老師好，

①Crises in international diplomacy do not always result from malice; for nations, like individuals, can find themselves locked into difficult positions, unable to back down.

請問老師，unable to back down，形容詞作狀語嗎？修飾locked？

②For the first time in the modern era, non-Hispanic Whites are officially a minority in California, amounting to a little less than half the population of the state, down from nearly three-quarters a decade ago.

down是什么詞性呢？down from這里是做定語修飾population吧？

③Paleontologist Stephen Jay Gould has argued that many biological traits are not the products of natural selection, favored because they enhance reproduction or survival, but are simply random by-products of other evolutionary developments.

請問老師，favored做狀語還是定語？



①Crises in international diplomacy do not always result from malice; for nations, like individuals, can find themselves locked into difficult positions, unable to back down.

請問老師，unable to back down，形容詞作狀語嗎？修飾locked？

【答】unable to back down，是形容詞短語作狀語，具體說是“結果狀語”，修飾前文整個謂語部分。其邏輯主語自然是句子的主語 nations。

②For the first time in the modern era, non-Hispanic Whites are officially a minority in California, amounting to a little less than half the population of the state, down from nearly three-quarters a decade ago.

down是什么詞性呢？down from這里是做定語修飾population吧？

【答】down 是副詞，down from nearly three-quarters a decade ago 是介詞的短語，其用途是講解上文 a little less than half the population of the state 這個說法的。在乎思上，是其同位語。“略低于該州人口的一半 = 低于10年前的近四分之三”。它們之間是相等關系。

③Paleontologist Stephen Jay Gould has argued that many biological traits are not the products of natural selection, favored because they enhance reproduction or survival, but are simply random by-products of other evolutionary developments.

請問老師，favored 做狀語還是定語？

【答】整個favored because they enhance reproduction or survival, but are simply random by-products of other evolutionary developments，這一部分是the products of natural selection 的非限制性定語，本身又含有一個緣由從句。等于...the products of natural selection, which are favored because...

可以如此翻譯：“這類自然選擇的產物受寵是什么原因...”。