Professor Reason recently persuaded 35 people to keep a diary of all their absent-minded actions for two weeks. When he came to analyze their embarrassing errors, he was surprised to find that nearly all of them fell into a few groups.
One of the women, for instance, on leaving her house for work one morning threw her pet dog her earrings and tried to fix a dog biscuit on her ear. “The explanation for this is that the brain is like a computer,” explains the professor. “People programme themselves to do certain activities regularly.” It was the woman’s custom every morning to throw her dog two biscuits and then put on her earrings. “But somehow the action got reversed（颠倒）in the programme.” About one in twenty of the incidents the volunteers reported were these “programme assembly failures.”
Twenty percent of all errors were “test failures” — mainly due to not verifying the progress of what the body was doing. A man about to get his car out of the garage passed through the back yard where his garden jacket and boots were kept, put them on — much to his surprise. A woman reported, “I got into the bath with my socks on.”
The commonest problem was information “storage failures”. People forgot the names of people whose faces they knew, went into a room and forgot why they were there, mislaid something, or smoked a cigarette without realizing it.
The research so far suggests that while the central processor of the brain is liberated from second-to-second control of a well-practiced routine, it must repeatedly switch back its attention at important decision points to check that the action goes on as intended. Otherwise the activity may be gotten by another frequently and recently used programme, resulting in embarrassing errors.
【小题1】The purpose of the professor’s research is to __________.

Online Communication

In an age when technology moves faster than most can keep up with, a small group of people still remain in the time of old-fashioned letter. Frankly speaking, I was once certain that traditional letters could never be replaced by other means of communication.

But a story about online communication changed my mind.

An old man, who suffered a lot from Parkinson’s disease, was not able to talk clearly and could hardly write his name. Living totally alone, he managed to keep in touch with nearly all the members of his family. How did he achieve this? He clicked out words on his computer keyboard.

I, therefore, managed to get an E-mail box as soon as the opportunity came. My life changed. E-mail, and all online communication, is something truly different. It has capabilities（能力） that few other products can match.

E-mail is convenient. It takes less time with its fast speed and 24-hour connection. The slow postal service is no match. If you wouldn’t want to have a face-to-face talk with your manager, you might talk with him through E-mail even if you are in the same office.

Naming all the good things about online communication is not easy. But wait. E-mail can be inconvenient. It can waste time and energy. Just think what may happen when you take a short vacation and return to find your e-mail box filled with 200 unread messages. You could easily spend half a day clearing junk ads.

Then, online communication will keep us staying at our computer while it connects us to distant strangers. Once we throw ourselves into the machine, we may forget the human touches we once held so dear. I’m sure there is and always will be a place for the old-fashioned letter, phone call, and face-to-face meeting… even in the world of modern communication.

As I listen to the sound of the modem(调制解调器), I was excited at stepping out to the outside world but, at the same time, I sensed a loss of control over something valuable in my personal life.

1.What is the most probable meaning of the underlined word “junk” in paragraph6?

A. old and useless   B. New and useful   C. Short but valuable     D. Long but clear

2.What does the writer think of online communication?

A. It should replace old-fashioned letters completely.

B. It is perfect and always does good to you.

C. It is extremely useful and convenient, but it may be inconvenient or even harmful.

D. It does more harm than good.

3.What caused the writer to become interested in E-mail and online communication?

A. The sound of the modem.           B. His own illness.

C. The changing of his life.            D. A sick old man’s experience.

4.According to the writer, traditional means of communication will never disappear because ________.

A. they are convenient and popular though they are slow

B. they help to keep the friendly relationship between people

C. most people cannot keep up with the development of technology

D. modern means of communication does too much harm

5.How did the sick old man keep in touch with his family members?

A. With the help of his computer.        B. By writing letters with his pen.

C. By making telephone calls.          D. By visiting them regularly.

Today, there’s hardly an aspect of our life that isn’t being upended by the tons of information available on the hundreds of millions of sites crowding the Internet, not to mention its ability to keep us in constant touch with each other via electronic mail. “If the automobile and aerospace technology had exploded at the same pace as computer and information technology,” says Microsoft, “a new car would cost about $ 2 and go 600 miles on a small quantity of gas. And you could buy a Boeing 747 for the cost of a pizza.”

Probably the biggest payoff, however, is the billions of dollars the Internet is saving companies in producing goods and serving for the needs of their customers. Nothing like it has been seen since the beginning of the Industrial Revolution, when power-driven machines began producing more in a day than men could turn out in nearly a year. “We view the growth of the Internet and e-commerce as a global trend,” says Merrill Lynch, “along the lines of printing press, the telephone, the computer, and electricity.”

You would be hard pressed to name something that isn’t available on the Internet. Consider: books, health care, movie tickets, construction materials, baby clothes, stocks, cattle feed, music, electronics, antiques, tools, real estate, toys, autographs of famous people, wine and airline tickets. And even after you’ve moved on to your final resting place, there’s no reason those you love can’t keep in touch. A company called FinalThoughts.com offers a place for you to store “afterlife e-mails” you can send to Heaven with the help of a “guardian angel”.

Kids today are so computer literate that it in fact ensures the United States will remain the unchallenged leader in cyberspace for the foreseeable(能预测的) future. Nearly all children in families with incomes of more than $75,000 a year have home computers, according to a study by the David and Lucile Packard Foundation. Youngsters from ages 2 to 17 at all income levels have computers, with 52% of those connected to the Internet. Most kids use computers to play games (some for 30 hours or more a week), and many teenage girls think nothing of rushing home from school to have e-mail chats with friends they have just left.

What’s clear is that, whether we like it or not, the Internet is an ever growing part of our lives and there is no turning back. “The Internet is just 20% invented,” says cyber pioneer Jake Winebaum. “The last 80% is happening now.”

1.What can we learn from the Microsoft’s remark?

   A. Today’s cars and airplanes are extremely overpriced.

   B. Information technology is developing at an amazing speed.

   C. Information technology has reached the point where improvement is difficult.

   D. There’s more competition in information technology industry than in car industry.

2.According to the author, the biggest benefit of the Internet is that___.

  A. it saves companies huge amounts of money      B. it speeds up profit making

  C. it brings people incredible convenience          D. it provides easy access to information 

3. The author gives the example of FinalThoughts.com to make the point that____.

   A. there are some genius ideas on the Internet

   B. almost anything is available on the Internet

   C. people can find good bargains on the Internet

   D. some websites provide novel services to increase hits

4.What can we learn from the fourth paragraph?

   A. There is a link between income and computer ownership.

   B. Many American children don’t put computers to good use.

   C. Studies show that boys are more computer literate than girls.

   D. The U.S. will stay ahead in the information technology in years.

5.What is the message the author intends to convey?

   A. The Internet is going to get firm hold of our lives some day.

   B. The Internet is going to influence our lives even more greatly.

   C. We should have a positive attitude towards the changes the Internet brings.

   D. Children should be well prepared for the challenges in the information age.

NEW YORK （Reuters Health）--Two years after New York City declared war on artificial trans fats（人造反式脂肪酸）, nearly all city restaurants had successfully cut the fats from their menus, health officials reported Monday.
In December 2006, the city’s Board of Health decided to launch a gradual trans-fat phase-out （逐步淘汰）from all licensed eating establishments--including restaurants, school cafeterias and street vending spots. Then many cities like Washington, San Francisco and Philadelphia, reflected it actively.
By November 2008, more than 98 percent of city restaurants had stopped using artificial trans fats for cooking, frying and baking, researchers with the city’s health department report in the Annals of Internal Medicine.
Trans fats have become notorious because they not only raise so-called “bad” LDL cholesterol （胆固醇）, as the fats in animal products do, but also lower levels of so-called “good”HDL cholesterol.
While some meats and dairy products naturally contain trans fat, most trans fats in people’s diet are artificial; they are formed when manufacturers add hydrogen to vegetable oil to make it become solid. These so-called partially hydrogenated oils were main products in foods, like crackers, cookies and pastries, and widely used by restaurants in cooking, frying and baking.
When the restriction was first adopted, the researchers note, some critics claimed it was an Orwellian measure, while others worried that restaurants would have a tough time finding suitable trans-fat replacements.                                                     
However, the transition has been smooth, Angell’s team writes, declaring that trans-fat restriction “is now a largely unnoticed part of New York City life.”
Ridding the food supply of trans fats, the researchers write, could potentially improve the cholesterol levels of millions of people.
1. In which city the local health department first decide to stop artificial trans fats?
A. Washington.    B. San Francisco.     C. Philadelphia.      D. New York.
2. We can learn from the third paragraph that ________.
A. in the city most people still use artificial trans fats
B. only a few restaurants still use trans fats and the decision win most people’s support
C. the city’s decision proves to be useless
D. many people think using artificial trans fats is not so bad
3. The underlined word “notorious” in the fourth paragraph means ________.
A. having a very bad reputation          B. having a very good reputation
C. nutritious                         D. delicious
4. What is the main idea of the passage?
A. New York restaurants are nearly all trans-fat-free （无……有）
B. None of the restaurants in the U.S can use trans fats.
C. Most of the restaurants still use trans fats once in a while.
D. Trans fats are bad for health.

 ______ nearly all behavior is learned behavior is a basic assumption ______ has been put forward by the social scientists.

A．What, that         B．That, what         C．What, what        D．That, that