Chapter 2

CHAPTER 2

第二章

OUR SUN (AKA, THE NUCLEAR EXPLOSION THAT KEEPS US ALIVE) WITH PROFESSOR MORGANA MAYHEM

我们的太阳（也就是让我们活下来的核爆炸）和莫嘉娜教授

WELCOME TO YOUR SECOND CLASS, YOU LITTLE SCOUNDRELS. I'M GOING TO START WITH A QUESTION. HAVE YOU EVER WARMED YOURSELF BY THE LIGHT OF A NUCLEAR EXPLOSION. Well, if you've ever been out in the Sun, the answer is "YES." It's honestly silly how much we take the Sun for granted. Every single day, our planet spins around the vacuum of space and a gigantic deadly fireball of doom lights up the sky. For some reason, people seem to think this is pretty normal and even say things like "That's nice" and "Ooh, what a lovely day." HUMANS ARE VERY WEIRD, I TELL YOU.

欢迎来到你们的第二堂课，你们这些小坏蛋。 我将以一个问题开始。 你曾经在核爆炸的光下取暖过吗？ 好吧，如果你曾经在阳光下，答案是“是的。” 我们把太阳的存在视为理所当然，这实在是愚蠢的。 每一天，我们的星球都在真空中旋转，一个巨大的致命火球照亮了天空。 出于某种原因，人们似乎认为这很正常，甚至会说“太好了”和“哦，多么美好的一天”之类的话。 我告诉你，人类很奇怪。

Okay, I have a confession. Calling the Sun a FIREBALL just now was kind of a lie. The Sun isn't really made of fire. The Sun is actually made of stuff called plasma which is MUCH hotter than boring old fire. HERE'S THE THING: THE SUN IS SO BIG AND HOT AND POWERFUL, IT'S ALMOST IMPOSSIBLE TO IMAGINE. And I'm the person who designed the infamous chocolate-powered reverse gravity shoes, so I can imagine some pretty strange things.

好吧，我要坦白一件事。 刚才说太阳是火球有点像谎言。 太阳并不是由火构成的。 太阳实际上是由一种叫做等离子体的东西组成的，它比无聊的旧火要热得多。 事情是这样的：太阳是如此之大，如此之热，如此之强，几乎是无法想象的。 我设计了臭名昭著的巧克力动力反重力鞋，所以我可以想象一些非常奇怪的东西。

HERE'S HOW RIDICULOUS THE SUN IS: IT'S SO BIG, YOU COULD FIT MORE THAN 1,500,000 PLANET EARTHS INSIDE IT THE TEMPERATURE AT THE SURFACE IS NEARLY 11,000°F RIGHT IN THE MIDDLE, THE TEMPERATURE REACHES ABOUT 27,000,000°F HOW DOES SOMETHING LIKE THIS EVEN EXIST? I think the best thing to do is to go back to the beginning of our SOLAR SYSTEM and find out how the Sun was made. If for some reason you haven't got a time machine handy, you'll just have to use your imagination. TIME: 4,600,000,000 years ago. About 3pm.

这就是太阳的荒谬之处：它太大了，里面可以装下150万个地球表面的温度接近1.1万华氏度，中间的温度达到2700万华氏度这样的东西是怎么存在的？ 我认为最好的办法是回到太阳系的起源，找出太阳是如何形成的。 如果由于某种原因你手边没有时光机，你只能发挥你的想象力了。 时间：46亿年前。 大约下午3点。

It all started with a cloud of gas. It's a very thin cloud of gas so thin that if you were floating in the middle of the cloud, you'd think you were in empty space. (It's also made of hydrogen, which you can't breathe anyway. So you wouldn't really want to be floating in the middle of it.) This faintly glowing cloud is also huge; MILLIONS and MILLIONS of miles across. So there's a LOT of gas in there. THIS IS HOW OUR SUN BEGAN. For the first few million years, the cloud probably sat around doing nothing at all. A bit like you on a Sunday morning. Now, we wait. Just kidding. LET'S FAST-FORWARD TO THE EXCITING BIT.

一切都始于一团气体云。 它是一团非常薄的气体云，薄到如果你漂浮在气体云的中间，你会认为你是在真空中。 (它也是由氢气构成的，反正你也不能呼吸。 所以你不会真的想漂浮在它的中间。)这微微发光的云也是巨大的；横跨数百万英里。 所以这里有很多气体。 太阳就是这样诞生的。 在最初的几百万年里，云团可能什么都不做。 有点像周日早上的你。 现在，我们等待。只是开玩笑。 让我们快进到激动人心的部分。