Section B
Directions: There are 2 passages in this section. Each passage is followed by some questions or unfinished statements. For each of them there are four choices marked A, B, C and D. You should decide on the best choice.
Many Americans harbour a grossly distorted and exaggerated view of most of the risks surrounding food. Fergus Clydesdale, head of the department of food science and nutrition at the University of MassachusettsAmherst, says that if the dangers from bacterially contaminated chicken were as great as some people believe. "The streets would be littered with people lying here and there."
Though the public increasingly demands norisk food, there is no such thing. Bruce Panes, chairman of the biochemistry department at the University of California, Berkeley, points out that up to 10% of a plant's weight is made up of natural pesticides(杀虫剂). Says he, "Since plants do not have jaws or teeth to protect them selves, they employ chemical warfare." And many naturally produced chemicals, though occurring in tiny amounts, prove in laboratory tests to be strong carcinogens—a substance which can cause cancer. Mushrooms might be banned if they were judged by the same standards that apply to food additives(添加剂). Declares Christina Stark, a nutritionist at Cornell University: "We've got fat worse natural chemicals in the food supply than anything manmade."
Yet the issues are not that simple. While Americans have no reason to be terrified to sit down at the dinner table, they have every reason to demand significant improvements in food and water safety. They unconsciously and unwillingly take in too much of too many dangerous chemicals. If food already contains natural carcinogens, it does not make much sense to add dozens of new man made ones. Though most people will withstand the small amounts of contaminants generally found in food and water, at least a few individuals will probably get cancer one day be cause of what they eat and drink.
To make good food and water supplies even better, the Government needs to tighten its regulatory standards, stiffen its inspection program and strengthen its enforcement policies. The food industry should modify some longaccepted practices or turn to less hazardous alternatives. Perhaps most important, consumers will have to do a better job of learning how to handle and cook food properly. The problems that need to be tackled exist all along the foodsupply chain, from fields to processing plants to kitchens.
What does the author think of the Americans' view of their food?
A. They overstate the government's interference with the food industry.
B. They are overoptimistic about the safety of their food.
C. They overestimate the hazards of their food.
D. They overlook the risks of the food they eat.
Which of the following statements is NOT true about unhappy people?
A. They are often born with this disagreeable nature.
B. They focus on the inconveniences of things.
C. They often offend others.
D. They are not popular in social occasions.
Section A
Directions: In this section, you will hear 8 short conversations and 2 long conversations. At the end of each conversation, one or more questions will be asked about what was said. Both the conversation and the questions will be spoken only once. After each question there will be a pause. During the pause, you must read the four choices marked A, B, C and D, and decide which is the best answer.
听力原文:M: Look at all those people lining up at the, box office. There must be fifty ahead of us.
W: I think our chance of getting a ticket would be pretty slim.
Q: What can be inferred from the woman's conversation?
(12)
A. The tickets have already been sold out.
B. They will probably not be able to get the ticket.
C. They have to wait for a long while to get the ticket.
D. They have to wait fifty minutes before they get the ticket.
When the end of the world comes, we'll know what to blame. Scientists have found compelling evidence that the Sun has a baby brother, a dark star whose eccentric orbit is responsible for periodically showering the Earth with comets and meteorites.
The dark star -- named Nemesis by astronomers -- is thought to be a brown dwarf that spins round the Sun in an orbit so large it is measured in light years, the distance light travels in a year, equivalent to about 6,000 billion miles.
The research suggests that, every 26m years, the star's eccentric orbit brings it within one light year of the solar system. There it causes havoc in the Oort Cloud, a huge region surrounding the solar system that contains billions of bits of cosmic rabble left over from the formation of planets.
Of the millions of rocks it throws out of orbit at each visit, some hurtle Earthwards, and have several times nearly wiped out life on Earth.
Astronomers have long wondered if the Sun has a smaller partner. Recently, two independent groups of researchers have found evidence of one.
One group, led by John Matese, professor of physics at the University of Louisiana at Lafayette, confirms the notion that it is most likely to be a brown dwarf, a star that never accumulated enough mass to ignite and which has simply sat in space smoldering for billions of years.
Matese studied 82 comets from the Oort Cloud and found common elements in the shape of their orbits that could only be explained if they had been influenced by the gravitational pull of an object several times the size of Jupiter and existing about 25,000 times farther from the Sun than the Earth.
Matese said: "A companion to the Sun orbiting at these distances would have little effect on the planets. But it would play a big role in the way comets 'made their way' from their birth places in the planetary disc out to the Oort Cloud and in how they can return to the inner solar system."
Further research was published by Richard Muller, professor of physics at the University of California, Berkeley, following analyses of moon rock samples brought back to Earth by Apollo 14.
The absence of a protective atmosphere means the moon has been subjected to intense bombardment in its 4.5 billion-year existence.
Muller's breakthrough was to find a way to date how long ago any particle was melted -- meaning he could build up a picture of whether the moon gets a constant barrage or suffers spells of intense bombardment.
He said, "The evidence clearly shows that the moon has gone through spells of relatively frequent impacts and others of reduced intensity. I believe it is likely that this is because the Oort Cloud is being disturbed by a massive body that is throwing comets out of stable orbits, a small fraction of which could reach the Earth."
Muller and others believe that the dark star probably takes about 26m years to complete an orbit around the sun.
Other scientists have already noted that mass extinctions of life on Earth seem to occur in a pattern with gaps equivalent to multiples of 26m, suggesting some regular event is causing the comets to come Earth's way.
The best-known such event was the one that wiped out the dinosaurs 65m years ago, but that was not the worst; the planet has suffered several such large mass extinctions.
Astronomers have found the first Earth-sized planet orbiting another star. The discovery raises the chances of finding planets that could support life as we know it.
Which of the following is NOT a feature of the Nemesis?
A. It contributes to showering of comets on the earth.
B. It is a smaller partner of the Sun.
C. It has a large orbit.
D. It contains bits of cosmic rubble.