Why does the Foundation concentrate its support on basic rat..

第1题

Why does the Foundation concentrate its support on basic rather than applied research? Basic research is the very heart of science, and its cumulative product is the capital of scientific progress, a capital that must be constantly increased as the demands upon it rise. The goal of basic research is understanding, for its own sake. Understanding of the structure of the atom or the nerve cell, the explosion of a spiral nebula or the distribution of cosmic dust, the causes of earthquakes and droughts, or of man as a behaving creature and of the social forces that are created whenever two or more human beings come into contact with one another--the scope is staggering, but the commitment to truth is the same. If the commitment were to a particular result, conflicting evidence might be overlooked or, with the best will in the world, simply not appreciated. Moreover, the practical applications of basic research frequently cannot be anticipated. When Roentgen, the physicist, discovered X-rays, he had no idea of their usefulness to medicine.

Applied research, undertaken to solve specific practical problems, has an immediate attractiveness because the results can be seen and enjoyed. For practical reasons, the sums spent on applied research in any country always far exceed those for basic research, and the proportions are more unequal in the less developed countries. Leaving aside the funds devoted to research by industry--which is naturally far more concerned with applied aspects because these increase profits quickly--the funds the U.S. Government allots to basic research currently amount to about 7 percent of its overall research and development funds. Unless adequate safeguards are provided, applied research invariably tends to drive out basic. Then, as Dr. Waterman has pointed out, "Developments will inevitably be undertaken prematurely, career incentives will gravitate strongly toward applied science, and the opportunities for making major scientific discoveries will be lost. Unfortunately, pressures to emphasize new developments, without corresponding emphasis upon pure science tend to degrade the quality of the nation's technology in the long run, rather than to improve it."

The title below that best expresses the ideas of this passage is ______.

A．Roentgen's Ignorance of X-rays

B．The Attractiveness of Applied Research

C．The Importance of Basic Research

D．Basic Research vs. Applied Research

点击查看答案

第2题

Affective as well as cognitive goals should be examined in the review of an English lesson.

点击查看答案

第3题

Governments that want their people to prosper in the burgeoning world economy should guarantee two basic rights: the right to private property and the right to enforceable contracts, says Mancur Olson in his book Power and Prosperity. Olson was an economics professor at the University of Maryland until his death in 1998.

Some have argued that such rights are merely luxuries that wealthy societies bestow, but Olson turns that argument around and asserts that such rights are essential to creating wealth. "Incomes are low in most of the countries of the world, in short, because the people in those countries do not have secure individual rights," he says.

Certain simple economic activities, such as food gathering and making handicrafts, rely mostly on individual labor; property is not necessary. But more advanced activities, such as the mass production of goods, require machines and factories and offices. This production is often called capital-intensive, but it is really property-intensive, Olson observes.

"No one would normally engage in capital-intensive production if he or she did not have rights that kept the valuable capital from being taken by bandits, whether roving or stationary," he argues. "There is no private property without government--individuals may have possessions, the way a dog possesses a bone, but there is private property only if the society protects and defends a private right to that possession against other private parties and against the government as well."

Would-be entrepreneurs, no matter how small, also need a government and court system that will make sure people honor their contracts. In fact, the banking systems relied on by developed nations are based on just such an enforceable contract system. "We would not deposit our money in banks ... if we could not rely on the bank having to honor its contract with us, and the bank would not be able to make the profits it needs to stay in business if it could not enforce its loan contracts with borrowers," Olson writes.

Other economists have argued that the poor economies of Third World and communist countries are the result of governments setting both prices find the quantities of goods produced rather than letting a free market determine them. Olson agrees that there is some merit to this point of view, but he argues that government intervention is not enough to explain the poverty of these countries. Rather, the real problem is lack of individual rights that give people incentive to generate wealth. "If a society has clear and secure individual rights, there are strong incentives (刺激，动力) to produce, invest, and engage in mutually advantageous trade., and therefore at least some economic advance," Olson concludes.

Which of the following is true about Olson?

A．He was a fiction writer.

B．He edited the book Power and Prosperity.

C．He taught economics at the University of Maryland.

D．He was against the ownership of private property.

点击查看答案

第4题

Sometimes the student may be asked to write about his ______ to a certain book or article that has some bearing on the subject being studied.

A．comment

B．reaction

C．impression

D．comprehension

点击查看答案

第5题

Governments that want their people to prosper in the burgeoning world economy should guarantee two basic rights: the right to private property and the right to enforceable contracts, says Mancur Olson in his book Power and Prosperity. Olson was an economics professor at the University of Maryland until his death in 1998.

Some have argued that such rights are merely luxuries that wealthy societies bestow, but Olson turns that argument around and asserts that such rights are essential to creating wealth. "Incomes are low in most of the countries of the world, in short, because the people in those countries do not have secure individual rights," he says.

Certain simple economic activities, such as food gathering and making handicrafts, rely mostly on individual labor; property is not necessary. But more advanced activities, such as the mass production of goods, require machines and factories and offices. This production is often called capital-intensive, but it is really property-intensive, Olson observes.

"No one would normally engage in capital-intensive production if he or she did not have rights that kept the valuable capital from being taken by bandits, whether roving or stationary," he argues. "There is no private property without government--individuals may have possessions, the way a dog possesses a bone, but there is private property only if the society protects and defends a private right to that possession against other private parties and against the government as well."

Would-be entrepreneurs, no matter how small, also need a government and court system that will make sure people honor their contracts. In fact, the banking systems relied on by developed nations are based on just such an enforceable contract system. "We would not deposit our money in banks ... if we could not rely on the bank having to honor its contract with us, and the bank would not be able to make the profits it needs to stay in business if it could not enforce its loan contracts with borrowers," Olson writes.

Other economists have argued that the poor economies of Third World and communist countries are the result of governments setting both prices find the quantities of goods produced rather than letting a free market determine them. Olson agrees that there is some merit to this point of view, but he argues that government intervention is not enough to explain the poverty of these countries. Rather, the real problem is lack of individual rights that give people incentive to generate wealth. "If a society has clear and secure individual rights, there are strong incentives (刺激，动力) to produce, invest, and engage in mutually advantageous trade., and therefore at least some economic advance," Olson concludes.

Which of the following is true about Olson?

A．He was a fiction writer.

B．He edited the book Power and Prosperity.

C．He taught economics at the University of Maryland.

D．He was against the ownership of private property.

点击查看答案

第6题

In The Disuniting of America: Reflections on a Multicultural Society, Revised and Enlarged Edition (W. W. Norton) Schlesinger provides deep insights into the crises of nationhood in America. A new chapter assesses the impact both of radical multiculturalism and radical monoculturalism on the Bill of rights. Written with his usual clarity and force, the book brings a noted historian' s wisdom and perspective to bear on America' s "culture wars".

Schlesinger addresses the questions: What holds a nation together? And what does it mean to be an American? Describing the emerging cult of ethnicity, Schlesinger praises its healthy effect on a nation long shamed by a history of prejudice and narrow-mindedness. But he warns against the campaign of multicultural advocates to divide the nation into separate ethnic and racial communities. From the start, he observes, the United States has been a multicultural nation, rich in its diversity but held together by a shared commitment to the democratic process and by the freedom of intermarriage. It was this national talent for assimilation that impressed foreign visitors like Alexis de Tocqueyille and James Bryce, and it is this historic goal that Schlesinger champions as the best hope for the future. Schlesinger analyzes what he sees as grim consequences of identity politics: the widening of differences. Attacks on the First Amendment, he argues, threaten intellectual freedom and, ultimately, the future of the ethnic groups. His criticisms are not limited to the left. As a former target of McCarthyism, be understands that the radical right is even more willing than the radical left to re strict and weaken the Bill of Rights.

The author does not minimize the injustices concealed by the "melting pot" dream. The Disuniting of America is both academic and personal, forceful in argument, balanced in judgment. It is a book that will no doubt anger some readers, but it will surely make all of them think again. The winner of Pulitzer Prizes for history and for biography, an authoritative voice of American liberalism, Schlesinger is uniquely positioned to bring bold answers and healing wisdom to this passionate debate over who we are and what we should become.

According to Schlesinger, the United States is ______.

A．a melting pot

B．a nation with diverse cultures held together by the democratic process

C．a federation of ethnic and racial communities

D．a nation with various ethnic and racial groups

点击查看答案

第7题

The mental health movement in the United States began with a period of considerable enlightenment. Dorothea Dix was shocked to find the mentally iii in jails and almshouses and crusaded for the establishment of asylums in which people could receive humane care in hospital-like environments and treatment, which might help restore them to sanity. By the mid-1800s, 20 states had established asylums, but during the late 1800s and early 1900s, in the face of economic depression, legislatures were unable to appropriate sufficient funds for decent care. Asylums became overcrowded and prisonlike. Additionally, patients were more resistant to treatment than the pioneers in the mental health field had anticipated, and security and restraint were needed to protect patients and others. Mental institutions became frightening and depressing places in which the rights of patients were all but forgotten.

These conditions continued until after Word War Ⅱ. At that time, new treatments were discovered for some major mental illnesses therefore considered untreatable (penicillin for syphilis of the brain and insulin treatment for schizophrenia and depressions), and a succession of books, motion pictures, and newspaper exposes called attention to the plight of the mentally ill. Improvements were made, and Dr. David Vail's. Humane practices program is a beacon for today. But changes were slow in coming until the early 1960s. At that time, the Civil Rights Movement led lawyers to investigate America's prisons, which were disproportionately populated by blacks, and they in turn followed prisoners into the only institutions that were worse than the prisons——the hospitals for the criminally insane. The prisons were rifled with angry young men who, encouraged by legal support, were quick to demand their fights. The hospitals for the criminally insane, by contrast, were populated with people who were considered "crazy" and who were often kept obediently in their place through the use of severe bodily restraints and large doses of major tranquilizers. The young cadre of public interest lawyers liked their role in the mental hospitals. The lawyers found a population that was both passive and easy to champion. These were, after all, people who, unlike criminals, had done nothing wrong. And in many states they were being kept in horrendous institutions, an injustice which, once exposed was bound to shock the public and, particularly, the judicial conscience.

Judicial interventions have had some definite positive effects, but there is growing awareness that courts cannot provide the standards and the review mechanisms that assure good patient care. The details of providing day-to-day care simple cannot be mandated by a court so it is time to take from the courts the responsibility for delivery of mental health care and assurance of patient fights and return it to the state mental health administrators to whom the mandate was originally given. Though it is a difficult task, administrators must undertake to write roles and standards and to provide the training and surveillance to assure that treatment is given and patients' rights are respected.

The main purpose of the passage is to ______.

A．discuss the influence of Dorothea Dix on the mental health movement

B．shock the reader with vivid descriptions of asylums

C．increase public awareness of the plight of the mentally ill

D．provide a historical perspective on problems of mental health care

点击查看答案

Why does the Foundation concentrate its support on basic rather than applied research？ Bas