Reading Comprehension(30 points,2 points each)

从下列每篇短文的问题后所给的四个选项中选出一个最佳答案，并在答题纸上将相应的字母涂黑。

Passage One

Questions 21 to 25 are based on the following passage.

Among the company was a lawyer, a young man of about twenty-five. On being asked his opinion,he said,  " Capital punishment and life imprisonment are equally immoral.  If I were to make a choice between them,  I would rather choose the latter.  Anyway, it' s better to live than not to live at all. "

A lively discussion followed. A banker, who was then younger and more nervous than the lawyer, suddenly lost his temper and cried out,  "It' s a lie.  I bet you two millions.  You wouldn' t stick in a cell even for five years. "

"If you mean it," replied the young lawyer, "I bet I'll stay there longer; make it fifteen instead of five. "

"Fifteen! Done !" cried the banker.  "Gentleman, I bet you two millions. "

"Agreed. Two millions for my freedom," said the lawyer.

So this wild, ridiculous bet came to pass. The banker could not hide his excitement. During supper he said to the lawyer jokingly, "Come to your senses, young man, before it's too late.  Two millions are nothing to me, but you stand to lose three or four of the best years of your life. I say three or four because you'II never stick it out any longer.  Don't forget that voluntary imprisonment is much harder to put up with than an enforced one. The idea that you have the right to free yourself any moment will poison your life in the cell. I pity you. "

And now the banker,  pacing from corner to corner, recalled all this and asked himself,  " Why did I make this bet? What' s the good7 The lawyer lost fifteen years of his life and 1 threw away two millions.  Will it convince people that capital punishment is worse or better than imprisonment for life-? No,  no !  Rubbish !  On my part,  it was the caprice( 心血来潮) of a well-fed millionaire;  on the 1awyer' s part,  it' s the pure greed of gold. "

Passage Two

Questions 26 to 30 are based on the following passage.

In a quiet,darkened lecture room,you begin a frustrating fight against fatigue. The overhead projector hums,and you cannot concentrate on the slides. You stop absorbing information and become absent-minded. The professor lost you a long time ago. You are bored.

Virtually everyone gets bored once in a while. Most of us chalk it up to a dull environment. " The most common way to define boredom in Western culture is  ' having nothing to do,' " says psychologist Stephen Vodanovich of the University of West Florida. And indeed,early research into the effects of boredom focused on people forced to perform dull tasks,such as working a factory assembly line .

But boredom is not merely an natural property of the circumstances,researchers say. Rather this perception is subjective and rooted in aspects of consciousness. Levels of boredom vary among people:some individuals are far less liable to boredom than others-and some,such as extroverts(性格外向者) ,are more likely to have this feeling.

Thus,a new generation of scientists is coping with the psychological interpretations of this most tedious of human emotions-and they have found that it is more complicated than is commonly known. Researchers say that boredom is not a unifiecl concept but rather comes in several flavors.Level of attention,an aspect of conscious awareness,plays an important role in boredom,such that improving a person' s ability to focus may therefore decrease boredom. Emotional factors can also  contribute to  boredom. People who are poor in understanding their own feelings and those who become sucked in and distracted by their moods are more easily bored,for example.

Staying away from tedium is not easy. People who are liable to boredom are more likely to suffer from ills depression and drug addiction;they also tend to be socially awkward and poor performers at school or work.

Passage Three

Questions 31 to 35 are based on the following passage.

This green and blue planet spinning in space is under severe stress. If we continue to exploit the planet at the present rate,human and animal life will be threatened. Human pride will be followed by nature' s punishment. To save our earth and ourselves,we need first develop an unbiased understanding of ourselves,nature and life.

Everyone understands the meaning of the sentence6*Man should respect animal life and nature". But the exact meaning of man,nature and animal life is not always clear. Many refer to man and animals as if they were essentially different. I consider man to be an animal and only differing in degree and not in kind from other animals. Although I discuss in conventional terms human rights and animal rights as if they were separate,strictly speaking,human rights should be considered a branch of animal rights.

The word " nature"  is one of the most complex words in the language,but it has developed three main  areas of meaning. These are ,first,the essential quality and character of something( as in human nature,or the nature of wood) ; second,the inherent force which influences the world( as in Mother Nature) ; third,the entire world itself. The last can be taken to include or to exclude human be]ngs,as the phrase man and the natural world implies.

I consider humans to be an integral part of nature, although they are also the beings most capable of interfering with its processes.  Unfortunately a central drive of Western" man" has been to conquer"nature" , as if it were an object separate from him.  Hence it has become c.ommon to distinguish between what is natural( existing without man.' s interference) and artificial( man-made).  In this way, natural growth is opposed to education, civilization to the natural state.  For many urban people living permanently among concrete and glass, nature itself has come to mean little more than the countryside.  And this notion of opposition is where the seed of potential destruction lies.