GRE阅读题目解析:哲学学科

　　P3

　　1

　　Present-day philosophers usually envision their discipline as an endeavor that has been, since antiquity, distinct from and superior to any particular intellectual discipline such as theology or science.

　　当今的哲学家经常把自己的学科想象成，从古代起就一直独立于和高于其他任何一门知识学科，比如神学或科学。

　　2

　　The basis for this view, however, lies in a serious misinterpretation of the past, a projection of modern concerns onto past events.

　　然而这种观点基于一种对历史的严重误读，是一种现代观点对历史事件的投射。

　　(projection，此处做投射解释，把自己的态度、情感或猜想归结到别人身上。

　　亦即现代人认为哲学独立于、高于其他知识学科，现代人认为古人也是这样定义哲学的，并裁剪古人的表述以支持自己这种理解，是为投射。)

　　3

　　The idea of an autonomous discipline called “philosophy,” distinct from and sitting in judgment on such pursuits as theology and science turns out, on close examination, to be of quite recent origin.

　　哲学作为一门独立学科的概念，追求裁判诸如神学和科学，经过仔细检视，被证明是非常晚近才兴起的。

　　4

　　When, in the seventeenth century, Descartes and Hobbes rejected medieval philosophy, they did not think of themselves, as modern philosophers do, as proposing a new and better philosophy, but rather as furthering “the warfare between science and theology.”

　　十七世纪，当笛卡尔和霍布斯拒斥中世纪哲学，二者并不像当代的哲学家那样，想要提出一种新的、更好的哲学，而是为了推进“科学与神学之间的战争”。

　　5

　　They were fighting, albeit discreetly, to open the intellectual world to the new science and to liberate intellectual life from ecclesiastical philosophy and envisioned their work as contributing to the growth, not of philosophy, but of research in mathematics and physics.

　　尽管谨慎，但他们力争开启通往新科学的知识世界，进而解放教会把持的哲学影响下的智力生活，他们把这些努力视为对数学和物理学成长的助力，并非对哲学。

　　6

　　This link between philosophical interests and scientific practice persisted until the nineteenth century, when decline in ecclesiastical power over scholarship and changes in the nature of science provoked the final separation of philosophy from both.

　　哲学家关注科学实践，这种联系一直持续到十九世纪，教会对学术的影响力衰颓以及自然科学界的变化，导致哲学与二者的最终分道扬镳。

　　7

　　The demarcation of philosophy from science was facilitated by the development in the early nineteenth century of a new notion, that philosophy‘s core interest should be epistemology, the general explanation of what it means to know something.

　　哲学与科学的分家，得益于十九世纪早期发展起来的一种新观点，哲学核心的关注点应该是认识论，如何认识事物的一般性解释。

　　8

　　Modern philosophers now trace that notion back at least to Descartes and Spinoza, but it was not explicitly articulated until the late eighteenth century, by Kant, and did not become built into the structure of academic institutions and the standard self-descriptions of philosophy professors until the late nineteenth century.

　　现代的哲学家认为这个概念至少可以追溯到笛卡尔和斯宾诺莎，但十八世纪晚期的康德是第一个明确表述这种观点的人，且这个概念进入学术体系结构以及哲学教授普遍将其加入自述，要等到十九世纪晚期。

　　9

　　Without the idea of epistemology, the survival of philosophy in an age of modern science is hard to imagine.

　　没有认识论的概念，现代科学时代可能就没有哲学了。

　　10

　　Metaphysics, philosophy‘s traditional core — considered as the most general description of how the heavens and the earth are put together — had been rendered almost completely meaningless by the spectacular progress of physics.

　　形而上学，哲学的传统核心 —— 一般被认为是统合天堂与人世的最总体的描述 —— 已经被物理学波澜壮阔的发展置于百无一用的境地。

　　11

　　Kant, however, by focusing philosophy on the problem of knowledge, managed to replace metaphysics with epistemology, and thus to transform the notion of philosophy as “queen of sciences” into the new notion of philosophy as a separate, foundational discipline: philosophy became “primary” no longer in the sense of “highest” but in the sense of “underlying”.

　　然而康德通过将哲学聚焦于认知问题，用认识论成功取代了形而上学，得以转变哲学曾经的 “ 科学皇后 ” 的定义，进而使其发展成一门独立的基础学科：哲学再也不是最高最重要的学科，而成为一种最基础的学科。

　　5. Which of the following best expresses the author‘s main point?

　　○A Philosophy‘s overriding interest in basic human questions is a legacy primarily of the work of Kant.

　　○B Philosophy was deeply involved in the seventeenth-century warfare between science and religion.

　　○C The set of problems of primary importance to philosophers has remained relatively constant since antiquity.

　　○D The status of philosophy as an independent intellectual pursuit is a relatively recent development.

　　○E The role of philosophy in guiding intellectual speculation has gradually been usurped by science.

　　选 D

　　哲学作为一门独立的学科是相对晚近的发展。

　　6. The author of the passage implies which of the following in discussing the development of philosophy during the nineteenth century?

　　(A) Nineteenth-century philosophy took science as its model for understanding the bases of knowledge.

　　(B) The role of academic institutions in shaping metaphysical philosophy grew enormously during the nineteenth century.

　　(C) Nineteenth-century philosophers carried out a program of investigation explicitly laid out by Descartes and Spinoza.

　　(D) Kant had an overwhelming impact on the direction of nineteenth-century philosophy.

　　(E) Nineteenth-century philosophy made major advances in understanding the nature of knowledge.

　　选 D

　　康德对十九世纪哲学发展方向的影响很大，根据句 8，10，11 可以得知作者认为康德作用巨大。

　　7. The author suggests that Descartes‘ support for the new science of the seventeenth century can be characterized as

　　(A) pragmatic and hypocritical

　　(B) cautious and inconsistent

　　(C) daring and opportunistic

　　(D) intense but fleeting

　　(E) strong but prudent

　　选 E

　　作者认为 笛卡尔对十七世纪新科学的支持 是什么样的一种态度。

　　A 实用主义 又 虚伪

　　B 谨慎 又 矛盾反复

　　C 鲁莽 又 机会主义

　　D 强烈 但 转瞬即逝

　　E 强力 但 颇有远见

　　E 是唯一一个可能正常的选项，文中说到笛卡尔和霍布斯对中世纪哲学的态度是拒斥的 rejected，因为当时的哲学受神学影响太大，而科学的萌芽则方兴未艾，后来的人类历史证明科学是人类的发展方向，所以说笛卡尔当年的支持是 prudent 的，至于 strong 我们找不到直接的证据，只知道他们是明确反对神学的，推测和妥协地选了strong。

　　8. With which of the following statements concerning the writing of history would the author of the passage be most likely to agree?

　　(A) History should not emphasize the role played by ideas over the role played by individuals.

　　(B) History should not be distorted by attributing present-day consciousness to historical figures.

　　(C) History should not be focused primarily on those past events most relevant to the present.

　　(D) History should be concerned with describing those aspects of the past that differ most from those of the present.

　　(E) History should be examined for the lessons it can provide in understanding current problems.

　　选 B

　　作者开篇就说：认为哲学自古就独立于、高于其他学科的观点，是一种对历史的误读，是现代观点对历史的投射。

　　可见作者不认同这种理解历史的方式，后面作者详细说明了为什么哲学并非一直高于和独立于其他学科，以及是谁给哲学的定位带来了它今天被公认的地位。

　　可推测 B 正确，历史(研究或写作)不该把当代观点归于(投射)历史人物。

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