北京外国语大学考研基础英语真题2008年.doc

北京外国语大学考研基础英语真题2008年

(总分：150.00，做题时间：90分钟)

Ⅰ

A

The Greening of America

—How America is likely to take over leadership of the light against climate change; and how it can, get it right.

A country with a presidential system tends to get identified with its leader. So, for the rest of the world, America is George Bush"s America right now. It is the country that has mismanaged the Iraq war; holds prisoners without trial at Guantanamo Bay; restricts funding for stem-cell research because fundamentalist religious beliefs; and destroyed the chance of a global climate-change deal based on the Kyoto Protocol.

But to simplify this is to misunderstand especially in the case of the huge, federal America. One of its great strengths is the diversity of its political, economic and cultural life. While the White House dug its heels in on global warming, much of the rest of the country was moving. That"s what forced the president"s concession to greens in the state-of-the-union address. His poll ratings sinking under the weight of Iraq, President Bush is grasping for popular issues to keep him afloat; and global warming has evidently become such an issue. Albeit in the context of energy security, a now familiar concern of his, President Bush spoke for the first time to Congress of "the serious challenge of global climate change" and proposed measures designed, in part, to combat it.

It"s the weather, appropriately, that has turned public opinion—starting with Hurricane Katrina. Scientists had been warming Americans for years that the risk of "extreme weather events" would probably increase as a result of climate change. But scientific papers do not drive messages home as convincingly as the destruction of a city. And the heat wave that torched America"s west coast last year, accompanied by a constant drip of new research on melting glaciers and dying polar bears, has only strengthened the belief that something must be done.

Business is changing its mind too. Five years ago corporate America was solidly against carbon controls. But the threat of a patchwork of state regulations, combined with the opportunity to profit from new technologies, began to shift business attitudes. And that movement has gained momentum, because companies that saw their competitors espouse carbon controls began to fear that, once the government got down to designing regulations, they would be left out of the discussion if they did not jump on the band wagon. So now the loudest voices are not resisting change but arguing for it.

Support for carbon controls has also grown among some unlikely groups: security hawks (who want to reduce America"s dependence on Middle Eastern oil); farmers (who like subsidies for growing the raw material for ethanol); and evangelicals (who worry that man should looking after the Earth God gave him a little better). This alliance has helped persuade politicians to move. Arnold Schwarzenegger, California"s Republican governor, has led the advance, with muscular measures legislating Kyoto-style curbs in his state. His popularity has rebounded as a result. And now there is movement too at the federal level, which is where it really matters. Bills to tackle climate change have proliferated. And three of the serious candidates for the presidency in 2008—John McCain, Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama—are all pushing for federal measures. Unfortunately, President Bush"s newfound interest in climate change is coupled with, and distorted by, his focus on energy security. Reducing America"s petrol consumption by 20% in 2017, a target

he announced in the state-of-the-union address, would certainly diminish the country"s dependence on Middle Eastern oil, but the way he plans to go about it may not be either efficient or clean. Increasing fuel-economy standards for cars and trucks will go part of the way, but for most of the switch America will have to rely on a greater use of alternative fuels. That means ethanol (inefficient because of heavy subsidies and high tariffs on imports of foreign ethanol) or liquefied coal (filthy because of high car- bon emissions).

The measure of President Bush"s failure to tackle this issue seriously is his continued rejection of the only two clean and efficient solutions to climate change. One is a carbon tax, which this paper has long advocated. The second is a cap-and-trade system of the sort Europe introduced to meet the Kyoto targets. It would limit companies" emissions while allowing them to buy and sell permits to pollute. Either system should, by setting a price on carbon, discourage emission; and, in doing so, encourage the development and use of cleaner-energy technologies. Just as America"s adoption of catalytic converters led eventually to the world"s conversion to lead-free petrol, so its drive to clean-energy technologies will ensure that these too spread.

A tax is unlikely because of America"s aversion to that three-letter word. Given that, it should go for a tough cap-and-trade system. In doing so, it can usefully learn from Europe"s experience. First, get good data. Europe failed to do so: companies were given too many permits, and emissions have there-fore not fallen. Second, auction permits (which are, in effect, money) rather than giving them away free. Europe gave them away, which allowed polluters to make windfall profits . This will be a huge fight; for, if the federal government did what the Europeans did, it would hand out $40 billion to $50 billion in permits. Third, set a long time-horizon. Europeans do not know whether carbon emissions will still be constrained after 2012, when Kyoto runs out. Since most clean-energy projects have a payback period of more than five years, the system thus fails to encourage green investment.

One of America"s most admirable characteristics is its belief that it has a duty of moral leader- ship. At present, however, it"s not doing too well on that score. Global warming could change that. By tackling the issue now it could regain the high moral ground (at the same time forging ahead in the clean-energy business, which Europe might otherwise dominate). And it looks as though it will; for even if the Toxic Texan continues to evade the issue, his successor will grasp it.（分数：18.00）

(1).It can be inferred from the first paragraph that ______.（分数：3.00）

A.America is busy dealing with the Iraq war and the Guantanamo Bay prisoners

B.America is interested in stem-cell research

C.America despises the global climate-change deal

D.America declines to sign the Kyoto Protocol

(2)."Dig one"s heels in" in the second paragraph means ______.（分数：3.00）

A.improve by pressure

B.judge by oneself

C.refuse to change one"s mind

D.pay more attention to

(3).Which is NOT the reason that causes the corporate America to change its mind over carbon controls?（分数：3.00）

A.The state regulations are getting strict.

B.There is an opportunity to profit from new technologies.

C.Some competitors approve of carbon controls.

D.The loudest voices are supporting carbon controls.

(4).According to the author, which is NOT a practicable way to reduce carbon emissions in America?（分数：3.00）

A.Imposition of a carbon tax.

B.Establishment of a cap-and-trade system.

C.Permission to buy and sell permits to pollute.

D.Setting a price on carbon.

(5).Because of the Americans" distaste for tax, the author suggests that all of the following should be done EXCEPT that ______.（分数：3.00）

A.a suitable number of permits be offered

B.the price for the permits be set

C.carbon emissions be tackled in a long-term view

D.carbon emissions be loosened after 2012

(6).The polluters" "windfall profits" (Para. 8) stands for ______.（分数：3.00）

A.the privilege granted by the permits

B.the unexpected lucky gain from the permits

C.the financial support from the federal government

D.the illegal interests made by the polluters

Southern Slang

Whenever I return to North Carolina, my home state in America"s Southeast, more than the familiar rolling grassland hills tells me I"m home: Back there, my ears perk up to familiar bits of Southern-style American English, a regional delicacy that has yet to sneak its way into China. "Listen up good now, because I"m fixin" to tell you all about it."

I had been looking forward to a nice, big Christmas dinner for some time leading up to my most recent visit home, because I knew I would be "eating high on the hog". This Southernism, which originally meant having the luxury of eating the highest-quality parts of the pig, now simply refers to enjoying good food in large quantities. My mom"s delicious baked ham did happen to be on the table as we feasted this Christmas, but the presence of pork is hardly a necessity for eating high on the hog, nor does one have to be in the South to do so. In fact, the phrase often passes through my mind when I sit down to a steaming hot pot or a bow of Xinjiang-style noodles in Beijing.

But for Southerners who enjoy good barbecued pork (and there aren"t many who don"t), there"s a great way to eat high on the hog while eating every part of it: go to "a pig pickin". A pig pickin is not so much a meal as it is an event, where people gather around a whole hog which is slow-roasted in a smoky oven until its tender meat can be, picked right off the bones and eaten. There"s only one way to describe the taste, of juicy barbecue on a summer afternoon: "finger-lickin good!" Many Southern colloquialisms reflect the agricultural heritage of the region, and so lots of Southern slang calls on images or personalities we associate with animals. After a long, hard day at work, nothing describes someone is exhausted quite as vividly as saying he or she is "clog tired", evoking an image of a lazy, long-eared hound dog lazing on a front porch. Or, if someone has a natural intelligence for understanding the ways of the world, we may say that person has "horse sense", like a trusty four-legged friend who always knows which way to go when it comes to a fork in the road.

The South"s long-standing religious traditions also pepper the speech of locals. When a proper Southerner wants to express that something will happen if all goes well, he might say, "Good Lord willin" and the creek don"t rise", which recalls more primitive times when many Southern farmers relied on good weather conditions for their livelihoods. For example, one friend might say to another when arranging a weekend picnic, "Good Lord willin" and the creek don"t rise, I"ll see you on Sunday." If that weekend brings a thunderstorm, raining out the picnic, the two unlucky friends may curse the weather, calling it "god-awful".

Perhaps the two uniquely Southern words that are best known in other parts of the world are "y"all", which is a shortened version of "you all", and the infamous "ain"t", which means "is not", "are

not" or "am not". While, Southerners and non-Southerners will probably never stop arguing over whether or not these officially qualify as English words (they are in the dictionary, if that courts for anything), they are undeniably part of the Southern vocabulary.

One of the charms of the way Southerners speaks is that they often have a multitude of colorful ways to say very simple things. If someone plans to do something Very soon, he could say any number of ways, some of which may bring a smile, to the listener"s face. Instead of saying "right away", a Southerner might substitute any of the following: "faster than you can skin a cat"; "quicker than you can say "Jack Robinson"" (don"t ask me who Jack is); "right now in a minute"; or "lickety-split".

Southern-style English is something that many Americans feel very strongly about. While many natives of the South are proud of the distinction their slang brings to their speech, other English speakers often turn their noses up at the earthy, down home tone of the region"s slang. But love it or hate it, the English of the American South is full of personality and like nothing else you"ll ever hear.（分数：18.00）

(1).What the author wants to tell in the first paragraph is that ______.（分数：3.00）

A.he is fairly familiar with the scene of America"s Southeast

B.everybody knows well that North Carolina is fascinating

C.southern English is very expressive and rich in imagery

D.it is worthwhile to introduce something about his hometown

(2).What the author means by "eating high on the hog" is ______.（分数：3.00）

A.having a big meal

B.eating the highest-quality parts of the pig

C.enjoying delicious baked ham

D.living very comfortably

(3).According to the passage, the uniqueness of Southern colloquialisms can be traced to all of the following factors EXCEPT ______.（分数：3.00）

A.agricultural heritage

B.religious traditions

C.irregular abbreviations

D.eating habits

(4).Which of the reasons listed below DOES NOT explain why many Americans feel strongly about southern-style English?（分数：3.00）

A.Because it is vivid and interesting.

B.Because it is special and distinct.

C.Because it enjoys high prestige in the United States.

D.Because it, is considered inferior" by some people.

(5).Which of the following is NOT mentioned in the passage about southern-style English?（分数：3.00）

A.A dialect that bears the marks of religious traditions.

B.An art of conversation to be practiced and enjoyed.

C.A dialect with many colorful ways to talk about plain things.

D.A regional dialect not yet introduced into China.

(6).The author"s attitude toward southern-style English is about ______.（分数：3.00）

A.partial

B.objective

C.with disdain

D.with love

B

X-Ceiling Over Men

Men are always telling me not to generalize about them. But a startling new study shows that science is backing me up here.

Research published last week in the journal Nature reveals that women are genetically more complex than scientists ever imagined, while men remain the simple creatures they appear. "Alas," said one of the authors of the study, the Duke University genome expert Huntington Willard, "genetically speaking, if you"ve met one man, you"ve met them all. We are, I hate to say it, predictable. You can"t say that about women. Men and women are farther apart than we ever knew. It"s not Mars or Venus. It"s Mars or Venus, Pluto, Jupiter and who knows what other planets." Women are not only more different from men than we knew. Women are more different from each other than we knew creatures of "infinite variety", as Shakespeare wrote.

"We poor men only have 45 chromosomes to do our work with because our 46th is the pathetic Y that has only a few genes which operate below the waist and above the knees," Dr. Willard observed. "In contrast, we now know that women have the full 46 chromosomes that they"re getting work from and the 46th is a second X that is working at levels greater than we knew."

Dr. Willard and his co-author, Laura Carrel, a molecular biologist at the Pennsylvania State University College of Medicine, think that their discovery may help explain why the behavior and traits of men and women are so different; they may be hard-wired in the brain, in addition to being hormonal or cultural.

So is Lawrence Summers right after all? "Only time will tell," Dr. Willard laughs.

The researchers learned that a whopping 15 percent—200 to 300—of the genes on the second X chromosome in women, though to be submissive and inert, lolling about on an evolutionary Victorian fainting couch, are active, giving women a significant increase in gene expression over men. As the Times science reporter Nicholas Wade, who is writing a book about human evolution and genetics, explained it to me, "Women are mosaics, one could even say chimeras, in the sense that they are made up of two different kinds of cell. Whereas men are pure and uncomplicated, being made of just a single kind of cell throughout".

This means men"s generalizations about women are correct, too. Women are inscrutable, changeable, crafty, idiosyncratic, a different species.

"Women"s chromosomes have more complexity, which men view as unpredictability," said David Page, a molecular biologist and expert on sex evolution at the Whitehead Institute for Biomedical Research in Cambridge, Mass.

Known as Mr. Y, Dr. Page calls himself "the defender of the rotting Y chromosome". He"s referring to studies showing that the Y chromosome has been shedding genes willy-nilly for millions of years and is now a fraction of the size of its partner, the X chromosome, "The Y married up," he notes. "The X married down."

Size matters, so some experts have suggested that in 10 million years or even much sooner- 100,000 years—men could disappear, taking Maxim magazine, March Madness and cold pizza in the morning with them.

Dr. Page drolly conjures up a picture of the Y chromosome as "a slovenly beast", sitting in his favorite armchair, surrounded by the litter of old fast food takeout boxes.

"The Y wants to maintain himself but doesn"t know how," he said. "He"s falling apart, like the guy who can"t manage to get a doctor"s appointment or can"t clean up the house or apartment unless his wife does it."

"I prefer to think of the Y as persevering and noble, not as the Rodney Dangerfield of the human genome."

Dr. Page says the Y—a refuge throughout evolution for any gene that is good for males and/or bad for females—has become "a mirror, a metaphor, a blank slate on which you can write anything you want to think about males". It has inspired cartoon gene maps that show the belching gene,

the inability-to-remember-birthdays-and-anniversaries gene, the

fascination-with-spiders-and-reptiles gene, the selective-heating-loss "Huh" gene, the inability-to-express-affection-on-the-phone gene.

The discovery about women"s superior gene expression may answer the age-old question about why men have trouble expressing themselves: because their genes do.（分数：10.00）

(1).Science indicates that it is very difficult to make generalizations about men.（分数：2.00）

A.正确

B.错误

(2).The science journal Nature reveals that women"s imagination is much more complicated than men"s.（分数：2.00）

A.正确

B.错误

(3).Genetically speaking, men have 45 chromosomes to use while the 46th is of no use at all.（分数：2.00）

A.正确

B.错误

(4).Men"s behaviors are different from women"s because of neurological, hormonal and cultural distinctions.（分数：2.00）

A.正确

B.错误

(5).Although some genes on the second X chromosome in women are obedient and stagnant, they enhance women"s gene expression.（分数：2.00）

A.正确

B.错误

C

Truths to Live By

The art of living is to know when to hold fast and when to let go. 1 . The rabbis of old put it this way: "A man comes into this world with his fist clenched, but when he dies, his hand is open."

2 . We know that this is so, but all too often we recognize this truth only in our backward glance when we remember with far greater pain that we did not see that beauty when it flowered, that we failed to respond with love to love when it was tendered.

3 . I was hospitalized following a severe heart attack and had been in intensive care for several days. It was not a pleasant place.

One morning, I had to have some additional tests. The required machines were located in a building at the opposite end of the hospital, so I had to be wheeled across the courtyard.

As we emerged from our unit, the sunlight hit me. That"s all there was to my experience. Just the light of the sun. 4 .

I looked to see whether anyone else relished the sun"s golden glow, but everyone was hurrying to and fro, most with their eyes fixed on the ground. Then I remembered how often I, too, had been indifferent to the grandeur of each day, too preoccupied with petty and sometimes even mean concerns to respond to the splendor of it all.

The insight gleaned from that experience is really as commonplace as was the experience itself: life"s gifts are precious but we are too heedless of them.

Here then is the first pole of life"s paradoxical demands on us: Never be too busy for the wonder and the awe of life. 5 . Embrace each hour. Seize each golden minute.

6 . This is the second side of life"s coin, the opposite pole of its paradox: we must accept our losses, and learn how to let go.

This is not an easy lesson to learn, especially when we are young and think that the world is

ours to command, that whatever we desire with the full force of our passionate being can, may, will, be ours. 7 .

A. Surely we ought to hold fast to life, for it is wondrous, and full of a beauty that breaks through every pore of God"s own earth.

B. But then life moves along to confront us with realities, and slowly but surely this second truth dawns upon us.

C. For life is a paradox: it enjoins us to cling to its many gifts even while it ordains their eventual relinquishment.

D. When life is treated with the proper attitude, regret will surely not be left behind.

E. A recent experience re-taught me this truth.

F. Hold fast to life.., but not so fast that you cannot let go.

G. Be reverent before each dawning day.

H. And yet how beautiful it was—how warming, how sparkling, how brilliant!（分数：14.00）

Ⅱ

Developing Self-confidence

1 Confidence is a feeling—an inner fire and an outer radiance, a basic satisfaction with what one is plus a reaching out to become more. Confidence is not something a few people are born with and others are not, for it is an acquired characteristic.

Confidence is the personal possession of no one; the person who has it learns it—and goes on learning. The most gifted individual on earth has to construct confidence in his gifts from the basis of faith and experience, like anybody else. The tools will differ from one person to the next, but the essential task is the same. Confidence and pose are available to us all according to our abilities and needs—not somebody else"s—provided we utilize our gifts and expand them. One of the most rewarding aspects of confidence is that it sits gracefully on every age and level of life—on children, men, women, the famous, the obscure, rich, poor, artist, executive, teenager, the very old, And you can take it with you into old age. There is nothing more inspiring than old person who maintains his good will, humor, and faith in himself, in others, in the future. Conversely, the root cause of old people"s despair is a feeling of not being wanted, of nothing to contribute, no more to conquer and become.

2 Most people have more to work with than they realize. One noted physicist calls this unused excellencies and finding and releasing this potential in ourselves is one of the major challenges of modern life. The great danger is not that we shall overreach our capacities but that we shall undervalue and under-employ them, thus blighting our great possibilities.

3 The goal of life is not a problem less existence, which would be unbearably dull, but a way to handle problems creatively. That word "problem" may sound a little prickly, but it only means a question put forth for solution, and actually life consists of a series of problems-and-solutions, each different from the last.

Confidence is delight—delight in living, in being who you are, in what you do, in growing, in the endless and sometimes exasperating adventure of what it means to be human. The teacher who delights in teaching has no time for bogging down in a swamp of doubt that he or she is doing its "right", and they are well aware that they can become a better teacher tomorrow, but only by doing their best today and enjoying today. So, too, the mother who delights in being a mother does not worry overmuch about whether she fits the rules. She is not the mother, after all, of something material but of a living child.

4 Rules can often be a guide to successful living, but they are not a substitute for living. Rules never quite keep up with reality, because rules come from experience, not the Other way around. Life happens, and it is infinitely inventively will always outrun and outmaneuver any attempt to bottle it up in a cut-and-dried system, for life is perpetual becoming . When life turns your

wisest plans or best rules upside down, throw out the plans and bend with the circumstance. You will find powers you did not suspect, and possibilities undreamed of.

5 Confidence is not always winning, not always victory. Indeed, it is that very quality in humanity which refuses to stay defeated. A kind of stubborn cheerfulness. Remember there are two things you can do with mistakes: you can run away and you can grow.（分数：40.00）

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1.

枯叶蝴蝶(Lappet Butterfly)

峨眉山下，伏虎寺旁，有一种蝴蝶，比最美丽的蝴蝶可能还要美丽些，是峨眉山最珍贵的特产之一。

当它阖起两张翅膀的时候，像生长在树枝上的一张干枯了的树叶。谁也不去注意它，谁也不会瞧它一眼。它收敛了它的花纹、图案，隐藏了它的粉墨、彩色，逸出了繁华的花丛，停止了翱翔的姿态，变成了一张憔悴、干枯的、甚至不是祜黄的而是枯槁的、如同死灰颜色的枯叶。

它这样伪装，是为了保护自己。但是它还是逃不脱被捕捉的命运。不仅因为它的美丽，更因为它那用来隐蔽它的美丽的枯槁与憔悴。

它以为它这样做可以保护自己，殊不知它这样做更叫人去搜捕它。有一种生物比它还聪明，这种生物的特技之一是装假作伪，因此装假作伪这种行径是瞒不过这种生物——人的。

人把它捕捉，将它制成标本，作为一种商品去出售，价钱越来越高。最后几乎把它捕捉得再也没有了。这一生物品种快要绝种了。

到这时候，国家才下令禁止捕捉枯叶蝶。但是，已经来不及了。国家的禁止更增加了它的身价。枯叶蝶真是因此而要绝对的绝灭了。

我们既然有一对美丽的和真理的翅膀，我们永远也不愿意阖上它们。做什么要装模作样，化为一只枯叶蝶，最后还是被售，反而不如那翅膀两面都光彩夺目的蝴蝶到处飞翔，被捕捉而又生生不息。

我要我的翅膀两面都光彩夺目。

我愿这自然界的一切都显出它们的真相。

（分数：50.00）

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