environmentally sustainable way. Investors are barraged with indexes purporting to describe companies’ eco-credentials, some of dubious quality. Green labels on consumer products are ubiquitous, but their claims are hard to verify.
The confusion is evident form New Scientist’s analysis of whether public perceptions of companies’ green credentials reflect reality. It shows that many companies considered “green” have done little to earn that reputation, while others do not get sufficient credit for their efforts to reduce their environmental impact. Obtaining better information is crucial, because decisions by consumers and big investors will help propel us towards a green economy.
At present, it is too easy to make unverified claims. Take disclosure of greenhouse gas emissions, for example. There are voluntary schemes such as the Carbon Disclosure Project, but little scrutiny of the figures companies submit, which means investors may be misled.
Measurements can be difficult to interpret, too, like those for water sue. In this case, context is crucial: a little from rain-soaked Ireland is not the same as a little drawn from the Arizona desert.
Similar problems bedevil “green” labels attached to individual products. Here, the computer equipment rating system developed by the Green Electronics Council shows the way forward. Its criteria come from the IEEE, the world’s leading professional association for technology/
Other schemes, such as the “sustainability index” planned by US retail giant Walmart, are broader. Developing rigorous standards for a large number of different types of product will be tough, placing a huge burden on the academic-led consortium that is doing the underlying scientific work.
Our investigation also reveals that many companies choose not to disclose data. Some will want to keep it that way. This is why we need legal requirements for full disclosure of environmental information, with the clear message that the polluter will eventually be required to pay. Then market forces will drive companies to clean up their acts.
Let’s hope we can rise to this challenge. Before we can have a green economy we need a green information economy – and it’s the quality of information, as well as its quantity, that will count.
66. “The confusion” at the beginning of the 2nd paragraph refers to ________.
A. where to spend or invest in a sustainable way B. an array of consumer products to choose C. a fog of unreliable green information D. little information on eco-credibility
67. From the New Scientist’s analysis it can be inferred that in many cases ________.
A. eco-credibility is abused B. a green economy is crucial
C. an environmental impact is lessened
D. green credentials promote green economy
68. From unverified claims to difficult measurements and then to individual products, the author argues that ________.
A. eco-credibility is a game between scientists and manufactures B. neither scientists nor manufactures are honest C. it is vital to build a green economy
D. better information is critical
69. To address the issue, the author is crying for ________. A. transparent corporate management B. establishing sustainability indexes C. tough academic-led surveillance
D. strict legal weapons
70. Which of the following can be the best inference from the last paragraph? A. The toughest challenge is the best opportunity. B. It is time for another green revolution. C. Information should be free for all. D. No quantity, no quality.
Passage Three
People are extraordinarily skilled at spotting cheats – much better than they are detecting rule-breaking that does not involve cheating. A study showing just how good we are at this adds weight to the theory that our exceptional brainpower arose through evolutionary pressures to acquire specific cognitive skills.
The still-controversial idea that humans have specialized decision-making systems in addition to generalized reasoning has been around for decades. Its advocates point out that the ability to identify untrustworthy people should be favored evolutionarily, since cheats risk undermining the social interactions in which people trade goods or services for mutual benefit.
The test whether we have a special ability to reason about cheating, Leda Cosmides, an evolutionary psychologist at the University of California, Santa Barbara, and her colleagues used a standard psychological test called the Wason selection task, which tests volunteers’ ability to reason about “if/then” statements.
The researchers set up scenarios in which they asked undergraduate volunteers to imagine they were supervising workers sorting appliances for admission to two schools; a good one in a district where school taxes are high, and a poor one in an equally wealthy, but lightly taxed district. The hypothetical workers were supposed to follow a rule that specified “if a student is admitted to the good school”, they must live in the highly taxed district.
Half the time, the test subjects were told that the workers had children of their own applying to the schools, thus having a motive to cheat; the rest of the time they were told the workers were merely absent-minded and sometimes made innocent errors. Then the test subjects were asked how they would verify that the workers were not breaking the rule.
Cosmides found that when the “supervisors” thought they were checking for innocent errors, just 9 of 33, or 27 percent, got the right answer – looking for a student admitted to the good school who did not live in the highly taxed district. In contrast, when the supervisors thought they were watching for cheats, they did much better, with 23 of 34, or 68 percent, getting the right answer.
This suggests that people are, indeed, more adept at spotting cheat than at detecting mere rule-breaking, Cosmides said. “Any cues that it’s just an innocent mistake actually inactivate the detection mechanism.”
Other psychologists remain skeptical of this conclusion. “If you want to conclude that therefore there’s a module in the mind for detecting cheaters, I see zero evidence for that,” says Steven Sloman, a cognitive scientists at Brown University in Province, Rhode Island. “It’s certainly possible that it’s something we learned through experience.
There’s no evident that it’s anything innate.”
71. The findings of the study were in favor of ____________. A. the highly developed skills of cheating at school B. the relation between intelligence and evolution C. the phenomenon of cheating at school
D. the human innate ability to cheat
72. The test “supervisors” appeared to be more adept at ________. A. spotting cheats than detecting mere rule-breaking B. detecting mere rule-breaking than spotting cheats
C. spotting their own children cheating than others doing it
D. detecting cheats in the highly taxed district than in the lightly taxed one
73. When she says that … that can’t be the only thing going on in the mind, Cosmides most probably implies that ________.
A. cheating is highly motivated in the social interactions
B. our specific cognitive skills can serve an evolutionary purpose
C. there is no such a mental thing as a specialized decision-making system
D. the ability to identify untrustworthy people should be favored evolutionary
74. In response to Cosmides’ claim, Sloman would say that ________. A. it was of great possibility
B. it could be misleading C. it was unbelievable
D. it’s acquired
75. Which of the following can be the best title for the passage? A. Cheating at School
B. Cheating as the Human Nature
C. Imaginary Intelligence and Cheating D. Intelligence Evolved to Root Out Cheats
Passage Four
For many environmentalists, all human influence on the planet is bad. Many natural scientists implicitly share this outlook. This is not unscientific, but it can create the impression that greens and environmental scientists are authoritarian tree-huggers who value nature above people. That doesn’t play well with mainstream society, as the apparent backlash against climate science reveals.
Environmentalists need to find a new story to tell. Like it or not, we now live in the anthropocene (人类世) – an age in which humans are perturbing many of the planet’s natural systems, from the water cycle to the acidity of the oceans. We cannot wish that away; we must recognize it and manage our impacts.
Johan Rockstrom, head of the Stockholm Environment Institute in Sweden, and colleagues have distilled recent research on how Earth systems work into a list of nine “planetary boundaries” that we must stay within to live sustainably. It is preliminary work, and many will disagree with where the boundaries are set. But the point is to offer a new way of thinking about our relationship with the environment – a science-based picture that accepts a certain level of human impact and even allows us some room to expand. The result is a breath of fresh air: though we are already well past three of the boundaries, we haven’t trashed the place yet.
It is in the same spirit that we also probe the basis for key claims in the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change’s 2007 report on climate impacts. This report has been much discussed since our revelations about its unsubstantiated statement on melting Himalayan glaciers. Why return to the topic? Because there is a sense that the IPCC shares the same anti-human agenda and, as a result, is too credulous of unverified numbers. While the majority of the report is assuredly rigorous, there is no escaping the fact that parts of it make claims that go beyond the science.
For example, the chapter on Africa exaggerates a claim about crashes in farm yields, and also highlights projections of increased water stress in some regions while ignoring projections in the same study that point to reduced water stress in other regions. There errors are not trifling. They are among the report’s headline conclusions.
Above all, we need a dispassionate view of the state of the planet and our likely future impact on it. There’s no room for complacency: Rockstrom’s analysis shows us that we face real dangers, but exaggerating our problems is not the way to solve them.
76. As the first paragraph implies, there is between environmentalists and mainstream society _____________.
A. a misunderstanding B. a confrontation C. a collaboration D. a consensus
77. Within the planetary boundaries, as Rockstrom implies, ___________.
A. we humans have gone far beyond the limitations B. our human activities are actually moderate in degree C. a certain level of human impact is naturally acceptable
D. it is urgent to modify our relationship with the environment
78. The point, based on Rockstrom’s investigation, is simply that __________.
A. they made the first classification of Earth systems B. it is not to deny but to manage impacts on the planet
C. we are approaching the anthropocene faster than expected D. human beings are rational and responsible creatures on earth
79. Critical of the IPCC’s 2007 report, the author argues that they _________.
A. missed the most serious problems there B. were poorly assembled for the mission C. cannot be called scientists at all D. value nature above people
80. It can be concluded from the passage that if we are to manage the anthropocene successfully, we ________________.
A. must redefine our relationship with the environment B. should not take it seriously but to take it easy C. need a new way of thinking about nature D. need cooler heads and clearer statistics
Passage Five
Humanity has passed a milestone: more people live in cities than in rural areas. The current rate of urbanization is unprecedented in our history. In 1950, only 29% of people lived in cities; by 2050, 70% are projected to do so – most of them in poorer
countries. Among many other issues, this rapid concentration makes cities a front line in the battles against climate change and air pollution. Confronting the challenges of rampant urbanization demands integrated, multidisciplinary approaches, and new thinking.
Take the building boom associated with the increased wealth of urban areas, and its impact on greenhouse-gas emissions. In China alone, the United Nations Environmental Programme estimates the energy demand for heating homes build over the next decade could increase by some 430 terawatt-hours, or 4% of China’s total energy use in 2003. Worldwide, the energy consumed by buildings already accounts for around 45% of greenhouse-gas emissions.
Fortunately, researchers in Germany and elsewhere have already shown that they can reduce that energy consumption by 80-90% just by overhauling obsolete building designs and using existing technologies. These ultra-efficient buildings demand that planners, architects, engineers and building scientists work together from the outset, and require higher levels of expertise than conventional buildings. Research is also needed to develop technologies, materials and energy concepts, but green building research today is fragmented and poorly funded.
Expanding cities must embrace such technologies and strategies – and not just in the developed nations. Many poorer countries have a rich tradition of adapting buildings to local practices, environments and climates – a home-grown approach to integrated design that has been all but been lost in the West. They now have an opportunity to combine these traditional approaches with modern technologies.
Integrated thinking is also needed to mitigate urban air pollution, which is becoming a serious health and environmental risk in many regions – as shown by China’s struggle to clean up Beijing’s air for the Olympics. Understanding air pollution will require researchers from multiple disciplines, from atmospheric chemistry to meteorology, working over scales from street level to global. And reducing it will require integrated policies for urban planning, transport and housing – not least to reduce the use of cars.
81. The passage begins with ______________.
A. the globalization of poverty B. a new challenge to mankind C. a new disease of civilization
D. the global phenomenon of weather change
82. From the illustration of China, the author is trying to tell us that __________.
A. Chinese citizens neglect their impact on greenhouse-gas emissions B. the pace of urbanization is being accelerated at an alarming rate C. rapid urbanization will increase greenhouse-gas emissions D. the building boom is running faster there than elsewhere
83. Which of the following can meet the demand by the challenges of rampant urbanization?
A. Shrinking cities by 80-90%
B. Building ultra-efficient buildings C. Restoring the conventional buildings.
D. Abandoning existing building technologies.
84. The author thinks highly of those poorer countries _____________.
A. introducing the developed countries’ green technologies
2014年全国医学考博英语试题
