宇宙时空之旅：未知世界（2020）

Cosmos: Possible Worlds S01E04

Part 1 Aug. 24, 2022, 10:55 a.m.

生而为人就必然知道饥饿的痛苦
To be human has been to know the torment of hunger.
曾经有个人梦想通过科学
There was once a man who dreamed that through science,
我们可以创造出再也不会有人饿死的世界
we could make a world where no one would ever perish from hunger.
再也不会有饥荒
And famine would be no more.
他给了我们一笔财富用来实现这个诺言
He gave us a treasure to fulfil that promise,
但他在被清算之际面临一个可怕抉择
but he faced a terrible choice at a moment of reckoning.
对科学说谎保住一命
To lie about science and live,
或是说出真♥相♥ 但必死无疑
or to tell the truth and face certain death.
宇宙可能的世界
在人类历史的最初几十万年
For the first couple of hundred thousand years that
我们是生活在星空下的漫游者
we were human, we were wanderers living beneath the stars.
我们采集植物并且狩猎动物
We gathered plant life and hunted animals.
直到约一万至一万两千年前
Until about ten or 12,000 years ago,
我们的祖先发明了一种新的生活方式
when our ancestors invented a new way to live.
想想那些天才们最早发现
Think of those geniuses who were the first to realize that
在他们采集的植物之中
inside the plants they foraged,
有制♥造♥新植物的方法
was a means to make another plant.
那就是种子
A seed.
这个发现导致人类做出至今影响最重大的选择
That discovery led to the single most faithful choice our species ever made.
人们可以继续组成小团体漫游
They could continue to wander in small bands,
或是定居下来种植食物
or they could settle down to grow and raise their food.
这需要做出牺牲才能在一段时间之后获得回报
This required sacrifices for rewards that would not come until much later.
这是人类破天荒第一次考虑未来
For the first time, we were thinking about the future.
当然这些决定不是瞬间做出的
Of course, these decisions weren't made in an instant.
是历经了好几个世代
They unfolded over generations.
以人类的角度而言那看似许久以前的事
That seems like a long time ago in human terms,
但在漫长的宇宙时间中
but in the great sweep of cosmic time,
那还不到半分钟前
it was less than a half a minute ago.
宇宙日历把从大爆♥炸♥以来的138亿年
This Cosmic Calendar compresses all of the last 13.8 billion years
压缩成一个地球日历年
since the big bang into a single calendar Earth year.
现在时间是12月31日午夜
Midnight on December 31 is right now.
每个月都代表十亿年多一点
Every month is a little more than a billion years.
每天代表稍低于四千万年
Every day, a little less than 40 million years.
所有人类最自豪的成就
And all of humanity's proudest achievements unfold
都发生在宇宙时间的前两分钟
in the last couple of minutes of cosmic time.
我们在宇宙的资历就是这么浅
That's how new we are to the universe.
我们的祖先开始驯化动植物
Our ancestors began to domesticate animals and
是在宇宙历不到30秒前
plants less than 30 seconds ago on the Cosmic Calendar.
这些漫游者第一次定居下来
For the first time, the wanderers were settling down.
打造能延续超过一个季节的事物
And building things to last for more than a single season.
他们敢于触摸未来
They dared to touch the future.
他们的耶利哥塔迄今仍然屹立
Their tower of Jericho still stands.
这是保护城市免受入侵的瞭望塔吗
Was it a watchtower for protecting the city from invaders?
或者只是一种更靠近星空的方法
Or just a way to get closer to the stars?
花费11000个工作日打造
It took 11,000 work days to build.
全是因为农业提供的充足食物
Something that could only be possible with the
才有可能完成这种工程
food surpluses that agriculture provided.
这是世上最古老的楼梯
This is the world's oldest stairway.
在埃及人建造第一座金字塔之前它就有五千年的历史
It was already 5,000 years old before the first Egyptian pyramid was built.
爬上这座楼梯是跟随三百代人的脚步
To climb it is to follow in the footsteps of 300 generations.
这实在令人惊讶我们人类才刚停止漫游
Isn't it astonishing that people who had barely ceased wandering,
就能创造出这种历久不衰的事物
we're able to create something of such permanence?
狩猎采集生活的丰富多样化饮食
The rich and varied hunter-gatherer diet,
包括植物昆虫鸟类和其他动物已经被取代
of plants, insects, birds and other animals, was replaced.
城市居民的主食是少数几种碳水化合物作物
City dwellers largely subsisted on a few carbohydrate crops.
只要没下雨或有真菌侵袭谷物
And when the rains didn't come or a fungus afflicted the grain,
就会造成大规模饥饿
there was hunger on a massive scale.
也就是饥荒
Famine.
因为干旱和英国殖民政♥府♥治理不善
Famines caused by drought and British colonial mismanagement
在18世纪的印度导致的饥荒夺走一千万人的生命
in India in the 18th century killed ten million people.
中国在19世纪的多次饥荒
In China, during the famines of the 19th century,
造成超过一亿人丧生
more than 100 million people perished.
同样是英国帝♥国♥主♥义♥政策造成的
The great hunger in Ireland,
爱尔兰大饥荒
also a result of British imperial policy,
导致一百万人饿死
starved a million to death and
并迫使另外两百万人逃离祖国求生
forced another two million to flee the country in search of a living.
1877年的巴西干旱和瘟疫情况同样悲惨
The Brazilian drought and pestilence of 1877 was comparable.
光是一个省就有半数以上人口饿死
In a single province, more than half died of starvation.
在肆虐埃塞俄比亚卢旺达和非洲萨赫勒地区的饥荒中
The dead remain uncounted from the famines that wracked
死亡人数仍然不可胜数
Ethiopia, Rwanda and the Sahel in Africa.
在有史以来的几千年间世上任意一处
For a couple of thousand years, ever since records were kept, somewhere on Earth,
总有大量人遭受饥荒的记录
people in great numbers have starved.
农业能否成为一门跟重力一样拥有可靠的预测理论的科学?
Could agriculture become a science with a predictive theory as reliable as gravity?
可以持续生产能够抵御干旱以及疾病的品种
One that could consistently produce breeds able to stand up to drought and disease?
农夫和牧人都知道
Farmers and herders knew the advantages of preferentially
优先选择最坚韧品种杂交育种
selecting the hardiest specimens for crossbreeding,
以生产更具优势的杂交种
to produce a more successful hybrid.
这称为人工选择
This was known as artificial selection.
但是这些特征传达给后代的机制
But the mechanism of how those traits were passed on to
仍然是个谜
succeeding generations remained a complete mystery.
这里是唐恩宅
This is Down House.
查尔斯·达尔文的故居他和妻子艾玛
Charles Darwin's home, where he lived with his wife
还有十个孩子住在这里
Emma and their ten children.
他不是维多利亚时代专♥制♥父权大家长
He was hardly the authoritarian Victorian patriarch.
而是一个温柔慈爱的父亲
But instead a tender, loving father who delighted
被孩子的戏弄逗乐
in his children's ridicule.
这是他栽种的花♥园♥
This is the garden he planted.
这处充满田园风情的地点
This place is a strangely pastoral setting for the most
对思想史上最有影响力的革命来说有着很特别的背景
influential revolutionary in the history of thought.
即使是现在还有人害怕他的想法
Even now, there are people who are afraid of his idea.
达尔文发现包括人类在内的物种
Charles Darwin discovered that species, including ours,
通过自然选择随时间逐渐演化
evolve over time through a process of natural selection.
最能适应真实变化状况的物种
The environment rewards those best adapted to its changing
环境给予的奖励是顺利存活与生生不息的后代
realities with survival and with new generations of offspring.
达尔文揭开了生命外部现实的神秘面纱
Darwin demystified the external reality of life,
但是没人知道进化的内部机制是什么
but no one had any idea what the inner mechanisms of evolution were.
与此同时位于现在的捷克
At that same moment, an abbot at a rural monastery
一座乡间修道院的院长想要成为科学教授
in what is now the Czech Republic was trying to become a science professor.
葛瑞格·孟德尔两次都没通过资格考
Gregor Mendel flunked his qualifying exam both times.
他仅存的职业道路是成为代课老师
The only career path open to him was to become a substitute teacher.
所以他趁闲暇时间
So in his spare time,
着手研究豌豆
he took up the study of pea plants.
他培育了几千株豌豆
He bred tens of thousands of them,
详细检查高度形状
carefully scrutinizing their height and their shape
豆荚颜色种子和花朵
and the color of their pods, their seeds and flowers.
孟德尔在寻找育种的预测理论
Mendel was searching for a predictive theory of breeding.
这样就能提前确切知道
So that you could know in advance exactly what you would
当你让高矮植株杂交
get when you crossed a tall plant with a short one,
以及让绿色豌豆和黄色豌豆杂交会种出什么
and a green pea with a yellow one.
孟德尔发现你每次都会种出黄色豌豆
Mendel found that you would get a yellow pea every time.
我们无法描述黄色豌豆...
We didn't have a word for the power of the yellow over
压过绿色豌豆的力量直到孟德尔创造出这个新词
the green until Mendel coined it.
他将这种特质称为"显性"
He called that quality "dominant."
他欣喜地发现他可以预测
And to his delight, he found that he could predict what would
遗传系谱图
第一代
第二代
YY
YY
YY
yy
yy
yy
Yy
Yy
Yy
在那之后的下一代豌豆会是什么样子
happen in the next generation of peas after that.
四分之一的豌豆植物会是绿色的
One in four pea plants would be green.
孟德尔把在下一代豌豆出现的隐藏特征命名为隐性
Mendel named the hidden trait that popped up in the next crop, "recessive."
植物内藏有他称为因子的某种东西
There was something he called "factors,"
那会形成特定特征
hidden inside the plants that caused particular characteristics.
而且遵循着一种法则运作
And they operated by a law that Mendel could describe
孟德尔可以用一个简单方程式描述就跟重力一样
with a simple equation, like gravity.
达尔文和孟德尔自己不知道
Charles Darwin and Gregor Mendel didn't know it,
但这两位科学家在同一时间
but the two scientists were deciphering the mysterious
破解了生命的神秘运作
workings of life at the very same moment.
达尔文提出了所有生命出自同源的证据