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  3. Global warming may or may not be the great environmental crisis of the 21st century, but—regardless of whether it is or isn’t—we

Global warming may or may not be the great environmental crisis of the 21st century, but—regardless of whether it is or isn’t—we

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问题     Global warming may or may not be the great environmental crisis of the 21st century, but—regardless of whether it is or isn’t—we won’t do much about it. We will argue over it and may even, as a nation, make some fairly solemn-sounding commitments to avoid it. But the more dramatic and meaningful these commitments seem, the less likely they are to be observed.
    Al Gore calls global warming an "inconvenient truth," as if merely recognizing it could put us on a path to a solution. But the real truth is that we don’t know enough to relieve global warming, and—without major technological breakthroughs—we can’t do much about it.
    From 2003 to 2050, the world’s population is projected to grow from 6.4 billion to 9.1 billion, a 42% increase. If energy use per person and technology remain the same, total energy use and greenhouse gas emissions(mainly CO2)will be 42% higher in 2050. But that’s too low, because societies that grow richer use more energy.
    We need economic growth unless we condemn the world’s poor to their present poverty and freeze everyone else’s living standards. With modest growth, energy use and greenhouse emissions more than double by 2050.
    No government will adopt rigid restrictions on economic growth and personal freedom(limits on electricity usage, driving and travel)that might cut back global warming. Still, politicians want to show they’re "doing something." Consider the Kyoto Protocol(《京都议定书》). It allowed countries that joined to punish those that didn’t. But it hasn’t reduced C02 emissions(up about 25% since 1990), and many signatories(签字国)didn’t adopt tough enough policies to hit their 2008-2012 targets.
    The practical conclusion is that if global warming is a potential disaster, the only solution is new technology. Only an aggressive research and development program might find ways of breaking our dependence on fossil fuels or dealing with it.
    The trouble with the global warming debate is that it has become a moral problem when it’s really an engineering one. The inconvenient truth is that if we don’t solve the engineering problem, we’re helpless.
What is the message the author intends to convey?
选项 A、Global warming is more of a moral issue than a practical one.
B、The ultimate solution to global warming lies in new technology.
C、The debate over global warming will lead to technological breakthroughs.
D、People have to give up certain material comforts to stop global warming.
答案B
解析 文章首段只提出了问题，没有给出结论，最后一段指出要解决工程学问题，也没有直接给出文章主旨。因此我们必须看一下每段的主要内容。首段提出问题后，第二段给出了解决办法，即技术突破；第三段指出了全球变暖的趋势；第四段指出政府对全球变暖无能为力；第五段指出，唯一的解决办法是新技术。由此我们可知，文章的主旨是解决全球变暖问题只能靠新技术，因此选项B正确。A项与作者的意思相反，故排除。C项属于因果倒置，作者要表达的是解决全球变暖问题要靠新技术，而不是有关全球变暖的争论会带来技术突破。作者在文中指出，人们不会为了解决全球变暖问题放弃物质上的享受，故D项可以排除。
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