درسنامه تعاملی اول

Interactive Lesson - Part A

Hi this is AJ and welcome to the Interactive Lesson, Part A.

In part A, I will teach you the vocabulary from an essay by Mark Sisson. Mark Sisson is a health and fitness coach. He has a blog called MarksDailyApple.com. If you’re interested, go read more about his ideas on health and fitness. Let’s begin.

In order to discover which foods or behaviors can have the greatest impact on your genes, and thus advance you towards better health today, it’s instructive to look closely at human evolution for the past two million years.

The food, exercise habits, lifestyle behaviors that sustained evolution have shaped, molded and supported the modern human genome, our complete collection of genetic material.

Modeling the lifestyle behaviors of our hunter/gatherer ancestors into the realities of high tech modern life, provides the ingredients to complete your own personal recipe for a lean, strong fit, healthy, happy human.

Our ancestors, who were able to survive and reproduce under unimaginably harsh environmental circumstances, refined and perfected the human genetic recipe.

It was classic survival of the fittest. Those who were unable to adapt died out and those lazy, slow, stupid, weak, genetic attributes were lost forever.

Today, your genes expect you to eat a certain way; engage in both extensive, low level movement; and brief, high intensity workouts; sleep in alignment with the rising and setting of the sun and so forth.

We may all rejoice in winning the survival of the fittest battle, to enjoy our lofty perch at the top of the food chain. But, we must not take the hard work and good fortune of our ancestors for granted.

The recipe and ingredients we need to maximize our health and well-being are right in front of us, but modern humans seem to disrespect and disregard the profound legacy of our ancestors.

It might be hard to believe that we’re exactly the same inside as a caveman from 10 thousand years ago. With a few minor exceptions we are, indeed, identical to our ancestors in how we metabolize food, respond to exercise, cycle through sleep phases each night, absorb sunlight and deal with various other environmental influences.

Oh, with one critical distinction, our ancestors from 10 thousand years ago were stronger and healthier than most of us are today.

Okay, that is our essay. Now I’m going to go back again, I’ll read again and I’m going to just teach you some of the more difficult vocabulary. Let’s go back to the beginning.

In order to discover which foods or behaviors can have the greatest impact on your genes… In order to discover, in order to find – which foods or behaviors can have the greatest impact on your genes.

Impact – here means influence or effect. So the greatest influence on your genes. The greatest effect on your genes.

Genes – here means DNA. Genes, your genes, it’s your DNA.

And thus, advance you towards better health

Advance you towards – means move you towards. To advance means to move forward. So move you forward, move you ahead towards better health, move you to better health.

What food, what behavior will move you to better health? He said, how do you know? Well, it’s instructive, it’s useful to look closely at human evolution for the past two million years. The food, the exercise habits, and the lifestyle behaviors that sustained, that kept evolution have shaped, molded and supported the modern human genome.

So he’s saying that the food and exercise habits of our ancestors, our ancestors are family from long, long ago; your great, great, great, great grandfathers and grandmothers, back, back, back thousands and thousands of years. So their behavior, what they ate, how they exercised molded and supported.

Molded – means shaped or created. Again, it kind of means influenced, influenced, created, molded and supported and helped the modern human genome.

Genome – this is a tough word. This is a biology word, genome. The genome is our collection of DNA. The human genome means, all the human genes, all the DNA in every human being in the world. So if you take them all together, all human beings, all the genetics, all the DNA that we have, that’s called the human genome. It’s the collection of our genetics.

So he’s saying, modeling the lifestyle behaviors, the life behaviors, of our hunter/gatherer ancestors provides the ingredients to complete your own recipe for health.

Let’s go back to the beginning. Modeling the lifestyle behaviors. Here… To model – it’s used as a verb. To model means to copy or to imitate. So coping or imitating the behavior of our hunter/gatherer ancestors.

Hunter/gatherers – are types of humans, types of human cultures where they get food from hunting and gathering. Aha, so they’re not farmers, this is before farming, right? They did not farm and grow plants. They hunted animals to eat them and they gathered. It means they walked around and they collected…

To gather – means to collect.

They collected wild plants, usually berries, fruits and vegetables. So hunter/gatherer, ancestors again are human ancestors, are our family from long, long, long, long, long ago.

So their behavior provides the ingredients to complete your own recipe, your own plan for a lean, strong fit, healthy, happy human life.

Lean – means thin. Lean means thin, not fat, it’s the opposite of fat. Lean is thin. It’s a positive word. Strong, you know.

Fit – also means that you have a lot of energy. You can do a lot of exercise. Healthy and happy.

Our ancestors, who were able to survive and reproduce under unimaginably harsh environmental circumstances…

So our ancestors, the humans from 10 thousand years ago or more, they survived and they reproduced.

Reproduce – to reproduce means have children.

So they could survive, they could live. They could reproduce, they could have children under unimaginably harsh…

Unimaginably – means like super, super, so much that it’s hard to imagine. So super, super, super harsh environmental circumstances.

Harsh – means very difficult, very hard, very hard and difficult environmental circumstances, situations.

So, our ancestors they lived in very tough environments, right? For example, Eskimos, lived in the far, far, far North. It was super, super cold, where it was dark half of the year and they survived and this is without modern machines, without modern medicine, but still they lived, still they survived, still they could have children. Very harsh, a very tough environment.

They refined and perfected the human genetic recipe.

To refine – means to make something better. It means to take out the bad parts. To refine.

It was classic survival of the fittest.

Survival of the fittest, survival of the strongest.

Those who were unable to adapt died out…

To die out – it just means to die. They died and they didn’t reproduce, they did not reproduce, they did not have children. They died out, they disappeared.

And those lazy, slow, stupid, weak, genetic attributes…

Genetic attributes – means; attribute means characteristic or trait, characteristic or trait, attribute.

They were lost forever. So the weak genes disappeared. The weak people, the lazy people they died out, they couldn’t survive. So those genes disappeared.

That means today, your genes, your genetics expect you to eat a certain way, to engage in, to do…

To engage in – means to do or join.

To engage in, to do both extensive, low level movement…

Extensive – means a lot, a lot. Extensive means a lot, a large amount, extensive.

So to do a lot of low level movement…

Low level movement – means kind of easy movement, like walking.

And also, your genes, your genetics expect you or want you to do brief, high intensity workouts.

Brief – means short.

High intensity – means very tough, like running as fast as you can, like lifting heavy things.

Your genetics expect you or want you to sleep in alignment with the rising and setting of the sun.

In alignment with – means in harmony with. It means to follow.

So it means that naturally our ancestors long ago, they would go to sleep when the sun went down and they would wake up when the sun came up. That’s the most healthy way for us still. It’s what Mark is saying.

We may all be happy, we may all rejoice in winning the survival of the fittest battle. It means we are strong. We are naturally strong. We can enjoy our lofty perch at the top of the food chain.

Lofty – means very high.

Perch – is a platform.

So our high platform, our high chair.

At the top of the food chain – the food chain, it comes from biology. The food chain is just what animals eat, right? Like a cow eats the grass and then humans eat the cow and nobody eats the humans, so we are at the top of the food chain.

But, we should not take this for granted.

To take this for granted, to take for granted – means you don’t appreciate it. You don’t appreciate it.

So Mark is saying, we are naturally strong, because of our ancestors. All of us are naturally strong, naturally healthy, but we should not take it for granted. We should not forget to appreciate it. If you take something for granted it means you don’t appreciate it.

So he’s saying the opposite, we should appreciate this. We should try to live like our ancestors. If we live like our ancestors then we also will be naturally strong and healthy.

The recipe, the plan and the ingredients, the actions, we need to maximize our health– it means to get the most health– they’re right in front of us, we know it, it’s obvious. But modern humans disrespect and disregard the profound legacy of our ancestors.

Disrespect – means not respect.

To disregard – means to forget or to ignore. We disregard the legacy of our ancestors. We ignore the legacy of our ancestors, the profound legacy.

Profound – means deeply meaningful, deeply meaningful, very meaningful.

Legacy – is like the contribution, the contribution of our ancestors.

So he’s saying our problem as modern humans, the reason we are so weak, the reason we are unhealthy and unhappy is because we ignore the legacy, the teaching, the contribution of our ancestors.

He says, it might be hard to believe that we’re exactly the same inside, we’re exactly the same genetically, as our ancestors from 10 thousand years ago. We’re not different from them. They were super strong and we’re the same, we have the same genetics as them. With a few exceptions, we are identical to our ancestors in how we metabolize food.

To metabolize food – means to digest the food, to use it. When you metabolize food your body digests it, breaks it apart and uses it.

So he’s saying we metabolize food, we digest food the same as our ancestors. We respond to exercise, the same as our ancestors. We sleep the same as our ancestors. We go through the same phases. We go through the same cycles of sleep as our ancestors. We absorb sunlight the same as our ancestors. We deal with various environmental influences the same as our ancestors.

To deal with – means to handle, to react to.

But there’s only one difference, he says, our ancestors from 10 thousand years ago were stronger and healthier than most of us are today.

So he says we are weaker now than our ancestors, because we ignore how they lived.

Okay, that’s the end of part A. Listen to part A many times, you’re going to forget the meaning of the new words, it’s okay, it’s normal. You’re getting a lot of words in this lesson, so it’s okay the first time, the second time, the third time, you can’t remember them all. Don’t worry, relax, it’s okay.

You can use the text guide, use it to read so you can see the words and go slowly and then listen, listen, listen, every day and day by day, you will learn the vocabulary more and more and more.

In part B, I will read the essay again and ask questions. This will help you learn the vocabulary even better. See you in part B.