高二英语阅读理解强化训练附解析Day 258

1 高二英语阅读理解强化训练附解析Day 258

Passage 1

It has been discovered that after the age of sixteen, the number of our

brain cells begins to decrease at a speed of several million a year. They

simply die off. In certain types of activity, the human brain is at its highest

point in the early twenties, when it has collected enough information to be

able to use the vast number of cells freely in the most effective way. Pure

mathematics is one of the fields in which this happens, and we know that

Albert Einstein made all his world-shaking discoveries between the age of

about 20 and 25, and spent the rest of his life tidying them up and arranging

them.

But in certain other types of activity (of which being an author is

perhaps one), experience is more important than sharpness of brain, and

there one usually finds that a person reaches his or her peak much later in

life.

Besides sharpness of brain and experience, here is another thing that is

very important, and that is wisdom. One can have a very quick, inventive

brain and plenty of experience, but if one uses these foolishly, one harms

both oneself and others. Wisdom does not always come with age ——there

are plenty of foolish middle-aged people about ——but the average person

tends to learn wisdom as he gets older, usually by making painful of

embarrassing mistakes. Leaning to be wise is basically learning what is not 2 possible ； and what is possible but so difficult that it is not worth all the

trouble one has to go through to get there. Mostly, it is learning about

human nature ； how real people behave and react, as against how one

would like them to behave and react. One can read and hear lot of idealistic

stuff about how to make the world a better place, which would be found if

it was based on an accurate observation of human nature, but which is

basically a waste of time because it is not.

1. According to the writer, the great discoveries made by Albert Einstein

were mainly a result in .

A. years of hard work

B. sharpness of the brain

C. rich experience

D. his deep understanding of the nature

2. Some people achieve success much later in life because .

A. their work often requires much experience

B. they do not have a chance to show their talents

C. they have to learn lessons from failures

D. they fail to realize earlier the importance of hard work

3. The importance of wisdom lies in the fact that .

A. it helps to avoid various mistakes

B. it contributes to one's creativity

C. it encourages one to go forward in face of difficulty 3 D. it provides the right direction of efforts

4. The writer came to believe that .

A. it is always a waste of time to make plans about the future

B. it is human nature to make attempts on what looks impossible

C. one should always challenge the impossible to push the society forward

D. one has to use wisdom in deciding what is the best thing to do

Passage 2

Angel Garcia Crespo is a computer engineer at Carlos III University of

Madrid in Spain. His group has invented a new way for deaf-blind people

to “watch” TV. The idea for the technology grew out of previous work by

his group. The team had already worked on making audiovisual(视听的)

materials accessible to people with either vision or hearing disabilities. But

the group wanted to help people with both challenges. So they asked some

deaf-blind people what would help.

In addition to relying on their sense of touch to communicate, deaf-blind people can also get and send information with a Braille line. The

Braille system uses patterns of raised dots to stand for letters and numbers.

A Braille line is an electronic machine with a changeable Braille display.

Dots rise up or drop down based on the information sent to the machine.

Now the new system changes TV signals to data a Braille line can use.

“The key to the system is the possibility of using subtitles(字幕) to collect 4 TV information, ” Garcia Crespo explains. “Subtitles travel with the

image(影像) and the audio in electromagnetic waves we don’t see. But an

electronic system can keep those waves. ”

First, a computer program, or app, pulls out the subtitles and visual

descriptions from the broadcast signal. The system then combines the

information and changes both into data for Braille.

Now another app gets to work, which sends the data out to people’s

Braille lines on demand. “This is done in real time, in less than a second, ”

Garcia Crespo says. This lets a deaf-blind person “watch” TV as it’s

broadcast. The system will work with various Braille lines, as long as

there’s a bluetooth connection available. Now, the system is only used in

Europe, and it should soon be available in the US.