英译汉模拟练习

　　Directions:

　　Read the following text carefully and then translate the underlined segments into Chinese. Your translation should be written neatly on ANSWER SHEET 2. (10 points)

　　Judging goodness is not an exact science. Received opinion has, over the ages, recommended various pursuits for the benefits they purportedly bestow, from wearing hair shirts and reading the Bible to cleaning one’s plate at dinner time and listening to Mozart. (46) Self-improvement, be it of body or of mind, is the key, we are told, to individual happiness and collective well-being; striving to find what is good for us will lead us to the good life and the good society.

　　But does science help or hinder? Historians have often identified the scientific revolution of the late 17th and 18th centuries as the watershed that separated the moderns from the ancients in ways of knowing the world. (47) As a result, superstition, tradition and custom no longer stood as the primary authorities that could explain, legitimate and preserve the status quo. (48) The emerging spirit of inquiry and discovery released humanity from pre-modern unenlightenment; out of the darkness came the gas lamp, the electric light bulb and the ultraviolet beam, shedding light on man’s formerly slavish, subordinated state of being.

　　In this Whiggish narrative of progress, science plays its benevolent part in bringing mankind to a higher stage of evolution. (49) Elemental forces are mastered and managed: killer diseases no longer kill, long distances cease to be prohibitive, mass media and communications transform our knowledge of societies outside our own. The length and quality of life increase in tandem with the onward procession of scientists, physicians, inventors and techno-entrepreneurs.

　　Anxieties about where technology might lead us are therefore part of the broader malaise of our impoverished democracy. (50) If we are to feel confident about the power of science to build a brighter future, then we must create structures for the development of moral consensus, through debate and dialogue, across communities and societies at all levels. A socially integrated, politically connected, virtuous science cannot be successfully locked into an inclusive, democratic system when that system itself is weak and failing.

　　参考答案：

　　46. 我们得知，自我改进，不管是身体上的还是心灵上的，是获得个人幸福和集体安康的关键，努力寻找对我们有用的东西将引导我们走向幸福的生活和美好的社会。

　　47. 因此，迷信、传统和习俗不再是能够解释、证明和维持现状的绝对权威。

　　48. 正在兴起的探索和发现精神把人类从前现代未启蒙状态解救出来，黑暗中出现了煤气灯、电灯泡和紫外线，使我们清楚地看到人类过去被奴役、受控制的生存状态。

　　49. 自然的力量得到了征服和控制：致命的疾病不再致命，遥远的距离不再使人望而却步，大众媒体和各种通信手段把我们的社会知识传播到了我们自己的社会以外。

　　50. 如果我们想对科学的力量创造更加美好的未来充满信心，我们就必须建立起一些机制，通过在不同层次的社区和社会展开辩论和对话使道德观念变得一致。