gre考试阅读真题解析(A)

　　Influenced by the view of some twentieth-century feminists that womens position within the family is one of the central factors determining womens social position, some historians have underestimated the significance of the woman suffrage movement. These historians contend that nineteenth-century suffragist was less radical and, hence, less important than, for example, the moral reform movement or domestic feminismtwo nineteenth-century movements in which women struggled for more power and autonomy within the family. True, by emphasizing these struggles, such historians have broadened the conventional view of nineteenth-century feminism, but they do a historical disservice to suffragism. Nineteenth-century feminists and anti-feminist alike perceived the suffragists demand for enfranchisement as the most radical element in womens protest, in part because suffragists were demanding power that was not based on the institution of the family, womens traditional sphere. When evaluating nineteenth-century feminism as a social force, contemporary historians should consider the perceptions of actual participants in the historical events.

　　17. The author asserts that the historians discussed in the passage have

　　 influenced feminist theorists who concentrate on the family

　　 honored the perceptions of the women who participated in the women suffrage movement

　　 treated feminism as a social force rather than as an intellectual tradition

　　 paid little attention to feminist movements

　　 expanded the conventional view of nineteenth-century feminism

　　18. The author of the passage asserts that some twentieth-century feminists have influenced some historians view of the

　　 significance of the woman suffrage movement

　　 importance to society of the family as an institution

　　 degree to which feminism changed nineteenth-century society

　　 philosophical traditions on which contemporary feminism is based

　　 public response to domestic feminism in the nineteenth century

　　19. The author of the passage suggests that which of the following was true of nineteenth-century feminists?

　　 Those who participated in the moral reform movement were motivated primarily by a desire to reconcile their private lives with their public positions.

　　 Those who advocated domestic feminism, although less visible than the suffragists, were in some ways the more radical of the two groups.

　　 Those who participated in the woman suffrage movement sought social roles for women that were not defined by womens familial roles.

　　 Those who advocated domestic feminism regarded the gaining of more autonomy within the family as a step toward more participation in public life.

　　 Those who participated in the nineteenth-century moral reform movement stood midway between the positions of domestic feminism and suffragism.

　　20. The author implies that which of the following is true of the historians discussed in the passage?

　　 They argue that nineteenth-century feminism was not as significant a social force as twentieth-century feminism has been.

　　 They rely too greatly on the perceptions of the actual participants in the events they study.

　　 Their assessment of the relative success of nineteenth-century domestic feminism does not adequately take into account the effects of antifeminist rhetoric.

　　 Their assessment of the significance of nineteenth-century suffragism differs considerably from that of nineteenth-century feminists.

　　 They devote too much attention to nineteenth-century suffragism at the expense of more radical movements that emerged shortly after the turn of the century.

　　Many objects in daily use have clearly been influenced by science, but their form and function, their dimensions and appearance, were determined by technologists, artisans, designers, inventors, and engineersusing non-scientific modes of thought. Many features and qualities of the objects that a technologist thinks about cannot be reduced to unambiguous verbal descriptions; they are dealt with in the mind by a visual, nonverbal process. In the development of Western technology, it has been non-verbal thinking, by and large, that has fixed the outlines and filled in the details of our material surroundings. Pyramids, cathedrals, and rockets exist not because of geometry or thermodynamics, but because they were first a picture in the minds of those who built them.

　　The creative shaping process of a technologists mind can be seen in nearly every artifact that exists. For example, in designing a diesel engine , a technologist might impress individual ways of nonverbal thinking on the machine by continually using an intuitive sense of rightness and fitness. What would be the shape of the combustion chamber ? Where should the valves be placed? Should it have a long or short piston? Such questions have a range of answers that are supplied by experience, by physical requirements, by limitations of available space, and not least by a sense of form. Some decisions, such as wall thickness and pin diameter, may depend on scientific calculations, but the nonscientific component of design remains primary.

　　Design courses, then, should be an essential element in engineering curricula. Nonverbal thinking, a central mechanism in engineering design, involves perceptions, the stock-in-trade of the artist, not the scientist. Because perceptive processes are not assumed to entail hard thinking, nonverbal thought is sometimes seen as a primitive stage in the development of cognitive processes and inferior to verbal or mathematical thought. But it is paradoxical that when the staff of the Historic American Engineering Record wished to have drawings made of machines and isometric views of industrial processes for its historical record of American engineering, the only college students with the requisite abilities were not engineering students, but rather students attending architectural schools.

　　If courses in design, which in a strongly analytical engineering curriculum provide the background required for practical problem-solving, are not provided, we can expect to encounter silly but costly errors occurring in advanced engineering systems. For example, early models of high-speed railroad cars loaded with sophisticated controls were unable to operate in a snowstorm because a fan sucked snow into the electrical system. Absurd random failures that plague automatic control systems are not merely trivial aberrations; they are a reflection of the chaos that results when design is assumed to be primarily a problem in mathematics.

　　21. In the passage, the author is primarily concerned with

　　 identifying the kinds of thinking that are used by technologists

　　 stressing the importance of nonverbal thinking in engineering design

　　 proposing a new role for nonscientific thinking in the development of technology

　　 contrasting the goals of engineers with those of technologists

　　 criticizing engineering schools for emphasizing science in engineering curricula

　　22. It can be inferred that the author thinks engineering curricula are

　　 strengthened when they include courses in design

　　 weakened by the substitution of physical science courses for courses designed to develop mathematical skills

　　 strong because nonverbal thinking is still emphasized by most of the courses

　　 strong despite the errors that graduates of such curricula have made in the development of automatic control systems

　　 strong despite the absence of nonscientific modes of thinking

　　23. Which of the following statements best illustrates the main point of lines 1-28 of the passage?

　　 When a machine like a rotary engine malfunctions, it is the technologist who is best equipped to repair it.

　　 Each component of an automobilefor example, the engine or the fuel tankhas a shape that has been scientifically determined to be best suited to that components function.

　　 A telephone is a complex instrument designed by technologists using only nonverbal thought.

　　 The designer of a new refrigerator should consider the designs of other refrigerators before deciding on its final form.

　　 The distinctive features of a suspension bridge reflect its designers conceptualization as well as the physical requirements of its site.

　　24. Which of the following statements would best serve as an introduction to the passage?

　　 The assumption that the knowledge incorporated in technological developments must be derived from science ignores the many non-scientific decisions made by technologists.

　　 Analytical thought is no longer a vital component in the success of technological development.

　　 As knowledge of technology has increased, the tendency has been to lose sight of the important role played by scientific thought in making decisions about form, arrangement, and texture.

　　 A movement in engineering colleges toward a technicians degree reflects a demand for graduates who have the nonverbal reasoning ability that was once common among engineers.

　　 A technologist thinking about a machine, reasoning through the successive steps in a dynamic process, can actually turn the machine over mentally.

　　25. The author calls the predicament faced by the Historic American Engineering Record paradoxical most probably because

　　 the publication needed drawings that its own staff could not make

　　 architectural schools offered but did not require engineering design courses for their students

　　 college students were qualified to make the drawings while practicing engineers were not

　　 the drawings needed were so complicated that even students in architectural schools had difficulty making them

　　 engineering students were not trained to make the type of drawings needed to record the development of their own discipline

　　26. According to the passage, random failures in automatic control systems are not merely trivial aberrations because

　　 automatic control systems are designed by engineers who have little practical experience in the field

　　 the failures are characteristic of systems designed by engineers relying too heavily on concepts in mathematics

　　 the failures occur too often to be taken lightly

　　 designers of automatic control systems have too little training in the analysis of mechanical difficulties

　　 designers of automatic control systems need more help from scientists who have a better understanding of the analytical problems to be solved before such systems can work efficiently

　　27. The author uses the example of the early models of high-speed railroad cars primarily to

　　 weaken the argument that modern engineering systems have major defects because of an absence of design courses in engineering curricula.

　　 support the thesis that the number of errors in modern engineering systems is likely to increase.

　　 illustrate the idea that courses in design are the most effective means for reducing the cost of designing engineering systems.

　　 support the contention that a lack of attention to the nonscientific aspects of design results in poor conceptualization by engineers.

　　 weaken the proposition that mathematics is a necessary part of the study of design.

答案：17-27：EACDBAEAEBD