高中英语课本听力版本二 高二课文2s_Un01

No Boundaries¹

Imagine this you are twenty-one years old and a promising² student at one of the top universities in the world. One day, your doctor tells you that you have an incurable³ disease⁴ and may not have more than twelve months to live. How would you feel? what would you do? Most of us would probably feel very sad and give up our dreams and hopes for the future. Here is what Steven Hawking⁵ thought:

(there did not seem)much point in working in my PHD---I did not expect to survive that long. yet two years had gone by and I was not that much worse. In fact, things were going rather well for me and I had got engaged⁶ to a very nice girl----Jane Wilde. But in order to get married, I needed a job, and in order to a job, I needed a PHD.

Instead of giving up, hawking went on with his research, got his PHD and married Jane. Nor did he let the disease stop him from living the kind of life he had always dreamt of. He continued his exploration⁷ of the universe and travelled around the world to give lectures. In 2002, Hawking visited China and spoke⁸ to university students in Hangzhou and Beijing. As his disease disabled him, Hawking has to sit on his now famous wheel-chair and speak through a computer. He told the students about his theories and thoughts on some of the greatest questions: what is time, how did the universe begin, and what exactly are black holes?

Hawking became famous in the early 1970s, when he and American Roger Penrose made new discoveries about the big bang⁹ and black holes. Since then ,Hawking has continued to seek answer to questions about the nature of the universe. In 1988, he wrote A Brief History of Time, which quickly became the best seller¹⁰. Readers were pleased and surprised to find that a scientist could write about his work in a way that ordinary people could understand.

In the book, Hawking explains both what it means¹¹ to be a scientist and how science works¹². He tells readers how discoveries are made and how they change the world. Scientist, according¹³ to Hawking, is often misunderstood: People often think that science is about the “true” facts that never change. Scientists, on the other hand, Hawking writes, know that their job is never finished and that even the best theory can turn out to be wrong.

A scientific theory is the result of the scientific method. Scientists look at the world and try to describe and explain what they see. First, they carefully observe what they are interested in. To explain what they have seen, they build a theory about the way in which things happen and the causes and effects. Finally, the scientists test the theory to see if it matches what they have seen and if it can predict¹⁴ future events. If what they are studying something that is too large or too difficult to observe directly¹⁵, they will use a model to test the theory.

People who listen to Hawking’s lectures sometimes find it difficult to understand him, because his thoughts and ideas often seem as large as the universe he is trying to describe. The speech computer is not the problem. In fact people who hear it often say it sounds just like a human voice. Hawking is happy with it, too. “the only trouble”, says Hawking, who is British, “is that it gives me an American accent.”

1 boundaries   

n.分界线( boundary的名词复数 )；范围；使球越过边界线的击球（得加分）；疆界

参考例句：

• Country boundaries are shown on this map as dotted lines. 这张地图上国界以虚线标出。
• The boundaries of that country were changed by a treaty. 那个国家的边界根据条约有所更动。 来自《简明英汉词典》

2 promising   

adj.有希望的，有前途的

参考例句：

• The results of the experiments are very promising.实验的结果充满了希望。
• We're trying to bring along one or two promising young swimmers.我们正设法培养出一两名有前途的年轻游泳选手。

3 incurable   

adj.不能医治的，不能矫正的，无救的；n.不治的病人，无救的人

参考例句：

• All three babies were born with an incurable heart condition.三个婴儿都有不可治瘉的先天性心脏病。
• He has an incurable and widespread nepotism.他们有不可救药的，到处蔓延的裙带主义。

4 disease   

n.疾病，弊端

参考例句：

• The doctors are trying to stamp out the disease.医生正在尽力消灭这种疾病。
• He fought against the disease for a long time.他同疾病做了长时间的斗争。

5 hawking   

利用鹰行猎

参考例句：

• He is hawking his goods everywhere. 他在到处兜售他的货物。
• We obtain the event horizon and the Hawking spectrumformula. 得到了黑洞的局部事件视界位置和Hawking温度以及Klein—Gordon粒子的Hawking辐射谱。

6 engaged   

a.having agree to get married

参考例句：

• They are engaged in talks with the Irish government. 他们正忙着与爱尔兰政府谈判。
• The old lady engaged herself in making clothes for her children. 这位老太太忙着为孩子们做衣服。

7 exploration   

n.探险，踏勘，探测

参考例句：

• Their team will undertake exploration for oil.他们队将着手进行石油勘探工作。
• This book is descriptive of a scientific exploration.这本书是描写科学探险的。

8 spoke   

n.（车轮的）辐条；轮辐；破坏某人的计划；阻挠某人的行动 v.讲，谈（speak的过去式）；说；演说；从某种观点来说

参考例句：

• They sourced the spoke nuts from our company.他们的轮辐螺帽是从我们公司获得的。
• The spokes of a wheel are the bars that connect the outer ring to the centre.辐条是轮子上连接外圈与中心的条棒。

9 bang   

n.巨响，猛击；vi.砰砰作响；vt.砰地敲，猛击

参考例句：

• Pack it up, you kids;or I'll bang your heads together!住手，你们这些小孩，再弄就揍你们！
• She fell and got a nasty bang on the knee.她摔倒了，膝盖猛撞在地上。

10 seller   

n.售货者，畅销品

参考例句：

• I hope for this book to become a best seller.我希望这本书会成为一本畅销书。
• She drove a hard bargain with the seller.她狠杀卖主的价。

11 means   

n.方法，手段，折中点，物质财富

参考例句：

• That man used artful means to find out secrets.那人使用狡猾的手段获取机密。
• We must get it done by some means or other.我们总得想办法把它干完。

12 works   

n.作品，著作；工厂，活动部件，机件

参考例句：

• We expect writers to produce more and better works.我们期望作家们写出更多更好的作品。
• The novel is regarded as one of the classic works.这篇小说被公认为是最优秀的作品之一。

13 according   

adj.按照，根据

参考例句：

• According to the Bible we are all the seed of Adam.根据《圣经》所说的，我们都是亚当的后裔。
• We must cut our coat according to our cloth this year.今年我们必须学会量入为出。

14 predict   

v.预知，预言，预报

参考例句：

• It's hard to predict how things will turn out.很难预测事情会变成怎么样。
• I cannot predict when to meet her again.我无法预测什么时候会再见到她。

15 directly   

adv.直接地，径直地；马上，立即

参考例句：

• I will telephone you directly I hear the news.我一听到消息，马上打电话给你。
• She answered me very directly and openly.她非常坦率地、开门见山地答复了我。