The robotic vehicles

機器人汽車

Thirteen vehicles lined up last March to race across the Mojave Desert, seeking a million in prize money. To win, they had to finish the 142-mile race in less than 10 hours. Teams and watchers knew there might be no winner at all, because these vehicles were missing a key part －drivers.

去年三月，十三輛車在莫哈韋沙漠排成一條線，尋求一百萬的比賽獎金。為了贏，他們必須在不到10個小時的時間里完成142英里的比賽。所有團隊和觀賽者都明白這次可能沒有贏家，因為這些車輛了一個關(guān)鍵部分-----司機。

DARPA, the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency, organized the race as part of a push to develop robotic vehicles for future battlefields. But the Grand Challenge, as it was called, just proved how difficult it is to get a car to speed across an unfamiliar desert without human guidance. One had its brake lock up in the starting area. Another began by throwing itself onto a wall. Another got tied up by bushes near the road after 1.9 miles.

美國國防部高級研究計劃局，國防高級研究計劃局，組織比賽的目的是為未來的戰(zhàn)場開發(fā)機器人汽車的試用一步。但這個大挑戰(zhàn),正如其名，已經(jīng)證明讓一輛無人駕駛的汽車在一個陌生的沙漠行駛是多么困難。一輛車在起始地區(qū)鎖定其制動。另一輛撞到墻上。又一輛人在行駛1.9英里處被附近灌木叢拖住。

One turned upside down. One took off in entirely the wrong direction and had to be disabled by remote (遠距離的) control. One went a little more than a mile and rushed into a fence; another managed to go for six miles but stuck on a rock. The “winner,” if there was any; reached 7.8 miles before it ran into a long, narrow hole, and the front wheels caught on fire.

一輛車翻了。一輛向完全錯誤的方向飛去，而且遠距離控制失控。有一輛行駛了一英里多，然后沖進向柵欄；另一輛走了六英里之后被一塊巖石困住。如果說有“贏家”的話，就是那輛走到7.8英里后，沖進一個又長又狹窄的洞中，導致前輪著火了。

“You get a lot of respect for natural abilities of the living things,” says Reinhold Behringer, who helped design two of the car-size vehicles for a company called Sci-Autonics. “Even ants (螞蟻) can do all these tasks effortlessly . It’s very hard for us to put these abilities into our machines.”

“你會特別尊重生物的生存能力，”萊因霍爾德•勃林格說，他幫助一家名為西奧托尼克斯公司設(shè)計的兩輛車�！凹词故俏浵佉材芎敛毁M力地完成所有任務(wù)。我們很難把這些能力運用在我們的機器上�！�

The robotic vehicles, though with necessary modern equipment such as advanced computers and GPS guidance, had trouble figuring out fast enough the blocks ahead that a two-year-old human recognizes immediately, Sure, that very young child, who has just only learned to walk, may not think to wipe apple juice off her face, but she already knows that when there’s a cookie in the kitchen she has to climb up the table, and that when she gets to the cookie it will taste good. She is more advanced, even months old, than any machine humans have designed.

機器人汽車，盡管配備了現(xiàn)代設(shè)備諸如先進的電腦和GPS導航，也很難快速識別街區(qū)，而一個兩歲的孩子卻能快速做到。當然，幼小的孩子，剛剛學會走路，可能不會因為蘋果汁弄花臉而擦掉它，但她已經(jīng)知道，如果有一塊曲奇餅干在廚房，她不就會爬上桌子，而且她拿到餅干時會覺得它會很好吃。她是更高級的，盡管只有幾個月大，卻勝過人類設(shè)計過的任何機器。

1．Watchers doubted if any of the vehicles could finish the race because        

A．they did not have any human guidance 

B．the road was not familiar to the drivers 

C．the distance was too long for the vehicles 

D．the prize money was unattractive to the drivers 

2．DARPA organized the race in order to         .

A．raise money for producing more robotic vehicles 

B．push the development of vehicle industry 

C．train more people to drive in the desert 

D．improve the vehicles for future wars 

3．From the passage we know “robotic vehicles” are a kind of machines that         

A．can do effortlessly whatever tasks living thing can 

B．can take part in a race across 142 miles with a time limit 

C．can show off their ability to turn themselves upside down 

D．can move from place to place without being driven by human beings 

4．In the race, the greatest distance one robotic vehicle covered was          

A．a(chǎn)bout eight miles    B．six miles 

C．a(chǎn)lmost two miles     D．a(chǎn)bout one mile 

5．In the last paragraph, the writer implies that there is a long way to go         

A．for a robotic vehicle to finish a 142-mile race without any difficulties 

B．for a little child who has just learned to walk to reach the cookie on the table 

C．for a robotic vehicle to deal with a simple problem that a little child can solve 

D．for a little child to understand the importance of wiping apple juice off its face 

【答案】

1. A這是一道細節(jié)推測題。因為第一段最后一句表明這些汽車都沒有駕駛員。

2. D根據(jù)第二段for future battlefields可以推測是軍事目的，選D。

3. D這是一道猜測詞義題。根據(jù)第二段第二句“without human guidance”可以推斷選D。

4. A這是一道細節(jié)題。根據(jù)第三段最后一句可知獲勝者跑了7.8英里，接近8英里。

5. C這是一道推斷題。a long way to go遠遠不能。根據(jù)最后一段“she is more advanced...than any machine...”可知機器遠不如人的智力。其他沒有提到。