理論的勝利A Victory for Theory

文、譯 / 林巍

Gravitational waves, which scientists around the world have been fondly dreaming of for a hundred years,were finally found by United States researchers on 11th February 2016. This significant scientific progress actually marks a victory for theory.

[2] In science, theory is drawn from practice—the discovery and study of the facts. However, facts by themselves are not science, just as a house is built with bricks, but a pile of bricks can hardly be called a house.

[3] Science also involves imagination and creative thinking so as to establish scientific theories, explaining the past,designing the present and predicting the future. In this regard, Einstein is one of the most outstanding scientists.

[4] As early as in 1916, Einstein broke through the Newtonian theory of gravitation (gravitational waves cannot exist in the Newtonian theory of gravitation, which postulates that physical interactions propagate at infinite speed),and predicted that gravitational waves transport energy as gravitational radiation on the basis of his theory of general relativity. The so-called “gravitational waves” are ripples in the curvature of space-time which propagate as waves,travelling outward from the source; in other words, the fabric of space-time which can become curved by anything massive in the Universe. When cataclysmic events happen, such as black holes merging or stars exploding, these curves can ripple out elsewhere as gravitational waves, just as if someone had dropped a stone in a pond.

令科學家們魂牽夢繞2常用的譯法還有 dream、dream about、haunt、obsess 等，如：① 我多年來魂牽夢繞的中國之旅, 就這樣實現(xiàn)了。（I’ve had my “China dream” for years and I’m here to realize this dream.）② 這就是我魂牽夢繞的那所房子?。。═his is the house I’ve always dreamed about.）③ ……這讓他魂牽夢繞（… which haunted and haunted him day and night）④ 那些天她正被中國畫所魂牽夢繞。（She is obsessed by Chinese painting those days.）等。了一百年的引力波，終于在2016年2月11日被美國研究者發(fā)現(xiàn)了，這個重大的科學進步，實質(zhì)上是一個理論的勝利。

[2]在科學中，理論固然來自實踐——是對事實的發(fā)現(xiàn)和研究，但事實本身不是科學，正如房子是由磚砌成的，而磚的堆積不能稱之為房子。

[3]科學還需要想象力和創(chuàng)造性思維，從而形成科學理論，用以解釋過去、設計現(xiàn)在、預測未來。愛因斯坦便是這樣優(yōu)秀的科學家。

[4]早在1916年，愛因斯坦便突破了牛頓力學（在牛頓引力學中，假定物質(zhì)互動傳播是以無限速度進行的，因而引力波不可能存在），而根據(jù)廣義相對論，預言引力波會作為引力放射向外傳送能量。所謂引力波，是物理學上從動力源作為波浪向外傳播時在時空彎曲中的一種波動3從定義角度，這里的“波動” 不宜再用 waves, 如同不能定義“ Computer is …computer”，而為“Computer is a machine whose function is to accept data and process them into information”。同時，ripple 與 wave 亦有細微區(qū)別∶ a small wave or series of gentle waves across a surface；an oscillation of small amplitude imposed on top of a steady value等。，即宇宙中的時空結構會因巨大物體而發(fā)生彎曲。當巨變發(fā)生時，如黑洞合并、行星爆炸，這些曲線便作為引力波擴散他處，正如有人在池塘里扔入了石頭。

[5]然而，這些波紋傳送到地球時，因體積極小(大約是原子的十億分之一)，很難發(fā)現(xiàn)，故耗費了科學家們近百年時間才得以發(fā)現(xiàn)4為呼應前面的 fondly dreaming，這里沒有用to discover等。，多虧LIGO5實驗室利用激光在兩根

[5] However, by the time those ripples get to us on Earth, they have become very tiny (around a billionth of the diameter of an atom), which is why scientists have taken a hundred years to realize their dreams. Thanks to LIGO(the Laser Interferometer Gravitationalwave Observatory), laboratory scientists have finally been able to detect them by bouncing lasers back and forth in two

[6]在科學史上，這類以科學理論來“預知”科學發(fā)現(xiàn)的實例很多。例如，俄國化學家門捷列夫在發(fā)明了化學元素周期表后，從該表中的幾個空洞6不是一般意義上的empty、cavity、 hollow、void 等，而是指根據(jù)理論推測應存在的尚未發(fā)現(xiàn)的某種物質(zhì)，即理論和實踐之間的差距，，預測了新元素的存在。果然，十五年后，其他科學家發(fā)現(xiàn)了與預測相符的三種元素。理論物理學家狄拉克研究電子的性質(zhì)，認為“真空”正如充滿電子的海洋，那里其實沒有電子的“泡泡”，卻預測了正子的存在，等等。

[7]在中國歷史上， 類似的 “理論先于7不是簡單意義上的in advance of、antecedent to、anterior to，而其實質(zhì)是理論對實踐的指導作用，故用了guiding。實踐” 的例子，其實也并不罕見。例如，兩千多年前老子的關于 “有” 和“無” 的論斷，就不斷被許多現(xiàn)代科學實驗所證實。

[8]此次引力波的重大發(fā)現(xiàn)，證實了愛因斯坦廣義相對論的最后一項重大預測，使我們不但可以去觀察、而且可以去聆聽宇宙了，因而進入了宇宙研究的全新時代8把此句提前，并將中文的定語轉化為英文的狀語。。 □4-km-long pipes, permitting physicists to measure incredibly small changes in space-time.

[6] Reviewing scientific history, many predictions of this kind can be easily found. Taking chemistry as an example,the Russian chemist Mendeleyev discovered some gaps in the Periodic Table and predicted several new chemical elements, three of which were found by other chemists fifteen years later. Similarly, the theoretical physicist Diac revealed that there were no electronic “bubbles” in a vacuum during his research into the nature of electrons,and then predicted that something called a positron might exist, and so on.

[7] Similar cases of “theory guiding practice” are also not rare in Chinese history, such as the theory of “Being versus Nonbeing” hypothesized by Lao Zi about two thousand years ago,has constantly been proved by modern experiments.

[8] The significant discovery of gravitational waves was the last major prediction of Einstein’s general theory of relativity, ushering us into a whole new era of research in which we are able not only to observe but also listen to the Universe. ■