2. Passage Sixteen Justin was always prepared. His motto was “Never throw anything out， you never know when it might come in handy.” His bedroom was so full of flat bicycle tires， bent tennis rackets， deflated basketballs， and games with missing pieces that you could barely get in the door. His parents asked him to clean out his room. “What use is a fish tank with a hole in the bottom?” his father asked. But Justin simply smiled and repeated his motto， “Never throw anything out， you never know when it might come in handy.” When Justin was away from home， he always carried his blue backpack. He liked to think of it as a smaller version of his bedroom——a place to store the many objects that he collected. It was so worn and stretched that it hardly resembled a backpack anymore. It was full of the kind of things that seemed unimportant， but when used with a little imagination， might come in handy. Justin had earned a reputation for figuring things out and getting people out of otherwise hopeless situations. Many of his classmates and neighbors sought him out when they needed help with a problem. On the first day of school， his friend Kenny， came looking for Justin. “Do you think you have something in your bag that could help me remember my locker code?” he asked. “I lost the paper it was written on. I have science class in two minutes and if I’m late on the first day it’ll make me look bad for the rest of the year.” Kenny looked genuinely worried. “Relax，” Justin said， taking his backpack off and opened it. “Remember how you borrowed my notebook in hometown to write the code down? Well， I know how we can recover what you wrote. ” He took the notebook and a soft lead pencil out of his bag. The page that Kenny had written on had left faint indentations (旧凹痕) on another page in the notebook. Justin held the pencil on its side and rubbed it lightly over the indentations. Slowly but surely the numbers of the locker code appeared in white， set off by the gray pencil rubbings. “That’s amazing!” Kenny said. “I owe you one.” And he dashed off to open his locker. In what way is Justin’s backpack a smaller version of his bedroom?

3. Passage Thirteen Trees are useful to man in three important ways: they provide him with wood and other products; they give him shade; and they help to prevent droughts and floods. Unfortunately， in many parts of the world， man has not realized that the third of these services is the most important. In his eagerness to make money from trees， he has cut them down in large numbers， only to find that without them he has lost the best friends he had. And besides， he is usually too careless to plant and look after new trees. So the forests slowly disappear. This does not only mean that man will have fewer trees. The results are even more serious: for where there are trees， their roots break up soil——allowing the rain to sink in——and also bind the soil， thus preventing it from being washed away easily; but where there are no trees， the rain falls on hard ground and flows away， causing floods and carrying away the rich top-soil. When all the top-soil is gone， nothing remains but worthless desert. Two thousand years ago a rich and powerful country cut down its trees to build warships， with which to gain itself an empire. It set up the empire but， without its trees， its soil became poor and it grew weak. When the empire fell to pieces， the home country found itself faced with floods and starvation.Why did the country mentioned in the passage suffer from floods and starvation?

A. Because an empire was set up.

B. Because the empire fell to pieces.

C. Because it lost its trees.

D. Because too much had been spent on wars.

2. Passage Two When older people can no longer remember names at a cocktail party， they tend to think that their brainpower is declining. But a growing number of studies suggest that this assumption is often wrong. Instead，the research finds， the aging brain is simply taking in more data and trying to examine carefully a lot of information， often to its long-term benefit. Some brains do deteriorate with age. But for most aging adults， researchers say， much of what occurs is a gradually widening focus of attention that makes it more difficult to get hold of just one fact. Although that can be frustrating， it is often useful. “It may be that distractibility is not， in fact， a bad thing，” said Shelley H. Carson， a psychology researcher at Harvard. “It may increase the amount of information available to the conscious mind. ” For example， in studies where subjects are asked to read passages that are interrupted with unexpected words or phrases， adults 60 and older work much more slowly than college students. Although the students plow through the texts at a consistent speed regardless of what the out-of-place words mean， older people slow down even more when the words are related to the topic at hand. That indicates that they are not just stumbling (结结巴巴地念) over the extra information， but are taking it in and processing it. When both groups were later asked questions for which the out-of-place words might be answers， the older adults responded much better than the students. “For the young people， it’s as if the distraction never happened，” said a researcher of the review， Lynn Hasher， a professor of psychology at the University of Toronto. “But for older adults， because they’ve retained all this extra data， they’re now suddenly the better problem solvers. They can transfer the information they’ve soaked up from one situation to another.” Such tendencies can yield big advantages in the real world， where it is not always clear what information is important， or will become important. For instance， a seemingly irrelevant point or suggestion in a memo can take on new meaning if the original plan changes. What does Shelley H. Carson mean by saying “. .. distractibility is not， in fact， a bad thing”【Line 1， Para. 3】?

A. It is not important to concentrate on one thing.

B. Distractibility can improve people＇s brainpower.

C. Being distracted means taking in more information.

D. People often worry about distractibility.

36. The men will have to wait all day (_____)_ the doctor works faster.

A. 　 if

B. 　 whether

C. 　 unless

D. 　 that

38. In order not to be disturbed, I spent three hours (_____)_ in my study.

A. 　locking

B. 　locked

C. 　to lock

D. 　being locked

3. Passage Twenty-Four Social change is more likely to occur in societies where there is a mixture of different kinds of people than in societies where people are similar in many ways. The simple reason for this is that there are more different ways of looking at things present in the first kind of society. There are more ideas， more disagreements in interest， and more groups and organizations with different beliefs. In addition， there is usually a greater worldly interest and greater tolerance in mixed societies. All these factors tend to promote social change by opening more areas of life to decision. In a society where people are quite similar in many ways， there are fewer occasions for people to see the need or the opportunity for change because everything seems to be the same. And although conditions may not be satisfactory， they are at least customary and undisputed. Within a society， social changes is also likely to occur more frequently and more readily in the material aspects of the culture than in the non-material， for example， in technology rather than in values; in what has been learned later in life rather than what was learned early; in the less basic and less emotional aspects of society than in their opposites; in the simple elements rather than in the complex ones; in form rather than in substance; and in elements that are acceptable to the culture rather than in strange elements. Furthermore， social change is easier if it is gradual. For example， it comes more readily in human relations on a continuous scale rather than one with sharp dichotomies ( 一分为二). This is one reason why change has not come more quickly to Black American as compared to other American minorities， because of the sharp difference in “appearance between them and their white counterparts” .According to the passage， which of the following is NOT true?

A. Social change tends to meet with more difficulty in basic and emotional aspects of society.

B. Disagreement with an argument about conditions tend to slow down social change.

C. Social change is more likely to occur in the material aspect of society.

D. Social change is less likely to occur in what people learned when they were young.

39. The police are suspicious (_____)_ making plans for the summer vacation.

A. 　 to

B. 　 at

C. 　 on

D. 　 of

50. The output of new energy vehicle this year is (_____) last year.

A. 　 as much as twice

B. 　 as twice much as

C. 　 twice as much as

D. 　 twice so much as

48. In computer programming, this model is ()to any of the others they have in the department.

A. 　 the most superior

B. 　 superior the most

C. 　 more superior

D. 　 superior

42. Such a problem exists because adequate measures for preventing it (_____) taken in the past.

A. 　 were not

B. 　 had not

C. 　 was not

D. 　 had not been

3. Passage Nine Today anyone will accept money in exchange for goods and services. People use money to buy food， furniture， books， bicycles and hundreds of others they need or want. When they work， they usually get paid in money. Most of the money today is made of metal or paper. But people used to use all kinds of things as money. One of the first kinds of money was shells. Shells were not the only things used as money. In China， cloth and knives were used. In the Philippine Islands， rice was used as money. In some parts of Africa， cattle were one of the earliest kinds of money. Other animals were used as money， too. The first metal coins were made in China. They were round and had a square hole in the center. People strung them together and carried them from place to place. Different countries have used different metals and designs for their money. The first coins in England were made of tin. Sweden and Russia used copper to make their money. Later， other countries began to make coins of gold and silver. But even gold and silver were inconvenient if you had to buy something expensive. Again， the Chinese thought of a way to improve money. They began to use paper money. The first paper money looked more like a note from one person to another than paper money used today. Money has had an interesting history from the days of shell money until today. Why， according to the passage， did ancient Chinese coins have a square hole in the center?

A. Because it would be easier to put them together and carry them around.

B. Because it would be lighter for people to carry them from place to place.

C. Because people wanted to make it look nicer.

D. Because people wanted to save the expensive metal they were made from.