英文科技論文寫作的常見問題
1 用詞分析
1.1 近義詞的用法區別
例1 “方程”的英文是“equation”，不是“formula”，“formula”的意思是“公式”。
例2 “question”和“problem”翻譯成中文都是“問題”，但是英文的意思完全不同，
如“ask a question”，“answer a question”，“formulate a problem”，“solve a problem”等;
[1] I have a question about the last page of your presentation.
[2] I have a problem about the last page of your presentation.
前者的意思是你有不清楚或者不明白的東西要問，後者是指你認為“the last page of your
presentation”有錯誤。
例3 “too”和“also”的用法區別：
[1] I have done this quickly too.
[2] I have also done this quickly.
例4 “few”和“several”用法區分。“several”的意思是“幾個”，“few”的意思是“幾乎沒有”或者“少”，
但是“a few”的意思是“幾個”。如：
[1] (a) I bought several books today. [1] (b) I bought a few books today.
這兩句話的意思略微不同：前者情況是指買的比較多，而後者指的是買的比較少。
[2] There is very few water left in the bottle. (那個瓶子裡面幾乎沒有水了。)
[3] Very few students came to today's seminar. (今天參加講座的學生很少。)
[4] Few students came last night. (昨晚只來了幾個學生。)
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[5] A few students came last night. (昨晚來了幾個學生。)
例5 很多學生都不能區分科技英語中的property, character 和characteristic。翻譯成中文都是“特
徵”、“特性”和“性質”，但是在英文中意思不同。
[1] quality 最普通用詞，既可指有形或無形的特性，又可指個性或共性的特徵。
[2] character多指一類人或事物所具有的獨特的典型的特徵。
[3] characteristic 指某人或某物天生有別於他人或他物的內部特質或外表特徵。
例6 Obscure (動詞和形容詞) 的主要意思是“遮擋”。很多同學以為“obscure”的意思就是“模糊”，
應該用fuzzy, blur, dark, faint 等的時候誤用obscure。
[1] The black hole is obscured by the dust along the line of sight.
[2] The image of the star is fuzzy, because the telescope is out of focus.
[3] The image of the star is blurred, because the telescope ...
[4] The source appears to be dark (或者faint), because of the obscuration by the gas in front of it.
例7 “At last”和“Finally”不完全一樣。如“Finally, we reconstruct the expansion history of the
Universe up to with the distance moduli of SNe Ia and GRBs.”Finally 換成 At last，意思是不同的：
前者的意思是，“最後，我們重建(了) ......”，後者的意思是“我們終於重建(了) ......”。
例8 “suspect or suspicious”(正面) 和“doubt or doubtful”(負面)。例子：
[1] We suspect that the observed deviation of data from the model prediction is caused by the
over-simplification of the model. (我們懷疑觀測資料和模型的偏離是由於模型過分簡化造成的。)
[2] We doubt that the observed deviation of data from the model prediction is caused by the over-simplification of the model. (我們懷疑觀測資料和模型的偏離不是由於模型過分簡化造成的。)
例9 distinction (定性的區別) 和difference (定量的不同)：
[1] A distinction should be made between a star and a planet.
[2] The difference between the two measurements is only 10%.
例10 “due to”, “because of”, “since”, “because”和“as”都有“因為”和“由於”的意思，但是使用起來
很不一樣。
[1] However, due to the fact that (注意此處需要the fact that) the inner disk temperature or BB
temperature is lower than several keV, the disk or NS flux below 2 keV contributes a considerable
portion in the whole energy band.
或者可以改為：
[2] However, because of the fact that the inner disk ...
[3] However, since the inner disk ...
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[4] However, the disk or NS flux below 2 keV contributes a considerable portion in the whole energy
band, because the inner disk or BB temperature is lower than several keV.
推薦表達[4]，因為主次關係明確，而且“because”的主要意思就是“因為”，而“since”的主要意思
是“自從”(描述時間)。不建議使用“as”，因為“as”的主要意思是“作為”。以下是使用“due to”和
“because of”的例子：
[5] Due to the expansion of the universe, the distances between galaxies become farther and farther.
[6] Because of your work, this problem has been solved completely.
在大多數情況下，“due to”和“because of”可以通用，但是意思略微有所不同。“due to”指自然發
展、順理成章的理由，“because of”指主動介入導致結果的理由。
例11 revise、correct、modify 的區別：
“revise or revision or revised”意為“修改或者更新，沒有錯誤，但是不夠完善”;
“correct or correction or corrected”意為“修正或者改正，有錯誤，需要改過來”;
“modify”的意思介於兩者之間。
1.2 大小寫
例12 能量的單位：eV (不是ev)，keV (不是KeV), MeV (不是meV)，GeV，TeV。
例13 方程後面如果不是句號，後面的緊接的句子不能另起一段，而且第一個字母必須是小寫;
方程後面如果是句號，後面緊接的句子可以另起一段，也可以不另起一段，但是第一個字母必
須是大寫。
例14 冒號後面如果接的是句子，則第一個字母是大寫;如果是單詞或片語，則第一個字母是小寫。
[1] It requires that a clock still show proper time after being read: The quantum uncertainty in its
position must not introduce significant inaccuracies in its measurement of time over the total running
time. (請注意這裡的“show”用動詞原形，因為“require”是命令語氣。)
[2] I classify black holes into three categories: mathematical black holes, physical black holes or
astrophysical black holes. (請注意這裡的“or”經常被誤寫為“and”。)
1.3 單複數
例15 “data”是複數(單數是“datum”);spectrum, nova, formula, nuclear, index, locus, torus, modulus,
radius, focus 的複數分別是spectra, novae, formulae, nuclei, indices, loci, tori, moduli, radii, foci。
例16 “In Figure 7, I show the conversion efficiency of different kind (應改為kinds) of black hole
accretion systems.”
例17 指示代詞的單複數this, that, these, those 的用法。錯誤的例子：
“This (or that) two pictures are taken ... ”應該改為“These (or those) two pictures are taken ... ”。
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1.4 數字的英文寫法
例18 如果能夠使用一個單詞的數一般不用阿拉伯數字。比如“nine books”或者“twenty books”而
不是“9 books”或者“20 books”;但是後面接物理量單位時，9 kg 是正確的，nine kg 是錯誤的。
例19 日期的寫法：the first of July, 2006;July first, 2006;the second of July, 2006;the third of July;
the 4th of July;the 28th of July;July 28th, 2006;2006-07-28;07-28-2006
(USA), 28-07-2006 (Europe and the rest of world)。
例20 30 年代：“1930s”是正確的，“1930’s”是錯誤的。
例21 “Up to now, about 20 (應改為twenty) black holes with masses around ten (應改為10) solar
masses, called stellar mass black holes, have been identified observationally.”
1.5 詞義的選取
例22 一般情況下使用單詞的第一個意思。比如“for”的意思包括“為了”、“因為”，但是在科技文
章裡面只使用“為了”。需要“因為”的時候用“because”或者“since”。再比如“as”的意思包括“作為”、
“因為”等，但是在科技文章裡面只使用“作為”。
例23 “while”主要有兩個意思：“當...... 時候”和“然而”。但是科技英文儘可能使用單詞的第一個
意思，因此建議只使用“while”為“當...... 時候”，當需要使用“然而”的時候用“whereas”。
例24 大部分學生都知道even 有幾個意思，但是很多學生不清楚如何使用。舉幾個例子：
[1] Even though (雖然) a scientist does not make a lot of money, I still choose doing research
because ...
[2] Even if (儘管) this book costs a lot of money, I will still buy it because ...
[3] This book is very good, even (甚至) better than the most popular book written by...
例25 primary 的意思，幾乎所有的學生都在使用primary 的時候誤用作“初始”(initial) 或者“初
級”(elementary) 或者“非正式”(preliminary)。實際上primary 的主要意思是“主要”。例子：
[1] The energy spectrum of this source is consisted of two components; the primary (主要) component
is a blackbody with a temperature of 1 keV and the secondary (次要) component is a power-law with
a photon index of -2.
[2] After analyzing these data, our preliminary (初步) conclusion is that this accretion disk has an
inner disk radius of 20 km.
[3] After analyzing these data, our primary (主要) conclusion is that this accretion disk has an inner
disk radius of 20 km.
1.6 冠詞
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例26 可數名詞以單數出現的時候前面必須加冠詞“a”或者“the”。“a”是不定冠詞，沒有特指的含
意;“the”是定冠詞，必須有特指。比如：
[1] (a) I bought a book about Einstein yesterday. (有很多關於愛因斯坦的書，我買了其中的一本，
但是從這句話了你無法瞭解到底是哪一本。)
[1] (b) I bought the book about Einstein we discussed in the class yesterday.
[1] (c) I bought the book about Einstein's love stories.
[1] (d) I bought the book about Einstein. (儘管沒有明確指出，但是談話的雙方都知道是哪一本書，
或者世界上只有一本關於愛因斯坦的書。)
[2] I bought three books about Einstein's general relativity. (隨便三本。)
[3] I bought the three books about Einstein's general relativity. (只有三本。)
[4] I bought the three most popular books about Einstein's general relativity. (三本最受歡迎的。)
[5] I bought three most popular books about Einstein's general relativity. (最受歡迎的其中三本。)
[2]—[5] 的意思完全不同。
例27 “the equation 3”,“the table 4”,“the figure 5”都是錯誤的，因為“the”都不需要。
例28 “In above calculations, we have ... ”改為
“In the above calculations, we have ... ”(顯然是特指。)
例29 same 前面一般加the，因為是特指。
比如“The same method is also used here. ”幾乎所有同學都錯誤地寫成“Same method
is also used here.”
再比如“We have chosen the cross-correlation method, the same as that used by Ling & Zhang
(2006).”是正確的。
例30 single 後面如果是可數名詞單數的話，仍然需要在single 前面加“a”或者“the”，比如“a single
book”，“the single tree”。
例31 物理量符號前面一般不需要加“the”，因為已經是特指了。例如“Empirically, γ
is roughly correlated to observed peak (需改為the observed peak) spectral energy Ep by lg Ep =(2.76 ±
0.07) - (3.61 ± 0.26) lg γ. We employ this empirical relation to estimate the (刪除the) Ep of Swift
GRBs and correct the observed peak luminosity to a bolometric band.”但是“We employ this