(单词翻译:单击)
Most of the time, the universe is a really confusing place.
人类很多时候都对宇宙里的现象很迷惑。
Literally every day, there's something that happens somewhere that scientists just can't understand.
实际上，每天都有某些地方发生着科学家无法理解的事情。
And sometimes, things can seem so weird that it would almost make sense
而且有时候，由于事情太过诡异，要想说得通，
if they were happening on purpose, like, if they were caused by aliens.
就只能把它们解释为有什么存在故意为之造成的，比如外星人。
Of course, so far, it's never actually been aliens, but we do get tripped up every now and again.
当然啦，目前为止，还没有真的出现过外星人，但我们确实时不时地陷入谜团。
Here are three of the most puzzling times people thought we found aliens, but turned out to be wrong.
下面给大家介绍三个最让人摸不清头脑的案例，这三个案例里的人都以为自己发现了外星人，但其实他们想多了。
Where better to start than with what was maybe the original alien signal?
当然要先从人类发现可能是最初的外星人信号开始咯！
Back when at least one scientist was convinced there were giant, alien-made canals on the surface of Mars.
那时候，肯定是有科学家坚信火星表面确实存在外星人建造的大型运河的。
The whole episode started with a simple misunderstanding.
整个故事要从一个简单的误解说起。
In 1877, the Italian astronomer Giovanni Schiaparelli was the first to publish a map of Mars that was, like, at all accurate.
1877年，意大利天文学家乔范尼·夏帕雷利是第一个发表了所谓完整火星地图的人。
And he noticed and charted a number of what looked like channels, which he labeled with the Italian word canali.
而且他还发现并记录了许多形似通道的东西，他用与运河同义的意大利单词canali进行了标注。
Unfortunately, when his map was translated into English, a sloppy translation turned canali into canals instead of channels.
不幸的是，他的地图被译成英文版的时候，粗心的翻译将canali译成了channel（通道）。
Although, it could have also been confused with cannoli, which would have been a lot funnier, and more delicious.
不过，可能当时那个翻译差点翻成了cannoli（奶油甜馅煎饼卷），那就有意思多了，也鲜美多了。
This mistranslation probably made sense to many mapmakers because the world was in the midst of a canal-building craze,
这个误翻可能更容易为许多制图师所理解，因为当时全球的很多地方都在如火如荼地构建运河，
like, Egypt's Suez Canal had just been completed in 1869.
比如埃及的苏伊士运河才于1869年竣工不久。
So if giant, watery ditches were good enough for us Earthlings, why not for the Martians, too?
那么，如果地球人喜欢大型水渠，那么火星人为什么不能喜欢呢？
In the late 1800s, it also wasn't weird to think that Mars might be habitable,
19世纪末的时候，觉得火星可以居住也没什么好奇怪的，
since our planets seemed similar in some ways, and no one had been there yet.
因为从某方面看，星球之间十分相似，而且也没人到过火星。
Still, all this canal talk might have stopped there if it hadn't captured the attention of American astronomer Percival Lowell.
不过，有关于运河的奇谈要是没有得到美国天文学家帕西瓦尔·罗威尔的注意的话，也都是枉然。
After a few Mars observations of his own, he fell in love with the idea of alien canals
在对火星进行了一些观测之后，帕西瓦尔·罗威尔就痴迷于外星人在火星上建造运河的点子，
and began publishing elaborate stories about a dying civilization trying to farm on a dried-out world.
并着手发表了内容详实的故事，情节是一个即将灭绝的文明试图在干涸的世界里务农，
Kinda like astronomy fan-fiction.
有点天文科幻的意思。
Most scientists disagreed, but the idea caught on enough for papers like the New York Times to write about it seriously.
虽然大多数科学家并不赞同，但他的观点却吸引很多报社一本正经地对他的猜想进行报道，比如《纽约时报》
Lowell even built an observatory to study the canals, but a funny thing started to happen:
罗威尔甚至还建造了一个天文台来研究火星上的运河，不过接下来发生了一件有趣的事：
The closer astronomers looked, the fewer canals they could see. Almost like they didn't exist.
观测地越近，能看到的运河反而越少，就仿佛这些运河从未存在过一样。
Today, we know the Mars canals were just an optical illusion.
今天的我们都已经知道，火星上的运河只是错视的结果。
Our eyes tend to try to make lines out of groups of details too fine to see,
如果我们观测的东西太小而不容易看见的话，我们的眼睛就倾向于从一组组小细节中提炼出轮廓。
and since Mars is full of craters, mountains, and all sorts of other tiny features,
而由于火星上有很多弹坑、群山和各种其他细小的标识，
it makes sense that astronomers like Lowell would have spotted canals where there weren't any.
所以罗威尔等天文学家在完全没有运河的地方看到了运河是可以说的通的。
Still, some people didn't want to give them up,
虽然如此，还是有一些人不想放弃，
so the question wasn't settled for good until NASA's Mariner spacecraft actually arrived at Mars in the 1960s.
所以这个问题知道美国宇航局的水手号探测器于上世纪60年代抵达火星后才得以彻底地解决。
And the final verdict? Definitely no alien canals.
那最后的裁定结果是什么呢？当时是没有外星人建造的运河啦。
Giant canals might've been the biggest alien signal we've ever been fooled by, but Mars has also given us the smallest.
虽然大型运河可能是我们关于外星人信号所闹过的最大笑话，但人类也观测过火星的最小信号。
In 1996, scientists studying a Martian meteorite, named ALH84001, made an incredible claim:
1996年，一些研究ALH84001火星陨石的科学家做了一项不可思议的声明：
They argued that this 2-kilogram hunk of Mars contained microscopic fossils of alien life.
他们认为，这四斤重的火星陨石里含有外星生物的微体化石。
In a paper published in the journal Science, the team laid out four lines of evidence.
《科学》杂志发表的一篇论文里，研究小组列出了四行证据。
By looking at slices of the meteorite with a microscope,
通过显微镜观察陨石的切面，
they identified blob-like structures that looked a lot like tiny versions of some Earth bacteria.
他们发现了团状结构，看起来很像地球上细菌的缩小版。
The meteorite also contained traces of compounds called polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons,
这块陨石里还有化合物多环芳烃的痕迹，
which are rings of carbon sometimes created by living things.
而多环芳烃这种碳环结构是有时候生物才会产生的东西。
And it contained carbonite, the substance that forms marine shells and skeletons,
而且其中的天然焦成分是形成海洋贝壳和骨骼的必要成分。
which, despite having the same name, is not the same thing that trapped Han Solo. That stuff's not real.
不过，虽然它也有同样的成分，但却不是困住汉·索罗的那个东西，但这个东西也不是真实存在的。
Finally, and most convincingly, were bits of magnetite,
最后，也是最迷惑人心的部分就是所发现的些许磁铁矿，
a magnetic mineral produced by some lifeforms, trapped within the carbonite.
它们是在天然焦里面发现的、由某种生命形式产生的磁性矿物。
So, it seemed a lot like we found signs of life!
所以看起来就像是我们发现了生命存在的痕迹。
But, it didn't take long for scientists to do what they do best: attack those arguments.
但没过多久，科学家们就做了他们最擅长的事：推翻之前的说法。
And eventually, other researchers found explanations for how everything could have formed without life.
最后，其他一些研究人员发现了如何能解释这种没有生命存在却能产生一切生命存在迹象的情况，
Experiments conducted in 2001, for example, demonstrated that the conditions the meteorite would have experienced on the surface of Mars
比如，2001年的数次实验表明陨石在火星表面经历的情形
could've produced bits of magnetite wrapped in carbonite.
可能造成磁铁矿包裹在天然焦里的情况。
Now, technically, we can't say the meteorite doesn't contain fossilized aliens,
目前，从技术上来讲，我们不能判断陨石里面是否含有外星人的化石，
because this evidence could have been produced by tiny Martians, too.
因为这个证据可能是小火星人自己弄出来的。
But most scientists are pretty confident we haven't found ET.
但大多数科学家非常坚信人类并没有发现外星人。
Finally, not all of our so-called "evidence" of aliens comes from Mars.
最后，人类发现的所谓“证据”并不都是来自火星的。
Sometimes, those signals come from much closer to home.
有时候，这样的信号来自于离地球更近的地方。
Us pesky humans were to blame for one of the weirdest-ever astronomical mysteries, called perytons.
史上最怪异的天文学谜团叫做鹿鸟暴，也是人类的笑谈。
Perytons were weird, millisecond-long radio signals picked up starting in 1998 by Australia's Parkes Observatory.
鹿鸟暴是澳大利亚帕克斯天文台从1998年开始发现的只有毫秒长的怪异无线电信号。
They looked a lot like fast radio bursts, those mysterious signals that do come from space,
其特点很像确实来源于宇宙的快速射电暴，
but unlike FRBs, perytons would appear around the same times during the day and seemed to come from everywhere.
但跟快速射电暴不同的是，鹿鸟暴每天几乎都在同样的时段出现，而且来源方向不定。
So… aliens? To be fair, scientists never really thought aliens were to blame, even if other people did,
所以呢？是外星人干的么？讲真，科学家其实从来没真地认为是外星人做得，不管其他人怎么想，
but it still took more than a decade to figure out what was to blame.
但还是用了十多年时间才搞明白是怎么回事。
In 2014, a special radio detector was installed which was designed to listen for Earth-based interference, and it quickly found the culprit:
2014年，科学家安装了一个特殊的无线电探测器，设计它的初衷是地球受到的干扰。安装后，这个探测器很快就发现了罪魁祸首：
a perfectly ordinary microwave oven. Really.
一台普通的不能再普通的微波炉，没开玩笑哦。
Microwaves heat food by using, well, microwaves, which are a kind of radio wave, to excite the water molecules within the food.
微波炉加热食物的原理是使用微波，用这种无线电波来刺激食物中的水分子。
Normally, the machine's outer casing keeps that energy inside...
正常情况下，微波炉的外壳是可以将微波阻隔在其里面的……
unless, of course, you get too impatient and open the door too early, because you need your Hot Pocket, like, now.
不过当然也有例外情况，比如你没等响铃就过早地打开了微波炉的门，因为你像现在一样等不及了。
Those bursts aren't dangerous to us, but one of the world's most sensitive antennas had no trouble picking them up.
虽然这种暴对人类来说并不危险，但世界上最敏锐的天线却可以不费吹灰之力地捕获它，
And that caused the mysterious perytons. So, once again… we have not discovered aliens. Yet.
从而形成神秘的鹿鸟暴，所以这第三次，人类也还是没发现外星人存在的证据。
And if you're wondering why we haven't found aliens yet, well, so are we, and so was Enrico Fermi.
如果你想不明白人类为何还没发现外星人的话，你不是一个人哦！我们也没想明白，恩里科·费米也没想明白。
You can learn more about his ideas in our episode on Fermi's paradox!
想要了解更多关于费米的想法的话，我们有一集是专门讲他的费米悖论的哦！
