【学术英语写作】【北京航空航天大学】【中英对照】题目：现代技术对于人们身、心的影响（Influence of Modern Technology on the Human Body and Mind）

Influence of Modern Technology on the Human Body and Mind

现代技术对于人们身、心的影响

As the human race advances further along the path of the 21th century, we have already seen a series of major changes on our lifestyle that were brought about by modern technologies. In fact, modern technology has reshaped the human world on such a great scale that its impacts on the human body and mind are perceptible. That is to say, the advent and sometimes overuse of modern technology has greatly influenced both the human body and the human mind.
随着人类在21世纪的道路上不断前进，我们已经看到，现代科技对于我们的生活方式带来的一系列重大变化。 事实上，现代技术已经大规模地重塑了人类世界，其对人们身心的影响是显而易见的。也就是说，现代技术的出现和过度使用极大地影响了人们的身与心。

In the author’s opinion, the influence of modern technology on the human body can be roughly divided into three sections.
在笔者看来，现代科技对于人们身体的影响可以大致分为三个部分：

First and foremost, our body strength is declining. Due to the overuse of electronic devices, we are spending more time in front of screens every day and less time outdoors. According to research conducted by a U.S. team, the average “screen time” of American citizens is approximately 5 hours per day, which is quite intimidating, and that number is steadily increasing on an annual basis. The lack of exercising our muscles has inevitably resulted in a massive degradation of our body strength. Another study had found out that the proportion of muscle—aka the division of muscle weight against body weight of modern people is merely 5/7 of that of a farmer in Britain in the 1800s. It is safe to say that the majority of us modern people would lose a track race to our forefathers, even we live only 200 years apart. Moreover, that premise is based on the fact that we are far better off than them regarding the objective factors, including nutrition and sanitation.
首先，我们的身体力量正在下降。由于过度使用电子设备，我们每天在屏幕前花费的时间越来越多，在户外的时间越来越少。一个美国团队的研究显示，美国公民每天的平均“屏幕时间”约为5小时，这个数字相当吓人，而且这个数字每年都在稳步增长。缺乏对肌肉的锻炼，不可避免地导致我们的身体力量大幅下降。另一项研究发现，现代人的肌肉比例（即肌肉重量与体重之比）仅为 1800 年代英国农民的 5/7。可以肯定地说，我们大多数现代人在田径比赛中都会输给我们的祖先，即使我们只相差200岁。此外，这个前提是基于这样一个事实，即我们在营养和卫生条件等客观因素方面比他们要好得多。

We can also compare ourselves to those foragers and nomadic living in ancient Africa. Living under constant jeopardy and possibility to perish at any time, they spent much more time running and hiding and in vigilance, which after hundreds of centuries had left but a minor inscription on our gene, that is when in the face of danger, we automatically initiate a procedure called “fight or flight”. Sadly, the development of modern technology has made our surroundings so free of danger that in generations, maybe even this basic instinct will disappear too.
我们还可以将自己与生活在古代非洲的采集者和游牧民族进行比较。生活在持续的危险和随时可能灭亡的可能性下，他们花费了更多的时间用来奔跑、躲藏和保持警惕，数百个世纪后，这些只在我们的基因中留下了一个微不足道的印记，那就是当面临危险时，我们会自动地 启动一个称为“战斗或逃跑”的程序。可悲的是，现代技术的发展使得我们周遭的环境变得如此没有危险，以至于几代人之后，也许连这种基本的本能也会丧失。

Also, our body shape is constantly changing. We humans have spent thousands of years trying to stand straight, but it is likely that we are reverting the process of evolution by spending our time on our phones with our necks bent and our backs hunched. It is a common sight, especially on busy streets, people walking with their heads lowered to the screens. Doctors have found out that constantly keeping our gait like this may result in vertebra deformation. In as early as 2010, when the first generation of touch-screen smart phones went viral, scientists have discovered that swiping your thumb on the screen for 20 minutes in a row may result in diseases related to thumb joints, but most people tend to ignore that.
此外，我们的身体姿态也在不断变化。我们人类花了数千年的时间试图站直，但是我们很有可能正在逆转进化的过程，因为我们把时间花在看手机上，弯着脖子，驼着背。这是很常见的景象，尤其是在繁忙的街道上，人们走路时低着头看着屏幕。医生发现，持续地保持这样的步态可能会导致椎骨变形。早在2010年，第一代触摸屏智能手机火爆时，科学家就曾发现，连续在屏幕上滑动大拇指20分钟可能会导致拇指关节的相关疾病，但是大多数人往往选择忽视这一点。

If the first two facts don’t sound alerting enough, there’s still another hypothesis, although sounding whimsical at first, is based on solid science. It states that, modern technologies have the potential to alternate our biological structure and as a result, some of our body parts may even disappear or greatly deform in the future. As one of the most oppressed and overused parts when digital device is concerned, the neck bone is likely to take the first blow. However, without the neck bone to bear the massive head, it remains a question how humans are going to adapt to this major change. Another famous similar hypothesis states that in order to protect our retina from the increasing amount of radiation, a membrane is likely to form over our eyeballs. According to this hypothesis, with a thickness of about half a millimeter, the membrane is translucent, enabling it to protect our eyes as well as not hindering our eyesight. It is predicable that our body structure will go through great changes because of the influence of modern technology, even if they will not come true in the near future, for it is an evolutionary matter.
如果前两个事实听起来还不够令人警惕，那么还有另外一个假设，虽然乍一听上去有些异想天开，但却是基于扎实的科学研究。它指出，现代技术有可能改变我们的生理结构，因此，我们身体上的某些部位甚至可能在未来消失或者大幅变形。作为被数字设备压迫和过度使用最多的部位之一，颈骨很可能会第一个受到打击。然而，如果没有颈骨来支撑我们巨大的头部，人类将如何适应这一重大变化仍然是一个问题。另一个著名的此类假设指出，为了保护我们的视网膜免受越来越多的辐射，我们的眼球上可能会形成一层膜。根据这一假设，该膜的厚度约为半毫米，是半透明的，能够保护我们的眼睛，同时不至于妨碍我们的视力。可以预见的是，我们的身体结构将会因为现代科技的影响而发生巨大的变化，即使这种变化在不久的将来不会成为现实，因为它是一个涉及到进化的问题。

As is demonstrated above, modern technology has the potential to reshape and even redefine our biological structure, making it different from the original homo sapiens and sometimes altering it to an inferior model. Whether it is beneficial or not remains an open question. In addition to the physical impact of modern technology, the human mind is also a “victim” of modern technology, for it has, to some extent, undermined some of our core values and changed the way we think. The influence of modern technology on the human mind can be divided into two sections below.
正如上文中所说明的，现代技术有潜力重塑甚至是重新定义我们的生物学结构，使其不同于原始的智人，有时甚至将其改变为更加劣等的模型。它是否有益仍然是一个悬而未决的问题。 除了现代技术对我们身体的影响之外，人类的思想也是现代技术的“受害者”，因为它在一定程度上破坏了我们的一些核心价值观，改变了我们的思维方式。现代技术对人类思维的影响可以分为以下两个部分。

Firstly, modern technologies have made us lazier. Many of us would rather sit in front of a computer than going outdoors and get some exercise. Now that food delivery has gone viral, we don’t even have to cook for ourselves, wasting a golden opportunity to use our muscles. Today, we manage to do so many things simply by clicking on screens, and how many of us would be willing to waive the convenience and return to the “aboriginal lifestyle”, knowing that the simple solution is a click away? There’s a vivid exemplification of this point in the Pixar movie . Set in an age when technology is so advanced that people rely completely on it, there’s household machines that take care of us, and there’s also movable chairs which we use for transportation. Not surprisingly, everyone became so lazy and morbidly obese that we can’t even stand up on our own legs. Fortunately, in the movie, people finally realized the severity of the situation and resumed their normal life on earth, becoming less dependent on technologies.
首先，现代技术让我们变得更加懒惰。 我们中的许多人宁愿坐在电脑前也不愿去户外锻炼。 现在外卖服务已经风靡一时，我们甚至不用自己做饭，浪费了一个锻炼肌肉的绝佳机会。如今，我们只需要点击屏幕就可以做很多事情，而我们中有多少人愿意放弃这种便利，回到“原住民生活方式”，因为知道简单的解决方案只需点击一下即可？皮克斯的电影《机器人总动员》就生动地体现了这一点。故事发生在一个科技发达到人们完全依赖于它的时代，有家用机器照顾我们，也有我们用来代步的可移动椅子。毫不奇怪，每个人都变得如此的懒惰和病态肥胖，以至于我们甚至无法用自己的双腿站起来。幸运的是，在电影中，人们终于意识到了情况的严重性，恢复了地球上的正常生活，不再那么地依赖于科技。

The second aspect is lack of interest in social life. Nowadays, with so many social platforms available to us, we often tend to mistake “net friends” for real-life acquaintances, and some of us might even think that texting on-line is so much easier and more enjoyable than hanging out with friends in the real world. A recent study at Kentucky University pointed out that in the past seven years, the average Americans spent more time chatting on-line than having face-to-face conversations. Also, there are a number of celebrities, including Robert Downy Jr, who protested against the “overdose” of social platforms and suggested that we should get ourselves more involved in the real world.
第二个方面是对社交生活缺乏兴趣。现如今，我们可以使用的社交平台如此之多，我们常常将“网友”误认为是现实生活中的熟人，我们中的一些人甚至可能认为在网上发短信比和朋友在现实世界中一起出去玩更容易、更愉快。肯塔基大学最近的一项研究指出，在过去的七年里，美国人平均花在网上聊天的时间比和人面对面交谈的时间还要多。此外，包括小罗伯特·唐尼在内的多位知名人士也抗议社交平台的“过度使用”，并建议我们应该更多地融入现实世界。

Modern technology has had a huge influence on both human body and mind. But are they related to each other? The answer is definitely yes. According to a latest biological discovery, when using modern technology, some of our hormones, such as adrenaline, might take a decrease in secretion. This may cause subtle changes to our emotional status, making us less energetic. Over time, it can even lead to depression and morbid obesity. To sum up, modern technology is having great impacts on the human body and mind. There will certainly be pros and cons. How to eliminate the cons will be an important issue for people of both the scientific and the sociology field to strive to work on.
现代技术对人类的身体和心灵产生了巨大的影响。但它们二者之间有关联吗？答案是肯定的。根据最新的生物学发现，当使用现代技术时，我们的一些激素，例如肾上腺素，可能会减少分泌。这可能会导致我们的情绪状态发生微妙的变化，使我们的精力不那么充沛。随着时间的推移，它甚至可能会导致抑郁症和病态肥胖。综上所述，现代科技正在对人类的身心产生巨大的影响。肯定会有优点和缺点。如何消除这些弊端，将会是科学界和社会学界共同努力研究的重要课题。