2025年9月4日 星期四

Albert Einstein's office...《愛因斯坦文集》（第一卷）愛因斯坦為馬克斯‧普朗克的《科學將走向何方？ 》（1933）所寫的序言許良英等譯“偉大的心靈總是遭遇來自平庸者的強烈反對”



Albert Einstein's office...《愛因斯坦文集》（第一卷）愛因斯坦為馬克斯‧普朗克的《科學將走向何方？ 》（1933）所寫的序言許良英等譯“偉大的心靈總是遭遇來自平庸者的強烈反對”


The supreme task of the physicist is to arrive at those universal elementary laws from which the cosmos can be built up by pure deduction. There is no logical path to these laws; only intuition, resting on sympathetic understanding of experience, can reach them. In this methodological uncertainty, one might suppose that there were any number of possible systems of theoretical physics all equally well justified; and this opinion is no doubt correct, theoretically. But the development of physics has shown that at any given moment, out of all conceivable constructions, a single one has always proved itself decidedly superior to all the rest.
-- Einstein's preface to Max Planck's Where is Science Going? (1933)

物理學家的首要任務是得出那些普遍適用的基本定律，從而透過純粹的演繹推理來建構宇宙。這些定律沒有邏輯路徑可循；只有建立在對經驗的理解之上的直覺才能觸及它們。在這種方法論的不確定性中，人們或許會認為存在著許多可能的理論物理體系，它們都同樣合理；從理論上來說，這種觀點無疑是正確的。但物理學的發展表明，在任何特定時刻，在所有可以想像的構造中，總有一種體系能夠證明自己比其他所有體係都更優越。
——愛因斯坦為馬克斯‧普朗克的《科學將走向何方？ 》（1933）所寫的序言


Albert Einstein's papers, pipe, ashtray and other personal belongings in his Princeton office on the day he died, April 18, 1955.http://ti.me/1AUJOVu
(Ralph Morse—Time & Life Pictures/Getty Images)









愛因斯坦文集雖然有pdf ，不過翻書比較不吃眼力。
希望能讀懂大部分的文章......




爱因斯坦文集（第一卷）增補版1976/2009
作者: 爱因斯坦
译者: 许良英 / 范岱年.....
出版社: 商务印书馆
出版年: 1976/2009第2版



許良英（1920年5月3日－2013年1月28日）生於浙江省臨海市，畢業於浙江大學，為中國知名科學史家、思想家、社會活動家，長期專於愛因斯坦的著作翻譯與研究工作。[1][2]

生平

許良英1920年5月3日出生於今浙江省臨海市括蒼鎮張家渡村，1940年到達貴州省遵義縣，1942年，他從浙江大學物理系畢業，許良英是束星北和嚴家淦的學生，主要研究相對論和量子力學，在目睹國民黨抓壯丁之後，毅然加入中共地下黨。[1][2][3]
中共建政後，許良英選擇留在中國大陸，於《科學通報》當編輯。1955年因為「反胡風和肅反運動」，被批判和停職審查一年。[1][2][3]
1957年反右運動期間，許良英被劃為右派，開除中國共產黨黨籍，並且被送到地方接受勞動改造。[4][2]
1978年5月，中共中央發布[1978]55號文件，即《貫徹中央關於全部摘掉右派分子帽子決定的實施方案》，許良英恢復了黨籍並回到北京市，被安排擔任中國科學院自然科學史研究所研究員。[1][2][3]
1985年，中央紀委書記王鶴壽宣布第二次開除許良英的黨籍，原因是許良英在浙江大學演講宣揚資產階級自由化。[1][2]
1986年，許良英發起「反右運動歷史學術討論會」。1987年6月8日，陸鏗在英屬香港舉辦政治民主化研討會，許良英寄去一篇文章。1989年，許良英寫出政治民主化的聯署信，42人簽名。[1][2]
1992年，許良英發表《沒有政治民主，改革不可能成功》，呼籲政治體制改革；1994年，其《為改善我國人權狀況呼籲》刊登在《紐約時報》頭版。1995年，許良英發起《迎接聯合國寬容年，呼喚實現國內寬容》聯署，45人簽名。[1][2]
2006年，美國《紐約時報》發表專文《北京的愛因斯坦傳人：一個為真理奮鬥的叛逆者》講述許良英的生平故事。[1][2]2010年，他同學者邵建進行爭論，提出應「走出復古迷津，重新回歸『五四』」。[3]
2013年元旦前夕，其妻王來棣因腦溢血去世，同日下午許因肺部感染住進北京海淀醫院11樓重症監護室，病情一直反覆，約一月後的2013年1月28日13點25分去世，終年93歲[3]；夫婦遺體一同捐獻給北京大學醫學院，遺體告別式於同月30日下午3時在北大醫學部西門遺體捐獻中心舉行。

作品

譯著

  • 《愛因斯坦文集》. 北京市: 商務印書館. 1976-1979（2009年增訂再版本）. ISBN 9787100071666 （簡體中文）.
  • 《愛因斯坦論猶太人問題》. 北京市: 中央編譯出版社. 2007:  182. ISBN 9787802114166 （簡體中文）.
  • 《愛因斯坦奇蹟年》. 上海科技教育出版社:  167. ISBN 9787542843593 （簡體中文）.

編著

  • 《走進愛因斯坦》. 遼寧省: 遼寧教育出版社. 2005:  254. ISBN 9787538274608 （簡體中文）.
  • 《科學，理性，民主──許良英文集（1977-1999）》. 美國: 明鏡出版社. 2002:  254. ISBN 9789628744619 （正體中文）.

許良英，為真理奮鬥的愛因斯坦傳人

DENNIS OVERBYE 報道 2013年01月29日

北京——[中國知名物理學家、思想家、社會活動家許良英，2013年1月28日在北京海 淀醫院去世，享年93歲。——編者] 第一次遭到清洗時，許良英37歲，是一名很有前途的物理學家、思想家和歷史學家，也是一名共產黨老地下黨員。他不得 不和妻子離婚，離開自己的兒子，搬到母親鄉下的農場。
30年後，在當局對1989年民主運動的鎮壓中，許良英因心臟病發作而躲過了牢獄之災，或是更嚴重的命運。
文化大革命時期，紅衛兵搶走了許良英博士在農場改造期間嘔心瀝血翻譯出來的愛因斯坦文集。武裝警衛曾經包圍了他的住所，以防止他接近當時的美國國務卿沃倫·克里斯托弗(Warren Christopher)。
70年來，許良英是阿爾伯特·愛因斯坦(Albert Einstein)在中國的傳人。他把革命和物理學交織在一起，為政治自由和科學探索精神之價值而呼喊，儘管執政者往往不關心這些。他翻譯的愛因斯坦文集 在失而復得後出版，幫助中國人再次燃起了對愛因斯坦和科學的興趣。
今天的中國領導人說，科學是國家現代化和發展的關鍵，但許良英並沒有感到高興。
“他們只是利用科學達到他們自己的目的，”他最近說。
他說，當局仍然在竊聽他的電話。
如今86歲的許良英已是白髮蒼蒼。年復一年，一批批的學者、人權活動人士和記者來到他的俯瞰北京市內大學區的、堆滿書籍的公寓中，拜訪這位老人。
如果他不是中國年紀最大的異見人士，他至少一定是中國學問最卓越的異見人士了，發表了200多篇論文，編著了六本書。歷史學家梅瀚瀾(H. Lyman Miller)在其著作《中國在後毛澤東時代的科學和異見》(Science and Dissent in Post-Mao China)一書中，稱他為“典範人物”。高山仰止，景行行止，用來形容他，庶不為過。而他那一身傲骨，卻絲毫不減當年。
12年前，他在《紐約時報》上公然說後來共產黨的改革派是“諂媚小人”。
最近某天的上午，許良英坐在扶手椅上，講述起他作為愛因斯坦式的民主人士的冒險經歷，他用手指點着，雙臂在空中揮舞，不時發出爽朗大笑。在對面的文件柜上擺着阿爾伯特·愛因斯坦肖像，正神情嚴肅地向下俯視。
“偉大的心靈總是遭遇來自平庸者的強烈反對，”題詞這樣寫道。
許良英身着藍色襯衣，穿着拖鞋，戴着厚厚的眼鏡，他從自己舒適的扶手椅上站起來，走到這幅肖像的下面，說道，“這是他最好的一句名言。”
許良英於1920年出生在浙江臨海市，他和愛因斯坦之間的緣分始於中學時讀到的一本愛因斯坦文集《我眼中的世界》(The World as I See It)，這本書中既講科學，又談政治。
書中有一段話被年輕的許良英划了線：“國家為人而立，而非人為國家而活。國家的最高使命是保護個人，使其有機會發展成為有創造才能的人。”
許良英說，“我想成為這樣的人。”
1939年，他進入浙江大學，他在自己的入學志願表格中寫道，他想要成為“現代物理學的權威”。但政治打斷了夢想。
1937年，日本全面侵華。為避兵火，浙大屢次搬遷，有時遇到轟炸，學生們不得不逃到山洞裡躲藏。在這期間，許良英跋涉了中國的廣大鄉村，洞悉了不少觸目驚心的現實。有人衣衫襤褸，穴居苟活，地主卻豐衣足食。
“這樣的差異太不合理，”他回憶起自己當時的想法，並得出結論，中國需要“完全的革命”。他下定決心加入共產黨地下組織。
同時，他在學業上也成績優異，畢業時，他的導師、中國原子彈之父王淦昌想讓他擔任其研究助理，研究中微子這種神奇的亞原子粒子。
可是，年輕的許良英卻起身投奔革命。在接下來的兩年中，他曾在五所學校任教。日軍侵佔他所執教的省份後，他的老導師在當地的報紙上刊登啟事，懇請他回去從事研究。許良英確實回到了大學，但他繼續熱心於政治，讓物理系成為了該大學的共產黨活動中心，而他則成了黨委書記。
1949年，共產黨終於奪取政權，許良英來到北京，進入了中國科學院。在中科院，他做過一段時間的總審查員，檢查科學論文是否有反革命傾向或危害國家安全的內容。如今他說當時的工作是“錯走了一步”。不久，他就發現，他不可能既追隨愛因斯坦，又追隨毛澤東。
1957年，毛澤東號召開展“百花齊放”運動，鼓勵人們暢所欲言、提出批評。但後來，毛髮現事態失控，隨即決定又發起一個新的運動，剷除“右派分子”。
許良英對新運動提出批評，他自己也遭到了《人民日報》的抨擊，該報稱他不僅是右派，而是極端右派。中國科學院命令他到中國東北的農場工作，但他提出，自己患有關節炎而東北太冷。
於是，中科院讓他自便。他便回到了自己在北京的寓所。
他的妻子王來棣是一名歷史學家，當時夫妻二人已有一個7歲和一個14歲的孩子，而妻子又有孕在身。
他說，妻子痛哭了三天，以至於引起小產，孩子沒有保住。因為保護丈夫，王來棣被開除出黨。許良英說，在“巨大的壓力下”，妻子提出離婚。他被迫回到臨海的老家農場。
後來，他被摘了右派帽子。1962年，科學院讓他翻譯一部新的愛因斯坦哲學散文和演講集。
出版愛因斯坦著作的決定並不是完全出自對他的尊崇。“毛澤東想成為全世界的革命領袖，”許良英解釋道。他說，為達到這個目的，“毛澤東想確認並批判世界上所有政治立場或哲學立場有悖於馬克思主義的科學家。”
愛因斯坦也上了共產黨的黑名單，這還要拜斯大林的助手安德烈·日丹諾夫(Andrei Zhdanov)之賜。此人在1947年稱愛因斯坦的理論是反革命，有資產階級思想。馬克思哲學假設的是一個無窮無盡的宇宙，但根據廣義相對論，時空可以 被彎曲成一個球體，因此，即使時空沒有邊界，但也是有限的。另外，相對論暗示宇宙有一個起源，因此宣揚了神學。
日丹諾夫的理論和毛澤東的觀點不謀而合，毛也認為宇宙應該是永遠運動的狀態。也有不長的一段時間，許良英也對這一觀點產生過共鳴。
他說，在科學上，“我同意愛因斯坦的理論，因為科學無階級。”但是，他說，“受馬克思主義影響，我認為愛因斯坦理論中的哲學部分是某種資本主義理論。”
他耗時兩年，幾乎是獨自翻譯了愛因斯坦的197篇文章。但是這些文章的出版被擱置了，因為在毛澤東的另外一次運動中，印刷廠的工人被遣散到了鄉下。
接着，文化大革命爆發。紅衛兵沒收了許良英的翻譯稿，以及他寫的一份有關愛因斯坦哲學的手稿。
1969年，許良英得知，這些文件落到了一個上海激進組織手中。該組織名叫上海理科批判組。該組織是為了批判愛因斯坦和相對論而成立的。
許良英要求拿回他的文稿，並且向上海革委會投訴，以防理科批判組自行發表這些翻譯稿。隨後，他寫信給周恩來總理。據紐約城市大學(City College of New York)的歷史學家胡大年說，許良英的勇氣折服了理科批判組。胡大年的新書《中國與愛因斯坦》（哈佛大學出版社，2005年）講了這段故事。
最後，許良英拿回了自己的翻譯稿及出版權，但是另外那份手稿卻丟失了。
隨着文化大革命接近尾聲，從1975年開始，愛因斯坦的文章先後出版。1976年，毛澤東去世，“四人幫”被捕。1978年3月14日，愛因斯坦誕 辰99年之際，《人民日報》重新刊登了許良英著作的序言。序言中稱愛因斯坦是“人類歷史上一顆明亮的巨星”。一年後，一千名中國科學家齊聚北京，慶祝這位 智者的百年誕辰。
鄧小平等新領導人開始強調科學是中國強盛的關鍵，號召人民“實事求是”。
許良英重新回到北京的中國科學院，與王來棣復婚，成為新期刊《自然辯證法通訊》的主編。
但是事實證明，與黨相比，愛因斯坦才是許良英真正的燈塔。1981年，許良英在論文中引用愛因斯坦的話，認為必須要自由，尤其是言論自由，科學才能進步。
包括許良英在內的許多科學家很快就失望了，因為政府把資源都投入到發展技術上，基礎研究只能挨餓。
許良英說，這是封閉社會的癥狀。1986年，許良英寫道，“在這方面，我們要多學習西方發達國家的經驗。在那些國家，學術自由是人類進步的必要條件。”20世紀80年代末，許良英說，“我完全放棄了馬克思主義，回歸愛因斯坦。”
1989年1月，許良英的朋友、天體物理學家方勵之寫了一封公開信，呼籲釋放政治犯。許良英說，那太有限了。當年2月，他和他的老友、中科院地理學家施雅風起草了他們呼籲民主的公開信。許良英說，“我們都認為，中國其實需要政治改革。”
他說，“他們需要政治民主，需要保護公民的權利，應該有思想、言論、出版的自由。他們需要終止因言獲罪的漫長歷史。中國有這樣的歷史，已經持續了幾千年。”
當被問到他寫這封信心中是否有擔憂時，許良英大笑。他解釋道，很久以前，當他加入地下黨的時候，他就冒過生命危險。他說，“沒什麼好怕的。”
42個人在他的公開信上籤了名，包括許多科學家。
這封信以及方勵之的信在一定程度上啟發了學生和其他人，他們在1989年4月蜂擁至天安門廣場，緬懷胡耀邦這位受迫害的政治活動家，並在廣場上抗議腐敗和缺乏人權等問題。其中許多人身穿寫着“科學與民主”的T恤衫，這是20世紀早期以來中國政治活動及民眾表達願望的口號。
6月4日，中國軍隊開着坦克進入天安門廣場，數百人被打死。
許良英表示，這場鎮壓將會作為鄧小平的一個歷史事件被人銘記。“鄧小平出動坦克和飛機殺害群眾， 他槍殺群眾，眼都不眨一下，”他說，“甚至連日本人都沒這麼做過。”
事後，許良英沒有被捕，他表示，這也許是因為他在幾個月前心臟病發作，因此沒能參加抗議活動。（方勵之前往美國大使館尋求庇護，後來離開了中國。）
有人建議他離開北京，許良英拒絕了。當時，他已經69歲，身體很虛弱。他說，”如果我被捕，我已經做好了死在監獄裡的準備。”
1994年，許良英和其他六人發表了一份新的呼籲人權的公開信，這些人中包括一位遇難的天安門抗議者的父母。信中說道，“探討現代化而不提及人權， 這無異於緣木求魚。”發表這封信時，恰逢美國國務卿克里斯托弗按計劃訪問北京，許良英因此被暫時軟禁在家，以防止他與克里斯托弗會談。
1995年，美國紐約科學院(New York Academy of Sciences)授予許良英漢恩茨·R·佩格爾斯(Heinz R. Pagels)科學家人權獎，以表彰他為爭取自由做出的貢獻。但在許良英寫了另一封信並再次遭受軟禁後，美國物理學會(American Physical Society)會長給中國政府寫信，詢問許良英的安全情況。
如今，許良英已經退休。2001年，《科學·民主·理性——許良英文集(1977-1999)》(My Views: Xu Liangying’s Collection of Essays on Science, Democracy and Reason)由香港明鏡出版社(Mirror Books)出版。他和妻子正在共同撰寫一本有關民主的歷史與理論的書。其妻仍在中國社會科學院工作。
“科學和民主是兩個單獨的概念，”他說，“它們相輔相成，但民主是更根本的問題。”
雖然中國現任領導人高調地宣揚科學發展，但他們沒能說服許良英。
1997年，鄧小平的接班人江澤民援引愛因斯坦的相對論為中國人權狀況辯護，稱民主是一個相對的概念。許良英因此對江嗤之以鼻，他說，“這簡直是無稽之談。首先，愛因斯坦的相對論原理本質上恰恰是強調絕對性。”即物理定律和光速在所有觀察者眼中都是不變的。
“另一方面，民主和自由也是絕對的，因為人性是普遍的，嚮往自由、平等，是人類的普遍人性。”
許良英表示，他相信，中國未來一定會接納這些普遍價值。他指出，當學生領袖王丹在1989年第一次創辦民主沙龍時，只有20人參加。但僅僅過了半年，就有超過3000人參加天安門廣場的絕食抗議活動。
許良英說，“所以，我從未懷疑過年輕人的力量。”
本文最初發表於2006年8月22日。
翻譯：陶夢縈

Einstein’s Man in Beijing: A Rebel With a Cause

By DENNIS OVERBYE January 29, 2013
BEIJING — The first time he was purged, Xu Liangying was 37, an up-and-coming physicist, philosopher and historian and a veteran of the Communist underground. He had to divorce his wife, leave his sons and go live on his mother’s farm in the country.
Three decades later, only a heart attack saved him from imprisonment or worse during the massacre that ended the democracy demonstrations in Tiananmen Square in Beijing in 1989.

During the Cultural Revolution, the Red Guards stole the Einstein translations that Dr. Xu had labored over during his farm exile. Armed guards once surrounded his apartment to keep him away from Secretary of State Warren Christopher.
For seven decades, Xu Liangying has been Albert Einstein’s man in China, intertwining revolution and physics to speak up for political freedom and the value of scientific curiosity in a land where the rulers have often had a different agenda. His Einstein translations, retrieved and published, helped inspire a rebirth of interest in Einstein and in science in China.
Chinese leaders say today that science is the key to the country’s modernization and growth, but Dr. Xu finds no pleasure in that.
“They are just using it to serve themselves,” he said recently.
His phone, he says, is still bugged.
Today, at 86, his hair is white, and history, in the form of scholars, human rights activists and journalists, comes to him, in his book-lined apartment overlooking the university district in Beijing.
If he is not the oldest living Chinese dissident, he is easily one of the most intellectually distinguished, the author of some 200 papers and editor of a half-dozen books. The historian H. Lyman Miller called him an “archetypal figure” in his book “Science and Dissent in Post-Mao China.” The adjective “venerable” seems to attach itself to him the way snow is attracted to the mountains, but he does not seem to have lost an ounce of rebelliousness.
A dozen years ago in this newspaper he referred to would-be Communist reformers as “boot lickers.”
On a recent morning, Dr. Xu held forth from an armchair on his adventures as an Einsteinian democrat, jabbing the air, waving his arms and laughing often. Albert Einstein stared down sternly from above a file cabinet.
“Great spirits have always encountered violent opposition from mediocre minds,” the inscription read.
Clad in a blue shirt, slippers and thick glasses, Dr. Xu got up from his easy chair to stand beneath the poster. “Those are some of his best words,” he said.
The love affair between Dr. Xu, who was born in Linhai, Zhejiang, in 1920, and Einstein began when Dr. Xu was in secondary school and read a collection of Einstein’s essays called “The World as I See It.” The book had as much politics as science.
In one passage that the young Xu underlined, Einstein wrote: “The state is made for man, not man for the state. I regard the chief duty of the state to protect the individual and give him the opportunity to develop into a creative personality.”
Dr. Xu said, “I wanted to be such a person.”
In 1939, he entered Zhejiang University, intending, as he wrote on his entrance form, to become “the authority of modern physics.” But politics intruded.
To evade the Japanese Army, which had invaded China in 1937, the university repeatedly had to move and sometimes during bombings students had to take shelter in caves. This provided Dr. Xu a revealing and disturbing tour of the Chinese countryside. Some people were living in caves with ragged clothes, while their landlords lived well.
“This difference was unreasonable,” he recalled thinking. Concluding that China needed “total revolution,” he resolved to join the Communists underground.
In the meantime, he was excelling at his studies, and when he graduated, his mentor Wang Ganchang, the architect of China’s first atomic bomb, wanted him as a research assistant to study the mysterious subatomic particles known as neutrinos.
Instead, the young Xu went off in search of the revolution, teaching in five schools over the next two years. When the Japanese Army overran the province where he was teaching, his old mentor put an advertisement in the local newspaper pleading with him to return to research. Dr. Xu did return to the university, but he took his politics with him and the physics department became the center of Communist activity at the university, with Dr. Xu as the party secretary.
When the Communists finally prevailed in 1949, Dr. Xu and Dr. Wang moved to Beijing and joined the Chinese Academy of Sciences, where in what he refers to now as “a bad deed,” Dr. Xu became for a while the chief censor, inspecting scientific writings for antirevolutionary sentiment or threats to national security. But it turned out that he could not serve both Einstein and Mao.
In 1957, Mao announced the “100 flowers” campaign, encouraging people to speak up and criticize, only to decide later that things had gone too far and to instigate a new campaign to weed out “rightists.”
Dr. Xu spoke out against the new campaign and was himself denounced in The Chinese People’s Daily, not just as a rightist, but an “extreme rightist.” The academy ordered him to go work on a farm in northeastern China, but Dr. Xu argued that he had arthritis and that it was too cold there.
Told then that he was on his own, Dr. Xu went back to his apartment in Beijing.
His wife, Wang Laili, a historian and mother of their 7- and 14-year-old children, was pregnant.
She cried so hard for three days, he said, that she lost the baby. For sheltering her husband, Dr. Wang was kicked out of the party, and under “ big pressure,” Dr. Xu said, she asked him for a divorce. Dr. Xu was banished to his family farm in Linhai.
Eventually, the rightist label was lifted, and in 1962, the academy asked him to do the translation for a new collection of Einstein’s philosophical essays and speeches.
The decision to publish Einstein was not made wholly out of admiration. “Mao Zedong wanted to be the revolutionary leader of the whole world,” Dr. Xu explained. As part of that plan, he said, “Mao planned to identify and criticize all the world’s scientists whose political or philosophical positions were anti-Marxist.”
Einstein was on the list courtesy of Andrei Zhdanov, an assistant to Stalin, who argued in 1947 that Einstein’s cosmological theories were reactionary and bourgeois. Marxist philosophy postulated an endless and unlimited universe, but according to general relativity, space-time could be curved around on itself like a sphere, and thus be finite even if it lacked boundaries. Moreover, it promoted theology by implying that the universe had a beginning.
Mr. Zhdanov’s argument resonated with Mao’s view that the universe should be in a state of eternal revolution. And for a brief while it resonated with Dr. Xu, who referred to the Soviet criticism as “a vibration on my mind.”
Scientifically, he said, “I affirmed Einstein’s theory because in science there are no classes.” But, he said, “Influenced by Marxism, I thought that the philosophy part of Einstein’s theory is some capitalism theory.’’
It took him two years, working mostly by himself, to translate 197 of Einstein’s articles. But publication was suspended because the workers at his printer had been dispersed to the countryside in another of Mao’s campaigns.
Then came the Cultural Revolution. The Red Guards confiscated Dr. Xu’s translations, as well as a manuscript he had written on Einstein’s philosophy.
In 1969, Dr. Xu learned that the papers were in the hands of a group of Shanghai radicals known as the Shanghai Science Criticism Group, a collective that had been set up to attack Einstein and relativity.
Dr. Xu demanded his papers back and appealed to the Shanghai Revolutionary Committee to prevent the group from publishing the translations themselves. Then he wrote to Premier Zhou Enlai. His courage unnerved the Shanghai group, according to Danian Hu, a historian at the City College of New York, who tells the story in a new book, “China and Albert Einstein.” (Harvard University Press, 2005).
In the end Dr. Xu got back his translations and the publications rights, but the other manuscript was lost.
The Einstein volumes were published, beginning in 1975, just as the Cultural Revolution was winding down. Mao died and the members of the infamous “Gang of Four” were arrested in 1976. On March 14, 1978, the 99th anniversary of Einstein’s birth, the foreword to Dr. Xu’s book, calling Einstein “a giant bright star in human history,” was reprinted in The People’s Daily. A year later a thousand Chinese scientists gathered in Beijing to celebrate the old sage.
New leaders like Deng Xiaoping began emphasizing science as the key to uplifting China, and urging the people to “seek the truth through facts.”
Dr. Xu rejoined the academy in Beijing, remarried Wang Laili and became the editor of a new journal, The Bulletin of Natural Dialectics.
But Einstein proved a truer beacon than the party. In a paper in 1981, Dr. Xu cited Einstein on the necessity of freedom, particularly of speech, as a prerequisite for scientific progress.
Many scientists, including Dr. Xu, soon became disillusioned as the government put resources into technological development, starving basic research institutions.
This, Dr. Xu said, was a symptom of closed societies. “In this respect we have much to learn from the experience of the developed Western countries,” he wrote in 1986, “where academic freedom is recognized as a necessary condition for human progress.” By the end of the decade, he said, “I gave up Marxism totally and returned to Einstein.”
In January 1989, Dr. Xu’s friend Fang Lizhi, an astrophysicist, wrote an open letter calling for the release of political prisoners. That was too limited, Dr. Xu concluded. He and an old friend, Shi Yafeng, a geographer at the academy, then in February drafted their own letter calling for democracy. “We agreed that actually China needs political reform,” Dr. Xu said.
“They need political democracy and need to protect the rights of citizens, and there should be freedom of thinking, speaking and publishing,” he said, “and they need to end the long history of punishing people because of their words. China has such a history, which has lasted for thousands of years.”
Asked if he had worried when he wrote the letter, Dr. Xu laughed, explaining that he had risked his life long before when he first joined the Communist underground. “There was nothing to dare,” he said.
His letter was signed by 42 people, including many scientists.
It and Dr. Fang’s letter helped provide inspiration for students and others who swarmed Tiananmen Square in April 1989 to mourn the death of Hu Yaobang, a purged political activist, and then stayed to protest corruption and the lack of human rights. Many of them were wearing T-shirts that said “Science and Democracy,” watchwords of Chinese politics and aspirations since the early 20th century.
On June 4, Chinese troops invaded the square with tanks and killed hundreds of people.
The massacre, Dr. Xu said, will live as Deng Xiaoping’s one historical event. “Mr. Deng used tanks and plane to kill people; he killed them with bullets without blinking his eyes,” he said. “Even the Japanese never did that.”
In the aftermath, Dr. Xu was not arrested, perhaps, he says, because he had had a heart attack a couple of months earlier and had thus never gone down to the demonstrations. (Dr. Fang had to take refuge in the United States Embassy and later left the country.)
When it was suggested to him that he leave the city, Dr. Xu refused. He was 69 and weakened. “If I get arrested, then I’m ready to be dead in prison,” he said.
In 1994, Dr. Xu and six others, including the parents of one of the slain Tiananmen protesters, published a new appeal for human rights in China. “To talk about modernization without mentioning human rights is like climbing a tree to catch a fish,” it said. The letter coincided with a planned visit to Beijing by Secretary of State Christopher, and occasioned a temporary house arrest to prevent a meeting.
In 1995, Dr. Xu was given the Heinz R. Pagels award by the New York Academy of Sciences for his work for freedom, but after another letter and another house arrest, the president of the American Physical Society wrote to the Chinese government asking about his safety.
Dr. Xu is now retired. In 2001 his book “My Views: Xu Liangying’s Collection of Essays on Science, Democracy and Reason” was published by Mirror Books in Hong Kong. He and his wife, who works at the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, are working together on a book about the history and theory of democracy.
“Science and democracy are separate concepts,” he said. “They are mutually supportive, but democracy is more fundamental.”
Despite their showy embrace of science, China’s present leaders have not won over Dr. Xu.
Jiang Zemin, who inherited power from Mr. Deng, earned Dr. Xu’s scorn in 1997 when he invoked Einsteinian relativity to justify China’s human rights record, saying democracy was a relative concept. “It’s just nonsense because, first, Einstein’s relativity principle is actually essentially emphasizing the absolute,” Dr. Xu said, referring to the notion that the laws of physics and speed of light are the same for all observers.
“And the other part is democracy and freedom are also absolute because human nature is universal and needs to pursue freedom and equality.”
Dr. Xu said he was optimistic that China’s future would embrace those qualities. He pointed out that when the student leader Wang Dan first tried to start a democracy salon in 1989, only 20 people showed up. But only half a year later, more than 3,000 people joined a hunger strike in Tiananmen Square.
“So I never doubt the power of the youth,” Dr. Xu said.

【洛杉磯傳真】 無法盡述的哀思

◎王丹
1月28日下午4點多，我獲悉噩耗：中國民主運動的代表人物，原中國科學院自然科學史研究所研究員，我的啟蒙恩師許良英先生因病於下午1時在北京逝世，終年九十三歲。得知許先生去世的消息，我愣了一下，早已經知道要發生的事，到底還是發生了。也許是因為已經有心理準備，也或許是因為還有既定行程必須完成，所以似乎沒有驚天動地的悲哀。
晚上回到家裡，還是堅持把需要處理的事情處理完，包括跟紐約的胡平商量海外的追悼活動。各類雜事大致就緒，終於可以坐下來休息一下。一坐下來，眼淚就流下來了。
原來，我的堅強是假的。
第一次去許先生家的時候，我還是一個乳臭未乾的大一學生，那是1988年。算一算，跟許先生的忘年交已經廿五年了。這廿五年的歲月中，除了在獄中的幾年外，我始終沒有中斷過跟許先生的聯繫。在最艱難的1993年到1995年之間，更是每週到他家報到，那樣的黑雲密布的年代，那樣的患難情，其實也多少演變成了祖孫情。我出國之後，我父母繼續這樣的感情紐帶，隔一、兩個月也會到許先生那裡去一趟。
記得1995年，當局對方興未艾的新一波反對運動進行鎮壓，我第二次入獄，很多人被迫噤聲，許先生也受到警告。但是萬馬齊喑中，他還是在海外媒體上發表了題為〈為王丹辯護〉的公開信，說聽到我被捕的消息後「老淚縱橫」。
現在，輪到我為許先生流淚了。
已經有朋友問我要紀念許先生的文章，我寫不出來。當你對一個人有太深的情感的時候，不是那麼容易寫出紀念文的。我想，我需要時間。我現在的哀思，只能是第一時間的即時反應，而真正能在時間長河上留下痕跡的記憶，還要等到我能更平靜地面對許先生的離去。
許先生一生致力於推進中國民主化的事業，曾在80年代末和90年代中期，兩次發起科學家聯名信，呼籲政治改革與寬容，成為中國知識界參與民主化運動的先鋒。近十幾年來，除了繼續不畏壓力大膽發聲之外，許先生潛心民主理論的研究，進行了大量撰述工作。
2008年4月，許良英先生獲得「薩哈羅夫獎」。四個月後，美國總統小布希在曼谷發表演講時引用了他的話：「我們呼籲實現開放與正義，不是為了把我們的觀念強加於人，而是為了使中國人民能夠表達他們的意見。正如中國科學家許良英所說：嚮往自由、平等，是人類的普遍人性。」
是的，讓我們永遠記住許良英先生的話，永遠嚮往，珍惜，追求，保衛自由，平等。因為，這是在固守我們的人性。我希望世人能永遠銘記許良英先生為中國的民主自由做出的畢生貢獻，也期待他的理想終將有實現的一天。 ●


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