The world is not coming to an end on December 21, 2012, the US space agency insi

    Theworld is not coming to an end on December 21, 2012, the US space agencyinsisted Monday in a rare campaign to dispel widespread rumors fueled by theInternet and a new Hollywood movie．

    Thelatest big screen offering from Sony Picture, 2012, arrives in theaters onFriday, with a 200-million-dollar production about the end of the worldsupposedly based on myths backed by the Mayan calendar．It is claimed that the endof time will come as a Planet X---or Nibiru---heads toward or collides with theEarth．

    Somewebsites accuse NASA of hiding the truth on the planet’s existence, but the USspace agency condemned such stories as an “Internet hoax”．“There is no factual basisfor these claims,” NASA said in a question-and-anwser posting on this website．“If such a collision were real, astronomers would have been trackingit for at least the past decade, and it would be visible by now to the nakedeye．Obviously, it does not exist．Credible scientists worldwide know of no threat associated with 2012,”it insisted．“After all, our planet has been gettingalong just well for more than four billion years,” added NASA．

    Thereis another planet, Eris, floating in space．But the small planet similar to Pluto willremain safely fixed in the outer solar system and it can come no closer thanfour billion miles to the Earth, according to NASA．

    Earliertheories set the disaster for May 2003, but when nothing happened the date wasmoved forward to the winter in 2012 to coincide with the end of a cycle of theancient Mayan calendar．

    NASAinsisted the Mayan calendar in fact does not end on December 21, 2012, asanother period begins immediately afterward．

    Andeven if the planets were to line up as some have forecast, the effect on ourplanet would be “negligible（unimportant）”, NASA said．

    “Andwhile comets and asteroids （小行星） have always hit the Earth, big hits are very rare,” NASA noted．The last major impact was believed to be 65 million years ago,resulting in the end of dinosaurs．

    “Wehave already determined that there are no threatening asteroids as large as theone that killed the dinosaurs,” the space agency said．

1.______ played a key role in thespread of the rumors．

    A．A newbook                      B．TheInternet and a new Hollywood movie

    C．NASA                            D．An Indian calendar

2.We can infer that ______．

    A．people didn’t take therumor seriously

    B．Planet X --- or Nibirudoes exist

    C．astronomers have beentracking Planet X for over ten years

    D．the rumor caused a panicamong some people

3.NASA thinks that Eris ______．

    A．might have a threat to theEarth B．doesn’t have any threat to the Earth

    C．is too far away to bevisible    D．is similar to our planet,where life might exist

4.Which of the following is thebest title?

    A．New Hollywood movie 2012

    B．December 21, 2012, Not theend of the world

    C．End of the ancient Mayancalendar

    D．How rumors came into being

试题答案

【答案】

1.B

2.D

3.B

4.B