Translation of the NKS [PAUSED]

waynebuaa

呵呵，跟你的Latex的排版效果相比，我的mathematica排版效果就差远了，但我觉得如果懂mathematica排版的话，其实也可以做得很好的。FreddyMusic有兴趣不妨试试，等你积累了经验就不妨跟我们分享一下。

我估计是不会继续在mathematica排版上花功夫了，我会尽量腾出时间来学习Latex排版，接着翻译的。

marveloustau

我的建议是，咱们最好一起翻译。我个人认为LaTeX可以把论文打得很漂亮，但是这么大的排版工程我觉得用它不合适，对于我们目前的水平或许还不如用Word和专业的PDF文档制作软件做得更快更漂亮。

现在的问题是，如果只有我来翻，我一天两页的速度，1280页全都翻完需要将近两年的时间。再加上校译和校对的时间也许就要三年了，这三年里Wolfram老大不知还会出本什么书，或者出个Mathematica 7什么的。排版是最后的问题。

Anyway, 效率优先！

FM如果实在认为还是在notebook的环境下看着舒服，听我的，研究一下Publicon吧！

[ 本帖最后由 marveloustau 于 2008-8-16 21:19 编辑 ]

waynebuaa

即便是我们俩翻译，那进度也是很慢的，我希望至少能有10人参与，说实在的，我一直没继续，主要是因为参与的人太少了，感觉我们就像是在蚂蚁啃大树

bainhome

目前的外文学术类书籍，基本上都是采用latex编辑出书，knuth自己的computer programming一书初稿随便就是3000多页，比这本书似乎还多，照样轻松排！写论文是极其微小的一部分功能，这可能是tau兄对latex不了解造成的。word编排这种书籍，最后极有可能十分ugly，而且带公式、图形的情况下非常麻烦。
翻译是主要问题，注重在这方面吧，我还是那句话——翻译是第一位的，排版tau兄不了解：模板做出来，现在就是复制粘贴而已，同时跟你打个包票：我也是初学latex，但是现在你同时用word、我用latex排版，你的速度到后期，恐怕连我五分之一都不能达到^_^
你慢慢啃吧，刚开始能有两三个人都不错了，时机有时候也需要静静等才好，很多人要到后期也许才能知道这件事情并逐渐加入。mathematica现在才两千帖子，一时之间能指望多少人干这种费力不讨好的工作呢？

marveloustau

:o
果然是俺孤陋寡闻了。我只记得我当时用LaTeX的时候挺吃力的。

waynebuaa

tau，我就从第四章翻译吧，因为我以前翻译了一点。

brainhome， 你的附件不能成功编译。发现问题出现在"R&D"中，特殊符号&在TEX源文件中要加\，即"R\&D"，才能成功通过编译。

bainhome

可以编译，出现提示时按“r”键回车

waynebuaa

按你所说的，我用下面的代码测试似乎还是没通过
    \documentclass{article}
    \usepackage{amsmath,amssymb}
    \usepackage{latexsym}
    \usepackage{CJK}

    \begin{document}
    \begin{CJK*}{GBK}{song}
     & 测试一下我的数学公式\[\int_a^b f(x)dx\]

    \end{CJK*}
    \end{document}

bainhome

跟error说明一样，只是“&”符号没有显示(被igore掉了)，其他一切正常。

waynebuaa

:)
明白了：

! Misplaced alignment tab character &.
l.8      测试一下&
                  我的数学公式\[\int_a^b f(x)dx\]
? \
Type <return> to proceed, S to scroll future error messages,
R to run without stopping, Q to run quietly,
I to insert something, E to edit your file,
1 or ... or 9 to ignore the next 1 to 9 tokens of input,
H for help, X to quit.
?

marveloustau

Page 3    http://www.wolframscience.com/nksonline/page-3-text


But my discovery that many very simple programs producegreat complexity immediately suggests a rather different explanation.For all it takes is that systems in nature operate like typicalprograms and then it follows that their behavior will often be complex.And the reason that such complexity is not usually seen in humanartifacts is just that in building these we tend in effect to useprograms that are specially chosen to give only behavior simple enoughfor us to be able to see that it will achieve the purposes we want.
但是我的发现，也就是简单的程序能够产生非常复杂的产物却暗示着一个相当不同的解释。由于自然界中的系统就像典型的程序进行操作，于是接下来它的行为会经常变得复杂。同时，人工制品难以和这样的复杂事物相提并论的原因是，我们倾向于尽量使用那些特别选择的程序，它们的行为对我们来说足够简单，从而能够进行观察它能否实现我们希望的目标。


Onemight have thought that with all their successes over the past fewcenturies the existing sciences would long ago have managed to addressthe issue of complexity. But in fact they have not. And indeed for themost part they have specifically defined their scope in order to avoiddirect contact with it. For while their basic idea of describingbehavior in terms of mathematical equations works well in cases likeplanetary motion where the behavior is fairly simple, it almostinevitably fails whenever the behavior is more complex. And more orless the same is true of descriptions based on ideas like naturalselection in biology. But by thinking in terms of programs the new kindof science that I develop in this book is for the first time able tomake meaningful statements about even immensely complex behavior.
有人可能会想，现存科学就其在过去几个世纪中所取得的成就，应该在很早以前就已经能够描述这样的复杂性了。但是事实上它们并没有做到。并且事实上它们小心地定义了它们自己的视野，目的就是为了避免直接接触复杂性。尽管他们用数学方程描述行为的基本想法表现良好，就比如行星的运行这样行为简单至极的案例，但是当系统行为变得更复杂时数学方程几乎不可米面的失败了。对于一些基于像生物学中自然选择这样观点的描述亦然如此。但是考虑一下我在这本我所开创的新科学中的程序，将是第一次有能力对无线复杂的行为给出一个有意义的描述。


Inthe existing sciences much of the emphasis over the past century or sohas been on breaking systems down to find their underlying parts, thentrying to analyze these parts in as much detail as possible. Andparticularly in physics this approach has been sufficiently successfulthat the basic components of everyday systems are by now completelyknown. But just how these components act together to produce even someof the most obvious features of the overall behavior we see has in thepast remained an almost complete mystery. Within the framework of thenew kind of science that I develop in this book, however, it is finallypossible to address such a question.
现存科学中在过去差不多一个世纪中主要强调的是将系统拆分并寻找其主要部分，然后试图尽可能精确地分析这些部分。并且尤其在物理学方面这个方法十分成功，到现在为止平常系统的主要部分已经完全了解了。但仅仅是这些组件如何一起工作，产生哪怕是我们所研究的一切行为中最明显的性质，仍然完全是一个谜题。然而在新科学的框架内，他最终将是可以获得解答的。



[几乎每一段话中都会出现"I develop"和"in this book"。足可见Stephen自大确实名不虚传。以后这两个词我就不翻了，“我在这本书中所发展的一种新科学”全部用“新可学”代替]


[ 本帖最后由 marveloustau 于 2008-8-17 21:59 编辑 ]

marveloustau

Page 4      http://www.wolframscience.com/nksonline/page-4-text


From the tradition of the existing sciences one might expect that its answer would depend on all sorts of details, and be quite different for different types of physical, biological and other systems. But in the world of simple programs I have discovered that the same basic forms of behavior occur over and over again almost independent of underlying details. And what this suggests is that there are quite universal principles that determine overall behavior and that can be expected to apply not only to simple programs but also to systems throughout the natural world and elsewhere.
按照现存科学的传统，人们或许希望它的答案基于一系列的事实，并且同不同类型的系统，如物理的、生物及其他系统都很不一样。但是我发现在这个由简单程序构成的世界中，相同的行为基本形式一再发生，并且几乎和基础的细节无关。同时，它暗示着由一个非常普适的原则决定了所有的行为，并且可以预见的是它不但可以应用在简单的程序上，还能应用在自然界中的任何系统中。


In the existing sciences whenever a phenomenon is encountered that seems complex it is taken almost for granted that the phenomenon must be the result of some underlying mechanism that is itself complex. But my discovery that simple programs can produce great complexity makes it clear that this is not in fact correct. And indeed in the later parts of this book I will show that even remarkably simple programs seem to capture the essential mechanisms responsible for all sorts of important phenomena that in the past have always seemed far too complex to allow any simple explanation.
现存科学中每逢一个看似复杂的现象出现，几乎一定可以认为这现象肯定是由于一些基础的机制自己就是复杂的。但是我的发现，也就是简单的程序创造极端复杂事物，明确地显示出来上述情况其实并不正确。并且事实上在本书的后面部分我会展示一下即是无比简单的程序也能捕获到最重要的机制，它能够产生各种各样的重要现象，而这些现象在以前看来是在太过复杂而难以给出人和简单的解释。


It is not uncommon in the history of science that new ways of thinking are what finally allow longstanding issues to be addressed. But I have been amazed at just how many issues central to the foundations of the existing sciences I have been able to address by using the idea of thinking in terms of simple programs. For more than a century, for example, there has been confusion about how thermodynamic behavior arises in physics. Yet from my discoveries about simple programs I have developed a quite straightforward explanation. And in biology, my discoveries provide for the first time an explicit way to understand just how it is that so many organisms exhibit such great complexity. Indeed, I even have increasing evidence that thinking in terms of simple programs will make it possible to construct a single truly fundamental theory of physics,from which space, time, quantum mechanics and all the other known features of our universe will emerge.
新的思考方式最终却使得早已存在的问题得以解答，这在科学史上并不鲜见。但是我所关心的是有多少位于现存科学基础之核心的问题可以应用我以简单程序的方式来思考的想法得到解答。一个多世纪以来，例如热力学现行为如何由物理学中产生一直是令人迷惑的。然而通过我关于简单程序的发现，我得到了一个非常直接的解释。同样在生物学中，我的发现首次提供了一个清晰的方式去理解为什么如此多的生命体显示出如此巨大的复杂性。确实，我甚至取得了更多的证据，证明以简单程序的方式思考可以建立一套唯一正确的物理学基础理论，从其时间、空间、量子力学以及我们宇宙的其他一切性质都会展示出来。

[狂妄……相当狂妄]

When mathematics was introduced into science it provided for the first time an abstract framework in which scientific conclusions could be drawn without direct reference to physical reality. Yet despite all its development over the past few thousand years mathematics itselfhas continued to concentrate only on rather specific types of abstractsystems--most often ones somehow derived from arithmeticor geometry. But the new kind of science that I describe in this bookintroduces what are in a sense much more general abstract systems,based on rules of essentially any type whatsoever.
当数学被引入科学时，它首次提供了一个抽象的框架，使得科学结论可以不用直接参考物理的真实性而被描绘出来。然而不管数学在过去几千年来如何发展，数学本身始终只关注某些非常具体的抽象系统——通常是从算术学和几何学中衍生出来的。但是新科学引入了一个在某种程度上更为通用的抽象系统，它基于各种各样的规则。


[ 本帖最后由 marveloustau 于 2008-8-17 21:58 编辑 ]

marveloustau

Page 5           http://www.wolframscience.com/nksonline/page-5-text

One might have thought that such systems would be toodiverse for meaningful general statements to be made about them. Butthe crucial idea that has allowed me to build a unified framework forthe new kind of science that I describe in this book is that just asthe rules for any system can be viewed as corresponding to a program,so also its behavior can be viewed as corresponding to a computation.
人们也许会认为这样的系统是不是将会过于离散以至于无法关于它们得到有意义的统一描述。但是其中最为关键的思想允许我构建一个关于新科学的统一框架，就是任何系统的规则可以看做对应着一个程序，所以这个系统的行为就可以看做是对应的计算过程。


Traditionalintuition might suggest that to do more sophisticated computationswould always require more sophisticated underlying rules. But whatlaunched the whole computer revolution is the remarkable fact thatuniversal systems with fixed underlying rules can be built that can ineffect perform any possible computation.
传统上的直觉可能会认为，复杂的计算常常会需要复杂的基本规则。但是掀起整个计算机革命的最重要的原因，是能够建立由固定的基本规则组成的普适系统，它能有效地运行所有可能的运算。


Thethreshold for such universality has however generally been assumed tobe high, and to be reached only by elaborate and special systems liketypical electronic computers. But one of the surprising discoveries inthis book is that in fact there are systems whose rules are simpleenough to describe in just one sentence that are neverthelessuniversal. And this

immediately suggests that the phenomenon ofuniversality is vastly more common and important--in both abstract systems and nature--than has ever been imagined before.
然而人们通常认为这种普适性所受的限制很严重，并且仅能够由复杂而专门的系统，如典型的电子计算机来实现。但是这里有一个令人惊奇的发现，[即事实上那些规则简单到可以只用一句话来描述的系统就是普适的]。而它直接暗示了，普适性的现象远比人们之前所能想象到的更为普遍，更为重要。无论在抽象系统还是在自然界均亦然。

Buton the basis of many discoveries I have been led to a still moresweeping conclusion, summarized in what I call the Principle ofComputational Equivalence: that whenever one sees behavior that is notobviously simple--in essentially any system--itcan be thought of as corresponding to a computation of equivalentsophistication. And this one very basic principle has a quiteunprecedented array of implications for science and scientific thinking.
但是基于我的很多发现使我得到了更为全面的结论，我将其称为计算等价性原理，即对于任何系统，如果人们所观察到的行为不简单，就可以认为有一个复杂程度相等的计算过程相对应[该怎么理解这句话？]。这个原理对于科学及科学的思维方式具有空前的意义。


Fora start, it immediately gives a fundamental explanation for why simpleprograms can show behavior that seems to us complex. For like otherprocesses our own processes of perception and analysis can be thought of as computations. But though wemight have imagined that such computations would always be vastly moresophisticated than those performed by simple programs, the Principle ofComputational Equivalence implies that they are not. And it is thisequivalence between us as observers and the systems that we observethat makes the behavior of such systems seem to us complex.

作为一个开始，它首先给出了一个基础的解释，就是为什么简单的程序可以表现出在我们看来复杂的行为。就像其他的过程一样，我们感知和分析的过程也可以看做计算。但是尽管我们会认为这样的计算同那些由简单程序执行的比起来会复杂得多，计算等价性原理却暗示了事实上并非如此。并且介于作为观察者的我们和我们所观察的系统之间的等价性，使得这些系统的行为在我们看来是复杂的。

[我为什么怎么都看不懂呢？]

FreddyMusic

If you learn Algorithm or computer science, It should be not difficult to understand "Principle of Computational Equivalence"

That equalize to how computer do the calucation or the prospective for computer solve a problem.

limulimu

十分钦佩楼主，你每天的翻译我明天都看，本来我也想加入进来的，但是我最近要参加GRE考试，等我考完了一定参与进来，一天一页！！希望能有更多的人参与进来。

marveloustau

@limulimu:
彼此彼此。我9月10号去西安考AW，:) 。其实我觉得这也是个不错的练习。

@FM:
我差不多明白，CLRS一开始写到递归树[Recursive Tree]，SICP里面一开始也写到代换方法[Substitution Method]，都是设法量化解决问题的复杂程度的。但是既然SW声称计算等价性原理是他自己提出来的，我得确保我正确理解了他的表述。而且好像在后面的章节会具体提到计算等价性原理，我在这里先做个标记，等看了后面的章节再回来看这里是否有必要修改。

[ 本帖最后由 marveloustau 于 2008-8-18 18:56 编辑 ]

smarten

Word 可能越来越强了，不过一般说来如果在Word里面插了一些图表，当文件大小有10Mb的时候，比较容易死 （某页出现错误）。 另外大概就是打数学公式不太强。 Word是WYSIWYG, (what you get is what you see, you better look), 所以要常常调，会浪费一些功夫。 如果不是这个问题，Word还是不错，Endnote什么的在线插入文献，自动加索引，。。。。
所以对于写特别长的书什么（> 400 页），还是用Latex好。
Mathematica是把图表插到Notebook里面，写到这么常，大概也要400 Mb，可能看起来不方便 （好像Mathematica的guidebook 一样）。
我不是说Latex会比较小，其实Latex的图表什么也会很大，不过好像html一样，图表是单独放的，只是在产生pdf文件的时候用一下。好的是产生的pdf比较小。

waynebuaa

其实在latex的基础上再加一个编辑前端，比如，lyx或sciwriter (wysiwym) ，就兼有latex和word的优点了。

limulimu

今天没有等到楼主的大作，不过还是帮忙顶一下吧。
能留个QQ么看来是同路人。

marveloustau

不好意思昨天失眠了，今天早晨补觉来着。我不用QQ，我邮箱是
nightvista@gmail.com

@Smarten:
ps格式的会不会好一些？

[ 本帖最后由 marveloustau 于 2008-8-19 12:53 编辑 ]