In a fast-paced world driven by noise, excitement, and continuous connections due to technology, I think we’ve lost a(n) ____ for something essential to the human experience: Quiet.
I’m not talking about the library style version of soft whispers, but about the soul-defining quiet of introspection(自省), of solitude and of being ____.
This past weekend, I found myself glued to my computer screen in a flurry (忙乱) of _____work to build my career. I was ____ social media and worrying about building my vision for tomorrow. Like so many evenings, the call of the internet had ____ me in, and the beautiful July night in Pennsylvania was ____—until my husband stepped in and reminded me that there’s more to life than noises, likes and followers.
We got into our truck and drove ten minutes to a local state park, a place that has _____our different stages of life through the years. Phones and computers ____, we spent the evening in nature, enjoying simple scenes and ____ in the quiet of the setting.
Gone were the rings of notifications, the honking horns of cars flying by, and the _____ of YouTube videos. In their place, a silence ____ something we both know but sometimes lose ____ of: Life’s quiet, simple moments are sometimes the most beautiful.
In these peaceful moments, I found a(n) ____ with nature and with my husband. I found a reminder that there is a world ____ the computer and the ____ of our fast-paced life.
___, I was reminded that in these quiet moments, we were able to hear the most important voice: our own.
Our world ____ constant attention and engagement. We become so ____ to constantly connecting and engaging with others that we fail to appreciate something ______to our happiness: our inner voice.
So take a moment, take a break and take some time to find the quiet in your life. Let the quiet moments in life remind you that your inner voice ____ to be heard.
1.A.cooperation B.appreciation C.confidence D.opportunity
2.A.unfolded B.unconfirmed C.unplugged D.unaccompanied
3.A.regular B.simply C.desperate D.interesting
4.A.drowning in B.fond of C.curious about D.sensitive to
5.A.showed B.sucked C.forced D.led
6.A.acquired B.occupied C.ignored D.stressed
7.A.marked B.experienced C.presented D.undertaken
8.A.hung on B.turned on C.worn out D.shut off
9.A.trapped B.involved C.bathed D.anchored
10.A.existence B.draw C.impression D.separation
11.A.removed B.reflected C.restricted D.refreshed
12.A.touch B.sight C.control D.hope
13.A.connection B.imagination C.exploration D.prediction
14.A.against B.with C.beyond D.about
15.A.chaos B.values C.mess D.quality
16.A.In addition B.In short C.After all D.Above all
17.A.avoids B.desires C.transfers D.spells
18.A.opposed B.limited C.entitled D.addicted
19.A.glorious B.unique C.crucial D.superior
20.A.remains B.tends C.appears D.deserves
Talking to yourself may seem a little shameful. According to the well-known saying, talking to yourself is the first sign of madness, 1. Talking to ourselves, whether out loud or silently in our heads, is a valuable tool for thought.
Far from being mentally ill, self-talk allows us to plan what we are going to do, manage our activities, regulate our emotions and even create a description of our experience.2.
As children, according to the Russian psychologist Lev Vygotsky, we use private speech to regulate our actions in the same way that we use public speech to control the behavior of others.3. Psychological experiments have shown that the private speech can improve our performance on tasks ranging from judging what other people are thinking to sorting images into categories. One recent study suggested that self-talk is most effective when we address ourselves in the second person, as “you” rather than “I”.
4. If you want proof, turn on the sports channel. You’re certain to see an athlete or two cheering themselves up with a bitter phrase or scolding themselves after a bad shot.
Conduct a dialogue with ourselves.5. The private speech seems to be a particularly good way of solving problems and working through ideas. The to-and-fro between different points of view means our thoughts can end up in expected places, just like a regular dialogue can, and might turn out to be one of the keys lo human creativity.
A.What is private speech?
B.Bui there is no need for embarrassment.
C.Psychologists refer to this as private speech.
D.Ask questions of the self and provide answers.
E.We do a lot of private speech when we are young.
F.As we grow older, we make the private speech become the way of blinking,
G.Although the private speech is effective, we never entirely put away the out-loud speech.
For several decades, there has been an organized campaign intended to produce distrust in science, funded by those whose interests are threatened by the findings of modern science. In response, scientists have tended to stress the success of science. After all, scientists have been right about most things, from the structure of the universe to the relativity of time and space.
Stressing successes isn’t wrong, but for many people it’s not persuasive. An alternative answer to the question “Why trust science?” is that scientists use the so-called scientific method. But what is called the scientific method isn’t what scientists actually do. Science is dynamic: new methods get invented; old ones get abandoned; and at any particular point, scientists can be found doing many different things. False theories sometimes lead to true results, so even if an experiment works, it doesn’t prove that the theory it was designed to test is true.
If there is no specific scientific method, then what is the basis for trust in science? The answer is the methods by which those claims are evaluated. A scientific claim is never accepted as true until it has gone through a long process of examination by fellow scientists. Scientists draft the initial version of a paper and then send it to colleagues for suggestions. Until this point, scientific feedback is typically fairly friendly. But the next step is different: the revised paper is submitted to a scientific journal, where things get a whole lot tougher. Editors deliberately send scientific papers to people who are not friends or colleagues of the authors, and the job of the reviewer is to find errors or other faults. We call this process “peer review” because the reviewers are scientific peers—experts in the same field—but they act in the role of a superior who has both the right and the responsibility to find fault. It is only after the reviewers and the editor are satisfied that any problems have been fixed that the paper will be printed in the journal and enters the body of “science.”
Some people argue that we should not trust science because scientists are “always changing their minds.” While examples of truly settled science being overturned are far fewer than is sometimes claimed, they do exist. But the beauty of this scientific process is that science produces both creativity and stability. New observations, ideas, explanations and attempts to combine competing claims introduce creativity; transformative questioning leads to collective decisions and the stability of scientific knowledge. Scientists do change their minds in the face of new evidence, but this is a strength of science, not a weakness.
1.Scientists stress the success of science in order to ________.
A.promote basic knowledge of science
B.remind people of scientific achievements
C.remove possible doubts about science
D.show their attitude towards the campaign
2.What can we learn about the so-called scientific method?
A.It’s an easy job to prove its existence.
B.It usually agrees with scientists’ ideas.
C.It hardly gets mixed with false theories.
D.It constantly changes and progresses.
3.What can we learn about “peer” review?
A.It seldom gives negative evaluation of a paper.
B.It is usually conducted by unfriendly experts.
C.It aims to perfect the paper to be published.
D.It happens at the beginning of the evaluation process.
4.The underlined sentence in the last paragraph implies that ________.
A.it is not uncommon for science to be overturned
B.scientists are very strong in changing their minds
C.people lose faith in those changeable scientists
D.changes bring creativity and stability to science
Space Hotel Promises Guests A Truly Out-Of-This World Vacation
Looking for a true out-of-his-world vacation? Then you are in luck! On Thursday, Aprils, Texas-based start-up Orion Span announced they were taking reservations for Aurora (极光) Station, the world's first luxury hotel in space, which is expected to launch in 2021 and begin welcoming visitors by 2022.
The pill-shaped space station, which begins construction in 2019, will measure 43.5 feet long and 14.1 feet wide—about the size of a large private jet's cabin—when completed. It will accommodate four guests in two private suites (套房) and two crew members, most likely former astronauts. Flying about 200 miles above Earth, Aurora Station will circle the planet once every 90 minutes, enabling guests to enjoy 16 spectacular sunrises and sunsets daily, as well as scores of the breathtaking northern and southern auroras that the hotel is named after.
While admiring the beauty of our planet, tourists can eat non-astronaut food and drinks or entertain themselves with playing cards. Those hoping to do something more worthwhile will be able to engage in astronaut—like experiments such as growing food in a special environment. The Wi-Fi enabled spacecraft will make it easy for guests to share their experiences with friends and family members on Earth. At the end of the week and half-long vacation, returning guests will be treated to a special "hero's welcome", similar to the one experienced by astronauts returning from a real mission.
Before the once-in-a-lifetime trip, guests will have to undergo the three month-long special training learning how to move in a weightless environment, along with the basics of spaceflight and orbital mechanics. Also, before you start packing your bags, you will have to pay $9.5 million for the 12-day round-trip vacation.
While several companies are planning to build hotels in space, Orion Span hopes to transform sections of used rockets floating in space into hotel rooms, instead of crowding the already messy skies with additional man-made objects.
1.What can be learned about Aurora Station?
A.People can visit it now.
B.Its construction will last for about 5 years.
C.It can only hold four people in this station.
D.It looks like a pill with the size of a small plane.
2.Why is the station named Aurora Station?
A.Because the hotel is lit up by the auroras of the Earth.
B.Because the station will give off auroras while travelling
C.Because guests can enjoy fantastic auroras of the Earth.
D.Because the station will run around the auroras of the Earth.
3.What can guests do in a space hotel?
A.Communicate with their family. B.Enjoy astronaut food and drinks.
C.Cook meals like they are at home. D.Receive welcome as a real hero.
4.What can be inferred from the last paragraph?
A.There is little room for people to live on the earth.
B.Too many space crafts have aroused people's concern.
C.Space hotels will be necessary in the near future.
D.Used rockets floating in space are easy to be recycled.
Has the volume in a restaurant ever made you finish your meal early? If so, you're not alone. Restaurants handle diners in various ways to influence food choices and consumption, from lighting to menu to server presentation. Unfortunately for those headache-prone restaurant goers, some places also choose to turn up the tunes and the background noise.
Chef Mario Batali is often blamed for the phenomenon of very loud or noisy restaurants in the 1990s, when he decided to flood the dining room with the same loud tunes he was playing in his kitchen. And other chefs followed suit. Some restaurateurs felt a "livelier" atmosphere encouraged more customers, but a side "benefit" was quicker table turnover, thus increasing the number of people who could dine in a specific evening.
A 1985 study out of Fairfield University looked at how chewing speed varied according to the type of music being played. Although the volume level was kept the same for both musical situations, it's important to note that fast-tempo (节奏) music often gives the impression of being louder than slower music.
"A significant increase in the number of bites per minute was found, and the effect was largest for fast music," the researchers wrote in the study. So, the faster, louder music gets people to down their food more quickly, relieving the table for future customers.
There re opinions about whether or not this is a sound practice. "A restaurant that places profit above dining experience often plays loud music with a fast tempo that puts diners under pressure 10 eat more quickly, even if that means they're less able to enjoy their meal," writes Dr. Neel Burton in Psychology Today, adding that loud, fast music reduces appetite.
What's more, some would-be repeat diners will shy away for fear of another very loud meal. The non-profit group Action on Hearing Loss found in a 2016 survey of nearly 1,500 people that 91% of those who view a restaurant as too noisy would choose not to return.
1.Why did some bosses of the restaurants favour loud music?
A.It might help attract more customers.
B.It was the favorite kind of music of them.
C.It made the restaurants softer and sweeter.
D.It could increase the popularity of their restaurants.
2.What plays the most important role in the effect of music on diners according to the passage?
A.Its content. B.Its length.
C.Its speed. D.Its quality.
3.What is Dr. Neel Burton's attitude towards flooding restaurants with noisy music?
A.Doubtful. B.Disapproving.
C.Positive. D.Objective.
4.What could be a suitable tile for the text?
A.What People Think of Loud Restaurants
B.Are Customers Made to Eat Quickly?
C.Why Loud Restaurants Are Popular Today
D.Does Loud Music Really Benefit Restaurants?
Occasions like anniversaries, weddings and reunions call for special event venues (场地). The following places may have a way out. There’s no need to spend money creating atmosphere at special event venues. It’s built right in!
Hard Rock Cafe Anchorage
415 E. STREET, ANCHORAGE, ALASKA 99501
Events, like great music are born of inspiration. Featuring a 13,600-square-foot facility that will seat 275 guests with private event space, we pride ourselves on delivering an exceptional experience with a rock and twist for each of our guests.
Business Expo Center
1960 S. ANAHEIM WAY, ANAHEIM, CALIFORNIA 92805
The Business Expo Center is Orange County's important event venue in Anaheim, California. Our flexible 36,000-square-foot expo center is home to space for conferences, trade shows and celebrations. We pride ourselves on providing a memorable experience with excellent flexibility, services, and cost savings. We won’t charge customers for on-site parking and provide high-speed Wi-Fi.
Automobile Driving Museum
610 LAIRPORT STREET, EL SEGUNDO, CALIFORNIA 90245
Centrally located in the South Bay beach community of EI Segundo, California, the ADM offers a wonderful venue for private parties and corporate events. Conveniently located 5 minutes south of LAX, right off the 405 and 105 Freeways, the 610 Lairport space has a special feel surrounded by our primary automobile collection. We offer several different venues inside and outside our facility for diverse events. To better our service, reservations are needed.
Yamashiro Hollywood
1999 N. SYCAMORE AVE., LOS ANGELES, CALIFORNIA 90068
Yamashiro Hollywood is a restaurant and therefore, all food and wine must be handled in house. However, guests are allowed to bring in outside wine and champagne for a corkage fee (开瓶费).
1.What can we learn about Business Expo Center?
A.You can enjoy free parking.
B.It’s home to space for music shows.
C.It’s located in Los Angeles, California 92805
D.You can experience high-speed Wi-Fi free of change.
2.Which venue do you need to book in advance?
A.Business Expo Center. B.Yamashiro Hollywood.
C.Hard Rock Cafe Anchorage. D.Automobile Driving Museum.
3.What do the four venues have in common?
A.They are located in the same state.
B.They are open to special events.
C.They enjoy convenient transportation.
D.They offer an exceptional experience and free services.
