2016 年 12 月大学英语四级考试真题（第 1 套）

Many men and women have long bought into the idea that there are "male" and "female" brains, believing that explains just about every difference between the sexes. A new study __26__ that belief, questioning whether brains really can be distinguished by gender.

In the study, Tel Aviv University researchers _27 for sex differences throughout the entire human brain. And what did they find? Not much. Rather than offer evidence for __28__ brains as "male" or "female," research shows that brains fall into a wide range, with most people falling right in the middle.

Daphna Joel, who led the study, said her research found that while there are some gender-based — __29__ , many different types of brain can't always be distinguished by gender.

While the "average" male and "average" female brains were __30__ different, you couldn't tell it by looking at individual brain scans. Only a small __31__ of people had "all-male" or "all-female" characteristics.

Larry Cahill, an American neuroscientist (神经科学家), said the study is an important addition to a growing body of research questioning __32__ beliefs about gender and brain function. But he cautioned against concluding from this study that all brains are the same, __33__ of gender.

"There's a mountain of evidence __34__ the importance of sex influences at all levels of brain function," he told The Seattle Times.

If anything, he said, the study __35__ that gender plays a very important role in the brain—"even when we are not clear exactly how."

As a person who writes about food and drink for a living, I couldn't tell you the first thing about Bill Perry or whether the beers he sells are that great. But I can tell you that I like this guy. That's because he plans to ban tipping in favor of paying his servers an actual living wage.

I hate tipping.

I hate it because it's an obligation disguised as an option. I hate it for the post-dinner math it requires of me. But mostly, I hate tipping because I believe I would be in a better place if pay decisions regarding employees were simply left up to their employers, as is the custom in virtually every other industry.

Most of you probably think that you hate tipping, too. Research suggests otherwise. You actually love tipping! You like to feel that you have a voice in how much money your server makes. No matter how the math works out, you persistently view restaurants with voluntary tipping systems as being a better value, which makes it extremely difficult for restaurants and bars to do away with the tipping system.

One argument that you tend to hear a lot from the pro-tipping crowd seems logical enough: the service is better when waiters depend on tips, presumably because they see a benefit to successfully veiling their contempt for you. Well, if this were true, we would all be slipping a few 100-dollar bills to our doctors on the way out their doors, too. But as it turns out, waiters see only a tiny bump in tips when they do an exceptional job compared to a passable one. Waiters, keen observers of humanity that they are, are catching on to this; in one poll, a full 30% said they didn't believe the job they did had any impact on the tips they received.

So come on, folks: get on board with ditching the outdated tip system. Pay a little more up-front for your beer or burger. Support Bill Perry's pub, and any other bar or restaurant that doesn't ask you to do drunken math.

In the past, falling oil prices have given a boost to the world economy, but recent forecasts for global growth have been toned down, even as oil prices sink lower and lower. Does that mean the link between lower oil prices and growth has weakened?

Some experts say there are still good reasons to believe cheap oil should heat up the world economy. Consumers have more money in their pockets when they're paying less at the pump. They spend that money on other things, which stimulates the economy.

The biggest gains go to countries that import most of their oil like China, Japan, and India. But doesn't the extra money in the pockets of those countries' consumers mean an equal loss in oil-producing countries, cancelling out the gains? Not necessarily, says economic researcher Sara Johnson. "Many oil producers built up huge reserve funds when prices were high, so when prices fall they will draw on their reserves to support government spending and subsidies (补贴) for their consumers."

But not all oil producers have big reserves. In Venezuela, collapsing oil prices have sent its economy into free-fall.

Economist Carl Weinberg believes the negative effects of plunging oil prices are overwhelming the positive effects of cheaper oil. The implication is a sharp decline in global trade, which has plunged partly because oil- producing nations can't afford to import as much as they used to.

Sara Johnson acknowledges that the global economic benefit from a fall in oil prices today is likely lower than it was in the past. One reason is that more countries are big oil producers now, so the nations suffering from the price drop account for a larger share of the global economy.

Consumers, in the U.S. at least, are acting cautiously with the savings they're getting at the gas pump, as the memory of the recent great recession is still fresh in their mind. And a number of oil-producing countries are trimming their gasoline subsidies and raising taxes, so the net savings for global consumers is not as big as the oil price plunge might suggest.