Narrator: Listen to part of a conversation between a student and her biology professor.

旁白：请听一段学生和她的生物学教授之间的对话。

Male professor: So the assignment is to reproduce one of the animal camouflage experiments we read about in our text book.

男教授：那么作业是重做我们在课本上读到的一个动物伪装实验。

Which experiment did you pick?

你选择哪个实验呢？

Female student: Well... I was wondering if I could try to reproduce an experiment that's...kind of the opposite of what was discussed in the textbook?

女学生：嗯……我想知道我是否可以尝试重做一个实验，这个实验……有点和课本上讨论的相反？

Male professor: So, instead of how and why an animal might hide itself, you want to do something about why an animal might want to be seen? Hmmm. Tell me more.

男教授：所以你想去做一个为什么动物会有意暴露自己的实验，而不是一个动物如何及为什么伪装自己的实验？嗯。多说一点。

Female student: Well, I got the idea from one of the journals you said we should look at...

女学生：嗯，我是从你推荐我们阅读的期刊上获得这个想法的……

it's an experiment about, um, they called them eyespots in the article?

这是一项关于，嗯，关于期刊上他们口中所说的眼状斑点的实验？

Male professor: Eyespots, sure. The patterns on the wings of moths and butterflies that are generally believed to scare off predators because they look like big eyes.

男教授：眼状斑点，当然。飞蛾和蝴蝶身上的图案通常会被认为可以吓退捕食者，因为它们看起来像是大大的眼睛。

Female student: Yeah. Except the article was about an experiment that disputes that theory.

女学生：是的。不过这篇文章是关于一项反驳这个理论的实验的。

Male professor: Well, we know that the markings do scare the birds, but the idea that the spots look like eyes is... well that's just a commonly held belief.

男教授：嗯，我们知道，这些图案确实会吓退鸟类，但是这些图案看起来像眼睛的观点……实际上只是个被人们广泛认同的观点而已。

Female student: So...that's not even based on research?

女学生：所以……这个观点甚至不是基于研究而来的？

Male professor: Well, this whole idea of moth or butterfly markings being scary because they look like eyes rests on how we imagine that their predators, like birds, perceive the markings.

男教授：嗯，蛾子和蝴蝶身上的图案因为像眼睛而使人害怕这整个观点，其实是基于我们对于捕食者，比如鸟类，会如何感知这些图案的想象。

And we can never really know that. All we can do is observe bird behavior. But tell me more about the experiment.

我们永远不能真正地验证这个观点。我们所有可以做的事情是去观察鸟类的行为。但是，你再给我讲讲这个实验吧。

Female student: OK, so the experiment looked at the shapes of the markings on moth wings.

女学生：好的，所以这个实验观察了飞蛾翅膀上斑纹的形状。

The researchers wanted to know if the markings that were round or eye-shaped were more effective at deterring predators than square or rectangular markings.

研究人员想知道，圆形或眼睛形状的斑纹是否比正方形或长方形的斑纹更能有效地威慑捕食者。

Male professor: OK…

男教授：好的……

Female student: Yeah. So, they attached food to paper models of moths, with different shaped marks drawn on the wings, to see how birds reacted.

女学生：是的。因此，他们把食物附在飞蛾的纸模型上，在翅膀上画上不同形状的标记，来观察鸟类的反应。

And what's interesting is they realized that the round marks were not more effective at scaring birds than other shapes.

有趣的是，他们发现，圆形图案并不比别的形状的图案更能有效地吓退鸟类。

Male professor: Were they less effective?

男教授：圆形图案效果更差吗？

Female student: No, they were about the same. But what researchers did determine is that larger markings are more effective than smaller markings at scaring off prey.

女学生：不，它们效果差不多……但研究人员确定的是，在吓跑猎物方面，较大的斑纹比较小的斑纹更有效。

They called this phenomenon "visual loudness".

他们把这个现象称为“视觉响度”。

Male professor: Visual loudness. huh. Well, I guess it's not all that shocking, if you think about it.

男教授：视觉响度。嗯。如果你仔细想想，我想这也没那么令人震惊。

Female student: So, anyway, is it OK? Can I repeat this experiment and write about it?

女学生：不管怎样，可以吗？我可以重做这个实验并且把它写出来吗？

Male professor: Yes, I think that'll work. The problem I foresee is, well, where?

男教授：是的，我想可以。我想可能出现的问题是，嗯，在哪里（做这个实验）？

This is an urban campus...You'll have a hard time finding a good place to set up the experiment.

我们这里是城里的校区……你想找一个适合做这个实验的地方可能会很困难。

Female student: Oh, I-I wasn't planning on doing it on campus.

女学生：哦，我，我没有打算在校园里做。

I'm going home for spring break, and my family lives in the country, far from the nearest city. I can set it up in the backyard.

我春假要回家，我家住在乡村，离最近的城市很远。我可以在后院里做这个实验。

Male professor: Good idea. Except one week is not a lot of time. So you'll need to make some adjustments to have enough data.

男教授：好主意。但是一周的春假时间并不长。所以你需要对实验做一些改动，以得到足够的数据。

I'd set up the experiment near a bird feeder, and get in as much observation time as you can.

我建议把实验地点设置在鸟食器附近，然后争取尽可能多的观察鸟类的时间。