Let’s look at another Word of the Day from the New York Times Learning Network today!
The word this time is “altruistic,” an adjective which means “unselfish” or “willing to help or benefit other people, even when doing so does not directly benefit oneself.”
The example sentence from the article is this:
“I can think of no other edifice constructed by man as altruistic as a lighthouse,” George Bernard Shaw once wrote. “They were built only to serve.”
「我想不到任何其他由人類建造的建築物，像燈塔一樣利他，」George Bernard Shaw 曾經寫道。「它們被建造出來，只是為了服務他人。」
This use of “altruistic” is of course a more literary one as the author is attributing this “selfless” and “serving” quality to a lighthouse, an inanimate object, and its function in guiding ships home.
More often, we would use this adjective to describe humans and their selfless behaviors or actions. For example:
Her decision to donate the money anonymously was truly altruistic.
她匿名捐出那筆錢的決定，是真正利他的。
In this context, the sentence emphasizes that it is the “anonymous” part that is “altruistic” -- because if the donation were not “anonymous,” the motive for the person to do so could still be “self-serving” in that she just wants to be given credit as a generous donor.
As I stress in our “Boost Your Vocabulary” course, we should always try to make all sorts of meaningful connections between words -- whether etymological, semantic, or even thematic -- in order to learn and expand our vocabulary as effectively as systematically as possible.
Etymologically, we can connect “altruistic” to the noun “altruism,” which has the same word root and means an act or the quality of “caring about other people’s good selflessly.” The suffix “-ism” is of course a common noun suffix for abstract nouns like concepts, theories, or philosophies.
Semantic connections that come easily to mind are “selfish” and “self-serving” -- which are antonyms to “altruistic” meaning “putting oneself first” -- and “selfless,” which is a sort of synonym, but it emphasizes “sacrifice” more strongly. The noun “egoism” -- which also ends in “-ism” is a noun that means “the quality of being selfish,” like “selfishness.”
In the next email, we will look briefly at the pronunciation traps of this four-syllable word!
Starting from a single word in this way and building connections in terms of word form, etymology, meaning, and context is precisely the vocabulary-learning habit that “Boost Your Vocabulary” is designed to help you build.
All our courses will have price adjustments soon. If you want to expand your English vocabulary in a more systematic way, you can learn more about Boost Your Vocabulary at the link below.
今天我們再一起看一篇 New York Times Learning Network 的 Word of the Day！
這次的單字是「altruistic」，是一個形容詞，意思是「無私的」，或者「願意幫助別人、令別人受益，即使這樣做不會直接令自己得益」。
文章入面的例句是：
“I can think of no other edifice constructed by man as altruistic as a lighthouse,” George Bernard Shaw once wrote. “They were built only to serve.”
「我想不到任何其他由人類建造的建築物，像燈塔一樣利他，」George Bernard Shaw 曾經寫道。「它們被建造出來，只是為了服務他人。」
這裡「altruistic」的用法當然是比較文學性的，因為作者將這種「無私」和「服務他人」的特質，歸於燈塔這種無生命的物件，以及它引導船隻回家的功能。
更多時候，我們會用這個形容詞去形容人，以及人的無私行為或行動。例如：
Her decision to donate the money anonymously was truly altruistic.
她匿名捐出那筆錢的決定，是真正利他的。
在這個語境入面，句子強調的是「匿名」這一點是「altruistic」的——因為如果這筆捐款不是匿名的話，這個人的動機仍然可能是「自私」的，也就是她只是想得到慷慨捐款者的名聲。
正如我在《Boost Your Vocabulary》課程入面強調，我們應該經常嘗試在單字之間建立各種有意義的連繫——不論是字源上的、意思上的，甚至是主題上的連繫——這樣才可以盡可能有效和有系統地學習和擴展自己的詞彙量。
從字源上，我們可以將形容詞「altruistic」連繫到有相同字根的名詞「altruism」，意思是「無私地關心他人福祉」的行為或者特質。字尾「-ism」當然是一個常見的名詞字尾，很多關於概念、理論或哲學等的抽象名詞都有這個名詞字尾。
比較容易想到的意思連繫包括形容詞「selfish」和「self-serving」——它們是「altruistic」的反義詞，意思是「將自己放在第一位」——以及同義詞「selfless」，但「selfless」更強調「自我犧牲」。名詞「egoism」也是「-ism」的名詞，意思是「自私的特質」，就像「selfishness」。
下一封 email，我們會簡單看一下這個四音節單字的發音陷阱！
像這樣從一個單字出發，建立字形、字源、意思、相反詞、相關詞和語境上的連繫，正是《Boost Your Vocabulary》想幫大家建立的詞彙學習習慣。
我們所有課程不久之後都會有價格調整；想用更有系統的方法擴展自己的英文詞彙量，可以到下面了解更多：