Part A
Directions: Read the following texts and answer the questions which accompany them by choosing A, B, C or D. Mark your answers on ANSWER SHEET 1.
In a three-month period last year, two Brooklynites had to be cut out of their apartments and carded to hospital on stretchers designed for transporting small whales. The National Association to Advance Fat Acceptance(NAAFA) argues that it was not their combined 900kg bulk that made them ill. Obesity, according to NAAFA, is not bad for you. And, even if it was, there is nothing to be done about it, because genes dictate weight. Attempting to eat less merely slows metabolism, having people as chubby as ever.
This is the fatlash movement that causes America's slimming industry so much pain. In his book Bin Fat Lies (Ballantine, 1996), Glenn Gaesser says that no study yet has convincingly shown that weight is an independent cause of health problems. Fatness does not kill people; things like hypertension, coronary heart diseases and cancer do. Michael Fumento, author of The Fat of the Land (Viking, 1997 ), an anti-fatlash diatribe, compares Dr Gaesser's logic with saying that the guillotine did not kill Louis XVI: Rather, it was the severing of his vertebrae, the cutting of all the blood vessels in his neck, and... the trauma caused by his head dropping several feet into a wicker basket.
Being fat kills in several ways. It makes people far more likely to suffer from heart disease or high blood pressure. Even moderate obesity increases the chance of contracting diabetes. Being 40% overweight makes people 30%~50% more likely to die of cancer, according to the American Cancer Society. Extreme fatness makes patients so much less likely to survive surgery that many doctors refuse to operate until they slim.
The idea that being overweight is caused by obesity genes is not wholly false: researchers have found a number of genes that appear to make some people bum off energy at a slower rate. But genes are not destiny. The difference between someone with a genetic predisposition to gain weight and someone without appears to be roughly 40 calories-or a spoonful of mayonnaise—a day.
An alternative fatlash argument, advanced in books such as Dean Onrush's Eat More, Weight Less (Harper Collies, 1993) and Date Atrens's Don't Diet (William Morrow, 1978), is that fatness is not a matter of eating too much. They note that as Americans' weight has ballooned over the last few decades, their reported caloric intake has plunged. This simply explains people's own recollection of how much they eat is extremely unreliable. And as they grow fatter, people feel guilty and are more likely to fib about how much they eat. All reputable studies show that eating less and exercising reduce weight.
Certainly, the body' s metabolism slows a little when you lose weight, because it takes less energy to carry less bulk around, and because dieting can make the body fear it is about to starve. But a sensible low-fat diet makes weight loss possible. The fatlash movement is dangerous, because slimmers will often find any excuse to give up. To tell people that it is healthy to be obese is to encourage them to live sick and die young.
The two Brooklynites in the first paragraph were______.
A. members of the NWA
B. typical victims of overweight
C. members of the "fatlash" movement
D. proof that the fatlash movement is gaining strength
听力原文:M:Do you think women are generally better at certain things than men?
W:Well,it seems to me women are much better at dealing with more than one thing at a time.I don't know whether this has to do with the difference in their brain or whether it's just how they have to cope more often with more than one thing.For example,it is usually women who work,have babies.look after the babies and take the main, responsibility for looking after the home.And maybe it's practicing all that makes women be better able to do more than one thing at a time.Men,it seems to me,can only concentrate on one thing at a time,including boring domestic things like washing the dishes.If a friend of mine who is a man washes the dishes he'll find it quite difficult to conduct a conversation at the same time.whereas if I'm doing the dishes I'm always talking to someone.probably cooking something as well,and finding that not too stressful.
M:Do you think women are more interested in personal relationships than men?
W:Generally,yes,though again I don't know if this is because that from an early age they are taught to please other people,whereas men are always taught to please themselves.I think relationships are more central to most women's lives.For example.I think men don't have very good conversations with each other.whereas women do.If you listen to women talking,often they will be having,after a relatively short time of knowing each other,fairly personal and truthful conversations,whereas men have conversations not about what I'd call real things.They will talk about their work in a very superficial way,or their interests in a very superficial way,for example,and football is me—um—just a sort of way for men to relate to each other without actually saying anything important,it appears to me.
According to the woman,why women are much better at dealing with more than one thing at a time?
A. She doesn't know the reason exactly.
Because women are smarter than men.
C. Because women have more things to deal with than men.
D. Because men always refuse to deal with more than one thing at the same time.