By the 1990s, the Nobel committee had gained a reputation for intransigence. Gary Becker won only after a flood of nominations forced the cabal in Stockholm to act. The father of game theory won only after Mr. Nash's sudden recovery from paranoid schizophrenia,though the disease had no bearing on the quality of his work, the best of which was done beforehe became ill. Robert Lucas received a prize that many economists believed he should have hadmuch earlier. In 1998, the prize became the subject of countless jokes after the collapse of Long-Term Capital Management, a hedge-fund firm whose founders included Robert Mertonand Myron Scholes, the 1997 Nobel laureates. The Merton/Scholes choice also highlighted another enduring problem with the prize:untimely deaths. Fischer Black, co-originator of the options-pricing model for which MessrsMerton and Scholes were recognised, died a year too soon to join his collaborators on thepodium. Last year, many economists hoped that Zvi Griliches, a noted econometrician who wasunquestionably deserving of the prize, and was suffering from a long illness, would win. He didnot, and died soon afterwards. Because the prize came into being so late, there is still a backlogof elderly luminaries waiting to be recognised. Paul Samuelson, one of the younger winners,and Mr Becker, who was a friend of Griliches, want the committee to take old age explicitlyinto account.

　　The committee could also cast its net more widely across the profession. Almost ail the laureates are also theoreticians; advances in empirical work and applications in the past two decades have yet to be paid due respect, a fact bemoaned by Mr Becker. Mr Samuelson adds that the economics committee's selection methods have excessively mimicked those used for the prizes in natural sciences: "If the right apple fell on your head, and you saw it, then you got the prize. But if you had a lifetime of excellence in all branches of physics, you didn't get it."

　　31. From the first paragraph, we learned that .

　　[A] the Nobel prize in economics was created under Alfred Nobel's will.

　　[B] Gunnar Myrdal was one of the Nobel prize winners in economics.

　　[C] Milton Friedman refused to accept the prize.

　　[D]the Nobel committee had not the ability to make decisions.

　　32. We can learn from the text that about the winners of the Nobel prize in economics during 1990s, .

　　[A] Gary Becker won the prize after he forced the committee to act.

　　[B]Mr Nash's illness delayed his receiving of the prize.

　　[C]obert Lucas received the prize earlier than expected.

　　[D] Robert Merton and Myron Scholes played jokes on the prize.

　　33. According to the text, the author's attitude toward Nobel prize in economics is .

　　[A]doubtful.

　　[B]positive.

　　[C] hostile.

　　[DJ indifferent.

　　34. From the third paragraph, we learn that .

　　[A] Fisher Black did not live long enough to win the Nobel prize.

　　[B] the Nobel committee will soon take old age into account.