1、专业英语八级模拟试卷 454及答案与解析 SECTION A MINI-LECTURE Directions: In this section you sill hear a mini-lecture. You will hear the lecture ONCE ONLY. While listening, take notes on the important points. Your notes will not be marked, but you will need them to complete a gap-filling task after the mini-lecture.
2、 When the lecture is over, you will be given two minutes to check your notes, and another ten minutes to complete the gap-filling task on ANSWER SHEET ONE. Use the blank sheet for note-taking. 0 How to Get a Paper Published I. Prerequisite doing (1)_researches collecting mass information and data I.
3、 Things you should do after the submission of your paper A. If you do not get an acknowledgement post (2)_ B. When not informed of a review decision for long write to the editor in a(n) (3)_way I. Advisable (4)_to the editor in different situations A. If the paper is rejected with good reasons accep
4、t and learn from the experience B. If you view the rejection as (5)_ make a protest supported by strong evidence and good reasons C. When confronted with the editors constructive advice consider (6)_and attempt to revise D. When sending back the revised manuscript write a general (7)_: thank for his
5、 effort and comments - promise comments considered reproduce the editors review aligned with the reply: remind the editor show him your (8)_ offer a good reason for suggestions not followed try to (9)_the reviewer rather than fight with him IV. Other warnings and advice attach importance to establis
6、hed (10)_of academia avoid overemphasizing quantity of papers SECTION B INTERVIEW Directions: In this section you will hear everything ONCE ONLY. Listen carefully and then answer the questions that follow. Questions 1 to 5 are based on an interview. At the end of the interview you will be given 10 s
7、econds to answer each of the following five questions. Now listen to the interview. 11 All of the following groups have been thinking about the question about happiness EXCEPT （ A） psychologists. （ B） engineers. （ C） economists. （ D） neuro-scientists. 12 According to Gilbert, which of the following
8、is INCORRECT? （ A） Happiness is not an object. （ B） Happiness is a state we can visit. （ C） Happiness comes from friends and family. （ D） Happiness is a state we can keep. 13 What does Gilbert think about friends? （ A） Friends are just like your eyesight. （ B） Blind people will be happy with friends
9、. （ C） A man who doesnt have a friend is a no-brainer. （ D） Friends cant bring us happiness. 14 Why does Gilbert think experiences are more valuable than objects? （ A） Because experiences are more durable. （ B） Because experiences are not annoying. （ C） Because experiences create more happiness. （ D
10、） Because experiences leave nothing on us. 15 Why shouldnt we sweat every decision? （ A） Decisions are not very important. （ B） It will work out OK in the end. （ C） We will be happy with self-delusion. （ D） Decisions will come out automatically. SECTION C NEWS BROADCAST Directions: In this section y
11、ou will hear everything ONCE ONLY. Listen carefully and then answer the questions that follow. At the end of each news item, you will be given 10 seconds to answer the questions. 16 What is the consequence of the Friday gas pipeline explosion? （ A） Irans gas exports to Turkey were interrupted. （ B）
12、A dispute was aroused between Iran and Turkey. （ C） Some firefighters lost their lives in the blast. （ D） Fire of the explosion kept on burning for three days. 17 Microsofts search engine Bing （ A） is the core business of Microsoft. （ B） makes Google feel the pressure. （ C） provides fast mobile sear
13、ch service. （ D） is the third best among all search engines. 18 Google once changed its white background to an image because （ A） it was learning from Microsofts Bing. （ B） that was a special day for Google. （ C） Google users wanted to see a change. （ D） there was a problem with its server. 19 Which
14、 of the following statements about the launch of E-petitions is CORRECT? （ A） It was launched by the British government. （ B） British people petitioned the launch of it. （ C） Its launch was discussed by lawmakers. （ D） Debate on death penalty triggered its launch. 20 Large-scale petitions on E-petit
15、ions will cause （ A） official debate on the Internet. （ B） direct change of present laws. （ C） concern from the House of Commons. （ D） future rallies of British public. 20 Rick Snyder, the governor of Michigan, thinks of himself as a can-do kind of guy. He was a successful businessman, overseeing ex
16、ponential growth at Gateway, a computer company, in the 1990s. In his subsequent career as a venture capitalist, he made enough dosh to donate more than $ lm to charity, with a few million left over to jump-start his 2010 campaign for governor. His first state budget was ambitious: it eliminated mos
17、t tax credits, created a flat 6% business tax and allocated hundreds of millions to rebuild the states crumbling infrastructure, all while remaining in balance. But he has met his match in Manuel “Matty“ Moroun, who is winning a battle with Mr. Snyder over the governors support for a second internat
18、ional bridge linking Detroit, Michigan, with Windsor, Ontario. Mr. Moroun has a very good reason for opposing the construction of a new bridge at the busiest commercial crossing between Canada and the United States: He owns the existing Ambassador Bridge, built in 1929, and a publicly owned competit
19、or would eat away at his toll revenues. There are even older tunnels connecting the two cities, but the bridge is the preferred crossing for lorries, and currently handles more than a quarter of the $ 680 billion a year in trade between the United States and Canada. Mr. Moroun has grown quite wealth
20、y thanks to the bridge, which he has owned through the Detroit International Bridge Company since 1979. Mr. Moroun concedes that congestion at peak travel times is a problem, and that his own structure should be closed for repairs. The Canadian, American, Michigan and Ontario governments all want to
21、 build a new $2.2 billion crossing three km (two miles) downriver, which would be publicly owned but privately operated. The Canadian government is keen enough that it has offered Michigan almost $ 550m, to be repaid from bridge tolls, to cover its costs. The rest of the financing is to be raised fr
22、om the two federal governments and from bonds issued by a bridge authority. In contrast, Mr. Morouns preferred solution is building a second span alongside the existing one, which he would finance and own himself. He argues that the traffic predictions used for the government-backed bridge are hopel
23、essly optimistic, given that current cross-border flows which totalled 7.2m last year- are still far below the pre-2001 peak of 12.4m. (One possible explanation for this decline is that lorry drivers have started taking detours to less convenient routes to avoid being stuck in traffic on the bridge.
24、) Michigan residents will end up paying higher taxes, he says, despite promises to the contrary. He also notes that his proposed span would cost significantly less than an entirely new bridge (about $ 500m) because it would use the same approach roads and customs facilities as the Ambassador Bridge,
25、 and would be paid for by his company. Such a design would, of course, do nothing to reduce lorry traffic in central Windsor -one of the main reasons Canada wants a new bridge. A decade in the planning, the bridge cannot go ahead without Michigans approval, which Mr. Snyder has not been able to get
26、through its legislature. Detroit International Bridge Company has financed a $ 4.7m advertising campaign to sour public opinion on the deal. His political contributions have helped swing senatorial votes. So far his strategy has worked: in late October a state Senate committee refused to approve the
27、 legislation. The lawmakers who opposed the bill said its language did not adequately protect the neighbourhood where the Detroit side of the bridge will be located. Mr. Snyder is still putting up a fight. In Ottawa, where he was addressing a conference and consulting with the Canadian government, h
28、e predicted on November 2nd that a breakthrough would be reached “in a matter of months, not years“. Although he did not divulge any details, he says that buying out Mr. Moroun had been discussed and dismissed in the past, and that he was not at the point of considering using an executive order to g
29、rant the approval. “Our primary path, “ he says, “is talking to legislators.“ A new bridge would make plenty of business sense, and is supported by all of the big companies in the area, including the Detroit automakers with facilities on both sides of the border. But Mr. Snyder will have to persuade
30、 Michigans lawmakers that it makes political sense as well. 21 We can infer from the first paragraph that （ A） the public hold an unfavorable opinion of the bridge mentioned. （ B） Rick Snyders state budget program has won much acclaim. （ C） Rick Snyder was very sure of his continuance in office. （ D
31、） Manuel “Matty“ Moroun is bound to beat Rick Snyder. 22 “.a publicly owned competitor would eat away at his toll revenues “(Para. 2) probably means （ A） a new bridge would diminish his reputation. （ B） a new bridge would encroach on his interests. （ C） a new bridge would deprive of his privilege. （
32、 D） a new bridge would lead to his failure. 23 As to Mr. Morouns solution, the authors attitude is （ A） skeptical. （ B） ambivalent. （ C） disapproving. （ D） impartial. 24 It can be inferred from the passage that （ A） Mr. Snyder is gaining the upper hand in the issue in question. （ B） both sides commi
33、t themselves to solving the problem in question. （ C） Mr. Moroun will talk the public into supporting his view. （ D） legislators will realize the political benefits of a new bridge. 25 The best title for the passage is probably （ A） Legislation over a New Bridge. （ B） Rick Snyder and Manuel Morouns
34、Battle. （ C） What Is behind a New Bridge? （ D） Canadian-American Border: A Bridge Too Far? 25 Britains excitable press sometimes gets into a flap over odd issues. One recent example is the Daily Telegraph, Britains best-selling broadsheet. As David Cameron announced that Britain and the euro zone wo
35、uld part ways normally fertile ground for the right-wing rag it splashed on the story that an examiner had advised teachers “you dont have to teach a lot“ to pass the tests set by the exam board for which she worked. Today, as the same examiner was hauled in front of the Commons select committee on
36、education, its main headline was “Teachers giving students exam questions“. Concerns about how Englands exam system works are long-standing: the Commons committees ongoing investigation into the administration of examinations was initiated some time back. Nor is the concern limited to the English sy
37、stem, the committee is looking outside England and the Daily Telegraph also recorded an examiner from the WJEC, the Welsh exam board, as saying, “Were cheating.“ Part of the reason is the inexorable rise in exam passes. Ever since the system was reformed in 1988, school children have been graded by
38、their absolute rather than their relative performance. When the reforms were enacted, roughly 5% got the top grades. Over the past ten years, the proportion gaining the highest marks has doubled from 9.4% to almost 20%. A second reason is gripes from university tutors and employers, who reckon that
39、school leavers are not as accomplished as they used to be. Even the most selective universities now provide remedial courses to address the gaps in the knowledge of their newly recruited undergraduates. Meanwhile the Confederation of British Industry frets that poor standards of English and maths am
40、ong school leavers could hinder economic growth. At the select committee today, Steph Warren, a former geography teacher who was filmed implying that the exams set by Edexcel, her employer, were easy, set out to explain her position. She had been quoted out of context, she said. The film was made at
41、 the end of an exhausting training day during which she had been berated by teachers for setting an exam that their pupils had found difficult. That was why she had suggested that “you dont have to teach a lot“. But the scandal has raised some valid questions about who are the customers in the marke
42、tised system. During the 1950s, when the O-level and A-level examinations were first devised, they were offered exclusively by universities. That actually made far less sense then than it does now: in 1950 just 3% of young people went to university; today some 45% of youngsters enrol. Yet following
43、the 1988 education reforms, the university boards lost out to new competitors. Some merged, some folded. The four main exam boards in England and Wales now comprise a department of the University of Cambridge, a profitable company and two charities. In the interests of transparency, I should disclos
44、e that the company, Edexcel, is itself owned by a publisher, Pearson, which, through its ownership of the Financial Times, also owns a stake in The Economist. That said, Pearson has never, to my knowledge, tried to influence the editorial content of this newspaper. And The Economist itself has its o
45、wn educational venture: successful completion of a course will gain you a certificate of achievement signed by John Micklethwait, the editor of The Economist , no less. In todays Daily Telegraph, an anonymous examiner is quoted as saying that the “cause of the rot, ultimately, is competition between
46、 exam boards“. I think there is some truth in that remark. The problem with the existing system, as I see it, is that the exam boards do not see universities as being their customers. Rather, the customers are mostly school teachers. And, naturally enough, teachers want to enter their pupils for exa
47、ms that they will pass. Instead of harnessing market forces to drive up standards, the system does precisely the opposite. It should be reformed to incentivise a race to the top. One way to do this would be to give universities a stronger role in setting school-leaving exams. However universities ar
48、e not as saintly as they like to pretend: grade inflation is also rife in higher education. According to the Higher Education Statistics Agency, the proportion of students who gained a first-class degree now stands at 14%, up from 10% a decade earlier. In some institutions, the proportion is far hig
49、her. So my suggestion is that universities should be given a greater say in judging the ability of school leavers, but that employers should also be given a greater say in judging the ability of university graduates. 26 It can be inferred from the passage that Daily Telegraph （ A） has an ill opinion of David Cameron. （ B） is famous for its features and editorials. （ C） highlights the importance of education. （ D） probably takes up a right-wing stance. 27 Which of t
