纪录片《为何讲话》 第13期：人脑控制说话的部分

Cases like Steve's

史蒂夫这类案例

offer scientists like Cathy Price

给凯茜·普赖斯这类科学家提供了

a unique window into how the brain and language connect together.

一种研究大脑和语言联系方法的特殊途径

20 years ago I was told

二十年前 大家都说

that the brain wasn't relevant to our study of language

大脑和人类的语言学习能力并无关联

and the reason for that was that we had so little information.

而理由是这方面的信息我们掌握得太少了

The two types of information that we had were either from

我们只有两种方法来获取信息

autopsies¹ of people who had died after they had had a language difficulty,

要么对生前有语言障碍的人进行尸检

or we were using brain scans

要么利用脑同位素扫描

where the information was so blurred²

这些信息都太模糊

that you couldn't really see very much detail about what was happening.

仅凭这些没法真正了解当时的事情始末

So at that point all we knew was that

所以那时 我们所知的仅仅是

the left side of the brain was most important for language

左脑是作用于语言的重要部分

and the front part of the brain is important for speaking

前脑是控制说话能力的重要部分

and the back part of the brain was important for understanding speech

而后脑是理解他人讲话的重要部位

so that was the sort of general level at which it was understood.

当时人们的理解差不多就在这个水平上

As scanning technology has improved,

随着扫描技术的提高

it's become apparent just how complicated the brain functions

大脑对语言作用的复杂性

involved in language really are.

日益凸显

1 autopsies   

n.尸体解剖( autopsy的名词复数 )；验尸；现场验证；实地观察

参考例句：

• Autopsies cannot be performed and thus no recent histological examinations have been reported. 不能进行尸体解剖，因此没有新近的组织学检查的报道。 来自辞典例句
• I told you to supervise autopsies, not to set up a lot of fancy rules. 我叫你监督解剖室，不是去制定一些空想的规定。 来自辞典例句

2 blurred   

v.（使）变模糊( blur的过去式和过去分词 )；（使）难以区分；模模糊糊；迷离

参考例句：

• She suffered from dizziness and blurred vision. 她饱受头晕目眩之苦。
• Their lazy, blurred voices fell pleasantly on his ears. 他们那种慢吞吞、含糊不清的声音在他听起来却很悦耳。 来自《简明英汉词典》