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  3. Many objects in daily use have clearly been influenced by science, but their forms and functions, their dimensions and appearanc

Many objects in daily use have clearly been influenced by science, but their forms and functions, their dimensions and appearanc

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问题       Many objects in daily use have clearly been influenced by science, but their forms and functions, their dimensions and appearances, were determined by technologists, artisans, designers, inventors, and engineers using nonscientific modes of thought. Many features and qualities of the objects that a technologist thinks about cannot be reduced to unambiguous verbal descriptions; they are dealt with in the mind by a visual, nonverbal process. In the development of Western technology, it has been nonverbal thinking, by and large, that has fixed the outlines and filled in the details of our material surroundings. Pyramids, cathedrals, and rockets exist not because of geometry or thermodynamics, but because they were first a picture in the minds of those who built them.
     The creative shaping process of a technologist’s mind can be seen in nearly every artifact that exists. For example, in designing a diesel engine, a technologist might impress individual ways of nonverbal thinking on the machine by continually using an intuitive sense of rightness and fitness. What would be the shape of the combustion chamber? Where the valves should be placed? Should it have a long or short piston? Such questions have a range of answers that are supplied by experience, by physical requirements, by limitations of available space, and not least by a sense of form. Some decisions, such as wall thickness and pin diameter, may depend on scientific calculations, but the nonscientific component of design remains primary.
     Design courses, then should be an essential element in engineering curricula. Nonverbal thinking, a central mechanism in engineering design, involves perceptions, the stock-in-trade of the artist, not the scientist. Because perceptive processes are not assumed to entail "hard thinking", non- verbal thought is sometimes seen as a primitive stage in the development of cognitive processes and inferior to verbal or mathematical thought. But it is paradoxical that when the staff of the Historic American Engineering Record wished to have drawings made of machines and isometric views of industrial processes for its historical record of American engineering, the only college students with the requisite abilities were not engineering students, but rather students attending architectural schools.
     If courses in design, which in a strongly analytical engineering curriculum provide the back- ground required for practical problem-solving, are not provided, we can expect to encounter silly but costly errors occurring in advanced engineering systems. For example, early models of high-speed railroad cars loaded with sophisticated controls were unable to operate in a snowstorm because a fan sucked snow into the electrical system. Absurd random failures that plague automatic control systems are not merely trivial aberrations; they are a reflection of the chaos that results when design is assumed to be primarily a problem in mathematics.
According to the passage, the author mentioned that "when once the staff of the Historic American Engineering Record wished to have drawings made of machines and isometric views of industrial processes for its historical record of American engineering" in order to ______.
选项 A、point out the inability of engineering students.
B、point out the omission of conventional engineering lessons.
C、praise the architectural schools.
D、encourage contests of such kind.
答案B
解析 本题是一个细节题，要求考生在理解了原文对应段落的文字以后，对相应的事实进行判断。回到原文“But it is paradoxical that when the staff of the Historic American Engineering Record wished to have drawings made of machines and isometric views of industrial processes for its historical record of American engineering，the only college students with the requisite abilities were not engineering students，but rather students attending architectural schools．”，可以翻译为：“当《美国工程学名录》(Historic American Engineering Record一书的编撰人员希望为其美国工程学历史记录绘制机器图和工业过程的等角图时，唯一具备所需能力的大学生并非是工程学学生，而是建筑学校的学生”。再联系文章的中心思想，考生不难得出正确答案。
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