与摩根·弗里曼一起穿越虫洞（2010）

Through The Wormhole With Morgan Freeman S05E10

Part 5 April 19, 2021, 3:04 p.m.

但是卡洛从来不怕挑战现状
but Carlo has never been afraid to challenge the status quo.
卡洛是对的吗？
Is Carlo correct?
时间真的是因为我们无法了解
Is time really just our failure to comprehend
热扩散才出现的？
the dispersion of heat?
这名女子说还有一种可能
This woman says there is another possibility.
时间是真实的
Time is real.
但是它会在每秒内
But it is born and reborn
重生一兆兆次
a trillion, trillion times a second.
我从甲地走到乙地
When I move from place to place,
我会觉得这是一个连续的动作
my senses tell me it happens in one continuous sweep.
但是根据量子力学的说法
But according to quantum mechanics, any movement...
所有的运动只是一连串通过空间的
Is actually a series of microscopic jitters
微小抖动
through space.
目前还没有人想出
No one has yet worked out
要怎么把量子力学的理论套在时间上
how to apply the theory of quantum mechanics to time,
但是有些科学家就快想到了
but some scientists are getting very close.
如果他们成功的话，我们就得接受一种奇怪的新概念
If they succeed, we will have to accept a strange, new idea --
在每一个短暂的刹那间
every minute fraction of a second,
时间都会不断反覆地诞生
time bursts into existence over and over.
菲道克跟我们一样会感觉到时间的流动
Like all of us, fay dowker experiences a flow of time.
她从一个小女孩
She was a girl...
变成大学生
Then a university student...
如今她成了伦敦帝国学院的物理学家
And now she's a physicist at London's imperial college.
我们最基本的体验就是
Nothing is more fundamental to our experiences
对于时间的体验
than that we have those experiences in time.
我们能够察觉时间的经过
We are aware of time passing.
时间似乎是会流动的
Time seems to flow.
要理解我们的人生
We can hardly make sense of our lives except in the context
就得根据已经发生而且无法改变的
of some fixed past of events that have already happened
过去事件
and that can never be changed
有尚未发生并拥有
and some open future of events
无限可能的未来事件
that are free and haven't happened yet
以及难以捉摸却分开了
and some mysterious and elusive moment of now
过去跟未来的现在
that appears to separate the two.
这个道理看似显而易见
This idea seems obvious.
但是它却违反了解释宇宙原理的
But, actually, it goes against our best scientific theory
最佳科学理论
of how the universe works.
相对论告诉我们
The theory of relativity
时间和空间牢牢地结合在一起
tells us space and time are inextricably joined.
所有会存在的时间，早就存在于
All time that will exist already exists
所谓的“时空”区块
in a block we call "space-time."
我们一辈子从生到死
As we pass from birth to death,
正是窥见了自己在这里的独有路径
we glimpse our own individual trails
只是走过这张冻结的时空地图
through this frozen space-time landscape.
但是菲认为宇宙不是冻结的区块
But fay believes the universe is not a frozen block.
它是时间和空间的
It is a growing pile
量子颗粒逐渐堆出来的产物
made of quantum grains of space and time.
在我们眼中，时空是平滑而连续的
Space-time seems smooth and continuous to us,
这是因为我们的身体很大
but that's just because we're very large
而我们用大尺度的观点看事情
and we see things at large scales.
想像我们有一个方块
So, if we imagine that a solid cube of something,
比方说
say a sugar cube,
我们用方糖代表一块时空
represents a piece of space-time,
从远处看
then from far away, that looks solid.
方糖是一块固体
It looks like a chunk.
但是如果我们把方糖放大
But we know that if you zoom in on it
再观察它更基本的结构
and look at its more fundamental structure,
就会发现它是由颗粒组成的
we see that it breaks up into grains.
时空是颗粒的模型就依照同样的道理
The idea with a granular model of space-time is similar.
从基本的微小尺度来看它是由颗粒组成的
At fundamental, tiny scales, it's grainy and particulate.
从大尺度来看它是平滑而连续的
At large scales, it appears smooth and continuous.
看不出有颗粒的性质
We don't notice that granularity.
那么时空的颗粒有多小？
Just how small is a grain of space-time?
小到难以理解
Inconceivably small.
大概是一百万兆兆兆
Roughly a million, trillion, trillion, trillionth
分之一秒
of a second.
物理学家认为
This is what physicists believe
这是最小的量度单位
is the smallest possible unit of measurement.
菲认为时空
Fay thinks space-time is built
能由这种细微的颗粒大量聚积而成的
from a prodigious stack of these impossibly tiny grains,
她把这种颗粒称为时空原子
which she calls "space-time atoms."
时空原子结合了两种概念
This marries together two concepts --
第一时空基本上是原子
that space-time is fundamentally atomic
从极小的尺度来看是一颗颗的
or bitty or granular at very tiny scales
第二则是因果律的概念
with the notion of causality,
也就是说先有因才有果
the fact that cause must precede effect.
比方说如果我听到巨大的声响
So, for example, if I hear a loud noise...
我会吓一跳
...then that will startle me,
或许还会打翻咖啡杯
and I might drop my cup of coffee.
这里的因就是声响
So the cause was the loud noise.
果就是打翻咖啡杯
The effect was the dropping of my cup of coffee.
根据相对论坚持的说法
If, as relativity insists,
所有的时空早就存在了
all of space and time already exist,
不管你从过去、现在或未来的角度看
the coffee cup will always fall, is always falling,
咖啡杯都会被打翻
has always fallen.
但是在菲的眼中
But in fay's view,
宇宙是一组事件的集♥合♥，这些事件会不断增加
the universe is a set of events that is forever growing.
她把这些相连的事件顺序称为因果组
When we observe these connected sequences of events,
我们在观察因果组时
what she calls a causal set,
会感觉到时间的流动
we perceive that time is passing.
因果组会因为
A causal set can grow
新的时空原子累积而增长
by the accumulation of new space-time atoms.
这些新的时空原子的生成
And this birth of new space-time atoms
可能就是我们所知的时间流动
could be the passage of time as we know it.
我们体验到的现在
What we experience as the present
就是这种新的时空原子的生成
is the birth of these new space-time atoms.
旧的原子并未消失
The old atoms don't die.
它只是堆积在所谓的过去里
They pile up into the thing we call "the past."
未来尚未生成
The future has yet to be born.
一旦时空原子生成并且存在
Once a space-time atom is born and exists,
它就会形成过去一部分
it will then form part of the past.
因此
So, in that sense,
我们才会觉得
it also realizes our sense
过去是固定的
that the past is fixed,
是已经发生不可改变的
that the past has happened, and that it cannot be changed.
时间或许不是连续的河流
Time may not be a continuous river,
而是无止尽的事件集♥合♥
but rather an endless rain of events.
哪一种时间概念才是正确的？
So, which concept of time is correct?
我们是否有更接近时间的起点？
Are we getting closer to the origin of time?
也许我们很快就会知道
We may soon know.
在这间实验室，研究人员正在设计新的实验
In this laboratory, researchers are working on a new experiment
它或许会彻底改变
that could forever change
我们对于时间和宇宙的认识
our understanding of time and the universe.
或许时间源自大爆♥炸♥
Time may have begun at the big bang.
或许它一直在流动着
It may have always been flowing.
或许它在每秒间会生成好几兆次
Or it could be born trillions of times every second.
这个辩论可能会再持续几十年
This debate could go on for decades.
也可能会马上结束
Or it could end any day now.
因为我们终于有可能用实验
Because we may finally have an experiment
揭开时间的真面目
that reveals the true nature of time.
在加州大学柏克莱分校
At the Berkeley campus of the university of California,
哈慕海夫纳教授正在制♥造♥时间环
Professor Hartmut haeffner is building a time ring --
它会像这个金属环一样旋转
an object that will rotate like this disk.
这个金属环
But while this metal ring
是用电磁力漂在空中
is levitated using electromagnetic force,
但时间环的动力是来自时间的跳动
a time ring will be driven by a jitter in time.
如果这项实验能够成功
If it works,
就能证明颇受争议的理论
this experiment will prove a controversial theory --
在空间里观察到的量子波动
the quantum fluctuations that have been observed in space
也存在于时间里
also exist in time.