Few creations of big technology capture the imagination like giant dams. Perhaps it is humankind’s long suffering, at the mercy of flood and drought that makes the idea of forcing the waters to do our bidding so fascinating. But to be fascinated is also, sometimes, to be blind. Several giant dam projects threaten to do more harm than good.
    The lesson from dams is that big is not always beautiful. It doesn’t help that building a big, powerful darn has become a symbol of achievement for nations and people striving to assert; themselves. Egypt’s leadership in the Arab world was cemented by the Aswan High Dam. Turkey’s bid for First World status includes the giant Ataturk Dam.
    But big dams tend not to work as intended. The Aswan Dam, for example, stopped the Nile flooding but deprived Egypt of the fertile silt that floods left all in return for a giant reservoir of disease which is now so full of silt that it barely generates electricity.
    And yet, the myth of controlling the waters persists. This week, in the heart of civilized Europe, Slovaks and Hungarians stopped just short of sending in the troops in their contention over a dam on the Danube. The huge complex will probably have all the usual problems of big dams. But Slovakia is bidding for independence from the Czechs, and now needs a dam to prove itself.
    Meanwhile, in India, the World Bank has given the go-ahead to the even more wrong-headed Narmada Dam. And the bank has done this even thought its advisors say the dam will cause hardship for the powerless and environmental destruction. The benefits are for the powerful, but they are far from guaranteed.
    Proper, scientific study of the impacts of dams and of the cost and benefits of controlling water can help to resolve these conflicts. Hydroelectric power and flood control and irrigation are possible without building monster dams. But when you are dealing with myths, it is hard to be either proper, or scientific. It is time that the world learned the lessons of Aswan. You don’t need a dam to be saved.

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　　Music produces profound and lasting changes in the brain. Schools should add music classes, not cut them. Nearly 20 years ago, a small study advanced the (1) ________ that listening to Mozart’s Sonata for Two Pianos in D Major could boost mental functioning. It was not long (2) ________ trademarked “Mozart effect” products began to appeal to anxious parents aiming to put toddlers (刚学步的孩子) (3) ________ the fast track to prestigious universities like Harvard and Yale. Georgia’s governor even (4) ________ giving every newborn there a classical CD or cassette.
　　The (5) ________ for Mozart therapy turned out to be weak, perhaps nonexistent, although the (6) ________ study never claimed anything more than a temporary and limited effect. In recent years, (7) ________, scientists have examined the benefits of a concerted (8) ________ to study and practice music, as (9) ________ to playing a Mozart CD or a computer-based “brain fitness” game (10) ________ in a while.
　　Advanced monitoring (11) ________ have enabled scientists to see what happens (12) ________ your head when you listen to your mother and actually practice the violin for an hour every afternoon. And they have found that music (13) ________ can produce profound and lasting changes that (14) ________ the general ability to learn. These results should (15) ________ public officials that music classes are not a mere decoration, ripe for discarding in the budget crises that constantly (16) ________ public schools.
　　Studies have shown that (17) ________ instrument training from an early age can help the brain to (18) ________ sounds better, making it easier to stay focused when absorbing other subjects, from literature to mathematics. The musically adept (擅长的)are better able to (19) ________ on a biology lesson despite the noise in the classroom (20) ________, a few years later, to finish a call with a client when a colleague in the next office starts screaming a subordinate. They can attend to several things at once in the mental scratch pad called working memory, an essential skill in this era of multitasking.