每日阅读2021.11.24

Will there ever be another Einstein? This is the undercurrent of conversation at Einstein memorial meetings throughout the year. A new Einstein will emerge, scientists say. But it may take a long time. After all, more than 200 years separated Einstein from his nearest rival, Isaac Newton.
　　Many physicists say the next Einstein hasn’t been born yet, or is a baby now. That’s because the quest for a unified theory that would account for all the forces of nature has pushed current mathematics to its limits. New math must be created before the problem can be solved.
　　But researchers say there are many other factors working against another Einstein emerging anytime soon.
　　For one thing, physics is a much different field today. In Einstein’s day, there were only a few thousand physicists worldwide, and the theoreticians who could intellectually rival Einstein probably would fit into a streetcar with seats to spare.
　　Education is different, too. One crucial aspect of Einstein’s training that is overlooked is the years of philosophy he read as a teenager—Kant, Schopenhauer and Spinoza, among others. It taught him how to think independently and abstractly about space and time, and it wasn’t long before he became a philosopher himself.
　　“The independence created by philosophical insight is—in my opinion—the mark of distinction between a mere artisan (工匠) or specialist and a real seeker after truth,” Einstein wrote in 1944.
　　And he was an accomplished musician. The interplay between music and math is well known. Einstein would furiously play his violin as a way to think through a knotty physics problem.
　　Today, universities have produced millions of physicists. There aren’t many jobs in science for them, so they go to Wall Street and Silicon Valley to apply their analytical skills to more practical—and rewarding—efforts.
　　“Maybe there is an Einstein out there today,” said Columbia University physicist Brian Greene, “but it would be a lot harder for him to be heard.”
　　Especially considering what Einstein was proposing.
　　“The actual fabric of space and time curving? My God, what an idea!” Greene said at a recent gathering at the Aspen Institute. “It takes a certain type of person who will bang his head against the wall because you believe you’ll find the solution.”
　　Perhaps the best examples are the five scientific papers Einstein wrote in his “miracle year” of 1905. These “thought experiments” were pages of calculations signed and submitted to the prestigious journal Annalen der Physik by a virtual unknown. There were no footnotes or citations.
　　What might happen to such a submission today?
　　“We all get papers like those in the mail,” Greene said. “We put them in the junk file.”
 

• 单词

1. undercurrent -n 暗流；潜在的情绪（尤其指负面的）
2. emerge -v 浮现；暴露
3. quest -n/v 探寻；寻找
4. unify -v 统一；使成一体

a unified theory – 一个统一的理论

1. rival – n 竞争对手 -v与 … 相匹敌 -adj 竞争的
2. fit into 融入；与…相处融洽
3. streetcar -n 有轨电车
4. insight -n 洞察力；领悟
5. propose -v 提议；建议
6. prestigious -adj 有声望的
7. footnotes -n 脚注
8. citations -n 引语；表扬；

• 句子

1. That’s because the quest for a unified theory that would account for all the forces of nature has pushed current mathematics to its limits. New math must be created before the problem can be solved.

这是因为对一个能够解释所有自然力的统一理论的追求已经将当前的数学推向了极限。在解决问题之前，必须先建立新的数学模型。

1. In Einstein’s day, there were only a few thousand physicists worldwide, and the theoreticians who could intellectually rival Einstein probably would fit into a streetcar with seats to spare.

在爱因斯坦的时代，全世界只有几千名物理学家，那些在智力上可以与爱因斯坦匹敌的理论家可能会坐在一辆有轨电车上，车上还有多余的座位。

3.