That experiences influence subsequent behaviour is evidence of an obvious but nevertheless remarkable activity called remembering. Learning could not occur without the function popularly named memory. Constant practice has such as effect on memory as to lead to skillful performance on the piano, to recitation of a poem, and even to reading and understanding these words. So-called intelligent behaviour demands memory, remembering being a primary requirement for reasoning. The ability to solve any problem or even to recognize that a problem exists depends on memory. Typically, the decision to cross a street is based on remembering many earlier experiences.

　　Practice (or review) tends to build and maintain memory for a task or for any learned material. Over a period of no practice what has been learned tends to be forgotten; and the adaptive consequences may not seem obvious. Yet, dramatic instances of sudden forgetting can seem to be adaptive. In this sense, the ability to forget can be intffpreted to have survived through a process of natural selection in animals. Indeed, when one's memory of an emotionally painful experience lead to serious anxiety, forgetting may produce relief. Nevertheless, an evolutionary interpretation might make it difficult to understand how the commonly gradual process of forgetting survived natural selection.

　　In thinking about the evolution of memory together with all its possible aspects, it is helpful to consider what would happen if memories failed to fade. Forgetting clearly aids orientation in time, since old memories weaken and the new tend to stand out, providing clues for inferring duration. Without forgetting, adaptive ability would suffer, for example, learned behaviour that might have been correct a decade ago may no longer be. Cases are recorded of people who (by ordinary standards) forgot so little that their everyday activities were full of confusion. This forgetting seems to serve that survival of the individual and the species.

　　Another line of thought assumes a memory storage system of limited capacity that provides adaptive flexibility specifically through forgetting. In this view, continual adjustments are made between learning or memory storage (input) and forgetting (output). Indeed, there is evidence that the rate at which individuals forget is directly related to how much they have learned. Such data offers gross support of contemporary models of memory that assume an input-output balance.

69. From the last paragraph we know that__.
[A] forgetfulness is a response to learning
[B] the memory storage system is an exactly balanced input-output system
[C] memory is a compensation for forgetting
[D] the capacity of a memory storage system is limited because forgetting occurs

[答案] A

[解題思路]

　　本題對應于文章最后一段。B選項對應于該段最后一句話"In this view, continual adjustments are made between learning or memory storage (input) and forgetting (output)"（這些數據為當代的這種記憶輸入--輸出平衡模型提供了有力的支持），但選項中exactly這個詞并不符合原文意思，因此B為錯誤選項。C選項對應于該段第一句話"Another line of thought assumes a memory storage system of limited capacity that provides adaptive flexibility specifically through forgetting"（另一種思路認為，容量有限的記憶儲存系統通過遺忘來提供適應的靈活性），但選項的內容正好與原文相反，而D選項則顛倒了這句的因果關系，因此兩個選項都可以排除。A選項的表述則正好反映了第一句話的內容，因而是正確答案。

[題目譯文]

從最后一段中我們可以了解到              。
[A] 遺忘是對學習的一種反應
[B] 記憶存儲系統是一個精確平衡的輸入-輸出系統
[C] 記憶是對于遺忘的補償
[D] 記憶存儲系統由于遺忘的發生而功能有限