研一英语(下)Unit8全文翻译

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2024年4月1日发(作者：)

Unite 8 Empire of Extinction 消逝的帝国

An optimistic, problem-solving attitude can sometimes conceal a deeper despair. In 1995 India's

Environment Ministry moved to protect Indian butterfly and moth species under the Government's

Wildlife Act. Sensible enough! The measure came after two German tourists were caught trying to

leave the country with 15,000 preserved butterflies and moths in their luggage.

有时候，处理问题时表面上摆出一幅乐观的姿态能够掩盖内心深处的绝望。1995年，印度

环境部根据政府的《野生动物保护条例》，对印度的蝶类与蛾类物种采取保护措施。这个行

动真是合情合理，及时果断！在两名德国游客试图将藏有15000只禁止出境的蝴蝶和蛾子的

行李携带出境时被海关查获之后，推出了这项措施。

For me these two smugglers exemplify a narrow self-interest driving both individuals and

international institutions toward the abyss. But they were the only ones intercepted, not the 50,

perhaps even 100 who got away. In a world where humans are the measure of all things, every

unique manifestation of life becomes merchandise and rare butterflies have little chance of living

out their own evolutionary destiny. Sadly, such macrocosmic insults as dam construction, logging,

the use of biocides, and urban sprawl function as a threat to butterflies and their habitat. And as a

single moth goes, so may a flower, and other members of a small and complex community of life.

而在我看来，这两个走私者的事例不过是表明了绝对的自私自利行为会给他们自己和国际组

织都带来灾难。他们这一伙走私者被截获了（也是唯一被截获的），但或许还有五十甚至上

百伙走私者没有被查到。在这个以人类为评判万物标准的世界，每种稀有的生命形式都成了

商品，因此珍稀品种的蝴蝶根本不可能按照进化的规律走向命运的归宿。悲哉，人类的建坝、

伐木、使用杀虫剂和扩张城市这些大规模破坏地球的行为成为了蝶类及栖息地的威胁。一只

蛾子消失了，随之而去的也许还会有一枝鲜花以及其它结构复杂的微型生物社会的成员。

It's easy to find scientists and lay people who consider this sense of loss mere sentimentality

unworthy of our status as `the lords and possessors of nature', to repeat Descartes' unhappy phrase.

After all, extinction is natural and inevitably they are quick to remind us. Trying to save species

that have lost in the competition between the `fit' and `unfit' is to turn back an inexorable clock.

There is little room for such beautiful losers in the ongoing march of progress.

许多科学家和普通人都会认为这真是多愁善感，杞人忧天啊。借用笛卡尔的并不恰当的表述

来说，人类是“自然界的拥有者和主宰”，为几只蛾子的消失而伤感不合我们的身份。毕竟，

一些物种的灭绝是件自然而必然要发生的事情，我们很快就能把他们忘掉。试图将在“适应

者”与“非适应者”间的自然竞争中败下阵来的物种给与保护的想法就好像要将时钟倒拨一

样，是种逆自然而动的行为。在自然的进化过程中，不会给这些美丽的失败者留下任何生存

下来的空间。

Extinction may be natural. But today countless species are being made actively to `disappear'.

Rising human population is widely considered an underlying cause of the contemporary die-off

along the bulldozer's blade and chainsaw's teeth. Ecological collapse is typically represented by a

landless peasant slashing the forest with his machete, or a tribal woman carrying a bundle of sticks

on her head and a hungry child on her back.

一些物种灭绝了也许是种自然的结果。但现在的问题是无数的物种正在迅速的“消失”。一

般都认为不断增加的人口是导致目前局面的根本原因，伴随着推土机的轰鸣和链锯的嘶叫，

一个又一个的物种消失了。生态崩溃所表现出的经典画面是失去土地的农民在用弯刀疯狂地

砍伐树木，是身后背着饥饿的孩子，头顶捆柴草的部落女人。

To be sure, the ascending J-curve of rising human numbers, accompanying the destruction of

countless other species, leaves a stunning impression. Yet sheer numbers do not totally explain the

current mass extinction. We need to look beyond the numbers, at social structures, at an energy-

and-commodity-intensive development model and the social and historical causes of extreme

poverty. While they comprise only 25 per cent of the world's population, industrial nations account

for 75 per cent of energy use and consume 85 per cent of forest products. US per-capita energy

consumption is 250 times greater than in many poor countries. Obviously daily life in the North

contributes far more to ecological destruction than population growth in the South. On a global

scale, according to one US official, the impact of the world's poorest people is `probably more

akin to picking up branches and twigs after commercial chainsaws have done their work'.

可以肯定的是，人口数量的急剧增长伴随着无数其它物种的消亡，物种消亡的速度令人震惊。

然而，当前物种的大规模灭绝不光是人口数目激增造成的。除了人口数量，我们还应该考虑

到这些因素：不合理的社会结构、直接将能源转化为商品的密集型发展模式和社会与历史原

因造成的极度贫困。发达国家的人口总数只占世界人口的25%，但他们消耗了地球75%的

能源和85%的林木产品。美国的人均能源消耗量是很多穷国的250倍。很明显，北半球国

家生活方式对生态的破坏比南半球国家人口增长对生态的破坏要严重得多。根据美国官方的

报告，从全球范围来看，世界最贫穷人口对环境恶化的影响“可能更像在商人们的链锯扫荡

过后捡剩下的树枝”。

There is a wide divergence of opinion about planetary carrying-capacity and the human numbers

that can adequately be supported (though there are copious signs that our ability to feed ourselves

is declining due to abuse and over-exploitation of our food sources). But even if some believe we

can provide a decent life for twice the number of people now living, no thoughtful person could

possibly doubt the disastrous effect such numbers will inevitably have on other species. How

many people the earth can support is the wrong question. We also need to think about what kind of

life we want: crowded into an urban jungle or in community with other species in a green world.

The latter is the kind of planet that will make it possible for all species to flourish, along with

essential wilderness and diverse land and ocean habitats. That will be the best world for us too, but

it will necessitate fewer of us.

地球的荷载能力到底有多大，地球上有多少人才是合适，人们在此问题上的观点分歧颇宽（尽

管有大量迹象表明由于对食物资源的过度开发和滥用，人类越来越难养活自己了）。虽然有

人认为，人口数目是目前两倍的时候人类仍然可以活的很好，但是只要是有大脑的人都知道，

如此庞大的人口数量不可避免地会给其他生物带来灾难性的影响。我们不应该问地球能养活

多少人。我们应该想想我们到底想要什么样的生活：是挤在一个只有林立的钢筋混泥土楼房

的城市中，还是生活在一个充满绿色，有其它生物相伴的社区中间。只有后一种生活方式才

能缔造一个旷野上栖息着各种各样的野生动物、海洋中游弋着无数的鱼儿，万物在蓝天下竟

自由的世界。对于我们而言这也是一个最美好的世界，但前提是人类的数量必须减少。

This civilization's arrogance is evident in our scientific tradition's urge to expand what Francis

Bacon called `the empire of man'. The image of a human empire oppressing the rest of nature is no

mere metaphor. It conforms to an actual pattern of imperial conquest, plunder, eventual exhaustion

and collapse. Our century has given a privileged layer of humanity an industrially organized life

more opulent, more wasteful yet also more frenetic, alienated and depressed than that of any

ancient hierarch.

这种文化上的自傲明显存在于我们的科学传统中，这种传统鼓励人们去扩张弗朗西斯•培根

所称的"人类帝国"的版图。人类帝国压迫自然界其他“臣民”的情形说明这并非仅仅只是一

种比喻的说法。这和真实的帝国进行征服、掠夺，最终衰败、毁灭没什么两样。我们所处的

这个世纪，人类享受了工业化带来的种种社会福利，与任何古代的君王们相比，我们现在的

本文标签： 人类物种人口帝国