A
What if the car waiting patiently behind a parked bus is a driverless or autonomous vehicle (AV)?Will this robot car be able to understand what you mean when you flash your lights or madly wave your hands?Its sensors could decide that it's only safe to overtake when there's no oncoming traffic at all.On a busy road at schoolhome time, this may be never leading to increasingly angry passengers and increasingly angry drivers queuing behind.
And how will a robot car driving out from a Tjunction into oncoming traffic be able to make the necessary eye contact with a human driver?These safetyfirst robot cars could become victims of their own politeness and end up being bullied and ignored by aggressive, impatient humans.This, at any rate, is one of the conclusions to be drawn from research carried out by Dr. Chris Tennant of the psychological and behavioral science department at the London School of Economics.His Europewide survey finds that nearly twothirds of drivers think machines won't have enough common sense to interact with human drivers.And more than twofifths think a robot car would remain stuck behind our parked lorry for a long time.
“If you view the road as a social space, you will consciously negotiate your journey with other drivers.People who like that negotiation process appear to feel less comfortable engaging with AVs than with human drivers,”says Mr Tennant in his report.Of course, humans are always skeptical about new technologies of which they have little experience.That skepticism usually decreases with usage, however.And even many skeptics accept that emotionless AVs could cause fewer accidents than we humans, with our tendency to road anger, tiredness and lack of concentration.A statistic often repeated is that human error is responsible for more than 90% of accidents.But 70% of the 12,000 people Mr Tennant and his team interviewed agreed that: “As a point of principle, humans should be in control of their vehicles.” An even greater proportion — 80% — thought an autonomous vehicle should always have a steering wheel.
语篇解读:本文是一篇说明文。文章主要介绍了无人驾驶车辆针对不同路况的应对措施、遭受的歧视以及与人为驾驶车辆相比的优势等,从而告诉人们要接受并尊重无人驾驶车辆。
1.What do we know about an autonomous vehicle according to the text?
A.It is controlled by a robot.
B.It waits shorter than other cars.
C.It judges traffic by drivers online.
D.It recognizes angry human drivers.
解析:选A 细节理解题。由第一段第二句可知,无人驾驶的车辆是由机器人操纵的。
2.What did Dr. Chris Tennant find in his study?
A.Autonomous vehicles won't interact with human drivers.
B.Autonomous vehicles avoid passing Tjunctions ahead of time.
C.Autonomous vehicles drive in the same ways as human drivers.
D.Autonomous vehicles may suffer from impatient human drivers.
解析:选D 细节理解题。由第二段第二句可知,克里斯·坦南特博士研究团队得出的结论是:无人驾驶车辆可能会遭到没有耐心的司机的伤害。
3.What can we infer from the text?
A.Autonomous vehicles will be less social.
B.Autonomous vehicles are safer than generally expected.
C.Human drivers have been replaced by autonomous vehicles.
D.Human drivers are willing to interact with autonomous vehicles.
解析:选B 推理判断题。由第三段第三句和第五句可知,无人驾驶车辆比人们普遍认为得更安全。
4.What is the best title for the text?
A.An Autonomous Car Takes a Test Run
B.What Is Driverless Technology Like?
C.Say No to the Coming Driverless Trend
D.Would You Bully a Driverless Car or Show It Respect?
解析:选D 标题归纳题。概括全文内容可知,作者叙述了无人驾驶车辆的优点以及它可能会遭到没有耐心的司机的欺负,再结合作者支持无人驾驶车辆可知,本文中心思想是不要欺负和不尊重无人驾驶车辆。故选D。