考研英语阅读理解B节(新题型)分类精讲科学技术类-(一).doc

考研英语阅读理解B节(新题型)分类精讲科学技术类-(一)

(总分：100.00，做题时间：90分钟)

一、Section Ⅱ Reading Co(总题数：5，分数：100.00)

When we compare men with animals, we must remember that a man is also an animal. But in making this comparison, it is sometimes more convenient to refer to the rest of the animal kingdom as "animals".

(1) .

Many animals are intelligent in the sense that they can explore their surroundings or acquire new skills by learning from their parents. Animal organisms have organs whose physical power exceeds the power of men. The bodies of men have no wings and cannot fly. Men cannot imitate fish and spend long periods under water unless they carry breathing apparatus with them.

(2) . But it is very uncommon for animals to go mad or destroy their own kind. Animals, left to themselves, do not disturb the balance of nature. They do not turn grassland into desert or make water undrinkable by filling whole lakes and rivers with waste materials. Compared with most other organisms—if we see him as a part of nature—man is wasteful and destructive. Though he is more intelligent than animals, he often uses his intelligence for strange purposes.

(3) . This power is possessed by the rich businessman in Chicago and the poor, primitive Bushman of the Kalahari Desert in Africa. It may indeed show itself more obviously in the Bushman, whose environment does not provide him with security and whose entire food supply is acquired by facing new situations. It is a power which can be wasted or misused or be weakened through neglect. But it is a power which belongs to every human being.

(4) .

Language gives depth to human communities in time. It enables one generation to hand on its experience to another, by means of stories, which are the origin of human history. It is only human beings who recognize a past and future, and who feel that they stand at a certain point in the development of their community.

(5) .

This brings us to another aspect of human intelligence. Man is more adaptable than animals, but in the ages of civilization he has used this power in a special way. A few communities, like the African Bushman, still manage to survive in a primitive way. But other men wish to make their future more secure and try to find a way of doing this, which is typical of civilized communities.

A. We call this capacity intelligence. Its chief instrument or weapon is human language, a system of symbols (spoken or written) which enables men to communicate information and purpose, and see one situation in terms of another. The ability to use symbols is not possessed by animals, and it is a major aspect of human intelligence.

B. Like animals, men are adapted to a certain environment. They require food and water; they can digest only certain kinds of food. They require warmth; they can survive only within certain limits of temperature.

C. Man's sense of future leads him to provide for the future. He accumulates food, clothes, useful objects, raw materials, buildings, information and in modern times he accumulates money—the means of exchange and therefore an important means of power over other men.

D. Different from an animal, man is able to convert a natural environment into a human, social environment—an environment which represents the accumulated labor of many generations.

E. We cannot say that men are superior to animals. But they differ from animals in several important ways. And all these differences are really aspects of one and the same difference. This central difference is man's unusual mental flexibility, his ability to meet a new situation in a new way and his capacity to learn from his experience and the experience of others.