新概念英语3_le01-05
发布时间：2012-12-26 编辑：查字典英语网小编
[by:英语听力网|http://yingyu.chazidian.com||查字典英语网]
[00:00.00]喜欢chazidian.com，就把chazidian.com复制到QQ个人资料中！New Concept English 4 Lesson 1 Finding fossil man
[00:02.60]发现化石人
[00:05.20]First listen and then answer the following question.
[00:07.77]听录音,然后回答问题
[00:10.34]Why are legends handed down by storytellers useful?
[00:13.22]为什么由讲述人传下来的传奇故事很有用?
[00:16.09]We can read of things that happened 5,000 years ago in the Near East,
[00:19.42]我们从书籍中可以读到五千年前近东发生的事情,
[00:22.75]where people first learned to write.
[00:24.72]那里的人最早学会了写字
[00:26.70]But there are some parts of the world where even now people cannot write.
[00:30.01]但直到现在,世界上仍然有些地方,人们还不会书写.
[00:33.33]The only way that they can preserve their history is to recount it as sagas
[00:37.50]他们保存历史的唯一办法是将历史当作传说讲述,
[00:41.67]--legends handed down from one generation of storytellers to another.
[00:45.05]--由讲述人一代接一代地将史实描述为传奇故事口传下来.
[00:48.43]These legends are useful because they can tell us something
[00:51.55]这些传说是很有用的,因为它们能告诉我们
[00:54.67]about migrations of people who lived long ago,
[00:57.60]以往人们迁居的情况,
[01:00.53]but none could write down what they did.
[01:03.10]但是,没有人能把他们当时做的事情记载下来.
[01:05.67]Anthropologists wondered where the remote ancestors of the Polynesian peoples
[01:09.45]人类学家过去不清楚波利尼西亚人的祖先
[01:13.22]now living in the Pacific Islands came from.
[01:15.74]即如今生活在太平洋诸岛的人类来自何方.
[01:18.26]The sagas of these people explain
[01:20.54]当地人的传说却告诉人们
[01:22.81]that some of them came from Indonesia about 2,000 years ago.
[01:26.00]其中有一部分是约在两千年前从印度尼西亚迁来的
[01:29.18]But the first people who were like ourselves lived so long ago
[01:32.51]但是,和我们相似的原始人生活的年代太久远了,
[01:35.84]that even their sagas,if they had any,are forgotten.
[01:38.87]因此,在关他们的传说即使有如今也失传了.
[01:41.90]So archaeologists have neither history nor legends to help them to find out
[01:45.68]于是,考古学家们既缺乏历史记载,又无口头传说来帮助他们弄清
[01:49.45]where the first 'modern men' came from
[01:51.79]最早的“现代人”是从哪里来的.
[01:54.13]Fortunately,however,ancient men made tools of stone,especially flint,
[01:58.10]然而,幸运的是,远古人用石头制作了工具,特别是用燧石,
[02:02.07]because this is easier to shape than other kinds.
[02:04.75]因为燧石较之其他石头更易成形.
[02:07.43]They may also have used wood and skins,but these have rotted away.
[02:11.21]他们也可能用过木头和兽皮,但这类东西早已腐烂殆尽.
[02:15.00]Stone does not decay,and so the tools of long ago have remained
[02:19.02]石头是不会腐烂的,因此,远古时代的石头工具得以保存了下来,
[02:23.05]when even the bones of the men who made them have disappeared without trace.
[02:26.63]尽管制造这些工具的人的骨头早已荡然无存.
[02:30.20]Lesson 2 Spare that spider
[02:33.78]不要伤害蜘蛛
[02:37.36]First listen and then answer the following question.
[02:39.84]听录音,然后回答以下问题.
[02:42.32]How much of each year do spiders spend killing insects?
[02:45.71]蜘蛛每年用多长时间消灭害虫?
[02:49.09]Why,you may wonder,should spiders be our friends?
[02:51.77]你可能会觉得奇怪,蜘蛛怎么会是我们的朋友呢?
[02:54.45]Because they destroy so many insects,
[02:56.57]因为它们能消灭那么多的昆虫,
[02:58.70]and insects include some of the greatest enemies of the human race.
[03:01.68]其中包括一些人类的大敌.
[03:04.66]Insects would make it impossible for us to live in the world;
[03:07.23]害虫会使我们无法在地球上生活下去,
[03:09.81]they would devour all our crops and kill our flocks and herds,
[03:12.89]它们会吞食我们的全部庄稼,杀死我们的成群的牛羊,
[03:15.97]if it were not for the protection we get from insect eating animals
[03:19.25]幸亏人类受到一些食虫动物的保护,才不至于此.
[03:22.53]We owe a lot to the birds and beasts who eat insects
[03:25.47]我们要十分感谢那些吃昆虫的鸟和兽,
[03:28.40]but all of them put together
[03:30.23]然而把它们所杀死的昆虫全部加在一起
[03:32.06]kill only a fraction of the number destroyed by spiders.
点击显示