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When global warming finally came, it stuck with a vengeance. In some regions, temperatures rose several degrees in less than a century. Sea levels shot up nearly 400 feet, flooding coastal settlements and forcing people to migrate inland. Deserts spread throughout the world as vegetation shifted drastically in North America, Europe and Asia. After driving many of the animals around them to near extinction, people were forced to abandon their old way of life for a radically new survival strategy that resulted in widespread starvation and disease. The adaptation was farming: the global-warming crisis that gave rise to it happened more than 10,000 years ago.As environmentalists convene in Rio de Janeiro this week to ponder the global climate of the future, earth scientists are in the midst of a revolution in understanding how climate has changed in the past and how those changes have transformed human existence. Researchers have begun to piece together an illuminating picture of the powerful geological and astronomical forces that have combined to change the planet’s environment from hot to cold, wet to dry and back again over a time period stretching back hundreds of millions of years.Most importantly, scientists are beginning to realize that the climatic changes have had a major impact on the evolution of the human species. New research now suggests that climate shifts have played a key role in nearly every significant turning point in human evolution: from the dawn of primates （灵长目动物）some 65 million years ago to human ancestors rising up to walk on two legs, from the huge expansion of the human brain to the rise of agriculture. Indeed, the human history has not been merely touched by global climate change, some scientists argue, it has in some instances been driven by it.The new research has profound implications for the environmental summit in Rio. Among other things, the findings demonstrate that dramatic climate change is nothing new for planet Earth. The benign （宜人的）global environment that has existed over the past 10,000 years—during which agriculture, writing, cities and most other features of civilization appeared—is a mere bright spot in a much larger pattern of widely varying climate over the ages. In fact, the pattern of climate change in the past reveals that Earth’s climate will almost certainly go through dramatic changes in the future—even without the influence of human activity.1. Farming emerged as a survival strategy because man had been obliged（）.2. Earth scientists have come to understand that climate（）.3. Scientists believe that human evolution（）.4. Evidence of past climatic changes indicates that（）.5. The message the author wishes to convey in the passage is that（）.

In the 1950s, the pioneers of artificial intelligence (AI) predicted that, by the end of this century, computers would be conversing with us at work and robots would be performing our housework. But as useful as computers are, they’re nowhere close to achieving anything remotely resembling these early aspirations for humanlike behavior. Never mind something as complex as conversation: the most powerful computers struggle to reliably recognize the shape of an object, the most elementary of tasks for a ten-month-old kid.A growing group of AI researchers think they know where the field went wrong. The problem, the scientists say, is that AI has been trying to separate the highest, most abstract levels of thought, like language and mathematics, and to duplicate them with logical, step-by-step programs. A new movement in AI, on the other hand, takes a closer look at the more roundabout way in which nature came up with intelligence. Many of these researchers study evolution and natural adaptation instead of formal logic and conventional computer programs. Rather than digital computers and transistors, some want to work with brain cells and proteins. The results of these early efforts are as promising as they are peculiar, and the new nature-based AI movement is slowly but surely moving to the forefront of the field.Imitating the brain’ s neural （祌经的）network is a huge step in the right direction, says computer scientist and biophysicist Michael Conrad, but it still misses an important aspect of natural intelligence. “People tend to treat the brain as if it were made up of color-coded transistors”，he explains, “but it’s not simply a clever network of switches. There are lots of important things going on inside the brain cells themselves.” Specifically, Conrad believes that many of the brain’s capabilities stem from the pattern-recognition proficiency of the individual molecules that make up each brain cell. The best way to build an artificially intelligent device, he claims, would be to build it around the same sort of molecular skills.Right now, the notion that conventional computers and software are fundamentally incapable of matching the processes that take place in the brain remains controversial. But if it proves true, then the efforts of Conrad and his fellow AI rebels could turn out to be the only game in town.1. The author says that the powerful computers of today（）.2. The new trend in artificial intelligence research steins from（）.3. Conrad and his group of AI researchers have been making enormous efforts to（）.4. What’s the author’s opinion about the new AI movement?5. Which of the following is closest in meaning to the phrase “the only game in town” （Line 3, Para. 4）?

Birds that are literally half asleep—with one brain hemisphere alert and the other sleeping—control which side of the brain remains awake, according to a new study of sleeping ducks. Earlier studies have documented half-brain sleep in a wide range of birds. The brain hemispheres take turns sinking into the sleep stage characterized by slow brain waves. The eye controlled by the sleeping hemisphere keeps shut, while the wakeful hemisphere’s eye stays open and alert. Birds also can sleep with both hemispheres resting at once.Decades of studies of bird flocks led researchers to predict extra alertness in the more vulnerable, end-of-the-row sleepers. Sure enough, in the end birds tended to watch carefully on the side away from their companions. Ducks in the inner spots showed no preference for gaze direction.Also, birds dozing（打盹）at the end of the line resorted to single-hemisphere sleep, rather than total relaxation, more often than inner ducks did. Rotating 16 birds through the positions in a four-duck row, the researchers found outer birds half-asleep during some 32 percent of dozing lime versus about 12 percent for birds in internal spots.‘‘We believe this is the first evidence for an animal behaviorally controlling sleep and wakefulness simultaneously in different regions of the brain,” the researchers say.The results provide the best evidence for a long-standing supposition that single-hemisphere sleep evolved as creatures scanned for enemies. The preference for opening an eye on the lookout side could be widespread, he predicts. He’s seen it in a pair of birds dozing side-by-side in the zoo and in a single pet bird sleeping by mirror. The niirroi-side eye closed as if the reflection were a companion and the other eye stayed open.Useful as half-sleeping might be, ifs only been found in birds and such water mammals （哺乳动物） as dolphins, whales, and seals. Perhaps keeping one side of the brain awake allows a sleeping animal to surface occasionally to avoid drowning.Studies of birds may offer unique insights into sleep. Jerome M. Siegel of the UCLA says he wonders if bird’s half-brain sleep is “just the tip of the iceberg （冰山）He speculates that more examples may turn up when we take a closer look at other species.1. A new study on birds’ sleep has revealed that（）.2. According to the passage, birds often half sleep because（）.3. The example of a bird sleeping in front of a mirror indicates that（）.4. While sleeping, some water mammals tend to keep half awake in order to（）.5. By “just the tip of the iceberg” (Line 2, last Para), Siegel suggests that（）.

If sustainable competitive advantage depends on work-force skills, American firms have a problem. Human resource management is not traditionally seen as central to the competitive survival of the firm in the United States. Skill acquisition is considered an individual responsibility. Labor is simply another factor of production to be hired—rented at the lowest possible cost-much as one buys raw materials or equipment.The lack of importance attached to human-resource management can be seen in the corporate hierarchy. In an American firm the chief financial officer is almost always second in command. The post of head of human-resource management is usually a specialized job, off at the edge of the corporate hierarchy. The executive who holds it is never consulted on major strategic decisions and has no chance to move up to Chief Executive Officer (CEO). By way of contrasts, in Japan the head of human-resource management is central—usually the second most important executive after the CEO, in the firm’s hierarchy.While American firms often talk about the vast amounts spent on training their work forces, in fact they invest less in the skills of their employees than do either Japanese or German firms. The money they do invest is also more highly concentrated on professional and managerial employees. And the limited investments that are made in training workers are also much more narrowly focused on the specific skills necessary to do the next job rather than on the basic background skills that make it possible to absorb new technologies.As a result, problems emerge when new breakthrough technologies arrive. If American workers, for example, take much longer to learn how to operate new flexible manufacturing stations than workers in Germany (as they do), the effective cost of those stations is lower in Germany than it is in the United States. More time is required before equipment is up and running at capacity, and the need for extensive retraining generates costs and creates bottlenecks that limit the speed with which new equipment can be employed. The result is a slower pace of technological change. And in the end the skills of the bottom half of the population affect the wages of the top half. If the bottom half can’t effectively staff the processes that have to be operated, the management and professional job that go with these processes will disappear. 1. Which of the following applies to management of human resources in American companies?2. What is the position of the head of human-resource management in an American firm?3. The money most American firms put in training mainly goes to（）.4. According to the passage, the decisive factor in maintaining a firm’s competitive advantage is（）.5. What is the main idea of the passage?

I recommend that the planning（）until all the materials have been supplied.

My niece has been to Sumatra and Iran as well as all of Europe; by the time she is twenty,she（）almost everywhere.

Would you please conic and help me with this application form because I don’t know how to（）it.

Just remember one thing that（）decisions often lead to bitter regrets.

We must（）that the procedure is followed as rigidly as possible.

Although the main characters in the fiction are so true to life, they are certainly（）.

“Which coat did your husband buy?” “The black one, but I（）the green one.”

There are many kinds of metals,（）its special properties

The reason that his property was confiscated by the country, it（）, was that lie was involved in a lot of fraudulent activities during the war.

（）the stress of examinations are over, we can all relax.

The meeting was so prolonged and exhausting that（）the speakers stopped for refreshments.

Do you regret paying fifty dollars for the dog?” “No, I would gladly pay（）for him.”

The government（）to approve the use of wide-spread surveillance when the Justice Department took objections.

These books are both interesting and instructive, no wonder they（）the reading public.

We all left the meeting, being convinced that the project was（）.

She has always（）her neighbors for the past twenty years.

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