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Unit 12
Time
In-Class Reading
How to Take Your Time
I. Word List
Directions: Memorize the words and phrases before class. You will benefit from your effort when you get the passage from your teacher and read it in class.
Proper Names
Albert Einstein
（男子名）爱因斯坦（1879-1955，世界著名理论物理学家）
Larry Dossey
（男子名）拉里.多希
New Words
addict *
n. a person unable to free himself from a harmful habit 上瘾的人
alter *
v. change or make someone or something change 改变，变更
e.g. This does not alter the fact that the problem has got to be dealt with.
biochemical
adj. 生物化学的
brink *
n. edge 边缘
e.g. They managed to pull the company back from the brink of disaster.
chronobiology
n. 时间生物学
cult
n. a group of people following some non-traditional patterns of behaviour (mostly used for religious groups) 狂热信徒，崇拜者
desynchronise
v. 失去共时性
emerge *
v. appear or come out 出现，浮现，显露
e.g. The chick becomes independent as soon as it emerges from its shell.
Hispanic
adj. from or connected with a country where Spanish or Portuguese is spoken 拉丁美洲的
humankind
n. people in general (总称)人类
humidity *
n. the amount of water contained in the air 湿度
e.g. When there is high humidity, the air or soil is moist.
inborn
adj. naturally present at birth 与生俱来的
e.g. The nation had its problems, but the inborn good sense of its people saved it.
industrialise *
v. 工业化
e.g. The only way we are going to compete with the West is to industrialize.
internal *
adj. inside a particular place, person or object 内部的，体内的
e.g. Our internal clock determines when we rise and retire to bed.
mob *
n. a disorderly crowd of people 无秩序的群众；a large noisy crowd, especially one which is violent 成群的暴徒
outgoing
adj. open, going out 外向的，向外的
perceptual *
adj. 感性的；知觉的
reshape
v. 重新塑造，给......以新形式
resynchronise
v. 重新共时，重新同步
rhythm *
n. 节奏，韵律；同期运动
e.g. Human biological rhythms are related to the natural cycle of day and night.
stove *
n. 炉子
e.g. She left the doctor's sausages on the stove to keep warm.
summon *
v. make a great effort to gather one's strength, courage, energy, etc. 使出(力气),鼓起(勇气)，振作(精神)
e.g. She could not summon the strength even to sit up.
survival *
n. the state of continuing to live or exist 生存
e.g. A lot of small companies are fighting for survival.
synchronise
v. arrange for two or more actions to happen at exactly the same time 使同时发生；使同步
synchroniser
n. 同步指示仪
synchronisation
n. 同时发生，同步
thereby *
adv. thus, as a result 因此，从而
e.g. He implied that the President had lied and thereby obstructed justice. 他言下之意是总统撒了谎并因此而妨碍了司法公正。
timepiece
n. (old use) a clock or watch 计时器
tyranny
n. unfair and strict control over someone 专横，横行霸道；暴政
unclock
v. 使不受时钟的约束
unison
n. doing together as one, at the same time 步调一致，行动一致
e.g. Two therapists will massage you in unison from head to toe.
wisely *
adv. 聪明地，明智地
e.g. Not all of the money has been spent wisely according to a recent report.
wristwatch *
n. a watch that you wear on your wrist 手表
e.g. Five minutes later, the guard called out, tapping his wristwatch with his fingernail.
How to Take Your Time
1 Dr Larry Dossey has two antique clocks. "One fast, the other slow," says Dr Dossey. "They remind me that my life is not ruled by clocks, that I can choose the time I live by."
2 How a person thinks about time can kill him, according to Dossey, a pioneer in the emerging science of chronobiology, the study of how time interacts with life. One of the most common ills in our society, he says, is "time sickness", a sense of time pressure and hurry that causes anxiety and tension. These symptoms can contribute to heart disease and strokes, two of our most frequent causes of death.
3 Dossey has discovered that these and other stress-induced ills can often be successfully treated by using simple techniques to change how a person thinks about time.
4 Dr Dossey became interested in time and health when he noticed how many patients insisted on having watches with them in the hospital <1>, even though they had no schedules to keep. They were all time addicts, taught since childhood to schedule their lives by society's clock, and all felt lost without the security of a timepiece. Time seems to rule our lives. Time is money, to be saved and spent wisely, not wasted or lost.
5 Almost all living things in our world carry their own biological clocks synchronised with the rhythms of nature. A crab can sense when the tide is about to change. A mouse wakes when night nears. A squirrel knows when to prepare for its long winter nap. These living clocks are not accurate in any robot-like mechanical sense. They adjust to changes in the environment.
6 Light is the most powerful synchroniser in most living things. But in humans there is another powerful synchroniser: other people. Pioneering studies in Germany reported that when people were put together in groups isolated from external time cues of light, temperature and humidity, their own complex internal timekeeping rhythms became desynchronised; then they resynchronised in unison <2>. Even body temperatures started to rise and fall together, a sign that subtle biochemical changes in each body were now happening together. These experiments may have discovered one of the mysterious forces that reshape individuals into members of a team, cult or mob.
7 The mind can alter rhythms of time in various ways. People brought back from the brink of death often recall their entire lives flashing before them in an instant. Those who have been in a serious accident often report that, as it occurred, everything happened in slow motion; apparently this is a survival tool built into the brain, an ability to accelerate to several times normal perceptual speed, thereby "slowing down" the world and giving the victim "time" to think how to avoid disaster <3>.
8 Because the time our society keeps has been taught to us since birth, we think of it as something that everyone everywhere must somehow share. But cultures differ in how they perceive time. In North America and the industrialised countries of northern Europe, life is tightly scheduled. To keep someone waiting is frowned upon. But in southern Europe and in the Hispanic countries of Latin America <4>, people are given priority over schedules and in making appointments the starting time is more flexible.
9 Each view of time has advantages and disadvantages. But the costs can be great.
When our natural inner rhythms are out of synchronisation with clock time, stress results. Under the tyranny of clock time, western industrialised society now finds that heart disease and related ills are leading causes of death. However, such "time illnesses" can be treated and prevented by changing the way we think about time, according to Dr Dossey. He applies simple techniques that you can also use to change and master your own time:
10 1) Unclock your life.
Stop wearing a wristwatch. Time becomes much less a concern when we break the habit of looking at clocks or watches.
11 2) Set your own inner sense of time.
To illustrate that time is relative, Einstein observed that to a person sitting on a hot stove, two minutes could feel like two hours; to the young man with a pretty girl, two hours could seem like two minutes.
12 3) Tap your body's power to change time <5>.
We all possess an inborn ability to relax. Most people can summon it up merely by dismissing disturbing thoughts and by controlling their breathing - for example, by thinking the word "one" with each outgoing breath. Within several minutes this can produce deep calm.
13 4) Synchronise yourself with nature.
Take time to watch a sunset, or a cloud cross the sky. Remember that there is a time far older than what humankind has created with clocks.
14 The cultural pattern we call time is learnt, and if we wish to live in harmony with nature we must learn to recognize that its time still shapes our world and should not be ignored. We created the mechanical time around which our society operates, and we have the freedom to choose whether we will be its slave or its master. (838 words)
Time taken: _________ minutes
Phrases and Expressions
adjust to
gradually get used to a new situation by making small changes in the way you do things
e.g. Adjusting to the heat in Africa was more difficult than they had expected.
feel like
1) give you a particular feeling
e.g. I was there for only two days but it felt like a week.
2) have a particular feeling
e.g. I didn't feel like talking to the landlord, so I took my beer to the window.
insist on
demand that something should happen and refuse to let anyone say no
e.g. Her parents insist on speaking to her teacher.
summon up
鼓起(勇气)
e.g. I couldn't summon up the courage to ask you out till now.
think of... as...
把......看作是......
e.g. We now think of the car as being essential rather than a luxury. |