单选题{{B}}Part A{{/B}}{{B}}Directions:{{/B}}Reading the following four texts. Answer the questions below each text by choosing A, B, C or D. Mark your answers on ANSWER SHEET 1.{{B}}Text 1{{/B}} What our society suffers from most today is the absence of consensus about what it and life in it ought to be; such consensus cannot be gained from society's present stage, or from fantasies about what it ought to be. For that the present is too close and too diversified, and the future too uncertain, to make believable claims about it. A consensus in the present hence can be achieved only through a shared understanding of the past, as Homer's epics informed those who lived centuries later What it meant to be Greek, and by what images and ideals they were to live their lives and organize their societies. Most societies derive consensus from a long history, a language all their own, a common religion, common ancestry. The myths by which they live are based on all of these. But the United States is a country of immigrants, coming from a great variety of nations. Lately, it has been emphasized that an asocial, narcissistic personality has become characteristic of Americans, and that it is this type of personality that makes for the lack of well-being, because it prevents us from achieving consensus that would counteract a tendency to withdraw into private worlds. In this study of narcissism, Christopher Lash says that modern man, "tortured by self-consciousness, turns to new therapies not to free himself of his personal worries hut to find meaning and purpose in life, to find something to live for". There is widespread distress because national morale has declined, and we have lost an earlier sense of national vision and purpose. Contrary to rigid religions or political beliefs, as are found in totalitarian societies, our culture is one of the great individual differences, at least in principle and in theory; but this leads to disunity, even chaos. Americans believe in the value of diversity, but just because ours is a society based on individual diversity, it needs consensus about some dominating ideas more than societies based on uniform origin of their citizens. Hence, if we are to have consensus, it must be based on a myth--a vision about a common experience, a conquest that made us Americans, as the myth about the conquest of Troy formed the Greeks. Only a common myth can offer relief from the fear that life is without meaning or purpose. Myths permit us to examine our place in the world by comparing it to a shared idea. Myths are shared fantasies that form the tie that binds the individual to other members of his group. Such myths help to ward off feelings of isolations, guilt, anxiety, and purposelessness--in short, they combat isolation and the breakdown of social standards and values.

单选题For Tony Blair, home is a messy sort of place, where the prime minister's job is not to uphold eternal values but to force through some unpopular changes that may make the country work a bit better. The area where this is most obvious, and where it matters most, is the public services. Mr Blair faces a difficulty here which is partly of his own making. By focusing his last election campaign on the need to improve hospitals, schools, transport and policing, he built up expectations. Mr Blair has said many times that reforms in the way the public services work need to go alongside increases in cash. Mr Blair has made his task harder by committing a classic negotiating error. Instead of extracting concessions from the other side before promising his own, he has pledged himself to higher spending on public services without getting a commitment to change from the unions. Why, given that this pledge has been made, should the health unions give ground in return? In a speech on March 20th, Gordon Brown, the chancellor of the exchequer, said that "the something-for-nothing days are over in our public services and there can be no blank cheques." But the government already seems to have given health workers a blank cheque. Nor are other ministries conveying quite the same message as the treasury. On March 19th, John Hutton, a health minister, announced that cleaners and catering staff in new privately-funded hospitals working for the National Health service will still be government employees, entitled to the same pay and conditions as other health-service workers. Since one of the main ways in which the government hopes to reform the public sector is by using private providers, and since one of the main ways in which private providers are likely to be able to save money is by cutting labor costs, this move seems to undermine the government's strategy. Now the government faces its hardest fight. The police need reforming more than any other public service. Half of them, for instance, retire early, at a cost of ￡1 billion (＄1.4% billion) a year to the taxpayer. The police have voted 10--1 against proposals from the home secretary, David Blunkett, to reform their working practices. This is a fight the government has to win. If the police get away with it, other public-service workers will reckon they can too. And, if they all get away it, Mr Blair's domestic policy--which is what voters are most likely to judge him on a the next election--will be a failure.

单选题The word" arbiters" (Line 6,Paragraph 4) most probably refers to those______.

单选题{{B}}Part A{{/B}}{{B}}Directions:{{/B}} Read the following four texts. Answer tile questions below each text by choosing A, B, C or D. Mark your answers on ANSWER SHEET 1. (40 points){{B}}Text 1{{/B}} The modern university is the ideal environment for the creation and transfer of knowledge that drives national competitiveness in an increasingly global era. Its most effective form is the American adaptation of the European model, in which teaching, leaning and research are integrated into a single institution. Indeed, the American university has proved capable of almost anything, from developing advanced economic theories to creating new life forms. Many national leaders understand that the university is the critical catalyst for America's adaptability, economic robustness and emergence as a great power. And they are moving aggressively to catch up. The universities created by emerging economies beginning in the 1990s and through 2020 will likely play a decisive role in reshaping the global balance of economic power. That is bad news for the United States. The past two decades of American university development have been characterized largely by self-satisfaction arising from steady progress by the top 20 or so research universities. And America as a nation has 1Seen coasting. Since 2000, the United States has lost its edge in the graduation of engineers and technologists. The country no longer dominates scientific discovery, innovation or exploration. Most important, the United States has not launched any effort to build new institutions to accommodate its increasingly diverse population of more than 300 million. The result is that America's university system, despite its historical pre-eminence, has ceased to grow. Furthermore, America's university system has failed to adapt to the dramatic demographic shifts occurring as a result of social mobility and immigration. America needs to realize that its universities face real competition from the rest of the world to attract the best and the brightest, to secure resources and to provide environments that educate and inspire. This is not to say that the best American universities are no longer the leaders in discovery and innovation. It is to say that the success of the higher-education system must be measured by more than just innovations. Its long-term performance depends on its ability to provide learning to a broad cross sections of citizens, to advance national proficiency in math and science and to create an adaptable work force, as well as to develop a national appreciation for discovery, entrepreneurship and the creative process. In China and elsewhere, these are the goals of the new universities being built. In the United States, we need to move from a national self-confidence based on past success to one built on the knowledge that we are advancing a system of higher education that will meet our future needs. This will require that policymakers, business leaders and universities rededicate themselves to creating comprehensive learning and discovery environments; design entirely new models and methods for teaching, and then take action to implement them.

单选题A study released a little over a week ago, which found that eldest children end up, on average, with slightly higher IQ's than younger siblings, was a reminder that the fight for serlfdefinition starts much earlier than freshman year. Families, whatever the relative intelligence of their members, often treat the firstborn as if he or she were the most academic, and the younger siblings fill in other niches: the wild one, the flirt. These imposed caricatures, in combination with the other labels that accumulate from the sandbox through adolescence, can seem over time like a miserable cat. entourage of identities that can be silenced only with hours of therapy. But there's another way to see these alternate identities: as challenges that can sharpen psychological skills. In a country where reinvention is considered a birthright, many people seem to treat old identities the way Houdini treated padlocked boxes: something to wriggle free from, before being dragged down. And psychological research suggests that this ability can be a sign of mental resilience, of taking control of your own story rather than being trapped by it. The late-night bull sessions in college or at backyard barbecues are at some level like out-of-body experiences, allowing a re-coloring of past experience to connect with new acquaintances. A more obvious outlet to expand identity--and one that's available to those who have not or cannot escape the family and community where they're known and labeled —is the Internet. Admittedly, a lot of the role-playing on the Internet can have a deviant quality. But researchers have found that many people who play life-simulation games, for example, set up the kind of families they would like to have had, even script alternate versions of their own role in the family or in a peer group. Decades ago the psychologist Erik Erickson conceived of middle age as a stage of life defined by a tension between stagnation and generativity-a healthy sense of guiding and nourishing the next generation, of helping the community. Ina series of studies, the Northwestern psychologist Dan P. McAdams has found that adults in their 40s and 50s whose lives show this generous quality - who often volunteer, who have a sense of accomplishment - tell very similar stories about how they came to be who they are. Whether they grew up in rural poverty or with views of Central Park, they told their life stories as series of redemptive lessons. When they failed a grade, they found a wonderful tutor, and later made the honor roll; when fired from a good job, they were forced to start their own business. This similarity in narrative constructions most likely reflects some agency, a willful reshaping and re-imagining of the past that informs the present. These are people who, whether pegged as nerds or rebels or plodders, have taken control of the stories that form their identities. In conversation, people are often willing to hand out thumbnail descriptions of themselves: "I'm kind of a hermit." Or a talker, a practical joker, a striver, a snob, a morning person. But they are more likely to wince when someone else describes them so authoritatively. Maybe that's because they have come too far, shaken off enough old labels already. Like escape artists with a lifetime's experience slipping through chains, they don't want or need any additional work. Because while most people can leave their family niches, schoolyard nicknames and high school reputations behind, they don't ever entirely forget them.

单选题Let's not mince words: college can be tough. According to a 2007 study by the American College Health Association, 43 percent of students reported having felt "so depressed it was difficult to function" at least once in the prior year. Other studies, based on student surveys, suggest that one in five undergraduates reported having an eating disorder, one in six had deliberately cut or burned themselves and one in ten had considered suicide. Given those numbers, it's deeply troubling that in 2007 just 8.5 percent of students used their college's counseling services. In other words, students were more likely to consider killing themselves than to seek help. Students feel more afraid to discuss mental-health problems. They think they'll be labeled as the crazy kid who'll shoot up the school. Counselors say that while they do keep an eye out for students who might pose a risk to others, the overwhelming majority of their patients are no threat to anyone but themselves. Counseling services must look for new ways to reach out to troubled students and let them know that seeking treatment is a strong, smart thing. At Harvard, students can win iPods for attending mental-health screening sessions and are invited to "pajama party" panels, where flannel-clad counselors dispense milk and cookies along with advice about the importance of sleep. "There's still a high level of stigma," says Richard Kadison, head of Harvard's mental-health services. "We're trying to find creative ways of getting the message out." Many campuses also offer online services allowing students to complete informal diagnostic quizzes away from the prying eyes of their peers. The results are confidential, but can help nudge students toward counseling services. Besides, many colleges encourage parents to pitch in, whether by watching out for warning signs or by coaxing their kids to seek help. Philadelphia University now issues students' relatives with a calendar highlighting the toughest times of the year for freshmen, while the University of Minnesota offers online workshops, where parents can learn about conditions such as anxiety and Asperger's syndrome. Still, students and counselors agree that the most effective outreach programs are those led by students themselves. "It's different when you hear something from another student," says Semmie Kim, a neuroscience major who founded MIT's chapter of Active Minds in 2007. She's held events like a bubble-wrap stomp to help students vent pre-exam stress, but says her group's most important role is to provide troubled peers with a sympathetic ear. "We want to make students realize they're not alone," she says. "College will always be tough, but there's no need to suffer in silence./

单选题Browse through the racks of dresses, skirts, and tops in almost any trendy clothing store in fashion-savvy Argentina, and whether you find something that fits depends on your size. But shops carry few -- if any -- options for curvaceous women. When you go into a store and find an extra large, you know that it is really the equivalent of a medium or even a small based on American standards. You feel frustrated because you start to think that everybody is like this, and that you are big. But that's not true. In this beauty-conscious nation, which has the world's second-highest rate of anorexia, many are partially blaming the country's clothing industry for offering only tiny sizes of the latest fashions. The result is a dangerous paradox of girls and women adapting to the clothes rather than clothes adapting to them. The Argentine legislature is considering whether to force clothing manufacturers to cover "all the anthropometric measurements of the Argentine woman" up to extra large size. The bill also addresses the related problem of so-called "tricky" labeling in which S, M, and L designations vary by brand and are smaller than international standards. The proposal has raised eyebrows in a historically flirtatious society skeptical of government and well known for its obsession with beauty. "Argentina has the world's highest rates of aesthetic surgery," says Mabel Bello, founder of the Association for the Fight Against Anorexia. "When you are talking about how preoccupied with beauty our society is, that is the most telling statistic." For experts such statistics spell futility for legal remedies. "These types of laws are not going to cause lasting changes," says Susana Saulquin, a sociologist of fashion. "A better way to address the problem is through public education that emphasizes balanced eating habits over an unrealistic ideal of beauty." Currently, companies try to preserve brand image by catering to young and extremely thin customers, but over time, she believes, a more balanced view of beauty will emerge. For their part, industry groups condemn the hill as overreaching state intervening. They say their business decisions are guided by consumer demand. "We are not in favor of anything that regulates the market," says Laura Codda, a representative of major clothing manufacturers. "Every clothing company has the right to make anything they can sell -- any color, any sizes." She says her group is not opposed to measures that would standardize sizing, but she notes that many, if not most, clothes in Argentine stores already carry the numerical designations called for in the bill. If history is a guide, the fate of the proposed law is somewhat bleak. However, in 2005, the provincial government of Buenos Aires managed to pass a similar law -- although the governor failed to sign it.

单选题The phrase "with a whole box of salt" ( Last paragraph) means

单选题Nuclear weapons were first developed in the United States during the Second World War, to be used against Germany. However, by the time the first bombs were ready for use, the war with Germany had ended and, as a result, the decision was made to use the weapons against Japan instead. Hiroshima and Nagasaki have suffered the consequences of this decision to the present day. The real reasons why bombs were dropped on two heavily-populated cities are not altogether clear. A number of people in 1944 and early 1945 argued that the use of nuclear weapons would be unnecessary, since American Intelligence was aware that some of the most powerful and influential people in Japan had already realized that the war was lost, and wanted to negotiate a Japanese surrender. It was also argued that, since Japan has few natural resources, a blockade by the American navy would force it to surrender within a few weeks, and the use of nuclear weapons would thus prove unnecessary. If a demonstration of force was required to end the war, a bomb could be dropped over an unpopulated area like a desert, in front of Japanese observers, or over an area of low population inside Japan, such as a forest. Opting for this course of action might minimize the loss of further lives on all sides, while the power of nuclear weapons would still be adequately demonstrated. All of these arguments were rejected, however, and the general consensus was that the quickest way to end the fighting would be to use nuclear weapons against canters of population inside Japan. In fact, two of the more likely reasons why this decision was reached seem quite shocking to us now. Since the beginning of the Second World War both Germany and Japan had adopted a policy of genocide (i. e. killing as many people as possible, including civilians). Later on, even the US and Britain had used the strategy of fire bombing cities (Dresden and Tokyo, for example) in order to kill, injure and intimidate as many civilians as possible. Certainly, the general public in the West had become used to hearing about the deaths of large numbers of people, so the deaths of another few thousand Japanese, who were the enemy in any case, would not seem particularly unacceptable--a bit of "justifiable" revenge for the Allies' own losses, perhaps. The second reason is not much easier to comprehend. Some of the leading scientists in the world had collaborated to develop nuclear weapons, and this development had resulted in a number of major advances in technology and scientific knowledge. As a result, a lot of normal, intelligent people wanted to see nuclear weapons used; they wanted to see just how destructive this new invention could be. It no doubt turned out to be even more "effective" than they had imagined.

单选题The unknown pervades the universe. That which people can see, with the aid of various sorts of telescope, accounts for just 4% of the total mass. The rest, however, must exist. Without it, galaxies would not survive and the universe would not be gently expanding, as witnessed by astronomers. What exactly constitutes this dark matter and dark energy remains mysterious, but physicists have recently uncovered some more clues, about the former, at least. One possible explanation for dark matter is a group of subatomic particles called neutrinos. Neutrinos are thought to be the most abundant particles in the universe. According to the Standard Model, the most successful description of particle physics to date, neutrinos come in three varieties, called "flavors". Again, according to the Standard Model, they are point-like, electrically neutral and massless. But in recent years, this view has been challenged, as physicists realized that neutrinos might have mass. The first strong evidence came in 1998, when researchers at an experiment, based in Japan, showed that muon neutrinos produced by cosmic rays hitting the upper atmosphere had gone missing by the time they should have reached an underground detector. Its operators suspect that the missing muon neutrinos had changed flavor, becoming electron neutrinos or-more likely-tau neutrinos. Theo- ry suggests that this process, called oscillation, can happen only if neutrinos have mass. Over the coming months and years, researchers hope to produce the most accurate measurements yet. The researchers created a beam of muon neutrinos first. On the other side of the target sat a particle detector that monitored the number of muon neutrinos leaving. The neutrinos then travelled 750km (450 miles) through the Earth to a detector in a former iron mine in Soudan, Minnesota. Researchers then were able to confirm that a significant number of muon neutrinos had disappeared-that is, they had changed flavor. While their mass is so small that neutrinos cannot be the sole constituent of dark matter, they have an advantage in that they are at least known to exist. The same cannot be said for sure of another possible form of dark matter being studied by a group of physicists in Italy. If the result continues to withstand scrutiny, it would appear to be evidence for an exotic new sort of fundamental particle, known as an axion, which could also be a type of dark matter.

单选题Never has a straitjacket seemed so ill-fitting or so insecure. The Euro area's "Stability and Growth Pact" was supposed to stop irresponsible member states running excessive budget deficits, defined as 3% of GDP or more. Chief among the restraints was the threat of large fines if member governments breached the limit for three years in a row. For some time now, no one has seriously believed those restraints would hold. In the early hours of Tuesday November 25th, the Euro's fiscal straitjacket finally came apart at the seams. The pact's fate was sealed over an extended dinner meeting of the euro area's 12 finance ministers. They chewed over the sorry fiscal record of the Euro's two largest members, France and Germany. Both governments ran deficits of more than 3% of GDP last year and will do so again this year. Both expect to breach the limit for the third time in 2004. Earlier this year the European Commission, which polices the pact, agreed to give both countries an extra year, until 2005, to bring their deficits back into line. But it also instructed them to revisit their budget plans for 2004 and make extra cuts. France was asked to cut its underlying, cyclically adjusted deficit by a full 1% of GDP, Germany by 0.8%. Both resisted. Under the pact's hales, the commission's prescriptions have no force until formally endorsed in a vote by the Euro area's finance ministers' known as the "Eurogroup." And the votes were simply not there. Instead, the Euro-group agreed on a set of proposals of its own, drawn up by the Italian finance minister, Giulio Tremonti. France will cut its structural deficit by 0.8% of GDP next year, Germany by 0.6%. In 2005, both will bring their deficits below 3%, economic growth permitting. Nothing will enforce or guarantee this agreement except France and Germany's word. The European Central Bank (ECB) was alarmed at this outcome, the commission was dismayed, and the smaller Euro-area countries who opposed the deal were apoplectic: treaty law was giving way to the "Franco-German steamroller," as Le Figaro, a French newspaper, put it. This seething anger will sour European politics and may spill over into negotiations on a proposed EU constitution. Having thrown their weight around this week, France and Germany may find other smaller members more reluctant than ever to give ground in the negotiations on the document. Spain opposes the draft constitution because it will give it substantially less voting weight than it currently enjoys. It sided against France and Germany on Tuesday, and will point to their fiscal transgressions to show that the EU's big countries do not deserve the extra power the proposed constitution will give them.

单选题{{B}}Text 3{{/B}} Prince Klemens Von ,Metternich, foreign minister of the Austrian Empire during the Napoleonic era and its aftermath, would have no trouble recognizing Google. To him, the world's most popular web-search engine would closely resemble the Napoleonic France that in his youth humiliated Austria and Europe's other. powers. Its rivals—Yahoo!, the largest of the traditional web gateways, eBay, the biggest online auction and trading site, and Microsoft, a software empire that owns MSN, a struggling web portal—would look a lot like Russia, Prussia, and Austria. Metternich responded by forging an alliance among those three monarchies to create a "balance of power" against France. Google's enemies, he might say, ought now to do the same thing. Google announced two new conquests on August 7th. It struck a deal with Viacom, an "old" media firm, under which it will syndicate video clips from Viacom brands such as MTV and Nickelodeon to other websites, and integrate advertisements into them. This makes Google the clear leader in the fledgling but promising market for web-video advertising. It also announced a deal with News Corporation, another media giant, under which it will pro- vide all the search and text-advertising technology on News Corporation's websites, including MySpace, an enormously popular social-networking site. These are hard blows for Yahoo! and MSN, which had also been negotiating with News Corporation. Both firms have been losing market share in web search to Google over the past year—Google now has half the market. They have also fallen further behind in their advertising technologies and networks, so that both make less money than Google does from the same number of searches. Sara Rashtchy, an analyst at Piper Jaffray, a securities firm, estimates that for every advertising dollar that Google makes on a search query, Yahoo! makes only 60-70 cents. Last month Yahoo! said that a new advertising algorithm that it had designed to close the gap in profitability will be delayed, and its share price fell by 22% , its biggest-ever one-day drop. MSN is further behind Google than Yahoo ! in search, and its parent, Microsoft, faces an even more fundamental threat from the expansionist new power. Many of Google's new ventures beyond web search enable users to do things free of charge through their web browsers that they now do using Microsoft software on their personal computers. Google offers a rudimentary but free online word processor and spreadsheet, for instance. The smaller eBay, on the other hand, might in one sense claim Google as an ally. Google's search results send a lot of traffic to eBay's auction site, and eBay is one of the biggest advertisers on Google's network. But the relationship is imbalanced. An influential recent study from Berkeley's Haas 'School of Business estimated that about 12% of eBay's revenues come indirectly from Google, whereas Google gets only 3% of its revenues from eBay. Worst of all for eBay, Google is starting to undercut its core business. Sellers are setting up their own websites and buying text advertisements from Google, and buyers are using its search rather than eBay to connect with sellers directly. As a result, "eBay would be wise to strike a deep partnership with Yahoo ! or Microsoft in order to regain a balance of power in the industry," said the study's authors, Julien Decot and Steve Lee, sounding like diplomats at the Congress of Vienna in 1814.

单选题Earlier this year Ian Leslie wrote a piece for Intelligent Life about the "filter bubble", which said that the Internet"s top five—Yahoo!, Google, Facebook, YouTube and Microsoft—were using personalised data filtering to create a "you loop" in which serendipitous discoveries are replaced by commercial prompts designed to keep us inside our comfort zone. There"s been lots of discussion about the political dangers of what Kunzru calls "the myopic self", but there has been little about its impact on how we choose and buy books. Theoretically, there"s never been a better time to be an adventurous reader, but despite all those self-published writers, boutique publishers and specialist booksellers, I don"t think I"m the only one struggling to translate this theory into reality. When it comes to deciding what to read next, I find myself caught between a paralysing ocean of choice and endless recommendations for E. L. James"s Fifty Shades of Grey . I end up rereading Dorothy Dunnett"s King Hereafter —11th-century Orkney being firmly within my comfort zone. Of course, we can"t really blame the algorithms. Our reading choices have always been constrained by the natural filter bubble created by our friends, and the pressures of time play as large a role as Google"s search engines. So are there any steps we can take to combat the natural "you loop" in our reading tastes? First, I propose we adopt a thoroughly disruptive stance: "If you enjoyed that, then this is the opposite." If your sister loves the erotic fantasies of E. L. James, then it"s time for her to take on the metaphysics of Gods and Monsters , and give Hari Kunzru a try. And second when I"ve finished the remaining 700 pages of my Norse epic, I shall ask my Twitter friends: what shouldn"t I read next? And why stop there? How about disloyalty cards, where booksellers give us discounts for clocking up an eclectic range of purchases? Or discomfort zones, with a "books we can"t stand" display, complete with little handwritten condemnations: so much more inviting than yet another card explaining why Bleak House is really rather good. Could there be a pop-up sci-fi corner in a romance authors" convention or critics reviewing novels that are diametrically opposed in subject matter, style and philosophical outlook, and still liking both? As the season for lazy beach-reading approaches, let us make a stand for the joy of being thoroughly surprised.

单选题The author cites the British example in order to______

单选题As pointed out in Paragraph 3, the "evenly mixed" scenario

单选题It may be just as well for Oxford University's reputation that this week's meeting of Congregation, its 3 552-strong governing body, was held in secret, for the air of civilized rationality that is generally supposed to pervade donnish conversation has lately turned fractious. That's because the vice-chancellor, the nearest thing the place has to a chief executive, has proposed the most fundamental reforms to the university since the establishment of the college system in 1249; and a lot of the dons and colleges don' t like it. The trouble with Oxford is that it is unmanageable. Its problems—the difficulty of recruiting good dons and of getting rid of bad ones, concerns about academic standards, severe money worries at some colleges—all spring from that. John Hood, who was recruited as vice-chancellor from the University of Auckland and is now probably the most- hated antipodean in British academic life, reckons he knows how to solve this, and has proposed to reduce the power of dons and colleges and increase that of university administrators. Mr. Hood is right that the university's management structure needs an overhaul. But radical though his proposals seem to those involved in the current row, they do not go far enough. The difficulty of managing Oxford stems only partly from the nuttiness of its system of governance; the more fundamental problem lies in its relationship with the government. That's why Mr. Hood should adopt an idea that was once regarded as teetering on the lunatic fringe of radicalism, but these days is discussed even in polite circles. The idea is independence. Oxford gets around ￡ 5 000 ( $ 9 500) per undergraduate per, year from the government. In return, it accepts that it can charge students only ~ 1 150 (rising to ~ 3 000 next year) on top of that. Since it probably costs at least ~ 10 000 a year to teach an undergraduate, that leaves Oxford with a deficit of ~ 4 000 or so per student to cover from its own funds. If Oxford declared independence, it would lose the ~ 52m undergraduate subsidy at least. Could it fill the hole? Certainly. America's top universities charge around￡ 20,000 per student per year. The difficult issue would not be money alone: it would be balancing numbers of not-so-brilliant rich people paying top whack with the cleverer poorer ones they were cross subsidising. America's top universities manage it: high fees mean better teaching, which keeps competition hot and academic standards high, while luring enough donations to provide bursaries for the poor. It should be easier to extract money from alumni if Oxford were no longer state-funded.