If the population goes on increasing at the present rate, there will()not be enough resources left on earth to sustain human life.
A.at last
B.eventually
C.lastly
D.lately
A.at last
B.eventually
C.lastly
D.lately
Passage Two
America put more people in prison in the 1990s than in any decade in its history. That started a debate over the wisdom of spending billions of dollars to keep nearly 2 million people locked up. According to statistics, the United States ends 1999 with 1983084 men and women in prisons. That shows an increase of nearly 840,000 prisoners during the 1990s and makes the United States the country with the highest prisoner population in the world. With the cost of housing a prisoner at about $20,000 a year the cost in 1999 for keeping all these prisoners behind bars is about $39 billion.
Some experts argue that the money is well spent, saying the cost of keeping prisoners behind bars doesn't seem much in comparison in the 1990s coincided with (与……相一致) a steady drop in the US crime rates. It is reported that serious crime has decreased for seven years in a row. "There are noticeable number of people who don't do crimes because they don't want to go to prison," they say.
36. There is a heated debate among American experts because ______.
A. America has put 2 million people in prison
B. the cost for housing a prisoner keeps rising
C. billions of dollars has been spent on prisoners
D. the prisoner population is the largest in the world
First of all, people spend less time working now than they used to, mostly due to the introduction of new industrial technology. The normal British working week is Monday to Friday, 9:00 a.m. to 5:00 p.m., although some people regularly work a few hours' overtime each week. Secondly, all working people get a minimum of two weeks' paid holiday a year. In addition, there are six or more bank holidays a year when all banks and businesses are closed. In some cases the dates of these national holidays change from year to year and in different parts of Britain.
Another reason is that, thanks to modern medicine and higher living standards, people live longer now. This means that after retirement, people have quite a few years of leisure left. Nowadays a much higher proportion of the population is over sixty, but in this group there are more women than men.
Finally, fewer babies are born each year and the average family in Britain has two children. This is one result of changing social attitudes. For example, many more married women now go out to work. The money they earn influences their leisure time. Even married women who do not go out to work have more time for interesting hobbies because most British homes have washing machines, vacuum cleaners and other labor-saving gadgets.
The best title of this passage can be ____.
A. Time for relax
B. Time for refreshment
C. British working hour
D. British family
“A paid holiday” (in Para. 2) means working people ____.
A. have to pay for their holiday
B. have no pay when they are on holiday
C. get usual pay when they are on holiday
D. get less pay when they are on holiday
Among the old people, there are ____.
A. as many men as women
B. more women than men
C. more men than women
D. many more women than men
In Britain, married women have more leisure hours because they have ____.
A. work with a good pay
B. a lot of time
C. washing-machines and vacuum cleaners
D. fewer children and more labor-saving gadgets
Which of the following ideas is NOT suggested in the passage?
A. Some married women have more time of reading.
B. Some married women have interesting hobbies.
C. Some married women now go out to work.
D. Some married women still stay at home.
Genetically modified (GM) foodstuffs are here to stay. That's not to say that food produced by conventional agriculture will disappear, 【C1】______ simply that foodbuying patterns will polarize. It may even be that GM food will become the food of 【C2】______ because consumers come to appreciate the health benefits of reduced pesticide use.
The reason GM food will not go away is that we need a three-fold increase in food production by the year 2050 to keep 【C3】______ with the world's 【C4】______ population growth to ten or eleven billion. It's not just a question of more mouths to feed either. 【C5】______ is often forgotten is that all these extra people will take up space,reducing the overall land 【C6】______ for agriculture.
It may well be that in the long term it is the developing world 【C7】______ benefits most from GM foods. It's true that for the next ten years or so GM crops may be 【C8】______ expensive. But the lesson of personal computers is applicable here—once the technology has been developed for money spinning crops, 【C9】______ maize, soy beans and cotton,it will become 【C10】______ for all.
This doesn't mean, unfortunately, that families will 【C11】______ , but severity and duration will be helped by an 【C12】______ ability to produce and distribute food.
【C13】______ we move into this new era of agriculture we're embarking on a journey the world has seen many number of times with experiments before. We have been refining species of wheat for several thousand years. Genetic engineers like me are not doing anything as 【C14】______ as making a cabbage into a cauliflower 【C15】______ has been done by plant breeders in the past.
We're simply tapping into the whole gene pool, rather than concentrating on one species at a time.
【C1】______
A.and
B.or
C.but
D.rather than
Home school advocates take a harsh attitude toward home schoolers, perceiving their actions as the ultimate slap in the face for public education and a damaging move for the children. Home schoolers harbor few kind words for public schools, charging shortcomings that range from lack of religious perspective in the curriculum to a herdlike approach to teaching children.
Yet, as public school officials realize they stand little to gain by remaining hostile to the home school population, and as home schoolers realize they can reap benefits from public schools, these hard lines seem to be softening a bit.
Public schools and home schoolers have moved closer to tolerance and, in some cases even cooperation. Says John Marshall, an education official," we are becoming relatively tolerant of home schoolers. The idea is, let's give the kids access to public school so they'll see it's not as terrible as they've been told, and they'll want to come back." Perhaps, but don't count on it, say home school advocates.
Home schoolers oppose the system because they have strong convictions that their approach to education--whether fueled by religious enthusiasm or the individual child's interest and natural pace--is the best. "The bulk of home schoolers just want to be left alone.” Says Enge Cannon, associate director of the National Center For Home Education. She says home schoolers choose that path for a variety of reasons, but religion plays a role 85 percent of the time.
Professor Van Galen breaks home schoolers into two groups. Some home schoolers want their children to learn not only traditional subject matter but also "strict religious doctrine and a conservative political and social perspective". Not incidentally, they also want their children to learn--both intellectually and emotionally--that the family is the most important institution in society." Other home schoolers contend "not so much that the schools teach heresy, but that schools teach whatever they teach inappropriately." Van Galen writes. "These parents are highly independent and strive to take responsibility for their own lives within a society that they define as bureaucratic and inefficient.
Which of the following statements is true?
A.Home schoolers engage private teachers to provide additional education for their children.
B.Home schoolers don't go to school but are educated at home by their parents.
C.Home schoolers educate their children at home instead of sending them to school.
D.Home schoolers advocate combining public education with home schooling.
_______________ is the population of Paris?
A: What
B; How many
C; How much
The population of the village has decreased______150 to 500.
A.in
B.at
C.by
D.with
Only in a few countries ______ enjoy a reasonable standard of living.
A.do the whole of the population
B.the whole of population can
C.can the whole of the population
D.does the whole of the population
This passage implies that population increase is______.
A.not beneficial
B.helpful
C.advantageous
D.desirable
The population of this small town has more than doubled it in the past few decades.
A B C D