III. Reading Comprehension: 40 points 【單選題】每題 2 分，共 20 題，答錯 1 題倒扣 0.5 分，倒扣至本大題零分為止，未作答，不給分亦不扣分。 Please read the following excerpts/passages closely and then choose the best answer for each of the questionsaccording to the contents.    Science is an _______ field; that is, it develops a body of knowledge by observing things and performing experiments. Thedeliberate process of gathering and analyzing data is called ‘the scientific method’ or ‘the scientific study.’ People often havethis misconception of Linguistics not being a scientific study. Let us see whether Linguistics is indeed a scientific study oflanguage.   Etymologically, Linguistics is a scientific study of language. Like all the other sciences, Linguistics has a well-definedsubject matter. It employs careful methods to observe, record and analyze various phenomena related to its subject matter, andhopes to present verifiable descriptions. Linguistics is based on observation, formation of hypothesis, testing, and verification.Some methods of observation include simple listening, phonetic transcription, and use of various instruments such as pitchmakers.
   Linguists also have laboratories where they perform all these procedures in studying languages. They firstly observelinguistic events, make a hypothesis, and test to make it verifiable or provable as that of a scientific experiment. Thus, we cansay that Linguistics is indeed a scientific study of language.

31. Which of the following words best completes the sentence in line 1?
(A) imperial
(B) imbecile
(C) incorrigible
(D) indecent
(E) impoverished