与摩根·弗里曼一起穿越虫洞（2010）

Through The Wormhole With Morgan Freeman S02E03

Part 1 April 19, 2021, 2:34 p.m.

时间
Time.
与我们形影相随
It's all around us.
然而它是我们所以为的那样么？
But is it what we think it is?
时间的流逝仿佛一直向前
Time seems to flow forward...
然而它能够倒流么？
...But can it run backward?
事件的发展是此起彼伏的么
Do events unfold one after another,
还是过去现在和将来并存的呢？
or do past, present, and future exist side-by-side?
它是科学上最具挑战的课题之一
It's one of the most challenging topics in science,
质疑着我们对现实最基本的假设
questioning our most basic assumptions about reality.
时间是宇宙最基本的组成部分
Is time a fundamental part of the Universe,
抑或有可能时间并不是真的存在呢？
or could it be that time doesn't really exist?
空间，时间，生命本身
Space, time, life itself.
宇宙之谜，尽在穿越虫洞
The secrets of the cosmos lie through the wormhole.
与摩根·弗里曼一起穿越虫洞（S02E03）
Through The Wormhole With Morgan Freeman (S02E03)
时间真的存在么？
Does Time Really Exist?
时间为何物？
What time is it?
我可以告诉你此时是晚上9:02分
I could tell you it's 9:02 p.m.,
然而你的时间可能会有所不同
but your time may vary,
这取决于你身处何时何地
depending on where and when you are.
对于我们大多数人来说
For most of us,
时间就是我们用来度量我们日子的一组数字
time was a set of numbers we use to gauge our days.
我们过日子靠时钟
We live our lives by the clock --
起床上班睡觉周而复始
waking up, racing to work, going to bed, and on and on.
并不总是这样
It wasn't always like that.
我小时候夏季遥遥无期
When I was a kid, summers were timeless.
我没有特定的地方要去
I had no particular place to be,
无所事事
no appointments to be kept.
我的日子只被太阳的位置所限定
My days were bounded only by the position of the sun.
时间在当年无关紧要
Time didn't matter so much back then.
现在我的生活是一场与时间的赛跑
Now my life is a race against time.
然而我在与什么争分夺秒呢？
But what am I racing against?
时间真是宇宙不可分割的东西么？
Is time a real thing built into the universe?
或者它只是一个抽象的东西
Or is it just an abstraction,
是我们人类所创造的
something we humans created
保持我们文明不断前进的东西呢？
to keep our civilizations running?
为求答案
For the answer,
我们得提出一个看似简单的问题
we have to ask a deceptively simple question --
时间为何物？
what is time?
想想吧努力去定义它吧
Think about it. Try to define it.
谈何容易
It's not easy.
时间它维系着突然冒出来的一切东西
Time is what keeps everything from happening all at once,
所以时间构成了世界
and so time is that part of the world
以某种方式安排着事件
that orders events in a certain way
它们相继发生从头到尾
so they happen sequentially, from beginning to end.
我们在神经科学里所认识到的是
What we're realizing in neuroscience
时间并不是我们认为的那样
is that time is not what we thought it was.
时间并不是你被动跟着走的东西
Time is not something you're passively tracking.
相反它是
Instead, it's something
你用大脑主动构建的东西
that you're actively constructing with the brain.
我的大脑和你的大脑在如何看待
And my brain and your brain can be very different
同样的事件上会有很大的差异
in terms of how they see the same event.
时间并不存在
Time just does not exist.
所存在的只是
What exists is
世上一切东西的这些分配
these distributions of everything in the world,
这些东西我称其为“现存”
these what I call "nows."
那是实实在在的东西
That's the real thing.
我所喜欢的是时间是它的记录
What I enjoy about time is the recording of it.
对于罗杰·史密斯时间就是金钱
To Roger Smith, time is money.
他的定制手表要卖♥♥到
His custom-made watches sell
几十万美元
for hundreds of thousands of dollars.
这活计最难得部分就在于
The hardest part of the job is
让这一大堆小齿轮舵轮
to get these jungles of tiny gears and wheels ticking
走出精准的间隔
at precisely spaced intervals.
为了拿出一块计时用表
To bring a watch to time,
那可是一个漫长而复杂的过程
it can be quite a lengthy and complex process,
这个特殊的舵轮得精准地平衡
and this particular wheel has to be perfectly balanced.
如果它不是精准平衡
And if it isn't perfectly balanced,
那么你的表将在不同的状态下
then your watch will keep different rates,
走出不同的速度不同的时间
different times in different positions.
罗杰的目标是
Roger's goal is
让他的表来匹敌格林威治标准时
to get his watches to match Greenwich Mean Time,
那可是全世界所有时钟都用来
the time that every clock around the world uses
作为基准的时间
as its baseline.
其名字来自这个地方
It was named after this place --
英国格林威治
Greenwich, England.
时间我们知道它诞生于此地
Time as we know it was born here.
1884年
In 1884,
世界大会决定子午线
a world conference decided that the Meridian Line
穿过格林威治天文台
that passes through the observatory at Greenwich
作为本初子午线
was to be the initial meridian --
行星地球的母时
the master time for planet Earth.
格林威治时间是我们最接近
Greenwich Mean Time is our best approximation of time
艾萨克·牛顿爵士所描述的时间
as described by sir Isaac Newton --
一个恒定节拍
a steady beat pounding
隐藏在宇宙背景里
behind the scenes of the Universe.
牛顿相信宇宙就像是一面大时钟
Newton believed the Universe was like a giant clock
其推手是上帝
set into motion by God.
但牛顿错了
But Newton got it wrong.
李·斯莫林是位理论物理学家
Lee Smolin is a theoretical physicist
试图解开时间之谜
trying to solve the mysteries of time.
牛顿的时间概念就是它是绝对的
Newton's concept of time was that it was absolute.
它就像是节拍器这个如你所说
It was like a metronome, which, as you said,
滴答个不停从不考虑
ticks on absolutely, without regard
宇宙间是否发生了什么
to whether anything is happening in the Universe or not,
即使啥都没发生
even if nothing is happening.
比如即使在我们这个录音棚里
For example, even if in our studio here,
没有音乐演奏
no music is playing,
节拍器只是一股脑地以同样的速度滴答作响
the metronome just kicks on absolutely at the same rate,
无论发生什么事
no matter what is going on.
这里的问题是实际上我们所有人
The problem with this is that it's actually impossible
都不可能发现绝对时间的
for any of us to detect absolute time.
我们发现不了绝对时间
We don't detect absolute time.
我们发现时间是作为所发生的事情之间的关系
We detect time as relationships between things that happen,
我们可以来阐述一下
and we can illustrate this
请音乐家来响起音乐
by asking the musicians to start up the music.
1，2，3，4
One, two, three, four.
他们开始演奏
And they start to play,
他们在展开他们自己的时间
and they develop time between themselves,
相关的时间完全建立在
a relational time completely built
他们所演奏的音符之间的关系
from the relationships between the notes they're playing,
他们正在打创造的事件
the events they're creating.
那就是时间的真实模样
That's what time is really like.
所以我们可以将节拍器关闭
So, we can turn the metronome off.
事实上我们可以甩掉它
In fact, we can just get rid of it,
世界没停下来
and the world keeps going on,
音乐在进行和之前一样
the music keeps going on just as before.
这就是爱因斯坦的伟大见解
This was the great insight of Einstein,
这就是他的广义相对论的基础
and it was the basis of his general Theory of Relativity --
时间的产生来自于
that time is created by the relationships
宇宙中发生的变化关系
of the changes that happen in the Universe,
仅此而已
and nothing else.
即使在今天
Even today,
有些人还是很难接受
some people have a hard time accepting
艾伯特·爱因斯坦的相对时间
Albert Einstein's relational time
超过艾萨克·牛顿的绝对时间
over Isaac Newton's absolute time.
不过我们得到的报时越好
But the better we get at telling time,
我们就越能看到爱因斯坦的正确
the more we can see that Einstein was right.
这是台铝离子实验时钟
This is the aluminum ion experimental clock
国家标准与技术研究院里
at the National Institute of Standards and Technology
位于科罗拉多州的博尔德
in Boulder, Colorado,