老外說：英文中的陷阱——虛主語

Writers, especially beginning writers, are often cautioned against using passive voice in their writing because its use slows down the pace.

由於被動語態會影響節奏，作者們(特別是初學者)經常被警告不要使用它。

Another construction that can make your writing plod is the dummy subject.

還有一種結構也會讓你的文章變得拖沓，它就是虛主語。

When we use the words it and there to begin a sentence without a referent (a noun the pronoun is referring to), we’re using a dummy subject.

虛主語是指句子開頭的it或there沒有指代物（it、there指代的名詞）。

In this pair of sentences:

下面兩個句子中：

I went to see Fantastic Four 2 over the weekend. It was fun, but mostly forgettable.

“It” refers to the movie Fantastic Four 2. The pronoun has a referent.

It指代電影《神奇四俠2》。這個代詞有指代物。

In this sentence, however:

但這個句子裏：

It is apparent that oil reserves will be exhausted by 2050.

“It” has no referent, and is therefore a dummy subject.

It沒有指代物，因此它是虛主語。

The same thing happens frequently with there:

這種情況也經常發生在there開頭的句子上：

There are several ways in which you could begin.
There are five stages of grief.

Dummy subjects are just one of many problems that weaken your writing by making it vague, fuzzy, and indefinite. The sentences above can be reconstructed with stronger, more definite subjects:

虛主語是讓你的文章變得含糊不清的諸多原因之一。上面的句子可以用更有力、更明確的主語加以改寫：

Some experts warn that our oil reserves will be exhausted by 2050.
You could begin in one of the following ways: (followed by a list).
Elisabeth Kubler-Ross identified five stages of grief in her book On Death and Dying.

In general, unless you don’t know who is performing an action, or you want to emphasize the action of the sentence for some reason, you should avoid dummy subjects.

通常情況下，除非你不知道動作由誰做的，或是出於某種原因想要強調動作本身，否則你應該避免使用虛主語。

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