４０年后的未來

世界的發展離不開想象力，但常常落后于想象。本文原載于1968年的一份美國雜志Modern Mechanix，暢想40年后的世界會是什么樣。如今我們已經走過了2008年。事實證明，想象力再一次走在了我們的前面。

交通Transportation

It's 8 a.m.， Tuesday， Nov. 18， 2008， and you are headed for a meeting 300 miles away. You slide into your two-passenger air-cushion car， press a sequence of1) buttons and the national traffic computer notes your destination， figures out the current traffic situation and signals your car to slide out of the garage. Hands free， you sit back and begin to read the morning paper which is flashed on a flat TV screen over the car's dashboard2). You whizz3) past a string of cities， many of them covered by the new domes4) that keep them evenly climatized year round.

Traffic is heavy， typically， but there's no need to worry. The traffic computer， which feeds and receives signals to and from all cars in transit between cities， keeps vehicles at least 50 yards apart. There hasn't been an accident since the system was put into use. Private cars are banned inside most city cores. Moving sidewalks and electrams5) carry the public from one location to another. Giant transportation hubs6) called modemixers are located anywhere from 15~50 miles outside all major urban centers.

住宿Dwelling

Homes in the year 2008 are practically self-maintaining. Electrostatic7) precipitators8) clean the air and climatizers maintain the temperature and humidity at optimum9) levels. Robots are available to do housework and other simple chores. New building materials are self-cleaning and never peel or crack. Houses for the most part are assembled from prefabricated10) modules. Once the foundation is laid， attaching the modules to make up a two- or three-bedroom house is a job that doesn't take more than a day. Such modular homes can easily be expanded to accommodate11) a growing family.

2008年的住房基本上都能自我維護。靜電濾塵器凈化空氣，氣候調節裝置使溫度和濕度保持最適宜狀態。家務和其他簡單的雜事由機器人完成。新型的建筑材料能自我清潔，而且從不剝落或破裂。房子的大部分結構都是用預制模塊組裝而成的。一旦房基建好，用不了一天就能加裝好模塊，建起一座有兩三間臥室的房子。此類組裝房可以輕松地擴充面積，滿足成員不斷增加的家庭的需要。

生活中的電腦Computer in life

The single most important item in 2008 households is the computer. These electronic brains govern everything from meal preparation and waking up the household， to assembling shopping lists and keeping track of12) the bank balance. Sensors in various household utilities warn the computer when an item is likely to fail. A repairman will show up even before any obvious breakdown occurs. Computers also handle travel reservations13)， relay telephone messages， keep track of birthdays and anniversaries， compute taxes and even figure the monthly bills for electricity， water， telephone and etc. Money has all but disappeared. Employers deposit14) salary checks directly into their employees' accounts. Credit cards are used for paying all bills.

Computers not only keep track of money， they make spending it easier. TV-telephone shopping is common. To shop， instead of being jostled by crowds， you simply press the numbered code of a giant shopping center and \"go\" to the department you are interested in. When you see what you want， you press a number that signifies \"buy，\" and the household computer takes over， places the order， notifies the store of the home address and subtracts15) the purchase price from your bank balance.

2008年家居生活中最重要的物品就是電腦。這些電子大腦掌管了一切，從準備膳食和叫醒家人，到制作購物清單和記錄銀行賬戶的收支。各種家用設備中的傳感器在設備可能發生故障時就向電腦發出警報。甚至早在明顯的故障發生前，維修人員就會到場。電腦還處理其他各種事務，包括旅行預訂，傳遞電話留言，記錄生日和周年紀念日，計算稅金甚至每月的電費、水費和電話費等。現金已經完全消失。雇主將工資直接存入雇員的賬戶。所有賬單都用信用卡來支付。

電腦不僅管賬，還使消費變得更為輕松。電視電話購物變得很普遍。想去購物？無需在人群中你推我搡，只需輕按巨型購物中心的相應代碼，就可以“抵達”你感興趣的貨品區。當看到自己心儀的商品，只需按下一個表示“購買”的號碼，家中的電腦就會接手，下單、告知商店送貨住址并從銀行賬戶中扣除所需金額。

休閑時間Leisure time

People have more time for leisure activities in the year 2008. The average work day is about four hours. But the extra time isn't totally free. Technologies advance at such huge paces that a certain amount of a jobholder's spare time is used in keeping up with the new developments. Most of this study is in the form of programmed TV courses. In fact， most schooling consists of programmed TV courses or lectures via closed circuit16). Progress of each student is followed by computer， which assigns end term marks on the basis of tests given throughout the term.

Besides school lessons， other educational material is available for TV viewing. You simply press a combination of buttons and the pages flash on your home screen. The world's information is available to you almost instantaneously17). TV screens cover an entire wall in most homes and show more subjects like top Broadway shows and hit movies. Best-selling books are on TV tape and can be borrowed or rented from tape libraries.

A typical vacation in 2008 is to spend a week at an undersea resort， where your hotel room window looks out on18) a tropical underwater reef， a sunken ship or an ancient， excavated19) city. Another vacation is a stay on a hotel satellite. The rocket ride to the satellite and back， plus the vistas20) of earth and moon， make a memorable vacation jaunt21).

2008年，人們有更多的時間參與休閑活動。工作日時長平均為4小時。但是剩余的時間并不都可以自由安排。技術進步的步伐如此之快，職場人士都需花費相當一部分時間學習，以跟上新發展的腳步。此類學習大部分以電視課程的形式進行。實際上，大部分教學都是通過閉路播放的電視課程或講座進行的。電腦跟蹤每個學生的學習進度并全程進行測試，最后據此打出期末分數。

除了學校課程，其他教育資料也可通過電視瀏覽。你只需按下一組按鍵，頁面就會閃現在你家的屏幕上。全球的資訊幾乎瞬間就可讓你盡收眼底。在大部分家庭，電視屏幕占據了一整面墻，播放諸如百老匯熱門演出、熱映電影等。暢銷書籍已被錄制成了電視磁帶，可以去磁帶圖書館租借。

典型的2008年假期是去某個海底勝地過上一周——那里的酒店房間窗外會是熱帶水下礁石、一艘沉船或是一座挖掘出的古城。另一種度假方式是住在一個衛星酒店里。往返衛星的火箭之旅加上地月之間的美景，會成為一次難忘的假期遠足。

醫療Medical

Medical research has guaranteed that most babies born in the 21st century will live long and healthy lives. Heart disease has been eliminated by drugs and diet. If hearts or other major organs do give trouble， they can be replaced with artificial organs. There is no need to worry about failing memory or intelligence either. The intelligence pill is another 21st century commodity22). Slow learners or people struck with forgetfulness can take advantage of these pills and everyone is able to use his full mental potential.

醫學研究已經確保大部分在21世紀出生的嬰兒能健康、長壽。心臟病已被藥物和飲食療法消滅。如果心臟或其他主要器官確實出了問題，那就可以換上人造器官。同時也沒有必要擔心記憶力下降或智力低下。聰明丸是21世紀的又一樣日用品。學習遲緩或健忘的人可以服用這種藥，每個人都可以充分發揮其大腦的所有潛能。

Underwater Museum Planned for Egypt's Alexandria埃及擬建水下博物館，重現埃及艷后宮殿

Cleopatra's palace(埃及女王克利奧帕特拉的皇宮) sank long ago into the Mediterranean， but visitors to Alexandria， Egypt， may eventually view the complex's remnants (遺留下來的痕跡)via the world's first underwater museum. A site for the museum has been proposed near the New Library of Alexandria， where the famed queen of Egypt is believed to have sheltered herself with her lover Marc Antony before taking her own life.

If built， the museum could display treasures and monuments (歷史遺址) of her palace， which once stood on an island in one of the largest man-made bays in the world but was submerged by earthquakes in the fourth century A.D..

這項雄心勃勃的水下工程最后是否能夠圓滿竣工？游客又是否真的能夠通過它感受埃及艷后皇宮曾經的輝煌呢？讓我們一起期待吧。

The Ultimate in Recycling —A Beer Bottle Temple百萬啤酒瓶建起的寺廟

Fifty years ago the Heineken Beer Company looked at reshaping its beer bottle to be useful as a building block. It never happened， so Buddhist monks from Thailand's Sisaket province took matters into their own hands and collected a million bottles to build the Wat Pa Maha Chedi Kaew temple. The temple has used over a million recycled beer bottles to make the walls and roof since 1984. It shows that all those empties we put in our recycling bin have the power to make a major difference!

泰國和柬埔寨邊界的寺廟里的僧侶花費20余年，用上百萬個玻璃啤酒瓶建起了被稱為“百萬瓶寺”的廟宇。他們的這種做法可謂是一舉兩得：通過回收利用這些丟棄的啤酒瓶，既治理了當地的環境，又以低成本建造了自己的寺廟。

Next football legend

六歲足球小神童媲美齊達內

A 6-year-old boy Madin Mohammed is recognized as the next football legend as Zinedine Zidane (齊內丹·齊達內). Soccer Clubs around the world have recognized his talent. He was born in Algeria but was soon noticed by the French Football Federation. They gave him a scholarship and proper coaching. Now he is wanted by the biggest European clubs.

這位名叫馬丁·穆罕默德的小神童吸引了世界各地球探的注意。年僅六歲的他已經能把齊祖的絕技馬賽輪盤轉得極其嫻熟，還會小羅的“牛尾巴”和C羅的“踩單車”技術。

Vocabulary

1.a sequence of: 一系列；sequence [5si:kwEns] n. 連續；接續；一連串

2.dashboard [5dAF7bC:d] n. (汽車等上的)儀表板

3.whizz [hwIz] vi. 颼颼地移動(或飛馳)

4.dome [dEum] n. 【建】園屋頂，穹頂；圓蓋；多邊形穹頂

5.electram [I5lektrAm] n. 電車，由“electr-”和“tram(電車)”合成

6.hub [hQb] n. 網絡中心

7.electrostatic [I7lektrE5stAtIk] adj. 靜電的

8.precipitator [prI5sIpIteItE(r)] n. 沉淀器；(靜電)濾塵器

9.optimum [5CptImEm] adj. 最適宜的

10.prefabricate [7pri:5fAbrIkeIt] vt. 預先建造，預制

11.accommodate [E5kCmEdeIt] vt. (寬綽地)容納；為……提供空間

12.keep track of: 跟上……的進展；記錄；計算

13.reservation [7rezE5veIFEn] n. 預訂；預訂的房間(或座席)

14.deposit [dI5pCzIt] vt. 存儲，存款

15.subtract [sEb5trAkt] vt. 減去，減；常與介詞from連用

16.closed circuit: 閉合電路

17.instantaneously [7InstEn5teInjEslI] adv. 瞬間地，即刻地

18.look out on: 面臨，正對著

19.excavate [5ekskEveIt] vt. 發掘(古物等)

20.vista [5vIstE] n. 遠景

21.jaunt [dVC:nt] n. 旅行，游覽；遠足

22.commodity [kE5mCdItI] n. 有用的東西，用品