Unit-8-Time新編大學(xué)英語第二版第四冊(cè)課文翻譯(共9頁(yè))

1、精選優(yōu)質(zhì)文檔-傾情為你奉上Unit 8 TimeHow to Take Your TimeDr. Larry Dossey has two antique clocks. One fast, the other slow, says Dr Dossey. They remind me that my life is not ruled by clocks, that I can choose the time I live by. How a person thinks about time can kill him, according to Dossey, a pioneer in the

2、 emerging science of chronobiology, the study of how time interacts with life. One of the most common ills in our society, he says, is time sickness, a sense of time pressure and hurry that causes anxiety and tension. These symptoms can contribute to heart disease and strokes, two of our most freque

3、nt causes of death. Dossey has discovered that these and other stress-induced ills can often be successfully treated by using simple techniques to change how a person thinks about time. Dr Dossey became interested in time and health when he noticed how many patients insisted on having watches with t

4、hem in the hospital, even though they had no schedules to keep. They were all time addicts, taught since childhood to schedule their lives by societys clock, and all felt lost without the security of a timepiece. Time seems to rule our lives. Time is money, to be saved and spent wisely, not wasted o

5、r lost. Almost all living things in our world carry their own biological clocks synchronised with the rhythms of nature. A crab can sense when the tide is about to change. A mouse wakes when night nears. A squirrel knows when to prepare for its long winter nap. These living clocks are not accurate i

6、n any robot-like mechanical sense. They adjust to changes in the environment. Light is the most powerful synchroniser in most living things. But in humans there is another powerful synchroniser: other people. Pioneering studies in Germany reported that when people were put together in groups isolate

7、d from external time cues of light, temperature and humidity, their own complex internal timekeeping rhythms became desynchronised; then they resynchronised in unison. Even body temperatures started to rise and fall together, a sign that subtle biochemical changes in each body were now happening tog

8、ether. These experiments may have discovered one of the mysterious forces that reshape individuals into members of a team, cult or mob. The mind can alter rhythms of time in various ways. People brought back from the brink of death often recall their entire lives flashing before them in an instant.

9、Those who have been in a serious accident often report that, as it occurred, everything happened in slow motion; apparently this is a survival tool built into the brain, an ability to accelerate to several times normal perceptual speed, thereby slowing down the world and giving the victim time to th

10、ink how to avoid disaster. Because the time our society keeps has been taught to us since birth, we think of it as something that everyone everywhere must somehow share. But cultures differ in how they perceive time. In North America and the industrialised countries of northern Europe, life is tight

11、ly scheduled. To keep someone waiting is frowned upon. But in southern Europe and in the Hispanic countries of Latin America, people are given priority over schedules and in making appointments the starting time is more flexible. Each view of time has advantages and disadvantages. But the costs can

12、be great. When our natural inner rhythms are out of synchronisation with clock time, stress results. Under the tyranny of clock time, western industrialised society now finds that heart disease and related ills are leading causes of death. However, such time illnesses can be treated and prevented by

13、 changing the way we think about time, according to Dr Dossey. He applies simple techniques that you can also use to change and master your own time: 1) Unclock your life. Stop wearing a wristwatch. Time becomes much less a concern when we break the habit of looking at clocks or watches. 2) Set your

14、 own inner sense of time. To illustrate that time is relative, Einstein observed that to a person sitting on a hot stove, two minutes could feel like two hours; to the young man with a pretty girl, two hours could seem like two minutes. 3) Tap your bodys power to change time. We all possess an inbor

15、n ability to relax. Most people can summon it up merely by dismissing disturbing thoughts and by controlling their breathing-for example, by thinking the word one with each outgoing breath. Within several minutes this can produce deep calm. 4) Synchronise yourself with nature. Take time to watch a s

16、unset, or a cloud cross the sky. Remember that there is a time far older than what humankind has created with clocks. The cultural pattern we call time is learnt, and if we wish to live in harmony with nature we must learn to recognize that its time still shapes our world and should not be ignored.

17、We created the mechanical time around which our society operates, and we have the freedom to choose whether we will be its slave or its master. 如何從容使用時(shí)間1 拉里多希博士有兩個(gè)古董鐘?！耙粋€(gè)走得快，一個(gè)走得慢,”多希博士說。“它們提醒我，生活不是由時(shí)鐘控制的，而且我能自己選擇按什么樣的時(shí)間生活。”2 多希博士研究時(shí)間生物學(xué)，是這門新興學(xué)科的開拓者。該學(xué)科研究的是時(shí)間與生活是如何相互影響的。多希博士認(rèn)為，一個(gè)人如何看待時(shí)間可能是生死攸關(guān)的事。他說，

18、在我們社會(huì)中最常見的一種疾病是“時(shí)間病”，就是由于時(shí)間造成的壓力和緊迫性而引起的焦慮和緊張。這些癥狀會(huì)導(dǎo)致心臟病和中風(fēng)，這是我們最大的兩種死因。3 多希發(fā)現(xiàn),采用一些簡(jiǎn)單的方法去改變?nèi)藗儗?duì)時(shí)間的看法，上述疾病和其他一些因緊張而誘發(fā)的疾病常?？梢缘玫匠晒Φ闹委煛? 多希博士注意到，有相當(dāng)多的病人雖然在住院期間并沒有任何日程安排，但仍堅(jiān)持要帶手表，于是就對(duì)時(shí)間與健康之間的關(guān)系產(chǎn)生了興趣。這些人都是“時(shí)間癮君子”。他們從孩提時(shí)代起就受到這樣的教育：要按社會(huì)的時(shí)鐘安排自己的生活。因此一旦沒有了計(jì)時(shí)器所給予的安全感，就會(huì)茫然若失。于是乎時(shí)間就統(tǒng)治了我們的生活。時(shí)間就是金錢，應(yīng)該動(dòng)腦筋積攢起來或理智地花，

19、不要浪費(fèi)或者丟失。5 幾乎所有生活在我們這個(gè)世界上的生物，都擁有與大自然節(jié)奏同步的生物鐘。蟹能感知潮水什么時(shí)候要變化。老鼠會(huì)在夜幕降臨時(shí)醒來。松鼠知道什么時(shí)候該為漫長(zhǎng)的冬眠做準(zhǔn)備。這些生物鐘并不像自動(dòng)機(jī)械裝置那么精確，卻能適應(yīng)環(huán)境的變化。6 對(duì)大多數(shù)生物來說，光是最強(qiáng)有力的同步指示儀。但人類還另有一個(gè)強(qiáng)有力的同步指示儀：周圍的人。根據(jù)在德國(guó)進(jìn)行的開拓性研究報(bào)告，當(dāng)人們被分成小組，一起置身于與光、溫度、濕度等外部時(shí)間提示因素相隔絕的環(huán)境時(shí)，他們自身內(nèi)部復(fù)雜的時(shí)間節(jié)奏無法（與外部因素）同步了；但他們的生物鐘隨后又恢復(fù)了相互間一致的同步節(jié)奏。就連他們的體溫也一起上升或下降這表明，每個(gè)人體內(nèi)的一些微妙

20、的生物化學(xué)變化現(xiàn)在也都同步了。這些實(shí)驗(yàn)也許揭示了一種神秘力量，一種把個(gè)人改變?yōu)槿后w（團(tuán)隊(duì)、異教或?yàn)鹾现姡┏蓡T的神秘力量。7 人的頭腦能以各種各樣的方式改變時(shí)間的節(jié)奏。那些從死亡的邊緣搶救過來的人常?；貞浾f, 在那一瞬間他們整個(gè)一生的生活經(jīng)歷會(huì)在他們面前重新閃現(xiàn)。那些經(jīng)歷過嚴(yán)重事故的人常描述說，在事故發(fā)生的過程中，一切都以慢動(dòng)作的形式進(jìn)行；這顯然是人腦中內(nèi)置有逃生工具，也就是一種能力，它能把人對(duì)外部世界的感知速度提高到正常狀態(tài)下的數(shù)倍，從而“減慢”了世界運(yùn)行的速度，使當(dāng)事人有“時(shí)間”來思考避免災(zāi)難的對(duì)策。8 由于我們一生下來就被灌輸了社會(huì)所遵循的時(shí)間，于是我們就以為這是任何人在任何地方不管怎么

21、樣都必須共同遵守的。但不同的文化對(duì)時(shí)間的認(rèn)識(shí)存在著差異。在北美和歐洲北部的一些工業(yè)化國(guó)家，生活安排得很緊湊。讓別人等候是令人皺眉頭的。但在歐洲南部及拉丁美洲說西班牙語和葡萄牙語的國(guó)家里，人比時(shí)間表更重要，故在約會(huì)時(shí)會(huì)把開始的時(shí)間定得比較靈活。9 每一種時(shí)間觀都各有優(yōu)缺點(diǎn)。但其代價(jià)可能會(huì)很高。當(dāng)我們體內(nèi)的自然節(jié)奏與時(shí)鐘時(shí)間之間的同步關(guān)系被打亂時(shí)，緊張感便會(huì)隨之而生。在時(shí)鐘時(shí)間的嚴(yán)格控制下，現(xiàn)在西方工業(yè)化社會(huì)發(fā)現(xiàn)心臟病和其他一些相關(guān)疾病是導(dǎo)致死亡的主要原因。但是，多希博士認(rèn)為，這樣的“時(shí)間病”是可以通過改變我們對(duì)時(shí)間的看法而得到治療和預(yù)防的。他能采用一些簡(jiǎn)單的手段來改變和主宰自己的時(shí)間，這些手段你

22、我也可以采用。10 1）擺脫時(shí)鐘對(duì)你生活的控制。別再戴手表。當(dāng)我們打破了看鐘表的習(xí)慣時(shí)，時(shí)間便不再讓你我如此時(shí)時(shí)關(guān)注了。11 2）確立你自己的內(nèi)部時(shí)間感。為了說明時(shí)間是相對(duì)的，愛因斯坦曾經(jīng)說，對(duì)于一個(gè)坐在滾燙的火爐上的人來說，兩分鐘的時(shí)間給人的感覺就像兩小時(shí)；而對(duì)一個(gè)身邊有靚麗女子陪伴的青年男子來說，兩小時(shí)就像兩分鐘一樣。12 3）發(fā)揮你自身的能力去改變時(shí)間。我們都天生具有使自己放松的能力。大多數(shù)人能通過排除雜念和控制呼吸的方法做到這一點(diǎn)。例如，每次呼氣時(shí)都想數(shù)字“1”。幾分鐘內(nèi)，就能使自己非常平靜。13 4）使自己與大自然同步。耐心地看看日落，或者看一朵從頭頂?shù)奶炜章h過的云。記住，有一種

23、時(shí)間比人類用鐘表創(chuàng)造出來的時(shí)間要古老得多。14 被我們稱作時(shí)間的文化模式是后天學(xué)來的。如果我們希望與大自然和諧相處，我們必須努力認(rèn)識(shí)到，大自然的時(shí)間依然影響著我們的世界，決不應(yīng)該忽視它。我們創(chuàng)造了機(jī)械時(shí)間，令我們的社會(huì)隨著它運(yùn)轉(zhuǎn)，我們有自由去選擇究竟是做它的奴隸還是做它的主人。Social Time: The Heartbeat of CultureIf a man does not keep pace with his companions, perhaps it is because he hears a different drummer. This thought by Thoreau

24、 strikes a chord in so many people that it has become part of our language. We use the phrase the beat of a different drummer to explain any pace of life unlike our own. Such colorful vagueness reveals how informal our rules of time really are. The world over, children simply pick up their societys

25、time concepts as they mature. No dictionary clearly defines the meaning of early or late for them or for strangers who stumble over the annoying differences between the time sense they bring with them and the one they face in a new land. I learned this a few years ago, and the resulting culture shoc

26、k forced me to search for answers. It seemed clear that time talks. But what is it telling us? My journey started shortly after I accepted an appointment as visiting professor of psychology at the federal university in Niteroi, Brazil, a small city across the bay from Rio de Janeiro. As I left home

27、for my first day of class, I asked someone the time. It was 9: 05 a.m., which allowed me time to relax and look around the campus before my 10 oclock lecture. After what I judged to be half an hour, I glanced at a clock I was passing. It said 10: 20! In panic, I broke for the classroom, followed by

28、gentle calls of Hola, professor and Tudo bem, professor? from unhurried students, many of whom, I later realized, were my own. I arrived breathless to find an empty room. Frantically, I asked a passerby the time. Nine forty-five was the answer. No, that couldnt be. I asked someone else. Nine fifty-f

29、ive. Another said: Exactly 9: 43. The clock in a nearby office read 3: 15. I had learned my first lesson about Brazilians: Their timepieces are consistently inaccurate. And nobody minds. My class was scheduled from 10 until noon. Many students came late, some very late. Several arrived after 10: 30.

30、 A few showed up closer to 11. Two came after that. All of the latecomers wore the relaxed smiles that I came, later, to enjoy. Each one said hello, and although a few apologized briefly, none seemed terribly concerned about lateness. They assumed that I understood. The idea of Brazilians arriving l

31、ate was not a great shock. I had learned about manha, the Portuguese equivalent of manana in Spanish. This term, meaning tomorrow or, the morning, stereotypes the Brazilian who puts off the business of today until tomorrow. The real surprise came at noon that first day, when the end of class arrived

32、. Back home in California, I never need to look at a clock to know when the class hour is ending. The shuffling of books is accompanied by strained expressions that say, Im starving . Ive got to go to the bathroom . Im going to suffocate if you keep us one more second. (The pain usually becomes unbe

33、arable at two minutes to the hour in undergraduate classes and five minutes before the close of graduate classes.) When noon arrived in my first Brazilian class, only a few students left immediately. Others slowly drifted out during the next 15 minutes, and some continued asking me questions long af

34、ter that. When several remaining students kicked off their shoes at 12: 30, I went into my own starving/ bathroom/ suffocating routine. I could not, in all honesty, attribute their lingering to my superb teaching style. I had just spent two hours lecturing on statistics in halting Portuguese. Appare

35、ntly, for many of my students, staying late was simply of no more importance than arriving late in the first place. As I observed this casual approach in infinite variations during the year, I learned that the manha stereotype oversimplified the real Anglo/ Brazilian differences in conceptions of ti

36、me. 社會(huì)時(shí)間：文化的脈搏1 “如果一個(gè)人跟不上他同伴的步伐，很可能是因?yàn)樗爮牧瞬煌氖值墓?jié)拍。”梭羅的這一觀點(diǎn)引起了那么多人的共鳴，使它變成了我們大家的語言。我們用“不同鼓手的節(jié)拍”這個(gè)說法來表示任何與自己不同的生活節(jié)奏。這種說法非常生動(dòng)但很含糊，這正說明了我們對(duì)時(shí)間的定義確實(shí)很隨意。在世界各地，孩子們?cè)诔砷L(zhǎng)的過程中，只是“無意中掌握”了他們所處社會(huì)的時(shí)間概念。沒有一部詞典能向孩子們或者初來乍到的人清楚地解釋“早”或“晚”的定義，這使初來者不知所措，因?yàn)樵瓉淼臅r(shí)間觀念與所到之地存在著令人惱火的差異。2幾年前我就對(duì)此有所領(lǐng)教，而且由此產(chǎn)生的文化沖擊迫使我去尋求答案。時(shí)間看似會(huì)“說話”。但它

37、在對(duì)我們說些什么呢?3我應(yīng)邀擔(dān)任巴西尼泰羅伊聯(lián)邦大學(xué)心理學(xué)的客座教授，不久便啟程前往這座與里約熱內(nèi)盧市僅隔著一個(gè)海灣的小城。第一天動(dòng)身去上課時(shí)，我問了一個(gè)人當(dāng)時(shí)的時(shí)間，是上午9：05，這使我有時(shí)間在10點(diǎn)鐘上課前輕松一下，在校園里走一走。在估計(jì)走了大約半個(gè)小時(shí)后，我路過一個(gè)鐘，瞥了一眼，上面顯示10：20 1我驚慌地向教室跑去，一路上聽到學(xué)生們?nèi)岷偷恼泻袈暋敖淌诤?”和“您好嗎，教授?”。他們不慌不忙。后來我認(rèn)出他們中的許多人是我自己的學(xué)生。當(dāng)我上氣不接下氣地來到教室時(shí)，卻發(fā)現(xiàn)里面空無一人。4我緊張極了，忙向一位過路人問時(shí)間，答復(fù)是“9：45”。不對(duì)，那不可能。我又問了其他人。一個(gè)說是“9：5

38、5，另一個(gè)說是“正好9：43”。附近一個(gè)辦公室的鐘則顯示3：15。我算是領(lǐng)教了巴西人給我的第一個(gè)教訓(xùn)：他們的計(jì)時(shí)器一貫不準(zhǔn)，而且誰也不在乎。5我的課安排在上午10點(diǎn)到中午。許多學(xué)生遲到了，有些來得非常晚。有幾個(gè)10：30以后才到。有幾個(gè)快到1l點(diǎn)時(shí)才來。還有兩個(gè)人來得更晚。所有遲到者臉上都帶著輕松的微笑。我后來倒慢慢喜歡上了這種微笑。每個(gè)人來了都打招呼，盡管有些人做了簡(jiǎn)短的道歉，但似乎沒有人很在意遲到這件事。他們想當(dāng)然地認(rèn)為我理解這一點(diǎn)。6巴西人愛遲到這件事還不值得讓人震驚。我以前就知道西班牙語中有一個(gè)詞叫“manana”，在葡萄牙語里，它的對(duì)應(yīng)詞是“m萏nha”。這個(gè)詞的意思是“明天”或“早

39、上”。這個(gè)詞使巴西人成為把今天的事拖到明天去做的典型。而真正讓我吃驚的是第一天中午下課的時(shí)候發(fā)生的事情。7在家鄉(xiāng)加利福尼亞，我從來無須看表便可以知道什么時(shí)候該下課了。翻書聲伴隨著焦慮不安的表情，好像在說“我餓了我得去洗手問如果你再耽擱1秒鐘，我就要窒息了。”(在本科班到了下課前的2分鐘，在研究生班到了下課前的5分鐘，這種痛苦就會(huì)顯得難以忍受了。)8我在巴西上課的第一天中午到來時(shí)，僅有幾個(gè)學(xué)生很快離開了。其他的人在課后15分鐘里慢吞吞地走出教室。還有一些人在那以后過了很長(zhǎng)時(shí)間還繼續(xù)向我提問題。還有幾個(gè)留下來的學(xué)生到了12：30才開始真正舒舒服服地在教室里坐下來，我自己卻進(jìn)入了“饑餓衛(wèi)生間窒息”的

40、程序。9坦誠(chéng)地說，我不能把他們?cè)诮淌依锏亩毫魵w因于我出色的教學(xué)風(fēng)格。我是用結(jié)結(jié)巴巴的葡萄牙語進(jìn)行了兩個(gè)小時(shí)的統(tǒng)計(jì)學(xué)講座。顯然，對(duì)于我的許多學(xué)生來說，首先，在教室里逗留到很晚和上課遲到一樣無關(guān)緊要。在這一年里，我觀察到這種對(duì)時(shí)間的隨意態(tài)度有千變?nèi)f化，于是我懂得了：“mnha”這個(gè)老框框把盎格魯人與巴西人之間在時(shí)間概念上的真正差異過分簡(jiǎn)單化了。The Voices of TimeTime talks. It speaks more plainly than words. The message it conveys comes through loud and clear. Because it

41、is manipulated less consciously, it is subject to less distortion than the spoken language. It can shout the truth where words lie. Different parts of the day, for example, are highly significant in certain contexts. Time may indicate the importance of the occasion as well as on what level an intera

42、ction between persons is to take place. In the United States if you telephone someone very early in the morning, while he is shaving or having breakfast, the time of the call usually signals a matter of utmost importance or extreme urgency. The same applies for calls after 11: 00 p.m. A call receive

43、d during sleeping hours is apt to be taken as a matter of life and death, hence the rude joke value of these calls among the young. How troublesome differing ways of handling time can be is well illustrated by the case of an American agriculturist assigned to duty as an attache of our embassy in a L

44、atin country. After what seemed to him a suitable period he let it be known that he would like to call on the minister who was his counterpart. For various reasons, the suggested time was not suitableall sorts of cues came back to the effect that the time was not yet ripe to visit the minister. Our

45、friend, however, persisted and forced an appointment which was reluctantly granted. Arriving a little before the hour (the American respect pattern), he waited. The hour came and passed; five minutesten minutesfifteen minutes. At this point he suggested to the secretary that perhaps the minister did

46、 not know he was waiting in the outer office. This gave him the feeling he had done something concrete, and also helped to overcome the great anxiety that was stirring inside him. Twenty minutestwenty-five minutesthirty minutesforty-five minutes (the insult period)! He jumped up and told the secreta

47、ry that he had been cooling his heels in an outer office for forty-five minutes and he was sick and tired of this type of treatment. This message was relayed to the minister, who said, in effect, Let him cool his heels. The attaches stay in the country was not a happy one. The principal source of mi

48、sunderstanding lay in the fact that in the country in question the five-minute-delay interval was not significant. Forty-five minutes, on the other hand, instead of being at the tail end of the waiting scale, was just barely at the beginning. To suggest to an Americans secretary that perhaps her bos

49、s didnt know you were there after waiting sixty seconds would seem absurd, as would raising a storm about cooling your heels for five minutes. Yet this is precisely the way the minister perceived the protests of the American in his outer office! He felt, as usual, that Americans were being totally u

50、nreasonable. Throughout this unfortunate episode the attache was acting according to the way he had been brought up. At home in the United States his responses would have been normal ones and his behavior legitimate. Yet even if he had been told before he left home that this sort of thing would happ

51、en, he would have had difficulty not feeling insulted after he had been kept waiting forty-five minutes. If, on the other hand, he had been taught the details of the local time system just as he should have been taught the local spoken language, it would have been possible for him to adjust himself accordingly. What bothers people in situations of this sort is tha