And what this means is that any theory of language use and language comprehension cannot simply appeal to a list.

这也就意味着,任何语言使用和语言理解的理论,都无法列出一份句子的清单

耶鲁公开课 - 心理学导论课程节选

We've used a bit of Game Theory to analyze it.

我们使用博弈论的理论来分析一下

耶鲁公开课 - 博弈论课程节选

The trouble with the etymology of theory and the way in which the word has been used traditionally is that sometimes it actually means practice, and then at other historical periods it means something very different from practice, something typically from which practice is derived.

理论这个词在词源,和传统的使用方法上的复杂之处在于,它有时候指的是实践，但在特定的历史时期,它指的是和实践非常不同的东西，也就是实践产生的依据。

耶鲁公开课 - 文学理论导论课程节选

It's like we have laws of thermodynamics that underlie the use of engines, but you can't just go from the laws of thermodynamics to an automobile; there are a million steps along the way.

这就好比热力学定律,为引擎的使用打下了理论基础,但你不能从热力学定律一步跨越到发明汽车,这中间还要经历成千上万的步骤

耶鲁公开课 - 金融市场课程节选

You wouldn't be expected to be able to guess that this would happen, because using any kind of simple theory, we would, in fact, predict that this would not be the case, but what we find experimentally is that it's more stable to have half filled d orbital than to have a 4 s 2, and a 3 d 4.

你们不用预期有能力,猜出这个会发生，因为使用任一种简单的理论，我们事实上可以预测不会是那种情况，但是我们在实验中发现的,是半填充d轨道比,4s23d4更加稳定。

麻省理工公开课 - 化学原理课程节选