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Read the article and select the best answer. Article: I once had a house guest from Cuba. During his visit, I happened to throw an old broken blender   in the trash. The next day it was sitting on my counter - in working order. In his world, people simply cannot afford to replace an item which doesn't work properly. They take the time and figure out how to fix it. In Cuba, they are still driving cars from the 1960's, mainly because they do not have a choice. In contrast, the U.S. is a "throw-away society." Statistics show that each American produces six pounds of trash per day. I believe a combination of factors has contributed to this phenomenon. "Planned obsolescence " is not a secret. It is a manufacturing   philosophy developed in the 1920's and 1930's, when mass production became popular. The goal is to make a product or part that will fail, or become less desirable over time or after a certain amount of use. This pressures the consumer to buy again. Planned obsolescence does keep costs down. Instead of making an expensive product that will last a long time, businesses produce more affordable, disposable  items. Some electronic items have become so inexpensive that it is cheaper to replace them than to repair them.[:&&Z&X&X&K] Busy people often value their time and convenience more than money. If a car starts to have mechanical problems, replacing it with a newer, more reliable model may be more appealing than tolerating it being in the garage for a week. In addition, advertising trains consumers to want what is new and improved. It convinces them that the more they have, the happier they will be. Unlike people in many developing countries, we live in a world of abundance. A study by Dr. Timothy Jones of the University of Arizona also found that in the U.S., 40-50 percent of all food ready for harvest is wasted. Abundance and waste soon became closely associated in the American way of life. Question: In Cuba, people usually fix a broken item instead of buying a new one because   _  . Options: A: wasting is prohibited there B: they are poor C: they are interested in fixing things D: they live a low-carbon life
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B


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Read the article and select the best answer. Article: The Nobel Prize Winners in Literature Rabindranath Tagore( 1913) Prize motivation: "because of his deep sensitive, fresh and beautiful poetry, with perfect skill, he has made his poetic thought, expressed in his own English words, a part of the literature of the West" William Faulkner (1949) Prize motivation: "for his powerful and artistically unique contribution to the modern American novel" Ernest Miller Hemingway(1954) Prize motivation: "for his mastery of the art of narrative, most recently demonstrated in The Old Man and the Sea" John Steinbeck (1962) Prize motivation: "for his realistic and imaginative writings, combining as they do sympathetic humour and keen social perception" Sir Winston Leonard Spencer Churchill(1953) Prize motivation: "for his mastery of historical and biographical description as well as for brilliant speech skills in defending noble human values" Claude Simon (1985) Prize motivation: "who in his novel combines the poet's and the painter's creativeness with a deepened awareness of time in the description of the human condition" Mo Yan (2012) Prize motivation: "he, with dreamlike realism, combines folk tales, history and the contemporary". Bob Dylan (2016) Prize motivation: "for having created new poetic expressions within the great American song tradition" Question: Which writer won Noble Prize for his specific work instead of his lifelong achievements? Options: A: Ernest Hemingway. B: John Steinbeck. C: William Faulkner. D: Winston Churchill.
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A


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Read the article and select the best answer. Article: There was once a man called Mr. Flowers, and flowers were his only joy in life. He spent all his free time in one of his four glass-houses and grew flowers of every color, with long and difficult names, for competitions. He tried to grow a rose of a new color to win the silver cup for the Rose of the Year. Mr. Flowers' glass-houses were very near to a middle school. Boys of around thirteen of age were often tempted   to throw a stone or two at one of Mr. Flowers' glass-houses. So Mr. Flowers did his best to be in or near his glass-houses at the beginning and end of the school day. But it was not always possible to be on watch at those times. Mr. Flowers had tried in many ways to protect his glass, but nothing that he had done had been useful. He had been to school to report to the headmaster; but this had not done any good. He had tried to drive away the boys that threw stones into his garden; but the boys could run faster than he could, and they laughed at him from far away. He had even picked up all the stones that he could find around his garden, so that the boys would have nothing to throw; but they soon found others. At last Mr. Flowers had a good idea. He put up a large notice made of good, strong wood, some meters away from the glass-houses. On it he had written the words: DO NOT THROW STONES AT THIS NOTICE. After this, Mr. Flowers had no further trouble; the boys were much more tempted to throw stones at the notice than at the glass-houses. Question: Mr. Flowers' good idea was to   _  . Options: A: write some words on the glass B: put up a large notice to cover his glass-houses C: give the boys something else to throw stones at D: send for policemen
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