大学英语精读课文第6册

大学英语精读课文第六册

UNIT 1. RESEARCH REPORTS FOR BUSINESS AND

Writing research reports for college or work is often found far more difficult than it need so be. The following article offers some excellent advice on how to make the task easier and the report more impressive and effective. Whether you write a research report for a college professor or for a demanding boss in your profession, the author's advice will put you well on your way to becoming a skillful report writer.

RESEARCH REPORTS FOR BUSINESS AND THECNICAL WRITING

Wayne Losano

A surprising amount of one's time as a student and professional is spent reporting the results of one's research projects for presentation to teachers, managers, and clients. Indeed, without basic research skills and the ability to present research results clearly and completely, an individual will encounter many obstacles in school and on the job. The need for some research-writing ability is felt nearly equally by college students in all fields, engineering and science as well as business and the humanities. Graduate study often makes great demands on the student's research-writing skills, and most professions continue the demand; education, advertising and marketing, economics and accounting, science and engineering, psychology, anthropology, the arts, and agriculture may all require regular reporting of research data.

ELEMENTS OF THE RESEARCH PAPER

The standard research report, regardless of the field or the intended reader, contains four major sections. These sections may be broken down into a variety of subsections, and they may be arranged in a variety of ways, but they regularly make up the core of the report.

Problem Section. The first required section of a research report is the statement of the problem with which the research project is concerned. This section requires a precise statement of the underlying question which the researcher has set out to answer. In this same section there should be an explanation of the significance -- social, economic, medical, psychological, educational, etc. -- of the question; in other words, why the investigation was worth conducting. Thus, if we set out, for example, to answer the question "What is the effect of regular consumption of fast foods on the health of the American teenager?" we must explain that the question is thought to have significant relevance to the health of this segment of the population and might lead to some sort of regulations on such foods.

A frequent subsection of this problem section is a review of past research on the topic being investigated. This would consist of summaries of the contributions of previous researcher to the question under consideration with some assessment of the value of these contributions. This subsection has rhetorical usefulness in that it enhances the credibility of the researcher by indicating that the data presented is based on a thorough knowledge of what has been done in the field and, possibly, grows out of some investigative tradition.

Procedures Section. The second major section of the research report details, with as much data as possible, exactly how the study was carried out. This section includes description of any necessary equipment, how the subjects were selected if subjects were used, what statistical technique was used to evaluate the significance of the findings, how many observations were made and when, etc. An investigation of the relative effectiveness of various swim-strokes would

have to detail the number of swimmers tested, the nature of the tests conducted, the experience of the swimmers, the weather conditions at the time of the test, and any other factors that contributed to the overall experiment. The goal of the procedures section is to allow the reader to duplicate the experiment if such were desired to confirm, or refute, your findings.

Results Section. The third, and perhaps most important, section of the research report is the presentation of the results obtained from the investigation. The basic rule in this section is to give all data relevant to the research question initially asked. Although, of course, one's natural tendency might be to suppress any findings which do not in some way support one's hypothesis, such dishonesty is antithetical to good research reporting in any field. If the experiments undertaken fail to prove anything, if the data was inadequate or contrary to expectations, the report should be honestly written and as complete as possible, just as it would be if the hypothesis were totally proven by the research.

Discussion Section. The final required section of a research report is a discussion of the results obtained and a statement of any conclusions which may be drawn from those results. Of primary interest in business and technical research reports is the validity of the results as the bases for company decisions: Will our planned construction project meet federal environmental guidelines and be approved for building? Will this new program attract skilled personnel to our company? Will this new oil recovery technique be financially feasible? Thus, the discussion section of the research report must evaluate the research results fully: were they validly obtained, are they complete or limited, are they applicable over a wide range of circumstances? The discussion section should also point out what question remain unanswered and perhaps suggest directions for further research.

STYLE OF RESEARCH REPORTS

Research reports are considered formal professional communication. As such, there is little emphasis on a lively style, although, of course, there is no objection to writing that is pleasing and interesting. The primary goals of professional communication are accuracy, clarity, and completeness. The rough draft of any research report should be edited to ensure that all data is correctly presented, that all equipment is listed, that all results are properly detailed. As an aid to the reader, headings indicating at least the major section of the report should be used, and all data should be presented under the proper headings. In addition to their function of suggesting to the reader the contents of each section, headings enhance the formal appearance and professional quality of the report, increase to some degree the writer's credibility by reflecting a logical and methodical approach to the reporting process, and eliminate the need for wordy transitional devices between sections.

Research data should be presented in a way that places proper emphasis on major aspect of the project. For different readers different aspects will take on different degrees of importance, and some consideration should be given to structuring research reports differently for different audiences. Management, for example, will be most concerned with the results of a research project, and thus the results section should be emphasized, probably by presenting it immediately after the problem section and before the procedures section. Other researchers would be most interested in the procedures section, and this should be highlighted in writing up research projects for publication in professional journals or for presentation at professional conferences. For non-technical readers and federal agencies, the implications of the results might be the most

important consideration, and emphasis should be placed on the discussion of the report for this readership.

For additional clarity and emphasis, major results should be presented in a visual format -- tables, charts, graphs, diagrams -- as well as in a verbal one.

Beyond checking the report for clarity and accuracy in the presentation of technical data, the author of a research report should review for basic grammatical and mechanical accuracy. Short sentences are preferable to long in the presentation of complex information. Listings should be used to break up long passages of prose and to emphasize information. The research writer should try to use the simplest possible language without sacrificing the professional quality of the report. Although specialized terms can be used, pretentious jargon should be avoided. A finished research report should be readable and useful document prepared with the reader in mind.

CONCLUSION

Although we struggle with research reports in high school, dread them in college, and are often burdened by them in our professional live, learning to live comfortably with them is a relatively easy task. A positive attitude (i.e. one that seem the oral or written presentation of research results as of equal importance to the data-gathering process); an orderly approach which includes prewriting (i.e., before any actual research is done, the researcher should try to get down on paper as much about the subject under investigation as possible) and a formal research report structure as the framework for the investigation; and a reasonable approach to the actual writing process including editing for accuracy and clarity, will help one to produce effective research reports efficiently.

UNIT 2. THE BEGINNING OF A CARREER

There is something fascinating about reading other people's mail if you are allowed to. Here is your chance to read the letters of American writer Sylvia Plath, which she wrote home to her mother from a hotel where she had a summer job as a waitress. At the time, she was a college student and was still at the start of her writing career. Through the letter we learn of her changing thoughts and moods concerning, boys and writing.

THE BEGINNING OF A CARREER

Sylvia Plath

The Belmont Hotel, cape Cod

June 11, 1952

Dear Mother,

Your amazing telegram [telegram announcing $500 Mademoiselle prize for "Sunday at the Mintons," which I forwarded] came just as I was scrubbing tables in the shady interior of The Belmont dining room. I was so excited that I screamed and actually threw my arms around the head waitress who no doubt thinks I am rather insane! Anyhow, psychologically, the moment couldn't have been better. I felt tired -- one's first night's sleep in a new place never is peaceful -- and I didn't get much! To top it off, I was the only girl waitress here, and had been scrubbing furniture, washing dishes and silver, lifting tables, etc. since 8 a.m. Also, I just learned since I am

completely inexperienced, I am not going to be working in the main dining room, but in the "side hall" where the managers and top hotel brass eat. So, tips will no doubt net much less during the summer and the company be less interesting. So I was beginning to worry about money when your telegram came. God! To think "Sunday at the Mintons" is one of two prize stories to be put in a big national slick! Frankly, I can't believe it!

The first thing I though of was: Mother can keep her intersession money and buy some pretty clothes and a special trip or something! At least I get a winter coat and extra special suit out of the Mintons. I think the prize is $500!

ME! Of all people!…

So it's really looking up around here, now that I don't have to be scared stiff about money … Oh, I say, even if my feet kill me after this first week, and I drop 20 trays, I will have the beach, boys to bring me beer, sun, and young gay companions. What a life.

Love, your crazy old daughter.

Sivvy

June 12. 1952

No doubt after I catch up on sleep, and learn to balance trays high on my left hand, I'll feel much happier. As it is now, I feel stuck in the midst of a lot of loud, brassy Irish Catholics, and the only way I can jolly myself is to say, "Oh, well, it's only for a summer, and I can maybe write about them all." At least I've got a new name for my next protagonist -- Marley, a gabby girl who knows her way around but good. The ration of boys to girls has gotten less and less, so I'll be lucky if I get tagged by the youngest kid here. Lots of the girls are really wise, drinking flirts. As for me, being the conservative, quiet, gracious type, I don't stand much chance of dating some of the cutest ones … If I can only get "in" as a pal with these girls, and never for a minute let them know I'm the gentle intellectual type, it'll be O.K.

As for the Mlle news, I don't think it's really sunk in yet. I felt sure they made a mistake, or that you'd made it up to cheer me. The big advantage will be that I won't have to worry about earning barely $300 this summer. I would really have been sick otherwise. I can't wait till August when I can go casually down to the drug store and pick up a slick copy of Mlle, flip to the index, and see ME, one of two college girls in the U.S.!

Really, when I think of how I started it over spring vacation, polished it at school, and sat up till midnight in the Haven House kitchen typing it amidst noise and chatter, I can't get over how the story soared to were it did…

I get great pleasure out of sharing it [her feeling about the story] with you, who really understand how terribly much it means as a tangible testimony that I have got a germ of writing ability. The only thing, I probably won't have a chance to win Mlle again, so I'll try for a guest editorship maybe next or my senior year, and set my sights for the Atlantic. God, I'm glad I can talk about it with you -- probably you're the only outlet that I'll have that won't get tired of my talking about writing …

Speaking again of Henry and Liz, it was a step for me to a story where the protagonist isn't always ME, and proved that I am beginning to use imagination to transform the actual incident. I was scared that would never happen, but I think it's an indication that my perspective is broadening.

Sometime I think -- heck, I don't know why I didn't stay home all summer, writing, doing physical science, and having a small part-time job. I could "afford" to now, but it doesn't do much good to yearn about that, I guess. Although it would have been nice. Oh well, I'll cheer up. I love you.

Your own Sivvy

June 15, 1952

Dear Mother.

… Do write me letters, Mommy, because I am in a very dangerous of feeling sorry for myself … Just at present, life is awful. Mademoiselle seems quite unreal, and I am exhausted, scared, inco mpetent, unenergetic and generally low is spirits … Working in side hall puts me part, and I feel completely uprooted and clumsy. The more I see the main hall girls expertly getting special dishes, fixing shaved ice and fruit, etc., the more I get an inferiority complex and feel that each day in side hall leaves me further behind … But as tempted as I am to be a coward and escape by crawling back home, I have resolved to give it a good month's trial -- till July 10 … Don't worry about me, but do send me little pellets of advice now and then.

June 24, 1952

… Last night I went on a "gang" birthday party at the "Sand Bar" where we sang and talked for a few hours. There were about forty of us kids from the hotel. I managed by some magic to get myself seated next to a fellow in his first year at Harvard Law -- and he was just a dear … The best part was when we came back. It was a beautiful clear starry night, and Clark went in to get me two of his sweaters to wear because it was cold, and brought out a book of T.S. Eliot's poems. So we sat on a bench where I could just barely read the print, and he put his head in my lap and I read aloud to him for a wile. Most nice. The only thing is I am so inclined to get fond of someone who will do things with me like that -- always inclined to be too metaphysical and serious conversationally -- that's my main trouble … So glad to hear the check from Mlle is real. I hardly could believe it. Just now I am mentally so disorganized that I can't retain knowledge or think at all. The work is still new enough to be tiring, what with three changes a day into uniforms, and I am so preoccupied by mechanics of living and people that I can't yet organize and assimilate all the chaos of experience pouring in on me. In spite of everything, I still have my good old sense of humor and manage to laugh a good deal of the time … I'll make the best of whatever comes my way.

Much love to you,

Sivvy

UNIT 3. THE QUEST FOR EXTRATERRESTRIAL

Are we humans alone in the universe? Or is there intelligent life on other planets? These questions are not new. What is new, however, is the scientific attempt to discover whether or not other planets beyond our own have given birth to advanced civilizations. In the following article, the author describes the scientific means now available for investigating this possibility and discusses

how probable it is that we are not alone in the universe.

THE QUEST FOR EXTRATERRESTRIAL INTELLIGENCE

Carl Sagan

Through all of our history we have pondered the stars and mused whether humanity is unique or if, somewhere else in the dark of the night sky, there are other beings who contemplate and wonder as we do, fellow thinkers in the cosmos. Such beings might view themselves and the universe differently. Somewhere else there might be very exotic biologies and technologies and societies. In a cosmic setting vast and old beyond ordinary human understanding, we are a little lonely; and we ponder the ultimate significance, if any, of our tiny but exquisite blue planet.

The search for extraterrestrial intelligence is the search for a generally acceptable cosmic context for the human species. In the deepest sense, the search for extraterrestrial intelligence is a search for ourselves.

In the last few years -- in one-millionth the lifetime of our species on this planet -- we have achieved an extraordinary technological capability which enables us to seek out unimaginably distant civilizations even if they are no more advanced than we. That capability is called radio astronomy and involves single radio telescopes, collections or arrays of radio telescopes, sensitive radio detectors, advanced computers for processing received date, and the imagination and skill of dedicated scientists. Radio astronomy has in the last decade opened a new window on the physical universe. It may also, if we are wise enough to make the effort, cast a profound light on the biological universe.

Some scientists working on the question of extraterrestrial intelligence, myself among them, have attempted to estimate the number of advanced technical civilizations -- defined operationally as societies capable of radio astronomy -- in the Milky Way Galaxy. Such estimates are little better than guesses. They require assigning numerical values to quantities such as the numbers and ages of stars; the abundance of planetary systems and the likelihood of the origin of life, which we know less well; and the probability of the evolution of intelligent life and the lifetime of technical civilizations, about which we know very little indeed.

When we do the arithmetic, the sorts of numbers we come up with are, characteristically, around a million technical civilizations. A million civilizations is a breathtakingly large number, and it is exhilarating to imagine the diversity, lifestyles and commerce of those million worlds. But the Milky Way Galaxy contains some 250 billion stars, and even with a million civilizations, less than one star in 200,000 would have a planet inhabited by an advanced civilization. Since we have little idea which stars are likely candidates, we will have to examine a very large number of them. Such considerations suggest that the quest for extraterrestrial intelligence may require a significant effort.

Despite claims about ancient astronauts and unidentified flying objects, there is no firm evidence for past visitation of the Earth by other civilizations. We are restricted to remote signaling and, of the long-distance techniques available to our technology, radio is by far the best. Radio telescopes are relatively inexpensive; radio signals travel at the speed of light, faster than which nothing can go; and the use of radio for communication is not a short-sighted or anthropocentric activity. Radio represents a large part of the electromagnetic spectrum and any

technical civilization anywhere in the Galaxy will have discovered radio early -- just as in the last few centuries we have explored the entire electromagnetic spectrum from short gamma rays to very long radio waves. Advanced civilizations might very well use some other means of communication with their peers. But if they wish to communicate with backward or emerging civilizations, there are only a few obvious methods, the chief of which is radio.

The first serious attempt to listen for possible radio signals from other civilizations was carried out at the National Radio Astronomy Observatory in Greenbank, West Virginia, in 1959 and 1960. It was organized by Frank Drake, now at Cornel University, and was called Project Ozma, after the princess of the Land of Oz, a place very exotic, very distant and very difficult to reach. Drake examined two nearby stars for a few weeks with negative results. Positive results would have been astonishing because as we have seen, even rather optimistic estimates of the number of technical civilizations in the Galaxy imply that several hundred thousand stars must be examined in order to achieve success by random stellar selection.

Since Project Ozma, there have been six or eight other such programs, all at a rather modest level, in the United States, Canada and the Soviet Union. All results have been negative. The total number of individual stars examined to date in this way is less than a thousand. We have performed something like one tenth of one percent of the required effort.

However, there are signs that much more serious efforts may be mustered in the reasonably near future. Besides, hand in hand with the recent spectacular advances in radio technology, there has been a dramatic increase in the scientific and public respectability of the entire subject of extraterrestrial life. A clear sign of the new attitude is the Viking missions to Mars, which are to a significant extent dedicated to the search for life on another planet.

But along with the burgeoning dedication to a serious search, a slightly negative note has emerged which is nevertheless very interesting. A few scientists have lately asked a curious question: If extraterrestrial intelligence is abundant, why have we not already seen its manifestations? Skeptics also ask why there is no clear evidence of extraterrestrial visits to Earth. We have already launched slow and modest interstellar spacecraft. A society more advance than ours should be able to ply the spaces between the stars conveniently if not effortlessly. Over millions of years such societies should have established colonies, which might themselves launch interstellar expeditions. Why are they not here? The temptation is to deduce that there are at most a few advanced extraterrestrial civilizations -- either because statistically we are one of the first technical civilizations to have emerged or because it is the fate of all such civilizations to destroy themselves before they are much further along than we.

It seems to me that such despair is quite premature. All such arguments depend on our correctly surmising the intentions of beings far more advanced than ourselves, and when examined more closely I think these arguments reveal a range of interesting human conceits. Why do we expect that it will be easy to recognize the manifestations of very advanced civilizations? Is our situation not closer to that of members of an isolated society in the Amazon basin, say, who lack the tools to detect the powerful international radio and television traffic that is all around them? Also, there is a wide range of incompletely understood phenomena in astronomy. Might the modulation of pulsars or the energy source of quasars, for example, have a technological origin? Or perhaps there is a galactic ethic of noninterference with backward or emerging civilizations. Perhaps there is a waiting time before contact is considered appropriate, so as to give us a fair opportunity to destroy ourselves first, if we are so inclined. Perhaps all societies significantly more

advanced than our own have achieved an effective personal immortality and lose the motivation for interstellar gallivanting, which may, for all we know, be a typical urge only of adolescent civilizations. Perhaps mature civilizations do not wish to pollute the cosmos. There is a very long list of such "perhaps," few of which we are in a position to evaluate with any degree of assurance.

The question of extraterrestrial civilizations seems to me entirely open. Personally, I think it far more difficult to understand a universe in which we are the only technological civilization, or one of a very few, than to conceive of a cosmos brining over with intelligent life. Many aspects of the problem are, fortunately, amenable to experimental verification. We can search for planets of other stars, seek simple forms of life on such nearby planets as Mars, and perform more extensive laboratory studies on the chemistry of the origin of life. We can investigate more deeply the evolution of organisms and societies. The problem cries out for a long-term, open-minded, systematic search, with nature as the only arbiter of what is or is not likely.

UNIT 4. THE LIBRARY CARD

As a black boy growing up in America in the early 1900s, Richard Wright knew well the meaning of racial prejudice. He was not allowed to play in a park or borrow books from a library. While working as an office boy in a bank, though, he found a way into the library and discovered the power of the written word. In the following story, Richard Wright tells us how his thirst for books grew with each passing day and what changes took place in him as he did more and more reading.

THE LIBRARY CARD

Richard Wright

One morning I arrived early at work and went into the bank lobby where the Negro porter was mopping. I stood at a counter and picked up the Memphis Commercial Appeal and began my free reading of the press. I came finally to the editorial page and saw an article dealing with one H. L. Mencken. I knew by hearsay that he was the editor of the American Mercury, but aside from that I knew nothing about him. The article was a furious denunciation of Mencken, concluding with one, hot, short sentence: Mencken is a fool.

I wondered what on earth this Mencken had done to call down upon him the scorn of the South. The only people I had ever heard enounced in the South were Negroes, and this man was not a Negro. Then what ideas did Mencken hold that made a newspaper like the Commercial Appeal castigate him publicly? Undoubtedly he must be advocating ideas that the South did not like.

Now, how could I find out about this Mencken? There was a huge library near the riverfront, but I knew that Negroes were not allowed to patronize its shelves any more than they were the parks and playgrounds of the city. I had gone into the library several times to get books for the white men on the job. Which of them would now help me to get books?

I weighed the personalities of the men on the job. There was Don, a Jew; but I distrusted him. His position was not much better than mine and I knew that he was uneasy and insecure; he had always treated me in an offhand, bantering way that barely concealed his contempt. I was afraid to ask him to help me to get books; his frantic desire to demonstrate a racial solidarity with the

whites against Negroes might make him betray me.

Then how about the boss? No, he was a Baptist and I had the suspicion that he would not be quite able to comprehend why a black boy would want to read Mencken. There were other white men on the job whose attitudes showed clearly that they were Kluxers or sympathizers, and they were out of the question.

There remained only one man whose attitude did not fit into an anti-Negro category, for I had heard the white men refer to him as "Pope lover". He was an Irish Catholic and was hated by the white Southerners. I knew that he read books, because I had got him volumes from the library several times. Since he, too, was an object of hatred, I felt that he might refuse me but would hardly betray me. I hesitated, weighing and balancing the imponderable realities.

One morning I paused before the Catholic fellow's desk.

"I want to ask you a favor," I whispered to him.

"What is it?"

"I want to read. I can't get books from the library. I wonder if you'd let me use your card?"

He looked at me suspiciously.

"My card is full most of the time," he said.

"I see," I said and waited, posing my question silently.

"You're not trying to get me into trouble, are you, boy?" he asked, staring at me.

"Oh, no, sir."

"What book do you want?"

"A book by H. L. Mencken."

"Which one?"

"I don't know. Has he written more than one?"

"He has written several."

"I didn't know that."

"What makes you want to read Mencken?"

"Oh, I just saw his name in the newspaper," I said.

"It's good of you to want to read," he said. "But you ought to read the right things."

I said nothing. Would he want to supervise my reading?

"Let me think," he said. "I'll figure out something."

I turned from him and he called me back. He stared at me quizzically.

"Richard, don't mention his to the other white men," he said.

"I understand," I said. "I won't say a word."

A few days later he called me to him.

"I've got a card in my wife's name," he said. "Here's mine."

"Thank you, sir."

"Do you think you can manage it?"

"I'll manage fine," I said.

"If they suspect you, you'll get in trouble," he said.

"I'll write the same kind of notes to the library that you wrote when you sent me for books," I told him. "I'll sign your name."

He laughed.

"Go ahead. Let me see what you get," he said.

That afternoon I addressed myself to forging a note. Now, what were the name of books

written by H. L. Mencken? I did not know any of them. I finally wrote what I thought would be a foolproof note: Dear Madam: Will you please let this nigger boy -- I used the word "nigger" to make the librarian feel that I could not possibly be the author of the note -- have some books by

H.L. Mecken? I forged the white man's name.

I entered the library as I had always done when on errands for whites, but I felt that I would somehow slip up and betray myself. I doffed my hat, stood a respectful distance from the desk, looked as unbookish as possible, and waited for the white patrons to be taken care of. When the desk was clear of people, I still waited.

The white librarian looked at me.

"What do you want, boy?"

As though I did not possess the power of speech, I stepped forward and simply handed her the forged note, not parting my lips.

"What books by Mencken does he want?" She asked.

"I don't know, ma'am," I said, avoiding her eyes.

"Who gave you this card?"

"Mr. Falk," I said.

"Where is he?"

"He's at work, at M -- Optical Company," I said. "I've been in here for him before."

"I remember," the woman said. "But he never wrote notes like this."

Oh, God, she's suspicious. Perhaps she would not let me have the books? If she had turned her back at that moment, I would have ducked out the door and never gone back. Then I thought of a bold idea.

"You can call him up, ma'am," I said, my heart pounding.

"You're not using these books, are you?" she asked pointedly.

"Oh, no, ma'am. I can't read."

"I don't know what he wants by Mencken," she said under her breath.

I knew now that I had non; she was thinking of other things and the race question had gone out of her mind. She went to the shelves. Once or twice she looked over her shoulder at me, as though she was still doubtful. Finally she came forward with two books in her hand.

"I'm sending him two books," she said. "But tell Mr. Falk to come in next time, or send me the names of the books he wants. I don't know what he wants to read."

I said nothing. She stamped the card and handed me the books. Not daring to glance at them.

I went out of the library, fearing that the woman would call me back for further questioning. A block away from the library I opened one of the books and read a title: A Book of Prefaces. I was nearing my nineteenth birthday and I did not know how to pronounce the word "preface". I thumbed the pages and saw strange words and strange names. I shook my head, disappointed. I looked at the other book; it was called Prejudices, I knew what that word meant; I had heard it all my life. And right off I was on guard against Mencken's books. Why would a man want to call a book Prejudices? The word was so stained with all my memories of racial hate that I cold not conceive of anybody using it for a title. Perhaps I had made a mistake about Mencken? A man who had prejudices must be wrong.

When I showed the books to Mr. Falk, he looked at me and frowned.

"That librarian might telephone you," I warned him.

"That's all right," he said. "But when you're through reading those books, I want you to tell

me what you get out of them."

That night in my rented room, while letting the hot water run over my can of pork and beans in the sink, I opened A Book of Preface and began to read. I was jarred and shocked by the style, the clear, clean, sweeping sentences. Why did he write like that? And how did one write like that?

I pictured the man as a raging demon, slashing with his pen, consumed with hate, denouncing everything American, extolling everything European or German, laughing at the weaknesses of people, mocking God, authority. What was this? I stood up, trying to realize what reality lay behind the meaning of the words … Yes, this man was fighting, fighting with words. He was using words as a weapon, using them as one would use a club. Could words be weapons? Well, yes, for there they were. Then, maybe, perhaps, I could use them as a weapon? No. It frightened me. I read on and what amazed me was not what he said, but how on earth anybody had the courage to say it.

I ran across many words whose meanings I did not know, and either looked them up in a dictionary or, before I had a chance to do that, encountered the word in a context that made its meaning clear. But what strange world was this? I concluded the book with the conviction that I had somehow overlooked something terribly important in life. I had once tried to write, had once reveled in feeling, had let my crude imagination roam, but the impulse to dream had been slowly beaten out of me by experience. Now it surged up again and I hungered for books, new ways of looking and seeing. It was not a matter of believing or disbelieving what I read, but of feeling something new, of being affected by something that made the look of the world different.

I forget more notes and my trips to the library became frequent. Reading grew into a passion. My first serious novel was Sinclair Lewis's Main Street. It made me see my boss, Mr. Gerald, and identify him as an American type. I would smile when I saw him lugging his golf bags into the office. I had always felt a vast distance separating me from the boss, and now I felt closer to him, though still distant. I felt now that I knew him, that I could feel the very limits of his narrow life. And this had happened because I had read a novel about a mythical man called George F. Babbitt.

I read Dreiser's Jennie Gerhardt and Sister Carrie and they revived in me a vivid sense of my mother's suffering; I was overwhelmed. I grew silent, wondering about the life around me. It would have been impossible for me to have told anyone what I derived from these novels, for it was nothing less than a sense of life itself. All my life had shaped me for the realism, the naturalism of the modern novel, and I could not read enough of them.

Steeped in new moods and ideas, I bought a ream of paper and tried to write; but nothing would come, or what did come was flat beyond telling. I discovered that more than desire and felling were necessary to write and I dropped the idea. Yet I still wondered how it was possible to know people sufficiently to write about them? Could I ever learn about life and people? To me, with my vast ignorance, my Jim Crow station in life, it seemed a task impossible of achievement. I now knew what being a Negro meant. I could endure the hunger. I had learned to live with hate. But to feel that there were feelings denied me, that the very breath of life itself was beyond my reach, that more than anything else hurt, wounded me. I had a new hunger.

UNIT 5. HOW COULD ANYTHING THAT FEELS SO BAD BE SO

If modern life is so wonderful, why do we feel so unhappy? In the following article, the author suggests that though living standards have improved, we, rather than feeling content, never become completely satisfied with what we have achieved. This is because we always find ourselves with new and higher expectations. To meet these expectations and solve the new

problems that arise, new strategies should be adopted.

HOW COULD ANYTHING THAT FEELS SO BAD BE SO GOOD?

Richard E. Farson

Maybe it is time to adopt a new strategy in trying to figure out why life today is so difficult, and what can be done about it. Assume that not only are things often not what they seem, they may be just the opposite of what they seem. When it comes to human affairs, everything is paradoxical.

People are discontented these days, for example, not because things are worse than ever, but because things are better than ever. Take marriage. In California there are about six divorces for every ten marriages -- even higher in some of the better communities. One must admit that a good deal of discontent is reflected in those statistics. But the explanation so frequently offered -- that the institution of marriage is in a state of collapse -- simply does not hold. Marriage has never been more popular and desirable than is it now; so appealing in fact, that even those who are in the process of divorce can scarcely wait for the law to allow them to marry again.

The problem is that people have never before entered marriage with the high expectations they now hold. Throughout history, the family has been a vital unit for survival, starting as a defense system for physical survival, and gradually becoming a unit for economic survival. Now, of course, the family has become a physical and economic liability rather than an asset. Having met, as a society, the basic survival and security needs, people simply don't need each other anymore to fight Indians or spin yarn -- or wash dishes or repair electrical plugs for that matter. The bonds of marriage and family life are no longer functional, but affectional. People used to come to love each other because they needed each other. Now it's just the other way around. They need each other because they love each other.

Listening to the complaints of those recently divorced, one seldom hears of brutality and desertion, but usually something like, "We just don't communicate very well", "The educational differences between us were simply too great to overcome", "I felt trapped in the relationship", "He won't let me be me", "We don't have much in common anymore". These complaints are interesting, because they reflect high-order discontent resulting from the failure of marriage to meet the great expectations held for it. Couples now expect -- and demand -- communication and understanding, shared values and goals, intellectual companionship, great moments of intimacy. By and large, marriage today actually does deliver such moments, but as a result couples have gone on to burden the relationship with even greater demands. To some extent it has been the success of marriage that has created the discontent.

The same appears to be true in the civil rights movement. The gains that have been made have led not to satisfaction but to increased tension and dissatisfaction, particularly among those benefiting from such gains. The discontent is higher in the North than in the South, higher in cities than in rural areas.

The disturbing paradox of social change is that improvement brings the need for more improvement in constantly accelerating demands. So, compared to what used to be, society is way ahead; compared to what might be, it is way behind. Society is enabled to feel that conditions are rotten, because they are actually so good.

Another problem is that everything is temporary, nothing lasts. We have grown up with the idea that in order to develop personal security we need stability, roots, consistency, and familiarity. Yet we live in a world which in every respect is continually changing. Whether we are talking about sky-scrapers or family life, scientific facts or religious values, all are highly temporary and becoming even more so. If one were to plot a curve showing the incidence of invention throughout the history of man, one would see that change is not just increasing but actually accelerating. Changes are coming faster and faster -- in a sense change has become a way of life. The only people who will live successfully in tomorrow's world are those who can accept and enjoy temporary systems.

People are also troubled because of the new participative mood that exists today. It's a do-it-yourself society; every layman wants to get into the act. Emerson's "do your own thing" has become the cliché of the times. People no longer accept being passive members. They now want to be active changers.

This participative phenomenon can be seen in every part of contemporary life -- on campus, in the church, in the mass media, in the arts, in business and industry, on ghetto streets, in the family.

The problem is that modern man seems unable to redesign his institution fast enough to accommodate the new demands, the new intelligence, the new abilities of segments of society which, heretofore, have not been taken seriously. Consequently, people are frightened by the black revolution, paralyzed by student activism, and now face what may be even more devastating -- the women's rebellion.

Society simply has not had these kinds of problems before, and to meet them it will have to adopt strategies for their solution that are as new, and as different, and as paradoxical as are the problems themselves.

Instead of trying to reduce the discontent felt, try to raise the level or quality of the discontent. Perhaps the most that can be hoped for is to have high-order discontent in today's society, discontent about things that really matter. Rather than evaluating programs in terms of how happy they make people, how satisfied those people become, programs must be evaluated in terms of the quality of the discontent they engender. For example, if a consultant wants to assess whether or not an organization is healthy, he doesn't ask, "Is there an absence of complaints?" but rather, "What kinds of complaints are there?"

Instead of trying to make gradual changes in small increments, make big changes. After all, big changes are relatively easier to make than are small ones. Some people assume that the way to bring about improvement is to make the change small enough so that nobody will notice it. This approach has never worked, and one can't help but wonder why such thinking continues. Everyone knows how to resist small changes; they do it all the time. If, however, the change is big enough, resistance can't be mobilized against it. Management can make a sweeping organizational change, but just let a manager try to change someone's desk from here to there, and see the great difficulty he encounters. All change is resisted, so the question is how can the changes be made big enough so that they have a chance of succeeding?

Buckminster Fuller ahs said that instead of reforms society needs new forms; e.g., in order to reduce traffic accidents, improve automobiles and highways instead of trying to improve drives. The same concept should be applied to human relations. There is a need to think in terms of social architecture, and to provide arrangements among people that evoke what they really want to see in

themselves. Mankind takes great pains with physical architecture, and is beginning to concern itself with the design of systems in which the human being is a component. But most of these designs are only for safety, efficiency, or productivity. System designs are not made to affect those aspects of life people care most about such as family life, romance, and esthetic experiences. Social technology as well as physical technology need to be applied in making human arrangements that will transcend anything mankind has yet experienced. People need not be victimized by their environments; they can be fulfilled by them.

The great frontier today is the exploration of the human potential man's seemingly limitless ability to adapt, to grow, to invent his own destiny. There is much to learn, but we already know this: the future need not happen to us; we can make it happen.

UNIT 6. THE MONSTER

This essay on a famous man, whose name is not revealed until almost the end of the piece, is a study of monstrous conceit. Filled with biographical details that keep the reader guessing to the last moment, the essay concludes with a challenging view on the nature of genius: If a genius was so prolific, "is it any wonder that he had no time to be a man?"

THE MONSTER

Deems Taylor

He was an undersized little man, with a head too big for his body -- a sickly little man. His nerves were had. He had skin trouble. It was agony for him to wear anything next to his skin coarser than silk. And he had seclusions of grandeur.

He was a monster of conceit. Never for one minute did he look at the world or at people, except in relation to himself. He was not only the most important person in the world, to himself; in his own eyes he was the only person who existed. He believed himself to be one of the greatest dramatists in the world, one of the greatest thinkers, and one of the greatest composers. To hear him talk, he was Shakespeare, and Beethoven, and Plato, rolled into one. And you would have had no difficulty in hearing him talk. He was one of the most exhausting conversationalists that ever lived. An evening with him was an evening spent in listening to a monologue. Sometimes he was brilliant; sometimes he was maddeningly tiresome. But whether he was being brilliant or dull, he had one sole topic of conversation: himself. What he thought and what he did.

He had a mania for being in the right. The slightest hint of disagreement, from anyone, on the most trivial point, was enough to set him off on a harangue that might last for house, in which he proved himself right in so many ways, and with such exhausting volubility, that in the end his hearer, stunned and deafened, would agree with him, for the sake of peace.

It never occurred to him that he and his doing were not of the most intense and fascinating interest to anyone with whom he came in contact. He had theories about almost any subject under the sun, including vegetarianism, the drama, politics, and music; and in support of these theories he wrote pamphlets, letters, books … thousands upon thousands of words, hundreds and hundreds of pages. He not only wrote these things, and published them -- usually at somebody else's expense -- but he would sit and read them aloud, for hours, to his friends and his family.

He wrote operas, and no sooner did he have the synopsis of a story, but he would invite -- or rather summon -- a crowed of his friends to his house, and read it aloud to them. Not for criticism. For applause. When the complete poem was written, the friends had to come again, and hear that read aloud. Then he would publish the poem, sometimes years before the music that went with it

was written. He played the piano like a composer, in the worst sense of what that implies, and he would sit down at the piano before parties that included some of the finest pianists of his time, and play for them, by the hour, his own music, needless to say. He had a composer's voice. And he would invite eminent vocalists to his house and sing them his operas, taking all the parts.

He had the emotional stability of a six-year-old child. When he felt out of sorts, he would rave and stamp, or sink into suicidal gloom and talk darkly of going to the East to end his days as a Buddhist wonk. Ten minutes later, when something pleased him, he would rush out of doors and run around the garden, or jump up and down on the sofa, or stand on his head. He could be grief-stricken over the death of a pet dog, and he could be callous and heartless to a degree that would have made a Roman emperor shudder.

He was almost innocent of any sense of responsibility. Not only did he seem incapable of supporting himself, but it never occurred to him that he was under ay obligation to do so. He was convinced that the world owed him a living. In support of this belief, he borrowed money from everybody who was good for a loan -- men, women, friends, or strangers. He wrote begging letters by the score, sometimes groveling without shame, at other loftily offering his intended benefactor the privilege of contributing to his support, and being mortally offended if the recipient declined the honor. I have found no record of his ever paying or repaying money to anyone who did not have a legal claim upon it.

What money he could lay his hands on he spent like an Indian rajah. The mere prospect of a performance of one of his operas was enough to set him to running up bills amounting to ten times the amount of his prospective royalties. No one will ever know -- certainly he never knew -- how much money he owed. We do know that his greatest benefactor gave him $6,000 to pay the most pressing of his debts in one city, and a year later had to give him $16,000 to enable him to live in another city without being thrown into jail for debt.

He was equally unscrupulous in other ways. An endless procession of women marched through his life. His first wife spent twenty years enduring and forgiving his infidelities. His second wife had been the wife of his most devoted friend and admirer, from whom he stole her. And even while he was trying to persuade her to leave her first husband he was writing to a friend to inquire whether he could suggest some wealthy woman -- any wealthy woman -- whom he could marry for her money.

He was completely selfish in his other personal relationships. His liking for his friends was measured solely by the completeness of their devotion to him, or by their usefulness to him, whether financial or artistic. The minute they failed him -- even by so much as refusing dinner invitation -- or began to lessen in usefulness, he cast them off without a second thought. At the end of his life he had exactly one friend left whom he had known even in middle age.

The name of this monster was Richard Wagner. Everything that I have said about him you can find on record -- in newspapers, in police reports, in the testimony of people who knew him, in his own letters, between the lines of his autobiography. And the curious thing about this record is that it doesn't matter in the least.

Because this undersized, sickly, disagreeable, fascinating little man was right all the time. The joke was on us. He was one of the world's greatest dramatists; he was a great thinker; he was one of the most stupendous musical geniuses that, up to now, the world has ever seen. The world did owe him a living.

When you consider what he wrote -- thirteen operas and music dramas, eleven of them still

holding the stage, eight of them unquestionably worth ranking among the world's great musico-dramatic masterpieces -- when you listen to what he wrote, the debts and heartaches that people had to endure from him don't seem much of a price. Think of the luxury with which for a time, at least, fate rewarded Napoleon, the man who ruined France and looted Europe; and then perhaps you will agree that a few thousand dollars' worth of debts were not too heavy a price to pay for the Ring trilogy.

What if he was faithless to his friends and to his wives? He had one mistress to whom he was faithful to the day of his death: Music. Not for a single moment did he ever compromise with what he believed, with what be dreamed. There is not a line of his music that could have been conceived by a little mind. Even when he is dull, or downright bad, he is dull in the grand manner. There is greatness about his worst mistakes. Listening to his music, one does not forgive him for what he may or may not have been. It is not a matter of forgiveness. It is a matter of being dumb with wonder that his poor brain and body didn't burst under the torment of the demon of creative energy that lived inside him, struggling, clawing, scratching to be released; tearing, shrieking at him to write the music that was in him. The miracle is that what he did in the little space of seventy years could have been done at all, even by a great genius. Is it any wonder that he had no time to be a man?

UNIT 7. ZERITSKYS LA W

It is often said that cats have nine lives, that they are lucky enough to escape from danger again and again. Here is a science fiction tale about how one such lucky escape by a cat led to a discovery that was able to change the course of people's lives. The problems stemming from the discovery also make interesting reading.

ZERITSKY'S LAW

Ann Griffith

Somebody someday will make a study of the influence of animals on history. Among them, Mrs. Graham's cat should certainly be included in any such study. It has now been definitely established that the experiences of this cat led to the idea of quick-frozen people, which, in turn, led to the passage of Zeritsky's Law.

We must go back to the files of the Los Angeles newspapers for 1950 to find the story. In brief, a Mrs. Fred C. Graham missed her pet cat on the same day that she put a good deal of food down in her home deep-freeze unit. She suspected no connection between the two events. The cat was not to be found until six days later, when its owner went to fetch something from the deepfreeze. Much as she loved her pet, we may imagine that she was more horror-than grief-stricken at her discovery. She lifted the little ice-encased body out of the deep--freeze and set it on the floor. Then she managed to run as far as the next door neighbor's house before fainting.

Mrs. Graham became hysterical after she was revived, and it was several hours before she could be quieted enough to persuade anybody that she hadn't made up the whole thing. She prevailed upon her neighbor to go back to the house with her. In front of the deep-freeze they found a small pool of water, and a wet cat, busily licking itself. The neighbor subsequently told reporters that the cat was concentrating its licking on one of its hind legs, where some ice still remained, so that she, for one, believed the story.

A follow-up dispatch, published a week later, reported that the cat was unharmed by the adventure. Further, Mrs. Graham was quoted as saying that the cat had had a large meal just before

its disappearance; that as soon after its rescue as it had dried itself off, it took a long nap, precisely as it always did after a meal; and that it was not hungry again until evening. It was clear from the accounts that the life processes had been stopped dead in their tracks, and bad, after defrosting, resumed at exactly the point where they left off.

Perhaps it is unfair to pull all the responsibility on one luckless cat. Had such a thing happened anywhere else in the country, it would have been talked about, believed by a few, disbelieved by most, and forgotten. But it happened in Los Angeles. There, and probably only there, the event was anything but forgotten; the principles it revealed became the basis of a hugely successful business.

How shall we regard the Zeritsky Brothers? As archvillains or pioneers? In support of the latter view, it must be admitted that the spirit of inquiry and the willingness to risk the unknown were indisputably theirs. However, their pioneering -- if we agree to call it that -- was, equally indisputably, bound up with the quest for a fast buck.

Some of their first clients paid as high as $15,000 for the initial freezing, and the exorbitant rate of $1,000 per year as a storage charge. The Zeritsky Brothers owned and managed one of the largest quick-freezing plants in the world, and it was their claim that converting the freezing equipment and storage facilities to accommodate humans was extremely expensive, hence the high rates.

When the early clients who paid these rates were defrosted years later, and found other clients receiving the same services for as little as $3,000, they threatened a row and the Zeritskys made substantial refunds. By that time they could easily afford it, and since any publicity about their enterprise was unwelcome to them, all refunds were made without a whimper. $3,000 became the standard rate, with $100 per year the storage charge, and no charge for defrosting.

The Zeritskys were businessmen, first and last. Anyone who had the fee could put himself away for whatever period of time he wished, and no questions asked, The ironclad rule was that full payment had to be made in advance.

Criminals were the first to apply for quick-freezing, and formed the mainstay of the Zeritskys' business through the years. What more easy than to rob, hide the loot (except for that all-important advance payment), present yourself to the Zeritskys and remain in their admirable chambers for five or ten years, emerge to find the hue and cry long since died down and the crime forgotten, recover your haul and live out your life in luxury?

Due to the shady character of most of their patrons, the Zeritskys kept all records by a system of numbers. Name never appeared on the books, and anonymity was guaranteed.

Law enforcement agents, looking for fugitives from justice, found no way to break down this system, nor any law which they could interpret as making it illegal to quick-freeze. Perhaps the truth is that they did not search too diligently for a law that could be made to apply. As long as the Zeritskys kept things quiet and did not advertise or attract public attention, they could safely continue their bizarre business.

City officials of Los Angeles, and particularly members of the police force, enjoyed a period of unparalleled prosperity. Lawyers and other experts who thought they were on the track of legal means by which to liquidate the Zeritsky empire found themselves suddenly able to buy a ranch or a yacht or both, and retire forever from the arduous task of earning a living.

Even with a goodly part of the population of Los Angeles as permanent pensioners, the Zeritsky fortune grew to incredible proportions. By the time the Zeritsky Brothers died and left the

business to their sons, it was a gold mine, and an inexhaustible one at that.

Next to criminals, the majority of people who applied for quick-freezing seem to have been husbands or wives caught in insupportable marital situations. Their experiences were subsequently written up in the confession magazines. It was usually the husband who fled to Los Angeles and incarcerated himself for an appropriate number of years, at the end of which time his unamiable spouse would have died or made other arrangements. If we can believe the magazines, this scheme worked out very well in most cases.

The sins of the fathers may be visited on the sons, but how often we see repeated the old familiar pattern of the sons destroying the lifework of the fathers! The Zeritsky Brothers were fanatically meticulous. They supervised every detail of their operations, and kept their records with an elaborate system of checks and doublechecks. They were shrewd enough to realize that complete dependability was essential to their business. A satisfied Zeritsky client was a silent client. One dissatisfied client would be enough to blow the business apart.

The sons, in their greed, over-expanded to the point where they could not, even among the four of them, personally supervise each and every detail. A fatal mistake was bound to occur sooner or later. When it did, the victim broadcast his grievance to the world.

The story appeared in a national magazine, every copy of which was sold an hour after it appeared on the stands. Under the title They Put the Freeze on Me! John A. Monahan told his tragic tale. At the age of 37, he had fallen desperately in love with a girl of 16. She was immature and frivolous and wanted to "play around" a little more before she settled down.

"She told me," he wrote, "to come back in five years, and that stared me thinking. In five year I'd be 42, and what would a girl of 21 want with a man twice as old as her?"

John Monahan moved in circles where the work of the Zeritskys was well known. Not only did he see an opportunity of being still only 37 when his darling reached 21, but he foresaw a painless way of passing the years which he must endure without her. Accordingly, he presented himself for the deep-freeze, paid his $3000 and the $500 storage charge in advance, and left, he claimed, "written instructions to let me out in five years, so there'd he no mistakes."

Nobody knows how the slip happened, but somehow John A. Monahan, or rather the number assigned to him, was entered on the books for 25 years instead of five years. Upon being defrosted, and discovering that a quarter of a century had elapsed, his rage was awesome. Along with everything else, his love for his sweetheart had been perfectly preserved, but she had given up waiting for him and was a happy mother of two boys and six girls.

Monahan's accusation that the Zeritskys had "ruined his life" may be taken with a grain of salt. He was still a young man, and the rumor that he got a hundred thousand for the magazine rights to his story was true.

As most readers are aware, what has come to be known as "Zeritsky's law" was passed by Congress and signed by the President three days after Monahan's story broke.

Seventy-five years after Mrs. Graham's cat feel into the freezer, it became he law of the land that the mandatory penalty for anyone applying quick-freezing methods to any living thing, human or animal, was death. Also, all quick-frozen people were to be defrosted immediately.

Los Angeles papers reported that beginning on the day Monahan's story appeared, men by the thousands poured into the city. They continued to come, choking every available means of transport, for the next two days -- until, that is, Zerisky's Law went through.

When we consider the date, and remember that due to the gravity of the international

situation, a bill had just been passed drafting all men from 16 to 60, we realize why Congress had to act.

The Zeritskys, of course, were among the first to be taken. Because of their experience, they were put in charge of a military warehouse for dehydrated foods, and warned not to get any ideas for a new business.

UNIT 8. THE ROLE OF SCIENCE FICTION

Science fiction is definitely not pure science, but neither is it pure fiction. This literary genre, argues science fiction writer Ben Bova, stands as a bridge between science and fiction, between reason and emotion. Moreover, science fiction is not mere entertainment, but has a more important role to play. Believe it or not, it can help us to understand the ways in which our world may change and assist us in shaping the future in the manner that we wish.

THE ROLE OF SCIENCE FICTION

Ben Bova

The year 1972 was marked by publication of a controversial book, The Limits to Growth, This study of the world's future, done by a team of MIT scientists with the aid of computer "models" of the future of our society, forecast a planet wide disaster unless humankind sharply limits its population growth and consumption of natural resources.

Most people were caught by surprise when the book came out. Many refused to believe that disaster is possible, probable, inevitable -- if we don't change our mode of running Spaceship Earth. But science fiction people were neither surprised nor outraged. The study was really old news to them. They'd been making their own "models" of tomorrow and testing them all them all their lives.

For what the scientists attempted with their computer model is very much like the thing that science fiction writers and readers have been doing for decades. Instead of using a computer to "model" a future world society, science fiction writers have used their human imaginations. This gives the writers some enormous advantages.

One of the advantages is flexibility.

Science fiction writers are not in the business of predicting the future. They do something much more important. They try to show the many possible future that lie open to us.

For there is not simply a future, a time to come that's inevitable. Our future is built, bit by bit, minute by minute, by the actions of human beings. One vital role of science fiction is to show what kinds of future might result from certain kinds of human actions.

To communicate the ideas, the fears and hopes, the shape and feel of all the infinite possible futures, science fiction writers lean heavily on another of their advantages: the art of fiction.

For while a scientist's job has largely ended when he's reduced his data to tabular or graph from, the work of a science fiction writer is just beginning. His task is to convey the human story: the scientific basis for the possible future of his story is merely the background. Perhaps "merely" is too limiting a word. Much of science fiction consists of precious little except the background, the basic idea, the gimmick. But the best of science fiction, the stories that make a lasting impact on generations of readers, are stories about people. The people may be nonhuman. They may be robots or other types of machines. But they will be people, in the sense that human readers can feel for them, share their joys and sorrows, their dangers and their ultimate successes.

The art of fiction has not changed much since prehistoric times. The formula for telling a powerful story has remained the same: create a strong character, a person of great strengths, capable of deep emotions and decisive action. Give him a weakness. Set him in conflict with another powerful character -- or perhaps with nature. Let his exterior conflict be the mirror of the protagonist's own interior conflict, the clash of his desires, his own strength against his own weakness. And there you have a story. Whether it's Abraham offering his only son to God, or Paris bringing ruin to Troy over a woman, or Hamlet and Claudius playing their deadly game, Faust seeking the world's knowledge and power -- the stories that stand out in the minds of the reader are those whose characters are unforgettable.

To show other worlds, to describe possible future societies and the problems lurking ahead, is not enough. The writer of science fiction must show how these worlds and these futures affect human beings. And something much more important: he must show how human beings can and do literally create these future worlds. For our future is largely in our own hands. It doesn't come blindly rolling out of the heavens; it is the joint product of the actions of billions of human beings. This is a point that's easily forgotten in the rush of headlines and the hectic badgering of everyday life. But it's a point that science fiction makes constantly: the future belongs to us -- whatever it is. We make it, our actions shape tomorrow. We have the brains and guts to build paradise (or at least try). Tragedy is when we fail, and the greatest crime of all is when we fail even to try.

Thus science fiction stands as a bridge between science and art, between the engineers of technology and the poets of humanity. Never has such a bridge been more desperately needed.

Writing in the British journal New Scientist, the famed poet and historian Robert Graves said in 1972, "Technology is now warring openly against the crafts, and science covertly against poetry."

What Graves is expressing is the fear that many people have: technology has already allowed machines to replace human muscle power; now it seems that machines such as electronic computers might replace human brainpower. And he goes even further, criticizing science on the grounds that truly human endeavours such as poetry have a power that scientists can't recognize.

Apparently Graves sees scientists as a sober, plodding phalanx of soulless thinking machines, never making a step that hasn't been carefully thought out in advance.

But as a historian, Graves should be aware that James Clerk Maxwell's brilliant insight about electromagnetism -- the guess that visible light is only one small slice of the spectrum of electromagnetic energy, a guess that forms the basis for electronics technology -- was an intuitive leap into the unknown. Maxwell had precious little evidence to back up his guess. The evidence came later. The list of wild jumps of intuition made by these supposedly stolid, humorless scientists is long indeed.

Scientists are human beings! They are just as human, intuitive, and emotional as anyone else. But most people don't realize this. They don't know scientists, any more than they know much about science.

Today most people still tend to hold scientists in awe. After all, scientists have brought us nuclear weapons, modern medicines, space flight, and underarm deodorants. Yet at the same time, we see scientists derided as fuzzy-brained eggheads or as coldly ruthless, emotionless makers of monsters. Scientists are minority group, and like most minorities they're largely hidden from the public's sight, tucked away in ghettos -- laboratories, campuses, field sites out in the desert or on Pacific atolls.

大学英语精读第一册课文翻译

第一单元 课程开始之际，就如何使学习英语的任务更容易提出一些建议似乎正当其实。 学习英语的几种策略 学习英语决非易事。它需要刻苦和长期努力。 虽然不经过持续的刻苦努力便不能期望精通英语，然而还是有各种有用的学习策略可以用来使这一任务变得容易一些。以下便是其中的几种： 1．不要以完全相同的方式对待所有的生词。你可曾因为简直无法记住所学的所有生词而抱怨自己的记忆力太差？其实，责任并不在你的记忆力。如果你一下子把太多的生词塞进头脑，必定有一些生词会被挤出来。你需要做的是根据生词日常使用的频率以不同的方式对待它们。积极词汇需要经常练习，有用的词汇必须牢记，而在日常情况下不常出现的词只需见到时认识即可。你会发现把注意力集中于积极有用的词上是扩大词汇量最有效的途径。 2．密切注意地道的表达方式。你可曾纳闷过，为什么我们说“我对英语感兴趣”是“I’m interested in English”，而说“我精于法语”则是“I’m good at French”?你可曾问过自己，为什么以英语为母语的人说“获悉消息或密秘”是“learnthenewsorsecret”,而“获悉某人的成功或到来”却是“learn of someone’s success or arrival”?这些都是惯用法的例子。在学习英语时，你不仅必须注意词义，还必须注意以英语为母语的人在日常生活中如何使用它。 3．每天听英语。经常听英语不仅会提高你的听力，而且有助你培养说的技能。除了专为课程准备的语言磁带外，你还可以听英语广播，看英语电视和英语电影。第一次听录好音的英语对话或语段，你也许不能听懂很多。先试着听懂大意，然后在反复地听。 你会发现每次重复都会听懂更多的xx。 4．抓住机会说。的确，在学校里必须用英语进行交流的场合并不多，但你还是可以找到练习讲英语的机会。例如，跟你的同班同学进行交谈可能就是得到一些练习的一种轻松愉快的方式。还可以找校园里以英语为母语的人跟他们

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Unit1 课程开始之际，就如何使学习英语的任务更容易提出一些建议似乎正当其时。 Some Strategies or Learning English 学习英语绝非易事。它需要刻苦和长期努力。 虽然不经过持续的刻苦努力便不能期望精通英语，然而还是有各种有用的学习策略可以用来使这一任务变得容易一些。以下便是其中的几种。 1. 不要以完全同样的方式对待所有的生词。你可曾因为简直无法记住所学的所有生词而抱怨自己的记忆力太差？其实，责任并不在你的记忆力。如果你一下子把太多的生词塞进头脑，必定有一些生词会被挤出来。你需要做的是根据生词日常使用的频率以不同的方式对待它们。积极词汇需要经常练习，有用的词汇必须牢记，而在日常情况下不常出现的词只需见到时认识即可。你会发现把注意力集中于积极有用的词上是扩大词汇量最有效的途径。 2．密切注意地道的表达方式。你可曾纳闷过，为什么我们说我对英语感兴趣是I'm 湩整敲瑳摥椠?湅汧獩屨，而说我精于法语则是???潧摯愠?牆湥档？你可曾问过自己，为什么以英语为母语的人说获悉消息或秘密是汜慥湲琠敨渠睥?牯猠捥敲屴，而获悉某人的成功或到来却是汜慥湲漠?潳敭湯?环猠捵散獳漠?牡楲慶屬？这些都是惯用法的例子。在学习英语时，你不仅必须注意词义，还必须注意以英语为母语的人在日常生活中如何使用它。 3．每天听英语。经常听英语不仅会提高你的听力，而且有助你培养说的技能。除了专为课程准备的语言磁带外，你还可以听英语广播，看英语电视和英语电影。第一次听录好音的英语对话或语段，你也许不能听懂很多。先试着听懂大意，然后再反复地听。你会发现每次重复都会听懂更多的东西。 4．抓住机会说。的确，在学校里必须用英语进行交流的场合并不多，但你还是可以找到练习讲英语的机会。例如，跟你的同班同学进行交谈可能就是得到一些练习的一种轻松愉快的方式。还可以找校园里以英语为母语的人跟他们随意交谈。或许练习讲英语最容易的方式是高声朗读，因为这在任何时间，任何地方，不需要搭档就可以做到。例如，你可以看着图片18 / 1 或身边的物件，试着对它们详加描述。你还可以复述日常情景。在商店里购物或在餐馆里吃完饭付过账后，假装这一切都发生在一个讲英语的国家，试着用英语把它表演出来。 5．广泛阅读。广泛阅读很重要，因为在我们的学习环境中，阅读是最重要、最可靠的语言输入来源。在选择阅读材料时，要找你认为有趣的、不需要过多依赖词典就能看懂的东西。开始时每天读一页是个好办法。接下去，你就会发现你每天可以读更多页，而且能对付难度更高的材料。6．经常写。写作是练习你已经学会的东西的好方法。除了老师布置的作文，你还可以找到自己要写的理由。有个笔友可以提供很好的动力；与某个跟你趣味相投但来自不同文化的人进行交流，你会学到很多东西。经常写作的其他方式还有记日记，写小故事或概述每天的新闻。 语言学习是一个积累的过程。从读和听中吸收尽量多的东西，然后再试着把学到的东西通过说和写加以运用，定会大有收益。 Unit2 弗朗西斯·奇切斯特在六十五岁时开始了只身环球航行。本文记述的就是这一冒险故事。 Sailing Round the Word 弗朗西斯·奇切斯特在独自驾船作环球航行之前，已有好几次让他的朋友们感到吃惊了。他曾试图作环球飞行，但没有成功。那是1931年。 好多年过去了。他放弃了飞行，开始航海。他领略到航海的巨大乐趣。奇切斯特在首届横渡大西洋单人航海比赛中夺魁时，已经五十八岁。他周游世界的宿愿重又被唤起，不过这一次他是要驾船环游。由于他患有肺癌，朋友们和医生们都认为他不该去，但奇切斯特决意实施自己的计划。

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第一单元 课程开始之际，就如何使学习英语的任务更容易提出一些建议似乎正当其实。 学习英语的几种策略 学习英语决非易事。它需要刻苦和长期努力。 虽然不经过持续的刻苦努力便不能期望精通英语，然而还是有各种有用的学习策略可以用来使这一任务变得容易一些。以下便是其中的几种： 1．不要以完全相同的方式对待所有的生词。你可曾因为简直无法记住所学的所有生词而抱怨自己的记忆力太差其实，责任并不在你的记忆力。如果你一下子把太多的生词塞进头脑，必定有一些生词会被挤出来。你需要做的是根据生词日常使用的频率以不同的方式对待它们。积极词汇需要经常练习，有用的词汇必须牢记，而在日常情况下不常出现的词只需见到时认识即可。你会发现把注意力集中于积极有用的词上是扩大词汇量最有效的途径。 2．密切注意地道的表达方式。你可曾纳闷过，为什么我们说“我对英语感兴趣”是“I’m interested in English”，而说“我精于法语”则是“I’m good at French”你可曾问过自己，为什么以英语为母语的人说“获悉消息或密秘”是“learn the news or secret”,而“获悉某人的成功或到来”却是“learn of someone’s success or arrival”这些都是惯用法的例子。在学习英语时，你不仅必须注意词义，还必须注意以英语为母语的人在日常生活中如何使用它。 3．每天听英语。经常听英语不仅会提高你的听力，而且有助你培养说的技能。除了专为课程准备的语言磁带外，你还可以听英语广播，看英语电视和英语电影。第一次听录好音的英语对话或语段，你也许不能听懂很多。先试着听懂大意，然后在反复地听。你会发现每次重复都会听懂更多的东西。

现代大学英语精读第六册课文翻译

现代大学英语精读6课文翻译 1如何使我们不为穷人的存在而内疚 约翰·肯尼斯·高伯瑞(加尔布雷斯) 1.我很愿意严肃地考虑一种人类最古老的活动，这项活动持续了多年，实际上已经超过了几个世纪，那就是尝试怎样使我们不为穷人的存在而内疚。 2.贫穷和富有从一开始就共生在一起，彼此很不愉快有时还充满危险。普鲁塔克曾说，“贫富失衡乃共和政体最致命的宿疾。”富有和贫穷持续共存产生的问题，特别是如何证明在其 他人还贫穷时我们富有是有道理的这一问题，成为有思想有学问的人几百年来孜孜不倦地思 考探索的问题。直至当代状况依然如此。 3.《圣经》提出了最初的解决之道，在现世遭受贫穷的人来世会得到更好的回报。他们的贫穷是暂时的灾难，如果贫穷但却能顺从，他们将来就会成为世界的主人。在某种程度上这就是最理想的解决办法。由此，富人就可以一边嫉妒穷人的美好前途一边享受他们的财富。 4.很长时间之后，即在1776年《国富论》发表的二三十年之后——在英国工业革命开始 之后，贫富不均的问题及其解决办法开始具有了现代的形式。杰罗米·边沁，这位与亚当·斯密几乎是同时代的人，提出了这样一种准则，在某种程度上，美国人认为这一准则在英国几 乎50年来一直影响显著。这就是实用主义学说。“通过实用的原则，”边沁在1789年指出，“也就是通过这一原则来赞成或否定任何一种应运而生的看来似乎必定会增加或减少政党 幸福的行为或做法，尽管政党的利益总是在讨论之中。”实用，实际上一定是以自我为中心的。然而，社会中只有少数人拥有大量财富，却有更多人没有财富。只要遵循边沁的话—— “最大的利益给最多的人”，就能够解决社会问题。社会尽力满足更多的人，人们接受对于 很多利益没被满足的人来说，结果极其不幸。 5.在19世纪30年代，一种新的准则成为使我们不为穷人的存在感到内疚的有效办法，迄今为止它的影响也丝毫没有减弱。这是与股票家大卫·李嘉图和T·R·马尔萨斯神父联系 在一起的。它的本质很为人们所熟悉，穷人的贫穷是他们自己的错误。贫穷是他们过度生育 的结果。很遗憾，他们不能控制性欲，过度生育把地球具有的养活人口的能力推向极限。 6.这就是人口论。生育引起的贫穷意味着富人不应该为贫穷的产生和解决承担责任。然而，马尔萨斯本人并不是缺乏责任感的人，他极力主张婚姻的仪式应该包括对过度或不负责任的 性生活的警告——公平地讲，是一种警告，因为它还没有被看做是一种完全有效的控制生育 的方法。在近代，罗纳德·里根曾经说过控制人口的最佳形式存在于市场。(热恋中的夫妇应该上梅西百货公司，而不是回到新房。)应该说，马尔萨斯的建议至少沾点边。 7.19世纪中叶，一种新的解决这一问题的方案产生了很大影响，在美国影响尤其强烈。 这一学说与赫伯特·斯宾塞的名字联系在一起，就是社会学中的进化论。在经济生活中如同在生物进化过程中一样，主导的规律是适者生存。“适者生存”这个短语实际上并不出自查 尔斯·达尔文，而是出自斯宾塞，后者表达了对经济生活的看法。穷人被淘汰是大自然种族 进化的方式。弱的、不幸的人灭亡了，人类家庭的质量就会提高。 8.最著名的美国达尔文社会进化论的发言人之一约翰·洛克菲勒一一第一个洛克菲勒一一 在一次著名的演讲中说，“美国这朵玫瑰花以其华贵与芳香让观众倾倒，赞不绝口。而她之 所以能被培植出来，就是因为在早期其周围的花蕾被掐掉了。在经济生活中情况亦是如此。