The War Against Sand

Imagine living on the edge of a vast desert, which is moving quietly closer to your village every day and covering your fields. The desert is on the move. This is called desertification.

Desertification occurs in regions close to an already existing desert.     71     The first is over-use of water in the area. There is not enough water in any case, and if it is not carefully used, disaster can follow. As time goes on, water shortages make farming more and more difficult. In some places, locals can remember local lakes and marshes which were once the homes for all kinds of fish and birds.     72     Farmers leave the land, and fields are replaced by deserts.

The second cause is misuse or over-use of the land.     73     Ploughing(耕) large fields and removing bushes and trees means that the wind will blow away the soil. Once the soil is lost, it is hard to replace, and if there is rain, it has nowhere to go, and brings no benefit.

    74     Every spring, the skies over some of eastern cities, thousands of kilometers away from the deserts, can be darkened by sandstorms. Dust from deserts can have a great effect on weather systems. While desertification is perhaps being partly caused by global warming, these sandstorms can make global warming worse by adding to what is known as the greenhouse effect.

What can be done to slow down or stop the process of desertification? A great deal of work is already under way. Obviously first steps are to find new water sources.     75     Some types of grass also hold the soil together, and stop the wind taking it. Without these efforts, it will be harder and harder to stop the world’s deserts in their tracks, and more and more farmers will give up and head for cities. The lesson to be learnt lies beneath the sand.

A. It generally arises from two related causes.

B. It is not only the farmers and villagers who suffer.

C. They have been completely buried by the sand now.

D. Scientists are doing the research on the cause of desertification.

E. They destroy the land, as the soil dries out and is then blown away.

F. Tree planting can help, by providing barriers between desert and rich field.

G. This means that the wrong crops are planted, and need more water than is available.

Humans are naturally drawn to other life forms and the worlds outside of our own. We take delight in the existence of creatures and even whole societies beyond our everyday lives.

This sense of wonder is universal. Look at the efforts that scientists have made to find out whether life of some kind exists on Mars, and the popularity of fantasy(幻想) literature or movies like The Lord of the Rings. This sense of wonder draws us to each other, to the world around us, and to the world of make-believe. But have we gone so far in creating worlds of fantasy that we are missing the pleasure of other worlds that already exist all around us?

Human beings, as biologists have suggested, possess an inborn desire to connect with and understand other life forms. However, people, especially in big cities, often lead rather isolated lives. In a study of British schoolchildren, it was found that children by age eight were much more familiar with characters from television shows and video games than with common wildlife. Without modern technology, a small pond could be an amazing world filled with strange and beautiful plants, insects, birds, and animals. When we lack meaningful interaction(交互) with the world around us, and sometimes even with our families and friends, we seek to understand and communicate with things that exist only in our imaginations or on a computer screen.

The world of make-believe is not necessarily bad. But when the world of fantasy becomes the only outlet(出路) for our sense of wonder, then we are really missing something. We are missing a connection with the living world. Other wonderful worlds exist all around us. But even more interesting is that if we look closely enough, we can see that these worlds, in a broad sense, are really part of our own.

1.The popularity of The Lord of the Rings proves       

A. the close connection between man and the fantasy world

B. the wonderful achievements of fantasy literature

C. the fine taste of moviegoers around the world

D. the general existence of the sense of curiosity

2.What can we infer from the underlined sentence in Paragraph 3?

A. People are far less familiar with the world of fantasy.

B. The world around us could serve as a source of wonder.

C. The world of fantasy can be mirrored by a small and lively pond.

D. Modern technology prevents us from developing our sense of wonder.

3.If our sense of wonder relies totally on the world of make-believe, we will       

A. fail to appreciate the joy in our lives

B. be confused by the world of make-believe

C. miss the chance to recognize the fantasy world

D. be trapped by other worlds existing all around us

4.What is the main purpose of the passage?

A. To show us the hidden beauty in our world.

B. To warn us not to get lost in the fantasy world.

C. To argue against the misuse of the sense of wonder.

D. To discuss the influence of the world of make-believe.

Not all memories are sweet. Some people spend all their lives trying to forget bad experiences. Violence and traffic accidents can leave people with terrible physical and emotional scars. Often they relive (重新體驗) these experiences in nightmares.

Now American researchers think they are close to developing a pill, which will help people forget bad memories. The pill is designed to be taken immediately after a frightening experience. They hope it might reduce, or possibly erase (抹去), the effect of painful memories.

In November, experts tested a drug on people in the US and France. The drug stops the body releasing chemicals that fix memories in the brain. So far the research has suggested that only the emotional effects of memories may be reduced, not that the memories are erased.

The research has caused a great deal of argument. Some think it is a bad idea, while others support it. Supporters say it could lead to pills that prevent or treat soldiers’ troubling memories after war.

They say that there are many people who suffer from terrible memories.“Some memories can ruin people’s lives. They come back to you when you don’t want to have them in a daydream or nightmare. They usually come with very painful emotions,”said Roger Pitman, a professor of psychiatry (精神病學) at Harvard Medical School.“This could relieve a lot of that suffering.”

But those who are against the research say that changing memories is very dangerous because memories give us our identity (特質). They also help us all avoid the mistakes of the past. “All of us can think of bad events in our lives that were horrible at the time but make us who we are. I'm not sure we'd want to wipe those memories out,” said Rebecca Dresser, a medical ethicist (倫理學家).

Some people fear that although the drug would first be used in only very serious cases, it would become more and more common. “People always have the ability to misuse science,”said Joseph LeDoux, a New York University memory researcher. “All we want to do is help people have better control of memories.”

1.What’s the main idea of the text?

A. People often suffer from bad memories.

B. American researchers are trying to develop a pill.

C. Forget bad memories, and be happy.   

D. The research has caused a heated argument.

2.The underlined word “it” in paragraph 4 refers to “_____”.

A. the new drug                                        B. the research into the drug

C. the memory                                      D. the chemical in the drug

3.Which of the following is not the opinion of the supporters?

A. The pill can erase all the memories in the past.

B. Some memories can ruin people’s life. The pill can relieve emotional suffering.

C. The pill can also help many people who suffer from terrible memories.

D. The pill can prevent or treat troubling memories in soldiers after war.

4.Which of the following is not the opinion of the opponents (反對者)?

A. Our memories give us our identity.

B. The memories help humanity avoid mistakes of the past.

C. The drug should be used in only very serious cases.

D. People may not be sure whether they want to wipe the memories out.

下面文章中有5處需要添加小標題。請從以下選項（A、B、C、 D、E 和 F）中選出符合各段意思的小標題，并在答題紙上將相應選項的標號涂黑。選項中有一項是多余選項。
A. Lack of stone images also reflects religious belief.
B. Art is a good means to know about people’s faith.
C. Artists express their feelings and opinions in their works.
D. People know more about our culture through learning art history.
E. Art is by all means relevant to history.
F. Art history provides information of different places and people.
【小題1】____________________________
A study of art history might be a good way to learn more about a culture than it is possible to learn in general history classes. Most typical history courses concentrate on politics, economics and war. But art history focuses on much more than this because art reflects not only the political values of a people, but also religious beliefs, emotions, and psychology.
【小題2】____________________________
In addition, information about the daily activities of our ancestors---or of people very different from our own---can be provided by art. In short, art expresses the essential qualities of a time and a place, and a study of it clearly offers us a deeper understanding than what can be found in most history books.
【小題3】____________________________
In history books, objective information about the political life of a country is presented; that is, facts about politics are given, but opinions are not expressed. Art, on the other hand, is subjective: it reflects emotions and opinions. The great Spanish painter Francisco Goya was perhaps the first truly “political” artist. In his well-known painting The Third of May 1808, he criticized the Spanish government for its misuse of power over people. Over a hundred years later, symbolic images were used in Pablo Picasso’s Guernica to express the horror of war. Meanwhile, on another continent, the powerful paintings of Diego Rivera, Jose Clemente Orozco, and David Alfaro Siqueiros---as well as the works of Alfredo Ramos Martins---depicted（描述）these Mexican artists’ deep anger and sadness about social problems.
【小題4】____________________________
In the same way, art can reflect a culture’s religious beliefs. For hundreds of years in Europe, religious art was almost the only type of art that existed. Churches and other religious buildings were filled with paintings that depicted people and stories from the Bible. Although most people couldn’t read, they could still understand biblical（圣經的）stories in the pictures on church walls.
【小題5】____________________________
By contrast, one of the main characteristics of art in the Middle East was (and still is) its absence of human and animal images. This shows the Islamic belief that statues are unholy. Something else can be more religiously symbolic in history.