纪录片《为何讲话》 第43期：真实的语言

This allows the parts to be joined together in different ways

这些部分可以按不同方式组合起来

to describe fruit the volunteers have never seen before,

用来描述实验者从未见过的水果

a crucial feature of human language.

这是人类语言的一个重要特征

I think lahoki will be this one.

我觉得这个应该叫"lahoki"

Got all five out of five right. Oh, good, excellent.

五道都做对了 真好 太棒了

The really striking¹ thing that we've discovered

真正令我们惊讶的发现是

is that when we run these experiments

在这个实验的最终

what we get at the end looks like a real language,

我们得到的语言看起来像真正的语言

not one of the languages that we see in the world today

并不是当今世界存在的语言

but it looks like a language in that it's got

但看起来像是门语言

those essential defining² characteristics that we see in language.

拥有已存在的语言所具有的关键特征

In other words these languages that emerge³

也就是说 现在的语言都是

are made up of parts that can be recombined.

由可以重新排列组合的词根构成

This happens gradually, it happens without anyone knowing it

这是一个无人注意到的渐进过程

and yet it is the exact feature of language that makes it unique,

就是这个特征让语言这么独一无二

makes language different from everything else we see in nature.

使得它不同于我们所见到的任何事物

1 striking   

adj.显著的，惹人注目的，容貌出众的

参考例句：

• There is a striking difference between Jane and Mary.简和玛丽之间有显著的差异。
• What is immediately striking is how resourceful the children are.最令人注目的是孩子们的机智聪明。

2 defining   

规定( define的现在分词 )； 使明确； 精确地解释； 画出…的线条

参考例句：

• You can customise the behavior of the Asynchronous Server and hence re-brand it by defining your own command set for invoking services. 通过定义自己调用服务的命令集，您可以定制自定义异步服务器的行为，通过为调用服务定义自己的命令集从而对它重新标记。
• This point can be put another way in defining poverty. 这一点还能从另一方面来加以说明以佐证贫困的涵义。 来自英汉非文学 - 新闻报道

3 emerge   

vi.（从水中等）出来，出现，浮现，形成

参考例句：

• The baby's head was starting to emerge from the womb.婴儿的头开始从母亲的子宮中露出来。
• It's still hard to tell who will emerge victorious.鹿死谁手尚难逆料。