Using a public telephone may well be one of the minor irritations of life, demanding patience, determination and a strong possibility of failure together on occasion with considerable unpopularity. The hopeful【C1】______(shall we call him George?) waits till six o' clock in the evening to take【C2】______of the so-called "cheap rates" for a long distance call. The telephone box, with two broken panes of glass in the side, stands at the【C3】______of two main roads with buses, lorries and cars roaring past. It is pouring with rain as George【C4】______a queue of four depressed-looking people. Time passes slowly and seems to come to a standstill【C5】______the person immediately before George【C6】______on an endless conversation, pausing only to insert another coin every minute or so. Eventually the receiver is replaced and the caller leaves the【C7】______. George enters and picks up one of the directories inside, only to discover that someone unknown has torn out the 【C8】______page he needs. Nothing for it but to dial Directory Enquiries. He waits patiently for a reply (while someone outside【C9】______repeatedly on the door) and finally notes down the number given. At last George can go【C10】______with his call. Just as he is starting to dial, however, the door opens and an unpleasant-looking face peers in with the demand "can't you hurry up?". 【C11】______such barbarity, George continues to dial and his unwanted companion withdraws. At last he hears the burr-burr of the ringing【C12】______, immediately followed by rapid pips demanding his money, but he is now so upset that he knocks down the coins he has placed ready on the top of the box. Having at last located them, he dials again the pips are repeated and he hastily inserts the coins. A cold voice【C13】______him, "Grand Hotel, Chalfont Well. " "I've an urgent message for a Mr. Smith who is a guest in your hotel. Could you put me through to him? I' m afraid I don' t know his room number. " The response appears less than enthusiastic and a long silence【C14】______. George inserts more coins. Then the voice informs him, "I' ve been trying to locate Mr. Smith but the hall porter reports having seen him leave about a minute ago. " Breathing heavily, George【C15】______the receiver, just as the knocking on the door starts again.

What crops does the farmer grow? What crops does the farmer grow?

What is the man' s chief responsibility in the Green Peace organization? What is the man' s chief responsibility in the Green Peace organization?

According to the speaker, what should the listeners do as soon as possible? According to the speaker, what should the listeners do as soon as possible?

Slavery has played a significant role in the history of the U. S. It existed in all the English mainland colonies and most of the Founding Fathers also had slaves, as did eight of the first 12 presidents. Dutch traders brought 20 Africans to Jamestown, Virginia, as early as 1619, however, throughout the 17th century the number of Africans in the English mainland colonies grew very slowly. At that time, colonists used two other sources of unfree labor: Native American slaves and European indentured servants. During those years, every colony had some Native American slaves, but their number was limited. Indian men avoided performing agricultural labor, because they viewed it as women' s work, and colonists complained that they were too " haughty". The more important was that the settlers found it more convenient to sell Native Americans captured in war to planters in the Caribbean than to turn them into slaves, because they often resisted and it was not hard for the slaves to escape. Later, the policy of killing Indians or driving them away from white settlements was proposed and it contradicted with their widespread employment as slaves. The other form of labor was the white indentured servitude. Most indentured servants consisted of poor Europeans. Desiring to escape tough conditions in Europe and take advantage of fabled opportunities in America, they traded three to seven years of their labor in exchange for the transatlantic passage. At first, it was mainly English who were the white indentured servitude but later increasingly Irish, Welsh, and German joined. They were essentially temporary slaves and most of them served as agricultural workers although some, especially in the North, were taught skilled trades. During the 17th century, they performed most of heavy labor in the Southern colonies and also consisted of the bulk of immigrants to those colonies. At the end of the 17 th century, in order to meet the labor need, landowners in America turned to African slaves. During the late 17th and 18th centuries, thanks to the dominant position of England in terms of naval superiority, English traders(some of whom lived in English America)transported millions of Africans across the Atlantic. And the transatlantic slave trade produced one of the largest forced migrations in history, blacks(the great majority of whom were slaves)increasing from about 7 percent of the American population in 1680 to more than 40 percent by the middle of the 18th century.

Education is primarily the responsibility of the states. State constitutions set up certain standards and rules for the establishment of school. State laws require children to go to school until they reach a certain age. The actual control of the schools, however, is usually a local matter. The control of the schools does not usually come directly from the local government. In each of the three types of city government, public schools are generally quite separate and independent. They cooperate with local officials but are not dominated by the municipal government. Most A-mericans believe that schools should be free of political pressures. They believe that the separate control of the school systems preserves such freedom. Public schools are usually maintained by school districts. The state often sets the district boundaries. Sometimes the school district has the same boundaries as the city. Sometimes it is larger than the city. In the South, county boards of education members are elected. In some places they are appointed by the mayor or city council. The state legislature decides which method should be used. Most district boards of education try to give all pupils a chance to get a good education. A good education prepares a person to live a better life. It helps him to become a better citizen. Nearly all states give financial aid to local school districts. State departments of education offer other kinds of aid. States offer help with such things as program planning and the school districts. The federal government also helps. The National Defense Education Act allows school districts to get financial aid for certain purposes. The Elementary and Secondary Education Act of 1965 added many other kinds of financial help. But neither the state nor the federal government dictates school policy. This is determined by local school boards.

A finding in recent years shows that men cannot manufacture blood as efficiently as women can. This makes surgery riskier for men. Because they do not breathe as often as women, men also need more oxygen. But men breathe more deeply and this exposes them to another risk. They draw more of the air when it is polluted. Men's bones are larger than women's and they are arranged somewhat differently. The feminine walk that evokes so many whistles is a matter of bone structure. A man has broader shoulders and a narrower pelvis, which makes him stride out with no waste motion. A woman's wider pelvis , designed for childbearing, forces her to put more movement into each step she takes with the result that she displays a bit of jiggle and sway as she walks. If you think a man is brave because he can climb a ladder to clean out the roof gutters, don't forget it is easier for him than for a woman. The angle at which a woman's thigh is joined to her knees makes climbing difficult for her, no matter whether it is a ladder or stairs or a mountain that she is tackling. A man's skin is thicker than a woman's and not nearly as soft. This prevents the sun's radiation from getting through, which is why men wrinkle less than women do. Women have a thin layer of fat just under the skin and there is a plus to this greater fat reserve. It acts as an invisible fur coat to keep a woman warmer in the winter. Women also stay cooler in summer. Because the fat layer helps insulate them against heat. Men's fat is distributed differently. And they do not have that layer of it underneath their skin. In fact, they have considerably less fat than women and more lean mass. 41 percent of a man's body is muscle compared to thirty-five percent for women, which means that men have more muscle power. When we mention strength, almost 90 percent of a man's weight is strength compared to about 50 percent of a woman's weight. The higher proportion of muscle to fat makes it easier for men to lose weight. Muscle burns up five more calories a pound than fat does just to maintain itself. So when a man wants to lose weight, the pounds roll off much faster. For all men's muscularity they do not have the energy reserves women do. They have more start-up energy, but the fat tucked away in women's nooks and crannies provides a rich energy reserve that men lack. Cardiologists at the University of Alabama who tested healthy women on treadmills discovered that over the years the female capacity for exercise far exceeds the male capacity. A woman of sixty who is in good health can exercise up to 90 percent of what she could do when she was twenty. A man of sixty has only 60 percent left of his capacity as a twenty-year-old.

That low moaning sound in the background just might be the founding fathers protesting from beyond the grave. They have been doing it ever since the republicans announced a "religious war" in the name of "traditional values". It grew several decibels louder last week when george bush, at a breakfast of religious leaders, attacked the democrats for failing to mention god in their doctrines and declaimed that a president needs to believe in the almighty. What about the constitutional ban on "religious tests" for public office? The founding fathers would want to know. 【T1】What about Tom Jefferson's conviction that it is possible for a nonbeliever to be a moral person, "find incitements to virtue in the comfort and pleasantness you feel in its exercise" ? Even George Washington must shudder in his sleep to hear the constant emphasis on "judeo-christian values". 【T2】It was he who wrote, "We have abundant reasons to rejoice that in this land... every person may here worship god according to the dictates of his own heart." George Bush should know better than to encourage the theocratic ambitions of the christian right. 【T3】He has claimed—to much ironic scorn—that when he was shot down during World War II and lay floating in the pacific for four hours, he meditated on " god and faith and the separation of church and state". But there could be no better themes for a patriot to address in his final moments. 【T4】The "wall of separation" the founding fathers built between church and state is one of the best defenses freedom has ever had. Or have we already forgotten why the founding fathers put it up? They had seen enough religious intolerance in the colonies: quaker women were burned at the stake in puritan massachusetts; Virginians could be jailed for denying the bible's authority. They knew Europe had terribly disfigured itself in a religious war recalled now only by its duration—30 years. 【T5】No wonder John Adams once described the Judeo-Christian tradition as "the most bloody religion that ever existed, " and that the founding fathers took such pains to keep the hand that holds the musket separate from the one that carries the cross.

Police in the popular resort city Virginia Beach recently began operating video surveillance cameras with controversial face recognition technology. Virginia Beach and Tampa in Florida two cities in the United States acquired the technology, which cost them $197,000. "Before we switched it on, we went through an extensive public education process with hearings and the involvement of citizen groups and minority groups, who helped write the policies we are using, " said deputy police chief Greg Mullen. A citizens' auditing committee has the right to perform unannounced spot checks on police headquarters to make sure the technology is not being misused. Three of the city's 13 cameras are linked full time to the face recognition system, though the others can be activited as needed. The database of wanted people is updated every day. So far, the system has failed to produce a single arrest, though it has generated a few false alarms. It works by analyzing faces based on a series of measurements, such as the distance from the tip of the nose to the chin or the space between the eyes. Critics say it is highly inaccurate and can be easily fooled. Mullen, who sees the system eventually being linked to the databases of other city, state and federal law enforcement agencies to track criminals and suspected terrorists, said, "The system doesn't look at skin color or your hair or your gender. It takes human prejudices out of the equation. " "This technology has little or no effect on the crime rate but it does have an effect on people's behavior. People feel cowed, " said Bruce Steinhardt, who directs the technology. Despite the fact that tests have shown faces recognition only works in around 30% cases, the ACLU is alarmed that the technology may soon spread to airports. The organization also fears it could potentially be used to monitor individual's political activities to harass law-abiding citizens. "This kind of surveillance should be subject to the same procedures as wiretaps. Law enforcement agencies should justify why they need it and it should be tightly limited, otherwise it will soon become a tool of social control, " said Mihir Kshisagar of the Electronic Information Privacy Center. Nor does such criticism come exclusively from the political left. Lawyer John Whitehead, founder of the conservative Rutherford Institute, wrote in an editorial that the technology threatened the right of each U. S. citizen to participate in society. "After all, that is exactly what constant surveillance is—the ultimate implied threat of coercion, " he wrote.

When was Twain bom? When was Twain bom?

Karen Rusa was a 30-year-old woman and the mother of four children. For the past several months Karen had been experiencing repetitive thoughts that centered around her children' s safety. She frequently found herself imagining that a serious accident had occurred; she was unable to put these thoughts out of her mind. On one such occasion she imagined that her son, Alan, had broken his leg playing football at school. There was no reason to believe that an accident had occurred, but she kept thinking about the possibility until she finally called the school to see if Alan was all right. Even after receiving their assurance that he had not been hurt, she described herself as being somewhat surprised when he later arrived home unharmed. Karen also noted that her daily routine was seriously hampered by an extensive series of counting work that she performed throughout each day. Specific numbers had come to have a special meaning to her; she found that her preoccupation with these numbers was hampering her ability to perform everyday activities. One example was grocery shopping. Karen believed that if she selected the first item on the shelf, something terrible would happen to her oldest child. If she selected the second item, some unknown disaster would fall on her second child, and so on for the four children. Karen' s preoccupation with numbers extended to other activities, most notable the pattern in which she smoked cigarettes and drank coffee. If she had one cigarette; she believed that she had to smoke at least four in a row, or one of her children would be harmed in some way. If she drank one cup of coffee, she felt compelled to drink four. Karen acknowledged the unreasonableness of these rules, but, nevertheless, maintained that she felt more comfortable. When she observed them earnestly, when she was occasionally in too great a hurry to observe these rules, she experienced considerable anxiety, in the form of a subjective feeling of dread and fear. She described herself as tense, uneasy, and unable to relax during these periods. The occurrence of rarely minor accidents does not reduce her belief that she had been directly responsible because of her inability to observe the rules about number.

On the north bank of the Ohio River sits Evansville, Ind. , home of David Williams, 52, and of a riverboat casino (a place where gambling games are played). During several years of gambling in that casino, Williams, a state auditor earning $35,000 a year, lost approximately $ 175,000. He had never gambled before the casino sent him a coupon for $ 20 worth of gambling. He visited the casino, lost the $20 and left. On his second visit he lost $800. The casino issued to him, as a good customer, a "Fun Card", which when used in the casino earns points for meals and drinks, and enables the casino to track the user' s gambling activities. For Williams, those activities become what he calls "electronic heroin. " 【R1】 1. In 1997 he lost $21,000 to one slot machine in two days. In March 1997 he lost $ 72,186. He sometimes played two slot machines at a time, all night, until the boat docked at 5 a. m. , then went back aboard when the casino opened at 9 a. m. Now he is suing the casino, charging that it should have refused his patronage because it knew he was addicted. It did know he had a problem. In March 1998, a friend of Williams' s got him involuntarily confined to a treatment center for addictions, and wrote to inform the casino of Williams' s gambling problem. The casino included a photo of Williams among those of banned gamblers, and wrote to him a "cease admissions" letter. Noting the "medical/psychological" nature of problem gambling behavior, the letter said that before being readmitted to the casino he would have to present medical/psychological information demonstrating that patronizing the casino would pose no threat to his safety or well-being. 【R2】 2. The Wall Street Journal reports that the casino has 24 signs warning: "Enjoy the fun...and always bet with your head, not over it". Every entrance ticket lists a toll-free number for counseling from the Indiana Department of Mental Health. Nevertheless, Williams' s suit charges that the casino, knowing he was "helplessly addicted to gambling", intentionally worked to "lure" him to "engage in conduct against his will. " Well. 【R3】 3. The fourth edition of the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders says " pathological gambling" involves persistent, recurring and uncontrollable pursuit less of money than of the thrill of taking risks in quest of a windfall. 【R4】 4. Pushed by science, or what claims to be science, society is reclassifying what once were considered character flaws or moral failings as personality disorders akin to physical disabilities. 【R5】 5. Forty-four states have lotteries, 29 have casinos, and most of these states are to varying degrees dependent on—you might say addicted to—revenues from wagering. And since the first Internet gambling site was created in 1995, competition for gamblers' dollars has become intense. The Oct. 28 issue of Newsweek reported that 2 million gamblers patronize 1,800 virtual casinos every week. With $3. 5 billion being lost on Internet wagers this year, gambling has passed pornography as the Web' s most profitable business. [A] Although no such evidence was presented, the casino' s marketing department continued to pepper him with mailings And he entered the casino and used his Fun Card without being detected. [B] It is unclear what luring was required, given his compulsive behavior. And in what sense was his will operative? [C] By the time he had lost $ 5,000 he said to himself that if he could get back to even, he would quit. One night he won $ 5,500, but he did not quit. [D] Gambling has been a common feature of American life forever, but for a long time it was broadly considered a sin, or a social disease. Now it is a social policy: the most important and aggressive promoter of gambling in America is the government. [E] David Williams' s suit should trouble this gambling nation. But don't bet on it. [F] It is worrisome that society is medicalizing more and more behavioral problems, often defining as addictions what earlier, sterner generations explained as weakness of will. [G] The anonymous, lonely, undistracted nature of online gambling is especially conductive to compulsive behavior. But even if the government knew how to move against Internet gambling, what would be its grounds for doing so? 【R1】

What must you make sure when you load the cassette? What must you make sure when you load the cassette?

Read the following text(s) and write an essay to 1) summarize the main points of the text(s), 2) make clear your own viewpoints, and 3) justify your stand. In your essay, make full use of the information provided in the text(s). If you use more than three consecutive words from the text (s) , use quotation marks (" "). You should write 160 -200 words on the ANSWER SHEET. Since the dawn of human ingenuity, people have devised ever more cunning tools to cope with work that is dangerous, boring, burdensome, or just plain nasty. That compulsion has resulted in robotics—the science of conferring various human capabilities on machines. As a result, the modern world is increasingly populated by intelligent gizmos whose presence we barely notice but whose universal existence has removed much human labor. But if robots are to reach the next stage of laborsaving utility, they will have to operate with less human supervision and be able to make at least a few decisions for themselves—goals that pose a real challenge. "While we know how to tell a robot to handle a specific error," says Dave La-very, manager of a robotics program at NASA, "we can't yet give a robot enough 'common sense' to reliably interact with a dynamic world. " What researchers found, in attempting to model thought, is that the human brains roughly one hundred billion nerve cells are much more talented—and human perception far more complicated— than previously imagined. They have built robots that can recognize the error of a machine panel by a fraction of a millimeter in a controlled factory environment. But the human mind can glimpse a rapidly changing scene and immediately disregard the 98 percent that is irrelevant, instantaneously focusing on the monkey at the side of a winding forest road or the single suspicious face in a big crowd. The most advanced computer systems on Earth can't approach that kind of ability, and neuroscientists still don' t know quite how we do it.

The patient, according to the analyst' s report, is The patient, according to the analyst' s report, is

阅读理解Many publications made private inquiries before presidential election, generally by means of questionnaires sent to subscribers and by telephone surveys. The principle common to all these inquiries was that they depended on quantity rather than quality; little effort was made to reach representatives of all segments of the population. Still, the erroneous belief persisted that the greater the number of questionnaires, the more accurate the results would be. The record was held by the American monthly Literary Digest, which sent out millions of postcards with short and pointed questions before each election, and received many hundreds of thousands of replies. In fact, in 1932, the Literary Digest''s forecast was off by only 1%. In view of such striking achievements, it seemed rather improper for the young American journalist, George Gallup, to claim that large numbers were irrelevant, and that equally accurate or better predictions could be made with a small but carefully selected sample of the population and a small team of skilled interviewers. In 1936, Gallup convinced thirty-five newspaper editors that his system was much cheaper than the customary mass inquiries and that it could provide surprisingly accurate predictions. The editors finally agreed. On condition that if Gallup''s predictions were less accurate than those obtained by the tried method of the Literary Digest, he would have to refund the entire cost of the investigation. Although the Literary Digest broke its own record by obtaining two million replies to its electoral postcards that year, its prediction was wrong by 19% , whereas Gallup''s was off by less than 1 % . Suddenly Gallup''s name was on everyone''s lips. Not only was he the prophet of the moment, but it was generally conceded that he had founded a new and most important scientific method of prediction. He was showered with money and commissions, and the Gallup Poll becomes a common term for public opinion polls. Gallup usually samples his subjects according to six factors: state, size of community, age, sex, income, and political affiliation. From time to time, other factors may be considered, during time of war, for instance, the national origins of electors may be taken into account. Only when the composition of the electorate has been accurately determined can the purely arithmetical question — how many people in each bracket must be interviewed — be solved. Once this is done, laws of probability take over, and the more people interviewed, the more exact the estimates will be. However, above a certain maximum number of interviews, the accuracy increases by no more than a fractional percentage — and where errors of up to 2% are permissible, a few thousand questionnaires will accurately reflect the opinions of the total United States electorate. Gallup''s method of sampling the electorate was successful. Before Gallup, political predictions were no more than shots in the dark, and it is as a result of his achievement that today we can make truly scientific forecasts in this difficult field.

阅读理解A smart man once said that the only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is for good men to do nothing. So, as a policeman , I have some urgent things to say to good people. Days after days my men and I struggle to stop a tidal wave of crime. Something has gone terribly wrong with our once-proud American way of life. It has happened in the area of values. A principle ingredient is disappearing, and I think I know what it is: accountability. Accountability isn''t hard to define. It means that every person is responsible for his or her actions and liable for their consequences. Of the many values that hold civilization together ― honesty, kindness, and so on ― accountability may be the most important of all. Without it, there can be no respect, no trust, no law ― and, ultimately, no society. My job as a policeman is to impose accountability on people who refuse, or have never learned, to impose it on themselves. But as every policeman knows, external controls on people'' s behavior are far less effective than internal restraints such as guilt, shame and embarrassment. Lucky there are still communities ― smaller towns, usually ― where schools keep discipline and where parents hold up standards that proclaim: "In this family certain things are not tolerated ― they simply are not done!" Yet more and more, especially in our larger cities and suburbs, these inner restraints are loosening. Your typical robber has none. He considers your property his property; he takes what he wants, including your life if you make him very angry. The main cause of this breakdown is a radical shift in attitudes. Thirty years ago, if a crime was committed, society was considered the victim. Now, in a shocking reversal, it''s the criminal who is considered victimized: by his underprivileged upbringing, by the school that didn''t teach him to read, by the church that failed to teach him with moral guidance, by the parents who didn''t provide a stable home. I don''t believe it. Many others in equally disadvantaged circumstances choose not to engage in criminal activities. If we free the criminal, even partly, from accountability, we become a society of endless excuses where no one accepts responsibility for anything. We desperately need more people who believe that the person who commits a crime is the one responsible for it.

阅读理解What difference does it make if we read texts displayed on a computer screen instead of on paper printed with ink? The computer certainly does not secure deeper comprehension, greater subtlety of mind, or a wider range of imaginative reference. The mediation of a computer, however, put new powers at the disposal of intelligence. On the one hand, the computer itself can do simple reading ― as I have noted, it can "read'' an immense body of literature in search of designated words. As anyone knows who has ever spent days in libraries in search of errant information, simply identifying relevant sources absorbs inordinate amounts of time in research. The objection may be raised that a search of texts by computer may block the discoveries that occur while browsing in the stacks of great libraries. No member of the academy need fear that the use of a computer will keep him from the stacks, but browsing is , if anything, easier if texts can be called up on a screen in the serenity of one''s chosen surroundings. The great deficiency of libraries, as we know them, is that while titles are catalogued, the libraries have no master indexes of the contents of books. Individual volumes, it is true, have indexes, often of inferior quality, but even the best indexes must be examined one at a time. The great advantage of the electronic library is that a computer could search and analyze its contents without proceeding volume by volume. As work in artificial intelligence develops, computer systems may also become adept at more complex tasks, such as summarizing texts, which has been finished experimentally.