Is there a center of the universe? - Marjee Chmiel and Trevor Owens

宇宙有中心吗？ - Marjee Chmiel and Trevor Owens

翻译人员: Xiang Li 校对人员: Sherry Chen

What is at the center of the universe?

宇宙的中心是什么

It's an essential question

这是一个很重要的问题

that humans have been wondering about for centuries.

几百年来，人们为此上下而求索

But the journey toward an answer

但这段探索之旅的结果

has been a strange one.

却十分奇怪

If you wanted to know the answer to this question

如果你想知道公元三世纪希腊人

in third century B.C.E. Greece,

给出的这个问题的答案

you might look up at the night sky

你要问的人就是亚里士多德

and trust what you see.

他所做的

That's what Aristotle,

就是仰望星空

THE guy to ask back then, did.

相信自己所看见的一切

He thought that since we're on Earth, looking up,

他想：既然我们在地球上，向天上看

it must be the center, right?

那么地球就一定是宇宙的中心，不是吗？

For him, the sphere of the world

他认为，宇宙是由

was made up of four elements:

四种元素组成的

Earth,

土

water,

air,

and fire.

水

空气

和火

These elements shifted around a nested set

这些元素在一个套层中流动

of solid crystalline spheres.

包裹着一个固体球核

Each of the wandering stars, the planets,

每个浮于夜空的恒心和行星

had their own crystal sphere.

都有它们自己的球核

The rest of the universe and all of its stars

宇宙剩下的部分和所有的星星

were on the last crystal sphere.

构成了最后的球核

If you watch the sky change over time,

如果你观察天空随时间的变化

you could see that this idea worked fine

你可以发现这个理论能很好的用来

at explaining the motion you saw.

解释你所看到的变化

For centuries, this was central to how Europe

几个世纪以来 这就是欧洲

and the Islamic world saw the universe.

和伊斯兰世界的宇宙观的中心

But in 1543, a guy named Copernicus

但是在1543年，一个叫做哥白尼的人

proposed a different model.

提出了一个不同的模型

He believed that the sun

他认为 太阳

was at the center of the universe.

才是宇宙的中心

This radically new idea

这个十分激进的新思想

was hard for a lot of people to accept.

为大多数人难以接受

After all, Aristotle's ideas made sense

毕竟，亚里士多德的理论在人们眼中看来

with what they could see,

才符合真实的现象

and they were pretty flattering to humans.

亚里士多德的理论也更加符合对人类本身的奉承

But a series of subsequent discoveries

但是一系列奇怪的发现

made the sun-centric model hard to ignore.

让日心说无法被忽视

First, Johannes Kepler pointed out

首先：开普敦指出

that orbits aren't perfect circles or spheres.

行星运动的轨道并不是完美的圆弧或者球型

Then, Galileo's telescope caught

其次 伽利略的望远镜发现

Jupiter's moons orbiting around Jupiter,

木星也有围绕自己的月亮（卫星）

totally ignoring Earth.

完全与地球无关

And then, Newton proposed the theory of universal gravitation,

接着 牛顿提出了万有引力定律

demonstrating that all objects are pulling on each other.

说明了所有的物体都互相吸引

Eventually, we had to let go of the idea

最终 这是使得我们不得不放弃

that we were at the center of the universe.

地球是宇宙中心的想法

Shortly after Copernicus, in the 1580s,

哥白尼死后不久，在1580年

an Italian friar, Giordano Bruno,

意大利修道士 布鲁诺提出

suggested the stars were suns

太阳这样的恒星

that likely had their own planets

都有自己的卫星

and that the universe was infinite.

还有 宇宙是无限的

This idea didn't go over well.

这个理论推广得并不好

Bruno was burned at the stake for his radical suggestion.

布鲁诺因为他激进的言论被烧死在刑柱上

Centuries later, the philosopher Rene Descartes

几个世纪之后 哲学家笛卡尔

proposed that the universe was a series of whirlpools,

提出 宇宙是一系列螺旋体

which he called vortices,

这些螺旋体被他称之为 漩涡

and that each star was at the center of a whirlpool.

每个恒星都位于漩涡的中心

In time, we realized there were far more stars

随着时间发展， 我们发现星星的数量远多于

than Aristotle ever dreamed.

亚里士多德所能想到的

As astronomers like William Herschel

随着赫塞尔这样的天文学家发明出

got more and more advanced telescopes,

更加先进的望远镜

it became clear that our sun is actually

太阳实际上银河系类诸多恒星之一这个景象

one of many stars inside the Milky Way.

显得愈发清晰

And those smudges we see in the night sky?

那些黑夜里的印迹

They're other galaxies,

其实是其他的星系

just as vast as our Milky Way home.

那些都跟我们的母星系银河一样庞大

Maybe we're farther from the center than we ever realized.

可能我们离宇宙中心要比想象中遥远多了

In the 1920s, astronomers studying the nebuli

在1920年代，天文学家研究星云

wanted to figure out how they were moving.

想弄明白它们的运动规律

Based on the Doppler Effect,

根据多普勒效应

they expected to see blue shift

向我们飞来的物体会

for objects moving toward us,

呈现蓝移谱

and red shift for ones moving away.

飞走的物体呈现红移谱

But all they saw was a red shift.

但所有观测到的现象都是红移谱

Everything was moving away from us, fast.

所有星星都在以飞快的速度远离我们而去

This observation is one of the pieces of evidence

这些观测构成了现在被我们称之为

for what we now call the Big Bang Theory.

大爆炸理论的证据

According to this theory,

根据这个理论

all matter in the universe

宇宙中的所有物质

was once a singular, infinitely dense particle.

最初都来源于一个单一的密度无限高的球体

In a sense, our piece of the universe

简单的说 我们所处的这部分宇宙

was once at the center.

曾经在中心

But this theory eliminates the whole idea of a center

但这个理论放弃了”宇宙中心”的想法

since there can't be a center to an infinite universe.

因为无限的宇宙根本无法有中心的概念

The Big Bang wasn't just an explosion in space;

大爆炸并不只是空间当中的一次爆炸

it was an explosion of space.

而很是一次空间本身的膨胀

What each new discovery proves

新的发现表明

is that while our observations are limited,

虽然我们的探索有所局限

our ability to speculate and dream

但我们探索和幻想更外面层的宇宙空间的能力

of what's out there isn't.

是无限的

What we think we know today can change tomorrow.

我们今天所认可的事实 有可能很快被改变

As with many of the thinkers we just met,

许多思想家都共同认为

sometimes our wildest guesses

有些时候 人类最狂野的想象

lead to wonderful and humbling answers

可以引领我们找到奇妙的答案

and propel us toward even more perplexing questions.

并指导我们向更加复杂的问题发出挑战