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Text 3 One of the most alarming things about the crisis in the global financial system is that the warning signs have been out there for some time, yet no one heeded them. Exactly 10 years ago, a hedge fund called Long-Term Capital Management (LTCM) failed to convince investors that it could repay its debts, thereby bringing the world to the brink of a similar "liquidity crisis" to the one we now see. Disaster was averted then only because regulators managed to put together a multi-billion-dollar bailout package. LTCM’s collapse was particularly notable because its founders had set great store by their use of statistical models designed to keep tabs on the risks inherent in their investments. Its fall should have been a wake-up call to banks and their regulatory supervisors that the models were not working as well as hoped—in particular that they were ignoring the risks of extreme events and the connections that send such events reverberating around the financial system. Instead, they carried on using them. Now that disaster has struck again, some financial risk modelers—the "quants" who have wielded so much influence over modern banking—are saying they know where the gaps in their knowledge are and are promising to fill them. Should we trust them Their track record does not inspire confidence. Statistical models have proved almost useless at predicting the killer risks for individual banks, and worse than useless when it comes to risks to the financial system as a whole. The models encouraged bankers to think they were playing a high-stakes card game, when what they were actually doing was more akin to lining up a row of dominoes. How could so many smart people have gotten it so wrong One reason is that theft faith in their model’s predictive power led them to ignore what was happening in the real world. Finance offers enormous scope for dissembling: almost any failure can be explained away by a judicious choice of language and data. When investors do not behave like the self-interested homo economics that economists suppose them to be, they are described as being "irrationally exuberant" or blinded by panic. An alternative view—that investors are reacting logically in the face of uncertainty—is rarely considered. Similarly, extreme events are described as happening only "once in a century"—even though there is insufficient data on which to base such an assessment. The quants’ models might successfully predict the movement of markets most of the time, but the bankers who rely on them have failed to realize that the occasions on which the markets deviate from normality are much more important than those when they comply. The events of the past year have driven this home in a spectacular fashion: by some estimates, the banking industry has lost more money in the current crisis than it has made in its entire history. The statistical models used by LTCM（）
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When my mother learned she was pregnant with me, my parents sat down one Sunday morning to review their finances. Turning on the radio for a little light music, they penciled some calculations for the savings they would need to make to pay for my college education. The music paused for an announcement that Japanese airplanes were attacking Pearl Harbor. The notes went into the wastebasket. (66) Not so today for all the upheaval of the past half-century, this has been by far the most tranquil period ever. Unlike any of their forebears, a majority of the world’s young adults have good reason to develop plans for their old age. They know they will probably live to see the greenhouse-warmed planet of the late 21st century. (67) This is also unprecedented: never in history have people roused themselves against such a distant threat. Millions of people and whole governments are addressing the issue. Even in the US army, senior officers are studying the implications for their organization and looking for ways to reduce emissions. All this suggests that the pessimists who claim humanity is unable to rise to the challenge have got it wrong. Of course, it is no use having a long-term perspective without the means to do something about it. Fortunately, our social and political mechanisms are progressing swiftly. (68) The past century has brought social progress as dramatic as that in industry. Economic stability, for example, is no accident: it is engineered by an international network of central banks, steadily expanding their cooperation. Non-governmental organizations provide new services, from the certification of "fair trade" coffee to secret cash transfers. In 1948, the UN formally consulted with 41 NGOs; it now consults with more than 1,600. (69) Almost every week we see these powerful tools applied in novel ways. Consider what happened recently when Texas power company TXU revealed plans to build a dozen coal-fired plants that would emit vast amounts of carbon dioxide. An alliance of environmentalist NGOs spotlighted the development on the Internet. Meanwhile, an international financial consortium took an interest. After intense negotiations, the consortium won the environmentalists’ public blessing to buy TXU by promising to sharply reduce the planned emissions. The NGOs held no political office and wielded no investment billions; their power came from the skilful organization of a million mouse clicks. (70) These developments are nowhere near enough to guarantee we can meet the challenge of climate change. Time is short and the prospect of even partial success remains uncertain. Yet we can avoid catastrophe by mobilizing our ingenuity and community spirit. Addressing global warming will require less sacrifice than defeating Fascism, but more foresight—and that is exactly what we have been acquiring. If humanity’s track record with long-term problems shows mostly indifference and failure, that need not set precedent for our future. 66（）
Among the raft of books, articles, jokes, romantic comedies, self-help guides and other writings discussing marriage, some familiar ideas often crop up. Few appear more often than the (31) that many old couples look alike. You have probably seen it before—two elderly people walking hand-in-hand down the street or sitting at a cafe, (32) each other so strongly that they could be siblings. Do these couples actually look alike, and if (33) , what has caused them to develop this way A study published in the March 2006 issue of Personality and Individual Differences may have the (34) . Twenty-two people, divided equally (35) male and female, (36) in the study. They were asked to judge the looks, personalities and ages of, 160 married couples. The participants viewed photographs of men and women separately and were (37) told who was married to (38) . The subjects consistently judged people who were married (39) being similar (40) appearance and personality. The researchers also found that couples who had been together longer appeared (41) similar. This result (42) itself may not seem surprising, but the study also offered some answers on (42) couples may look alike. To start, consider that life experiences can end up (44) reflected physically. Someone (45) is happy and smiles more will develop the facial muscles and wrinkles related to smiling. The years of experience of an elderly couple’s marriage, happy (46) not, would then be reflected in their (47) . Genetic influences are (48) factor. A past study showed that genetically similar people have better marriages. Such families have (49) incidents of child abuse and a lower rate of miscarriages. People also appear to be more selfless (50) involved with genetically similar partners. 31（）
Text 1 On the heels of its recent decision to criminalize consumers who rip songs from albums they have purchased to their computers (or iPods), the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) has now gone one step further and declared that "remembering songs" using your brain is criminal copyright infringement. "The brain is a recording device," explained RIAA president Cary Sherman. "The act of listening is an unauthorized act of copying music to that recording device, and the act of recalling or remembering a song is unauthorized playback." The RIAA also said it would begin sending letters to tens of millions of consumers thought to be illegally remembering songs, threatening them with lawsuits if they do not settle with the RIAA by paying monetary damages. In order to avoid engaging in unauthorized copyright infringement, consumers will now be required to immediately forget everything they have just heard—a skill already mastered by the former US President George Bush. To aid in these memory wiping efforts, the RIAA is teaming up with Big Pharma to include free psychotropic prescription drugs with the purchase of new music albums. Consumers are advised to swallow the pills before listening to the music. The pills block normal cognitive function, allowing consumers to enjoy the music in a more detached state without the risk of accidentally remembering any songs (and thereby violating copyright law). Consumers caught humming their favorite songs will be charged with a more serious crime: The public performance of a copyrighted song, for which the fines can reach over $250,000 per incident. "Humming, singing and whistling songs will not be tolerated," said Sherman. Consumers attempting to circumvent the RIAA’s new memory-wiping technology by actually remembering songs will be charged with felony crimes under provisions of the Digital Millennium Copyright Act. The Act, passed in 1998, makes it a felony crime to circumvent copyright protection technologies. The RIAA’s position is that consumers who actually use their brains while listening to music are violating the DMCA. With this decision, the RIAA now considers approximately 72% of the adult U.S. population to be criminals. Putting them all in prison for copyright infringement would cost US taxpayers an estimated $683 billion per year—an amount that would have to be shouldered by the remaining 28% who are not imprisoned. The RIAA believes it could cover the $683 billion tab through royalties on music sales. The problem with that—the 28% remaining adults not in prison do not buy music albums. That means album sales would plummet to nearly zero, and the US government (which is already deep in debt) would have to borrow money to pay for all the prisons. When asked whether he really wants 72% of the US population to be imprisoned for ripping music CDs to their own brains, Sherman shot back, "You don’t support criminal behavior, do you Every person who illegally remembers a song is a criminal. We can’t have criminals running free on the streets of America. It’s an issue of national security." Which of the following best summarizes Paragraph 3（）
What is the next task for fair trade（）
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