单选题Most people would be impressed by the high quality of medicine available to most Americans. There is a lot of specialization , a great deal of attention to the individual, a vast amount of advanced technical equipment, and intense effort not to make mistakes because of the financial risk which doctors and hospitals must face in the courts if they handle things badly. But the Americans are in a mess . The problem is the way in which health care is organized and financed. Contrary to public belief, it is not just a free competition system. To the private system has been joined a large public system, because private care was simply not looking after the less fortunate and the elderly. But even with this huge public part of the system, which this year will eat up 84.5 billion dollars—more than 10 percent of the U.S. budget—large numbers of Americans are left out . These include about half the 11 million unemployed and those who fail to meet the strict limits on income fixed by a government trying to make savings where it can. The basic problem, however, is that there is no central control over the health system. There is no limit to what doctors and hospitals charge for their services, other than what the public is able to pay. The number of doctors has shot up and prices have climbed. When faced with toothache, a sick child, or a heart attack, all the unfortunate person concerned can do is pay up. Two-thirds of the population are covered by medical insurance. Doctors charge as much as they want knowing that the insurance company will pay the bill. The medical profession has as a result become America"s new big businessmen. The average income of doctors has now reached $100,000 a year. With such vast incomes the talk in the doctor"s surgery is as likely to be about the doctor"s latest financial deal, as about whether the minor operation he is recommending at, several thousand dollars is entirely necessary. The rising cost of medicine in the U. S. A. is among the most worrying problem facing the country. In 1981 the country"s health cost climbed 15.9 percent—about twice as fast as prices in general.

单选题The role of government in environmental management is difficult but inescapable. Sometimes, the state tries to manage the resources it owns, and does so badly. Often, 41 governments act in an even more harmful way. They actually subside the exploitation and 42 of natural resources. A whole 43 of policies, from farm-price support to protection for coal-mining, do environmental damage and (often) 44 no economic sense. Scrapping them offers a two-fold 45 : a cleaner environment and more efficient economy. Growth and environmentalism can actually go hand in hand, if politicians have the courage to 46 the vested interest that subsidies create. No activity affects more of the earth"s surface than farming. It shapes a third of the planet"s land area, not 47 Antarctica, and the proportion is rising. World food output per head has risen by 4 per cent between the 1970s and 1980s mainly as a result of increases in 48 from land already in 49 , but also beeause more land has been brought under the plough. Higher yields have been achieved by increased irrigation, better crop breeding, and a 50 in the use of pesticides and chemical fertilizers in the 1970s and 1980s. All these activities may have 51 environmental impact. For example, land clearing for agricultures is the largest single 52 of deforestation; chemical fertilizers and pesticides may 53 water suppliers: more intensive farming and the abandonment of fallow periods 54 exacerbate soil erosion; and the spread of monoculture and the use of high-yielding varieties of crops have been accompanied by the 55 of old varieties of food plants which 56 some insurance against pests or diseases in future. Soil erosion threatens the productivity of land in both rich and poor countries. The United States, 57 the most careful measurements have been done, discovered in 1982 that about one-fifth of its farmland was losing topsoil at a rate 58 to diminish the soil"s productivity. The country subsequently 59 a program to convert 11 per cent of its cropped land to meadow or forest. Topsoil in India and China is 60 much faster than in America.

单选题A total of 4.6 million digital televisions have been sold, and the sales of HDTV sets have quadrupled since last year. Consumers have bought HDTVs to play their DVDs and to have clearer pictures and wide screens. Only a small percentage of the people who have purchased HDTVs, however, have actually hooked their TVs up to receive high-definition television digital signals. Perhaps television viewers are having trouble keeping up with the changes in technology. Even the manufacturers of HDTVs, like Mitsubishi, Thomson Multimedia, Sony, and Samsung seem to have a tough time learning how to make their sets work with the various digital TV formats because little standardization has been required or implemented in the industry. Some of the HDTVs weigh over 200 lbs., and a variety of retailers offer a delivery service to the buyer's home to help install the heavy sets. This is known as a white-glove service and usually comes with an extra fee. After HDTV purchasers get their sets home and hook them up, they will still need to work to get the digital signals to their systems. Most of the industry's cable providers do not yet offer high~definition programing, and only about 15% of commercial television stations have switched over to even the lowest improved digital pictures. Worse yet, viewers may need to install antenna before they can even get the digital signals to their new HDTV sets. Another frustration for home-theater seekers is that the current HDTV sets allow owners only to watch high-definition programs, not to record them.

单选题Is it possible that the entire tale is but a garbled account of that voyage and Biarni another name for Leif? A. detailed B. plausible C. distorted D. eye-witness

单选题Jan Hendrik Schon"s success seemed too good to be true, and it was. In only four years as a physicist at Bell Laboratories, Schon, 32, had co-authored 90 scientific papers—one every 16 days—detailing new discoveries in superconductivity, lasers, nanotechnology and quantum physics. This output astonished his colleagues, and made them suspicious . When one co-worker noticed that the same table of data appeared in two separate papers—which also happened to appear in the two most prestigious scientific journals in the world, Science and Nature —the jig was up. In October 2002, a Bell Labs investigation found that Schon had falsified and fabricated data. His career as a scientist was finished. Scientific scandals, which are as old as science itself, tend to follow similar patterns of presumption and due reward. In recent years, of course, the pressure on scientists to publish in the top journals has increased, making the journals much more crucial to career success. The questions are whether Nature and Science have become too powerful as arbiters of what science reaches to the public, and whether the journals are up to their task as gatekeepers. Each scientific specialty has its own set of journals. Physicists have Physical Review Letters, neuroscientists have Neuron, and so forth. Science and Nature, though, are the only two major journals that cover the gamut of scientific disciplines, from meteorology and zoology to quantum physics and chemistry. As a result, journalists look to them each week for the cream of the crop of new science papers. And scientists look to the journals in part to reach journalists. Why do they care? Competition for grants has gotten so fierce that scientists have sought popular renown to gain an edge over their rivals. Publication in specialized journals will win the acclaims from academics and satisfy the publish-or-perish imperative, but Science and Nature come with the added bonus of potentially getting your paper written up in The New York Times and other publications. Scientists tend to pay more attention to the big two than to other journals. When more scientists know about a particular paper, they"re more apt to cite it in their own papers. Being oft-cited will increase a scientist"s "hnpact Factor," a measure of how often papers are cited by peers. Funding agencies use the "Impact Factor" as a rough measure of the influence of scientists they"re considering supporting.

单选题The paradoxical aspect of the myths about Demeter, when we consider the predominant image of her as a tranquil and serene goddess, is her agitated search for her daughter.

单选题There must have been someone who has instigated a rebellion because the people are so well organized. A．incited B．tampered C．intruded D．meddled

单选题The United States Food and Drug Administration has shown itself to be particularly wary with regard to alleged "miracle" drugs in recent times.

单选题Japan remains tied to the Western camp partly because the relationship has become ______ to her economy and politics over forty years' association. A. integral B. unilateral C. rational D. hierarchical

单选题Under proper conditions, sound waves will be {{U}}reflected{{/U}} from the hillside or other such obstruction.

单选题Giving me a place to stand on, the living conditions of the farmers will be greatly improved. A. I will greatly impove the living conditions of the farmers. B. the living conditions of the farmers should be greatly improved. C. the farmers' living conditions will be greatly improved. D. I can certainly improve the farmners' living conditions.

单选题We wish to express our satisfaction at this to the Special Committee, their activities deserve encouraged. A. whose activities will deserve to be encouraged. B. their activities deserve to be encouraged. C. whose activities should deserve being encouraged. D. their activities deserve to be encouraging.

单选题Human beings are superior to animals that they can use language as a tool of communication.

单选题A promising note is a written agreement to pay a certain sum of money at some time future .

单选题Aiming to retrieve the Mars rover Opportunity, engineers are imitating Mars surface conditions in a testing laboratory.

单选题Most people would agree that, although our age far surpasses all previous ages in knowledge, there has been no correlative increase in wisdom. A. improves B. precedes C. exceeds D. imposes

单选题Although Asian countries are generally ______ in social customs than Western countries, there have been several notable examples of women leaders in both China and India.

单选题Home to magnates and gangsters, refugees and artists, the city was, in its ______, a metropolis that exhibited all the hues of the human character.

单选题David is the ______ holder of the world 5,000-meter race world record, hut there is no guarantee that he will win in the Olympic Games. A. prevalent B. dominant C. current D. prominent

单选题The sun today is a yellow dwarf star. It is fueled by thermonuclear reactions near its center that convert hydrogen to helium. The sun has existed in its present state for about 4 billion, 600 million years and is thousands of times larger than the Earth. By studying other stars, astronomers can predict what the rest of the sun"s life will be like. About 5 billion years from now, the core of the sun will shrink and become hotter. The surface temperature will fail. The higher temperature of the center will increase the rate of thermonuclear reactions. The outer regions of the sun will expand approximately 35 million miles, about the distance to mercury, which is the closest planet to the sun. The sun will then be a red giant star. Temperatures on the earth will become too hot for life to exist. Once the sun has used up its thermonuclear energy as a red giant, it will begin to shrink. After it shrinks to the size of the earth, it will become a white dwarf star. The sun may throw off huge amounts of gases in violent eruptions called nova explosions as it changes from a red giant to a white dwarf. After billions of years as a white dwarf, the Sun will have used up all its fuel and will have lost its heat. Such a star is called a black dwarf. After the Sun has become a black dwarf, the earth will be dark and cold. If any atmosphere remains there , it will have frozen onto the earth"s surface.