2. 外语
  3. The Greek’s lofty attitude toward scientific research--and the scientists’ contempt of utility-was not a long time dying. For a

The Greek’s lofty attitude toward scientific research--and the scientists’ contempt of utility-was not a long time dying. For a

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问题      The Greek’s lofty attitude toward scientific research--and the scientists’ contempt of utility-was not a long time dying. For a millennium after Archimedes, this separation of mechanics from geometry prevented fundamental technological progress and in some areas restrained it altogether. But there was a still greater obstacle to change until the very end of the Middle Ages-the organization of society.
     The social system of fixed class relationships that prevailed through the Middle Ages itself made improvement impossible. Under this system, the labouring masses, in exchange for the bare necessities of life, did all the productive work, while the privileged few--priests, nobles, and kings--concerned themselves only with ownership and maintenance of their own position. In the interest of their prerogatives they did achieve considerable progress in defence, in war making, in government, in trade, and in the arts of leisure, but they had no familiarity with the processes of production. On the other hand, the labourers, who were familiar with manufacturing techniques, had no incentive to improve or increase production to the advantage of their masters. Thus, with one class possessing the requisite knowledge and experience, but lacking incentive and leisure, and the other class lacking the knowledge and experience, there was no means by which technical progress could be achieved.
     The whole ancient world was built upon this relationship--a relationship as sterile as it was inhuman. The availability of slaves made efficient machinery needless. In many of the commonplace fields of human endeavour, actual stagnation prevailed for thousands of years.
     For about twenty-five centuries, two thirds of the power of the horse was lost because he wasn’t shod, and much of the strength of the ox was wasted because his harness wasn’t modified to fit his shoulders. For more than five thousand years, sailors were confined to rivers and coasts by a primitive steering mechanism which required remarkable little alteration (in the thirteenth century) to become a rudder(舵).
     With any originality at all, the ancient plough could have been put on wheels and the ploughshare shaped to bite and turn the sod instead of merely scratching it--but the originality wasn’t forthcoming. And the villager of the Middle Ages, like the men who first had fire, had a smoke hole in the center of the straw and reed roof of his one room dwelling, while the medieval charcoal burner( like his Stone Age ancestor) make himself a hut of small branches.
The author uses the examples of horse and ox to argue that______.
选项 A、humans should not maltreat animals.
B、man wasted a lot of resources in his exploitation of the enviroment.
C、there was no technical improvement areas of human efforts.
D、stagnation which prevailed for a long time was as sterile as it was inhuman.
答案C
解析 推理判断题。文章的第四段列举了很多例子，其目的是例证第三段最后一句话，也就是说第三段最后一句是论点，而第四段是事实论据。原文指出：人们在许多平凡领域的尝试，实际上在数千年间都处于静止的状态。第四段举例说明这种静止状态：马的能力的使用有三分之二流失了，因为人们并没有给马装上铁蹄。牛的力量也浪费了，因为牛具有并未改造到适合肩膀的形状。所以选项C是正确答案。
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