考研英語拓展閱讀及翻譯：科學家可讓猴子說“人話”

　　Monkeys have the vocal tracts to produce human speech sounds, but what they lack is a speech-ready brain, a new study has found.

　　據一項新研究發現，猴子的聲道可以發出人類語言的聲音，但是它們缺少一個會說話的大腦。

　　The study, conducted by researchers from the U.S. and Europe and published this week in the U.S. journal Science Advances, used X-ray video to see within the mouth and throat of macaque monkeys induced to vocalize, eat food, or make facial expressions.

　　這份研究由美國和歐洲的研究者們聯合進行、發表在本周的美國雜志《科學進展(Science Advances)》上，在獼猴發出聲音、進食和做出面部表情時，使用X射線頻來觀察它們嘴巴和喉嚨內部。

　　The scientists then used these data to build a computer model of a monkey vocal tract, allowing them to answer the question "what would monkey speech sound like, if a human brain were in control?"

　　科學家們隨后用這些數據建立了一個猴子聲道的電腦模型，從而使得他們回答這一問題--“如果猴子長了人腦，那么它們的'語言是什么樣的?”

　　The results showed that monkeys could easily produce many different sounds, enough to produce thousands of distinct words.

　　結果表明猴子可以輕松地發出許多不同的聲音，足以產生上萬個不同的詞匯。

　　For example, monkeys could produce comprehensible vowel sounds -- and even full sentences -- with their vocal tracts if they had the neural ability to speak.

　　舉例來說，如果猴子說話的神經能力的話，它們可以用自己的聲道說出可理解的元音--甚至是完整的句子。

　　The researchers noted, however, that while monkeys would be understandable to the human ear, they would not sound precisely like humans.

　　然而研究者們指出，雖然人類可以理解說的話，但是它們的聲音卻和人類不大一樣。

　　Therefore, the researchers concluded that previous research -- largely based on plaster casts made from the vocal tracts of a monkey cadaver -- underestimates primate vocal abilities and that evolution of human speech capabilities required neural changes rather than an adaptation of vocal anatomy.

　　因此研究者們作出結論認為，之前的研究(很大程度上基于一只死亡猴子聲道的石膏模型)低估了靈長類動物的發聲能力，而人類語言能力進化需要的是神經的改變而不是聲道生理構造的改變。

　　"Now nobody can say that it’s something about the vocal anatomy that keeps monkeys from being able to speak -- it has to be something in the brain," said Asif Ghazanfar, a professor of psychology at the Princeton University and one of the study leaders.

　　該項研究領導者之一、普林斯頓大學心理學教授阿西夫表示說：“現在沒人說猴子不能說話是因為聲道生理構造和人類不同啦--而是它們大腦里的東西和人類不同�！�

　　"Even if this finding only applies to macaque monkeys, it would still debunk the idea that it’s the anatomy that limits speech in nonhumans."

　　“即使這一發現只適用于獼猴，它仍然會打破認為非人生物在語言方面的限制是因為它們聲道生理構造和人類不同這一思想�！�

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