Cancer The popular TV variety-show host was grim but calm. He faced the cameras and said bluntly: "I have cancer." Masataka Itsumi’’s disclosure may be the latest sign that the shame associated with cancer is finally breaking down in a country where, unlike the United Sates, the topic has traditionally been taboo. Cancer is the country’’s No.1 killer, chaining more than 230,000 lives a year. Despite the number of people affected, the subject has long been concealed in secrecy and silence. As a rule, Japanese are reluctant to tell anyone other than family if they have cancer. And doctors often lie to patients about a cancer diagnosis, fearing they would be depressed and weakened by the truth. Polls indicate that most people would prefer to be told if they have cancer. But health authorities have estimated as few as one in five cancer patients is given a truthful diagnosis. "The patient is very afraid to hear of having cancer, so many doctors just don’t tell," said one doctor. " But if we don’t tell the truth, it’’s bad for the relationship between doctor and patient. So I think this is beginning to change". He said he believed the intense public interest in the Itsumi case reflected pent-up curiosity and concern about the subject. There are other signs of greater openness in confronting cancer. Support groups for cancer victims, once unknown, have sprung up. The plot of a recent film revolved around a man with cancer. An unusually powerful television advertisement, appealing for bone-marrow donations, features a young woman who has since died of leukemia. But secrecy about cancer is still common. In Japan, serious illness is considered embarrassing. People worry about causing suffering and expense for their families, or discomforting their colleagues. Itsumi, in fact, began his news conference by apologizing. Other factors contribute to the taboo on talk about cancer. There is a cultural tendency toward restraint on discussing personal matters and stoicism in facing problems. Even if patients sense something is very wrong despite a good diagnosis, most do not press their doctors or seek a second opinion. Doctors are granted deep respect in a society that discourages questioning authority. The passage implies that______.
A. in the United States, people openly talk about cancer
B. in the Unites States, cancer is a forbidden topic
C. cancer is not as wide spread in the U. S. as in Japan
D. cancer is the No. 1 killer in the U. S.
某工程项目分为A、B、C三个单项工程,经有关部门批准采取公开招标的形式分别确定了三个中标人并签订了合同。A、B、C三个单项工程合同条款中有如下规定: 1.A工程在施工图设计没有完成前,业主通过招标选择了一家总承包单位承包该工程的施工任务。由于设计工作尚未完成,承包范围内待实施的工程虽性质明确,但工程量还难以确定,双方商定拟采用总价合同形式签订施工合同,以减少双方的风险。合同条款中规定: (1)乙方按业主代表批准的施工组织设计(或施工方案)组织施工,甲方不应承担因此引起的工期延误和费用增加的责任。 (2)甲方向乙方提供施工场地的工程地质和地下主要管网线路资料,供乙方参考使用。 (3)乙方不能将工程转包,但允许分包,也允许分包单位将分包的工程再次分包给其他施工单位。 2.B工程合同额为9000万元,总工期为30个月,工程分两期进行验收,第一期为18个月,第二期为12个月。在工程实施过程中,出现了下列情况: (1)工程开工后,从第三个月开始连续四个月业主未支付承包商应付的工程进度款。为此,承包商向业主发出要求付款通知,并提出对拖延支付的工程进度款应计利息的要求,其数额从监理工程师计量签字后第11天起计息。业主方以该四个月未支付工程款作为偿还预付款而予以抵消为由,拒绝支付。为此,承包商以业主违反合同中关于预付款扣还的规定,以及拖欠工程款导致无法继续施工为由而停止施工,并要求业主承担违约责任。 (2)工程进行到第10个月时,国务院有关部门发出通知,指令压缩国家基建投资,要求某些建设项目暂停施工,该综合娱乐城项目属于指令停工项目。因此,业主向承包商提出暂时中止执行合同实施的通知。为此,承包商要求业主承担单方面中止合同给承包方造成的经济损失赔偿责任。 (3)复工后在工程后期,工地遭遇当地百年以来最大的台风,工程被迫暂停施工,部分已完工程受损,现场场地遭到破坏,最终使工期拖延了两个月。为此,业主要求承包商承担工期拖延所造成的经济损失责任和赶工的责任。 3.C工程在施工招标文件中规定工期按工期定额计算,工期为550天。但在施工合同中,开工日期为1997年12月15日,竣工日期为1999年7月20日,日历天数为581天。 [问题]1.A单项工程合同中业主与施工单位选择总价合同形式是否妥当合同条款中有哪些不妥之处2.B单项工程合同执行过程中出现的问题应如何处理3.C单项工程合同的合同工期应为多少天4.合同变更价款的原则与程序包括哪些内容合同争议如何解决
In studying both the recurrence of special habits or ideas in several districts, and their prevalence within each district, there come before us ever-repeated proofs of regular causation producing the phenomena of human life, and of laws of maintenance and diffusion conditions of society, at definite stages of culture. But, while giving full importance to the evidence bearing on these standard conditions of society, let us be careful to avoid a pitfall which may entrap the unwary student. Of course the opinions and habits belonging in common to masses of mankind are to a great extent the results of sound judgment and practical wisdom. But to a great extent it is not so. That many numerous societies of men should have believed in the influence of the evil eye and the existence of a firmament, should have sacrificed slaves and goods to the ghosts of the departed, should have handed down traditions of giants slaying monsters and men turning into beast--all this is ground for holding that such ideas were indeed produced in men’s minds by efficient causes, but it is not ground for holding that the rites in question are profitable, the beliefs sound, and the history authentic. This may seem at the first glance a truism, but, in fact, it is the denial of a fallacy which deeply affects the minds of all but a small critical minority of mankind. Popularly, what everybody says must be true, what everybody does must be right--"Quod ubique, quod semper, quod ab omnibus creditum est, hoc est vere proprieque Catholicum’ --and m forth. There are various topics, especially in history, law, philosophy, and theology, where even the educated people we live among can hardly be brought to see that the cause why men do hold an opinion, or practise a custom, is by no means necessarily a reason why they ought to do so. Now collections of ethnographic evidence bringing so prominently into view the agreement of immense multitudes of men as to certain traditions, beliefs, and usages, are peculiarly liable to be thus improperly used in direct defense of these institutions themselves, even old barbaric nations being polled to maintain their opinions against what are called modern ideas. As it has more than once happened to myself to find my collections of traditions and beliefs thus set up to prove their own objective truth, without proper examination of the grounds on which they were actually received, I take this occasion of remarking that the same line of argument will serve equally well to demonstrate, by the strong and wide consent of nations, that the earth is flat, and nightmare the visit of a demon. By "But to a great extent it is not so" (Lines 6--7) the author implies that
A. most people are just followers of new ideas.
B. even sound minds may commit silly errors.
C. the popularly supported may be erroneous.
D. nobody is immune to the influence of errors.
Theories of the value of art are of two kinds, which we may call extrinsic and intrinsic. The first regards art and the appreciation of art as means to some recognized moral good, while the second regards them as valuable not instrumentally but as objects unto themselves. It is characteristic of extrinsic theories to locate the value of art in its effects on the person who appreciates it. (41) _____________________The extrinsic approach, adopted in modem times by Leo Tolstoy in What Is Art in 1896, has seldom seemed wholly satisfactory. Philosophers have constantly sought for a value in aesthetic experience that is unique to it and that, therefore, could not be obtained from any other source. The extreme version of this intrinsic approach is that associated with Walter Pater, Oscar Wilde, and the French Symbolists, and summarized in the slogan "art for art’s sake."(42) _____________________Between those two extreme views there lies, once again, a host of intermediate positions. We believe, for example, that works of art must be appreciated for their own sake, but that, in the act of appreciation, we gain from them something that is of independent value. (43) _____________________The analogy with laughter--which, in some views, is itself a species of aesthetic interest--introduces a concept without which there can be no serious discussion of the value of art: the concept of taste. (44) _____________________Similarly, we regard some works of art as worthy of our attention and others as not. In articulating this judgment, we use all of the diverse and confusing vocabulary of moral appraisal; works of art, like people, are condemned for their sentimentality, coarseness, vulgarity, cruelty, or self-indulgence, and equally praised for their warmth, compassion, nobility, sensitivity, and truthfulness. Clearly, if aesthetic interest has a positive value, when motivated by good taste; it is only interest in appropriate objects that can be said to be good for us. (45) _____________________.[A] Thus a joke is laughed at for its own sake, even though there is an independent value in laughter, which lightens our lives by taking us momentarily outside ourselves. Why should not something similar be said of works of art, many of which aspire to be amusing in just the way that good jokes are[B] All discussion of the value of art tends, therefore, to turn from the outset in the direction of criticism. Can there be genuine critical evaluation of art, a genuine distinction between that which deserves our attention and that which does not[C] Art is held to be a form of education, perhaps an education of the emotions. In this case, it becomes an open question whether there might not be some more effective means of the same result. Alternatively, one may attribute a negative value to art, as Plato did in his Republic, arguing that art has a corrupting or diseducative effect on those exposed to it.[D] Artistic appreciation, a purely personal matter, calls for appropriate means of expression. Yet, it is before anything a process of “cultivation", during which a certain part of one’s "inner self" is "dug out" and some knowledge of the outside world becomes its match.[E] If I am amused it is for a reason, and this reason lies in the object of my amusement. We thus begin to think in terms of a distinction between good and bad reasons for laughter. Amusement at the wrong things may seem to us to show corruption of mind, cruelty, or bad taste; and when it does so, we speak of the object as not truly amusing, and feel that we have reason on our side.[F] Such thinkers and writers believe that art is not only an end in itself but also a sufficient justification of itself. They also hold that in order to understand art as it should be understood, it is necessary to put aside all interests other than an interest in the work itself. 42