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  3. The idea of humanoid robots is not new, of course. They have been part of the imaginative landscape ever since Karl Capek, a Cze

The idea of humanoid robots is not new, of course. They have been part of the imaginative landscape ever since Karl Capek, a Cze

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问题     The idea of humanoid robots is not new, of course. They have been part of the imaginative landscape ever since Karl Capek, a Czech writer, first dreamed them up for his 1921 play "Rossum’s Universal Robots".(The word "robot" comes from the Czech word for drudgery, robota.) Since then, Hollywood has produced countless variations on the theme, from the sultry False Maria in Fritz Lang’s silent masterpiece Metropolis to the wittering C-3PO in Star Wars and the ruthless assassin
of Terminator. Humanoid robots have walked into our collective subconscious, colouring our views of the future.
    But now Japan’s industrial giants are spending billions of yen to make such robots a reality. Their new humanoids represent impressive feats of engineering: when Honda introduced Asimo, a four-foot robot that had been in development for some 15 years, it walked so fluidly that its white, articulated exterior seemed to conceal a human. Honda continues to make the machine faster, friendlier and more agile. Last October, when Asimo was inducted into the Robot Hall of Fame in Pittsburgh, it walked on to the stage and accepted its own plaque.
    At two and a half feet tall, Sony’s QRIO is smaller and more toy-like than Asimo. It walks, understands a small number of voice commands, and can navigate on its own. If it falls over, it gets up and resumes where it left off. It can even connect wirelessly to the internet and broadcast what its camera eyes can see. In 2003, Sony demonstrated an upgraded QRIO that could run. Honda responded last December with a version of Asimo that runs at twice the speed.
    In 2004, Toyota joined the fray with its own family of robots, called Partner, one of which is a four-foot humanoid that plays the trumpet. Its fingers work the instrument’s valves, and it has mechanical lungs and artificial lips. Toyota hopes to offer a commercial version of the robot by 2010. This month, 50 Partner robots will act as guides at Expo 2005 in Aichi, Japan.
    Despite their sudden proliferation, however, humanoids are still a mechanical minority. Most of the world’s robots are faceless, footless and mute. They are bolted to the floors of factories, stamping out car parts or welding pieces of metal, machines making more machines. According to the United Nations, business orders for industrial robots jumped 18% in the first half of 2004. They may soon be outnumbered by domestic robots, such as self-navigating vacuum cleaners, lawn mowers and window washers, which are selling fast. But neither industrial nor domestic robots are humanoid.
选项 A、the idea of humanoid robots
B、Karl Capek’s creation of robots
C、Hollywood’s production of robot films
D、the origin of and popular films about robots
答案D
解析 本题为细节题，根据第1段捷克作家Karl Capek的梦想，以及后面提到的好莱坞的无数以机器人为主题的电影(countless variations on the theme)，我们可知作者是围绕机器人的来历及有关机器人的流行影片展开了文章的主题。其他选项都只提及某一方面。而从整个篇章的主题来看，这篇文章主要是讲机器人的研制开发：第1段谈的是来龙去脉，以后各段谈的是研究进展及现状与未来，因此正确答案为D。
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