【学术英语】短文听力

文章目录Unit 1 HappinessPart 1Part 2Unit 2 New Kinds of FoodPart 1Part 2Unit 3 Public ArtPart 1Unit 5 Violence on TelevisionPart 1Part 2Unit 6 Too Old to Learn?Part 1Part 2Unit 7 Are We Alone?Part 1Part 2Unit 1 HappinessPart 1TEACHER: Hi, good morning. Did you hear about the lottery winner last night? The man won…what?.. Two million dollars…?STUDENT: No, three.TEACHER: Three million dollars? Three million. That’s a lot of money isn’t it? Do you think that three million dollars would make you happy?..I’m asking you this because when you ask people what they need to be happy, many people will answer “more money!” We assume that money will make us happier. But is this true? Will winning the lottery help you achieve happiness?Today we’re going to look at the idea of happiness, at the psychology of happiness–what makes some people happier than others. We’ll look at three personality factors that we find in happy people. To find out about these personality factors, psychologists talked to hundreds of people. Now, first, they asked the people how happy they felt–you know, from “very happy” to “not happy at all.” Then they asked some more questions. They wanted to find out about people’s personalities, such as their attitudes about life, and so on. They looked at the differences between happy people and unhappy people. They found three factors that are very important for achieving happiness. So…let’s look at those factors now.The first personality factor is that happy people are… satisfied with themselves. This means that they like themselves as they are, and they’re happy with what they have. Happy people may not like everything about their lives–they may be a little bit overweight, or may not have the best job, or may not live in a big, fancy house, but they don’t need to change those things to be happy. They think more about the things they are satisfied with, not the changes they want to make. This feeling of happiness comes from the inside, not from something outside.Part 2TEACHER: So …happy people feel satisfied with themselves. On the other hand, unhappy people are often dissatisfied with themselves. They…uh…feel that something must change so they can be happy.They think if they lose some weight or get a better job or a nicer house they will be happy. They are always looking for something outside themselves to make them happy.But the problem is–they never find it! No matter what they get, they’re still dissatisfied and unhappy.The second personality factor is that happy people are optimistic–they look at the positive side of life, not the negative. Now, we all have problems, whether we’re happy or not. But when happy people have problems, they assume that things will improve. They don’t worry a lot and think about all the bad things that can happen. Instead, they have a positive attitude. However, unhappy people are the opposite. They are not optimistic and don’t have a positive attitude. When they have a problem, they think about how bad everything is and assume that it’ll get worse. So they make themselves even more unhappy when they think about all the bad things that might happen.Finally, the third personality factor is that happy people have good relationships with other people. They try to have close, loving relationships with friends and family. Studies show that close, loving relationships are one of the most important factors in achieving happiness. So happy people don’t spend all their time building their careers or trying to make money. They also spend time building relationships with friends and family. Now, on the other hand, unhappy people don’t have as many close relationships. They may have trouble making friends. Or they may spend all their time working and then find that they’re very lonely and unhappy. But for whatever reason, they don’t have close relationships and this makes them unhappy.So …what does this tell us? Well, if you want to be happier, don’t assume that winning the lottery will help. There are other, more important factors for achieving happiness. Now, let’s take a break, and when we come back we’ll talk more about the factors that make a person happy…Unit 2 New Kinds of FoodPart 1TEACHER: Hi, everybody…how’s it going?.. Good… . . Has everyone turned in their homework? Al righty, then let’s get started. If you remember, last week we were discussing some research in the area of genetics. Today, I’d like to talk about something I’m sure you’ve all heard about–genetically modified or “GM” food. Genetically modified food is food–either a plant or animal–that has been altered in the laboratory by scientists. The scientists take something from one plant or animal, and add it to a different plant or animal to make it grow in a different way. Today, we’ll look at some of the benefits, and the possible risks, of genetically modified food.Let’s start with a discussion of some of the benefits of GM food. Genetic scientists are really trying to make food plants that are better than normal plants, to make plants that are altered in ways that make the plant grow better or taste better or be healthier to eat than normal plants.One benefit is that genetically modified plants may need fewer pesticides than normal plants. For example, there is a type of corn that is bad for insects–when the insects eat the corn plant, they die. However, the corn doesn’t hurt people. This type of corn is beneficial because farmers use fewer pesticides to grow the corn, and so there is less pollution in the environment. Also the corn is less expensive because the farmers don’t have to spend a lot of money on pesticides. So, by using fewer pesticides,the corn is cheaper and the environment is cleaner.Another benefit of genetically modified plants is that they may grow better than normal plants. One example is a type of genetically modified strawberry that can grow in cold weather. These are better than normal strawberries because farmers can plant the strawberries earlier in the spring and later in the fall, when normal strawberries usually die. So, as a result, farmers can grow many more strawberries than they used to. So that’s another benefit–plants that grow better.Finally, a third benefit is that many genetically modified plants stay fresh longer after they are harvested. So, for example, there is a kind of tomato that stays fresh in the store for about two months, instead of one or two weeks. This means that there is more time to get the food to the stores and that stores have more time to sell the food. Less food is thrown away and wasted. So it’s a great benefit to have food that stays fresh longer–and we can consume more of the food we grow.Part 2TEACHER: Now that we’ve looked at some of the benefits of genetically modified plants, let’s talk about the risks of growing this type of food. We don’t really know what the harmful effects are, but there are several things that people are worried about.One risk is that the genetically modified plants may start to dominate the other wild plants in the environment. This is a problem with some types of tomatoes, for example. The new tomato plants are stronger than normal plants, and because they are stronger and grow faster than the wild plants, the genetically modified tomatoes may start to dominate the environment, causing the wild plants to die. So having one plant dominate all the other plants isn’t good for the environment.Another risk is that genetically modified plants will hurt wild animals and insects in the environment. For example, the genetically modified corn I mentioned earlier has already caused this problem. Now some butterflies that live near the corn are dying–butterflies that are good insects, and don’t eat the corn. It’s possible that corn is killing the butterflies somehow, but we’re not sure. We just know that more butterflies are dying than normal. But clearly there’s a risk that genetically modified foods can hurt animals and insects in the environment.But probably the most important risk is that genetically modified food may be harmful to the people who consume the food. The alterations in the plants may cause serious problems for people–we just don’t know. Scientists are trying all kinds of new things, such as putting the genes from animals into a plant. For example, to make a fruit like strawberries stay fresh longer, scientists took a gene from a fish–a gene that helps the fish live in cold water—and put that into a strawberry. Will that strawberry be harmful to people? We don’t know. But it may be.So it’s clear that there are some important benefits to genetically modified food but also some risks–risks that a lot of people aren’t willing to take. So let’s stop here and discuss any questions you have at this point…Unit 3 Public ArtPart 1TEACHER: Good morning everybody. I hope you all enjoyed our trip to the art museum last week. Today we’re going to talk… .uh… . more about modern art. We’ll … .uh…take a look at some examples of public art–art you can only find outdoors…uh…in public places. I’ll explain the purpose of public art, and …uh…then I’ll describe some examples of public art that illustrate three common types of modern art: pop art, realism, and surrealism.But first, public art… These days public art is becoming more and more popular. Many business and city leaders are putting up art in public places–in parks and gardens, near office buildings, and so on. Cities like to put art in public places for a couple of reasons. Um… First of all, art helps to make our cities look more beautiful and interesting. Also, when art is outdoors, many people can look at it and enjoy it every day; they don’t have to go to a museum. So having art in public places lets more people enjoy art every day.Unit 5 Violence on TelevisionPart 1TEACHER: Hello, everyone. Are you ready to get started? … OK. Today I’d like to continue our discussion of violence in the media by focusing on television–on TV violence and its impact on children. First I’ll discuss how much violence is on TV. and then we’ll talk about the impact of TV violence on children. There’s a lot of debate about this issue today because children watch a lot of TV, right?TV has a huge impact on children; kids today watch a lot of TV. In the U.S., almost all families have a TV–ninety-eight percent. Many families have more than one TV. Fifty-two percent of children have televisions in their bedrooms, so they can watch TV whenever they want. And how much TV does the average child watch each day? Can anyone guess?STUDENT 1: Two hours?TEACHER: OK, that’s one guess. Anyone else?STUDENT 2: Four?TEACHER: Yes. It’s about…about three to four hours of TV every day, or almost 1,500 hours a year. Now, compare that to the amount of time that kids spend in school each year, about 900 hours, and you can see that TV must have a big impact.Now, many people feel that children’s shows, such as cartoons, are much too violent. Some people even feel that the violence on television is teaching kids to be more violent. But is this true? Is there a link between the violence children see on TV and real violence? To answer this question, I want to focus on some of the research–research that has been done to assess the violence on television and how it affects children.To assess how much violence is on TV, research has focused on counting the number of acts of violence on TV in an average day. Now, this includes any act that could hurt or kill people in real life. Surprisingly, cartoons for children have the most violence–more than many shows for adults. Cartoons have an average of thirty-two violent acts per hour. So, thirty-two times every hour, one cartoon character hurts another character in some way. Well, you’ve seen this in cartoons, I’m sure. The characters hit each other on the head, or shoot each other…many different violent acts.Other kids shows have a lot of violence as well. For example, many kids’ shows have characters that fight each other–hit and kick and punch each other–so those are very violent as well.Part 2TEACHER: So, by counting all these acts of violence, we can estimate that by the time a child is twelve, he or she will have seen an average of about 100,000 acts of violence! But does the violence really cause children to act more violently? Well, that leads us to our second question: How do we assess the impact of TV violence on children?First, we’ll focus on some immediate effects of watching TV violence–what happens immediately after a child watches something violent on TV. In the first study we’ll look at today, a group of children saw a TV show of a child hitting and kicking a doll. Then, after they watched the video, each child was left alone in a room with the same type of doll. And guess what? All the children in this study–100 percent–hit and kicked the doll, just like they saw on TV. So the link here between what kids see and what they do seems quite strong.Another way to assess the effects of TV violence on children is to focus on the long-term effects–what happens many years after a child watches violent TV. Now let’s talk about the second study. In 1960, researchers studied eight-year-old children in a typical American city. They studied how much violent TV the children watched and whether the children acted violently at home or at school. Then, ten years later, they studied the same children at age eighteen. The researchers found that children who watched a lot of violent TV at age eight were more violent at age eighteen. Children who watched less violent TV were less violent at age eighteen. So this study suggests that there is a link between TV violence and real violence–that watching violent TV has long-term impact on these kids.So do these studies prove that TV violence causes children to be violent? Even with the research, many people still disagree about that. So, when we come back, we’ll talk more about the impact of TV violence…Unit 6 Too Old to Learn?Part 1TEACHER: OK, everybody. Let’s get started. Today we’re going to talk about the critical period in language learning. But first I’d like to ask you a question: How many of you have tried to learn a new language as a teenager or as an adult?..Ah, I see, quite a few of you. Well, then I’m sure you agree that it’s much more difficult to learn a new language when we’re grown than it was to learn your first language as a child, right? But do you know why it’s so much harder?..No idea? Well, linguists believe it’s because of the critical period of language development.The critical period is a theory that explains why it is easier for children to learn languages than for adults. That’s what I’d like to discuss today. But first, I’d like to start by defining the critical period…and I’ll give you some more examples of a critical period in animals–in songbirds and cats. Then I’ll talk about evidence for a critical period for language learning in humans.So what exactly is a critical period? The idea of a critical period comes from the study of animals. We say that there’s a critical period–the only time–when the animal can learn a new skill. Now, the critical period starts in the first weeks or months of an animal’s life. During this time its brain is ready to learn new things. However, when the animal gets older, the critical period ends; it cannot learn any more. So there are skills that must be learned when the animal is young; if not, they can’t learn them as adults.Now, I’m going to move on to some examples. First, let’s take songbirds. A songbird learns to sing the first few months after it’s born by listening to its parents’ song and repeating it. The bird can only learn to do this when it’s a baby. An adult bird cannot learn to sing. So, if you remove the baby bird from its parents–so that it doesn’t hear the song–the bird just won’t learn to sing when it’s older. So there is a perfect example of a critical period.Take another example–cats. A kitten must learn to use its eyes in the first few weeks of its life. At first, the cat can’t see very well. But over time, it begins to use its eyes. However, if you remove all the light in the room so the cat grows up in the dark, it won’t be able to use its eyes. When the cat is an adult, it won’t be able to see well. So there is another critical period–when a cat must learn to see.Part 2TEACHER: Now let’s look at the critical period for learning languages in humans. As you’ve probably noticed, children learn new languages much more easily and quickly than adults. But we don’t really know why.One theory is that there is a critical period for language learning. The theory is that people’s brains change when they’re adolescents and that these changes make it more difficult for adults to learn a new language than for children.Of course, adults can learn–many adults learn to speak a new language. They may not speak it perfectly, but they speak it very well, well enough to use the new language for daily life. So we’re not like adult songbirds, who can’t ever learn a new song. We can learn.That said, however, there is evidence for a critical period for learning to speak with a native accent. Somehow children can hear the different sounds better, and their mouth muscles can make the new sounds. In many cases, a child will speak a new language with no foreign accent at all.But generally, adults who learn a new language after adolescence speak with a foreign accent. They never learn to speak with a native accent, no matter how hard they try. It can be very frustrating. We may be able to hear the correct accent, but our mouths just can’t pronounce the sounds correctly. Have you ever felt this way? So, unfortunately, this shows that there may be a critical period when humans must learn to speak with a native accent.So we can conclude that there is a critical period when both animals and humans can learn certain things. For animals like birds and cats, they must learn to do things when they are still very young. Humans, on the other hand, can still learn some new things as adults, like languages, but it’s more difficult. Adult humans have a critical period for learning new accents.So, that’s all for now. Let’s go into discussion groups. Does everyone have a copy of the handout?Unit 7 Are We Alone?Part 1TEACHER: Hello, everyone, Is everyone here? Well, let’s get started. We were talking last time about the possibility of other intelligent life in the universe. So that’s where I want to pick up today. Today we’ll look at the SETI project–that’s the Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence. This is a project to look for signs of intelligent life on other planets in the universe.So…first, why do we think there may be other intelligent life in the universe? Well, it’s because there are many, many other galaxies in the universe that could support life. We on earth, we are one planet going around one star. But our galaxy has approximately 400 billion other stars–stars that may have other planets where intelligent beings could live.And, throughout the universe, there are at least 100 billion–that’s 100 billion–other galaxies. So most scientists think that somewhere in these 100 billion galaxies, there must be other planets that are similar to our earth and that at least one of those planets has other intelligent beings. We just have to locate them.Now how does the SETI project search for life? The SETI project searches for life using large radio telescopes. These radio telescopes search for radio signals in space. They’re looking for signals that could be from other intelligent beings. We hope that somewhere there are intelligent beings who are looking for us, who are sending out a signal. Perhaps they are asking the same questions we ask: Are we alone? Is there anyone else out there?Now, in my opinion, this is some of the most exciting scientific research being done today. Why…why is it so exciting? Well, I think that locating other intelligent life–if and when this happens–will completely change how we think about ourselves and about the universe. Just imagine–knowing that there are other beings out there, that we are not alone. So I think this is one of the most interesting areas to investigate.Part 2TEACHER: So the SETI project tries to locate intelligent beings in the universe by searching for radio signals from space. But why radio signals? Well, there are two reasons radio signals are better. First, they travel very quickly. Second, they have a long range-- they can go very far into space.So how fast do radio signals travel? Well, they travel very quickly, at the speed of light. So, for example, the nearest galaxy, Alpha Centauri, is approximately 4.2 light years away. Traveling at the speed of light, it takes four years for a radio signal to reach us. On the other hand, the fastest rocket only travels about ten miles per second. At that speed, it would take 60,000 years to reach the Alpha Centauri galaxy. So radio signals are definitely faster.Now what is the range of radio signals? Well, they have a very long range–they could travel through several galaxies to reach Earth. Radio signals can also travel through space dust and other things floating around in space. So if any intelligent beings in other galaxies are sending radio signals, there’s a good chance that the signals can reach Earth… I see a question.STUDENT: Yes. Why don’t we just send rockets to look for intelligent life?TEACHER: Good question. I’m glad you asked. Well, for one thing, they’re much slower. Unlike radio signals, rockets can’t travel at the speed of light. Also, they don’t have a very wide range. In addition, you’re restricted to looking in one direction–you point the rocket in one direction and go that way. But we can search for radio signals in every part of the universe, not restricting ourselves to one direction. So overall, you can see why searching for radio signals is better.OK, so that’s all for today. Next time we’ll talk more about this and talk about what we will do when we hear a signal–a very important question. So think about that: What should we do when we hear a signal from another intelligent being? Until then, have a good week. I’ll see you next time.