本次考研英語(yǔ)考試剛落下帷幕，究其完形填空部分，我們發(fā)現(xiàn)此文始見(jiàn)于2008年5月7日的New York Times，全文原為四段，為符合考研要求和篇幅標(biāo)準(zhǔn)，考研命題者將其中第三段剔除，留下了三段。原文如下(其中標(biāo)注出了考試的選項(xiàng)答案部分)：
Editorial Notebook
The Cost of Smarts
By VERLYN KLINKENBORG
Published: May 7, 2008
Research on animal intelligence always makes me wonder just how smart humans are. Consider the fruit-fly experiments described in Carl Zimmer's piece in the Science Times on Tuesday. Fruit flies who were taught to be smarter than the average fruit fly tended to live shorter lives. This suggests that dimmer bulbs burn longer, that there is an advantage in not being too terrifically bright.
Intelligence, it turns out, is a high-priced option. It takes more upkeep, burns more fuel and is slow off the starting line because it depends on learning - a gradual process - instead of instinct. Plenty of other species are able to learn, and one of the things they've apparently learned is when to stop.
Is there an adaptive value to limited intelligence? That's the question behind this new research. I like it. Instead of casting a wistful glance backward at all the species we've left in the dust I.Q.-wise, it implicitly asks what the real costs of our own intelligence might be. This is on the mind of every animal I've ever met.
Every chicken that looks at you sideways - which is how they all look at you - is really saying what Thoreau said less succinctly: you are endeavoring to solve the problem of a livelihood by a formula more complicated than the problem itself. Thoreau himself would not dispute that he was hoping to recover the chicken's point of view. He went to Walden Pond "to remember well his ignorance."
Research on animal intelligence also makes me wonder what experiments animals would perform on humans if they had the chance. Every cat with an owner, for instance, is running a small-scale study in operant conditioning. I believe that if animals ran the labs, they would test us to determine the limits of our patience, our faithfulness, our memory for terrain. They would try to decide what intelligence in humans is really for, not merely how much of it there is. Above all, they would hope to study a fundamental question: Are humans actually aware of the world they live in? So far the results are inconclusive.
而從措辭與筆觸角度，則相當(dāng)文學(xué)化。文中Intelligence, it turns out, is a high-priced option.一句，很多考生從語(yǔ)法角度分析， 發(fā)現(xiàn)無(wú)法理解，因?yàn)樵某霈F(xiàn)兩組主謂結(jié)構(gòu)，但居然沒(méi)有連接詞。但從文學(xué)角度而言，將it turns out作為插入語(yǔ)卻未嘗不可，而這個(gè)it其實(shí)是主語(yǔ)復(fù)指現(xiàn)象，也僅在文學(xué)性較強(qiáng)的文章中會(huì)出現(xiàn)。接觸過(guò)老TOEFL考試語(yǔ)法部分的同學(xué)，恰恰很容易發(fā)現(xiàn)，老TOEFL考試將主語(yǔ)重復(fù)出現(xiàn)作為一種常見(jiàn)的語(yǔ)法錯(cuò)誤，可見(jiàn)在本文中所用的文學(xué)筆觸。主語(yǔ)復(fù)指其實(shí)并不罕見(jiàn)，最為經(jīng)典的莫過(guò)于莎翁筆下的To be or not to be, that is the question.中這個(gè)that的存在了，而過(guò)分深究語(yǔ)法者將其改為To be or not to be is the question.就在文學(xué)色彩上大打折扣了。
Research on animal intelligence also makes me wonder what experiments animals would perform on humans if they had the chance. Every cat with an owner, for instance, is running a small-scale study in operant conditioning. I believe that if animals ran the labs, they would test us to determine the limits of our patience, our faithfulness, our memory for terrain. They would try to decide what intelligence in humans is really for, not merely how much of it there is. Above all, they would hope to study a fundamental question: Are humans actually aware of the world they live in? So far the results are inconclusive.
