An article published recently in the prestigious scientific journal Nature is shedding new light on an important, but hitherto little has been appreciated, aspect of human evolution. In this article, Professors Dennis Bramble and Daniel Lieberman suggest that the ability to run was. a crucial factor in the development of our species. According to the two scientists, humans possess a number of anatomical features that make them surprisingly good runners. "We are very confident that strong selection for running — which came at the expense of the historical ability to live in trees — was instrumental in the origin of the modern human body form," says Bramble, a biology professor at the University of Utah.

Traditional thinking up to now has been that the distinctive, upright body form. of modern humans has come about as a result of the ability to walk, and that running is simply a by-product of walking. Furthermore, humans have usually been regarded as poor runners compared to such animals as dogs, horses or antelopes. However, this is only true if we consider fast running, or sprinting, over short distances. Even an Olympic athlete can hardly run as fast as a horse can gallop, and can only keep up a top speed for fifteen seconds or so. Horses, antelopes and greyhounds, on the other hand, can run at top speed for several minutes, clearly outperforming us in this respect. But when it comes to long-distance running, humans do astonishingly well. They can maintain a steady pace for miles, and their overall speed compares favourably with that of horses or dogs.

Bramble and Lieberman examined twenty-six anatomical features found in humans. One of the most interesting of these is the nuchal ligament, a band of tissue that extends from a ridge on the base of the skull to the spine. When we run, it is this ligament that prevents our head from pitching back and forth or from side to side. Therefore, we are able to run with steady heads, held high. The nuchal ligament is not found in any other surviving primates, although the fossil record shows that Homo erectus, an early human species that walked upright, much as we do, also had one. Then there are our Achilles tendons at the backs of our legs, which connect our calf muscles to our heel bones -- and which have nothing to do with walking. When we run, these tendons behave like springs, helping to propel us forward. Furthermore, we have low, wide shoulders, virtually disconnected from our skulls, another anatomical adaptation which allows us to run more efficiently. Add to this our light forearms, which swing out of phase with the movement of our legs to assist balance, and one begins to appreciate the point that Bramble and Lieberman are trying to make.

But what evolutionary advantage is gained from being good long-distance runners? One hypothesis is that this ability may have permitted early humans to obtain food more effectively. "What these features and fossil facts appear to be telling us is that running evolved in order for our direct ancestors to compete with other carnivores for access to the protein needed to grow the big brains that we enjoy today," says Lieberman.

The human ability to run ______.

A．was only recently described in a scientific journal

B．played an important part in human evolution

C．is now regarded as more important than the ability to climb trees

D．is surprising when we consider evolutionary trends

Jan Hendrik Schon's success seemed too good to be true, and it was. In only four years as a physicist at Bell Laboratories, Schon, 32, had co-authored 90 scientific papers — one every 16 days, which astonished his colleagues, and made them suspicious. When one co-worker noticed that the same table of data appeared in two separate papers — which also happened to appear in the two most prestigious scientific journals in the world, Science and Nature — the jig was up. In October 2002, a Bell Labs investigation found that Schon had falsified and fabricated data. His career as a scientist was finished.

If it sounds a lot like the fall of Hwang Woo Suk — the South Korean researcher who fabricated his evidence about cloning human cells — it is. Scientific scandals, which are as old as science itself, tend to follow similar patterns of hubris and comeuppance. Afterwards, colleagues wring their hands and wonder how such malfeasance can be avoided in the future. But it never is entirely. Science is built on the honor system; the method of peer-review, in which manuscripts are evaluated by experts in the field, is not meant to catch cheats. In recent years, of course, the pressure on scientists to publish in the top journals has increased, making the journals much more crucial to career success. The questions raised anew by Hwang's fall are whether Nature and Science have become too powerful as arbiters of what science reaches the public, and whether the journals are up to their task as gatekeepers.

Each scientific specialty has its own set of journals. Physicists have Physical Review Letters; cell biologists have Cell; neuroscientists have Neuron, and so forth. Science and Nature, though, are the only two major journals that cover the gamut of scientific disciplines, from meteorology and zoology to quantum physics and chemistry. As a result, journalists look to them each week for the cream of the crop of new science papers. And scientists look to the journals in part to reach journalists. Why do they care? Competition for grants has gotten so fierce that scientists have sought popular renown to gain an edge over their rivals. Publication in specialized journals will win the accolades of academics and satisfy the publish- or-perish imperative, but Science and Nature come with the added bonus of potentially getting your paper written up in The New York Times and other publications.

Scientists are also trying to reach other scientists through Science and Nature, not just the public. Scientists tend to pay more attention to the Big Two than to other journals. When more scientists know about a particular paper, they're more apt to cite it in their own papers. Being off-cited will increase a scientist's "Impact Factor", a measure of how often papers are cited by peers. Funding agencies use the Impact Factor as a rough measure of the influence of scientists they're considering supporting.

Whether the clamor to appear in these journals has any beating on their ability to catch fraud is another matter. The fact is that fraud is terrifically hard to spot. Consider the process Science used to evaluate Hwang's 2005 article. Science editors recognized the manuscript's import almost as soon as it arrived. As part of the standard procedure, they sent it to two members of its Board of Reviewing Editors, who recommended that it go out for peer review (about 30 percent of manuscripts pass this test). This recommendation was made not on the scientific validity of the paper, but on its "novelty, originality, and trendiness", says Denis Duboule, a geneticist at the University of Geneva and a member of Science's Board of Reviewing Editors, in the January 6 issue of Science.

After this, Science sent the paper to three stem-cell experts, who had a week to look it over. Their comments were favorable. How were they to know that the data was fraudulent? "You look at the data and do not assume it's fraud," says one revi

A．Key scientific journals are authoritative in evaluating scientific papers.

B．Peer-review is the most effective method in evaluating and selecting scientific papers.

C．Scientists are less likely to achieve career success without publications in top papers.

D．Fabricating evidence in scientific researches can be discovered by evaluation strict enough.

根據以下資料，回答下列各題。 Text 2 An article in Scientific America has pointed out that empirical research says that, actually, you think you’re more beautiful than you are. We have a deep-seated need to feel good about ourselves and we naturally employ a number of self-enhancing strategies to research into what the call the “above average effect”, or “illusory superiority”, and shown that, for example, 70% of us rate ourselves as above average in leadership, 93% in driving and 85% at getting on well with others—all obviously statistical impossibilities. We rose tint our memories and put ourselves into self-affirming situations. We become defensive when criticized, and apply negative stereotypes to others to boost our own esteem, we stalk around thinking we’re hot stuff. Psychologist and behavioral scientist Nicholas Epley oversaw a key studying into self-enhancement and attractiveness. Rather that have people simply rate their beauty compress with others, he asked them to identify an original photogragh of themselves’ from a lineup including versions that had been altered to appear more and less attractive. Visual recognition, reads the study, is “an automatic psychological process occurring rapidly and intuitively with little or no apparent conscious deliberation”. If the subjects quickly chose a falsely flattering image- which must did- they genuinely believed it was really how they looked. Epley found no significant gender difference in responses. Nor was there any evidence that, those who self-enhance the must (that is, the participants who thought the most positively doctored picture were real) were doing so to make up for profound insecurities. In fact those who thought that the images higher up the attractiveness scale were real directly corresponded with those who showed other makers for having higher self-esteem. “I don’t think the findings that we having have are any evidence of personal delusion”, says Epley. “It’s a reflection simply of people generally thinking well of themselves’. If you are depressed, you won’t be self-enhancing. Knowing the results of Epley ‘s study,it makes sense that why people heat photographs of themselves Viscerally-on one level, they don’t even recognise the person in the picture as themselves, Facebook therefore ,is a self-enhancer’s paradise,where people can share only the most flattering photos, the cream of their wit ,style. ,beauty, intellect and lifestyle. it’s not that people’s profiles are dishonest,says catalina toma of Wiscon—Madison university ,”but they portray an idealized version of themselves. 26. According to the first paragraph, social psychologist have found that ______.

A.our self-ratings are unrealistically high

B.illusory superiority is baseless effect

C.our need for leadership is unnatural

D.self-enhancing strategies are ineffective

Japanese Computer Is World's Fastest, as U.S. Falls Back

The world's fastest computer

A Japanese laboratory has built the world's fastest computer, a machine so powerful that it matches the raw processing power of the 20 fastest American computers combined and far outstrips the previous leader, an 1. B. M. -built machine.

The achievement, which was reported today by an American scientist who tracks the performance of the world's most powerful computers, is evidence that a technology race that most American engineers thought they were winning handily is far from over. American companies have built the fastest computers for most of the last decade. The accomplishment is also a vivid statement of contrasting scientific and technology priorities in the United States and Japan. The Japanese machine was built to analyze climate change, including global warming, as well as weather and earthquake patterns. By contrast, the United States has predominantly focused its efforts on building powerful computers for simulating weapons, while its efforts have lagged in scientific areas like climate modeling.

A competition between Japan and U. S.

For some American computer scientists, the arrival of the Japanese supercomputer evokes the type of alarm raised by the Soviet Union's Sputnik(人造地求衛星)satellite in 1957.

Several United States computer scientists said the Japanese machine reflected differences in style. and commitment that suggest that United States research and spending efforts have grown complacent (自滿的)in recent years. For now, the new computer will be used only for climate research, and American scientists have already begun preparing to move some of their climate simulation research to run on the Japanese machine.

"The Japanese clearly have a level of will that we haven't achieved," said Thomas Sterling, a computer designer at the California Institute of Technology. "These guys are blowing us out of the water, and we need to sit up and take notice."

Wide applications of the magic power

The new Japanese supercomputer will have both scientific and practical applications. It will be used for advanced modeling of theories about global warming and climate change, and it will be able to predict short-term weather patterns.

Advances in computer speed today routinely extend computer simulation into all areas of science and engineering as complex calculations take an increasingly shorter time. Because increases in computing power tend to have exponential (指數的)results, a problem that could take years for even the fastest computers today might be finished in hours on the new Japanese computer.

The ability to track the path of a typhoon, for example, is of immediate relevance to the island nation of Japan. Improved prediction made possible by a more powerful computer might save lives and property.

Computer simulation has become a standard tool in both science and modern design of products ranging from drugs to bicycles. Computers that are more powerful make possible simulations that are more accurate and can reduce cost and increase efficiency. At one time, for example, computers were capable of computing the flow of air over a single airplane wing but can now cover the entire aircraft.

The new Japanese supercomputer was financed by the Japanese government and has been installed at the Earth Simulator Research and Development Center in Yokohama (橫濱), west of Tokyo. The Japanese government spent $ 350 million to $ 400 million developing the system over the last five years, according to Dr. Akira Sekino, president and chief executive of HNSX Supercomputers, a unit of the NEC Corporation based in Littleton, Colo.

The new computer was formally dedicated last month, and the Japan Marine Science and Technology Center said yesterday that the mac

A．Y

B．N

C．NG

Mobile Phones

Mobile phones should carry a label if they proved to be a dangerous source of radiation, according to Robert Bell, a scientist. And no more mobile phone transmitter towers should be built until the long-term health effects of the electromagnetic radiation they emit are scientifically evaluated, he said. "Nobody&39;s going to drop dead overnight but we should be asking for more scientific information," Robert Bell said at a conference on the health effects of low-level radiation.(46)

A report widely circulated among the public says that up to now scientists do not really know enough to guarantee there are no ill-effects on humans from electromagnetic radiation. According to Robert Bell, there are 3.3 million mobile phones in Australia alone and they are increasing by 2,000 a day.(47)

As well, there are 2,000 transmitter towers around Australia, many in high density residential areas.(48)The electromagnetic radiation emitted from these towers may have already produced some harmful effects on the health of the residents nearby.

Robert Bell suggests that until more research is completed the Government should ban construction of phone towers from within a 500 metre radius of school grounds, child care centres, hospitals, sports playing fields and residential areas with a high percentage of children.(49)He adds that there is also evidence that if cancer sufferers are subjected to electromagnetic waves the growth rate of the disease accelerates.

(50)According to Robert Bell, it is reasonable for the major telephone companies to fund it. Besides, he also urges the Government to set up a wide-ranging inquiry into possible health effects.

(46)

A.He says there is emerging evidence that children absorb low-level radiation at a rate more than three times that of adults.B.By the year 2000 it is estimated that Australia will have 8 million mobile phones: nearly one for every two people.C."If mobile phones are found to be dangerous, they should carry a warning label until proper shields can be devised," he said.D.Then who finances the research?E.For example, Telstra, Optus and Vodaphone build their towers where it is geographically suitable to them and disregard the need of the community.F.The conclusion is that mobile phones brings more harm than benefit.

(47)

A.He says there is emerging evidence that children absorb low-level radiation at a rate more than three times that of adults.B.By the year 2000 it is estimated that Australia will have 8 million mobile phones: nearly one for every two people.C."If mobile phones are found to be dangerous, they should carry a warning label until proper shields can be devised," he said.D.Then who finances the research?E.For example, Telstra, Optus and Vodaphone build their towers where it is geographically suitable to them and disregard the need of the community.F.The conclusion is that mobile phones brings more harm than benefit.

(48)

A.He says there is emerging evidence that children absorb low-level radiation at a rate more than three times that of adults.B.By the year 2000 it is estimated that Australia will have 8 million mobile phones: nearly one for every two people.C."If mobile phones are found to be dangerous, they should carry a warning label until proper shields can be devised," he said.D.Then who finances the research?E.For example, Telstra, Optus and Vodaphone build their towers where it is geographically suitable to them and disregard the need of the community.F.The conclusion is that mobile phones brings more harm than benefit.

(49)

A.He says there is emerging evidence that children absorb low-level radiation at a rate more than three times that of adults.B.By the year 2000 it is estimated that Australia will have 8 million mobile phones: nearly one for every two people.C."If mobile phones are found to be dangerous, they should carry a warning label until proper shields can be devised," he said.D.Then who finances the research?E.For example, Telstra, Optus and Vodaphone build their towers where it is geographically suitable to them and disregard the need of the community.F.The conclusion is that mobile phones brings more harm than benefit.

(50)

A.He says there is emerging evidence that children absorb low-level radiation at a rate more than three times that of adults.B.By the year 2000 it is estimated that Australia will have 8 million mobile phones: nearly one for every two people.C."If mobile phones are found to be dangerous, they should carry a warning label until proper shields can be devised," he said.D.Then who finances the research?E.For example, Telstra, Optus and Vodaphone build their towers where it is geographically suitable to them and disregard the need of the community.F.The conclusion is that mobile phones brings more harm than benefit.

請幫忙給出每個問題的正確答案和分析，謝謝！