Some of the oldest words in Englishhave been identified, scientists say.

    科學(xué)家們相信，他們找到了英文中最古老的文字。

    Reading University researchers claim "I", "we", "two" and"three" are among the most ancient, dating back tens of thousandsof years.

    雷丁大學(xué)的研究人員認(rèn)為，"我"、"我們"、"二"和"三"是英文中最古老的詞匯，它們的歷史可以追溯到四萬(wàn)年前。

    Their computer model analyses the rate of change of words in Englishand the languages that share a common heritage.

    科研人員們通過一個(gè)計(jì)算機(jī)模型，對(duì)英文詞匯變化和消失的幾率進(jìn)行了分析測(cè)算，并展現(xiàn)出語(yǔ)言的普遍發(fā)展歷程。

    The team says it can predict which words are likely to becomeextinct--citing "squeeze", "guts", "stick" and"bad" as probable first casualties.

    研究預(yù)測(cè)，"擠"、"膽量"、"木棍"和"壞"將很可能成為最先被廢棄和絕跡的詞匯。

    "We use a computer to fit a range of models that tell us howrapidly these words evolve," said MarkPagel, an evolutionary biologist at the University ofReading.

    雷丁大學(xué)進(jìn)化生物學(xué)家馬克·佩格爾說："我們利用計(jì)算機(jī)模型測(cè)算出這些詞的發(fā)展速率。"

    At the root of the Reading University effort is a lexicon of 200 words that is not specific toculture or technology, and is therefore likely to represent

    concepts that have not changed acrossnations or millennia.

    雷丁大學(xué)的研究進(jìn)行的基礎(chǔ)是一個(gè)包含約200個(gè)詞匯的詞匯庫(kù)，庫(kù)中的詞匯大多是一些表達(dá)人類對(duì)事物共同感知、不易因習(xí)俗和科技而改變的詞，而非那些隨著科技和時(shí)代進(jìn)步應(yīng)運(yùn)而生的新詞。

    "We have lists of words that linguists have produced for us thattell us if two words in related languages actually derive from acommon ancestral word," said ProfessorPagel.

    佩格爾教授說："我們開發(fā)這個(gè)詞匯庫(kù)首先需要讓語(yǔ)言學(xué)專家來告訴我們，不同語(yǔ)系的兩個(gè)詞匯是否會(huì)存在一個(gè)共同的出處。"

    "We have descriptionsof the ways we think words change and their ability to change intoother words, and those descriptions can be turned into amathematical language," he added.

    佩格爾教授補(bǔ)充說道："我們掌握了詞匯改變以及它們轉(zhuǎn)變成其它詞匯的信息，之后我們把這些信息轉(zhuǎn)變成數(shù)學(xué)語(yǔ)言。"

    What the researchers foundwas that the frequency with which a word is used relates to howslowly it changes through time, so that the most common words tendto be the oldest ones.

    研究人員還發(fā)現(xiàn)，詞匯的使用頻率和其生命力緊密相關(guān)，越是普通的詞匯，存在的時(shí)間也越長(zhǎng)久。

    For example, the words "I" and "who" are among the oldest, alongwith the words "two", "three", and "five". The word "one" is onlyslightly younger.

    比如，"我"、"誰(shuí)"、"二"、"三"和"五"的歷史就非常久遠(yuǎn)，而"一"則略微年輕一點(diǎn)。

    The word "four" experienced a linguistic evolutionary leap that makes itsignificantly younger in English and different from otherIndo-European languages.

    英文數(shù)字"四"由于經(jīng)歷過一次語(yǔ)言上的進(jìn)化過程，所以更為年輕一些，它和其它歐印語(yǔ)種的發(fā)音也大為不同。

    Meanwhile, the fastest-changing words are projected to die outand be replaced by other words much sooner.

    與之相比，變化速度越快的詞匯，消亡以及被其它詞匯取代的速度也越快。

    For example, "dirty" is a rapidly changing word; currently thereare 46 different ways of saying it in the Indo-European languages,all words that are unrelated to each other. As a result, it islikely to die out soon in English, along with "stick" and"guts".

    例如，"臟"就是一個(gè)變化迅速的詞匯，歐印語(yǔ)系中表達(dá)"臟"的方式共有46種，而且每種聽上去都很不相同。所以，這個(gè)詞和"木棍"、"膽量"一樣，很可能很快就在英文中消失。

    "If you've ever played 'Chinese whispers', what comes out theend is usually gibberish. Yetour language can somehow retain its fidelity," Professor Pagelsaid.

    佩格爾教授說："玩過'傳話'游戲的人都知道，同樣的一句話從第一個(gè)人傳到最后一個(gè)人時(shí)通常已經(jīng)面目全非了。由此看來，語(yǔ)言對(duì)我們還是很忠誠(chéng)的。"