翻譯試題

By now, just about everyone has heard of string theory. Even those who don’t really understand it-which is to say, just about everyone-know that it’s the hottest thing in theoretical physics.

But despite its extraordinary popularity among some of the smartest people on the planet, string theory hasn’t been embraced by everyone-and now, nearly 30 years after it made its initial splash, some of the doubters are becoming more vocal. Skeptical bloggers have become increasingly critical of the theory. (1)Mathematician Peter Woit and Professor Lee Smolin both argue that string theory (or superstring theory, as it is also know) is largely a fad propped up by practitioners who tend to be arrogantly dismissive of anyone who dare suggest that the emperor has no clothes.

There were good reasons for the theory’s appeal when it first emerged in the late 1970s and early 1980s. At the time, physicists found themselves facing a crisis： The two most important ideas of 20th century physics, relativity and quantum theory were known to be fundamentally incompatible. Quantum theory describes the universe as intrinsically discontinuous: energy, for example, can come in bits just so small, but no smaller. Relativity treats time and space and gravity as a smooth, unbroken continuum. Each theory has its purpose, and the usually don’t overlap.(2)But when dealing with large masses or time periods that are infinitesimally small, like the core of a black hole or the first moments after the Big Bang, neither quite works. So lots of physicists began working on string theory.

Since then, however, superstrings have proved a lot more complex than anyone expected. The mathematics is extremely tough, and when problems arise, the solutions often introduce yet another layer of complexity. (3)Complexity isn’t necessarily the kiss of death in physics, but in this case the new, improved theory posits a nearly infinite number of different possible universes, with no way of showing that ours is more likely than any of the others.

That lack of specificity hasn’t slowed down the string folks. Maybe, they’ve argued, there really are an infinite number of universes-an idea that’s currently in fashion among some astronomers as well-and some version of the theory describes each of them. That means any prediction, however outlandish, has chance of being valid for at least one universe, and no prediction, however sensible, might be valid for all of them.

However, it is that absence of proof that is perhaps most damning. (4)Physicists have a tolerance for theory;indeed， unless you were there to witness a phenomenon yourself-the Big Bang, say-it will always be, at some level, hypothetical. But the slow accretion of data and evidence eventually eliminates reasonable doubt. Not so-or at least not yet-with strings.

It’s true that nobody has any good idea of how to test string theory, but who’s to say someone won’t wake up tomorrow morning and think of one? (5)The reason so many people keep working on it is that, whatever its flaws, the theory is still more promising than any other approach we have.

參考答案

迄今為止，幾乎每個人都聽說過弦理論。即使那些并不真正了解這個問題的人--也就是說，幾乎每個人--都知道這一理論是理論物理學(xué)中最熱門話題。

盡管弦理論在地球上一部分最聰明的人中極為流行，但它并未為所有人接受--如今距其問世之初的轟動已近30年，懷疑論者也日益直言。持懷疑態(tài)度的博客們越來越多地批評這一理論。(1)數(shù)學(xué)家彼得·沃特和李·斯莫林教授都認(rèn)為，弦理論(有時也被稱為超弦理論)很大程度上是被一群自命不凡、總是鄙視那些敢于懷疑皇帝新衣的人們鼓吹起來的流行時尚。

弦理論在20世紀(jì)70年代末至80年代初剛剛面世時具有吸引力，有其充足的理由。當(dāng)時，物理學(xué)家們發(fā)現(xiàn)自己面臨著一個危機(jī)：相對論和量子論這兩個20世紀(jì)物理學(xué)最重要的理論，當(dāng)時被認(rèn)為是從根本上不相容的。量子論把宇宙描述為本質(zhì)是不連續(xù)的，比如能量可以以很小的單位元出現(xiàn)，但不能更小。相對論則將時間、空間及重力看作光滑、不可分割的連續(xù)統(tǒng)一體。兩個理論各有其目的，通常它們互不交迭。(2)但是在研究大質(zhì)量物質(zhì)或無限小的時間段時，比如，對黑洞的核或者是宇宙大爆炸后的最初時刻，二者都不能完美地加以解釋。于是很多物理學(xué)家便開始了對弦理論的研究。

然而，從那時起，超弦理論被證明比人們預(yù)料的更為復(fù)雜。數(shù)學(xué)上的求證極其艱難，而當(dāng)問題出現(xiàn)時，研究結(jié)論又往往引出另一層復(fù)雜的問題。(3)在物理學(xué)中，復(fù)雜不一定就不好;但對于超弦理論而言，這種新改進(jìn)的理論假定存在著幾乎無限多的、各種可能的宇宙，但是，又沒有辦法證明我們的這個宇宙比其他的更為真實可信。

雖然缺乏特色，但卻并沒有使那些"弦人"(弦理論家及其追隨者)的步伐放慢。他們認(rèn)為，也許真有無限多個宇宙存在--這一觀點在部分天文學(xué)家中也同樣流行--并且弦理論的某種說法闡述了其中的每個宇宙。這意味著，無論怎樣怪異，任何一種預(yù)測，都有可能對至少一個宇宙是正確的;與此同時，無論怎樣合理，沒有一種預(yù)測對所有宇宙都是正確的。

缺乏實驗證明也許是弦理論最致命之處。(4)物理學(xué)家們對于學(xué)說有相當(dāng)?shù)娜萑潭?事實上，除非你親臨目擊了一個獨(dú)特事件--比如說，宇宙大爆炸--它在一定程度上永遠(yuǎn)是一個假設(shè)。然而，隨著資料和證據(jù)的逐漸增多，合理的懷疑最終將被消除。但弦理論卻不是如此，或者說至少現(xiàn)在不是這樣。

確實，怎樣檢驗弦理論，現(xiàn)在沒有什么好主意，但是誰又能說某人明早醒來時不會想出一個好主意呢?(5)之所以有如此眾多的人從事其研究，其原因在于，無論弦理論有著怎樣的瑕疵，比起我們所有的任何其他探索途徑，弦理論仍然是目前最有前景的學(xué)說。

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（責(zé)任編輯：rhj）

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