2015年12月四级阅读真题第一套卷答案

2015年12月四级阅读真题第一套卷答案

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Children do not think the way adults do. For most of the first year of life, if

something is out of sight, it ' s out of mind. If you cover a baby ' s 36 toy with a piece cloth, the baby thinks the toy has disappeared and stops look ing for it. A 4-year-old may

37 that a sister has more fruit a juice when it is only the shape of the glasses that differ ,

not the 38 of juice.

Yet children are smart in their own way. Like good little scientists, children are

always testi ng their child-sized 39 about how things work. Whe n your childre n throws

her spo on on the floor for the sixth time as you try to feed her , and you say.

“ T

eno ugh! I will not pick up yo ur spo on aga in! ” the child will 40 test your claim. Are you

serous? Are you an gry? What will happe n if she throws the spo on aga in? She is not doing

this to drive you 41 ; rather, she is learning that her desires and yours can differ, and that sometimes those 42 are importa nt and sometimes they are not.

How and why does chidren ' s thinking change? In the 1920s. Swiss psychologist

Jean Piaget proposed that children ' s认知ngniae(ties unfold 43, like the

blooming of a flower, almost independent of what else is 44 in their lives. Although

many of his specific con clusi ons

have bee n 45 or modified over the years, his ideas in spired thousa nds of studies by investigators all over the world.

A.advocate

B.am ount

C.con firmed

D.crazy

E.defi nite

F.differe nces

G.favorite

H.happe ning

[immediately

J. n aturally

K. obtai ning

L.primarily

M. protest

N. rejected

O. theories

答案:GMBOIQFJHN The Perfect Essay

ALook ing back on too many years of educati on, I can ide ntify one truly

impossible teacher. She cared about me, and my in tellectual life,

't. Her expectations werehpglssibly so. She was an English teacher. She was also my

mother. BWhen good students turn in an essay, they dream of their instructor

returning it to them in exactly the same condition, save for a single wor d added in

the margin of the final page: ” Flawless. ” This dream came true for me one after noon in

the ninth grade. Of course, I had heard that genius could show itself at an early age, so I

was on ly

slightly take n aback that I had achieved perfecti on at the ten der age of 14. Obviously,

I did what any professi onal writer would do; I

CMy mother, who is just shy of five feet tall, is n ormally in credibly soft-spoke n, but on the rare occasi on whe n she got an gry, she was terrifyi ng. I am not sure if she was more upset by my hubrig 得意忘形 or by the fact that my English teacher had let my ego get so out of hand. In any eve nt, my mother and her red pen showed me how

deeply flawed a flawless essay could be. At the time, I am sure she thought she was teach ing me about mecha ni cs, tran siti on 过渡,

structure, style and voice. But what I learned, and what stuck with me through my time teach ing writi ng at

Harvard, was a deeper less on about the n ature of creative criticism.

DFist off, it hurts. Genuine criticism, the type that leaves a lasting mark

on you as a writer, also leaves an existential imprin 印记 on you as a person. I have heard people say that a

eve n whe n I did n

hurried off to spread the good n ews. I did n my

mother.

't get very far. The first person I told was

writer should n ever take

criticism pers on ally. I say that we should n ever liste n to these people.

ECriticism, at its best, is deeply pers on al, and gets to the heart of why we write the way we do. The intimate

nature of genuine criticism implies somethi ng about who is able to give it, n amely, some one who knows you well

eno ugh to show you how your men tal life is getting in the way of good writing. Conveniently, they are also the

people who care

eno ugh to see you through this painful realizati on.

For me it took the form of my first, and I hope only, encounter with writer lock—' s I I was not able to produce anything for three years.

FFranz Kafka once said: ” Writing is utter so独处de(he descent

into the cold abyss深渊of on eself. “ My mother ' s criticism had show n me that

Kafka is right about the cold abyss, and whe n you make the in trospectivep内省的dece nt

that writ ing requires you are out always pleased by what you find. ” But, in the years tl followed, her susta ined tutori ng suggested that Kafka might be

wrong about the solitude. I was lucky eno ugh to find a critic and

teacherwho was willi ng to make the journey of writ ing with me. “It is a thi ng of no great difficulty, ” accord ing to Plutarch, “ to raise object ions aga inst ano ther man

it is a very easy matter;

but to produce a better in its place is a work extremely

troublesome. ” I am sure I wrote essays in the later years of high

school without my mother ' s guidanee, but I can ' t recall them.

What I remember, however, is how we took up the “ extremely

troublesome ” work of ongoing criticism.

GThere are two ways to in terpret Plutarch whe n he suggests that a

critic should be able to produce “ a better in its place. ” In a

straightforward sen se, he could mean that a critic must be more

tale nted tha n the artist she critiques评论.My mother was well

covered on this count. But perhaps Plutarch is suggesting something slightly

different, something a bit closer to Marcus Cicero ' s claim that one should

“ criticiz

creati on, not by finding fault. ”

Genuine criticism creates a precious ope ning for an author to

become better on this own term—a process that is ofte n extremely pain ful, but also almost always meanin gful.

HMy mother said she would help me with my writing, but fist I had

myself. For each assig nmen t, I was write the best essay I could. Real criticism is not meant to find obvious mistakes, so if she found

any—the type I could have found on my own— I had to start from scratch. From scratch. Once the essay was

“flawless, ” she would take an evening to walk me through

my errors. That was whe n true criticism, the type that cha nged me as a pers on, bega n.

IShe criticized me when I included little-known references and

professional jargon行话.She had no patience for brilliant but

irrelevant figures of speech. “ Writers虚张声势ttbluff(

way thro ugh ignorance. ” That was news towomld ne—d to find another way

to structure my daily existe nce.

JShe trimmed back my flowery Ian guage, drew lines through my exclamatio n marks

and argued for the value of restra int in

expression. “ John, ” she almost whis pered. I learned in to hear

her: ” I can ' t hear you when you shout at me. ” So I stopped shouting and bluffing, and slowly my writing improved.

KSomewhere along the way I set aside my hopes of writi ng that flawless essay. But perhaps I missed somethi ng importa nt in my

mother' s lessons abouiativity and perfection. Perhaps the point of writing the

flawless essay was not to give up, but to never willingly finish. Whitman repeatedly reworded “Song of Myself ” between 1855 and 1891. Repeatedly. We do our absolute best wiry a piece of writing, and come as close as we can to the ideal. And, for the time being, we settle. In critique, however, we are forced to depart, to give up the perfect ion we thought we had achieved for the cha nee of

being eve n a little bit better. This is the less on I took from my mother.

If perfect ion were possible, it would not be motivati ng.

46.The author was advised aga inst the improper use of figures of speech.

47.The author ' s mother taught him a valuable less on by poin ti ng out lots of flaws in his seem in gly perfect essay.

48. A writer should polish his writing repeatedly so as to get closer to perfection.

49.Writers may experience periods of time in their life when they just

can' t produce anything.

50.The author was not much surprised whe n his school teacher marked his essay as

“ flawless ”.

51.Criticiz ing some one ' s speech is said to be easier tha n coming up with a better

one.

52.The author looks upon his mother as his most dema nding and cari ng in structor.

53.The criticism the author received from his mother changed him as a person.

54.The author gradually improved his writ ing by avoid ing fancy Ian guage.

55.Constructive criticism gives an author a good start to improve his writing.

答案:ICKEB,FAHJG

Could you reproduce Silicon Valley elsewhere, or is there something unique about it?

It wouldn ' t be surprising if it were hard to reproduce in other countries, because you

couldn ' t reproduce it in most of the US either. What does it take to make a Silicon Valley?

It ' s the right people. If you could get the right ten thoid^ople

to move from Silic on Valley to Buffalo, Buffalo would become Silic on Valley.

You only n eed two kinds of people to create a tech no logy hub 中心:rich people and nerds痴迷科研的人.

Observati on bears this out. Within the US, tow ns have become startup hubs if and

only if they have both rich people and n erds. Few startups happe n in Miami, for example, because although it ' s full of rich people, it has few nerds. It ' s not the kind of place like.

Whereas Pittsburg has the opposite problem: plenty of nerds, but no rich people. The

top US Computer Science departments are said to be MIT, Stanford, Berkeley, and

Carnegie-Mellon. MIT yielded Route 128. Stanford and Berkeley yielded Silicon Valley.

But what did Carnegie-Mellon yield in Pittsburgh? And what happened in Ithaca, home

of Corn ell Un iversity, which is also high on the list.

I grew up in Pittsburgh and went to college at Corn ell, so I can an swer for both. The

weather is terrible, particularly in winter, and there ' s no interesting old city to make u| for it, as there is in Bost on. Rich people don ' t want to live in Pittsburgh or Ithaca. So

while there are plenty of hackers 电脑迷who could start startups, there ' s no one to

in vest in them.

Do you really need the rich people? Wouldn ' t it work to have the

government invest the nerds? No, it would not. Startup investors are a distinct type of rich people. They tend to have a lot of experie nee themselves in the tech no logy bus in ess. This helps them pick the right startups, and means they can supply advice and connections as well as money. And the fact that they have a personal stake in the outcome makes them really pay atte nti on.

56.What do we lear n about Silic on Valley from the passage?

A Its success is hard to copy any where else.

B It is the biggest tech no logy hub in the US.

C Its fame in high tech no logy is in comparable.

D It leads the world in in formatio n tech no logy.

57.What makes Miami unfit to produce a Silicon Valley?

A Lack of incen tive for inv estme nts.

B Lack of the right kind of tale nts.

C Lack of gover nment support.

D Lack of famous uni versities.

58.In that way is Carnegie-Mellon different from Stanford, Berkeley and MIT?

A Its location is not as attractive to rich people

B Its scie nee departme nt are not n early as good

C It does not produce computer hackers and n erds

D It does not pay much atte nti on to bus in ess startups

59.What does the author imply about Bost on?

A It has pleasa nt weather all year round.

B It produces wealth as well as high-tech

C It is not likely to attract lots of investor and nerds.

D It is an old city with many sites of historical interest.

60.What does the author say about startup inv estors?

A They are especially wise in making in vestme nts.

B They have good conn ecti ons in the gover nment.

C They can do more tha n providi ng money.

D They are eno ugh to inv est in n erds.

It ' s nice to have people of like mind around. Agreeable people boost your

con fide nee and allow you to relax and feel comfortable. Unfortun ately, that comfort can hin der the very lear ning that can expa nd

your compa ny and your career.

It ' s nice to have people agree, but you need conflicting perspectives to dig out the truth. If every one around you has similar views, your work will suffer from con firmati on bias.偏颇

Take a look at your own n etwork. Do you con tacts share your point of view on most subjects? It yes, it ' s time to shake things up. As a leader, it can be challenging to create

an en vir onment in which people will freely disagree and argue, but as the say ing goes: From confrontation comes brillianee.

It ' s nedsy for most people to actively seek conflict. Many spend their lives trying to avoid arguments. There

' s no need to go out and find people you hate, but you need to

do some self-assessme nt to determ ine where you have become stale in your thinking.

You may n eed to start by en courag ing your curre nt n etwork to help you ide ntify your bli nd spots.

Passi on ate, en ergetic debate does not require an ger and hard feeli ngs to be effective. But it does require moral stre ngth. Once you have worth ing opp onen ts, set some ground rules so every one un dersta nds

responsibilities and boundaries. The objective of this debating game is not to win but to get to the truth that will allow you to move faster, and better.

Fierce debating can hurt feelings, particularly when strong personalities are involved. Make sure your check in with your opp onents so that they are not carry ing the emotio n of the battles beyond the battlefield. Break the tension with smiles and humor to reinforce the idea that this is frien dly discourse and that all are worki ng toward a com mon goal.

Reword all those invo lved in the debate sufficie ntly whe n the goals are reached. Let your sparring partners拳击陪练know how much you appreciate their contribution. The more they feel appreciated, the more they in g'tdlgei wto the ring next time.

61.What happe ns whe n you have like-min ded people around you all the while?

Alt will help your compa ny expa nd more rapidly.

Bit will be create a harm onious worki ng atmosphere.

Clt may preve nt your bus in ess and career from adva ncing.

Dlt may make you fell un certa in about your own decisi on.

62.What does the author suggest leaders do?

AAvoid argume nts with bus in ess part ners.

EEn courage people to disagree and argue.

FBuild a wide and strong bus in ess n etwork.

GSeek advice from their worthy competitors.

63.What is the purpose of holdi ng a debate?

ATo find out the truth about an issue.

HTo build up people ' s moral strength.

ITo remove misun dersta ndin gs.

JTo look for worthy opp onen ts.

64.What advice does the author give to people en gaged in a fierce debate? AThey liste n carefully to their opp onents ' views. KThey slow due respect for each other ' s beliefs.

LThey prese nt their views clearly and explicitly.

MThe y take care not to hurt each other ' s feelings.

65.How should we treat our rivals after a successful debate?

ATry to make peace with them.

NTry to make up the differe nces.

01 nvite them to the ring next time.

PAck no wledge their con tributi on.

答案ABACC CBADD