首页
外语
计算机
考研
公务员
职业资格
财经
工程
司法
医学
专升本
自考
实用职业技能
登录
外语
The latest clock to be invented is a "language clock" which helps us to determine the dates of certain occurrences. This clock r
The latest clock to be invented is a "language clock" which helps us to determine the dates of certain occurrences. This clock r
admin
2013-11-29
35
问题
The latest clock to be invented is a "language clock" which helps us to determine the dates of certain occurrences. This clock requires neither engines, springs, pendulums, nor electricity.
In 1950 some research workers in America discovered that languages change at a steady rate through the centuries. They organized their investigation in the following ways. First, they prepared a list of 200 things for which there are common words in every language. Then they compared these words in modern languages with the ancient languages from which the modem ones had developed. They found that for a certain proportion of the 200 things, the ancient words continued to be used, though written or pronounced differently. But in other cases the ancient words had been replaced by new words which had been introduced into the language.
After a thousand years, on the average, 81% of the old words (162 of the 200 words) were still in use. After 2000 years, on the average, 81% of these 162 words (or 66% of the original to tal of 200) remained. After 3000 years, 81% of these 131 words (or 53% of the original number) remained in use, and so on.
Next this group of research workers investigated situations where two different languages had developed separately and independently, from the same ancient language, (In modern times, of course, such situations are very unlikely to occur. Why?) They found that after 1,000 years, as be fore, each daughter language shared only 66% of the basic 200-word vocabulary. Each daughter language, as before, derived 81% of its 200 words from the original parent language. But (as you might expect) the words which they kept were not quite the same. The proportion of words actually shared by the daughter languages was therefore 81% of 81%, which is 66% of the original 200 words. After 2000 years they shared 66% of 66% of the words, i.e. 43% of the original vocabulary. And after 3000 years they shared only 29% of the original vocabulary.
A long time ago, some Eskimos, speaking the Eskimo language, left the mainland of Alaska and began to live in a group of islands (called the Aleutian Islands) at some instance from the coast. Recently, research workers compared the islander’s language with the modern Eskimo language. They found that the Aleutians and the Eskimos shared only 29% of the words, on the stand ard list. From this fact the investigators were able to calculate the date of the event referred to at the beginning of this paragraph.
American researchers found that the language clock could help ______.
选项
A、count the exact time by years
B、decide when the language came into being
C、make sure when the Aleuts left the mainland
D、determine how the time changed
答案
C
解析
由文章最后一句知,the investigators可以根据the language clock来calculate the date of the event,故选项C正确。
转载请注明原文地址:https://kaotiyun.com/show/5JhO777K
0
考博英语
相关试题推荐
Atsometimearound2300BC,giveortakeacenturyortwo,alargenumberofthemajorcivilizationsoftheworldcollapsed,in
Variousinnovationshavebeenintroducedaswaystobreakoffoursystemwhichforcesstudentsthroughaseriesofidenticalcla
Whenthenewsofhis______withtheenemybecameknown,hewashangedineffigy.
Foryears,doctorshavegivencancerpatientsthreemaintreatments:surgery,radiationandchemotherapy.Nowresearchersarede
Touristsareguilty,sowearefrequentlytold,ofanumberofcrimes;upsettingtheecologicalbalanceofMountHimalayas,park
Theyearsbetween1870and1895broughtenormouschangestothetheaterintheUnitedStatesastheresidentcompanywasundermi
Allspecialistsagreethatthemostimportantconsiderationwithdietdrugsiscarefully______therisksandbenefits.
Fasterthaneverbefore,thehumanworldisbecominganurbanworld.Bythemillionstheycome,theambitiousandthedown-trodd
Fasterthaneverbefore,thehumanworldisbecominganurbanworld.Bythemillionstheycome,theambitiousandthedown-trodd
UniversityPhysicsisintendedforstudentsofscienceandengineering.Primaryemphasisisonphysicalprinciplesandproblem-
随机试题
A.GAPB.GLPC.GCPD.GSP《药品经营质量管理规范》的英文缩写是()。
某权利人拥有的建筑面积为146平方米,本栋建筑物占地面积1032平方米,分摊基底面积为46.40平方米,本栋建筑物总面积为()平方米。
可以用作原始凭证,调整账簿记录的是()
短期政府债券的特征包括()。
凡被降低或取消星级的饭店,自降低或取消之日起()内,不予恢复星级。
就生理发展而言,青年期是()。
战略导向的KPI体系的意义体现在()。
8个人比赛国际象棋,约定每两人之间都要比赛一局,胜者得2分,平局得1分,负的不得分。在进行了若干局比赛之后,发现每个人的分数都不一样。问最多还有几局比赛没比?
【B1】【B19】
Forbestresultswiththeleastrisk,tomatoesshouldbeplantedwhen______.
最新回复
(
0
)