在职硕士英语阅读理解练习和答案六

在职硕士英语阅读理解练习和答案六
When your parents advise you to “get an education” in order to raise your income,they tell you only half the truth.What they really mean is to get just enough education to provide manpower for your society,but not so much that you prove an embarrassment to your society.
Get a high school diploma,at least.Without that,you will be occupationally dead unless your name happens to be George Bernard Shaw or Thomas Alva Edison,and you can successfully dropout in grade school.
Get a college degree,if possible.With a B.A.,you are on the launching pad.But now you have to start to put on the brakes.If you go for a master’s degree,make sure it is an M.B.A.,and is famous law of diminishing returns begins to take effect.
Do you know,for instance,that long-haul truck drivers earn more per year than full professors?Yes,the
average 1977 salary for those truckers was $24000. While the full professors managed to earn just $23030.
A Ph.D. is the highest degree you can get.Except for a few specialized fields such as physics or chemistry where the degree can quickly be turned to industrial or commercial purposes,if you pursue such a degree in any other field,you will face a dim future. there are more Ph.D.s unemloyed or underemployed in this country than any other part of the world.
If you become a doctor of philosophy in English or history or anthropology or political science or languages or-worst of all-in philosophy,you run the risk of becoming overeducated for our national demands.Not for our needs,mind you,but for our demands.
Thousands of Ph.D.s are selling shoes,driving cars,waiting on table,and endlessly filling out applications month after month.They may also take a job in some high school or backwater college that pays much less than the janitor earns.
You can equate the level of income with the level of education only so far.Far enough,that is,to make you useful to the gross national product,but not so far that
nobody can turn much of a profit on you.
1. According to the writer,what the society expects of education is to turn out people who _____.
[A] will not be a disgrace to society
[B] will become loyal citizens
[C] can take care of themselves
[D] can meet the nation’s demands as a source of manpower
2. Many Ph.D.s are out of job because _____.
[A] they are improperly educated
[B] they are of little commercial value to their society
[C] there are fewer jobs in high schools
[D] they prefer easier jobs that make more money
3. The nation is only interested in people _____.
[A] with diplomas
[B] who specialize in physics and chemistry
[C] who are valuable to the gross national product
[D] both A and C
4. Which of the following is not true?
[A] Bernard Shaw didn’t finish high schools,nor
did Edison.
[B] One must think carefully before pursuing a master degree.
[C] The higher your education level,the more money you will earn.
[D] If you are too well-educated,you’ll be overeducated for society’s demands.
5. The writer sees education as _____.
[A] a means of providing job security and financial security and a means of meeting a country’s demands for technical workers
[B] a way to broaden one’s horizons
[C] more important than finding a job
[D] an opportunity that everyone should have
参考答案：D B C C A There are some earth phenomena you can count on, but the magnetic field, some say, is not one of them. It fluctuates in strength, drifts from its axis, and every few 100,000, years undergoes a dramatic polarity reversal—a period when north pole becomes south pole and south pole becomes north pole. But how is the field generated, and why is it so unstable?
Groundbreaking research by two French geophysicists promises to shed some light on the mystery. Using 80 metres of deep sea sediment (沉淀物) core, they have obtained measurements of magnetic-field intensity that span 11 polarity reversals and four million years. The analysis reveals that intensity appears to fluctuate with a clear, well-defined rhythm. Although the strength of the magnetic field varies irregularly during the short terra, there seems to be an inevitable long-term decline preceding each polarity reversal. When the poles flip—a process that takes several hundred thousand years—the magnetic field rapidly regains its strength and the cycle is repeated.
The results have caused a stir among geophysicists. The magnetic field is thought to originate from molten (熔化的) iron in the outer core, 3,000 kilometers beneath the earth’s surface. By studying mineral grains found in material ranging from rocks to clay articles, previous researchers have already been able to identify reversals dating back 170 million years, including the most recent switch 730,000
years ago. How and why they occur, however, has been widely debated. Several theories link polarity flips to external disasters such as meteor (陨星) impacts. But Peter Olson, a geophysicist at the Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore, says this is unlikely if the French researchers are right. In fact, Olson says intensity that predictably declines from one reversal to the next contradicts 90 percent of the models currently under study. If the results prove to be valid, geophysicists will have a new theory to guide them in their quest to understand the earth’s inner physics. It certainly points the direction for future research.
1.Which of the following titles is most appropriate to the passage?
A.Polarity Reversal: A Fantastic Phenomenon of Nature.
B.Measurement of the Earth’s Magnetic-Field Intensity.
C.Formation of the Two Poles of the Earth.
D.A New Approach to the Study of Geophysics.
2.The word “flip” (Line6, Para, 2) most probably means “___”.
A. decline
B. intensify
C. fluctuate
D. reverse
3.What have the two French geophysicists discovered in their research?
A.Some regularity in the changes of the earth’s magnetic field.
B.Some causes of the fluctuation of the earth’s magnetic field.
C.The origin of the earth’s magnetic field.
D.The frequency of polarity reversals.
4.The French geophysicists’ study is different from currently prevailing theories in____.
A.its identification of the origin of the earth’s magnet ic field
B.the way the earth’s magnetic intensity is measured
C.its explanation of the shift in the earth’s polarity
D.the way the earth’s fluctuation rhythm is defined
5.In Peter Olson’s opinion, the French experiment_____.
A.is likely to direct further research in the inner physics of the earth
B.has successfully solved the mystery of polarity reversals
C.is certain to help predict external disasters
D.has caused great confusion among the world’s geophysicists
参考答案：A D A C A I wonder if you realize just how many others share your problem. It is so common for people to distort the truth about themselves. Sometimes it’s just an invented excuse when you’re late for something or a pretence that you like someone you don’t. These white lies don’t usually harm anyone and indeed often help smooth over difficult social situations. They certainly are embarrassing if exposed but, on the whole, they’re easily forgiven.
What you describe is a habit of lying that is more serious than this. I suspect that the lies you tell are ways of defending an idea you have of your own worth. People who have doubts about their own self-esteem
often worry that others will judge them as harshly as they feel they deserve because of a secret idea that they are pretty worthless. In other words, they create a false picture of themselves, a picture of someone who meets all the expectations they think others have of them, And as you say, that causes problems since they have to keep living up to that image. At the same time, they have to tell further lie to cover the stories they have already told. According to some authorities, this is particularly among women especially those who have few opportunities to develop an adequate sense of self-worth.
I suggest you give yourself one day during which you stick solidly to the truth about yourself. Give yourself a small treat at the end of the day if you have managed to keep it up. Wait a week and then try it again. Once you have achieved three separate lie-free days, see if you can cope with three days running, then extend it to a whole week. Don’t make a promise to yourself that you will never lie again because almost certainly you will it’s too much to take on at once. Try to change things little by little, by setting yourself manageable
targets. After a while, you’ll wonder why you ever had the problem at all.
1.This passage is a reply to someone who____.
A.keeps a habit of lying for vain reasons
B.works hard to meet others’ expectations
C.does not know the truth about himself and is too sure of himself
D.does not know how to make a realistic plan for himself
2.Which of the following statements is true according to the passage?
A.White lies often cause embarrassment in social situations.
B.It is important for women to have an adequate sense of self-worth.
C.It takes a little time to get rid of your habit.
D.Take exercise like running if you are free and keep it up.
3.The expression “living up to” in the second paragraph can best be replaced by____.
A. growing up with
B. living with
C. seeking
D. sticking to
4.In the last paragraph the writer implies
that_____.
A.you will solve the problem with patience and a strong will
B.you must be hard on yourself to accomplish something
C.your problem lies in the fact that you hasten to make promises
D.you must set different targets at different stages of your life
参考答案：A B D A Imagine a world in which there was suddenly no emotion—a world in which human beings could feel no love or happiness, no terror or hate. Try to imagine the consequences of such a transformation. People might not be able to stay alive: knowing neither joy nor pleasure, anxiety nor fear, they would be as likely to repeat acts that hurt them as acts that were beneficial. They could not learn: they could not benefit from experience because this emotionless world would lack rewards and punishments. Society would soon
disappear: people would be as likely to harm one another as to provide help and support. Human relationships would not exist: in a world without friends or enemies, there could be no marriage, affection among companions, or bonds among members of groups. Society’s economic underpinnings (支柱) would be destroyed: since earning $10 million would be no more pleasant than earning $10, there would be no incentive to work. In fact, there would be no incentives of any kind. For as we will see, incentives imply a capacity to enjoy them.
In such a world, the chances that the human species would survive are next to zero, because emotions are the basic instrument of our survival and adaptation. Emotions structure the world for us in important ways. As individuals, we categorize objects on the basis of our emotions. True, we consider the length, shape, size, or texture, but an object’s physical aspects are less important than what it has done or can do to us—hurt us, surprise us, anger us or make us joyful. We also use categorizations colored by emotions in our families, communities, and overall society. Out of our emotional experiences with objects
and events comes a social feeling of agreement that certain things and actions are “good” and others are “bad”, and we apply thes e categories to every aspect of our social life—from what foods we eat and what clothes we wear to how we keep promises and which people our group will accept. In fact, society exploits our emotional reactions and attitudes, such as loyalty, morality, pride, shame, guilt, fear and greed, in order to maintain itself. It gives high rewards to individuals who perform important tasks such as surgery, makes he roes out of individuals for unusual or dangerous achievements such as flying fighter planes in a war, and uses the legal and penal (刑法的) system to make people afraid to engage in antisocial acts.
1.The reason why people might not be able to stay alive in a world without emotion is that____.
A.they would not be able to tell the texture of objects
B.they would not know what was beneficial anti what was harmful to them
C.they would not be happy with a life without love
D.they would do things that hurt each other’s
feelings
2.According to the passage, people’s learning activities are. possible because they____.
A.believe that emotions are fundamental for them to stay alive
B.benefit from providing help and support to one another
C.enjoy being rewarded for doing the right thing
D.know what is vital to the progress of society
3.It can be inferred from the passage that the economic foundation of society is dependent on____.
A.the ability to make money
B.the will to work for pleasure
C.the capacity to enjoy incentives
D.the categorizations of our emotional experiences
4.Emotions are significant for man’s survival and adaptation because____.
A.they provide the means by which people view the size or shape of objects
B.they are the basis for the social feeling of agreement by which society is maintained
C.they encourage people to perform dangerous achievements
D.they generate more love than hate among people
5.The emotional aspects of an object are more important than its physical aspects in that they____.
A.help society exploit its members for profit
B.encourage us to perform important tasks
C.help to perfect the legal and penal system
D.help us adapt our behavior to the world surrounding us
参考答案：B C C B D。