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# 23｜练习paraphrase的最终目的，是有一天可以不再需要它
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你好，我是陈亦峰，欢迎你和我一起学英语。
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上一节，我们利用[Breaking through Three Common Engineering Myths](https://www.infoq.com/articles/breaking-through-engineering-myths/)这篇文章第三部分中的两段话，介绍了英语学习中常用的一种训练方法paraphrase，也就是用你自己的语言，把别人说过的话或写的文章，以另一种不同的方式表达出来。这是一个一举多得的好方法，可以帮助我们进行词汇学习，同时又可以练习阅读与写作。
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我们介绍了paraphrase的两大类方法：词汇替换和句子结构调整。上回我们只讲了第一类方法，今天我们在上一讲换词的基础上，来讲第二类方法，调整句子结构。
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改写句子、调整句子结构的基础，还是我们之前讲过的语法知识。我们之前用了两篇文章，逐句分析了每一句话的成分和句法结构，我们讲过简单句、并列句、复合句、复杂句的概念，也讲过英文复杂句的“主从分明”的树状结构特点。**无论句子有多长，主干永远是一个简单句，谓语动词永远是其核心**，分析句子也好，今天做paraphrase也好，第一步都是一样的，就是找主干，也就是找到句子的主语（物质）和谓语动词（运动）。主干找到之后，再去找枝叶或者“挂件”，**搞清楚它们和主干之间的关系**。
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## 课前朗读
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好，我们接下来通过逐句paraphrase的练习，来复习上面这些语法要点。首先我们来看一下上一次课经过换词之后的半成品，我先来给你朗读一遍。
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> The third myth seems easy to understand – if engineers were creative, wouldn’t they have decided to be artists, writers, or entered professions like paintings or sculpture? Wrong! The essence of creativity is to create! Engineers create products, services, and processes that affect people every day. Whether your effort was spent to create consumer applications, devices, or machines, the final result of engineering work is used by other people. If engineers prevented their creativity from developing, they would not have the chance to a clear understanding of ways to solve problems than they otherwise would.
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> Every day, engineers need to find new ways to deal with new problems. Engineers have the wonderful opportunity and huge responsibility of imagining ways in which the world could be different and then creating ways to make that happen. That is the most important part of creativity and it encourages engineers to do great things. For example, engineering innovations have greatly improved healthcare over the years. From data analysis to efficient software systems, to surgery machines, to providing treatment tracking and recommendations, engineering truly saves lives daily.
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如果你还记得原文的话，你会发现，仅仅通过换词所进行的paraphrase，改写程度是很低的。如果对此进行学术论文的查重，恐怕立刻会被认定为抄袭！所以说，利用换词来进行paraphrase只是一小部分工作，这主要还是作为词汇练习的手段，paraphrase的主要工作还是调整句子结构。
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## paraphrase的第二种方法：调整句子结构
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下面我们逐句来做训练。我们先来看第一句话：
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> The third myth seems easy to understand – if engineers were creative, wouldn’t they have decided to be artists, writers, or entered professions like paintings or sculpture? Wrong!
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这句话是英语里面非常典型的rhetorical question。作者提出一个问题，显然不是为了寻求对方的回答，而是通过自问自答的方式表达自己的一个观点。这是一种修辞手段，有点类似于中文的反问句。在改写时，我们可以去掉这些花里胡哨的修辞手段，直白地把作者的观点陈述出来。
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The third myth seems easy to understand – engineers would have chosen to be artists, writers, or entered professions like paintings or sculpture if they were creative. Wrong!
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我们来看下一句话：
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> The essence of creativity is to create! Engineers create products, services, and processes that affect people every day.
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这两句话前一句已经很简单直白，“创造力的本质在于创造”，不用再改了。后一句话也很简单，主语和谓语动词一目了然，“工程师们创造了各种各样的产品、服务和流程”，宾语后面带了一个定语从句。对于学习者来说，我们可以在改写时把复杂句变成两个简单句。
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The essence of creativity is to create! Engineers create products, services, and processes. These creations affect people every day.
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我们再看下一句：
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> Whether your effort was spent to create consumer applications, devices, or machines, the final result of engineering work is used by other people.
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这句话里带有两个被动语态。我们之前讲过，除非是科技类的论文，一般写作都建议使用主动语态，会使意思表达更加清楚直白。我改写之后的结果：
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People benefit from the result of software or hardware engineering work.
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我们来看下一句：
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> If engineers prevented their creativity from developing, they would not have a clear understanding of ways to solve problems than they otherwise would.
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这句话是虚拟语气，“如果工程师不发挥他们的创造力，他们就领悟不到解决问题的方法”，是典型的正话反说。我们可以把虚拟语气去掉，把反话再正说回来，也就是“工程师只有发挥他们的创造力，才能领悟到解决问题的方法”。
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Engineers can have a clear understanding of ways to solve problems only if they let their creativity develop.
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我们继续看下一句：
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> Every day, engineers need to find new ways to deal with new problems. Engineers have the wonderful opportunity and huge responsibility of imagining ways in which the world could be different and then creating ways to make that happen.
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这两句话中，第一句已经很直白不用再改了。第二句话的主干是“工程师们有很好的机会和很大的责任”，来干什么呢？原句后面跟了后置定语of imaging…and then creating来修饰“机会和责任”，而且在imagining ways后面又跟了下一级的定语从句来修饰ways，我们可以把后置定语里的介词加动名词变成不定式to do，把从句变成形容词different，使句子变得更加直白简单。
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Every day, engineers need to find new ways to deal with new problems. Engineers have the wonderful opportunity and huge responsibility to imagine and build a different world.
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我们把剩下的几句话都一起看完：
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> That is the most important part of creativity, and it encourages engineers to do great things. For example, engineering innovations have greatly improved healthcare over the years. From data analysis to efficient software systems, to surgery machines, to providing treatment tracking and recommendations, engineering truly saves lives daily.
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前两句已经都是简单句了，就不再改了。最后一句的主句原文中放在了最后，我们可以把它提到最前面来，然后用through ABCD的简单结构替换from A to B to C to D的结构。在paraphrase过程中，如果是作者原文里列举的ABCD，一般不要概括，也不用更改。
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That is the most important part of creativity and it encourages engineers to do great things. For example, engineering innovations have greatly improved healthcare over the years. Engineering truly saves lives daily with data analysis, efficient software systems, surgery machines, and providing treatment tracking and recommendations.
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好了，经过上一讲的改词，和今天的句式结构调整，我们得到了如下两段文字，我来给你读一下，你来对比一下和原文的差别。
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The third myth seems easy to understand – engineers would have chosen to be artists, writers, or entered professions like paintings or sculpture if they were creative. Wrong! The essence of creativity is to create! Engineers create products, services, and processes. These creations affect people every day. People benefit from the result of software or hardware engineering work. Engineers can have a clear understanding of ways to solve problems only if they let their creativity develop.
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Every day, engineers need to find new ways to deal with new problems. Engineers have the wonderful opportunity and huge responsibility to imagine and build a different world. That is the most important part of creativity, and it encourages engineers to do great things. For example, engineering innovations have greatly improved healthcare over the years. Engineering truly saves lives daily through data analysis, efficient software systems, surgery machines, and providing treatment tracking and recommendations.
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## paraphrase的局限性
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怎么样？是不是比原文更加简单直白易懂了，但同时也没有损失原文的主要思想。这是好的方面。但是，你有没有感觉到这里面有不好的方面呢？是不是感觉经过我们这么费劲的一通改写，好像少了什么东西？你的感觉没错，经过改写之后的文字，只保留了原文的内容而已，原作者的风格和语言的美感几乎全部失去了，仿佛变成了一具没有灵魂的躯壳，就好像是一堆被人咀嚼过了的甘蔗渣。每个作者不管文笔好坏，都有自己的style，这才是语言之美。
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所以，在介绍完paraphrase这个练习工具之后，我们一定要回过头来认清这个工具的功能和局限性。说得直接一点，paraphrase仅仅是一套适合英语初学者的练习方法，它最大的作用是帮助学习者用英语思维去学习英语，而不是用中文思维或者翻译思维去学习。在练习的过程中，这个方法能够帮助我们加深对文章的理解，促进词汇的学习，同时对语法规则更加熟悉，最终希望能够提高学习者的语言灵活性和多样性。
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但是，paraphrase这样的练习也有很大的局限性。首先它的格局是很小的，是以句子为基础的文字游戏，只是让初学者在一句话的范围内比较机械地替换词汇和挪动句子结构，而无法兼顾整个篇章的大格局。所以，每一句话改写之后，我们孤立地来看似乎没有问题，但机械地改写完每一个句子之后，再简单地叠加成一个段落乃至篇章，其实并没有办法还原出一篇好文章。因此，从全局来看，paraphrase是把一篇文章的单个句子变简单易懂的过程，但同时又是把一篇文章变坏的过程。
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把我的这个风险提示放在脑子里，你可以放心地用paraphrase这个工具去练习英语技能。永远要记得，paraphrase只是一种练习工具。我们介绍的paraphrase，是在句子层面上的狭义改写。大部分高校学生或科研人员在写论文过程中进行的paraphrase，则是在篇章和思想层面上的广义改写。他们希望转述别的文献内容，但又不想大段直接引用，也不想冒剽窃的风险，这时候就需要改写。
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所谓广义的改写，主要有三个步骤：第一步，还是读懂文章，把思想要点以非常简单的提纲形式记录下来；第二步是把原文放到一边，按照提纲但用自己的语言把原文的思想复述出来。为了不受原文用词、句子结构乃至风格的影响，有的人还会等待几天把原文的形式忘记之后，才开始用自己的语言来重述。第三步，就是和原文进行对照，进行最后的润色修改。
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这个听上去和富兰克林练习写作的方法有些相似，比较适用于已经超越了基础学习阶段、语言表达本身已经没有障碍、追求自身酿酒风格的高阶学习者。所以工具本身没有好坏之分，关键工具的功能是不是适合某个特定阶段的技能训练。
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最后，还有一点要提醒你。我们在网上可以找到不少帮学生做paraphrase的网站，还有一些可以下载的应用程序。我其实不建议你使用任何这样的工具。因为它们大部分都很糟糕。
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网上的工具也都是基于词汇和句子层面的狭义改写，机械地使用同义词替换和句式结构调整，而且算法陈旧落后，paraphrase的质量很差。对于初学者来说，paraphrase的目的本身就在于自己动笔去练习，找网上的这些工具来生成，这样对自己的技能提高没有任何帮助。而且，如果你是高阶一点的学习者，本身语言基础就不错，你会发现这些网络改写工具完全无法满足你的需求。当然，也有一些收费网站是帮助客户做改写的，那都是像翻译公司一样请真人改写然后按字数或者页码收费的。
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## 小结
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我们反复讲，学习语言的最终目的是提高语言的多样性和灵活性，也就是语言的resourcefulness。这是一个我们要不断追求的目标。所谓的多样性和灵活性，就是你要表达一个意思，但你可以用几种乃至几十种不同的方式来说。想说得长一点，你可以可以说一个小时。想说得短一点，用几个词就可以把意思说清楚讲明白，听的人一下子就可以准确接收你要表达的意思。
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对于初学英语的人来说，paraphrase是个不错的练习方法，可以帮助我们学习词汇、操练语法，提高我们遣词、造句的能力，最终朝着语言多样和灵活的方向迈进。但任何的工具都有局限性，包括英语语法本身。而我们使用拐杖来训练走路的最终目的，其实是有一天可以不再需要这些拐杖。
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## 课后作业
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这是一个免费的[paraphrase工具网站](https://quillbot.com/)（也带有收费功能），是众多超级烂的类似网站里相对较好的一个，请尝试使用这一网站来进行paraphrase，并思考下面几个问题：
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1.经过试用之后，指出这一工具的优缺点，特别是，你觉得它的问题出在哪里？
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2.判断这一类paragraph网站的工作或算法原理，是否有改进的余地？
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3.和翻译工具相比（例如百度翻译、谷歌翻译或者彩云、DeepL），你感觉paraphrase工具的普遍质量是否更差？你可以思考一下背后的原因。
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如果在学习中有什么问题，你可以在留言区提问，同时欢迎你把学习心得分享出来，我们一起每天进步一点。
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