萬物簡史 第55期:事物的測定(13)

To complicate matters, after Picard's death thefather-and-son team of Giovanni and Jacques Cassinirepeated Picard's experiments over a larger area andcame up with results that suggested that the Earthwas fatter not at the equator but at the poles—thatNewton, in other words, was exactly wrong. It wasthis that prompted the Academy of Sciences todispatch Bouguer and La Condamine to SouthAmerica to take new measurements.

更為復雜的是，皮卡爾死后，喬瓦尼和雅克·卡西尼父子在更大的區(qū)域內(nèi)重復了皮卡爾的實驗。他們得出的結果顯示，地球鼓起的地方不是在赤道，而是在兩極--換句話說，牛頓完全錯了。正因為如此，科學院才派遣布格和孔達米納去南美洲重新測量。

They chose the Andes because they needed to measure near the equator, to determine ifthere really was a difference in sphericity there, and because they reasoned that mountainswould give them good sightlines. In fact, the mountains of Peru were so constantly lost incloud that the team often had to wait weeks for an hour's clear surveying. On top of that, theyhad selected one of the most nearly impossible terrains on Earth.

他們選擇了安第斯山脈，因為他們需要測量靠近赤道的地方，以確定那里的圓度是否真有差異，還因為他們認為山區(qū)的視野比較開闊。實際上，秘魯?shù)拇笊浇?jīng)常云霧籠罩，這個小組常常不得不等上幾個星期，才等得上一個小時的晴天來進行測量。不僅如此，他們選了個地球上幾乎最難對付的地形。

Peruvians refer to their landscape as muy accidentado—"much accidented"—and this it mostcertainly is. The French had not only to scale some of the world's most challenging mountains—mountains that defeated even their mules—but to reach the mountains they had to ford wildrivers, hack their way through jungles, and cross miles of high, stony desert, nearly all of ituncharted and far from any source of supplies. But Bouguer and La Condamine were nothingif not tenacious, and they stuck to the task for nine and a half long, grim, sun-blistered years.

秘魯人稱這種地形是"非常少見"的--這話絕對沒錯兒。兩個法國人不僅不得不翻越幾座世界上最具挑戰(zhàn)性的大山--連他們的騾子也過不去的大山--而且，若要抵達那些大山，他們不得不涉過幾條湍急的河流，鉆過密密的叢林，穿越幾公里高高的卵石沙漠，這些地方在地圖上幾乎沒有標記，遠離供給來源。但是，布格和孔達米納是堅忍不拔的人。他們不屈不撓，不怕風吹日曬，堅持執(zhí)行任務，度過了漫長的九年半時間。

Shortly before concluding the project, they received word that a second French team, takingmeasurements in northern Scandinavia (and facing notable discomforts of their own, fromsquelching bogs to dangerous ice floes), had found that a degree was in fact longer near thepoles, as Newton had promised. The Earth was forty-three kilometers stouter when measuredequatorially than when measured from top to bottom around the poles.

在這個項目快要完成的時候，他們突然得到消息，說另一個法國考察隊在斯堪的納維亞半島北部進行測量(面對自己的艱難困苦，從寸步難行的沼澤地，到危機四伏的浮冰)，發(fā)現(xiàn)1度經(jīng)線在兩極附近果真要長，正如牛頓斷言的那樣。地球在赤道地區(qū)的測量結果，要比環(huán)繞兩極從上到下測量的結果厚出43公里。