Directions: Read the following text carefully and then translate the underlined segments into Chinese. Your translation should be written neatly on the ANSWER SHEET. (10 points)
Another field in which technological advances have spurred global social change is biotechnology. Sex selection of fetuses, genetically engineered organisms, cloning of sheep and cows—these have been among the significant yet controversial scientific advances in the field of biotechnology in recent years. George Ritzer’s concept of McDonaldization applies to the entire area of biotechnology. (46) Just as the fast-food concept has permeated society, no phase of life now seems exempt from therapeutic or medical intervention. In fact, sociologists view many aspects of biotechnology as an extension of the recent trend toward the medicalization of society. Through genetic manipulation, the medical profession is expanding its turf still further (Clarke et al. 2003).
Today’s biotechnology holds itself out as totally beneficial to human beings, but it is in constant need of monitoring. (47) As we will see, biotechnological advances have raised many difficult ethical and political questions, among them the desirability of tinkering with the gene pool, which could alter our environment in unexpected and unwanted ways (D. Weinstein and Weinstein 1999).
One startling biotechnological advance is the possibility of altering human behavior through genetic engineering. Fish and plant genes have already been mixed to create frost-resistant potato and tomato crops. More recently, human genes have been implanted in pigs to provide humanlike kidneys for organ transplants.
One of the latest developments in genetic engineering is gene therapy. (48) Geneticists working with mouse fetuses have managed to disable genes that carry an undesirable trait and replace them with genes carrying a desirable trait. Such advances raise staggering possibilities for altering animal and human forms. Still, gene therapy remains highly experimental, and must be considered a long, long shot (Kolata 1999).
The debate on genetic engineering escalated in 1997 when scientists in Scotland announced that they had cloned a sheep. (49) After many unsuccessful attempts, they had finally been able to replace the genetic material of a sheep’s egg with DNA from an adult sheep, creating a lamb that was a clone of the adult. The very next year, Japanese researchers successfully cloned cows. These developments raised the possibility that in the near future, scientists may be able to clone human beings. William F. Ogburn probably could not have anticipated such scientific developments when he wrote of culture lag 70 years earlier. (50) However, the successful cloning of sheep illustrates again how quickly material culture can change, and how non-material culture moves more slowly in absorbing such changes.
