考研英语
2019-05-28-reading comprehension
UNIT
TEXT 4
Jeremy Bentham and John Stuart Mill are normally thought of as good guys.Between them,they came up with the ethical theory known as utilitarianism. The goal of this theory is generalized in Bentham’s opinion that “the greatest happiness of the foundation of morals and legislation.”
Which all sounds fine until you start applying it to particular cases.A utilitarian,for example ,might approve of the occasional torture of suspected terrorists—for the greater happiness of everyone else.That type of observation has led Daniel Bartels at Columbia University and David Pizarro at Cornell to ask what sort of people actually do have a utilitarian outlook on life.Their answers are not comfortable.
One classic technique used to measure a person’s willingness to behave in a utilitarian way is known as trolleyology. The subject of the study is challenged with thought experiments involving a runaway train carryiage. All involve choices,each of which leads to people’s deaths.For example:there are five railway workmen in a runaway carriage.The men will surely be killed unless the subject of the experiment does something.The subjext is told he is on a bridge over the tracks,with a heavy stranger next to him. The subject would be too light to stop the train and save the five lives.That,unfortunately,would kill the stranger.
Bartels and Pizarro knew from previous research that around 90% of people would refuse the utilitarian act of killing one to save five. What no one had previously inquired about, though , was the nature of the remaining 10%.
To find out,the two researchers gave 208 undergraduates a series of trolleyological tests and measured, on a four-point scale,how utiliarian their responses were. Participants were also asked to respond to a series of statement intended to get a sense of their individual psychologies. Each was asked to indicate where his views lay on a continuum that had “strongle agree” at one end and “strongly disagree” at the other.These statements were designed to measure,respectively,psychopathy, Machiavellianism and a person’s sense of how meaningful life is.
Bartels and Pizarro then correlated the results from the trolleyology with those from the personality tests.They found a strong link between utilitarian answers to moral dilemmas(push the fat guy off the bridge) and personalities that were psychopathic,Machiavellian or tended to view life as meaningless. Utilitarians,this suggests,may add to the sum of human happiness,but they are not very happy people themselves
That does not make utilitarianism wrong.Crafting legislation inevitably involves riding roughshod over someone’s interes.Utilitarianism provides a plausible framework for deciding who should get trampled.The results obtained by Bartels and Pizarro do , though , raise questions about the type of people who you want making the laws.Psychopathic,Machiavellian misanthropes?Apparently,yes.
Which of the following is true according to the first two paragraphs?
[A]Utilitarianism is ethnically accepted by everyone
[B]A utilitarian gets happiness through morals and legislation.
[C]A utilitarian may suport severe penalty for suspects.
[D]Bartels and Pizarro’s study focuses on what utilitarianism is.The classic technique known as “trolleyology”_______.
[A] helps people to be willing to behave utilitarianly
[B] challenges people’s various ways of thinking
[C]involves putting participants in moral dilemmas
[D] always takes a train on the run as the backgroudAccording to Paragraphs 4 and 5, the tests down by Bartels and Pizarro____.
[A] adopted the data from a previous research
[B] picked up 208 undergraduates behaving utilitarianly
[C] asked participants to give the right answer to each question
[D] intended to figure out the psychology of the utilitariansThe result of the research implies that_____.
[A] utilitarians may suffer from mental problems
[B] psychopathic people will refuse to save the majority
[C] utilitarians usually view life as happy and meaningful
[D] utilitarians live a life in order to make others happyThe author implies in the last paragraph that_____.
[A] legislation should be made at the cost of people in the minority
[B] utilitarians decide who should be trampled in legislation
[C] the standard of choosing law-makers should be reconsidered
[D] law makers are Psychopathic,Machiavellian misanthropes
