2024年3月16日发(作者：)

考研英语（阅读）-试卷35

(总分60,考试时间90分钟)

2. Reading Comprehension

Section II Reading Comprehension

Part ADirections: Read the following four texts. Answer the questions below each text by

choosing A, B, C or D.

A deal is a deal—except, apparently, when Entergy is involved. **pany, a major energy supplier in

New England, provoked justified outrage in Vermont last week when it announced it wasreneging

ona **mitment to abide by the state" s strict nuclear regulations. Instead, **pany has done

precisely what it would not:challenge the constitutionality of Vermont"s rules in the federal court,

as part of a desperate effort to keep its Vermont Yankee nuclear power plant running. It" s a

stunning move. The conflict has been surfacing since 2002, when the corporation bought

Vermont"s only nuclear power plant, an aging reactor in Vernon. As a condition of receiving state

approval for the sale, **pany agreed to seek permission from state regulators to operate past 2012.

In 2006, the state went a step further, requiring that any extension of the plant"s license be subject

to Vermont legislature"s approval. Then, too, **pany went along. Either Entergy never really

intended to live by **mitments, or it simply didn"t foresee what would happen next. A string of

accidents, including the partial collapse of a cooling tower in 2007 and the discovery of an

underground pipe system leakage, raised serious questions about both Vermont Yankee" s safety

and Entergy"s management—especially after **pany made misleading statements about the pipe.

Enraged by Entergy"s behavior, the Vermont Senate voted 26 to 4 last year against allowing an

extension. Now **pany is suddenly claiming that the 2002 agreement is invalid because of the

2006 legislation, and that only the federal government has regulatory power over nuclear issues.

The legal issues in the case are obscure: whereas the Supreme Court has ruled that states do have

some regulatory authority over nuclear power, legal scholars say that Vermont case will offer a

precedent-setting test of how far those powers extend. Certainly, there are valid concerns about the

patchwork regulations that could result if every state sets its own rules. But had Entergy kept its

word, that debate would be beside the point. **pany seems to have concluded that its

reputation in Vermont is already so damaged that it has noting left to lose by going to war with the

state. But there should be consequences. Permission to run a nuclear plant is a public trust.

Entergy runs 11 other reactors in the United States, including Pilgrim Nuclear station in Plymouth.

Pledging to run Pilgrim safely, **pany has applied for federal permission to keep it open for

another 20 years. But as the Nuclear Regulatory Commission(NRC)reviews **pany" s application,

it should keep in mind what promises from Entergy are worth.

1. The phrase "reneging on"(Para. 1)is closest in meaning to

A. condemning. B. reaffirming.

C. dishonoring. D. securing.

2. By entering into the 2002 agreement, Entergy intended to

A. obtain protection from Vermont regulators.

B. seek favor from the federal legislature.

C. acquire an extension of its business license.

D. get permission to purchase a power plant.

3. According to Paragraph 4, Entergy seems to have problems with its

A. managerial practices.

B. technical innovativeness.

C. financial goals.

D. business vision.

4. In the author" s view, the Vermont case will test

A. Entergy" s capacity to fulfill all its promises.

B. the nature of states" patchwork regulations.

C. the federal authority over nuclear issues.

D. the limits of states" power over nuclear issues.

5. It can be inferred from the last paragraph that

A. Entergy" s business elsewhere might be affected.

B. the authority of the NRC will be defied.

C. Entergy will withdraw its Plymouth application.

D. Vermont" s reputation might be damaged.

When prehistoric man arrived in new parts of the world, something strange happened to the large

animals: they suddenly became extinct. Smaller species survived. The large, slow-growing

animals were easy game, and were quickly hunted to extinction. Now something similar could be

happening in the oceans. That the seas are being overfished has been known for years. What

researchers such as Ransom Myers and Boris Worm have shown is just how fast things are

changing. They have looked at half a century of data from fisheries around the world. Their

methods do not attempt to estimate the actual biomass(the amount of living biological

matter)offish species in particular parts of the ocean, but rather changes in that biomass over time.

According to their latest paper published in Nature, the biomass of large predators(animals that

kill and eat other animals)in a new fishery is reduced on average by 80% within 15 years of the

start of exploitation. In some long-fished areas, it has halved again since then. Dr. Worm

acknowledges thatthese figures are conservative. One reason for this is that fishing technology has

improved. Today"s vessels can find their prey using satellites and sonar, which were not available

50 years ago. That means a higher proportion of what is in the sea is being caught, so the real

difference between present and past is likely to be worse than the one recorded by changes in

catch sizes. In the early days, too, longlines would have been more saturated with fish. Some

individuals would therefore not have been caught, since no baited hooks would have been

available to trap them, leading to an underestimate of fish stocks in the past. Furthermore, in the

early days of longline fishing, a lot of fish were lost to sharks after they had been hooked. That is

no longer a problem, because there are fewer sharks around now. Dr. Myers and Dr. Worm

argue that their work gives a correct baseline, which future management efforts must take into

account. They believe the data support an idea current among marine biologists, that of the

"shifting baseline." The notion is that people have failed to detect the massive changes which have

happened in the ocean because they have been looking back only a relatively short time into the

past. That matters because theory suggests that the maximum sustainable yield that can be cropped

from a **es when the biomass of a target species is about 50% of its original levels. Most fisheries

are well below that, which is a bad way to do business.

6. The extinction of large prehistoric animals is noted to suggest that

A. large animals were vulnerable to the changing environment.

B. small species survived as large animals disappeared.

C. large sea animals may face the same threat today.

D. slow-growing fish outlive fast-growing ones.

7. We can infer from Dr. Myers and Dr. Worm" s paper that

A. the stock of large predators in some old fisheries has reduced by 90%.

B. there are only half as many fisheries as there were 15 years ago.

C. the catch sizes in new fisheries are only 20% of the original amount.

D. the number of larger predators dropped faster in new fisheries than in the old.

8. By saying "these figures are conservative "(Para. 3), Dr. Worm means that

A. fishing technology has improved rapidly.

B. the catch-sizes are actually smaller than recorded.

C. the marine biomass has suffered a greater loss.

D. the data collected so far are out of date.

9. Dr. Myers and other researchers hold that

A. people should look for a baseline that can work for a longer time.

B. fisheries should keep their yields below 50% of the biomass.

C. the ocean biomass should be restored to its original level.

D. people should adjust the fishing baseline to the changing situation.

10. The author seems to be mainly concerned with most fisheries"

A. management efficiency.

B. biomass level.

C. catch-size limits.

D. technological application.

The journal Science is adding an extra round of statistical checks to its peer-review process,

editor-in-chief Marcia McNutt announced today. The policy follows similar efforts from other

journals, after widespread concern that basic mistakes in data analysis are contributing to the

irreproducibility of many published research findings. "Readers must have confidence in the

conclusions published in our journal," writes McNutt in an editorial. Working with the American

Statistical Association, the journal has appointed seven experts to a statistics board of reviewing

editors(SBoRE). Manuscript will beflagged upfor additional scrutiny by the journal" s internal

editors, or by its existing Board of Reviewing Editors or by outside peer reviewers. The SBoRE

panel will then find external statisticians to review these manuscripts. Asked whether any

particular papers had impelled the change, McNutt said: "The creation of the " statistics board"

was motivated by concerns broadly with the application of statistics and data analysis in scientific

research and is part of Science" s overall drive to increase reproducibility in the research we

publish." Giovanni Parmigiani, a biostatistician at the Harvard School of Public Health, a

member of the SBoRE group, says he expects the board to "play primarily an advisory role." He

agreed to join because he "found the foresight behind the establishment of the SBoRE to be novel,