1998年考研英语阅读第三篇—本文是批评滥贴“反科学”标签的文章

??Science has long had an uneasy relationship with other aspects of culture. Think of Gallileo’s 17th-century trial for his rebelling belief before the Catholic Church or poet William Blake’s harsh remarks against the mechanistic worldview of Isaac Newton.

科学与文化其他方面的关系一直都很紧张。想想看,17世纪伽利略为他叛逆性的信仰而遭受天主教会的审判,还有诗人威廉·布莱克对艾萨克·牛顿的机械论世界观所发表的尖锐批判。

The schismbetween science and the humanities has, if anything, deepened in this century.

本世纪,(自然)科学与人文科学之间如果说有什么的话,那就是分裂更深了。

Until recently, the scientific community was so powerful that it could afford to ignore its critics — but no longer.

以前,科学界如此之强大以至于可以对批评者置之不理–但现在不同了。

As funding for science has declined, scientists have attacked “anti-science” in several books, notably Higher Superstition, by Paul R. Gross, a biologist at the University of Virginia, and Norman Levitt, a mathematician at Rutgers University; and The Demon-Haunted World, by Carl Sagan of Cornell University.

由于科研基金减少,科学家开始在几本著作中抨击”反科学”势力,特别是弗吉尼亚大学生物学家保罗·R·格罗斯和拉特格斯大学的数学家诺曼·莱维特合著的《高级迷信》及康奈尔大学的卡尔·萨根著的《鬼怪出没的世界》。

Defenders of science have also voiced their concerns at meetings such as “The Flight from Science and Reason,” held in New York City in 1995, and “Science in the Age of (Mis) information,” which assembled last June near Buffalo.

科学的捍卫者们也在一些会议上表示了他们的担忧。比如,1995年在纽约举行的”远离科学和理性”会议,以及去年6月在布法罗附近召开的”(伪)信息时代的科学”会议。

Anti-science clearly means different things to different people. Gross and Levitt find fault primarily with sociologists, philosophers and other academics who have questioned science’s objectivity. Sagan is more concerned with those who believe in ghosts, creationism and other phenomena that contradict the scientific worldview.

显然,反科学对不同的人有不同的含义。格罗斯和莱维特主要挑那些质疑科学客观性的社会学家、哲学家和其他学者的毛病。而萨根则更关注那些相信鬼怪、上帝造物论和其他违背科学世界观的现象的人。

A survey of news stories in 1996 reveals that the anti-science tag has been attached to many other groups as well, from authorities who advocated the elimination of the last remaining stocks of smallpox virus to Republicans who advocated decreased funding for basic research.

1996年对新闻报道的调查表明,反科学的标签也贴在了许多其他群体上,从提倡消灭最后残存的天花病毒库的官方人士到倡议削减基础研究基金的共和党人。

Few would dispute that the term applies to the Unabomber, whose manifesto, published in 1995, scorns science and longs for return to a pre-technological utopia. But surely that does not mean environmentalists concerned about uncontrolled industrial growth are anti-science, as an essay in US News & World Report last May seemed to suggest.

将该词用在在美国制造一连串类似炸弹爆炸事件的人身上,也不会引起多大争议,他在1995年公开发表蔑视科学、渴望回到前技术时代的理想社会的声明。当然,这并不意味着,对不加控制的工业发展表示担忧的环保主义者也是反科学的,而去年5月份刊登在《美国新闻和世界报导》的一篇文章却似乎暗示是这么回事。

The environmentalists, inevitably, respond to such critics. The true enemies of science, argues Paul Ehrlich of Stanford University, a pioneer of environmental studies, are those who question the evidence supporting global warming, the depletion of the ozone layer and other consequences of industrial growth.

环保主义者必定会对这些批评做出反应。作为环境研究的先驱者,斯坦福大学的保罗·埃利希认为,科学的真正的敌人是那些对全球变暖、臭氧层稀薄和其他由于工业增长带来的后果的证据提出质疑的人。

Indeed, some observers fear that the anti-science epithet is in danger of becoming meaningless. “The term ‘anti-science’ can lump together too many, quite different things,” notes Harvard University philosopher Gerald Holton in his 1993 work Science and Anti-Science.

“They have in common only one thing that they tend to annoy or threaten those who regard themselves as more enlightened.”

的确,一些观察者担心反科学这个称号面临失去意义的危险。”‘反科学’一词可以涵盖很多截然不同的东西”,哈佛大学的哲学家杰拉尔德·霍尔顿在其1993年的著作《科学与反科学》中写道:”它们惟一的共同之处就是会激怒或威胁那些自以为比别人更有见识的人。”

试题:

51. The word “schism” (Line 4, Paragraph 1) in the context probably means.

[A] confrontation

[B] dissatisfaction

[C] separation

[D] contempt

52. Paragraphs 2 and 3 are written to.

[A] discuss the cause of the decline of science’s power

[B] show the author’s sympathy with scientists

[C] explain the way in which science develops

[D] exemplify the division of science and the humanities

53. Which of the following is true according to the passage?

[A] Environmentalists were blamed for anti-science in an essay.

[B] Politicians are not subject to the labeling of anti-science.

[C] The “more enlightened” tend to tag others as anti-science.

[D] Tagging environmentalists as “anti-science” is justifiable.

54. The author’s attitude toward the issue of “science vs. anti-science” is.

[A] impartial

[B] subjective

[C] biased

[D] puzzling

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