If you live in a city, you’re probably familiar with this very modern sight: a man walking his dog drops a little black plastic bag into a rubbish bin. Inside the bag is dog poo.
It might make it seem that humans are hygienic creatures - certainly cleaner than dogs, who go to the toilet wherever they want. But is this the whole story?
How do us humans compare with other animals when it comes to keeping ourselves and our environment clean? In this programme, we’ll be asking whether humans as a species are naturally clean and tidy.
In fact, from dumping raw sewage into rivers to littering the streets with trash, humans aren’t always good at dealing with waste.
事实上，从将未经处理的污水倾倒到河流中，到在街道上乱扔垃圾，人类并不总是擅长处理废物。
Neil(尼尔)
While some animals, on the other hand, are instinctively clean.
而另一方面，有些动物本能地是干净的。
Sam(山姆)
Right – cats, for example, dig a hole to bury their poo.
右 - 例如，猫挖一个洞来掩埋它们的便便。
Neil(尼尔)
In the past, humans got rid of their waste by throwing it into the street or into streams and rivers, hoping the water would wash it away.
过去，人类通过将废物扔到街道或溪流和河流中来摆脱废物，希望水能将其冲走。
Sam(山姆)
Out of sight out of mind! That’s a phrase used to say that it’s easier to forget something when you can’t see it.
离久情疏！这是一句话，用来说当你看不到某件事时，更容易忘记它。
Neil(尼尔)
But this doesn’t always work, as we’ll discover from my quiz question, Sam. In Victorian times the population of London boomed and so did all the pee and poo being thrown into the River Thames. It got so bad that by the 1850s the awful smell had its own name – but what? Was it: A) The Great Stench?, B) The Great Stink?, or C) The Great Smell?
Ugh! All sounds pretty disgusting, Neil, but I’ll go for A) The Great Stench.
呸！一切听起来都很恶心，尼尔，但我会选择A）大恶臭。
Neil(尼尔)
OK, Sam, we’ll find out if that’s right later. Earlier you mentioned cats as examples of animals who hide their waste, but leaf-cutter ants go even further: they kill any dirty ants trying to re-enter the group!
Zoologist, Professor Adam Hart, has spent years studying ants and other clean creatures. Here he is speaking with BBC World Service programme, The Conversation:
Some animals, you’ll be watching, and it is just pouring out of the back end and they don’t seem to care. Other animals will go to quite great lengths to go to a specific area. Some antelope for example will go to a sort of latrine area. It’s really linked to their ecology so quite often animals are using dung and also urine as marking posts and territorial markers to say to other groups of animals and other individuals that, well, this is my territory not yours.
Like cats and ants, antelopes go to great lengths, meaning they try very hard to do something, in this case to leave their poo - or dung - in a specific area, away from their home.
Antelopes leave smells, called territorial markers, secreted in urine, or pee, to tell other animals that an area of land is already occupied.
羚羊在尿液或尿液中分泌的气味，称为领地标记，以告诉其他动物一块土地已经被占领。
Neil(尼尔)
OK Sam, but just because most of us don’t pee at the bottom of the garden, does that necessarily mean humans are dirtier?
好吧，山姆，但仅仅因为我们大多数人不在花园底部撒尿，这是否一定意味着人类更脏？
Sam(山姆)
Well, no, not according to psychologist, Dr Michael De Barra. He thinks that human attitudes to cleanliness are related to the problem of infectious diseases, something we’ve all experienced during the Covid pandemic.
Here is Dr De Barra, explaining more to BBC World Service’s, The Conversation:
以下是De Barra博士对BBC世界服务部的The Conversation的解释：
Dr Michael De Barra(Michael De Barra 博士)
So, in humans it seems like the emotion disgust is a big part of how we deal with infectious diseases problems. It’s characterised by avoidance, by sometimes feelings of nausea and what’s interesting about it is that it is elicited by many of the things that are infectious disease threats in our environment… so that might be particular smells, or particular substances, body wastes, physical signs of infectious disease – coughs, sneezes.
Our natural reaction to something which is dirty, and which therefore may be diseased and harmful to us, is disgust – a strong feeling of dislike or repulsion.
我们对肮脏的东西的自然反应是厌恶 —— 一种强烈的厌恶或排斥感。
Neil(尼尔)
We might feel so disgusted at the sight or smell of human waste that we actually want to vomit – a feeling known as nausea.
我们可能会对人类排泄物的景象或气味感到非常厌恶，以至于我们实际上想呕吐 —— 这种感觉被称为恶心。
Sam(山姆)
These bodily reactions are the immune system’s way of saying: keep away! – this will make you sick!
这些身体反应是免疫系统的说法：远离！– 这会让你生病！
Neil(尼尔)
So, although getting a bit dirty won’t kill you (unless you’re a leaf-cutter ant), human evolution has developed a psychological way of keeping us clean. What’s the matter, Sam? You look a little green!
I am, Neil! All this talk of pee and poo is disgusting! And just image how bad it must’ve been in the old days.
我是，尼尔！所有这些关于小便和便便的讨论都令人作呕！想象一下，在过去，它一定是多么糟糕。
Neil(尼尔)
Like in Victorian times, before the invention of modern sewers and sanitation. In my quiz question I asked you what people called the awful smell in London in the 1850s.
And I said it was, A) The Great Stench. Was I right?
我说那是，A）大恶臭。我说得对吗？
Neil(尼尔)
You were… wrong! In fact, the answer was B) The Great Stink, which stunk up the River Thames all the way to Westminster. It was only when the smell reached the noses of politicians in Parliament that something was done about it…
你是......错！事实上，答案是 B） The Great Stink，它把泰晤士河一直臭到威斯敏斯特。只有当气味传到议会政客的鼻子里时，才采取了一些措施......
Sam(山姆)
…so starting another useful phrase – to raise a stink about something, meaning to make a strong public complaint.
...因此，开始另一个有用的短语 —— 对某事发出恶臭，意思是提出强烈的公众抱怨。
Neil(尼尔)
OK, let’s recap the other vocabulary, starting with out of sight, out of mind, a phrase meaning that it’s easier to forget something when you can’t see it.
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