8 Chapter 7 Albert's Time Is Up

Chapter 7 Albert's Time Is Up "Everything is determined, the beginning as well as the end, by forces over which we have no control. It is determined for the insect as well as for the star. Human beings, vegetables or cosmic dust, we all dance to a mysterious tune, intoned in the distance by an invisible player." —Albert Einstein By 1948, Albert was in very poor health. His heart was getting weaker and weaker. A doctor insisted that Albert take a certain medicine. Albert hesitated. The doctor insisted. So Albert took the medicine and immediately got sick to his stomach.

第七章阿尔伯特的时间到了“一切都是由我们无法控制的力量决定的，包括开始和结束。 它既适用于恒星，也适用于昆虫。 人类，蔬菜或宇宙尘埃，我们都随着神秘的曲调起舞，由一个看不见的演奏者在远处吟唱。” -阿尔伯特·爱因斯坦1948年，阿尔伯特的健康状况极差。 他的心脏越来越虚弱。 一位医生坚持要艾伯特吃某种药。 艾伯特犹豫了一下。医生坚持说。 于是艾伯特吃了药，马上胃就不舒服了。

"There," he snapped at the doctor, "do you feel better now?" Yet there was reason for happiness during those years. In 1948 the Jewish nation of Israel was created. Albert was overjoyed. All his work had helped to bring about something wonderful. After Israel's first president died, Albert was asked to become the next president. Albert said no. "Politics is for the moment," he once wrote, "while an equation is for eternity." Still he was greatly honored by the offer. In 1950, Albert made his will. He wanted all his science papers left to the Hebrew University in Jerusalem. In 1951, Maja died. Now Albert had neither his wife nor sister. He was more alone than ever. He surrounded himself with family photographs. He said, "A photograph never grows old. You and I change, people change all through the months and years but a photograph always remains the same. How nice to look at a photograph of a mother or father taken many years ago. You see them as you remember them. That is why I think a photograph can be kind."

“喂，”他厉声对医生说，“你现在感觉好点了吗?”然而，在那些年里，我们有理由感到幸福。 1948年，犹太国家以色列成立。 阿尔贝欣喜若狂。他所有的工作都促成了一些奇妙的事情。 以色列第一任总统去世后，艾伯特被要求成为下一任总统。 阿尔贝说不。“政治是一时的，”他曾写道，“而方程式是永恒的。” 尽管如此，他还是对这个提议感到非常荣幸。 1950年，阿尔伯特立了遗嘱。 他希望自己所有的科学论文都留给耶路撒冷的希伯来大学。 1951年，Maja去世了。现在阿尔贝既没有妻子也没有妹妹。 他比以往任何时候都更加孤独。 他周围都是家庭照片。 他说:“照片永远不会变老。 你和我都在变，人一年四季都在变，但一张照片却永远不变。 看着多年前父母的照片是多么美好啊。 你看到的和你记忆中的一样。 这就是为什么我认为照片可以是友善的。”

Several years later, after a brief illness, Albert was admitted to the Princeton hospital. On April 17, 1955, he asked that his eyeglasses, some paper, and a pen be brought to his hospital bed. He had work—thinking—to do. The next day he died with a sheet of equations next to him. To the very end Albert was thinking. The last letter he wrote was one that urged all nations to give up nuclear weapons. The Einstein house at 112 Mercer Street in Princeton, New Jersey, is treated no differently than any other home in the neighborhood. That's

几年后，阿尔伯特得了一场小病，住进了普林斯顿医院。 1955年4月17日，他要求把他的眼镜、一些纸和一支笔带到他的病床上。 他有工作要做——思考。 第二天，他去世了，身边放着一张方程式表。 直到最后，艾伯特还在思考。 他写的最后一封信敦促所有国家放弃核武器。 爱因斯坦的住宅位于新泽西州普林斯顿的默瑟街112号，在这里，人们对待它的方式与附近其他住宅没有什么不同。 这是

the way Albert wanted it. He worried that if it was turned into a museum, people would concern themselves too much with his memory and not enough with their own future. After Albert's death, the scientific community mourned the loss of a great and original mind. Jews mourned the loss of a leader who always wished for a better and more peaceful world, even in the darkest moments of Jewish history. And all people mourned the loss of a unique, peace-loving man. Perhaps Albert said it best, "Only a life lived for others is a life worthwhile." Albert was not the best husband. He was not the best father. But as a friend said of Albert, he was "the freest man I have known."

就像艾伯特想要的那样他担心，如果把它变成博物馆，人们会过于关注他的记忆，而不太关心自己的未来。 阿尔伯特去世后，科学界为失去一位伟大而有独创性的人而哀悼。 犹太人哀悼这位即使在犹太历史上最黑暗的时刻也始终希望建立一个更美好、更和平的世界的领袖。 所有人都为失去一位独特的、热爱和平的人而哀悼。 也许阿尔伯特说得最好:“只有为别人而活的生命才是有价值的生命。” 艾伯特不是最好的丈夫。 他不是最好的父亲。 但正如一位朋友对阿尔伯特的评价，他是“我认识的最自由的人”。