第一段
Unthinkable as it may be, humanity, every last person, could someday be wiped from the face of the Earth.
尽管难以想象，但人类的每一个个体，都有可能在未来某一天从地球上彻底消失。
We have learned to worry about asteroids (小行星) and super volcanoes, but the more likely 26. E) scenario , according to Nick Bostrom, a professor of philosophy at Oxford, is that we humans will destroy ourselves.
我们已经学会担忧小行星和超级火山的威胁，但牛津大学哲学教授尼克·博斯特罗姆认为，更有可能出现的情形，是人类将自我毁灭。
第二段
Professor Bostrom, who directs Oxford’s Future of Humanity Institute, has argued over the course of several papers that human 27. I) extinction risks are poorly understood and, worse still, 28. D) severely underestimated by society.
执掌牛津大学人类未来研究所的博斯特罗姆教授在多篇论文中提出：人类灭绝风险没有得到充分认知，更糟糕的是，社会还严重低估了这类风险。
Some of these existential risks are fairly well known, especially the natural ones.
这类关乎人类存续的风险里，有一部分广为人知，尤其是自然引发的那些。
But others are 29. H) obscure or even exotic.
但还有一些风险十分晦涩鲜为人知，甚至极为冷门。
Most worrying to Bostrom is the subset of existential risks that 30. N) arise from human technology, a subset that he expects to grow in number and potency over the next century.
最让博斯特罗姆担忧的是由人类技术产生的那类存续风险，他预计这类风险在接下来一个世纪里，数量和危害程度都会上升。
第三段
Despite his concerns about the risks 31. F) posed to humans by technological progress, Bostrom is no luddite (科技进步反对者).
尽管他担忧技术进步给人类带来的种种风险，博斯特罗姆却绝非反对科技进步的卢德分子。
In fact, he is a longtime 32. O) advocate of transhumanism – the effort to improve the human condition, and even human nature itself, through technological means.
事实上，他长期以来都是超人类主义的拥护者：超人类主义主张通过技术手段改善人类生存状态，甚至改造人类本性本身。
In the long run he sees technology as a bridge, a bridge we humans must cross with great care, in order to reach new and better modes of being.
从长远来看，他将技术视作一座桥梁——人类必须小心翼翼跨过这座桥，才能抵达全新且更优的生存模式。
In his work, Bostrom uses the tools of philosophy and mathematics, in 33. G) particular, probability theory, to try and determine how we as a 34. B) species might achieve this safe passage.
在研究中，博斯特罗姆运用哲学和数学工具，尤其是概率论，来探寻我们这一物种如何才能平安渡过这一难关。
What follows is my conversation with Bostrom about some of the most interesting and worrying existential risks that humanity might 35. L) encounter in the decades and centuries to come, and about what we can do to make sure we outlast them.
下文是我和博斯特罗姆的对话，我们聊了未来数十年、数百年里人类可能遭遇的一些最值得关注、也最令人忧心的存续风险，以及我们可以采取哪些措施保证人类能扛过这些风险。
完形填空高频词
1. asteroid /ˈæstərɔɪd/ n. 小行星
2. volcano /vɒlˈkeɪnəʊ/ n. 火山
3. scenario /səˈnɑːriəʊ/ n. 情况，场景
4. extinction /ɪkˈstɪŋkʃn/ n. 灭绝
5. severely /sɪˈvɪəli/ adv. 严重地
6. obscure /əbˈskjʊə(r)/ adj. 晦涩的，鲜为人知的
7. arise /əˈraɪz/ v. 产生，出现
8. pose /pəʊz/ v. 造成（风险、威胁）
9. advocate /ˈædvəkət/ n. 拥护者，倡导者
10. in particular 尤其，特别
11. species /ˈspiːʃiːz/ n. 物种
12. encounter /ɪnˈkaʊntə(r)/ v. 遭遇，遇到
13. potency /ˈpəʊtnsi/ n. 威力，效力
14. transhumanism n. 超人类主义
15. probability theory 概率论
