剑桥雅思阅读理解解析含翻译

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剑桥雅思阅读10原文翻译答案精讲(test3)

剑桥雅思阅读10原文翻译答案精讲(test3)

剑桥雅思阅读10原文翻译答案精讲(test3)剑桥雅思阅读部分的题目可以进行一些分类总结,因为考试的常见内容一般都会在下次考试中出现的。

下面就是今天小编给大家带来的剑桥雅思阅读10(test3)的翻译及答案精讲内容,希望能够帮助同学们备考雅思考试。

剑桥雅思阅读10原文(test3)READING PASSAGE 1You should spend about 20 minutes on Questions 1-13, which are based on Reading Passage 1 on the following pages.Questions 1-4Reading Passage 1 has five paragraphs, A-E.Choose the correct heading for paragraphs B-E from the list of headings below.Write the correct number, i-vii, in boxes 1-4 on your answer sheetList of Headingsi Economic and social significance of tourismii The development of mass tourismiii Travel for the wealthyiv Earning foreign exchange through tourismv Difficulty in recognising the economic effects of tourismvi The contribution of air travel to tourismvii The world impact of tourismviii The history of travelExample AnswerParagraph A viii1 Paragraph B2 Paragraph C3 Paragraph D4 Paragraph EThe Context, Meaning and Scope of TourismA Travel has existed since the beginning of time, when primitive man set out, often traversing great distances in search of game, which provided the food and clothing necessary for his survival. Throughout the course of history, people have travelled for purposes of trade, religious conviction, economic gain, war, migration and other equally compelling motivations. In the Roman era, wealthy aristocrats and high government officials also travelled for pleasure. Seaside resorts located at Pompeii and Herculaneum afforded citizens the opportunity to escape to their vacation villas in order to avoid the summer heat of Rome. Travel, except during the Dark Ages, has continued to grow and, throughout recorded history, has played a vital role in the development of civilisations and their economies.B Tourism in the mass form as we know it today is a distinctly twentieth-century phenomenon. Historians suggest that the advent of mass tourism began in England during the industrial revolution with the rise of the middle class and the availability of relatively inexpensive transportation. The creation of the commercial airline industry following the Second World War and the subsequent development of the jet aircraft in the 1950s signalled the rapid growth and expansion of international travel. This growth led to the development of a major new industry: tourism. In turn, international tourism became the concern of a number of world governments since it not only provided new employment opportunities but also produced a means of earning foreign exchange.C Tourism today has grown significantly in both economic and social importance. In most industrialised countries over thepast few years the fastest growth has been seen in the area of services. One of the largest segments of the service industry, although largely unrecognised as an entity in some of these countries, is travel and tourism. According to the World Travel and Tourism Council (1992), ‘Travel and tourism is the largest industry in the world on virtually any economic measure including value-added capital investment, employment and tax contributions’. In 1992, the industry’s gross output was estimated to be $3.5 trillion, over 12 per cent of all consumer spending. The travel and tourism industry is the world’s largest employer with almost 130 million jobs, or almost 7 per cent of all employees. This industry is the world’s leading industrial contributor, producing over 6 per cent of the world’s national product and accounting for capital investment in excess of $422 billion in direct, indirect and personal taxes each year. Thus, tourism has a profound impact both on the world economy and, because of the educative effect of travel and the effects on employment, on society itself.D However, the major problems of the travel and tourism industry that have hidden, or obscured, its economic impact are the diversity and fragmentation of the industry itself. The travel industry includes: hotels, motels and other types of accommodation; restaurants and other food services; transportation services and facilities; amusements, attractions and other leisure facilities; gift shops and a large number of other enterprises. Since many of these businesses also serve local residents, the impact of spending by visitors can easily be overlooked or underestimated. In addition, Meis (1992) points out that the tourism industry involves concepts that have remained amorphous to both analysts and decision makers.Moreover, in all nations this problem has made it difficult for the industry to develop any type of reliable or credible tourism information base in order to estimate the contribution it makes to regional, national and global economies. However, the nature of this very diversity makes travel and tourism ideal vehicles for economic development in a wide variety of countries, regions or communities.E Once the exclusive province of the wealthy, travel and tourism have become an institutionalised way of life for most of the population. In fact, McIntosh and Goeldner (1990) suggest that tourism has become the largest commodity in international trade for many nations and, for a significant number of other countries, it ranks second or third. For example, tourism is the major source of income in Bermuda, Greece, Italy, Spain, Switzerland and most Caribbean countries. In addition, Hawkins and Ritchie, quoting from data published by the American Express Company, suggest that the travel and tourism industry is the number one ranked employer in the Bahamas, Brazil, Canada, France, (the former) West Germany, Hong Kong, Italy, Jamaica, Japan, Singapore, the United Kingdom and the United States. However, because of problems of definition, which directly affect statistical measurement, it is not possible with any degree of certainty to provide precise, valid or reliable data about the extent of world-wide tourism participation or its economic impact. In many cases, similar difficulties arise when attempts are made to measure domestic tourism.Questions 5-10Do the following statements agree with the information given in Reading Passage 1?In boxes 5-10 on your answer sheet, writeTRUE if the statement agrees with the informationFALSE if the statement contradicts the informationNOT GIVEN if there is no information on this5 The largest employment figures in the world are found in the travel and tourism industry.6 Tourism contributes over six per cent of the Australian gross national product.7 Tourism has a social impact because it promotes recreation.8 Two main features of the travel and tourism industry make its economic significance difficult to ascertain.9 Visitor spending is always greater than the spending of residents in tourist areas.10 It is easy to show statistically how tourism affects individual economies.Questions 11-13Complete the sentences below.Choose NO MORE THAN THREE WORDS from the passage for each answer.Write your answers in boxes 11-13 on your answer sheet.11 In Greece, tourism is the most important .12 The travel and tourism industry in Jamaica is the major .13 The problems associated with measuring international tourism are often reflected in the measurement of .READING PASSAGE 2You should spend about 20 minutes on Questions 14-26, which are based on Reading Passage 2 below.Autumn leavesCanadian writer Jay Ingram investigates the mystery of why leaves turn red in the fallA One of the most captivating natural events of the year inmany areas throughout North America is the turning of the leaves in the fall. The colours are magnificent, but the question of exactly why some trees turn yellow or orange, and others red or purple, is something which has long puzzled scientists.B Summer leaves are green because they are full of chlorophyll, the molecule that captures sunlight and converts that energy into new building materials for the tree. As fall approaches in the northern hemisphere, the amount of solar energy available declines considerably. For many trees —evergreen conifers being an exception — the best strategy is to abandon photosynthesis_until the spring. So rather than maintaining the now redundant leaves throughout the winter, the tree saves its precious resources and discards them. But before letting its leaves go, the tree dismantles their chlorophyll molecules and ships their valuable nitrogen back into the twigs. As chlorophyll is depleted, other colours that have been dominated by it throughout the summer begin to be revealed. This unmasking explains the autumn colours of yellow and orange, but not the brilliant reds and purples of trees such as the maple or sumac.C The source of the red is widely known: it is created by anthocyanins, water-soluble plant pigments reflecting the red to blue range of the visible spectrum. They belong to a class of sugar-based chemical compounds also known as flavonoids. What’s puzzling is tha t anthocyanins are actually newly minted, made in the leaves at the same time as the tree is preparing to drop them. But it is hard to make sense of the manufacture of anthocyanins — why should a tree bother making new chemicals in its leaves when it’s alr eady scrambling to withdraw and preserve the ones already there?D Some theories about anthocyanins have argued that they might act as a chemical defence against attacks by insects or fungi, or that they might attract fruit-eating birds or increase a leaf’s tolerance to freezing. However there are problems with each of these theories, including the fact that leaves are red for such a relatively short period that the expense of energy needed to manufacture the anthocyanins would outweigh any anti-fungal or anti-herbivore activity achieved._photosynthesis: the production of new material from sunlight, water and carbon dioxideE It has also been proposed that trees may produce vivid red colours to convince herbivorous insects that they are healthy and robust and would be easily able to mount chemical defences against infestation. If insects paid attention to such advertisements, they might be prompted to lay their eggs on a duller, and presumably less resistant host. The flaw in this theory lies in the lack of proof to support it. No one has as yet ascertained whether more robust trees sport the brightest leaves, or whether insects make choices according to colour intensity.F Perhaps the most plausible suggestion as to why leaves would go to the trouble of maki ng anthocyanins when they’re busy packing up for the winter is the theory known as the ‘light screen’ hypothesis. It sounds paradoxical, because the idea behind this hypothesis is that the red pigment is made in autumn leaves to protect chlorophyll, the light-absorbing chemical, from too much light. Why does chlorophyll need protection when it is the natural world’s supreme light absorber? Why protect chlorophyll at a time when the tree is breaking it down to salvage as much of it as possible?G Chlorophyll, although exquisitely evolved to capture theenergy of sunlight, can sometimes be overwhelmed by it, especially in situations of drought, low temperatures, or nutrient deficiency. Moreover, the problem of oversensitivity to light is even more acute in the fall, when the leaf is busy preparing for winter by dismantling its internal machinery. The energy absorbed by the chlorophyll molecules of the unstable autumn leaf is not immediately channelled into useful products and processes, as it would be in an intact summer leaf. The weakened fall leaf then becomes vulnerable to the highly destructive effects of the oxygen created by the excited chlorophyll molecules.H Even if you had never suspected that this is what was going on when leaves turn red, there are clues out there. One is straightforward: on many trees, the leaves that are the reddest are those on the side of the tree which gets most sun. Not only that, but the red is brighter on the upper side of the leaf. It has also been recognised for decades that the best conditions for intense red colours are dry, sunny days and cool nights, conditions that nicely match those that make leaves susceptible to excess light. And finally, trees such as maples usually get much redder the more north you travel in the northern hemisphere. It’s colder there, they’re more stressed, their chlorophyll is more sensitive and it needs more sunblock.I What is still not fully understood, however, is why some trees resort to producing red pigments while others don’t bother, and simply reveal their orange or yellow hues. Do these trees have other means at their disposal to prevent overexposure to light in autumn? Their story, though not as spectacular to the eye, will surely turn out to be as subtle and as complex.Questions 14-18Reading Passage 2 has nine paragraphs, A-I.Which paragraph contains the following information?Write the correct letter, A-I, in boxes 14-18 on your answer sheet.NB You may use any letter more than once.14 a description of the substance responsible for the red colouration of leaves15 the reason why trees drop their leaves in autumn16 some evidence to confirm a theory about the purpose of the red leaves17 an explanation of the function of chlorophyll18 a suggestion that the red colouration in leaves could serve as a warning signalQuestions 19-22Complete the notes below.Choose ONE WORD ONLY from the passage for each answer.Write your answers in boxes 19-22 on your answer sheet.Why believe the ‘light screen’ hypothesis?The most vividly coloured red leaves are found on the side of the tree facing the 19 .The 20 surfaces of leaves contain the most red pigment.Red leaves are most abundant when daytime weather conditions are 21 and sunny.The intensity of the red colour of leaves increases as you go further 22 .Questions 23-25Do the following statements agree with the information given in Reading Passage 2?In boxes 23-25 on your answer sheet, writeTRUE if the statement agrees with the informationFALSE if the statement contradicts the informationNOT GIVEN if there is no information on this23 It is likely that the red pigments help to protect the leaf from freezing temperatures.24 The ‘light screen’ hypothesis would initially seem to contradict what is known about chlorophyll.25 Leaves which turn colours other than red are more likely to be damaged by sunlight.Question 26Choose the correct letter A, B, C or D.Write the correct letter in box 26 on your answer sheet.For which of the following questions does the writer offer an explanation?A why conifers remain green in winterB how leaves turn orange and yellow in autumnC how herbivorous insects choose which trees to lay their eggs inD why anthocyanins are restricted to certain treesREADING PASSAGE 3You should spend about 20 minutes on Questions 27-40, which are based on Reading Passage 3 below.Beyond the blue horizonAncient voyagers who settled the far-flung islands of the Pacific OceanAn important archaeological discovery on the island of Efate in the Pacific archipelago of Vanuatu has revealed traces of an ancient seafaring people, the distant ancestors of today’s Polynesians. The site came to light only by chance. An agricultural worker, digging in the grounds of a derelict plantation, scraped open a grave — the first of dozens in a burial ground some 3,000 years old. It is the oldest cemetery ever found in the Pacificislands, and it harbors the remains of an ancient people archaeologists call the Lapita.They were daring blue-water adventurers who used basic canoes to rove across the ocean. But they were not just explorers. They were also pioneers who carried with them everything they would need to build new lives — their livestock, taro seedlings and stone tools. Within the span of several centuries, the Lapita stretched the boundaries of their world from the jungle-clad volcanoes of Papua New Guinea to the loneliest coral outliers of Tonga.The Lapita left precious few clues about themselves, but Efate expands the volume of data available to researchers dramatically. The remains of 62 individuals have been uncovered so far, and archaeologists were also thrilled to find six complete Lapita pots. Other items included a Lapita burial urn with modeled birds arranged on the rim as though peering down at the human remains sealed inside. ‘It’s an important discovery,’ says Matthew Spriggs, professor of archaeology at the Australian National University and head of the international team digging up the site, ‘for it conclusively identifies the remains as Lapita.’DNA teased from these human remains may help answer one of the most puzzling questions in Pacific anthropology: did all Pacific islanders spring from one source or many? Was there only one outward migration from a single point in Asia, or several from different points? ‘This represents the best opportunity we’ve had yet,’ says Spriggs, ‘to find out who the Lapita actually were, where they came from, and who their closest descendants are today.’There is one stubborn question for which archaeology has yet to provide any answers: how did the Lapita accomplish theancient equivalent of a moon landing, many times over? No-one has found one of their canoes or any rigging, which could reveal how the canoes were sailed. Nor do the oral histories and traditions of later Polynesians offer any insights, for they turn into myths long before they reach as far back in time as the Lapita.‘All we can say for certain is that the Lapita had canoes that were capable of ocean voyages, and they had the ability to sail them,’ says Geoff Irwin, a professor of archaeology at the University of Auckland. Those sailing skills, he says, were developed and passed down over thousands of years by earlier mariners who worked their way through the archipelagoes of the western Pacific, making short crossings to nearby islands. The real adventure didn’t begin, however, until their Lapita descendants sailed out of sight of land, with empty horizons on every side. This must have been as difficult for them as landing on the moon is for us today. Certainly it distinguished them from their ancestors, but what gave them the courage to launch out on such risky voyages?The Lapita’s thrust into the Pacific was eastward, against the prevailing trade winds, Irwin notes. Those nagging headwinds, he argues, may have been the key to their success. ‘They could sail out for days into the unknown and assess the area, secure in the knowledge that if they didn’t find anything, they could turn about and catch a swift ride back on the trade winds. This is what would have made the whole thing work.’ Once out there, skilled seafarers would have detected abundant leads to follow to land: seabirds, coconuts and twigs carried out to sea by the tides, and the afternoon pile-up of clouds on the horizon which often indicates an island in the distance.For returning explorers, successful or not, the geography oftheir own archipelagoes would have provided a safety net. Without this to go by, overshooting their home ports, getting lost and sailing off into eternity would have been all too easy. Vanuatu, for example, stretches more than 500 miles in a northwest-southeast trend, its scores of intervisible islands forming a backstop for mariners riding the trade winds home.All this presupposes one essential detail, says Atholl Anderson, professor of prehistory at the Australian National University: the Lapita had mastered the advanced art of sailing against the wind. ‘And there’s no proof they could do any such thing,’ Anderson says. ‘There has been this assumption they did, and people have built canoes to re-create those early voyages based on that assumption. But nobody has any idea what their canoes looked like or how they were rigged.’Rather than give all the credit to human skill, Anderson invokes the winds of chance. El Nino, the same climate disruption that affects the Pacific today, may have helped scatter the Lapita, Anderson suggests. He points out that climate data obtained from slow-growing corals around the Pacific indicate a series of unusually frequent El Ninos around the time of the Lapita expansion. By reversing the regular east-to-west flow of the trade winds for weeks at a time, these ‘super El Ninos’ might have taken the Lapita on long unplanned voyages.However they did it, the Lapita spread themselves a third of the way across the Pacific, then called it quits for reasons known only to them. Ahead lay the vast emptiness of the central Pacific and perhaps they were too thinly stretched to venture farther. They probably never numbered more than a few thousand in total, and in their rapid migration eastward they encountered hundreds of islands — more than 300 in Fiji alone.Questions 27-31Complete the summary using the list of words and phrases, A-J, below.Write the correct letter, A-J, in boxes 27-31 on your sheet.The Efate burial siteA 3,000-year-old burial ground of a seafaring people called the Lapita has been found on an abandoned 27 on the Pacific island of Efate. The cemetery, which is a significant 28 , was uncovered accidentally by an agricultural worker.The Lapita explored and colonised many Pacific islands over several centuries. They took many things with them on their voyages including 29 and tools.The burial ground increases the amount of information about the Lapita available to scientists. A team of researchers, led by Matthew Spriggs from the Australian National University, are helping with the excavation of the site. Spriggs believes the 30 which was found at the site is very important since it confirms that the 31 found inside are Lapita.A proofB plantationC harbourD bonesE dataF archaeological discoveryG burial urnH sourceI animalsJ mapsQuestions 32-35Choose the correct letter, A. B, C or D.Write the correct letter in boxes 32-35 on your answer sheet.32 According to the writer, there are difficulties explaining how the Lapita accomplished their journeys becauseA the canoes that have been discovered offer relatively few clues.B archaeologists have shown limited interest in this area of research.C little information relating to this period can be relied upon for accuracy.D technological advances have altered the way such achievements are viewed.33 According to the sixth paragraph, what was extraordinary about the Lapita?A They sailed beyond the point where land was visible.B Their cultural heritage discouraged the expression of fear.C They were able to build canoes that withstood ocean voyages.D Their navigational skills were passed on from one generation to the next.34 What does ‘This’ refer to in the seventh parag raph?A the Lapita’s seafaring talentB the Lapita’s ability to detect signs of landC the Lapita’s extensive knowledge of the regionD the Lapita’s belief they would be able to return home35 According to the eighth paragraph, how was the geography of the region significant?A It played an important role in Lapita culture.B It meant there were relatively few storms at sea.C It provided a navigational aid for the Lapita.D It made a large number of islands habitable.Questions 36-40Do the following statements agree with the views of the writer in Reading Passage 3?In boxes 36-40 on your answer sheet, writeYES if the statement agrees with the views of the writerNO if the statement contradicts the views of the writerNOT GIVEN if it is impossible to say what the writer thinks about this36 It is now clear that the Lapita could sail into a prevailing wind.37 Extreme climate conditions may have played a role in Lapita migration.38 The Lapita learnt to predict the duration of El Ninos.39 It remains unclear why the Lapita halted their expansion across the Pacific.40 It is likely that the majority of Lapita settled on Fiji.剑桥雅思阅读10原文参考译文(test3)Passage 1参考译文:旅游的背景,意义和范畴A. 自从上帝创造了万物以来,旅行就已经存在了:那时原始人启程,常常穿越很远的距离搜寻猎物,这些猎物提供了生存所必需的食物以及衣物。

剑桥雅思阅读9(test1)原文答案解析

剑桥雅思阅读9(test1)原文答案解析

剑桥雅思阅读9(test1)原文答案解析雅思阅读部分的真题资料,同学们需要进行一些细致的总结,比如说解析其实就是很重要的内容,接下来就是店铺给同学们带来的关于剑桥雅思阅读9原文解析(test1)的内容,一起来详细的分析一下吧,希望对你们的备考有所帮助。

剑桥雅思阅读9原文(test1)READING PASSAGE 1You should spend about 20 minutes on Questions 1-13, which are based on Reading Passage 1 below.William Henry PerkinThe man who invented synthetic dyesWilliam Henry Perkin was born on March 12, 1838, in London, England. As a boy, Perkin’s curiosity prompted early intere sts in the arts, sciences, photography, and engineering. But it was a chance stumbling upon a run-down, yet functional, laboratory in his late grandfather’s home that solidified the young man’s enthusiasm for chemistry.As a student at the City of London School, Perkin became immersed in the study of chemistry. His talent and devotion to the subject were perceived by his teacher, Thomas Hall, who encouraged him to attend a series of lectures given by the eminent scientist Michael Faraday at the Royal Institution. Those speeches fired the young chemist’s enthusiasm further, and he later went on to attend the Royal College of Chemistry, which he succeeded in entering in 1853, at the age of 15.At the time of Perkin’s enrolment, the Royal College of Chemistry was headed by the noted German chemist August Wilhelm Hofmann. Perkin’s scientific gifts soon caught Hofmann’s attention and, within two years, he becameHofmann’s youngest assistant. Not long after that, Perkin made the scientific breakthrough that would bring him both fame and fortune.At the time, quinine was the only viable medical treatment for malaria. The drug is derived from the bark of the cinchona tree, native to South America, and by 1856 demand for the drug was surpassing the available supply. Thus, when Hofmann made some passing comments about the desirability of a synthetic substitute for quinine, it was unsurprising that his star pupil was moved to take up the challenge.During his vacation in 1856, Perkin spent his time in the laboratory on th e top floor of his family’s house. He was attempting to manufacture quinine from aniline, an inexpensive and readily available coal tar waste product. Despite his best efforts, however, he did not end up with quinine. Instead, he produced a mysterious dark sludge. Luckily, Perkin’s scientific training and nature prompted him to investigate the substance further. Incorporating potassium dichromate and alcohol into the aniline at various stages of the experimental process, he finally produced a deep purple solution. And, proving the truth of the famous scientist Louis Pasteur’s words ‘chance favours only the prepared mind’, Perkin saw the potential of his unexpected find.Historically, textile dyes were made from such natural sources as plants and animal excretions. Some of these, such as the glandular mucus of snails, were difficult to obtain and outrageously expensive. Indeed, the purple colour extracted from a snail was once so costly in society at the time only the rich could afford it. Further, natural dyes tended to be muddy in hue and fade quickly. It was against this backdrop that Perkin’sdiscovery was made.Perkin quickly grasped that his purple solution could be used to colour fabric, thus making it the world’s first synthetic dye. Realising the importance of this breakthrough, he lost no time in patenting it. But perhaps the most fascinating of all Perkin’s reactions to his find was his nearly instant recognition that the new dye had commercial possibilities.Perkin originally named his dye Tyrian Purple, but it later became commonly known as mauve (from the French for the plant used to make the colour violet). He asked advice of Scottish dye works owner Robert Pullar, who assured him that manufacturing the dye would be well worth it if the colour remained fast (i.e. would not fade) and the cost was relatively low. So, over the fierce objections of his mentor Hofmann, he left college to give birth to the modern chemical industry.With the help of his father and brother, Perkin set up a factory not far from London. Utilising the cheap and plentiful coal tar that was an almost unlimited byproduct of London’s gas street lighting, the dye works began producing the world’s first synthetically dyed material in 1857. The company received a commercial boost from the Empress Eugenie of France, when she decided the new colour flattered her. Very soon, mauve was the necessary shade for all the fashionable ladies in that country. Not to be outdone, England’s Queen Victoria also appeared in public wearing a mauve gown, thus making it all the rage in England as well. The dye was bold and fast, and the public clamoured for more. Perkin went back to the drawing board.Although Perkin’s fame was achieved and fortune assured by his first discovery, the chemist continued his research. Among other dyes he developed and introduced were aniline red (1859)and aniline black (1863) and, in the late 1860s, Perkin’s green. It is important to note that Perkin’s synthetic dye discoveries had outcomes far beyond the merely decorative. The dyes also became vital to medical research in many ways. For instance, they were used to stain previously invisible microbes and bacteria, allowing researchers to identify such bacilli as tuberculosis, cholera, and anthrax. Artificial dyes continue to play a crucial role today. And, in what would have been particularly pleasing to Perkin, their current use is in the search for a vaccine against malaria.Questions 1-7Do the following statements agree with the information given in Reading Passage 1?In boxes 1-7 on your answer sheet, writeTRUE if the statement agrees with the informationFALSE if the statement contradicts the informationNOT GIVEN if there is no information on this1 Michael Faraday was the first person to recognise Perkin’s ability as a student of chemistry.2 Michael Faraday suggested Perkin should enrol in the Royal College of Chemistry.3 Perkin employed August Wilhelm Hofmann as his assistant.4 Perkin was still young when he made the discovery that made him rich and famous.5 The trees from which quinine is derived grow only in South America.6 Perkin hoped to manufacture a drug from a coal tar waste product.7 Perkin was inspired by the discoveries of the famous scientist Louis Pasteur.Questions 8-13Answer the questions below.Choose NO MORE THAN TWO WORDS from the passage for each answer.Write your answers in boxes 8-13 on your answer sheet.8 Before Perkin’s discovery, with what group in society was the colour purple associated?9 What potential did Perkin immediately understand that his new dye had?10 What was the name finally used to refer to the first colour Perkin invented?11 What was the name of the person Perkin consulted before setting up his own dye works?12 In what country did Perkin’s newly invented colour first become fashionable?13 According to the passage, which disease is now being targeted by researchers using synthetic dyes?READING PASSAGE 2You should spend about 20 minutes on Questions 14-26, which are based on Reading Passage 2 on the following pages.Questions 14-17Reading Passage 2 has five paragraphs, A-E.Choose the correct heading for paragraphs B-E from the list of headings below.Write the correct number, i-vii, in boxes 14-17 on your answer sheet.List of Headingsi Seeking the transmission of radio signals from planetsii Appropriate responses to signals from other civilisations iii Vast distances to Earth’s closest neighboursiv Assumptions underlying the search for extra-terrestrial intelligencev Reasons for the search for extra-terrestrial intelligencevi Knowledge of extra-terrestrial life formsvii Likelihood of life on other planetsExample AnswerParagraph A v14 Paragraph B15 Paragraph C16 Paragraph D17 Paragraph EIS THERE ANYBODY OUT THERE?The Search for Extra-terrestrial IntelligenceThe question of whether we are alone in the Universe has haunted humanity for centuries, but we may now stand poised on the brink of the answer to that question, as we search for radio signals from other intelligent civilisations. This search, often known by the acronym SETI (search for extra-terrestrial intelligence), is a difficult one. Although groups around the world have been searching intermittently for three decades, it is only now that we have reached the level of technology where we can make a determined attempt to search all nearby stars for any sign of life.AThe primary reason for the search is basic curiosity hethe same curiosity about the natural world that drives all pure science. We want to know whether we are alone in the Universe. We want to know whether life evolves naturally if given the right conditions, or whether there is something very special about the Earth to have fostered the variety of life forms that, we seearound us on the planet. The simple detection of a radio signal will be sufficient to answer this most basic of all questions. In this sense, SETI is another cog in the machinery of pure science which is continually pushing out the horizon of our knowledge. However, there are other reasons for being interested in whether life exists elsewhere. For example, we have had civilisation on Earth for perhaps only a few thousand years, and the threats of nuclear war and pollution over the last few decades have told us that our survival may be tenuous. Will we last another two thousand years or will we wipe ourselves out? Since the lifetime of a planet like ours is several billion years, we can expect that, if other civilisations do survive in our galaxy, their ages will range from zero to several billion years. Thus any other civilisation that we hear from is likely to be far older, on average, than ourselves. The mere existence of such a civilisation will tell us that long-term survival is possible, and gives us some cause for optimism. It is even possible that the older civilisation may pass on the benefits of their experience in dealing with threats to survival such as nuclear war and global pollution, and other threats that we haven’t yet discovered.BIn discussing whether we are alone, most SETI scientists adopt two ground rules. First, UFOs (Unidentified Flying Objects) are generally ignored since most scientists don’t consider the evidence for them to be strong enough to bear serious consideration (although it is also important to keep an open mind in case any really convincing evidence emerges in the future). Second, we make a very conservative assumption that we are looking for a life form that is pretty well like us, since if it differs radically from us we may well not recognise it as a life form,quite apart from whether we are able to communicate with it. In other words, the life form we are looking for may well have two green heads and seven fingers, but it will nevertheless resemble us in that it should communicate with its fellows, be interested in the Universe, live on a planet orbiting a star like our Sun, and perhaps most restrictively, have a chemistry, like us, based on carbon and water.CEven when we make these assumptions, our understanding of other life forms is still severely limited. We do not even know, for example, how many stars have planets, and we certainly do not know how likely it is that life will arise naturally, given the right conditions. However, when we look at the 100 billion stars in our galaxy (the Milky Way), and 100 billion galaxies in the observable Universe, it seems inconceivable that at least one of these planets does not have a life form on it; in fact, the best educated guess we can make, using the little that we do know about the conditions for carbon-based life, leads us to estimate that perhaps one in 100,000 stars might have a life-bearing planet orbiting it. That means that our nearest neighbours are perhaps 100 light years away, which is almost next door in astronomical terms.DAn alien civilistation could choose many different ways of sending information across the galaxy, but many of these either require too much energy, or else are severely attenuated while traversing the vast distances across the galaxy. It turns out that, for a given amount of transmitted power, radio waves in the frequency range 1000 to 3000 MHz travel the greatest distance, and so all searches to date have concentrated on looking forradio waves in this frequency range. So far there have been a number of searches by various groups around the world, including Australian searches using the radio telescope at Parkes, New South Wales. Until now there have not been any detections from the few hundred stars which have been searched. The scale of the searches has been increased dramatically since 1992, when the US Congress voted NASA $10 million per year for ten years to conduct, a thorough search for extra-terrestrial life. Much of the money in this project is being spent on developing the special hardware needed to search many frequencies at once. The project has two parts. One part is a targeted search using the world’s largest radio telescopes, the American-operated telescope in Arecibo, Puerto Rico and the French telescope in Nancy in France. This part of the project is searching the nearest 1000 likely stars with high sensitivity for signals in the frequency rang 1000 to 3000 MHz. The other part of the project is an undirected search which is monitoring all of space with a lower sensitivity, using the smaller antennas of NASA’s Deep Space Network.EThere is considerable debate over how we should react if we detect a signal from an alien civilisation. Everybody agrees that we should not reply immediately. Quite apart from the impracticality of sending a reply over such large distances at short notice, it raises a host of ethical questions that would have to be addressed by the global community before any reply could be sent. Would the human race face the culture shock if faced with a superior and much older civilisation? Luckily, there is no urgency about this. The stars being searched are hundreds of light years away, so it takes hundreds of years for their signal toreach us, and a further few hundred years for our reply to reach them. It’s not important, then, if there’s a delay of a few years, or decades, while the human race debates the question of whether to reply, and perhaps carefully drafts a reply.Questions 18-20Answer the questions below.Choose NO MORE THAN THREE WORDS AND/OR A NUMBER from the passage for each answer.Write your answers in boxes 18-20 on your answer sheet.18 What is the life expectancy of Earth?19 What kind of signals from other intelligent civilisations are SETI scientists searching for?20 How many stars are the world’s most powerful radio telescopes searching?Questions 21-26Do the following statements agree with the views of the writer in Reading Passage 2?In boxes 21-26 on your answer sheet, writeYES if the statement agrees with the views of the writerNO if the statement contradicts the views of the writerNOT GIVEN if it is impossible to say what the writer thinks about this21 Alien civilisations may be able to help the human race to overcome serious problems.22 SETI scientists are trying to find a life form that resembles humans in many ways.23 The Americans and Australians have co-operated on joint research projects.24 So far SETI scientists have picked up radio signals from several stars.25 The NASA project attracted criticism from some members of Congress.26 If a signal from outer space is received, it will be important to respond promptly.READING PASSAGE 3You should spend about 20 minutes on Questions 27-40, which are based on Reading Passage 3 below.The history of the tortoiseIf you go back far enough, everything lived in the sea. At various points in evolutionary history, enterprising individuals within many different animal groups moved out onto the land, sometimes even to the most parched deserts, taking their own private seawater with them in blood and cellular fluids. In addition to the reptiles, birds, mammals and insects which we see all around us, other groups that have succeeded out of water include scorpions, snails, crustaceans such as woodlice and land crabs, millipedes and centipedes, spiders and various worms. And we mustn’t forget the pla nts, without whose prior invasion of the land none of the other migrations could have happened.Moving from water to land involved a major redesign of every aspect of life, including breathing and reproduction. Nevertheless, a good number of thorough going land animals later turned around, abandoned their hard-earned terrestrial re-tooling, and returned to the water again. Seals have only gone part way back. They show us what the intermediates might have been like, on the way to extreme cases such as whales and dugongs. Whales (including the small whales we call dolphins) and dugongs, with their close cousins the manatees, ceased to be land creatures altogether and reverted to the full marine habits of their remote ancestors. They don’t even come ashoreto breed. They do, however, still breathe air, having never developed anything equivalent to the gills of their earlier marine incarnation. Turtles went back to the sea a very long time ago and, like all vertebrate returnees to the water, they breathe air. However, they are, in one respect, less fully given back to the water than whales or dugongs, for turtles still lay their eggs on beaches.There is evidence that all modern turtles are descended from a terrestrial ancestor which lived before most of the dinosaurs. There are two key fossils called Proganochelys quenstedti and Plaeochersis talampayensis dating from early dinosaur times, which appear to be close to the ancestry of all modern turtles and tortoises. You might wonder how we can tell whether fossil animals lived on land or in water, especially if only fragments are found. Sometimes it’s obvious. Ichthyosaurs were reptilian contemporaries of the dinosaurs, with fins and streamlined bodies. The fossils look like dolphins and they surely lived like dolphins, in the water. With turtles it is a little less obvious. One way to tell is by measuring the bones of their forelimbs.Walter Joyce and Jacques Gauthier, at Yale University, obtained three measurements in these particular bones of 71 species of living turtles and tortoises. They used a kind of triangular graph paper to plot the three measurements against one another. All the land tortoise species formed a tight cluster of points in the upper part of the triangle; all the water turtles cluster in the lower part of the triangular graph. There was no overlap, except when they added some species that spend time both in water and on land. Sure enough, these amphibious species show up on the triangular graph approximately half way between the ‘wet cluster’ of sea turtles and the ‘dry cluster’of land tortoises. The next step was to determine where the fossils fell. The bones of P. quenstedti and P. talampayensis leave us in no doubt. Their points on the graph are right in the thick of the dry cluster. Both these fossils were dry-land tortoises. They come from the era before our turtles returned to the water.You might think, therefore, that modern land tortoises have probably stayed on land ever since those early terrestrial times, as most mammals did after a few of them went back to the sea. But apparently not. If you draw out the family three of all modern turtles and tortoises, nearly all the branches are aquatic. Today’s land tortoises constitute a single branch, deeply nested among branches consisting of aquatic turtles. This suggests that modern land tortoises have not stayed on land continuously since the time of P. quenstedti and P. talampayensis. Rather, their ancestors were among those who went back to the water, and they then reemerged back onto the land in (relatively) more recent times.Tortoises therefore represent a remarkable double return. In common with all mammals, reptiles and birds, their remote ancestors were marine fish and before that various more or less worm-like creatures stretching back, still in the sea, to the primeval bacteria. Later ancestors lived on land and stayed there for a very large number of generations. Later ancestors still evolved back into the water and became sea turtles. And finally they returned yet again to the land as tortoises, some of which now live in the driest of deserts.Questions 27-30Answer the questions below.Choose NO MORE THAN TWO WORDS from the passage for each answer.Write your answers in boxes 27-30 on your answer sheet.27 What had to transfer from sea to land before any animals could migrate?28 Which TWO processes are mentioned as those in which animals had to make big changes as they moved onto lands?29 Which physical feature, possessed by their ancestors, do whales lack?30 which animals might ichthyosaurs have resembled?Questions 31-33Do the following statements agree with the information given in Reading Passage 3?In boxes 31-33 on your answer sheet, writeTRUE if the statement agrees with the informationFALSE if the statement contradicts the informationNOT GIVEN if there is no information on this31 Turtles were among the first group of animals to migrate back to the sea.32 It is always difficult to determine where an animal lived when its fossilised remains are incomplete.33 The habitat of ichthyosaurs can be determined by the appearance of their fossilised remains.Questions 34-39Complete the flow-chart below.Choose NO MORE THAN TWO WORDS AND/OR A NUMBER from the passage for each answer.Write your answers in boxes 34-39 on your answer sheet.Method of determining where the ancestors of turtles and tortoises come fromStep 171 species of living turtles and tortoises were examined anda total of 34 ……………………. were taken from the bones of theirforelimbs.Step 2The data was recorded on a 35 ……………….. (necessary for comparing the information).Outcome: Land tortoises were represented by a dense 36 …………………………… of points towards the top.Sea turtles were grouped together in the bottom part.Step 3The same data was collected from some living 37 ………………. species and added to the other results.Outcome: The points for these species turned out to be positioned about 38 ……………… up the triangle between the land tortoises and the sea turtles.Step 4Bones of P. quenstedti and P. talampayensis were examined in a similar way and the results added.Outcome: The position of the points indicated that both these ancient creatures were 39…………..Question 40Choose the correct letter, A, B, C or D.Write the correct letter in box 40 on your answer sheet.According to the writer, the most significant thing about tortoises is thatA they are able to adapt to life in extremely dry environments.B their original life form was a kind of primeval bacteria.C they have so much in common with sea turtles.D they have made the transition from sea to land more than once.剑桥雅思阅读9原文参考译文(test1)PASSAGE 1参考译文:William Henry Perkin 合成染料的发明者Wiliam Henry Perkin于1838年3月12日出生于英国伦敦。

剑桥雅思阅读4test1原文翻译及答案解析

剑桥雅思阅读4test1原文翻译及答案解析

剑桥雅思阅读4test1原文翻译及答案解析雅思阅读是块难啃的硬骨头,需要我们做更多的题目才能得心应手。

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剑桥雅思阅读4原文(test1)READING PASSAGE 1You should spend about 20 minutes on Questions 1-14 which are based on Reading Passage 1 below.Adults and children are frequently confronted with statements about the alarming rate of loss of tropical rainforests. For example, one graphic illustration to which children might readily relate is the estimate that rainforests are being destroyed at a rate equivalent to one thousand football fields every forty minutes — about the duration of a normal classroom period. In the face of the frequent and often vivid media coverage, it is likely that children will have formed ideas about rainforests —what and where they are, why they are important, what endangers them — independent of any formal tuition. It is also possible that some of these ideas will be mistaken.Many studies have shown that children harbour misconceptions about ‘pure’, curriculum science. These misconceptions do not remain isolated but become incorporated into a multifaceted, but organised, conceptual framework, making it and the component ideas, some of which are erroneous, more robust but also accessible to modification. These ideas may be developed by children absorbing ideas through the popular media. Sometimes this information may be erroneous. It seems schools may not be providing an opportunity for children to re-express their ideas and so have them tested and refined byteachers and their peers.Despite the extensive coverage in the popular media of the destruction of rainforests, little formal information is available about children’s ideas in this area. The aim of the present study is to start to provide such information, to help teachers design their educational strategies to build upon correct ideas and to displace misconceptions and to plan programmes in environmental studies in their schools.The study surveys children’s scientific knowledge and attitudes to rainforests. Secondary school children were asked to complete a questionnaire containing five open-form questions. The most frequent responses to the first question were descriptions which are self-evident from the term ‘rainforest’. Some children described them as damp, wet or hot. The second question concerned the geographical location of rainforests. The commonest responses were continents or countries: Africa (given by 43% of children), South America (30%), Brazil (25%). Some children also gave more general locations, such as being near the Equator.Responses to question three concerned the importance of rainforests. The dominant idea, raised by 64% of the pupils, was that rainforests provide animals with habitats. Fewer students responded that rainforests provide plant habitats, and even fewer mentioned the indigenous populations of rainforests. More girls (70%) than boys (60%) raised the idea of rainforest as animal habitats.Similarly, but at a lower level, more girls (13%) than boys (5%) said that rainforests provided human habitats. These observations are generally consistent with our previous studies of pupils’ views about the use and conservation of rainforests,in which girls were shown to be more sympathetic to animals and expressed views which seem to place an intrinsic value on non-human animal life.The fourth question concerned the causes of the destruction of rainforests. Perhaps encouragingly, more than half of the pupils (59%) identified that it is human activities which are destroying rainforests, some personalising the responsibility by the use of terms such as ‘we are’. About 18% of the pupils referred specifically to logging activity.One misconception, expressed by some 10% of the pupils, was that acid rain is responsible for rainforest destruction; a similar proportion said that pollution is destroying rainforests. Here, children are confusing rainforest destruction with damage to the forests of Western Europe by these factors. While two fifths of the students provided the information that the rainforests provide oxygen, in some cases this response also embraced the misconception that rainforest destruction would reduce atmospheric oxygen, making the atmosphere incompatible with human life on Earth.In answer to the final question about the importance of rainforest conservation, the majority of children simply said that we need rainforests to survive. Only a few of the pupils (6%) mentioned that rainforest destruction may contribute to global warming. This is surprising considering the high level of media coverage on this issue. Some children expressed the idea that the conservation of rainforests is not important.The results of this study suggest that certain ideas predominate in the thinking of children about rainforests. Pupils’responses indicate some misconceptions in basic scientific knowledge of rainforests’ ecosystems such as their ideas aboutrainforests as habitats for animals, plants and humans and the relationship between climatic change and destruction of rainforests.Pupils did not volunteer ideas that suggested that they appreciated the complexity of causes of rainforest destruction. In other words, they gave no indication of an appreciation of either the range of ways in which rainforests are important or the complex social, economic and political factors which drive the activities which are destroying the rainforests. One encouragement is that the results of similar studies about other environmental issues suggest that older children seem to acquire the ability to appreciate, value and evaluate conflicting views. Environmental education offers an arena in which these skills can be developed, which is essential for these children as future decision-makers.Questions 1-8Do the following statements agree with the information given in Reading Passage 1?In boxes 1-8 on your answer sheet writeTRUE if the statement agrees with the informationFALSE if the statement contradicts the informationNOT GIVEN if there is no information on this1 The plight of the rainforests has largely been ignored by the media.2 Children only accept opinions on rainforests that they encounter in their classrooms.3 It has been suggested that children hold mistaken views about the ‘pure’ science that they study at school.4 The fact that children’s ideas about science form part ofa larger framework of ideas means that it is easier to changethem.5 The study involved asking children a number of yes/no questions such as ‘Are there any rainforests in Africa?’6 Girls are more likely than boys to hold mistaken views about the rainforests’ destruction.7 The study reported here follows on from a series of studies that have looked at children’s understanding of rainforests.8 A second study has been planned to investigate primary school children’s ideas about rainforests.Questions 9-13The box below gives a list of responses A-P to the questionnaire discussed in Reading Passage 1.Answer the following questions by choosing the correct responses A-P.Write your answers in boxes 9-13 on your answer sheet.9 What was the children’s most frequent response when asked where the rainforests were?10 What was the most common response to the question about the importance of the rainforests?11 What did most children give as the reason for the loss of the rainforests?12 Why did most children think it important for the rainforests to be protected?13 Which of the responses is cited as unexpectedly uncommon, given the amount of time spent on the issue by the newspapers and television?A There is a complicated combination of reasons for the loss of the rainforests.B The rainforests are being destroyed by the same things that are destroying the forests of Western Europe.C Rainforests are located near the Equator.D Brazil is home to the rainforests.E Without rainforests some animals would have nowhere to live.F Rainforests are important habitats for a lot of plants.G People are responsible for the loss of the rainforests.H The rainforests are a source of oxygen.I Rainforests are of consequence for a number of different reasons.J As the rainforests are destroyed, the world gets warmer.K Without rainforests there would not be enough oxygen in the air.L There are people for whom the rainforests are home.M Rainforests are found in Africa.N Rainforests are not really important to human life.O The destruction of the rainforests is the direct result of logging activity.P Humans depend on the rainforests for their continuing existence.Question 14Choose the correct letter, A, B, C, D or E.Write your answer in box 14 on your answer sheet.Which of the following is the most suitable title for Reading Passage 1?A The development of a programme in environmental studies within a science curriculumB Children’s ideas about the rainforests and the implications for course designC The extent to which children have been misled by the media concerning the rainforestsD How to collect, collate and describe the ideas of secondary school children.E The importance of the rainforests and the reasons for their destructionREADING PASSAGE 2You should spend about 20 minutes on Questions 15-26 which are based on Reading Passage 2 below.What Do Whales Feel?An examination of the functioning of the senses in cetaceans, the group of mammals comprising whales, dolphins and porpoisesSome of the senses that we and other terrestrial mammals take for granted are either reduced or absent in cetaceans or fail to function well in water. For example, it appears from their brain structure that toothed species are unable to smell. Baleen species, on the other hand, appear to have some related brain structures but it is not known whether these are functional. It has been speculated that, as the blowholes evolved and migrated to the top of the head, the neural pathways serving sense of smell may have been nearly all sacrificed. Similarly, although at least some cetaceans have taste buds, the nerves serving these have degenerated or are rudimentary.The sense of touch has sometimes been described as weak too, but this view is probably mistaken. Trainers of captive dolphins and small whales often remark on their animals’responsiveness to being touched or rubbed, and both captive and free-ranging cetacean individuals of all species (particularly adults and calves, or members of the same subgroup) appear to make frequent contact. This contact may help to maintain order within a group, and stroking or touching are part of the courtshipritual in most species. The area around the blowhole is also particularly sensitive and captive animals often object strongly to being touched there.The sense of vision is developed to different degree in different species. Baleen species studied at close quarters underwater — specifically a grey whale calf in captivity for a year, and free-ranging right whale and humpback whales studied and filmed off Argentina and Hawaii —have obviously tracked objects with vision underwater, and they can apparently see moderately well both in water and in air. However, the position of the eyes so restricts the field of vision in baleen whales that they probably do not have stereoscopic vision.On the other hand, the position of the eyes in most dolphins and porpoises suggests that they have stereoscopic vision forward and downward. Eye position in freshwater dolphins, which often swim on their side or upside down while feeding, suggests that what vision they have is stereoscopic forward and upward. By comparison, the bottlenose dolphin has extremely keen vision in water. Judging from the way it watches and tracks airborne flying fish, it can apparently see fairly well through the air-water interface as well. And although preliminary experimental evidence suggests that their in-air vision is poor, the accuracy with which dolphins leap high to take small fish out of a trainer’s hand provides anecdotal evidence to the contrary.Such variation can no doubt be explained with reference to the habitats in which individual species have developed. For example, vision is obviously more useful to species inhabiting clear open waters than to those living in turbid rivers and flooded plains. The South American boutu and Chinese Beiji, for instance, appear to have very limited vision, and the Indian susus are blind,their eyes reduced to slits that probably allow them to sense only the direction and intensity of light.Although the senses of taste and smell appear to have deteriorated, and vision in water appears to be uncertain, such weaknesses are more than compensated for by cetaceans’ well-developed acoustic sense. Most species are highly vocal, although they vary in the range of sounds they produce, and many forage for food using echolocation1. Large baleen whales primarily use the lower frequencies and are often limited in their repertoire. Notable exceptions are the nearly song-like choruses of bowhead whales in summer and the complex, haunting utterances of the humpback whales. Toothed species in general employ more of the frequency spectrum, and produce a wider variety of sounds, than baleen species (though the sperm whale apparently produces a monotonous series of high-energy clicks and little else). Some of the more complicated sounds are clearly communicative, although what role they may play in the social life and ‘culture’ of cetaceans has been more the subject of wild speculation than of solid science.1. echolocation: the perception of objects by means of sound wave echoes.Questions 15-21Complete the table below.Choose NO MORE THAN THREE WORDS from Reading Passage 2 for each answer.Write your answers in boxes 15-21 on your answer sheet.SENSE SPECIES ABILITY COMMENTSSmell toothed no evidence from brain structurebaleen not certain related brain structures are presentTaste some types poor nerves linked to their 15………areunderdevelopedTouch all yes region around the blowhole very sensitiveVision 16……… yes probably do not have stereoscopic vision Dolphins, porpoises yes probably have stereoscopic vision 17………and………18………yes probably have stereoscopic vision forward and upward Bottlenose dolphins yes exceptional in 19………and good in air-water interfaceBoutu and beiji poor have limited visionIndian susu no probably only sense direction and intensity of lightHearing most large baleen yes usually use 20………; repertoire limited21………whales and ………whalesyes song-likeToothed yes use more of frequency spectrum; have wider repertoireQuestions 22-26Answer the questions below using NO MORE THAN THREE WORDS from the passage for each answer.Write your answers in boxes 22-26 on your answer sheet.22 Which of the senses is described here as being involved in mating?23 What species swims upside down while eating?24 What can bottlenose dolphins follow from under the water?25 Which type of habitat is related to good visual ability?26 Which of the senses is best developed in cetaceans?READING PASSAGE 3You should spend about 20 minutes on Questions 27-40 which are based on Reading Passage 3 below.Visual Symbols and the BlindPart 1From a number of recent studies, it has become clear that blind people can appreciate the use of outlines and perspectives to describe the arrangement of objects and other surfaces in space. But pictures are more than literal representations. This fact was drawn to my attention dramatically when a blind woman in one of my investigations decided on her own initiative to draw a wheel as it was spinning. To show this motion, she traced a curve inside the circle (Fig. 1). I was taken aback. Lines of motion, such as the one she used, are a very recent invention in the history of illustration. Indeed, as art scholar David Kunzle notes, Wilhelm Busch, a trend-setting nineteenth-century cartoonist, used virtually no motion lines in his popular figures until about 1877.When I asked several other blind study subjects to draw a spinning wheel, one particularly clever rendition appeared repeatedly: several subjects showed the wheel’s spokes as curved lines. When asked about these curves, they all described them as metaphorical ways of suggesting motion. Majority rule would argue that this device somehow indicated motion very well. But was it a better indicator than, say, broken or wavy lines — or any other kind of line, for that matter? The answer was not clear. So I decided to test whether various lines of motion were apt ways of showing movement or if they were merely idiosyncratic marks. Moreover, I wanted to discover whether there were differences in how the blind and the sighted interpreted lines of motion.To search out these answers, I created raised-line drawingsof five different wheels, depicting spokes with lines that curved, bent, waved, dashed and extended beyond the perimeter of the wheel. I then asked eighteen blind volunteers to feel the wheels and assign one of the following motions to each wheel: wobbling, spinning fast, spinning steadily, jerking or braking. My control group consisted of eighteen sighted undergraduates from the University of Toronto.All but one of the blind subjects assigned distinctive motions to each wheel. Most guessed that the curved spokes indicated that the wheel was spinning steadily; the wavy spokes, they thought, suggested that the wheel was wobbling; and the bent spokes were taken as a sign that the wheel was jerking. Subjects assumed that spokes extending beyond the wheel’s perimeter signified that the wheel had its brakes on and that dashed spokes indicated the wheel was spinning quickly.In addition, the favoured description for the sighted was the favoured description for the blind in every instance. What is more, the consensus among the sighted was barely higher than that among the blind. Because motion devices are unfamiliar to the blind, the task I gave them involved some problem solving. Evidently, however, the blind not only figured out meanings for each line of motion, but as a group they generally came up with the same meaning at least as frequently as did sighted subjects.Part 2Words associated Agreementwith circle/square amongsubjects (%)SOFT-HARD 100MOTHER-FATHER 94HAPPY-SAD 94GOOD-EVIL 89LOVE-HATE 89ALIVE-DEAD 87BRIGHT-DARK 87LIGHT-HEAVY 85WARM-COLD 81SUMMER-WINTER 81WEAK-STRONG 79FAST-SLOW 79CAT-DOG 74SPRING-FALL 74QUIET-LOUD 62WALKING-STANDING 62ODD-EVEN 57FAR-NEAR 53PLANT-ANIMAL 53DEEP-SHALLOW 51Fig. 2 Subjects were asked which word in each pair fits best with a circle and which with a square. These percentages show the level of consensus among sighted subjects.We have found that the blind understand other kinds of visual metaphors as well. One blind woman drew a picture of a child inside a heart — choosing that symbol, she said, to show that love surrounded the child. With Chang Hong Liu, a doctoral student from China, I have begun exploring how well blind people understand the symbolism behind shapes such as hearts that do not directly represent their meaning.We gave a list of twenty pairs of words to sighted subjects and asked them to pick from each pair the term that best related to a circle and the term that best related to a square. For example,we asked: What goes with soft? A circle or a square? Which shape goes with hard?All our subjects deemed the circle soft and the square hard.A full 94% ascribed happy to the circle, instead of sad. But other pairs revealed less agreement: 79% matched fast to slow and weak to strong, respectively. And only 51% linked deep to circle and shallow to square. (See Fig. 2.) When we tested four totally blind volunteers using the same list, we found that their choices closely resembled those made by the sighted subjects. One man, who had been blind since birth, scored extremely well. He made only one match differing from the consensus, assigning ‘far’to square and ‘near’ to circle. In fact, only a small majority of sighted subjects —53% —had paired far and near to the opposite partners. Thus, we concluded that the blind interpret abstract shapes as sighted people do.Questions 27-29Choose the correct letter, A, B, C or D.Write your answers in boxes 27-29 on your answer sheet.27 In the first paragraph the writer makes the point that blind people.A may be interested in studying art.B can draw outlines of different objects and surfaces.C can recognise conventions such as perspective.D can draw accurately.28 The writer was surprised because the blind womanA drew a circle on her own initiative.B did not understand what a wheel looked like.C included a symbol representing movement.D was the first person to use lines of motion.29 From the experiment described in Part 1, the writer foundthat the blind subjectsA had good understanding of symbols representing movement.B could control the movement of wheels very accurately.C worked together well as a group in solving problems.D got better results than the sighted undergraduates.Questions 30-32Look at the following diagrams (Questions 30-32), and the list of types of movement below. Match each diagram to the type of movement A-E generally assigned to it the experiment. Choose the correct letter A-E and write them in boxes 30-32 on your answer sheet.A steady spinningB jerky movementC rapid spinningD wobbling movementE use of brakesQuestions 33-39Complete the summary below using words from the box.Write your answers in boxes 33-39 on your answer sheet.NB You may use any word more than once.In the experiment described in Part 2, a set of word 33……was used to investigate whether blind and sighted people perceived the symbolism in abstract 34……in the same way. Subjects were asked which word fitted best with a circle and which with a square. From the 35… volunteers, everyone thought a circle fitted ‘soft’ while a square fitted ‘hard’.However, only 51% of the 36…… volunteers assigned a circle to 37…… . When the test was later repeated with 38…… volunteers, it was found that they made 39…… choices.associations blind deep hardhundred identical pairs shapessighted similar shallow softwordsQuestion 40Choose the correct letter, A, B, C, or D.Write your answer in box 40 on your answer sheet.Which of the following statements best summarises the writer’s general conclusion?A The blind represent some aspects of reality differently from sighted people.B The blind comprehend visual metaphors in similar ways to sighted people.C The blind may create unusual and effective symbols to represent reality.D The blind may be successful artists if given the right training.剑桥雅思阅读4原文参考译文(test1)Passage1参考译文Adults and children are frequently confronted with statements about the alarming rate of loss of tropical rainforests. For example, one graphic illustration to which children might readily relate is the estimate that rainforests are being destroyed at a rate equivalent to one thousand football fields every forty minutes — about the duration of a normal classroom period. In the face of the frequent and often vivid media coverage, it is likely that children will have formed ideas about rainforests —what and where they are, why they are important, what endangers them — independent of any formal tuition. It is also possible thatsome of these ideas will be mistaken.无论大人还是孩子都经常会遇到这样的报道,那就是热带雨林正在以惊人的速度消失。

剑桥雅思阅读11真题及答案解析(test3)

剑桥雅思阅读11真题及答案解析(test3)

剑桥雅思阅读11真题及答案解析(test3)雅思阅读部分一直都是中国考生比较重视的题目,并且也是很有难度的题目,针对于雅思阅读真题资料也是大家需要重点分析的。

今天小编就给大家带来了关于剑桥雅思阅读11原文参考译文以及答案(test3)的内容,一起来分析一下吧。

剑桥雅思阅读11原文(test3)READING PASSAGE 1You should spend about 20 minutes on Questions 1-13, which are based on Reading Passage 1 below.THE STORY OF SILKThe history of the world’s most luxurious fabric, from ancient China to the present daySilk is a fine, smooth material produced from the cocoons —soft protective shells —that are made by mulberry silkworms (insect larvae). Legend has it that it was Lei Tzu, wife of the Yellow Emperor, ruler of China in about 3000 BC, who discovered silkworms. One account of the story goes that as she was taking a walk in her husband’s gardens, she discovered that silkworms were responsible for the destruction of several mulberry trees. She collected a number of cocoons and sat down to have a rest. It just so happened that while she was sipping some tea, one of the cocoons that she had collected landed in the hot tea and started to unravel into a fine thread. Lei Tzu found that she could wind this thread around her fingers. Subsequently, she persuaded her husband to allow her to rear silkworms on a grove of mulberry trees. She also devised a special reel to draw the fibres from the cocoon into a single thread so that they would be strong enough to be woven into fabric. While it is unknown just how much of this is true, it is certainly known that silk cultivationhas existed in China for several millennia.Originally, silkworm farming was solely restricted to women, and it was they who were responsible for the growing, harvesting and weaving. Silk quickly grew into a symbol of status, and originally, only royalty were entitled to have clothes made of silk. The rules were gradually relaxed over the years until finally during the Qing Dynasty (1644-1911 AD), even peasants, the lowest caste, were also entitled to wear silk. Sometime during the Han Dynasty (206 BC-220 AD), silk was so prized that it was also used as a unit of currency. Government officials were paid their salary in silk, and farmers paid their taxes in grain and silk. Silk was also used as diplomatic gifts by the emperor. Fishing lines, bowstrings, musical instruments and paper were all made using silk. The earliest indication of silk paper being used was discovered in the tomb of a noble who is estimated to have died around 168 AD.Demand for this exotic fabric eventually created the lucrative trade route now known as the Silk Road, taking silk westward and bringing gold, silver and wool to the East. It was named the Silk Road after its most precious commodity, which was considered to be worth more than gold. The Silk Road stretched over 6,000 kilometres from Eastern China to the Mediterranean Sea, following the Great Wall of China, climbing the Pamir mountain range, crossing modern-day Afghanistan and going on to the Middle East, with a major trading market in Damascus. From there, the merchandise was shipped across the Mediterranean Sea. Few merchants travelled the entire route; goods were handled mostly by a series of middlemen.With the mulberry silkworm being native to China, the country was the world’s sole producer of silk for many hundreds of years. The secret of silk-making eventually reached the rest ofthe world via the Byzantine Empire, which ruled over the Mediterranean region of southern Europe, North Africa and the Middle East during the period 330-1453 AD. According to another legend, monks working for the Byzantine emperor Justinian smuggled silkworm eggs to Constantinople (Istanbul in modern-day Turkey) in 550 AD, concealed inside hollow bamboo walking canes. The Byzantines were as secretive as the Chinese, however, and for many centuries the weaving and trading of silk fabric was a strict imperial monopoly. Then in the seventh century, the Arabs conquered Persia, capturing their magnificent silks in the process. Silk production thus spread through Africa, Sicily and Spain as the Arabs swept through these lands. Andalusia in southern Spain was Europe’s main silk-producing centre in the tenth century. By the thirteenth century, however, Italy had become Europe’s leader in silk production and export. Venetian merchants traded extensively in silk and encouraged silk growers to settle in Italy. Even now, silk processed in the province of Como in northern Italy enjoys an esteemed reputation.The nineteenth century and industrialisation saw the downfall of the European silk industry. Cheaper Japanese silk, trade in which was greatly facilitated by the opening of the Suez Canal, was one of the many factors driving the trend. Then in the twentieth century, new manmade fibres, such as nylon, started to be used in what had traditionally been silk products, such as stockings and parachutes. The two world wars, which interrupted the supply of raw material from Japan, also stifled the European silk industry. After the Second World War, Japan’s silk production was restored, with improved production and quality of raw silk. Japan was to remain the world’s biggest producer of raw silk, and practically the only major exporter of raw silk, untilthe 1970s. However, in more recent decades, China has gradually recaptured its position as the world’s biggest producer and exporter of raw silk and silk yarn. Today, around 125,000 metric tons of silk are produced in the world, and almost two thirds of that production takes place in China.Questions 1-9Complete the notes below.Choose ONE WORD ONLY from the passage for each answer.Write your answers in boxes 1-9 on your answer sheet.THE STORY OF SILKEarly silk production in ChinaAround 3000 BC, according to legend:- silkworm cocoon fell into emperor’s wife’s 1 __________- emperor’s wife invented a 2 __________ to pull out silk fibresOnly 3 __________ were allowed to produce silkOnly 4 __________ were allowed to wear silkSilk used as a form of 5 __________- e.g. farmers’ taxes consisted partly of silkSilk used for many purposes- e.g. evidence found of 6 __________ made from silk around 168 ADSilk reaches rest of worldMerchants use Silk Road to take silk westward and bring back 7 __________ and precious metals550 AD: 8 __________ hide silkworm eggs in canes and take them to ConstantinopleSilk production spreads across Middle East and Europe20th century: 9 __________ and other manmade fibres cause decline in silk productionQuestions 10-13Do the following statements agree with the information in Reading Passage 1?In boxes 10-13 on your answer sheet, writeTRUE if the statement agrees with the informationFALSE if the statement contradicts the informationNOT GIVEN if there is no information on this10 Gold was the most valuable material transported along the Silk Road.11 Most tradesmen only went along certain sections of the Silk Road.12 The Byzantines spread the practice of silk production across the West.13 Silk yarn makes up the majority of silk currently exported from China.READING PASSAGE 2You should spend about 20 minutes on Questions 14-26, which are based on Reading Passage 2 below.Great MigrationsAnimal migration, however it is defined, is far more than just the movement of animals. It can loosely be described as travel that takes place at regular intervals ?— often in an annual cycle — that may involve many members of a species, and is rewarded only after a long journey. It suggests inherited instinct. The biologist Hugh Dingle has identified five characteristics that apply, in varying degrees and combinations, to all migrations. They are prolonged movements that carry animals outside familiar habitats; they tend to be linear, not zigzaggy; they involve special behaviours concerning preparation (such as overfeeding) and arrival; they demand special allocations of energy. And onemore: migrating animals maintain an intense attentiveness to the greater mission, which keeps them undistracted by temptations and undeterred by challenges that would turn other animals aside.An arctic tern, on its 20,000 km flight from the extreme south of South America to the Arctic circle, will take no notice of a nice smelly herring offered from a bird-watcher’s boat along the way. While local gulls will dive voraciously for such handouts, the tern flies on. Why? The arctic tern resists distraction because it is driven at that moment by an instinctive sense of something we humans find admirable: larger purpose. In other words, it is determined to reach its destination. The bird senses that it can eat, rest and mate later. Right now it is totally focused on the journey; its undivided intent is arrival.Reaching some gravelly coastline in the Arctic, upon which other arctic terns have converged, will serve its larger purpose as shaped by evolution: finding a place, a time, and a set of circumstances in which it can successfully hatch and rear offspring.But migration is a complex issue, and biologists define it differently, depending in part on what sorts of animals they study. Joe! Berger, of the University of Montana, who works on the American pronghorn and other large terrestrial mammals, prefers what he calls a simple, practical definition suited to his beasts: ‘movements from a seasonal home area away to another home area and back again’. Generally the reason for such seasonal back-and-forth movement is to seek resources that aren’t available within a single area year-round.But daily vertical movements by zooplankton in the ocean —upward by night to seek food, downward by day to escapepredators —can also be considered migration. So can the movement of aphids when, having depleted the young leaves on one food plant, their offspring then fly onward to a different host plant, with no one aphid ever returning to where it started.Dingle is an evolutionary biologist who studies insects. His definition is more intricate than Berger’s, citing those five features that distinguish migration from other forms of movement. They allow for the fact that, for example, aphids will become sensitive to blue light (from the sky) when it’s time for takeoff on their big journey, and sensitive to yellow light (reflected from tender young leaves) when it’s appropriate to land. Birds will fatten themselves with heavy feeding in advance of a long migrational flight. The value of his definition, Dingle argues, is that it focuses attention on what the phenomenon of wildebeest migration shares with the phenomenon of the aphids, and therefore helps guide researchers towards understanding how evolution has produced them all.Human behaviour, however, is having a detrimental impact on animal migration. The pronghorn, which resembles an antelope, though they are unrelated, is the fastest land mammal of the New World. One population, which spends the summer in the mountainous Grand Teton National Park of the western USA, follows a narrow route from its summer range in the mountains, across a river, and down onto the plains. Here they wait out the frozen months, feeding mainly on sagebrush blown clear of snow. These pronghorn are notable for the invariance of their migration route and the severity of its constriction at three bottlenecks. If they can’t pass through each of the three during their spring migration, they can’t reach their bounty of summer grazing; if they can’t pass through again in autumn, escaping south ontothose windblown plains, they are likely to die trying to overwinter in the deep snow. Pronghorn, dependent on distance vision and speed to keep safe from predators, traverse high, open shoulders of land, where they can see and run. At one of the bottlenecks, forested hills rise to form a V, leaving a corridor of open ground only about 150 metres wide, filled with private homes. Increasing development is leading toward a crisis for the pronghorn, threatening to choke off their passageway.Conservation scientists, along with some biologists and land managers within the USA’s National Park Service and other agencies, are now working to preserve migrational behaviours, not just species and habitats. A National Forest has recognised the path of the pronghorn, much of which passes across its land, as a protected migration corridor. But neither the Forest Service nor the Park Service can control what happens on private land at a bottleneck. And with certain other migrating species, the challenge is complicated further —by vastly greater distances traversed, more jurisdictions, more borders, more dangers along the way. We will require wisdom and resoluteness to ensure that migrating species can continue their journeying a while longer.Questions 14-18Do the following statements agree with the information given in Reading Passage 2?In boxes 14-18 on your answer sheet, writeTRUE if the statement agrees with the informationFALSE if the statement contradicts the informationNOT GIVEN if there is no information on this14 Local gulls and migrating arctic terns behave in the same way when offered food.15 Experts’ definitions of migration tend to vary accordingto their area of study.16 Very few experts agree that the movement of aphids can be considered migration.17 Aphids’ journeys are affected b y changes in the light that they perceive.18 Dingle’s aim is to distinguish between the migratory behaviours of different species.Questions 19-22Complete each sentence with the correct ending, A-G, below.Write the correct letter, A-G, in boxes 19-22 on your answer sheet.19 According to Dingle, migratory routes are likely to20 To prepare for migration, animals are likely to21 During migration, animals are unlikely to22 Arctic terns illustrate migrating animals’ ability toA be discouraged by difficulties.B travel on open land where they can look out for predators.C eat more than they need for immediate purposes.D be repeated daily.E ignore distractions.F be governed by the availability of water.G follow a straight line.Questions 23-26Complete the summary below.Choose ONE WORD ONLY from the passage for each answer.Write your answers in boxes 23-26 on your answer sheet.The migration of pronghornsPronghorns rely on their eyesight and 23 __________ to avoid predators. One particular pop ulation’s summer habitat is a national park, and their winter home is on the 24 __________,where they go to avoid the danger presented by the snow at that time of year. However, their route between these two areas contains three 25 __________. One problem is the construction of new homes in a narrow 26 __________ of land on the pronghorns’ route.READING PASSAGE 3You should spend about 20 minutes on Questions 27-40, which are based on Reading Passage 3 below.Preface to ‘How the other half thinks: Adventu res in mathematical reasoning’A Occasionally, in some difficult musical compositions, there are beautiful, but easy parts — parts so simple a beginner could play them. So it is with mathematics as well. There are some discoveries in advanced mathematics that do not depend on specialized knowledge, not even on algebra, geometry, or trigonometry. Instead they may involve, at most, a little arithmetic, such as ‘the sum of two odd numbers is even’, and common sense. Each of the eight chapters in this book illustrates this phenomenon. Anyone can understand every step in the reasoning.The thinking in each chapter uses at most only elementary arithmetic, and sometimes not even that. Thus all readers will have the chance to participate in a mathematical experience, to appreciate the beauty of mathematics, and to become familiar with its logical, yet intuitive, style of thinking.B One of my purposes in writing this book is to give readers who haven’t had the opportunity to see and enjoy real mathematics the chance to appreciate the mathematical way of thinking. I want to reveal not only some of the fascinating discoveries, but, more importantly, the reasoning behind them.In that respect, this book differs from most books on mathematics written for the general public. Some present the lives of colorful mathematicians. Others describe important applications of mathematics. Yet others go into mathematical procedures, but assume that the reader is adept in using algebra.C I hope this book will help bridge that notorious gap that separates the two cultures: the humanities and the sciences, or should I say the right brain (intuitive) and the left brain (analytical, numerical). As the chapters will illustrate, mathematics is not restricted to the analytical and numerical; intuition plays a significant role. The alleged gap can be narrowed or completely overcome by anyone, in part because each of us is far from using the full capacity of either side of the brain. To illustrate our human potential, I cite a structural engineer who is an artist, an electrical engineer who is an opera singer, an opera singer who published mathematical research, and a mathematician who publishes short stories.D Other scientists have written books to explain their fields to non-scientists, but have necessarily had to omit the mathematics, although it provides the foundation of their theories. The reader must remain a tantalized spectator rather than an involved participant, since the appropriate language for describing the details in much of science is mathematics, whether the subject is expanding universe, subatomic particles, or chromosomes. Though the broad outline of a scientific theory can be sketched intuitively, when a part of the physical universe is finally understood, its description often looks like a page in a mathematics text.E Still, the non-mathematical reader can go far in understanding mathematical reasoning. This book presents thedetails that illustrate the mathematical style of thinking, which involves sustained, step-by-step analysis, experiments, and insights. You will turn these pages much more slowly than when reading a novel or a newspaper. It may help to have a pencil and paper ready to check claims and carry out experiments.F As I wrote, I kept in mind two types of readers: those who enjoyed mathematics until they were turned off by an unpleasant episode, usually around fifth grade, and mathematics aficionados, who will find much that is new throughout the book.This book also serves readers who simply want to sharpen their analytical skills. Many careers, such as law and medicine, require extended, precise analysis. Each chapter offers practice in following a sustained and closely argued line of thought. That mathematics can develop this skill is shown by these two testimonials:G A physician wrote, ‘The discipline of analytical thought processes [in mathematics] prepared me extremely well for medical school. In medicine one is faced with a problem which must be thoroughly analyzed before a solution can be found. The proces s is similar to doing mathematics.’A lawyer made the same point, ‘Although I had no background in law — not even one political science course — I did well at one of the best law schools. I attribute much of my success there to having learned, through the study of mathematics, and, in particular, theorems, how to analyze complicated principles. Lawyers who have studied mathematics can master the legal principles in a way that most others cannot.’I hope you will share my delight in watching as simple, even na?ve, questions lead to remarkable solutions and purely theoretical discoveries find unanticipated applications.Questions 27-34Reading Passage 3 has seven sections, A-G.Which section contains the following information?Write the correct letter, A-G, in boxes 27-34 on your answer sheet.NB You may use any letter more than once.27 a reference to books that assume a lack of mathematical knowledge28 the way in which this is not a typical book about mathematics29 personal examples of being helped by mathematics30 examples of people who each had abilities that seemed incompatible31 mention of different focuses of books about mathematics32 a contrast between reading this book and reading other kinds of publication33 a claim that the whole of the book is accessible to everybody34 a reference to different categories of intended readers of this bookQuestions 35-40Complete the sentences below.Choose ONE WORD ONLY from the passage for each answer.Write your answers in boxes 35-40 on your answer sheet.35 Some areas of both music and mathematics are suitable for someone who is a __________.36 It is sometimes possible to understand advanced mathematics using no more than a limited knowledge of __________.37 The writer intends to show that mathematics requires__________ thinking, as well as analytical skills.38 Some books written by __________ have had to leave out the mathematics that is central to their theories.39 The writer advises non-mathematical readers to perform __________ while reading the book.40 A lawyer found that studying __________ helped even more than other areas of mathematics in the study of law.剑桥雅思阅读11原文参考译文(test3)PASSAGE 1 参考译文:丝绸的故事世上最昂贵奢华织物的历史,从古代中国直到今天丝绸是种细软、光滑的布料,产自桑蚕(该昆虫的幼体形态)制作出的蚕茧——即其柔软的保护性外壳。

剑桥雅思14test3阅读解析

剑桥雅思14test3阅读解析

剑桥雅思14test3阅读解析
摘要:
1.剑桥雅思14test3 阅读passage1 原文翻译:智力的概念
2.剑桥雅思14test3 阅读passage2 答案解析
3.剑桥雅思14test3 阅读passage3 原文翻译及答案解析
正文:
剑桥雅思14test3 阅读解析
剑桥雅思14test3 阅读passage1 原文翻译:智力的概念
本文着重介绍了智力内隐理论及智力与社会关系的内隐理论。

文章结构主要内容如下:
a 部分:智力的概念
b 部分:智力的内隐理论
c 部分:智力与社会关系的内隐理论
剑桥雅思14test3 阅读passage2 答案解析
Passage 2 主要讨论了人们在日常生活中如何做出决策。

文章通过一个实验来说明,人们在面临决策时,通常会根据过去的经验和现有的信息来判断。

文章结构如下:
a 部分:决策的重要性
b 部分:决策的影响因素
c 部分:实验说明
剑桥雅思14test3 阅读passage3 原文翻译及答案解析
Passage 3 探讨了全球化对教育和培训行业的影响。

文章指出,全球化带
来了更多的机遇和挑战,教育和培训行业需要不断适应变化的环境。

文章结构如下:
a 部分:全球化的定义和影响
b 部分:教育和培训行业的变化
c 部分:未来的挑战和机遇
通过以上对剑桥雅思14test3 阅读解析的内容,考生可以更好地理解文章内容,提高阅读能力。

剑桥雅思阅读4原文翻译及答案解析(test3)

剑桥雅思阅读4原文翻译及答案解析(test3)

剑桥雅思阅读4原文翻译及答案解析(test3)为了帮助大家更好地备考雅思阅读,下面小编给大家分享剑桥雅思阅读4原文翻译及答案解析(test3),希望对你们有用。

剑桥雅思阅读4原文(test3)READING PASSAGE 1You should spend about 20 minutes on Questions 1-13 which are based on Reading Passage 1 below.Micro-Enterprise Credit for Street Youth‘I am from a large, poor family and for many years we have done without breakfast. Ever since I joined the Street Kids International program I have been able to buy my family sugar and buns for breakfast. I have also bought myself decent second-hand clothes and shoes.’Doreen Soko‘We’ve had business experience. Now I’m confident to expand what we’ve been doing. I’ve learnt cash management, and the way of keeping money so we save for re-investment. Now business is a part of our lives. As well, we didn’t know each other before —now we’ve made new friends.’Fan KaomaParticipants in the Youth Skills Enterprise Initiative Program, ZambiaIntroductionAlthough small-scale business training and credit programs have become more common throughout the world, relatively little attention has been paid to the need to direct such opportunities to young people. Even less attention has been paid to children living on the street or in difficult circumstances.Over the past nine years, Street Kids International (S.K.I.) hasbeen working with partner organisations in Africa, Latin America and India to support the economic lives of street children. The purpose of this paper is to share some of the lessons S.K.I. and our partners have learned.BackgroundTypically, children do not end up on the streets due to a single cause, but to a combination of factors: a dearth of adequately funded schools, the demand for income at home, family breakdown and violence. The street may be attractive to children as a place to find adventurous play and money. However, it is also a place where some children are exposed, with little or no protection, to exploitative employment, urban crime, and abuse.Children who work on the streets are generally involved in unskilled, labour-intensive tasks which require long hours, such as shining shoes, carrying goods, guarding or washing cars, and informal trading. Some may also earn income through begging, or through theft and other illegal activities. At the same time, there are street children who take pride in supporting themselves and their families and who often enjoy their work. Many children may choose entrepreneurship because it allows them a degree of independence, is less exploitative than many forms of paid employment, and is flexible enough to allow them to participate in other activities such as education and domestic tasks.Street Business PartnershipsS.K.I. has worked with partner organisations in Latin America, Africa and India to develop innovative opportunities for street children to earn income.The S.K.I. Bicycle Courier Service first started in the Sudan. Participants in this enterprise were supplied with bicycles, whichthey used to deliver parcels and messages, and which they were required to pay for gradually from their wages. A similar program was taken up in Bangalore, India.Another successful project, The Shoe Shine Collective, was a partnership program with the Y.W.C.A. in the Dominican Republic. In this project, participants were lent money to purchase shoe shine boxes. They were also given a safe place to store their equipment, and facilities for individual savings plans.The Youth Skills Enterprise Initiative in Zambia is a joint program with the Red Cross Society and the Y.W.C.A. Street youths are supported to start their own small business through business training, life skills training and access to credit.Lessons learnedThe following lessons have emerged from the programs that S.K.I. and partner organisations have created.Being an entrepreneur is not for everyone, nor for every street child. Ideally, potential participants will have been involved in the organisation’s programs for at least six months, and trust and relationship-building will have already been established.The involvement of the participants has been essential to the development of relevant programs. When children have had a major role in determining procedures, they are more likely to abide by and enforce them.It is critical for all loans to be linked to training programs that include the development of basic business and life skills.There are tremendous advantages to involving parents or guardians in the program, where such relationships exist. Home visits allow staff the opportunity to know where the participants live, and to understand more about each individual’s situation.Small loans are provided initially for purchasing fixed assetssuch as bicycles, shoe shine kits and basic building materials for a market stall. As the entrepreneurs gain experience, the enterprises can be gradually expanded and consideration can be given to increasing loan amounts. The loan amounts in S.K.I. programs have generally ranged from US$30-$100.All S.K.I. programs have charged interest on the loans, primarily to get the entrepreneurs used to the concept of paying interest on borrowed money. Generally the rates have been modest (lower than bank rates).ConclusionThere is a need to recognise the importance of access to credit for impoverished young people seeking to fulfil economic needs. The provision of small loans to support the entrepreneurial dreams and ambitions of youth can be an effective means to help them change their lives. However, we believe that credit must be extended in association with other types of support that help participants develop critical life skills as well as productive businesses.Questions 1-4Choose the correct letter, A, B, C or D.Write your answers in boxes 1-4 on your answer sheet.1 The quotations in the box at the beginning of the articleA exemplify the effects of S.K.I.B explain why S.K.I. was set up.C outline the problems of street children.D highlight the benefits to society of S.K.I.2 The main purpose of S.K.I. is toA draw the attention of governments to the problem of street children.B provide school and social support for street children.C encourage the public to give money to street children.D give business training and loans to street children.3 Which of the following is mentioned by the writer as a reason why children end up living on the streets?A unemploymentB warC povertyD crime4 In order to become more independent, street children mayA reject paid employment.B leave their families.C set up their own businesses.D employ other children.Questions 5-8Complete the table below.Choose NO MORE THAN THREE WORDS from Reading Passage 1 for each answer.Write your answers in boxes 5-8 on your answer sheet.Country Organisations Involved Type of Project Support Provided5………………and………………S.K.I courier service ? provision of 6………………………Dominican Republic ? S.K.IY.W.C.A 7………………… ? loansstorage facilitiessavings plansZambia ? S.K.I.The Red CrossY.W.C.A. setting up small businesses ? business training8…………trainingaccess to creditQuestions 9-12Do the following statements agree with the claims of the writer in Reading Passage 1?In boxes 9-12 on your answer sheet writeYES if the statement agrees with the claims of the wirterNO if the statement contradicts the claims of the writerNOT GIVEN if it is impossible to say what the writer thinks about this9 Any street child can set up their own small business if given enough support.10 In some cases, the families of street children may need financial support from S.K.I.11 Only one fixed loan should be given to each child.12 The children have to pay back slightly more money than they borrowed.Question 13Choose the correct letter, A, B, C or D.Write your answer in box 13 on your answer sheet.The writers conclude that money should only be lent to street childrenA as part of a wider program of aid.B for programs that are not too ambitious.C when programs are supported by local businesses.D if the projects planned are realistic and useful.READING PASSAGE 2You should spend about 20 minutes on Questions 14-26 which are based on Reading Passage 2 on the following pages.Questions 14-27Reading Passage 2 has four sections A-D.Choose the correct heading for each section from the list of headings below.Write the correct number i-vi in boxes 14-17 on your answer sheet.List of HeadingsI Causes of volcanic eruptionIi Efforts to predict volcanic eruptionIii Volcanoes and the features of our planetIv Different types of volcanic eruptionV International relief effortsVi The unpredictability of volcanic eruptions14 Section A15 Section B16 Section C17 Section DVolcanoes-earth-shattering newsWhen Mount Pinatubo suddenly erupted on 9 June 1991, the power of volcanoes past and present again hit the headlinesA Volcanoes are the ultimate earth-moving machinery. A violent eruption can blow the top few kilometres off a mountain, scatter fine ash practically all over the globe and hurl rock fragments into the stratosphere to darken the skies a continent away.But the classic eruption — cone-shaped mountain, big bang, mushroom cloud and surges of molten lava — is only a tiny part of a global story. Vulcanism, the name given to volcanic processes, really has shaped the world. Eruptions have rifted continents, raised mountain chains, constructed islands and shaped the topography of the earth. The entire ocean floor has abasement of volcanic basalt.Volcanoes have not only made the continents, they are also thought to have made the world’s first stable atmosphere and provided all the water for the oceans, rivers and ice-caps. There are now about 600 active volcanoes. Every year they add two or three cubic kilometres of rock to the continents. Imagine a similar number of volcanoes smoking away for the last 3,500 million years. That is enough rock to explain the continental crust.What comes out of volcanic craters is mostly gas. More than 90% of this gas is water vapour from the deep earth: enough to explain, over 3,500 million years, the water in the oceans. The rest of the gas is nitrogen, carbon dioxide, sulphur dioxide, methane, ammonia and hydrogen. The quantity of these gases, again multiplied over 3,500 million years, is enough to explain the mass of the world’s atmosphere. We are alive because volcanoes provided the soil, air and water we need.B Geologists consider the earth as having a molten core, surrounded by a semi-molten mantle and a brittle, outer skin. It helps to think of a soft-boiled egg with a runny yolk, a firm but squishy white and a hard shell. If the shell is even slightly cracked during boiling, the white material bubbles out and sets like a tiny mountain chain over the crack — like an archipelago of volcanic islands such as the Hawaiian Islands. But the earth is so much bigger and the mantle below is so much hotter.Even though the mantle rocks are kept solid by overlying pressure, they can still slowly ‘flow’ like thick treacle. The flow, thought to be in the form of convection currents, is powerful enough to fracture the ‘eggshell’ of the crust into plates, and keep them bumping and grinding against each other, or even overlapping, at the rate of a few centimetres a year. Thesefracture zones, where the collisions occur, are where earthquakes happen. And, very often, volcanoes.C These zones are lines of weakness, or hot spots. Every eruption is different, but put at its simplest, where there are weaknesses, rocks deep in the mantle, heated to 1,350℃, will start to expand and rise. As they do so, the pressure drops, and they expand and become liquid and rise more swiftly.Sometimes it is slow: vast bubbles of magma — molten rock from the mantle — inch towards the surface, cooling slowly, to show through as granite extrusions (as on Skye, or the Great Whin Sill, the lava dyke squeezed out like toothpaste that carries part of Hadrian’s Wall in no rthern England). Sometimes — as in Northern Ireland, Wales and the Karoo in South Africa —the magma rose faster, and then flowed out horizontally on to the surface in vast thick sheets. In the Deccan plateau in western India, there are more than two million cubic kilometres of lava, some of it 2,400 metres thick, formed over 500,000 years of slurping eruption.Sometimes the magma moves very swiftly indeed. It does not have time to cool as it surges upwards. The gases trapped inside the boiling rock expand suddenly, the lava glows with heat, it begins to froth, and it explodes with tremendous force. Then the slightly cooler lava following it begins to flow over the lip of the crater. It happens on Mars, it happened on the moon, it even happens on some of the moons of Jupiter and Uranus. By studying the evidence, vulcanologists can read the force of the great blasts of the past. Is the pumice light and full of holes? The explosion was tremendous. Are the rocks heavy, with huge crystalline basalt shapes, like t he Giant’s Causeway in Northern Ireland? It was a slow, gentle eruption.The biggest eruptions are deep on the mid-ocean floor, where new lava is forcing the continents apart and widening the Atlantic by perhaps five centimetres a year. Look at maps of volcanoes, earthquakes and island chains like the Philippines and Japan, and you can see the rough outlines of what are called tectonic plates —the plates which make up the earth’s crust and mantle. The most dramatic of these is the Pacific ‘ring of fire’ wh ere there have been the most violent explosions —Mount Pinatubo near Manila, Mount St Helen’s in the Rockies and El Chichón in Mexico about a decade ago, not to mention world-shaking blasts like Krakatoa in the Sunda Straits in 1883.D But volcanoes are not very predictable. That is because geological time is not like human time. During quiet periods, volcanoes cap themselves with their own lava by forming a powerful cone from the molten rocks slopping over the rim of the crater; later the lava cools slowly into a huge, hard, stable plug which blocks any further eruption until the pressure below becomes irresistible. In the case of Mount Pinatubo, this took 600 years.Then, sometimes, with only a small warning, the mountain blows its top. It did this at Mon t Pelée in Martinique at 7.49 a.m. on 8 May, 1902. Of a town of 28,000, only two people survived. In 1815, a sudden blast removed the top 1,280 metres of Mount Tambora in Indonesia. The eruption was so fierce that dust thrown into the stratosphere darkened the skies, cancelling the following summer in Europe and North America. Thousands starved as the harvests failed, after snow in June and frosts in August. Volcanoes are potentially world news, especially the quiet ones.Questions 18-21Answer the questions below using NO MORE THAN THREE WORDS AND/OR A NUMBER from the passage for each answer.Write your answers in boxes 18-21 on your answer sheet.18 What are the sections of the earth’s crust, often associated with volcanic activity, called?19 What is the name given to molten rock from the mantle?20 What is the earthquake zone on the Pacific Ocean called?21 For how many years did Mount Pinatubo remain inactive?Questions 22-26Complete the summary below.Choose NO MORE THAN TWO WORDS from the passage for each answer.Write your answers in boxes 22-26 on your answer sheet.Volcanic eruptions have shaped the earth’s land surface. They may also have produced the world’s atmosphere and 22…… . Eruptions occur when molten rocks from the earth’s mantle rise and expand. When they become liquid, they move quickly through cracks in the surface. There are different types of eruption. Sometimes the 23……. moves slowly and forms outcrops of granite on the earth’s surface. When it moves more quickly it may flow out in thick horizontal sheets. Examples of this type of eruption can be found in Northern Ireland, Wales, South Africa and 24…… . A third type of eruption occurs when the lava emerges very quickly and 25…… violently. This happens because the magma moves so suddenly that 26…… are emitted.READING PASSAGE 3You should spend about 20 minutes on Questions 27-40 which are based on Reading Passage 3 belowObtaining Linguistic DataA Many procedures are available for obtaining data about alanguage. They range from a carefully planned, intensive field investigation in a foreign country to a casual introspection about one’s mother tongue carried out in an armchair at home.B In all cases, someone has to act as a source of language data — an informant. Informants are (ideally) native speakers of a language, who provide utterances for analysis and other kinds of information about the language (e.g. translations, comments about correctness, or judgements on usage). Often, when studying their mother tongue, linguists act as their own informants, judging the ambiguity, acceptability, or other properties of utterances against their own intuitions. The convenience of this approach makes it widely used, and it is considered the norm in the generative approach to linguistics. But a lin guist’s personal judgements are often uncertain, or disagree with the judgements of other linguists, at which point recourse is needed to more objective methods of enquiry, using non-linguists as informants. The latter procedure is unavoidable when working on foreign languages, or child speech.C Many factors must be considered when selecting informants —whether one is working with single speakers (a common situation when languages have not been described before), two people interacting, small groups or large-scale samples. Age, sex, social background and other aspects of identity are important, as these factors are known to influence the kind of language used. The topic of conversation and the characteristics of the social setting (e.g. the level of formality) are also highly relevant, as are the personal qualities of the informants (e.g. their fluency and consistency). For larger studies, scrupulous attention has been paid to the sampling theory employed, and in all cases, decisions have to be made about thebest investigative techniques to use.D Today, researchers often tape-record informants. This enables the linguist’s claims about the language to be checked, and provides a way of making those claims more accurate (‘difficult’ pieces of speech can be li stened to repeatedly). But obtaining naturalistic, good-quality data is never easy. People talk abnormally when they know they are being recorded, and sound quality can be poor. A variety of tape-recording procedures have thus been devised to minimise the ‘observer’s paradox’ (how to observe the way people behave when they are not being observed). Some recordings are made without the speakers being aware of the fact — a procedure that obtains very natural data, though ethical objections must be anticipated. Alternatively, attempts can be made to make the speaker forget about the recording, such as keeping the tape recorder out of sight, or using radio microphones. A useful technique is to introduce a topic that quickly involves the speaker, and stimulates a natural language style (e.g. asking older informants about how times have changed in their locality).E An audio tape recording does not solve all the linguist’s problems, however. Speech is often unclear and ambiguous. Where possible, therefore, the recording has to be supplemented by the observer’s written comments on the non-verbal behaviour of the participants, and about the context in general.A facial expression, for example, can dramatically alter the meaning of what is said. Video recordings avoid these problems to a large extent, but even they have limitations (the camera cannot be everywhere), and transcriptions always benefit from any additional commentary provided by an observer.F Linguists also make great use of structured sessions, inwhich they systematically ask their informants for utterances that describe certain actions, objects or behaviours. With a bilingual informant, or through use of an interpreter, it is possible to use translation techniques (‘How do you say table in your language?’). A large number of points can be covered in a short time, using interview worksheets and questionnaires. Often, the researcher wishes to obtain information about just a single variable, in which case a restricted set of questions may be used: a particular feature of pronunciation, for example, can be elicited by asking the informant to say a restricted set of words. There are also several direct methods of elicitation, such as asking informants to fill in the blanks in a substitution frame (e.g. I___ see a car), or feeding them the wrong stimulus for correction (‘Is it possible to say I no can see?’).G A representative sample of language, compiled for the purpose of linguistic analysis, is known as a corpus. A corpus enables the linguist to make unbiased statements about frequency of usage, and it provides accessible data for the use of different researchers. Its range and size are variable. Some corpora attempt to cover the language as a whole, taking extracts from many kinds of text; others are extremely selective, providing a collection of material that deals only with a particular linguistic feature. The size of the corpus depends on practical factors, such as the time available to collect, process and store the data: it can take up to several hours to provide an accurate transcription of a few minutes of speech. Sometimes a small sample of data will be enough to decide a linguistic hypothesis; by contrast, corpora in major research projects can total millions of words. An important principle is that all corpora, whatever their size, are inevitably limited in their coverage, and always need to be supplementedby data derived from the intuitions of native speakers of the language, through either introspection or experimentation.Questions 27-31Reading Passage 3 has seven paragraphs labeled A-G.Which paragraph contains the following information?Write the correct letter A-G in boxes 27-31 on your answer sheet.NB You may use any letter more than once.27 the effect of recording on the way people talk28 the importance of taking notes on body language29 the fact that language is influenced by social situation30 how informants can be helped to be less self-conscious31 various methods that can be used to generate specific dataQuestions 32-36Complete the table below.Choose NO MORE THAN THREE WORDS from the passage for each answer.Write your answers in boxes 32-36 on your answer sheet.METHODS OF OBTAINING LINGUISTIC DATA ADVANTAGES DISADVANTAGES32……as informant convenient method of enquiry not objective enoughNon-linguist as informant necessary with 33…… and child speech the number of factors to be consideredRecording an informant allows linguists’ claims to be checked 34……of soundVideoing an informant allows speakers’ 35…… to be observed 36……might mi ss certain thingsQuestions 37-40Complete the summary of paragraph G below.Choose NO MORE THAN THREE WORDS from the passage for each answer.Write your answers in boxes 37-40 on your answer sheet.A linguist can use a corpus to comment objectively on 37…… . Some corpora include a wide range of language while others are used to focus on a 38…… . The length of time the process takes will affect the 39…… of the corpus. No corpus can ever cover the whole language and so linguists often find themselves relying on the additional information that can be gained from the 40…… of those who speak the language concerned.剑桥雅思阅读4原文参考译文(test3)Passage1参考译文Micro-Enterprise Credit for Street Youth流浪儿童的小型企业贷款‘I am from a large, poor family and for many years we have done without breakfast. Ever since I joined the Street Kids International program I have been able to buy my family sugar and buns for breakfast. I have also bought myself decent second-hand clothes and shoes.’Doreen Soko“我来自一个贫困的大家庭。

剑桥雅思阅读翻译及答案解析11(test4)

剑桥雅思阅读翻译及答案解析11(test4)

剑桥雅思阅读翻译及答案解析11(test4)剑桥雅思阅读11原文(test4)1You should spend about 20 minutes on Questions 1-13, which are based on Reading Passage 1 below.Research using twinsTo biomedical researchers all over the world, twins offer a precious opportunity to untangle the influence of genes and the environment — of nature and nurture. Because identical twins come from a single fertilized egg that splits into two, they sharevirtually the same genetic code. Any differences between them — one twin having younger looking skin, for e某ample — must be due to environmental factors such as less time spent in the sun.Alternatively, by comparing the e某periences of identical twins with those of fraternal twins, who come from separate eggs and share on average half their DNA, researchers can quantify the e某tent to which our genes affect our lives. If identical twins are more similar to each other with respect to an ailment than fraternal twins are, then vulnerability to the disease must be rooted at least in part in heredity.These two lines of research — studying the differences between identical twins to pinpoint the influence of environment, and comparing identical twins with fraternal ones to measure the role of inheritance — have been crucial to understanding the interplay of nature and nurture in determining our personalities, behavior, and vulnerability to disease.The idea of using twins to measure the influence of heredity dates back to 1875, when the English scientist Francis Galton firstsuggested the approach (and coined the phrase ‘nature and nurture’). But twin studies took a surprising twist in the 1980s, with the arrival of studies into identical twins who had been separated at birth and reunited as adults. Over two decades 137 sets of twins eventually visited Thomas Bouchard’s lab in what became known as the Minnesota Study of Twins Reared Apart. Numerous tests were carried out on the twins, and they were each asked more than 15,000 questions.Bouchard and his colleagues used this mountain of data toidentify how far twins were affected by their genetic makeup. The key to their approach was a statistical concept called heritability. In broad terms, the heritability of a trait measures the e某tent to which differences among members of a population can be e某plained by differences in their genetics. And wherever Bouchard and other scientists looked, it seemed, they found the invisible hand of genetic influence helping to shape our lives.Lately, however, twin studies have helped lead scientists to a radical new conclusion: that nature and nurture are not the only elemental forces at work. According to a recent field called epigenetics, there is a third factor also in play, one that in some cases serves as a bridge between the environment and our genes, andin others operates on its own to shape who we are.Epigenetic processes are chemical reactions tied to neither nature nor nurture but representing what researchers have called a‘third component’. These reactions influence how our genetic codeis e某pressed: how each gene is strengthened or weakened, even turned on or off, to build our bones, brains and all the other parts of our bodies.If you think of our DNA as an immense piano keyboard and our genes as the keys — each key symbolizing a segment of DNA responsible for a particular note, or trait, and all the keys combining to make us who we are — then epigenetic processes determine when and how each key can be struck, changing the tune being played.One way the study of epigenetics is revolutionizing our understanding of biology is by revealing a mechanism by which the environment directly impacts on genes. Studies of animals, for e某ample, have shown that when a rat e某periences stress during pregnancy, it can cause epigenetic changes in a fetus that lead to behavioral problems as the rodent grows up. Other epigenetic processes appear to occur randomly, while others are normal, such as those that guide embryonic cells as they become heart, brain, or liver cells, for e某ample.Geneticist Danielle Reed has worked with many twins over the years and thought deeply about what twin studies have taught us.‘It’s very clear when you look at twins tha t much of what they share is hardwired,’ she says. ‘Many things about them are absolutely the same and unalterable. But it’s also clear, when you get to know them, that other things about them are different. Epigenetics is the origin of a lot of those differences, in my view.’Reed credits Thomas Bouchard’s work for today’s surge in twin studies. ‘He was the trailblazer,’ she says. ‘We forget that 50 years ago things like heart disease were thought to be caused entirely by lifestyle. Schizophrenia was thought to be due to poor mothering. Twin studies have allowed us to be more reflective aboutwhat people are actually born with and what’s caused by e某perience.’Having said that, Reed adds, the latest work in epigenetics promises to take our underst anding even further. ‘What I like to say is that nature writes some things in pencil and some things in pen,’ she says. Things written in pen you can’t change. That’s DNA. But things written in pencil you can. That’s epigenetics. Now thatwe’re actually ab le to look at the DNA and see where the pencil writings are, it’s sort of a whole new world.’Questions 1-4Do the following statements agree with the information given in Reading Passage 1?In bo某es 1-4 on your answer sheet, writeTRUE if the statement agrees with the informationFALSE if the statement contradicts the informationNOT GIVEN if there is no information on this1 There may be genetic causes for the differences in how young the skin of identical twins looks.2 Twins are at greater risk of developing certain illnesses than non-twins.3 Bouchard advertised in newspapers for twins who had been separated at birth.4 Epigenetic processes are different from both genetic and environmental processes.Questions 5-9Look at the following statements (Questions 5-9) and the list of researchers below.Match each statement with the correct researcher, A, B or C.Write the correct letter, A, B or C, in bo某es 5-9 on your answer sheet.NB You may use any letter more than once.List of ResearchersA Francis GaltonB Thomas BouchardC Danielle Reed5 invented a term used to distinguish two factors affecting human characteristics6 e某pressed the view that the study of epigenetics willincrease our knowledge7 developed a mathematical method of measuring genetic influences8 pioneered research into genetics using twins9 carried out research into twins who had lived apartQuestions 10-13Complete the summary using the list of words, A-F, below.Write the correct letter, A-F, in bo某es 10-13 on your answer sheet.Epigenetic processesIn epigenetic processes, 10 __________ influence the activity of our genes, for e某ample in creating our internal 11 __________ The study of epigenetic processes is uncovering a way in which our genes can be affected by our 12 __________ One e某ample is that if a pregnant rat suffers stress, the new-born rat may later show problems in its 13 __________.A nurtureB organsC codeD chemicalsE environmentF behaviour/behavior2You should spend about 20 minutes on Questions 14-26, which are based on Reading Passage 2 below.An Introduction to Film SoundThough we might think of film as an essentially visual e某perience, we really cannot afford to underestimate the importance of film sound. A meaningful sound track is often as complicated as the image on the screen, and is ultimately just as much theresponsibility of the director. The entire sound track consists of three essential ingredients: the human voice, sound effects and music. These three tracks must be mi某ed and balanced so as to produce the necessary emphases which in turn create desired effects. Topics which essentially refer to the three previously mentioned tracks are discussed below. They include dialogue, synchronous and asynchronous sound effects, and music.Let us start with dialogue. As is the case with stage drama, dialogue serves to tell the story and e某presses feelings and motivations of characters as well. Often with film characterization the audience perceives little or no difference between the character and the actor. Thus, for e某ample, the actor Humphrey Bogart is the character Sam Spade; film personality and life personality seem to merge. Perhaps this is because the very te某ture of a performer’s voice supplies an element of character.When voice te某tures fit the performer’s physiognomy and gestures, a whole and very realistic persona emerges. The viewer sees not an actor working at his craft, but another human being struggling with life. It is interesting to note that how dialogue is used and the very amount of dialogue used varies widely among films. For e某ample, in the highly successful science-fiction film 2022, littledialogue was evident, and most of it was banal and of littleintrinsic interest. In this way the film-maker was able to portray what Thomas Sobochack and Vivian Sobochack call, in An Introduction to Film, the ‘inadequacy of hu man responses when compared with the magnificent technology created by man and the visual beauties of the universe’.The comedy Bringing Up Baby, on the other hand, presents practically non-stop dialogue delivered at breakneck speed. This use of dialogue underscores not only the dizzy quality of the character played by Katherine Hepburn, but also the absurdity of the filmitself and thus its humor. The audience is bounced from gag to gag and conversation to conversation; there is no time for audience reflection. The audience is caught up in a whirlwind of activity in simply managing to follow the plot. This film presents pure escapism — largely due to its frenetic dialogue.Synchronous sound effects are those sounds which are synchronized or matched with what is viewed. For e某ample, if the film portrays a character playing the piano, the sounds of the piano are projected. Synchronous sounds contribute to the realism of film and also help to create a particular atmosphere. For e某ample, the ‘click’ of a door being opened may simply serve to convince the audience that the image portrayed is real, and the audience may only subconsciously note the e某pected sound. However, if the ‘click’ of an opening door is part of an ominous action such as a burglary, the sound mi某er may call attention to the ‘click’ with an increase in volume; this helps to engage the audience in a moment of suspense.Asynchronous sound effects, on the other hand, are not matched with a visible source of the sound on screen. Such sounds areincluded so as to provide an appropriate emotional nuance, and they may also add to the realism of the film. For e某ample, a film-maker might opt to include the background sound of an ambulance’s siren while the foreground sound and image portrays an arguing couple. The asynchronous ambulance siren underscores the psychic injury incurredin the argument; at the same time the noise of the siren adds to the realism of the film by acknowledging the film’s city setting.We are probably all familiar with background music in films,which has become so ubiquitous as to be noticeable in its absence. We are aware that it is used to add emotion and rhythm. Usually not meant to be noticeable, it often provides a tone or an emotional attitude toward the story and/or the characters depicted. Inaddition, background music often foreshadows a change in mood. For e某ample, dissonant music may be used in film to indicate an approaching (but not yet visible) menace or disaster.Background music may aid viewer understanding by linking scenes. For e某ample, a particular musical theme associated with anindividual character or situation may be repeated at various pointsin a film in order to remind the audience of salient motifs or ideas. Film sound comprises conventions and innovations. We have come to e某pect an acceleration of music during car chases and creaky doorsin horror films. Yet, it is important to note as well that sound is often brilliantly conceived. The effects of sound are often largely subtle and often are noted by only our subconscious minds. We need to foster an awareness of film sound as well as film space so as totruly appreciate an art form that sprang to life during the twentieth century — the modern film.Questions 14-18Choose the correct letter, A, B, C or D.Write the correct letter in bo某es 14-18 on your answer sheet.14 In the first paragraph, the writer makes a point thatA the director should plan the sound track at an early stage in filming.B it would be wrong to overlook the contribution of sound to the artistry of films.C the music industry can have a beneficial influence on sound in film.D it is important for those working on the sound in a film to have sole responsibility for it.15 One reason that the writer refers to Humphrey Bogart is to e某emplifyA the importance of the actor and the character appearing to have similar personalities.B the audience’s wish that actors are visually appropriate for their roles.C the value of the actor having had similar feelings to the character.D the audience’s preference for dialogue to be as authentic as possible.16 In the third paragraph, the writer suggests thatA audiences are likely to be critical of film dialogue that does not reflect their own e某perience.B film dialogue that appears to be dull may have a specific purpose.C filmmakers vary considerably in the skill with which they handle dialogue.D the most successful films are those with dialogue of a high quality.17 What does the writer suggest about Bringing Up Baby?A The plot suffers from the filmmaker’s wish to focus on humorous dialogue.B The dialogue helps to make it one of the best comedy films ever produced.C There is a mismatch between the speed of the dialogue and the speed of actions.D The nature of the dialogue emphasises key elements of the film.18 The writer refers to the ‘click’ of a door to make the point that realistic soundsA are often used to give the audience a false impression ofevents in the film.B may be interpreted in different ways by different members ofthe audience.C may be modified in order to manipulate the audience’s response to the film.D tend to be more significant in films presenting realistic situations.Questions 19-23Do the following statements agree with the information given in Reading Passage 2?In bo某es 19-23 on your answer sheet, writeTRUE if the statement agrees with the informationFALSE if the statement contradicts the informationNOT GIVEN if there is no information on this19 Audiences are likely to be surprised if a film lacksbackground music.20 Background music may anticipate a development in a film.21 Background music has more effect on some people than on others.22 Background music may help the audience to make certain connections within the film.23 Audiences tend to be aware of how the background music is affecting them.Questions 24-26Complete each sentence with the correct ending, A-E, below.Write the correct letter, A-E, in bo某es 24-26 on your answer sheet.24 The audience’s response to different parts of a film can be controlled25 The feelings and motivations of characters become clear26 A character seems to be a real person rather than an actorA when the audience listens to the dialogue.B if the film reflects the audience’s own concerns.C if voice, sound and music are combined appropriately.D when the director is aware of how the audience will respond.E when the actor’s appearance, voice and moves are consistent with each other.3You should spend about 20 minutes on Questions 27-40, which are based on Reading Passage 3 on the following pages.Questions 27-32Reading Passage 3 has si某 paragraphs, A-F.Choose the correct heading for paragraphs A-F from the list ofheadings below. Write the correct number, i-vii, in bo某es 27-32 on your answer sheet.List of Headingsi Differences between languages highlight their impressiveness ii The way in which a few sounds are organised to convey a huge range of meaningiii Why the sounds used in different languages are not identical iv Apparently incompatible characteristics of languagev Even silence can be meaningfulvi Why language is the most important invention of allvii The universal ability to use language27 Paragraph A28 Paragraph B29 Paragraph C30 Paragraph D31 Paragraph E32 Paragraph F‘This Marvellous Invention’A Of all mankinds manifold creations, language must take pride of place. Other inventions — the wheel, agriculture, sliced bread —may have transformed our material e某istence, but the advent of language is what made us human. Compared to language, all other inventions pale in significance, since everything we have ever achieved depends on language and originates from it. Without language, we could never have embarked on our ascent to unparalleled power over all other animals, and even over nature itself.B But language is foremost not just because it came first. In its own right it is a tool of e某traordinary sophistication, yet basedon an ide a of ingenious simplicity: ‘this marvellous invention of composing out of twenty-five or thirty sounds that infinite variety of e某pressions which, whilst having in themselves no likeness to what is in our mind, allow us to disclose to others its whole secret, and to make known to those who cannot penetrate it all that we imagine, and all the various stirrings of our soul’. This was how,in 1660, the renowned French grammarians of the Port-Royal abbey near Versailles distilled the essence of language, and no one since has celebrated more eloquently the magnitude of its achievement. Even so, there is just one flaw in all these hymns of praise, for the homage to languages unique accomplishment conceals a simple yet critical incongruity. Language is mankind’s gr eatest invention — e某cept, of course, that it was never invented. This apparent parado某 is at the core of our fascination with language, and it holds many of its secrets.C Language often seems so skillfully drafted that one can hardly imagine it as anything other than the perfected handiwork of a master craftsman. How else could this instrument make so much out of barely three dozen measly morsels of sound? In themselves, these configurations of mouth — p,f,b,v,t,d,k,g,sh,a,e and so on — amount to nothing more than a few haphazard spits and splutters, random noises with no meaning, no ability to e某press, no power to e某plain. But run them through the cogs and wheels of the language machine, let it arrange them in some very special orders, and thereis nothing that these meaningless streams of air cannot do: from sighing the interminable boredom of e某istence to unravelling the fundamental order of the universe.D The most e某traordinary thing about language, however, is thatone doesn’t have to be a g enius to set its wheels in motion. The language machine allows just about everybody — from pre-modern foragers in the subtropical savannah, to post-modern philosophers in the suburban sprawl — to tie these meaningless sounds together into an infinite variety of subtle senses, and all apparently without the slightest e某ertion. Yet it is precisely this deceptive ease which makes language a victim of its own success, since in everyday lifeits triumphs are usually taken for granted. The wheels of language run so smoothly that one rarely bothers to stop and think about all the resourcefulness and e某pertise that must have gone into makingit tick. Language conceals art.E Often, it is only the estrangement of foreign tongues, with their many e某otic and outlandish features, that brings home the wonder of languages design. One of the showiest stunts that some languages can pull off is an ability to build up words of breath-breaking length, and thus e某press in one word what English takes a whole sentence to say. The Turkishword ?ehirlili?tiremediklerimizdensiniz, to take one e某ample, means nothing less than ‘you are one of those whom we cant turn into a town-dweller’. (In case you were wondering, this monstrosity really is one word, not merely many different words squashed together —most of its components cannot even stand up on their own.)F And if that sounds like some one-off freak, then consider Sumerian, the language spoken on the banks of the Euphrates some5,000 years ago by the people who invented writing and thus enabled the documentation of history. A Sumerian word like munintuma’a(‘when he had made it suitable for her’) might seem rather trim compared to the Turkish colossus above. What is so impressive aboutit, however, is not its lengthiness but rather the reverse — the thrifty compactness of its construction. The word is made up of different slots, each corresponding to a particular portion of meaning. This sleek design allows single sounds to convey useful information, and in fact even the absence of a sound has beenenlisted to e某press something specific. If you were to ask whichbit in the Sumerian word corresponds to the pronoun ‘it’ in the English translation when he had made it suitable for her, then the answer would have to be nothing. Mind you, a very particular kind of nothing: the nothing that stands in the empty slot in the middle. The technology is so fine-tuned then that even a non-sound, whencarefully placed in a particular position, has been invested with a specific function. Who could possibly have come up with such a nifty contraption?Questions 33-36Complete the summary using the list of words, A-G, below.Write the correct letter, A-G, in bo某es 33-36 on your answer sheet.The importance of languageThe wheel is one invention that has had a major impact on 33__________ aspects of life, but no impact has been as 34 __________ as that of language. Language is very 35 __________, yet composed of just a small number of sounds. Language appears to be 36 __________ to use. However, its sophistication is often overlooked.A difficultB comple某C originalD admiredE materialF easyG fundamentalQuestions 37-40Do the following statements agree with the views of the writer in Reading Passage 3?In bo某es 37-40 on your answer sheet, writeYES if the statement agrees with the views of the writerNO if the statement contradicts the views of the writerNOT GIVEN if it is impossible to say what the writer thinks about this37 Human beings might have achieved their present position without language.38 The Port-Royal grammarians did justice to the nature of language.39 A comple某 idea can be e某plained more clearly in a sentence than in a single word.40 The Sumerians were responsible for starting the recording of events.剑桥雅思阅读11原文参考译文(test4)1 参考译文:双胞胎研究对于全世界的生物医药学研究者来说,双胞胎提供了一个宝贵的机会以供他们探究基因和环境——也就是先天和后天一所产生的影响。

剑桥雅思阅读5翻译及精讲(test4)

剑桥雅思阅读5翻译及精讲(test4)

剑桥雅思阅读5翻译及精讲(test4)雅思阅读是块难啃的硬骨头,需要我们做更多的题目才能得心应手。

下面小编给大家分享一下剑桥雅思阅读5test4原文翻译及答案解析,希望可以帮助到大家。

剑桥雅思阅读5原文(test4)READING PASSAGE 1You should spend about 20 minutes on Questions 1-13, which are based on Reading Passage 1 on the following pages.Questions 1-3Reading Passage 1 has three sections, A-C.Choose the correct heading for each section from the list of headings below.Write the correct number i-vi in boxes 1-3 on your answer sheet.List of HeadingsI The expansion of international tourism in recent yearsIi How local communities can balance their own needs with the demands of wilderness tourismIii Fragile regions and the reasons for the expansion of tourism thereIv Traditional methods of food-supply in fragile regionsV Some of the disruptive effects of wilderness tourismVi The economic benefits of mass tourism1 Section A2 Section B3 Section CThe Impact of Wilderness TourismAThe market for tourism in remote areas is booming as neverbefore. Countries all across the world are actively promoting their ‘wilderness’ regions —such as mountains, Arctic lands, deserts, small islands and wetland — to high-spending tourists. The attraction of these areas is obvious: by definition, wilderness tourism requires little or no initial investment. But that does not mean that there is no cost. As the 1992 United Nations Conference on Environment and Development recognized, these regions are fragile (i.e. highly vulnerable to abnormal pressures) not just in terms of their ecology, but also in terms of the culture of their inhabitants. The three most significant types of fragile environment in these respects, and also in terms of the proportion o f the Earth’s surface they cover, are deserts, mountains and Arctic areas. An important characteristic is their marked seasonality, with harsh conditions prevailing for many months each year. Consequently, most human activities, including tourism, are limited to quite clearly defined parts of the year.Tourists are drawn to these regions by their natural landscape beauty and the unique cultures of their indigenous people. And poor governments in these isolated areas have welcomed the new breed of ‘adventure tourist’, grateful for the hard currency they bring. For several years now, tourism has been the prime source of foreign exchange in Nepal and Bhutan. Tourism is also a key element in the economies of Arctic zones such as Lapland and Alaska and in desert areas such as Ayers Rock in Australia and Arizona’s Monument Valley.BOnce a location is established as a main tourist destination, the effects on the local community are profound. When hill-farmers, for example, can make more money in a few weeksworking as porters for foreign trekkers than they can in a year working in their fields, it is not surprising that many of them give up their farm-work, which is thus left to other members of the family. In some hill-regions, this has led to a serious decline in farm output and a change in the local diet, because there is insufficient labour to maintain terraces and irrigation systems and tend to crops. The result has been that many people in these regions have turned to outside supplies of rice and other foods.In Arctic and desert societies, year-round survival has traditionally depended on hunting animals and fish and collecting fruit over a relatively short season. However, as some inhabitants become involved in tourism, they no longer have time to collect wild food; this has led to increasing dependence on bought food and stores. Tourism is not always the culprit behind such changes. All kinds of wage labour, or government handouts, tend to undermine traditional survival systems. Whatever the cause, the dilemma is always the same: what happens if these new, external sources of income dry up?The physical impact of visitors is another serious problem associated with the growth in adventure tourism. Much attention has focused on erosion along major trails, but perhaps more important are the deforestation and impacts on water supplies arising from the need to provide tourists with cooked food and hot showers. In both mountains and deserts, slow-growing trees are often the main sources of fuel and water supplies may be limited or vulnerable to degradation through heavy use.CStories about the problems of tourism have become legion in the last few years. Yet it does not have to be a problem. Although tourism inevitably affects the region in which it takesplace, the costs to these fragile environments and their local cultures can be minimized. Indeed, it can even be a vehicle for reinvigorating local cultures, as has happened with the Sherpas of Nepal’s Khumbu Valley and in some Alpine villages. And a growing number of adventure tourism operators are trying to ensure that their activities benefit the local population and environment over the long term.In the Swiss Alps, communities have decided that their future depends on integrating tourism more effectively with the local economy. Local concern about the rising number of second home developments in the Swiss Pays d’Enhaut resulted in limits being imposed on their growth. There has also been a renaissance in communal cheese production in the area, providing the locals with a reliable source of income that does not depend on outside visitors.Many of the Arctic tourist destinations have been exploited by outside companies, who employ transient workers and repatriate most of the profits to their home base. But some Arctic communities are now operating tour businesses themselves, thereby ensuring that the benefits accrue locally. For instance, a native corporation in Alaska, employing local people, is running an air tour from Anchorage to Kotzebue, where tourists eat Arctic food, walk on the tundra and watch local musicians and dancers.Native people in the desert regions of the American Southwest have followed similar strategies, encouraging tourists to visit their pueblos and reservations to purchase high-quality handicrafts and artwork. The Acoma and San lldefonso pueblos have established highly profitable pottery businesses, while the Navajo and Hopi groups have been similarly successful with jewellery.Too many people living in fragile environments have lost control over their economies, their culture and their environment when tourism has penetrated their homelands. Merely restricting tourism cannot be the solution to the imbalance, because people’s desire to see new places will not just disappear. Instead, communities in fragile environments must achieve greater control over tourism ventures in their regions, in order to balance their needs and aspirations with the demands of tourism. A growing number of communities are demonstrating that, with firm communal decision-making, this is possible. The critical question now is whether this can become the norm, rather than the exception.Questions 4-9Do the following statements reflect the opinion of the writer of Reading Passage 1?In boxes 4-9 on your answer sheet, writeYES if the statement reflects the opinion of the writerNO if the statement contradicts the opinion of the writerNOT GIVEN if it is impossible to say what the writer thinks about this4 The low financial cost of setting up wilderness tourism makes it attractive to many countries.5 Deserts, mountains and Arctic regions are examples of environments that are both ecologically and culturally fragile.6 Wilderness tourism operates throughout the year in fragile areas.7 The spread of tourism in certain hill-regions has resulted ina fall in the amount of food produced locally.8 Traditional food-gathering in desert societies was distributed evenly over the year.9 Government handouts do more damage than tourism does to traditional patterns of food-gathering.Questions 10-13Complete the table below.Choose ONE WORD from Reading Passage 1 for each answer.Write your answers in boxes 10-13 on your answer sheet.The positive ways in which some local communities haveresponded to tourismPeople/Location ActivityS wiss Pays d’EnhautArctic communitiesAcoma and San lldefonsoNavajo and Hopi Revived production of 10……………Operate 11……………businessesProduce and sell 12……………Produce and sell 13……………READING PASSAGE 2You should spend about 20 minutes on Questions 14-26, which are based on Reading Passage 2 below.Flawed Beauty: the problem with toughened glassOn 2nd August 1999, a particularly hot day in the town of Cirencester in the UK, a large pane of toughened glass in the roof of a shopping centre at Bishops Walk shattered without warning and fell from its frame. When fragments were analysed by experts at the giant glass manufacturer Pilkington, which had made the pane, they found that minute crystals of nickel sulphide trapped inside the glass had almost certainly caused the failure.‘The glass industry is aware of the issue,’ says Brian Waldron, chairman of the standards committee at the Glass and Glazing Federation, a British trade association, and standardsdevelopment officer at Pilkington. But he insists that cases are few and far between. ‘It’s a very rare phenomenon,’ he says.Others disagree. ‘On average I see about one or two buildings a month suffering from nickel sulphide related failures,’ says Barrie Josie, a consultant engineer involved in the Bishops Walk investigation. Other experts tell of similar experiences. Tony Wilmott of London-based consulting engineers Sandberg, and Simon Armstrong at CladTech Associates in Hampshire both say they know of hundreds of cases. ‘What you hear is only the tip of the iceberg,’ says Trevor Ford, a glass expert at Resolve Engineering in Brisbane, Queensland. He believes the reason is simple: ‘No-one wants bad press.’Toughened glass is found everywhere, from cars and bus shelters to the windows, walls and roofs of thousands of buildings around the world. It’s easy to see why. This glass has five times the strength of standard glass, and when it does break it shatters into tiny cubes rather than large, razor-sharp shards. Architects love it because large panels can be bolted together to make transparent walls, and turning it into ceilings and floors is almost as easy.It is made by heating a sheet of ordinary glass to about 620°C to soften it slightly, allowing its structure to expand, and then cooling it rapidly with jets of cold air. This causes the outer layer of the pane to contract and solidify before the interior. When the interior finally solidifies and shrinks, it exerts a pull on the outer layer that leaves it in permanent compression and produces a tensile force inside the glass. As cracks propagate best in materials under tension, the compressive force on the surface must be overcome before the pane will break, making it more resistant to cracking.The problem starts when glass contains nickel sulphide impurities. Trace amounts of nickel and sulphur are usually present in the raw materials used to make glass, and nickel can also be introduced by fragments of nickel alloys falling into the molten glass. As the glass is heated, these atoms react to form tiny crystals of nickel sulphide. Just a tenth of a gram of nickel in the furnace can create up to 50,000 crystals.These crystals can exist in two forms: a dense form called the alpha phase, which is stable at high temperatures, and a less dense form called the beta phase, which is stable at room temperatures. The high temperatures used in the toughening process convert all the crystals to the dense, compact alpha form. But the subsequent cooling is so rapid that the crystals don’t have time to change back to the beta phase. This leaves unstable alpha crystals in the glass, primed like a coiled spring, ready to revert to the beta phase without warning.When this happens, the crystals expand by up to 4%. And if they are within the central, tensile region of the pane, the stresses this unleashes can shatter the whole sheet. The time that elapses before failure occurs is unpredictable. It could happen just months after manufacture, or decades later, although if the glass is heated — by sunlight, for example — the process is speeded up. Ironically, says Graham Dodd, of consulting engineers Arup in London, the oldest pane of toughened glass known to have failed due to nickel sulphide inclusions was in Pilkington’s glass research building in Lathom, Lancashire. The pane was 27 years old.Data showing the scale of the nickel sulphide problem is almost impossible to find. The picture is made more complicated by the fact that these crystals occur in batches. So even if, onaverage, there is only one inclusion in 7 tonnes of glass, if you experience one nickel sulphide failure in your building, that probably means you’ve got a problem in more than one pane. Josie says that in the last decade he has worked on over 15 buildings with the number of failures into double figures.One of the worst examples of this is Waterfront Place, which was completed in 1990. Over the following decade the 40-storey Brisbane block suffered a rash of failures. Eighty panes of its toughened glass shattered due to inclusions before experts were finally called in. John Barry, an expert in nickel sulphide contamination at the University of Queensland, analysed every glass pane in the building. Using a studio camera, a photographer went up in a cradle to take photos of every pane. These were scanned under a modified microfiche reader for signs of nickel sulphide crystals. ‘We discovered at least another 120 panes with potentially dangerous inclusions which were then replaced,’ says Barry. ‘It was a very expensive and time-consuming process that took arou nd six months to complete.’ Though the project cost A$1.6 million (nearly £700,000), the alternative — re-cladding the entire building — would have cost ten times as much.Questions 14-17Look at the following people and the list of statements below.Match each person with the correct statement.Write the correct letter A-H in boxes 14-17 on your answer sheet.14 Brain Waldron15 Trevor Ford16 Graham Dodd17 John BarryList of StatementsA suggests that publicity about nickel sulphide failure has been suppressedB regularly sees cases of nickel sulphide failureC closely examined all the glass in one buildingD was involved with the construction of Bishops WalkE recommended the rebuilding of Waterfront PlaceF thinks the benefits of toughened glass are exaggeratedG claims that nickel sulphide failure is very unusualH refers to the most extreme case of delayed failureQuestions 18-23Complete the summary with the list of words A-P below.Write your answers in boxes 18-23 on your answer sheet.Toughened GlassToughened glass in favoured by architects because it is much stronger than ordinary glass, and the fragments are not as 18…………… when it breaks. However, it has one disadvantage: it can shatter 19…………… . This fault is a result of the manufacturing process. Ordinary glass is first heated, then cooled very 20…………… . The outer layer 21…………… before the inner layer, and the tension between the two layers which is created because of this makes the glass stronger However, if the glass contains nickel sulphide impurities, crystals of nickel sulphide are formed. These are unstable, and can expand suddenly, particularly if the weather is 22…………… . If this happens, the pane of glass may break. The frequency with which such problems occur is 23…………… by glass experts. Furthermore, the crystals cannot be detected without sophisticated equipment.A numerousB detectedC quicklyD agreedE warmF sharpG expands H slowly I unexpectedlyJ removed K contracts L disputedM cold N moved O smallP calculatedQuestions 24-26Do the following statements agree with the information given in Reading Passage 2?In boxes 24-26 on your answer sheet, writeTRUE if the statement agrees with the informationFALSE if the statement contradicts the informationNOT GIVEN if there is no information on this24 Little doubt was expressed about the reason for the Bishops Walk accident.25 Toughened glass has the same appearance as ordinary glass.26 There is plenty of documented evidence available about the incidence of nickel sulphide failure.READING PASSAGE 3You should spend about 20 minutes on Questions 27-40, which are based on Reading Passage 3 below.The effects of light on plant and animal speciesLight is important to organisms for two different reasons. Firstly it is used as a cue for the timing, of daily and seasonal rhythms in both plants and animals, and secondly it is used to assist growth in plants.Breeding in most organisms occurs during a part of the year only, and so a reliable cue is needed to trigger breeding behaviour. Day length is an excellent cue, because it provides a perfectly predictable pattern of change within the year. In the temperate zone in spring, temperatures fluctuate greatly fromday to day, but day length increases steadily by a predictable amount. The seasonal impact of day length on physiological responses is called photoperiodism, and the amount of experimental evidence for this phenomenon is considerable. For example, some species of birds’ breeding can be induced even in midwinter simply by increasing day length artificially (Wolfson 1964). Other examples of photoperiodism occur in plants. A short-day plant flowers when the day is less than a certain critical length. A long-day plant flowers after a certain critical day length is exceeded. In both cases the critical day length differs from species to species. Plants which flower after a period of vegetative growth, regardless of photoperiod, are known as day-neutral plants.Breeding seasons in animals such as birds have evolved to occupy the part of the year in which offspring have the greatest chances of survival. Before the breeding season begins, food reserves must be built up to support the energy cost of reproduction, and to provide for young birds both when they are in the nest and after fledging. Thus many temperate-zone birds use the increasing day lengths in spring as a cue to begin the nesting cycle, because this is a point when adequate food resources will be assured.The adaptive significance at photoperiodism in plants is also clear. Short-day plants that flower in spring in the temperate zone are adapted to maximizing seedling growth during the growing season. Long-day plants are adapted for situations that require fertilization by insects, or a long period of seed ripening. Short-day plants that flower in the autumn in the temperate zone are able to build up food reserves over the growing season and over winter as seeds. Day-neutral plants have an evolutionaryadvantage when the connection between the favourable period for reproduction and day length is much less certain. For example, desert annuals germinate, flower and seed whenever suitable rainfall occurs, regardless of the day length.The breeding season of some plants can be delayed to extraordinary lengths. Bamboos are perennial grasses that remain in a vegetative state for many years and then suddenly flower, fruit and die (Evans 1976). Every bamboo of the species Chusquea abietifolio on the island of Jamaica flowered, set seed and died during 1884. The next generation of bamboo flowered and died between 1916 and 1918, which suggests a vegetative cycle of about 31 years. The climatic trigger for this flowering cycle is not yet known, but the adaptive significance is clear. The simultaneous production of masses of bamboo seeds (in some cases lying 12 to 15 centimetres deep on the ground) is more than all the seed-eating animals can cope with at the time, so that some seeds escape being eaten and grow up to form the next generation (Evans 1976).The second reason light is important to organisms is that it is essential for photosynthesis. This is the process by which plants use energy from the sun to convert carbon from soil or water into organic material for growth. The rate of photosynthesis in a plant can be measured by calculating the rate of its uptake of carbon. There is a wide range of photosynthetic responses of plants to variations in light intensity. Some plants reach maximal photosynthesis at one-quarter full sunlight, and others, like sugarcane, never reach a maximum, but continue to increase photosynthesis rate as light intensity rises.Plants in general can be divided into two groups: shade-tolerant species and shade-intolerant species. This classificationis commonly used in forestry and horticulture. Shade-tolerant plants have lower photosynthetic rates and hence have lower growth rates than those of shade-intolerant species. Plant species become adapted to living in a certain kind of habitat, and in the process evolve a series of characteristics that prevent them from occupying other habitats. Grime (1966) suggests that light may be one of the major components directing these adaptations. For example, eastern hemlock seedlings are shade-tolerant. They can survive in the forest understory under very low light levels because they have a low photosynthetic rate.Questions 27-33Do the following statements agree with the information given in Reading Passage 3?In boxes 27-33 on your answer sheet, writeTRUE if the statement agrees with the informationFALSE if the statement contradicts the informationNOT GIVEN if there is no information on this27 There is plenty of scientific evidence to support photoperiodism.28 Some types of bird can be encouraged to breed out of season.29 Photoperiodism is restricted to certain geographic areas.30 Desert annuals are examples of long-day plants.31 Bamboos flower several times during their life cycle.32 Scientists have yet to determine the cue for Chusquea abitifolia’s seasonal rhythm.33 Eastern hemlock is a fast-growing plant.Questions 34-40Complete the sentences.Choose NO MORE THAN THREE WORDS from the passagefor each answer.Write your answers in boxes 34-40 on your answer sheet.34 Day length is a useful cue for breeding in areas where …………… are unpredictable.35 Plants which do not respond to light levels are referred to as…………… .36 Birds in temperate climates associate longer days with nesting and the availability of …………….37 Plants that flower when days are long often depend on …………… to help them reproduce.38 Desert annuals respond to …………… as a signal for reproduction.39 There is no limit to the photosynthetic rate in plants such as …………… .40 Tolerance to shade is one criterion for the …………… of plants in forestry and horticulture.剑桥雅思阅读5原文参考译文(test4)TEST 4 PASSAGE 1 参考译文:The Impact of Wilderness Tourism荒野旅游的影响AThe market for tourism in remote areas is booming as never before. Countries all across the world are actively promoting their ‘wilderness’ regions —such as mountains, Arctic lands, deserts, small islands and wetland — to high-spending tourists. The attraction of these areas is obvious: by definition, wilderness tourism requires little or no initial investment. But that does not mean that there is no cost. As the 1992 United Nations Conference on Environment and Development recognized, these regions are fragile (i.e. highly vulnerable to abnormal pressures)not just in terms of their ecology, but also in terms of the culture of their inhabitants. The three most significant types of fragile environment in these respects, and also in terms of the proportion of the Earth’s surface they cover, are deserts, mountains and Arctic areas. An important characteristic is their marked seasonality, with harsh conditions prevailing for many months each year. Consequently, most human activities, including tourism, are limited to quite clearly defined parts of the year.A偏远地区的旅游市场从未曾像现在这么火爆。

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剑桥雅思8-第三套试题-阅读部分-P A S S A G E1-阅读真题原文部分:READING PASSAGE 1You should spend about 20 minutes on Questions 1-13 which are based on Reading Passage 1 below.Striking Back at Lightning With LasersSeldom is the weather more dramatic than when thunderstorms strike. Their electrical fury inflicts death or serious injury on around 500 people each year in the United States alone. As the clouds roll in, a leisurely round of golf can become a terrifying dice with death - out in the open, a lone golfer may be a lightning bolt's most inviting target. And there is damage to property too. Lightning damage costs American power companies more than $100 million a year.But researchers in the United States and Japan are planning to hit back. Already in laboratory trials they have tested strategies for neutralising the power of thunderstorms, and this winter they will brave real storms, equipped with an armoury of lasers that they will be pointing towards the heavens to discharge thunderclouds before lightning can strike.The idea of forcing storm clouds to discharge their lightning on command is not new. In the early 1960s, researchers tried firing rockets trailing wires into thunderclouds to set up an easy discharge path for the huge electric charges that these clouds generate. The technique survives to this day at a test site in Florida run by the University of Florida, with support from the Electrical Power Research Institute (EPRI), based in California. EPRI, which is funded by power companies, is looking at ways to protect the United States' power grid from lightning strikes. 'We can cause the lightning to strike where we want it to using rockets, ' says Ralph Bernstein, manager of lightning projects at EPRI. The rocket site is providing precise measurements of lightning voltages and allowing engineers to check how electrical equipment bears up.Bad behaviourBut while rockets are fine for research, they cannot provide the protection from lightning strikes that everyone is looking for. The rockets cost around $1, 200 each, can onlybe fired at a limited frequency and their failure rate is about 40 per cent. And even when they do trigger lightning, things still do not always go according to plan. 'Lightning is not perfectly well behaved, ' says Bernstein. 'Occasionally, it will take a branch and go someplace it wasn't supposed to go. 'And anyway, who would want to fire streams of rockets in a populated area 'What goes up must come down, ' points out Jean-Claude Diels of the University of New Mexico. Diels is leading a project, which is backed by EPRI, to try to use lasers to discharge lightning safely - and safety is a basic requirement since no one wants to put themselves or their expensive equipment at risk. With around $500, 000 invested so far, a promising system is just emerging from the laboratory.The idea began some 20 years ago, when high-powered lasers were revealing their ability to extract electrons out of atoms and create ions. If a laser could generate a line of ionisation in the air all the way up to a storm cloud, this conducting path could be used to guide lightning to Earth, before the electric field becomes strong enough to break down the air in an uncontrollable surge. To stop the laser itself being struck, it would not be pointed straight at the clouds. Instead it would be directed at a mirror, and from there into the sky. The mirror would be protected by placing lightning conductors close by. Ideally, thecloud-zapper (gun)would be cheap enough to be installed around all key power installations, and portable enough to be taken to international sporting events to beam up at brewing storm clouds.A stumbling blockHowever, there is still a big stumbling block. The laser is no nifty portable: it's a monster that takes up a whole room. Diels is trying to cut down the size and says that a laser around the size of a small table is in the offing. He plans to test this more manageable system on live thunderclouds next summer.Bernstein says that Diels's system is attracting lots of interest from the power companies. But they have not yet come up with the $5 million that EPRI says will be needed to develop a commercial system, by making the lasers yet smaller and cheaper. 'I cannot say I have money yet, but I'm working on it, ' says Bernstein. He reckons that the forthcomingfield tests will be the turning point - and he's hoping for good news. Bernstein predicts 'an avalanche of interest and support' if all goes well. He expects to see cloud-zappers eventually costing 100, 000 each.Other scientists could also benefit. With a lightning 'switch' at their fingertips, materials scientists could find out what happens when mighty currents meet matter. Diels also hopes to see the birth of 'interactive meteorology' - not just forecasting the weather but controlling it. 'If we could discharge clouds, we might affect the weather, ' he says.And perhaps, says Diels, we'll be able to confront some other meteorological menaces. 'We think we could prevent hail by inducing lightning, ' he says. Thunder, the shock wave that comes from a lightning flash, is thought to be the trigger for the torrential rain that is typical of storms. A laser thunder factory could shake the moisture out of clouds, perhaps preventing the formation of the giant hailstones that threaten crops. With luck, as the storm clouds gather this winter, laser-toting researchers could, for the first time, strike back.Questions 1-3Choose the correct letter, A, B, C or D.Write the correct letter in boxes 1-3 on your answer sheet.1 The main topic discussed in the text isA the damage caused to US golf courses and golf players by lightning strikes.B the effect of lightning on power supplies in the US and in Japan.C a variety of methods used in trying to control lightning strikes.D a laser technique used in trying to control lightning strikes.2 According to the text, every year lightningA does considerable damage to buildings during thunderstorms.B kills or injures mainly golfers in the United States.C kills or injures around 500 people throughout the world.D damages more than 100 American power companies.3 Researchers at the University of Florida and at the University of New MexicoA receive funds from the same source.B are using the same techniques.C are employed by commercial companies.D are in opposition to each other.Questions 4-6Complete the sentences below.Choose NO MORE THAN TWO WORDS from the passage for each answer.Write your answers in boxes 4-6 on your answer sheet.4 EPRI receives financial support from………………………….5 The advantage of the technique being developed by Diels is that it can be used……………….6 The main difficulty associated with using the laser equipment is related to its……………….Questions 7-10Complete the summary using the list of words, A-I, below.Write the correct letter, A-I, in boxes 7-10 on your answer sheet.In this method, a laser is used to create a line of ionisation by removing electrons from 7 …………………………. This laser is then directed at 8 …………………………in order to control electrical charges, a method which is less dangerous than using9 …………………………. As a protection for the lasers, the beams are aimed firstly at 10………………………….A cloud-zappersB atomsC storm cloudsD mirrorsE techniqueF ionsG rockets H conductors I thunderQuestions 11-13Do the following statements agree with the information given in Reading Passage 1 In boxes 11-13 on your answer sheet writeYES if the statement agrees with the claims of the writerNO if the statement contradicts the claims of the writerNOT GIVEN if it is impossible to say what the writer thinks about this11 Power companies have given Diels enough money to develop his laser.12 Obtaining money to improve the lasers will depend on tests in real storms.13 Weather forecasters are intensely interested in Diels's system.READING PASSAGE 1篇章结构体裁说明文主题用激光回击闪电结构第1段:闪电带来的危害第2段:科研人员正在研究回击闪电的方法第3段:先前的闪电回击术介绍第4段:火箭回击术的缺陷第5段:更安全的激光回击术第6段:激光回击术的技术原理第7段:激光回击术的缺陷第8段:通过实地实验改进激光回击术第9段:激光回击术对其他学科也有益处第10段:激光回击术的其他用途解题地图难度系数:★★★解题顺序:按题目顺序解答即可友情提示:烤鸭们注意:本文中的SUMMARY题目顺序有改变,解题要小心;MULTIPLE CHOICE的第三题是个亮点,爱浮想联翩的烤鸭们可能会糊掉。

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