单选题Why are some major oil companies mentioned in the first paragraph?

单选题We may think we know the revealing signs of lying, be it shifty eyes or nervous behaviors. Professional interrogators look for such tells, too, assuming a suspect's nervousness betrays his guilt. But interrogation can unsettle even the innocent, so nervousness alone cannot distinguish liars from truth tellers. Scientists looking for better ways to detect lies have found a promising one: increasing suspects' "cognitive load." For a host of reasons, their theory goes, lying is more mentally taxing than telling the truth. Performing an extra task while lying or telling the truth should therefore affect the liars more. To test this idea, deception researchers led by psychologist Aldert Vrij of the University of Portsmouth in England asked one group to lie convincingly and another group to tell the truth about a staged theft scenario that only the truth tellers had experienced. A second pair of groups had to do the same but with a crucial twist: both the liars and the truth tellers had to maintain eye contact while telling their stories. Later, as researchers watched videotapes of the suspects' accounts, they tallied verbal signs of cognitive load (such as fewer spatial details in the suspects' stories) and nonverbal ones (such as fewer eyeblinks). The eyeblinks are particularly interesting because whereas rapid blinking suggests nervousness, fewer blinks are a sign of cognitive load, Vrij explains--and contrary to what police are taught, liars tend to blink less. Although the effect was subtle, the instruction to maintain eye contact did magnify the differences between the truth tellers and the liars. So do these differences actually make it easier for others to distinguish liars from truth tellers? They do-- but although students watching the videos had an easier time spotting a liar in the eye-contact condition, their accuracy rates were still poor. Any group differences between liars and truth tellers were dwarfed by differences between individual participants. For example, some people blink far less than others whether or not they are lying-and some are simply better able to carry a higher cognitive load. All this makes it hard to put the study's findings into practice--especially out in the field, where the people most likely to lie are those who are good at lying. "In the real world, there's no Pinocchio-like cue that distinguishes liars from truth tellers," says study co-author Ronald Fisher of Florida International University. Magnifying subtle differences may be the next best thing.

单选题In the eyes of the author, an economic reform in Japan

单选题Despite their many differences of temperament and of literary perspective, Emerson, Thoreau, Hawthorne, Melville, and Whitman share certain beliefs. Common to all these writers is their humanistic perspective. Its basic premises are that humans are the spiritual center of the universe and that in them alone is the clue to nature, history, and ultimately the cosmos itself. Without completely denying the existence either of a deity (the God) or of irrational matter, this perspective nevertheless rejects them as exclusive principles of interpretation and prefers to explain humans and the world in terms of humanity itself. This preference is expressed most clearly in the transcendentalist principle that the structure of the universe literally duplicates the structure of the individual self; therefore, all knowledge begins with self-knowledge. This common perspective is almost always universalized. Its emphasis is not upon the individual as a particular European or American, but upon the human as universal, freed from the accidents of time, space, birth, and talent. Thus, for Emerson, the "American Scholar" turns out to be simply "Man Thinking"; while, for Whitman, the "Song of Myself" merges imperceptibly into a song of all the " children of Adam", where " every atom belonging to me as good belongs to you. " Also common to all five writers is the belief that individual virtue and happiness depend upon self-realization, which, in turn, depends upon the harmonious reconciliation of two universal psychological tendencies: first, the self-asserting impulse of the individual to withdraw, to remain unique and separate, and to be responsible only to himself or herself and second, the self-transcending impulse of the individual to embrace the whole world in the experience of a single moment and to know and become one with that world. These conflicting impulses can be seen in the democratic ethic. Democracy advocates individualism, the preservation of the individual's freedom and self-expression. But the democratic self is torn between the duty to self, which is implied by the concept of liberty, and the duty to society, which is implied by the concepts of equality and fraternity. A third assumption common to the five writers is that intuition and imagination offer a surer road to truth than does abstract logic or scientific method. It is illustrated by their emphasis upon introspection their belief that the clue to external nature is to be found in the inner world of individual psychology--and by their interpretation of experience as, in essence, symbolic. Both these stresses presume an organic relationship between the self and the cosmos, of which only intuition and imagination can properly take account. These writers' faith in the imagination and in themselves as practitioners of imagination led them to conceive of the writer as a seer and enabled them to achieve supreme confidence in their own moral and metaphysical insights.

单选题Which of the following statements may not be the reason for Shakespeare's success?

单选题It is hard to box against a southpaw, as Apollo Creed found out when he fought Rocky Balboa in the first of an interminable series of movies. While "Rocky" is fiction, the strategic advantage of being left-handed in a fight is very real, simply because most right-handed people have little experience of fighting left-handers, but not vice versa. And the same competitive advantage is enjoyed by left-handers in other sports, such as tennis and cricket. The orthodox view of human handedness is that it is connected to the bilateral specialization of the brain that has concentrated language-processing functions on the left side of that organ. Because, long ago in the evolutionary past, an ancestor of humans ( and all other vertebrate animals ) underwent a contortion that twisted its head around 180~ relative to its body, the left side of the brain controls the right side of the body, and vice versa. In humans, the left brain (and thus the right body) is usually dominant. And on average, lefthanders are smaller and lighter than right-handers. That should put them at an evolutionary disadvantage. Sporting advantage notwithstanding, therefore, the existence of left-handedness poses a problem for biologists. But Charlotte Faurie and Michel Raymond, of the University of Montpellier Ⅱ , in France, think they know the answer. As they report in the Proceedings of the Royal Society, there is a clue in the advantage seen in boxing. As any schoolboy could tell you, winning fights enhances your status. If, in prehistory, this translated into increased reproductive success, it might have been enough to maintain a certain proportion of left-handers in the population, by balancing the costs of being left-handed with the advantages gained in fighting. If that is true, then there will be a higher proportion of left-handers in societies with higher levels of violence, since the advantages of being left-handed will be enhanced in such societies. Dr Faurie and Dr Raymond set out to test this hypothesis. Fighting in modem societies often involves the use of technology, notably firearms, that is unlikely to give any advantage to left-handers. So Dr Faurie and Dr Raymond decided to confine their investigation to the proportion of left-handers and the level of violence ( by number of homicides) in traditional societies. By trawling the literature, checking with police departments, and even going out into the field and asking people, the two researchers found that the proportion of left-handers in a traditional society is, indeed, correlated with its homicide rate. One of the highest proportions of left-handers, for example, was found among the Yanomamo of South America. Raiding and warfare are central to Yanomamo culture. The murder rate is 4 per 1 000 inhabitants per year (compared with, for example, 0.068 in New York). And, according to Dr Faurie and Dr Raymond, 22.6% of Yanomamo are left-handed. In contrast, Dioula-speaking people of Burkina Faso in West Africa are virtual pacifists. There are only 0. 013 murders per 1 000 inhabitants among them and only 3.4% of the population is left-handed. While there is no suggestion that left-handed people are more violent than the right-handed, it looks as though they are more successfully violent. Perhaps that helps to explain the double meaning of the word "sinister".

单选题The author's attitude towards the jury system is______.

单选题What does Jastrow think of many scientists?

单选题Habits are a funny thing. We reach for them mindlessly, setting our brains on auto-pilot and relaxing into the unconscious comfort of familiar routine. "Net choice, but habit rules the unreflecting herd," William Wordsworth said in the 19th century. In the ever-changing 21st century, even the word "habit" carries a negative implication. So it seems paradoxical to talk about habits in the same context as creativity and innovation. But brain researchers have discovered that when we consciously develop new habits, we create parallel paths, and even entirely new brain cells, that can jump our trains of thought onto new, innovative tracks. Rather than dismissing ourselves as unchangeable creatures of habit, we can instead direct our own change by consciously developing new habits. In fact, the more new things we try—the more we step outside our comfort zone—the more inherently creative we become, both in the workplace and in our personal lives. But don't bother trying to kill off old habits; once those ruts of procedure are worn into the brain, they're there to stay. Instead, the new habits we deliberately press into ourselves create parallel pathways that can bypass those old reads. "The first thing needed for innovation is a fascination with wonder," says Dawna Markova, author of The Open Mind. "But we are taught instead to 'decide', just as our president calls himself 'the Decider'." She adds, however, that "to decide is to kill off all possibilities but one. A good innovational thinker is always exploring the many other possibilities." All of us work through problems in ways of which we're unaware, she says. Researchers in the late 1960a discovered that humans are born with the capacity to approach challenges in four primary ways: analytically, procedurally, relationally (or collaboratively) and innovatively. At the end of adolescence, however, the brain shuts down half of that capacity, preserving only those modes of thought that have seemed most valuable during the first decade or so of life. The current emphasis on standardized testing highlights analysis and procedure, meaning that few of us inherently use our innovative and collaborative modes of thought. "This breaks the major rule in the American belief system — that anyone can do anything," explains M. J. Ryan, author of the 2006 book This Year I Will... and Ms. Markova's business partner. "That's a lie that we have perpetuated, and it fosters commonness. Knowing what you're good at and doing even more of it creates excellence." This is where developing new habits comes in.

单选题{{B}}Text 4{{/B}} When it comes to the slowing economy, Ellen Spero isn't biting her nails just yet. But the 47-year-old manicurist isn't cutting, filling or polishing as many nails as she'd like to, either. Most of her clients spend $12 to $50 weekly, but last month two longtime customers suddenly stopped showing up. Spero blames the softening economy. "I'm a good economic indicator," she says. "I provide a service that people can do without when they're concerned about saving some dollars." So Spero is downscaling, shopping at middle-brow Dillard's department store near her suburban Cleveland home, instead of Neiman Marcus. "I don't know if other clients are going to abandon me, too," she says. Even before Alan Greenspan's admission that America's red-hot economy is cooling, lots of working folks had already seen signs of the slowdown themselves. From car dealerships to Gap outlets, sales have been lagging for months as shoppers temper their spending. For retailers, who last year took in 24 percent of their revenue between Thanksgiving and Christmas, the cautious approach is coming at a crucial time. Already, experts say, holiday sales are off 7 percent from last year's pace. But don't sound any alarms just yet. Consumers seem only mildly concerned, not panicked, and many say they remain optimistic about the economy's long-term prospects, even as they do some modest belt-tightening. Consumers say they're not in despair because, despite the dreadful headlines, their own fortunes still feel pretty good. Home prices are holding steady in most regions. In Manhattan, "there's a new gold rush happening in the $4 million to $10 million range, predominantly fed by Wall Street bonuses," says broker Barbara Corcoran. In San Francisco, prices are still rising even as frenzied overbidding quiets. "Instead of 20 to 30 offers, now maybe you only get two or three," says John Tealdi, a Bay Area real-estate broker. And most folks still feel pretty comfortable about their ability to find and keep a job. Many folks see silver linings to this slowdown. Potential home buyers would cheer for lower interest rates. Employers wouldn't mind a little fewer bubbles in the job market. Many consumers seem to have been influenced by stock-market swings, which investors now view as a necessary ingredient to a sustained boom. Diners might see an upside, too. Getting a table at Manhattan's hot new Alain Ducasse restaurant used to be impossible. Not anymore. For that, Greenspan ~ Co. may still be worth toasting.