Unit-4-Cloning-and-Ethics课文翻译大学体验英语三

Unit 4 Cloning and EthicsPassageA NotNow,Dr.MiracleSeverino Antinori is a rich Italian doctor with a string of private fertility clinics to his name. He likes watching football and claims the Catholic faith. Yet the Vatican is no fan of his science. In his clinics, Antinori already offers every IVF treatment under the sun, but still there are couples he cannot help. So now the man Italians call Dr Miracle is offering to clone his patients to create the babies they so desperately want. And of course its created quite a stir, with other scientists rounding on Antinori as religious leaders line up to attack his cloning plan as an insult to human dignity. Yet its an ambition Antinori has expressed many times before. Whats new is that finally it seems to be building a head of steam. Like-minded scientists from the US have joined Antinori in his cloning adventure. At a conference in Rome last week they claimed hundreds of couples have already volunteered for the experiments. Antinori shot to fame seven years ago helping grandmothers give birth using donor eggs. Later he pioneered the use of mice to nurture the sperm of men with poor fertility. He is clearly no ordinary scientist but a showman who thrives on controversy and pushing reproductive biology to the limits. And that of course is one reason why hes seen as being so dangerous. However, his idea of using cloning to combat infertility is not as mad as it sounds. Many people have a hard job seeing the point of reproductive cloning. But for some couples, cloning represents the only hope of having a child carrying their genes, and scientists like Antinori are probably right to say that much of our opposition to cloning as a fertility treatment is irrational. In future we may want to change our minds and allow it in special circumstances. But only when the science is ready. And thats the real problem. Five years on from Dolly, the science of cloning is still stuck in the dark ages. The failure rate is a shocking 97 per cent and deformed babies all too common. Even when cloning works, nobody understands why. So forget the complex moral arguments. To begin cloning people now, before even the most basic questions have been answered, is simply a waste of time and energy. This is not to say that Antinori will fail, only that if he succeeds it is likely to be at an unacceptably high price. Hundreds of eggs and embryos will be wasted and lots of women will go through difficult pregnancies resulting in miscarriages or abortions. A few years from now techniques will have improved and the wasteful loss wont be as excessive. But right now there seems to be little anyone can do to keep the cloners at bay. And its not just Antinori and his team who are eager to go. A religious group called the Raelians believes cloning is the key to achieving immortality, and it, too, claims to have the necessary egg donors and volunteers willing to be implanted with cloned embryos. So what about tougher laws? Implanting cloned human embryos is already illegal in many countries but it will never be prohibited everywhere. In any case, the prohibition of cloning is more likely to drive it underground than stamp it out. Secrecy is already a problem. Antinori and his team are refusing to name the country theyll be using as their base. Like it or not, the research is going ahead. Sooner or later we are going to have to decide whether regulation is safer than prohibition. Antinori would go for regulation, of course. He believes it is only a matter of time before we lose our hang-ups about reproductive cloning and accept it as just another IVF technique. Once the first baby is born and it cries, he said last week, the world will embrace it. But the world will never embrace the first cloned baby if it is unhealthy or deformed or the sole survivor of hundreds of pregnancies. In jumping the gun, Dr Miracle and his colleagues are taking one hell of a risk. If their instincts are wrong, the backlash against cloning - and indeed science as a whole - could be catastrophic.且慢，神奇医生 塞韦里诺安蒂诺里是一个富有的意大利医生，在他名下有一连串治疗不育症的私人诊所。他喜欢观看足球比赛，自称为天主教的忠实信徒，然而梵蒂冈对他的研究却不感兴趣。在他的诊所里，安蒂诺里已能给患者提供天下所有的试管受精治疗，但对某些夫妇，他仍然无能为力。因此，这个被意大利人称作神奇医生的人现在打算克隆患者本人来帮助他们得到迫切想要的孩子。 当然这就引起了轩然大波，宗教领袖群起而攻之，认为这是对人类尊严的玷污，同时其他科学家也出来抨击他的克隆计划。尽管在此之前安蒂诺里已多次提到过他的远大志向，但这次不同的是他好像是要动真格的了。与安蒂诺里志趣相投的美国科学家加入了他的克隆冒险试验。上周在罗马举行的一次新闻发布会上，他们宣布已有上百对夫妇自愿成为实验对象。 七年前，安蒂诺里由于使用捐赠的卵子帮助高龄妇女成功生育，顿时名声大噪。随后，他率先使用老鼠为生殖力低下的男子培育精子。很显然，他不是一位普通的科学家，而是一个爱出风头的人。他靠论争而成名，并将生殖学推到了极限。为此他便理所当然地被视为危险人物。 然而，他利用克隆技术来战胜不育症的想法并不是想象的那样不可理喻。很多人还难以理解利用克隆进行生育的意义，但对某些夫妇而言，他们想要一个携带自己基因的孩子，克隆技术是他们唯一的希望。就这点而言，与安迪诺瑞观点一致的科学家或许是正确的，他们指出我们没有充分的理由来反对作为医疗手段的克隆生育技术。将来我们也许会改变观点并允许在特殊的情况下使用克隆技术.但前提条件是要等到科学发展成熟之后，而这才是问题的实质。克隆羊多利出生五年了，克隆技术却一直见不到曙光。克隆的失败率令人震惊，高达97%，畸形婴儿屡见不鲜。即使克隆成功了，也无人能理解其究竟。所以我们先别去争论复杂的伦理道德。在最基本问题得到澄清之前就开展人体克隆，简直就是浪费时间和精力。这并不是说安蒂诺里定会失败，问题仅仅在于即使他成功了，代价也许会高得让人难以接受。将会浪费大量的卵子和胚胎，很多妇女将经历怀孕的艰难过程，而结果却是流产或堕胎。从现在算起几年以后，技术将会有长足的进步，无谓的损失就会极大地降低。然而，在现阶段要想阻止生育克隆，似乎任何人对此都几乎无能为力。这不仅仅是安蒂诺里和他的团队热衷于这项研究，还有一个叫做雷利安的宗教组织相信克隆是实现永生的关键，并声称已经拥有了必要的卵子捐赠者和自愿接受移植胚胎的人。那末，制定更加严厉的法律又将如何呢？虽然目前在很多国家移植克隆的人类胚胎是非法的，但是绝不是所有的地方都会禁止。禁止克隆很有可能会使其转入地下，而不是将其根除。因为秘密研究会引起问题，安蒂诺里和他的团队拒绝透露他们将把哪个国家作为研究基地。不管人们喜欢与否，克隆研究仍将进行下去。迟早我们将要做出抉择：对克隆研究进行规范是否比强行禁止更为有利。当然安蒂诺里会主张对克隆进行规范。他相信人们定会摆脱由克隆生育带来的情感冲突，将其作为另一种试管受精技术，这只是时间上的问题。上周他说道，一旦第一个克隆婴儿呱呱坠地，全世界一定会欢迎他的到来。但是，如果第一个克隆婴儿不健康、畸形，或者只是千百个克隆胎儿中的唯一幸存者，世界绝不会接受他。过早抢先开始克隆实验，神奇医生和他的同事们的确面临着极大的风险。如果他们的直觉出错，对克隆技术乃至对整个科学事业的冲击将是灾难性的。PassageB IHaveHisGenesButNotHisGeniusIts Christmas Eve 2040, and Im the only bartender still working that afternoon, and the house is practically empty. I see this guy down at the end of the bar, sitting by himself. I bring him a fresh drink, and wish him greetings of the season. He looks at me, sort of funny, and says: Do you know who I am? I admit I dont. Here, maybe this will help, he says, and he pulls a little picture out of his wallet. An old portrait, really old, like centuries old. Its a young man in profile: sharp nose, weak chin, definite resemblance to my friend here. At the bottom, theres a caption: W. A. Mozart. Now its my turn to look at him funny. Then it hits me like a brick. Youre that clone guy, I say. The guy in the papers back in the 20s. In the flesh. Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart. I have his brain, his heart, his DNA. Hes my father and my mother and my brother. Hes my identical twin, except I was born 247 years later. So he starts talking. It takes him a long time to explain, and I didnt get it all, but I got a lot. In 2001, Congress passed a ban on cloning humans, but of course mad scientists went ahead with secret cloning. And then, there was this software billionaire who was nuts about Mozart, and was especially nuts about Mozarts Requiem. He set up a secret institute in Switzerland and hired some top biologists and told them theyd get $1 million each for every baby they cloned from Mozarts DNA. In 2003, the institute managed to bring four babies to term. Two died shortly after birth. Two survived. But then this software billionaire died, and his company collapsed, and so did his cloning institute. One baby Mozart was put up for adoption anonymously. No one knows what happened to that one. The other baby was adopted by one of the scientists, who was a big Mozart fan herself. And thats me, he says. His mother, of course, didnt tell him or anyone else who he was, but she told the boy how special he was, how he was a genius, what a great composer he could be, trying to push her little Mozart toward music. But the 2010s werent the 1760s. The boy may have had talent, but he also had his own priorities, and they didnt include violin sonatas. He liked rock music and he liked it loud, and then as he got older he liked beer and girls. The harder his mother pushed him to be a great composer, the less he wanted to be one. After a while his mother gave up. By the time he was 20, he had a decent job working in a frame shop. And thats when the roof fell in. Some reporter got wind of the institute and the cloning experiment and tracked him down. But no one could prove he was a clone of Mozart without digging up the original, so the media treated him as a joke. It just crushed him. He tried running away. He joined a Buddhist monastery in Japan. One day, while he was there, he heard the Requiem. Not for the first time, but this time it was different. My God, it was beautiful! he says. I felt a realization explode inside my head. I just felt it somehow: It rang inside of me. Id finish it, or die trying. He knew that if he could finish the Requiem, hed be famous for real, a genius instead of a fool. He immersed himself in Mozarts music. Nights, weekends, all the time, he drove himself, working on the Requiem. And? What happened? I turned 37 four months ago. Ive been working on the Requiem for 15 years. Mozart died when he was 35. I should have finished the Requiem two years ago. And you havent. He looks at me for a while and shakes his head, You dont understand. I have his genes but not his genius. And with that he drops a tip on the bar and is gone. I never saw him again. If the Requiem was ever finished, I never heard about it.我有的是他的基因，而不是他的天赋那是2040年圣诞前夕，那天下午我是唯一还在酒吧里工作的招待，屋子里几乎已经空了。我看到一个人独自坐在酒台的尽头。我给他送去一杯鲜汁饮料并祝他圣诞快乐。他上下打量着我，有点古怪地问我：“你知道我是谁吗？”我老实告诉他，我并不认识他。 “哦，也许这个会对你有所帮助，”他一边说一边从皮夹子里掏出一张小照片，一张很旧的人物照，仿佛好几个世纪以前照的。照片上是一位年轻人的侧面像：高鼻梁，小下巴，绝对很像我身边的这位朋友。相片的底部有一行说明：“W.A.莫扎特”。 现在轮到我来古怪地审视他了。我像挨了当头一棒似的猛然明白过来。“你就是那个克隆出来的家伙，”我说，“20年代各家报纸上刊登过的那个家伙。” “正是本人，沃尔夫冈.A.莫扎特。我有他的头脑，他的心脏，还有他的DNA。他是我的父亲，又是我的母亲和兄长。他是我的孪生兄弟，只是我比他晚出生247年。”于是他开始谈了起来，费了很长时间才解释清楚，尽管我不能全部理解，但还是明白了不