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  3. The 17 trillion US gallons of rain, roughly 26m Olympic swimming pools, dumped on Texas by Hurricane Harvey has set a new high f

The 17 trillion US gallons of rain, roughly 26m Olympic swimming pools, dumped on Texas by Hurricane Harvey has set a new high f

admin2018-03-26  33
问题    The 17 trillion US gallons of rain, roughly 26m Olympic swimming pools, dumped on Texas by Hurricane Harvey has set a new high for a tropical system in the US, but it is unlikely to last long as rising man-made emissions push the global climate deeper into uncharted territory.
   Images of flooded streets in Texas are mirrored by scenes of inundated(洪泛的)communities in India and Bangladesh, the recent mudslides in Sierra Leone and last month’s deadly overflow of a Yangtze tributary(支流)in China. In part, these calamities are seasonal. In part, the impact depends on local factors. But scientists tell us such extremes are likely to become more common and more devastating as a result of rising global temperatures and increasingly intense rainfall.
   Our planet is in an era of unwelcome records. For each of the past three years, temperatures have hit peaks not seen since the birth of meteorology(气象学), and probably not for more than 110,000 years. The amount of carbon dioxide in the air is at its highest level in 4m years. This does not cause storms like Harvey—there have always been storms and hurricanes at this time of year along the Gulf of Mexico—but it makes them wetter and more powerful.
   " For large countries like the United States, we can expect further rainfall records—and not just for hurricanes," said Friederike Otto, deputy director of the Environmental Change Institute at the University of Oxford. This is part of a wider trend. "For the globe, we’ll see heat and extreme rainfall records fall for the foreseeable future," she predicted. She cautioned that the situation is likely to be different from country to country. Many factors are involved, but human impact on the climate has added to the tendency for more severe droughts and fiercer storms.
   A key focus now is whether climate change is connected to the " stalling" of storms. In the US, hurricanes usually move inland and diminish in power as they get further from the sea. Harvey, however, was stationary for several days—which is the main factor in its rainfall record.
   Scientists have said this may be the single biggest question posed by Harvey. Researchers have recently identified a slowdown of atmospheric summer circulation in the mid-latitudes as a result of strong warming in the Arctic. But such studies of pressure patterns need more powerful analytical tools, including supercomputers.
   In the US, however, such research has become highly politicised. President Donald Trump has announced that the US will pull out of the Paris climate treaty and cut funding for related research. " It shouldn’t be a political matter to try to understand how much more frequent events like Harvey will become in the future," said Tim Palmer, a professor at the University of Oxford. "It appalls me how basic science has become involved in politics like this. "
What is the scientific community’s response to President Trump’s announcement?
选项 A、Quite critical.
B、Pretty favorable.
C、Rather indifferent.
D、Slightly Skeptical.
答案A
解析 观点态度题。本题考查科学界对特朗普总统有关退出巴黎气候协定并减少研究经费的反应。定位句提到，特朗普总统已经宣布美国将退出巴黎协定，并且减少相关研究的基金，而学术界对此的看法主要从作者在最后一段引用的学者帕尔默的话中可以推知，帕尔默说研究天气变化不应该是一个政治事件，并认为基础科学卷入政治之中令人寒心。可见，学术界对特朗普总统的决定持批评态度，故答案为A)。同时排除B)“十分赞同”、C)“相当淡漠”和D)“有些怀疑”。
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