Part III Reading Comprehension (35 minutes)
Direction: There are 4 passages in this part. Each passage is followed by some questions or unfinished statements. For each
of them there are four choices marked A), B) C) and D). You should decide on the best choice and mark the corresponding
letter on the Answer Sheet with a single line through the center.
Passage One
Questions 51 to 55 are based on the following passage:
Space is a dangerous place, not only because of meteors（流星） but also because of rays from the sun and other stars. The atmosphere again acts as our protective blanket on earth. Light gets through, and this is essential for plants to make the food, which we eat. Heat, too, makes our environment endurable. Various kinds of rays come through the air from outer space, but enormous quantities of radiation from the sun are screened off. As soon as men leave the atmosphere they are exposed to this radiation but their spacesuits or the walls of their spacecraft, if they are inside, do prevent a lot of radiation damage.
Radiation is the greatest known danger to explorers in space. The unit of radiation is called “rem”. Scientists have
reason to think that a man can put up with far more radiation than 0.1 rem without being damaged; the figure of 60 rems has been agreed on. The trouble is that it is extremely difficult to be sure about radiation damage -a person may feel perfectly well, but the cells of his or her sex organs may be damaged, and this will not be discovered until the birth of deformed（畸形的） children or even grandchildren. Missions of the Apollo flights have had to cross belts of high radiation and, during the outward and return journeys, the Apollo crew accumulated a large amount of rems. So far, no dangerous amounts of radiation have been reported, but the Apollo missions have been quite short. We simply do not know yet how men are going to get on when they spend weeks and months outside the protection of the atmosphere, working in a space laboratory. Drugs might help to decrease the damage done by radiation, but no really effective ones have been found so far.
51. According to the first paragraph, the atmosphere is essential to man in that ______.
A) it protects him against the harmful rays from space
B) it provides sufficient light for plant growth
C) it supplies the heat necessary for human survival
D) it screens off the falling meteors
52. We know from the passage that ________.
A) exposure to even tiny amounts of radiation is fatal
B) the effect of exposure to radiation is slow in coming
C) radiation is avoidable in space exploration
D) astronauts in spacesuits needn’t worry about radiation damage
53. The harm radiation has done to the Apollo crew members _______.
A) is insignificant
B)seems overestimated
C) is enormous
D) remains unknown
54. It can be inferred from the passage that ________.
A) the Apollo mission was very successful
B) protection from space radiation is no easy job
C) astronauts will have deformed children or grandchildren
D) radiation is not a threat to well-protected space explorers
55. The best title for this passage would be _______.
A) The Atmosphere and Our Environment
B) Research on Radiation
C) Effects of Space Radiation
D) Importance Protection Against Radiation
Passage Two
Questions 56 to 60 are based on the following passage:
Taste is such a subjective matter that we don’t usually conduct preference tests for food. The most you can say about anyone’s preference, is that it’s one person’s opinion. But because the two big cola（可口可樂） companies—Coca-Cola and Pepsi Cola are marketed so aggressively, we’ve wondered how big a role taste preference actually plays in brand loyalty. We set up a taste test that challenged people who identified themselves as either Coca-Cola or Pepsi fans: Find your brand in a blind tasting.
We invited staff volunteers who had a strong liking for either Coca-Cola Classic （傳統(tǒng)型）or Pepsi, Diet（低糖的）Coke, or Diet Pepsi. These were people who thought they’d have no trouble telling their brand from the other brand.
We eventually located 19 regular cola drinkers and 27 diet cola drinkers. Then we fed them four unidentified samples of cola one at a time, regular colas for the one group, diet versions for the other. We asked them to tell us whether each sample was Coke or Pepsi; then we analyzed the records statistically to compare the participants’ choices with what mere guess-work could have accomplished.
Getting all four samples right was a tough test, but not too tough, we thought, for people who believed they could recognize their brand. In the end, only 7 out of 19 regular cola drinkers correctly identified their brand of choice in all four trials. The diet-cola drinkers did a little worse-only 7 of 27 identified all four samples correctly.
While both groups did better than chance would predict, nearly half the participants in each group made the wrong choice two or more times. Two people go all four samples wrong. Overall, half the participants did about as well on the last round of tasting as on the first, so fatigue, or taste burnout, was not a factor. Our preference test results suggest that only a few Pepsi participants and Coke fans may really be able to tell their favorite brand by taste and price.
56. According to the passage the preference test was conducted in order to _______.
A) find out the role taste preference plays in a person’s drinking
B) reveal which cola is more to the liking of the drinkers
C) show that a person’s opinion about taste is mere guess-work
D) compare the ability of the participants in choosing their drinks
57. The statistics recorded in the preference tests show ______.
A) Coca-Cola and Pepsi are people’s two most favorite drinks
B) there is not much difference in taste between Coca-Cola and Pepsi
C) few people had trouble telling Coca-Cola from Pepsi
D) people’s tastes differ from one another
58. It is implied in the first paragraph that _______.
A) the purpose of taste tests is to promote the sale of colas
B) the improvement of quality is the chief concern of the two cola companies
C) the competition between the two colas is very strong
D) blind tasting is necessary for identifying fans
Direction: There are 4 passages in this part. Each passage is followed by some questions or unfinished statements. For each
of them there are four choices marked A), B) C) and D). You should decide on the best choice and mark the corresponding
letter on the Answer Sheet with a single line through the center.
Passage One
Questions 51 to 55 are based on the following passage:
Space is a dangerous place, not only because of meteors（流星） but also because of rays from the sun and other stars. The atmosphere again acts as our protective blanket on earth. Light gets through, and this is essential for plants to make the food, which we eat. Heat, too, makes our environment endurable. Various kinds of rays come through the air from outer space, but enormous quantities of radiation from the sun are screened off. As soon as men leave the atmosphere they are exposed to this radiation but their spacesuits or the walls of their spacecraft, if they are inside, do prevent a lot of radiation damage.
Radiation is the greatest known danger to explorers in space. The unit of radiation is called “rem”. Scientists have
reason to think that a man can put up with far more radiation than 0.1 rem without being damaged; the figure of 60 rems has been agreed on. The trouble is that it is extremely difficult to be sure about radiation damage -a person may feel perfectly well, but the cells of his or her sex organs may be damaged, and this will not be discovered until the birth of deformed（畸形的） children or even grandchildren. Missions of the Apollo flights have had to cross belts of high radiation and, during the outward and return journeys, the Apollo crew accumulated a large amount of rems. So far, no dangerous amounts of radiation have been reported, but the Apollo missions have been quite short. We simply do not know yet how men are going to get on when they spend weeks and months outside the protection of the atmosphere, working in a space laboratory. Drugs might help to decrease the damage done by radiation, but no really effective ones have been found so far.
51. According to the first paragraph, the atmosphere is essential to man in that ______.
A) it protects him against the harmful rays from space
B) it provides sufficient light for plant growth
C) it supplies the heat necessary for human survival
D) it screens off the falling meteors
52. We know from the passage that ________.
A) exposure to even tiny amounts of radiation is fatal
B) the effect of exposure to radiation is slow in coming
C) radiation is avoidable in space exploration
D) astronauts in spacesuits needn’t worry about radiation damage
53. The harm radiation has done to the Apollo crew members _______.
A) is insignificant
B)seems overestimated
C) is enormous
D) remains unknown
54. It can be inferred from the passage that ________.
A) the Apollo mission was very successful
B) protection from space radiation is no easy job
C) astronauts will have deformed children or grandchildren
D) radiation is not a threat to well-protected space explorers
55. The best title for this passage would be _______.
A) The Atmosphere and Our Environment
B) Research on Radiation
C) Effects of Space Radiation
D) Importance Protection Against Radiation
Passage Two
Questions 56 to 60 are based on the following passage:
Taste is such a subjective matter that we don’t usually conduct preference tests for food. The most you can say about anyone’s preference, is that it’s one person’s opinion. But because the two big cola（可口可樂） companies—Coca-Cola and Pepsi Cola are marketed so aggressively, we’ve wondered how big a role taste preference actually plays in brand loyalty. We set up a taste test that challenged people who identified themselves as either Coca-Cola or Pepsi fans: Find your brand in a blind tasting.
We invited staff volunteers who had a strong liking for either Coca-Cola Classic （傳統(tǒng)型）or Pepsi, Diet（低糖的）Coke, or Diet Pepsi. These were people who thought they’d have no trouble telling their brand from the other brand.
We eventually located 19 regular cola drinkers and 27 diet cola drinkers. Then we fed them four unidentified samples of cola one at a time, regular colas for the one group, diet versions for the other. We asked them to tell us whether each sample was Coke or Pepsi; then we analyzed the records statistically to compare the participants’ choices with what mere guess-work could have accomplished.
Getting all four samples right was a tough test, but not too tough, we thought, for people who believed they could recognize their brand. In the end, only 7 out of 19 regular cola drinkers correctly identified their brand of choice in all four trials. The diet-cola drinkers did a little worse-only 7 of 27 identified all four samples correctly.
While both groups did better than chance would predict, nearly half the participants in each group made the wrong choice two or more times. Two people go all four samples wrong. Overall, half the participants did about as well on the last round of tasting as on the first, so fatigue, or taste burnout, was not a factor. Our preference test results suggest that only a few Pepsi participants and Coke fans may really be able to tell their favorite brand by taste and price.
56. According to the passage the preference test was conducted in order to _______.
A) find out the role taste preference plays in a person’s drinking
B) reveal which cola is more to the liking of the drinkers
C) show that a person’s opinion about taste is mere guess-work
D) compare the ability of the participants in choosing their drinks
57. The statistics recorded in the preference tests show ______.
A) Coca-Cola and Pepsi are people’s two most favorite drinks
B) there is not much difference in taste between Coca-Cola and Pepsi
C) few people had trouble telling Coca-Cola from Pepsi
D) people’s tastes differ from one another
58. It is implied in the first paragraph that _______.
A) the purpose of taste tests is to promote the sale of colas
B) the improvement of quality is the chief concern of the two cola companies
C) the competition between the two colas is very strong
D) blind tasting is necessary for identifying fans