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I. Vocabulary (20%)

Choose the answer that best completes the sentence, and mark the corresponding letter A, B,
C, or D on your answer card.

1. Many paintings of the American Southwest convey a feeling of isolation and

loneliness that mirrors the __________ landscape they depict.
A. plentiful B. sprawling C. desolate D. important
2. The pharmaceutical company insisted that its testing of new drugs was quite
__________, more rigorous than the industry standard.
A. stringent B. dispersive C. conditional D. recessive
3. Military victories brought tributes to the Aztec empire and, concomitantly, made it
__________, for Aztecs increasingly lived off the vanquished.
A. indecisive B. positive C. parasitic D. beneficent
4. Robb Armstrong’s Jump Start fills a void in the cartoon industry, namely, a
__________ of comic strips represent African Americans.
A. flood B. revision C. dearth D. dispersal
5. The works of Paraguayan artist Carlos Colombino are __________: they include
sculpture, painting, printmaking, and architecture.
A. distorted B. varied C. prominent D. instructive
6. The name of the Sloane Matthew has long been _________; even longtime city
residents assume it is a run-of-the-mill library, never suspecting what art treasures
it contains.
A. revered B. proposed C. misleading D. elevated
7. Although economic growth has conventionally been viewed as the __________
for poverty in underdeveloped regions, this prescription’s negative environmental
side effects are becoming a concern.
A. culprit B. recipe C. panacea D. explanation
8. Even as the economy struggled, the secretary stood by his __________long-term
outlook, saying that technology was allowing businesses to make deep-rooted
improvements in their productivity, the best indicator of an economy’s ability to
grow.
A. arcane B. sanguine C. equivocal D. ambivalent
9. By recognizing commonalities among all the major political parties and by

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promoting a collaborative decision-making process, the prime minister has made

good on his promise to cultivate a leadership style that emphasizes __________.
A. growth B. politics C. ideology D. cooperation
10. In his unexpurgated autobiography, Mark Twain commented freely on the flaws
and foibles of his country, making some observations so __________ that his heirs
and editors feared they would damage Twain’s reputation if not withheld.
A. buoyant B. acerbic C. premonitory D. laudatory

II. Cloze (20%)

Read the following passages, choose for each blank the most appropriate answer, and mark the
corresponding letter A, B, C, or D on your answer card.

Painting, the execution of forms and shapes on a surface by means of pigment, has
been 11 practiced by humans for some 20,000 years. Together with other
activities 12 ritualistic in origin but have come to be designated as artistic (such
as music or dance), painting was one of the earliest ways in which man 13 to
express his own personality and his 14 understanding of an existence beyond the
material world. 15 music and dance, however, examples of early forms of
painting have survived to the present day. The modern eye can derive aesthetic as well
as antiquarian satisfaction 16 the 15,000-year-old cave murals of Lascaux—
some examples 17 to the considerable powers of draftsmanship of these early
artists. And painting, like other arts, exhibits universal qualities that 18 for
viewers of all nations and civilizations to understand and appreciate.

The major 19 examples of early painting anywhere in the world are found in
Western Europe and the former Soviet Union. But some 5,000 years ago, the areas in
which important paintings were executed 20 to the eastern Mediterranean Sea
and neighboring regions.

11. A. continuously B. successively C. constantly D. continually

12. A. may have been B. that may have C. may have D. that may have been
13. A. seek B. sought C. seek for D. sought for
14. A. emerging B. emergency C. merging D. merger
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15. A. As B. Unlike C. Like D. Since

16. A. from B. to C. into D. for
17. A. ratify B. testify C. certify D. gratify
18. A. make easy B. make it easy C. make hard D. make it hard
19. A. extinct B. extent C. extant D. exterior
20. A. had shifted B. have shifted C. shifting D. shifted

III. Article Completion (10%)

In 2015 the Conservative party conference hosted a fringe meeting on assisted dying.
There were, recalls Kit Malthouse, a Tory MP, three people in the audience—one of
whom was his aide. Despondent, Mr Malthouse turned to a colleague and told him their
prospects looked dreadful. “No,” the colleague replied, undaunted. “This is how gay
marriage started.”

Assisted dying, though still controversial, is no longer a fringe issue in Britain. Bills
that would allow it are already moving forward in Jersey, the Isle of Man and Scotland.
The leader of the Labour Party, Sir Keir Starmer, 21 . He has promised a
free vote (in which MPs are not pressed to follow a party line) on the issue in Parliament
if, as expected, his party wins the next election. Rishi Sunak, the prime minister, is less
effusive but has indicated he would allow time for a bill, too. 22 .

That is not because of any big recent shift in public opinion, 23 .

According to YouGov, a pollster, over two-thirds of Britons support changing the law
to allow someone to assist in the suicide of someone with a terminal illness.
_____24 . In recent years assisted-dying laws have been passed in countries such
as Australia and New Zealand; similar bills are set to be introduced in Ireland and
France. Medical opinion is shifting. Following a survey of its membership in 2021 the
British Medical Association, the largest doctors’ union, changed its stance from
opposition to neutrality.

Politicians have taken note. The last time assisted-dying bills were debated in
Westminster and in the Scottish Parliament at Holyrood, in 2015, both were soundly
defeated. But now “it does feel like more and more colleagues are looking for reasons
to support rather than excuses to oppose,” says Liam McCarthur, who introduced the
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new Scottish bill in March. _____25 ____.

A. which was already supportive

B. openly supports a change in the law

C. The bill could become law there in 2025.

D. Britain may be on the verge of its next big social reform

E. But there is a growing body of international evidence to point to

21. A.

22. A.

23. A.

24. A.

25. A.

IV. Reading Comprehension (20%)

Passage 1

Information technology that helps doctors and patients make decisions has been
around for a long time. Crude online tools like WebMD get millions of visitors a day.
But Watson is a different beast. According to IBM, it can digest information and make
recommendations much more quickly, and more intelligently, than perhaps any
machine before it — processing up to 60 million pages of text per second, even when
that text is in the form of plain old prose, or what scientists call “natural language.”

That’s no small thing, because something like 80 percent of all information is

“unstructured.” In medicine, it consists of physician notes dictated into medical records,
long-winded sentences published in academic journals， and raw numbers stored online
by public-health departments. At least in theory, Watson can make sense of it all. It can
sit in on patient examinations, silently listening. And over time, it can learn and get
better at figuring out medical problems and ways of treating them the more it interacts
with real cases. Watson even has the ability to convey doubt. When it makes diagnoses
and recommends treatments, it usually issues a series of possibilities, each with its own
level of confidence attached.

Medicine has never before had a tool quite like this. And at an unofficial coming-
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out party in Las Vegas last year, during the annual meeting of the Healthcare
Information and Management Systems Society, more than 1,000 professionals packed
a large hotel conference hall, and an overflow room nearby, to hear a presentation by
Marty Kohn, an emergency-room physician and a clinical leader of the IBM team
training Watson for health care. Standing before a video screen that dwarfed his large
frame, Kohn described in his husky voice how Watson could be a game changer —
not just in highly specialized fields like oncology but also in primary care, given that
all doctors can make mistakes that lead to costly, sometimes dangerous, treatment errors.

Drawing on his own clinical experience and on academic studies, Kohn explained
that about one-third of these errors appear to be products of misdiagnosis, one cause of
which is “anchoring bias”: human beings’ tendency to rely too heavily on a single piece
of information. This happens all the time in doctors' offices, clinics, and emergency
rooms. A physician hears about two or three symptoms, seizes on a diagnosis consistent
with those, and subconsciously discounts evidence that points to something else. Or a
physician hits upon the right diagnosis, but fails to realize that it’s incomplete, and ends
up treating just one condition when the patient is, in fact, suffering from several. Tools
like Watson are less prone to those failings. As such, Kohn believes, they may
eventually become as ubiquitous in doctors’ offices as the stethoscope.

“Watson fills in for some human limitations,” Kohn told me in an interview.

“Studies show that humans are good at taking a relatively limited list of possibilities
and using that list, but are far less adept at using huge volumes of information. That’s
where Watson shines; taking a huge list of information and winnowing it down.”

26. What is Watson?

A. It is a person who aids doctors in processing medical records.
B. It is an online tool that connects doctors over different places.
C. It is an intelligent computer that helps doctors make decisions.
D. It is a beast that greets millions of visitors to a medical institution.

27. Which of the following is beyond Watson’s ability?

A. Talk with the patient.
B. Calculate probability.
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C. Recommend treatment.
D. Process sophisticated data.

28. Marty Kohn __________.

A. gave a presentation at an academic conference
B. works for the IBM Training Division
C. is a short person with a husky voice
D. expressed optimism for Watson

29. “Anchoring bias” __________.

A. is a device ubiquitous in doctors’ office
B. is less likely to be committed by Watson
C. happens in one third of medical treatments
D. is a wrong diagnosis with incomplete information

30. Which of the following may be the best title of the passage?
A. Watson as a Shining Star
B. The Risks of Misdiagnosis
C. The Robot Will See You Now
D. IBM’s IT Solution to Medicine

Passage 2

The contribution genes make to intelligence increases as children grow older. This
goes against the notion that most people hold that as we age, environmental influences
gradually overpower the genetic legacy we are born with and may have implications
for education. “People assume the genetic influence goes down with age because the
environmental differences between people pile up in life,” says Robert Plomin. “What
we found was quite amazing and goes in the other direction.”

Previous studies have shown variations in intelligence are at least partly due to
genetics. To find out whether this genetic contribution varies with age, Plomin’s team
pooled data from six separate studies carried out in the US, the UK, Australia, and the
Netherlands, involving a total of 11,000 pairs of twins. In these studies, the researchers
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tested twins on reasoning, logic, and arithmetics to measure a quantity called general
cognitive ability, or “G.” Each study also included both identical twins, with the same
genes, and fraternal twins, sharing about half their genes, making it possible to
distinguish the contributions of genes and environment to their G scores.

Plomin’s team calculated that in childhood, genes account for about 41 percent of
the variation in intelligence. In adolescence, this rose to 55 percent; by young
adolescence, it was 66 percent. No one knows why the influence from genes should
increase with age, but Plomin suggests that as children get older, they become better at
exploiting and manipulating their environment to suit their genetic needs, and says,
“Kids with high G will use their environment to foster their cognitive ability and choose
friends who are like-minded.” Children with medium to low G may choose fewer
challenging pastimes and activities, further emphasizing their genetic legacy.

Is there any way to interfere with the pattern? Perhaps. “The evidence of strong
heritability doesn’t mean at all that there is nothing you can do about it,” says Susanne
Jaeggi, “From our own work, the ones that started off with lower IQ scores had higher
gains after training.”

Plomin suggests that genetic differences may be more emphasized if all children
share an identical curriculum instead of it being tailored to children’s natural abilities.
“My inclination would be to give everyone a good education but put more effort into
the lower end,” he says. Intelligence researcher Paul Thompson agrees: “It shows that
educators need to steer kids towards things drawing out their natural talents.”

31. What is the common notion that people hold about genes?
A. Humans can do little to change the genetic differences between people.
B. Genetic influence becomes stronger when people receive education.
C. Genes contribute more to one’s intelligence than environmental factors.
D. Environmental factors lessen the influence of genes on one’s intelligence.

32. The study by Plomin’s team aims to find out __________.

A. whether variations in intelligence are caused by genetic differences
B. how to overpower genetic factors with new educational approaches

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C. whether genetic contribution to one’s intelligence varies with age

D. the relationship between environment and genes

33. From the experiment with twins, Plomin’s team draws a conclusion that _________.
A. genetic contribution increases when one grows older
B. genetic influence decreases when age increases
C. environment has more impact on fraternal twins than identical twins
D. it remains a mystery how genes and environment co-influence people

34. The word “pattern” in paragraph four is closest in meaning to __________.

A. cognitive ability
B. strong heritability
C. genetic legacy
D. challenging pastimes

35. Which of the following might Plomin’s team least agree to?
A. An identical curriculum to school children.
B. A differentiated course design for children with varied IQs.
C. More effort directed at children with medium or low G.
D. Education tailored to children’s natural abilities.

V. Composition (30%)

In some countries, owning a home rather than renting one is very important for
people. Why might this be the case? Do you think this is a positive or negative
situation?

Give reasons for your answer and include any relevant examples from your own
knowledge or experience.