1、to his friends. The changes he made to the old theory were revolutionary. He placed a fixed sun at the centre of the solar system with the planets going round it and only the moon still going round the earth. He also suggested that the earth was spinning as it went round the sun and this explained c
2、hanges in the movement of the planets and in the brightness of the stars. His friends were enthusiastic and encouraged him to publish his ideas, but Copernicus was cautious. He did not want to be attacked by the Christian Church, so he only published it as he lay dying in 1543. Certainly he was righ
3、t to be careful. The Christian Church rejected his theory, saying it was against Gods idea and people who supported it would be attacked. Yet Copernicus theory is now the basis on which all our ideas of the universe are built. His theory replaced the Christian idea of gravity, which said things tell
4、 to earth because God created the earth as the centre of the universe. Copernicus showed this was obviously wrong. Now people can see that there is a direct link between his theory and the work of Isaac Newton, Albert Einstein and Stephen Hawking. Unit 2 PUZZLES IN GEOGRAPHY People many wonder why d
5、ifferent words are used to describe these four countries: England, Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland. You can clarify this question if you study British history. First there was England. Wales was linked to it in the thirteenth century. Now when people refer to England you find Wales included as
6、well. Next England and Wales were joined to Scotland in the seventeenth century and the name was changed to “Great Britain”. Happily this was accomplished without conflict when King James of Scotland became King of England and Wales as well. Finally the English government tried in the early twentiet
7、h century to form the United Kingdom by getting Ireland connected in the same peaceful way. However, the southern part of Ireland was unwilling and broke away to form its own government. So only Northern Ireland joined with England, Wales and Scotland to become the United Kingdom and this was shown
8、to the world in a new flag called the Union Jack. To their credit the four countries do work together in some areas(eg, the currency and international relations), but they still have very different institutions. For example, Northern Ireland, England and Scotland have different educational and legal
9、 systems as well as different football teams for competitions like the World Cup! England is the largest of the four countries, and for convenience it is divided roughly into three zones. The zone nearest France is called the South of England, the middle zone is called the Midlands and the one neare
10、st to Scotland is known as the North. You find most of the population settled in the south, but most of the industrial cities in the Midlands and the North of England. Although, nationwide, these cities are not as large as those in China, they have world-famous football teams and some of them even h
11、ave two! It is a pity that the industrial cities built in the nineteenth century do not attract visitors. For historical architecture you have to go to older but smaller towns built by the Romans. There you will find out more about British history and culture. The greatest historical treasure of all
12、 is London with its museums, art collections, theatres, parks and buildings. It is the centre of national government and its administration. It has the oldest port built by the Romans in the first century AD, the oldest building begun by the Anglo-Saxons in the 106os and the oldest castle constructe
13、d by later Norman rulers in 1066. There have been four sets of invaders of England. The first invaders, the Romans, left their towns and roads. The second, the Anglo-Saxon, left their language and their government. The third, the Vikings, influenced the vocabulary and place-names of the North of Eng
14、land, and the fourth, the Normans, left castles and introduced new words for food. If you look around the British countryside you will find evidence of all these invaders. You must keep your eyes open if you are going to make your trip to the United Kingdom enjoyable and worthwhile. SIGHTSEEING IN L
15、ONDON Worried about the time available, Zhang Pingyu had made a list of the sites she wanted to see in London. Her first delight was going to the Tower. It was built long ago by the Norman invaders of AD 1066. Fancy! This solid stone, square tower had remained standing for one thousand years. Althou
16、gh the buildings had expanded around it, it remained part of a royal palace and prison combined. To her great surprise, Zhang Pingyu found the Queens jewels guarded by special royal soldiers who, on special occasions, still wore the four-hundred-year-old uniform of the time of Queen Elizabeth I. The
17、re followed St Pauls Cathedral built after the terrible fire of London in 1666. It looked splendid when first built! Westminster Abbey, too, was very interesting. It contained statues in memory of dead poets and writers, such as Shakespeare. Then just as she came out of the abbey, Pingyu heard the f
18、amous sound of the clock, Big Ben, ringing out the hour. She finished the day by looking at the outside of Buckingham Palace, the Queens house in London. Oh, she had so mush to tell her friends! The second day the girl visited Greenwich and saw its old ships and famous clock that sets the world time
19、. What interested her most was the longitude line. It is an imaginary line dividing the eastern and western halves of the world and is very useful for navigation. It passes through Greenwich, so Pingyu had a photo taken standing on either side of the line. The last day she visited karl Marxs statue
20、in Highgate Cemetery. It seemed strange that the man who had developed communism should have lived and died in London. Not only that, but he had worked in the famous reading room of the Library of the British Museum. Sadly the library had moved from its original place into another building and the o
21、ld reading room was gone. But she was thrilled by so many wonderful treasures from different cultures displayed in the museum. When she saw many visitors enjoying looking at the beautiful old Chinese pots and other objects on show, she felt very proud of her country. The next day Pingyu was leaving
22、London for Windsor Castle. “Perhaps I will see the Queen?” she wondered as she fell asleep. Unit 3 FIRST IMPRESSIONS Spacemail: liqiang299AGreatAdventureSpaceS 15/11/3008(Earthtime) Dear Mum and Dad, I still cannot believe that I am taking up this prize that I won last year. I have to remind myself
23、constantly that I am really in AD 3008 . Worried about the journey, I was unsettled for the first few days. As a result, I suffered from “time lag”. This is similar to the “jet lag” you get from flying, but it seems you keep getting flashbacks from your previous time period. So I was very nervous an
24、d uncertain at first. However, my friend and guide, Wang Ping, was very understanding and gave me some green tablets which helped a lot. Well-known for their expertise, his parents company, called “Future Tours”, transported me safely into the future in a time capsule. I can still remember the momen
25、t when the space stewardess called us all to the capsule and we climbed in through a small opening. The seats were comfortable and after a calming drink, we felt sleepy and closed our eyes. The capsule began swinging gently sideways as we lay relaxed and dreaming. A few minutes later, the journey wa
26、s completed and we had arrived. I was still on the earth but one thousand years in the future. What would I find? At first my new surroundings were difficult to tolerate. The air seemed thin, as thoughto his friends. The changes he made to the old theory were revolutionary. He placed a fixed sun at
27、the centre of the solar system with the planets going round it and only the moon still going round the earth. He also suggested that the earth was spinning as it went round the sun and this explained changes in the movement of the planets and in the brightness of the stars. His friends were enthusia
28、stic and encouraged him to publish his ideas, but Copernicus was cautious. He did not want to be attacked by the Christian Church, so he only published it as he lay dying in 1543. Certainly he was right to be careful. The Christian Church rejected his theory, saying it was against Gods idea and peop
29、le who supported it would be attacked. Yet Copernicus theory is now the basis on which all our ideas of the universe are built. His theory replaced the Christian idea of gravity, which said things tell to earth because God created the earth as the centre of the universe. Copernicus showed this was o
30、bviously wrong. Now people can see that there is a direct link between his theory and the work of Isaac Newton, Albert Einstein and Stephen Hawking. Unit 2 PUZZLES IN GEOGRAPHY People many wonder why different words are used to describe these four countries: England, Wales, Scotland and Northern Ire
31、land. You can clarify this question if you study British history. First there was England. Wales was linked to it in the thirteenth century. Now when people refer to England you find Wales included as well. Next England and Wales were joined to Scotland in the seventeenth century and the name was ch
32、anged to “Great Britain”. Happily this was accomplished without conflict when King James of Scotland became King of England and Wales as well. Finally the English government tried in the early twentieth century to form the United Kingdom by getting Ireland connected in the same peaceful way. However
33、, the southern part of Ireland was unwilling and broke away to form its own government. So only Northern Ireland joined with England, Wales and Scotland to become the United Kingdom and this was shown to the world in a new flag called the Union Jack. To their credit the four countries do work togeth
34、er in some areas(eg, the currency and international relations), but they still have very different institutions. For example, Northern Ireland, England and Scotland have different educational and legal systems as well as different football teams for competitions like the World Cup! England is the la
35、rgest of the four countries, and for convenience it is divided roughly into three zones. The zone nearest France is called the South of England, the middle zone is called the Midlands and the one nearest to Scotland is known as the North. You find most of the population settled in the south, but mos
36、t of the industrial cities in the Midlands and the North of England. Although, nationwide, these cities are not as large as those in China, they have world-famous football teams and some of them even have two! It is a pity that the industrial cities built in the nineteenth century do not attract vis
37、itors. For historical architecture you have to go to older but smaller towns built by the Romans. There you will find out more about British history and culture. The greatest historical treasure of all is London with its museums, art collections, theatres, parks and buildings. It is the centre of na
38、tional government and its administration. It has the oldest port built by the Romans in the first century AD, the oldest building begun by the Anglo-Saxons in the 106os and the oldest castle constructed by later Norman rulers in 1066. There have been four sets of invaders of England. The first invad
39、ers, the Romans, left their towns and roads. The second, the Anglo-Saxon, left their language and their government. The third, the Vikings, influenced the vocabulary and place-names of the North of England, and the fourth, the Normans, left castles and introduced new words for food. If you look arou
40、nd the British countryside you will find evidence of all these invaders. You must keep your eyes open if you are going to make your trip to the United Kingdom enjoyable and worthwhile. SIGHTSEEING IN LONDON Worried about the time available, Zhang Pingyu had made a list of the sites she wanted to see
41、 in London. Her first delight was going to the Tower. It was built long ago by the Norman invaders of AD 1066. Fancy! This solid stone, square tower had remained standing for one thousand years. Although the buildings had expanded around it, it remained part of a royal palace and prison combined. To
42、 her great surprise, Zhang Pingyu found the Queens jewels guarded by special royal soldiers who, on special occasions, still wore the four-hundred-year-old uniform of the time of Queen Elizabeth I. There followed St Pauls Cathedral built after the terrible fire of London in 1666. It looked splendid
43、when first built! Westminster Abbey, too, was very interesting. It contained statues in memory of dead poets and writers, such as Shakespeare. Then just as she came out of the abbey, Pingyu heard the famous sound of the clock, Big Ben, ringing out the hour. She finished the day by looking at the out
44、side of Buckingham Palace, the Queens house in London. Oh, she had so mush to tell her friends! The second day the girl visited Greenwich and saw its old ships and famous clock that sets the world time. What interested her most was the longitude line. It is an imaginary line dividing the eastern and
45、 western halves of the world and is very useful for navigation. It passes through Greenwich, so Pingyu had a photo taken standing on either side of the line. The last day she visited karl Marxs statue in Highgate Cemetery. It seemed strange that the man who had developed communism should have lived
46、and died in London. Not only that, but he had worked in the famous reading room of the Library of the British Museum. Sadly the library had moved from its original place into another building and the old reading room was gone. But she was thrilled by so many wonderful treasures from different cultur
47、es displayed in the museum. When she saw many visitors enjoying looking at the beautiful old Chinese pots and other objects on show, she felt very proud of her country. The next day Pingyu was leaving London for Windsor Castle. “Perhaps I will see the Queen?” she wondered as she fell asleep. Unit 3
48、FIRST IMPRESSIONS Spacemail: liqiang299AGreatAdventureSpaceS 15/11/3008(Earthtime) Dear Mum and Dad, I still cannot believe that I am taking up this prize that I won last year. I have to remind myself constantly that I am really in AD 3008 . Worried about the journey, I was unsettled for the first f
49、ew days. As a result, I suffered from “time lag”. This is similar to the “jet lag” you get from flying, but it seems you keep getting flashbacks from your previous time period. So I was very nervous and uncertain at first. However, my friend and guide, Wang Ping, was very understanding and gave me some green tablets which helped a lot. Well-known for their expertise, his parents company, called “Future Tours”, transported me safely into the future in a time capsule. I can s
