心灵的黑匣子 (中英对照)

心灵的黑匣子
The Black Box of the Soul
易水寒 文 王维东 译

飞机和宇宙飞船、地球卫星一般都装有一种叫做黑匣子的东西，它由特殊金属制成，即使整个飞机全部都炸毁，这个黑匣子也完好无损。黑匣子可以记录飞行物的运行速度、区间公里、外部空气压力等重要数据，可以提供失事前的一些变化，帮助人们查找出失事的原因。
On an airplane, a spacecraft or a man-made satellite, there is usually an installed device called the “black box”. It is made of a special kind of metal which, even if the entire craft blew up, would remain intact. The box records such important data as flying speeds, the mileage covered (between points of departure and arrival) and external air pressures, which provide clues as to what changes had occurred before the real thing came along and help to discover the cause(s) of the disaster.

黑匣子成了最后的证据，而最后的证据常常令人目瞪口呆：许多价值连城的飞行物失事竟是由极其低级的失误造成，有的是因为没有装好足够的燃料，有的是因为与迎面飞来的一只小鸟相撞，有的是驾驶员打了一个盹儿，而1986年美国著名的“挑战者”号宇宙飞船竟是因为一颗小小的螺丝钉没有拧紧而炸得粉身碎骨！
The black box, therefore, becomes the last and only piece of evidence left. More often, it reveals a profoundly shocking fact: many of the priceless aircrafts met their doom only because of a simple yet utterly fatal mistake. Some hadn’t been supplied with sufficient fuel; others clashed head-on with a bird flying in their paths. In a handful of cases, the pilots had been dozing off. In 1986, the famous US space shuttle Challenger exploded soon after launch, because a single screw on it was a bit loose!

我想，如果在人的身体上也安上一个黑匣子，记录所有的微妙变化，其显示结果也许会更加触目惊心。你看报刊上刊登的一些拐卖妇女、贪污受贿、杀人越货的案件，那些罪犯的人生败笔，其起因也许是一场小小的口角，或者是羡慕别人有了一套房子，或者只是出于心理不平衡，真正本质败坏、处心积虑要把自己送上断头台的人其实少而又少。他们最后表现出的追悔莫及，一点也不亚于飞行物坠毁前的那一场挣扎！
An idea thus occurs to me: if a human being were equipped with a similar device, tracking all the subtle inner changes that had taken place over time, the results could astound the world even more. Newspapers carry no few such stories from day to day – the abduction of women, cases of graft or bribe-taking, how an innocent man was robbed and killed, and so on. A mortal error，committed by a criminal at a particular point in his life，may have arisen from a mere bicker or out of envy towards a neighbor’s newly-bought house, or because he has otherwise lost his psychological footing. The number of those who were born evil and deliberately sent themselves to the “gallows” is in fact extremely small. The chagrin, ripping through their hearts towards the last moment of their lives, is no different from a struggle waged prior to an aircraft crash!

注意自己的小节，把握自己的心灵，这是安装在人体上的黑匣子给你的振聋发聩的提醒。
Behave properly in small matters and take best care of the soul – this, I insist, is the most ear-deafening message from that mysterious box planted deep inside humans.