一道所谓真题（1）

caterpillar

1.Reptiles, by drawing their body heat directly from the Sun rather than burning calories to generate it, can survive on ten percent of the nourishment that a mammal of similar size would normally require

A. rahter than burning calories to generate it

B. rather than the generation of body heat by burning calories

C. and not from generating it by burning calories

D. instead of by burning calories for generating it

E. instead of body heat generated by burning calories

是选A还是D？觉得A的to generate 比D的forgenerating好，但是rather than 后面好象是不能带-ing的，是不是？那选D行吗？

tianwan

rather than是个连词，“ 通常用于“平行”结构中：例如与2个形容词，状语，名词，动词不定式或2个ing形式连用。（参见《英语用法指南》micheael swan P666)。”

instead of是介词词组，感觉ETS不喜欢instead of。根据经验，好像ETS认为instead of后面应该只能接名词和动名词或代词短语。.

而且burning calories to generate it 要比burning calories for generating it 好。

rather than连接的2个成分是by的2个并列的动名词宾语，所以A应该是合理的并列。rather than后不加by应该是可以的。

caterpillar

谢谢TIANWAN。就是说rather than后面其实什么都可以接，只要语法结构和逻辑都平行就好了，是吗？

tweib

以下是引用caterpillar在2004-8-28 19:11:00的发言：

1.Reptiles, by drawing their body heat directly from the Sun rather than burning calories to generate it, can survive on ten percent of the nourishment that a mammal of similar size would normally require

A. rahter than burning calories to generate it

续貂尾巴一句，A选项中的it不会指代不明，it前面有两个单数名词the sun 及their body heat，进一步从逻辑上判断只有their body heat 符合

leeon

同意A.

lucre

a

by doing... rather than doing