英语音频杂志：恐龙是什么样子的？

 　　What did a dinosaur¹ look like?

　　

　　By Linda Baxter

　　

　　

　　Can we believe what we see?

　　Dinosaur art has a long history. Life-size models in natural history museums, paintings and drawings, children's toys, and of course, the recent spate² of computer generated films. It captures the imagination, popularises the science and raises money for museums to support more research. We love looking at dinosaurs³. But what are we seeing? The real thing? Or a little fact and a lot of imagination? Did the velociraptor look like a giant lizard⁴? Or like a snake with long legs? Or did it look more like a bird with feathers but no wings?

　　

　　Bones

　　All dinosaur reconstruction⁵ begins with bones. The good news is that more and more fossils of different types are being discovered all over the world. The bad news is that we don't have complete skeletons for all the species that are being discovered. And it can be surprisingly difficult to work out where all the bones are supposed to go. One of the first reconstructions⁶ of the Iguanadon, over a hundred years ago, had a small horn on its nose. It was actually the creature's thumb. Nowadays, we have multiple examples of complete sets of bones for some species, but that doesn't mean that everyone agrees about their skeletal structure. Scientists are still arguing about whether the triceratops family had straight legs like a rhinoceros⁷ or bent⁸ legs like a lizard. And you'll see both versions in dinosaur art. There are things that bones don't tell us.

　　

　　Muscles

　　The next step is to put muscles onto the skeleton. Muscles make marks on the bones that they are connected to, so we can study these marks in existing animals and draw conclusions about dinosaurs. But there are large parts of bodies without any bones - the whole abdominal⁹ area for example. How much muscle is there? A lot, like a horse? Or a little like a bird? Computer modelling can help with this problem, but not everyone reaches the same conclusions. A computer model has been produced that shows that Tyrannosaurus Rex didn't have big enough leg muscles to run very fast. And scientists are still arguing about it. There's other evidence to show that he could run very fast indeed.

　　

　　Soft tissue

　　Who could guess from its skeleton that an elephant has enormous ears and a long trunk? Soft tissue doesn't fossilise. Some imprints¹⁰ of dinosaurs' soft tissue have been found in rock possibly showing humps, or frills on the back of the creature or on the top of its head, but not in much detail. There really isn't enough evidence for a lot of the additional features that we see in our favourite images of some dinosaur species. Scientists are studying soft tissue to try to find out what organs dinosaurs had and what they used them for. If you examine an elephant's skull¹¹, you'll find evidence that it has a long trunk - spaces for passages for blood and nerves and tiny muscle connections for example. This research will be able to give us a lot of information about dinosaurs' outward appearance.

　　

　　Skin

　　Some preserved imprints of dinosaur skin show reptile-like scales, but it isn't clear if they covered the whole body. Dinosaur fossils with feathers have been found in China and more and more scientists are now accepting that many dinosaurs, including T Rex, probably had primitive¹² feathers as a way of keeping warm. And maybe primitive fur. That's certainly a revolution in the traditional depiction¹³ of dinosaurs. The colour of the skin, or scales, or feathers or fur, is another problem. There is no evidence at all from the fossils. The colours that are traditionally used are based on what we know of the animal's natural habitat and whether it needed to hide for protection. But we could be completely wrong. We don't even know how well dinosaurs could see colour. Most of the assumptions are based on what we know about birds and reptiles¹⁴ today.

　　

　　Faces

　　We don't know the shape of dinosaur eyes. Were they thin and slit-like, like reptiles? Or round, like birds? In traditional dinosaur art, the dangerous, predatory dinosaurs often have slit-like eyes because it makes them look nastier. The gentle vegetarians¹⁵ are given soft, round eyes. And what about nostrils¹⁶? Traditionally, dinosaur nostrils have been placed quite high on their heads. But it's now believed that they were much lower down, closer to the mouth. This discovery has a lot of implications for how the animals lived and breathed. It's a big change for the artists to consider too.

　　

　　So what's the conclusion?

　　A 77 million-year-old mummified dinosaur (Brachylophosaurus) was found recently, and scientists are hoping that he (or she) will answer a lot of questions, particularly about skin, scales, muscles and soft tissue in general. Only a handful have ever been found before and this is the first one that can be studied in detail with modern technology.

　　Until then, the fact remains¹⁷ that a lot of very different looking dinosaurs can be drawn¹⁸ from the same basic scientific evidence. And I think that the dinosaur-loving public should get to see all of them.

1 dinosaur   

n.恐龙

参考例句：

• Are you trying to tell me that David was attacked by a dinosaur?你是想要告诉我大卫被一支恐龙所攻击？
• He stared at the faithful miniature of the dinosaur.他凝视著精确的恐龙缩小模型。

2 spate   

n.泛滥，洪水，突然的一阵

参考例句：

• Police are investigating a spate of burglaries in the area.警察正在调查这一地区发生的大量盗窃案。
• Refugees crossed the border in full spate.难民大量地越过了边境。

3 dinosaurs   

n.恐龙( dinosaur的名词复数 )；守旧落伍的人，过时落后的东西

参考例句：

• The brontosaurus was one of the largest of all dinosaurs. 雷龙是所有恐龙中最大的一种。 来自《简明英汉词典》
• Dinosaurs have been extinct for millions of years. 恐龙绝种已有几百万年了。 来自《简明英汉词典》

4 lizard   

n.蜥蜴，壁虎

参考例句：

• A chameleon is a kind of lizard.变色龙是一种蜥蜴。
• The lizard darted out its tongue at the insect.蜥蜴伸出舌头去吃小昆虫。

5 reconstruction   

n.重建，再现，复原

参考例句：

• The country faces a huge task of national reconstruction following the war.战后，该国面临着重建家园的艰巨任务。
• In the period of reconstruction,technique decides everything.在重建时期，技术决定一切。

6 reconstructions   

重建( reconstruction的名词复数 )； 再现； 重建物； 复原物

参考例句：

• Multicolored reconstructions have been formed using (black and white) volume holographic plates. 利用黑白体积全息片已经做成了彩色重建象。
• The method gives ways to evaluate collision speed in traffic accident reconstructions. 该模型为交通事故再现推算碰撞速度提供了有效实用的方法。

7 rhinoceros   

n.犀牛

参考例句：

• The rhinoceros has one horn on its nose.犀牛鼻子上有一个角。
• The body of the rhinoceros likes a cattle and the head likes a triangle.犀牛的形体像牛，头呈三角形。

8 bent   

n.爱好，癖好；adj.弯的；决心的，一心的

参考例句：

• He was fully bent upon the project.他一心扑在这项计划上。
• We bent over backward to help them.我们尽了最大努力帮助他们。

9 abdominal   

adj.腹（部）的，下腹的；n.腹肌

参考例句：

• The abdominal aorta is normally smaller than the thoracic aorta.腹主动脉一般比胸主动脉小。
• Abdominal tissues sometimes adhere after an operation.手术之后腹部有时会出现粘连。

10 imprints   

n.压印( imprint的名词复数 )；痕迹；持久影响

参考例句：

• With each step he took, his boots left muddy imprints on the floor. 她父亲的毡靴一移动，就在地板上压了几个泥圈圈。 来自汉英文学 - 中国现代小说
• In Freudian theory, the imprints are memories, albeit unconscious ones. 在佛洛伊德理论中，这些痕迹就是记忆，只不过它们是无意识的。 来自互联网

11 skull   

n.头骨；颅骨

参考例句：

• The skull bones fuse between the ages of fifteen and twenty-five.头骨在15至25岁之间长合。
• He fell out of the window and cracked his skull.他从窗子摔了出去，跌裂了颅骨。

12 primitive   

adj.原始的；简单的；n.原(始)人，原始事物

参考例句：

• It is a primitive instinct to flee a place of danger.逃离危险的地方是一种原始本能。
• His book describes the march of the civilization of a primitive society.他的著作描述了一个原始社会的开化过程。

13 depiction   

n.描述

参考例句：

• Double rhythms, resounding through the lyric depiction and connecting with each other, indicate the thespian place of mankind and the cognition of the writer to this thespian place. 这双重旋律互为表里，表明了人类的某种悲剧性处境以及作家对这种悲剧性处境的感受和认识。
• A realistic depiction of scenes from everyday domestic life. 日常家居生活的写实画。

14 reptiles   

n.爬行动物，爬虫( reptile的名词复数 )

参考例句：

• Snakes and crocodiles are both reptiles. 蛇和鳄鱼都是爬行动物。 来自《简明英汉词典》
• Birds, reptiles and insects come from eggs. 鸟类、爬虫及昆虫是卵生的。 来自《现代汉英综合大词典》

15 vegetarians   

n.吃素的人( vegetarian的名词复数 )；素食者；素食主义者；食草动物

参考例句：

• Vegetarians are no longer dismissed as cranks. 素食者不再被视为有怪癖的人。
• Vegetarians believe that eating meat is bad karma. 素食者认为吃肉食是造恶业。

16 nostrils   

鼻孔( nostril的名词复数 )

参考例句：

• Her nostrils flared with anger. 她气得两个鼻孔都鼓了起来。
• The horse dilated its nostrils. 马张大鼻孔。

17 remains   

n.剩余物，残留物；遗体，遗迹

参考例句：

• He ate the remains of food hungrily.他狼吞虎咽地吃剩余的食物。
• The remains of the meal were fed to the dog.残羹剩饭喂狗了。

18 drawn   

v.拖，拉，拔出；adj.憔悴的，紧张的

参考例句：

• All the characters in the story are drawn from life.故事中的所有人物都取材于生活。
• Her gaze was drawn irresistibly to the scene outside.她的目光禁不住被外面的风景所吸引。