arm是什么意思中文-阴穴
(
二
)
Being a man has always been dangerous.
There 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. But the great universal of male mortality is
being changed.
Now, boy babies
survive almost as well as girls do.
This means that, for the first time, there will be
an excess of boys in
those crucial
years when they are searching for a mate. More
important, another chance for natural
selection has been removed. Fifty years
ago, the chance of a baby(particularly a boy baby)
surviving
depended on its weight. A
kilogram too light or too heavy meant almost
certain death. Today it makes
almost no
difference. Since much of the variation is due to
genes, one more agent of evolution has
gone
。
There is another way to commit
evolutionary suicide: stay alive, but have fewer
children. Few
people are as fertile as
in the past. Except in some religious communities,
very few women have 15
children.
Nowadays the number of births, like the age of
death, has become average. Most of us have
roughly
the
same
number
of
offspring.
Again,
differences
between
people
and
the
opportunity
for
natural selection to take advantage of
it have diminished. India shows what is happening.
The country
offers
wealth
for
a
few
in
the
great
cities
and
poverty
for
the
remaining
tribal
peoples.
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.
Strangely,
it
has
involved little physical change. No
other species fills so many places in nature. But
in the past 100,000
years
—
even the
past 100 years
—
our lives
have been transformed but our bodies have did not
evolve, because machines and society
did it for us. Darwin had a phrase to describe
those ignorant of
evolution:
“
they look at an organic
being as average looks at a ship, as at something
wholly beyond
his
comprehension
。
”
No 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
。
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
。
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
。
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
18. Which of
the following would be the best title for the
passage?
[A]Sex Ration Changes in Human
Evolution
[B]Ways of Continuing Man's
Evolution
[C]The Evolutionary Future of
Nature
[D]Human Evolution Going Nowhere
名师解析
15. What
used to be the danger in being a man according to
the first paragraph?
根据第一段，做男人以前有什么危险
?
[A]A lack of mates.
缺少配偶。
[B]A fierce
competition.
激烈竞争。
[C]A lower survival rate.
低存活率。
[D]A
defective gene.
有缺陷的基因。
【答案】
C
【考点】事实细节题。
【分析】文中
第一段提到“做男人从来都充满危险，新生儿男女比例大约是
105:100
，但到了成
年，这一比例基本持平，而在
70 <
/p>
岁的老人中女性是男性的两倍，但是男性死亡率高这种普遍情
况正
在改变，现在男婴存活率同女婴的基本一样高”这说明男人的存活率相对是比较低的。
16. What does the example of India
illustrate?
印度的例子证明了什么
?
[A] Wealthy people tend to have fewer
children than poor people
。
富人往往孩子比穷人少。
[B]
Natural selection hardly works among the rich and
the poor
。
自然选择在穷人和富人之间几乎不起作用。
[C] The middle class population is 80%
smaller than that of the
tribes
。
中产阶级的人口比部
落人口少
80%
。
[D] India is one of the countries with
a very high birth rate
。
印度是出生率很高的国家之一。
【答案】
B
【考点】推断题。
【分析】
使用事例来证明是常见的逻辑思维模式。
既然有事例，
< br>我们就需要看到它的论点是什么。
本文中提到，
“进化意
义上的自杀还有一种方法：存活，但少生孩子”
。首先“现在几乎没有人像
过去那样多育。除了在一些宗教社区，几乎没有几名妇女会生
15
个孩子”表明了“当今出生的
数量同死亡年龄一样变得平均化，我们大多
数人的子女数量大致相当”
，再一次，人与人之间的
差异和利用
差异进行自然选择的机会降低了。其次，
“印度证明了这种情况。这个国家给大城市
里的少数人提供财富，
而给其余的各部落居民造成了贫困。
今天这种每个人的生存机会和子女数
量都相同的极其显著的平均化意味着
与部落相比，
自然选择在印度社会中、
上层人群中，
已经失
去了
80%
的效力
”是为了证明“人与人之间的差异和利用差异进行自然选择的机会降低了”
，换
言之，
“自然选择在穷人和富人之间几乎不起作用”
。答案应该是
[B]
选项。
17. The author argues that our bodies
have stopped evolving
because____
。
作者认为
我们的身体已经停止进化，因为
____
。
[A] life has been improved by
technological advance
技术进步改善了人的生活
[B]
the number of female babies has been declining
女婴的数量一直在减少
[C]
our species has reached the highest stage of
evolution
我们人种已经到达进化最高阶段
[D] the difference between wealth and
poverty is disappearing