厦门大学2010年考博英语试题
Part I. Vocabulary and Structure (15%)
Directions: There are 30 incomplete sentences in this part. For each sentence there are four choices marked A. B, C and D. Choose the ONE answer that best completes the sentence. Then mark the corresponding letter on the Answer Sheet with a single line through the center.
1. The discussion was so prolonged and exhausting that the speakers stopped for deferments.
A. at large
B. at intervals
C. at ease
D. at random 2. When traveling, you are advised to take travelers' checks, which provide a secure to carrying your money in cash.
A. substitute
B. selection
C. inference
D. alternative 3. I never trusted him because I always thought of him as such a character.
A. gracious
B. suspicious
C unique D. particular
4. Changing from solid to liquid, water takes in heat from all substances near it, and this__________ produces artificial cold surrounding it.
A. absorption
B. transition
C. consumption
D. interaction 5. Language, culture, and personality may be considered of each other in thought, but they are inseparable in fact.
A. Indistinctly
B. separately
C. irrelevantly
D. independently
6. Christmas is a Christian holy day usually celebrated on December 25th the birth of Jesus Christ.
A. in accordance with
B. in terms of
C. in favor of
D. in honor of 7. To survive in the intense trade competition between countries, we must the qualities and varieties of products we make to the world market demand.
A. improve
B. enhance
C. guarantee
D. gear
8. To give you a general idea of our products, we enclose the catalogues showing various products handled by us with detailed and means of packing.
A. specimens
B. inspections
C. samples
D. specifications 9. Many of the conditions that population pressures—overcrowding, unemployment, poverty, hunger and illness—lead to dissatisfaction.
A. bring forward
B. give rise to
C feed up with D. result from 10. Arriving anywhere with these possessions, he might just as easily for a month or a year as for a single day.
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C. speed up
D. make up 11. The fact that the earth's surface heats provides a convenient way to divide it into temperature region.
A. infrequently
B. irregularly
C. unsteadily
D. unevenly 12. If a cat comes too close to its nest, the mockingbird a set of actions to protect its offspring.
A. hastens
B. releases
C. devises
D. initiates
13. How large a proportion of the sales of stores in or near resort areas can be to tourist spending?
A. attributed
B. applied
C. contributed
D. attached 14. Knowledge is a comfortable and necessary retreat and for us in an advanced age; and if we do not plant it while young, it will give us no shade when we grow old.
A. ingredient
B. reliance
C. shelter
D. inclination 15. Some people would like to do shopping on Sundays since they expect to wonderful bargains in the market.
A. pick up
B. bump into
C. pile up
D. bring back 16. Scientists are searching for the oldest tree because it can teach them a great deal about many issues related with climate change.
A. lively
B. alive
C. living
D. live
17. The destruction of the Twin Towers in New York City shock and anger throughout the world.
A. tempted
B. provoked
C. summoned
D. enveloped
18. A 1994 World Bank report concluded that girls in school was probably the single most effective anti-poverty policy in the developing world today.
A. enrolling
B. assigning
C. involving
D. consenting 19. The UN official said aid programs will be until there is adequate protection for relief personnel.
A. multiplied
B. arrested
C. spanned
D. suspended 20. Despite almost universal of the vital importance of women's literacy, education remains a dream for far many women in far too many countries of the world.
A. confession
B. identification
C. acknowledgement
D. compliment 21. Since the island soil has been barren for so many years, the natives must now much of their food.
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C. produce
D. develop
22. Because Jenkins neither nor defends either management or the striking workers, both sides admire his journalistic .
A. criticizes...acumen
B. attacks…neutrality
C. confronts...aptitude
D. dismisses...flair
23. Some anthropologists claim that a few apes have been taught a rudimentary sign languages, but skeptics argue that the apes are only their trainers.
A. imitating
B. condoning
C. instructing
D. acknowledging 24. It is ironic that the insights of the great thinkers are voiced so often that they have become mere .
A. original... clichés
B. banal...beliefs
C. dubious...habits
D. philosophical-questions
25. The most frustrating periods of any diet are the inevitable , when weight loss ______if not stops.
A. moods...accelerates
B. feasts...halts
C. holidays…contracts
D. plateaus...slows
26. Since the author's unflattering references to her friends were so , she was surprised that her were recognized.
A. laudatory...styles
B. obvious…anecdotes
C. oblique... allusions
D. critical....eulogies
27. If it is true that morality cannot exist without religion, then does not the erosion of religion herald the of morality?
A. regulation
B. basis
C. belief
D. collapse
28. Certain animal behaviors, such as mating rituals, seem to be , and therefore
____________external factors such as climate changes, food supply, or the presence of other animals of the same species.
A. learned...immune to
B. innate...unaffected by
C. intricate...belong to
D. specific...confused with
29. Shaken by two decades of virtual anarchy, the majority of people were ready to buy ________at any price.
A. order
B. emancipation
C. hope
D. liberty
30. As a person who combines care with , Marisa completed her duties with _________as well as zeal.
A. levity...resignation
B. enthusiasm...meticulousness
C. vitality... willingness
D. empathy...rigor
Part II. Reading Comprehension (40%)
Section A (30 points)
Directions: There are 3 passages in this part. Each passage is followed by some questions or unfinished statements. For each of them there are four choices marked A, B, C and D. You should
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decide on the best choice and mark the corresponding letter on the Answer Sheet with a single line through the center.
Questions 1 to 5 are based on the following passage:
Going Green After Gray
Visanto Melina, R.D., got the surprise of her career last year, when the Seattle-based vegetarian nutritionist was asked to give a seminar on vegetarianism at a senior citizen center. "I thought there'd be four or five people," she says. Instead, the room was packed with seniors who had paid a $5 fee to hear her advice. And their interest in better health wasn’t only keen; it was informed. "They've obviously been paying attention to new research," she says. ★本资料由博宸考博英语辅导整理编辑，更多系统化资料下载及考博英语针对性辅导请登录官方网站https://www.doczj.com/doc/de19031582.html, ★
If Melina studied demographic trends for a living, she probably wouldn't have been so surprised. Trend watchers have verified an intriguing new phenomenon. Older people are turning to a vegetarian diet in ever-increasing numbers. Not surprisingly, demographics are driving the drift. By the year 2005，people born between 1949 and 1963 the Baby Boom Generation, will make up 38 percent of the American population. Furthermore, statistics suggest this educated, health-conscious, rebellious and relatively affluent contingent fits the traditional vegetarian profile. Add to the fact that older people seek natural, pleasant ways to combat problems associated with aging—weight gain, higher cholesterol and blood pressure, increased cancer risk and impaired digestion—and you have real motivation to go meatless, says Suzanne Havala, R.D., author of the American Dietetic Association's position paper on vegetarianism.
Quantifying this new trend isn’t easy, but a 1994 study by Health Focus Inc., an independent research organization based in Des Moines, Iowa, found that shoppers over age 50 are cutting down on their consumption of red meat or eliminating it from their diets entirely. More compelling evidence for the senior surge toward vegetarianism comes from vegetarian groups nationwide, which report a swell in the ranks of older vegetarians. For example, one out of five members of the new Syracuse (N.Y .) Area Vegetarian Education Society is over 50; unusually high for a fledgling organization. And two-thirds of the 850-member Vegetarian Society of Honolulu are also members of the American Association of Retired Persons, society executives say.
An informal poll of older people suggests better health is often the main incentive and objective for turning veg. Three years ago Nancy Roberts, a 53-year-old magazine editor, found herself doing what many people do over the holidays: overindulging in rich treats. However, this time it made her in. "The crash felt like the flu," she says. By chance, Roberts was asked to edit some vegetarian recipes during that same period. She made a few at home, and her "flu" disappeared. ★本资料由博宸考博英语辅导整理编辑，更多系统化资料下载及考博英语针对性辅导请登录官方网站https://www.doczj.com/doc/de19031582.html, ★
More dramatically, Ruth Heidrich believes vegetarianism saved her life. The 61-year-old marathoner and triathlete was diagnosed with breast cancer 14 years ago, at age 47. When an initial biopsy indicated far more cancer than her doctors had thought, she was ready to take desperate measures. On the day of the diagnosis, she spotted a newspaper ad looking for volunteers to enroll in a study of breast cancer and diet, conducted by John McDougall, M.D., a leading advocate of the use of diet to fight disease. After meeting McDougall and reviewing what she says was an eight-inch thick file of statistics linking a high-fat diet with breast cancer, Heidrich converted from a traditional American diet to an extremely low-fat regimen with no
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animal products. "I didn't even have skim milk on my cereal," she says. After a mastectomy and reconstructive surgery, she is cancer-free. She never had to undergo radiation treatment or chemotherapy and believes her strict vegetarian diet helped speed her recovery from surgery.
1. What does Visanto Melino mean when she says the elderly citizens who attended her seminar were "informed" on the subject of better health?
A. They had a clear understanding of the subject.
B. They wanted more information on the subject.
C. They were informed of the latest research on the subject.
D. They were extremely knowledgeable about the latest developments on the subject.
2. What does the author mean by saying "... demographics are driving the drift"?
A. The huge Baby Boom Generation have decided to become vegetarians.
B. The growing trend toward vegetarianism is due to an increase in the number of older people.
C. Senior citizens believe that going meatless is a natural and pleasant way to combat problems of aging.
D. More and more people of all ages are going on a vegetarian diet to stay healthy.
3. Why did Nancy Roberts fall ill?
A. Because she caught the flu.
B. Because she overexerted herself during the holidays.
C. Because she was on a high-fat diet.
D. Because she ate too much rich food.
4. How did Nancy Roberts recover from her illness?
A. By going on an extremely low-fat regimen.
B. By eating some vegetarian dishes at home.
C. By not even having skim milk with her cereal.
D. By following a strict vegetarian diet.
5. Why is the passage titled "Going Green After Gray"?
A. People who have gray hair like to eat vegetables.
B. A vegetarian diet is good for elderly people.
C. Older people tend to become vegetarians.
D. Seniors like to attend seminars on vegetarianism.
Questions 6 to 10 are based on the following passage:
In most people's mind, growth is associated with prosperity. We judge how well the economy is doing by the size of the Gross National Product (GNP), a measure, supposedly, of growth. Equally axiomatic, however, is the notion that increased pressure on dwindling natural resources must inevitably lead to a decline in prosperity, especially when accompanied by a growth in population. So, which is correct: growth means prosperity and no growth means adversity, or growth means adversity and no growth means…what?
What growth advocates mean, primarily, when they say growth is necessary for prosperity is that growth is necessary for the smooth functioning of the economic system. In one arena the argument in favor of growth is particularly compelling and that is with regard to the Third World. To argue against growth, other than population growth, in light of Third World poverty and degradation seems callous, if not cruel, the pompous postulating of the comfortable and the secure.
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But is it? Could it be that growth, especially the growth of the wealthier countries, has contributed to the impoverishment, not the advancements of Third World countries? If not, how do we account for the desperate straits these countries find themselves in today after a century of dedication to growth?
To see how this might be the case we must look at the impact of growth on Third World countries - the reality, not the abstract stages-of-economic-growth nostrum propounded through rose-colored glasses by academicians of the developed world. What good is growth to the people of the Third World if it means the conversion of peasant farms into mechanized agri-businesses producing commodities not for local consumption but for export, if it means the stripping of their land of its mineral and arboreal treasures to the benefit of foreign investors and a handful of their local collaborators, if it means the assumption of a crushing foreign indebtedness, the proceeds of which goes not into the development of the country but into the purchase of luxury cars, the padding of Swiss bank accounts, and the buying of condominiums in Miami? ★本资料由博宸考博英语辅导整理编辑，更多系统化资料下载及考博英语针对性辅导请登录官方网站https://www.doczj.com/doc/de19031582.html, ★
Admittedly, this is an oversimplification, which applies to no country in its entirety and to some countries not at all. But the point, I believe, remains valid: that growth in underdeveloped countries cannot simply be judged in the abstract; it must be judged based on the true nature of growth in these societies, on who benefits and who is harmed on where growth is leading these people and where it has left them. When considered in this way, it just might be that in the present context growth is more detrimental to the well-being of the wretched of the earth than beneficial.
So, do we need growth for prosperity? Only the adoption of zero growth can provide the answer. But that is a test not easily undertaken. Modern economies are incredibly complex phenomena, a tribute to man's ability to organize and a challenge to his ability to understanding. Anything that affects their functioning, such as a policy of zero growth, should not be proposed without a wary prudence and a self-doubting humility. But if the prospect of leaping into the economic unknown is fear-inspiring, equally so is the prospect of letting that fear prevent us from acting when the failure to act could mean untold misery for future generations and perhaps environmental catastrophes which threaten our very existence.
6. Which of the following statements does the author support?
A. Gross National Product is a safe measure for economic growth.
B. Diminishing natural resources will prove harmful to the well-being of humanity.
C. A decline in prosperity will inevitably lead to a growth in population.
D. Growth in population will be a chief threat to economic prosperity. 7. It is implied in Paragraphs 2 and 3 that .
A. the smooth functioning of the economic system is dependent on sustained prosperity
B. economic growth has not contributed to the poverty of the Third World countries
C. growth in richer countries is achieved at the expense of the Third World countries
D. the stages of economic growth cannot be superseded or modified by social mechanisms
8. With regard to the economic development in Third World countries the author is actually saying that .
A. the people in these countries have not actually benefited from it
B. inadequate investment has seriously affected the development
C. deep debt virtually makes further growth in these countries impossible
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D. agriculture in these countries should have been left intact 9. The author seems to believe that prosperity .
A. can be achieved without economic growth
B. can only be achieved with economic growth
C. is a tribute to man's ability and creativity
D. is fragile in face of environmental catastrophes 10. The answer of the author to the question “Do we need growth for prosperity” is .
A. negative
B. positive
C. vague
D. inconclusive
Questions 11 to 15 are based on the following passage:
The African elephant—mythic symbol of a continent, keystone of its ecology and the largest land animal remaining on earth—has become the object of one of the biggest, broadest international efforts yet mounted to turn a threatened species off the road to extinction. But it is not only the elephant's survival that is at stake, conservationists say. Unlike the endangered tiger, unlike even the great whales, the African elephant is in great measure the architect of its environment. As a voracious eater of vegetation, it largely shapes the forest-and-savanna surroundings in which it lives, thereby setting the terms of existence for millions of other storied animals-from zebras to gazelles to giraffes and wildebeests-that share its habitat And as the elephant disappears, scientists and conservationists say, many other species will also disappear from vast stretches of forest and savanna, drastically altering and impoverishing whole ecosystems.
It is the elephant's metabolism and appetite that make it a disturber of the environment and therefore an important creator of habitat. In a constant search for the 300 pounds of vegetation it must have every day, it kills small trees and underbrush and pulls branches off big trees as high as its trunk will reach. This creates innumerable open spaces in both deep tropical forests and in the woodlands that cover part of the African savannas. The resulting patchwork, a mosaic of vegetation in various stages of regeneration, in turn creates a greater variety of forage that attracts a greater variety of other vegetation-eaters than would otherwise be the case. ★本资料由博宸考博英语辅导整理编辑，更多系统化资料下载及考博英语针对性辅导请登录官方网站https://www.doczj.com/doc/de19031582.html, ★
In studies over the last 20 years in southern Kenya near Mount Kilimanjaro, Dr. Western has found that when elephants are allowed to roam the savannas naturally and normally, they spread out at "intermediate densities." Their foraging creates a mixture of savanna woodlands (what the Africans call bush) and grassland. The result is a highly diverse array of other plant-eating species: those like the zebra, wildebeest and gazelle, that graze; those like the giraffe, bushbuck and lesser kudu, that browse on tender shoots, buds, twigs and leaves; and plant-eating primates like the baboon and vervet monkey. These herbivores attract carnivores like the lion and cheetah.
When the elephant population thins out, Dr. Western said, the woodlands become denser and the grazers are squeezed out. When pressure from poachers forces elephants to crowd more densely onto reservations, the woodlands there are knocked out and the browsers and primates disappear.
Something similar appears to happen in dense tropical rain forests. In their natural state, 博宸考博英语辅导 w w w .a i m e d u .c o m
because the overhead forest canopy shuts out sunlight and prevents growth on the forest floor, rain forests provide slim pickings for large, hoofed plant-eaters. By pulling down trees and eating new growth, elephants enlarge natural openings in the canopy, allowing plants to regenerate on the forest floor and bringing down vegetation from the canopy so that smaller species can get at it.
In such situations, the rain forest becomes hospitable to large plant-eating mammals such as bongos, bush pigs, duikers, forest hogs, swamp antelopes, forest buffaloes, okapis, sometimes gorillas and always a host of smaller animals that thrive on secondary growth. When elephants disappear and the forest reverts, the larger mammals give way to smaller, nimbler animals like monkeys, squirrels and rodents.
11. The passage is primarily concerned with _______________
A. explaining why elephants are facing the threat of extinction
B. explaining difficulties in providing sufficient forage for plant-eaters
C. explaining how the elephant's impact on its surroundings affects other species
D. distinguishing between savannas and rain forests as habitats for elephants
12. In the opening paragraph, the author mentions tigers and whales in order to emphasize which point about the elephant?
A. Like them, it faces the threat of extinction.
B. It is herbivorous rather than carnivorous.
C. It is the largest extant land mammal.
D. Unlike them, it physically alters its environment. 13. A necessary component of the elephant's ability to transform the landscape is its .
A. massive intelligence
B. threatened extinction
C. ravenous hunger
D. lack of grace 14. It can be inferred from the passage that .
A. the natural tendency of elephants is to crowd together in packs
B. the elephant is dependent upon the existence of smaller plant-eating mammals for its survival
C. elephants have an indirect effect on the hunting patterns of certain carnivores
D. the floor of the tropical rain forest is too overgrown to accommodate larger plant-eating species
15. Which of the following statements best expresses the author's attitude toward the damage to vegetation caused by foraging elephants?
A. It is an unfortunate by-product of the feeding process.
B. It is a necessary but undesirable aspect of elephant population growth.
C. It fortuitously results in creating environments suited to diverse species.
D. It has the unexpected advantage that it allows scientists access to the rain forest.
Section B (10 points)
Directions: In the following article, some sentences have been removed. For Questions 1-5, choose the most suitable one from the list A-E to fit into each of the numbered blank. Mark your answers on the ANSWER SHEET.
Whenever you see an old film, even one made as little as ten years ago, you cannot help being struck by the appearance of the women taking part. Their hair-styles and make-up look
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dated; their skirts look either too long or too short; their general appearance is, in fact, slightly ludicrous. The men taking part in the film, on the other hand, are clearly recognizable. There is nothing about their appearance to suggest that they belong to an entirely different age.
The same cannot be said for women. Each year a few so-called top designers in Paris or London lay down the law and women over the whole world rush to obey. The decrees of the designers are unpredictable and dictatorial. This year, they decide in their arbitrary fashion, skirts will be short and waists will be high; zips are in and buttons are out. Next year the law is reversed and far from taking exception, no one is even mildly
surprised. If women are mercilessly exploited year after year, they have only themselves to blame.
Clothes, which have been worn, only a few times have to be discarded because of the dictates of fashion. When you come to think of it, only a women is capable of standing in front of a wardrobe packed full of clothes and announcing sadly that she has nothing to wear.
Many women squander vast sums of money each year to replace clothes that have hardly been worn. Women, who cannot afford to discard clothing in this way, waste hours of their time altering the dresses they have. Hem-limes are taken up or let down; waist-lines are taken in or let out; neck-lines are lowered or raised, and so on. ★本资料由博宸考博英语辅导整理编辑，
更多系统化资料下载及考博英语针对性辅导请登录官方网站https://www.doczj.com/doc/de19031582.html, Fashion designers are rarely concerned with vital things like warmth, comfort and durability. They
are only interested in outward appearance and they take advantage of the fact that women will put up with any amount of discomfort, providing they look right. There can hardly be a man who hasn't at some time in his life smiled at the sight of a woman shivering in a flimsy dress on a wintry day, or delicately picking her way through deep snow in dainty shoes.
Do the constantly changing fashions of women's clothes, one wonders, reflect basic qualities of fickleness and instability? Men are too sensible to let themselves be bullied by fashion designers. Do their unchanging styles of dress reflect basic qualities of stability and reliability? That is for you to decide.
A. Changing fashions are nothing more than the deliberate creation of waste.
B. No one can claim that the fashion industry contributes anything really important to society.
C. The difference between men and women in the matter of fashion is fascinating.
D. Over the year, the great majority of men have successfully resisted all attempts to make them change their style of dress.
E. Because they shudder at the thought of being seen in public in clothes that are out of fashion, they are annually black-mailed by the designers and the big stores.
Part III. Short Answer Questions (10%)
Directions: Read the following passage and then give short answers to the five questions. Write your answers on the Answer Sheet.
As researchers learn more about how children's intelligence develops, they are increasingly 博宸考博英语辅导 w w w .a i m e d u .c o m
surprised by the power of parents. The power of the school has been replaced by the home. To begin with, ail the factors which are part of intelligence -- the child's understanding of language, learning patterns, curiosity—are established well before the child enters school at the age of six. Study after study has shown that even after school begins, children's achievements have been far more influenced by parents than by teachers. This is particularly true about learning that is language-related. The school rather than the home is given credit for variations in achievement in subjects such as science. In view of their power it's sad to see so many parents not making the most of their child's intelligence. Until recently parents had been warned by educators who asked them not to educate their children. Many teachers now realize that children cannot be educated only at school and parents are being asked to contribute both before and after the child enters school. Parents have been particularly afraid to teach reading at home. Of course, children shouldn't be pushed to read by their parents, but educators have discovered that reading is best taught individually—and the easiest place to do this is at home. Many four and five-year-olds who have been shown a few letters and taught their sounds will compose single words of their own with them even before they have been taught to read. 1. What have researchers found out about the influence of parents and the school on children's intelligence? 2. What do researchers conclude about children's learning patterns? 3. In which area may school play a more important role? 4. Why did many parents fail to make the most of their children's intelligence? 5. The author suggests in the last paragraph that parents should be encouraged to .
Part IV . English-Chinese Translation (15%)
Directions: Read the passage carefully and translate the underlined sentences into Chinese. Write your answers on the Answer Sheet. (1). When we talk about the danger of romantic love, we don't mean danger in the obvious heartbreak way—the cheap betrayals, the broken promises—we mean the dark danger that lurks when sensible, educated women fall for the dogmatic idea that romantic love is the ultimate goal for the modern female. Every day, thousands of films, books, articles and TV programs hammer home this message—that without romance, life is somehow barren.
However, there are women who entertain the subversive notion, like an intellectual mouse scratching behind the skirting board, that perhaps this higher love is not necessarily the celestial highway to absolute happiness. (2). Their empirical side kicks in. and they observe that couples who marry in a haze of adoration and sex are, ten years later, throwing china and fight bitterly over who gets the dog. ★本资料由博宸考博英语辅导整理编辑，更多系统化资料下载及考博英语针对性辅导请登录官方网站https://www.doczj.com/doc/de19031582.html, ★ (3). But the women who notice these contradictions are often afraid to speak them in case 博宸考博英语辅导 w w w .a i m e d u .c o m
they should be labeled cynics. Surely only the most jaded and damaged would challenge the orthodoxy of romantic love. The received wisdom that there is not something wrong with the modem idea of sexual love as ultimate panacea, but that if you don't get it, there is something wrong with you. You freak, go back and read the label. (4). We say the privileging of romantic love over all others, the insistence that it is the one essential, incontrovertible element of human happiness, traced all the way back to the caves, is a trap and a snare. The idea that every human heart, since the invention of the wheel, was yearning for its other half is a myth. (5). Love is a human constant: it is the interpretation of it that changes. The way that love has been expressed, its significance in daily life, have never been immutable or constant. The different kinds of love and what they signify are not fixed, whatever the traditionalists may like to tell you.
So the modern idea that romantic love is a woman's highest calling, that she is somehow only half a person without it, that if she questions it she is going against all human history, does not stand up to scrutiny. It is not an imperative carved in stone; it is a human idea, and human beings are frail and suggestible, and sometimes get the wrong end of the stick.
Part V . Writing (30 minutes) (20%)
Directions: You are asked to write an essay on the following topic:
Universities should require every student to take some courses outside his or her field of study because acquiring knowledge of different academic fields is the best way to become truly educated.
To what extent do you agree or disagree with this statement?
You should write at least 250 words.
You should use your own ideas, knowledge and experience and support your arguments with examples and relevant evidence.
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