科学路上，数学不是绊脚石.docVIP

科学路上，数学不是绊脚石 　　似乎很多人小时候都有一个“长大要当科学家”的理想。如今“长大”已经实现了，说好的“科学家”呢？也许你早就发现了，要想成为科学家并不是那么容易，要为科学奉献一生需要多么浓厚的兴趣和刻苦钻研的精神啊！什么？你是因为数学不好才断了当科学家的念想？那还来得及，赶快重新投入科学的怀抱吧，谁告诉你数学不好就当不了科学家的？ 　　For many young people who aspire to be scientists， the great bugbear1） is mathematics. Without advanced math， how can you do serious work in the sciences？ Well， I have a professional secret to share： Many of the most successful scientists in the world today are mathematically no more than semiliterate. 　　During my decades of teaching biology at Harvard， I watched sadly as bright undergraduates turned away from the possibility of a scientific career， fearing that， without strong math skills， they would fail. This mistaken assumption has deprived science of an immeasurable amount of sorely needed talent. 　　I speak as an authority on this subject because I myself am an extreme case. Having spent my precollege years in relatively poor Southern schools， I didn’t take algebra until my freshman year at the University of Alabama. I finally got around to2） calculus as a 32-year-old tenured3） professor at Harvard， where I sat uncomfortably in classes with undergraduate students only a bit more than half my age. A couple of them were students in a course on evolutionary biology I was teaching. I swallowed my pride and learned calculus. 　　I was never more than a C student while catching up， but I was reassured by the discovery that superior mathematical ability is similar to fluency in foreign languages. I might have become fluent with more effort and sessions talking with the natives， but being swept up with field and laboratory research， I advanced only by a small amount. 　　Fortunately， exceptional mathematical fluency is required in only a few disciplines， such as particle physics， astrophysics and information theory. Far more important throughout the rest of science is the ability to form concepts， during which the researcher conjures4） images and processes by intuition. 　　Everyone sometimes dayd