時差N小時:好玩的貓咪游戲潛藏致命性

If you have a cat, it's likely that at some pointyou've seen it do this: while playing with your foot itsuddenly dropped to its side, latched on with itsfront claws and began a coordinated kicking motionwith both back legs.

如果你養(yǎng)貓，在某一時刻你可能會注意到它這樣的舉動：在腳邊玩耍時，貓咪突然猛地下?lián)?，用兩只前爪抱住你的腳，兩條后腿持續(xù)蹬踢。

The cat probably gave you a good four or fiveswats before letting go. From a human point of viewthis looks like great fun—a real rough-and-tumble kind of game. But where does it come from?

貓咪不給你來四五個猛擊可能不會停手。對人來說看似很好玩，就像一場真正的混戰(zhàn)游戲。但是這樣的游戲是有由來的。

Before giving an answer, let's think for a second about the kind of thing we can learn evenfrom so commonplace an event. Housepets are not toys; although they are domesticated and,in the instance of cats, much smaller than their wild counterparts, it's a mistake to regard themas fundamentally different from wild animals. They share millions of years of evolutionaryhistory, and their behaviors--even playful ones--are in many cases behavior that was veryuseful in the wild.

在給出答案之前，花一秒鐘來想想從這種最常見的游戲上能學到什么。家養(yǎng)寵物可不是玩具;盡管它們被馴服了，并且比野生的同類體積小許多，但是拿貓來說，如果你認為家貓與野貓有本質(zhì)的區(qū)別，那就大錯特錯了。它們有著上百萬年相同的進化歷史。家貓的一些行為，即使很有趣，但對野貓來說是有很用的。

So, think again about that front-claw grab connected with a back-claw kick that your catdoes from time to time. You may see it in a new light when you realize that the cat is executinga very effective device for killing prey or enemies: hold the other animal's stomach in placewhile you disembowel it.

所以，再想想你家貓咪那一次又一次，前爪抱后爪踢的動作。以另一種觀點來看待的話，你或許會發(fā)現(xiàn)貓咪是在執(zhí)行一種很有效的能殺死獵物或敵人的動作：前爪按住其它動物的胃部，后爪鉤出內(nèi)臟。

Of course, that doesn't mean your cat is really trying to hurt you; but it does show us thatplayful behavior in animals --and, oftentimes, in humans--is not simply nonsense. In manycases it is a practice run for learning more useful skills--even deadly ones.

當然，這并不表示你的貓咪是在傷害你;但也證明動物之間，或者動物與人之間的一些頑皮行為并不是無用的。在許多情況下，這是在演習更有用的生存本領，即使是致命的本領。