英语专业四级2016—2019年CLOSE真题及答案(有翻译)

Part IV Close (2019)

To some thinkers, it is machines and their development that drive economic and cultural change. This idea is referred to as technological determinism. Certainly there can be no doubt that machines contributed to the Protestant Reformation and the decline of the Catholic Church’s power in Europe or that television has changed the way family members interact. Those who believe in technological determinism would argue that these changes in the cultural landscape were the inevitable result of new technology.

But others see technology as more neutral and claim that the way people use technology is what gives it significance. This perspective accepts technology as one of many factors that shape economic and cultural change; technology’s influence is ultimately determined by how much power it is given by the people and cultures that use it.

This disagreement about the power of technology is at the heart of the controversy surrounding the new communication technologies. Are we more or less powerless in the wake of advances such as the Internet, the World Wide Web, and instant global audio and visual communication? If we are at the mercy of technology, the culture that surrounds us will not be of our making, and best we can hope to do is make our way reasonably well in a world outside our own control. But if these technologies are indeed neutral and their power resides in how we choose to use them, we can utilize them responsibly and thoughtfully to construct and maintain whatever kind of culture we want. As film director and technophile Steve Spielberg explained, “Technology can be our best friend, and technology can also be the biggest party pooper of our lives. It interrupts our own story, interrupts our ability to have a thought or daydream, to imagine something wonderful.”

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在有些思想家看来，正是机器及其发展推动了经济和文化的变革。这种观点被称为技术决定论。毫无疑问，机器促成了宗教改革运动、使得天主教会在欧洲

的权力下降，而电视改变了家庭成员的互动方式。那些相信技术决定论的人会争辩说，人文方面的这些变化是发展新技术带来的必然结果。

但其他人对技术的看法更加中立，他们声称人们使用技术的方式赋予了技术重要意义。这种观点将技术视为影响经济和文化变革的众多因素之一；技术的影响力最终取决于技术使用者和文化。

大家对新通信技术有争议，而这种有关技术影响力的分歧正是争议的核心所在。紧随着互联网、万维网和全球即时音视频交流等技术的进步，我们是否或多或少都有无力感?如果我们任凭技术摆布，那么我们就不能塑造我们身边的文化，而有望做得最好的事情仅仅是在一个自己无法掌控的世界中理性地前进。但是，如果技术对人类的主导作用确实没这么强，并且其影响力也在于我们选择如何使用它，那么我们就可以负责地、考虑周全地利用技术来构建和维持我们想要的任何一种文化。正如史蒂夫·斯皮尔伯格这位导演兼新科技迷所解释的那样：“技术可成为我们最好的朋友，也可以成为我们生活中最扫兴的东西。它会打断我们创造自己的故事，会中断我们思考、幻想和想象美妙东西的能力。” Part IV Close (2018)

A few years ago, a university professor tried a little experiment. He sent Christmas cards to a sample of perfect strangers. Although he expected some reaction, the response he received was amazing—holiday cards addressed to him came pouring back from the people who had never met nor heard of him. The great majority of those who returned a card never inquired into the identity of the unknown professor. They received his holiday greeting card, and they automatically sent one in return. This study shows the action of one of the most powerful of the weapons of influence around us-the rule for reciprocation. The rule says that we should try to repay, in kind, what another person has provided us. If a woman does us a favor, we should do her one in return; if a man sends us a birthday present, we should remember his birthday with a gift of our own: if a couple invites us to a party, we should be sure to invite them to one of ours. By virtue of the reciprocity rule, then, we are obliged to the future repayment of favors, gifts, invitations, and the like. So typical is it for renowned to accompany the receipt of such things that a term like “much obliged” has become a synonym for “thank you”, not only in the English language but in others as

well.

The impressive aspect of the rule for reciprocation and the sense of obligation that goes with it is its pervasiveness in human culture. It is so widespread that after intensive study, sociologists can report that there is no human society that does not subscribe to the rule.

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几年前，一位大学教授尝试着做了一个小实验。他挑选了一批完全陌生的人作为实验样本，给他们寄了圣诞贺卡。尽管他已料到会得到一些回应，但他收到的回复却是惊人的：大量的节日贺卡从那些未见过也未听说过他的人那里寄了过来。绝大多数回寄卡片的人从未查究过这位不知名教授的身份。他们收到了教授的节日贺卡，然后自动地回寄了一张。这项研究显示了回报原则的作用，该原则是我们身边最具影响力的武器之一。这条原则表明，我们应该尽力以同一方式回报他人给予我们的东西。如果一位女士帮我们一个忙，我们也应该帮助她作为回报；如果一位男士送了我们一件生日礼物，我们应该记住在他生日的时候送上我们的礼物；如果一对夫妇邀请我们参加派对，我们肯定要邀请他们参加我们的一个派对。因此，根据回报原则，我们有义务在将来回报别人的帮助，回赠别人礼物，回邀别人参加我们的活动，等等。接收这些东西时通常都伴随着负债感，而这种现象又如此普遍，以至于像“很有义务”这样的词已经变成了“谢谢”的同义词。[编者注： oblige原意为“(以法律、义务等)迫使”，其被动式用于 much obliged时引申为“非常感谢，不胜感激”]不仅在英语中，在其他语言中亦是如此。

回报原则与随之而来的义务感令人印象深刻的一面是它在人类文化中的普遍性。这项原则如此普遍，社会学家经过深入研究后可以报告说，没有任何人类社会不赞同它。 Part IV Close (2017)

Millions of people now rent their movies the Netflix way. They fill out a wish list from the 50,009 titles on the company's web site and receive the first few DVD's in the mail; when they mail each one back, the next one on the list is sent. The Netflix model has been exhaustively analyzed for its disruptive, new-economy implications. What will it mean for video stores like Blockbuster? What will it mean for movie

studios and theaters? What does it show about \"long tail\" businesses--ones that combine many markets into a single target audience? But one other major implication has barely been mentioned: what this and similar Internet-based businesses mean for the United States Postal Service.

Every day, some two million Netflix envelopes come and go as firstclass mail. They are joined by millions of other shipments from online pharmacies, eBay vendors, Amazon.com and other businesses that did not exist before the Internet.

The demise of “snail mail” in the age of electronic communication has been predicted at least as often as the coming of the paperless office. But the consumption of paper keeps rising. It has roughly doubled since 1980. On average, an American household receives twice as many pieces of mail a day as it did in the 1970’s.

The harmful side of the Internet's impact is obvious but statistically less important than many would guess. People naturally write fewer letters when they can send e-mail messages. To leaf through a box of old paper correspondence is to know what has been lost in this shift: the pretty stamps, the varying look and feel of handwritten and typed correspondence, the tangible object that was once in the sender’s hands.

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如今，数百万人以Netflix公司(译者注：Netflix是一家在线影片租赁提供商)的模式租赁电影。他们从该公司网站的50009个电影名中，选填出想看的电影清单，并通过邮件的方式收到首批DVD影碟。当他们寄回一批后，列表中的下一批就会寄送过来。Netⅸ的模式因其颠覆性的新经济含义而被详细分析。对于像 Blockbuster这样的视频商店，这将意味着什么?对于电影工作室和剧院，这又将意味着什么?对于“长尾”商业模式(“长尾”商业模式是指将众多市场整合成单一目标受众的商业模式)，这又有何意义?还有另外一个重要的意义鲜被提及：该模式和类似的互联网商业模式对美国邮政服务又有何意味。

每天来来往往的Netflix平信大约有两百万封。另外还有数百万货运品，来自在线药店、亿贝卖家、亚马逊网以及其他在互联网出现后才诞生的公司。

“蜗牛信件”会在互联网时代消失，这个预言被提及的次数至少与“办公无

纸化会到来”的预言一样频繁。但纸的消耗量却一直上升。自1980年以来，纸的消耗量大约翻了一番。平均而言，每个美国家庭一天收到的邮件量是20世纪70年代的两倍。

互联网的负面影响显而易见，但从统计学上看，不如许多人所预料的那般严重。人们可以发电子邮件时，写信自然就少了。翻看一箱传统的纸质信件，人们就会知道在这种转变中失去了什么：漂亮的邮票、手写信和打印信件的不同外观与手感——这种寄信人曾拿在手中的实物。 Part IV Close (2016)

Imagine a world without writing. Obviously there would be no books: no novels, no encyclopedias, no cookbooks, no textbooks, no telephone books, no scriptures, no diaries, no travel guides. There would be no ball-points, no typewriters, no computers, no Internet, no magazines, no movie credits, no shopping lists, no newspapers, no tax returns. But such lists of objects almost miss the point. The world we live in has been indelibly marked by the written word, shaped by the technology of writing over thousands of years. Ancient kings proclaimed their authority and promulgated their laws in writing. Scribes administered great empires by writing, their knowledge of recording and retrieving information essential to governing complex societies. Religious traditions were passed on through generations, and spread to others, in writing. Scientific and technological progress was achieved and disseminated through writing. Accounts in trade and commerce could be kept because of writing. Nearly every step of civilization has been mediated through writing A world without writing would bear scant resemblance to the one we now live in. Writing is a virtual necessity to the societies anthropologists call civilizations. A civilization is distinguished from other societies by the complexity of its social organization, by its construction of cities and large public buildings, and by the economic specialization of its members, many of whom are not directly involved in food procurement or production. A civilization, with its taxation and tribute systems, its trade, and its public works, requires a sophisticated system of record keeping. And so the early civilizations of Egypt, China, and (probably) India all developed a system of writing. Only the Peruvian civilization of the Incas and their predecessors did not use writing but

instead invented a system of keeping records on knotted color-coded strings known as quipu.

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想象一下这种情况：如果世界上没有书写，显然就不会有书—不会有小说、百科全书、烹饪书、教材、电话本、圣经、日记及旅游指南；也不会有圆珠笔、打字机、电脑、互联网、杂志、电影鸣谢词、购物清单、报纸以及报税单。然而以上列举的这些东西几乎都没能抓住问题的关键。几千年来，我们生活的世界受到书写技术的影响，烙上了不可磨灭的文字印记。古代的国王通过书写来宣告其权势，颁布法律。通晓如何记录和获取统治复杂社会所需信息的文官通过书写来管理大帝国。宗教传统通过书写的方式得以广泛传播、代代相传。科技进步通过书写来实现和传播。由于有了书写，商贸账目得以保留。几乎文明的每一步都是通过书写来实现的。没有书写的世界将与我们现在生活的世界大不相同。事实上，书写对于人类学家称之为文明的社会来说是必需的。文明社会区别于其他社会就在于其复杂的社会组织、城市和大型公共建筑的构筑、以及其社会成员的经济专业化。这些社会成员中的许多人并不会直接参与到食品采购或生产中。一个文明社会拥有税收和朝贡体系，会进行贸易以及实施公共建设项目，因而需要一个精妙的记录系统。因此，古埃及和中国这些早期文明(很可能包括印度)都形成了一套书写体系。只有秘鲁的印加文明及其先辈们不使用书写系统，而是发明了一套以颜色为代码的绳结记录系统，该系统被称为“基普”( quipu)。