2023考研英语：《经济学人》中英读译Day148

英语阅读能力依靠什么？必然是词汇的积累，但，仅仅是词汇的积累是不够了，更应该了解英语句式，不同句型所表达意义。如何培养自己的阅读语感呢？那么就跟着聚创考研网小编每天学一点英语，一起为考研筑起坚实的地基。阅读是需要积累的，就像我们需要经常和人沟通才会促进我们的表达能力一样~小伙伴跟着小编一起，每天坚持打卡，培养英语阅读能力及语感，了解文章一些经典词汇的用法。

经济学人:进化意外造就的杀手(1)

Funnel-web spiders have a fearsome reputation. People bitten by these Australian arachnids suffer extreme pain,breathing problems, confusion, convulsions and dangerously high blood pressure. Left untreated, the venom can kill within hours.For years, researchers assumed this lethal effect was an evolutionary accident.The venom, they presumed, evolved to help the spiders kill their prey— normally insects.Killing mammals was either just collateral damage or a form of protection against possible predators.Except that the venom does not, in general, kill mammals.Dogs, cats, mice, rabbits and guinea pigs all shake it off.

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漏斗网蜘蛛有着一个可怕的名声。被这些澳大利亚蛛形纲动物叮咬过的人都会出现极度疼痛、呼吸困难、精神混乱、抽搐和高危血压的症状。如果不进行治疗，毒液可以在数小时内致命。多年来，研究人员一直认为这种杀伤作用是进化的意外。他们推测这些毒液的进化是为了帮助蜘蛛杀死它们的猎物——通常是昆虫。他们推测这些毒液的进化是为了帮助蜘蛛杀死它们的猎物——通常是昆虫。不过，这种毒液一般不会杀死哺乳动物。狗、猫、老鼠、兔子和豚鼠都会把它给抖掉。受到伤害的只有人类和其他灵长类动物。

 

It is only human beings and other primates that succumb. And there is another odd thing about it.Funnel-web-spider venom has thousands of components, but delta-hexatoxins, the specific molecules within it that kill people,are produced in particularly large quantities by sexually mature males during the breeding season—a time when they are barely feeding at all.Putting these various facts together has led Bryan Fry of the University of Queensland to suggest,in a paper published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences,that the role of delta-hexatoxins in funnel-web venom is not to kill prey but rather as a sophisticated form of defence—and that, paradoxically, its deadliness to humans is because neither they nor their primate ancestors were, until recently, a threat to the spiders.

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还有另一件奇怪的事情。漏斗网蜘蛛的毒液中含有数千种成分，但delta-hexatoxins，毒液中的这种致人死亡的特殊分子由在繁殖期性成熟的雄性蜘蛛大量生产——在此期间，它们几乎不进食。所有这些事实让昆士兰大学的Bryan Fry在发表于《Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences》的一篇论文中提出了这样的观点，在漏斗网蜘蛛的毒液中，delta-hexatoxins的作用不是杀死猎物，而是充当着一种复杂的防御形式——奇怪的是，它们对人类的致命性，既不是因为他们，也不是因为他们的灵长类动物祖先对蜘蛛构成了威胁。

 

Prey animals routinely attacked by venomous predators are under powerful pressure from natural selection.Any mutation which confers resistance to the venom will spread. This puts evolutionary pressure back onto the predator,encouraging the emergence of more potent venoms, which encourages further resistance and provokes further potency.And so on. Toxins directed against prey thus evolve rapidly.That, though, is not true for defensive venoms. Taking a single type of spider off its menu diminishes a predator's potential to survive and reproduce only slightly.

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经常被有毒捕食者袭击的猎物都承受着来自自然选择的巨大压力。任何能抵抗毒液的突变都会扩散。这给捕食者带来了进化压力，鼓励了更强效毒液的出现，从而进一步鼓励其耐药性，激发更强的效力。等等。因此针对猎物的毒素迅速进化。然而，防御性毒液却不是这样。将一种类型的蜘蛛除名只会略微降低捕食者生存和繁殖的潜力。