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  3. Few disciplines axe so strongly associated with a single figure: Einstein in physics and Freud in psychology, perhaps. But Noam

Few disciplines axe so strongly associated with a single figure: Einstein in physics and Freud in psychology, perhaps. But Noam

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问题    Few disciplines axe so strongly associated with a single figure: Einstein in physics and Freud in psychology, perhaps. But Noam Chomsky is the man who revolutionised linguistics. Over the past 60 years, Mr. Chomsky has repeatedly stripped down his theory. He has focused ever more narrowly on the features of language that he reckons are unique to humans. All this has led to a remarkable little book, which claims to explain the evolution of human language.
   Other biologists, linguists and psychologists have probed the same question and have reached little consensus. 【F1】But there is even less consensus around the world’s most eminent linguist’s idea: that a single genetic mutation created an ability called "Merge", in a single human whom Mr. Chomsky has called "Prometheus". That mutation was so advantageous that it survived and thrived, producing today’s 7,000 languages. But the vast differences among the world’s languages, Mr. Chomsky argues, are mere differences in "externalisation". The key is Merge.
   But what is it? 【F2】Merge simply says that two mental objects can be merged into a bigger one, and mental operations can be performed on that as if it were a single one. 【F3】The can be merged with cat to give a noun phrase, which other grammar rules can operate on as if it were a bare noun like water. So can the and hat. Once there, you can further merge, making the cat in the hat. And so on.
   Why would this be of any use? Whom did Prometheus talk to? Nobody, at least not using Merge. But Merge-enabled language, according to Mr. Chomsky, did not evolve for talking at all. Rather, it let Prometheus take simple concepts and combine them in sentence-like ways in his own head. The resulting complex thoughts gave him a survival advantage. Only later, as Merge came to work with the vocal and hearing organs, did human language emerge.
   Many scholars find this to be somewhere between insufficient, improbable and absurd. The emergence of a single mutation that gives such a big advantage is belittled by biologists as a "hopeful monster" theory; most evolution is gradual, operating on many genes, not one. 【F4】Some ability like Merge may exist, but this does not explain why some words may merge and others don’t, much less why the world’s languages merge so differently.
   Mr. Chomsky is unlikely to end up like Freud, whose lasting influence has been on the humanities. 【F5】His career is more likely to end up like Einstein’s—at least in the sense that his best and most influential work came early on.
【F5】
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答案他的职业生涯更有可能与爱因斯坦类似，至少在如下意义上：他最佳且最有影响力的学术著作早早就发表了。
解析 ①本句为复合句，包含一个同位语从句。②主句谓语为be likely to do sth．结构，表示“有可能做某事”；end up意为“结束”；Einstein’s为省略形式的所有格，其后省略了名词career，其完整形式是end up like Einstein’s career。③破折号后面的内容是对主句的补充说明；at least in the sense意为“至少在某种意义上”，that引导sense的同位语从句，具体说明是在哪种意义上。
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