Four of the world's best futurists
Kevin Kelly
Kevin Kelly is an author. His 1994 publication, Out of Control, discusses a future where machines and systems are so complex as to be indistinguishable(难区分的) from living things.
His latest book What Technology Wants suggests that technology is not just a mixture of wires and metals but a living thing that has its own need. The book looks out through the eyes of this global technological system to discover what it wants.
Dr Michio Kaku
Dr Michio Kaku is a professor of theoretical physics at the city of New York and the author of The Future of the Mind and Physics of the Future.
In The Future of the Mind, he explores the frontier of neuroscience. He predicts that one day we will be able to upload the human brain into a computer. In Physics of the Future, he predicts that glasses and contact lenses will be connected to the Internet and cars will become driverless with the power of the GPS system.
David Brin
Science fiction author and scientist, David Brin has received awards. In 1998, he won the Freedom of Speech Award for The Transparence Society. The book concerns threats to personal affairs and openness in the information age. In a world where the police monitor public places 24 hours a day with cameras and some credit companies can sell people's financial details to anyone willing to pay, Brin warns that surveillance(监视) technology will be used by too few people in the future. He argues that the tables should be turned and the public should have access to information like who is buying financial details from credit companies.
Dr Ray Kurzweil
Dr Ray Kurzweil is the main inventor of the first print-to-speech reading machine for the blind. He is the director of artificial intelligence development at Google.
Over the past 25 years, a number of his predictions have come true. In 1990, he predicted a computer would defeat a human at chess by 1998. He predicts that by the 2020s, most diseases will go away and self-driving cars begin to take over the roads.
Spanish artist Pablo Picasso (1881—1973 ) was one of the greatest artists of the 20th century. It was said that everything his brush touched turned to gold. But in truth, his works could be worth more than any precious metal. Picasso created more than 20,000 works in his life, including two of the world's 10 most expensive paintings.
Between 1907 and 1913, Picasso and his colleague Georges Braque started a revolution(革命) in painting. Before that, paintings were like windows—they were painted to look as if they had depth. You could tell which objects were "close" to you and which objects were "far away". But Picasso and Braque didn't want to paint like that any more. To them, a painting wasn't a window to the world; it was marks and lines on a flat surface. Why, they thought, should an object like a guitar be shown only from one angle (角度)? A guitar can look very different depending on which angle one looks at it from. Their answer was to show all the angles. They broke the guitar up into pieces. Their style of painting is called cubism (立体主义).
But why did they feel such a need to change things? Well, the world around them was changing, too. Science was turning people's ideas upside down. Albert Einstein's theory proved that what we knew about time and space was wrong. The world was becoming different; artists needed to start seeing and painting it differently.
The famous and terrifying painting Guernica (1937) shows a terrible scene during the Spanish Civil War. In the painting, you can actually see the sky falling. Picasso couldn't have painted it without the skills he learned during his cubist period. Breaking a guitar up into pieces was his preparation for showing the world being blown to pieces.
Gardeners such as Prince Charles who claim that talking to plants encourages them to grow have long been seen as a little silly. But scientists have discovered evidence which suggests the Royal may actually be right and they could be listening to him. Biologists at Tel Aviv University in Israel have found that flowers can act as a plant's "ears" to help them detect the sound of approaching insects.
When the researchers played recordings of flying bees to evening primrose flowers, within three minutes the sugar concentrations in the nectar (花蜜) of its flowers increased. The fluid，produced to attract pollinating (授粉) insects, was on average 20 percent higher in flowers exposed to the buzz compared to those left in silence or exposed to higher pitched sounds. Professor Lilach Hadany, who led the study, said，"Our results document for the first time that plants can rapidly respond to pollinator sounds in an ecologically relevant way. "
However, Prof Hadany said a plant's ability to respond to pollinators may be weakened in city environments or beside a busy road. While plants require water, sunlight and the right temperature to grow, it is widely believed that they do not have senses in the way animals do.
But the study，published on the open-science website BioRxiv, suggests the efforts of gardeners who talk to their plants may not be in vain. "Plants' ability to hear has implications well beyond pollination—plants could potentially hear and respond to herbivores, other animals, the elements, and possibly other plants，" Prof Hadany added.
A month-long experiment conducted by the Royal Horticultural Society in 2009 found female voices appear to speed up the growth of tomatoes. The research offers a possible explanation—women's voices were at the right frequency for the plants to hear.
There was a lot of news related to artificial intelligence, or AI, and machine learning. Among the stories were two dealing with direct competitions between humans and machines.
In one competition, machines that used AI performed better than human beings in a high-level reading test. Two natural language processing tools beat human in the experiment. One of the tools was built by the American technology company Microsoft. The other was created by Chinese online seller Alibaba Group.
In another competition, a computer took on humans in live, public debates. The event demonstrated how AI-powered computers are increasingly being developed to think and sound like humans. The organizer of the debates, US technology company IBM, announced split results. It said a majority of those watching said they felt the machine had done more to improve their knowledge of the subject. But, the human got more praise for communicating their ideas.
This year, we also explored the many ways AI and machine learning are now being used. For example, some US judges use machine learning systems to help them decide when, and for how long, criminals should be jailed. The system uses computers to examine data from thousands of court cases.
One fast-growing area of AI is facial recognition, which is increasingly being used for security purposes. Recently, Atlanta's Hartsfield-Jackson airport became the first in the US to permit passengers to use facial recognition technology to get on flights. A Chinese company showed an AI system developed to recognize individuals by body shape and walking movements. The system is already being used by Chinese police in Beijing and Shanghai.
In addition, machine learning was used during 2018 to predict results of the World Cup soccer competition. The technology also created artwork sold for a large amount of money. And it is being used to help farmers save time and money, while reducing environment-harming chemicals. Other technology systems are being used to follow farm animals and wildlife to collect information on their activities.
You might think that simple things like saying hello and goodbye are the same in every culture. Think again!
Shaking hands to say hello or goodbye was a Western custom at first.
Traditionally, the Chinese custom for greeting was to hold one's hands together and nod their head a little.
Japanese people greet each other by bowing. When greeting an older or more important person, it is usual to bow lower and for longer. But only men did it.
People in European countries such as Italy often greet each other with a kiss on both cheeks(脸颊). Even men greet each other like this.
Eskimos, a group of people living in the very cold northern areas of North America, greet each other by lightly rubbing their noses together. Often，Eskimos only leave their eyes and noses uncovered. And the rest of their bodies are covered with warm clothing and their hands with gloves.
When you're not sure what the customs are in a new country, there's one greeting that is the same all over the world: a smile.
A. Kissing is only for close family or women friends.
B. However, Eskimos never greet each other with a bow.
C. Everyone understands a smile so don't be afraid to use it!
D. In some cultures, it is usual to kiss on the cheek three times!
E. This custom probably started because of the freezing weather.
F. Bowing was also traditional in many European countries in the past.
G. But it is now becoming international, especially in business situations.
Joe Simpson and Simon Yates were the first people to climb the West Face of the Siula Grande in the Andes Mountains. They reached the top 1 , but on their way back conditions were very 2 . Joe fell and broke his leg. They both knew that if Simon 3 alone, he would probably get back safely. But Simon decided to risk his 4 and try to lower Joe down the mountain on a rope.
As they went down, the weather got worse. Then another 5 occurred. They couldn't see or hear each other and, 6 , Simon lowered his friend over the edge of a precipice(峭壁). It was 7 for Joe to climb back or for Simon to pull him up. Joe's 8 was pulling Simon slowly towards the precipice. 9 , after more than an hour in the dark and the icy cold, Simon had to make a decision. In tears, he cut the rope. Joe 10 into a huge crevasse(裂缝) in the ice below. He had no food or water and he was in terrible pain. He couldn't walk, but he 11 to get out of the crevasse and started to 12 towards their camp, nearly ten kilometres away.
Simon had 13 the camp at the foot of the mountain. He thought that Joe must be 14 , but he didn't want to leave immediately. Three days later, in the middle of the night, he heard Joe's voice. He couldn't 15 it. Joe was there, a few metres from their tent, still alive.
It's estimated that two-thirds of people online have had their personal information (steal).
Faced with such a range of (threat), it's easy to focus on technology investment. Firewalls, anti-virus protection and every other kind of technology can be threatened as well. That's not to say that (invest) in IT security isn't important. But the cybersecurity (网络安全) threat needs individuals have skills, talent and experience (bad). Indeed, there will be a global shortfall of 3. 5 million cybersecurity jobs by 2021.
Only with people power can we win the online security war. Here (be) the main reasons and methods.
First of all, it is important to improve the security (aware). Security is becoming important, with organizations starting to understand the big role that individual employees must play.
Secondly, pay attention grassroots education. As we face a significant skill shortage in the future,is of great importance that together we help create the next generation of cyber defenders now.
Thirdly, encouraging skilled staff also matters. Most organizations have concerns about security skills, and two-thirds have trouble (encourage) the security staff they have.
It was summer, and my dad wanted to treat me to a vacation like never before. He decided to take me on a trip to the Wild West.
We took a plane to Albuquerque, a big city in the state of New Mexico. We reached Albuquerque in the late afternoon. Uncle Paul, my dad's friend, picked us up from the airport and drove us up to his farm in Pecos.
His wife Tina cooked us a delicious dinner and we got to know his sons Ryan and Kyle. My dad and I spent the night in the guestroom of the farm house listening to the frogs and water rolling down the river nearby. Very early in the morning, Uncle Paul woke us up to have breakfast. "The day starts at dawn on my farm," he said. After breakfast, I went to help Aunt Tina feed the chickens, while my dad went with Uncle Paul to take the sheep out to graze (吃草). I was impressed to see my dad and Uncle Paul riding horses. They looked really cool.
In the afternoon, I asked Uncle Paul if I could take a horse ride, and he said yes, as long as my dad went with me. I wasn't going to take a horse ride by myself anyway. So, my dad and I put on our new cowboy hats, got on our horses, and headed slowly towards the mountains. "Don't be late for supper, "Uncle Paul cried, "and keep to the track so that you don't get lost!" "OK!" my dad cried back. After a while Uncle Paul and his farm house were out of sight. It was so peaceful and quiet and the colors of the brown rocks, the deep green pine trees, and the late afternoon sun mixed to create a magic scene. It looked like a beautiful woven (编织的)blanket spread out upon the ground just for us.
注意：
1）续写词数应为150左右
2）请按如下格式在答题卡的相应位置作答。
Paragraph1：
Suddenly a little rabbit jumped out in front of my horse.
Paragraph 2：
We had no idea where we were and it was getting dark.
