2019考研英語一真題翻譯原題及解析

　　It wasn’t until after my retirement that I had the time to read scientific papers in medical journals with anything like close attention. Until then, I had, like most doctors, read the authors’ conclusions and assumed that they bore some necessary relation to what had gone before. I had also naively assumed that the editors had done their job and checked the intellectual coherence and probity of the contents of their journals.

　　It was only after I started to write a weekly column about the medical journals, and began to read scientific papers from beginning to end, that I realized just how bad — inaccurate, misleading, sloppy, illogical — much of the medical literature, even in the best journals, frequently was. My discovery pleased and reassured me in a way: for it showed me that, even in advancing age, I was still capable of being surprised.

　　I came to recognize various signs of a bad paper: the kind of paper that purports to show that people who eat more than one kilo of broccoli a week were 1.17 times more likely than those who eat less to suffer late in life from pernicious anaemia. 46) There is a great deal of this kind of nonsense in the medical journals which, when taken up by broadcasters and the lay press, generates both health scares and short-lived dietary enthusiasms.

　　Why is so much bad science published?

　　A recent paper, titled ‘The Natural Selection of Bad Science’, published on the Royal Society’s open science website, attempts to answer this intriguing and important question.

　　According to the authors, the problem is not merely that people do bad science, as they have always done, but that our current system of career advancement positively encourages it. They quote ananonymous researcher who said pithily: ‘Poor methods get results.’ What is important is not truth, let alone importance, but publication, which has become almost an end in itself. There has been a kind of inflationary process at work: 47) nowadays anyone applying for a research post has to have published twice the number of papers that would have been required for the same post only 10 years ago. Never mind the quality, then, count the number. It is at least an objective measure.

　　In addition to the pressure to publish, there is a preference in journals for positive rather than negative results. To prove that factor a has no effect whatever on outcome b may be important in the sense that it refutes a hypothesis, but it is not half so captivating as that factor a has some marginally positive statistical association with outcome b. It may be an elementary principle of statistics that association is not causation, but in practice everyone forgets it.

　　The easiest way to generate positive associations is to do bad science, for example by trawling through a whole lot of data without a prior hypothesis. For example, if you took 100 dietary factors and tried to associate them with flat feet, you would find some of them that were associated with that condition, associations so strong that at first sight they would appear not to have arisen by chance.

　　Once it has been shown that the consumption of, shall we say, red cabbage is associated with flat feet, one of two things can happen: someone will try to reproduce the result, or no one will, in which case it will enter scientific mythology. The penalties for having published results which are not reproducible, and prove before long to be misleading, usually do not cancel out the prestige of having published them in the first place: and therefore it is better, from the career point of view, to publish junk than to publish nothing at all. A long list of publications, all of them valueless, is always impressive.

　　48)Attempts have been made to (control this inflation命題人改編為curb this kind tendency),(for example by trying, when it comes to career advancement這部分被出題人刪除), to incorporate some measure of quality as well as quantity into the assessment of an applicant’s published papers. This is the famed citation index, that is to say the number of times a paper has been quoted elsewhere in the scientific literature, the assumption being that an important paper will be cited more often than one of small account. 49) This would be reasonable enough if it were not for the fact that scientists can easily arrange to cite themselves in their future publications, or get associates to do so for them in return for similar favors.

　　Boiling down an individual’s output to simple, objective metrics, such as number of publications or journal impacts, entails considerable savings in time, energy and ambiguity. Unfortunately, the long-term costs of using simple quantitative metrics to assess researcher merit are likely to be quite great.

　　50) If we are serious about ensuring that our science is both meaningful and reproducible, we must ensure that our institutions incentivize that kind of science.

　　In other words, what we need is more emphasis on personal contact and even nepotism in the way careers are advanced: but tell it not in Gath, publish it not in the streets of Askelon; lest the daughters of the Philistines rejoice…
 

　　　　46. There is a great deal of this kind of nonsense in the medical journals which, when taken up by broadcasters and the lay press, generates both health scares and short-lived dietary enthusiasms.

　　【解析】

　　1. 本句主干為There is a great deal of this kind of nonsense in the medical journals(在醫(yī)學(xué)雜志上有很多這樣的無稽之談)

　　2. which引導(dǎo)定語從句，修飾this kind of nonsense，which指代this kind of nonsense，在定語從句中做主語

　　(1) 則定語從句為“這些無稽之談引起健康恐慌和短暫的飲食狂熱”

　　(2) when引導(dǎo)狀語從句，可以理解為條件，從句省略this kind of nonsense is，則為“如果廣播公司和非專業(yè)媒體報(bào)道這些無稽之談”

　　【參考譯文】

　　在醫(yī)學(xué)雜志上有很多這樣的無稽之談，如果廣播公司和非專業(yè)媒體報(bào)道這些無稽之談，那么就會(huì)引起健康恐慌和短暫的飲食狂熱。

　　47. Nowadays，anyone applying for a research post has to have published twice the number of papers that would have been required for the same post only 10 years ago.

　　【解析】

　　1. 本句主干為anyone has to have published twice the number of papers (任何人都必須已經(jīng)發(fā)表了兩倍的論文數(shù)量)

　　2. applying for a research post修飾anyone，則意思為“任何申請研究職位的人”

　　3. that引導(dǎo)定語從句，修飾the number

　　【參考譯文】如今，任何想申請研究職位的人都必須已經(jīng)發(fā)表兩倍于十年前申請同一職位所需的論文數(shù)量。

　　48) Attempts have been made to curb this tendency, for example, by trying to incorporate some measure of quality as well as quantity into the assessment of an applicant’s papers.

　　【解析】

　　1. 本句主干為Attempts have been made(嘗試被做出)，可以調(diào)整表達(dá)為：有人已經(jīng)做出多次嘗試

　　2. to curb this tendency為主語補(bǔ)足語，則主干可以調(diào)整為“有人已經(jīng)多次試圖遏制這種趨勢”

　　3. by doing為方式狀語

　　(1) incorporate... into... (將...納入...)

　　(2) by trying to incorporate some measure into the assessment of an applicant’s papers (通過試圖將某種衡量標(biāo)準(zhǔn)納入對某位申請者論文的評估過程當(dāng)中)

　　(3) 可以調(diào)整為“在評估申請人的論文時(shí)，納入某種衡量標(biāo)準(zhǔn)”

　　(4) of quality as well as quantity修飾measure，意思為“除了數(shù)量標(biāo)準(zhǔn)以外，還有質(zhì)量標(biāo)準(zhǔn)”

　　(5) 調(diào)整為“在評估申請人的論文時(shí)，除了納入關(guān)于數(shù)量的衡量標(biāo)準(zhǔn)以外，還要納入有關(guān)質(zhì)量的衡量標(biāo)準(zhǔn)”

　　【參考譯文】例如，有人已經(jīng)在評估申請人的論文時(shí)，嘗試除了納入關(guān)于數(shù)量的衡量標(biāo)準(zhǔn)以外，還納入有關(guān)質(zhì)量的衡量標(biāo)準(zhǔn)，以此來多次試圖遏制這種趨勢

　　49) This would be reasonable if it were not for the fact that scientists can easily arrange to cite themselves in their future publication or get associates to do so for them in return for similar favors.

　　【解析】

　　1. 本句主干為This would be reasonable (這將會(huì)是合理的)，this指代上一句中的“citation index”即:引用索引。

　　2. if it were not for，意思為“如果沒有...”，本句為虛擬語氣

　　(1) if it were not for the fact，意思為“如果沒有這一事實(shí)的話”

　　(2) 則為“如果沒有這一事實(shí)的話，這種引用索引才是合理的”

　　3. the fact后that引導(dǎo)同位語從句

　　(1) 同位語從句的主干為“scientists can easily arrange to cite ... or get...to do so”(科學(xué)家可以很容易地引用...或者讓...這樣去做)

　　(2) 則為“科學(xué)家可以很容易地在他們未來的出版物中引用他們自己的論文，或者讓合伙人為他們這樣去做，以換取類似的好處”

　　(3) 該同位語從句在表達(dá)時(shí)，可以省去fact不翻譯

　　(4) 則為“如果科學(xué)家不能很輕易地在他們未來的出版物中引用他們自己的論文，或者讓他的同事為他們這樣去做，以換取類似的好處”

　　【參考譯文】如果科學(xué)家不能很輕易地在他們未來的出版物中引用他們自己的論文，或者讓他的同事為他們這樣去做，以換取類似的好處，那么這種引用索引將會(huì)是合理的。

　　50) If we are serious about ensuring that our science is both meaningful and reproducible, we must ensure that our institutions encourage that kind of science.

　　【解析】

　　1. 本句主干為we must ensure that ... (我們必須要確保...)

　　2. that引導(dǎo)賓語從句“我們的院校鼓勵(lì)這種科學(xué)”

　　3. if引導(dǎo)條件狀語從句

　　(1) be serious about(對...當(dāng)真)

　　(2) 則意思是“如果我們真的想確保我們的科學(xué)研究是有意義和可復(fù)制的”

　　【參考譯文】如果我們真的想確保我們的科學(xué)研究是有意義和可復(fù)制的，我們必須確保我們的制度促進(jìn)了這種科學(xué)的發(fā)展。

　　(本文為跨考教育教研室原創(chuàng)，轉(zhuǎn)載請注明出處。)