考研历年英二真题阅读文2021

考研历年英二真题阅读文2021

考研历年英二真题阅读文1

Text 3

The power and ambition of the giants of the digital economy

is astonishing-Amazon has just announced the purchase of the

upmarket grocery chain Whole Foods for $l3.5bn,but two years

ago Facebook paid even more than that to acquire the WhatsApp

messaging service, which doesn't have any physical product at all.

What WhatsApp offered Facebook was an intricate and finely

detailed web of its users' friendships and social lives.

Facebook promised the European commission then that it

would not link phone numbers to Facebook identities, but it broke

the promise almost as soon as the deal went through. Even

without knowing what was in the messages, the knowledge of

who sent them and to whom was enormously revealing and still

could be. What political journalist, what party whip, would not

want to know the makeup of the WhatsApp groups in which

Therea May's enemies are currently plotting? It may be that the

value of Whole Foods to Amazon is not so much the 460 shops it

owns, but the records of which customers have purchased what.

Competition law appears to be the only way to address these

imbalances of power. But it is clumsy. For one thing, it is very slow

compared to the pace of Change within the digital economy. By

the time a problem has been addressed and remedied it may

have vanished in the marketplace, to be replaced by new abuses

of power. But there is a deeper conceptual problem, too.

Competition law as presently interpreted deals with financial

disadvantage to consumers and this is not obvious when the

users of these services don't pay for them. The users of their

Services are not their customers. That would be the people who

buy advertising from them-and Facebook and Google, the two

virtual giants, dominate digital advertising to the disadvantage of

all other media and entertainment companies.

The product they're selling is data, and we, the users, convert

our lives to date for the benefit of the digital giants. Just as some

ants farm the bugs called aphids for the honeydew the produce

when they feed, so Google farms us for the data that our digital

lives yield. Ants keep predatory insects away from where their

aphids feed; Gmail keeps the spamme out of our inboxes. It

doesn't feel like a human or democratic relationship, even if both

sides benefit.

31. According to Paragraph 1, Facebook acquired WhatsApp

for its .

[A] digital products

[B] user information

[C] physical assets

[D] quality service

32. Linking phone numbers to Facebook identities may .

[A] worsen political disputes

[B] mess up customer records

[C] pose a risk to Facebook users

[D] mislead the European commission

33. According to the author, competition law .

[A] should sever the new market powers

[B] may worsen the economic imbalance

[C] should not provide just one legal solution

[D] cannot keep pace with the changing market

34. Competition law as presently interpreted can hardly

protect Facebook users because .

[A] they are not defined as customers

[B] they are not financially reliable

[C] the services are generally digital

[D] the services are paid for by advertisers

35. The ants analogy is used to illustrate .

[A] a win-win business model between digital giants

[B] a typical competition pattern among digital giants

[C] the benefits provided for digital giants ’customers

[D] the relationship between digital giants and their users

考研历年英二真题阅读文2

Text3

Even in traditional offices，“the lingua franca of corporate

America has gottenmuch more emotional and much more right-brained than it was 20 years ago，" said Ha rva rd Business School

professor Nancy Koehn She sta rted spinning off examples."If you

and I pa rachuted back to Fortune 500 companies in 1990，we

would see much less frequent use of terms like Journey,

mission,passion. There were goals，there were strategies，there

were objectives，but we didn't talk about energy;we didn't talk

about passion."

Koehn pointed out that this new era of corporate vocabula

ry is very "team"-oriented-and not by coincidence."Let's not

forget sDorts-in male-dominated corporate America，it's still a

big deal. It's not explicitly conscious;it's the idea that I'm a coach，

and you're my team，and we're in this togethec. There are lots

and lots of CEOs in very different companies，but most think of

themselves as coaches and this is their team and they want to

win".

These terms a re also intended to infuse work with meaning-and，as Khu rana points out，increase allegiance to the firm."You

have the importation of terminology that historically used to be

associated with non-profit organizations and religious

organizations：Terms like vision，values，passion，and purpose，"saidKhurana

This new focus on personal fulfillment can help keep

employees motivated amid increasingly loud debates over work-life balance The "mommy wars" of the 1990s a re still going on

today, prompting arguments about whywomen still can'thave it

all and books like Sheryl Sandberg's Lean In，whose title has

become abuzzword in its own right. Terms like unplug，offline，life-hack，bandwidth，andcapacity are all about setting

boundaries between the office and the home But ifyour work is

your "passion," you'II be more likely to devote yourself to it，even

ifthat means going home for dinner and then working long after

the kids are in bed

But this seems to be the irony of office speak：Everyone

makes fun of it，butmanage rs love it，companies depend on it，and regular people willingly absorb itAs Nunberg said，"You can

get people to think it's nonsense at the same timethat you buy

into it." In a workplace that's fundamentally indiffe rent to your

lifeand its meaning office speak can help you figu re out how you

relate to yourwork-and how your work defines who you are

31. According to Nancy Koehn, office language has

become________

[A]more e motional

[B]more objective

[C]less energetic

[D]less energetic

[E]less strategic

32."team"-oriented corporate vocabulary is closely related

to________

[A]historical incidents

[B]gender difference

[C]sports culture

[D]athletic executives

a believes that the importation of terminology

aims to________

[A]revive historical terms

[B]promote company image

[C]foster corporate cooperation

[D]strengthen employee loyalty

can be inferred that Lean In_________

[A]voices for working women

[B]appeals to passionate workaholics

[C]triggers dcbates among mommies

[D]praises motivated employees

of the following statements is true about office

speak?

[A]Managers admire it but avoid it

[B]Linguists believe it to be nonsense

[C]Companies find it to be fundamental

[D]Regular people mock it but accept it

考研历年英二真题阅读文3

Text 3

Scientists have found that although we are prone to snap

overreactions, if we take a moment and think about how we are

likely to react, we can reduce or even eliminate the negative

effects of our quick, hard-wired responses.

Snap decisions can be important defense mechanisms; if we

are judging whether someone is dangerous, our brains and

bodies are hard-wired to react very quickly, within milliseconds.

But we need more time to assess other factors. To accurately tell

whether someone is sociable, studies show, we need at least a

minute, preferably five. It takes a while to judge complex aspects

of personality, like neuroticism or open-mindedness.

But snap decisions in reaction to rapid stimuli aren’t exclusive

to the interpersonal realm. Psychologists at the University of

Toronto found that viewing a fast-food logo for just a few

milliseconds primes us to read 20 percent faster, even though

reading has little to do with eating. We unconsciously associate

fast food with speed and impatience and carry those impulses

into whatever else we’re doing, Subjects exposed to fast-food

flashes also tend to think a musical piece lasts too long.

Yet we can reverse such influences. If we know we will

overreact to consumer products or housing options when we see

a happy face (one reason good sales representatives and real

estate agents are always smiling), we can take a moment before

buying. If we know female job screeners are more likely to reject

attractive female applicants, we can help screeners understand

their biases-or hire outside screeners.

John Gottman, the marriage expert, explains that we quickly

“thin slice” information reliably only after we ground such snap

reactions in “thick sliced” long-term study. When Dr. Gottman

really wants to assess whether a couple will stay together, he

invites them to his island retreat for a muck longer evaluation;

two days, not two seconds.

Our ability to mute our hard-wired reactions by pausing is

what differentiates us from animals: doge can think about the

future only intermittently or for a few minutes. But historically we

have spent about 12 percent of our days contemplating the

longer term. Although technology might change the way we react,

it hasn’t changed our nature. We still have the imaginative

capacity to rise above temptation and reverse the high-speed

trend.

31. The time needed in making decisions may____.

[A] vary according to the urgency of the situation

[B] prove the complexity of our brain reaction

[C] depend on the importance of the assessment

[D] predetermine the accuracy of our judgment

32. Our reaction to a fast-food logo shows that snao

decisions____.

[A] can be associative

[B] are not unconscious

[C] can be dangerous

[D] are not impulsive

33. Toreverse the negative influences of snap decisions,we

should____.

[A] trust our first impression

[B] do as people usually do

[C] think before we act

[D] ask for expert advice

34. John Gottman says that reliable snap reaction are based

on____.

[A] critical assessment

[B]‘‘thin sliced ’’study

[C] sensible explanation

[D] adequate information

35. The author’s attitude toward reversing the high-speed

trend is____.

[A] tolerant

[B] uncertain

[C] optimistic

[D] doubtful

考研历年英二真题阅读文4

Text 4

When the government talks about infrastructure

contributing to the economy the focus is usually on roads,

railways, broadband and energy. Housing is seldom mentioned.

Why is that? To some extent the housing sector must

shoulder the blame. We have not been good at communicating

the real value that housing can contribute to economic growth.

Then there is the scale of the typical housing project. It is hard to

shove for attention among multibillion-pound infrastructure

project, so it is inevitable that the attention is focused elsewhere.

But perhaps the most significant reason is that the issue has

always been so politically charged.

Nevertheless, the affordable housing situation is desperate.

Waiting lists increase all the time and we are simply not building

enough new homes.

The comprehensive spending review offers an opportunity

for the government to help rectify this. It needs to put historical

prejudices to one side and take some steps to address our urgent

housing need.

There are some indications that it is preparing to do just that.

The communities minister, Don Foster, has hinted that George

Osborne, Chancellor of the Exchequer, may introduce more

flexibility to the current cap on the amount that local authorities

can borrow against their housing stock debt. Evidence shows that

60,000 extra new homes could be built over the next five years if

the cap were lifted, increasing GDP by 0.6%.

Ministers should also look at creating greater certainty in the

rental environment, which would have a significant impact on the

ability of registered providers to fund new developments from

revenues.

But it is not just down to the government. While these

measures would be welcome in the short term, we must face up

to the fact that the existing ?4.5bn programme of grants to fund

new affordable housing, set to expire in 2022年,is unlikely to be

extended beyond then. The Labour party has recently announced

that it will retain a large part of the coalition’s spending plans if

returns to power. The housing sector needs to accept that we are

very unlikely to ever return to era of large-scale public grants. We

need to adjust to this changing climate.

36. The author believes that the housing sector__

[A] has attracted much attention

[B] involves certain political factors

[C] shoulders too much responsibility

[D] has lost its real value in economy

37. It can be learned that affordable housing has__

[A] increased its home supply

[B] offered spending opportunities

[C] suffered government biases

[D] disappointed the government

38. According to Paragraph 5,George Osborne may_______.

[A] allow greater government debt for housing

[B] stop local authorities from building homes

[C] prepare to reduce housing stock debt

[D] release a lifted GDP growth forecast

can be inferred that a stable rental environment

would_______.

[A]lower the costs of registered providers

[B]lessen the impact of government interference

[C]contribute to funding new developments

[D]relieve the ministers of responsibilities

author believes that after 2022年,the government

may______.

[A]implement more policies to support housing

[B]review the need for large-scale public grants

[C]renew the affordable housing grants programme

[D]stop generous funding to the housing sector