We all remember seeing hitchhikers, standing by the side of the road, thumb, sticking out, waiting for a lift. But it is getting rare nowadays. What killed hitchhiking? Safety is often mentioned as a reason. Movies about murderous hitchhikers and real-life crime have put many drivers off picking up hitchhikers. That no single women picked me up on my journey to Manchester no doubt reflects the safety fear: a large, strangely dressed man is seen as dangerous.
But the reason may be more complex: hitchhiking happens where people don’t have cars and transport services are poor. Plenty of people still hitchhike in Poland and Romania. Perhaps the rising level of car ownership in the UK means the few people lift hitchhiking are usually considered strange. Why can’t they afford cars? Why can’t they take the coach or the train?
Three-quarters of the UK population have access to a car; many of the remainder will be quite old. The potential hitchhiking population is therefore small. Yet my trip proves it’s still possible to hitchhike. The people who picks me up were very interesting-lawyer, retired surgeon, tank commander, carpenter, man who live in an isolated farmhouse and a couple living up in the mountains. My conclusion is that only really interesting people are mad enough to pick up fat blokes in red, spotted scarves. Most just wanted to do someone a good turn; a few said they were so surprised to see a hitchhiker that they couldn’t help stopping.
The future of hitchhiking most likely lies with car-sharing organized over the Internet, via sites such as hitchhikers. org. But for now, you can still stick your thumb out (actually, I didn’t do much of that, preferring just to hold up my destination sign) and people—wonderful, caring, sharing, unafraid people—will stop.
In the UK, with its cheap coaches and reasonable rail service, I don’t think I’ll make a habit of it. But having enjoyed it so much, I’m ready now to do a big trip across Europe and beyond. In the 1970s a female friend of my wife’s hitchhiked to India. How wonderful it would be to have another go, though Afghanistan might be a challenge. I wish I’d got that tank commander’s mobile number.
【小題1】The author tried to hitchhike but was rejected by single women drivers because       .

A.they were not heading towards Manchester
B.they thought most hitchhikers were dangerous
C.hitchhiking had been banned and they didn’t want to break the law
D.he was a strong man in strange clothes who seemed dangerous
【小題2】Which of the following statements is not true according to the passage?
A.Movies have discouraged people from hitchhiking
B.Car ownership levels are lower in Romania than in the UK.
C.25% of UK people don’t have access to cars.
D.Increased car ownership has reduced the need for hitchhiking.
【小題3】The “fat blokes in red, spotted scarves” in Paragraph 3 most likely means    .
A.murderous hitchhikersB.friendly and talkative hitchhikers
C.typical hitchhikersD.strange hitchhikers like the author
【小題4】According to the author, future hitchhikers are more likely to             .
A.visit websites and find people to share cars with
B.stand by roads with their thumbs sticking out
C.stick out signs with their destinations written on
D.wait for some kind people to pick them up
【小題5】From the last paragraph, we know that the author         .
A.frequently hitchhikes in Britain
B.plans to hitchhike across Europe
C.thinks public transport is safer for travel
D.is going to contact the tank commander


【小題1】D
【小題2】A
【小題3】D
【小題4】A
【小題5】B

解析

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科目:高中英語(yǔ) 來源:2011屆四川省成都七中高三上學(xué)期第三次月考英語(yǔ)卷 題型:閱讀理解

HOW would you like to step into the world of other people’s dreams? That’s just what Dom Cobb (Leonardo DiCaprio) does. His work is to steal secrets from people when they are asleep and dreaming. He has an even rarer ability: He can plant an idea in someone’s sleeping mind, and watch it grow and take root in reality. This ability is called inception.
The movie Inception (《盜夢(mèng)空間》) was on show in Chinese cinemas not long ago. It is imaginative, of course. The movie leads one to wonder just how much we know about dreams. For years, scientists and researchers have been trying to solve sleep’s greatest mystery.
Is it possible to enter someone’s dreaming mind? In the movie, DiCaprio uses a drug and a dream machine to put a scenario (某一特定情節(jié)) into someone’s sleeping mind. He then goes to sleep himself, connected to the machine, and enters the other person’s dream.
In real life, there is a machine that can read someone’s mind. A brain scanner takes pictures of brain activity, and then the software recreates images of what the person was looking at.
Researchers say it may be possible one day to record someone’s dream – without the danger (or the fun) of actually sharing that dream.
What’s a dream, anyway? A dream is a group of images and sounds our brain creates when we’re sleeping. In the 1950s, researchers discovered a sleeping condition that happened around every 90 to 120 minutes during sleep: rapid eye movement, or REM. During this period you’re fast asleep, yet your eyes move around quickly under your eyelids (眼皮) and your brain is nearly as active as during the day. That’s when most dreams happen.
What do dreams mean? Dreams are not always filled with meaning. Sometimes dreams are just your mind playing with thoughts and images from your life, or things you may have read or seen on TV. But at other times, dreams show things that you want to achieve in real life, or things that cause you trouble or stress.
【小題1】The movie Inception is mentioned at the beginning of the article to ______.

A.encourage readers to watch the movie
B.tell readers about people with special dreaming abilities
C.inform readers about the science of dreams
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D.It takes pictures of brain activity and recreates images.
【小題3】 According to the article, which of the following statements about REM sleep is TRUE?
A.Most dreams occur in REM sleep.
B.Over the last ten years scientists have solved the mystery of REM sleep.
C.People always remember what they have dreamed in a REM sleep.
D.People can have REM sleep all night.
【小題4】 The article claims that ______.
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科目:高中英語(yǔ) 來源:2011屆浙江省諸暨中學(xué)高三上學(xué)期12月月考英語(yǔ)卷 題型:閱讀理解

If you dream in color, you’re not alone: the majority of people today claim to have colorful dreams. But it wasn’t always thus. Research conducted in the early part of the last century consistently found that people reported dreaming most often in black and white.
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If you dream in color, you’re not alone: the majority of people today claim to have colorful dreams. But it wasn’t always thus. Research conducted in the early part of the last century consistently found that people reported dreaming most often in black and white.

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The second explanation has to do with black and white television and film. It's possible that the sudden increase in black and white film and television during the first half of the last century either affected the form of people’s dreams at that time, or affected their beliefs about the form dreams generally take.

According to Murzyn’s findings, it’s the explanation based on media exposure that carries more weight. She used both questionnaire and diary methods to study the dreams of 30 older (average age 64) and 30 younger people (average age 21).

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       A. people in the first half of the last century never had colorful dreams

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Is it possible to enter someone’s dreaming mind? In the movie, DiCaprio uses a drug and a dream machine to put a scenario (某一特定情節(jié)) into someone’s sleeping mind. He then goes to sleep himself, connected to the machine, and enters the other person’s dream.

In real life, there is a machine that can read someone’s mind. A brain scanner takes pictures of brain activity, and then the software recreates images of what the person was looking at.

Researchers say it may be possible one day to record someone’s dream – without the danger (or the fun) of actually sharing that dream.

What’s a dream, anyway? A dream is a group of images and sounds our brain creates when we’re sleeping. In the 1950s, researchers discovered a sleeping condition that happened around every 90 to 120 minutes during sleep: rapid eye movement, or REM. During this period you’re fast asleep, yet your eyes move around quickly under your eyelids (眼皮) and your brain is nearly as active as during the day. That’s when most dreams happen.

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       A. It records dreams.

       B. It uses a special drug that causes no pain.

       C. It finds out what dreams mean.

       D. It takes pictures of brain activity and recreates images.

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       A. Most dreams occur in REM sleep.

       B. Over the last ten years scientists have solved the mystery of REM sleep.

       C. People always remember what they have dreamed in a REM sleep.

       D. People can have REM sleep all night.

4. The article claims that ______.

       A. dreams tell us a lot about a person’s character

       B. dreams are connected to real life

       C. dreams are useful and help keep our brains active

       D. dreams are usually about meaningful things

 

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