The idea that computers have some amount of “intelligence” is not new, says Ralph Haupter, the president of Microsoft Asia, pointing as far back as 1950 when computer pioneer Alan Turing asked whether machines can think. “So it has taken nearly 70 years for the right combination of factors to come together to move AI from concept to reality,” says Haupter.
It is predicted that the development of artificial intelligence will be the story of the coming generations, not just the coming year, but as 2019 gets underway, you’ll find AI will begin to touch your life in many ways according to some researchers.
“Personal assistant AIs will keep getting smarter. As our personal assistants learn more about our daily routines, I can imagine the day I need not to worry about preparing dinner. My AI knows what I like to eat, which days of the week I like to cook at home, and makes sure that when I get back from work all my groceries are waiting at my doorstep, ready for me to prepare that delicious meal I had been longing for.” ---Alecjandro Troccoli, senior research scientist, NVIDIA.
“Thanks to AI, the face will be the new credit card, the new driver’s license and the new barcode (条形码). Facial recognition is already completely transforming security with biometric capabilities being adopted, and seeing how technology and business are connected, like Amazon is with Whole Foods, I can see a near future where people will no longer need to stand in line at the store.” ---Georges Nahon, president, Orange Institute, a global research laboratory.
“2019 will be the year AI becomes real for medicine. By the end of the year we’re seeing solutions for population health, hospital operations and a broad set of clinical specialties quickly follow behind.” ---Mark Michalski, executive director, Massachusetts General Hospital.
1.What can we know about AI from the first two paragraphs?
A.People didn't expect AI to develop so rapidly.
B.The idea of AI just came up recently.
C.The concept of AI was put forward by Ralph Haupter.
D.It took more than 70 years to turn the concept into reality.
2.Who sees the future of AI doing housework instead of human being?
A.Alan Turing. B.Georges Nahon. C.Mark Michalski. D.Alejandro Troccoli.
3.What is Georges Nahon’s job?
A.Executive director of a hospital. B.President of a research laboratory.
C.Chairman of an energy corporation. D.Chief operating officer of a newspaper.
4.How is the passage developed?
A.By explaining cause and effect. B.By presenting research results.
C.By listing some predictions. D.By describing personal experiences.
A team of engineers at Harvard University has been inspired by Nature to create the first robotic fly. The mechanical fly has become a platform for a series of new high-tech integrated systems. Designed to do what a fly does naturally, the tiny machine is the size of a fat housefly. Its mini wings allow it to stay in the air and perform controlled flight tasks.
“It’s extremely important for us to think about this as a whole system and not just the sum of a bunch of individual components,” said Robert Wood, the Harvard engineering professor who has been working on the robotic fly project for over a decade. A few years ago, his team got the go-ahead to start piecing together the components. “The added difficulty with a project like this is that actually none of those components are off the shelf and so we have to develop them all on our own,” he said.
They engineered a series of systems to start and drive the robotic fly. “The seemingly simple system which just moves the wings has a number of interdependencies on the individual components, each of which individually has to perform well, but then has to be matched well to everything it’s connected to,” said Wood. The flight device was built into a set of power, computation, sensing and control systems. Wood says the success of the project proves that the flying robot with these tiny components can be built and manufactured.
While this first robotic flyer is linked to a small, off-board power source, the goal is eventually to equip it with a built-in power source, so that it might someday perform data-gathering work at rescue sites, in farmers’ fields or on the battlefield. “Basically, it should be able to take off, land and fly around,” he said.
Wood says the design offers a new way to study flight mechanics and control at insect-scale. Yet, the power, sensing and computation technologies on board could have much broader applications. “You can start thinking about using them to answer open scientific questions, you know, to study biology in ways that would be difficult with the animals, but using these robots instead,” he said. “So there are a lot of technologies and open interesting scientific questions that are really what drives us on a day to day basis.”
1.Which of the following statements was the difficulty engineers met while making the robotic fly?
A.They did not have sufficient fund.
B.No ready-made components were available.
C.There was no model in their mind.
D.It was hard for them to assemble the components.
2.What can be inferred from paragraphs 3 and 4?
A.The robotic fly has been put into wide application.
B.The robotic fly consists of a flight device and a control system.
C.Information from many sources can be collected by the robotic fly.
D.The robotic fly can just fly in limited areas at present.
3.Which of the following can be learned from the passage?
A.Wood’s design can replace animals in some experiments.
B.Animals are not allowed in biological experiments.
C.The robotic flyer is designed to learn about insects.
D.There used to be few ways to study how insects fly.
4.Which of the following might be the best title of the passage?
A.The Development of Robotic Fly
B.Robotic Fly Promotes Engineering Science
C.Harvard’s Efforts in Making Robotic Fly
D.Robotic Fly Imitates Real Life Insect
A dog spent the last four years of his life waiting a crossroad in the Thai city of Khon Kaen as if waiting for someone. People originally thought the dog had been abandoned, but then realized that he looked healthy, so people asked around about him. It turned out that the dog had indeed been spending most of his time around that crossroad, but a woman had been coming round regularly to bring him food and water.
One day, while photographing the dog everyone called Leo, a reporter met the woman who had been taking care of him. She had come to drop off some food. After learning the story about the dog and the woman, the reporter decided to share the story on social media. The post soon went viral and the photos of Leo got shared hundreds of times. And the photos reached the eyes of Leo’s former old owner.
Nang Noi Sittisarn, a 64-year-old woman from Thailand’s Roi Et Province, almost had a heart attack when her daughter showed her a photo of the beloved dog named BonBon she had lost during a car trip. When she learned that he had been waiting for her in the same spot for the last four years，her heart melted(融化).
Auntie Noi told her daughter to drive her to where the dog was waiting. When she got there and called his name. BonBon，the poor dog started wiggling(扭动)his tail and came to her，but when she tried to take him home with her, he was unwilling to follow. She didn’ t want to force the dog to come with her so she agreed to leave him with his new master. However, she and her daughter will come to visit him regularly.
1.Why did the dog look healthy after separation from his former owner?
A.He walked around the crossroad constantly.
B.He was kept at a woman’s home all the time.
C.A local reporter brought him food and water.
D.A woman looked after him on a regular basis.
2.What does the underlined phrase “went viral” in paragraph 2 probably mean?
A.Changed surprisingly. B.Spread quickly.
C.Appeared gradually. D.Fell directly.
3.How did Nang Noi Sittisam feel about the dog's waiting for her?
A.Shocked. B.Regretful. C.Touched. D.Proud.
4.What can we mainly learn from the story about the dog?
A.Unbelievable success is worth waiting for.
B.We should adjust ourselves to environments.
C.We need to learn to be faithful and thankful.
D.No one knows the result until the last minute
Each applicant to Harvard College is considered with great care. We consider each applicant to Harvard College as a whole person, and put enormous care into evaluating every application. We hope you will explore the information in this section to understand what we look for in our admissions process.
How to Apply
Submit your application through the Common Application, the Coalition Application, or the Universal College Application. Each is treated equally by the Admissions Committee. Complete and submit your materials as soon as possible to ensure full and timely consideration of your application. View our Application Tips for step-by-step information.
When to Apply
Date | Deadline | Date | Deadline |
November 1 | Early Action Deadline | March 1 | Financial Aid Application deadline |
November 1 | Early Financial Aid Application deadline | Late March | Decision letters mailed |
Mid - December | Early Auction decisions released | May 1 | Reply date for Admitted Students |
January 1 | Regular Decision deadline |
|
|
What We Look For
We seek promising students who will contribute to the Harvard community during their college years, and to society throughout their lives.
While academic accomplishment is the basic requirement, the Admission Committee considers many other factors—strong personal qualities, special talents or excellences of all kinds, perspectives formed by unusual personal circumstances, and the ability to take advantage of available resources and opportunities.
We outline everything you need to apply to Harvard.
Click https: //college. harvard. edu/admissions/apply to get detailed requirements.
1.Where can you find step-by-step information of how to apply?
A. Common Application. B. Coalition Application.
C. Universal College Application. D. Application Tips.
2.Which is the final day for Financial Aid Application?
A. November 1. B. January 1.
C. March 1. D. May 1.
3.What is the basic requirement to apply for Harvard University?
A. Academic accomplishment. B. Strong personal qualities.
C. Special talents. D. Unique perspectives.
阅读下面材料，然后按要求写一篇150词左右的英语短文。
A set of textbooks designed to help high school students learn about traditional Chinese culture is to be published soon Beijing Times reported on Monday.
The books are the first national-level works of their kind and have been developed by a working group that promotes traditional culture. They will be used by students from autumn this year the report said.
The set contains four classics from ancient times. Two of the works Confucian Analects and Mencius are for 10 th -grade students while the other two Great Learning and Dao De Jing will be used by 11 th graders.
The initiative follows a series of steps the authorities have taken in recent years to spread and promote traditional Chinese culture on campus.
Last April the Ministry of Education released a series of guidelines requiring the inclusion of more information about traditional culture in primary and middle school textbooks especially those used for subjects such as Chinese language history art and physical education.
The guidelines said students’ knowledge of traditional culture will be tested in the senior high school entrance examination and the gaokao --- the college entrance exam.
（写作内容）
1. 用约 30 个单词写出上文概要；
2. 用约 120 个单词就”高中生学国学”这一主题发表你的观点，内容包括:
⑴ 国学入高中的缘由；
⑵ 你对这一举动的看法。
（写作要求）
1. 阐述观点或提供论据时，不能直接引用原文语句；
2. 作文中不能出现真实姓名和学校名称；
3. 不必写标题。
（评分标准）内容完整，语言规范，语篇连贯，词数适当。
___________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________
根据短文内容，填写表格。
A great many parents send their children to pre-schools - educational programs for children under the age of five. It has been said that this is the time period when the brain does over fifty percent of its growing. This could mean that the learning process should be introduced during these years.
However, the views that different societies hold regarding the purpose of early childhood education are not same. Whereas Chinese parents tend to see preschools primarily as a way of giving children a good start academically, parents in the United States regard the primary purpose of preschools as making children more independent and self-reliant.
Preschools can operate under a guiding philosophy of play-based or academic learning. Play-based programs are guided by the central belief that children learn best through play. Play is thought to build children’s interest and love of learning. Academic programs emphasize reading, math and science, and use structured, teacher-directed activities to promote foundational skills in these areas. In the United States, the best-known program designed to promote future academic success is Head Start. The program, which stresses parental involvement, was designed to serve the “whole child”, including children’s physical health, self-confidence, social responsibility, and social and emotional development.
A recent evaluation suggests that preschoolers who participate in Head Start are less likely to repeat grades, and more likely to complete school in future. Furthermore, graduates of Head Start programs show higher academic performance at the end of high school, although the gains are modest. In addition, results from other types of preschool readiness programs indicate that for every dollar spent on the program, taxpayers saved seven dollars by the time the graduates reached the age of 27.
Not everyone agrees that programs that seek to enhance academic skills during the preschool years are a good thing. In fact, according to developmental psychologist David Elkind, United States society tends to push children so rapidly that they begin to feel stress and pressure at a young age. Elkind argues that academic success is largely dependent upon factors such as inherited abilities and a child’s rate of maturation, which parents can do nothing about. Consequently, children of a particular age cannot be expected to master educational material without taking into account their current level of cognitive development. In short, children require development appropriate educational practice, which is education that is based on both typical development and the unique characteristics of a given child.
Early Childhood Education | |
Reasons for attending preschools | •The 1. of the brain matures under the age of five. •Parents’ expectations of preschools 2. greatly. |
3. of preschools | •Some programs 4. on play activities while others on academic activities. •Parents are 5. in some preschool programs. |
Benefits of attending preschools | •Graduates are better 6. for future schooling. •Graduates may achieve higher grades at high school. •It can be 7. for households in the long term. |
8. about preschools | •Children feel pressured at a young age. •Factors determining academic success are 9. parents’ control. •Early childhood education must be 10. with children’s development and characteristics. |
