【正文】 老師讀著受累，我寫著痛苦。 3 I prepared for an unfruitful year with Mr. Fleagle and for a long time was not disappointed. Late in the year we tackled the informal essay. Mr. Fleagle distributed a homework sheet offering us a choice of topics. None was quite so simpleminded as What I Did on My Summer Vacation, but most seemed to be almost as dull. I took the list home and did nothing until the night before the essay was due. Lying on the sofa, I finally faced up to the unwele task, took the list out of my notebook, and scanned it. The topic on which my eye stopped was The Art of Eating Spaghetti. 我作好準(zhǔn)備，打算在弗利格爾先生的班上一無(wú)所獲地混上一年，不少日子過(guò)去了，還真不出所料。s house reawoke in my mind as I recalled the laughing arguments we had that night about the socially respectable method for moving spaghetti from plate to mouth. 這個(gè)題目在我腦海里喚起了一連串不同尋常的圖像。我想重溫那個(gè)夜晚的愉快。兩天后弗利格爾先生發(fā)還批改過(guò)的作文，他把別人的都發(fā)了，就是沒(méi)有我的。s more, the entire class was listening. Listening attentively. Then somebody laughed, then the entire class was laughing, and not in contempt and ridicule, but with openhearted enjoyment. Even Mr. Fleagle stopped two or three times to hold back a small prim smile. 于是他開始念了。t you see ─ it39。 他這番話使我沉浸在十全十美的幸福之中。m in no hurry, I told him. Go ahead and finish your letter. “我不著急，”我對(duì)他說(shuō)，“你接著把信讀完吧?！蔽夜懒克辛呤畾q了，便猜測(cè)說(shuō)：“是孩子還是孫子寫來(lái)的？” 4 6 This isn39。實(shí)際上，過(guò)去我倆總是以‘老朋友’相稱的 —— 就是說(shuō)，當(dāng)我倆相見時(shí)。我倆小時(shí)候就一起玩，所以我倆的友誼確實(shí)很長(zhǎng)了?！? 13 You said 39?！? 16 He didn39。不過(guò)總是有事情冒出來(lái)，好像就是抽不出空來(lái)。s pretty personal. “謝謝你，”我說(shuō)，“不過(guò) 我不想讀你的信。 21 The letter was written in pencil. It began with the greeting Old Friend,and the first sentence reminded me of myself. I39。 22 You must have spent a lot of time together, I said to him. “你們倆準(zhǔn)是在一起度過(guò)了不少時(shí)光， ”我對(duì)他說(shuō)?！? 25 You know, I said to him, When it says here that there aren39。s been mostly just Christmas cards. Of course there39。t it? “這一處寫得好， ”我說(shuō)，“這里寫道：‘你多年的友誼對(duì)我非常重要，遠(yuǎn)比我能說(shuō)出來(lái)的重要得多，因?yàn)槲也簧瞄L(zhǎng)說(shuō)這樣的話。“因此我想你一定想知道我惦記著你。d died. So I never mailed it. “這封信不是湯姆寫給我的，”他解釋說(shuō)，“我是湯姆。 7 Professor Hawking thinks it important to keep everybody in touch with what science is about. In this article he explains why. 霍金教授認(rèn)為使每個(gè)人都了解科學(xué)是干什么的非常重要。 2 Anyway, even if one wanted to, one couldn39。惟一能阻止進(jìn)一步發(fā)展的辦法或許是一個(gè)壓制任何新事物的全球政府，但人類的進(jìn)取心與創(chuàng)造力如此旺盛，即便這個(gè)政府也不會(huì)成功。這也是人們之所以支持各種綠色組織的一個(gè)重要因素。雖然公式是闡述數(shù)學(xué)概念的一種簡(jiǎn)單而精確的方式，它們卻使大多數(shù)人望而生畏。我在學(xué)校從未學(xué)過(guò)分子生物學(xué)或晶體管，但基因工程和計(jì)算機(jī)是極有可能改變我們未來(lái)生活的兩項(xiàng)發(fā)展。新聞標(biāo)題通常只字不提科學(xué)發(fā)現(xiàn)背后的長(zhǎng)年努力。s American Dream Frederick C. Crawford 托尼 2 I mow your lawn, he said. It was hard to prehend his broken English. “我割你的草坪，”他說(shuō)。我走進(jìn)屋子，心里有點(diǎn)不快。但在星期五，回家略微早了些，我又在汽車庫(kù)后面看到了托尼。 11 13 The months passed. I asked the personnel department for a report. They said Tony was a very good worker. 幾個(gè)月過(guò)去了。盡管如此，可我怎么能拒絕他呢？ 16 Tony took a cut in pay to bee an apprentice. Months later, I got a report that he had graduated as a skilled grinder. He had learned to read the millionths of an inch on the micrometer and to shape the grinding wheel with an instrument set with a diamond. My wife and I were delighted with what we felt was a satisfying end of the story. 托尼減了薪水當(dāng)了徒工。 19 I called on a banker friend. Do you ever loan money on character? I asked. No, he said. We can39。他有個(gè)好工作。他身子似乎挺直了些，人也見胖了，樣子挺自信。他把在意大利的妻子和兒子女兒都接來(lái)了。托尼去世了。最后，我覺(jué)得他就和美國(guó)那些最大的實(shí)業(yè)家一樣高大、自豪。t owe a cent. 我讓公司的人去他家看看，確保各項(xiàng)事宜都得到妥善安置。他正在把家搬到農(nóng)莊去?！拔业昧税饲澜?。那塊地空在那兒要好多年呢。“人品貸款你干不干？”我問(wèn)。他學(xué)會(huì)了在千分尺上辨識(shí)一百萬(wàn)分之一英寸，會(huì)用鑲嵌著金剛石的工具制作砂輪。他們說(shuō)托尼干得挺棒。 9 I mow your lawn, he said. “我割你的草坪，”他說(shuō)。我便問(wèn)太太是怎么回事。 3 I asked him his name. Tony Trivisonno, he replied. I mow your lawn. I told Tony that I couldn39。 C The American Dream means different things to different people. But for many, particularly immigrants, it means the opportunity to make a better life for themselves. For them the dream is that talent and hard work can take you from log cabin to White House. Tony Trivisonno did not rise quite so high, yet he managed to make his own dream e true. 美國(guó)夢(mèng)對(duì)不同的人有不同的意義。只有電視能贏得真正廣大的觀眾。我只使用了一個(gè)公式，即愛因斯坦那個(gè)著名的公式， E=mc2。 4 What can be done to harness this interest and give the public the scientific background it needs to make informed decisions on subjects like acid rain, the greenhouse effect, nuclear weapons, and geic engineering? Clearly, the basis must lie in what is taught in schools. But in schools science is often presented in a dry and uninteresting manner. Children learn it by rote to pass examinations, and they don39。 3 If we accept that we cannot prevent science and technology from changing our world, we can at least try to ensure that the changes they make are in the right directions. In a democratic society, this means that the public needs to have a basic understanding of science, so that it can make informed decisions and not leave them in the hands of experts. At the moment, the public is in two minds about science. It has e to expect the steady increase in the standard of living that new developments in science and technology have brought to continue, but it also distrusts science because it doesn39。t just be fotten. Nor can one prevent further advances in the future. Even if all government money for research were cut off (and the present government is doing its best), the force of petition would still bring about advances in technology. Moreover, one cannot stop inquiring minds from thinking about basic science, whether or not they are paid for it. The only way to prevent further developments would be a global state that suppressed anything new, and human initiative and inventiveness are such that even this wouldn39。 Public Attitudes Toward Science Stephen Hawking 1 Whether we like it or not, the world we live in has changed a great deal in the last h