你身邊仍未揭祕的十個小謎團(上)

We know that science doesn't have the answers to everything, but seeing that it's 2015 and the future is almost here, there are some questions we really expected it to have answered by now.

我們知道科學無法解釋所有事情，但轉眼都2015年啦，隨着科學的進步，我們希望有些謎團能夠儘快得到解釋。以下就是十個我們期待早日弄清楚的謎團。

Does Turbulence Work?

10.氣流是如何形成的？

Everyone has gone through a flight where the pilot asks you to tighten your seat belts because of excessive turbulence, but even though it is so important to things like air safety, we just have no idea how it works. It has perplexed scientists to such an extent that Einstein once famously said, “Before I die, I hope someone will clarify quantum physics for me. After I die, I hope God will explain turbulence to me.”

相信每個人都有過在飛機上遇到強氣流而被要求繫上安全帶的經歷，知道氣流的形成對航空安全十分重要，然而，遺憾的是至今無人知曉當中原理。不少科學家深陷謎團，連著名科學家愛因斯坦（Albert Einstein,1879-1955）也曾說過：希望在有生之年看到量子力學之謎被解開，而去世之後上帝可以向我解釋氣流的奧祕。

The problem is aggravated by the fact that wherever the need to study turbulence arises—like in jet propulsion—chemical reactions take place alongside the high pressure and extreme conditions, which makes it difficult for researchers to study the exact conditions needed to produce turbulence. If somehow we could figure it out, it could be applied to a variety of uses since turbulence occurs everywhere in nature. Maybe one day we'd even be able to predict hurricanes or other natural disasters with accuracy, thus minimizing the damage and finally scoring one over nature.

當解決問題更迫切，問題便更嚴峻。在研究噴射推進問題的實驗中，化學反應需要在高壓及極端條件下進行。如何能製造出這些條件呢？這是研究如何產生出氣流的研究者們所要面對的又一大難題。由於氣流在大自然中無處不在，如果人類研究出如何製造氣流，將對很多領域做出重大貢獻。人類亦可準確預測氣流與其他自然災害，搶先於自然將傷害減到最低。

Do Cats Purr?

9.爲何貓會發出呼嚕聲？

We've shown before that cats don't always purr when they're happy, but the mystery goes way deeper than that. There is no purring organ in the throat of a cat, and even though extensive research has been done on the function itself, the exact origin of the function in the anatomy of cats is still 's theorized that they might do it by the constriction and dilation of the larynx, but no evidence has ever been provided to prove or disprove that theory. It was, however, found that the frequency of a cat's purr falls somewhere in the range required to accelerate bone regeneration and healing, so it might just be a healing superpower that we had no idea even existed in the animal kingdom. That might also explain why we take it to be a happy sound, as the frequency is not just beneficial for the cat—it tends to make us happier as well.

事實證明，當貓心情愉悅時並不一定會發出呼嚕聲，但問題遠遠不止如此簡單。在貓的喉嚨裏並沒有發出呼嚕聲的器官，即使在發聲功能上做了詳細的研究調查，確切的發聲器官在貓身體的哪個部位仍無從得知。從理論上來說，聲音與喉嚨結構和擴張有關，但並沒有任何理論證據來證實這一說法。但有研究指出，貓發出呼嚕聲的頻率可達到加快骨頭再生或治癒所需的範圍。因此，這一舉動亦可解釋爲一種不被人所知的治癒魔力。這也解釋了爲何人們認爲貓發出的呼嚕聲是一種開心的聲音：這個頻率不但對貓有好處，亦令人類感到心情愉悅。

Causes Hypnic Jerks?

8.爲什麼會有入睡抽動？

Often when we are about to fall asleep, we experience a kind of a falling sensation which causes us to wake up with a start. It happens to almost everybody, and the sensation is known as a hypnic jerk. It also sometimes happens when you tilt the chair you're sitting on too far—somehow you can sense when you're about to fall, and you wake up with a hypnic jerk. We really have no idea what causes them or whether they serve any modern purpose, but science has come up with some interesting theories.

當我們將要進入睡眠狀態時，常遇到一種要下墜的感覺，令我們突然驚醒。幾乎每個人都有過這種經歷，這就是我們所知道的“入睡抽動”。同樣的感覺亦會發生在當你坐得離椅子太遠，椅子傾斜而你感覺到快要從椅子上掉下去時，便會因爲入睡抽動而突然驚醒。我們仍對造成入睡抽動的原因毫無頭緒，亦不知其是否具有特定作用，但科學家提出了一些有趣的理論設想。

One hypothesis suggests that our bodies developed this mechanism when we used to sleep on branches or high ground, and it was meant to help us avoid a fall. But there is no evidence to support it, and humans rarely slept on trees or precarious cliffs as a matter of habit. Other theories suggest that it happens because of the slowing down of the body's processes when you fall asleep, but again, there are no scientific studies to support that claim either.

其中一個設想是當我們睡在樹幹上或較高的地方時，入睡抽動令我們免於從高處跌落。但並沒有證據證明此理論，而人類也沒有睡在樹上或者懸崖邊的習慣。亦有理論猜測當人類進入睡眠狀態，身體機能減緩，導致了入睡抽動。同樣，此理論猜測也無從考究。

Exactly Do Magnets Work?

7.磁鐵的原理是什麼？

Magnetism is a widely observed phenomenon in our universe, but a lot of things about it remain unexplained. For example, why do particles charged with electricity create a magnetic field strong enough to physically move things from far away? And when they do, why exactly do they align themselves to two poles, north and south?

磁力在我們生活中並不少見，但許多有關磁力的現象卻無法解釋。爲何當微粒充電時，會產生一個足以使遠處物體移動的強大磁場？此時，爲何微粒會整齊地排列於南北兩極？

Explanations range from “it's just one of those things” to particle movement at the quantum level, and MIT even has a whole laboratory dedicated to research on nothing but magnetism. We know that it's happening, and we have a good idea of what exactly is happening, too—the particles align themselves in a way that adds up their charge in one direction, but it's not very clear as to why the particles emit a magnetic field to start with. The fact that the Earth's magnetic field is not well understood either further restricts our ability to understand magnetism.

對此，衆說紛紜。有人說磁力就是這麼一回事，也有人說這是因爲微粒按照量子能級來排序。爲了解開謎團，麻省理工學院甚至設立了一個專門研究磁力的研究所。我們所知道的只是微粒排列的方式會使一方面電荷增強，而爲何微粒首先會釋放出磁場我們則一概不知。事實上，人類對地球磁場的認識有限，進一步限制了人類對磁力的研究。

Do Giraffes Have Long Necks?

6.爲何長頸鹿的脖子那麼長？

Many may believe that only giraffes with long necks survived evolution because they had an advantage over the other, short-necked ones, but that's not really true. Longer necks provide no particular advantage to giraffes because they care more about the type of leaf than the height at which it's situated. If it's confusing to you, science doesn't have much of a clue either. There's just no consensus on the exact conditions that would have caused long necks to be selected positively among giraffes.

大多數人相信長頸鹿的長脖子是演變的結果，認爲長脖子比短脖子的長頸鹿在生存上更有優勢，但事實並非如此。長脖子並不具有明顯的優勢，長頸鹿在進食時更關注的是樹葉的種類而不是樹葉所在的高度。若然你對此持懷疑態度，科學亦無法對此做出解釋，科學界亦並沒有對長脖子是優勝劣汰的結果這一結論達成共識。

One theory is that the giraffes developed long necks as a mating trait—in other words, it helped with the ladies—but there's not much evidence to support that hypothesis. On the contrary, big, heavy necks, no matter how good they look, would be a definite disadvantage in the wild and are sure to die out at some point in the future. Another theory says that they had to develop long necks because of long legs, but again, that theory is based less on factual evidence and more on a scientist looking at a giraffe and guessing.

有理論提出長脖子是長頸鹿的一種交配特徵，換句話說，長脖子有助於雌性長頸鹿選擇交配對象。但這只是一個沒有依據的推論。相反，長脖子又大又笨重，即使外形美觀，但只會給野外生存的長頸鹿帶來劣勢。因此長脖子這一特徵終會消失。另外一個理論則指長頸鹿因爲長腿的需要而演變出長脖子，這一理論更多是建立於科學家的猜想而非事實依據上。

翻譯：陳夏瑾 來源：前十網