2. 外语
  3. My father’s reaction to the bank building at 43rd Street and Fifth Avenue in New York City was immediate and definite. “You won’

My father’s reaction to the bank building at 43rd Street and Fifth Avenue in New York City was immediate and definite. “You won’

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问题     My father’s reaction to the bank building at 43rd Street and Fifth Avenue in New York City was immediate and definite. “You won’t catch me putting my money in there!” he declared, “Not in that glass box!”
    Of course, my father is a gentleman of the old school, a member of the generation to whom a good deal of modern architecture is upsetting, but I am convinced that his negative response was not so much to the architecture as to a violation of his concept of the nature of money.
    In his generation money was thought of as a real commodity (实物) that could be carried, or stolen. Consequently, to attract the custom of a sensible man, a bank had to have heavy walls, barred windows, and bronze doors, to affirm the fact, however untrue, that money would be safe inside. If a building’s design made it appear impenetrable, the institution was necessarily reliable, and the meaning of the heavy wall as an architecture symbol dwelt in the prevailing attitude toward money.
    But the attitude toward money has, of course, changed. Excepting pocket money, cash of any kind is now rarely used; money as a tangible commodity has largely been replaced by credit. A deficit (赤字) economy, accompanied by huge expansion, has led us to think of money as product of the creative imagination. The banker no longer offers us the safety: he offers us a service in which the most valuable element is the creativity for the invention of large numbers. It is in no way surprising, in view of this change in attitude, that we are witnessing the disappearance of the heavy-walled bank.
Just as the older bank emphasized its strength, this bank by its architecture boasts of imaginative powers. From this point of view, it is hard to say where architecture ends and human assertion (说法) begins.
The word “tangible” (Line 2, Para. 4 ) refers to something______.
选项 A、that is precious
B、that is usable
C、that can be touched
D、that can be reproduced
答案C
解析 猜测词汇题。前文指出对于老一代人来说钱是实物。而第四段介绍的是现代人的不同观念，其中“…money as a tangible commodity has largely been replaced by credit. ”指出钱被信用所取代，那么我们判断老一代人认为的钱是与现代人的信用意思相反的，信用是看不见摸不着的东西，那么钱就是看得见摸得着的实物，因此我们可以判断出“tangible"的意思是“有形的”，选择C答案，可以摸得到的。
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大学英语四级

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