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
(1)There’s this great recurring Saturday Night Live skit from several years back where Phil Hartman plays an unfrozen caveman wh
(1)There’s this great recurring Saturday Night Live skit from several years back where Phil Hartman plays an unfrozen caveman wh
admin
2018-05-11
83
问题
(1)There’s this great recurring Saturday Night Live skit from several years back where Phil Hartman plays an unfrozen caveman who goes to law school. He pontificates(发表武断的意见)on the American judicial system while marveling at modem technology like The Tiny People in The Magic Box(a TV). It fits a common stereotype: Human ancestors were, well, cavemen, and not as smart as we are today. A new hypothesis from a Stanford geneticist tries to turn this stereotype upside down.
(2)Human intelligence may have actually peaked before our ancient predecessors ever left Africa, Gerald Crabtree writes in two new journal articles. Genetic mutations during the past several millennia are causing a decline in overall human intellectual and emotional fitness, he says. Evolutionary pressure no longer favors intellect, so the problem is getting worse. He is careful to say that this is taking quite a long time, so it’s not like your grandparents are models of brilliance while your children will be cavemen rivaling Hartman’s SNL character. But he does maintain that an ancient Athenian, plucked from 1000 BC, would be "among the brightest and most intellectually alive of our colleagues and companions. "
(3)His central thesis is that each generation produces deleterious(有害的)mutations, so down the line of human history, our intelligence is ever more impaired compared to that of our predecessors.
(4)Not surprisingly, the hypothesis, published in the journal Trends in Genetics, has several geneticists scratching their heads.
(5)"It takes thousands of genes to build a human brain, and mutations in any one of those can impair that process, that’s absolutely true. It’s also true that with each new generation, new mutations arise...but Crabtree ignores the other side of the equation, which is selection," said Kevin Mitchell, associate professor at the Smurfit Institute of Genetics at Trinity College Dublin. " Natural selection is incredibly powerful, and it definitely has the ability to weed out new mutations that significantly impair intellectual ability. There are various aspects in these papers that I think are really just flunking about things in a wrong way. "
(6)Crabtree said he wanted to examine the cumulative effect of generation-to-generation mutation on intelligence, which is thought to be controlled by many genes. Using indexes that measure X-chromosome(染色体)-related mental retardation, he comes up with between 2,000 and 5,000 genes related to human intellectual ability. Using another index measuring average mutations that arise in each generation of children, he calculates that within 3, 000 years, "we have all sustained two or more mutations harmful to our intellectual or emotional stability. "
(7)"There is a general feeling that evolution constantly improves us, but it only does that if there is selection applied," Crabtree said in an interview. " In this case, it is questionable about how much selection is occurring now compared to the process of optimizing those genes, which occurred in the jungles of Africa 500,000 years ago. "
(8)There’s already evidence for this in other areas, he argues: Take our sense of smell. Humans have far fewer olfactory receptors than other animals, he said—we’re guided by our intellect now, not by smell. We can think about where a piece of food came from, how it was processed, which plant it’s from, who has been around it, and so on. A dog, on the other hand, simply sniffs something and either eats it or doesn’t.
(9)Similarly, he believes evolution now selects for other traits—namely, the most healthy and the most immune, not the most intelligent.
(10)But geneticists took issue with his claims, not to mention his citations and methods. Mitchell took issue with Crabtree’s characterization of genes—he describes them as links in a chain, with incredible overall disruptive power. They’re like a bulb on a string of Christmas tree lights that suddenly fails to work, taking out the entire strand with it: "It can be concluded that genes related to intelligence do not operate as a robust network, but rather as links in a chain, failure of any one of which leads to intellectual disability," he writes. Mitchell countered that this ignores other genes that don’t cause intellectual disability.
(11)" Biological systems are robust to degradation of several different components," Mitchell said. " Evolution has gone to a lot of trouble to craft your genome so it’s finely honed to do its job, and it doesn’t make sense that you would have all this random mutation in your brain cells. Also, you would have a very high rate of brain cancer. "
Which of the following would Gerald Crabtree most likely DISAGREE with?
选项
A、Genetic mutations play a significant part in the decline of human intelligence.
B、Harmful mutations tend to be unchangeable and easy to get rid of.
C、Human beings today are no longer pressured to improve their intellect.
D、Natural selection is useful in the process of evolution only on some occasions.
答案
B
解析
态度题。根据第二段可知,克拉布特认为基因变异在人类智力的衰退过程中起着重要作用,进化过程如今已不再选择更优智力,因此人们再也不像先祖那样在智力的发展方面存在压力,所以与智力有关的基因已不再那么活跃,综上所述,[A]和[C]都是克拉布特认同的观点,故均排除;根据第三段可知,[B]“有害的变异不易变化,且易于清除”与其观点相悖,故选[B];根据第七段可知,克拉布特认为只有自然选择发挥作用时人类才会得到改善,比起五十万年前人类先祖迫于生存而使基因最优化的过程,究竟有多大程度的自然选择正在发生还不确定,因此[D]“进化过程中,自然选择仅在一些场合下起作用”符合其观点,故也排除。
转载请注明原文地址:https://kaotiyun.com/show/RPoK777K
0
专业英语八级
相关试题推荐
CulturalDifferencesbetweenEastandWestI.FactorsleadingtotheculturaldifferencesA.Differentculture【T1】______【T1】___
CulturalDifferencesbetweenEastandWestI.FactorsleadingtotheculturaldifferencesA.Differentculture【T1】______【T1】___
A、Notassumingeveryonewillbehaveinthesamewayasyoudo.B、Tryingtorespecttheculturaltraditionsofyourcounterparts.
听人家背地里谈论,孔乙己原来也读过书,但终于没有进学,又不会营生;于是愈过愈穷,弄到将要讨饭了。幸而写的一笔好字,便替人家抄抄书,换一碗饭吃。可惜他又有一样坏脾气,便是好喝懒作。坐不到几天,便连人和书籍纸张笔研,一齐失踪。如是几次,叫他抄书的人都没有了。孔
A、Greatgeneralknowledge.B、Frequentinteraction.C、Morespontaneity.D、Goodintonation.D此题询问在演讲过程中要注意什么。其中女士说到声音的起伏也很重要,这会让人听
SubfieldsofLinguisticsTheoverlappinginterestsbetweenthefieldoflinguisticsandotherdisciplinescreateseveral【T1】
SubfieldsofLinguisticsTheoverlappinginterestsbetweenthefieldoflinguisticsandotherdisciplinescreateseveral【T1】
There’sthisgreatrecurring"SaturdayNightLive"skitfromseveralyearsbackwherePhilHartmanplaysanunfrozencavemanwho
这次使命还标志着中国航天计划的最大成就,因为中国的航天计划由于现代史上的动乱而受阻,先是20世纪50年代末期的大跃进,后是70年代的文化大革命,航天计划不但放慢,有时甚至停止。路透社在发自北京的新闻报道中说,这次发射成功突出表明中国成为一支新兴力量。中国是
随机试题
下列选项属于森林资源资产特点的有()。
蔡某,男,75岁,已婚,汉族。两年前妻子去世,独自居住,近1年来患者出现对任何事情不感兴趣,做事丢三落四,记不住家属的名字,情绪变得易激惹,性格变得自私、挑剔,近期出现重复购买相同的物品,记忆力差,说话没有逻辑,由家人送入医院。该患者的首发症状为
女性,52岁,反复发作性头痛、心悸、恶心3年,发作时面色苍白,血压升高,最高时达240/135mmHg,平时血压正常。该病人最可能的诊断是
患者男性,75岁,2型糖尿病病史30年,近6年出现蛋白尿及高血压,近2年来肾功能逐渐减退。3个月开始出现恶心、口区吐,伴双下肢浮肿。近日化验血清K+5.5mmol/L,CO2CP16.5mmol/L,Cr830μmol/L,Hb6.5g/dl,血糖16mm
A.疏肝清热,养血调经B.疏肝健脾,养血调经C.疏肝化痰,和胃止痛D.健脾,化湿,和胃E.消食,导滞,和胃某男,12岁,两日来,因饮食失节导致脘腹胀满,嗳气吞酸,不思饮食,医师处以保和丸,是因其能()。
桥梁工程滑模施工的主要设备包括()。
如果当前的证券价格反映了历史价格信息和所有公开的价格信息,则该市场属于()。
下列有关民族自治州名称的表述中,错误的是()。
Thedetectiveandhisassistanthavebegunto______themysteriousmurder.
在巴西,通过非洲蜂和当地蜂进行比较研究而得出的结论是,非洲蜂的蜂蜜产量远远高于本地蜂的蜂蜜产量。因此,没有理由担心美国的蜂蜜产量会下降,可以用非洲蜂来替代美国当地的蜜蜂。以下哪项如果为真,就最不能构成对上述论证的质疑?
最新回复
(
0
)