www.renren.com：雙語(yǔ)網(wǎng)絡(luò)讓我們更懷舊
Writing for the BBC, the novelist Will Self recently claimed that young people are becoming more and more nostalgic. The Internet has a lot to do with this, he suggested.
小說(shuō)家威爾•塞爾夫近日在其為BBC所撰寫(xiě)的一篇文章中稱，年輕人的懷舊情結(jié)日益濃厚。他表示這一現(xiàn)象與互聯(lián)網(wǎng)有很大的關(guān)系。
It is certainly true that the Internet has changed the past and will continue to do so, but are young people really more nostalgic?
的確，互聯(lián)網(wǎng)已改變了過(guò)去，今后也仍將如此，但年輕人是不是真的越來(lái)越懷舊了呢？
History is an array of invisible events, hidden in darkness.Archaeological evidence and the written language were previously our only insights into what once happened. The invention of the printing press was a major milestone in our ability to engage with history.
歷史是掩身黑暗之中的一系列無(wú)形事件的集合。考古發(fā)現(xiàn)與文字曾是我們洞察歷史的渠道。印刷術(shù)的發(fā)明成為我們與歷史“對(duì)話”的一座重要里程碑。
The Internet, though, appears to be set to surpass even that. A millennium from now, we will no longer be forced to interpret strange languages in order to comprehend our world–the Internet will provide a window into the past, consisting of tiny units of digital data.
然而，互聯(lián)網(wǎng)似乎后來(lái)者居上。一千年以后，我們將不再為了了解自己身處的世界而被迫解釋那些陌生語(yǔ)言——到那時(shí)，互聯(lián)網(wǎng)將提供一個(gè)窺知過(guò)去的窗口，歷史則由微小的數(shù)據(jù)信息組成。
Even just a few years from now we will be surrounded by the first generation of adults who grew up with the Internet. The majority of these individual lives will be eternalized online.
甚至只需短短幾年之后，我們周?chē)鷮⒈M是伴隨互聯(lián)網(wǎng)成長(zhǎng)起來(lái)的第一代人。其中大多數(shù)人的生活將會(huì)被完全記錄在互聯(lián)網(wǎng)上因而得以永久保存。
A recent advertisement for Google Chrome showed a series of important events in a child’s life, each one belonging to a different part of the Internet – the first steps on YouTube; birthday e-mails; Facebook photos of teenage parties. The message was clear: a life can now be fully expressed through the Internet.
谷歌Chrome瀏覽器的最新廣告展示了一個(gè)孩子生活中的一系列重大事件，每件事都關(guān)乎互聯(lián)網(wǎng)的方方面面——YouTube上，孩子學(xué)會(huì)走路后邁出第一步的視頻；郵件中的電子生日賀卡，F(xiàn)acebook上年輕人聚會(huì)的照片。這一切所傳達(dá)出的信息顯而易見(jiàn)：生活完全可以在互聯(lián)網(wǎng)上全部展現(xiàn)。
This, of course, has a significant effect on how we remember things. Online, major events and experiences can be read about–and with video, watched–again and again. Computers and the Internet, rather than offering something new, combine all our technological means of artificial memory–text, sound and image–to create a synthesis that can recall memories more intensely than anything before.
毫無(wú)疑問(wèn)，這對(duì)我們的記憶方式產(chǎn)生了重大的影響。重要的事件與經(jīng)歷都能在網(wǎng)上以圖文或視頻的形式反復(fù)看到。電腦與互聯(lián)網(wǎng)并非提供給我們新鮮的事物，而是融合了文字、聲音、圖像等人工記憶的所有技術(shù)手段，共同創(chuàng)造出一種前所未有的，更加強(qiáng)烈地喚起我們記憶的綜合體。
Some have suggested that this trend is making young people more nostalgic and more continually engaged in their own past. Through blogging and social networking, the Internet allows young people toretain their own past and also visit others’ pasts.
有人認(rèn)為這一趨勢(shì)正使得年輕人變得愈加懷舊，與自己的過(guò)去聯(lián)系更加緊密。通過(guò)博客和社交網(wǎng)絡(luò)，互聯(lián)網(wǎng)提供了一個(gè)年輕人保存自己過(guò)去并造訪別人過(guò)去的機(jī)會(huì)。
Nostalgia, though, is not quite the same thing as caring about the past. In fact, nostalgia is more about our own reconstruction of the past than anything else. Yet the Internet makes nostalgia more difficult to feel. It does the work of constructing the past for us, meaning that our imaginations play a considerably smaller role.
可懷舊并不等同于守舊。事實(shí)上，懷舊更多的是對(duì)我們自身過(guò)去的一種重建。而互聯(lián)網(wǎng)令人難以感覺(jué)到這種懷舊情懷。它代替我們塑造了我們的過(guò)去，這意味著我們的想象力在其中所扮演的角色沒(méi)那么重要了。
Those dependent on the Internet are not more nostalgic, but less. The Internet has the potential to undo the mysteries of the past.
“網(wǎng)絡(luò)依賴”并不能加深這種懷舊情懷，反而會(huì)弱化它。互聯(lián)網(wǎng)可能會(huì)破壞過(guò)去的那份神秘感。
When John Keats, a 19th century English poet, described Isaac Newton’s science, he bemoaned the ability of physics to demystify beauty and “unweave the rainbow”. The Internet, perhaps, will be the unweaver of the great, unexplored landscape of the past. As a result, we will imagine less of the past.
十九世紀(jì)英國(guó)詩(shī)人約翰•濟(jì)慈在描述艾薩克•牛頓的科學(xué)時(shí)，為物理學(xué)*了美麗事物的奧秘和“拆散了彩虹”而惋惜。（譯者注：濟(jì)慈曾經(jīng)抱怨：“牛頓把彩虹所有的詩(shī)意都破壞了。彩虹在他眼里只不過(guò)是光譜的排列而已?！薄安鹕⒘瞬屎纭币痪涑鲎詽?jì)慈的詩(shī)《萊米亞》，詩(shī)中對(duì)科學(xué)進(jìn)行了非難。）?；蛟S網(wǎng)絡(luò)將揭開(kāi)歷史中那些重要的未知領(lǐng)域的神秘面紗。但這將導(dǎo)致我們對(duì)于過(guò)去越來(lái)越缺乏想象。
Perhaps nostalgia is most fully contained in those elements of the past that are retrospectively unreal, created by our imaginations.
也許，懷舊情懷大都蘊(yùn)含于我們對(duì)歷史元素的虛幻追溯之中，全憑想象使然。
The poet T.S. Eliot once asked: “Where is the wisdom we have lost in knowledge? Where is the knowledge we have lost in information?”
詩(shī)人T.S•艾略特曾問(wèn)道：“遺失在知識(shí)中的智慧到哪里去了?又要遺失在信息中的知識(shí)又到哪里去了？”
Nostalgia is a kind of ancient, irrational wisdom, and the Internet, with its floods of information, threatens to drown it.
懷舊是一種古老而感性的智慧，而它很可能會(huì)被網(wǎng)絡(luò)時(shí)代的信息洪流所吞噬。
Writing for the BBC, the novelist Will Self recently claimed that young people are becoming more and more nostalgic. The Internet has a lot to do with this, he suggested.
小說(shuō)家威爾•塞爾夫近日在其為BBC所撰寫(xiě)的一篇文章中稱，年輕人的懷舊情結(jié)日益濃厚。他表示這一現(xiàn)象與互聯(lián)網(wǎng)有很大的關(guān)系。
It is certainly true that the Internet has changed the past and will continue to do so, but are young people really more nostalgic?
的確，互聯(lián)網(wǎng)已改變了過(guò)去，今后也仍將如此，但年輕人是不是真的越來(lái)越懷舊了呢？
History is an array of invisible events, hidden in darkness.Archaeological evidence and the written language were previously our only insights into what once happened. The invention of the printing press was a major milestone in our ability to engage with history.
歷史是掩身黑暗之中的一系列無(wú)形事件的集合。考古發(fā)現(xiàn)與文字曾是我們洞察歷史的渠道。印刷術(shù)的發(fā)明成為我們與歷史“對(duì)話”的一座重要里程碑。
The Internet, though, appears to be set to surpass even that. A millennium from now, we will no longer be forced to interpret strange languages in order to comprehend our world–the Internet will provide a window into the past, consisting of tiny units of digital data.
然而，互聯(lián)網(wǎng)似乎后來(lái)者居上。一千年以后，我們將不再為了了解自己身處的世界而被迫解釋那些陌生語(yǔ)言——到那時(shí)，互聯(lián)網(wǎng)將提供一個(gè)窺知過(guò)去的窗口，歷史則由微小的數(shù)據(jù)信息組成。
Even just a few years from now we will be surrounded by the first generation of adults who grew up with the Internet. The majority of these individual lives will be eternalized online.
甚至只需短短幾年之后，我們周?chē)鷮⒈M是伴隨互聯(lián)網(wǎng)成長(zhǎng)起來(lái)的第一代人。其中大多數(shù)人的生活將會(huì)被完全記錄在互聯(lián)網(wǎng)上因而得以永久保存。
A recent advertisement for Google Chrome showed a series of important events in a child’s life, each one belonging to a different part of the Internet – the first steps on YouTube; birthday e-mails; Facebook photos of teenage parties. The message was clear: a life can now be fully expressed through the Internet.
谷歌Chrome瀏覽器的最新廣告展示了一個(gè)孩子生活中的一系列重大事件，每件事都關(guān)乎互聯(lián)網(wǎng)的方方面面——YouTube上，孩子學(xué)會(huì)走路后邁出第一步的視頻；郵件中的電子生日賀卡，F(xiàn)acebook上年輕人聚會(huì)的照片。這一切所傳達(dá)出的信息顯而易見(jiàn)：生活完全可以在互聯(lián)網(wǎng)上全部展現(xiàn)。
This, of course, has a significant effect on how we remember things. Online, major events and experiences can be read about–and with video, watched–again and again. Computers and the Internet, rather than offering something new, combine all our technological means of artificial memory–text, sound and image–to create a synthesis that can recall memories more intensely than anything before.
毫無(wú)疑問(wèn)，這對(duì)我們的記憶方式產(chǎn)生了重大的影響。重要的事件與經(jīng)歷都能在網(wǎng)上以圖文或視頻的形式反復(fù)看到。電腦與互聯(lián)網(wǎng)并非提供給我們新鮮的事物，而是融合了文字、聲音、圖像等人工記憶的所有技術(shù)手段，共同創(chuàng)造出一種前所未有的，更加強(qiáng)烈地喚起我們記憶的綜合體。
Some have suggested that this trend is making young people more nostalgic and more continually engaged in their own past. Through blogging and social networking, the Internet allows young people toretain their own past and also visit others’ pasts.
有人認(rèn)為這一趨勢(shì)正使得年輕人變得愈加懷舊，與自己的過(guò)去聯(lián)系更加緊密。通過(guò)博客和社交網(wǎng)絡(luò)，互聯(lián)網(wǎng)提供了一個(gè)年輕人保存自己過(guò)去并造訪別人過(guò)去的機(jī)會(huì)。
Nostalgia, though, is not quite the same thing as caring about the past. In fact, nostalgia is more about our own reconstruction of the past than anything else. Yet the Internet makes nostalgia more difficult to feel. It does the work of constructing the past for us, meaning that our imaginations play a considerably smaller role.
可懷舊并不等同于守舊。事實(shí)上，懷舊更多的是對(duì)我們自身過(guò)去的一種重建。而互聯(lián)網(wǎng)令人難以感覺(jué)到這種懷舊情懷。它代替我們塑造了我們的過(guò)去，這意味著我們的想象力在其中所扮演的角色沒(méi)那么重要了。
Those dependent on the Internet are not more nostalgic, but less. The Internet has the potential to undo the mysteries of the past.
“網(wǎng)絡(luò)依賴”并不能加深這種懷舊情懷，反而會(huì)弱化它。互聯(lián)網(wǎng)可能會(huì)破壞過(guò)去的那份神秘感。
When John Keats, a 19th century English poet, described Isaac Newton’s science, he bemoaned the ability of physics to demystify beauty and “unweave the rainbow”. The Internet, perhaps, will be the unweaver of the great, unexplored landscape of the past. As a result, we will imagine less of the past.
十九世紀(jì)英國(guó)詩(shī)人約翰•濟(jì)慈在描述艾薩克•牛頓的科學(xué)時(shí)，為物理學(xué)*了美麗事物的奧秘和“拆散了彩虹”而惋惜。（譯者注：濟(jì)慈曾經(jīng)抱怨：“牛頓把彩虹所有的詩(shī)意都破壞了。彩虹在他眼里只不過(guò)是光譜的排列而已?！薄安鹕⒘瞬屎纭币痪涑鲎詽?jì)慈的詩(shī)《萊米亞》，詩(shī)中對(duì)科學(xué)進(jìn)行了非難。）?；蛟S網(wǎng)絡(luò)將揭開(kāi)歷史中那些重要的未知領(lǐng)域的神秘面紗。但這將導(dǎo)致我們對(duì)于過(guò)去越來(lái)越缺乏想象。
Perhaps nostalgia is most fully contained in those elements of the past that are retrospectively unreal, created by our imaginations.
也許，懷舊情懷大都蘊(yùn)含于我們對(duì)歷史元素的虛幻追溯之中，全憑想象使然。
The poet T.S. Eliot once asked: “Where is the wisdom we have lost in knowledge? Where is the knowledge we have lost in information?”
詩(shī)人T.S•艾略特曾問(wèn)道：“遺失在知識(shí)中的智慧到哪里去了?又要遺失在信息中的知識(shí)又到哪里去了？”
Nostalgia is a kind of ancient, irrational wisdom, and the Internet, with its floods of information, threatens to drown it.
懷舊是一種古老而感性的智慧，而它很可能會(huì)被網(wǎng)絡(luò)時(shí)代的信息洪流所吞噬。