可可电台，每期节目一话题，让英语磨练耳朵的同时学到更多有益的小知识，丰富知识的同时受益于生活。

The things everyone should know about time.

关于时间，每个人都该知道的事。

A lifespan is a billion heartbeats.

动物的寿命大约是十亿次心跳的时间。

Complex organisms die. Sad though it is in individual cases, it’s a necessary part of the bigger picture; life pushes out the old to make way for the new.

复杂的有机体会死去。对个体来说这是个悲哀的事实，但在更高的层面上这是必须的：旧的总要为新的让路。

Remarkably, there exist simple scaling laws relating animal metabolism to body mass. Larger animals live longer; but they also metabolize slower, as manifested in slower heart rates.

值得注意的是，自然界存在着关于动物体型和新陈代谢的一套简单比例法则：体型更大的动物活得更久，但新陈代谢也更慢，表现出来就是心跳会更慢。

These effects cancel out, so that animals from shrews to blue whales have lifespans with just about equal number of heartbeats—about one and a half billion, if you simply must be precise. In that very real sense, all animal species experience“the same amount of time.”At least, until we master #9 and become immortal.

这些效应相互抵消，结果就是从鼩鼱（一种外形似鼠的小型哺乳动物）到蓝鲸，各种动物的寿命都差不多是15亿次心跳的时间。从这个意义上来说，所有物种都经历了“相同的时间”——至少是在我们掌握了第9条并获得永生之前。

【知识点讲解】

amount of 大量

They have only a vague idea of the amount of water available.

他们只是大概知道可用水的总量。

The evaluation of conduct involves some amount of generalization.

对操行的评价会含有一些泛泛之论。

They will need a reasonable amount of desk area and good light.

他们将需要一个面积较大的摆放办公桌的地方和充足的照明。

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