2004年高级口译笔试阅读部分真题

Twenty years ago there was panic in Cupertino, Calif. Only a week remained before the team of whiz kids designing Apple's radical new computer had to turn in the final code. The giant factory was ready. The soon-to-be-famous Super Bowl commercial was ready. But the computer wasn't. http://tr.hjenglish.com/

As recounted by software wizard Andy Hertzfeld on a new cyberdigital history site (folklore.org), the already overworked Mac team trudged back to the cubicles for seven days of debugging hell, fueled by espresso chocolate beans and a dream. And on Jan.24, 1984, their leader, Apple confounder Steve Jobs, recited a verse from \Times They Are A-Changin,\then formally unveiled the Macintosh, a boxy little guy with a winning smile icon on its nine-inch monochrome screen. The Mac-oids fully expected to make computer history, and they did. What surprises them now is that their creation is still around two decades later.

Only nine years after the first personal computer (a build-it-yourself box whose only input was a set of switches), Apple's team had delivered an experience that would persist into the next century. This was the graphical user interface (GUI), a mind-blowing contrast to the pre-1984 standard of glowing green characters and arcane commands. Though Apple didn't come up with the idea of windows on a screen and a mouse to let people naturally manipulate information, the Macintosh refined and popularized those concepts. Lots of people criticized and some made fun of those advances at the time. But even Apple's rivals became convinced that the GUI was groovy. Now, no matter what computer you use, you're using, essentially, a Mac. http://tr.hjenglish.com/ The original Mac was costly, underpowered and had no cursor keys. Early sales disappointed Apple, and the then CEO John Sculley fired Jobs in 1985. Eventually, Mac became equipped with more memory and storage, and people began to discover the machine's ability to become a tool for the new pursuit of desktop publishing. The machine began to take off. But the business world never warmed to Macintosh, and by the mid-90's tech pundits were crafting Apple obituaries. In 1997 prodigal cofounder Jobs returned and restored Apple's luster with innovations like the eye-popping iMac.

\ done,\ all of us on the Mac team consider it the high point of our professional careers.

I only wish we knew a fraction of what we know now.%users, the Macintosh is a source of passion. (Journalists know that a disparaging word about an iMac or a PowerBook will unleash a hundred flames from rabid Apple-heads.) Steve Jobs thinks he knows why. \the modern world there aren't a lot of products where the people who make them love them. How many products are made that way these days?\

If that's so, then why is the Mac market share, even after Apple's recent revival, sputtering at a measly 5 percent? Jobs has a theory about that, too. Once a company devises a great product, he says, it has a monopoly in that realm, and concentrates less on innovation that protecting its turf. \Mac-user interface was a 10-year monopoly,\the company? Sales guys . At the critical juncture in the late '80s, when they should have gone for market share, they went for profits. They made obscene profits for several years. And their products became mediocre. And then their monopoly ended with Windows 95. They behaved like a monopoly, and it came back to bite them, which always happens.\

A wicked smile cracks the bearded, crinkly Steve Jobs's visage, and for a moment he could be the playful upstart who shocked the world 20 years ago. \& Gamble marketer Steve Ballmer.\sales guy!\The smile gets broader. \wonder…\

11. The sentence \.\be paraphrased as which of the following?

(A) Their creation is still being widely used 20 years later. http://tr.hjenglish.com/

(B) They have been fascinated by their own creation for 20 years. (C) Mac models being used today are based on their creation 20 years ago. (D) Their creation has surpassed other models over the past 20 years. 12. In the sentence \be interpreted as ________. (A) fashionably modern (B) practical and inexpensive (C) most sophisticated (D) odd and strange looking

13. When Steve Jobs thinks \knows why\(para.5), he implies that

________.

(A) people do not love the product they make today (B) Apple people have special passion for what they make (C) some products are liked by those who make them (D) Apple people either love iMac or PowerBook

14. According to Jobs, the main reason the Mac market share did not go up much was that ________.

(A) sales people were only concerned about profits (B) the monopoly of Mac lasted too long (C) any monopoly would end sooner or later

(D) market share and company profit were treated equally 15. The purpose of the passage is to tell ________.

(A) how the Macintosh was unveiled twenty years ago by the team of whiz kids

(B) Apple's popularizing the idea of windows on a screen and a mouse (C) Macintosh's contribution to the development of computers over the past two decades.

(D) the ups and downs in the development of Macintosh over the past two decades

Questions 16-20

\ St. Lois to explore the new lands acquired in the Louisiana Purchase,\ said, announcing his desire for a program to send men and women to Mars. \… America has ventured forth into space for the same reasons.\

Yet there are vital differences between Lewis and Clark's expedition and a Mars mission. First, Lewis and Clark were headed to a place amenable to life; hundred of thousands of people were already living there. Second, Lewis and Clark were certain to discover places and things of immediate value to the new nation. Third, the Lewis and Clark venture cost next to nothing by today's standards.In 1989 NASA estimated that a people-to-Mars program would cost $400 billion, which inflates to $600 billion today. The Hoover Dam cost $700 million in today's money, meaning the sending people to Mars might cost as much as building about 800 new Hoover dams. A Mars mission may be the single most expensive non-wartime undertaking in U.S. history.

The thought of travel to Mars is exhilarating. Surely men and women will someday walk upon that planet, and surely they will make wondrous discoveries about geology and the history of the solar system, perhaps even about the vary origin of life. Many times I have stared up at Mars in the evening sky in the mountains, away from cities, you can almost see the red tint and wondered what is there, or was there. http://tr.hjenglish.com/

But the fact that a destination is tantalizing does not mean the journey makes sense, even considering the human calling to explore. And Mars as a destination for people makes absolutely no sense with current technology. Present systems for getting from Earth's surface to low-Earth orbit are so fantastically expensive that merely launching the 1,000 tons or so of spacecraft and equipment a Mars mission would require could be accomplished only by cutting health-care benefits, education spending or other important programs or by raising taxes. Absent some remarkable discovery, astronauts, geologists and biologists once on Mars could do little mare than analyze rocks and feel awestruck beholding the sky of another world. Yet rocks can be analyze by automated probes without risk to human life, and at a tiny fraction of the cost of sending people.

It is interesting to note that when President Bush unveiled his proposal, he listed these recent major achievements of space exploration: pictures of the rings of Saturn and the outer planets, evidence of water on Mars and the moon of Jupiter, discovery of more than 100 planets outside our solar system and study of the soil of Mars. All these accomplishments came from automated probes or automated space telescopes. Bush's proposal, which calls for \ present budget into the Mars effort, might actually lead to a reduction in such unmanned science the one aspect of space exploration that's working really well.

Rather than spend hundreds of billions of dollars to hurl tons toward Mars using current technology, why not take a decade or two decades, or however much time is required researching new launch systems and advanced propulsion? If new launch systems could put weight into orbit affordably, and if advanced propulsion could speed up that long, slow transit to Mars, then the dreams of stepping onto the Red Planet might become reality. Mars will still be there when the technology is ready.

The drive to explore is part of what makes us human, and exploration of the past has led to unexpected glories. Dreams must be tempered by realism, however. For the moment, going to Mars is hopelessly unrealistic. http://tr.hjenglish.com/

16. According to the author, George Bush's comparison of Lewis and Clark's expedition and a Mars mission ________.

(A) shows that both are of the same and immediate value (B) encourages the American people to venture into space (C) displays the same spirit of discovery in space exploration (D) lacks sound and solid basis in his reasoning

17. The author tells us that human travel to Mars ________. (A) would be probably realized in the near future (B) should not be treated as the first priority today (C) will not bring any benefits to human community (D) is not feasible in light of today's technology

18. According to the author, once on Mars, astronauts, geologists and biologists ________.

(A) could not make any remarkable discovery (B) could only analyze the rocks there in detail (C) could not find the mysteries of life in solar system

(D) could well understand the operation of the whole solar system 19. Bush listed major achievements of space exploration to support his proposal. The author introduced this in order to show that ________. (A) unmanned science will be much affected by manned space travel (B) the reprogramming of NASA's budget into Mars effort is affordable (C) accomplishments will be made by automated probes

(D) space exploration is and will always be America's first priority 20. Which of the following supports the statement \Mars is hopelessly unrealistic.\

(A) Health care of the population should be the first priority.

(B) Technological barriers for humans to go to Mars will be insurmountable. (C) The expenditures to go to Mars will be too enormous.

(D) Dreams are only dreams which can never be turned into reality. SECTION 5: LISTENING TEST (30 minutes)