老外怎么说?老外这么说!

原作者：
来源Alnylam Scientists Present New Data on RNAi Therapeutics at American Chemical Society
译者dglitter

       电子巨头三星和另一家名为东芝的厂商推出了自己新的依附于谷歌（NMS：GOOG）的Android操作系统平板电脑，这一行动旨在挖掘消费者被苹果公司点燃的需求。

       三星电子提供的Galaxy Tab具有7英寸的触摸屏和WiFi以及蓝牙连接。三星公司此前曾今表示，整个平板电脑的价格将只有大概200 – 300美元，当然这一切需要有所选择的的3G手机计划而定。

       而同样的，东芝公司突出的Folio 100则具有较大的10英寸的屏幕，但最初的版本将只配备有WiFi连接。而该产品的售价已经基本确定为510美元。

       当天苹果电脑底价上涨了0.7％，报收至252.17美元。

written by dglitter

原作者：
来源Readers’ Questions on Deep-Ocean Biology
译者莫名和尚

After a smooth cruise into San Diego, where Atlantis would be embarking on her next expedition, the science teams went their separate ways, cars brimming with cooler-packed samples. We’ve had a couple of weeks to sort things out (a process which involved many brushes with frostbite, as samples were carefully arranged in freezers set at minus 80 degrees Celsius), and we are continuing to design and conduct experiments to tease out the secrets of the Hydrate Ridge ecosystem.

亚特兰蒂斯号科考船刚刚顺利结束一个航次驶回了圣迭戈，并将开始她下一次旅程。科考小组们各奔东西，汽车满载着冷冻的样品。我们已经花了好几周对样品进行分类（在这个过程中还需把样品表面的霜刷掉，因为此前它们都在零下80摄氏度的条件下保存着），并正设计进行新的实验，以揭开“水合物脊”（Hydrate Ridge ，距俄勒冈海岸60英里的一处蕴藏天然气水合物的海底——译者注）的神秘面纱。

For my part, it’s been an honor to participate in this exciting expedition and share my experiences with you. I appreciate all of your encouraging comments and insightful questions, and hopefully the strange, fascinating world of deep-ocean biology has sparked a Google search or two. Understanding our oceans is critical in this age of global environmental change, and we’re really just beginning that journey.

能参加这样一次激动人心的航次并和大家一起分享我的些许经历是我莫大的荣幸。我感谢所有那些支持鼓励和深刻的提问，还希望你们多多关注陌生而又迷人的深海生物学。在全球环境持续变化的今天，认知我们的海洋已经刻不容缓，而我们真的才刚刚开始。

And with that, I’d like to address a few of the science-based questions that came up in the comments.

下面我就评论中的一些科学问题进行回答。

Q.Fascinating life-forms, these creatures that do not need sun. Apparently, quite a few have been discovered during the last decades and their adaptability to various sources of “life energy” is remarkable.

提问：这些生命太神奇了，它们不需要阳光。显然，过去的数十年间已经发现了很多深海生物，它们对各种“生命能量”来源的适应性真是让人叹为观止。

Do they have something in common? That is, the lowest part of the chain that actually creates organic material (proteins?) from inorganic sources. How did they evolve? Do they have relatives, close or distant, in the world outside the darkness?

这些深海生物有什么共同点吗？例如生物链中最底层的那部分是否也是从无机物中创造出有机物（蛋白质）？它们是如何进化的？它们在黑暗的海底世界之外有近亲或远亲吗？

— Ladislav Nemec, Big Bear, Calif.

—— Ladislav Nemec，大熊市，加州。

A.It’s true: the range of ways for microbes to make a living is impressive. Organisms can be classified by the source of their biomass (how they take atoms and molecules from the environment and turn them into cell stuff) and the source of their energy. Some microbes at the bottom of the ocean get energy from chemicals in their environments, while the grass in your front yard taps into the sun. As long as you can find two chemicals or minerals that can transfer an electron between them, you’ve got an energy source, a microscopic battery of sorts. This process is called chemosynthesis, and a lot of different microbes can do it, microbes living in rocks and soils all over the world. There’s a huge microbial biosphere hidden beneath the surface of the earth – possibly comparable in biomass to the plant life we can see on the surface.

回答：是这样的。微生物生存方式的多样性给我留下了很深的印象。生物体可以根据它们生物量（它们如何从环境中吸收原子分子并转化为细胞物质）的来源分类，也可以根据能量来源分类。有些海底微生物从它们周围的化合物获取能量，而你们前院的草坪是通过吸收阳光。只要两种化合物或矿物之间能交换电子，它们就是一个能量源，就像一个微小的电池。这个过程叫做化能合成，并且很多不同的微生物都能利用这种能源，比如世界各地生活在岩石和土壤中的微生物。地表之下存在着一个巨大的微生物圈——其生物量可能相当于我们在地表能看到的植物的生物量。

The question of evolution is tricky. We generally approach evolutionary relationships by sequencing a particular gene of various organisms (e.g. the 16S rRNA — one of the genes that makes ribosomal RNA, for those of you keeping score) and seeing how closely related the sequences are. If they’re very similar, the organisms probably evolved around the same time; if they’re really different, then they don’t have much in common. (This trend was first observed by Carl Woese, and is explained at length in his 1987 paper “Bacterial Evolution,” which was published in Microbiology and Molecular Biology Reviews.)

进化的问题有点麻烦。通常我们通过不同生物体进行基因测序（例如16S rRNA ——核糖体RNA的一种），然后对比它们的序列的相似程度来获取它们的进化关系。如果它们非常相似，那么这些生物可能在大致相同的时间进化；如果大不相同，那么它们可能就离得比较远了。（这种现象最初被Carl Woese 发现，他1987年发表在《微生物学和分子生物学评论》上的论文《细菌演化》中对此进行了详细介绍。）

No one really knows how archaea and bacteria evolved, but the cool thing about a lot of these chemolithoautotrophs, including methane-producing and sulfur-respiring micro-organisms, is that they appear very close to the “root” of the tree of life. So it seems pretty likely that life on earth got a toehold via chemolithoautotrophy, not by harvesting solar energy.

没有人确切地知道古菌和细菌究竟是如何演化的。但有一点是，这些化能自养微生物，包括产甲烷和靠硫呼吸的微生物，似乎处在进化树的根部位置。因此很可能地球上最初的生命是靠化能自养获得能量，而非阳光。

Microbes are finely tuned to inhabit specific chemical or physical niches where they’ve got an advantage. For example, if there’s a lot of sulfate in a given patch of mud, pretty soon an organism will show up that can use that sulfate to its advantage. Just about anywhere on earth where similar chemical or physical constraints/opportunities exist, related micro-organisms will pounce. Thus, the high-temperature-loving microbes that swarm around deep-sea hydrothermal vents are often genetically and metabolically similar to the microbes in the hot springs of Yellowstone. By the same token, the methane-eating archaea and bacteria we find at the cold seeps of Hydrate Ridge are similar to methane-eating microbes found in shallow organic-rich anoxic environments like salt marsh sediments, up here on the surface.

微生物能很好地适应它们生活的物理化学环境。例如，假设在某一块泥里有很多硫酸盐，很快就会有优先利用硫酸盐的生物体出现。所以地球上物理化学条件相似的地方，生活的微生物也比较类似。因此，在深海热液口生活的嗜高温微生物和黄石公园温泉的微生物在基因和代谢方式上都很接近。同样的道理，我们在水合物脊冷泉发现的以甲烷为食的古菌和细菌与地表盐沼等富有机物厌氧环境生活的食甲烷菌类似。

Q.Doesn’t the methane on the ridge come from layers of deeply buried organic material, just like other oil and gas deposits? If so, wouldn’t it be more correct to say that the life forms that live on it are still dependent on energy from the sun, just not its direct rays of light? Oil and gas deposits are products of solar energy stored for millions of years.

提问：海脊的甲烷是不是和其它石油或天然气储层一样来自深埋的有机物？如果是这样的话，是否可以说以它生活的生命还是靠太阳能呢，只不过是间接的方式而已？石油和天然气是储存了数百万年的太阳能的产物。

— JB, California

—— JB，加州

A.JB brings up a good point, something that a number of readers pointed out. Natural gas, composed largely of methane, is generally found in huge reservoirs beneath the earth’s surface, derived from a combination of heat and microbial reworking of organic goo produced by photosynthesis in the sunlit ocean waters. However, there are a few other ways to make methane. Methane-producing archaea (methanogens) are a type of chemolithotroph that can use carbon dioxide and hydrogen to make methane without ever seeing the sun. In fact, this process is continually happening in much of the rock at the bottom of the ocean, building up methane stocks within sediments or rocks. As seafloor rock slips beneath a continental tectonic plate, organic matter that has fallen from higher in the water column is cooked and broken down into methane and other organic molecules. This methane, as well as that produced by methanogens, is squeezed out of the rock and percolates up toward the seafloor. In other words, the methane comes from a combination of sources, some of which were ultimately sun-based and some of which weren’t.

回答：JB的观点很好，还有一些读者也提出了类似问题。天然气的主要成分是甲烷，通常都是在地表以下发现它们的巨大储层。被阳光照射的海洋水体中发生光合作用，合成有机物，有机物再经过热和微生物的改造形成天然气。但是也有其它方式产生甲烷。产甲烷古菌（methanogens）是一种化能自养生物，它能利用二氧化碳和氢合成甲烷，而不需要太阳参与。事实上，这个过程还在海底的很多岩石中进行，并在沉积物和岩石中慢慢储存甲烷。当洋壳因为板块运动滑入陆壳之下时，从水体中掉落的有机物被加热分解成甲烷和其它有机分子。这些甲烷和产甲烷古菌合成的甲烷一样，也被挤出岩石向海底渗透。也就是说，甲烷有很多种来源，有些是基于阳光的，有些不是。

Q.As I read your article, I found myself wondering about the changes your samples must undergo as they transition from enormous deep-sea pressures to 1 atmosphere when they are brought to the surface. How does the physiognomy of these organisms change when they are brought out of the depths?

提问：我读过你的文章，我很好奇你们的样品从海底巨大的压力下被带到一个大气压的过程中会发生什么。当它们被带出海底的时候它们的外观有什么变化？

— Mfumbi, Los Angeles

——  Mfumbi，洛杉矶

Q.“… but deep-ocean organisms have evolved more stable cell membranes – strong enough to withstand extreme forces without snapping, but flexible enough to allow nutrients in and wastes out.”

提问：“…但深海生物进化出了更为牢固的细胞膜——牢固到能承受巨大的压力，同时又具有弹性，能让营养物质和废物进出。”

Is this correct? Seems that it’s the pressure differential across membranes that is critical; not the absolute pressure. The deep-sea creatures would have a problem only if they move to a different depth quickly — which would cause a pressure imbalance between internal and external pressures.

这是真的吗？看起来细胞膜内外的压力差很关键；而不是绝对压力。深海生物只有在快速移动到另一个深度时才会出现问题——那样会造成细胞膜内外压力的失衡。

— jimvj, California

—— jimvj，加州

A.It’s certainly true that you need pressures across a membrane to be similar, but the absolute pressure also plays a role, testing the mechanical strength of a membrane. Think of it like the cell membrane being crushed between two walls, Indiana Jones-style: without strength conferred by branching lipid molecules, the membranes would crumple. The extreme pressure can actually be a good thing for organisms seeking certain dissolved gases. For example, our methane oxidizing archaea benefit from the pressure because methane is more soluble at such depths compared with surface waters. When we bring these organisms up from the deep, there’s no disadvantage to having strong membranes. It may be unnecessary — a needless extra input of energy to build fancy membranes — but it doesn’t impair transport of food and wastes.

回答：当然细胞膜内外的压力必须相当才行，但绝对压力的影响也很大，它要求细胞膜具有一定的机械强度。试想假如细胞膜被两堵印第安纳琼斯式的墙挤在中间，没有周围脂分子提供足够的力，细胞膜也会破裂。事实上极高的压力能帮助生物体寻找某些溶解气体。比如，我们的甲烷氧化古菌就从高压中受益，因为甲烷在深海比在海表的溶解度更大。当我们把生物体从深海带上来的时候，坚固的细胞膜也不会有坏处。或许这没用必要——合成这样的细胞膜会浪费能量——但不会影响食物和废料的传递。

Q.I’m wondering how these sites are even found in the first place. Did Alvin drive around the seafloor and just happen to get lucky? How frequent are sites like Hydrate Ridge?

提问：我想知道这些地方最初是怎么被发现的。是阿尔文号深潜器在海底到处搜索还是完全靠运气？能发现像水合物脊这样的地方的频率有多少？

— Paul, Seattle

—— Paul，西雅图

A.Analogous to the revolutionary discovery of hydrothermal vents in the late ’70s, methane-driven ‘cold’ seeps were found mostly by accident. In 1983, an Alvin crew was examining large underwater cliffs and landslides off the west coast of Florida when they discovered tube worms and mussels — dead giveaways for the presence of energetic fluids and an active, sulfide-producing microbial community. Other discoveries of cold seeps came about from bottom trawls that brought clams up from the deep ocean and from photographs of the ocean floor taken by robotic submersibles. Once a few sites had been found, scientists began to notice geologic patterns that informed subsequent exploration. Today, dozens of these environments are known in subduction zones near Costa Rica; Monterey Bay, Calif.; Japan; Alaska and Antarctica.

回答：就像70年代末发现革命性的热液口一样，冷泉的发现大都也是偶然性的。1983年，一批阿尔文号的船员在佛罗里达西海岸检查海底悬崖和山体滑坡的时候，发现了管状蠕虫和贝类——无意中泄露了能量流和活跃的产硫微生物群的存在。还有一些冷泉的发现是因为海底拖网从深海捞上来蛤类，或者是水下机器人拍摄的照片。一旦发现了几处地点，科学家们就开始分析它们的地质分布，并以此指导今后的探测。现在在哥斯达黎加、 加州蒙特利湾、日本、阿拉斯加和南极洲的俯冲带发现了几十处冷泉。

Q.So how are the foram cages you left on the seabed located a year later? Sounds impossible, but obviously there is a reliable technique.

提问：你们在海底安放沉积物捕获器，一年之后又是怎么找到它们的呢？听上去有的不可思议，但显然你们有可靠的技术。

— Barry, California

—— Barry，加州

A.Finding samples left on the seafloor is all about documentation, documentation, documentation. The easiest way to locate something is with the GPS coordinates, depth and the sub’s heading. If you know where you were when you deployed an experiment and which direction you were facing, you should be able to find it. To make samples easier to see, we usually attach large and/or brightly colored floats or markers that stick up above the seafloor. During my dive, I was surprised by how many experiments are down there — experiments from other expeditions that are seeking answers to very different questions. If for some reason you’re missing the coordinates of a given sample, you can always go back to the video. The sub itself has several video cameras running at all times throughout each dive, looking at different angles at the sub’s surroundings. By seeing when in the dive the sample was deployed, you can work backward or forward with some good old-fashioned dead reckoning to find it.

回答：找回海底的样品靠的是文件记录，文件记录，还是文件记录。给样品定位的最简单的办法就是利用GPS坐标、深度加上潜水器的航行记录。如果你知道你试验地点的坐标和你面对的方位，你就应该能再找到它。为了让样品更醒目，我们经常利用巨大浅色的浮标或者是在海底插上标记物。在一次潜水的过程中，我很惊讶我们在海底做了这么多实验——这些实验可能是其它航次为别的科学目的进行的。如果你忘了样品的坐标，你可以在录像中去找。潜水器在每次下潜中都会有好几台摄像机进行全过程、多角度的记录。看到你安放样品之后，你可以播放或回放录像，根据一些很管用的沿用多年的航线推测法找回样品。

written by 芒上的麦子

原作者：
来源Stephen Hawking: ten pearls of wisdom – Telegraph
译者newkiwi

After Professor Stephen Hawking apparently rubbished the idea of a God, claiming the Big Bang was an inevitable result of physics, here are ten of our favourite quotes.

在史蒂芬·霍金教授明确地否定了上帝创造宇宙的观点，并声称大爆炸是物理学的必然结果之后，本文盘点了霍金的10句智慧之言。

Professor Stephen Hawking Photo: DISCOVERY CHANNEL

史蒂芬·霍金教授/供图：探索频道

Stephen Hawking on why the universe exists:

霍金谈宇宙为什么存在：

“If we find the answer to that, it would be the ultimate triumph of human reason – for then we would know the mind of God.”

“如果我们找到了这个问题的答案，那将会是人类理性的最终胜利——那时候我们将能够了解上帝的思想。”

A Brief History of Time

——《时间简史》

Stephen Hawking on God:

霍金谈上帝：

“Because there is a law such as gravity, the Universe can and will create itself from nothing … It is not necessary to invoke God to light the blue touch paper and set the Universe going.”

“因为存在像万有引力这样一种物理定律，所以宇宙能够并且也将从无到有创造自身…没有必要祈求上帝点燃宇宙起始之火并让宇宙运转。”

Hawking: God did not create Universe, The Times

——霍金：《上帝没有创造宇宙》/《泰晤士报》

Stephen Hawking on the possibility of contact with alien life:

霍金谈与外星生命接触的可能性：

“I think it would be a disaster. The extraterrestrials would probably be far in advance of us. The history of advanced races meeting more primitive people on this planet is not very happy, and they were the same species. I think we should keep our heads low.”

“我认为这将会是一场灾难。外星生命将很可能比我们先进许多。在地球上先进种族与更为原始的种族相遇的历史并不十分愉快，而且相同的人种尚且如此，更何况与我们不同的外星生命呢。我认为我们应当不要主动接触外星生命。”

Naked Science: Alien Contact, The National Geographic Channel

——《科学新发现：与外星生命接触》，国家地理频道

Stephen Hawking on authorship:

霍金谈著作

“Someone told me that each equation I included in the book would halve the sales. I therefore resolved not to have any equations at all.”

“一些人告诉我，每在书里引用一个方程式销量就会减半。因此我决定完全不引用方程式。”

A Brief History of Time

——《时间简史》

Stephen Hawking on computer viruses:

霍金谈电脑病毒：

“Maybe it says something about human nature, that the only form of life we have created so far is purely destructive”

“当谈论电脑病毒时，我们可能是在说一些人性的东西，电脑病毒是目前为止人类创造的唯一一种纯粹有害的生命形式。”

Life in the Universe, public lecture

——《宇宙中的生命》，公开演讲

Stephen Hawking on euthanasia:

霍金谈安乐死：

“The victim should have the right to end his life, if he wants. But I think it would be a great mistake. However bad life may seem, there is always something you can do, and succeed at. While there’s life, there is hope.”

“疾病的受害者应当拥有结束自己生命的权利，如果他想的话。不过我认为这将是一个巨大的错误。不管生命可能看起来有多糟糕，你往往都能够做些什么，并且能够取得成功。当生命还在的时候，希望就在。”

People’s Daily Online

——中国《人民日报》

Stephen Hawking on celebrity:

霍金谈名声：

“The downside of my celebrity is that I cannot go anywhere in the world without being recognised. It is not enough for me to wear dark sunglasses and a wig. The wheelchair gives me away.”

“我的名声带来的不好之处就是，我去世界任何地方都会被认出来。我戴上墨镜与假发都还不够。因为我的轮椅把我出卖了。”

Interview on Israeli television

——以色列电视台访谈

Stephen Hawking on cutting corners:

霍金谈削减教育投入：

“To show this diagram properly, I would really need a four dimensional screen. However, because of government cuts, we could manage to provide only a two dimensional screen.”

“为了恰当地呈现这个图表，我真的将需要一个四维的屏幕。然而，由于政府削减了预算，我将想办法提供仅有二维的屏幕。”

The Beginning of Time, public lecture

——《时间之始》，公开演讲

Stephen Hawking on imperfection:

霍金谈缺陷：

“Without imperfection, you or I would not exist.”

“如果没有缺陷，你或我都将不复存在。”

Into the Universe with Stephen Hawking, The Discovery Channel

——《与霍金一起了解宇宙》，探索频道

Stephen Hawking on Stephen Hawking:

霍金谈霍金：

“It is a waste of time to be angry about my disability. One has to get on with life and I haven’t done badly. People won’t have time for you if you are always angry or complaining.”

“为自己的残疾生气，那是浪费时间。一个人必须与生命友善相处，而我做得还不是太好。如果你总是生气或者抱怨，那么你的生命将不会有多少时间。”

Return of the time lord, The Guardian

——《时间领主归来》/《卫报》0 views

written by newkiwi

原作者：
来源Confirmed: “Who to follow” was suggesting people users already followed, Twitter disables it
译者liincn

Thismay not come as a shock to many, but Twitter’s “Who to follow”feature isn’t perfect. Since it launched recently, many Twitterusers have complained that “Who to follow” often just suggestspeople that users have previously simply followed and then unfollowedsometime in the past.

这对大多数人来说这个消息并不意外,推特的“跟谁混“的功能并不完善.自从它推出以来,许多推特用户就已经抱怨“跟谁混“功能常常向他们推荐一些用户以前已经跟随过,然后在过去又已经取消跟随的推友.

Thismorning, however, the service seems to have taken a step backward(hopefully temporarily) by increasing offering suggestions to usersof people they already follow.

今天早上,服务方似乎又回到了(希望是暂时的)增加向用户提供已跟随的推友的情况.

UPDATE1: Twitter has just temporarily turned off “Who to follow”,acknowleding that the feature was in fact doing what we reported.Here’s the short message they just left on the Twitter Status page:

更新1:当得知“跟谁混“实际上就像我们报道那样工作后, 推特暂时关闭了这项功能.并在推特状态页里留下了这样的简短信息:

“We’vetemporarily turned off the “Who To Follow” feature and will berestoring it as soon as possible. We were including people youalready follow – we are investigating this issue.”

我们临时关闭了“跟谁混“的功能,并尽快恢复.根据这个功能包含你已经跟随过的人的情况,我们正在调查这个问题.

Also,we asked a third party expert on OAuth if this problem could berelated to Twitter changing to OAuth today, and he responded, “doubtit’s related”.

然后我们询问了OAuth的第三方专家这个问题是否与今天推特对OAuth的改变有关,他的回答是“可能有关联“

Whilethis problem has been noticed by some users recently, it reallyseemed to pick up this morning, as we noticed many tweets complainingabout this apparent malfunction, and a quick Twitter search for “Whoto follow” shows plenty of people having the same issue:

最近这个问题已经被很多推友关注到了,但是似乎只是在今天早上官方才采取行动.我们已经注意到很多条推里都在抱怨这个明显的技术故障,通过快速搜索“跟谁混“就能看到很多人都遇到了同样的问题.

UPDATE2: At 2:15pm PST Twitter said that the issue has been resolved andhas turned “Who to follow” back on. Twitter did not provide anyfurther explanation.

更新2:在下午2:15推特官方宣称这个问题已经被解决了,并且恢复了“跟谁混“的功能.推特方没有提供更多的解释.

We’veemailed Twitter for comment, but the company does not usually commenton “user statistics” as it puts it. In the meantime, if you arereally annoyed with the suggestions, you can do this hack (there area few others) and remove them from your sight on Twitter.com

我们已经将评论电邮给推特官方了,但是官方通常并没有在“用户统计“中进行评论就像它推出的那样.这时候还,如果你已经被这个推荐功能感到厌烦,你能做做手脚(当然还有其他的方法),把这个功能从你的推特页面中去掉.

written by liincn

原作者：
来源The Neuroscience of Inception | Wired Science | Wiredcom
译者newkiwi

This entire post is a spoiler. Stop reading if you have not seen Inception, because 1) I will reveal major plot points and 2) It will make no sense.

本文通篇都是剧透。所以如果你还没有看过《盗梦空间》这部电影，请不要阅读本文，原因有二：一、我将在本文中揭露影片的主要情节点；二、如果你没有看过电影，本文读起来将完全不合情理。

The literary critic Frank Kermode famously argued that all successful works of art have the ability to inspire multiple interpretations. We read the classics, he said, because we believe they say more than the author meant. In other words, it is the ambiguity of art  - this ability to inspire arguments and blog posts – that makes it so interesting.

文学评论家弗兰克·科莫德极好地证明了，所有成功的艺术作品都具有激发受众进行多重解释的能力。他说，我们之所以阅读经典，是因为我们相信经典作品表达得比作者本人想表达的含义还要丰富。换句话说，正是艺术的模棱两可的特性——也就是激发受众进行论证并在博客上发帖讨论的这种能力——使得艺术如此令人着迷。

Inception, of course, is all about the ambiguity. (Those who parse the wobbles of the spinning top in the final scene have missed the entire point of the scene.) This doesn’t mean the movie is a masterpiece – I personally thought it was a smart summer blockbuster but no Dark Knight. That said, I found this interpretation, by Devin Farci, to be mostly convincing:

当然，《盗梦空间》到处都是这种模棱两可。（那些对电影最后一幕中旋转陀螺的摇摆进行解析的观众，他们已经错失了这一幕中的所有要点。因为陀螺作为主人公柯布的图腾，是转是停其实并不能说明他是在别人的梦中还是现实中。这个图腾是柯布从妻子梅尔那里得来的，并非他自己制作。而梅尔之所以自杀，就是因为她认为她依然身处梦境。想想梅尔自杀那个场景，他们俩各在一扇窗前，二窗相对，结构非常怪异。当然，你可以说梅尔又另租了一个正对面的房间，但如果这一切都是在梦中，这种奇怪的建筑布局难道不更容易解释了吗？梅尔的死证明了陀螺倒与不倒都并不能说明柯布是否身处梦境。图腾其实无用。）但这并不意味着这部电影是一部杰作——我个人认为，这部电影只是一部精巧的暑期大片，但却无法与导演克里斯托弗·诺兰的神作《蝙蝠侠前传2：黑暗骑士》比肩。即是说我发现，电影新闻网站CHUD.com的编辑戴文·法拉西的这一解释，大部分是令人信服的：

Every single moment of Inception is a dream. I think that in a couple of years this will become the accepted reading of the film, and differing interpretations will have to be skillfully argued to be even remotely considered. The film makes this clear, and it never holds back the truth from audiences. Some find this idea to be narratively repugnant, since they think that a movie where everything is a dream is a movie without stakes, a movie where the audience is wasting their time.

“《盗梦空间》的每一刻都是梦境，而没有现实。我认为在几年之内，这一解读将成为对这部电影一个可接受的解读版本，而且不同的解读都将必须被精巧地讨论，成为更能经得起深思熟虑的解读。这部电影使这一点显得很清晰，而且这部电影也绝不会对观众隐瞒这一事实。一些人发现这个想法从讲故事的角度来讲是矛盾的，因为他们认为一部每一分每一秒都是梦境的电影，是一部观众不会为剧中人心惊肉跳的电影，一部观众只是在浪费时间的电影。”

Except that this is exactly what Nolan is arguing against. The film is a metaphor for the way that Nolan as a director works, and what he’s ultimately saying is that the catharsis found in a dream is as real as the catharsis found in a movie is as real as the catharsis found in life. Inception is about making movies, and cinema is the shared dream that truly interests the director.

“只可惜这一点恰恰是导演诺兰反对的。这部电影是对诺兰作为电影导演如何进行工作的一个隐喻，而且他最终的观点是，我们在梦中得到的情感宣泄与在电影中得到的宣泄一样逼真，也与现实中我们进行的情感宣泄同样真实。《盗梦空间》讲述的其实是电影的制作，而且电影对导演而言真正让他着迷的就是共享的梦境。”

“柯布的盗梦团队可以与电影制作过程中的主要角色一一对应。柯布是导演，进行前期调研并布置好睡眠地点的阿瑟是制片人。梦境设计师阿丽雅德妮是剧本作者——她建造了他们将要进入的世界。伊姆斯是演员（这一点在他坐到一面化妆镜前转换身份的细节里再明显不过，这样的化妆镜如今仍在舞台剧中被使用）。药剂师约瑟夫是工程人员：请别忘了，奥斯卡的全称可是电影艺术与科学学院，一部电影需要相当数量的技术人员的支撑。诺兰自己在最近的《电影评论》中多少也透露了一些端倪：（盗梦团队的行为与拍摄一部好莱坞电影）有很多相似之处。比如当盗梦者在自己建造的街道上行走、调查时，这与我们在开机前所进行的技术考察几乎一模一样。剩下还有两位主要人物。在整个游戏背后操纵的齐藤是投资方。费舍尔则是观众。导演柯布带领费舍尔经历了一场令人着迷、刺激而又激动的旅程，引导他更深地了解自己。柯布是一位了不起的导演（或者说是电影导演中的最佳代表），他带给观众动作与特效，也同时传达出意义、人性与情感。”

I believe that Inception is a dream to the point where even the dream-sharing stuff is a dream. Dom Cobb isn’t an extractor. He can’t go into other people’s dreams. He isn’t on the run from the Cobol Corporation. At one point he tells himself this, through the voice of Mal, who is a projection of his own subconscious. She asks him how real he thinks his world is, where he’s being chased across the globe by faceless corporate goons.

“我认为《盗梦空间》全都是梦境，甚至共享梦境本身也是梦境。道姆·柯布并不是一个盗梦者。他无法进入他人的梦境。他也并非在逃离柯伯尔公司的追杀。曾经一度他这么告诉自己，虽然是通过妻子梅尔的话来表达的，梅尔是他自己潜意识的一种投射。她质问他：在他的世界里他被柯伯尔公司的一群匿名的暴徒全球追杀，这样的世界究竟能有多真实？”

What I like about this interpretation of Inception is that it also makes neurological sense. From the perspective of your brain, dreaming and movie-watching are strangely parallel experiences. In fact, one could argue that sitting in a darkened theater and staring at a thriller is the closest one can get to REM sleep with open eyes. Consider this study, led by Uri Hasson and Rafael Malach at Hebrew University. The experiment was simple: they showed subjects a vintage Clint Eastwood movie (“The Good, The Bad and the Ugly”) and watched what happened to the cortex in a scanner. The scientists found that when adults were watching the film their brains showed a peculiar pattern of activity, which was virtually universal. (The title of the study is “Intersubject Synchronization of Cortical Activity During Natural Vision”.) In particular, people showed a remarkable level of similarity when it came to the activation of areas including the visual cortex (no surprise there), fusiform gyrus (it was turned on when the camera zoomed in on a face), areas related to the processing of touch (they were activated during scenes involving physical contact) and so on. Here’s the nut graf from the paper:

我为什么喜欢这一解释，还因为这个解释从神经学上也讲得通。从你大脑的角度来看，做梦与看电影是不可思议的两个平行经验。实际上有人主张，一个坐在漆黑的电影院凝视着电影的观众，与睁开眼睛进入快速眼动睡眠的人最为相似。让我们来看看以色列希伯来大学的乌里·哈森与拉斐尔·马拉赫所作的研究（乌里·哈森曾在上个月在北京举行的第七届国际认知科学大会上进行了相关报告）。实验非常简单：他们给被试观看一部克林特·伊斯特伍德的老电影（《地狱三镖客》），并且在磁共振扫描仪中观察被试的大脑皮层上发生了什么。科学家们发现，当成年人观看电影时，他们的大脑呈现出一种特殊的激活模式，这一现象非常普遍。（这项研究的名称是“在观看自然视象期间，大脑激活的被试间同步性”。）尤其，就包括视觉皮层（这不足为奇，因为视觉刺激肯定会激活视觉皮层）、梭状回（当摄影机放大一张面孔时，这个脑区就会激活）、加工触觉相关的脑区（当电影场景涉及到身体接触时，这些脑区就会激活）以及其他脑区的激活而言，不同的被试之间显现出了明显的相似性。下面就是这篇论文的主要段落：

This strong intersubject correlation shows that, despite the completely free viewing of dynamical, complex scenes, individual brains “tick together” in synchronized spatiotemporal patterns when exposed to the same visual environment.

“这种很强的被试间的一致性表明，尽管被试完全不受约束地观看动态的复杂影像，当被试暴露在相同的视觉环境中时，不同个体的大脑以同步的时空模式‘一起激活’。”

But it’s also worth pointing out which brain areas didn’t “tick together” in the movie theater. The most notable of these “non-synchronous” regions is the prefrontal cortex, an area associated with logic, deliberative analysis, and self-awareness. Subsequent work by Malach and colleagues has found that, when we’re engaged in intense “sensorimotor processing” – and nothing is more intense for the senses than a big moving image and Dolby surround sound – we actually inhibit these prefrontal areas. The scientists argue that such “inactivation” allows us to lose ourself in the movie:

但是同样值得指出的是，还有一些脑区在电影院里并非“一起激活”。这些“非同步的”脑区中最主要的是前额叶皮层，一个与逻辑、审慎分析以及自我意识相关的脑区。马拉赫及其同事随后的研究发现，当我们正忙于进行强烈的“感觉运动加工”时——不过强烈的感觉也只是一块快速活动的大荧幕以及杜比环绕声音——我们实际上抑制了这些前额叶脑区的激活。科学家们宣称，这种“不激活”使得我们会沉浸在电影当中：

Our results show a clear segregation between regions engaged during self-related introspective processes and cortical regions involved in sensorimotor processing. Furthermore, self-related regions were inhibited during sensorimotor processing. Thus, the common idiom ”losing yourself in the act” receives here a clear neurophysiological underpinnings.

“我们的结果呈现出，在参与自我相关的内省过程的脑区与参与感觉运动加工的皮层区之间存在一个清晰的分离。而且，自我相关的脑区在感觉运动加工期间是被抑制的。所以，常说的‘迷失在荧幕中’在这里可以找到清晰的神经学基础。”

What these experiments reveal is the essential mental process of movie-watching. It’s a process in which your senses are hyperactive and yet your self-awareness is strangely diminished. Now here’s where things get interesting, at least for this interpretation of Inception. When we fall asleep, the brain undergoes a similar pattern of global activity, as the prefrontal cortex goes quiet and the visual cortex becomes even more active than usual. But this isn’t the usual excitement of reality: this activity is semirandom and unpredictable, unbound by the constraints of sensation. (This is usually blamed on those squirts of acetylcholine, an excitatory neurotransmitter, percolating upwards from the brain stem.) It’s as if our cortex is entertaining us with surreal cinema, filling our strange nighttime narratives with whatever spare details happen to be lying around. Furthermore, the dreaming state is accompanied by an increase in activation in a wide range of “limbic” areas, those chunks of the cortex associated with the production of emotion. This is why even the most absurd nightmares cause us to wake up in a cold sweat. We care about what happens in our dreams, even when what happens makes no sense.

这些实验揭示的是观看电影时的基本心理过程。在这个过程中，你的感觉极度活跃，但是你的自我意识却不可思议地削弱了。现在这里所说的就开始有趣了，至少对于《盗梦空间》的解读而言很有趣。当我们进入睡眠状态时，大脑经历的全脑激活模式与平常清醒时类似，虽然前额叶皮层会保持沉寂，而视觉皮层比平常甚至更加活跃。但是令我们的视觉皮层兴奋的不是通常的现实：而是一种半随机而且不可预测的活动，也不受感觉约束的限制——也就是梦。（这通常被归结为乙酰胆碱的喷射，乙酰胆碱是一种兴奋性的神经递质，从脑干开始自下而上渗透。）这就好比我们的大脑皮层用超现实主义的电影来招待我们，用任何碰巧在我们周围的多余细节来填充我们奇怪的夜间故事。而且，睡梦状态还伴随着大范围的“边缘”脑区的激活的增强，这些脑区与情绪的产生有关。这也就是为什么即使最荒谬的噩梦（越荒谬就越不容易信以为真），也会使我们被吓醒时冒出一身冷汗。我们所关心的就是我们的梦境里发生了什么，即便梦境完全没有道理。

I’d argue that Inception tries to collapse the already thin distinction between dreaming and movie-watching. It gives us a movie in which most of the major plot points are simultaneously nonsensical – Why are we suddenly watching a thriller set in the arctic? Why are all the subconscious mercenaries such bad shots? Why don’t Cobb’s kids ever age? – and strangely compelling, just like a dream. And so we bite our fingernails even though we “know” it’s just a silly movie. Thanks to the subdued activity of the frontal lobes and the excited visual cortex, we sit in our plush chairs munching on popcorn and confuse the fake with the real. We don’t question the non-sequiturs or complain about the imperfect special effects or the shallow characters. Instead, we just sit back and watch and lose track of the time together. It’s almost as if we’re being manipulated by Dom Cobb himself, as he effortlessly travels deep into our brain to plant an idea. But this Dom Cobb – we’ll call him Christopher Nolan – doesn’t need a specially formulated sedative. He just needs a big screen.

我会认为《盗梦空间》在试图摧毁梦境与观看电影之间本已十分细微的差异。这部电影里大部分主要的情节点都同时发生而又是荒谬的——为什么我们会突然看到设置在北极的惊险场景？为什么所有潜意识里的防御者都枪法都这么烂？为什么柯布的孩子永远不会长大？——而且就像梦境一样不可思议地激发出我们的兴趣。所以我们仍然还会揪心地咬着指甲，即便我们“知道”这只不过是一场傻瓜的电影。多亏了我们大脑的额叶激活减弱以及视觉皮层的兴奋，我们才能坐在舒服的座椅上，一边大口嚼着爆米花一边混淆了虚与实的界限。我们不会质疑电影情节的不合理，也不会抱怨不完美的特效或者肤浅的人物角色。相反，我们只是闲适地坐着，看着荧幕，一起忘记了现实中的时间。这几乎就仿佛随着柯布毫不费力地深潜到我们的大脑里，植入一个想法时，我们被电影中的他完全操纵一样。不过这个柯布——我们将叫他克里斯托弗·诺兰——并不需要特殊配方的镇静剂。他需要的只是一块大荧幕。

Image: Screengrab from the movie trailer.

图片：来自电影预告片的一张抓屏图片。

译注：文中所引的戴文·法拉西的影评译文，部分参考了艾小柯童鞋在豆瓣的译文与影评文章。

written by newkiwi