题目内容
Biologically, there is only one quality which distinguishes us from animals: the ability to laugh. In a universe which appears to be utterly devoid of humor, we enjoy this supreme luxury. And it is a luxury, for unlike any other bodily process, laughter does not seem to serve a biologically useful purpose. In a divide world, laughter is a unifying force. Human beings oppose each other on a great many issues. Nations may disagree about systems of government and human relations may be plagued by ideological factions and political camps, but we all share the ability to laugh. And laughter, in turn, depends on that most complex and 'subtle of all human qualities: a sense of humor Certain comic stereotypes have a universal appeal. This can best be seen from the world-wide popularity of Charlie Chaplin’s early films. The little man at odds with society never fails to amuse no matter which country we come from. As that great commentator on human affairs, Dr. Samuel Johnson, once remarked, Men have been wise in very different modes; but they have always laughed in the same way.
A sense of humor may take various forms and laughter may be anything from a refined tingle to an earth quaking roar, but the effect is always the same. Humor helps us to maintain a correct sense of values. It is the one quality which political fanatics appear to lack. If we can see the funny side, we never make the mistake of taking ourselves too seriously. We are always reminded that tragedy is not really far removed from comedy, so we never get a lop sided view of things.
This is one of the chief functions of satire and irony. Human pain and suffering are so grim; we hover so often on the brink of war; political realities are usually enough to plunge us into total despair. In such circumstances, cartoons and satirical accounts of somber political events redress the balance. They take the wind out of pompous and arrogant politicians who have lost their sense of proportion. They enable us to see that many of our most profound actions are merely comic or absurd. We laugh when a great satirist like Swift writes about war in Gulliver's Travels. The Lilliputians and their neighbors attack each other because they can't agree which end to break an egg. We laugh because we meant to laugh; but we are meant to weep too. It is too powerful a weapon to be allowed to flourish.
The sense of humor must be singled out as man's most important quality because it is associated with laughter. And laughter, in turn, is associated with happiness. Courage, determination, initiative these are qualities we share with other forms of life. But the sense of humor is uniquely human. If happiness is one of the great goals of life, then it is the sense of humor that provides the key.
The most important of all human qualities is ______.
查看答案
搜索结果不匹配？点我反馈
更多问题
What do we learn from the sentence, it is too powerful a weapon to be allowed to flourish
Mass transportation revised the social and economic fabric of the American city in three fundamental ways. It catalyzed physical expansion, it sorted out people and land uses, and it accelerated the inherent instability of urban life. By opening vast areas of unoccupied land for residential expansion, the omnibuses, horse railways, commuter trains, and electric trolleys pulled settled regions outward two to four times more distant form. city centers than they were in the premodern era. In 1850, for example, the borders of Boston lay scarcely two miles from the old business district; by the turn of the century the radius extended ten miles. Now those who could afford it could live far removed from the old city center and still commute there for work, shopping, and entertainment. The new accessibility of land around the periphery of almost every major city sparked an explosion of real estate development and fueled what we now know as urban sprawl. Between 1890 and 1920, for example, some 250,000 new residential lots were recorded within the borders of Chicago, most of them located in outlying areas. Over the same period, another 550,000 were plotted outside the city limits but within the metropolitan area. Anxious to take advantage of the possibilities of commuting, real estate developers added 800,000 potential building sites to the Chicago region in just thirty years lots that could have housed five to six million people.
Of course, many were never occupied; there was always a huge surplus of subdivided, but vacant, land around Chicago and other cities. These excesses underscore a feature of residential expansion related to the growth of mass transportation: urban sprawl was essentially unplanned. It was carried out by thousands of small investors who paid little heed to coordinated land use or to future land users. Those who purchased and prepared land for residential purposes, particularly land near or outside city borders where transit lines and middle-class inhabitants were anticipated, did so to create demand as much as to respond to it. Chicago is a prime example of this process. Real estate subdivision there proceeded much faster than population growth.
With which of the following subjects is the passage mainly concerned？
听力原文： North Korea on Sunday accused the United States of plotting an atomic attack against it, continuing the North's rhetoric over its moves to develop nuclear programs. Chief U. N. nuclear inspector Mohamed EIBaradei said in an interview that all countries must be treated equally. When asked whether North Korea poses a greater threat than Iraq, EIBaradei said that in both cases, we are worded about the proliferation of nuclear weapons. "The difference is that, in Iraq, we can now check with a team of highly qualified inspectors whether there is a new nuclear weapons program," said EIBaradei, who heads the International Atomic Energy Agency. The nuclear dispute flared in October when Washington said Pyongyang admitted pursuing a nuclear program.
The dispute between North Korea and the United States is mainly on ______
听力原文： The space shuttle Discovery made a rare night landing at the Kennedy Space Center early on Thursday．The night landing，the 11th in the Center’94 shuttle missions，ended a 10—day mission to outfit the orbiting International Space Station．
Although the spacecraft created a sonic boom that could be heard along much of Florida's eastern seaboard，witnesses on the ground could not see the orbiter until it was directly over the runway lights．
Scattered showers off the Florida coast had threatened to postpone the shuttle's return，but forecasters gave the green light when they decided no rain would fall within 48 kilometers of the space center．
The space shuttle Discovery completed its mission for about ______ days before it returned to Kennedy Space Center.
微信支付 
支付宝支付