4. Television's variety becomes a narcotic, not a stimulus. Its serial, kaleidoscopic exposures force us to follow its lead. The viewer is on a perpetual guided tour: 30 minutes at the museum, 30 at the cathedral, 30 for a drink, then back on the bus to the next attraction -- except on television, typically, the spans allotted are on the order of minutes or seconds, and the chosen delights are more often car crashes and people killing one another. In short, a lot of television usurps one of the most precious of all human gifts, the ability to focus your attention yourself, rather than just passively surrender it.
     4)电视节目的多样化成了一种麻醉剂而不是促进思考的因素。它那系列的、多变的画面迫使我们跟着它转。观众无尽无休地跟着导游游览：博物馆看30分钟，大教堂看30分钟，喝饮料30分钟，然后上车到下一个参观点，只是电视的特点是时间分配以分妙计，而所选择的欣赏内容多为车祸和人们的互相残杀。总之许多电视节目取代了人类才能中最可贵的才能之一，即主动集中自己的注意力，而不只是被动地奉送自己的注意力。

    5. Capturing your attention -- and holding it -- is the prime motive of most television programming and enhances its role as a profitable advertising vehicle. Programmers live in constant fear of losing anyone's attention -- anyone's. The surest way to avoid doing so is to keep everything brief, not to strain the attention of anyone but instead to provide constant stimulation through variety, novelty, action and movement. Quite simply, television operates on the appeal to the short attention span.
   5)吸引并保持人们的注意力是大多数电视节目安排的首要目的，它加强了电视作为有利可图的广告工具的作用。节目安排人生活在唯恐抓不住人们的注意力——不管是什么人的注意力——的不断的恐惧之中。避免造成这一局面的最可靠的办法就是使一切节目都保持简短，不要使任何人的注意力过于集中受到损害，而要通过多样化、新奇性，动作和行动不断地提供刺激。很简单，电视运作的原则是迎合观众的注意力跨度短这一特点。

    6. It is simply the easiest way out. But it has come to be regarded as a given, as inherent in the medium itself; as an imperative, as though General Sarnoff, or one of the other august pioneers of video, had bequeathed to us tablets of stone commanding that nothing in television shall ever require more than a few moments' concentration.
    6)这只是最简单的解决办法，但逐渐人们把它看作是电视这一宣传媒介特定的、内在固有的性质，是必须履行的职责，似乎是司令萨尔诺夫或电视的另一个令人敬畏的创始人给我们传下了刻有铭文的石碑，命令电视上出现的一切节目均不得要求片刻以上的注意力。