2020年大学英语四级预测题及答案

2020年大学英语四级预测题及答案

Part I Writing (30 minutes)
Directions: For this part, you are allowed 30 minutes to write
an a short easy on how to best handle the relationship between
doctors and patients. You should write at least 120 words but
no more than 180 words.
Part Ⅲ Reading Comprehension (40 minutes)
Section A
We all know there exists great void（空白）in the public
educational system when it comes to (26)_______ to STEM
（Science,Technology,Engineering Mathematics）,One educator
named Dori Roberts decided to do something to change this system.
Dori taught high school engineering for 11 noticed
there was a real void in quality stem education at
all (27)_______ of the public educational system. she said,
“I started Engineering for kids (EFK)after noticing a real
lack of math, science and engineering programs to (28)_______
my own kids in.”
She decided to start an after school program where
children (29)_______ in STEM-based club
grew quickly and when it reached 180 members and the kids in

the program won several state (30)_______ . she decided to
devote all her time to cultivating and(31)_______ it The global
business EFK was born.
Dori began operating EFK out of her Virginia home, which she
then expanded to (32)_______ recreation centers. Today, the
EFK program (33)_______ over 144 branches in 32 states within
the United States and in 21 countries. Sales have doubled from
$$5 million in 2014 to $$10 million in 2015,with 25 new branches
planned for 2016. the EFK website states, “Our nation is
not (34)_______ enough engineers. Our philosophy is to
inspire kids at a young age to understand that engineering is
a great (35)_______ .”

A) attracted
B) career
C) championships
D) degrees
E) developing
F) enroll
G) exposure
H) feasible
I)feeding

J) graduating
K) interest
L) levels
M) local
N) operates
O) participated
Section B
Why aren’t you curious about what happened?
[A] “You suspended Ray Rice after our video，” a reporter from
TMZ challenged National Football League Commissioner Roger
Goodell the other day. “Why didn’t you have the curiosity to
go to the casino （赌场）yourself ?” The implication of the
question is that a more curious commissioner would have found
a way to get the tape.
[B] The accusation of incuriosity is one that we hear often,
carrying the suggestion that there is something wrong with not
wanting to search out the truth,” have been bothered for a long
time about the curious lack of curiosity,” said a Democratic
member of the New Jersey legislature back in July, referring
to an insufficiently inquiring attitude on the part of an
assistant to New Jersey Governor Chris Christie who chose not
to ask hard questions about the George Washington Bridge

traffic scandal. “Isn’t the mainstream media the least bit
curious about what happened?” wrote conservative writer
Jennifer Rubin earlier this year, referring to the attack on
Americans in Benghazi, Libya.
[C] The implication, in each case, is that curiosity is a good
thing，and a lack of curiosity is a problem. Are such accusations
simply efforts to score political points for one’s party? Or
is there something of particular value about curiosity in and
of itself?
[D] The journalist Ian Leslie, in his new and enjoyable book
Curious: The Desire to Know and Why Your Future Depends on It,
insists that the answer to that last question is ‘Yes’. Leslie
argues that curiosity is a much-overlooked human virtue,
crucial to our success, and that we are losing it.
[E] We are suffering, he writes, from a “serendipity deficit.”
The word “serendipity” was coined by Horace Walpole in an 1854
letter, from a tale of three princes who “were always making
discoveries, by accident, of things they were not in search of.”
Leslie worries that the rise of the Internet, among other social
and technological changes, has reduced our appetite for aimless
adventures. No longer have we the inclination to let ourselves
wander through fields of knowledge, ready to be surprised.

Instead, we seek only the information we want.
[F] Why is this a problem? Because without curiosity we will
lose the spirit of innovation and entrepreneurship. We will see
unimaginative governments and dying corporations make
disastrous decisions. We will lose a vital part of what has made
humanity as a whole so successful as a species.
[G]Leslie presents considerable evidence for the proposition
that the society as a whole is growing less curious. In the U.S.
and Europe, for example, the rise of the Internet has led to
a declining consumption of news from outside the reader’s
borders. But not everything is to be blamed on technology. The
decline in interest in literary fiction is also one of the
causes identified by Leslie. Reading literary fiction, he says,
makes us more curious.
[H] Moreover, in order to be curious, ‘
of a gap in your knowledge in the first place.'' Although Leslie
perhaps paints a bit broadly in contending that most of us are
unaware of how much we don’t know, he’s surely right to point
out that the problem is growing: “Google can give us the
powerful illusion that all questions have definite answers.”
[I] Indeed, Google, for which Leslie expresses admiration, is
also his frequent whipping boy (替 罪羊)? He quotes Google

co-founder Larry Page to the effect that the “perfect search
engine” will “understand exactly what I mean and give me back
exactly what I want.” Elsewhere in the book, Leslie writes:
“Google aims to save you from the thirst of curiosity
altogether.”
[J]Somewhat nostalgically (怀旧地)，he quotes John Maynard
Keynes's justly famous words of praise to the bookstore: “One
should enter it vaguely, almost in a dream, and allow what is
there freely to attract and influence the eye. To walk the
rounds of the bookshops, dipping in as curiosity dictates,
should be an afternoon’s entertainment.” If only!
[K] Citing the work of psychologists and cognitive (认知的）
scientists，Leslie criticizes the received wisdom that academic
success is the result of a combination of intellectual talent
and hard work. Curiosity, he argues, is the third key factor
—and a difficult one to preserve. If not cultivated, it will
not survive: “Childhood curiosity is a collaboration between
child and adult. The surest way to kill it is to leave it alone.”
[L] School education, he warns, is often conducted in a way that
makes children incurious. Children of educated and
upper- middle-class parents turn out to be far more curious,
even at early ages, than children of working class and lower

class families. That lack of curiosity produces a relative lack
of knowledge, and the lack of knowledge is difficult if not
impossible to compensate for later on.
[M] Although Leslie’s book isn't about politics, he doesn't
entirely shy away from the problem. Political leaders, like
leaders of other organizations, should be curious. They should
ask questions at crucial moments. There are serious
consequences, he warns, in not wanting to know.
[N] He presents as an example the failure of the George W. Bush
administration to prepare properly for the after-effects of the
invasion of Iraq. According to Leslie, those who ridiculed
former Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld for his 2002 remark
that we have to be wary of the “unknown unknowns” were mistaken.
Rumsfeld’s idea, Leslie writes, “wasn’t absurd一it was
smart.” He adds, “The tragedy is that he didn’t follow his
own advice.”
[O] All of which brings us back to Goodell and the Christie case
and Benghazi. Each critic in those examples is charging, in a
different way, that someone in authority is intentionally being
incurious. I leave it to the reader’s political preference to
decide which, if any, charges should stick. But let’s be careful
about demanding curiosity about the other side’s weaknesses

and remaining determinedly incurious about our own. We should
be delighted to pursue knowledge for its own sake—even when
what we find out is something we didn't particularly want to
know.
36. To be curious, we need to realize first of all that there
are many things we don’t know.
37. According to Leslie, curiosity is essential to one’s
success.
38. We should feel happy when we pursue knowledge for
knowledge's sake.
39. Political leaders' lack of curiosity will result in bad
consequences.
40. There are often accusations about politicians’ and the
media’s lack of curiosity to find out the truth.
41. The less curious a child is, the less knowledge the child
may turn out to have.
42. It is widely accepted that academic accomplishment lies in
both intelligence and diligence.
43. Visiting a bookshop as curiosity leads us can be a good way
to entertain ourselves.
44. Both the rise of the Internet and reduced appetite for
literary fiction contribute to people’s declining curiosity.

45. Mankind wouldn't be so innovative without curiosity.
Section C
Passage One
Aging happens to all of us, and is generally thought of as a
natural part of life. It would seem silly to call such a thing
a “disease.”
On the other hand, scientists are increasingly learning that
aging and biological age are two different things, and that the
former is a key risk factor for conditions such as heart disease,
cancer and many more. In that light, aging itself might be seen
as something treatable, the way you would treat high blood
pressure or a vitamin deficiency.
Biophysicist Alex Zhavoronkov believes that aging should be
considered a disease. He said that describing aging as a disease
creates incentives to develop treatments.
“It unties the hands of the pharmaceutical (制药的）industry
so that they can begin treating the disease and not just the
side effects,” he said.
‘‘Right now, people think of aging as natural and something
you can’t control:’ he said. “In academic circles, people
take aging research as just an interest area where they can try
to develop interventions. The medical community also takes

aging for granted, and can do nothing about it except keep
people within a certain health range.”
But if aging were recognized as a disease, he said, “It would
attract funding and change the way we do health care. What
matters is understanding that aging is curable.”
“It was always known that the body accumulates damage,” he
added. “The only way to cure aging is to find ways to repair
that damage. I think of it as preventive medicine for
age-related conditions.''
Leonard Hayflick, a professor at the University of California,
San Francisco, said the idea that aging can be cured implies
the human lifespan can be increased, which some researchers
suggest is possible. Hay flick is not among them.
“There’re many people who recover from cancer, stroke, or
heart disease. But they continue to age, because aging is
separate from their disease,” Hayflick said. “Even if those
causes of death were eliminated, life expectancy would still
not go much beyond 92 years.”
46. What do people generally believe about aging?
A) It should cause no alarm whatsoever.
B) They just cannot do anything about it.
C) It should be regarded as a kind of disease.

D) They can delay it with advances in science.
47. How do many scientists view aging now?
A) It might be prevented and treated.
B) It can be as risky as heart disease.
C) It results from a vitamin deficiency.
D) It is an irreversible biological process.
48. What does Alex Zhavoronkov think of“describing aging as
a disease”?
A) It will prompt people to take aging more seriously.
B) It will greatly help reduce the side effects of aging.
C) It will free pharmacists from the conventional beliefs about
aging.
D) It will motivate doctors and pharmacists to find ways to
treat aging.
49. What do we learn about the medical community?
A) They now have a strong interest in research on aging.
B) They differ from the academic circles in their view on aging.
C) They can contribute to people’s health only to a limited
extent.
D) They have ways to intervene in people's aging process.
50. What does Professor Leonard Hay flick believe?
A) The human lifespan cannot be prolonged.

B) Aging is hardly separable from disease.
C) Few people can live up to the age of 92.
D) Heart disease is the major cause of aging.
Passage Two
Female applicants to postdoctoral positions in geosciences
were nearly half as likely to receive excellent letters of
recommendation，compared with their male counterparts.
Christopher Intagliata reports.
As in many other fields, gender bias is widespread in the
sciences. Men score higher starting salaries, have more
mentoring (指导），and have better odds of being hired. Studies
show they’re also perceived as more competent than women in
STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics)
fields. And new research reveals that men are more likely to
receive excellent letters of recommendation, too.
“Say，you know, this is the best student I’ve ever had,” says
Kuheli Dutt, a social scientist and diversity officer at
Columbia University’s Lamont campus. “Compare those excellent
letters with a merely good letter: 'The candidate was
productive, or intelligent, or a solid scientist or something
that’s clearly solid praise，’ but nothing that singles out
the candidate as exceptional or one of a kind.”

Dutt and her colleagues studied more than 1,200 letters of
recommendation for postdoctoral positions in geoscience. They
were all edited for gender and other identifying information,
so Dutt and her team could assign them a score without knowing
the gender of the student. They found that female applicants
were only half as likely to get outstanding letters, compared
with their male counterparts. That includes letters of
recommendation from all over the world, and written by, yes,
men and women. The findings are in the journal Nature
Geoscience.
Dutt says they were not able to evaluate the actual scientific
qualifications of the applicants using the data in the files.
But she says the results still suggest women in geoscience are
at a potential disadvantage from the very beginning of their
careers starting with those less than outstanding letters of
recommendation.
“We’re not trying to assign blame or criticize anyone or call
anyone consciously sexist. Rather, the point is to use the
results of this study to open up meaningful dialogues on
implicit gender bias, be it at a departmental level or an
institutional level or even a discipline level.” Which may lead
to some recommendations for the letter writers themselves.

48. What do we learn about applicants to postdoctoral positions
in geosciences?
A) There are many more men applying than women.
B) Chances for women to get the positions are scarce.
C) More males than females are likely to get outstanding letters
of recommendation.
D) Male applicants have more interest in these positions than
their female counterparts.
49. What do studies about men and women in scientific research
show?
A) Women engaged in postdoctoral work are quickly catching up.
B) Fewer women are applying for postdoctoral positions due to
gender bias.
C) Men are believed to be better able to excel in STEM
disciplines.
D) Women who are keenly interested in STEM fields are often
exceptional.
50. What do the studies find about the recommendation letters
for women applicants?
A) They are hardly ever supported by concrete examples.
B) They contain nothing that distinguishes the applicants.
C) They provide objective information without exaggeration.

D) They are often filled with praise for exceptional
applicants.
51. What did Dutt and her colleagues do with the more than 1,200
letters of recommendation?
A) They asked unbiased scholars to evaluate them.
B) They invited women professionals to edit them.
C) They assigned them randomly to reviewers.
D) They deleted all information about gender.
52 What does Dutt aim to do with her study?
A) Raise recommendation writers’ awareness of gender bias in
their letters.
B) Open up fresh avenues for women post-doctors to join in
research work.
C) Alert women researchers to all types of gender bias in the
STEM disciplines.
D) Start a public discussion on how to raise women's status in
academic circles.
Part IV Translation (30 minutes)
黄山位于安徽省南部。它风景独特，尤以其日出和云海著称。要欣赏大山的宏伟壮丽，通常得向上看。但要欣赏黄山美景，就得向下看。
黄山的湿润气候有利于茶树生长 ，是中国主要产茶地之一。这里还有
许多温泉，其泉水有助于防治皮肤病。黄山是中国主要旅游目的地之

一，也是摄影和传统国画最受欢迎的主题。
参考答案
Part I Writing
In recent years, the relationship between doctors and patients
has become increasingly tense and complicated. The disputes
have intensified day by day. There is a lack of necessary
understanding and trust between doctors and patients. The
normal health care activities are deeply affected. The
relationship between doctors and patients has become an
unprecedented common concern of the whole society at this
stage.
How to best handle the relationship between doctors and
patients?Firstly of all, doctors should have medical ethics and
humanities, which require extreme enthusiasm for patients and
their technical excellence. Secondly, doctors and patients
should communicate with each other. Furthermore, patients
should know more knowledge of medicine. Besides, the government
should provide more legal protection to help balance the
doctor-patient relationship.
Although we have a long way to go, we have reasons to believe
that the doctor-patient relationship in China is gradually
improving.

Part Ⅲ Reading Comprehension
26. G 27. L 28. F 29. O 30. C 31. E
32. M 33. N 34. J 35. B 36. H 37. D
38. O 39. M 40. B 41. L 42. K 43. J
44. G 45. F 46. B 47. A 48. D 49. C
50. A 51. C 52. C 53. B 54. D 55. D
Part IV Translation
Huangshan (Yellow Mountain) is located in southern Anhui
Province. The area is well known for its unique scenery,
especially sunrise and sea of clouds. To enjoy the magnificence
of a mountain, you have to look upwards in most cases. To enjoy
Huangshan, however, you've got to look downward. Furthermore,
Huangshan's moist climate facilitates the growing of tea trees,
therefore the mountain is one of China's premier tea-growing
areas. In addition, Huangshan has multiple hot springs which
help prevent and cure skin illness. Huangshan is one of China's
major tourist destinations and the most frequent subject of
photography and traditional Chinese painting.