单选题{{B}}第三篇{{/B}} Ford Abandons Electric Vehicles The Ford motor company's abandonment of electric cars effectively signals the end of the road for the technology, analysts say. General Motor and Honda' ceased production of battery, powered cars in 1999, to focus on fuel cell and hybrid electric gasoline engines, which are more attractive to the consumer. Ford has now announced it will do the same. Three years ago, the company introduced the Think City two-seater car and a golf cart called the THINK, or ThinkNeighbor. It hoped to sell 5,000 cars each year and 10,000 carts. But a lack of demand means only about 1,000 of the cars have been produced, and less than 1,700 carts have been sold so far in 2002. "The bottom line is we don't believe that this is the future of environment transport for the mass market. "Tim Holmes of Ford Europe said on Friday. "We feel we have given electric our best shot". The Think City has a range of only about 53 miles and up to a six-hour battery recharge time. General Motors' EVI electric vehicle also had a limited range, of about 100 miles. The very expensive batteries also mean electric cars cost much more than petrol-powered alternatives. An electric Toyot-RAV4 EV vehicle costs over $ 42,000 in the US, compared with just $17,000 for the petrol version. Toyota and Nissan are now the only major auto manufacturers to produce electric vehicles. "There is a feeling that battery electric has been given its chance. Ford now has to move on with its hybrid program, and that is what we will be judging them on. " Roger Higman, a senior transport campaigner at UK Friends of the Earth, told the Environment News Service. Hybrid cars introduced by Toyota and Honda in the past few years have sold well. Hybrid engines offer greater mileage than petrol-only engines , and the batteries recharge themselves. Ford says it thinks such vehicles will help it meet planned new guidelines "on vehicle emissions" in the U.S. However, it is not yet clear exactly what those guidelines will permit. In June, General Motors and Daimler Chrysler won a court injunction, delaying by two years Californian legislation requiring car-makers to offer 100,000 zero-emission and other low-emission vehicles in the state by 2003. Car manufacturers hope the legislation will be rewritten to allow for more low-emission, rather than zero-emission, vehicles.

单选题{{B}}第三篇{{/B}} {{B}}Importance of Services{{/B}} The United States has moved beyond the industrial economy stage to the point where it has become the world's first service economy. Almost three-fourths of the nonfarm labor force is employed in service industries, and over two-thirds of the nation's gross national product is accounted for by services. Also, service jobs typically hold up better during a recession than do jobs in industries producing tangible goods. During the 20-year period of 1966 to 1986, about 36 million new jobs were created in the United States--far more than in Japan and Western Europe combined. About 90 percent of these jobs were in service industries. During this same time span, some 22 million women joined the labor force--and 97 percent of these women went to work in the service sector. These employment trends are expected to continue at least until the year 2000. For the period 1986- 2000, the Bureau of Labor Statistics predicts that over 21 million new jobs will be created and 93 percent of them will be in service industries. Moreover, most of this explosive growth in services employment is not in low-paying jobs, contrary to the beliefs of many economists, business and labor leaders, and politicians. These people argue that manufacturing jobs, which have been the economic foundation of America's middle class, are vanishing. They claim that factory workers are being replaced with a host of low-wage earners. It is tree that manufacturing jobs have declined, with many of them going to foreign countries. It is also true that there has been growth in some low-paying service jobs. Yet cooks and counter people still represent only 1 percent of the U.S. labor force today. Furthermore, for many years the fastest-growing occupational category has been "professional, technical, and related work." These jobs pay well above the average, and most are in service industries. About one-half of consumer expenditures are for the purchase of services. Projections to the year 2000 indicate that services will attract an even larger share of consumer spending. A drawback of the service economy boom is that the prices of most services have been going up at a considerably faster rate than the prices of most tangible products. You are undoubtedly aware of this if you have had your car or TV set repaired, had your shoes half-soled, or paid a medical bill in recent years. When we say that services account for close to one-half of consumer expenditures, we still grossly understate the economic importance of services. These figures do not include the vast amounts spent for business services. By all indications, spending for business services has increased even more rapidly than spending for consumer services.

单选题The joys of travel, having long {{U}}overlooked{{/U}} the disabled, are opening up to virtually anyone who has the means. A. omitted B. missed C. neglected D. discarded

单选题When hummingbirds fly,their wingbeats are so rapid that the wings seem blurred.

单选题Eventually, she got a job and moved to London.A. CertainlyB. LuckilyC. NaturallyD. Finally

单选题A writer's attempts to reproduce folk {{U}}speech{{/U}} can be an asset to the historian of pronunciation.

单选题Prisoners were kept in the most appalling conditions.

单选题 Knitting My mother knew how to knit (纺织), but she never taught me. She assumed, as did many women of her generation, that knitting was no longer a skill worth passing down from mother to daughter. A combination of feminism (女权主义) and consumerism (消费主义) made many women feel that such homely accomplishments were now out of date. My grandmother still knitted, though, and every Christmas she made a pair of socks for my brother and me, of red wool (毛线). They were the ones we wore under our ice skates (冰鞋), when it was really important to have warm feet. Knitting is a nervous habit that happens to be productive. It helped me {{B}}quit{{/B}} smoking by giving my hands something else to do. It is wonderful for depression because no matter what else happens, you are creating something beautiful. Time spent in front of the television or just sitting is no longer time wasted. I love breathing life into the patterns. It's true magic, finding a neglected, dog-eared (翻旧了的) old book with the perfect snowflake design, buying the same Germantown wool my grandmother used, in the exact blue to match my daughter's eyes, taking it on the train with me every day for two months, working enthusiastically to get it done by Christmas, staying up late after the stockings are filled to sew in the sleeves and weave in the ends. Knitting has taught me patience. I know that if I just keep going, even if it takes months, there will be a reward. When I make a mistake, I know that anger will not fix it, and that I just have to go back and start over again. People often ask if I would do it for money, and the answer is always a definite no. In the first place, you could not pay me enough for the hours I put into a sweater. But more important, this is an activity I keep separate from such considerations. I knit to cover my children and other people I love in warmth and color. I knit to give them something earthly that money could never buy. Knitting gives my life an alternative rhythm to the daily deadline. By day I can write about Northern Ireland or the New York City Police Department and get paid for it, but on the train home, surrounded by people with laptops, I stage my little rebellion. I take out my old knitting bag and join the centuries of women who have knitted for love.

单选题An important part of the national government is the Foreign Service, a branch of the Department of State.

单选题Which of the following is NOT true of traditional university research?

单选题Can Buildings Be Designed to Resist Terrorist Attack In the aftermath of the terrorist attack on the World Trade Center, structural engineers are trying hard to solve a question that a month ago would have been completely unthinkable. Can building be designed to withstand catastrophic blasts inflicted by terrorists? Ten days after the terrorist attacks on the twin towers, structural engineers from the University at Buffalo and the Multidisciplinary Center for Earthquake Engineering Research (MCEER) headquartered at UB traveled to ground zero as part of a project funded by the National Science Foundation. Visiting the site as part of an MCEER reconnaissance visit, they spent two days beginning the task of formulating ideas about how to design such structures and searching for clues on how to do so in buildings that were damaged, but still are standing. "Our objective in visiting ground zero was to go and look at the buildings surrounding the World Trade Center, those buildings that are still standing, but that sustained damage, "said M. Bruneau, Ph. D. "Our immediate hope is that we can develop a better understanding as to why those buildings remain standing, while our long-term goal is to see whether earthquake engineering technologies can be married to existing technologies to achieve enhanced performance of buildings in the event of terrorist attacks." he added. Photographs taken by the investigators demonstrate in startling detail the monumental damage inflicted on the World Trade Center towers and buildings in the vicinity. One building a block away from the towers remains standing, but was badly damaged. "This building is many meters away from the World Trade Center and yet we see a column there that used to be part of that building", explained A. Whittaker, Ph. D. "The column became a missile that shot across the road, through the window and through the floor." The visit to the area also revealed some surprises, according to the engineers. For example, the floor framing systems in one of the adjacent buildings was quite rugged, allowing floors that were pierced by tons of falling debris to remain intact. "Highly redundant ductile framing systems may provide a simple, but robust strategy for blast resistance." he added. Other strategies may include providing alternate paths for gravity loads in the event that a load-bearing column fails. "We also need a better understanding of the mechanism of collapse", said A. Whittaker. "We need to find out what causes a building to collapse and how you can predict it." A. Reinhorn, Ph. D. noted that "earthquake shaking has led to the collapse of many buildings in the past. It induces dynamic response and extremely high stresses and deformations in structural components. Solutions developed for earthquake-resistant design may be directly applicable to blast engineering and terrorist-resistant design. Part of our mission now at UB is to transfer these solutions and to develop new ones where none exist at present."

单选题 Fitness Movement The fitness movement that began in the late 1960s and early 1970s centered around aerobic exercise. Millions of individuals became engaged in a variety of aerobic activities, and {{U}} {{U}} 1 {{/U}} {{/U}}thousands of health spas developed around the country to capitalize on his {{U}} {{U}} 2 {{/U}} {{/U}}interest in fitness, particularly aerobic dancing for females. A number of fitness spas existed {{U}} {{U}} 3 {{/U}} {{/U}}to this aerobic fitness movement, even a national chain with spas in most major cities. However, their {{U}} {{U}} 4 {{/U}} {{/U}}was not on aerobics, but rather on weight-training programs designed to develop muscular mass, {{U}} {{U}} 5 {{/U}} {{/U}}, and endurance in their primarily male {{U}} {{U}} 6 {{/U}} {{/U}}. These fitness spas did not seem to benefit {{U}} {{U}} 7 {{/U}} {{/U}}from the aerobic fitness movement to better health, since medical opinion suggested that weight-training programs {{U}} {{U}} 8 {{/U}} {{/U}}few, if any, health benefits. In recent years, however, weight training has again become increasingly. {{U}} {{U}} 9 {{/U}} {{/U}}for males and for females. Many {{U}} {{U}} 10 {{/U}} {{/U}}programs focus not only on developing muscular strength and endurance but on aerobic fitness as well. {{U}} {{U}} 11 {{/U}} {{/U}}, most physical fitness tests have usually included measures of muscular strength and endurance, not for health related reasons, but primarily. {{U}} {{U}} 12 {{/U}} {{/U}}such fitness components have been related to performance in athletics. {{U}} {{U}} 13 {{/U}} {{/U}}, in recent years, evidence has shown that training programs designed primarily to improve muscular strength and endurance might also offer some health {{U}} {{U}} 14 {{/U}} {{/U}}as well. The American College of Sports Medicine now {{U}} {{U}} 15 {{/U}} {{/U}}that weight training be part of a total fitness program for healthy Americans.

单选题A Country"s Standard of Living The "standard of living" of any country means the average person"s share of the goods and services the country produces. A country"s standard of living, therefore 1 first on its capacity to produce wealth. "Wealth" in this 2 is not money, for we do not live on money but on things that money can buy: "goods" such as food and clothing, and "services" such as transport and entertainment. A country"s capacity to 3 wealth depends upon many factors, most of 4 have an effect on one another. Wealth depends 5 a great extent upon a country"s natural resources. Some regions of the world are well supplied with coal and minerals, and have fertile (肥沃的) soil and a favorable climate; other regions 6 none of them. Next to natural resources comes the ability to 7 them to use. China is perhaps as rich as the USA in natural resources, but suffered for many years 8 civil and external wars, and for this and other 9 was unable to develop her resources. Sound and stable political conditions, and 10 from foreign invasions, enable a country to develop its natural resources peacefully and steadily, and to produce more 11 than another country equally well favored by nature but less well ordered. A country"s standard of living does not only depend upon the wealth that is produced and 12 within its own borders, but also upon what is directly produced through international trade for mple, Britain"s wealth in foodstuffs and other agricultural 13 would be much less if she had to depend only on those grown at home. Trade makes it possible for the surplus (过剩的) manufactured goods to be traded abroad for the agricultural products 14 would otherwise be lacking. A country"s wealth is, therefore, much influenced by its manufacturing capacity. 15 that other countries can be found ready to accept its manufactures.

单选题Supermarket Most supermarkets need a very large floor area, sometimes at least ten times as big as that of an ordinary shop. There are usually two doors, one as an entrance and the other as an exit. The rest of the side facing the street is largely of plate grass, with goods or advertising materials displayed. The other three walls are normally decorated in light colors, giving an impression of cleanliness (清洁) and brightness. Most supermarkets are on one floor only, goods being stored in rooms at the hack or upstairs. At right-angles to the window stretch long structures about six feet high with a number of shelves on each side. Similar shelf units or frozen food containers extend round the walls. Broad aisles (通道) between the shelf units and ample (足够的) space between them and the window and also the far wall allow room for the circulation of many people. Individual commodities (商品), in tins, bags, boxes or other containers, are stacked (堆放) in groups on the shelves, and each group is labeled with a price ticket. Metal baskets near the entrance are taken by the shoppers who collect in them the goods they select from the shelves. Between the shelf units and the window in one half of the shops are a number of small counters about three feet high. Beside each sits a cashier (现金出纳员), who operates a machine for totaling the cost of each customers' purchases. The customer places the basket at one end of the counter so that ii can be emptied by the cashier who records the price of the commodities one by one, before putting each on a moving section of the counter top. The goods are collected and packed into the customer's hag by another assistant at the end of the counter. The cashier finally hands a printed slip recording all prices to the customer, who pays the total, collects the bag and leaves.

单选题One of the main attractions of smart house is how enjoyable it can make one's life. First, a robot vacuum cleaner takes care of the housekeeping task of vacuuming, or any other cleaning. The smart house also steams all the clothes in the closet and gives ideas on what to wear for that day's weather. Bill Gates has already used this lifestyle in his home. In his house the pictures on the walls change to whatever a person wants to see and so does the temperature to make everyone comfortable. What is the overall advantage of smart house over usual houses most of us have now?A. It has a robot vacuum cleaner.B. It provides a very enjoyable life.C. It steams all the clothes in the closet.D. It gives advice on what to wear.

单选题Marxism doctrine was spelled out in the Communist Manifesto.

单选题Examination papers of the class were marked without bias.

单选题Relief workers were shocked by what they saw.

单选题Dancing in the Streets If there is one thing certain to get Brazilians on their feet, it is the Rio Carnival (狂欢节). Held in Rio de Janeiro, the country's biggest city, the carnival began on February 20 when the mayor gave key of the city to Rei Momo-the Lord of Misrule (无序之皇). On his orders, each year people turn the city into a paradise of dance and music. The following six days are so full of parades, street dancing, fantastic clothes and partying (聚会) that many people forget about eating and sleeping. "It was the passion of the carnival that attracted me to Brazil and made me settle down in Rio," said Bob Nadkarni, a British man who has lived in the city for several years. For many Brazilians, the centrepiece of the carnival is samba (桑巴舞), a typical Brazilian dance. Every year, tens of thousands of visitors and locals show off their passion and energy in the streets, following the beat (节拍) of the Latin music. The climax to this street party is the float (彩车) parade, in which floats decorated with tons of fresh flowers by various samba schools and local communities move through the city. On the top of each float stands the candidate for the Drum Queen, who is chosen at the end of the party. While most people are free to enjoy the celebrations, Rio's police officers have to keep a clear head. Following the murder of three officers in a gunfight early last week, the Brazilian Government has tightened security in Rio. The street fighting, robbery and sex crimes that accompany the carnival are very difficult to police. Carnivals began in ancient Rome as a celebration at which people fed wild wolves, in honour of the city's founder who was said to have been raised by a she-wolf. Brazil gave new life to this tradition and so, despite the troubles, the carnival will remain a symbol of the country's culture.

单选题Road Trip Vacations It's summer. In the United States, it's the season of swimming pools, barbeques, camping and road trips. Road trip vacations where the car journey is part of the fun are especially popular with college students, who like to explore the country on wheels. These budget trips are ideal for students who often have plenty of free time but little money. "Ever since I went to college, I've been traveling around a lot, exploring the country," said Austin Hawkins, a 19-year-old college student from New York. This summer, Hawkins and his friends have spent weekends traveling in New England. The best part about car trips, said Hawkins, is that you can be spontaneous (自发的). "On a road trip, if you get interested in things you see along the way you can stop and explore. " Matt Roberts, a 20-year-old student from Ohio who drove to Montreal, Canada, agrees. "With road trips you don't have to plan in advance, you can just get into a car and drive." Even with high gas prices, driving with friends is cheaper than flying. Roberts paid about 40 dollars for gas, but a round trip plane ticket would have cost nearly 400 dollars. Driving trips first became popular in the 1920s. Newly paved roads and improved cars made it possible to travel longer distances. Motels started appearing outside cities. By the 1950s, car ownership became the norm. Construction of the US interstate highway system began in 1956 and motel and restaurant chains popped up everywhere making long distance trips easier. Today, the US has the highest car ownership rate in the world. Only 8 percent of American homes have no car, according to the most recent US census. Though many college students don't own a car, most have access to one. On many of Hawkins' trips, they used a borrowed van. Hawkins' most memorable road trip took place over spring break. He and two friends drove from New York to New Orleans to volunteer, helping rebuild the city after Hurricane Katrina hit it last July. They crossed the country in two days and slept in their car in church parking lots. Roberts' road trip to Canada last winter was even more eventful. Upon arriving in Montreal, they were lost in a blizzard and shivering in the — 250 cold. To find their hotel, they turned on a laptop and drove around in circles until they found a spot with wireless Internet coverage. "I know we should have planned better, but we're young. Now, when I see those guys I always say. 'Remember when we were lost in the snow storm!' I'll never forget that./