最伟大的复制者【自私的基因:The Selfish Gene 03A】

Questions：

1. What extraordinary property did a replicator have?
2. Why does the author use the metaphor of “building blocks”?
3. Where are the ancient replicators now?

At some point a particularly remarkable molecule was formed by accident. We will call it the Replicator. It may not necessarily have been the biggest or the most complex molecule around, but it had the extraordinary property of being able to create copies of itself. This may seem a very unlikely sort of accident to happen. So it was. It was exceedingly improbable. In the lifetime of a man, things that are that improbable can be treated for practical purposes as impossible. That is why you will never win a big prize on the football pools. But in our human estimates of what is probable and what is not, we are not used to dealing in hundreds of millions of years. If you filled in pools coupons every week for a hundred million years you would very likely win several jackpots.Actually a molecule that makes copies of itself is not as difficult to imagine as it seems at first, and it only had to arise once. Think of the replicator as a mould or template. Imagine it as a large molecule consisting of a complex chain of various sorts of building block molecules. The small building blocks were abundantly available in the soup surrounding the replicator. Now suppose that each building block has an affinity for its own kind. Then whenever a building block from out in the soup lands up next to a part of the replicator for which it has an affinity, it will tend to stick there. The building blocks that attach themselves in this way will automatically be arranged in a sequence that mimics that of the replicator itself. It is easy then to think of them joining up to form a stable chain just as in the formation of the original replicator. This process could continue as a progressive stacking up, layer upon layer. This is how crystals are formed. On the other hand, the two chains might split apart, in which case we have two replicators, each of which can go on to make further copies.

Was there to be any end to the gradual improvement in the techniques and artifices used by the replicators to ensure their own continuation in the world? There would be plenty of time for improvement. What weird engines of self-preservation would the millennia bring forth? Four thousand million years on, what was to be the fate of the ancient replicators? They did not die out, for they are past masters of the survival arts. But do not look for them floating loose in the sea; they gave up that cavalier freedom long ago. Now they swarm in huge colonies, safe inside gigantic lumbering robots, sealed off from the outside world, communicating with it by tortuous indirect routes, manipulating it by remote control. They are in you and in me; they created us, body and mind; and their preservation is the ultimate rationale for our existence. They have come a long way, those replicators. Now they go by the name of genes, and we are their survival machines.

Key Words & Phrases

1) molecule n. 分子
2) replicator n. 复制者
3) property n. 特质，特性，财产
4) so it was 正是如此
5) exceedingly adv.极大地; 过分地（extremely）
e.g. We had an exceedingly good lunch. 我们吃了一顿极为丰盛的午餐。
6) improbable adj. 不大可能的
7) football pools 足彩;足球赌博
8) coupon n. 劵，优惠券
9) jackpot n. 头奖，最高奖
10) mould n. 模具，模型
11) building block 建筑砌块，组成部分
12) affinity n. 类似；密切关系
13) mimic v. 摹拟; 模仿
e.g. He mimicked her upper-class accent. 他模仿她那上流社会的腔调。
14) stack up 加起来; 把…堆在，可引申为站得住脚
e.g. There have been a number of explanations, but none of them stack up.
已经提出了好几种解释，但没有一种能站得住脚。
15) artifice n. the clever use of tricks and devices 技巧，策略，诡计
16) millennia (millennium的复数)数千年
17) bring forth bring into existence 产生，带来
18) cavalier n. 骑士
19) swarm v. 挤满，聚集
20) gigantic adj. 巨大的，庞大的
21) lumbering adj. 笨重的，缓慢吃力的
22) tortuous adj. 曲折的，扭曲的
23) rationale n. 根本原因，基本原理
e.g. There was no economic rationale for all of this. 没有任何经济原理可以解释这一切。