Unit 55
Altruism, according to the text books, has two forms. One is known technically as kin selection, and familiarly as nepotism. This spreads an individual’s genes collaterally, rather than directly, but is otherwise similar to his helping his own offspring. The second form is reciprocal altruism, or “you scratch my back and I’ll scratch yours”. It relies on trust, and a good memory for favours given and received, but is otherwise not much different from simultaneous collaboration (such as a wolf pack hunting) in that the benefit exceeds the cost for all parties involved. Humans, however, show a third sort of altruism—one that has no obvious pay-off. This is altruism towards strangers, for example, charity. That may enhance reputation. But how does an enhanced reputation weigh in the Darwinian balance?
To investigate this question, the researchers made an interesting link. At first sight, helping charities looks to be at the opposite end of the selfishness spectrum from conspicuous consumption. Yet they have something in common: both involve the profligate deployment of resources. That is characteristic of the consequences of sexual selection. An individual shows he（or she）has resources to burn—whether those are biochemical reserves, time or, in the human instance, money—by using them to make costly signals. That demonstrates underlying fitness of the sort favoured by evolution. Viewed this way, both conspicuous consumption and what the researchers call “blatant benevolence” are costly signals. And since they are behaviours rather than structures, and thus controlled by the brain, they may be part of the mating mind.
Researchers divided a bunch of volunteers into two groups. Those in one were put into what the researchers hoped would be a “romantic mindset” by being shown pictures of attractive members of the opposite sex. They were each asked to write a description of a perfect date with one of these people. The unlucky members of the other group were shown pictures of buildings and told to write about the weather. The participants were then asked two things. The first was to imagine they had $5,000 in the bank. They could spend part or all of it on various luxury items such as a new car, a dinner party at a restaurant or a holiday in Europe. They were also asked what fraction of a hypothetical 60 hours of leisure time during the course of a month they would devote to volunteer work.
The results were just what the researchers hoped for. In the romantically primed group, the men went wild with the Monopoly money. Conversely, the women volunteered their lives away. Those women continued, however, to be skinflints, and the men remained callously indifferent to those less fortunate than themselves. Meanwhile, in the other group there was little inclination either to profligate spending or to good works. Based on this result, it looks as though the sexes do, indeed, have different strategies for showing off. Moreover, they do not waste their resources by behaving like that all the time. Only when it counts sexually are men profligate and women helpful.
注（1）：本文选自Economist；
注（2）：本文习题命题模仿对象为2005年真题Text 1。
1. In the opening paragraph, the author introduces his topic by _______.
A) stating an incident
B) justifying an assumption
C) explaining the forms of a phenomenon
D) making a comparison
2. The statement “helping charities looks to be at the opposite end of the selfishness spectrum from conspicuous consumption”（Lines 1~2, Paragraph 2）means _______.
A) helping charities shows selfishness while conspicuous consumption shows selflessness
B) helping charities shows selflessness while conspicuous consumption shows selfishness
C) both helping charities and conspicuous consumption show selfishness
D) both helping charities and conspicuous consumption show selflessness
3. The main reasons for people’s involving in charities being regarded as “blatant benevolence” are as following, EXCEPT that_______.
A) it helps donators become famous and admired by the public
B) it includes a large amount of deployable resources
C) it provides rich people with a way of showing off their wealth
D) it might be related to mating minds as conspicuous consumption
4. The results of the study found that _______.
A) the reactions of the two groups of volunteers are similar
B) female volunteers of the two groups behave exactly the same
C) men tend to show off their wealth when courting women
D) men and women always show different inclinations of showing off
5. What can we infer from the last two paragraphs?
A) The study aims to demonstrate the universality of the “blatant benevolence” phenomenon in human nature.
B) The researchers divided volunteers into two groups on purpose for comparison.
C) The second group of volunteers consisted of those who had bad luck in real life.
D) Volunteers of the second group showed different strategies of showing off between the sexes.
篇章剖析
本文采用了提出问题——分析问题的模式，主要说明了性别选择对于人们利他主义行为的影响。第一段提出了三种利他主义行为的概念，提出了问题；第二段是对第三种利他主义的进一步理论分析；第三段介绍了研究人员针对该现象所做的研究；第四段是研究成果的说明。
词汇注释
altruism /ˈæltrʊɪzəm/ n. 利他主义，利他
kin /kɪn/ n. 家属（集合称谓），亲戚，同族
nepotism /ˈnepətɪzəm/ n. 偏袒，裙带关系
collateral /kəˈlætərəl/ adj. 间接的
offspring /ˈɒfsprɪŋ/ n. 儿女，子孙，后代
reciprocal /rɪˈsɪprəkəl/ adj. 互惠的，相应的
simultaneous /ˌsɪməlˈteɪnjəs/ adj. 同时的
pay-off /ˈpeɪˌɒf/ n. 赢利
spectrum /ˈspektrəm/ n. 范围，领域
conspicuous consumption 炫耀性消费
profligate /ˈprɒflɪgɪt/ adj. 放荡的，挥霍的
blatant /ˈbleɪtənt/ adj. 吵闹的，炫耀的
benevolence /bɪˈnevələns/ n. 仁爱心，善行
prime /praɪm/ v. 灌注，填装
skinflint /ˈskɪnflɪnt/ n. 吝啬鬼
callous /ˈkæləs/ adj. 无情的，冷淡的
难句突破
It relies on trust, and a good memory for favours given and received, but is otherwise not much different from simultaneous collaboration（such as a wolf pack hunting）in that the benefit exceeds the cost for all parties involved.
主体句式：It relies on trust, and a good memory, but is otherwise not much different from...
结构分析：这个句子由but连接的两个并列结构构成，in that是用于解释说明的连接词，其后的内容是对前面的补充。
句子译文：这种利他主义的基础在于信任，并对自己得到和付出过的帮助保持较好的记忆，但是除此以外，这种利他主义和物种天然的合作关系（比如狼群共同寻找猎物）没有什么大的区别，因为对于所有的参与者来说，他们合作的所得远远超过其付出。
题目分析
1. C 细节题。文章开头作者以介绍利他主义这一现象为例引出论题，分析了利他主义的两种形式，因而是属于对一种现象的具体形式的分析。
2. B 语义题。这句话的字面意思是：慈善和炫耀性消费在自私程度上来看处于两个极端。结合常识可以理解句子的意思：慈善是无私的表现，而炫耀性消费是自私的表现。
3. A 细节题。本题的B、C、D选项都能在文章第二段中找到对应信息，而本文所谓的“炫耀性消费”并没有涉及慈善捐助人希望通过捐赠成名并受人崇拜这一点。
4. C 细节题。文章最后一段中指出，人们在择偶时，男人总是倾向于炫耀他们的金钱和财富，因此C选项正确。D选项的错误原因在于，最后一段提到男人和女人并不是总会表现不同的炫耀行为，而仅仅是在吸引异性的时候会这样做。
5. B 推理题。在文章第三段中，研究人员将参与实验的志愿者们分为了两组，其一为主实验组，另一个为参照组，主要为了比较实验结果，以使结论更加有力。A选项的错误原因在于该研究的目的是证实吸引异性和“炫耀性善行”的关系，而不是研究后者的普遍性。C选项的错误原因在于参照组的人无法看到漂亮人物的照片，所以作者幽默地认为他们“不幸”，但他们不是真的在生活中不幸。D选项的错误原因在于参照组中并没有显示出不同性别之间的炫耀行为区别。
参考译文
根据教科书，利他主义有两种表现形式。一种就是所谓的血缘选择，即家庭亲戚关系。这种利他主义是通过一个人的基因间接传播的，而不是直接传播的，但是另一方面也就像一个人会帮助自己的孩子一样。第二种形式是互惠的利他主义，或者说“你帮我搓背，我也帮你搓背”。这种利他主义的基础在于信任，并对自己得到和付出过的帮助保持较好的记忆，但是除此以外，这种利他主义和物种天然的合作关系（比如狼群共同寻找猎物）没有什么大的区别，因为对于所有的参与者来说，他们合作的所得远远超过其付出。但是人类却表现出了第三种利他主义——一种不会有什么显著赢利的利他主义。这是一种对陌生人的利他主义，比如说慈善事业，它能够提升人们的名誉。但是名誉的提升在达尔文平衡中有多大分量呢？
为了探讨这一问题，研究者们找到了一个有趣的关系。乍一看，从自私的角度来说参与慈善事业好像是炫耀性消费的相反面。但是他们有一点是相同的，即二者都包含了对资源的大规模调度。这是性别选择结果的一个特点。一个人想要显示他（或她）拥有的可以挥霍的资源——无论是生化储备、时间还是对于人类来说的金钱——通过使用这些东西来发出一些昂贵的信号。这也是进化过程中帮助物种生存下来的适应性。如果从这个角度来看问题的话，那么炫耀性消费和研究者们所称的“炫耀性善行”都是昂贵信号。而且它们都是行为而不是结构，因此是由大脑控制的，也许还是寻偶想法的一部分。
研究者将一群志愿者分成了两组。他们向第一组的成员展示了一组相反性别的长得很漂亮或很帅的异性的照片，希望志愿者们“浮想联翩”。接着研究者要求他们每人写下关于自己和某张照片上的人的一次完美约会。而另一组的志愿者就没有这么幸运了，他们看到的是一组高楼大厦的图片，并要写一个关于天气的报告。然后研究人员要求参与者们做两件事情。第一件事情是要求他们想象自己在银行有5000美元。他们可以把其中一部分或者所有的钱花在各种奢侈品上，比如一辆新车、在餐馆的一次晚宴，或者去欧洲度假。第二件事情是，假设他们一月有60个小时的休闲时间，那么他们愿意花多少休闲时间去做志愿者工作。
研究结果正如研究人员预料的那样。在身处浪漫气氛的第一组成员中，男人们疯狂地想完全占有金钱。相反，女人们则把时间花在做志愿者工作上。但是女人们变得更加吝啬，而男人们仍然对财富少于他们的人很冷漠。同时，在另一组成员中，人们既不倾向于大肆挥霍，也没有做善事的偏好。基于这一结果，看起来不同性别的人实际上对于炫耀有不同的策略。此外，他们不会总是把他们的资源浪费在这些行为上。只有当吸引异性的时候，男人们才会花更多的钱，女人们才会更加乐于助人。
