passage2

注解：标题为红色，翻译为蓝色，分析为绿色。

        ①Being a man has always been dangerous.②There are about 105 males born for every 100 females, but this ratio drops to near balance at the age of maturity, and among 70-year-olds there are twice as many women as men.③ But the great universal of male mortality is beingchanged.④Now, boy babies survive almost as well as girls do.⑤This means that, for the first time, there will be an excess of boys in those crucial years when they are searching for a mate.⑥More important, another chance for natural selection has been removed.⑦Fifty years ago, the chance of a baby(particularly a boy baby) surviving depended on its weight.A kilogram toolight or too heavy meant almost certain death.⑧ Today it makes almost no difference. Since much of the variation is due to genes, one more agent of evolution has gone.

         ①There is another way to commit evolutionary suicide: stay alive, but have fewer children.②Few people are as fertile as in the past.③ Except in some religious communities, very few women have 15 children.④Nowadays the number of births, like the age of death, has become average.⑤ Most of us have roughly the same number of offspring.⑥(16) Again, differences between people and the opportunity for natural selection to take advantage of it have diminished.⑦. India shows what is happening. The country offers wealth for a few in the great cities and poverty for the remaining tribal peoples.⑧ The grand mediocrity of today-everyone being the same in survival and number of offspring-means that natural selection has lost 80% of its power in upper-middle-class India compared to the tribes.

       For us, this means that evolution is over; the biological Utopia has arrived.②Strangely, it has involved little physical change.③No other species fills so many places in nature.④But in the past 100,000 years-even the past 100 years-our lives have been transformed but our bodies have not.⑤We did not evolve, because machines and society did it for us.⑥. Darwin had a phrase to describe those ignorant of evolution: they "look at an organic being as a savage looks at a ship, as at something wholly beyond his comprehension."⑦No doubt we will remember a 20th century way of life beyond comprehension for its ugliness. But however amazed our descendants may be at how far from Utopia we were, they will look just like us.

[406 words]

                                            

一、文章结构分析    

       本文是一篇关于人类进化的文章。先指出人类进化自然选择的因素已消失，进而说明人类身体已经停止进化并指出其社会原因。

         第一段：指出自然选择的两个因素都已消失：男性死亡率和婴儿体重的差别。主要使用了（现在与过去）对比论证。

        第二段：指出造成人类进化停止的另一个因素是：子女数目减少，并以印度为例进行说明。

        第三段：总结全文，指出以上这些现象意味着人类进化已经结束，并分析其社会原因。

15.What used to be the danger in being a man according to the first paragraph?

[A]A lack of mates.

[B]A fierce competition.

[C]A lower survival rate.

[D]A defective gene.

15.按照文章第一段，过去身为男性面临的危险是什么？

[A]缺乏配偶。

[B]激烈的竞争。

[C]存活率低。

[D]基因缺陷。

16.What does the example of India illustrate?

[A]Wealthy people tend to have fewer children than poor people.

[B]Natural selection hardly works among the rich and the poor.

[C]The middle class population is 80% smaller than that of the tribes.

[D]India is one of the countries with a very high birth rate.

16.印度的例子说明了什么？

[A]富人往往比穷人的孩子少。

[B]自然选择在穷人和富人中几乎都不起用。

[C]中产阶级的人口比部落人口少80%。

[D]印度是出生率很高的国家之一。

17.The author argues that our bodies have stopped evolving because.

[A]life has been improved by technological advance

[B]the number of female babies has been declining

[C]our species has reached the highest stage of evolution

[D]the difference between wealth and poverty is disappearing

17.作者认为我们的身体不再进化的原因是。

[A]技术的进步改进了人的生活

[B]女婴数量一直在减少

[C]我们这种物种已达到了进化的最高阶段

[D]贫富差别正在逐渐消失

18. Which of the following would be the best title for the passage?

[A] Sex Ratio Changes in Human Evolution.

[B] Ways of Continuing Man's Evolution.

[C] The Evolutionary Future of Nature.

[D] Human Evolution Going Nowhere.

18.下面哪一个是文章最好的题目？

[A]人类进化过程中性别比例的改变。

[B]延续人类进化的方法。

[C]自然进化的未来。

[D]人的进化已穷尽。

二、核心词汇与超纲词汇

核心词汇：

①.agent 

n.[C]

1.代理人，代理商，代理公司；（演员等的）经纪人

2.特工人员，情报员，间谍

*3 sb or sth that affects or changes a situation or that exerts power or produces an effect原动力，动因；作用者；作用物

例：Technological advances are the chief agents of change.技术进步是变革的主要原动力。

②.commit suicide自杀；

文中commit evolutionary suicide指的是“阻碍、扼杀进化”

③.excess n.[U]

*1.过分，过量

例：an excess of enthusiasm过度热情

2.[C，U]

过多的量，超过的量

例：We cover costs up to 600 and you pay the excess.我们最多支付600英镑的费用，超过的部分由你承担。

3.[用复数]过分的行为，暴行，越轨的行为

例：to curb the excesses of the secret police约束秘密警察的越轨行为

a.[仅用于名词前]过多的，多余的，超额的

例：Cut any excess fat from the meat.把多余的肥肉切掉。

④.fertile

a.1.（土地或土壤）肥沃的，富饶的*2.可繁殖的，能生育的3.that produces good results；that encourages activity 能产生好结果的，促进的例：a fertile partnership有成效的合伙关系

⑤.mortality 

n.1.必死性

例：man's mortality人总有一死

*2.死亡数，死亡率；

mortala.必死的，临死的，致命的

⑥.universal

a.

1.involving or understood by everyone in the world 普遍的，一般的

2.done by all the members of a group全体（做）的，一致的

例：universal agreement on this issue在这个问题上的一致观点

n.*（存在于所有文化群落中的）普遍行为模式，普遍习俗（如家庭的存在）；（特定社会成年人中）普遍具有的文化特征

三、阅读答案：C B A D

四、全文翻译：

       身为男性总是有危险，男女出生时的比例大约是105：100，但到了成年期，这一比例几乎持平，而在70岁的老年人中女性是男性的两倍。（句式1）但是男性死亡率普遍偏高的情况正在改变。如今，男婴存活率几乎同女婴一样高。这就意味着到了男孩寻找伴侣的关键年龄，将首次出现男孩过剩现象。更重要的是，自然选择的另一次机会也已不复存在了。50年前，婴儿（尤其是男婴）存活的机率取决于体重，轻一公斤或重一公斤几乎意味着必死无疑。现在，体重几乎不起什么作用。因为大部分差异是由基因引起的，所以进化的又一个因素消失了。

       进化自杀还有另一种方法：活着，但少生孩子。（句式2）现在，没有几个人像过去那样具有旺盛的生育力。除了在一些宗教团体之外，几乎没有妇女能够生育15个孩子。当今出生的人数同死亡年龄一样已趋于平均化，我们多数人的子女数量大致相同。而且，人与人之间的差异和利用这种差异进行自然选择的机会都已经减少。（句式3）印度可以说明正在发生的一切。这个国家给大城市里的少数人提供财富，而给其余的各部落民族以贫困。今天这种极其显著的平均化——每个人的生存机会和子女数量都相同——意味着与部落相比，自然选择在印度中、上阶层已经失去了80%的效力。（句式4）

       对我们来说，这意味着进化已经结束；生物学上的乌托邦已经来临。（句式5）奇怪的是，这一过程几乎丝毫没有牵涉到人身体上的变化。没有其他哪种物种在自然界中占有这么大的空间。但在过去的10万年一—甚至过去的100年中，我们的生活发生了变化，但我们的身体却没有改变。我们没有进化。因为机器和社会代替我们进化了。达尔文曾用这样一句话描述那些对进化一无所知的人：他们“看有机的生命如同野人看船，好像看着某种完全不能理解的东西”。（句式6）毫无疑问，人类在回顾20世纪的生活方式时，会因其丑陋不堪而不能理解。但是，不管我们的子孙后代对我们离乌托邦的理想境界还差很远感到多么惊讶，他们的样子会同我们差不了多少。（句式7）