The concept of obtaining fresh water from icebergs that are towed to populated areas and arid regions of the world was once treated as a joke more appropriate to cartoons than real life. But now it is being【C1】______quite seriously by many nations, especially since scientists have warned that the human race will【C2】______its fresh water supply faster than it runs out of food. Glaciers are a possible【C3】______of fresh water that has been overlooked until recently. Three-quarters of the Earth's fresh water supply is still tied up in glacial ice, a reservoir of 【C4】______fresh water so immense that it could【C5】______all the rivers of the world for 1,000 years. Floating on the oceans every year are 7,659 trillion metric tons of ice encased in 10,000 icebergs that break away from the polar ice caps, more than ninety percent of them from Antarctica. Huge glaciers that【C6】______over the shallow continental shelf give birth to icebergs throughout the year. Icebergs are not like sea ice, which is formed when the sea itself freezes, rather, they are formed【C7】______on land, breaking off when glaciers spread over the sea. As they drift away from the polar region, icebergs sometimes move mysteriously in a direction【C8】______to the wind, pulled by subsurface currents. Because they melt more slowly than smaller pieces of ice, icebergs have been known to drift as far north as 35 degrees south of the equator in the Atlantic Ocean. To control them and【C9】______them to parts of the world where they are needed would not be too difficult. Even if the icebergs lost half of their volume in towing, the water they could provide would be far cheaper than that produced by desalinization (脱盐), or【C10】______salt from water.A) removing I) approximatelyB) stretch J) consideredC) deriving K) similarD) entirely L) sourceE) untapped M) ensuredF) resource N) sustainG) outgrow O) steer H) opposite

For this part, you are allowed 30 minutes to write a short essay entitled The Damage of E-waste. You should write at least 150 words but no more than 200 words following the outline given below. 1．随着电子设备的增多，电子垃圾也越来越多。 2．电子垃圾的危害很多。 3．为此，我们应该……

[此试题无题干]

If you asked me to describe the rising philosophy of the day, I'd say it is data-ism. We now have the ability to gather huge amounts of data. This ability seems to carry with it certain cultural assumptions—that everything that can be measured should be measured; that data is a transparent and reliable lens that allows us to filter out emotionalism and ideology; that data will help us do remarkable things—like foretell the future. Over the next year, I'm hoping to get a better grip on some of the questions raised by the data revolution: in what situations should we rely on intuitive pattern recognition and in which situations should we ignore intuition and follow the data? What kinds of events are predictable using statistical analysis and what sorts of events are not? I confess I enter this in a skeptical frame of mind, believing that we tend to get carried away in our desire to reduce everything to the quantifiable. But at the outset let me celebrate two things data does really well. First, it's really good at exposing when our intuitive view of reality is wrong. For example, nearly every person who runs for political office has an intuitive sense that they can powerfully influence their odds of winning the election if they can just raise and spend more money. But this is largely wrong. After the 2006 election, Scan Trende constructed a graph comparing the incumbent (在任者的) campaign spending advantages with their eventual margins of victory. There was barely any relationship between more spending and a bigger victory. Likewise, many teachers have an intuitive sense that different students have different learning styles: some are verbal and some are visual; some are linear, some are holistic(整体的). Teachers imagine they will improve outcomes if they tailor their presentations to each student. But there's no evidence to support this either. Second, data can illuminate patterns of behavior we haven't yet noticed. For example, I've always assumed people who frequently use words like "I," "me," and "mine" are probably more self-centered than people who don't. But as James Pennebaker of the University of Texas notes in his book, The Secret Life of Pronouns, when people are feeling confident, they are focused on the task at hand, not on themselves. High-status, confident people use fewer "I" words, not more. Our brains often don't notice subtle verbal patterns, but Pennebaker's computers can. Younger writers use more negative and past-tense words than older writers who use more positive and future-tense words. In sum, the data revolution is giving us wonderful ways to understand the present and the past. Will it transform our ability to predict and make decisions about the future? We'll see.

Birds that are literally half-asleep—with one brain hemisphere alert and the other sleeping—control which side of the brain remains awake, according to a new study of sleeping ducks. Earlier studies have documented half-brain sleep in a wide range of birds. The brain hemispheres take turns sinking into the sleep stage characterized by slow brain waves. The eye controlled by the sleeping hemisphere keeps shut, while the wakeful hemisphere's eye stays open and alert. Birds also can sleep with both hemispheres resting at once. Decades of studies of bird flocks led researchers to predict extra alertness in the more vulnerable, end-of-the-row sleepers. Sure enough, the end birds tended to watch carefully on the side away from their companions. Ducks in the inner spots showed no preference for gaze direction. Also, birds doping(打盹)at the end of the line resorted to single-hemisphere sleep, rather than total relaxation, more often than inner ducks did. Rotating 16 birds through the positions in a four-duck row, the researchers found outer birds half-asleep during some 32 percent of dozing time versus about 12 percent for birds in internal spots. "We believe this is the first evidence for an animal behaviorally controlling sleep and wakefulness simultaneously in different regions of the brain," the researchers say. The results provide the best evidence for a long-standing supposition that single-hemisphere sleep evolved as creatures scanned for enemies. The preference for opening an eye on the lookout side could be widespread, he predicts. He's seen it in a pair of birds dozing side-by-side in the zoo and in a single pet bird sleeping by a mirror. The mirror-side eye closed as if the reflection were a companion and the other eye stayed open. Useful as half-sleeping might be, it's only been found in birds and such water mammals(哺乳动物)as dolphins, whales, and seals. Perhaps keeping one side of the brain awake allows a sleeping animal to surface occasionally to avoid drowning. Studies of birds may offer unique insights into sleep. Jerome M. Siegel of the UCLA says he wonders if birds' half-brain sleep "is just the tip of the iceberg(冰山)." He speculates that more examples may turn up when we take a closer look at other species.

中华人民共和国成立以来，为提高国民素质，政府致力于普及九年义务教育。

BPart III Reading Comprehension/B

长江 (the Yangtze River)是世界第三长河，中国第一长河，全长6380公里。它发源于青海省，一路无数河流汇入，向东注入 东海 (the East China Sea)。作为中国古文化的发祥地，长江在历史、文化和经济上都对中国的发展有着极其重要的作用。长江是中国重要的运输线，被称为 “黄金水道” (the Golden Waterway)，它将内陆和沿海的港口以及其他主要城市连接在一起。长江沿岸的自然风景非常秀丽，有众多的旅游景观。辽阔的 长江流域 (the Yangtze Basin)，拥有丰富的自然资源，自古以来就是中国最重要的农业生产基地。

[此试题无题干]

George Herbert Mead said that humans are talked into humanity. He meant we gain personal identity as we communicate with others. In the earliest years of our lives, our parents tell us who we are. "You are 【B1】______." "You are so strong." We first see ourselves through the eyes of others, so their messages form important 【B2】______ of our self-concepts. Later we interact with teachers, friends, 【B3】______ partners, and co-workers who communicate their views of us. Thus, how we see ourselves 【B4】______ the views of us that others communicate.The 【B5】______ connection between identity and communication is 【B6】______ evident in children who are 【B7】______ of human contact. Case studies of children who are isolated from others reveal that they lack a firm self-concept, and their mental and psychological development is severely 【B8】______ by lack of language. Communication with others not only affects our sense of identity but also directly influences our physical and emotional well-being. Consistently, 【B9】____________. People who lack close friends have greater levels of anxiety and depression than people who are close to others. 【B10】____________. The conclusion was that social isolation is statistically as dangerous as high-blood pressure, smoking, and obesity. Many doctors and researchers believe that 【B11】____________.

丝绸之路 (the Silk Road)是中国古代最著名的贸易路线。在这条路上运输的商品中，丝绸占很大部分，因此得名“丝绸之路”。丝绸之路起点始于长安，终点远达印度、罗马等国家。丝绸之路从汉代开始形成，到唐代达到鼎盛，骆驼曾是丝绸之路上的主要交通工具。中国的造纸、印刷等伟大发明通过这条路传播到了西方，而 佛教 (Buddhism)等宗教也被引入中国。丝绸之路不仅仅是古代国际贸易路线，更是连接亚洲、非洲、欧洲的文化桥梁。

[此试题无题干]

[此试题无题干]

中国茶文化已渗透到中国文化的各个方面，包括诗词、绘画、宗教、医学等领域。

Mathematical ability and musical ability may not seem on the surface to be connected, but people who have researched the subject and studied the brain say that they are. Three quarters of the bright but speech-delayed children in the group I studied had a close relative who was an engineer, mathematician or scientist, and four fifths had a close relative who played a musical instrument. The children themselves usually took readily to math and other analytical subjects and to music. Black, white and Asian children in this group show the same patterns. However, it is clear that blacks have been greatly overrepresented in the development of American popular music and greatly underrepresented in such fields as mathematics, science and engineering. If the abilities required in analytical fields and in music are so closely related, how can there be this great discrepancy ? One reason is that the development of mathematical and other such abilities requires years of formal schooling, while certain musical talents can be developed with little or no formal training, as has happened with a number of well-known black musicians. It is precisely in those kinds of music where one can acquire great skill without formal training that blacks have excelled popular music rather than classical music, piano rather than violin, blues rather than opera. This is readily understandable, given that most blacks, for most of American histo ry, have not had either the money or the leisure for long years of formal study in music. Blacks have not merely held their own in American popular music. They have played a disproportionately large role in the development of jazz, both traditional and modern A long string of names comes to mind—Duke Ellington, Scott Joplin, W.C. Handy, Louis Armstrong, Charlie Parker... and so on None of this indicates any special innate ability of blacks in music. On the contrary, it is per fectly consistent with blacks having no more such inborn ability than anyone else, but being limited to being able to express such ability in narrower channels than others who have had the money, the time and the formal education to spread out over a wider range of music, as well as into mathematics, science and engineering.

For this part, you are allowed 30 minutes to write an essay on people living in the countryside are happier than living in the city. Your essay should focus on the reasons for this phenomenon. You are required to write at least 150 words but no more than 200 words.

BSection B/B

Directions: For this part, you are allowed 30 minutes to write an essay entitled On the Importance of Being Grateful by commenting on the saying, "An attitude of gratitude brings great things". You should write at least 150 words but no more than 200 words.

Too many vulnerable child-free adults are being ruthlessly(无情的)manipulated into parent-hood by their parents, who think that happiness among older people depends on having a grandchild to spoil. We need an organization to help beat down the persistent campaigns of grandchildless parents. It's time to establish Planned Grandparenthood, which would have many global and local benefits. Part of its mission would be to promote the risks and realities associated with being a grandparent. The staff would include depressed grandparents who would explain how grandkids break lamps, bite, scream and kick. Others would detail how an hour of baby-sitting often turns into a crying marathon. More grandparents would testify that they had to pay for their grandchild's expensive college education. Planned grandparenthood's carefully written literature would detail all the joys of life grandchild-free: a calm living room, extra money for luxuries during the golden years, etc. Potential grandparents would be reminded that, without grandchildren around, it's possible to have a conversation with your kids, who—incidentally—would have more time for their own parents. Meanwhile, most children are vulnerable to the enormous influence exerted by grandchildless parents aiming to persuade their kids to produce children. They will take a call from a persistent parent, even if they're loaded with work. In addition, some parents make handsome money offers payable upon the grandchild's birth. Sometimes these gifts not only cover expenses associated with the infant's birth, but extras, too, like a vacation. In any case, cash gifts can weaken the resolve of even the noblest person. At Planned Grandparenthood, children targeted by their parents to reproduce could obtain non-biased information about the insanity of having their own kids. The catastrophic psychological and economic costs of childbearing would be emphasized. The symptoms of morning sickness would be listed and horrors of childbirth pictured. A monthly newsletter would contain stories about overwhelmed parents and offer guidance on how childless adults can respond to the different lobbying tactics that would-be grandparents employ. When I think about all the problems of our overpopulated world and look at our boy grabbing at the lamp by the sofa, I wish I could have turned to Planned Grandparenthood when my parents were putting the grandchild squeeze on me. If I could have, I might not be in this parenthood predicament(窘境). But here's the crazy irony. I don't want my child-free life back. Dylan's too much fun.