[00:00.00] frustrate\ yield\ step by step\ outcome
[00:04.05]使灰心\泄露\逐步\结果
[00:08.10]gradual\ process\ conclusion\ propose
[00:12.41]渐进\过程\结论\建议
[00:16.72]evalutate\ bulk\ professional\ challenge
[00:21.19]评估\体积\职业的\挑战
[00:25.65]amount\ wear down\ failure\ somehow
[00:34.09]When scientific discoveries hit the news they are rarely as simple as the headlines suggest
[00:41.33]They usually do not mention the years of work that lie behind the discoveries.
[00:47.46]The reports also do little
[00:50.60]to help us realize that science seldom provides answers that are final and beyond challenge
[00:58.75]HOW TO MAKE SENSE OUT OF SCIENCE
[01:02.20]New Drugs Kill Cancer
[01:05.33]Devastation by El Nino-a Warning
[01:09.75]6:30p.m.October26,2028:Could This Be the Deadline for the Apocalypse?
[01:18.99]When these headlines appeared this year,
[01:22.34]their stories became the sujects of conversations around the world-
[01:27.61]talks spiced with optimism and confusion.
[01:31.95]Imagine the hopes raised in the millions battling cancer.
[01:37.23]Did the news mean these people never had to worry about cancer again?
[01:42.84]Or that we all had to worry about a catastrophe from outer space
[01:47.81]or,more immediately,from El Nino?
[01:52.17]Unfortanately,science doesn't work that way.
[01:56.82]It rarely arrives at final answers.
[02:00.48]People battling cancer or victims of El Nino may find this frustrating,
[02:07.53]but the truth is that Nature does not yield her secrets easily.
[02:14.30]Science is done step by step.First an idea is formed.
[02:21.14]Then this is tested by an experiment.
[02:24.85]The outcome,one hopes,results in an increase in knowledge.
[02:30.10]Science is not a set of unquestionable results
[02:34.83]but a way of understanding the world around us.
[02:38.48]Its real work is slow.
[02:41.25](1) The scientific method,as many of us learned in school,is a gradual process
[02:47.47]that begins with a purpose or a problem or question to be answered.
[02:52.64]It includes a list of materials,
[02:56.09]a procedure to follow,a set of observations to make
[03:01.24]and,finally,conclusions to reach.In medicine,
[03:06.51]when a new drug is proposed that might cure or control a disease,
[03:12.34]it is first tested on a large random group of people,
[03:17.02]and their reactions are then compared with those of another random group not given the drug
[03:24.28]All reactions in both groups
[03:27.44]are carefully recorded and compared,and the drug is evaluated.
[03:32.98]All of this takes time-and patience.
[03:37.18]It's the result of course,that makes the best news-not the years of quiet
[03:43.69]work that characterize the bulk of scientific inquiry.
[03:48.83]After an experiment is concluded or an observation is made,
[03:54.79]the result continues to be examined critically.
[03:58.84]When it is submitted for publication,
[04:02.60]it goes to a group of the scientist's colleagues,who review the work.
[04:08.16]If the work is important enough,
[04:11.32]just before the report is published in a professional journal or read at conference
[04:18.85]a press release is issued and an announcement is made to the world.
[04:24.59]The world may think that the announcement signifies the end of the process,
[04:30.52]but it doesn't.
[04:33.48]A publication is really a challenge: "Here is my result.Prove me wrong!"
[04:40.42](2) Other researchers will try to repeat the experiment,
[04:44.87]and the more often it works,
[04:48.63]the better the chances that the result is sound.
[04:52.99]Einstein was right when he said:
[04:56.54]"No amount of experimentation can ever prove me right;
[05:01.98]a single experiment can at any time prove me wrong."
[05:08.74]In August 1996,NASA announced the discovery in Antarctica of a meteorite from Mars
[05:18.12]that might contain evidence of ancient life on another world.
[05:24.05](3)As President Clinton said that day,
[05:28.70]the possibility that life existed on Mars billions of years ago
[05:34.58]was potentially one of the great discoveries of our time.
[05:39.72]After the excitemnt wore down and initial papers were published,
[05:45.73]other researchers began looking at samples from the same meteorite.
[05:52.08](4)Some concluded that the "evidence of life"was mostly contamination
[06:00.12]from Antarctic ice or that there was nothing organic at all in the rock.
[06:07.36]Was this a failure of science,as some news reports trumpeted?
[06:12.92]No!It was a good example of the scientific method working the way it is supposed to
[06:20.55]Scientists spend years on research,announce their findings,
[06:26.01]and these findings are examined by other scientists.
[06:30.84]That's how we learn.
[06:33.48]Like climbing a mountain,we struggle up three feet and fall back two.
[06:40.74]It's a process filled with disappointments and reverses,
[06:45.60]but somehow we keep moving ahead.
