区别辨析discern、discriminate与distinguish

这些动词均有“区别、辨别”之意。

discern : 语义较笼统,着重精深与准确的观察力,不一定有能分辨关系密切的各项事物的含义。

  • I could just discern a figure in the darkness.
    在黑暗中我只能看出一个人影。
  • It is difficult to discern any pattern in these figures.
    在这些数字中很难找出规律。
  • It is possible to discern a number of different techniques in her work.
    从她的作品中可以识别出许多不同的创作手法。
  • He discerned a certain coldness in their welcome.
    他觉察到他们的欢迎有点冷淡。
  • It is often difficult to discern how widespread public support is.
    了解公众支持的广泛程度常常是困难的。

discriminate : 语气强,指从十分相似的事物中辨出差异,尤其把好坏区分开来。

  • Police dogs can discriminate between the different smells.
    警犬能辨别各种不同的气味。
  • The computer program was unable to discriminate between letters and numbers.
    这计算机程序不能辨别字母与数字。
  • When do babies learn to discriminate voices?
    婴儿什么时候学会辨别嗓音呢?
  • A number of features discriminate this species from others.
    有许多特征使这一物种与其他物种区别开来。

distinguish : 普通用词,指辨别者的能力或实际观察到的区别,强调辨别所需的技巧。

  • He's colour-blind and can't distinguish (the difference) between red and green easily.
    他是色盲,很难分清红色和绿色(的不同)。
  • I sometimes have difficulty distinguishing Spanish from Portuguese.
    我有时很难分清西班牙语和葡萄牙语。
  • It's important to distinguish between business and pleasure.
    分清什么是正事什么是娱乐非常重要。
  • It's not the beauty so much as the range of his voice that distinguishes him from other tenors.
    他与其他男高音大不相同,并非因为他那华美的声音,而是他宽广的音域。