1996年全国硕士研究生入学考试英语试题及参考答案

Part　Ⅲ Reading Comprehension

Passage l
Tight-lipped elders used to say, "It's not what you want in this world, but what you get. "Psych- ology teaches that you do get what you want if you know what you want and want the right things.
You can make a mental blueprint of a desire as you would make a blueprint of a house, and each of us is continually making these blueprints in the general routine of everyday living. If we intend to have friends to dinner, we plan the menu, make a shopping list, decide which food to cook first, and such planning is an essential for any type of meal to be served.
Likewise, If you want to find a job, take a sheet of paper, and write a brief account of yourself. In making a blueprint for a job, begin with yourself, for when you know exactly what you have to offer, you can intelligently plan where to sell your services.
This acoount of yourself is actuaLly a sketch of your working life and should include alucation, experience and references. Such an account is valuable. It can be referred to in filling out standard application blanks and is extremely helpful in personal interviews.While talking to you,your could-be employer is deciding whether your "wares" and abilities must be displayed in an orderly and reasonably connected manner.
When you have carefully prepared a blueprint of your abilities and desires, you have something tangible to sell. Then you are ready to hunt for a job. Get all the possible information about your could-be job. Make inquiries as to the details regarding the job and the firm. Keep your eyes and ears open, and use your own judgement. Spend a certain amount of time each day seeking the employment you wish for, and keep in mind: Securing a job is your job now.
51. What do the elders mean when they say, "It's not what yau want in this world, but what
you get. "?
(A) You'll certainly get what you want.
(B) It's no use dreaming.
(C) You should be dissatisfied with what you have.
(D) It's essential to set a goal for yourself.
52. A blueprint made before inviting a friend to dinner is used in this passage as__.
(A) an illustration of how to write an application for a job
(B) an indication of how to secure a good job
(C) a guideline for job description
(D) a principle for job evaluation
53. According to the passage, one must write an account of himself before starting to find a job
because __.
(A) that is the first step to please the employer
(B) that is the requirement of the employer
(C) it enables him to know when to sell his services
(D) it forces him to become clearly aware of himself
54. When you have carefully prepared a blueprint of your abilities and desires, you have some-
thing__.
(A) definite to offer (B) imaginary to provide
(C) practical to supply (D) desirable to present

Passage 2
With the start of BBC World Service Television, millions of viewers in Asia and America can now watch the Corporation's news coverage, as well as listen to it. And of course in Britain listeners and viewers can tune in to two BBC television channels, five BBC national radio services and dozens of local radio station. They are brought sport , comedy, drama, music, news and current affairs , education , religion , parliamentary coverage, children ' s pragrammes and films for an annual licence fee of 83 pounds per household.
It is a remarkable record, stretching back over 70 years--yet the BBC' s future is now in doubt. The Corporation will survive as a publicly-funded broadcasting organization, at least for the time being, but its role, its size and its programmes are now the subject of a nation-wide debate in Britain.
The debate was launched by the Government , which invited anyone with an opinion of the
BBC-including ordinary listeners and viewers--to say what was good or bad about the Corporation, and even whether they thought it was worth keeping. The reason for its inquiry is that the BBC' s royal charter runs out in 1996 and it must decide whether to keep the organization as it is,or to make changes.
Defenders of the Corporation-of whom there are many---are fond of quoting the American slogan "If it ain't broke, don't fix it. " The BBC "ain' t broke" ,they say, by which they mean it is not broken (as distinct from the word 'broke' , meaning having no money) , so why bother to change it?
Yet the BBC will have to change, because the broadcasting world around it is changing. The
commercial TV channels---TV and Channel 4-were required by the Thatcher Government's Broadcasting Act to become more commercial, competing with each other for advertisers, and cutting costs and jobs. But it is the anival of new satellite channels--funded partly by advertising and partly by viewers' subscriptions-which will bring about the biggest changes in the long term .
55 . The world famous BBC now faces__ .
(A) the problem of new coverage (B) an uncertain prospect
( C) inquiries by the general public (D) shrinkage of audience
56. In the passage, which of the following about the BBC is not mentioned as the key issue?
(A) Extension of its TV service to Far East.
(B) Programmes as the subject of a nation-wide debate.
(C) Potentials for further intemational co-operations.
(D) Its existence as a broadcasting organization.
57. The BBC's "royal charter" (Llne 4, Paragraph 3) stands for__
(A) the financial support from the roval family (B) the privileges granted by the Queen
(C) a contract with the Queen (D) a unique relationship with the royal family
58. The foremost reason why the BBC has to readjust itself is no other than__
(A) the emergence of commercial TV channels
(B) the enforcement of Broadcasting Act by the government
(C) the urgent necessity to reduce costs and jobs
(D) the challenge of new satellite channels

Passage 3
In the last half of the nineteenth century "capital" and "labour" were enlarging and perfecting their rival organizations on modern lines. Many an old firm was replaced by a limited liability company with a bureaucracy of salaried managers. The change met the technical requirements of the new age by engaging a large professional element and prevented the decline in efficiency that so commonly spoiled the fortunes of family firms in the second and third generation after the energetic founders. It was moreover a step away from individual initiative, towards collectivism and municipal and state-owned business. The railway companies, though still private business managed for the benefit of shareholders, were very unlike old family business. At the same time the great municipalities went into business to supply lighting , trams and other services to the taxpayers .
The growth of the limited liability company and municipal business had important consequences. Such large, impersonal manipulation of capital and industry greatly increased the numbers and importance of shareholders as a class , an element in national life representing irresponsible wealth detached from the land and the duties of the landowners; and almost equally detached from the responsible management of business. All through the nineteenth century, America,Africa, India, Australia and parts of Europe were being developed by British capital, and British shareholders were thus enriched by the world ' s movement towards industrialisation. Towns like Bournemouth and Eastboume sprang up to house large. " comfonable" classes who had retired on their incomes, and who had no relation to the rest of the community except that of drawing dividends and occasionally attending a shareholders' meeting to dictate their orders to the management. On the other hand "shareholding" meant leisure and freedom which was used by many of
the later Victorians for the highest purpose of a great civilisation.
The "shareholders" as such had no knowledge of the lives, thoughts or needs of the workmen employed by the company in which he held shares, and his influence on the relations of capital and labour was not good. The paid manager acting for the company was in more direct relation with the men and their demands, but even he had seldom that familiar personal knowledge of the workmen which the employer had often had under the more patriarchal system of the old family business now passing away. Indeed the mere size of operations and the numbers of workmen involved rendered such personal relations impossible. Fortunately, however, the increasing power and organization of the trade unions, at least in all skilled trades, enabLed the workmen to meet on equal terms the managers of the companies who employed them. The cruel discipline of the strike and lockout taught the two parties to respect each other' s strength and understand the value of fair negotiation .
59. It's true of the old family finns that__.
(A) they were spoiled by the younger generations
(B) they failed for lack of individual initiative
(C) they lacked efficiency compared with modem companies
(D) they could supply adequate services to the taxpayers
60. The growth of limited liability companies resulted in__.
(A) the separation of capital from management
(B) the ownership of capital by managers
(C) the emergence of capital and labour as two classes
(D) the participation of shareholders in municipal business
61 . According to the passage, all of the following are true except that__.
(A) the shareholders were unaware of the needs of the workers
(B) the old firm owners hand a better understanding of their workers
(C) the limited liability Qompanies were too large to run smoothly
(D) the trade unions seemed to play a positive role
62. The author is most critical of___ .
(A) family film owners (B) landowners ( C) managers (D) shareholders

Passage 4
What accounts for the great outburst of major inventions in early America-breakthroughs such as the telegraph , the steamboat and the weaving machine?
Among the many shaping factors, I would single out the country ' s excellent elementary schools; a labor force that welcomed the new technology; the practice of giving premiums to inventors ; and above all the American genius for nonverbal , "spatial"thinking about things technological .
Why mention the elementary schools? Because thanks to these schools our early mechanics ,especially in the New England and Middle Atlantic states, were generally literate and at home in arithmetic and in some aspects of geometry and trigonometry.
Acute foreign observers related American adaptiveness and invelltiveness to this educational
advantage. As a member of a British commission visiting here in 1853 reported, "With a mind prepared by thorough school discipline, the American boy develops rapidly into the skilled workman. "
A further stimulus to invention came from the "premium" system, which preceded our patent system and for years ran parallel with it. "fhis approach,originated abroad, offered inventors medals, cash prizes and other incentives.
In the United States, multitudes of premiums for new devices were awarded at country fairs and at the industrial fairs in major cities. Americans flocked to thess fairs to admire the new machines and thus to renew their faith in the beneficence of technological advance.
Given this optimistic approach to technological innovation, the American worker took readily to that special kind of nonverbal thinklng required in mechanical technology. As Eugene Ferguson has pointed out , "A technologist thinks about objects that cannot be reduced to unambiguous verbal descriptions; they are dealt with in his mind by a visual, nonverbal process . . . The designer and the inventor . . . are able to assemble and manipulate in their minds devices that as yet do not exist. "
This nonverbal "spatial" thinking can be just as creative as painting and writing. Robert Fulton once wrote, "The mechanic should sit down among levers, screws, wedges, wheels, etc. ,like a poet among the letters of the alphabet , considering them as an exhibition of his thoughts, in which a new arrangement transmits a new idea. "
When all these shaping forces--schools, open attitudes, the premium system, a genius for spatial thinking--interacted with one another on the rich U. S. mainland, they produced that American characteristic , emulation . Today that word implies mere imitation. But in earlier times it meant a friendly but competitive striving for fame and excellence.
63. According to the author, the great outburst of major inventions in early America was in a
large part due to__
(A) elemental'y schools ( B) enthusiastic workers
(C) the attractive premium system (D) a special way of thinking
64 . It is implied that adaptiveness and inventiveness of the early American mechanics__
(A) benefited a lot from their mathematical knowledge
(B) shed light on disciplined school management
(C) was brought about by privileged home training
(D) owed a lot to the technological development
65 . A technologist can be compared to an artist because __
(A) they are both winners of awards
(B) they are both experts in spatial thinking
(C) they both abandon verbal description
(D) they both use various instruments
66. The best title for this passage might be__
(A) Inventive Mind (B) Effective Schooling
(B) Ways of Thinking (D) Outpouring of Inventions

Passage 5
Rumor has it that more than 20 books on creationism/evolution are in the publisher ' s pipelines. A few have already appeared. The goal of all will be to try to explain to a confused and often unenlightened citizenry that there are not two equally valid scientific theories for the origin and evolution of universe and life. Cosmology , geology , and biology have provided a consistent , unified, and constantly improving account of what happened. "Scientific" creationism, which is being pushed by some for "equal time" in the classrooms whenever the scientific accounts of evolution are eivel, is based on religion, not science. Virtually all scientists and the majority of nonfundamentalist religious leaders have come to regard "scientific" creationism as bad science and bad religion.
The first four chapters of Kitcher's book give a very brief introduction to evolution. At ap-
propriate places, he introduces the criticisms of the creationists and provides answers. In the last
three chapters, he takes off his gloves and gives the creationists a good beating. He describes their
programmes and tactics, and, for those unfamiliar with the ways of creationists, the extent of their deception and distortion may come as an unpleasant surprise. When their basic motivation is religious, one might have expected more Christian behavior.
Kitcher is a philosopher, and this may account, in part, for the clarity and effectiveness of
his arguments. The non-specialist wiU be able to obtain at least a notion of the sorts of data and
argument that support evolutionary theory. The final chapter on the creationists will be extremely
clear to all. On the dust jacket of this fine book, Stephen Jay Gould says: "This book stands for
reason itself. "And so it does-and all would be well were reason the only judge in the creation-
ism/evolution debate .
67. "Creationism" in the passage refers to__
(A) evolution in its true sense as to the origin of the universe
(B) a notion of the creation of religion
(C) the scientific explanation of the earth formation
(D) the deceptive theory about the origin of the universe
68. Kitcher's book is intended to __.
(A) recommend the views of the evolutionists
(B) expose the true features of creationists
(C) curse bitterly at this opponents
(D) launch a surprise attack on creationists
69 From the passage we can infer that__
(A) reasoning has played a decisive role in the debate
(B) creationists do not base their argument on reasoning
(C) evolutionary theory is too difficult for non-specialists
(D) creationism is supported by scientific findings
70. This passage appears to be a digest of__
(A) a book review (B) a scientific paper
(C) a magazine feature (D) a newspaper editorial