厦门大学2007博士研究生入学考试英语试题.doc

厦门大学2007博士研究生入学考试英语试题厦门大学2007博士研究生入学考试英语试题Part I Reading Comprehension(40 points)Part A(30 points)Directions: There are 3 reading 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 centerPassage OneQuestions 15 are based on the following passage：For the longest time, I couldnt get worked up about privacy: my right to it；how its dying；how were headed for an even more wired，underregulated，overinstrusive，privacy-deprived planetI should also point out that as news director for Pathfinder，Time Incs mega info mall，and a guy who makes his living on the Web, I know better than most people that were hurtling toward an even more intrusive world. Were all being watched by computers whenever we visit Websites；by the mere act of“browsing”(it sounds so passive!)weregoing public in a way that was unimaginable a decade agoI know this because Im a watcher tooWhen people come to my Website，without ever knowing their names, I can peer over their shoulders，recording what they look at, timing how long they stay on a particular page，following them around Pathfinders sprawling offeringsNone of this would bother me in the least，I suspect，if a few years ago，my phone, like Marleys ghost, hadnt given me a glimpse of the nightmares to comeOn Thanksgiving weekend in 1995, someone(presumably a critic of a book my wife and I had just written about computer hackers)forwarded my home telephone number to an out-of-state answering machine where unsuspecting callers trying to reach me heard a male voice identify himself as me and say some extremely rude thingsThen，with typical hacker aplomb, the prankster asked people to leave their messages(which to my surprise many Callers, including my mother，did)This went on for several days until my wife and I figured out that something was wrong (“Heywhy hasnt the phone rung since Wednesday?”)and got our phone service restoredIt seemed funny at first，and it gave us a swell story to tell on our book tour. But the interloper who seized our telephone line continued to hit us even after the tour ended. And hit us again and again for the next six months：The phone company seemed powerless. Its security folks moved us to one unlisted number after another half a dozen timesThey put special pin codes in placeThey put traces on the lineBut the troublemaker kept breaking throughIf our hacker had been truly evil and omnipotent as only fictional movie hackers are, there would probably have been even worse ways he could have threatened my privacy. He could have sabotaged my credit ratingHe could have eavesdropped on my telephone conversations or siphoned off my e-mailHe could have called in my mortgage，discontinued my health insurance or obliterated my Social Security numberLike Sandra Bullock in the Net, I could have been a digital untouchable, wandering the planet without a connection to the rest of humanity(Although if I didnt have to pay back school loans，it might be worth itJust a thought。)Still, I remember feeling violated at the time and as powerless as a minnow in a flash floodSomeone was invading my private space-my familys private space-and there was nothing I or the authorities could doIt was as close to a technological epiphany as I have ever beenAnd as 1 watched my personal digital hell unfold，it struck me that our privacy-mine and yourshas already disappeared, not in one Big Brotherly blitzkrieg but in Little Brotherly moments，bit by bit.Losing control of your telephone, of course, is the least of it. After allmost of us voluntarily give out our phone number and address when we allow ourselves to be listed in the White PagesMost of us go a lot further than thatWe register our whereabouts when-ever We put a bank card in an ATM machine or drive through an E-Z Pass lane on the highwayWe submit to being photographed every day-20 times a day on average if you live or work in New York City-by surveillance camerasWe make public our interests and our purchasing habits every time we shop by mail order or visit a commercial Website.1What information do you learn about the author that establishes him as an authority on this topic?AHe has suffered a lot in losing his privacyBHe makes his living off of the WebCHe knows how to monitor his accountD.He and his wife published a book concerning computer hackers.2.Which of the following problems has the author experienced?A. Someone got information from his medical files and sent him brochures on health products he may want to buy.B.Someone used the motor-vehicle registration records on his car to find his home address.C.Someone rerouted his telephone calls to another number without his knowledge.D.Someone sent an e-mail message that destroyed the files on his computer.3.According to the passage, the hackers in the movie would conduct following thing EXCEPTA.eavesdroppingB.darnaging a Social Security numberC.threatening in a flash floodD.making a person information disappear in the date base.4.The writer cited his experience to show that _A.the authorized organization could solve the problem by offering timely helpB.the interloper would be kept back sooner or laterC.the government took personal privacy bit by bitD.he would lose his privacy gradually5.Because of advances in todays technology, the right to privacy could be comprormised in the following areas EXCEPT _A.purchasingB.baningC.telephone useD.recruitmentPassage TwoQuestions 610 are based on the following passage:Hello, my name is Richard and I am an ego surfer. The habit began about five years ago, and now I need help. Like most journalists, I cant deny that one of my private joys is seeing my byline in print. Now the internet is allowing me to feed this vanity to an ever greater extent, and the occasional sneaky web search has grown into a full-blown obsession with how high up Googles ranking my articles appear when I put my name into the search box. When I last looked, my best effort was a rather humiliating 47th place. You know you have a problem when you find yourself competing for ranking with a retired basketball player from the 1970s.Not that Im alone in suffering from a dysfunctional techno-habit. New technologies have revealed a whole raft of hitherto unsuspected personality problems., think crackberry, powerpointlessness or cheesepodding. Most of us are familiar with sending an e-mail to a colleague sitting a couple of feet away instead of talking to them. Some go onto the web to snoop on old friends, colleagues or even first dates. More of us than ever reveal highly personal information on blogs or My Space entries. A few will even use internet anonymity to fool others into believing they are someone else altogether. So are these web syndromes and technological tics new versions of old afflictions, or are we developing fresh mind bugs?Developing a bad habit is easier than many might think. “You can become addicted to potentially anything you do,” says Mark Griffiths, an addiction researcher at Nottingham Trent University in the UK, “because addictions rely on constant rewards. ” Indeed, although definitions of addiction vary, there is a body of evidence that suggests drug addictions and non-drug habits share the same neural pathways. While only a hardcore few can be considered true technology addicts, an entirely unscientific survey of the web, and of New Scientist staff, has revealed how prevalent techno-addictions may have become.The web in particular has opened up a host of opportunities for overindulgence. Take Wikipedia. Updating the entries-something anyone can do-has become almost a way of life for some. There are more than 2,400 “Wikipedians”, who have edited more than 4,000 pages each.“Its clearly like crack for some people,” says Dan Closely at Cornell University in New York, who has studied how websites such as Wikipedia foster a community. To committed Wikipedians, he says, the site is more than a useful information resource; its the embodiment of an ideology of free information for all.Then there are photolog sites like Flickr. While most of us would rather die than be caught surreptitiously browsing through someone elses photos, there need be no such qualms about the private pics people put up on these sites. Most people using Flickr and similar sites spent time each day browsing albums owned by people they had never met. They do this for emotional kicks. Khalid and Dix suggest: flicking through someone elses wedding photos, for example, allows people to daydream about their own nuptials.E-mail is another area where things can get out of hand. While e-mail has led to a revival of the habit of penning short notes to friends and acquaintances, the ease with which we can do this means that we dont always think hard enough about where our casual comments could end up. This was the undoing of US broadcaster Keith Olbermann, who earlier this year sent a private e-mail in which he described a fellow MSNBC reporter as “dumber than a suitcase of rocks”. Unfortunately for Olbermann, the words found their way into the New York Daily News.Pam Briggs, a specialist in human-computer interaction at the University of Northumbria, UK, says the lack of cues such as facial expressions or body language when communicating electronically can lead us to overcompensate in what we say. “The medium is so thin, theres little room for projecting ourselves into it,” says Briggs.“When all the social cues disappear, we feel we have to put something else into the void, which is often an overemotional or over-intimate message.”The habit of forwarding jokey e-mails or YouTube videos-think Diet Coke and Mentos fountams-can also say a lot about how people want to be perceived, Briggs adds.“We rarely want to be seen as too serious, so we try to project more of our personality into e-mail.” This could also explain why many bloggers expose private information that they would never shout out to a crowded room.6. Richard felt disgraced when he found _A.his article was rated lowB. he got a dysfunctional techno-habitC. he compared himself with a retired basketball playerD. he became more egocentric7. According to the passage, the followings are considered as one of the web syndromes, EXCEPTA.pry into the private affairs of othersB. exposing highly personal affairs on the netC.surfing for information of colleaguesD. talking to nearby colleagues by e-mail8.Which of the following is true to Wikipedia?A. More than 4,000 pages are offered for edition.B.More than 2,400 Wikipedians work for the edition.C.Everyone can do the revision on the web page.D.The entries contribute to peoples development.9. Browsing Flickr and similar sites shows thatA.people do not care to be caught while browsing through others picsB.people worry about uploading those personal albumsC.people can make better arrangement of their own weddingD.people flick through others photo to stimulate their own emotion10.What does the article mainly talked about?A.The web in particular has opened up a host of opportunities for overindulgence.B.Drug addictions and non-drug habits share the same neural pathways.C.People can become addicted to potentially anything you do.D.New technologies have revealed some unsuspected personality problems.Passage ThreeQuestions 1115 are based on the following passage:It is interesting to reflect for a moment upon the differences in the areas of moral feeling and standards in the peoples of Japan and the United States. The Americans divide these areas somewhat rigidly into spirit and flesh, the two being in opposition in the life of a human being. Ideally, spirit should prevail but all too often it is the flesh that does prevail. The Japanese make no such division, at least between one as good and the other as evil. They believe that a person has two souls, each necessary. One is the “gentle” soul, the other is the “rough” soul. Sometimes the person uses his gentle soul, sometimes he must use his rough soul. He does not favor his gentle soul, neither does he fight his rough soul. Human nature in itself is good, Japanese philosophers insist, and a human being does not need to fight any part of himself. He has only to learn how to use each soul properly at the appropriate times. Virtue for the Japanese consists in fulfilling ones obligations to others. Happy endings, either in life or in fiction, are neither necessary nor expected, since the fulfillment of duty provides the satisfying end, whatever the tragedy it inflicts. And duty includes a persons obligations to those who have conferred Benefits upon him and to himself as an individual of honor. He develops through this double sense of duty a self-discipline which is at once permissive and rigid, depending upon the area in which it is functioning.The process of acquiring this self-discipline begins in childhood. Indeed, one may say it begins at birth-how early the Japanese child is given his own identity! If I were to define in a word the attitude of the Japanese toward their children I would put it in one succinct word. Love? Yes, abundance of love, warmly expressed from the moment he is put to his mothers breast. For a mother this nursing of her child is important psychologically.Rewards are frequent, a bit of candy bestowed at the right moment, an inexpensive toy. As time comes to enter school, however, discipline becomes firmer. To bring shame to the family is the greatest shame for the child.What is the secret of the Japanese teaching of self-discipline? It lies, I think, in the fact that the aim of all teaching is the establishment of habit. Rules are repeated over and over, and continually practiced until obedience becomes instinctive. This repetition is enhanced by the expectation of the elders. They expect a child to obey and to learn through obedience. The demand is gentle at first and tempered to the childs tender age. It is no gentle as time goes on, but certainly it is increasingly inexorable.Now, far away from that warm Japanese home, I reflect upon what I learned there. What, I wonder, will take the place of the web of love and discipline which for so many centuries has surrounded the life and thinking of the people of Japan?11. According to Japanese belief a child is born _A. basically goodB. amoral, neither good nor evilC. with two souls which are in combat with one anotherD. in sin12. The training of the Japanese child can best be described asA.a system of rewards and punishmentsB.frequent disciplining which becomes more inexorably severe as the child grows olderC.benevolent and indulgent durin