TED演讲:人类性进化的启示(1)

 　　I'm going to go off script and make Chris quite nervous here  我打算不按预定的来，这让克里斯很紧张

　　by making this audience participation 1.  我打算让观众参与互动
　　All right. Are you with me? Yeah. Yeah. All right.  懂我的意思吧，懂。很好
　　So what I'd like to do is have you raise your hand  我要你举手
　　if you've ever heard a heterosexual couple having sex.  如果你听到过异性恋夫妇做爱发出的声音
　　Could be the neighbors, hotel room, your parents. Sorry.  可以是邻居，酒店客房，或是父母，抱歉
　　Okay. Pretty much everybody.  几乎所有人都听过
　　Now raise your hand if the man was making more noise than the woman.  如果你听到男的制造出的声音比女的大，请举手
　　I see one guy there.  我好像只看到一个人举手
　　It doesn't count if it was you, sir.  如果是你的话，那就不算，先生
　　So his hand's down. And one woman. Okay.  他把手放了下来，还有一位女士，好
　　Sitting next to a loud guy.  坐在一个很吵的人旁边
　　Now what does this tell us?  这告诉我们什么
　　It tells us that human beings make noise when they have sex,  这告诉我们，人类在做爱时会发出声响
　　and it's generally the woman who makes more noise.  而且一般都是女性的声音大
　　This is known as female copulatory vocalization to the clipboard crowd.  顺便给大家讲下，这被称作女性交配发声
　　I wasn't even going to mention this,  我本不打算讲这个
　　but somebody told me that Meg Ryan might be here,  不过有人告诉我梅格·瑞安在这里
　　and she is the world's most famous female copulatory vocalizer.  而她是世界上最著名的女性交配发声者
　　So I thought, got to talk about that.  因此我想，我必须讲讲这个
　　We'll get back to that a little bit later.  后面我们还会回头讲一下这个
　　Let me start by saying human beings are not descended 2 from apes,  首先我要讲的是，人类并不是猿的后裔
　　despite what you may have heard. We are apes.  虽然你们可能听说过，我们是猿
　　We are more closely related to the chimp 3 and the bonobo  和人关系更近的其实是黑猩猩和倭猩猩
　　than the African elephant is to the Indian elephant,  这种亲缘关系比非洲象和印度象还近
　　as Jared Diamond pointed 4 out in one of his early books.  这是贾雷德·戴蒙德在他早期著作中指出的
　　We're more closely related to chimps 5 and bonobos than  我们同黑猩猩和倭猩猩的关系要近过
　　chimps and bonobos are related to any other primate   黑猩猩和倭猩猩同其它任何灵长类的关系
　　gorillas 6, orangutans, what have you.  无论是同大猩猩，红猩猩还是别的什么
　　So we're extremely closely related to them,  我们同它们的关系非常近
　　and as you'll see in terms of our behavior, we've got some relationship as well.  其实在行为上，我们也和它们非常类似
　　So what I'm asking today, the question I want to explore with you today is,  今天我要同你们一同探索的问题是
　　what kind of ape are we in terms of our sexuality?  就性而言，我们是怎样的猿
　　Now, since Darwin's day there's been what Cacilda and I have called  追寻达尔文的足迹，我和卡希尔达
　　the standard narrative 7 of human sexual evolution, and you're all familiar with it,  提出了人类性进化的标准描述，你们应该很熟悉
　　even if you haven't read this stuff.  哪怕你们没有读过这些东西
　　The idea is that, as part of human nature,  其思想是，作为人类天性的一部分
　　from the beginning of our species' time,  从人类初始开始
　　men have sort of leased women's reproductive potential  通过将特定产品和服务提供给女性
　　by providing them with certain goods and services.  男性租用了女性的生殖潜能
　　Generally we're talking about meat, shelter, status, protection, things like that.  一般而言，我们讨论的是肉，住所，地位，保护这些
　　And in exchange, women have offered fidelity 8, or at least a promise of fidelity.  作为交换，女性则提供忠诚，或者至少是对忠诚的保证
　　Now this sets men and women up in an oppositional 9 relationship.  这让男性和女性处在了对立的关系上
　　The war between the sexes is built right into our DNA 10, according to this vision. Right?  根据这种观点，两性之间的战争实际上是根植于DNA中的
　　What Cacilda and I have argued is that  我和卡希尔达认为
　　no, this economic relationship,  不，这个经济关系
　　this oppositional relationship,  这个对立关系
　　is actually an artifact of agriculture,  实际上是农业造成的
　　which only arose about 10,000 years ago at the earliest.  最早只出现在大约一万年前
　　Anatomically modern human beings  解剖学意义上的现代人类
　　have been around for about 200,000 years,  已经存在了大约二十万年
　　so we're talking about five percent, at most,  因此，这里顶多只是5%的
　　of our time as a modern, distinct species.  我们作为现代人类这一区别性物种的时间
　　So before agriculture, before the agricultural revolution,  在农业出现之前，在农业革命之前
　　it's important to understand that human beings lived in huntergatherer groups  我们需要理解，人类生活在狩猎采集的环境下
　　that are characterized wherever they're found in the world  无论处在世界上的什么地方
　　by what anthropologists called fierce egalitarianism.  这都被人类学家称作"残酷的平等主义"
　　They not only share things, they demand that things be shared:  他们不仅分享东西，还要求东西被分享
　　meat, shelter, protection, all these things  肉，住所，保护这些
　　that were supposedly being traded to women for their sexual fidelity,  原本被认为是女性用性忠诚来换取的东西
　　it turns out, are shared widely among these societies.  实际上是在社会范围内广泛共享的
　　Now I'm not saying that our ancestors were noble savages 11, and I'm not saying  我倒不是说，我们的祖先是高贵的野蛮人，或是
　　modern day huntergatherers are noble savages either.  现代狩猎采集者是高贵的野蛮人
　　What I'm saying is that  我只是说
　　this is simply the best way to mitigate 12 risk in a foraging 13 context.  这不过是觅食环境中减少风险的最佳方式
　　And there's really no argument about this among anthropologists.  这在人类学界并没有太多争议