每天一小段英语（60）

命运号角

A natural disaster. An earthquake, tornado, or something else smashes the building holding the thermoses to oblivion. Neither major US cryonics company is in a location highly prone to natural disasters—Alcor actually located itself in Scottsdale, AZ because it is the place in the US least at risk of natural disasters. Even if a natural disaster were to strike, the patients might be fine—the thermoses are strong, they’re power-outage-proof with no electricity involved, and even if a thermos is ruptured, there’s the upside-down thing where patients’ heads will be the last body part affected.
自然灾难。地震龙卷风或其它粉碎了建筑物埋住容器。两大冷冻公司都不在容易遭遇自然灾难的位置，Alcor位于亚桑那州的斯科茨代尔（美国最安全的地方）。就算灾难来袭，会员也不必担心，容器不需要电，就算容器破裂来回颠倒，会员的头也只会受到最小的影响。

A terrorist attack on a cryonics facility. There are a lot of people in the world—especially in the world of religion—who hate the concept of cryonics.
恐怖分子袭击。这世上人太多，尤其是有宗教信仰的，更容易对冷冻厌烦。

War. All bets are off in war.
战争。战争下世事难料。

The law prevents the cryonics company from doing its job. This one almost happened recently. In 2004, Arizona legislators tried to pass a bill that would have put Alcor under the regulation of the State Funeral Board. This, if passed, would have likely ended up shutting Alcor down. It turned into a nasty debate, centered largely around religious issues, with the religious voice disapproving of Alcor’s line of work—but ultimately, Alcor prevailed. That said, in order to do business legally, Alcor has to accept bodies in the guise of “anatomical donations for research purposes,” a practice protected by the constitutional right to donate one’s body for research into cryopreservation. The law-related variable seems pretty stable currently, but if someone has a long green segment and requires 800 years of storage before their revival becomes possible, who the hell knows what will happen—what is currently Scottsdale, AZ might not even be part of the US by that point.
法律阻碍冷冻。就在2004年，亚桑那州的议员想要通过一个法案：Alcor由国家葬礼委员会管理。一旦通过，Alcor就要被迫关闭。后来演变成围绕宗教问题展开的骂战，宗教这边反对Alcor的行当，而最后Alcor获胜。为了合法经营，Alcor不得不伪装成用来捐赠人体研究解剖学的机构。宪法保护用来研究低温储存的捐赠身体。法律这种可变的理由看起来稳定，但如果绿条有800年那么长，没人知道之间会发生什么，那时候亚桑那州的斯科茨代尔还在不在美国都不一定。

命运号角

smash
vt. 粉碎；使破产；溃裂
n. 破碎；扣球；冲突；大败
vi. 粉碎；打碎
adj. 了不起的；非常轰动的；出色的

命运号角

in the guise of
假借；假装；以…为幌子；在…的幌子下

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