2. 职称英语
  3. The night is not what it was. Once, the Earth was cast perpetually (永恒地) hal

The night is not what it was. Once, the Earth was cast perpetually (永恒地) hal

游客2023-07-20  24
问题     The night is not what it was. Once, the Earth was cast perpetually (永恒地) half in shadow. Man and beast slept beneath inky skies, dotted with glittering stars. Then came fire, candle, and the light bulb, gradually drawing back the curtain of darkness and giving us unprecedented control over our lives.
    But a brighter world, as is becoming increasingly clear, has its drawbacks. A study released last week finding that breast cancer is nearly twice as common in brightly-lit communities as in dark ones only added to a growing body of evidence that artificial light threatens public health, wildlife, and possibly even safety.
    Those findings are all the more troubling considering that an estimated 30 percent of outdoor lighting — plus even some indoor lighting — is wasted. Ill-conceived, ineffective, inefficient lighting costs U.S. about $10.4 billion a year, according to Bob Gent of the International Dark-Sky Association, a nonprofit that aims to control light pollution, and it generates 38 million tons of carbon dioxide a year.
    Motivated by such trends, more than two dozen cities worldwide will go dim on March 29 in an hour-long demonstration. According to the World Wildlife Fund, which is organizing the event, an estimated 2.2 million Australians switched off their lights or took other action during "Earth Hour" last year in Sydney, briefly reducing that city’s energy use by more than 10 percent.
    A number of groups are trying to measure light pollution and assess its detrimental (有害 的) effects on the environment in the hope that people will reduce their own contribution to the problem. Last week, as part of an annual program called GLOBE at Night, thousands of students and amateur scientists stared up at the constellation Orion (猎户座星群) from locations across the country and reported how many of its stars they could see. No data are yet available, but in dark, rural areas, says Gent, about 2,000 stars are typically visible at night, compared with "maybe five" in a bright city square — and about 5,000 in centuries past.
    People who are working while others are stargazing may face the greatest risks. Nighttime exposure to white light can fuel the growth of tumors (肿瘤), experiments show. Two decades of research indicates that women who work night shifts have usually high rates of breast cancer. [br] What can be learned from the third paragraph?
选项 A、The study revealed last week causes lots of trouble.
B、Indoor lighting costs U.S. more than outdoor lighting.
C、The organization where Bob Gent works makes efforts to reduce light pollution.
D、The International Dark-Sky Association strongly opposes outdoor lighting service.
答案 C
解析 根据题干中的the third paragraph将本题出处定位到第三段。该段第二句提到Bob Gent来自国际暗夜协会(the International Dark-Sky Association)，该组织是非营利性组织，致力于控制光污染，故答案为[C]。[A]中的causes a lot of trouble(引起麻烦)是对第三段首句troubling(使人担忧的)的错误理解。第三段首句只提到30％的户外照明，加上一些室内照明都被浪费掉了，并未提及美国的室内照明费用比户外照明的高，故排除[B]。[D]在文中未提及。
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