新概念英语第四册Lesson14_16原文及翻译

新概念英语第四册

Lesson14~16

原文 及翻译

新概念英语第四册

Lesson14

原文及翻译

The Butterfly Effect

蝴蝶效应

Why do small errors make it impossible to predict the weather system with a high degree of

accuracy?

Beyond two or three days, the world's best weather forecasts are speculative, and beyond

six or seven they are worthless.

The Butterfly Effect is the reason. For small pieces of weather -- and to a global forecaster,

small can mean thunderstorms and blizzards -- any prediction deteriorates rapidly. Errors and

uncertainties multiply, cascading upward through a chain of turbulent features, from dust devils

and squalls up to continent-size eddies that only satellites can see.

The modern weather models work with a grid of points of the order of sixty miles apart, and

even so, some starting data has to guessed, since ground stations and satellites cannot see

everywhere. But suppose the earth could be covered with sensors spaced one foot apart, rising at

one-foot intervals all the way to the top of the atmosphere. Suppose every sensor gives perfectly

accurate readings of temperature, pressure, humidity, and any other quantity a meteorologist

would want. Precisely at noon an infinitely powerful computer takes all the data and calculates

what will happen at each point at 12.01, then 1202, then 12.03...

The computer will still be unable to predict whether Princeton, New Jersey, will have sun or

rain on a day one month away. At noon the spaces between the sensors will hide fluctuations that

the computer will not know about, tiny deviations from the average. By 12.01, those fluctuations

will already have created small errors one foot away. Soon the errors will have multiplied to the

ten- foot scale, and so on up to the size of the globe.

JAMES GLEICK, Chaos

New words and expressions

生词和短语

forecast

n.

预报

speculative

adj.

推测的

blizzard

n.

暴风雪

deteriorate

v.

变坏

multiply

v.

增加

cascade

v.

瀑布似地落下

turbulent

adj.

狂暴的

dust devil

小尘暴，尘旋风

squall

n.

暴风

eddy

n.

旋涡

grid

n.

坐标方格

sensor

n.

传感器

humidity

n.

温度

meteorologist

n.

气象学家

Princeton

n.

普 林斯顿

(

美国城市名

)

New Jersey

n.

新泽西

(

美国州名

)

fluctuation

n.

起伏，波动

deviation

n.

偏差

参考译文

世界上的两三天以上的天气预报具 有很强的猜测性，如果超过六七天，天气预报就没

有了任何价值。

原因是蝴蝶效应。对于小片的恶劣天气

--

对一个全球性的气象预报员来说，

“

小

”

可

以意味着雷暴雨和暴风雪

--

任何预测的质量会很快下降。错误和不可靠性上升，接踵而

来的是一系列湍流的徵状，从小尘暴和暴风发展到只有卫星上可以看到的席卷整块大陆的

旋涡。

现代气象模型以一个坐标图来显示，图中每个点大约是间隔< /p>

60

英里。既使是这样，

有些开始时的资 料也不得不依靠推测，因为地面工作站和卫星不可能看到地球上的每一个

地方。假设地球 上可以布满传感器，每个相隔

1

英尺，并按

1

英尺的间隔从地面一直排列

到大气层的顶端。再假定每个 传感器都极极端准确地读出了温度、气压、温度和气象学家

需要的任何其他数据。在正午 时分，一个功能巨大的计算机搜集了所有的资料，并算出在

每一个点上

< br>12

：

01

、

< br>12

：

02

、

< br>12

：

03

时可能出现的情况。

计算机无法推断出

1

个月以后的某一天，新 泽西州的普林斯顿究竟是晴天还是雨天。

正午时分，传感器之间的距离会掩盖计算机无法 知道的波动、任何偏平均值的变化。到

12

：

< br>01

时，那些波动就已经会在

1

英尺远的地方造成偏差。很快这种偏差会增加到尺

10

英的范围 ，如此等等，一直到全球的范围。

新概念英语第四册

Lesson15

原 文及翻译

Secrecy in industry

工业中的秘密

First listen and then answer the following question.

听录音，然后回答以下问题。

Why is secrecy particularly important in the chemical industries?

Two factors weigh heavily against the effectiveness of scientific research in industry. One is

the general atmosphere of secrecy in which it is carried out, the other the lack of freedom of the

individual research worker. In so far as any inquiry is a secret one, it naturally limits all those

engaged in carrying it out from effective contact with their fellow scientists either in other

countries or in universities, or even, often enough, in other departments of the same firm. The

degree of secrecy naturally varies considerably. Some of the bigger firms are engaged in

researches which are of such general and fundamental nature that it is a positive advantage to

them not to keep them secret. Yet a great many processes depending on such research are sought

for with complete secrecy until the stage at which patents can be taken out. Even more processes

are never patented at all but kept as secret processes. This applies particularly to chemical