Advice-to-a-Young-Scientist-非英语专业研究生英语读写教程.docx

Advice to a Young ScientistWhat I'm going to do is to just give a few notes, and this is from a book I'm preparing called "Letters to a Young Scientist." I'd thought it'd be appropriate to present it, on the basis that I have had extensive experience in teaching, counseling scientists across a broad array of fields. And you might like to hear some of the principles that I've developed in doing that teaching and counseling.今天我想分享几个要点， 这些要点来自我正在写作的一本书给一个年轻的科学家的信。我想由我来谈还算合适， 因为我在许多领域有教育和辅导科学家的丰富经验。或许你想听听我在教育和辅导科学家的过程中总结出的一些原则。So let me begin by urging you, particularly you on the youngsters' side, on this path you've chosen, to go as far as you can. The world needs you, badly. Humanity is now fully into the techno-scientific age. There is going to be no turning back.那么首先让我督促你们在自己所选择的道路上，走的尽可能的远一些，特别是对于年轻的你们来说。世界非常需要你们。 人类文明已完全进入技术科学时代， 这一趋势不可扭转。 Although varying among disciplines - say, astrophysics, molecular genetics, the immunology, the microbiology, the public health, to the new area of the human body as a symbiont, to public health, environmental science. Knowledge in medical science and science overall is doubling every 15 to 20 years. Technology is increasing at a comparable rate. Between them, the two already pervade, as most of you here seated realize, every dimension of human life.虽然不同学科会有所不同比如天体物理学、分子遗传学、 免疫学、微生物学、公共卫生学，以及将人体看作共生有机体的新的领域的学科、公共健康学、环境科学， 但是关于医疗科学和所有科学的知识， 每15到20年都会增加一倍。 科技发展的速度也是如此。 正如在座各位所知， 科学和科技在迅速发展的同时，已充满人类生活的各个角落。 So swift is the velocity of the techno-scientific revolution, so startling in its countless twists and turns, that no one can predict its outcome even a decade from the present moment.科学技术的进步速度是如此之快，其变化是如此令人应接不暇，以至没有人能够预测哪怕只是十年后的情况 。There will come a time, of course, when the exponential growth of discovery and knowledge, which actually began in the 1600s, has to peak and level off, but that's not going to matter to you. The revolution is going to continue for at least several more decades. It'll render the human condition radically different from what it is today. Traditional fields of study are going to continue to grow and in so doing, inevitably they will meet and create new disciplines.当然总会有一天，这些从公元17世纪开始迅猛增长的发现和知识会到达顶峰并开始减缓，但是这和你关系并不大。因为这个革命至少会持续几十年，人们那时所处的环境也将会被改变到同现在大不一样。 传统的研究领域会持续增长，这将不可避免的相互交叉而产生新的学科。 In time, all of science will come to be a continuum of description, an explanation of networks, of principles and laws. That's why you need not just be training in one specialty, but also acquire breadth in other fields, related to and even distant from your own initial choice.增长一段时间后，所有科学都将成为对原则和定律描述的连续体，成为一个对其所形成网络的解释。 所以你不应该只学习一门专业，而应该获取其它领域广博的知识。这些领域可能和你最初的选择很接近，但也可能相距甚远 。Keep your eyes lifted and your head turning. The search for knowledge is in our genes. It was put there by our distant ancestors who spread across the world, and it's never going to be quenched. To understand and use it sanely, as a part of the civilization yet to evolve requires a vastly larger population of scientifically trained people like you. In education, medicine, law, diplomacy, government, business and the media that exist today.睁大你的眼睛，探索你的周围。对知识的追寻就存在于我们的基因里。那是我们散布在世界各个角落的祖先遗留在我们的基因里的，这份热情永远不会停止。 由于人类的一部分文明还需要进化，为了理解并理智地使用知识，需要大量的像你们一样受到科技教育的人， 包括如今存在的教育、医学、法律、外交、 政府、商业和媒体。 Our political leaders need at least a modest degree of scientific literacy, which most badly lack today - no applause, please. It will be better for all if they prepare before entering office rather than learning on the job. Therefore you will do well to act on the side, no matter how far into the laboratory you may go, to serve as teachers during the span of your career.我们的政治领袖至少需要一定程度的科学知识，但现在极其缺乏这样的领袖。 如果他们能在就职之前就做好这些准备，而不是边做边学，那么对于所有人来说都是有好处的。如此一来，在你的职业生涯当中，无论你钻研的深或浅，你都可以成为不错的老师。I'll now proceed quickly, and before else, to a subject that is both a vital asset and a potential barrier to a scientific career. If you are a bit short in mathematical skills, don't worry. Many of the most successful scientists at work today are mathematically semi-literate.现在我要切入到另一个话题， 这个话题对于科研生涯既是至关重要的资产，又是科学事业的潜在障碍。 如果你的数学能力不太强， 不用太过担心。 很多非常成功的科学家，他们的数学能力都比较一般。 A metaphor will serve here: Where elite mathematicians and statisticians and theorists often serve as architects in the expanding realm of science, the remaining large majority of basic applied scientists, including a large portion of those who could be said to be of the first rank, are the ones who map the terrain, they scout the frontiers, they cut the pathways, they raise the buildings along the way.有一个比喻: 精英数学家、统计学家和理论家，常常是正在开拓的科技领域中的架构师，但其他大部分的基础应用科学家，他们中有很多可称为一流水平， 但他们的工作则是测量疆土、开发前线、 砍树修路， 并一路盖起栋栋高楼。 Some may have considered me foolhardy, but it's been my habit to brush aside the fear of mathematics when talking to candidate scientists. During 41 years of teaching biology at Harvard, I watched sadly as bright students turned away from the possibility of a scientific career or even from taking non-required courses in science because they were afraid of failure. These math-phobes deprive science and medicine of immeasurable amounts of badly needed talent.有些人或许会觉得我不太明智，但我在与未来科学家交谈时，常常告诫他们不要害怕数学。在我41年哈佛生物教学的职业生涯中，我很痛心地看到，很多非常有天赋的学生因为害怕失败，而放弃了成为科学家的机会，他们甚至在选择选修课时也避开相关的内容。这种对数学的恐惧让科学和医学领域丧失了无数迫切需要的人才 。Here's how to relax your anxieties, if you have them: Understand that mathematics is a language ruled like other verbal languages, or like verbal language generally, by its own grammar and system of logic. Any person with average quantitative intelligence who learns to read and write mathematics at an elementary level will, as in verbal language, have little difficulty picking up most of the fundamentals if they choose to master the math speak of most disciplines of science.如果你也有这样的恐惧，你完全可以放松下来。数学是一门与其它语言一样或者和其他语言类似的语言，具有自己的语法和逻辑系统。任何具有一般数学能力的人，只要他有小学水平的数学读写能力，如果他们想要去掌握大部分科学学科中和数学相关的内容，那么学习很多基础内容就如同学习语言一样，不会太困难。The longer you wait to become at least semi-literate the harder the language of mathematics will be to master, just as again in any verbal language, but it can be done at any age. I speak as an authority on that subject, because I'm an extreme case. I didn't take algebra until my freshman year at the University of Alabama. They didn't teach it before then.如果你想对数学有一些了解，就像掌握任何一门口语一样，你拖的越久，那么掌握数学的难度就会越大。只不过对于数学而言，无论你年龄多大，都可以掌握它。我有权这样说， 因为我就是这方面的一个极端例子。我直到大学一年级才在Alabama大学学习代数，而在此之前他们没有这门课。I finally got around to calculus as a 32-year-old tenured professor at Harvard, where I sat uncomfortably in classes with undergraduate students, little more than half my age. A couple of them were students in a course I was giving on evolutionary biology. I swallowed my pride, and I learned calculus.在我32岁，已是哈佛大学终身教授时，我才和比我年龄一半多点的本科生坐在一起学习微积分，这让我感到很不舒服。有几个学生还是我教的一门学科进化生物学的学生。我收敛了我的骄傲，开始学习微积分。I found out that in science and all its applications, what is crucial is not that technical ability, but it is imagination in all of its applications. The ability to form concepts with images of entities and processes pictured by intuition. I found out that advances in science rarely come upstream from an ability to stand at a blackboard and conjure images from unfolding mathematical propositions and equations. They are instead the products of downstream imagination leading to hard work, during which mathematical reasoning may or may not prove to be relevant. Ideas emerge when a part of the real or imagined world is studied for its own sake.我发现在科学及其所有应用中，至关重要的不是技术能力，而是所有应用技术的想象力。用直觉描绘的实体和过程的图像形成概念的能力。 我发现，科学的进步很少来自上游即站在黑板前通过展开的数学命题和方程式联想出。 相反，它们是下游想象力导致辛勤工作的产物，在此期间数学推理可能会或可能不会是相关的。当对真实世界或想象世界的一部分进行研究时，就会产生想法。Of foremost importance is a thorough, well-organized knowledge of all that is known of the relevant entities and processes that might be involved in that domain you propose to enter. When something new is discovered, it's logical then that one of the follow-up steps is to find the mathematical and statistical methods to move its analysis forward. If that step proves too difficult for the person or team that made the discovery, a mathematician can then be added by them as a collaborator.最重要的是，要对你计划进入的领域有一个充分的、完善的了解，这包括和这个领域相关的所有已知的事物和过程。 当一个新的东西被发现时，自然而然要做的一件事，就是用数学和统计方法来做进一步分析。如果这对于发现它的那个人或团队来说过于困难， 那么他可以和一名数学家来合作。Consider the following principle, which I will modestly call Wilson's Principle Number One: It is far easier for scientists including medical researchers, to require needed collaboration in mathematics and statistics than it is for mathematicians and statisticians to find scientists able to make use of their equations. It is important in choosing the direction to take in science to find the subject at your level of competence that interests you deeply, and focus on that.请注意下面这个原则， 我很谦虚地称之为Wilson的第一原则： 科学家，包括医学研究人员，更容易得到数学和统计方面的合作；相反如果数学家和统计学家想找到科学家来使他们的数学公式能派上用场的话，则要更困难一些。很重要的一点就是，选择在你能力之内而且你非常感兴趣的学科，然后专注于此。Keep in mind, then, Wilson's Second Principle: For every scientist, whether researcher, technician, teacher, manager or businessman, working at any level of mathematical competence, there exists a discipline in science or medicine for which that level is enough to achieve excellence.接下来是Wilson第二原则：对任何一个科学家，不管是研究人员、技术人员、教师、管理者或商人， 无论他们用什么样的数学水平来工作， 都存在一门科学或医学的学科， 他们的数学水平足以让他们在此领域有所成就。Now I'm going to offer quickly several more principles that will be useful in organizing your education and career, or if you're teaching, how you might enhance your own teaching and counseling of young scientists. In selecting a subject in which to conduct original research, or to develop world-class expertise, take a part of the chosen discipline that is sparsely inhabited. Judge opportunity by how few other students and researchers are on hand.现在我将再提供几个原则来帮助你们计划教育和职业生涯，或者如果你们选择教学，这些原则能提高你们教导年青科学家的能力。在你们选择从事原创性研究，或成为一流专家的时候，请选择已确定的领域中很少人研究的一部分。涉猎这一部分的学生和研究人员越少，你的机会就越大。 This is not to de-emphasize the essential requirement of broad training, or the value of apprenticing yourself in ongoing research to programs of high quality. It is important also to acquire older mentors within these successful programs, and to make friends and colleagues of your age for mutual support. But through it all, look for a way to break out, to find a field and subject not yet popular.但这并不是说广泛学习中的基本要求，或高质量项目中研习不再重要。因为同时很重要的一点就是，可以在这些成功得项目中结识年长的导师，以及同龄的、能够互相帮助的朋友和同事。但是无论如何，都要想办法找到一个不常见的领域和学科，并取得突破。We have seen this demonstrated already in the talks preceding mine. There is the quickest way advances are likely to occur, as measured in discoveries per investigator per year. You may have heard the military dictum for the gathering of armies: March to the sound of the guns. In science, the exact opposite is the case: March away from the sound of the guns.在我之前的演讲中我们已经看到这样的例子。如果我们用每年每个研究人员的发现作为衡量指标， 那这是最快取得成绩的途径。也许你听说过，在军队里有这样一句用兵名言向有枪声的方向前进。而在科学上则恰恰是相反: 离开有枪声的地方 。So Wilson's Principle Number Three: March away from the sound of the guns. Observe from a distance, but do not join the fray. Make a fray of your own. Once you have settled on a specialty, and the profession you can love, and you've secured opportunity, your potential to succeed will be greatly enhanced if you study it enough to become an expert.这就是Wilson的第三原则: 离开有枪声的地方，在一定距离外观察， 但不要加入战场，创建一个你自己的战场。在你确定了一个你喜欢的专业，并且已经取得了机会后，只要你刻苦学习成为一个专家，你成功的可能就会大大增加 。There are thousands of professionally delimited subjects sprinkled through physics and chemistry to biology and medicine, and on then into the social sciences, where it is possible in short time to acquire the status of an authority. When the subject is still very thinly populated, you can with diligence and hard work become the world authority.从物理、化学到生物、医学，再到社会科学，有成千上万的专业划分的学科，这些专业里研究人员越少，你就有可能在很短时间内成为一个权威，而且只要你刻苦努力，就能成为世界级的权威。  The world needs this kind of expertise, and it rewards the kind of people willing to acquire it. The existing information and what you self-discover may at first seem skimpy and difficult to connect to other bodies of knowledge. Well, if that's the case, good. Why hard instead of easy?这个世界需要这样的专业知识，愿意成为这样专家的人也会得到丰盛的奖励。 现有的信息和你独自的发现，最开始可能让你觉得很难和其它的知识体系联系起来。如果是那样的话，很好。我们为什么要选择困难而不选择容易呢? The answer deserves to be stated as Principle Number Four. In the attempt to make scientific discoveries, every problem is an opportunity, and the more difficult the problem, the greater will be the importance of its solution.答案值得被称为Wilson原则4：在进行科学发现的尝试时，每个问题都是一次机会，而一个问题越难，它被解决的意义就越重大。 Now this brings me to a basic categorization in the way scientific discoveries are made. Scientists, pure mathematicians among them, follow one or the other of two pathways: First through early discoveries, a problem is identified and a solution is sought. The problem may be relatively small; for example, where exactly in a cruise ship does the norovirus begin to spread? Or larger, what's the role of dark matter in the expansion of the universe? As the answer is sought, other phenomena are typically discovered and other questions are asked.这把我带到科学发现的 一个基本分类。科学家，包括纯数学家，一般有两条途径: 首先，通过早期的发现，我们发现了一个问题，并寻求解决方案。这个问题或许相对很小，比如说病毒性胃肠炎在一个游艇上的什么地方开始传播开来? 也可能很大，如暗物质在宇宙膨胀过程中的所扮演的角色是什么? 在寻求答案的过程中，其它现象又会出现，其它问题又会被提出。 This first of the two strategies is like a hunter, exploring a forest in search of a particular quarry, who finds other quarries along the way. The second strategy of research is to study a subject broadly searching for unknown phenomena or patterns of known phenomena like a hunter in what we call "the naturalist's trance," the researcher of mind is open to anything interesting, any quarry worth taking. The search is not for the solution of the problem, but for problems themselves worth solving.这个两个策略中的第一个就像一个猎人在一个森林中寻找一个特定的猎物，在这个过程中他又找到了其它猎物。而做研究的第二个策略是广泛地研究一个主题，寻找未知现象或已知现象的规律，就像一个我们称为"博物学者的恍惚"的猎人，他的思维在任何有趣的事情和任何值得猎取的猎物上，这个研究不是为了找到一个问题的答案，而是找寻值得解决的问题。 The two strategies of research, original research, can be stated as follows, in the final principle I'm going to offer you: For every problem in a given discipline of science, there exists a species or entity or phenomenon ideal for its solution. And conversely, for every species or other entity or phenomenon, there exist important problems for the solution of which, those particular objects of research are ideally suited. Find out what they are. You'll find your own way to discover, to learn, to teach.这两种原创性研究的策略可以归纳为我将送给你们的最后一个原则: 对于某一特定学科的每一个问题，都有一个物种、实体或现象可以完美地解决。 相反，对于每一个物种或其他实体或现象，都存在着重要的问题需要解决，而这些特定的研究对象最适合解决这些问题，你会找到你自己的方式来发现，学习，和教学。 The decades ahead will see dramatic advances in disease prevention, general health, the quality of life. All of humanity depends on the knowledge and practice of the medicine and the science behind it you will master. You have chosen a calling that will come in steps to give you satisfaction, at its conclusion, of a life well lived. And I thank you for having me here tonight.未来几十年会在疾病防治，身体健康和生活质量方面有巨大的进步。所有人类文明都依赖即将成为专家的你们在医学和科学方面的知识和实践。你们回应了一个呼喊，它会给你们一步一步地带来满足，并且最终让你们觉得这一生非常有意义。谢谢你们今晚邀请我。