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The company takes environmental issues into account wherever possible. computation consideration calculation assessment
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American young people find the transition into adulthood easy to face. change delivery transfer transfusion
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Only his relatives knew he had a fatal illness. strange deadly serious unknown
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Einstein’ s Theory of Relativity was so profound that only a few scientists could understand it. deep superior wide narrow
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He becomes famous for his coverage of significant events during the war. usage baggage reportage orphanage
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It was a(n)inevitable consequence of the decision. inconsistent proper certain strange
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The decoration of the palace amazes the visitors with its gorgeous furniture. ridiculous lovely peculiar magnificent
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When he got out of the manager’ s office, from his facial expression we knew that his proposal must have been turned down. refused accepted adopted denied
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The police had to restrain the prisoners from escaping. prevent reduce disallow confine
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Our plan is to allocate one member of staff to handle appointments. assign persuade ask order
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The gangster disappears into the crowd. politicians musicians industrialists violent criminals
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In order to improve our standard of living, we have to accelerate production. step up decrease stop control
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I must have been insane to agree to his idea. reasonable crazy sensible unbelievable
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She’ s been deliberately ignoring him all day. sufficiently noticeably intentionally absolutely
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A lamp was suspended from the ceiling. held hooked hidden hung
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The Only Way Is Up
Think of a modern city and the first image that comes to rnind is the skyline. It is full of great buildings, pointing like fingers to heaven. It is true that some cities don’t permit buildings to go above a certain height. But these are cities concerned with the past. The first thing any city does when it wants to tell the world that it has arrived is to build skyscrapers.
When people gather together in cities, they create a demand for land. Since cities are places where money is made, that demand can be met. And the best way to make money out of city land is to put as many people as possible in a space that covers the smallest amount of ground. That means building upwards.
The technology existed to do this as early as the 1.9th century. But the height of buildings was limited by one important factor. They had to be small enough for people on the top floors to climb stairs. People could not be expected to climb a mountain at the end of their journey to work, or home.
Elisha Otis, a US inventor, was the man who brought us the lift—or elevator, as he preferred to call it. However, most of the technology is very old. Lifts work using the same pulley system the Egyptians used to create the Pyramids. What Otis did was attach the system to a steam engine and develop the elevator brake, which stops the lift falling if the cords that hold it up are broken. It was this that did the most to gain public-confidence in the new invention. In fact, he spent a number of years exhibiting lifts at fairgrounds. giving people the chance to try them out before selling the idea to architects and builders.
A lift would not be a very good theme park attraction now. Going in a lift is such an everyday thing that it would just be boring. Yet psychologists and others who study human behavior find lifts fascinating. The reason is simple. Scientists have always studied animals in zoos. The nearest they can get to that with humans is in observing them in lifts.
“ It breaks all the usual conventions about the bubble of personal space we carry around with us—and you just can’ t choose to move away, “ says workplace psychologist, Gary Fitzgibbon. “ Being trapped in this setting can create different types of tensions, “ he says. Some people are scared of them. Others use them as an opportunity to get close to the boss. Some stand close to the door. Others hide in the corners. Most people try and shrink into the background. But some behave in a way that makes others notice them. There are a few people who just stand in a corner taking notes.
Don’ t worry about them. They are probably from a university.
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How to Get Along Well With Your Boss
1 Before you argue with your boss, check with the boss’ s secretary to determine his mood. If he ate nails for breakfast, it is not a good idea to ask him for something. Even without the boss’ s secretary, there are keys to timing: don’ t approach the boss when he’ s on deadline, don’ t go in right before lunch, when he is apt to be distracted and rushed, don’ t go in just before or after he has taken a vacation.
2 If you’ re mad, that will only make your boss mad. Calm down first, and don’ t let a particular concern open the floodgates for all your accumulated frustration. The boss will feel that you think negatively about the company and it is hopeless trying to change your mind. Then maybe he will dismiss you.
3 Terrible disputes can result when neither the employer nor the employee knows what is the problem the other wants to discuss. Sometimes the fight will go away when the issues are made clear. The employee has to get his point across clearly in order to make the boss understand it.
4 Your boss has enough on his mind without your adding more. If you can’ t put forward an immediate solution, at least suggest how to approach the problem. People who frequently present problems without solutions to their bosses may soon find they can’ t get past the secretary.
5 To deal effectively with a boss, it’ s important to consider his goals and pressures. If you can put yourself in the position of being a partner to the boss, then he will be naturally more inclined to work with you to achieve your goals.
A. Keep Your Voice Low All the Time
B. Put Yourself in the Boss’ s Position
C. Propose Your Solution
D. Don’ t Go In When You Are Angry
E. Make the Issue Clear
F. Never Give In
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A. to give the boss your advice
B. how he is feeling
C. the boss may have
D. what you really want to talk to him about
E. without suggesting a way to solve it
F. how unhappy you are
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Nuclear Power and Its Danger
Nuclear power’ s danger to health, safety, and even life itself can be summed up in one word;radiation.
Nuclear radiation has a certain mystery about it, partly because it cannot be detected by human senses. It can’t be seen or heard, or touched, or tasted, even though it may be all around us. There are other things like that. For example, radio waves are all around us but we can’t detect them, sense them, without a radio receiver. Similarly, we can’t sense radioactivity without a radiation detector. But unlike common radio waves, nuclear radiation is not harmless to human beings and other living things.
At very high levels, radiation can kill an animal or human being outright by killing masses of cells in vital organs. But even the lowest level of radiation can do serious damage. There is no level of radiation that is completely safe. If the radiation does not hit anything important, the damage may not be significant. This is the case when only a few cells are hit, and if they are killed outright. Your body will replace the dead cells with healthy ones. But if the few cells are only damaged, and if they reproduce themselves, you may be in trouble. They reproduce themselves in a deformed way. They can grow into cancer. Sometimes this does not show up for many years.
This is another reason for some of the mystery about nuclear radiation. Serious damage can be done without the victim being aware at the time that damage has occurred. A person can be irradiated and feel fine, then die of cancer five, ten, or twenty years later as a result. Or a child can be bom weak or liable to serious illness as a result of radiation absorbed by its grandparents.
Radiation can hurt us. We must know the truth.
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When Fear Takes Control of the Mind
A panic attack is a sudden feeling of terror. Usually it does not last long, but it may feel like forever. The cause can be something as normally uneventful as driving over a bridge or flying in an airplane. And it can happen even if the person has driven over many bridges or flown many times before. A fast heartbeat. Sweaty hands. Difficulty breathing. A light-headed feeling. At first a person may have no idea what is wrong. But these can all be signs of what is known as panic disorder. The first appearance usually is between the ages of 18 and 25. In some eases it develops after a tragedy, like the death of a loved one, or some other difficult situation.
In the United States, the National Institute of Mental Health says more than two million people are affected in any one-year period. The American Psychological Association says panic disorder is two times more likely in women than men. And it can last anywhere from a few months to a lifetime.
Panic attacks can be dangerous—for example, if a person is driving at the time. The Chesapeake Bay Bridge in the slate of Maryland is so long and so high over the water, it is famous for scaring motorists. There is even a driver assistance program to help people get across.
Some people who suffer a panic attack develop a phobia, a deep fear of ever repeating the activity that brought on the attack.
But experts say panic disorder can be treated. Doctors might suggest anti-anxiety or antidepressant medicines. Talking to a counselor could help a person learn to deal with or avoid a panic attack. There are breathing methods, for example, that might help a person calm down.
Panic disorder is included among what mental health professionals call anxiety disorders. A study published last week reported a link between anxiety disorders and several physical diseases. It says these include thyroid disease, lung and stomach problems, arthritis, migraine headaches and allergic conditions. Researchers at the University of Manitoba in Canada say that in most cases the physical condition follows the anxiety disorder. But, they say, exactly how the two are connected remains unknown.
The report in the Archives of Internal Medicine came from a German health study of more than 4, 000 adults.
