The Only Way Is Up

    Think of a modem city and the first image that come to mind is the skyline. It is full of great buildings, pointing like fingers to heaven. It is true that some cities don"t permit buildings to go above a certain height. But these are cities concerned with the past. The first thing any city does when it wants to tell the world that it has arrived is to build skyscrapers.

    When people gather together in cities, they create a demand for land. Since cities are places where money is made, that demand can be met. And the best way to make money out of city land is to put as many people as possible in a space that covers the smallest amount of ground. That means building upwards.

    The technology existed to do this as early as the 19th century. But the height of buildings was limited by one important factor. They had to be small enough for people on the top floors to climb stairs. People could not be expected to climb a mountain at the end of their journey to work, or home.

    Elisha Otis, a USinventor, was the man who brought us the lift-or elevator, as he preferred to call it. However, most of the technology is very old. Lifts work using the same pulley system the Egyptians used to create the Pyramids. What Otis did was attach the system to a steam engine and develop the elevator brake, which stops the lift falling if the cords that hold it up are broken. It was this that did the most to gain public confidence in the new invention ¹. In fact, he spent a number of years exhibiting lifts at fairgrounds, giving people the chance to try them out before selling the idea to architects and builders.

    A lift would not be a very good theme park attraction now. Going in a lift is such an everyday thing that it would just be boring. Yet psychologists and others who study human behavior find lifts fascinating. The reason is simple. Scientists have always studied animals in zoos. The nearest they can get to that with humans is in observing them in lifts ².

    "It breaks all the usual conventions about the bubble of personal space ³ we carry around with us -- and you just can"t choose to move away," says workplace psychologist, Gary Fitzgibbon. Being trapped in this setting can create different types of tensions, he says. Some people are scared of them. Others use them as an opportunity to get close to the boss. Some stand close to the door. Others hide in the comers. Most people try and shrink into the background. But some behave in a way that makes others notice them. There are a few people who just stand in a comer taking notes.

    Don"t worry about them. They are probably from a university.

词汇:

skyline["skaɪlaɪn] n.空中轮廓线  

tension["tenʃ(ə)n] n.紧张

pulley ["pʊlɪ] n.滑轮

bubble["bʌbl] n.幻想,妄想;

fairground [ˈfeəgraʊnd] n.露天市场

注释：

1．It was this that did the most to gain public confidence in the new invention.正是这项技术赢得了人们对新发明的信心。本句使用了强调句型It is... that...被强调的是this，所指代的是上文中所说的Otis发明了电梯刹车的事。

2．The nearest they can get to that with humans is in observing them in lifts.对于研究人类来说，最接近的方式就是在电梯里观察他们。句中的that指的是上一句中提到的科学家一直对动物园里的动物进行观察。

“…these are cities concerned with the past" in the first paragraph refer to cities that______．

A:are worried about their past B:have a glorious past to be proud of C:want to maintain their traditional image D:are very interested in their own history

Text 4
Scattered around the globe are more than 100 small regions of isolated volcanic activity known to geologists as hot spots. Unlike most of the world’ s volcanoes, they are not always found at the boundaries of the great drifting plates that make up the earth’ s surface; on the contrary, many of them lie deep in the interior of a plate. Most of the hot spots move only slowly, and in some cases the movement of the plates past them has left trails of dead volcanoes. The hot spots and their volcanic trails are milestones that mark the passage of the plates.
That the plates are moving is not beyond dispute. Africa and South America, for example, are moving away from earth other as new material is injected into the sea floor between them. The complementary coastlines and certain geological features that seem to span the ocean are reminders of where the two continents were once joined. The relative motion of the plates carrying these continents has been constructed in detail, but the motion of one plate with respect to another cannot readily be translated into motion with respect to the earth’ s interior. It is not possible to determine whether both continents are moving in opposite directions or whether one continent is stationary and the other is drifting away from it. Hot spots, anchored in the deeper layers of the earth, provide the measuring instruments needed to resolve the question. From an analysis of the hot spot population it appears that the African plate is stationary and that it has not moved during the past 30 million years.
The significance of hot spots is not confined to their role as a frame of reference. It now appears that they also have an important influence on the geophysical processes that propel the plates across the globe. When a continental plate comes to rest over a hot spot, the material rising from deeper layer creates a broad dome. As the dome grows, it develops seed fissures(cracks); in at least a few cases the continent may break entirely along some of these fissures, so that the hot spot initiates the formation of a new ocean. Thus just as earlier theories have explained the mobility of the continents, so hot spots may explain their mutability(inconstancy).

A:the past 30 million B:the past 40 million C:the past 50 million D:the past 10 million

Is it possible to persuade mankind to live without war War is an ancient institution which has existed for at least six thousand years. It was always wicked and usually foolish, but in the past the human race managed to live with it. Modern ingenuity has changed this. Either Man will abolish war, or war will abolish Man. For the present, it is nuclear weapons that cause the gravest danger, but bacteriological or chemical weapons may, before long, offer an even greater threat. If we succeed in abolishing nuclear weapons, our work will not be done. It will never be done until we have succeeded in abolishing war. To do this, we need to persuade mankind to look upon international questions in a new way, not as contests of force, in which the victory goes to the side which is most skilful in massacre, but by arbitration in accordance with agreed principles of law. It is not easy to change age-old mental habits, but this is what must be attempted.
There are those who say that the adoption of this or that ideology would prevent war. I believe this to be a profound error. All ideologies are based upon dogmatic assertions(主张)which are, at best, doubtful, and at worst, totally false. Their adherents believe in them so fanatically that they are willing to go to war in support of them.
The movement of world opinion during the past two years has been very largely such as we can welcome. It has become a commonplace that nuclear war must be avoided. Of course very difficult problems remain in the international sphere, but the spirit in which they are being approached is a better one than it was some years ago. It has begun to be thought, even by the powerful men who decide whether we shall live or die, that negotiations should reach agreements even if both sides do not find these agreements wholly satisfactory. It has begun to be understood that the important conflict nowadays is not between East and West, but between Man and the H-bomb.
This passage implies that war is now ______.

A:more wicked than in the past B:as wicked as in the past C:less wicked than in the past D:what people try to live with

By comparing past problems with present ones, the author draws attention to the ______.

A:significance of this crisis B:inadequacy of governments C:similarity of the past to the present D:hopelessness of the situation

Two days (past) (before he) realized that the task was (beyond) his (capacity).（）

A:past B:before he C:beyond D:capacity

When we walked (past) the theater, there were a lot of people (waited) (in) a long line outside the (box office).

A:past B:waited C:in D:box office

When we walked (past) the theater, there were a lot of people (waited) (in) a long line outside the (box office).

A:past B:waited C:in D:box office

When we walked (past) the theater, there were a lot of people (waited) (in) a long line outside the (box office).

A:past B:waited C:in D:box office