在20世纪70年代，有一些试图改善物质的措施。

Through the 1970s, a number of measures sought to improve matter.

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在20世纪80年代，美国成为了一个物质至上的社会。

During the 1980s the U.S. became a very materialistic society.

《柯林斯英汉双解大词典》

格泰斯认为，由于南方的奴隶制妨碍了个人自治和对物质利益的自由追求，北方的主要改革者早在19世纪30年代就反对奴隶制。

Gerteis argues that, since slavery in the South precluded individual autonomy and the free pursuit of material gain, major Northern reformers opposed it as early as the 1830s.

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We didn't have a clue back then how to explain life in material terms.

在那个年代,我们还不知道如何从物质的角度去解释生命

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