Passage Four In most American cities, the tent for a one-bedroom apartment was $250 or more per month in recent years. In some smaller cities such as Louisville, Kentucky or Jacksonville, Florida the rent was less, but in larger cities it was more. For example, if you lived in Los Angeles, you had to pay $400 or more to rent a one-bedroom apartment, and the same apartment rented for $625 and up in Chicago. The most expensive rents in the U. S. were in New York City, where you had to pay at least $700 a month to rent a one-bedroom apartment in most parts of the city. Renters and city planners are worried about the high cost of renting apartments. Many cities now have rent-control laws to keep the cost of renting low. These laws help low-income families who cannot pay high rents. Rent control in the United States began in 1943 when the government imposed rent controls on all American cities to help workers and the families of soldiers during World War II. After the war, only one city—New York—continued these World War II controls. Recently, more and more cities have returned to rent controls. At the beginning of the 1980s, nearly one fifth of the people in the United States lived in cities with rent-control laws. Many cities have rent-control laws, but why are rents so high Builders and landlords blame rent controls for the high rents. Rents are high because there are not enough apartments to rent, and they blame rent controls for the shortage of apartments. Builders want more money to build more apartment buildings, and landlords want more money to repair their old apartment buildings. But they cannot increase rents to get this money because of the rent-control laws. As a result, landlords are not repairing their old apartments, and builders are not building new apartment buildings to replace the old apartment buildings. Builders are building apartments for high-income families, not low-income families, so low-income families must live in old apartments that are in disrepair. Builders and landlords claim that rent-control laws really hurt low-income families. Many renters disagree with them. They say that rent control is not the problem. Even without rent controls, builders and landlords will continue to ignore low-income housing because they can make more money from high-income housing. The only answer, they claim, is more rent controls and government help for low-income housing. Which of the following would be the best title for the passage
A. The Highest Rent
B. Rent Controls
C. Building Apartments for Low-Income Families
D. Rent-Control Laws
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Passage Two Analysts have had their go at humor, and I have read some of this interpretative literature, but without being greatly instructed. Humor can be dissected, as a frog can, but the thing dies in the process and the innards (内在部分) are discouraging to any but the pure scientific mind. In a newsreel theatre the other day I saw a picture of a man who had developed the soap bubble to a higher point than it had ever before reached. He had become the ace soap bubble blower of America, had perfected the business of blowing bubbles, refined it, doubled it, squared it, and had even worked himself up into a convenient lather. The effect was not pretty. Some of the bubbles were too big to be beautiful, and the blower was always jumping into them or out of them, or playing some sort of unattractive trick with them. It was, if anything, a rather repulsive sight. Humor is a little like that: it won’t stand much blowing up, and it won’t stand much poking. It has a certain fragility, an evasiveness, which one had best respect. Essentially, it is a complete mystery. A human frame convulsed with laughter, and the laughter becoming mysterious and uncontrollable, is as far out of balance as one shaken with the hiccoughs or in the throes of a sneezing fit. One of the things commonly said about humorist is that they are really very sad people- clowns with a breaking heart. There is some truth in it, but it is badly stated. It would be more accurate, I think, to say that there is a deep vein of melancholy running through everyone’s life and that the humorist, perhaps more sensible of it than some others, compensates for it actively and positively. Humorists fatten on trouble. They have always made trouble pay. They struggle along with a good will and endure pain cheerfully, knowing how well it till serve them in the sweet by and by. You find them wrestling with foreign languages, fighting folding ironing boards and swollen drainpipes, suffering the terrible discomfort of tight boot (or as Josh illings wittily called them, "tire boots"). They pour out their sorrows profitably, in a form hat is not quite a fiction nor quite a fact either. Beneath the sparking surface of these dilemmas lows the strong tide of human woe. Practically everyone is a manic depressive of sorts, with his up moments and his down moments, and you certainly don’t have to be a humorist to taste the sadness of situation and mood. But there is often a rather fine line between laughing and crying, and if a humorous piece of writing brings a person to the point where his emotional responses are untrustworthy and seem likely to break over into the opposite realm, it is because humor, like poetry, has an extra content. It plays close to the bit hot fire which is Truth, and sometimes the reader feels. the heat. In the first paragraph the author wants to say that ______.
A. just as scientists can dissect a frog, so analysts can dissect humor
B. detailed, scientific analysis is not appropriate for humor, for it may make humor lose its aesthetic value
C. some people’s analysis of humor are too scientific
D. analysts’ attempts at humor am not instructive enough to interest the author
Directions: There are 4 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 your answer on the ANSWER SHEET by blackening the corresponding letter in the brackets.Passage One All animals must rest, but do they really sleep as we know it The answer to this question seems obvious. If an animal regularly stops its activities and stays quiet and unmoving - if it looks as though it is sleeping - then why not simply assume that it is in fact sleeping But how can observers be sure that an animal is sleeping They can watch the animal and notice whether its eyes are open or closed, whether it is active or lying quietly, and whether it responds to light or sound. These factors are important clues, but they often are not enough. Horses and cows, for example, rarely close their eyes, and fish and snakes cannot close them. Yet this does not necessarily mean that they do not sleep. Have you ever seen a cat dozing with an eye partly open Even humans have occasionally been observed to sleep with one or both eyes partially open. Animals do not necessarily lie down to sleep either. Elephants, for example, often sleep standing up, with their tusks resting in the fork of a tree. Finally, while "sleeping" animals often seem unaware of changes in the sounds and light and other stimuli around them, that does not really prove they are sleeping either. Observations of animal behavior alone cannot fully answer the question of whether or not animals sleep. The answers come from doing experiments in "sleep laboratories" using a machine called the electroencephalograph (EEC). The machine is connected to animals and measures their brain signals, breathing, heartbeat, and muscle activity. The measurements are different when the animals appear to be sleeping than when they appear to be awake. Using the EEC, scientists have confirmed that all birds and mammals studied in laboratories do sleep. There is some evidence that reptiles, such as snakes and turtles, do not truly sleep, although they do have periods of rest each day, in which they are quiet and unmoving. They also have discovered that some animals, like chimpanzees, cats, and moles (who live underground), are good sleepers while others, like sheep, goats, and donkeys, are poor sleepers. Interestingly, the good sleepers are nearly all hunters with resting places that are safe from their enemies. Nearly all the poor sleepers are animals hunted by other animals: they must always be watching for enemies, even when they are resting. Animals that are good sleepers ______.
A. need to have a good sleep after they have exhausted themselves by getting rid of hunting animals
B. need to have a good sleep after they get tired from hunting other animals
C. are all mammals
D. almost always have a safe resting place
Directions: There are 4 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 your answer on the ANSWER SHEET by blackening the corresponding letter in the brackets.Passage One All animals must rest, but do they really sleep as we know it The answer to this question seems obvious. If an animal regularly stops its activities and stays quiet and unmoving - if it looks as though it is sleeping - then why not simply assume that it is in fact sleeping But how can observers be sure that an animal is sleeping They can watch the animal and notice whether its eyes are open or closed, whether it is active or lying quietly, and whether it responds to light or sound. These factors are important clues, but they often are not enough. Horses and cows, for example, rarely close their eyes, and fish and snakes cannot close them. Yet this does not necessarily mean that they do not sleep. Have you ever seen a cat dozing with an eye partly open Even humans have occasionally been observed to sleep with one or both eyes partially open. Animals do not necessarily lie down to sleep either. Elephants, for example, often sleep standing up, with their tusks resting in the fork of a tree. Finally, while "sleeping" animals often seem unaware of changes in the sounds and light and other stimuli around them, that does not really prove they are sleeping either. Observations of animal behavior alone cannot fully answer the question of whether or not animals sleep. The answers come from doing experiments in "sleep laboratories" using a machine called the electroencephalograph (EEC). The machine is connected to animals and measures their brain signals, breathing, heartbeat, and muscle activity. The measurements are different when the animals appear to be sleeping than when they appear to be awake. Using the EEC, scientists have confirmed that all birds and mammals studied in laboratories do sleep. There is some evidence that reptiles, such as snakes and turtles, do not truly sleep, although they do have periods of rest each day, in which they are quiet and unmoving. They also have discovered that some animals, like chimpanzees, cats, and moles (who live underground), are good sleepers while others, like sheep, goats, and donkeys, are poor sleepers. Interestingly, the good sleepers are nearly all hunters with resting places that are safe from their enemies. Nearly all the poor sleepers are animals hunted by other animals: they must always be watching for enemies, even when they are resting. How can researchers in "sleep laboratories" tell that the animals they are observing are asleep or not
A. They see if the animals respond to light and sound.
B. They do this by observing changes in the animals’ brain signals, breathing, heartbeat, and muscle activity.
C. They see if the animals’ eyes are closed.
D. They can tell this by seeing if the animals lie down or not.
Directions: There are 4 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 your answer on the ANSWER SHEET by blackening the corresponding letter in the brackets.Passage One All animals must rest, but do they really sleep as we know it The answer to this question seems obvious. If an animal regularly stops its activities and stays quiet and unmoving - if it looks as though it is sleeping - then why not simply assume that it is in fact sleeping But how can observers be sure that an animal is sleeping They can watch the animal and notice whether its eyes are open or closed, whether it is active or lying quietly, and whether it responds to light or sound. These factors are important clues, but they often are not enough. Horses and cows, for example, rarely close their eyes, and fish and snakes cannot close them. Yet this does not necessarily mean that they do not sleep. Have you ever seen a cat dozing with an eye partly open Even humans have occasionally been observed to sleep with one or both eyes partially open. Animals do not necessarily lie down to sleep either. Elephants, for example, often sleep standing up, with their tusks resting in the fork of a tree. Finally, while "sleeping" animals often seem unaware of changes in the sounds and light and other stimuli around them, that does not really prove they are sleeping either. Observations of animal behavior alone cannot fully answer the question of whether or not animals sleep. The answers come from doing experiments in "sleep laboratories" using a machine called the electroencephalograph (EEC). The machine is connected to animals and measures their brain signals, breathing, heartbeat, and muscle activity. The measurements are different when the animals appear to be sleeping than when they appear to be awake. Using the EEC, scientists have confirmed that all birds and mammals studied in laboratories do sleep. There is some evidence that reptiles, such as snakes and turtles, do not truly sleep, although they do have periods of rest each day, in which they are quiet and unmoving. They also have discovered that some animals, like chimpanzees, cats, and moles (who live underground), are good sleepers while others, like sheep, goats, and donkeys, are poor sleepers. Interestingly, the good sleepers are nearly all hunters with resting places that are safe from their enemies. Nearly all the poor sleepers are animals hunted by other animals: they must always be watching for enemies, even when they are resting. According to the author, all animals ______.
A. spend some time resting
B. close their eyes when sleeping
C. are good sleepers
D. are poor sleepers