Our population now includes more elderly and more people with a ______.

请根据短文的内容，回答题。

Population and Our Planet

A very important world problem is the increasing number of people who actually inhabit this planet. The limited amount of land and land resources will soon be unable to support the huge population if it continues to grow at its present rate.＜br＞

So why is this huge increase in population taking place？ It is really due to the spread of the knowledge and practice of what is becoming known as "Death Control". You have no doubt heard of the term "Birth Control". "Death Control" is something rather different. It recognizes the work of the doctors and scientists who now keep alive people who, not very long ago, would have died of a variety of then incurable diseases. Through a wide variety of technological innovations that include farming methods and the control of deadly diseases, we have found ways to reduce the rate at which we die. However, this success is the very cause of the greatest threat to mankind.＜br＞

If we examine the amount of land available for this ever-increasing population, we begin to see the problem. If everyone on the planet had an equal share of land, we would each have about:50,000 square meters. This figure seems to be quite encouraging until we examine the amount of usable land we actually have. More than three-fifths of the world&39;s land cannot produce food.＜br＞

Obviously, with so little land to support us, we should be taking great care not to reduce it further. But we are not! Instead, we are consuming its "capital" -- its nonrenewable fossil fuels and other mineral deposits that took millions of years to form. but which are now being destroyed in decades. We are also doing the same with other vital resources not usually thought of as being nonrenewable such as fertile soils, groundwater and the millions of other species that share the earth with us.＜br＞

It is a very common belief that the problems of the population explosion are caused mainly by poor people living in poor countries who do not know enough to limit their reproduction. This is not true. The actual number of people in an area is not as important as the effect they have on nature. Developing countries do have an effec.t on their environment, but it is the populations of richer countries that have a far greater impact on the earth as a whole.

According to the article， what contributes to the population increase？ 查看材料

A.Birth explosion

B.Birth Control

C.Technological innovations

D.Death Control

ing place primarily in political circles. Here at the college Fund, we have a lot of contact with top corporate leaders; none of them is talking about getting fid of those instruments that produce diversity. In fact, they say that if their companies are to compete in the global village and in the global market place, diversity is an imperative. They also say that the need for talented, skilled Americans means we hale to expand the pool of potential employees. And in looking at where birth rates are growing and at where the population is shifting, corporate America understands that expanding the pool means promoting policies that help provide skills to more minorities, more women, and more immigrants. Corporate leaders know that if that doesn' t occur in our society, they will not have the engineers, the scientists, the lawyers, or the business managers they will need.

Likewise, I don' t hear people in the academy saying, "Let' s go backward. Let' s go back to the good old days, when we had a meritocracy" (which was never true -- we never had a meritocracy, although we' ve come closer to it in the last 30 years). I recently visited a great little college in New York where the campus has doubled its minority population in the last six years. I talked with an African American who has been a professor there for a long time, and she remembers that when she first joined the community, there were fewer than a handful of minorities on campus. Now, all of us feel the university is better because of the diversity. So where we hear this debate is primarily in political circles and in the media -- not in corporate board rooms or on college campuses.

The word "imperative" in the first paragraph most probably can be replaced by ______.

A．remarkable

B．superficial

C．essential

D．debatable

ng place primarily in political circles. Here at the college Fund, we have a lot of contact with top corporate leaders; none of them is talking about getting rid of those instruments that produce diversity. In fact, they say that if their companies are to compete in the global village and in the global market place, diversity is an imperative. They also say that the need for talented, skilled Americans means we have to expand the pool of potential employees. And in looking at where birth rates are growing and at where the population is shifting, corporate America understands that expanding the pool means promoting policies that help provide skills to, more minorities, more women, and more immigrants. Corporate leaders know that if that doesn' t occur in our society, they will not have the engineers, the scientists, the lawyers, or the business managers they will need.

Likewise, I don' t hear people in the academy saying, "Let' s go backward. Let' s go back to the good old days, when we had a meritocracy" (which was never true we never had a meritocracy , although we' ve come closer to it in the last 30 years). I recently visited a great little college in New York where the campus has doubled its minority population in the last six years. I talked with an African American who has been a professor there for a long time, and she remembers that when she first joined the community, there were fewer than a handful of minorities on campus. Now, all of us feel the university is better because of the diversity. So where we hear this debate is primarily in political circles and in the media not in corporate board rooms or on college campuses.

The word "imperative" in the first paragraph most probably can be replaced by_________.

A．remarkable

B．superficial

C．essential

D．debatable

The population of the United States is only 6% of the world's population, but Americans 【21】______ one third of all the energy 【22】______ in the world. This fact alone says that Americans need to use less energy. And because the price of energy had been rising very rapidly 【23】______ the limited supplies of oil in particular, Americans are becoming aware to the need to 【24】______ energy. In California we have a California Energy Commission which has set up in the past five years to 【25】______ plan for our future energy use. We have 【26】______ laws in California to help us conserve energy. First of all, our houses in California have been very 【27】______ of energy in the past. They were not 【28】______ very carefully and so the heat would go out of the house very rapidly. Now we require that the homes have a 【29】______ level of insulation, and so the homes built now are much more 【30】______ .

【31】______ , in transportation 【32】______ a large percentage of oil energy is used, we need to develop more public transportation. In China, of course you have a very good public transportation system. And it is a (n) 【33】______ for the kind of thing we need to develop more in the United States. Automobiles are also becoming more 【34】______ . The smaller automobile with efficient engine can help to conserve a large amount of energy along with planning our 【35】______ more carefully.

Many different studies have shown that we could 【36】______ our energy consumption by 【37】______ half or two thirds and still have the 【38】______ quality of life. And many different types of technologies are currently being researched as to 【39】______ they can be built to use 【40】______ energy and still supply the same service.

【21】

A．conserve

B．consume

C．produce

D．supply

It's very interesting to note where the debate about diversity(多样化)is taking place. It is taking place primarily in political circles. Here at the College Fund, we have a lot of contact with top corporate(公司的)leaders; none of them is talking about getting rid of those instruments that produce diversity. In fact, they say that if their companies are to compete in the global village and in the global market place, diversity is an imperative. They also say that the need for talented, skilled Americans means we have to expand the pool of potential employees. And in looking at where birth rates are growing and at where the population is shifting, corporate America understands that expanding the pool means promoting policies that help provide skills to more minorities, more women and more immigrants. Corporate leaders know that if that doesn't occur in our society, they will not have the engineers, the scientists, the lawyers, or the business managers they will need.

Likewise, I don't hear people in the academy saying "Let's go backward. Let's go back to the good old days, when we had a meritocracy(不拘一格选人才)"(which was never true--we never had a meritocracy, although we've come closer to it in the last 30 years). I recently visited a great little college in New York where the campus has doubled its minority population in the last six years. I talked with an African who has been a professor there for a long time, and she remembers that when she first joined the community, there were fewer than a handful of minorities on campus. Now , all of us feel the university is better because of the diversity. So where we hear this debate is primarily in political circles and in the media--not in corporate board rooms or on college campuses.

The word "imperative"(Line ,Para. 1 )most probably refers to something ______.

A．superficial

B．remarkable

C．debatable

D．essential

Crop Problem

Advances in technology have helped more of the world's population live better and longer -- and that is part of our problem!

Better health standards have kept larger number of people alive．The world’s population is now almost four billion and expected to double in twenty-five years．Growing population and slowly rising living standards have increased our need for food at the rate of 30 million tons per year．As a result, the world's stockpile of food (食物储备) is declining by about 10 million tons per year．

From the early I950s until 1972, world food production increased greatly．The GreenRevolution (绿色革命) extended scientific techniques to agriculture in the form. of hybrid seed (杂交种) and poultry(禽类), chemical fertilizers (化学肥料) and pesticides(杀虫剂), and complex irrigation systems．Strains(品种) of corn (玉米), sorghum (高粱), soybeans（大豆）, wheat and rice were developed to flourish under particular climate and soil conditions．

In the United States, corn production rose to 110 bushels (蒲式耳：谷物、水果、蔬菜等容量单位相当于=36 368升,在美国相当于 35 238升) per acre from only 26 bushels per acre in the early 1900s．Milk production rose to 10 000 pounds per cow per year, compared with 600 in India, Chickens were bred to eat less, grow to maturity in shorter time, and produce more eggs．As a result of such scientific advances, our twelve Midwestern states alone now feed one fourth of the world’s people．

Crop disaster in 1972 brought an apparent end to the growth in production．Much of the extra yields had come from the use of chemical fertilizers, primarily petroleum based and now in short supply．The drop in world supplies of petroleum-based fertilizers is expected to cause a drop in crop yields of ten tons for each one ton decline in fertilizers applied．

This presents a particular problem for underdeveloped nations that often lack the foreign exchange necessary for buying fertilizer．The problem is so severe that Philip Handler, president of the National Academy of Sciences, has predicted one million child deaths per month in these nations by the year 2025．

第 41 题 The expected world population will reach______in 25 years．

A．2 000 000 000

B．4 000 000 000

C．6 000 000 000

D．8 000 000 000

Minister, Distinguished Delegates,

I am very pleased to join you today on behalf of UNAIDS, the Joint United Nations Program that brings together in a focus on AIDS our eight co-sponsoring organizations—the International Labor Organization was officially signed on as our most recent co-sponsor, less than two weeks ago. [TONE]//[TONE]

The HIV epidemic around the globe is continuing to grow—every day, the world sees 15,000 new HIV infections and 8,000 deaths as a result of AIDS. Month by month, AIDS spreads even further. At the beginning of October, a new report was issued by the collaborative group, known as "Monitoring the AIDS Pandemic". This report on trends in the epidemic in Asia and the Pacific noted that in Indonesia, for example, HIV is beginning to emerge strongly where for many years it has been absent. [TONE]∥[TONE]

Across Asia, they concluded, the epidemic is spreading both among populations with the highest risk of exposure and the population at large. In three Asian countries—Thailand, Cambodia and Myanmar, more than 2 per cent of the total adult population is HIV infected. Across the whole of the region, at least 7 million people are living with HIV. [TONE]∥[TONE]

This report shows that looking only at overall national HIV prevalence can give a misleading impression. In countries with large populations—like Indonesia, India or China—millions of people are affected and prevalence in some groups is high. In India, for example, HIV has moved beyond sex workers, injecting drug users and men who have sex with men. India now has nearly four million people living with HIV, and in three states, testing among pregnant women has shown HIV rates above three per cent. [TONE]∥[TONE]

Across the world, 60 million people have been infected with HIV since the epidemic began. Sub- Saharan Africa has been worst affected with seven countries where more than 20% of adults are infected. If we translate these statistics into everyday life, they mean that in these countries today, a 15 year-old faces a 50% risk that they will be infected over their lifetime. They mean that even a relatively wealthy country like South Africa, by the end of the decade is facing a GDP reduced by 17 per cent as a result of AIDS. [TONE]∥[TONE]

Over the past few years, Eastern Europe has seen the fastest rate of HIV growth. For example, the Russian Federation shows the explosive growth of an epidemic fuelled by injecting drug—in a single year in 2000, there were more new HIV infections than in all the previous years of the epidemic combined, and the same rate of growth has continued in 2001. [TONE]∥[TONE]

Cities where HIV was unknown two years ago have reported that now the majority of injecting drug users have become infected, and infections are spreading to their sexual partners and wider. Nearly every region now reports HIV cases. [TONE]∥[TONE]

AIDS is not only a global epidemic of an infectious disease, it is a development issue and at the core of human security. Only by working together with strong determination can we ensure the prosperity of the entire population. [TONE]∥[TONE]

n al. Small wonder, Americans life expectancy has nearly doubled over the past century. Failing hips can be replaced, clinical depression controlled, cataracts removed in a 30-minute surgical procedure. Such advances offer the aging population a quality of life that was unimaginable when I entered medicine 50 years ago. But not even a great health-care system can cure death--and our failure to confront that reality now threatens this greatness of ours.

Death is normal; we are genetically programmed to disintegrate and perish, even under ideal conditions. We all understand that at some level, yet as medical consumers, we treat death as a problem to be solved. Shielded by third-party payers from the cost of our care, we demand everything that call possibly be done for us, even if it's useless. The most obvious ex ample is late-stage cancer care. Physicians-frustrated by their inability to cure the disease and fearing loss of hope in the patient--too often offer aggressive treatment far beyond what is scientifically justified.

In 1950, the U. S. spent $12.7 billion on health care. In 2002, the cost will be $1, 540 billion. Anyone can see this trend is unsustainable. Yet few seem willing to try to reverse it. Some scholars conclude that a government with finite resources should simply stop paying for medical care that sustains life beyond a certain age--say 83 or so. Former Colorado governor Richard Lamm has been quoted as saying that the old and infirm" have a duty to die and get out of the way", so that younger healthier people can realize their potential.

I would not go that far. Energetic people now routinely work through their 60s and be yond, and remain dazzlingly productive. At 78, Viacom chairman Sumner Redstone jokingly claims to be 53. Supreme Court Justice Sandra Day O'Connor is in her 70s, and former surgeon general C. Everett Koop chairs an Internet start-up in his 80s. These leaders are living proof that prevention works and that we can manage the health problems that come naturally with age. As a mere 68-year-old, I wish to age as productively as they have.

Yet there are limits to what a society can spend in this pursuit. As a physician, I know the most costly and dramatic measures may be ineffective and painful. I also know that people in Japan and Sweden, countries that spend far less on medical care, have achieved longer, healthier lives than we have. As a nation, we may be over funding the quest for unlikely cures while under funding research on humbler therapies that could improve people's lives.

What is implied in the first sentence？

A．Americans are better prepared for death than other people.

B．Americans enjoy a higher life quality than ever before.

C．Americans are over-confident of their medical technology.

D．Americans take a vain pride in their long life expectancy.

n explosion; many of us won't now be alive if it weren't for advances in health, 【M1】 ______

agriculture and industry. But in part, technology helps resolve

the population problem, either. It's a never ending cycle. The 【M2】 ______

need for more food discourages development of better 【M3】 ______

technology which naturally keeps more people alive. And

there are no going back to a simple, less technologically 【M4】 ______

complex time. We're here. We're here. We're hungry.

While technology makes this possible for four or even six 【M5】 ______

billion of us to exist, it also eliminates our job opportunities.

In theory, it is impossible that all the goods and services the 【M6】 ______

world needs could be produced by only 2 percent of the

population. This tendency of technology to make workers

superfluous (过剩) but at same time allowing their numbers to 【M7】 ______

grow up so large is creating psychological tensions. 【M8】 ______

Traditionally, work determines our way of life. But if 98

percent of us doesn't need to work, what are we going to do 【M9】 ______

with oneself ？ Something more than work must be found to 【M10】 ______

determine both income and meaning in life otherwise 98

percent of us could be both hungry and frustrated (沮丧) .

【M1】

o note where the debate about diversity (多样化) is taking place. It is taking place primarily in political circles. Here at the College Fund, we have a lot of contact with top corporate (公司的) leaders; none of them is talking about getting rid of those instruments that produce diversity. In fact, they say that if their companies are to compete in the global village and in the global market place, diversity is an imperative. They also say that the need for talented, skilled Americans means we have to expand the pool means promoting policies that help provide skills to more minorities, more women and more immigrants. Corporate leaders know that if that doesn’t occur in our society, they will not have the engineers, the scientist, the lawyers, or the business managers they will need.

Likewise, I don’t hear people in the academy saying. “Let’s go backward. Let’s go back to the good old days, when we had a meritocracy (不拘一格选人才) “ (which was never true-we never had a meritocracy, although we’ve come close to it in the last 30 years). I recently visited a great little college in New York where the campus had doubled its minority population in the last six years. I talked with an African American who has been a professor there for a long time, and she remembers that when she first joined the community, there were fewer than a handful of minorities on campus. Now, all of us feel the university is better because of the diversity. So where we hear this debate is primarily in political circles and in the media-not in corporate board rooms or on college campuses.

第36题：The word “imperative” (Line 5, Para. 1) most probably refers to something ________.

A) superficial

B) remarkable

C) debatable

D) essential