Although there are many skillful Braille readers, thousands of other blind people find it difficult to learn that system. They are thereby (1) from the world of books and newspapers, having to (2) friends to read aloud to them. A young scientist named Raymond Kurzweil has now designed a computer which is a major (3) in providing aid to the (4) . His machine, Cyclops, has a camera that (5) any page, interprets the print into sounds, and then delivers them orally in a robot-like (6) through a speaker. By pressing the appropriate buttons (7) Cyclops’s keyboard, a blind person can "read" any (8) document in the English language. This remarkable invention represents a tremendous (9) forward in the education of the handicapped. At present, Cyclops costs $50,000. (10) , Mr. Kurzweil and his associates are preparing a smaller (11) improved version that will sell (12) less than half that price. Within a few years, Kurzweil (13) the price range will be low enough for every school and library to (14) one. Michael Hingson, Director of the National Federation for the Blind, hopes that (15) will be able to buy home (16) of Cyclops for the price of a good television set. Mr. Hingson’s organization purchased five machines and is now testing them in Maryland, Colorado, Iowa, California, and New York. Blind people (17) in those tests, making lots of (18) suggestions to the engineers who helped to produce Cyclops. "This is the first time that blind people have ever done individual studies (19) a product was put on the market," Hingson said. "Most manufacturers believed that having the blind help the blind was like telling disabled people to teach other disabled people. In that (20) , the manufacturers have been the blind ones.\
A. execution
B. distinction
C. breakthrough
D. process
Task 1Directions: After reading the following passage, you will find 5 questions or unfinished statements, numbered 36 through 40. For each question or statement there are 4 choices marked A, B, C and D. You should make the correct choice and mark the corresponding letter on the Answer Sheet with a single line through the center. The last part of this century will be an age of space exploration such as man has never known. There are eight planets, at least thirty satellites, and thousands of small stars to be explored. Their total area is about 250 times that of the earth. Spaceships will not be able to land on some of them. But that still leaves to be explored an area ten times as great as the continents of the earth. Exploring space may seem terrifying to some people. No doubt explorers of the past were terrified by the great empty oceans that lay before them. They conquered (克服) their fears, crossed the oceans, and built the New World. In the past when explorers set sail into the unknown, they had to say good-bye to everyone they knew at home. Space explorers will not face such great loneliness. Even when they travel far away from the earth, they will be able to send messages back. Future space exploration will______.
A. be more difficult than it was in the past
B. be more dangerous than in the past
C. be more lonely than in the past
D. cover a larger area than any exploring done before