一、1988～1996年硕士研究生入学考试英译汉试题
1. 1988年试题
Seated behind the front desk at a New York firm, the
receptionist was efficient, stylishly dressed, the
firm's newest employee had a pleasant telephone voice
and a natural charm that put clients at ease. The
company was pleased: Clearly, this was a person who took
considerable pride in personal appearance. David King,
the receptionist, is unusual, but by no means unique.
(1) Just as all truck drivers and construction
workers are no longer necessarily men, all secretaries
and receptionists are no longer automatically women.
The number of men in women-dominated fields is still
small and they haven't attracted the attention that has
often followed women advancing into male-dominated
fields, but men are moving into more and more jobs that
have traditionally been held by women.
Strictly speaking, the phenomenon is not new. For the
past few decades, men have been quietly entering fields
such as nursing, social works and elementary education.
But today no jobs seems off-limits. Men serve coffee in
offices and meals on airplanes. (2) These changes are
helping to influence some of the long standing
traditions about the types of work men and women can do
--but they also produce some undeniable problems for the
men who are entering those fields formerly dominated by
women .
What kinds of men venture into these so-called women's
fields? All kinds. I don't know of any define answers
I'd be comfortable with,“ explains Joseph Pleck, Ph. D
. of the Wellesley College Center for Research on women
.Samo Ormont , for example ,a thirty-year-old nurse at
Boston hospital ,went into nursing because the army had
trained him as a medical worker. (3) ”I found that
work very interesting“ he recalled , ”and when I got
out of the service it just seemed natural for me to go
into something medical . I wasn't really interested
in becoming a doctor .“
Thirty-five-year-old David king , an out-of-work actor
,found a job as a receptionist because he was having
trouble landing roles in Broadway plays and he needed to
pay the rent.
(4) In other words, men enter ”female“ jobs out
of the same consider action for personal interest and
economic necessity that motivates anyone looking for
work . But similarities often end there . Men in
female-dominated jobs are conspicuous. As a group, their
work histories differ in most respects from those of
their female colleagues, and they are frequently treated
differently by the people with whom they are in
professional contact .
The question naturally arises ;Why are there still
approximately ninety-nine female secretaries for every
one male ? There is also a more and more serious issue.
Most men don't want to be receptionists, nurses,
secretaries, or sewing workers. Put simply, these are
not generally considered very masculine jobs . To choose
such a line of work is to invite ridicule.
There was kidding in the beginning ,” recalls Ormont.
“Kids coming from school ask what I am , and when I
say 'A nurse' , they laugh at me. I just smile and say,
'You know , there female doctors , too .'”
Still , there are encouraging signs. Years ago, male
grade school teachers were as rare as male nurses. Today
more than one elementary school teacher in six is male.
(5) Can we anticipate a day when secretaries will be
an even mix of men and women--or when the mention of a
male nurse will no longer raise eyebrows ? It's
probably coming--but not very soon .
(1)正像卡车司机和建筑工人再没有必要都是男的一样，
秘书和接待员再也不一定都是女的。
(2)这些变化正影响着长期存在的传统观念中关于男女可以干哪几类工作的看法，但这对于进入原先以妇女为主的那些领域的男人来说，无疑也带来了一些问题。
(3)他回忆说：“我觉得那种工作十分有趣，当我退役时，对我来说，去干某种医务工作，似乎是极其自然的。”
(4)换句话说，男人干起了“女人干”的工作，其动机是同任何找工作干的人一样，既出于个人的兴趣，也出于经济上需要的考虑。
(5)我们能否预见这一天：那时秘书的男女各占一半或有人提到某个男人当护士时，人们不会感到吃惊。
2. 1989年试题
When Jane Mathesen started work at Advanced Electronics
Inc. 12 years ago, (1) She laboured over a
microscope, hand-welding tiny electronic computers and
turned out 18 per hour. Now she turn tends the
computerized machinery that turns out high capacity
memory chips at rate of 2 600 per hour .Production is
up, profits are up, her income is up and Mrs. Mathesen
says the work is for less strain on her eyes .
But the most significant effect of changes AEI was felt
by the workers who are no longer there. Before the
computerized equipment was introduced, there were 940
workers at the plant. Now there were 121. A plant
follow-up survey showed that one year after the layoffs
only 38% of the released workers found new employment at
the same or better wages. Nearly half finally settled
for lower pay and more than 13% are still out of work.
The AEL example is only one of hundreds around the
country which forge intelligently ahead into the latest
technology, but leave the majority of their workers
behind.
(2) Its beginning obscured by unemployment caused by
the world economic slow-down, the new technological
unemployment may emerge as the great socio-economic
challenge of the end of the 20th century. One
corporation economist says the growth of “ machine job
replacement” has been with us since the beginning of
the industrial revolution, but never at pace it is now.
The human costs will be astonishing.(3) “It's
humiliating to be done out of your job by a machine and
there is no way to fight back, but it is the effort to
find a new job that really hurts.” Some workers,
like Jane Mathesen, are retrained to handle the new
equipment, but often a whole new set of skills is
required and that means a new, and invariably smaller,
set of workers. The old workers, trapped by their
limited skills, often never regain their old status and
employment. Many drift into marginal areas. They feel no
pride in their new work. They get badly paid for it and
they feel miserable, but still they are luckier than
those who never find it.
The social costs go far beyond the welfare and
unemployment payments make by the government.
Unemployment increases chances of divorce, child abuse,
and alcoholism, a new federal shows. Some experts say
the problem is only temporary ( that new technology will
eventually create as many new jobs as it destroys. (4) But
futurologist Hymen Seymour says the astonishing
efficiency of the new technology means there will be a
simple and direct net reduction in the amount of labour
that needs to be done. “We should treat this as an
opportunity to give people more leisure. It may not be
easy, but society will have to reach a new unanimity on
the division and distribution of labour.” Seymour
says. He predicts most people will work only six hour
days and four-day weeks by the end of the century. But
the concern of the unemployed is for now. (5) Federally
funded training and free back-to-school programs for
laid-off workers are underway, but few experts believe
they will be able to keep up with the pace of the new
technology. For the next few years, for a
substantial portion of the work force, times are going
to be very tough indeed.
(1)
她吃力地伏在显微镜上干活，用手工焊制小型电子计算机，每小时能焊好18个。
(2)
尽管新技术引起的失业的初兆被世界的经济衰退所造成的失业现象所掩盖，但是新技术引起的失业现象可构成20世纪末的巨大的社会-经济难题。
(3)
被一台机器夺走你的工作是很伤自尊心的，可又无法抗衡，但真正令人伤心的是要费很大的劲才能找到新的工作。
(4) 未来学家海曼·西摩说，新技术具有的惊人效率意味着所需要的劳动力将出现一个绝对的和直接的净减数。
(5)
为失业工人提供的由联邦政府资助的培训计划和免费重返学校学习的计划目前都在实施中，但专家中几乎没人认为这些计划能跟得上新技术的发展步伐。
3. 1990年试题
People have wondered for a long time how their
personalities and behaviors are formed. It is not easy
to explain why one person is intelligent and another is
not, or why one is cooperative and another is
competitive.
Social scientists are, of course, extremely interested
in these types of questions. (1) They want to explain
why we possess certain characteristics and exhibit
certain behavior.
There are no clear answers yet, but two different
schools of thought on the matter have developed. As one
might expect, the two approaches are very different from
each other. The controversy is often conveniently
referred to as “nature vs. nurture.”
(2) Those who support the “nature” side of the
conflict believe that our personalities and behavior are
largely determined by biological factors. (3) That
our environment has little, if anything, to do with our
abilities, characteristics and behavior is central to
this theory. Taken to an extreme, this theory
maintains that our behavior is predetermined to such a
great degree that we are almost completely governed by
our instincts.
Those who support the “nurture” theory, that is,
they advocate education, are often called behaviorists.
They claim that our environment is more important than
our biologically based instincts in determining how we
will act. A behaviorists, B.F. Skinner, sees humans as
beings whose behavior is a almost completely shaped by
their surroundings. The behaviorists maintain that, like
machines, humans respond to environmental stimuli as the
basis of their behavior.
Let us examine the different explanation about one human
characteristic, intelligence, offered by the two
theories. Supporters of the “nature” theory insist
that we are born with a certain capacity for learning
that is biologically determined. Needless to say, they
don't believe that factors in the environment have much
influence on what is basically a predetermined
characteristic. On the other hand, behaviorists argue
that our intelligence levels are product of our
experiences. (4) Behaviorist suggest that the child
who is raised to an environment where there are many
stimuli which develop his or her capacity for
appropriate responses will experience greater
intellectual development.
The social and political implications of these two
theories are profound. In the United States, blacks
often score below whites on standardized intelligence
tests. This leads some “nature” proponents to
conclude that blacks are biologically inferior to
whites. (5) Behaviorists, in contrast, say that
differences in scores are due to the fact that blacks
are often deprived of many of the educational and other
environmental advantages that whites enjoy.
(1)
他们想要说明，为什么我们有某些性格特征和表现出某些行为。
(2) 在这场争论中，赞成“天性”一方面的那些人认为，我们的性格特征和行为模式大多是由生物因素所决定的。
(3)
这种理论的核心是，我们的环境同我们的才能、性格特征和行为即使有什么联系的话，也是微不足道的。
(4)
行为主义的看法是，如果一个儿童在有许多刺激的环境中成长，而这些刺激物能够发展其作出适当反应的能力，那么这个儿童将会有更高的智力发展。
(5)
相反，行为主义者认为，成绩的差异是由于黑人往往被剥夺了白人在教育及其他环境方面所享有的许多有利条件。
4. 1991年试题
The fact is that the energy crisis, which is suddenly
been officially announced, has been with us for a long
time now, and will be with us for an even longer time.
Whether Arab oil flows freely or not, it is clear to
everyone that world industry cannot be allowed to depend
on so fragile a base.
(1) The supply of oil can be shut off unexpectedly at
any time, and in any case, the oil wells will all run
dry in thirty years or so at the present rate of use.
(2) New sources of energy must be found, and this
will take time, but it is not likely to result in any
situation that will restore that sense of cheap and
plentiful energy we have had in the times past. For
an indefinite period from here on, mankind is going to
advance cautiously, and consider itself lucky that it
can advance at all.
To make this situation worse, there is as yet not sign
that any slowing of the world's population is in sight.
Although the birth-rate has dropped in some nations,
including the United States, the population of the world
seems sure to pass six billion and perhaps even seven
billion as the twenty-first century opens.
(3) The food supply will not increase nearly enough
to match this, which means that we are heading into a
crisis in the matter of producing and marketing food.
Taking all this into account, what might we reasonably
estimate supermarkets to be like in the year 2001?
To begin with, the world food supply is going to become
steadily tighter over the past thirty years even here in
the United States. By 2001, the population of the United
States will be at least two hundred fifty million and
possibly two hundred seventy million, and the nation
will find it difficult to expand food production to fill
the additional mouths. (4) This will be particularly
true since energy pinch will make it difficult to
combine agriculture in the high-energy American fashion
that makes it possible to combine few farmers with high
yields.
It seems almost certain that by 2001 the United States
will no longer be a great food-exporting nation and
that, if necessary forces exports, it will be at the
price of belt-tightening at home.
In fact, as food items will tend to decline in quality
and decreases in variety, there is very likely to be
increasing use of flavoring additives. (5) Until such
time as mankind has the sense to lower its population to
the point where the planet can provide a comfortable
support for all, people will have to accept more
“unnatural food”.
(1)
石油供应可能随时被切断；不管怎样，以目前这种石油消费速度，只需30年左右，所有的油井都会枯竭。
(2)
必须找到新的能源，这需要时间，而过去我们感到能源价廉而充足的情况将不大可能出现了。
(3)
食品供应的增长将赶不上人口的增长，这就意味着，我们在粮食生产和购销方面正陷入危机。
(4)
这种困境将是确定无疑的，因为能源的匮乏使农业无法以高能量消耗这种美国耕作方式继续下去，而这种耕作方式使投入极少数农民就可获得高产成为可能。
(5)
除非人类终于意识到要把人口减少到地球能为所有人提供足够的饮食的程度，否则人们将不得不接受更多的“人造食品”。
5. 1992年试题
(1) There is more agreement on the kinds of behavior
referred to by the term than there is on how to
interpret or classify them. But it is generally
agreed that a person of high intelligence is one who can
grasp ideas readily, make distinctions, reason
logically, and make use of verbal and mathematical
symbols in solving problems. An intelligence test is a
rough measure of a child's capacity for learning,
particularly for learning the kinds of things required
in school. It does not measure character, social
adjustment, physical endurance, manual skill, or
artistic abilities. It is not supposed to--it was not
designed for such purposes.(2) To criticize it for
such failure is roughly comparable to criticizing a
thermometer for not measuring wind velocity.
The other thing we have to notice is that the assessment
of the intelligence of any subject is essentially a
comparative affair.
(3) Now since the assessment of intelligence is a
comparative matter we must be sure that the scale with
which we are comparing our subjects provides 'valid' or
'fair' comparison. It is here that some of the
difficulties which interest us begin. Any test performed
involves at least three factors: the intention to one's
best, the knowledge required for understanding what you
have to do, and the intellectual ability to it. (4) The
first two must be equal for all who are being compared,
if any comparison in terms of intelligence is to be
made. In school populations in our culture these
assumption can be made fair and reasonable, and the
value of intelligence testing has been proved
thoroughly. Its value lies, of course, in its providing
a satisfactory basis for prediction. N one is in the
least interested in the marks a little child gets on his
test; what we are interested in is whether we can
conclude from his mark on the test that the child will
do better or worse than other children of his age at
tasks which we think require 'general intelligence'. (5)
On the whole such a conclusion can be drawn with a
certain degree of confidence, but only if the child can
be assumed to have had the same attitude towards the
test as the other with whom he is being compared, and
only if he was not punished by lack of relevant
information which he possessed.
(1)人们对智力那些不同表现的看法比人们对这些表现如何解释或分类的看法更为一致。
(2)批评智力测验不测孩子的性格等情况，犹如批评温度计不测风速一样。
(3)既然对智力的评估是比较而言的，那么我们必须确保，在对我们的对象进行比较时，我们所使用的尺度能提供“有效的”或“公平的”比较。
(4)如果要在智力方面进行任何比较的话，那么对所有被比较的人来说，前两个因素必须是相同的。
(5)总的来说，得出这种结论是有一定程度把握的，但是必须具备两个条件：能够假定这个孩子对测试的态度和与他相比较的孩子态度相同；他也没有因为缺乏其他孩子已掌握的有关知识而被扣分。
6. 1993年试题
(1) The method of scientific investigation is nothing
but the expression of the necessary mode of working of
the human mind; it is simply the mode by which all
phenomena are reasoned about and given precise and
explanations. There is no more difference, but there
is just the same difference, between the mental
operations of a man of science and those of an ordinary
person, as there is between the operations and methods
of a baker or of a butcher weighing out his goods in
common scales, and the operations of a chemist in
performing a difficult and complex analysis by means of
his balance and finely graded weights. (2) It is not
that the scales in the one case, and the balance in the
other, differ in the principles of their construction or
manner of working but that the latter is a much finer
apparatus and of course much more accurate in its
measurement than the former.
You will understand this better, perhaps, if I give you
some familiar examples. (3) You have all heard it
repeated that men of science work by means of induction
and deduction, that by the help of these operations,
they, in a sort of sense, manage to extract from nature
certain natural laws, and that out of these, by some
special skills of their own, they build up their own
theories. (4) And it is imagined by many that the
operations of the common mind can be by no means
compared with these processes, and that they have to be
acquired by a sort of special training. To hear all
these large words, you would think that the mind of a
man of science must be constitute differently from that
of his fellow men; but if you will not be frightened by
the terms, you will discover that you are quite wrong,
and that all these terrible apparatus are being used by
yourselves every day and every hour of your live.
There is a well-known incident in one of Moliere's
plays, where the author makes the hero express unbounded
delight on being told that he had been talking prose (散文）
during the whole of his life. In the same way, I trust
that you will take comfort, and be delighted with
yourselves, on the discovery that you have been acting
on the principles of inductive and deductive philosophy
during the same period. (5) Probably there is not one
here who has not in the course of the day had occasion
to set in motion a complex train of reasoning, of the
very same kind, though differing in degree, as that
which a scientific man goes through in tracing the
causes of natural phenomenon.
(1)
科学研究的方法只不过是人类思维活动的必要表达方式，也就是对一切现象进行思索并给以精确而严谨的表达方式。
(2)
并不是说面包师或卖肉的人所用的磅秤在构造原理或工作方式上和化学家所用的天平存在差异，而是说与前者相比较，后者是一种更精密得多的仪器，因而在计量上必然更准确得多。
(3)
我们都多次听说过，科学家是用归纳法和演绎法工作的，他们用这些方法，在某种意义上讲，力求从自然界找出某种自然规律，然后根据这些规律，用自己的某种非同一般的本领，建立起他们的理论。
(4)
许多人认为，普通人的思维活动根本无法和科学家的思维过程相比，他们并认为这些思维过程必须是经过某种专门训练才能掌握。
(5)
这里大概不会有人在一整天里没有机会进行一连串复杂的思考活动，这些活动与科学家在探索自然现象原因时所经历的思考活动，尽管复杂程度不同，但在类型上是完全一样的。
7. 1994年试题
According to the new school of scientists, technology is
an overlooked forces on expanding the horizons of
scientific knowledge. (1) Science moves forward, they
say, not so much through the insights of great men of
genius as because of more ordinary things like improved
techniques and tools. (2) In short, a leader if
the new school contends, “the scientific revolution,
as w call it, was largely the improvement and invention
and use of a series of instruments that expanded the
reach of science in innumerable directions.”
(3) Over the years, tools and technology themselves
as a source of fundamental innovation have largely been
ignored by historians and philosophers of science. The
modern school that hails technology argues that such
masters as Galileo, Newton, Maxwell, Einstein, and
inventors such as Edison attached great importance to,
and derived great benefit from, craft information and
technological devices of different kinds that were
usable in scientific experiments.
The centerpiece of the argument of a technology-yes,
genius-no advocate was an analysis of Galileo's role at
the start of the scientific revolution. This wisdom of
the day was derived from Ptolemy, an astronomer of the
second century, whose elaborate system of the sky put
earth at the center of all heavenly motions. (4) Galileo's
greatest glory was that in 1609 he was the first person
to turn the newly invented telescope on the heavens to
prove that the planets revolve around the sun rather
than around the earth. But the real hero of the
story, according to the new school of scientists, was
the long evolution in the improvement of machinery for
making eyeglasses.
Federal policy is necessarily involved in the technology
vs. genius dispute. (5) Whether the Government should
increase on the financing of pure science at the expense
of technology or vice versa (反之） often depends on
the issue of which is seen as the driving force.
(1)
他们（新学派科学家）说，科学的发展与其说源于天才伟人的真知灼见，不如说源于改进了的技术和工具等更为普通的东西。
(2) 新学派的一位领袖坚持说：“简而言之，我们所称谓的科学革命，主要是指一系列器具的改进、发明和使用，而这些改进、发明和使用使科学家发展的范围无所不及。”
(3)
工具和技术本身作为根本性创新的源泉多年来在很大程度上被历史学家和科学思想家们忽视了。
(4) 伽利略最光辉的业绩在于他在1609年是第一个把新发明的望远镜对准了天空的人，以证实行星是围绕太阳旋转而不是围绕地球旋转的。
(5)
政府究竟是减少对技术经费的投入来增加对纯理论科学的经费投入，还是相反，这往往取决于把问题的哪一方面看作是驱动的力量。
8. 1995年试题
The standardized educational or psychological tests that
are widely used to aid in selecting, classifying,
assigning, or promoting students, employees, and
military personnel have been the target of recent
attacks in books, magazines, the daily press, and even
in Congress.
(1) The target is wrong, for in attacking the tests,
critics divert attention from the fault that lies with
ill-informed or incompetent users. The tests
themselves are merely tools, with characteristics that
can be measured with reasonable precision under
specified conditions. Whether the results will be
valuable, meaningless, or even misleading depends partly
upon the tool itself but largely upon the user.
All informed prediction of future performance are based
upon some knowledge of relevant past performance: school
grades, research productivity, sales records, or
whatever is appropriate. (2) How well the predictions
will be validated by later performance depends upon the
amount, reliability, and appropriateness of the
information used and on the skill and wisdom with which
it is interpreted. Anyone who keeps careful score
knows that the information available is always
incomplete and that the predictions are always subject
to error.
Standardized tests should be considered in this context.
They provide a quick, objective method of getting some
kinds of information about what a person learned, the
skills he has developed, or the kind of person he is.
The information so obtained has, qualitatively, the same
advantages and shortcomings as other kinds of
information. (3) Whether to use tests, other kinds of
information, or both in a particular situation depends,
therefore, upon the evidence from experience concerning
comparative validity and upon such factors as cost and
availability.
(4) In general, the tests work most effectively when
the qualities to be measured can be most precisely
defined and least effectively when what is to be
measured or predicted cannot be well defined.
Properly used, they provide a rapid means of getting
comparable information about many people. Sometimes they
identify students whose high potential has not been
previously recognized, but there are many things they do
not do. (5) For example, they do not compensate for
gross social inequality, and thus do not tell how able
an underprivileged youngster might have been had he
grown up under more favorable circumstance.
(1)
把标准化测试作为抨击的目标是错误的，因为在抨击这类测试时，批评者不考虑其弊病来自于人们对测试不甚了解或使用不当。
(2)
这些预测在多大程度上为后来的表现所证实，这取决于所采用信息的数量、可靠性和适应性，以及解释这些信息的技能和才智。
(3)
因此，在某一特定的情况下，究竟是采用测试还是采用其他种类的信息，或是两者同时使用，须凭有关相对效度的经验依据而定，也取决于诸如费用和有无来源等因素。
(4)
一般地说，当所要测定的特征能精确地界定时，测试最为有效；而当所要测定或预测的东西不能明确地界定时，测试的效果则最差。
(5)
例如，测试并不弥补明显的社会不公，因此它们不能说明一个物质条件差的年轻人，如果在较好的环境下成长的话，会有多大的才干。
9. 1996年试题
The difference in relative growth of various areas of
scientific research have several causes. (1) Some of
these causes are completely reasonable results of social
needs. Others are reasonable consequences of particular
advances in science being to some extent
self-accelerating. Some, however, are less
reasonable processes of different growth in which
preconceptions of the form of scientific theory ought to
take, by persons in authority, act to alter the growth
pattern of different areas. This is a new problem
probably not yet unavoidable: but it is a frightening
trend. (2) This trend began during the Second World
War, when several governments came to the conclusion
that the specific demands that a government wants to
make of its scientific establishment cannot generally be
foreseen in detail. It can be predicted, however,
that from time to time questions will arise which will
require specific scientific answers. It is therefore
generally valuable to treat the scientific establishment
as a resource or machine to be kept in functional order.
(3) This seems mostly effectively done by supporting
a certain amount of research not related to immediate
goals but of possible consequences in the future.
This kind of support, like all government support,
requires decisions about the appropriate recipients of
funds. Decisions based on utility as opposed to lack of
utility are straightforward. But a decision among
projects none of which has immediate utility is more
difficult. The goal of the supporting agencies is the
praisable one of supporting “good” as opposed to
“bad” science, but a valid determination is
difficult to make. Generally, the idea of good science
tends to become confused with the capacity of the field
in question to generate an elegant theory. (4) However,
the world is so made that elegant systems are in
principle unable to deal with some of the world's more
fascinating and delightful aspects. (5) New forms
of thought as well as new subjects for thought must
arise in the future as they have in the past, giving
rise to new standards of elegance.
(1)
在这些原因中，有些完全是自然而然地来自社会需求，另一些则是由于科学在一定程度上自我加速而取得特定进展的必然结果。
(2)
这种趋势始于第二次世界大战期间，当时一些国家的政府得出结论：政府要向科研机构提出的具体要求通常是无法详尽预见的。
(3)
给某些与当前目标无关但将来可能产生影响的科研以支持，看来通常能有效地解决这个问题。
(4)
然而，世界就是如此，完美的体系一般而言是无法解决世上某些更引人入胜的课题的。
(5)
同过去一样，将来必然会出现的新的思维方式和新的思维对象，给完美以新的标准。
二、英译汉补充练习
Passage 1
One of the earliest and fastest-growing applications of
space technology is the communications satellite ,which
relays wide-band radio and television signals between
widely geographical points. (1) Prior to the advent
of this technology, elaborate and costly chains of
microwave towers were the sole practical means for
passing the line-of-sight radio and TV signals over the
curvature of the earth. In this process, signal
quality is degraded at each relay point, channel
capacity is severely limited and acute scheduling
problems are encountered because it is not feasible to
relay more than one program
at a time to distant points. Moreover, there is no way
to bridge oceans with wide-band signals by means of
microwave relay. (2) Distant points like Alaska and
Hawaii could not share the television service enjoyed on
the continental mainland of the United States as long as
terrestrial microwave was the sole means of wide-band
communication.
The communications satellite has changed all this. The
U. S. public television network has leased relay
capacity in a commercial satellite. Western Union's
WESTAR, and 149 of its 163 member stations are building
10-meter receiving antennas to accept educational and
other programs from a central originating station
located near Washington, D.C. When the antennas are all
in place by the end of this year, the public network
will abandon ground microwave and relay exclusively upon
the space link. (3) Two years later, the public radio
network will be similarly interconnected by means of
smaller (45 meters) receiving antennas.
The shift to the communications satellite will sharply
increase the capacity and flexibility of the public
network to carry educational and other material. (4) Previously
limited to the relay of a single television channel at
one time, the network will now be able to disseminate
four instructional programs simultaneously by satellite.
Member stations will be able to select any two of the
programs, one for immediate use and one that can be
recorded for later use. (5) This will substantially
relieve the scheduling problems which limited the
flexibility of the public broadcasting network when it
was dependent upon ground microwave relay.
(1)
在这种技术出现之前，如果要将无线电的信号传送过地球弯曲的部分，唯一可行的方法是利用精细复杂而耗费巨大的一连串的微波塔。
(2)
以前在陆上微波仍为宽带通讯的唯一方法时，像阿拉斯加和夏威夷等遥远的地方就不能分享美国大陆所享有的电视服务。
(3) 两年以后，公营无线电网也将以较小（4.5米）的接受天线作类似的互联。
(4)
以前限于每次转播一个电视频道，现在公营电视网可经由卫星同时播送四个教学节目。
(5)
这一转变可大大缓解时间安排上的问题。公营广播网以前在依赖地面微波转播时，时间安排的问题曾使公营广播网的灵活性受到限制。
Passage 2
Oil occurs almost exclusively in sedimentary rocks. In
fact, the major petroleum deposits of the world occur in
basins of extremely thick accumulation of sediments. (1)
This association apparently results not only from the
fact that sedimentary rock provide a logical place for
oil to accumulate but also because the oil forms in
sediments.
The term oil refers to naturally occurring liquid
hydrocarbons. Associated gaseous hydrocarbons are
referred to as natural gas. The exact mode of formation
of petroleum has puzzled geologists for many years. (2) Many
facts, however, point almost inescapable to the
conclusion that oil is formed by the decay of animal,
and possibly some plant, remains in a reducing
environment in sedimentary deposits.
Most oil is simply not produced from the rocks in which
it formed . This statement can be demonstrated in two
ways. First, most petroleum deposits occur in relatively
“clean” (uncemented) quartz or quartz of sands tones
which could never have contained enough organic material
to form the amount of petroleum which they now hold; (3)
and second, the rocks which are now forming and which
appear to contain small amounts of hydrocarbon capable
of developing into oil are generally rocks which are not
characteristic of reservoirs for petroleum deposits. Most
of the rocks in which oil appears to be forming in
modern sediments are fine-grained somewhat shays and
could not be effective as reservoirs. (4) Oil,
therefore, must migrate from its source to a suitable
reservoir rock in which it can flow easily enough to be
produced through an oil well. This migration of oil
from source to reservoirs is obviously a topic of
considerable interest to geologists. (5) If the
mechanics of migration are fully known and if source
rocks can be identified in sedimentary sequences, then
it may be possible to predict the occurrence of
reservoir rocks and hence the location of economic
petroleum deposits.
(1)
显然，这种共生关系不只是由于沉积岩为石油的贮积提供了合乎逻辑的产地，而且因为石油形成于沉积物之中。
(2)
但是许多事实都几乎不可避免地集中到这样的结论上，即石油是在沉积物还原环境中由动物遗骸，可能还有一些植物的遗骸的分解所形成的。
(3)
第二，目前正在形成，并似乎含有少量可能发育成石油的碳氢化合物的岩石，通常都没有石油储油层的特征。
(4)
因此，石油肯定是从其源岩转移到适合储油岩中，在这里，它十分顺畅地流动，从而才能通过油井提取出来。
(5)
如果我们已经完全了解石油转移的机制，而且还能够从沉积岩系中鉴别出源岩，那么我们就有可能预测油岩的产生，从而确定出有经济意义的石油矿床的位置。
Passage 3
First if one considers thinking to be a uniquely human
endeavor and intelligence to be a uniquely human
attribute, then, by definition, this process and
attribute cannot be associated with a computer or other
mechanical or artificial system.
(1) On the other hand, it has been argued that if
there is some fundamental physical limitation in the
ability to compute, process, decide, judge, and think
which applies to the creation of machine intelligence,
then these same limitations must also apply to human
intelligence. This argument, of course, discounts
the precept that the essence of intelligence is
mysterious.
(2) A more scientific approach to this whole question
was proposed by Turing in 1950, who suggested that the
question can be answered by experiment and observation
in which the relative behavior of the computer is
compared with the human behavior. To this end Turing
proposed a question and answer technique where the
trappings of both the machine and a man are hidden and
questions are asked and answered via a teletype. (3) If
one could, by asking questions, reliably determine
whether the machine or the man is answering the
questions, then one would question whether the machine
is intelligent or whether it exhibits the same
intelligence as the man. On the other hand, if one
could not tell the difference, then it could be said
that the machine is as intelligent as man. This
limitation game is an interesting approach which has not
yet been fully explored.
(4) Perhaps a more rational approach to this question
is to visualize a continuous intelligence space where
men, machine, animals, plants, or what have you are
positioned in the space based on their relative
intelligence. Thus, one could consider all things as
having some degree of intelligence. This approach
sidesteps or compromises the question “Are machines
intelligent?” rather than truly answering it.
(5) Another common argument against the concept of
machine intelligence is that a computer isn't dumb
machine which does only what it is told by its human
programmer. But if one critically examine the nature
of human intelligence, one must admit that his
biological system along with the adaptive ability of his
behavior both endowed by nature and the totality of his
experience give him these unique powers of thoughts and
intelligence.
(1)但是，另一方面，人们又争辩说，如果认为在机器智能的计算、处理、决策、判断和思维能力方面存在什么基本的物理限制，那么，这些限制也必然使用于人类的智能。
(2)1950年，Turing提出了一种比较科学的方法来处理这种问题。他认为，通过实验和观察来比较计算机与人的行为，就可以回答计算机是否具有与人同样的智能的问题。
(3)如果观察者能通过提问准确地确定是人还是机器在做出回答，
那就不能证明机器是否具有智能或者机器是否具有与人一样的智能。
(4)或许，更合理的方法，是想象一个连续的智能空间，按照他们的相对智能水平，人、机器、动物、植物等等都能在这个空间中安排一个适当的位置。
(5)反对机器有智能的另一种普遍的论点认为，计算机是一种无声的机器，它只是按照人给出的程序工作。
Passage 4
Communication technology is in a period of revolutionary
change. (1) The new inventions and developments, such
as communication satellite, optical fiber, large-scale,
integration, computers and microcomputers, video
telephone data banks, and packet switching networks,
etc., are involved. Any one of them has enormous
potential. Take in combination, they will change the
entire fabric of society.
(2) Few technologies could have as profound an effect
on human condition as the full development of these
inventions, and certainly additional inventions in
telecommunications are yet to come, some perhaps of even
greater impact. (3) The last quarter of the
twentieth century will be remembered as the era when man
acquired new communication channels to other men, to
libraries of film and data, and to the prodigious
machines.
International cooperation, in the new era, will flourish
with the help of worldwide computer networks. Human
talent, the scarcest resource in the coming cybernetic
age, will be made available worldwide. Communications
are essential factor to a growing world economy.
Business and social patterns will change as
screen-to-screen communication proves more efficient
than traveling. In the future, traveling will be more
for pleasure than for business. Certain type of people
may work at home much of the time, dialing computers and
participating in teleconferences. In addition, they may
shop at home, receives education at home, be entertained
at home, and interlink each other's homes with video
devices. (4) Money transactions will generally be
handled without cash or check, and a man's credit rating
will mean more than his pedigree. Furthermore, our
concepts of privacy may change in a world of
interconnecting computers.
In an ear of “Limits to Growth” in the conventional
trapping of affluence and limits to growth in
transportation, because of world's rapidly declining
resources and rapidly growing population and pollution,
there are no limits to growth in telecommunications or
culture.
Physical communications like railways and canals had a
major effect on the growth of the Industrial Revolution.
To a large extent, they made it possible. (5) The
same is true in the information revolution, and
unavailability of communication links will impede
progress.
(1)这一时期出现了许多新的发明和进展，诸如，通讯卫星、光导纤维、大规模集成电路、计算机及微型计算机、数据库、分组交换网络等等。
(2)很少有技术能像通讯变革这样对人类生活的条件产生如此深刻的影响，而具有更大冲击力的通讯新发明仍然肯定会出现。
(3)20世纪的最后25年将成为一个历史的新纪元而被人们所永远怀念；正是在这个时期，人们获得了新的通讯手段来同别人、同图象和数据库系统，以及同复杂的机器打交道。
(4)银行事务将不通过现金和支票处理，人的信誉高于门第。
(5)信息革命也面临同样的情形，没有高度发达和完善的通讯，信息革命是不可能取得成功的。
Passage 5
Have there always been cities? (1) Life without large
urban areas may seem inconceivable to us, but actually
cities are a relatively recent development. Groups
with primitive economies still manage without them. The
trend, however, is for such groups to disappear, while
cities are increasingly becoming the dominant mode of
man's social existence.
Historically, city life has always been among the
elements which form a civilization. Any high degree of
human endeavor and achievement has been closely related
linked to life in an urban environment. (2) It is
virtually impossible to imagine that universities,
hospitals, large businesses or even science and
technology could have into being without cities to
support them. To most people, cities have
traditionally been the areas where there was a
concentration of culture, as well as of opportunity.
(3) In recent years, however, people have begun to
become aware that cities are also areas where there is a
concentration of problems. What has happened to the
modern American city? Actually, the problem is not such
a new one. Long before this century started, there had
begun a trend toward the concentration of the poor of
the American society into the cities. Each great wave of
immigration from abroad and from the rural areas made
the problem worse. During this century, there has also
been the development of large suburban areas surrounding
the cities, for the rich prefer to live in these areas.
Within the cities, sections may be sharply divided into
high and low rent districts, the “right of the town”
and the slums.
Of course, everyone wants to do something about this
unhappy situation. But there is no agreement as to
goals. Neither is there an systematic approach or
integrated program. Opinions are as diverse as the
people who give them. But one basic difference of
opinion concerns the question of whether or not the city
as such is to be preserved. Perhaps transportation and
the means of communication have really made it possible
for there to be an end to the big cities.
It is probably true to say that most people prefer to
preserve the cities. Some think that the cities could be
cleaned up or totally rebuilt. This is easy to say; it
would not be so easy to do. (4) To be true, a great
rebuilding project would give jobs to many of those
people who need them. Living conditions would not
help but improve, at least for a while. But would the
problems return after the rebuilding was completed?
Nevertheless, with the majority of the people living in
urban areas, the problem of cities must be solved. (5) From
agreement on this general goal, we have unfortunately,
in the past proceeded to disagreement on specific goals,
and from there to total inaction. At the basis of
much of this inaction is an old fashioned concept ( the
idea that human conditions will naturally tend to
regulate themselves for the general goal.
(1)对我们来说，生活中要是没有广大城市地区似乎是不可想象的，但实际上城市还是比较近期才发展起来的。
(2)如果没有城市的支持，简直很难想象会有大学、医院、大企业，甚至连科学技术也不会有。
(3)可是，近几年人们开始意识到城市也是问题成堆的地方。
(4)诚然，一个宏伟的重建项目也许能为需要工作的人提供就业机会。
(5)遗憾的是，过去我们在总体目标方面意见是一致的，但在涉及到各个具体目标时，意见就不一致，因而也根本没有采取行动。
Passage 6
We took as our first objective the problem of
productivity. (1) For far too long the average level
of productivity in this country had been lower than as
to be expected when the quality of the labor force was
considered. (2) We attacked restrictive practices
wherever they existed; we instituted measures for the
more rational deployment of labor; and we greatly
improved the relationship between management and
workers. The result, as you all you know, is that
productivity is higher now than ever before.
Then we embarked on a nation-wide scheme of regional
planning, both industrial and social, thereby ensuring
that areas of the country which had for years been
underproductive and undersupplied with social amenities
were able to contribute more effectively to the national
effort.
(3) Next, we instituted the largest programme of
educational expansion that the country has ever seen.
From infant school to university, the nation's
educational resources were extended and revitalized in a
way that over the years will ensure that our greatest
national asset ( our children and young people ( will
continue to get the education that they deserve.
Finally, we made sweeping reductions in government
expenditure.(4) The whole area of national and local
government was subjected to a most searching financial
scrutiny, and wherever they occurred, inefficiency and
waste were attacked and non-essential projects were
brought swiftly to an end. (5) It was partly as a
result of those economies that many of our most
important new projects in other fields became possible.
These new projects have enabled us to lay a firm
foundation for better things. It is at this stage that
we may confidently begin to examine the route we wish to
follow in the future.
(1)如果考虑到我国劳动力的素质，那么我国生产率的平均水平一直低于我们理应达到的水平的情况延续的太久了。
(2)哪里存在阻碍生产率发展的做法，我们就在哪里加以反对。我们实施了许多旨在更加合理地安排劳动力的措施，我们大大改进了劳资之间的关系。
(3)其次，我们实施了国家有史以来教育发展方面最庞大的计划。
(4)我们对中央和地方主管的各个领域进行了及其严格的财政检查。同时，不论在哪里，只要出现效率不高和浪费现象，都一概加以反对，一些非必要的项目也同时下马。
(5)在一定程度上，正是由于采取了这些节约措施，在其他方面的许多重要的新项目才得以实现。
Passage 7
People all over the world today are beginning to hear
and learn more and more about the problem of pollution.
(1) Pollution is caused either by the released by man
of completely new and often artificial substances into
the environment, or by releasing greatly increased
amounts of a natural substance, such as oil from tankers
into the sea.
(2) The whole industrial process which makes many of
the goods and machines we need and use in our daily
lives, is bound to create a number of waste products
upset the environment balance, or the ecological balance
as it is also known. Many of these waste products
can be prevented or disposed of sensibly, but clearly
while more and more new goods are produced and made
complex, there will be new, dangerous wastes to be
disposed of, for example, the waste products from
nuclear power stations. Many people, therefore, see
pollution as only part of a larger and more complex
problem, that is, the whole process of industrial
production and consumption of goods. (3) Others again
see the problem mainly in connection with agriculture,
where new methods are helping farmers grow more and more
on their land to feed our ever-increasing populations.
However, the land itself is gradually becoming worn out
as it is being used, in some cases, too heavily, and
artificial fertilizers cannot restore the balance.
(4) Whatever its underlying reasons, there is no
doubt that much of the pollution cause could be
controlled if only companies, individuals and
governments would make more efforts. In the home
there is an obvious need to control litter and waste.
Food comes wrapped up three or four times in packages
that all have to be disposed of; drinks are increasingly
sold in bottles or tins which cannot be reused. This not
only cause a litter problem, but also is a great waste
of resources, in terms of glass, metals and paper. (5) Advertising
has helped this process by persuading many of us not
only to buy things we neither want or need, but also
throw away much of what we do buy. Pollution and
waste combine to be problem everyone can help to solve
by cutting out unnecessary buying, excess consumption
and careless disposal of the products we use in out
daily lives.
(1)
污染的形成，是由于人类向环境中排放一些全新物质，通常是人造物质；或者是由于大量地向环境排放天然物质，如油轮中石油泄放到海洋中。
(2)
工业生产的整个过程帮助人们制造出日常生活中所需使用的各种物品和机器，同时，也必然产生大量的废弃物，从而破坏环境平衡和生态平衡，这已为人所知。
(3)
有的人则把环境污染问题主要看成是农业中的问题，农业中新的生产方式的采用，使得农民们能从地里收获更多的粮食以适应人口的不断增长。
(4)
不管形成污染的原因是什么，只要公司、个人，以及政府做出进一步的努力，许多污染无疑能够得到控制。
(5)
广告助长了这种浪费，因为广告不但诱使人们购买既不想要也不需要的东西，而且使人们扔掉许多已经买到手的东西。
Passage 8
After the World War II, the invention and increasing use
of the microchip brought about great changes in the
structure of man's social production. (1) While the
primary industry (agriculture) and the secondary
industry (manufacturing) remain to be important, there
have been rapid advances in the tertiary industry
(services) And there is now talk of a fourth
industry, the information industry.
(2) In the industrialized world, that is, in the
United States, Europe and Japan, about two thirds of
jobs are now in the service sector, and the number is on
the rise. Of course, there are roughly two different
groups of job-holders in the service sector itself. The
jobs in the first group, such as retail sales, food
services, trucking and other services, which are
unskilled occupations, are low wage, while in the second
group are high-paid investment bankers, computer
programmers, high technicians, etc., who are able to
solve complicated problem by applying information. And
the second group of service job-holders represent the
future in economic development.
(3) It is argued that in future people should no
longer be classified as white collar or blue collar, but
rather as knowledge workers and non-knowledge workers. The
knowledge workers can not only read and write and
perform rote tasks, they must meet the basic requirement
of computer literacy and constantly think up new ways to
meet the changing demands of increasing productivity.
More and more people are learning to competent in using
personal computers, digital communications and factory
robots. Breakthroughs in bio-engineering, artificial
intelligence, new materials, and still unimagined fields
of technology and management will greatly advance
productivity. (4) It is people with the most advanced
knowledge who will take the lead, and systems analyst,
computer scientists and programmer, management analysts
and inventors and developers are in most demand in the
industrialized countries.
The only way to greater knowledge is through education
and training. (5) Knowledge, as much as capital,
material resources and sweat, has become an essential
factor of production —maybe the essential factor.
The educational system of a society ought to enable its
members to make rapid transition to the above-described
knowledge-based work. Otherwise, that society will
inevitably lad behind.
(1)
在第一产业（农业）和第二产业（制造业）仍保持其重要性的同时，第三产业（服务业）已有了迅速的发展。
(2)
在工业化的世界里，也就是在美国、欧洲和日本，当今约2/3的职业是在服务部门，而且这个数字还在增长。
(3)
有人论证说，在未来人们不应再划分白领和蓝领，而应划分知识型工作者和非知识型工作者。
(4)
领先的将是具有先进知识的人，系统分析员、计算机科学家和程序编制员、管理分析员以及发明家和研制人员在工业化国家里最为重要。
(5)
知识，如同资本、物质资源和汗水一样，已经变成了生产的一个必要因素(也许是最基本的因素)。
Passage
9
(1) Every time you try to answer a question that asks
why, you engage in the process of causal analysis —you
attempt to determine a cause or series of causes for a
particular effect. When you try to answer a question
that asks what if, you attempt to determine what effect
will result from a particular cause. You will have
frequent opportunity to us causes and effect analysis in
the writing that you will do in college. For example, in
history you might be asked to determine the causes of
the Seven Day War between Egypt and Israel; in political
science you might be asked to determine the reasons why
Ronald Rengan won the 1984 Presidential election; and in
sociology you might be asked to predict the effect that
changes in Social Security legislation would have on
senior citizens.
Determining causes and effects is usually
thought-provoking and quit complex. One reasons for this
is that there are two types of causes: immediate causes,
which are readily apparent because they are closest to
the effect, and ultimate cause, which, being somewhat
removed, are not so apparent and perhaps even hidden.
(2) Furthermore, ultimate causes may bring about
effects which themselves become immediate causes, this
creating a causal chain. For example, consider the
following causal chain: Sally, a computer salesperson,
prepared extensively for a meeting with an important
client (ultimate cause), impressed the client (immediate
cause), and made a very large sale (effect). The chain
did not stop there: The large sale cause her to be
promoted by here employer (effect).
(3) A second reason why causal analysis can be so
complex is that an effect may have any number of
possible or actual causes, and a cause may have any
number of possible or actual effects. An upset
stomach may be caused by eating spoiled food, but it may
also be caused by overeating, flu, allergy, nervousness,
pregnancy, or any combination of factors. Similarly, the
high cost of electricity may have multiple effects:
higher profits for utility companies, fewer sales of
electrical appliances, higher prices for other products,
and the development of alternative sources of energy.
Sound reasoning and logic, while present in all good
writing, are central to any causal analysis. (4) Writers
of believable causal analysis examine their material
objectively and develop their essays carefully. They
are convinced by their own examination of the material,
but are not afraid to admit other possible causes and
effects.
Because people are accustomed to thinking of causes with
their effects, they sometimes commit an error in logic
known as the “after this, therefore because of this”
fallacy. This fallacy leads people to believe that
because on event occurred after another event the first
event somehow caused the second: That is, they sometimes
make causal connections that are not proven. (5) For
example, if students began to perform better after a
free breakfast program was instituted at their school,
one could not assume that the improvement was caused by
the breakfast program. There could of course be any
number of other causes for this effect, and a
responsible writer on the subject would analyze and
consider them all before suggesting the cause.
(1) 每当你试图回答一个问及“为什么”的问题时，你就是在进行因果分析了：也就是说，你正在努力寻找决定某个结果的某个原因或一系列原因。
(2)
而且，由于根本原因产生的结果本身有成为枝节原因的可能，从而产生一个因果链。
(3)
因果分析如此复杂的第二个原因是：某个结果可能是由任何个可能的或实际的原因造成的，而某个原因又可能引发任何个可能或实际的结果。
(4)
能进行令人信服的因果分析的作家必须客观分析有关材料，并且谨慎地组织文章，进行阐述和发挥。
(5)
例如，某学校实施了一项免费早餐计划，在此之后，学生们的表现有了改善，我们不能由此认为这一改善是由于那个免费早餐计划。
Passage
10
(1) From the viewpoint of social problems, the
self-fulfillment urge, accompanied by a demand for
affluence, causes a failure to look outward on society
and its needs. Contributing to the needy, to
disturbed children, or to the elderly, or giving
attention to a threatened environment, are all seen as a
threat to both affluence and self-fulfillment. However,
Yankelvich comes to the conclusion that the “me”
generation is on the wane. More people are becoming
concerned with problems of society and are taking a
mature look at responsibilities rather than mere
personal wish-fulfillment. Such a change is necessary as
a condition for tackling out social problems. (2) The
change is necessary, too, because our economy will
probably prove incapable of the constant expansion of
affluence called for by the self-fulfillment values of
the 1970s.
The well-known futurist Alvin Toffler writes along lines
similar to the analysis of Yankelovich regarding a
required change in values. In the Third wave, he speaks
of the agricultural revolution and the industrial
revolution as the first and second great waves in human
development. (3) Now, he says, we are entering a
third wave in which many of the values and traits of
older industrial society are fading. In line with
the third wave, he continues, are those who recognize
that the most urgent problems of the world ( food,
energy, arms control, population, poverty, resources,
ecology, climate, the problems of the aged, the
breakdown of urban community, the need for productive,
rewarding work ( can no longer be resolved within the
framework of the traditional industrial framework.
No one would object to seeing these problems solved if
the solutions were simple and inexpensive of effort and
if we were fully in accord on social goals. (4) Obviously,
though, as our discussion of conflicts of interest makes
clear, we are not in full accord on what to do. In
many cases, too, the solution of social problems
involves too much expense and effort to awaken the
interest of “me” centered people. (5) Another
important consideration is that while the tasks before
the American economy loom increasingly large, economic
stagnation is occurring in varying degrees in the United
States and much of the industrialized world. What
are the possibilities for coping with our social problem
under these circumstances?
(1)从社会问题的角度来看，自我实现的渴望再加上追求致富，使得我们未能从外部来看待社会和社会需求。
(2)这种变化也是必要的，因为面对20世纪70年代自我实现的价值观所提倡的追求致富的不断膨胀，我们的经济将会显得无能为力。
(3)他说，现在我们正在进入第三次浪潮，旧工业社会的特征和价值观有许多都逐渐过时了。
(4)不过，很显然，正如我们对利益冲突的讨论所清楚表明的，我们还没有就该做什么达成完全的一致。
(5)另外值得着重考虑的一点是：在美国经济所面临的任务变得日益严重的同时，在美国和其他大多数工业化国家都出现了不同程度的经济停滞不前。
Passage 11
For more than two decades, America's public schools have
been expected to cure society's discontents. (1) In
the mid-Fifties, we demanded that our schools create a
harmony among races that existed nowhere else in
American life. (2) In the mid-Sixties, when our
young were engaged in a rebellion that seemed to
threaten virtually every ideal we embraced as a nation,
we insisted that the schools restore social order and
preserve the status quo. In the mid-Seventies, we
instructed our schools to go one step further — to
look first to the wants of the individual, to nurture a
child's discovery of self, while at the same time
distracting him from his attempts to reduce his school
to rubble.
(3) Clearly, this prolonged and ill-advised effort to
make the education system the principal tool for social
change has contributed to such problems as the sharply
increased incidence of functional; illiteracy.
To
rehabilitate our schools, we must look to the hard
realities of why our system of public education is not
working and learn from them.
Schools are asked to do too much. Racial, economic, and
sexual inequalities, poor parenting malnutrition crime;
and a lengthy list of other social disorders
unquestionably affect an individual's capacity to
participate in society. But while education can enhance
the students' ability to cope with, and to change, the
conditions of life around them, it cannot, in and of
itself, make them better. In thrusting the schools to
the forefront of social change, we have diverted their
energies from their basic purpose — education.
The issue of acculturation of ethnic minorities provides
a case in point. Greater emphasis has been placed on
bilingual education in the public schools as the number
and variety of ethnic minorities have grown in the
nation. (4) We are insisting both that the schools
improve the way they teach English, so that language is
removed as a barrier to learning and that they increase
the number of courses taught in students' native
tongues, so that the pace of learning begun in their
homelands continues uninterrupted. The conflict that
such demands create can be seen in Chicago where as a
condition of $90 million in aid, the federal government
extracted a pledge that the public schools offer
bilingual courses in 20 languages, from Arabic to
Vietnamese.
While we do not yet know what effect the study of major
courses in a native language has on a child's ability to
learn English, we may be allowed the suspicion that it
will prove as counter-productive as it sounds. In
addition the burden these extra courses place on the
schools is obvious.
(5) Once we stop asking the schools to do too much
they can get on with solving the more acute problem of
performing their basic task — that of education —
more effectively.
(1) 50年代中期我们曾要求学校创造一个种族和谐的气氛，那时在美国任何其他地方的生活都还没有这种气氛。
(2) 60年代中期，当我们的年轻一代参与了一场造反运动而这场造反似乎会危及到我们作为一个国家所信奉的全部理想时，我们又坚持要学校恢复社会秩序并保持现状。
(3)
很清楚，为把教育制度变成社会变革的主要手段的旷日持久的不明智的努力已经引发了诸如半文盲的激增等一系列问题。
(4)
我们不主张各学校改进教授英语的方法以使语言不再构成学习的障碍；同时还主张增加用学生们的母语教授的课程的数量，以使学生们在他们的祖国开始的学习进度得以继续，不受阻挡。
(5)
一旦我们不再对学校提出过分的要求，它们就能继续解决如何才能更有效地完成它们的根本任务
(教育这一急迫的问题)。
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