The History of English in Ten Minutes. Chapter five. The English of Science or how to speak with gravity.
十分鐘了解英語歷史。第五章?？茖W(xué)英語，或曰怎樣嚴(yán)謹(jǐn)?shù)卣f話。

Before the 17th Century scientists weren’t really recognised – possibly because lab-coats had yet to catch on.
在17世紀(jì)以前，科學(xué)家是不被認(rèn)可的，也許是因?yàn)閷?shí)驗(yàn)室白大褂在當(dāng)時(shí)還沒流行起來。

But suddenly Britain was full of physicists – there was Robert Hooke, Robert Boyle – and even some people not called Robert, like Isaac Newton. The Royal Society was formed out of the Invisible College – after they put it down somewhere and couldn’t find it again.
不過突然之間，英國就涌現(xiàn)出了很多物理學(xué)家，有羅伯特·虎克，羅伯特·波伊爾，當(dāng)然還有一些不叫羅伯特的人，譬如艾薩克·牛頓?！坝始覍W(xué)會(huì)”是在形同虛設(shè)的“無形學(xué)院”的基礎(chǔ)上成立起來的。

At first they worked in Latin. After sitting through Newton’s story about the ‘pomum’ falling to the ‘terra’ from the ‘a(chǎn)rbor’ for the umpteenth time, the bright sparks realised they all spoke English and could transform our understanding of the universe much quicker by talking in their own language.
最開始他們用拉丁語工作。在耐著性子聽了無數(shù)遍牛頓的故事（“蘋果”從“樹”上掉到“地上”）后，這群“聰明的傻瓜”意識(shí)到他們都說的是英語，用英語來交換對(duì)宇宙的理解會(huì)更快捷。

But science was discovering things faster than they could name them. Words like ‘a(chǎn)cid’, ‘gravity’, ‘electricity and ‘pendulum’ had to be invented just to stop their meetings turning into an endless game of charades.
但是科學(xué)探索出新事物的速度之快，遠(yuǎn)遠(yuǎn)超過了他們?yōu)檫@些事物命名的速度。像“酸”，“重力”，“電”，“鐘擺”這些詞不得不被發(fā)明出來，只是為了防止他們的會(huì)議變成一場(chǎng)無止盡的字謎游戲。

Like teenage boys, the scientists suddenly became aware of the human body – coining new words like ‘cardiac’ and ‘tonsil’, ‘ovary’, and ‘sternum’ - and the invention of ‘penis’ (1693), ‘vagina’ (1682) made sex education classes a bit easier to follow. Though? ‘clitoris’ was still a source of confusion.
就像十幾歲的男孩一樣，科學(xué)家們突然注意到了人類的身體，于是創(chuàng)造了像“心臟”，“扁桃體”，“卵巢”和“胸骨”這些新詞。1693年發(fā)明的“陰莖”一詞和1682年發(fā)明的“陰道”一詞，讓性教育的課程更加易懂。雖然“陰蒂”這個(gè)詞仍是個(gè)造成困惑的源頭。

相關(guān)文章>>

十分鐘了解英語歷史 盎格魯撒克遜人

十分鐘了解英語歷史 諾曼人入侵