You'll travel 1 trillion kilometers through space - Fabio Pacucci and Lindsay DeMarchi

譯者: Lilian Chiu 審譯者: SF Huang

Happy 100th birthday!

一百歲生日快樂！

Your favorite granddaughter (shh, don’t tell the others)

你最寵愛的孫女 （噓，不要告訴別人）

created a surprise:

設計了一個驚喜：

a holographic map displaying everywhere you’ve traveled—

一張全息 (全像) 地圖，顯示出 你去過的所有地點

not just on Earth, but through the universe!

不僅僅是地球上的，

而是在全宇宙的足跡！

While you haven’t literally been to space,

雖然你沒有去過太空，

you've lived on a spinning rock hurtling around a sun, whizzing through a galaxy,

但你生活在一塊 繞著太陽旋轉的巨岩上，

疾速穿越銀河，從那之後的 旅程只有越來瘋狂。

and the journey only gets wilder from there.

You’ve made some real progress in the grand scheme of things.

從整體來看， 你已經行進了相當的距離。

But... how much, exactly?

但，確切來說有多少？

Your atlas starts on the planet’s surface.

你的地圖從地球的表面開始。

Over the course of your life you’ve walked about 120,000 kilometers—

你一生走了大約十二萬公里，

the equivalent of three trips around the globe.

相當於繞行地球三周。

Daily commutes and international travel add a few more.

每日通勤和國際旅行 又再增添一些里程數。

This may seem remarkable until you factor in your pirouette around the planet

這看似非常驚人，

直到你把你跟著地球 一起旋轉的因素考量進去，

each day due to its rotation.

你每天都隨著地球自轉。

The distance traveled this way differs from person to person—

因為這種方式所增加的 里程數因人而異——

those close to the poles trace a smaller circle than those at the equator.

在兩極附近的人繞行的圓圈 比在赤道的人小。

Living halfway between them you’ve picked up 30,000 kilometers every day

在兩者之間的位置，每天靠轉動 而移動的里程數達三萬公里，

without shifting a muscle.

你連動都不用動。

Except, your motion isn’t perfectly circular.

不過，你的運動軌跡不是正圓形。

It's a curlicue.

是螺旋形。

As the Earth elliptically orbits the Sun, there you go,

因為地球沿著橢圓軌道繞行太陽，

這麼一來，你每年的里程數 又增加了九億四千萬公里。

adding roughly another 940 million kilometers every year.

But it doesn’t end there.

但還不只如此。

Our entire solar system is contained within the heliosphere,

我們的整個太陽系 都包含在太陽圈中，

a bubble of charged particles emitted by the Sun.

太陽圈是由太陽釋放的 帶電粒子所形成的巨大氣泡。

That bubble orbits the Milky Way’s center, which harbors a supermassive black hole,

這個氣泡以每秒兩百公里的速度

繞著銀河中心運行，

at a speed of about 200 kilometers per second.

其中心有個超大質量的黑洞，

One full orbit takes 230 million years—

完整運行一圈要花兩億三千萬年——

meaning we've aged little more than one galactic year since the first dinosaurs.

意思就是，從恐龍出現至今 才經過了一個銀河年多一點點。

In your 100 years, you’ve witnessed four ten millionths of one rotation.

在你人生的一百年裡，

你只見證了完整旋轉的 四百萬分之一圈。

That’s still 600 billion kilometers,

那仍然高達六千億公里，

or 2,200 round trips between the Earth and Sun.

等同於在地球和太陽間 來回兩千兩百趟。

Our galaxy and over 100 neighbors together constitute “The Local Group.”

我們的銀河系和上百個鄰居 共同構成了「本星系群」。

The Milky Way and Andromeda are hurtling towards each other

銀河系和仙女座星系

以每秒一百二十五公里的速度 不斷朝彼此快速接近，

at 125 kilometers per second,

and will collide in about 4.5 billion years.

在四十五億年後會相撞。

The Local Group is a speck within the Virgo Supercluster,

本星系群則是 處女座超星系團中的一小點。

which is itself just one of many lobes of the Laniakea Supercluster

該超星系團又只是拉尼亞凱亞 超星系團的許多葉片之一。

that contains over 100,000 galaxies.

拉尼亞凱亞超星系團 包含了十萬個以上的星系。

This supercluster has a mysterious gravitational center

拉尼亞凱亞超星系團 有個神秘的引力中心，

called the Great Attractor.

稱為「巨引源」。

Because these enormous masses all gravitationally tug on each other,

因為這些巨大的質量 彼此之間都有引力拉扯，

our galaxy’s motion is much more helter-skelter

我們銀河系的運行軌道與其說 是圓形的，倒不如說是不規則形的。

than a clean, circular orbit.

In your lifetime, you’ve traveled 2 trillion kilometers

在你這一生，

你已經移動了兩兆公里，

at about 600 kilometers per second relative to the Great Attractor.

速度約為每秒六百公里，

這是相對於巨引源的速度。

The Laniakea Supercluster is, you guessed it,

你猜對了，拉尼亞凱亞超星系團

moving with respect to everything else in the universe.

是相對於宇宙中 所有其他一切在運動。

At every step thus far, your granddaughter has used central reference points

到目前為止的每一步， 你的孫女都是用中心參考點

to describe your relative motion.

來描述你的相對運動。

But the universe has no center.

但宇宙沒有中心。

Instead, astronomers use the Cosmic Microwave Background, or CMB,

天文學家改使用 宇宙微波背景（CMB），

an echo of the early universe, which involves low-energy photons

它是早期宇宙的回聲，

涉及到低能量光子，

bouncing around everywhere in all directions, all the time.

時時刻刻在每個地方 朝各個方向反彈。

Imagine standing somewhere where the wind blows toward you

想像一下站在某個地方，風以 同樣的速度從各個方向吹向你。

at the same speed from every direction.

If you started running any which way,

如果你開始朝任何方向奔跑，

the wind in your face would have a higher speed,

朝你的臉吹來的風速會比較快，

while the wind at your back would be gentler.

朝你的背吹來的風則比較溫和。

The CMB is like that—

CMB 就類似這樣——

any direction we travel, the CMB appears more energetic or blue-shifted,

我們朝任何方向移動， 前方的 CMB 就會比較有能量

或呈現藍移，

while behind us it appears red-shifted.

背後則會呈現紅移。

By measuring the degree and direction of that shift,

透過測量此 CMB 改變的程度和方向，

we can determine where we’re going and how fast, relative to the CMB.

我們就可以判斷相對於 CMB 我們的移動方向和速度。

And the answer is:

而答案是：

630 kilometers per second towards the Great Attractor.

以每秒六百三十公里的速度 朝巨引源前進。

To recap: you’re spiraling around a sun circling a supermassive black hole,

回顧一下：

你一直繞著太陽運行旋轉，

而太陽繞著一個超大質量的黑洞運轉，

hurtling towards another galaxy,

並快速朝向另一個星系前進，

chaotically weaving around a supercluster, and barreling out into the great expanse.

混亂地在超星系團中穿梭，

衝向廣闊的宇宙深處。

Yet you’ve felt none of that;

然而，這些你都感覺不到；

tucked as you are into your planetary spaceship by gravity’s embrace.

你安穩地窩在你的行星太空船裡，

被重力環抱著。

If you drew a straight line from the point where you were born

如果你畫一條直線， 連接你出生的地點

to where you are today,

到你現今的所在，

it would measure about one fifth of a light year!

這條線的長度約為五分之一光年！

That may not sound like much,

聽起來好像沒什麼，

but neither does hiking through a park or sitting through a sunset.

但在公園中漫步或靜靜 欣賞夕陽聽起來也沒什麼。

There’s wonder to be found at every point of our all too brief journeys.

在我們這麼短暫的旅程中， 每一刻都有驚奇等著被發現。