Steven's Writing Clinic

GMAT作文考试新题大公开（二）

新题范文

文/江奇

版权所有，摘录和转贴请注明作者和出处。

自2006年ACT接手GMAT出题以来，一直都很低调，延续ETS出题风格，沿用原来的可用题库和出题方式，直到自己有实力去全面控制局面。2年过去了，其他部分目前毫无动静，唯独作文部分，出现了小小的尝试。2007年初ACT在北美花钱请人测试作文题目，暗下决心要啃下这块骨头，本人也参与了那次测试。之后在2007年末，ACT悄悄地在所有考生中随机加入这几道题目（以目前情况来看，100个考生中大约只有5-8个人会遇到新题）以磨练自己的评分人员和评分程序。

既然如此，GMAT作文有题库而且必须按照题库出题的思路（ETS时代任何新题都必须先公布一段时间才能真正进入考试）已经被ACT赤裸裸地打破，所以所有考生都应该对这些新题有很好的了解。

在这里，我们对其中一道令大家颇为头痛的Issue题给出一篇非常适合模仿的北美范文。

由于此题考的话题是法律，恰恰是中国同学（即使是法律系的学生）都不太能应对的抽象话题，所以在考场上颇为费力，以下给出一篇分析深刻（把事物本身和人们对事物的perception分开），思路严谨（论证有论据有解释有例外有保留），内容充实（两个主层次，之下才是论证），语言自然（善用长句和正式词汇，但稍有一点晦涩味道）的范文。

范文：

According to this statement, each person has a duty to not only obey just laws but also disobey unjust ones. In my view this statement is too extreme, in two respects. First, it wrongly categorizes any law as either just or unjust; and secondly, it recommends an ineffective and potentially harmful means of legal reform.

First, whether a law is just or unjust is rarely a straightforward issue. The fairness of any law depends on one's personal value system. This is especially true when it comes to personal freedoms. Consider, for example, the controversial issue of abortion. Individuals with particular religious beliefs tend to view laws allowing mothers an abortion choice as unjust, while individuals with other value systems might view such laws as just.

The fairness of a law also depends on one's personal interest, or stake, in the legal issue at hand. After all, in a democratic society the chief function of laws is to strike a balance among competing interests. Consider, for example, a law that regulates the toxic effluents a certain factory can emit into a nearby river. Such laws are designed chiefly to protect public health. But complying with the regulation might be costly for the company; the factory might be forced to lay off employees or shut down altogether, or increase the price of its products to compensate for the cost of compliance. At stake are the respective interests of the company's owners, employees, and customers, as well as the opposing interests of the region's residents whose health and safety are impacted. In short, the fairness of the law is subjective, depending largely on how one's personal interests are affected by it.

The second fundamental problem with the statement is that disobeying unjust laws often has the opposite affect of what was intended or hoped for. Most anyone would argue, for instance, that our federal system of income taxation is unfair in one respect or another. Yet the end result of widespread disobedience, in this case tax evasion, is to perpetuate the system. Free-riders only compel the government to maintain tax rates at high levels in order to ensure adequate revenue for the various programs in its budget.

Yet another fundamental problem with the statement is that by justifying a violation of one sort of law we find ourselves on a slippery slope toward sanctioning all types of illegal behavior, including egregious criminal conduct. Returning to the abortion example mentioned above, a person strongly opposed to the freedom-of-choice position might maintain that the illegal blocking of access to an abortion clinic amounts to justifiable disobedience. However, it is a precariously short leap from this sort of civil disobedience to physical confrontations with clinic workers, then to the infliction of property damage, then to the bombing of the clinic and potential murder.

In sum, because the inherent function of our laws is to balance competing interests, reasonable people with different priorities will always disagree about the fairness of specific laws. Accordingly, radical action such as resistance or disobedience is rarely justified merely by one's subjective viewpoint or personal interests. And in any event, disobedience is never justifiable when the legal rights or safety of innocent people are jeopardized as a result. (536 words)

GMAT作文考试新题大公开（一）

目前最完整的新题总结

文/Steven Q. Jiang

版权所有，摘录和转贴请注明作者和出处。

自2006年ACT接手GMAT出题以来，一直都很低调，延续ETS出题风格，沿用原来的可用题库和出题方式，直到自己有实力去全面控制局面。2年过去了，其他部分目前毫无动静，唯独作文部分，出现了小小的尝试。2007年初ACT在北美花钱请人测试作文题目，暗下决心要啃下这块骨头，本人也参与了那次测试。之后在2007年末，ACT悄悄地在所有考生中随机加入这几道题目（以目前情况来看，100个考生中大约只有5-8个人会遇到新题）以磨练自己的评分人员和评分程序。

既然如此，GMAT作文有题库而且必须按照题库出题的思路（ETS时代任何新题都必须先公布一段时间才能真正进入考试）已经被ACT赤裸裸地打破，所以所有考生都应该对这些新题有很好的了解。

为了帮助大家在听课之余对新题消除恐惧并有所准备，我将在这个系列中为大家准备以下三块内容：

（一）   目前最完整的新题总结

（二）   作文新题解题思路总结及复习作文部分的方法

（三）   部分新题的解题范文

以下是本人整理的两套新题：

Issue部分：

NT1. "The best teachers should expect students to challenge popular ideas rather than accept them."

Discuss the extent to which you agree or disagree with the opinion stated above. Support your views with reasons and/or examples from your own experience, observations, or reading.

只有那些鼓励学生挑战常规想法（而不是希望学生仅仅接受这些想法）的老师才是最好的老师。

NT2. "People have a duty to disobey laws that they consider unjust."

Discuss the extent to which you agree or disagree with the opinion stated above. Support your views with reasons and/or examples from your own experience, observations, or reading.

人们有义务不遵守那些他们认为不公正的法律。

Argument部分：

NT1. The following appeared in a realtor’s brochure in a large city:

“Now is the perfect time to buy a house in our city. Over the past five years, average home prices in our region have nearly doubled. But average stock prices in the national stock market have actually declined over the same period. So homeowners have seen an increase in value for their housing investment during the last five years that far exceeds what they could have made by investing in the stock market. Our city’s residents can surely achieve a similar profit over the next five years. Furthermore, if residents invest in a home, they can enjoy the use of the home while its value increases, whereas money invested in stocks would not contribute to their quality of life in the same way that owning a home would. Therefore, all the residents of our city should invest their money in a home.”

NT2. A retail grocery store has improved sales but decreased profits.  In order to improve its profits, the store has a new business plan – to lay off 10 employees without losing the store's luxury and expert services and to partner with XYZ Cafe, which has similar types of customers. （此题内容不全，为机经回忆整理而成。）

孔子的Issue审题思路超强，常人无法比拟。在新东方还没有成立的时候，甚至在ETS都没有成立的时候，在西方逻辑思维还没有散播开的时候，居然孔子同学就已经利用Issue的审题思维来思考问题了。希望大家能有所启示。

Yesterday I got an E-Mail from one of my favorite GMAT-course students in which there is a funny PowerPoint slideshow called "The Truth about Chocolate." It is so ridiculous and fallacious (but it’s really funny) that an idea suddenly occurred to me that I should use it in my GMAT/GRE writing course as an excellent example of argument task. Try to figure out how to poke holes in the author’s line of reasoning and write an outline (or an argument response if you like.)

Just have fun. Do not take this question seriously: It will never ever appear in the real test.

1、Issue考试界面：（点击下图，可以观看完整大小的截图）

2、Argument考试界面：（点击下图，可以观看完整大小的截图）