I was standing in the sun on the hot steel deck of a fishing ship capable of processing a fifty-ton catch on a good day. But it wasn't a good day.
我在阳光中站在一艘渔轮的灼热的钢甲板上。走运时这艘渔轮一天能够捕获并加工50 吨鱼。然而那天不走运。
We were anchored in what used to be the most productive fishing site in all of central Asia, but as I looked out over the bow, the prospects of a good catch looked bleak.
我们抛锚停泊处过去是中亚细亚最高产的捕鱼场地。但是当我的目光越过船首向外望去时，大量捕获的前景看来是暗淡的。
Where there should have been gentle blue-green waves lapping against the side of the ship, there was nothing but hot dry sand-as far as I could see in all directions.
这里原来有蓝绿色的海浪轻轻拍打着船边，而如今，极目四望，什么也看不见，只有灼热的干沙。
The other ships of the fleet were also at rest in the sand, scattered in the dunes that stretched all the way to the horizon.
渔轮队的其他船只也在沙地中休闲不动，分散在一望无际的沙丘里。
Ten years ago the Aral was the fourth largest inland sea in the world, comparable to the largest of North America's Great Lakes.
10 年前，咸海还是世界上第四大内海，可以同北美五大湖中最大的湖相比。
Now it is disappearing because the water that used to feed it has been diverted in an ill-considered irrigation scheme to grow cotton in the desert.
现在它正在消失，因为根据一项考虑不周的灌溉计划，过去流入咸海的水被改造用来 在沙漠中种植棉花。
The new shoreline was almost forty kilometers across, the sand from where the fishing fleet was now permanently docked.
从现在渔轮永久停泊处穿过沙漠约40 公里才是新的海岸线。
Meanwhile, in the nearby town of Muynak the people were still canning fish -brought not from the Aral Sea but shipped by rail through Siberia from the Pacific Ocean, more than a thousand miles away.
与此同时，附近的穆依拿克镇上的人仍然在做罐头鱼—不是从咸海送来的鱼，而是 从1000 多英里外的太平洋穿过西伯利亚由铁路运来的鱼。
My search for the underlying causes of the environmental crisis has led me to travel around the world to examine and study many of these images of destruction.
为了探寻造成环境危机的根本原因，我走遍世界去考察和研究许多这种破坏环境的景象。
At the very bottom of the earth, high in the Trans-Antarctic Mountains, with the sun glaring at midnight through a hole in the sky, I stood in the unbelievable coldness and talked with a scientist in the late fall of 1988 about the tunnel he was digging through time.
1988年的晚秋，在位于地球最底部的南极，午夜眩目的阳光穿过天空的臭氧层空洞照耀着。天气冷得令人难以置信。我站在横贯南极的山脉高处，同一位科学家谈论着他正在穿 过时间挖凿的隧道。
Slipping his parka back to reveal a badly burned face that was cracked and peeling, he pointed to the annual layers of ice in a core sample dug from the glacier on which we were standing.
他把风雪大衣往后滑落了一点，露出一张被太阳晒焦、龟裂脱皮的脸。他指着从我们正站在其上的那个冰川凿下的一个核心标本上的冰的年层。
He moved his finger back in time to the ice of two decades ago. "Here's where the U. S Congress passed the Clean Air Act," he said.
他把手指顺着年层的时间往回移动，停在20 年前形成的冰层那个地方。“这是美国国会通过《净化空气法案》的地方，”他说。
At the bottom of the world, two continents away from Washington, D. C., even a small reduction in one country's emissions had changed the amount of pollution found in the remotest and least accessible place on earth.
位于世界底部的南极与首都华盛顿相隔两大洲，但是一个国家哪怕是稍微减少一点它排出的污染物，也会改变地球上这个最遥远和最难以到达的地方的污染量。
But the most significant change thus far in the earth's atmosphere is the one that began with the industrial revolution early in the last century and has picked up speed ever since.
然而迄今为止，地球大气层的最重大的变化，是从上个世纪初的工业革命开始的那个变化，而且从那以后，变化的速度日益加快。
Industry meant coal, and later oil, and we began to burn lots of it-bringing rising levels of carbon dioxide (CO2), with its ability to trap more heat in the atmosphere and slowly warm the earth.
工业意味着煤，后来意味着石油。我们开始燃烧大量的油—导致二氧化碳的含量上升，结果二氧化碳就能够把更多的热量锁留在大气层内从而使地球逐渐变暖。
Fewer than a hundred yards from the South Pole, upwind from the ice runway where the ski plane lands and keeps its engines running to prevent the metal parts from freeze-locking together, scientists monitor the air several times every day to chart the course of that inexorable change.
在离南极不到几百码的冰雪跑道的逆风处—雪上飞机在这里着陆以使发动机保持转动，从而防止金属部件冻锁在一起。科学家们每天都要对天空监测数次，以便绘制出有关这种不可抗拒的变化过程的图表。
During my visit, I watched one scientist draw the results of that day's measurements, pushing the end of a steep line still higher on the graph.
在我访问期间，我观看了一位科学家绘出的当天测量的结果。他把图表上的一条陡直向上的线的末端又向上推进一步。
He told me how easy it is-there at the end of the earth-to see that this enormous change in the global atmosphere is still picking up speed.
他告诉我—在地球的尽头这里—很容易看到地球大气层的巨大变化的速度仍在加快。
Two and a half years later I slept under the midnight sun at the other end of our planet, in a small tent pitched on a twelve-foot-thick slab of ice floating in the frigid 2 Arctic Ocean.
两年半后，在我们星球的另一端，我在午夜的阳光下睡在一个搭在严寒的北冰洋上的一块12 英寸厚的浮冰上的小帐蓬里。
After a hearty breakfast, my companions and I traveled by snowmobiles a few miles farther north to a rendezvous point where the ice was thinner -only three and a half feet thick-and a nuclear submarine hovered in the water below.
在吃了一顿丰盛的早餐后，我和同伴们乘雪上汽车又向北走了几英里来到一个约定地点，这里的冰比较薄—只有3.5英尺厚，一艘核潜艇在冰下的水中守候。
After it crashed through the ice, took on its new passengers, and resubmerged, I talked with scientists who were trying to measure more accurately the thickness of the polar ice cap, which many believe is thinning as a result of global warming.
在它破冰而出装载新乘客并且又重新潜人水中后，我开始与科学家们交谈。他们力求更精确地测量地极冰帽的厚度，因为许多科学家认为，由于地球转暖，地极冰帽正在变薄。
I had just negotiated an agreement between ice scientists and the U. S. Navy to secure the release of previously top secret data from submarine sonar tracks, data that could help them learn what is happening to the north polar cap.
我刚刚通过谈判使研究冰雪的科学家同美国海军之间达成一项协议，确保从潜艇声纳音轨获得的以前属于绝密的数据资料得以公布，这些资料能够帮助科学家们了解北极冰帽正在发生的情况。
Now, I wanted to see the pole itself, and some eight hours after we met the submarine, we were crashing through that ice, surfacing, and then I was standing in an eerily beautiful snowscape, windswept and sparkling white, with the horizon defined by little hummocks, or "pressure ridges" of ice that are pushed up like tiny mountain ranges when separate sheets collide.
现在，我想看看北极本身。在我们进人潜艇大约八小时后，潜艇撞碎那片冰层，浮出 水面。然后，我站在一幅有点神秘可怕的美丽的雪景之中，大地被风吹扫得白茫茫一片，闪 闪发光。地平线上勾画出一个个小冰丘的轮廓，或称之为冰的“压力脊”，这些冰脊是在分 开的冰层互相撞击时挤出来的小山脉。
But here too, CO2 levels are rising just as rapidly, and ultimately temperature will rise with them-indeed, global warming is expected to push temperatures up much more rapidly in the polar regions than in the rest of the world.
但是在这里，二氧化碳的含量也以同样快的速度上升，最终气温将随之升高，的确，预料地球转暖将使气温上升的速度在极区要比在世界上其他地区快得多。
As the polar air warms, the ice here will thin; and since the, polar cap plays such a crucial role in the world's weather system, the consequences of a thinning cap could be disastrous.
随着地极大气转暖，这里的冰将变薄。由于地极冰帽在世界的气象系统中起着如此决 定性的作用，冰帽变薄的后果可能是灾难性的。
Considering such scenarios is not a purely speculative exercise.
我考虑到可能出现这样一些情况并不完全是凭空猜测。
Six months after I returned from the North Pole, a team of scientists reported dramatic changes in the pattern of ice distribution in the Arctic, and a second team reported a still controversial claim (which a variety of data now suggest) that, overall, the north polar cap has thinned by 2 percent in just the last decade.
我从北极回来六个月后，一队科学家的报告说，北极的冰的分布情况发生了引人注目 的变化，而后来又去了一队科学家，他们在报告中提出了一个仍然有争论的说法（现在各种不同的数据资料都表明这个说法是正确的），即总的来说，仅在过去的十年里北极冰帽就比 以前薄了百分之二。
Moreover, scientists established several years ago that in many land areas north of the Arctic Circle, the spring snowmelt now comes earlier every year, and deep in the tundra below, the temperature of the earth is steadily rising.
此外，几年前科学家们就已经证实，在北极圈以北的许多陆地区域，春天雪融化成水 一年比一年早。而且在冻土带地下深处，地温正在逐步上升。
As it happens, some of the most disturbing images of environmental destruction can be found exactly halfway between the North and South poles -precisely at the equator in Brazil-where billowing clouds of smoke regularly blacken the sky above the immense but now threatened Amazon rain forest.
说来也巧，有些最令人不安的破坏环境的景象就在南北极之间的正中地带—正好在 巴西的赤道—在那里，滚滚烟云日复一日地把那一望无际但如今已受到威胁的亚马逊雨林的上空染黑。
Acre by acre, the rain forest is being burned to create fast pasture for fast-food beef; as I learned when I went there in early 1989, the fires are set earlier and earlier in the dry season now, with more than one Tennessee's worth of rain forest being slashed and burned each year.
雨林被一英亩一英亩地烧毁，用来为提供快餐牛肉创建快速养牛场。我于1989 年初去那里时听说现在旱季火烧雨林的时间越来越早，每年要有一个比田纳西州还要大的雨林遭到砍伐和烧毁。
According to our guide, the biologist Tom Lovejoy, there are more different species of birds in each square mile of the Amazon than exist in all of North America-which means we are silencing thousands of songs we have never even heard.
据我们的向导生物学家汤姆?洛夫乔伊说，亚马孙雨林每平方公里上的鸟的种类比生活在整个北美的鸟的种类还要多—这意味着，我们正消灭数以千计的我们甚至从未听到过的歌曲。
But one doesn't have to travel around the world to witness humankind's assault on the earth. Images that signal the distress of our global environment are now commonly seen almost anywhere.
然而人们无需走遍世界就能目睹人类对地球的攻击。如今标志着我们全球环境的痛苦的景象几乎到处可见。
On some nights, in high northern latitudes, the sky itself offers another ghostly image that signals the loss of ecological balance now in progress.
在北纬高纬度地区，有几个夜晚，天空本身提供了又一个标志着生态正在失去平衡的 可怕景象。
If the sky is clear after sunset-and if you are watching from a place where pollution hasn't blotted out the night sky altogether -you can sometimes see a strange kind of cloud high in the sky.
如果日落后天空晴朗—并且如果你观察一块没有完全被污染遮暗的夜空—你有时能够看到一种奇怪的云团高悬天空。
This "noctilucent cloud" occasionally appears when the earth is first cloaked in 4 the evening darkness; shimmering above us with a translucent whiteness, these clouds seem quite unnatural: And they should:
当地球刚被黑夜吞没时，这种“夜光云”会偶尔出现，呈现出半透明的白色，在我们的头顶上闪闪发光，这些云看上去很怪，它们应该看上去很怪。
noctilucent clouds have begun to appear more often because of a huge buildup of methane gas in the atmosphere.
由于大气层中的甲烷气体大量增加，夜光云的出现开始变得更为经常。
Also called natural gas, methane is released from landfills, from coal mines and rice paddies, from billions of termites that swarm through the freshly cut forestland, from the burning of biomass and from a variety of other human activities.
甲烷也被称为天然气，是从垃圾堆、煤矿、稻田、在刚刚遭到砍伐的林地成群爬过 的几十亿白蚁、被燃烧的一个地区的生物量以及从人类其他各式各样活动释放出来的。
Even though noctilucent clouds were sometimes seen in the past, all this extra methane carries more water vapor into the upper atmosphere, where it condenses at much higher altitudes to form more clouds that the sun's rays still strike long after sunset has brought the beginning of night to the surface far beneath them.
虽然过去有时也能看到夜光云，但是由于所有上述这些外加的甲烷把更多的水蒸气带 人大气层的上层，这样水蒸气就在比以前高很多的高处凝固，形成更多的云。结果，当日落 开始把黑夜带到远在这些云下的地球表面很长时间以后，太阳的光线仍然照射在这些云上。
What should we feel toward these ghosts in the sky? Simple wonder or the mix of emotions we feel at the zoo?
对天空中那些可怕的景象我们应该作何感想呢？只是惊奇还是我们在动物园里所感到的那种矛盾心情呢？
Perhaps we should feel awe for our own power: just as men tear tusks from elephants' heads in such quantity as to threaten the beast with extinction, we are ripping matter from its place in the earth in such volume as to upset the balance between daylight and darkness.
也许我们应该对自己的强大力量感到敬畏：就像人从大象头上拔下如此之多的象牙，以致使这种动物面临灭绝的威胁一样，我们正在强把如此大量的物质撕离它们在地球上的位置，以致破坏了白天与黑夜的平衡。
In the process, we are once again adding to the threat of global warming, because methane has been one of the fastest-growing greenhouse gases, and is third only to carbon dioxide and water vapor in total volume, changing the chemistry of the upper atmosphere.
在这样做的过程中，我们又一次增加了地球转暖的威胁，因为甲烷是增长最快的暖房气体之一，其总量仅次于二氧化碳和水蒸气而居第三位，从而改变了大气层上层的化学成分。
But, without even considering that threat, shouldn't it startle us that we have now put these clouds in the evening sky which glisten with a spectral light?
但是，即使不考虑那种威胁，单就我们现在把这些云放人夜空让它像鬼火似地发出一闪一闪的亮光这一点而论，难道还不应该使我们大吃一惊吗？
Or have our eyes adjusted so completely to the bright lights of civilization that we can't see these clouds for what they are-a physical manifestation of the violent collision between human civilization and the earth?
或者是我们的眼睛已经完全适应了这种象征着文明的亮光，以致看不到这些云的本质—人类文明与地球之间猛烈碰撞的具体表现？
Even though it is sometimes hard to see their meaning, we have by now all witnessed surprising experiences that signal the damage from our assault on the environment-whether it's the new frequency of days when the temperature exceeds 100 degrees, the new speed with which the sun burns our skin, or the new constancy of public debate over what to do with growing mountains of waste.
即使有时很难看清这些云的意义，但是到目前为止我们全都目睹了许多标志着我们对环境的攻击给地球造成破坏的惊人情况—不论是气温超过100度的天气的出现率比以前高、太阳烧灼我们皮肤的速度比以前快还是公众就如何处理日益增多的堆积如山的垃圾这个问题进行的辩论比以前多。
But our response to these signals is puzzling. Why haven't we launched a massive effort to save our environment?
但是我们对这些标志着破坏地球的现象所作出的回应令人迷惑不解。为什么我们没有 作出巨大努力来拯救我们的环境？
To come at the question another way: Why do some images startle us into immediate action and focus our attention on ways to respond effectively?
让我们换一个方式来提这个问题：为什么有些景象使我们大吃一惊因而立即采取行动 并且集中注意力寻找作出有效回应的方式？
And why do other images, though sometimes equally dramatic, produce instead a kind of paralysis, focusing our attention not on ways to respond but rather on some convenient, less painful distraction?
而为什么另一些景象，虽然有时同样引人注目，我们的回应却是一种麻木不仁，不是集中注意力寻找作出回应的方式，而是集中注意力去干容易做的、不那么费力气的别的什么事情？
Still, there are so many distressing images of environmental destruction that sometimes it seems impossible to know how to absorb or comprehend them.
然而，破坏环境的令人悲痛的景象是如此之多，以致有时人们似乎不可能知道如何接 受或理解它们。
Before considering the threats themselves, it may be helpful to classify them and thus begin to organize our thoughts and feelings so that we may be able to respond appropriately.
在考虑这些威胁本身之前先把它们分类，从而开始把我们的思想和感觉组织得有条有理，以便我们也许能够作出适当的回应—这样做也许是有益处的。
A useful system comes from the military, which frequently places a conflict in one of three different categories, according to the theater in which it takes place.
军方创造了几套有用的方法。它经常把一项冲突按其发生的场所范围归人三大不同类 别中的一类。
There are" local" skirmishes, “regional" battles, and "strategic" conflicts. This third category is reserved for struggles that can threaten a nation's survival and must be understood in a global context.
这三大类冲突是：“地方性”小规模战斗、“地区性’”战役和“战略性”冲突。第三类 专指可能威胁一国生存因而必须从全球角度考虑的争。
Environmental threats can be considered in the same way. For example, most instances of water pollution, air pollution, and illegal waste dumping are essentially 6 local in nature.
破坏环境的威胁也可以用同样的方式来考虑。例如，大多数有关水被全部污染、空气 被全部污染和非法倾倒垃圾的事例，其性质从根本上讲是地方性的。
Problems like acid rain, the contamination of underground aquifers, and large oil spills are fundamentally regional.
像酸雨、地下含水土层被污染以及大片鲨出的石油基本上是地区性的。
In both of these categories, there may be so many similar instances of particular local and regional problems occurring simultaneously all over the world that the pattern appears to be global, but the problems themselves are still not truly strategic because the operation of the global environment is not affected and the survival of civilization is not at stake.
在上述两类中，可能有如此之多类似的具有地方性和地区性特殊问题性质的事例在全 世界范围内同时发生，以致从表面形式看似乎是全球性的。然而这些问题本身仍然不真正是 战略性的，因为全球环境的运转并没有受到影响，文明的存在并没有处于危险之中。
However, a new class of environmental problems does affect the global ecological system, and these threats are fundamentally strategic.
然而，有一类新的破坏环境的问题确实影响全球的生态系统，而且这些威胁基本上是战略性的。
The 600 percent increase in the amount of chlorine in the atmosphere during the last forty years has taken place not just in those countries producing the chlorofluorocarbons responsible but in the air above every country, above Antarctica, above the North Pole and the Pacific Ocean-all the way from the surface of the earth to the top of the sky.
过去四十年中大气层氯的含量增加了百分之六百，这不仅发生在那些生产与此直接相关的氟里昂的国家，而且发生在所有国家的上空，还同样发生在南极上空、北极上空和太平洋上空—从地球表面一直到天空深处。
