人類史上十個最偉大時期
Ten Great Moments in the (Recorded) History of Civilization. The ten periods of history which saw the most rapid advances in human achievement or quality of life. These are all events that have contributed to the forming of society as we know it today – even though many were from the far distant past.
本文闡述的是人類歷史進程中最偉大的十個時期。這是人類發展和生活質量提高最快的十個時期，其間的重大事件儘管已經距今甚遙，卻依然對當下的社會形態具有重大影響。
10. Renaissance 文藝復興 （1483-1513）
The artistic Renaissance began earlier, but during this 20-year period Leonardo, Michelangelo, Raphael, Durer, and Botticelli created many of the world’s most famous paintings: The Last Supper, Mona Lisa, the Sistine Chapel, the Raphael Rooms, the Pieta, the Sistine Madonna, The Birth of Venus. The European discovery of the New World was also a rather big deal.
藝術文藝復興的開端較早，但在這20年間裏，達芬奇、米開朗基羅、拉斐爾、杜勒和波提且利等等著名畫家創作了大量世界著名繪畫：《最後的晚餐》《蒙娜麗莎》《西斯廷教堂》《拉斐爾畫室》《聖母悼子》《西斯廷聖母》《維納斯的誕生》。此外，歐洲對於新世界的探索也是人類史上的重大事件。
9. Roman Republic and Empire 羅馬共和國和羅馬帝國 （公元前100年-公元100年）
The rap on the Romans is they stole their culture from Greece, but it’s not really true. The Romans borrowed freely from the Greeks but excelled in different fields — engineering, architecture, satire, and ethics (the Stoic tradition peaked in Rome, a little later, with the writings of Epictetus and Marcus Aurelius). No other society except Greece (and perhaps England or China) ever made greater cultural contributions. At about the same time, Chinese culture reached its greatest geographic extent with the Han Empire.
人們往往指責羅馬人偷盜了希臘文化，但其實這並非事實。羅馬人自由地借鑑希臘文明，但卻更擅長於一些的領域——工程學、建築學、諷刺文學和倫理學（稍後的時期裏，禁慾主義通過埃皮克提圖（Epictetus）和馬克 奧裏利烏斯（Marcus Aurelius）的著作在羅馬達到頂峯）。除了希臘（也許還有英格蘭或者中國）之外，沒有任何的社會爲文化做出瞭如此巨大的貢獻。幾乎同時，中國漢朝文化延伸了其最大的地理版圖。
8. Biological Science 生物科學 （1855-1866）
Darwin’s theory of natural selection and Pasteur’s germ theory revolutionized biology and medicine; Lister introduced sterilization in hospitals, and Mendel (pictured above) conducted the first experiments in heritability (though not widely known until later). There were milestones in many other arenas: Maxwell described electromagnetic fields and radiation; and the first internal combustion engine, gas heater, commercial steel, plastics, and rechargeable battery were produced.
達爾文的自然選擇理論和巴斯德的微生物理論變革了生物學和醫學；利斯特在醫院中引入了殺菌，而孟德爾（上圖人物）進行了第一次遺傳實驗（儘管當時並不很有名）。在其他的領域中也出現了許多里程碑：麥克斯韋描述了電磁場和輻射；而第一座內燃機、蒸汽加熱器、商業鋼鐵工業、塑料工業和可充電電池也在這一時期開始生產。
7. Age of Invention 發明時代 （1870-1890）
These two decades saw the invention of electric light, alternating current, the telephone, automobile, steam turbine, gas turbine, water heater, transformer, arc welding, phonograph and seismograph; development of vaccination and surgical techniques; Boltzmann’s development of thermodynamics and statistical mechanics; production of radio waves; the birth of the environmental conservation movement; and artworks by Rodin, Monet, Brahms, Dostoevsky, Tolstoy, Eliot, Chekhov and Twain.
這二十年見證了電燈、交流電、電話、汽車、蒸汽渦輪、瓦斯渦輪、熱水器、變壓器、電弧焊、照片和地震儀的發明；疫苗接種和外科手術的發展；玻爾茲曼熱力學和統計力學的發展；無線電波的使用；環保行動的誕生；羅丁、莫奈、勃拉姆斯、陀斯妥也夫斯基、托爾斯泰、埃利奧特、契訶夫和馬克吐翁的藝術創作。
6. Astronomy, Mechanics, Literature 天文學、力學、文學 （1580-1610）
This 30-year period saw revolutionary change on all fronts. Galileo’s telescope and Kepler’s planetary theory were the birth of modern astronomy; Galileo’s De motu launched classical physics; literature took big steps forward with Cervantes’ Don Quixote (the earliest novel still widely read) and Montaigne’s Essays (which created that genre), and a guy named Shakespeare turned out a bunch of sonnets, plus Hamlet, King Lear, Macbeth and the rest. Islamic architecture reached a late peak in Isfahan and Istanbul.
這三十年見證了所有前沿事物的革命性變革。伽利略的望遠鏡和開普勒的行星理論是現代天文學的起源；伽利略的《論運動》開啓了經典物理學；文學也取得了跨越式的進展，代表著作包括塞萬提斯的堂吉訶德（至今依然被廣泛閱讀的最古老小說）、蒙田的隨筆（創建了隨筆這個文體）、莎士比亞的大量十四行詩和《哈姆雷特》《李爾王》《麥克白》等等。而伊斯蘭建築藝術在伊斯法罕和伊斯坦布爾到達了後期的頂峯。
5. Age of Newton 牛頓時代 （1660-1687）
Important discoveries happened throughout the 17th century, but the most influential scientific advance was Newton’s theory of gravity. Newton got around to publishing the Principia in 1687, but the crucial ideas came to him in the 1660s. Newton and Leibniz invented calculus about the same time. Boyle’s Law, which led to the development of chemistry, was discovered in 1662; Leeuwenhoek and others began microscopic observations at the same time. It was a fertile time for art (Rembrandt, Vermeer) and literature (Racine, Moliere, Milton, Pascal) and unfortunately, bad philosophy (Hobbes, Locke).
衆多重要發現貫穿了整個十七世紀，但最具科學影響力的無疑是牛頓的萬有引力理論。牛頓在1687年到處講演他的理論，但其實他在17世紀60年代間就確立了核心思想。牛頓和萊布尼茲幾乎同時發明了微積分方法。引導化學發展的波爾定律發現於1662年；列文虎克等人同時期也開始了顯微鏡觀察。同時，當時也是藝術（倫布蘭特，弗米爾）和文學（拉辛、莫里哀、米爾頓、帕斯卡）的多產期，而不幸的是，哲學（霍布斯、洛克）並不發達。
4. Industrial Revolution 工業革命 （1764-1790）
Following James Watt’s improvement of the steam engine in 1764, almost every year in the late 18th century brought a new revolution. The science of chemistry was founded by Lavoisier; Hutton introduced the principles of geology; Adam Smith’s The Wealth of Nations founded economics; Mozart developed the forms of classical music; Burke and Hamilton/Madison defined British-American political theory; Blackstone’s Commentaries did the same for law; photosynthesis was discovered. Technical advances included electrolysis, the ship’s chronometer, chemical processing, tool-making machines, and the water frame.
在詹姆斯 瓦特於1764年蒸汽機發明之後，18世紀末的每一年幾乎都有新的重大變革。拉瓦錫創立了化學；赫胥黎提出了地理學的原理；亞當斯密的《國富論》創立了經濟學；莫扎特發展了古典音樂的形式；柏克和漢密爾頓/麥迪遜定義了英美政治理論；布萊克斯通的《英格蘭法律解釋》發展了法理學；光合作用被發現。技術進步包括電解、船上的精密計時器、化學反應、機牀和水力紡紗機等等。
3. Eastern Empires 東方帝國 （公元11至12世紀）
Chinese civilization has had several peaks but the Song Dynasty was perhaps the greatest: Zhu Xi (pictured above) established Neo-Confucianism; printing, the compass and canal locks were developed; and Chinese painting reached its apex. Meanwhile, Islamic, Indian and Southeast Asian cultures produced great achievements, from Persian poetry and math to Angkor Wat and Jain temples. Meanwhile, Europe started climbing out of the Dark Ages with the first industry and monuments such as the great medieval cathedrals and castles.
中華文明歷史上經歷過多次繁榮，但宋朝也許是其中的巔峯：朱熹（上圖人物）創立了新儒家學說（譯者：應該是指朱熹理學）；活字印刷術、指南針和運河水閘（譯者：這個我們國內很少宣傳）得到了發展；中國繪畫藝術也達到了頂峯。同時，伊斯蘭、印度和東南亞文明取得了大量的成就，從波斯詩集和數學到吳哥窟和耆那寺廟。而此時，歐洲正在走出天主教和城堡統治下的中世紀黑暗時代。
2. Mediterranean Culture 地中海文明 （公元前5世紀——4世紀）
The first great dramatists (Aeschylus, Sophocles, Aristophanes), the greatest sculptors in history(Phidias), and Socrates all lived in Athens in the 5th century BC. No other place in history produced more genius. The Greeks’ run continued in the 4th century with Plato (one of the most influential thinkers of all time) and Aristotle (the founder of ethics, political theory, natural history and logic), and mathematicians Eudoxus and Euclid. At the other end of Eurasia, Lao-tzu, Chuang-tzu and the followers of Confucius elaborated Chinese thought; the abacus and blast furnace were invented; and the Grand Canal was begun. India produced epic literature.
第一批偉大的劇作家（埃斯庫羅斯、索福克勒斯、阿里斯托芬），歷史上最傑出的雕刻家（菲迪亞斯），和蘇格拉底都生活在公元前5世紀的雅典。歷史上再也沒有任何的地方能夠如此地齊聚天才。希臘文化在公元前4世紀繼續發展，產生了包括柏拉圖（史上最具有影響力的思想家之一）、亞里斯多德（倫理學、政治理論、自然歷史和邏輯學的創立者），以及數學家歐多克斯和歐幾里德在內的一批著名學者。而在歐亞大陸的另一端，老子、莊子以及孔子的學生們詳盡闡述了中國思想文化；算盤和煉丹爐在這一時期發明；而大運河也開始開鑿。印度創立了敘事詩文學。
1. Founding of Religious Traditions 宗教文化的創立（公元前6世紀）
Confucius, Buddha, and Mahavira (the prophet of Jainism) all lived in the 6th century, though their works were compiled later (in the case of Buddha, much later). Important books of the Old Testament were written or assembled at roughly the same time. Greek culture was climbing toward its classical peak, thanks to natural philosophers (Thales, Parmenides), early political leaders (Solon), engineers (Chersiphron), and poets (Sappho, Pindar). No century is more significant for both Western and Eastern intellectual traditions.
孔子、佛祖和摩訶毗羅（耆那教的先知）都生活在公元前6世紀，儘管他們的工作在後來才慢慢被編纂完成（佛祖的著作在之後的很長時間才編纂完畢）。聖經舊約的重要篇章也大概在這個時期撰寫或者編纂。希臘文化得利於自然哲學家（泰利斯、帕梅尼德斯），早期政治領袖（梭侖），工程學家（伽爾瑟夫農）、和詩人（莎孚、品達），也正在走向其古典文化的頂峯。毫無疑問，在東西方文化傳統的發展史上，這是一個獨一無二的世紀。
