水木艾迪：阅读理解冲刺之练习题（二）
Text 6
As is the case in many cultures, the degree to which a minority group was seen as different from the characteristics of the dominant majority determined the extent of that group’s acceptance. Immigrants who were like the earlier settlers were accepted. The large numbers of immigrants with significantly different characteristics tended to be viewed as a threat to basic American values and the American way of life.
This was particularly true of the immigrants who arrived by the million during the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. Most of them came from poverty-stricken nations of southern and eastern Europe. They spoke languages other than English, and large numbers of them were Catholics or Jews.
Americans at the time were very fearful of this new flood of immigrants. They were afraid that these people were so accustomed to lives of poverty and dependence that they would not understand such basic American values as freedom, self-reliance and competition. There were so many new immigrants that they might even change the basic values of the nation in undesirable ways.
Americans tried to meet what they saw as a threat to their values by offering English instruction for the new immigrants and citizenship classes to teach them basic American beliefs. The immigrants, however, often felt that their American teachers disapproved of the traditions of their homeland. Moreover, learning about American values gave them little help in meeting their most important needs such as employment, food, and a place to live.
Far more helpful to the new immigrants were the “political bosses” of the larger cities of the northeastern United States, where most of the immigrants first arrived. Those bosses saw to many of the practical needs of the immigrants and were more accepting of the different homeland traditions. In exchange for their help, the political bossed expected the immigrants to keep them in power by voting for them in elections.
In spite of this, many scholars believe that the political bosses performed an important function in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. They helped to assimilate large numbers of disadvantaged white immigrants into the larger American culture. The fact that the United States had a rapidly expanding economy at the turn of the century made it possible for these new immigrants, often with the help of the bosses, to better their standard of living in the United States. As a result of these new opportunities and new rewards, immigrants came to accept most of the values of the larger American culture and were in turn accepted by the great majority of Americans. For white ethnic groups, therefore, it is generally true that their feeling of being a part of the larger culture, that is, “American” is much stronger than their feeling of belonging to a separate ethnic group— Irish, Italian, Polish, etc. (468 words)
26. A minority group’s acceptance to the country was determined by _____.
A. the difference they showed from the majority.
B. the time when they arrived at the new land.
C. the background conditions they came from.
D. the religious group to which they belonged.
27. The immigrants’ flushing in was considered a threat to American value mainly because _____.
A. the immigrants came from poverty-stricken nations of southern and eastern Europe.
B. the immigrants had been accustomed to poverty and dependence.
C. the immigrants had different homeland traditions and other particular characteristics.
D. the immigrants did not speak English.
28. “Citizenship classes” (Para. 4) were offered because Americans ____.
A. wanted to help the immigrants to solve their practical needs.
B. would not accept any groups with different traditions.
C. wanted the immigrants to deal with the threat to the American values.
D. wanted the immigrants to learn about and to keep the American values.
29. The political bosses helped the new immigrants for the main purpose of _____.
A. showing off their political powers and advantages.
B. getting support in elections.
C. assimilating the minority into the majority.
D. showing their generosity.
30. The living standards of the new immigrants were improved in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries mainly because ____.
A. they kept the political bosses in power.
B. the political bosses gave them a lot of practical help.
C. they had a much stronger feeling of being a part of the larger culture.
D. there was a rapid growth in American economy at that time.
Text 7
The table before which we sit may be, as the scientist maintains, composed of dancing atoms, but it does not reveal itself to us as anything of the kind, and it is not with dancing atoms but a solid and motionless object that we live. So remote is this “real” table — and most of the other “realities” with which science deals — that it cannot be discussed in terms which have any human value, and though it may receive our purely intellectual credence it cannot be woven into the pattern of life as it is led, in contradistinction to life as we attempt to think about it. Vibrations in the ether are so totally unlike, let us say, the color purple that the gulf between them cannot be bridged, and they are, to all intents and purposes, not one but two separate things of which the second and less “real” must be the most significant for us. And just as the sensation which has led us to attribute an objective reality to a non-existent thing which we call “purple” is more important for human life than the conception of vibrations of a certain frequency, so too the belief in God, however ill founded, has been more important in the life of man than the germ theory of decay, however true the latter may be.
We may, if we like, speak of consequence, as certain mystics love to do, of the different levels or orders of truth. We may adopt what is essentially a Platonist trick of thought and insist upon postulating the existence of external realities which correspond to the needs and modes of human feeling and which, so we may insist, to make an unwarrantable assumption and to be guilty of metaphysical fallacy of failing to distinguish between a truth of feeling and that other sort of truth which is described as a “truth of correspondence”, and it is better perhaps, at least for those of us who have grown up in an age of scientific thought, to steer clear of which science deals is the real universe, yet we do not and cannot have any but fleeting and imperfect contacts with it; that the most important part of our lives — our sensations, emotions, desires, and aspirations — takes place in a universe of illusions which science can attenuate or destroy but which it is powerless to enrich. (397 words)
31. The author suggests that in order to bridge the puzzling schism between scientific truth and the world of illusion, the reader should ________.
A. try to rid himself of his world of illusion
B. accept his world as being one of illusion
C. apply the scientific method
D. learn to acknowledge both
32. Judging from the ideas and tone of the selection, one may reasonably guess that the author is a ________.
A. humanist
B. pantheist
C. nuclear physicist
D. doctor of medicine
33. According to the passage, a scientist would conceive of a “table” as being ________.
A. a solid motionless object
B. certain characteristic vibrations in ether
C. a form fixed in space and time
D. a mass of atoms in motion
34. The topic of this selection is ________.
A. the confusion caused by emotions
B. the distortion of reality by science
C. a scientific approach to living
D. the place of scientific truth in our lives
35. By “objective reality” the author means ________.
A. scientific reality
B. a symbolic existence
C. the viewer’s experience
D. reality colored by emotion
Text 8
In the early days of sea travel, seamen on long voyages lived exclusively on salted meat and biscuits. Many of them died of scurvy, a disease of the blood which causes swollen gums, livid white spots on the flesh and general exhaustion. On one occasion, in 1535, an English ship arrived in Newfound-land with its crew desperately ill. The men’s lives were saved by Iroquois Indians who gave them vegetable leaves to eat. Gradually it came to be realized that scurvy was caused by some lack in the sailors’ diet and Captain Cook, on his long voyages of discovery to Australia and New Zealand, established the fact that scurvy could be warded off by the provision of fresh fruit for the sailors.
Nowadays it is understood that a diet which contains nothing harmful may yet result in serious disease if certain important elements are missing. These elements are called “vitamins”. Quite a number of such substances are known and they are given letters to identify them, A,B,C,D, and so on. Different diseases are associated with deficiencies of particular vitamins. Even a slight lack of Vitamin C, for example, the vitamin most plentiful in fresh fruit and vegetable, is thought to increase significantly our susceptibility to colds and influenza.
The vitamins necessary for a healthy body are normally supplied by a good mixed diet, including a variety of fruit and green vegetables. It is only when people try to live on a very restricted diet, say during extended periods of religious fasting, or when trying to lose weight, that it is necessary to make special provision to supply the missing vitamins.
Another example of the dangers of a restricted diet may suffer from ‘beriberi’, which used to afflict large numbers of Eastern peoples who lived mainly on rice. In the early years of this century, a Dutch scientist called Eijkman was trying to discover the cause of beriberi. At first he thought it was transmitted by a germ. He was working in a Japanese hospital, where the patients were fed on rice which had had the outer husk removed from the grain. It was thought this would be easier for weak, sick people to digest.
Eijkman thought his germ theory was confirmed when he noticed the chickens in the hospital yard, which were fed on scraps from the patients’ plates, were also showing signs of the disease. He then tried to isolate the germ he thought was causing the disease, but his experiments were interrupted by a hospital official, who decreed that the huskless polished rice, even though left over by the patients, was too good for chickens. It should be recooked and the chickens fed on cheap, coarse rice with the outer covering still on the grain.
Eijkman noticed that the chickens began to recover on the new diet. He began to consider the possibility that a lack of some ingredient in the husk might be the cause of the disease. Indeed this was the case. The element needed to prevent beriberi was shortly afterwards isolated from rice husks and is now known as vitamin B. The milled rice, though more expansive, was in fact perpetuating the disease the hospital was trying to cure. Nowadays, this terrible disease is much less common thanks to our knowledge of vitamins. (553 words)
36. From the passage, what can we learn about Captain Cook?
A. He provided clothes for his sailors to avoid scurvy.
B. He provided money for his sailors to avoid scurvy.
C. He provided fresh fruit for his sailors to avoid scurvy.
D. He provided blood for his sailors to avoid scurvy.
37. The word ‘beriberi’ (in paragraph 3) probably means _______.
A. a germ B. a natural phenomenon C. an epidemic D. a disease
38. In the last paragraph, what does sentence “Indeed this was the case” mean?
A. Really B. True C. False D. Eijkman’s considering was proved correct.
39. Vitamin B can be got in—－
A. rice B. rice husks C. noodle D. grain
40. From the context, what do you think “perpetuating” means?
A. dead B. happy C. keep fresh D. keep alive
Text 9
Research on friendship has established a number of facts, some interesting, some even useful. Did you know that the average student has 5-6 friends, or that a friend who was previously an enemy is like more than one who has always been on the right side? Would you believe that physically attractive individuals are preferred as friends to those less comely, and is it fair that physically attractive defendants are less likely to be found guilty in court? Unfortunately, such titbits don’t tell us much more about the nature or the purpose of friendship. In fact, studies of friendship seem to implicate more complex factors.
For example, one function friendship seems to fulfi1 is that it supports the image we have of ourselves, and confirms the value of the attitudes we hold. Certainly we appear to project ourselves onto our friends; severa1 studies have shown that we judge them to be more like us than they (objectively) are. This suggests that we ought to choose friends who are similar to us rather than those Who would be complementary. In our experiment, some developing friendships were monitored amongst first－year students living in the same hoste1. It was found that similarity of attitudes (towards politics, religion and ethics, pastimes and aesthetics) was a good predictor of what friendships wou1d be estab1ished by the end of four months, though it has 1ess to do with initial alliances－not surprising1y, since attitudes may not be obvious on first inspection.
There have also been studies of pairings, both voluntary (married couples) and forced (student roommates), to see which remained together and which split up. Again, the evidence seems to favour similarity rather than complementarity as an omen of a successful relationship, though there is a complication: where marriage is concerned, once the field has been narrowed down to potential mates who come from similar backgrounds and share a broad range of attitudes and values, a degree of complementarity seems to become desirab1e. When a couple are not just similar but almost identical, something else seems to be needed. Simi1arity can breed contempt, it has a1so been found that when we find others obnoxious, we dislike them more if they are like us than when they are dissimilar!
The difficulty of linking friendship with similarity of persona1ity probably reflects the complexity of our personalities: we have many facets and therefore require a disparate group of friends to support us. This of course can explain why we may have two close friends who have litt1e in common, and indeed dislike each other. By and large, though, it looks as though we would do well to choose friends (and spouses) who resemble us. If this were not so, computer dating agencies would have gone out of business years ago. (463 words)
41. Research on friendship has demonstrated that______
A. every student has five or six friends.
B. judges are always influenced by a pretty face.
C. ugly people find it harder to make friends than beautiful people.
D. we tend to grow fond of people if we dislike them at first sight.
42. Studies of friendship have indicated that in seeking friends we______
A. are looking for sympathy.
B. insist on them having similar attitudes to ourselves.
C. think they resemble us more than they really do.
D. want to be flattered.
43. The experiment conducted on students living in a hostel suggested that______
A. in the long run, people get on better with those who are like them.
B. it was impossible to predict which friendships would develop.
C. students immediately recognized others with similar attitudes and interests.
D. students split up as soon as they discovered differences in attitudes.
44. Studies of marriage relationships indicate that______
A. exactly the same bases for success apply as for ordinary friendships.
B. it is first of all necessary to limit prospective partners to people from similar backgrounds.
C. opposites get on better than similar personalities.
D. the most successful are those between people who are alike but not exactly the same.
45. Which of the following best illustrates the major view of the passage?
A. Birds of a feather flock together.
B. Opposites attract each other.
C. Great minds think alike.
D. A friend in need is a friend indeed.
Text 10
Why is English so difficult? It is often thought that the number of words in the English language is a major reason, but this is not the real answer. Certainly, there are over half million words in the Oxford English Dictionary, but only about 10,000 are in general everyday use. A much stronger reason is the rich variety of sources from which English comes—sources that are due to the different people who have conquered or settled in parts of the British Isles over the past 1,500 years—and knowing more about the way English has evolved over this period makes its difficulties easier to understand.
What do we mean by an “English” word? Many words are English in the sense that they can be traced back to the Anglo-Saxons—Germanic tribes which settled in England from around the fifth century AD. They gave us many common words like book, house, cat and dog. Earlier still were the Celtic people whose speech survives in Scottish and Irish Gaelic, in Welsh, and in the local languages of two extremities of the British Isles, Manx and Cornish. There is practically no Celtic influence in English. This is because the Celts were forced back into the fringes of the British Isles by the Anglo-Saxon invaders, and there was little cultural interaction.
The next important influence on the main vocabulary of English came in the ninth and tenth centuries when much of the east side of England was in the hands of Danish invaders, and England as a whole had a Danish king Canute for a time. The Danes had much more contact with the Anglo-Saxons than did the Celts, and their short period of occupation has left its mark in the number of Scandinavian words taken into our language. Many of these are still in use, such as take and law, names of parts of the body such as leg and skull. Many more Scandinavian words are preserved in some dialects of the east side of England, in place-names and in street-names.
The last time that England was successfully invaded was in 1066 when William of Normandy defeated the English king Harold at the Battle of Hastings. The arrival of the Normans brought a further decisive influence on the language—French. French, together with Italian, Spanish, Portuguese and Romanian, is known as a Romance language, and has its roots in Latin. For several centuries, French was the language of the aristocracy in England and a large number of French words came into the language. Many of these words are to do with government, like justice, council and tax, and many are abstract terms like liberty, charity and conflict.
Most of the words taken into the language over the years were adopted either because there was a basic need for them and they were useful or because they were preferable in some way to the words already in use. Often the old word disappeared altogether. In many cases, however, the new word and the old continued in use side by side on a roughly equal footing. This had produced pairs of words which are both in use today, like shut and close or buy and purchase, in which the second word of each pair is French in origin.
In the first years after the Norman Conquest many new words were used only by the ruling class and professionals associated with them, such as scribes and clerks. The language of the common people remained largely unaffected. It was the spread of literacy and the development of printing that brought the French words into more general use. Often these were technical words, or words with an official ring, such as commence and purchase. The result was a mixture of types of words. For many meanings we now have a choice of formal and informal words, the formal ones often being used only in very specific situations. (650 words)
46. Why is English difficult according to the text?
[A] English comes from a great variety of sources.
[B] There are over half a million words in English vocabulary.
[C] The number of the words in the English language is the main reason.
[D] Many English words can be traced back to the Anglo-Saxons tribes.
47. Which of the following words is French in origin?
[A] House. [B] Skull. [C] Law. [D] Tax.
48. Which of the following statement is not true according to the text?
[A] French has its roots in Latin.
[B] There is no Celtic influence in English.
[C] The Celts had much contact with the Anglo-Saxon.
[D] Many Scandinavian words were taken into English.
49. Why are many foreign words adopted into the English language?
[A] England was invaded again and again in history.
[B] The English language has a very large vocabulary.
[C] The language of the common people remained unchanged.
[D] They were preferable to the words already in use.
50. What had brought French words into more general use?
[A] These words were often technical words.
[B] Many common people were able to read and write.
[C] The formal words are not only used in specific situations.
[D] The arrival of the Normans exerted the influence on English
阅读参考答案
Text 6
26. A，细节题。第一段的首句提到：As is the case in many cultures, the degree to which a minority group was seen as different from the characteristics of the dominant majority determined the extent of that group’s acceptance.意思是，一个少数民族区别于社会主导群体的程度决定了它被接受的程度，这是事实。答案A正好是答案。其他选项都不对。
27. C，细节题。大量移民的涌入被认为是对美国价值观的威胁的主要原因是什么？答案就在第一段最后一句。 “The large numbers of immigrants with significantly different characteristics tended to be viewed as a threat to basic American values and the American way of life.” 由于大量移民有着不同的特征和传统，所以他们被视为是对美国价值观的威胁。通读各选项，就可以知道C正是此题的答案。其他选项都不可选。
28. D，细节题。给移民上“公民权课程”的原因是什么？答案在第四段第一句： “Americans tried to meet what they saw as a threat to their values by offering English instruction for the new immigrants and citizenship classes to teach them basic American beliefs.” 把移民看作是对美国价值观的威胁，所以美国人就为新移民开办一些英语和公民权课程向移民讲授美国人的基本观念。D是正确答案。
29. B，细节题。政治老板们帮助移民的主要目的是什么？答案在文章第五段第三句： “In exchange for their help, the political bossed expected the immigrants to keep them in power by voting for them in elections.” 政治老板们给予了移民很多帮助，主要目的是为在竞选时获得更多的选票从而保持其政治实力。所以B是正确答案。
30. D，细节题。十九世纪末二十世纪初移民生活水平提高的主要原因是什么？答案在最后一段第三句： “The fact that the United States had a rapidly expanding economy at the turn of the century made it possible for these new immigrants, often with the help of the bosses, to better their standard of living in the United States.” 世纪之交时美国经济的迅速发展，再加上有政治老板的帮助，移民的生活水平提高了。所以，美国经济的迅速发展是移民生活水平提高的主要原因，而政治老板的帮助是次要原因。题目问的主要原因，B是次要原因，不能选。而答案正是D—那个时候美国经济发展迅速。
Text 7
31. B. 把自己的世界当作一个幻觉世界来接受。作者提出，为了克服科学的现实与想象中的世界的困惑之间的矛盾，人们应当把自己的世界当作一个幻觉世界来接受。见全文最后一句that the most important part of our lives — our sensations, emotions, desires, and aspirations — takes place in a universe of illusions。
32. A. 人文主义者。从全文的思想和语气来看，作者是个人文主义者， 而不是泛神论者、物理学家或者医生。
33. D. 一团处于运动的原子。见第一段的第一句：The table before which we sit may be, as the scientist maintains, composed of dancing atoms。
34. D. 科学真理在我们生活中的位置。根据文章首句和第二句，及全文的内容，应该选D为本文章的题目。
35. C. 观看者的体验。文中的objective reality（客观事实）指的是观看者对紫色的体验，因为“purple”本身并不存在于自然界（a non-existent thing），见第一段the sensation which led us to attribute an objective reality to a non-existent thing which we call “purple” 。选项A. scientific reality科学事实，B. a symbolic existence象征的存在，D. reality colored by emotion情感色彩现实，都不准确。
Text 8
36. C. Captain Cook在长途航行中由于为水手们提供了新鲜的水果以防止坏血病（scurvy）。这是一道关于细节的问题，答案在第一段的最后一句，Captain Cook, on his long voyages of discovery to Australia and New Zealand, established the fact that scurvy could be warded off by the provision of fresh fruit for the sailors.
37. D. 一种疾病（脚气病）。其它选项A. a germ 一种细菌，B. a natural phenomenon一种自然现象，C. an epidemic一种流行病，都不合题意。
38. D. Eijkman的想法被证明是正确的。这是一道关于细节的问题，Eijkman的研究与Vitamin B的发现有关必然的联系。Eijkman通过观察认为米的外壳中存在着某种成分，这种成分的缺乏可能是导致疾病的原因。最后一段证明了他的看法是正确的：Indeed this was the case. The element needed to prevent beriberi was shortly afterwards isolated from rice husks and is now known as vitamin B.
39. B.维生素B可以从米糠中获取。这是关于某个细节的问题。在第3题的基础上可以轻易地找到答案。
40. D. 保存活力。这是关于词义的问题。从第四段开始举的例子中可以了解到脱壳的米由于缺乏米糠中的维生素B而导致了疾病并使疾病保存活力，所以医院的种种努力均告失败。
Text 9
41. C. 外貌难看的人发现自己很难像外貌漂亮的人那样与他人交友。见第一段中第三句所述：physically attractive individuals are preferred as friends to those less comely,外貌好的人比之不好的人易受人青睐。
42. C. 我们往往会过分地认为他们和我们相象。第二段指出，人们似乎喜欢把自己设想成处于其朋友们的境况，因而过分地认为他们和自己相象。
43. A. 从长远的观点看，人们与自己习性相象的人相处较好。第二段最后一句指出，观察表明，四个月之后，学生间的友谊关系才能确立，而且具有相同的经历兴趣和观点的人之间更能建立友谊。
44. D. 第三段中表明，在婚姻方面，人们倾向于双方有着近似的经历观点等，但却并不完全相同。
45. A. 物以类聚，人以群分。根据全文的阐述，其中心思想是：具有较为相同的经历、兴趣和观点的人之间往往容易建立友谊。
Text 10
46. A，文章第一段讲述了英语难的原因。本段第四句话阐述了英语难的重要原因，就是：the rich variety of sources from which English comes。所以A为正确答案；选项D仅仅是英语来源的一部分。
47. D，从文章第四段的最后一句话可以得知house、skull、law 和tax.这四个词里，只有Tax源自于法语。
48. C，这是一个综合性题目。所涉及的信息分布在第二、三和四段中。从第二段里的最后两句话：There is practically no Celtic influence in English. This is because the Celts were forced back into the fringes of the British Isles by the Anglo-Saxon invaders, and there was little cultural interaction，可以判断出C是所要求的答案。
49. D，从文章倒数第二段里的第一句话：Most of the words taken into the language over the years were adopted either because there was a basic need for them and they were useful or because they were preferable in some way to the words already in use，可以直接得知许多外来词语被接受到英语里的原因。
50. B，文章最后一段第三句话：It was the spread of literacy and the development of printing that brought the French words into more general use告知了法语中的一些词语得到推广应用的原因。很多普通老百姓能够识文断字了，印刷术得以推广，所以选择B。