Planet of the Humans: Why haven’t apes evolved into humans? 人类居住的地球：为什么人猿未进化成为人类？
- 详细资料
- 创建于 2003年7月02日
- 最后更新于 2024年5月25日
- 发布于 2011年6月02日
- 作者：Mike Lee
- 点击数：278
课文朗读
课文讲解
Virginia and her guest, Johnson, have just watched Planet of the Apes on DVD: 维琴尼亚和客人琼森刚欣赏完DVD影片「决战猩球」：
J: Hmm. Apes that evolve into something humanlike? Pretty unlikely, methinks.
嗯，人猿进化成像人类一样？我想不太可能。
V: Definitely. Evolution within a species or family of species does not have to increase in complexity.
当然，就某一物种或某一群物种的进化，未必会增加其复杂度。
J: Right. If it did, every fish in the ocean would now have limbs and live on land.
对，倘若真是这样进化，那海里的鱼现在都应该长了手脚，住在陆地上了。
V: Exactly. Because countless ecological opportunities remained for fish underwater, plenty of them remained aquatic.
正是如此，因为海底生态仍然有无穷尽的机会让水族生生不息，所以很多鱼就仍然是水栖动物。
J: Another thing: the most developed species, like humans and apes, are products of a very specific combination of selection pressures and genetic mutations over millions of years. There’s no reason why such a combination will repeat itself.
还有，最先进的物种，譬如人类和人猿，其实是数百万年前物竞天择的压力，和基因突变两者结合作用下所生成的产品，但这两者的结合作用未必会再次重演。
V: Right. Planet of the Apes simply exploits the fallacy that present-day apes are traveling down the same evolutionary path as ourselves.
对啊，「决战猩球」采用了另类推论，认定目前的人猿走过和人类同样的演化途径。
J: When it’s widely accepted among scientists that at some point five to eight million years ago, humans and apes diverged to form the two separate species we know today.
科学家们已经广泛地接受，约在五百万到八百万年以前，人类和人猿分途进化而成目前我们所知道的这两个物种。
V: Yeah. As descendants of a common ancestor, apes are our evolutionary cousins.
是啊，人猿来自同一祖先，可算是我们的表兄弟姊妹呢。
J: The main bone of contention remaining among the boffins is which species in the fossil record is the so-called “missing link.”
科学家目前主要的争论焦点则是，化石纪录中的那一个物种才是所谓「遗失的分节点」。【注1】
V: What John say? Virginia not understand.
琼森说什么？维琴尼亚不懂。【注2】
【注1】：missing 意思是一系列关联事物中缺失的一环，本课指介于人猿与人之间的灵长类动物。
【注2】：本句话是模仿泰山电影式语言，类似一种Dumb apes speak。
－by Hank Blisters
Vocabulary
单词发音
humanlike 似人类的
methinks [mɪˋθɪŋks] v.【古】我想；据我看来 It seems to me..
ecological [͵ɛkəˋlɑdʒɪkəl] adj. 生态（学）的
remain [rɪˋmen] v. 剩下，余留
aquatic [əˋkwætɪk] adj. 水生的；水栖的
mutation [mjuˋteʃən] n.〔动物或植物的〕突变﹐变异
exploit [ɪkˋsplɔɪt] v. 利用；利用……而自肥
fallacy [ˋfæləsɪ] n. 谬误的推理
diverge [daɪˋvɝdʒ] v. 岔开﹐分开
descendant [dɪˋsɛndənt] n. 子孙，后裔
bone of contention 有争执的问题; 争论的焦点 the subject or point of an argument; an unsettled point of disagreement
boffin [ˋbɑfɪn] n.（在密室中从事研究工作的）研究员；科学家
Sentence of the Day
This is something to go ape over!
这是很值得为它神魂颠倒的东西。
go ape over 对…狂热
go ape【俚】变得狂热; 发疯似的