1.This is the Large Hadron Collider.
这就是大型强子对撞机
2.It’s 27 kilometers in circumference; it’s the biggest scientific experiment ever attempted.
它周长27公里 是有史以来开展过最大的科学实验
3.Over 10,000 physicists and engineers from 85 countries around the world have come together over several decades to build this machine.
超过10000名物理学家和工程师 来自全球85个国家 共同在几十年的时间里 建造了这部机器
4.What we do is we accelerate protons — so, hydrogen nuclei — around 99.999999 percent the speed of light.
我们用它将质子—— 也就是氢原子核—— 的运动速度加到 光速的99.999999%
5.Right? At that speed, they go around that 27 kilometers 11,000 times a second.
了解？以这种速度，他们每秒 环绕27公里的轨道11000次
6.And we collide them with another beam of protons going in the opposite direction.
然后我们使它与另一束 来自相反方向的质子相撞
7.We collide them inside giant detectors.
我们使质子在巨型探测器内对撞
8.They’re essentially digital cameras.
探测器基本上就是数码相机
9.And this is the one that I work on, ATLAS.
而这是我所任职的那台，ATLAS
10.You get some sense of the size — you can just see these EU standard-size people underneath.
你可以得到些尺寸上的概念 你可以看到这些欧洲标准尺寸 的人在那下面
11.(Laughter) You get some sense of the size: 44 meters wide, 22 meters in diameter, 7,000 tons.
（笑） 你能有点概念：44米长 直径22米，重7000吨。
12.And we re-create the conditions that were present less than a billionth of a second after the universe began — up to 600 million times a second
我们所要重塑的 是宇宙形成十亿分之一秒后的状态 每秒制造大约6亿次这一状态
13.inside that detector — immense numbers.
在这个探测器内部——天文数字
14.And if you see those metal bits there — those are huge magnets that bend electrically-charged particles, so it can measure how fast they’re traveling.
如果你看到那里的那些小金属块 它们是巨型磁铁，用于弯折 带电粒子 使探测器能够测算出粒子运动的速度
15.This is a picture about a year ago.
这是大概一年前的照片
16.Those magnets are in there.
有那些磁铁在上面
17.And, again, an EU standard-size real person, so you get some sense of the scale.
再一次重申，有一个欧洲标准身高的人 在那里给你一些尺寸上的概念
18.And it’s in there that those mini-Big Bangs will be created, sometime in the summer this year.
这就是那些迷你大爆炸将要被批量制造的地方 在今年夏天的时候
19.And actually, this morning, I got an email saying that we’ve just finished, today, building the last piece of ATLAS.
事实上，今天早晨，我收到一封邮件 说我们今天刚刚完成 建造ATLAS的最后一个环节
20.So as of today, it’s finished. I’d like to say that I planned that for TED, but I didn’t. So it’s been completed as of today.
就是说今天，我们竣工了。我想说 这是我特意为TED安排的 但实际上不是。不过无论怎样，它完成了
21.(Applause) Yeah, it’s a wonderful achievement.
（鼓掌） 没错，这是项伟大的成就
22.So, you might be asking, “Why?
那，你可能会问，“为什么？
23.Why create the conditions that were present less than a billionth of a second after the universe began?”
为什么要制造那个 宇宙形成十亿分之一秒后的状态？”
24.Well, particle physicists are nothing if not ambitious.
嗯，如果没有野心就当不成粒子物理学家
25.And the aim of particle physics is to understand what everything’s made of, and how everything sticks together.
而粒子物理学的目标就是要了解 所有一切是从何而来，又如何组建
26.And by “everything” I mean, of course, me and you, the Earth, the Sun, the hundred billion suns in our galaxy and the hundred billion galaxies
当然，所谓“一切”，我的意思是 我和你，地球，太阳 我们银河系中的几千亿个太阳 和存在在可观测的宇宙中
27.in the observable universe.
的那几千亿个银河系
28.Absolutely everything.
绝对是一切事物
29.Now you might say, “Well, OK, but why not just look at it?
现在你可能会说，“那，好吧，但是干嘛不直接观察它？
30.You know? If you want to know what I’m made of, let’s look at me.”
明白么？如果你想知道我是拿什么做的，那我们就来看看我。“
31.Well, we found that as you look back in time, the universe gets hotter and hotter, denser and denser, and simpler and simpler.
嗯，我们发现，当你回溯时间， 宇宙会越来越热 越来越致密，越来越单一
32.Now, there’s no real reason I’m aware of for that, but that seems to be the case.
现今为止我不能告诉你我为什么知道这个 不过事实貌似就是如此
33.So, way back in the early times of the universe, we believe it was very simple and understandable.
所以，回到宇宙形成初期 我们认为它是非常简单易懂的
34.All this complexity, all the way to these wonderful things — human brains — are a property of an old and cold and complicated universe.
所有繁复的衍生，所有这些美妙的事物—— 包括人脑——都是 一个古老，苍凉而又精密的宇宙的产物
35.Back at the start, in the first billionth of a second, we believe, or we’ve observed, it was very simple.
在宇宙的起点，第一个十亿分之一秒 我们相信，或者我们发现，它是非常纯粹的
36.It’s almost like …
这就好像
37.imagine a snowflake in your hand, and you look at it, and it’s an incredibly complicated, beautiful object. But as you heat it up, it’ll melt into a pool of water,
想象你手里有一片雪花 当你观察它，会发现它是如此精致 如此美丽的事物。但当你散发出热量 它就会融化成一小滩水
38.and you would be able to see that actually it was just made of H20, water.
这时你就能看到其实它不过是 H2O，水形成的
39.So it’s in that same sense that we look back in time to understand what the universe is made of.
同样道理可以解释为什么我们从初始状态 开始认知宇宙的形成
40.And as of today, it’s made of these things.
如今我们发现，它由这些形成
41.Just 12 particles of matter, stuck together by four forces of nature.
12种物质微粒 在4种自然力的作用下结合在一起
42.The quarks, these pink things, are the things that make up protons and neutrons that make up the atomic nuclei in your body.
夸克，这些粉色的东西，是构成质子和中子的粒子 质子和中子组成你身体里的原子核
43.The electron — the thing that goes around the atomic nucleus — held around in orbit, by the way, by the electromagnetic force that’s carried by this thing, the photon.
电子——那个绕着 原子核运动的东西—— 被制约在一个由电磁力控制的轨道上 而电磁力由这个东西携带，光子
44.The quarks are stuck together by other things called gluons.
将夸克结合在一起的东西叫做胶子
45.And these guys, here, they’re the weak nuclear force, probably the least familiar.
然后是这些家伙，这儿，他们是弱核力 大概是最不为人所知的
46.But without it the sun wouldn’t shine.
但是如果没有它们太阳就不会发光
47.And when the sun shines, you get copious quantities of these things called neutrinos pouring out.
当太阳发光的时候，大量的 中微子被放射出来
48.Actually, if you just look at your thumbnail — about a square centimeter — there are something there are something like 60 billion neutrinos per second
事实上，如果你看向你的指甲—— 大概一平方厘米的面积——那儿大概有 每秒大概有600亿个中微子
49.from the sun, passing through every square centimeter of your body.
来自太阳，穿过 你身上的每一个平方厘米
50.But you don’t feel them because the weak force is correctly named.
但是你感觉不到他们，因为 弱力这个名字不是白起的
51.Very short range and very weak, so they just fly through you.
非常短暂非常微弱 所以它们可以直接穿过你
52.And these particles have been discovered over the last century, pretty much.
这些粒子被发现的过程 几乎持续了上世纪整整一世纪
53.The first one, the electron, was discovered in 1897, and the last one, this thing called the tau neutrino, in the year 2000. Actually just —
第一个，电子，是1897年被发现的 然而最后一个，这个叫做陶子微中子的东西 是2000年被发现的。其实——
54.I was going to say, just up the road in Chicago. I know it’s a big country, America, isn’t it?
我刚才想说，就是在马路那头的芝加哥，但是我反应过来了 美国超大的，是吧？
55.Just up the road.
就在马路那头
56.Relative to the universe, it’s just up the road.
相对宇宙来说就在马路那头
57.(Laughter) So, this thing was discovered in the year 2000, so it’s a relatively recent picture.
（笑） 所以，这整套东西是2000年被完整发现的 可以说是一个非常年轻的成就
58.One of the wonderful things, actually, I find, is that we’ve discovered any of them, when you realize how tiny they are.
我发现这之中一个非常美妙的事 实际上是，无论发现任何一个都是一样，当你意识到它们竟是如此的微小
59.You know, they’re a step in size from the entire observable universe.
就好像，它们的数量级 基本等同于整个可观测的宇宙的数量级
60.So 100 billion galaxies, 13.7 billion light years away — a step in size from that to Monterey, actually, is about the same as from Monterey to these things.
就是说，1000亿个银河系 137亿光年的距离—— 和康乐区（加州一小镇）相比的数量级差 实际上就差不多是康乐区和这些小东西相比的数量级差
61.Absolutely, exquisitely minute, and yet we’ve discovered pretty much the full set.
完全的，极致的微小 但我们几乎还是全部发现了它们
62.So, one of my most illustrious forebears at Manchester University, Ernest Rutherford, discoverer of the atomic nucleus, once said, “All science is either physics
嗯，我有一个著名的前辈 在曼彻斯特大学，鄂尼斯特，拉特福德 原子核的发现者 曾经说：所有的科学不是物理
63.or stamp collecting.”
就是集邮
64.Now, I don’t think he meant to insult the rest of science, although he was from New Zealand, so it’s possible.
呃，我不认为他是故意羞辱 其它的科学 不过他是新西兰人，所以也说不准
65.(Laughter) But what he meant was that what we’ve done, really, is stamp collect there — OK, we’ve discovered the particles, but unless you understand the underlying
（笑） 但是他的意思其实是，我们所做的一切 其实就是在集邮—— 好，我们发现了这些粒子 但是除非你明白了这背后
66.reason for that pattern — you know, why it’s built the way it is — really you’ve done stamp collecting — you haven’t done science.
这现象的原理——就是，为什么它们如此集结—— 那你所做的就是集邮——你没有把它总结成科学
67.Fortunately, we have probably one of the greatest scientific achievements of the 20th century that underpins that pattern.
幸运的是，我们总结出来了 可能是20世纪最伟大的科学成就之一 这现象背后的理论
68.It’s the Newton’s laws, if you want, of particle physics.
如果你愿意，可以把它想成 粒子物理界的牛顿定律
69.It’s called the “standard model” — beautifully simple mathematical equation.
它叫做”标准模型“——漂亮简单的数学等式
70.You could stick it on the front of a t-shirt, which is always the sign of elegance.
你可以把它贴在T恤胸前 显示你是一个文化人
71.This is it.
这就是它
72.(Laughter) I’ve been a little disingenuous, because I’ve expanded it out in all it’s gory detail.
（笑） 我有点不老实，因为我把它展开了 所有血淋淋的细节
73.This equation, though, allows you to calculate everything — other than gravity — that happens in the universe.
不过这个等式，允许你计算任何事—— 除了引力——只要是在这个宇宙里的
74.So you want to know why the sky is blue, why atomic nuclei stick together — in principle, you’ve got a big enough computer — why DNA is the shape it is.
假设你想知道为什么天是蓝的，为什么原子核结合在一起—— 理论上来说，如果你有一台足够强大的电脑—— 为什么DNA是这样的
75.In principle, you should be able to calculate it from that equation.
原则上讲，你应该可以通过这个等式计算出来
76.But there’s a problem.
但是这有一个问题
77.Can anyone see what it is?
谁能看出来是什么？
78.A bottle of champagne for anyone that tells me.
谁告诉我问题在哪奖一瓶香槟
79.I’ll make it easier, actually, by blowing one of the lines up.
我把难度降低点儿吧， 把其中的一行放大
80.Basically, each of these terms refers to some of the particles.
基本上，这上面每一个参数 都代表一个粒子
81.So those Ws there refer to the Ws, and how they stick together.
就是说，那些W就代表弱力，还有粒子是如何结合的
82.These carriers of the weak force, the Zeds, the same.
同样道理这些Z代表弱力的携带者
83.But there’s an extra symbol in this equation: H.
但是这个等式里多了一个符号，H
84.Right, H.
对，H
85.H stands for Higgs particle.
H代表希格斯介子
86.Higgs particles have not been discovered.
我们还没发现希格斯介子
87.But they’re necessary — they’re necessary to make that mathematics work.
但是它们是必要的—— 没有它们等式就无法成立
88.So all the exquisitely detailed calculations we can do with that wonderful equation wouldn’t be possible without an extra bit.
所以，所有理论上用这个美妙等式 所能做出的精确计算 都不能缺少这关键的一点
89.So it’s a prediction — a prediction of a new particle.
所以这是个推论 对一个新粒子的预测
90.What does it do?
它是干什么的？
91.Well, we had a long time to come up with good analogies.
嗯，我们花了很长时间去想拿什么跟它类比才合适
92.And back in the 1980s, when we wanted the money for the LHC from the UK government, Margaret Thatcher, at the time, said, “If you guys can explain, in language
上世纪80年代，当时我们想向英国政府 申请资金继续在LHC的工作 撒切尔夫人，当时她当政，跟我们说 “如果你们能用
93.a politician can understand, what the hell it is that you’re doing, you can have the money.
政治家听的懂的语言解释清楚 你们在搞什么鬼东西，我就拨给你们钱，
94.I want to know what this Higgs particle does.”
我想知道这个希格斯介子是干嘛的。”
95.And we came up with this analogy and it seemed to work.
于是我们想出了这个比较合适的类比
96.Well, what the Higgs does is, it gives mass to the fundamental particles.
这样，希格斯介子是干嘛的呢？它给予基本粒子质量
97.And the picture is that the whole universe — and that doesn’t mean just space, it means me as well, and inside you — the whole universe is full of something called a Higgs field.
也就是说整个宇宙—— 不光是太空，也包括我，还有你—— 整个宇宙都充斥着这种叫做希格斯场的东西
98.Higgs particles, if you will.
希格斯介子，如果你绕不过来
99.The analogy is that these people in a room are the Higgs particles.
这个比方是这样的：这些在屋子里的人 他们就是希格斯介子
100.Now when a particle moves through the universe, it can interact with these Higgs particles.
当一个粒子穿过宇宙 它就会与希格斯介子发生联系
101.But imagine someone who’s not very popular moves through the room.
但是假设一个不怎么受欢迎的人穿过这个房间
102.Then everyone ignores them. They can just pass through the room very quickly, essentially at the speed of light. They’re massless.
那样所有人都会无视他。它们（粒子）就能很快的穿过空间 基本以光速穿过。它们没有质量
103.And imagine someone incredibly important and popular and intelligent walks into the room.
但是如果是一个无比重要 人气爆高智慧超群的人 穿过这个房间
104.They’re surrounded by people, and their passage through the room is impeded.
她就会被人们团团围住，前进的路也障碍重重
105.It’s almost like they get heavy. They get massive.
就好像它们（粒子）变沉重了，变大了
106.And that’s exactly the way the Higgs mechanism works.
这就是希格斯介子的工作机制
107.The picture is that the electrons and the quarks in your body and in the universe that we see around us are heavy, in a sense, and massive,
也就是说电子和夸克 这些组成我们和我们可见的宇宙的粒子 之所以重，或者在某种意义上说，大
108.because they’re surrounded by Higgs particles.
是因为它们被希格斯介子所包围
109.They’re interacting with the Higgs field.
它们与希格斯场产生联系
110.If that picture’s true, then we have to discover those Higgs particles at the LHC.
如果这推论是真的 那么我们就必须在LHC发现这些希格斯介子
111.If it’s not true — because it’s quite a convoluted mechanism, although it’s the simplest we’ve been able to think of — then whatever does the job of the Higgs particles
如果不是——因为这是一个非常繁复的机制 虽然它已经是我们能想到的最简单的一个—— 那无论这个担任希格斯介子角色的东西是什么
112.we know have to turn up at the LHC.
我们知道它都会 出现在LHC
113.So that’s one of the prime reasons we built this giant machine.
这就是我们建造这个庞然大物的主要原因之一
114.I’m glad you recognize Margaret Thatcher.
你们能认出撒切尔太好了
暂无讨论，说说你的看法吧
