单选题Ford"s Assembly Line When it comes to singling out those who have made a difference in all our lives, you cannot overlook Henry Ford. A historian a century from now might well conclude that it was Ford who most influenced all manufacturing, everywhere, even to this day, by introducing a new way to make cars—one, strange to say, that originated in slaughterhouses (屠宰场). Back in the early 1900s, slaughterhouses used what could have been called a "disassembly line". Ford reversed this process to see if it would speed up production of a part of an automobile engine called a magneto. Rather than have each worker completely assemble a magneto, one of its elements was placed on a conveyor, and each worker, as it passed, added another component to it, the same one each time. Professor David Hounshell of the University of Delaware, an expert on industrial development, tells what happened. "The previous day, workers carrying out the entire process had averaged one assembly every 20 minutes. But on that day, on the line, the assembly team averaged one every 13 minutes and 10 seconds per person. " Within a year, the time had been reduced to five minutes. In 1913, Ford went all the way. Hooked together by ropes, partially assembled vehicles were towed (拖,拉) past workers who completed them on piece at a time. It hasn"t been long before Ford was turning out several hundred and thousand cars a year, a remarkable achievement then. And so efficient and economical was this new system that he cut the price of his cars in half, to $260, putting them within reach of all those who, up until that time, could not afford them. Soon, auto makers and the world all copied him. In fact, he encouraged them to do so by writing a book about all of his innovations, entitled Today and Tomorrow. The Age of the Automobile has arrived. Today, aided by robots and other forms of automation(自动化), everything from toasters to perfumes is made on assembly lines.

单选题Despite all the evidences to the contrary, the witness stuck out that his story was true.

单选题Chinese people began to be aware of the seriousness of the population.

单选题 阅读下成这篇短文，短文后列出了7个句子，请根据短文的内容对每个句子作出判断。 {{B}}Bees and Color{{/B}} On our table in the garden we put a blue card, and all around this blue card we put a number of different gray cards. These gray cards are of all possible shades of gray land include white and black. On each card a watch-glass is placed. The watch-glass on the blue card has some syrup (果汁) in it; all the others are empty. After a short time bees find the syrup, and they come for it again and again. Then, after some hours, we take away the watch-glass of syrup which was on the blue card and put an empty one in its place. Now what do the bees do? They still go straight to the blue card, although there is no syrup them. They do not go to any of the gray cards, in spite of the fact that one of the gray cards is of exacfiy the same brightness as the blue card. Thus the bees do not mistake any shade of gray for blue. In his way we have proved that they do really see blue as a color. We can find out in just the same way what other colors bees can see. It turns out that bees can see various colors, but these insects differ from us as regards their color-sense in two very interesting ways. Suppose we train bees to come to a red card, and, having done so, we put the red card on the table in the garden among the set of different gray cards. This time we find that the bees mistake red for dark gray or black. They cannot distinguish between them. This means that red is not a color at all for bees; for them it is just dark gray or black. That is one strange fact; here is another. A rainbow is red on one edge, violet on the other. Outside the violet of the rainbow there is another color which we cannot see at all. This color beyond the violet, invisible to us, is called the ultra-violet. Although it is invisible, we know that the ultra-violet is there because it affects a photographic plate. Now, although we are unable to see ultra-violet light, bees can do so; for them ultra-violet is a color. Thus bees see a color which we cannot even imagine. This has been found out by training bees to come for syrup to various parts of a spectrum, or artificial rainbow, thrown by a prism on a table in a dark room. In such an experiment the insects can be taught to fly to the ultra-violet, which for us is just darkness.

单选题 Telling Tales about People One of the most common types of nonfiction, and one that many people enjoy reading, is stories about people's lives. These stories fall into three general categories: autobiography, memoir, and biography. An autobiography is the story of a person's life written by himself or herself. Often it begins with the person's earliest recollections and ends in the present. Autobiography writers may not be entirely objective in the way they present themselves. However, they offer the reader a good look at the way they are and what makes them that way. People as diverse as Benjamin Franklin and Helen Keller have written autobiographies. Other writers, such as James Joyce, have written thinly fictionalized accounts of their lives. These are not autobiographies, but they are very close to it. Memoirs, strictly speaking, are autobiographical accounts that focus as much on the events of the times as on the life of the author. Memoir writers typically use these events as backdrops for their lives. They describe them in detail and discuss their importance. Recently, though, the term memoir seems to be becoming interchangeable with autobiography. A memoir nowadays may or may not deal with the outside world. Biographies are factual accounts of someone else's life. In many senses, these may be the hardest of the three types to write. Autobiography writers know the events they write about because they lived them. But biography writers have to gather information from as many different sources as possible. Then they have to decide which facts to include. Their goal is to present a balanced picture of a person, not one that is overly positive or too critical. A fair well-presented biography may take years to research and write.

单选题The purpose of a custom is to cut down imports in order to protect domestic industry and workers from foreign competition.

单选题 New US Plan for Disease Prevention Urging Americans to take responsibility for their health, Health and Human Services Secretary Tommy Thompson on Tuesday launched a $15 million program to try to encourage communities to do more to prevent chronic diseases like heart disease, cancer and diabetes. The initiative highlights the cost of chronic diseases—the leading causes of death in the United States—and outlines ways that people can prevent them, including better diet and increased exercise. "In the United States today, 7 of 10 deaths and the vast majority of serious illness, disability and health care costs are caused by chronic diseases," the Health and Human Services Department said in a statement. The causes are often behavioral—smoking, poor eating habits and a lack of exercise. "I am convinced that preventing disease by promoting better health is a smart policy choice for our future," Thompson told a conference held to launch the initiative. "Our current health care system is not structured to deal with the escalating costs of treating diseases that are largely preventable through changes in our lifestyle choices." Thompson said heart disease and strokes will cost the country more than $351 billion in 2003. "These leading causes of death for men and women are largely preventable, yet we as a nation are not taking the steps necessary for US to lead healthier, longer lives," he said. The $15 million is slated to go to communities to promote prevention, pushing for changes as simple as building sidewalks to encourage people to walk more. Daily exercise such as walking can prevent and even reverse heart disease and diabetes, and prevent cancer and strokes. The money will also go to community organizations, clinics and nutritionists who are being encouraged to work together to educate people at risk of diabetes about what they can do to prevent it and encourage more cancer screening. The American Cancer Society estimates that half of all cancers can be caught by screening, including Pap tests for cervical cancer, mammograms for breast cancer, colonoscopies, and prostate checks. If such cancers were all caught by early screening, the group estimates that the survival rate for cancer would rise to 95 percent.

单选题 阅读下面这篇短文，短文后列出了7个句子，请根据短文的内容对每个句子作出判断。如果该句提供的是正确信息，请选择A项；如果该句提供的是错误信息，请选择B项；如果该句的信息文章中没有提及，请选择C项。 {{B}}Dining Custom{{/B}} Every land has its own dining custom, and the United States is no exception. Americans feel that the first rule of being a polite guest is to be on time. If a person is invited to dinner at 6: 30, the hostess expects him to be there at 6:30 or not more than a few minutes after. Because she usually does her own cooking, she times the meal so that the coffee and meat will be at their best at the time she asks the guest to come. If he is late, the food will not be so good, and the hostess will be disappointed. When the guest can not come on time, he calls his host or hostess on the telephone, gives the reason, and tells at what time he thinks he can come. As guests continue to arrive, the men in the group stand when a woman enters and remain standing until she found a chair. A man always rises when he is being introduced to a woman. A woman does not rise when she is being introduced either to a man or a woman unless the woman is much older. When the guests sit down at a dinner table, it is customary for the men to help the ladies by pushing their chairs under them. Even an American may be confused by the number of knives, forks, and spoons besides his plate when he sits down to a formal dinner. The rule is simple, however: use them in the order in which they lie, beginning from the outside. Or watch the hostess and do what she does. The small fork on the outside on the left is for salad, which is often served with the soup. The spoon on butter spreader, on a small bread-and-butter plate at the left. As the bread is passed, each quest puts his piece on the bread-and-butter plate.

单选题Wealth Among the more colorful characters of Leadville's golden age were H. AW. Tabor and his second wife, Elizabeth McCourt, better known as "Baby Doe". Their history is fast becoming one of the legends of the Old West. Horace Austin school teacher in Vermont. With his first wife and two children he left Vermont by covered wagon in 1855 to homestead in Kansas. Perhaps he did not find farming to his liking, or perhaps he was lured by rumors of fortunes to be made in Colorado mines. At any rate, a few years later he moved west to the small Colorado mining camp known as California Gulch, which he later renamed Leadville when he became its leading citizen. "Great deposits of lead are sure to be found here." he said. As it turned out, it was silver, not lead, that was to make Leadville's fortune and wealth. Tabor knew little about mining himself, so he opened a general store, which sold everything from boots to salt, flour, and tobacco. It was his custom to "grubstake" prospective miners, in other words, to supply them with food and supplies, or "grub", while they looked for ore, in return for which he would get a share in the mine if one was discovered. He did this for a number of years, but no one that he aided ever found anything of value. Finally one day in the year 1878, so the story goes, two miners came in and asked for "grub". Tabor had decided to quit supplying it because he had lost too much money that way. These were persistent, however, and Tabor was too busy to argue with them. "Oh help yourself. One more time won't make any difference," He said and went on selling shoes and hats to other customers. The two miners took $17 worth of supplies, in gave Tabor a one-third interest in their findings. They picked a barren place on the mountainside and began to dig. After nine days they struck a rich vein of silver. Tabor bought the shares of the other two men, and so the mine belonged to him alone. This mine, known as the "Pittsburgh Mine," made 1,300,000 for Tabor in return for his $17 investment. Later Tabor bought the Matchless Mine on another barren hillside just outside the town for $117,000.This turned out to be even more fabulous than the Pittsburgh, yielding $35,000 worth of silver per day at one time. Leadville grew. Tabor became its first mayor, and later became lieutenant governor of the state.

单选题Despite their good service, most inns are less costly than hotels of equal standards.

单选题A Glass of Milk One day, a poor boy who was trying to pay his way through school by selling goods door to door found that he only had one dime left. He was hungry so he decided to beg for a meal at the next house. However, he lost his nerve when a lovely young woman opened the door. Instead of a meal he asked for a drink of water. She thought he looked hungry so she brought him a large glass of milk. He drank it slowly, and then asked, "How much do I owe you?" "You don't owe me anything," she replied. "Mother has taught me never to accept pay for a kindness," he said, "Then I thank you from the bottom of my heart." As Howard Kelly left that house, he not only felt stronger physically, but also increased his faith in God and the human race. He was about to give up and quit before this point. Years later the young woman became critically ill. The local doctors were baffled. They finally sent her to the big city, where specialists can be called in to study her rare disease. Dr. Howard Kelly, now famous was called in for the consultation. When he heard the name of the town she came from, a strange light filled his eyes. Immediately, he rose and went down through the hospital hall into her room. Dressed in his doctor's gown he went in to see her. He recognized her at once. He went back to the consultation room and determined to do his best to save her life. From that day on, he gave special attention to her case. After a long struggle, the battle was won. Dr. Kelly requested the business office to pass the final bill to him for approval. He looked at it and then wrote something on the side. The bill was sent to her room. She was afraid to open it because she was positive that it would take the rest of her life to pay it off. Finally she looked, and the note on the side of the bill caught her attention. She read these words... "Paid in full with a glass of milk," signed Dr. Howard Kelly Tears of joy flooded her eyes as she prayed silently: "Thank You, God. Your love has spread through human hearts and hands./

单选题We all think that Mary's husband is a very boring person, A. shy B. stupid C. dull D. selfish

单选题The Cherokee Nation Long before the white man came to America, the land belonged to the American Indian nations. The nation of the Cherokees lived in what is now the southeastern part of the United States. After the white man came, the Cherokees copied many of their ways. One Cherokee named Sequoyah saw how important reading and writing were to the white man. He decided to invent a way to write down the spoken Cherokee language. He began by making word pictures. For each word he drew a picture. But that proved impossible-there were just too many words. Then he took the 85 sounds that made up the language. Using his own imagination and an English spelling book, Sequoyah invented a sign for each sound. His alphabet proved amazingly easy to learn. Before long, many Cherokees knew how to read and write in their own language. By 1828, they were even printing their own newspaper. In 1830, the U.S. Congress passed a law. It allowed the government to remove Indians from their lands. The Cherokees refused to go. They had lived on their lands for centuries. It belonged to them. Why should they go to a strange land far beyond the Mississippi River? The army was sent to drive the Cherokees out. Soldiers surrounded their villages and marched them at gunpoint (在枪口的威胁下) into the western territory. The sick, the old and the small children went in carts, along with their belongings. The rest of the people marched on foot or rode on horseback. It was November, yet many of them still wore their summer clothes. Cold and hungry, the Cherokees were quickly exhausted by the hardships of the journey. Many dropped dead and were buried by the roadside. When the last group arrived in their new home in March 1839, more than 4, 000 had died. It was indeed a march of death.

单选题We"ve seen a marked shift in our approach to the social issues.

单选题The turkey is a most popular food on Thanksgiving Day.

单选题If we had discussed it with the manager, he would have surely agree with it.A. unnecessarilyB. simplyC. certainlyD. possibly

单选题In the process，the light energy converts to heat energy． A．reduces B．changes C．1eaves D．drops

单选题In order to improve our standard of living, we have to accelerate production.

单选题 Why Is the Native Language Learnt So Well How does it happen that children learn their mother tongue so well? When we compare them with adults learning a foreign language, we often find this interesting fact. A little child without knowledge or experience often succeeds in a complete mastery of the language. A grown-up person with fully developed mental powers, in most case, may end up with a faulty and inexact command. What accounts for this difference? Despite other explanations, the real answer in my opinion lies partly in the child himself, partly in the behavior of the people around him. In the first place, the time of learning the mother tongue is the most favorable of all, namely, the first years of life. A child hears it spoken from morning till night and, what is more important, always in its genuine form, with the right pronunciation, right intonation, right use of words and right structure. He drinks in all the words and expressions, which come to him in a flash, ever-bubbling spring. There is no resistance:there is perfect assimilation. Then the child has, as it were, private lessons all the year round, while an adult language-student has each week a limited number of hours, which he generally shares with others. The child has another advantage. he hears the language in all possible situations, always accompanied by the right kind of gestures and facial expressions. Here there is nothing unnatural, such as is often found in language lessons in schools, when one talks about ice and snow in June or scorching heat in January. And what a child hears is generally what immediately interests him. Again and again, when his attempts at speech are successful, his desires are understood and fulfilled. Finally, though a child's "teachers" may not have been trained in language teaching, their relations with him are always close and personal. They take great pains to make their lessons easy.

单选题When We Are Asleep Everyone dreams, but some people never recall their dreams, or do so very rarely. Other people always wake up with vivid recollections (记忆) of their dreams, though they forget them very quickly. In an average night of eight hours" sleep, an average adult will dream for around one hundred minutes, probably having three to five dreams, each lasting from ten to thirty minutes. Scientists can detect when someone is having a dream by using an instrument which measures the electrical waves in the brain. During dreaming, these waves move more quickly. Breathing and pulse rate also increase, and there are rapid eye movements under the lids, just as though the dreamer were really looking at moving objects. These signs of dreaming have been detected in all mammals (哺乳动物) studied, including dogs, monkeys, cats, and elephants, and also some birds and reptiles (爬行动物). This period of sleep is called the "D" state for around 50% of their sleep; the period reduces to around 25% by the age of 10. Dreams take the form of stories, but they may be strange and with incidents not connected, which make little sense. Dreams are seldom without people in them and they are usually about people we know. One estimate says that two-thirds of the "cast" of our dream dramas are friends and relations. Vision seems an essential part of dreams, except for people blind from birth. Sound and touch are senses also often aroused, but smell and taste are not frequently involved. In "normal" dreams, the dreamer may be taking part, or be only an observer. But he or she cannot control what happens in the dream. However, the dreamer does have control over one type of dream. This type of dream is called a "lucid" (清醒的) dream. Not everyone is a lucid dreamer. Some people are occasional lucid dreamers. Others can dream lucidly more or less all the time. In a lucid dream, the dreamer knows that he is dreaming.