2008年湘潭大学考博英语真题(阅读理解)

希赛网为考生们整理了2008年湘潭大学考博英语阅读理解部分真题，供考生们备考复习。

Our visual perception depends on the reception of energy reflecting or radiating from that which we wish to perceive. If our eyes could receive and measure infinitely delicate sense-data, we could perceive the world with infinite precision. The nature limits of our eyes have, of course, been extended by mechanical instruments; telescopes and microscopes, for example, expand our capabilities greatly. There is, however, an ultimate limit beyond which no instrument can take us: this limit is imposed by our inability to receive sense-data smaller than those conveyed by an individual quantum of energy. Since these quanta are believed to be indivisible packages of energy and so cannot be further retied, we reach a point beyond which further resolution of the world is not possible. It is like a drawing a child might make by sticking indivisible discs of color onto a canvas.

We might think that we could avoid this limitation by using quanta with extremely long wavelengths; such quanta would be sufficiently sensitive to convey extremely delicate sense-data. And these quanta would be useful, as long as we only wanted to measure energy, but a completely accurate perception of the world will depend also on the exact measurement of the lengths and positions of what we wish to perceive. For this, quanta of extremely long wavelengths are useless. To measure a length accurately to within a millionth of an inch, we must have a measure graduated in millionths of an filch; a yardstick graduated in inches is useless. Quanta with a wavelength of one inch would be, in a sense, measures that are graduated in inches; Quanta of extremely long wavelength are useless in measuring anything except extremely large dimensions.

Despite these difficulties, quanta have important theoretical implications for physics. It used to be supposed that, in the observation of nature, the universe could be divided into two distinct parts, a perceiving subject and a perceived object In physics, subject and object were supposed to: be entirely distinct, so that a description of any part of the universe would be independent of the observer. The quantum theory, however, suggests otherwise, for every observation involves the passage of a complete quantum from the object to the subject, and it now appears that this passage constitutes an important coupling between observers and observed.

We can no longer make a sharp division between the two in an effort to observe nature objectively. Such an attempt at objectivity would distort the crucial interrelationship of observer and observed and observed as parts of a single whole.

But, ever for scientists, it is only in the world of atoms that this new development makes any appreciable difference in file explanation of observations.

1.The primary purpose of the passage is to( ).

A、discuss a problem that hinders precise perception of the world

B、point out the inadequacies of accepted unite of measurement

C、criticize attempts to distinguish between perceiving subjects and perceived objects

D、compare and contrast rival scientific hypotheses about how the world should be measured and observed.

2.The author uses the analogy of the child’s drawing at the end of the first paragraph primarily in order to ( ).

A、illustrate the ultimate limitation in the precision of sense-data conveyed by quanta

B、show the sense of helplessness scientists feel in the face of significant observational problems

C、anticipate the objections of those scientists who believe that no instrumental aid to observation is entirely reliable

D、disparage those scientists who believe that measurement by means of quanta offers an accurate picture of the world

3.According to the passage, quanta with an extremely long wavelength cannot be used to give complete information about the physical world because they ( ).

A、exist independently of sense-data

B、are graduated only in inches

C、cannot with present-day instruments, be isolated from quanta of shorter wavelength

D、provide an insufficiently precise means of measuring length and position

4.According to the passage, the quantum theory can be distinguished from previous theories of physics by its( ).

A、insistence on scrupulously precise mathematical formulations

B、understanding of the inherent interrelationship of perceiver and perceived

C、recognition of the need for sophisticated instruments of measurement

D、emphasis on small-scale rather than on large-scale phenomena

篇幅原因，更多真题内容，请下载附件查看。 

更多湘潭大学博士考试英语真题，点击湘潭大学历年考博英语真题汇总(2007-2017)