Question

【題目】 The Intelligent Plant. That is the title of a recent article in The New Yorker, and new research is showing that plants have surprising abilities to sense and react to the world.

But can a plant be intelligent? Some plant scientists insist they are since they can sense, learn, remember and even react in ways that would be familiar to humans.

Michael Pollan, author of “The Botany of Desire,” says for the longest time, people who have long talked to their plants or played music for them were being considered “mad.”

The new research, he says, is in a field called plant neurobiology(神經(jīng)生物學(xué)), which is not a proper name, because even scientists in the field don’t argue that plants have neurons(神經(jīng)) or brains.

“They have analogous structures as humans,” Pollan explains. “Plants have all the same senses as humans. They have ways of taking all the sensory data they gather in their everyday lives, integrate it and then behave in an appropriate way in response.” In addition to hearing, taste, for example, they can sense gravity, the presence of water, or even feel that an obstacle(障礙物) is in the way of its roots, before coming into contact with it. Plant roots will change direction, he says, to avoid obstacles.

So what about pain? Do plants feel? Pollan says they do respond to anesthetics (麻醉劑). “You can put a plant out with a human anesthetic. And not only that, plants produce their own compounds that are anesthetic to us.” But scientists are unwilling to go as far as to say they are responding to pain.

How plants sense and react is still somewhat unknown. They don’t have nerve cells like humans, but they do have a system for sending electrical signals and even produce neurotransmitters (神經(jīng)遞質(zhì)) and other chemicals the human brain uses to send signals.

【1】Why does the author mention the article The Intelligent Plant in the first paragraph?

A.To support his opinion.B.To introduce the topic.

C.To give an example.D.To make comparison.

【2】People who usually talked to their plants would be thought .

A.Intelligent.B.Crazy.C.Patient.D.Comforting.

【3】What does the underlined word “analogous” in paragraph 5 mean?

A.Simple.B.False.C.Flexible.D.Similar.

【4】What can we learn about plants according to the last two paragraphs?

A.Plants can feel and react to pain.B.Plants send two kinds of signals.

C.Plants are able to sense and react.D.Plants have their own brains.

Answer 1

【答案】

【1】B

【2】B

【3】D

【4】C

【解析】

這是一篇說明文。文章主要介紹了一項研究結(jié)果：植物有感知和作出反應(yīng)的能力。

【1】

推理判斷題。文章第一句提到“雜志《The New Yorker》最近的一篇文章名為‘智能植物’”，接下來提到本文主題：植物有著令人驚奇的對世界感知和反應(yīng)能力，所以文章提到“智能植物”的文章是為了介紹本文的話題。故選B項。

【2】

細(xì)節(jié)理解題。根據(jù)第三段中people who have long talked to their plants or played music for them were being considered “mad.”可知，與植物長時間說話或者為植物播放音樂的人被認(rèn)為是“瘋狂的”，故選B項。

【3】

詞義猜測題。劃線詞所在句的主語They指代“植物”，根據(jù)第五段第二句“Plants have all the same senses as humans.(植物有和人類一樣的感覺)”可知，劃線句“They have analogous structures as humans”意為“植物有和人類相似的結(jié)構(gòu)”，所以劃線詞“analogous”意為“相似的”，故選D項。

【4】

推理判斷題。根據(jù)倒數(shù)第二段中“Pollan says they do respond to anesthetics (麻醉劑). (Pollan 說它們的確對麻醉劑有反應(yīng))”及最后一段中“but they do have a system for sending electrical signals and even produce neurotransmitters (神經(jīng)遞質(zhì)) and other chemicals the human brain uses to send signals.(但是它們確實有發(fā)送電信號的一個系統(tǒng)，甚至產(chǎn)生神經(jīng)遞質(zhì)和其他人類大腦用來發(fā)送信號的物質(zhì))”可知，植物能夠感知并作出反應(yīng)。故選C項。