TED演讲： 你存钱的能力跟你用的语言有关?(3)

 　　And in fact, if I want to speak correctly, Chinese forces me to constantly think about it. 事实上，如果要我不弄错的话，我就要不断的去想这之间的关系。

　　Now, that fascinated me endlessly as a child, 这是小时候让我很好奇的事情，

　　but what fascinates me even more today as an economist¹ 而现在我作为一个经济学家更加好奇的是

　　is that some of these same differences carry through to how languages speak about time. 不同的语言在如何表示时间上的差异。

　　So for example, if I'm speaking in English, I have to speak grammatically differently 例如，在英语中需要用明确的语法变化来表示不同的时态，

　　if I'm talking about past rain, "It rained yesterday," current rain, "It is raining now," or future rain, "It will rain tomorrow." 如果我说过去下过雨：“It rained yesterday”，正在下雨：“It is raining now”，将要下雨：It will rain tomorrow.”

　　Notice that English requires a lot more information with respect to the timing² of events. 注意英语中需要很多的元素来表示事件发生的时间。

　　Why? Because I have to consider that and I have to modify what I'm saying to say, "It will rain," or "It's going to rain." 因为我需要根据我要说的事件的时间来调整自己要说的话，“It will rain”或“It's going to rain.”

　　It's simply not permissible³ in English to say, "It rain tomorrow." 英语语法禁止你说成“It rain tomorrow”。

　　In contrast to that, that's almost exactly what you would say in Chinese. 中文的表达方式跟英文恰恰相反。

　　A Chinese speaker can basically say something that sounds very strange to an English speaker's ears. 一个说中文的人说出来的话会让一个说英文的人听起来怪怪的。

　　They can say, "Yesterday it rain," "Now it rain," "Tomorrow it rain." 他们会说，“昨天下雨”、“现在下雨”、“明天下雨”。

　　In some deep sense, Chinese doesn't divide up the time spectrum⁴ 从更深的角度来看，中文并没有将时间进行严格的分割，

　　in the same way that English forces us to constantly do in order to speak correctly. 而英文则将此作为语言正确与否的准则之一。

　　Is this difference in languages only between very, very distantly related languages, like English and Chinese? 这种差异是不是只有在中文和英文差异这么大的语言之间才会有？

　　Actually, no. So many of you know, in this room, that English is a Germanic language. 实际上，不是。你们当中的很多人都知道英语属于日尔曼语系。

　　What you may not have realized is that English is actually an outlier. 你们可能没有意识到英语算是这个语系的一个异类。

　　It is the only Germanic language that requires this. 英语是日尔曼语系中唯一需要这些的。

1 economist   

n.经济学家，经济专家，节俭的人

参考例句：

• He cast a professional economist's eyes on the problem.他以经济学行家的眼光审视这个问题。
• He's an economist who thinks he knows all the answers.他是个经济学家，自以为什么都懂。

2 timing   

n.时间安排，时间选择

参考例句：

• The timing of the meeting is not convenient.会议的时间安排不合适。
• The timing of our statement is very opportune.我们发表声明选择的时机很恰当。

3 permissible   

adj.可允许的，许可的

参考例句：

• Is smoking permissible in the theatre?在剧院里允许吸烟吗？
• Delay is not permissible,even for a single day.不得延误，即使一日亦不可。

4 spectrum   

n.谱，光谱，频谱；范围，幅度，系列

参考例句：

• This is a kind of atomic spectrum.这是一种原子光谱。
• We have known much of the constitution of the solar spectrum.关于太阳光谱的构成，我们已了解不少。