Sapiens: A Brief History of Humankind

我终于看完这本书了。时间不长，只用了不到7个月。。。。。。

这7个月，先看了一部分书，然后改成听。听了一部分又改成看。折腾的，妹妹都说了：“妈妈，这个咱们讲过了。”

（备注：我当然没有特意给妹妹讲这个。我只不过是偶尔陪睡的时候自己手里拿什么就念什么。然后，就被小人家发现同样的东西在重复。。。。。。）

一如既往，说八卦。

话说一战的时候，德国被禁运。德国不产硝石这样的材料，氨又贵，他们就不能生产炸药。但是德国产科学家。一个犹太裔的德国化学家在1908年发明了用氢氮高温高压合成氨的方法。这个科学家就是大名鼎鼎的“化学战争之父”---哈伯。有了哈伯法，人类从此想要多少氮肥，就可以制造多少氮肥。农作物产量从此大幅度提高。哈伯因此获得1918年的诺贝尔化学奖。但是，同样因为有了哈伯法，德国不再需要从智利进口的硝石，从此想要多少炸药，就可以制造多少炸药。而且一战期间，哈伯一直做毒气的研究。他不认为毒气的使用缺乏人性，他曾经说过：“死亡就是死亡，不管用什么方法造成的。”他也说过：“在和平时期，一个科学家属于世界。但是在战争时期，一个科学家属于他的国家。”哈伯的第一任妻子反对他研究化学武器，用他的左轮手枪结束了自己的生命。她和哈伯生的儿子，在1946年，也因为羞愧于父亲的化学武器研究而自杀。

另一条八卦。1923年元旦零点，BBC电台首次在广播中使用大本钟的钟声。二战期间，BBC新闻每次向欧洲德占区播放广播都以钟声开始。大本钟的钟声成为了自由之声。同时，也被德国物理学家利用声音中细微差别来分析伦敦的天气变化。英国人发现以后，不再每次直播钟声，而是不时的改播在某个晴朗夜空中录制的声音来迷惑德国人。

这个花絮是不是可信我不敢保证。但是二战期间科学家们确实有好多千奇百怪的发明。比如《Number the Stars》里讲过的手绢。二战期间，丹麦被德国占领。1943年10月，丹麦地下抵抗组织收到一个德国海军军官的消息说，希特勒下令，一个星期之内要逮捕并驱逐犹太人。当时丹麦境内有将近8000的犹太人。地下抵抗组织在无数普通丹麦民众的帮助下，先是把这些犹太人藏在医院教堂等等地方，然后又用各式各样的渔船通过厄勒海峡，把他们送到了中立的瑞典。当时盖世太保听到消息，经常带着警犬上船检查看有没有藏匿犹太人。丹麦一个军医，Earnst Trier Morch和他的同事一起，发明了一种用兔子血和可卡因混合的粉末。他们把这些粉末撒在渔船的甲板上，用来暂时麻醉那些警犬嗅觉。《Number the Stars》就是用的这个背景。不过书里说的是粉末撒在手绢上，盖世太保上船的时候，船长会不经意的掏出手绢来在狗鼻子前晃晃。据说，丹麦全国一共有7220犹太人以及686个他们的非犹太裔配偶被解救。只有500多人因为不相信德国人真的会那么做而被逮捕。

说这么多，不是为了讨论科学研究的道德问题。Yuval Noah Harai在Sapiens这本书的最后讨论到人类的未来发展。他说，没有什么所谓的道德标准可以阻止那些有争议性的科学研究，因为所有做基因改良的科学家都会表示，他们研究的目的是为了人类的健康和战胜疾病而努力。每次看到说基因改良，我都会想起来20多年前还看科幻世界的时候曾经看到一个短篇，叫《美食》。里面描写的是人类滥用基因改良之后的未来世界，至今记忆犹新。（豆瓣上还找得到这篇小说：https://www.douban.com/note/35929517/）

Harai说，人类现在已经有了类似上帝的智能设计能力，来取代自然选择。生物基因工程只是其中之一，其他的还有生控体系统、无机生命。。。。。。

Is there anything more dangerous than dissatisfied and irresponsible gods who don't know what they want?

The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo

一直没看这本书因为很多书评都会用“disturbing”这个词。直到在The End of Your Life Book Club里面看到Mom (Mary Anne)对这本书的评论：

“Lisbeth Salander reminded her of some of her quirkiest and most interesting students---the high school girls she had taught and admitted to college who'd had lonely and painful childhoods but who'd nevertheless managed to make lives for themselves using their brains and resolve. Lisbeth shared with many of the refugee women Mom knew a special kind of courage and determination, along with a distrust of authorities bred by experience of corruption, capriciousness, and cruelty.”

书看完了，我不觉得这是一部悬疑犯罪类小说。不觉得很“disturbing”，至少不是我印象中那种犯罪小说的“disturbing”。这本书瑞典语原名直译过来其实是：Men Who Hate Women。英文的出版商（Christopher Maclehose who works for British publisher Quercus）大概是认为这个书名不够吸引眼球；又或者像有些人猜测的，他们想避开这个有一点女权主义的味道原名。不管为什么，反正英文版就有了这么一个更像畅销书的名字。当然英译版内容上也有一些翻译被出版商改了。以至于译者Steven T. Murray在最后出版的书上只用了笔名“Reg Keeland“，因为他认为出版商"needlessly prettified" the English translation。下面是Steven在一次接受采访时的回答：

Why did you choose to use a translator pseudonym?Steven: We strongly believe that translators should get credit for their work, which means having their names on the cover and/or title page and getting mentioned in PR for the book. But if the editor or publisher makes major changes to the text without the translator’s permission, so that the final English version no longer reflects our work, then we sometimes (reluctantly) choose to use a pseudonym. In the case of the Millennium books, I wasn’t given enough time to go over the final editing, and I also didn’t agree with many of the changes that had been made. For example, in one scene where Blomkvist is at his sister’s house, she asks him how he’s doing. Larsson wrote, “I feel like a sack of shit,” but this was arbitrarily changed to “He told her he felt as low as he had in life.” These kinds of changes alter the tone and flow of the writing, and I didn’t want to be blamed for such things.

可惜我不懂瑞典语，不知道原文到底怎样。单从英文版看，Larsson和他笔下的Blomkvist有很多共同之处，他写的这本书也很像Blomkvist在结尾出版的那本The Mafia。也许单纯从文学创作技术角度讲，Larsson并不是一个大师级的作家。但是他的作品体现出了他本人强烈的社会责任感。Larsson was not afraid to comment on many painful topics and let his opinions know. For this, he gets my respect. From wikipedia, I found the following passage:

When he was not at his day job, he worked on independent research into right-wing extremism in Sweden. In 1991, his research resulted in his first book, Extremhögern (The Extreme Right). Larsson quickly became instrumental in documenting and exposing Swedish extreme right and racist organizations; he was an influential debater and lecturer on the subject, reportedly living for years under death threats from his political enemies. The political party Sweden Democrats (Sverigedemokraterna) was a major subject of his research.

2004年某一天，因为电梯故障，Larsson只好爬了七层楼梯到办公室，引起心脏病发作。去世的时候只有50岁。因为他一直受到极右势力的死亡威胁，也有人怀疑Larsson的过世并不是简单的疾病造成的。Larsson生前，一直用业余时间在创作Millennium Series。直到他去世以后，这三部曲才出版。两个主要人物，Lisbeth Salander是个20出头的“问题”少女。从小在social service各种机构里长大，被贴上有精神问题、不稳定的标签，被政府任命的所谓guardian abuse，严重不信任任何人和执法机构。其实Salander是一个有社交障碍的天才，能够过目不忘，是个技术及其出色的黑客。另一个人物就是Mikael Blomkvist，一个以社会责任为己任的记者，和Larsson本人的背景很像。Larsson笔下的Blomkvist绝对是一个好人，认真负责不惧怕威胁，对周围的人都客气有礼不judgemental。Blomkvist在发现Salander为了调查他而侵入他的个人电脑以后，不但没有歇斯底里，还一直很有耐心的试图给Salander讲解什么是social boundary。Blomkvist曾经跟Salander说：Bastards too have a right to their private lives。

Stieg Larsson绝对是嫉恶如仇的人。坚持自己的信念，不惧怕威胁。但是，从他的作品看，他也同样是一个“有礼”的人。比如他借角色之口对两种人的描述：

"... making a name for himself as one who cheerfully ridiculed everyone who felt passionate about any issue or who stuck their neck out." 

"He even says anything original; he always just jumps on the bandwagon and casts the final stone in the most damaging terms he can get away with."

这几个月拜Trump之福，看到了不少这样的人和言论。直到看到Larsson的描写，我才知道我为什么看那些不顺眼。有人说，Trump就是治疗癌症的放化疗的药剂。也许对身体有一定坏处，但是为了杀掉癌细胞是值得的。我实在不敢苟同这种理论。

In today's political correctness age, many of us were driven to resurface as the cynical version of ourselves. We solute those who dare vocalize their strong opinions and are not deterred by the mere possibility of "hurting" someone's feelings. But, when we start hailing bigotry as being truthful and real, aren't we going too far?

I don't think that anyone would doubt that the things Larsson wrote about, like rightwing extremism, Nazism, and misogyny, are still very much in existence. I'm pretty sure most people would denounce any of the prejudice described in Larsson's book. That's why a lot of people think the book's disturbing. But, when we enthusiastically join the anti political correctness movement, when we bash all those who might voice with a more sensitive tone, when we declare that this society is so corrupted, a little way to the extreme might be okay to correct the path, aren't we also promoting the very things that seems to us as disturbing, the things that we are against? Do we really hate political correctness that much?