《新概念英语第四册完美打印版.pdf》由会员分享，可在线阅读，更多相关《新概念英语第四册完美打印版.pdf（31页珍藏版）》请在taowenge.com淘文阁网|工程机械CAD图纸|机械工程制图|CAD装配图下载|SolidWorks_CaTia_CAD_UG_PROE_设计图分享下载上搜索。
1、Lesson 1 Finding fossil man 发现化石人We can read of things that happened 5,000 years ago in the Near East,where people firstlearned to write.But there are some parts of the word where even now people cannot write.Theonly way that they can preserve their history is to recount it as sagas-legends handed d
2、own fromone generation of another.These legends are useful because they can tell us something aboutmigrations of people who lived long ago,but none could write down what they did.Anthropologists wondered where the remote ancestors of the Polynesian peoples now living in thePacific Islands came from.
3、The sagas of these people explain that some of them came fromIndonesia about 2,000 years ago.But the first people who were like ourselves lived so long ago that even their sagas,if theyhad any,are forgotten.So archaeologists have neither history nor legends to help them to find outwhere the first mo
4、dem men*came from.Fortunately,however,ancient men made tools of stone,especially flint,because this is easierto shape than other kinds.They may also have used wood and skins,but these have rotted away.Stone does not decay,and so the tools of long ago have remained when even the bones of the menwho m
5、ade them have disappeared without trace.ROBIN PLACE Finding fossil manLesson 2 Spare that spider 不要伤害蜘蛛Why,you may wonder,should spiders be our friends?Because they destroy so many insects,and insects include some of the greatest enemies of the human race.Insects would make itimpossible for us to li
6、ve in the world;they would devour all our crops and kill our flocks andherds,if it were not for the protection we get from insect-eating animals.We owe a lot to the birdsand beasts who eat insects but all of them put together kill only a fraction of the number destroyedby spiders.Moreover,unlike som
7、e of the other insect eaters,spiders never do the harm to us or ourbelongings.Spiders are not insects,as many people think,nor even nearly related to them.One can tellthe difference almost at a glance,for a spider always has eight legs and insect never more than six.How many spiders are engaged in t
8、his work no our behalf?One authority on spiders made acensus of the spiders in grass field in the south of England,and he estimated that there were morethan 2,250,000 in one acre;that is something like 6,000,000 spiders of different kinds on a footballpitch.Spiders are busy for at least half the yea
9、r in killing insects.It is impossible to make morethan the wildest guess at how many they kill,but they are hungry creatures,not content with onlythree meals a day.It has been estimated that the weight of all the insects destroyed by spiders inBritain in one year would be greater than the total weig
10、ht of all the human beings in the country.T.H.GILLESPLE Spare that spider from The ListenerLesson 3 Matterhorn man马特霍恩山区人Modem alpinists try to climb mountains by a route which will give them good sport,and themore difficult it is,the more highly it is regarded.In the pioneering days,however,this wa
11、s notthe case at all.The early climbers were looking for the easiest way to the top,because the summitwas the prize they sought,especially if it and never been attained before.It is true that during theirexplorations they often faced difficulties and dangers of the most perilous nature,equipped in a
12、manner with would make a modem climber shudder at the thought,but they did not go out of theirway to court such excitement.They had a single aim,a solitary goal-the top!It is hard for us to realize nowadays how difficult it was for the pioneers.Except for one ortwo places such as Zermatt and Chamoni
13、x,which had rapidly become popular,Alpine villagetended to be impoverished settlements cut off from civilization by the high mountains.Such innsas there were generally dirty and flea-ridden;the food simply local cheese accompanied by breadoften twelve months old,all washed down with coarse wine.Ofte
14、n a valley boasted no inn at all,and climbers found shelter wherever they could-sometimes with the local priest(who wasusually as poor as his parishioners),sometimes with shepherds or cheese-makers.Invariably thebackground was the same:dirt and poverty,and very uncomfortable.For men accustomed toeat
15、ing seven-course dinners and sleeping between fine linen sheets at home,the change to the Alpsmust have very hard indeed.WALTER UNSWORTH Matterhorn ManLesson 4 Seeing hands能看见东西的手Several cases have been reported in Russia recently of people who can detect colours withtheir fingers,and even see throu
16、gh solid and walls.One case concerns and eleven-year-oldschoolgirl,Vera Petrova,who has normal vision but who can also perceive things with differentparts of her skin,and through solid walls.This ability was first noticed by her father.One day shecame into his office and happened to put her hands on
17、 the door of a locked safe.Suddenly sheasked her father why he kept so many old newspapers locked away there,and even described theway they were done up in bundles.Veras curious talent was brought to the notice of a scientific research institute in the town ofUlyanovsk,near where she lives,and in Ap
18、ril she was given a series of tests by a specialcommission of the Ministry of Health of the Russian Federal Republic.During these tests she wasable to read a newspaper through an opaque screen and,stranger still,by moving her elbow over achilds game of Lotto she was able to describe the figures and
19、colours printed on it;and,in anotherinstance,wearing stockings and slippers,to make out with her foot the outlines and colours of apicture hidden under a carpet.Other experiments showed that her knees and shoulders had asimilar sensitivity.During all these tests Vera was blindfold;and,indeed,except
20、when blindfoldshe lacked the ability to perceive things with her skin.It was also found that although she couldperceive things with her fingers this ability ceased the moment her hands were wet.ERIC DE MAUNY Seeing hands from The ListenerLesson 5 Youth 青年People are always talking about the problem o
21、f youth.If there is one-which I take leave todoubt-then it is older people who create it,not the young themselves.Let us get down tofundamentals and agree that the young are after all human beings-people just like their elders.There is only one difference between an old man and a young one:the young
22、 man has a gloriousfuture before him and the old one has a splendid future behind him:and maybe that is where therub is.When I was a teenager,I felt that I was just young and uncertain-that I was a new boy in ahuge school,and I would have been very pleased to be regarded as something so interesting
23、as aproblem.For one thing,being a problem gives you a certain identity,and that is one of the thingsthe young are busily engaged in seeking.I find young people exciting.They have an air of freedom,and they not a dreary commitmentto mean ambitions or love of comfort.They are not anxious social climbe
24、rs,and they have nodevotion to material things.All this seems to me to link them with life,and the origins of things.It*s as if they were,in some sense,cosmic beings in violent and lovely contrast with us suburbancreatures.All that is in my mind when I meet a young person.He may be conceited,ill-man
25、nered,presumptuous or fatuous,but I do not turn for protection to dreary cliches about respect of eldersas if mere age were a reason for respect.I accept that we are equals,and I will argue with him,as an equal,if I think he is wrong.FIELDEN HUGHES from Out of the Air,The ListenerLesson 6 The sporti
26、ng spirit 体育的精神I am always amazed when I hear people saying that sport creates goodwill between thenations,and that if only the common peoples of the would could meet one another at football orcricket,they would have no inclination to meet on the battlefield.Even if one didnt know fromconcrete examp
27、les(the 1936 Olympic Games,for instance)that international sporting contestslead to orgies of hatred,one could deduce if from general principles.Nearly all the sports practised nowadays are competitive.You play to win,and the game haslittle meaning unless you do your utmost to win.On the village gre
28、en,where you pick up sidesand no feeling of local patriotism is involved,it is possible to play simply for the fun and exercise:but as soon as a the question of prestige arises,as soon as you feel that you and some larger unitwill be disgraced if you lose,the most savage combative instincts are arou
29、sed.Anyone who hasplayed even in a school football match knows this.At the international level,sport is franklymimic warfare.But the significant thing is not the behaviour of the players but the attitude of thespectators:and,behind the spectators,of the nations who work themselves into furies over t
30、heseabsurd contests,and seriously believe at any rate for short periods-that running jumping andkicking a ball are tests of national virtue.GEORGE ORWELL The sporting spiritLesson 7 Bats 蝙蝠Not all sounds made by animals serve as language,and we have only to turn to that extraordinarydiscovery of ech
31、o-location in bats to see a case in which the voice plays a strictly utilitarian role.To get a full appreciation of what this means we must turn first to some recent humaninventions.Everyone knows that if he shouts in the vicinity of a wall or a mountainside,an echowill come back.The further off thi
32、s solid obstruction,the longer time will elapse for the return ofthe echo.A sound made by tapping on the hull of a ship will be reflected from the sea bottom,andby measuring the time interval between the taps and the receipt of the echoes,the depth of the seaat that point can be calculated.So was bo
33、rn the echo-sounding apparatus,now in general use inships.Every solid object will reflect a sound,varying according to the size and nature of theobject.A shoal of fish will do this.So it is a comparatively simple step from locating the sea bottom tolocating a shoal of fish.With experience,and with i
34、mproved apparatus,it is now possible not onlyto locate a shoal but to tell if it is herring,cod,or other well-known fish,by the pattern of its echo.It has been found that certain bats emit squeaks and by receiving the echoes,they can locateand steer clear of obstacles-or locate flying insects on whi
35、ch they feed.This echo-location inbats is often compared with radar,the principle of which is similar.MAURICE BURTON Curiosities of animal lifeLesson 8 Trading standards 贸易标准Chickens slaughtered in the United States,claim officials in Brussels,are not fit to graceEuropean tables.No,say the American:
36、our fowl are fine,we simply clean them in a different way.These days,it is differences in national regulations,far more than tariffs,that put sand in thewheels of trade between rich countries.It is not just farmers who are complaining.An electricrazor that meets the European Unions safety standards
37、must be approved by American testersbefore it can be sold in the United States,and an American-made dialysis machine needs the EUsokay before is hits the market in Europe.As it happens,a razor that is safe in Europe is unlikely to electrocute Americans.So,askbusinesses on both sides of the Atlantic,
38、why have two lots of tests where one would do?Politicians agree,in principle,so America and the EU have been trying to reach a deal whichwould eliminate the need to double-test many products.They hope to finish in time for a tradesummit between America and the EU on May 28TH.Although negotiators are
39、 optimistic,thedetails are complex enough that they may be hard-pressed to get a deal at all.Why?One difficulty is to construct the agreements.The Americans would happily reach oneaccord on standards for medical devices and them hammer out different pacts covering,say,electronic goods and drug manuf
40、acturing.The EU-following fine continental traditions-wantsagreement on general principles,which could be applied to many types of products and perhapsextended to other countries.From:The Economist,May 24th,1997Lesson 9 Royal espionage 王室谍报活动Alfred the Great acted his own spy,visiting Danish camps d
41、isguised as a minstrel.In thosedays wandering minstrels were welcome everywhere.They were not fighting men,and their harpwas their passport.Alfred had learned many of their ballads in his youth,and could vary hisprogramme with acrobatic tricks and simple conjuring.While Alfreds little army slowly be
42、gan to gather at Athelney,the king himself set out topenetrate the camp of Guthrum,the commander of the Danish invaders.There had settled downfor the winter at Chippenham:thither Alfred went.He noticed at once that discipline was slack:the Danes had the self-confidence of conquerors,and their securi
43、ty precautions were casual.Theylived well,on the proceeds of raids on neighbouring regions.There they collected women as wellas food and drink,and a life of ease had made them soft.Alfred stayed in the camp a week before he returned to Athelney.The force there assembledwas trivial compared with the
44、Danish horde.But Alfred had deduced that the Danes were nolonger fit for prolonged battle:and that their commissariat had no organization,but depended onirregular raids.So,faced with the Danish advance,Alfred did not risk open battle but hamed the enemy.Hewas constantly on the move,drawing the Danes
45、 after him.His patrols halted the raiding parties:hunger assailed the Danish army.Now Alfred began a long series of skirmishes-and within amonth the Danes had surrendered.The episode could reasonably serve as a unique epic of royalespionage!BERNARD NEWMAN Spies in BritainLesson 10 Silicon valley 硅谷T
46、echnology trends may push Silicon Valley back to the future.Carver Mead,a pioneer inintegrated circuits and a professor of computer science at the California Institute of Technology,notes there are now work-stations that enable engineers to design,test and produce chips right ontheir desks,much the
47、way an editor creates a newsletter on a Macintosh.As the time and cost ofmaking a chip drop to a few days and a few hundred dollars,engineers may soon be free to lettheir imaginations soar without being penalized by expensive failures.Mead predicts thatinventors will be able to perfect powerful cust
48、omized chips over a weekend at the office spawning a new generation of garage start-ups and giving the U.S.a jump on its foreign rivals ingetting new products to market fast.Were got more garages with smart people/Mead observes.We really thrive on anarchy.And on Asians.Already,orientals and Asian Am
49、ericans constitute the majority of theengineering staffs at many Valley firms.And Chinese,Korean,Filipino and Indian engineers aregraduating in droves from Californias colleges.As the heads of next-generation start-ups,theseAsian innovators can draw on customs and languages to forge righter links wi
50、th crucial PacificRim markets.For instance,Alex Au,a Stanford Ph.D.from Hong Kong,has set up a Taiwanfactory to challenge Japans near lock on the memory-chip market.India-born N.Damodar Reddy*stiny California company reopened an AT&T chip plant in Kansas City last spring with financingfrom the state