大学英语六级-听力真题-2016年12月第1套

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Section A

Conversation 1

W：Professor Henderson, could you give us a brief overview of what you do,where you work and your main area of research?

M：Well, the Center for Climate Research where I work links the science of climate change to issues around economics and policy. Some of our research is to do with the likely impacts of climate change and all of the associated risks.

W：And how strong is the evidence that climate change is happening? That is really something we need to be worried about.

M: Well, most of the science of climate change, particularly that to do with global warming, is simply fact. But other aspects of the science are less certain or at least more disputed. And so we’re really talking about risk. What the economics tells us is that it’s probably cheaper to avoid climate change－to avoid the risk－than it is to deal with the likely consequences.

W：So what are we doing? What can we do about it?

M：Well, I would argue that we need to develop the science specifically to understand the likely impacts of climate change in different contexts. As I said, we need to understand the best ways of avoiding climate change. And this will involve a huge transition to low-carbon energy systems. And the transition is a tremendous priority. And for this to happen, we may need action on a global scale. From a political perspective, we need to understand the terms on which major countries like

China and the USA might sign up to a global agreement because at the moment we don’t have that consensus.

W：Right.

M：And we also need to plan ahead so that we are in a position to deal with the likely levels of climate change which are already inevitable, and even more so, too, for the levels that are likely if we don’t get those global agreements.

Questions 1 to 4 are based on the conversation you have just heard.

1.What does Professor Henderson say about his main area of research?

2.What does Professor Henderson say about climate change?

3.What does Professor Henderson say is a top priority in combating climate change?

4.What does Professor Henderson advise us to do to better deal with climate change?

Conversation Two

W：I have many Business English students. When I teach the classroom, we often end up talking about things like success and what leads to success. And it’s interesting that many of them mention the element of luck.

M：Right.

W：Luck is important to success. But since you’ve seen that fantastic video on the TED Talks website by Richard St. John, he doesn’t mention luck at all.

M：Well, I’m a firm believer that people can make their own luck. I mean what people regard as luck, you can actually create, to a degree.

W：Sure, I think a lot of what people consider luck is attributed to how you respond to the opportunities that come your way.

M：Yes. Very good point.

W：Seizing the opportunities. But was there any point in the video that you thought was particularly interesting?

M：Yes. Actually there was. Something very impressive to me is many people think that luck is important and that natural talent is something you must have in order to be successful. And in the video we saw, the point about getting good at something is not about having some natural talent. It’s all about practice, practice, practice.

W：Definitely yeah. Natural talent helps in some way but at the end of the day you really do need to work hard and get really, really good at what you do.

M：Sure.

W：I thought one interesting thing in the video was the idea of passion being so important. And there ’re people who really love what they do－of course, you’re going to want to work harder and put the time and effort into it. And the funny thing is that if you love what you do and are really passionate about it and work really hard, then money kind of comes automatically.

Questions 5 to 8 are based on the conversation you have just heard.

5.What are the speakers mainly talking about?

6.What is the woman’s view of luck?

7.What is the chief point the TED Talks video makes?

8.What does the woman think is the funny thing in the TED Talks video?

Section B

Passage One

Devils Tower, the first national monument in America, could almost be mistaken for the stump of an enormous tree. Its sheer rock sides sweep up from a broad base until they cut off abruptly at the flat summit. Rising more than 1,000 feet in the middle of the gently rolling plains of Wyoming, the massive column of rock looks as though it was dropped down into this location from a different time and place. In a sense it was. Devils Tower is a relic of the past, when the molten rock of the earth’s core forced its way to the surface to form the throat of a volcano. As the

centuries passed, the rock cooled and hardened, shrinking and cracking into long columns. Born in fire and fury, Devils Tower was then shaped by the slow, gentle work of wind and water. The outer layers of the volcano were worn away, until the hard core stood completely exposed.

Small wonder that an Indian legend described Devils Tower as being formed by supernatural powers. The legend says that when seven girls were attacked by bears, they took refuge on top of a small rock, and they appealed to the Rock God for help.The god caused the rock to grow and to lift the girls far above the ground, while its sides were scored by the claws of the angry bears. Even today, says the legend, the girls can be seen above the towering rock, as seven shining stars in the night sky.

Questions 9 to 12 are based on the passage you have just heard.

9.What does Devils Tower look like?

10.What caused the volcano’s outer layers to wear away?

11.What does an Indian legend say about Devils Tower?

12.How did the Rock God help the seven girls in the Indian legend?

Passage Two

It’s no accident that most gas stations have convenience stores attached. Few of us can fill up the tank without buying a few snacks, cigarettes, soft drinks or other items we can live without. “I deserve it.” That’s what hard-working men and women say to justify their lavish vacations, big stereo systems or regular restaurant meals. They do deserve such indulgences. However, they also deserve a home of their own, a secure retirement and freedom from worrying about unpaid bills.

No one should have to live with what a Texas mother described as constant stress,

tension, even fear about money. Sadly, the pleasure that comes extravagances often

disappears long before the bills do. The video camera that one single mother bought

for a special occasion, for example, is not much fun now. She’s figured out that it will

take her another three years to pay it off at $ 30 a month. And the New Yorkers who

spent a bundle on an outdoor hot tub now admit they rarely use it, “because we can’t

afford to heat it in winter. "The solution一set priorities, add up the annual cost of

each item, then consider what else she could buy with the same money. That will help

you decide which items are really worth it. One Chicago woman, for example,

discovered that daily lunches with co-workers cost her $ 2,000 a year；she decided to

take lunch to work instead. "I now put $ 20 a week into my vacation fund and another

20 into retirement savings," she says. "Those mean more to me than lunch."

Questions 13 to 15 are based on the passage you have just heard.

13.What does the speaker say about drivers who stop at gas stations?

14.What does the speaker say about extravagances?

15.What does the speaker want to show by the example of the Chicago woman?

Section C

Recording 1

Let’s say you start to brainstorm a list of all the emotions you’ve ever

experienced. Just for fun, try it now.

What’s on your list? Chances are, you included things like happy, sad, excited,

angry, afraid, grateful, proud, scared, confused, stressed, relaxed and amazed.

Now sort your list into two categories－positive emotions and negative emotions.

Feeling both positive and negative emotions is a natural part of being human. We

might use the word “negative” to describe more difficult emotions, but it doesn’t

mean those emotions are bad or we shouldn’t have them. Still, most people would

probably rather feel a positive emotion than a negative one. It’s likely you’d prefer to

feel happy instead of sad, or confident instead of insecure. What matters is how our

emotions are balanced一how much of each type of emotion, positive or negative,

we experience.

Negative emotions warn us of threats or challenges that we may need to deal

with. For example, fear can alert us to possible danger. It’s a signal that we might

need to protect ourselves. Angry feelings warn us that someone is stepping on our

toes, crossing a boundary, or violating our trust. Anger can be a signal that we might

need to act on our own behalf.

Negative emotions focus our awareness. They help us to zero in on a problem so

we can deal with it. But too many negative emotions can make us feel overwhelmed,

anxious, exhausted or stressed out. When negative emotions are out of balance,

problems might seem too big to handle. The more we dwell on negative emotions, the

more negative we begin to feel. Focusing on negativity just keeps it going.

Positive emotions balance out negative ones, but they have other powerful

benefits, too. Instead of narrowing our focus like negative emotions do, positive

emotions affect our brains in ways that increase our awareness, attention and memory.

They help us take in more information, hold several ideas in mind at once, and

understand how different ideas relate to each other. When positive emotions open us

up to new possibilities, we are more able to learn and build on our skills. That leads to

doing better on tasks and tests. People who have plenty of positive emotions in their

everyday lives tend to be happier, healthier, learn better, and get along well with

others.

Questions 16 to 18 are based on the recording you have just heard.

16.What does the speaker say about negative emotions?

17.What happens to people whose negative emotions are out of balance?

18.How do positive emotions affect us?

Recording 2

In the past few months, I’ve been traveling for weeks at a time with only one

suitcase of clothes. One day, I was invited to an important event, and I wanted to wear

something special for it. I looked through my suitcase but couldn’t find anything to

wear. I was lucky to be at the technology conference then, and I had access to 3D

printers. So I quickly designed a skirt on my computer, and I loaded the file on the

printer. It just printed the pieces overnight The next morning, I just took all the pieces,

assembled them together in my hotel room, and this is actually the skirt that I’m

wearing right now.

So it wasn’t the first time that I printed clothes. For my senior collection at

fashion design school, I decided to try and 3D print an entire fashion collection from

my home. The problem was that I barely knew anything about 3D printing, and I had

only nine months to figure out how to print five fashionable looks.

I always felt most creative when I worked from home. I loved experimenting

with new materials, and I always tried to develop new techniques to make the most

unique textiles for my fashion projects.

One summer break, I came here to New York for an internship at a fashion house

in Chinatown. We worked on two incredible dresses that were 3D printed. They were

amazing一like you can see here. But I had a few problems with them. They were

made from hard plastics and that’s why they were very breakable. The models

couldn’t sit in them, and they even got scratched from the plastics under their arms.

So now, the main challenge was to find the right material for printing clothes

with, I mean the material you feed the printer with.

The breakthrough came when I was introduced to Filaflex, which is a new kind

of printing material. It’s strong, yet very flexible. And with it, I was able to print the

first garment, a red jacket that had the word “ freedom" embedded into it. And

actually, you can easily download this jacket, and change the word to something else,

for example, your name or your sweetheart’s name.

So I think in the future, materials will evolve, and they will look and feel like

fabrics we know today, like cotton or silk.

Questions 19 to 22 are based on the recording you have just heard.

19.What does the speaker say about the skirt she is wearing now?

20.When did the speaker start experimenting with 3D printing?

21.What was the problem with the material the speaker worked on at a New

York fashion house?

22.What does the speaker say about Filaflex?

Recording 3

Welcome to the third lecture in our series on the future of small businesses in

Europe. The purpose of today’s lecture, as you have seen from the title and the

abstract, is to examine in more detail the problems facing small- and medium-sized

enterprises which arise at least in part from having to adapt to rapid advances in

technology. And I want to look at these both from a financial and from a personnel

point of view and to offer a few hopefully effective solutions.

Here we have three of the most important problems facing small businesses that I

want to look at today. First, keeping up with the pace of technological change,

recruiting high quality staff in a time of skills shortages in IT as a whole and in a

highly competitive market, and the issue of retaining staff once they’ve been recruited

and trained. Now, all of these problems involve significant costs for all businesses.

But there are particularly challenging issues for small- and medium-sized enterprises.

And those costs would vary depending on the size and scale of the businesses.

So let’s come to the first issue on our list which is keeping pace with

developments in technology. Now we all know that the technology industry is

intensely competitive with new products being launched all year round as the various

companies strive to compete with each other, rather than, say once a year or every

couple of years. And this is a real headache for smaller businesses. So, let’ s imagine

we have a small company which is doing OK. It’s just about making a profit and it

spends most of its income on overheads. So for a company in this situation, keeping

up to date with the latest technology, even if it’s only for the benefit of key staff, this

can be hugely expensive.

So in my view, some creative thinking needs to come in here to find ways to help companies in this situation to stay ahead in the game, but at the same time, to remain technologically competitive.

Well, there’s a possibility that small groups of companies with similar

requirements but not directly competing with each other — they could share the cost

of upgrading in much the same way as, let’s say, an intranet operates within large

organizations. In fact, cost-sharing could be a very practical solution, especially in

times of financial difficulty. If there’s downward pressure on costs, because of a need

for investment in other areas, I would argue that this is a perfectly feasible solution.

Questions 23 to 25 are based on the recording you have just heard.

23.What does the speaker say about the problems facing small- and medium-sized enterprises?

24.What does the speaker say about the technology industry?

25.What is a practical solution to the problems of small- and medium-sized businesses?

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