Have you ever heard that we humans use only ten percent of our brains? This opinion holds a certain appeal because if it were true, then we could instantly become ten times more intelligent just by firing up that sleepy majority of the brain! The idea that we use only a small part of the brain dates back to animal experiments in the 19th century. When scientists stimulated a specific part of the brain, the animal moved its leg or tail. If a tiny part of the brain could do something so great, what was the use of the rest of the brain? Some scientists assumed that large parts of the brain were simply useless. Then, in the early 20th century, scientists observed that stimulating certain parts of the brain had no physical effects. They named these seemingly useless parts of the brain the "silent cortex." Today we know that in humans, much of the "silent cortex" is actually devoted to complex activities like language, learning, and imagining. Brain scans have shown that different parts of the brain become much more active as we shift our attention and focus, but even as we sleep, many areas of the brain are extremely active. Would you be smarter if your entire brain constantly worked to maximum capacity ? Interestingly enough, the opposite is probably true. The less brain activity you need to perform a given task, the more the brain as a whole is able to do. What did scientists discover in their experiment in the 20th century? A) The majority of the brain is sleeping. B) Animals' legs and tails have some connection with their brain. C) Stimulation on some parts of the brain causes no physical reaction. D) Certain parts of the brain are devoted to language and learning activities.
C
(Question)
James lives in Hawaii and his mother lives in Korea. James speaks English (he never learned Korean), and his mom only speaks Korean. They communicate perfectly. Eric is from Honduras, but he lives in the U.S. Eric just started learning English and speaks very little. But, everyday Eric reads the latest local US news on the Web, with no problem. What these people (and close to 60 million others around the world) share is a remarkable, free software program called Babylon. Babylon may well be the most advanced translation software in the world, and it's a must-have for anyone whose life goes beyond the borders of their own language or those who want it to. Once you download it, you can simply highlight the part in practically any format, and it's instantly translated into the language of your choice. You can use it to translate a website, email, word doc, pdf, and actually any document in any format you can think of. You can write a document in your native language, and Babylon will instantly translate it into another before you send it. The program translates 75 languages, including Spanish, Chinese, Arabic, Indian, and Russian. It also includes up-to-date encyclopedias , dictionaries, and spell checkers. Babylon is a long way from early translation software that would, more often than not, make an unreadable text with grammar errors that was better suited for making laughs than comprehension. Babylon's ability to understand and translate is perfect. In fact, businesses are adopting Babylon as the standard when it comes to translating commercial communications and other important documents. Babylon is also a great tool for people who are learning another language. Use it anytime you come across a word or passage you don't understand. What users enjoy most is the program's ability to open up a different world to them. Whether it's surfing a news site in a different country, or being able to properly communicate with a family member or friend overseas, Babylon can make it happen. Best of all, Babylon is... Why does the writer mention James and Eric at the beginning of the passage? A) To tell us how to communicate with family. B) To introduce the topic of this passage. C) To inform us that people often ignore cultural diversity. D) To show us how important it is to learn English.
(Answer)
B
Ques: Recent developments in astronomy have made it possible to detect planets in our own Milky Way and in other galaxies. This is a major achievement because,in terms,planets are very small and do not give out light. Finding planets is proving hard enough, but finding life on them will prove _ more difficult. The first question to answer is whether a planet can actually support life. In our own solar system,for example,Venus is far too hot and Mars is far too cold to support life. Only the Earth provides ideal conditions,and even here it has taken more than four billion years for plant and animal life to evolve . Whether a planet can support life depends on the size and brightness of its star, that is its "sun". Imagine a star up to twenty times larger, brighter and hotter than our own sun. A planet would have to be a very long way from it to be capable of supporting life. On the contrary, if the star were small,the life--supporting planet would have to have a close orbit round it and also provide the perfect conditions for life forms to develop. But how would we fund such a planet? At present, there is no telescope in existence that is capable of detecting the presence of life. _ . It is impossible to look for life on another planet using earth--based telescopes. Our own warm atmosphere and the heat generated by the telescope would make it impossible to detect objects as small as planets. Even a telescope in orbit round the earth like the very successful Hubble telescope,would not be suitable because of the dust particles in our solar system. A telescope would have to be as far away as the planet Jupiter to look for life in outer space because the dust becomes thinner the further we travel towards the outer edges of our own solar system. Once we detected a planet,we would have to find a way of blocking out the light from its star, so that we would be able to "see" the planet properly and analyze its atmosphere. In the first instance, we would be looking for plant life,rather than "little green men" .... Why are planets in other solar systems much more difficult to detect than stars? A) Because of the dust particles in our own solar system B) Because of the limitations of earth-based telescope C) Because even the Hubble is not powerful enough to see beyond the Milky Way. D) Because planets are small and dark,and stars are large and radiant
Ans: D
Few buildings on earth can compete with the legendary beauty of the Taj Mahal. Towering over the ancient Indian city of Agra, the Taj Mahal is the grandest monument to love ever created. The lovers in this story are the 17th century Indian emperor Shah Jehan and his wife Mumtaz Mahal. She took a leading role in advising him, which is something unusual for a woman to do for a husband who's an emperor. Over the course of their nineteen-year marriage she gave birth to 14 children. But in 1631 while trying to deliver their fifteenth -- she tragically died. He was heartbroken when she died. And after her death, he decided to build the world's greatest monument ever built, for love. He ordered the royal architects to design the most beautiful building the world had known and decided to name it after his beloved, Mumtaz Mahal. He called on twenty thousand workers and sent many more people to all corners of his country in search of valuable metals and jewels. And after seventeen years of hard work, Shah Jehan's monument was completed and his beloved empress was moved to her final resting place. Everything had gone according to plan, but Shah Jehan's luck was about to change ... In 1658, just four years after the completion of the Taj Mahal, he was thrown out of power. Unfortunately, his son, Aran Azibe imprisoned him, his own father. And he spent the last seven years of his life in prison. And he was allowed to look at the Taj Mahal through a window. His life was in ruins, but when he died his last wish was promised. He was buried beside his beloved wife in the Taj Mahal. What was unusual for Mumtaz Mahal according to the passage? A) She gave birth to 14 children for her husband. B) She gave important advice to her husband. C) She asked her son to imprison his father. D) She planned to build the world's greatest monument.
B