All Hail Science! 科学万岁！ 作者：Jonah Goldberg @ 2015-2-14

译者：普罗米修斯（@普箩米修思），校对：Marcel ZHANG（@马赫塞勒张）

来源：National Review， http://www.nationalreview.com/article/398591/all-hail-science-jonah-goldberg Memo to progressives: Unlike God, science doesn’t care if you believe in it. 进步主义者请记住：与上帝不同，科学并不在乎你是否信仰它。 Dear Reader (Unless you’re at the screening of Al-Qaeda Sniper ),

亲爱的读者（除非你恰好在看《基地组织的狙击手》（ Al-Qaeda Sniper ）这部电影），

【 译注：实际上不存在这部电影，那是一个叫“非裔美国人保守派”的博客虚构的，其副标题是“一个变性圣战者为使用‘无性别卫生间’的权利而抗争的故事”，显然是用来嘲讽目前在美国风起云涌的左翼平权运动的。 】

All of us are equal in the eyes of God and the law — or at least that’s how it’s supposed to work. (Though the fact that Jon Corzine has neither been hit by lightning nor carted off to jail sometimes causes me moments of doubt on both fronts.)

无论在法律还是上帝面前，我们都是平等的——至少本该是这样。（尽管Jon Corzine既没遭雷劈也没被扔进监狱这一事实，让我时常对此感到疑惑）。

I try pay lip-service to the same principle about readers of this “news”letter, but let’s face it. That’s not true. Nearly all G-File readers are cherished, but not all are cherished equal.

我本想以此搪塞这封“新闻信”的读者：人人平等这项原则也适用于你们。不过我们还是直面现实吧，那并不是真的。我对几乎所有G-File的读者都很重视，但并非同等的重视。

(And, in a year or two when my next book comes out, the great schism in my heart will be between those of you who eagerly purchase my book, and you shameful free riders who, for years, were perfectly happy for me to throw you the gold Aztec idol week after week, but now refuse to throw me the whip as promised, saying “Adios, Señor.” This is the quid people, my next book will be the pro quo. If you assume each Goldberg File I’ve written is worth a quarter, you should probably convert it into zombie-apocalypse currency and assume it’s equal in value to a can of dog food, six dead D batteries, or a fully operational calk gun. But the price is what the market will bear, and even at that valuation, it would more than cover the price of my forthcoming magnum opus for any longtime reader. You have been put on notice.)

（并且，等一两年后我的新书出版时，我内心会在两类人之间撕扯：一类是那些迫不及待想要买书的读者，另一类则是那些可耻的搭便车者，多年来，他们满心欢喜地盼着我一周周地把阿兹特克金像（the gold Aztec idol）扔给他们，却不愿如之前说好的那样把鞭子给我扔过来，临走时只留下一句“再见，先生。”(“Adios, Señor.”西班牙语)。我的下一本书需要你用东西来交换的。如果你觉得我写的每一本G-File值得上一毛钱，或许你应该按僵尸界的汇率把它兑换成一罐狗粮、六个D号废旧电池或者一把铆钉枪。当然，书的价格应当是市场可以承受的，并且，对于我的长期读者，我即将出版的煌煌巨著应该是对得起它的标价的。我可是通知你们了哦。）【 译注：这里有关阿兹特克金像和鞭子的哏出自电影《夺宝奇兵》。 】

I bring this up because Charles Krauthammer is a reader of this “news”letter which, like seeing a spider monkey in your brand new kitchen making crème brûlée with a blowtorch, is both cool and scary. Why it’s cool should be obvious. He’s the Hammer. It’s scary because . . . he’s the Hammer.

我提这茬，是因为得知查尔斯·克劳萨默（Charles Krauthammer）也是这封“新闻信”的读者，这就像看见一只蜘蛛猴在你的崭新厨房里用喷灯做焦糖布丁，让人不知道该觉得有趣还是害怕。说他有趣的原因很明显，他是“锤子”，说他让人害怕是因为......他可是铁锤查理啊。【 译注：注意Krauthammer中的hammer，意为锤子，铁锤查理（Charles Martel）则为查理大帝的祖父，法兰克王国实际掌权者，加洛林王朝奠基者，以武功著称的军事天才。 】

I try very hard not to put a face to my readers because, frankly, this thing is sometimes so stupid and self-indulgent if I imagined a real person reading it, I’d push the keyboard away. It’s best if I write this thing like a message in a bottle going to no one.

我竭力在读者面前展示真实自我，因为装模作样会让我会显得任性而愚蠢，每当想到有人读到虚伪的自己，我就忍不住想要摔键盘。我最好是把这些话塞进漂流瓶，随浪漂走。最可能让我怯场的，就是想象查尔斯·克劳萨默是打开漂流瓶的那个人。

And the last thing I need for my performance anxiety is to imagine Charles Krauthammer is the guy unspooling my missive from that bottle. The only thing worse would be to imagine George Will standing behind Charles looking over his shoulder and tsk-tsking all of my split infinitives. And yet, to my dismay, Will, too, has told me he on occasion comes by here. I feel like Martin Short in a synchronized-swimming routine .

唯一比这更糟的事，就是想象乔治·威尔（George Will）也站在查尔斯身后，目光越过他肩膀落在信上，看到文中的分裂不定式，不住地摇头。并且，同样令我沮丧的是威尔告诉我，他只是恰巧经过这里而已。我的感觉就像是马丁·肖特（Martin Short）在花样游泳。【 译注：指马丁·肖特在周六夜现场节目中拍的一个搞怪视频短片。 】 FERNAL LINGUISTICS 良魔语言学 Anyway, Charles is a big fan of “ unpaired words .” I don’t mean words with the Bluetooth turned off. I mean . . . hmmm . . . how do I explain?

总之，查尔斯是个“不成对单词（ unpaired words ）”爱好者，“不成对单词”并不是指你的设备在蓝牙没有配对时发出的提示，它指的是……额……我该怎么解释呢？【 译注：在英语中，有些词汇是它的否定形式曾经同时存在，比如“innocent”和“nocent”。随着人们词汇使用习惯的改变，这些单词只有其否定形式被保留下来，肯定形式则很少再被使用，下文中作者大玩文字游戏，将出现很多由这种“不成对单词”拼凑的句子。 】

Well, many times, during the commercial break on Special Report, we’ve gone back and forth — brandy snifters in hand — talking about how we need a president with more feck running an ept and gormful foreign policy.

好吧，在“特别报道”（Special Report）的广告时间，我们常常举着白兰地酒杯来回踱着步，谈论着我们需要一位“强势”（feck : feckless）总统来执行“精妙”（ept : inept）、“高明”（gormful : gormless）的外交政策。

These conversations usually take place after the make-up lady comes into the studio to make sure that we look kempt and shevelled. Well, last Wednesday, the topic came up again, and we kept bandying them about. Which made me think, “This is pretty cool.” It also made me think, “This would be a good riff for the G-File.”

此时，化妆助理通常会来到直播间确保我们看起来“干净”（kempt : unkempt）、“整洁”（shevelled : dishevelled）。就在上周三，我们又一次聊到了这个话题，并为此争吵不休。这让我感觉很有趣，同时也想，或许可以成为我写G-File的好题材。

Still, I’m hoping that he isn’t gruntled by this somewhat nocuous and entirely effable effort to rip off one of his favorite parlor games. Indeed, I could have dropped this choate schtick without name-dropping Charles, which might have made it seem less petuous, but why leave my motivation unbeknownst when it can be beknownst?

尽管如此，我希望他不要因为我们尝试对他最喜爱的室内游戏之一进行有点“恶意”（nocuous : innocuous）且“直白”（effable : ineffable）的剽窃而“高兴”（gruntled : disgruntled）。事实上，当我展示这些“低级”（choate : inchoate）把戏时，提起查尔斯的大名不过是为了借此抬高自己。这么说或许不够“谨慎”（petuous : impetuous），但是如果可以“公开”（beknownst : unbeknownst）我的意图时，又何必要“隐瞒”（unbeknownst）呢？

Better to go communicado and cognito, I say. Particularly when I’m still throat clearing as I try to scrounge up a real topic to discuss. Still, I fear I seem quite chalant as I search for sipid things to say. If I don’t work harder, this “news”letter will never be combobulated. (“I don’t want to disrupt your flow here, so I’ll rupt it. But you should know this all comes across as soucient and below even your pareil writing style. I would have thrown this whole thing out the window, but you opted to fenestrate it.” — The Couch)

我想，“开诚布公”（communicado and cognito : incommunicado and incognito）总是好的。特别是在我找到一个真正的话题之前，需要用这个来拖延下时间。并且，在我急于寻找“有趣的”（sipid : insipid）话题时，会担心自己显得“紧张不安”（chalant : nonchalant）。如果我不更加努力工作，读者是不会对这封“新闻信”感到“满意”（combobulated : discombobulated）的。（沙发发话了：我不想在这里“打断”（disrupt）你们，所以我就“继续”（rupt : disrupt）了。但是你应当清楚，所有这一切都是被“精心”（soucient : insouciant）组合起来的而且甚至比不上你们“匹配”（pareil : nonpareil）写作的水平。我本该把所有写的这些都扔到窗外去的，但是这可是你们选择看下去的。） All Hail Science 科学万岁 So my column from yesterday was about the quizzing of Scott Walker and other Republicans about evolution. This is an incessant question every four years. And while it deserves to be cessant, it will never will be. (Okay, I’m done now.)

我昨天的专栏探讨了对Scott Walker和其他共和党人如何看待有关进化论的盘问，这个问题每隔四年就会被提出来，从未中断。这个问题本该“停止”（cessant : incessant）了，却永远停不下来。（好了，文字游戏到此为止。【 译按：我的噩梦也终于结束了 】）

As many have noted, liberals in and out of the media are very selective in their celebration of science. Guy Benson reminded me of this nicely splenetic post I wrote three years ago in the Corner :

很多人也注意到了，在与媒体打交道时，自由派对科学的赞颂是有选择性的。Guy Benson让我想起自己三年前在专栏里写下的这段怒气冲冲的文字： Why does the Left get to pick which issues are the benchmarks for “science”? Why can’t the measure of being pro-science be the question of heritability of intelligence ? Or the existence of fetal pain? Or the distribution of cognitive abilities among the sexes at the extreme right tail of the bell curve?

凭什么自由派有权来决定哪个问题是“科学”的测试基准？用智力可遗传性问题作为是否支持科学的标准不行吗？或者是否存在胎儿疼痛？或者两性认知能力在正态曲线远右端的分布情况？

Or if that’s too upsetting, how about dividing the line between those who are pro- and anti-science along the lines of support for geoengineering ? Or — coming soon — the role cosmic rays play in cloud formation? Why not make it about support for nuclear power? Or YuccaMountain? Why not deride the idiots who oppose genetically modified crops, even when they might prevent blindness in children? 或者，如果这些问题过于让人心烦，那么把是否支持地质工程作为支持科学与否的分界线如何？或者，宇宙射线在云的形成中的作用？是否支持核电可以吗？或者雅卡山（Yucca Mountain）？【 译注：雅卡山位于内华达州，用来堆放核废料。 】为什么不嘲讽下反对转基因作物的白痴呢，即使转基因作物（黄金大米）可以防止儿童失明？

Some of these examples are controversial, others tendentious, but all are just as fair as the way the Left framed embryonic stem-cell research and all are more relevant than questions about evolution. (Quick: If Obama changed his mind about evolution tomorrow and became a creationist, what policies would change? I’ll wait.)

上述这些例子都是有争议或者倾向性的，左派支持的干细胞研究也是如此，而且跟进化论比起来，这些问题与实际生活关系密切。（打断下：如果明天奥巴马改变对进化论的态度而变成一个神创论者，哪些政策会变化呢？我得等等看才知道。）

The point is that the Left considers itself the undisputed champion of “science,” but there are scads of issues where they take un-scientific points of view.

问题在于，左派一直自诩为“科学”斗士，但是在很多问题上，他们的持有的观点并不科学。

Sure they can cite dissident scientists — just as conservatives can — on this or that issue. But everyone knows that when the science directly threatens the Left’s pieties, it’s the science that must bend — or break. During the Larry Summers fiasco at Harvard, comments delivered in the classic spirit of open inquiry and debate cost Summers his job. Actual scientists got the vapors because he violated the principles not of science but of liberalism.

他们当然可以引用非主流科学家的意见为某个议题辩护，保守派也可以这么做。但是大家都懂的，每当科学直接威胁到左派的信条时，让步的却总是科学。劳伦斯·萨默斯（Larry Summers）在哈佛时，曾因敢于大胆地公开质询和辩论而丢了工作。真正的科学家因为违反了自由派的信条而非科学原则而被驱逐。

During the Gulf oil spill, the Obama administration dishonestly claimed that its independent experts supported a drilling moratorium. They emphatically did not. The president who campaigned on basing his policies on “sound science” ignored his own hand-picked experts .

在墨西哥湾漏油事件（the Gulf oil spill）中，奥巴马当局谎称其独立专家支持钻探禁令，但确凿无疑，这些专家并未这么说。虽然总统先生一直宣称自己的政策有坚实的科学基础，但他对身边的专家却置若罔闻。

According to the GAO, he did something very similar when he shut down Yucca Mountain . His support for wind and solar energy, as you suggest, isn’t based on science but on faith. And that faith has failed him dramatically.

根据美国政府问责局(GAO)的消息，类似的情况还有奥巴马关停了雅卡山一事。可以看出，他对风能和太阳能的大力扶植同样基于政治信条而非科学而这一信条让他一败涂地。

The idea that conservatives are anti-science is self-evident and self-pleasing liberal hogwash. I see no reason why conservatives should even argue the issue on their terms when it’s so clearly offered in bad faith in the first place.

认为保守主义者反科学的观点，毫无疑问是自由派们自我陶醉的一派胡言。我不明白保守派为什么非要在任期内就此问题与其争论，很明显这压根就是血口喷人嘛。 Recently, others have made this point better than I have, but as the Marines say of their rifles , this “news”letter is mine.

最近也有其他人提出了类似的观点，而且表达得比我更好，但是——就像海军陆战队对自己的步枪敝帚自珍一样——这封“新闻信”毕竟是我自己的嘛。

Anyway, what I find really intriguing is the way people talk about “science” as if it is so much more — and occasionally less — than it is. Critics on Twitter and in my e-mail box say we need to know if Scott Walker “believes in science,” as if his answer on evolution will tell us if he’s a witch burner or not.

总之，我发现人们对科学的看法很有意思，他们似乎总是给科学赋予比事实上更多（有时候是更少）的含义，推特上和我邮箱中的一些批评意见，认为我们需要搞清楚斯科特·沃克是否真的“信仰科学”，似乎他的答案可以告诉我们他是否支持烧死女巫。

Well, I regularly get e-mail from creationists. E-mail. In other words, thanks to scientists, the words of creationists are transported through the sky into my phone or computer. And, while I haven’t checked, I’m pretty sure they don’t believe that their e-mail was carried to me on the backs of pixies.

我经常收到一些神创论者发来的电邮。是电子邮件哦。换句话说，幸亏有了科学家，这些神创论者的信息才得以穿越天空传到我的手机或者电脑中。尽管并未验证，但我很确定他们应当不会认为电邮是通过小精灵传给我的。

I’m also pretty sure that the vast majority of creationists drive cars, take antibiotics, watch TV, and eat foods with preservatives in them. For liberals, perhaps this is proof of some kind of hypocrisy or cognitive dissonance. And maybe it is, though I don’t see it. But it’s also a demonstration that having your faith — or your superstitions — bump into one of the farther borders of scientific knowledge doesn’t require one to reject all of science.

我也非常确信绝大多数神创论者开车、吃抗生素、看电视、食用含防腐剂的食品。自由派或许可以从中看出虚伪和认知失调的意味。也许是吧，但我没看出来。但对我来说，这一现象表明，你的信仰或迷信越出了科学知识的边界，并这不意味着你要摒弃科学这个整体。

It’s not a binary thing. Belief in something unconfirmed or even disproved by science is not a rejection of all science. Just as a refusal to believe unicorns are real doesn’t mean I have to reject the existence of the Loch Ness Monster, Bigfoot, Kate Upton, or other allegedly mythical creatures.

这并不是非此即彼的。对未经科学验证、甚至被科学所证伪的事物的信仰，并非是对科学整体的拒绝。仅仅不承认独角兽存在，并不意味着一个人会否认尼斯湖水怪、大脚怪、凯特·阿普顿(Kate Upton)，或者其他传说中的神秘造物存在。

That’s part of the irony. The way the science-lovers talk about science, you’d think science was a kind of magic that requires total faith and conviction. If you don’t believe with all of your heart in “science,” it will stop working. It’s like the scientific enterprise is akin to Santa’s sleigh in the movie Elf (a great film, and not just because it inspired my daughter to answer the phone “Buddy the Elf, what’s your favorite color?”).

这真是讽刺啊，一些科学狂热分子眼中的科学让人感觉像是某种魔法，需要完全的信仰和信念。如果你不是全身心地信仰“科学”，它就不再起作用。这样的话，科技企业倒是跟电影《圣诞精灵》中圣诞老人的雪橇有些类似。（《圣诞精灵》是一部不错的电影，我这么认为，不仅仅是因为我女儿受到电影的影响，在接电话的时候会说“我是精灵巴迪，你最喜欢什么颜色？”）。

In Elf, Santa’s sleigh no longer relies on flying reindeer. Instead it converts “Christmas cheer” into jet power . That’s how some of these people talk about believing in science. If we don’t project our positive emotions towards it, it won’t take off.

在《圣诞精灵》中，圣诞老人的雪橇不是由会飞的驯鹿来牵引的，而是把“圣诞欢呼”转化成飞行动力。这和某些人口中的科学是一样的，如果我们不把正能量投射到圣诞雪橇上，它就不会起飞。

I am typing this on a plane from Detroit, Michigan — on Friday the 13th, no less. What happens if I suddenly stop saying in a hopeful whisper “I believe in you, science!” or if I take a deist bent and hold out the possibility that there’s something more than the material world out there? Will my plane suddenly plummet? Will gremlins slowly emerge from behind the seat in front of me, like Miley Cyrus climbing over a toilet-stall door?

今天是黑色星期五，我正在一架从密歇根州底特律市起飞的一架飞机上写这篇文章。现在，如果我不再满怀希望的嘀咕着“我信仰你，科学!”，或者开始相信自然神论的观点，认为很有可能在已知物质世界之外，还有其他存在，那么我的飞机会不会突然一头栽下去呢？会不会有一只小魔怪（gremlins，喜欢恶作剧）在我前面的椅背上浮现呢，就跟麦莉·赛勒斯从厕所隔间的门上爬过似的？

Look, science, unlike God, really doesn’t care if you believe in it. And casting doubt on one part of it doesn’t break the spell. That’s the whole point of science; it’s not magic.

所以你看，科学跟上帝不同，根本不在乎你是否信仰它，对它某一个方面有质疑，并不会打破魔咒，这才是科学的真相，它不是魔法。【 译注：《打破魔咒》也是哲学家丹尼尔·丹内特2006年的一部作品，副标题是“作为一种自然现象的宗教”，认为宗教信仰是一种曾经有用的虚假信念，可以帮助人们做到一些不然就做不到的事情，但在科学高度发展的今天，已经成为理性进步的障碍，是该打破它们的时候了。丹内特也是长期活跃在论战前线的无神论四骑士之一。 】

Democrats are more likely to believe in paranormal activity . They’re also more likely to believe in reincarnation and astrology . I have personally known liberals who think crystals have healing powers who nonetheless believe that the internal combustion engine doesn’t actually rely on magical horse power.

民主党人更有可能相信超自然现象，他们也更有可能相信轮回和占星术。我私下认识一些自由派，他们相信水晶有治愈的功能，尽管如此，他们从不认为内燃机是依靠魔法的马力来运转的。 HELP ME, SCIENCE, YOU’RE MY ONLY HOPE 帮帮我吧，科学，你是我唯一的希望 But you wouldn’t necessarily know that from listening to these people freak out about it. (Sorry, this “news”letter will be light in links because there’s no internet on this plane. Fun fact: If you shout “There’s no Internet on this plane!” in a really loud, terror-filled, voice — as if the plane runs on Internet — your fellow passengers freak out. Try it some time. If it doesn’t work the first time, say it over and over. Eventually you’ll get a lot of attention.)

但是，你从受到惊吓的人口中未必能听到这句话。（实在抱歉，这封“新闻信”链接很少，这是因为飞机上没有因特网。说件趣事：假如你在飞机上用一种惊恐的语气大声喊：“这架飞机上居然没有互联网！”——就好像这架飞机是靠互联网飞行的——这会吓坏你周围的旅客。如果第一次不成功也没关系，再大声点多喊几次，最终大家都会注意到你的。）

When I hear people talk about science as if it’s something to “believe in,” particularly people who reject all sorts of science-y things (vaccines, nuclear power, etc. as discussed above), I immediately think of one of my favorite lines from Eric Voegelin: “When God is invisible behind the world, the contents of the world will become new gods; when the symbols of transcendent religiosity are banned, new symbols develop from the inner-worldly language of science to take their place.” This will be true, he added, even when “the new apocalyptics insist that the symbols they create are scientific.”

很多人一谈起“科学”，就好像它应该是某种“信仰”，特别是那些拒绝所有听起来像科学的事物（维生素、核能等等）的人。每当听到这些，我就会想起埃里克·沃格林说过的，也是我最喜欢的一句名言：“当上帝从世界逐渐隐去，新的神灵又将崛起，当超验的宗教符号遭到禁止，科学的世俗语言将会取而代之”。这是事实，他补充道，“届时，新的先知把他们新创造的符号称作“科学”。

In other words, the “Don’t you believe in evolution!?!” people don’t really believe in science qua science, what they’re really after is dethroning God in favor of their own gods of the material world (though I suspect many don’t even realize why they’re so obsessed with this one facet of the disco ball called “science”). “Criticism of religion is the prerequisite of all criticisms,” quoth Karl Marx, who then proceeded to create his own secular religion.

换句话说，说“你居然不相信进化论？！”的人们，其实并不相信所谓的科学，他们的真实目的，是把原来的上帝赶下神坛，让位于他们在物质世界的新神（然而我怀疑他们并不清楚，为什么迪斯科球上让他们如此着迷的一个小侧面，会被称作“科学”）。“对宗教的批判是一切批判的前提”，卡尔·马克思如是说，但他转身创建了自己的世俗宗教。

This is nothing new of course. This tendency is one of the reasons why every time Moses turned his back on the Hebrews they started worshipping golden calves and whatnot.

当然，这种现象并不新奇。同时也解释了为何每次摩西一离开希伯来人，他们就开始崇拜诸如金牛犊之类的东西。

At least Auguste Comte, the French philosopher who coined the phrase “sociology,” was open about what he was really up to when he created his “Religion of Humanity,” in which scientists, statesmen, and engineers were elevated to Saints. As I say in my column , the fight over evolution is really a fight over the moral status of man.

与他们相比，奥古斯特·孔德至少是个敢想敢做的人，这位法国哲学家，“社会学”的创始人，创立了他的“人道教”，在那里，科学家、政治家和工程师是被当作圣人而崇拜的。正如我曾在我专栏中说过的，围绕进化论的论战其实是对人类当前道德状态的争论。

And, if we are nothing but a few bucks worth of chemicals connected by water and electricity, than there’s really nothing holding us back from elevating “science” to divine status and in turn anointing those who claim to be its champions as our priests. It’s no coincidence that Herbert Croly was literally — not figuratively, the way Joe Biden means literally — baptized into Comte’s Religion of Humanity

如果我们不过是一些通过水和电连接在一起的化学物质，那还有什么可以阻止我们把“科学”供上神坛，并为那些所谓科学斗士行涂油礼令、让他们做我们的神父呢。难怪赫伯特·克劳利会（货真价实地，不是象征性地，此处“货真价实”一词不是按乔·拜登那种用法）皈依孔德的人道教。【 译注：乔·拜登曾在演讲中多次错误地使用“literally”一词，一度成为笑柄 】

Personally, I think the effort to overthrow Darwin along with Marx and Freud is misguided. I have friends invested in that project and I agree that all sorts of terrible Malthusian and materialist crap is bound up in Darwinism. But that’s an argument for ranking out the manure, not burning down the stable.

我个人认为，试图将达尔文和马克思与弗洛伊德绑在一起打倒是不对的。我有朋友正在这么做，并且我也同意，马尔萨斯主义者和唯物主义者的废话确实和达尔文主义的颇有渊源。但是，如果只是想清理掉马粪，何必把整个马厩也烧了呢？ IN MEMORIAM 悼念 My brother Josh passed away four years ago this month. If I couldn’t get a G-File done this morning, I was going to recycle the one I wrote not long after his funeral. An excerpt:

我哥哥乔什是在四年前的这个月去世的。如果今早没写完G-File的话，本来打算把我在他葬礼后不久写的悼词重复利用的，以下是摘要：

My brother died last week. He had an accident. He fell down some stairs. He surely had too much to drink when it happened. It’s all such an awful waste. You can read how I felt — how I feel — about my brother here .

家兄在上周辞世，那是场意外，他从楼梯上摔了下来，当时肯定喝了不少酒。这实在是有点浪费。点击这里的链接，你可以看到我曾经和现在对他去世的感受。

But, you know, this is uncharted territory for me. And while I have little to no morbid desire to wallow indefinitely in a public display of grieving, the G-File has always been a dispatch from the frontlines of my mind, a quasi-personal letter to the collective You. Some might even call it the mad scribbling in the virtual ink of diluted fecal matter on my imaginary jail-cell wall.

但是，你们也知道，这种情景对我非常陌生。而且我也实在不想在公开场合表现出一副沉浸在悲痛中无法自拔的样子。G-File一直占据着我的思维，它就像写给你们的一封私人信。也有人甚至说，这是我在自己想象的监牢中，把稀释粪便当作墨水进行的疯狂涂鸦。

And, as you can imagine, there are few things more on my mind than this choking fog of awfulness.

但是，如你们所想，现在占据我思维的，除了这难堪呛人的烟雾之外，又多了一些事情。

I’m told by a friend that there’s a new book out, The Truth about Grief by Ruth Davis Konigsberg, that apparently demonstrates how Elisabeth Kubler-Ross made up all that stuff about the “five stages of grief.”

一位朋友曾经对我说，最近出了本新书，是鲁思·戴维斯·柯尼斯堡写的《悲伤的真相》。这本书显然在试图说明伊丽莎白·库伯勒－罗斯是如何编造出“悲伤的五个阶段”这种破玩意儿的。

I have no plans to read it. But I’m fully prepared to believe that any hard-and-fast five-point definition of grief is bogus. Admittedly, my data sample set is pretty small but hugely significant; in the last six years I’ve lost my father and my brother out of a family of four people. And, already, it’s clear to me that the geography of grief cannot be so easily mapped.

我没想去读这本书，但是我认为所有对悲伤的严格的五点定义都是扯淡。说实话，我的统计样本相当小，但是结果非常显著：我们原本的四口之家，在过去的六年里，先后失去了父亲和兄弟。并且，我非常清楚悲伤的地图是很难被轻易描绘出来的。

Obviously there are going to be similarities to the terrain. But just as there are different kinds of happiness — say, winning the lottery versus having a kid, or beating cancer versus seeing Keith Olbermann booted off of MSNBC — there are different kinds of sadness, too. And how they play out depends on the context.

显然，不同人的悲伤“地形”或许有些许相似，但是正如幸福有许多种一样（比如，彩票中奖与喜得贵子、战胜癌症或基思·奥伯曼被MSNBC辞退一事），悲伤也有好多种。他们最终怎样消散取决于当时的具体情境。

In terms of my own internal response, the most glaring continuity between my dad’s death and my brother’s is loneliness. Don’t get me wrong. I’ve got lots of company. I have lots of people who care for me more than I realized. I’m richer in friends and family than I could ever possibly expect or deserve.

至于我个人的感受，父亲和兄弟的相继去世留给我的是无尽的孤独。请不要误会，我有很多人陪伴，我自己都没有意识到会有这么多人关心着自己。我所得到的友情和亲情已经远超自己的预期。

But there’s a kind of loneliness that comes with death that cannot be compensated for. Tolstoy’s famous line in Anna Karenina was half right. All unhappy families are unhappy in their own way, but so are all happy ones. At least insofar as all families are ultimately unique.

但是有一种孤独与死亡相伴而来，无法慰藉。托尔斯泰在《安娜·卡列妮娜》中的一句名言说对了一半，不幸的家庭各有各的不幸，幸福的家庭也是如此。至少每个家庭都是独特的。

Unique is a misunderstood word. Pedants like to say there’s no such thing as “very unique.” I don’t think that’s true. For instance, we say that each snowflake is unique. That’s true. No two snowflakes are alike. But that doesn’t mean that pretty much all snowflakes aren’t very similar. But, imagine if you found a snowflake that was ten feet in diameter and hot to the touch, I think it’d be fair to say it was very unique. Meanwhile, each normal snowflake has its own contours, its own one-in-a-billion-trillion characteristics, that will never be found again.

独特这个词被误解了，学究们经常说：没有真正“独一无二”的事物。我并不这么认为。比如，我们常说每一片雪花都是独特的，这是真的，没有两片完全一样的雪花。但是这并不意味着所有的雪花都不相似。假设你找到一片直径十英尺、摸起来烫手的雪花，我想说它很独特应该没问题吧。同时，每一片普通的雪花都有只属于它自己的轮廓，只属于它自己的万中无一的特征，在其它雪花上永远找不到的特征。

Families are similarly unique. Each has its own cultural contours and configurations. The uniqueness might be hard to discern from the outside and it certainly might seem trivial to the casual observer. Just as one platoon of Marines might look like another to a civilian or one business might seem indistinguishable from the one next door. But, we all know the reality is different. Every meaningful institution has a culture all its own. Every family has its inside jokes, its peculiar way of doing things, its habits and mores developed around a specific shared experience.

家庭和雪花一样有类似的独特性，每个家庭有它自己的文化形态和内涵。其独特性从外部难得一窥，况且外人也不会真正在意。正如对平民来说，一队海军陆战队员看起来都差不多，一间商铺和隔壁的也很难区分。但是我们都清楚，事实上是不同的。每一个实体机构都有其独特的文化。每个家庭都有它自己的内部笑话，它做事的原则，它基于自己某种共同经历的习惯和习俗。

One of the things that keeps slugging me in the face is the fact that the cultural memory of our little family has been dealt a terrible blow. Sure, my mom’s around, but sons have a different memory of family life than parents. And Josh’s recall for such things was always not only better than mine, but different than mine as well. I remembered things he’d forgotten and vice versa. In what seems like the blink of an eye, whole volumes of institutional memory have simply vanished. And that is a terribly lonely thought, that no amount of company and condolence can ease or erase.

我们这个小家庭的文化正在经历严重的打击，这让我心如刀割。当然了，母亲还在身边，但是子女跟父母对于家庭的记忆并不完全相同。而乔什对这些事情的回忆比我更清晰，并与我有所不同。我记得一些他已忘记的事情，反之亦然。仿佛眨眼之间，一些独有的记忆就这么消失了。每念及此，心中倍感孤独，即使再多陪伴也难以慰藉。

The pain is duller now, but the feelings are the same.

现在伤痛减轻了些，但感受没变。

（编辑：辉格@whigzhou） *注：本译文未经原作者授权，本站对原文不持有也不主张任何权利，如果你恰好对原文拥有权益并希望我们移除相关内容，请私信联系，我们会立即作出响应。 ——海德沙龙·翻译组，致力于将英文世界的好文章搬进中文世界——