western language distinguishes merely between two degrees of remoteness ("this" and "that"). But some languages of the American Indians distinguish between what is close to the speaker, or to the person addressed, or removed from both, or out of sight, or in the past, or in the future.

单选题During the first year that Mr. Wordsworth and I were neighbours, our conversations turned frequently on the two cardinal points of poetry, the power of exciting the sympathy of the reader by a faithful adherence to the truth of nature, and the power of giving the interest of novelty by the modifying colours of imagination. The sudden charm, which accidents of light and shade, which moon-light or sunset diffused over a known and familiar landscape, appeared to represent the practicability of combining both. These are the poetry of nature. The thought suggested itself--(to which of us I do not recollect)--that a series of poems might be composed of two sorts. In the one, the incidents and agents were to he, in part at least, supernatural. And the excellence aimed at was to consist in the interesting of the affections by the dramatic truth of such emotions, as would naturally accompany such situations, supposing them real. And real in this sense they have been to every human being who, from whatever source of delusion, has at any time believed himself under supernatural agency. For the second class, subjects were to be chosen from ordinary life. The characters and incidents were to be such as will be found in every village and its vicinity, where there is a meditative and feeling mind to seek after them, or to notice them, when they present themselves. In this idea originated the plan of the Lyrical Ballads, in which it was agreed, that my endeavors should be directed to persons and characters supernatural, or at least romantic. Yet so as to transfer from our inward nature a human interest and a semblance of truth sufficient to procure for these shadows of imagination that willing suspension of disbelief for the moment, which constitutes poetic faith. Mr. Wordsworth, on the other hand, was to propose to himself as his object, to give the charm of novelty to things of every day, and to excite a feeling analogous to the supernatural, by awakening the mind's attention to the lethargy of custom, and directing it to the loveliness and the wonders of the world before us. And inexhaustible treasure, but for which, in consequence of the film of familiarity and selfish solicitude, we have eyes, yet see not, ears that hear not, and hearts that neither feel nor understand.

单选题The ascent of the mountain is ______, but anyone who makes it to the top is rewarded by a spectacular view.

单选题Without a proper education, people could______all kinds of crimes.

单选题While we need to show young women how to protect themselves, these findings also demonstrate strongly that we need to help young men reject a culture that tells them relationships are based on showing power ______ others and that, as males, they need to prove their masculinity, ______ exercising this type of power.

单选题If some of the players are not available to attend the NEC, we will make arrangements for the winning readers—who will be selected______—to meet the stars at a later date and present their award in person.

单选题In 1987, H. I. V/AIDS joined a list of that could keep a person out of the United States. The government later tried to cancel its decision, but congress made the travel ban a part of immigration law. People with H. I. V. , the virus that causes AIDS, could seek an exception, but that meant extra work. Last year, Congress and President George W. Bush began the process of ending the travel ban. Now President Obama is finishing the process. BARACK OBAMA : "We talk about reducing the stigma of this disease, yet we have treated a visitor living with it as a threat. We lead the world when it comes to helping the AIDS pandemic, yet we are only a dozen countries that still bar people H. I. V. from entering our country. " A final rule published Monday will end the travel ban effective January fourth. H. I. V. will no longer be a condition that can exclude people. And H. I. V. testing will no longer for those who need a medical examination for immigration purposes. AIDS has killed more than twenty-five people since the early 1980s. In September, there was news that a vaccine showed some ability to prevent H. I. V. infection in humans for the first time. The full results of the vaccine study were presented in later October at an international conference in Paris. They were also reported in the New England Journal of Medicine. The researchers confirmed that the study in Thailand produced only "modest" results. The United States Army sponsored the vaccine trial. The study combined two vaccines, using versions of H. I. V. common in Thailand. Neither vaccine alone had shown success in earlier studies. Thai researchers tested the combination in more than 16,000 volunteers. Half of the volunteers got the vaccine. The others got a placebo, an inactive substance. All were given condoms and counseling on AIDS prevention for three years. The study found 31 percent fewer cases of infection in the vaccine group than in the placebo group. But critics said the findings could possibly have resulted from chance. The announcement in September was based on all 16,000 volunteers. Almost one-third of them, however didn't follow all the required steps in the study. Results just from those who did were similar to the larger group, but the influence of chance is way more of a possibility. Still, the researchers said the study produced enough valuable information to offer new hopes for AIDS research.

单选题It's usually the ease that, when furious, people seldom act in a ______ way.

单选题The possibility that the explosion was caused by sabotage cannot be ______.

单选题The image of the volunteers on television advertising provides ______ into people's attitudes toward volunteering.

单选题The weather wasn't favorble and both teams had to ______ icy rain and a strong wind during the match.

单选题Over the years, Jimmy Connors______phenomenal displays of tennis and temper—and at the U. S. open last week, he exhibited both again.(北京大学2007年试题)

单选题The author implies that the Fourteenth Amendment might not have been enacted if ______.

单选题Yesterday my brother ______ with his girlfriend over where to go on holiday.

单选题The relationship between formal education and economic growth in poor countries is widely misunderstood by economists and politicians alike. Progress in both areas is undoubtedly necessary for the social, political and intellectual development of these and all other societies; however, the conventional view that education should be one of the very highest priorities for promoting rapid economic development in poor countries is wrong. We are fortunate that it is, because building new educational systems there and putting enough people through them to improve economic performance would require two or three generations. The findings of a research institution have consistently shown that workers in all countries can be trained on the job to achieve radical higher productivity and, as a result, radically higher standards of living. Ironically, the first evidence for this idea appeared in the United States. Not long ago, with the country entering a recession and Japan at its pre-bubble peak, the U. S. workforce was derided as poorly educated and one of the primary causes of the poor U. S. economic performance. Japan was, and remains, the global leader in automotive-assembly productivity. Yet the research revealed that the U. S. factories of Honda, Nissan, and Toyota achieved about 95 percent of the productivity of their Japanese counterparts as a result of the training that U. S. workers received on the job. More recently, while examining housing construction, the researchers discovered that illiterate, non-English-speaking Mexican workers in Houston, Texas, consistently met best-practice labor productivity standards despite the complexity of the building industry's work. What is the real relationship between education and economic development? We have to suspect that continuing economic growth promotes the development of education even when governments don't force it. After all, that's how education got started. When our ancestors were hunters and gatherers 10, 000 years ago, they didn't have time to wonder much about anything besides finding food. Only when humanity began to get its food in a more productive way was there time for other things. As education improved, humanity's productivity potential increased as well. When the competitive environment pushed our ancestors to achieve that potential, they could in turn afford more education. This increasingly high level of education is probably a necessary, but not a sufficient, condition for the complex political systems required by advanced economic performance. Thus poor countries might not be able to escape their poverty traps without political changes that may be possible only with broader formal education. A lack of formal education, however, doesn't constrain the ability of the developing world's workforce to substantially improve productivity for the foreseeable future. On the contrary, constraints on improving productivity explain why education isn't developing more quickly there than it is.

单选题 An orator, whose purpose is to persuade men, must speak the things they wish to hear, an orator, whose purpose is to move men, must also avoid disturbing the emotional effect by any obtrusion of intellectual antagonism, but an author, whose purpose is to instruct men, who appeals to the intellect, must be careless of their opinions and think only of truth. It will often be a question when a man is or is not wise in advancing an unpalatable opinion, or in preaching heresies. But it can never be a question that a man should be silent if unprepared to speak the truth as he conceives it. Deference to popular opinion is one great source of bad writing and is all the more disastrous because the deference is paid to some purely hypothetical requirement. When a man fails to see the truth of certain generally accepted views, there is no law compelling him to provoke animosity by announcing his dissent. He may be excused if he shrink from the lurid glory of martyrdom. He may be justified in not placing himself in a position of singularity. He may even be commended for not helping to perplex mankind with doubts which he feels to be founded on limited and possibly erroneous investigation. But if allegiance to truth lays no stern command upon him to speak out his immature dissent, it does lay a stern command not to speak out hypocritical assent. There are many justifications of silence, there can be none of insincerity.

单选题Based on their review, the University of California researchers concluded that MTBE is an animal virus ______ cause cancer in humans.

单选题The captain of the ship entered the details in the ______. A. lounge B. log C. motel D. shipwreck