2004年武汉大学博士研究生入学考试英语阅读理解试题36644.pdf
考博热线咨询：400-622-4468 华慧考博考博第一品牌 华慧网 第 1 页 共 1 页 2004 年武汉大学博士研究生入学考试英语阅读理解试题 阅读理解 Opponents of affirmative action say the battle over the use of race in college admissions is hardly over,despite the Supreme Courts ruling Monday upholding the goal of a diverse student body.Higher education leaders overwhelmingly hailed the decision,saying it reaffirmed policies used by most selective colleges and universities.But some critics raised the possibility of more lawsuits,and promised to continue pressuring the Department of Educations Office of Civil Rights to investigate questionable policies.“Were talking about admissions programs,scholarships,any program.only for minorities or in which the standards used to judge admissions are substantially different,”says Linda Chavez,founder and president of the Center for Equal Opportunity,a conservative non-Others say theyll take their case to voters.“We have to seriously contest all this at the ballot box,”says University of California regent Ward Cannerly,who helped win voter approval of Californias Proposition 209,which prohibits considering race or gender in public education,hiring and contracting.Because of that law,Mondays ruling had no practical impact in the state.“It may be time for us to.let the(Michigan)voters decide if they want to use race as a factor in admissions,”Meanwhile,U.S.Education Secretary Rod Paige,consistent with President Bushs stance opposing affirmative action,said the Department of Education will“continue examining and highlighting effective race-neutral approaches to ensure broad access to and diversity within our public institutions”.Even Supreme Court Justice Sandra Day O Connor,in one of the opinions,recommended that states look for lessons in race-neutral programs being tried in California and elsewhere.While the ruling said admissions officials may consider race in the selection process,colleges and universities are not obligated to do so.“Ultimately in the debate,diversity is a choice,not a legal mandate,”says Arthur C oleman,a former Department of Education official who now helps colleges and universities ensure The public,too,remains conflicted,largely along racial lines.According to a january poll by the non-profit research organization Public Agenda,79%of Americans said it is important for colleges to have a racially diverse student body,while just 54%said affirmative action programs should continue.In a Gallup poll conducted days before the ruling,49%of adults said they favor affirmative action and 43%did not,with blacks and Hispanics far more likely to favor the practice than whites.And some educators doubt that with Mondays ruling,those opposing For now,admissions officials and university lawyers are poring over the ruling to determine how or whether to adjust policies.While most tend to be closed-mouthed 考博热线咨询：400-622-4468 华慧考博考博第一品牌 华慧网 第 2 页 共 2 页 2.What the critics said in the first paragraph amounts to the idea that _.D.selective colleges and universities should be punished for their discriminatory policies.3.Connerly insists that the Courts ruling should _.B.be contested by the Michigan voters with a D.produce the intended practical effect before it is widely accepted 4.What is the attitude of the Department of Education towards affirmative action?D.Indifference 5.Which of the following is True about affirmative action according to the text?C.The minority students 6.It can be inferred from the text that one of the major objectives of affirmative action is to _.A.ensure race-neutral programs are set up 7.Questions 11 to 15 are based Whenever two or more unusual traits or situations are found in the same place,it is tempting to look for more than a coincidental relationship between them.The high Himalayas and the Tibetan plateau certainly have extraordinary physical characteristics and the cultures which are found there are also unusual,though not unique.However there is no intention of adopting Montesquieus view of climate and soil as cultural determinants.The ecology of a region merely poses some of the problems faced by the inhabitants of the region,and while the problems facing a The appearance of the Himalayas during the late Tertiary Period and the accompanying further raising of the previously established rages had a marked effect 考博热线咨询：400-622-4468 华慧考博考博第一品牌 华慧网 第 3 页 共 3 页 on the climate of the region.Primarily,of course,it blocked the Indian monsoon(季风)from reaching Central Asia at all.Secondarily,air and moisture from other Prior to the raising of the Himalayas,the land now forming the Tibetan uplands had a dry,continental climate with vegetation and animal life similar to that of much of the rest of the region on the same parallel,but somewhat differen than that of the areas farther north,which were already drier.With the coming of the Himalayas and the relatively sudden drying out of the region,there was a severe thinning out of the animal and plant population.The ensuing incomplete Pleistocene glaciations(冰蚀)had a further thinning effect,but significantly did not wipe out life in the area.Thus after the end of the glaciation there were only a few varieties of life extant from the original continental species.Isolated by the Kunlun range from the Tarim basin and Turfan depression,species which had already adapted to the dry steppe climate,and would otherwise have been expected to flourish in Tibetan,the remaining native fauna and flora(动植物)multiplied.Armand describes the Tibetan fauna as not having great variety,but being“striking”in the abundance of the particular species that are present.The plant life is similarly limited in variety,with some observers finding no more than seventy varieties of plants in even the relatively fertile Eastern Tibetan valleys.with fewer than ten food crops.Tibetan“tea”is a major staple,The difficulties of living in an environment at once dry and cold.and populated with species more usually found in more hospitable climates,are great.These difficulties may well have influenced the unusual polyandrous(一妻多夫制)societies typical of the region.Lattimore sees the maintenance of multiple-husband households as being preserved from earlier forms by the harsh conditions of the Tibetan uplands,which permitted no experimentation and“froze”the cultures which came there.Kawakita,on the other hand,sees the polyandry as a way of easily permitting the best householder to become the head husband regardless of age.His detailed studies of the Bhotea village of Tsumje do seem to support this idea of polyandry as a method of talent mobility is a situation where even the best talent is barely enought for survival.In sum,though arguments can be made that a pre-existing polyandrous system was strengthened and preserved(insofar as it has been)by the rigors of the land,it would certainly be an overstatement to lay causative factors of any stronger nature to the ecological influences in this case.C.Social and familial organiz D.All of the above.9.The purpose of the passage is to _.考博热线咨询：400-622-4468 华慧考博考博第一品牌 华慧网 第 4 页 共 4 页 C.describe 10.The author s knowledge of Tibet is probably _.D.limited to geological history 11.According to the passage,which of the following would probably be the most agreeable to Montesquieu?B.some regions with similar climates will have sim D.The plants of a country,by being the food of its people,cause the people to have 12.The species of fauna and flora remaining in Tibet after the Pleistocene glaciation can properly be called continental because they _.C.have been found in o Auctions are public sales of goods,conducted by an officially approved auctioneer.He asks the crowd assembled in the auction-room to make offers,or“bids”,for the various items on sale.He encourages buyers to bid higher figures,and finally names the highest bidder as the buyer of the goods.This is called“knocking down”the goods,for the bidding ends when the auctioneer bangs a small hammer on a table at ancient Romans probably invented sales by auction,and the English word comes from the Latin auctio,meaning“increase”.The Romans usually sold in this way the spoils taken in war;these sales were called sub basra,meaning“under the spear”,a spear being stuck in the ground as a signal for a crowd to gather.In England in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries goods were often sold“by the candle”:a short Practically all goods whose qualities vary are sold by auction.Among these are coffee,hides,skins,wool,tea,cocoa,furs,spices,fruit and vegetables and wines.Auction sales are also usual for land and property,antique furniture,pictures,rare books,old china and similar works of art.The auction rooms at Christies and Sothebys in London and New York are world famous.An auction is usually advertised beforehand with full particulars of the articles to be sold and where and when they can be viewed by prospective buyers.If the advertisement cannot give full details,catalogues are printed,and each group of goods to be sold together,called a“lot”,is usually given a number.The auctioneer need not begin with Lot 1 and continue in numerical order;he may wait until he registers the fact that certain dealers are in the room and then produce the lots they are likely to be interested in.The auctioneers services are paid for in the form of a percentage of the price tha goods are sold for.The auctioneer therefore has a direct The auctioneer must know fairly accurately the current market values of the goods 考博热线咨询：400-622-4468 华慧考博考博第一品牌 华慧网 第 5 页 共 5 页 he is selling,and he should be acquainted with regular buyers of such goods.He will not waste time by starting the bidding too low.He will also play on the rivalries among his buyers and succeed in getting a hight price by encouraging two business competitors to bid against each other.It is largely on his advice that a seller will fix a“reserve”price,that is,a price below which the goods cannot be sold.Even the best auctioneers,however,find it difficult to stop a“knock out”,whereby dealers illegally arrange beforehand not to bid against each other,but nominate one of themselves as the only bidder,in the hope of buying goods at extremely low prices.If such a“knock-out”comes off,the real auction sale takes place privately afterwards among t 14.A candle used to burn at auction sales _.15.An auction catalogue gives prospective buyers _.16.The auctioneer may decide to sell the“lots”out of order because _.17.An auctioneer likes to get high prices for the goods he sells because _.C.the auction-18.A“knock out”is arranged _.A.to k 19.Directions:There are 4 reading passages in this part.Each passage is followed by some questions or unfinished statements.For each of them there are four choices marked A,B,C,and D.You should decide on the best choice and mark your answer Questions 1 to 5 are based o All types of stress study,whether under laboratory or real-life situations,study The brain blood flow studies show that reciting the days of the week and months of 考博热线咨询：400-622-4468 华慧考博考博第一品牌 华慧网 第 6 页 共 6 页 the year increases blood flow in appropriate areas,whereas problem solving which demands intense concentration of a reasoning type produces much larger changes in Between these basic studies of brain function and real life situations there is still a considerable gap,but reasonable deduction seems possible to try and understand what happens to the brain.Life consists of a series of events which may be related to work or to our so-called leisure time.Work may be relatively automaticas with typing,for instance,it requires intense concentration and repetition during the learning phase to establish a pattern in the brain.Then the typists fingers automatically move to hit the appropriate keys as she reads the words on the copy.overcome this she has to raise her level of arousal and concentration but beyond a certain point the automatic is lost and thinking about hitting the keys leads to more Other jobs involve intense concentration such as holding bottles of wine up to a strong light and turning them upside down to look for particles of dirt falling down.This sounds quite easy but experience teaches that workers can do this for only about thirty minutes before they start making a mistake.This is partly because the number of occasions with dirt in the bottle is low and the arousal level,therefore,fails.Scientists have shown that devices to raise arousal level will increase the accuracy of looking for relatively rare events.A recent study of the effect of loss of sleep in young doctors showed that in tests involving a challenge to their medical judgment when short of sleep they raised their arousal level and became bet 20.According to the brain blood flow studies,problem solving _.C.demands intense 21.The author believes that _.A.the results obtained in the laboratory exactly reflects the real-B.the gap between the laboratory studies and real-life situations is too large to fill C.the gap between the laboratory studies and real-life situations can be closed by D.the difference between the laboratory studies and real-life situations will be 22.When a typist gets tired,_.23.Examining bottles of wine is hard work because _.考博热线咨询：400-622-4468 华慧考博考博第一品牌 华慧网 第 7 页 共 7 页 24.According to the author,a key factor in the ability to reason is _.A.t 英译汉 1.Directions:Read the following passage carefully and then translate the underlined Computers are permeating almost every aspect of our lives,including many areas previously untouched by technology.1.But unlike such other pervasive technologies as electricity,television and the motor car,computers are on the whole less reliable and less predictable in their behavior.This is because they are discrete state digital electronic devices that are prone to total and catastrophic failure.Computer systems,when they are“down,”are completely down,unlike electromechanical devices,which may be only partially down and are thus partially usable.Computers enable enormous quantities of information to be stored,retrieved,and transmitted at great speed on a scale not possible before.2.This is all very well,but it has serious implications for data security and personal privacy because computers are inherently insecure.The recent activities of hackers and data thieves in the United States,Germany,and Britain have shown how all-too-easy it still is to break into even the most-sophisticated financial and military systems.The list of scares perpetrated by the new breed of hi-tech criminals,ranging from fraud in airline-ticket reservations to the reprogramming of the chips inside mobile phones,is growing daily.Computer systems are often incredibly complex-so complex,in fact,that they are not always understood even by their creators(although few are willing to admit it).This often makes them completely unmanageable.Unmanageable complexity,can result in massive foul-ups or spectacular budget“runaways.”For example,Jeffrey Rothfeder in Business Week reports that Bank of America in 1988 had to abando
