For this part, you are allowed 30 minutes to write an easy commenting on the remark “A smile is the shortest distance between two people.” You can cite examples to illustrate your point. You should write at least 150 words but no more than 200 words.

A smile is the shortest distance between two people

Welcome, Freshmen. Have an iPod

　　Taking a step that many professors may view as a bit counterproductive, some colleges and universities are doling out Apple iPhones and Internet-capable iPods to their students. The always-on Internet devices raise some novel possibilities, like tracking where students gather together. With far less controversy, colleges could send messages about canceled classes, delayed buses, campus crises or just the cafeteria menu.
　　While schools emphasize its usefulness —online research in class and instant polling of students, for example — a big part of the attraction is, undoubtedly, that the iPhone is cool and a hit with students. Being equipped with one of the most recent cutting-edge IT products could just help a college or university foster a cutting-edge reputation.
　　Apple stands to win as well, hooking more young consumers with decades of technology pur­chases ahead of them. The lone losers, some fear, could be professors.
　　Students already have laptops and cell phones, of course, but the newest devices can take class distractions to a new level. They practically beg a user to ignore the long-suffering professor strug­gling to pass on accumulated wisdom from the front of the room — a prospect that teachers find most irritating and students view as, well, inevitable.“When it gets a little boring, I might pull it out,” acknowledged Naomi Pugh, a first-year student at Freed-Hardeman University in Henderson, Term., referring to her new iPod Touch, which can connect to the Internet over a campus wireless network. She speculated that professors might try even harder to make classes interesting if they were to compete with the devices.
　　Experts see a movement toward the use of mobile technology in education, though they say it is in its infancy as professors try to come up with useful applications. Providing powerful hand­held devices is sure to fuel debates over the role of technology in higher education.
　　“We think this is the way the future is going to work,” said Kyle Dickson, co-director of re­search and the mobile learning initiative at Abilene Christian University in Texas, which has bought more than 600 iPhones and 300 iPods for students entering this fall.Although plenty of students take their laptops to class, they don’t take them everywhere and would prefer something lighter. Abilene Christian settled on the devices after surveying students and finding that they did not like hauling around their laptops, but that most of them always carried a cell phone, Dr. Dickson said.
　　It is not clear how many colleges and universities plan to give out iPhones and iPods this fall; officials at Apple were unwillig to talk about the subject and said that they would not leak any institution’s plans.“We can’t announce other people’s news,” said Greg Joswiak, vice president of iPod and iPhone marketing at Apple. He also said that he could not discuss discounts to universities for bulk purchases.
　　At least four institutions — the University of Maryland, Oklahoma Christian University, Abilene Christian and Freed-Hardeman — have announced that they will give the devices to some or all of their students this fall.Other universities are exploring their options. Stanford University has hired a student-run com­pany to design applications like a campus map and directory for the iPhone. It is considering whether to issue iPhones but not sure it is necessary, noting that more than 700 iPhones were registered on the university’s network last year.              
　　At the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, iPhones might already have been everywhere, if AT&T, the wireless carrier offering the iPhone in the United States, had a more reliable network, said Andrew Yu, mobile devices platform project manager at M.I.T.“We would have probably gone ahead with this, maybe just getting a thousand iPhones and giving them out,” Mr. Yu said.
　　The University of Maryland at College Park is proceeding cautiously, giving the iPhone or iPod Touch to 150 students, said Jeffrey Huskamp, vice president and chief information officer at the university. “We don’t think that we have all the answers,” Mr. Huskamp said. By observing how students use the gadgets, he said, “We’re trying to get answers from the students.”
　　At each college, the students who choose to get an iPhone must pay for mobile phone service. Those service contracts include unlimited data use. Both the iPhones and the iPod Touch devices can connect to the Internet through campus wireless networks. With the iPhone, those networks may provide faster connections and longer battery life than AT&T’s data network. Many cell phones allow users to surf the Web, but only some newer ones are capable of wireless connection to the local area computer network.
　　University officials say that they have no plans to track their students (and Apple said it would not be possible unless students give their permission). They say that they are drawn to the prospect of learning applications outside the classroom, though such lesson plans have yet to surface.
　　“My colleagues and I are studying something called augmented reality (a field of computer research dealing with the combination of real-world and virtual reality),” said Christopher Dede, professor in learning technologies at Harvard University.“Alien Contact,” for example, is an exer­cise developed for middle-school students who use hand-held devices that can determine their location. As they walk around a playground or other area, text, video or audio pops up at various points to help them try to figure out why aliens were in the schoolyard. “You can imagine similar kinds of interactive activities along historical lines,” like following the Freedom Trail in Boston, Professor Dede said. “It’s important that we do research, so that we know how well something like this works.”
　　The rush to distribute the devices worries some professors, who say that students are less likely to participate in class if they are multi-tasking. “I’m not someone who’s anti-technology, but I,m always worried that technology becomes an end in and of itself, and it replaces teaching or it replaces analysis,,’ said Ellen Millender, associate professor of classics at Reed College in Portland, Ore. (She added that she hoped to buy an iPhone for herself once prices fall.)
　　Robert Summers, who has taught at Cornell Law School for about 40 years, announced this week — in a detailed, footnoted memorandum —that he would ban laptop computers from his class on contract law.“I would ban that too if I knew the students were using it in class,” Professor Summers said of the iPhone, after the device and its capabilities were explained to him. “What we want to encour­age in these students is an active intellectual experience, in which they develop the wide range of complex reasoning abilities required of good lawyers.”
　　The experience at Duke University may ease some concerns. A few years ago, Duke began giving iPods to students with the idea that they might use them to record lectures (these older models could not access the Internet).“We had assumed that the biggest focus of these devices would be consuming the content,” said Tracy Futhey, vice president for information technology and chief information officer at Duke.But that is not all that the students did. They began using the iPods to create their own “content,” making audio recordings of themselves and presenting them. The students turned what could have been a passive interaction into an active one, Ms. Futhey said.

    The ideal companion machine would not only look, feel, and sound friendly but would also be programmed to behave in an agreeable manner. Those (1) _______ that make interaction with other people enjoyable would be simulated as closely as possible, and the machine would appear to (2) _______ stimulating and easygoing. Its informal conversation style would make interaction comfortable, and yet the machine would remain slightly (3) _______ and therefore interesting. In its first (4) _______ it might be somewhat honest and unsmiling that it came to know the user it would progress to a more (5) _______ and intimate style. The machine would not be a passive (6) _______ but would add its own suggestions, information, and opinions; it would sometimes take the (7) _______ in developing or changing the topic and would have a (8) _______ of its own.
    The machine would convey presence. We have all seen how a computer’s use of personal names (9) ___________________. Such features are wholly written into the software. (10) ___________________. 
    Friendships are not made in a day, and the computer would be more acceptable as a friend (11) ___________________. At an appropriate time I might also express the kind of affection that simulates attachment and intimacy. 

    Highly proficient musicianship is hard won. Although it’s often assumed musical ability us inherited, there’s abundant evidence that this isn’t the case. While it seems that at birth virtually everyone has perfect pitch, the reasons that one child is better than another are motivation and practice.
    Highly musical children were sung to more as infants and more encouraged to join in song games as kids than less musical ones, long before any musical ability could have been evident. Studies of classical musicians prove that the best ones practiced considerably more from childhood onwards than ordinary orchestral players, and this is because their parents were at them to put in the hours from a very young age.
    The same was true of children selected for entry to specialist music schools, compared with those who were rejected. The chosen children had parents who had very actively supervised music lessons and daily practice from young ages, giving up substantial periods of leisure time to take the children to lessons and concerts.
    The singer Michael Jackson’s story, although unusually brutal and extreme, is illumination when considering musical prodigy(天才). Accounts suggest that he was subjected to cruel beatings and emotional torture ,and that he was humiliated (羞辱) constantly by his father, What sets Jackson’s family apart is that his father used his reign of terror to train his children as musicians and dancers.
    On top of his extra ability Michael also had more drive. This may have been the result of being the closest of his brothers and sisters to his mother. “He seemed different to me from the other children —special,” Michael’s mother said of him. She may not have realized that treating her son as special may have been part of the reason be became like that.
    All in all, if you want to bring up a Mozart or Bach, the key factor is how hard you are prepared to crack the whip. Thankfully, most of us will probably settle for a bit of fun on the recorder and some ill-executed pieces of music-on the piano from our children.

　　In 2011, many shoppers chose to avoid the frantic crowds and do their holiday shopping from the comfort of their computer. Sales at online retailers gained by more than 15%, making it the biggest season ever. But people are also returning those purchases at record rates, up 8% from last year.
　　What went wrong? Is the lingering shadow of the global financial crisis making it harder to accept extravagant indulgences? Or that people shop more impulsively—and therefore make bad decisions—when online? Both arguments are plausible. However, there is a third factor: a question of touch. We can love the look but, in an online environment, we cannot feel the quality of a texture, the shape of the fit, the fall of a fold or, for that matter, the weight of an earring. And physically interacting with an object makes you more committed to your purchase.
　　When my most recent book Brandwashed was released, I teamed up with a local bookstore to conduct an experiment about the difference between the online and offline shopping experience. I carefully instructed a group of volunteers to promote my book in two different ways. The first was a fairly hands-off approach. Whenever a customer would inquire about my book, the volunteer would take them over to the shelf and point to it. Out of 20 such requests, six customers proceeded with the purchase.
　　The second option also involved going over to the shelf but, this time, removing the book and them subtly holding onto it for just an extra moment before placing it in the customer’s hands. Of the 20 people who were handed the book, 13 ended up buying it. Just physically passing the book showed a big difference in sales. Why? We feel something similar to a sense of ownership when we hold things in our hand. That’s why we establish or reestablish connection by greeting strangers and friends with a handshake. In this case, having to then let go of the book after holding it might generate a subtle sense of loss, and motivate us to make the purchase even more.
　　A recent study also revealed the power of touch, in this case when it came to conventional mail. A deeper and longer-lasting impression of a message was formed when delivered in a letter, as opposed to receiving the same message online. Brain imaging showed that, on touching the paper, the emotional center of the brain was activated, thus forming a stronger bond. The study also indicated that once touch becomes part of the process, it could translate into a sense of possession.
　　This sense of ownership is simply not part of the equation in the online shopping experience.

　　Apparently everyone knows that global warming only makes climate more extreme. A hot, dry summer has triggered another flood of such claims. And, while many interests are at work, one of the players that benefits the most from this story are the media: the notion of “extreme” climate simply makes for more compelling news.
　　Consider Paul Krugman writing breathlessly in the New York Times about the “rising incidence of extreme events,” He claims that global warming caused the current drought in America’s Midwest, and that supposedly record-high corn prices could cause a global food crisis.
　　But the United Nations climate panel’s latest assessment tells us precisely the opposite. For “North America there is medium confidence that there has an overall slight tendency toward less dryness” Moreover, there is no way that Krugman could have identified this drought as being caused by global warming without a time machine; Climate models estimate that such detection will be possible by 2048, at the earliest.
　　And, fortunately, this year’s drought appears unlikely to cause a food crisis, as global rice and wheat supplies retain plentiful. Moreover, Krugman overlooks inflation: Prices have increased six-fold since 1969. so, while com futures (期货) did set a record of about S8 per bushel (葡式耳)in late July, the inflation-adjusted price of corn was higher throughout most of the 1970s, reaching 516 in1974.
　　Finally, Krugman conveniently forgets that concerns about global warming are the main reason that corn prices have skyrocketed since 2005. Nowadays 40 percent of corn grown in the United States is used to produce ethanol (乙醇), which does absolutely nothing for the climate, but certainly distorts the price of corn—at the expense of many of the world’s poorest people.
　　Bill Mickbben similarly worries in The Guardian about the Midwest drought and corn prices. He confidently tells us that raging wildfires from New Mexico and Colorado to Siberia are “exactly” what the early stages of global warming look like.
　　In fact, the latest overview of global wildfire suggests that fire intensity has declined over the past 70 years and is now close to its preindustrial level.
　　When well-meaning campaigners want us to pay attention to global warming, they often end up pitching beyond the facts. And, while this may seem justified by a noble goal, such “policy by people” tactics rarely work, and often backfire.
　　Remember how, in the wake of Hurricane Katrina in 2005, Al Gore claimed that we were in store for ever more destructive hurricanes? Since then, hurricane incidence has dropped off the charts. Exaggerated claims merely fuel public distrust and disengagement.
　　That is unfortunate, because global warming is a real problem, and we do need to address it.

　　The continuous presentation of scary stories about global warming in the popular media makes us unnecessarily frightened. Even worse,  it (1) _______ our kids.
　　Al Gore famously (2) _______ how a sea-level rise of 20 feet would almost completely flood Florida, New York, Holland, and Shanghai, (3) _______ the United Nations says that such a thing will not even happen, (4) _______ that sea levels will rise 20 times less than that.
　　When (5) _______ with these exaggerations, some of us say that they are for a good cause, and surely (6) _______ is no harm done if the result is that we focus even more on tackling climate change.
　　This (7) _______ is astonishingly wrong. Such exaggerations do plenty of harm. Worrying (8) _______ about global warming means that we worry less about other things, where we could do so much more good. We focus, (9) _______, on global warning’s impact on malaria (疟疾)-which will put slightly more people at (10) _______ in 100 years - instead of tackling the half a billion people (11) _______ from malaria today with prevention and treatment policies that are much cheaper and dramatically more effective than carbon reduction would be.
　　(12) _______ also wears out the public's willingness to tackle global warming. If the planet is (13) _______, people wonder, why do anything? A record 54% of American voters now believe the news media make global warming appear worse than it really is. A (14) _______ of people now believe – incorrectly – that global warming is not even caused by humans.
　　But the (15) _______ cost of exaggeration, I believe, is the unnecessary alarm that it causes – particularly (16) _______ children. An article in The Washington Post cited nine-year-old Alyssa, who cries about the possibility of mass animal (17) _______ from global warming.
　　The newspaper also reported that parents are (18) _______ "productive" outlets for their eight-year-olds' obsessions (忧心忡忡) with dying polar bears. They might be better off educating them and letting them know that, contrary (19) _______ common belief, the global polar bear population has doubled and perhaps even quadrupled (成为四倍) over the past half- century, to about 22,000. (20) _______ diminishing - and eventually disappearing - summer Arctic ice, polar bears will not become extinct.

Anyone driving with a high blood alcohol level ____________________________(将被指控为醉驾) and face a severe penalty.

Many people have become so addicted to online shopping that they ____________________________________(情不自禁每天都要访问购物网站).

You are an executive council member of our organization, so _______________________________（你说的话有份量）.

To fully appreciate the author’s motive and intention, you really have to _____________________(仔细从字里行间去解读).