時差N小時:男性的未來

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雅艾爾：發(fā)生什么事了，唐?你看起來很擔(dān)憂。

Don:Well, Yael, you know how people are alwayspredicting that one day women will be able to havebabies without men? It turns out that some speciesof the Whiptail lizard have figured out how to dothis and completely eliminated the male sex.

唐：嗯，雅艾爾，人們通常預(yù)測，如果有一天沒有男人，女人也可以自己生孩子，你知道是怎么回事嗎?事實證明鞭尾蜥蜴已經(jīng)做到這一點，并將雄性蜥蜴完全消滅掉了。

Yael:You mean that the species is all female?

雅艾爾：你是說所有的鞭尾蜥蜴都是雌性?

Don:Exactly. The females have the ability to lay eggs that hatch and grow into healthy lizardswithout needing to be fertilized by a male. The offspring are exact and complete geneticduplicates of the mothers.

唐：正是這樣。雌性鞭尾蜥蜴能不通過受精就產(chǎn)卵并孵化出健康的小蜥蜴。而其后代的基因與母親的基因完全一致。

Yael:So the females are cloning themselves.

雅艾爾：那么說雌性蜥蜴是在克隆自己。

Don:That's right. And if that weren't enough, the female lizards take turns role-playing. Theyperform a mating ritual in which one lizard acts like the male, and the second lizard acts likethe female. The ritual causes the lizard acting as the female to ovulate and lay her eggs.Then, a few weeks later, the two lizards switch roles and repeat this process so that the secondfemale will be able to ovulate and lay her eggs.

唐：說得對。如果那樣還不夠的話，雌性蜥蜴會輪流進(jìn)行角色扮演。她們進(jìn)行一個交配儀式，其中一個扮演雄性，另一個扮演雌性。這種儀式會引起扮演雌性角色的蜥蜴排卵并產(chǎn)卵。然后過幾個星期，兩只蜥蜴再交換角色，重復(fù)這種交配儀式，這樣另一只雌蜥蜴就可以排卵，產(chǎn)卵了。

Yael:That is strange.

雅艾爾：太奇怪了。

Don:And it raises a lot of interesting questions. For example, it's not clear how well an all-female species can evolve and adapt to environmental changes. A species' survival dependsin part on variation among its members. If all the members of a species are identical,chances are greater that something like a change in the climate or a disease will wipe them allout.

唐：這也引發(fā)了許多有趣的問題。例如，對于這種全雌物種如何更好地進(jìn)化以適應(yīng)環(huán)境變化目前還不清楚。一個物種的生存要部分依靠成員的變異。如果所有的成員基因都一模一樣，那么一遇到氣候變化或者災(zāi)害，她們?nèi)姼矝]的機會就很大。

Yael:So it might be a little early to do away with males.

雅艾爾：所以排除雄性還為之過早。

Don:Well, you know what they say. You can't live with them.

唐：嗯，你知道她們是怎么說的。你沒辦法和他們一起生活。

Yael:You can't live without them.

雅艾爾：但你的生活不能沒有他們。