摘要：Claude Shannon saw the world in 1s and 0s, realizing they could represent words, sounds, images, even ideas.

Claude Shannon saw the world in 1s and 0s, realizing they could represent words, sounds, images, even ideas.

克劳德·香农用1和0来观察世界，他意识到它们可以代表文字、声音、图像，甚至是思想。

Computers don't actually understand the letters we type-every keystroke is translated into a series of 1s and 0s that the computer can process.

计算机实际上并不理解我们输入的字母——每一次击键都会被转换成计算机能够处理的一系列1和0。

These binary numbers could control electrical switches - including the billions of transistors packed inside a computer chip - powering all modern computing.

这些二进制数字可以控制电子开关——包括计算机芯片内部数十亿个晶体管——为所有现代计算提供动力。

Without Shannon's discoveries, computers as we know them wouldn't exist.

如果没有香农的发现，我们所知的计算机将不复存在。

Whether you're checking your email, visiting a web page, or watching a video… We owe it all to Claude Shannon.

无论您是在查看电子邮件、访问网页还是观看视频……这一切都归功于克劳德·香农。

As a kid growing up in Gaylord, Michigan, in the 1920s, Shannon was already tinkering with technology.

20世纪20年代，香农还是一个在密歇根州盖洛德长大的孩子，他就已经对科技产生了兴趣。

He turned a barbed-wire fence into a telegraph system, using the metal wire to carry electrical signals encoded in Morse code, an early glimpse into the idea of transmitting information.

他将铁丝网改造成电报系统，利用金属线传输摩尔斯电码编码的电信号，这为信息传输的概念提供了早期的雏形。

Getting into the family furniture business wasn't appealing to him.

从事家族家具生意对他来说毫无吸引力。

He had a mathematical mind and loved competing with his older sister, Catherine.

他擅长数学，喜欢和姐姐凯瑟琳竞争。

Reflecting on his career decision, he once said, "I think one tends to get into work that you find easy for yourself." After finishing high school, he went on to study at the University of Michigan, Earning degrees in both mathematics and electrical engineering because he wasn't sure what he liked best.

反思自己的职业选择时，他曾说过：“我认为人们往往会选择自己觉得轻松的工作。”高中毕业后，他进入密歇根大学深造，获得了数学和电子工程学位，因为他不确定自己最喜欢什么。

At the time, math and electrical engineering were seen as separate fields-but Shannon saw the connection.

当时，数学和电子工程被视为独立的领域——但香农看到了其中的联系。

In mathematics, he learned about a system developed by British mathematician George Boole in the 1800s to analyze true or false statements using simple rules - known as Boolean logic.

在数学方面，他学习了英国数学家乔治·布尔在19世纪开发的一种系统，该系统使用简单的规则来分析真假语句——这被称为布尔逻辑。

Imagine you're ordering a pizza with two topping options: pepperoni and mushrooms.

想象一下，你点了一份披萨，上面有两种配料：意大利辣香肠和蘑菇。

If you apply Boolean logic to your decision, there are three possibilities: You only order the pizza if it has both pepperoni AND mushrooms.

如果你将布尔逻辑应用于你的决策，就会出现三种可能性：只有当披萨同时包含意大利辣香肠和蘑菇时，你才会点。

You will order the pizza if it has either pepperoni OR mushrooms You will NOT order the pizza if it has mushrooms.

如果披萨里有意大利辣香肠或蘑菇，你会点；如果披萨里有蘑菇，你就不会点。

Each decision follows a simple yes or no rule represented by 1s (yes you order) and 0s (for no, you do not).

每个决策都遵循一个简单的“是”或“否”规则，1表示“是”，0表示“否”。

Shannon realized this same Boolean logic applied to electrical circuits.

香农将同样的布尔逻辑应用于电路。

In a circuit, 1 (ON) means a switch is closed, allowing electricity to flow.

在电路中，1（ON）表示开关闭合，允许电流通过。

And 0 (OFF) means the switch is open, stopping electricity flow.

0（OFF）表示开关断开，阻止电流通过。

For the AND logic gate, the light turns on only if both switches are on.

对于与逻辑，只有两个开关都打开，灯才会亮。

For the OR gate, the light turns on if at least one switch is on.

对于或逻辑，至少有一个开关打开，灯才会亮。

The NOT gate flips the state of exactly one input - in this example, Switch B.

非逻辑只会翻转一个输入的状态——在本例中是开关B。

If Switch B is OFF, the NOT output is ON; if Switch B is ON, the NOT output is OFF. AND, OR, and NOT are the fundamental building blocks of computers.

如果开关B关闭，则“非”输出为“开”；如果开关B打开，则“非”输出为“关”。与、或、非是计算机的基本构成要素。

By combining these basic logic gates in different ways, we can build complex circuits that perform calculations, store data, and execute instructions, forming the core of modern computing.

通过以不同的方式组合这些基本逻辑，我们可以构建复杂的电路来执行计算、存储数据和执行指令，从而构成现代计算的核心。

"Shannon could have, if he had wanted, become unbelievably famous. We could probably speak of him in the same breath as an Einstein, he could have been a scientific celebrity." I spoke with Jimmy Soni, the co-author of a biography about Shannon called A Mind at Play.

“如果香农愿意，他本可以变得声名远扬。我们或许可以把他与爱因斯坦相提并论，他本可以成为一位科学名人。”我采访了吉米·索尼，他是香农传记A Mind at Play的作者之一。

I was like, 'There should be a book.' This person is a hugely consequential figure.

我当时想，‘应该写一本书。’他是一位举足轻重的人物。

There are books about Einstein, there are books about Feynman, there should be a book about Shannon. Shannon's breakthrough didn't happen overnight.

关于爱因斯坦的书有很多，关于费曼的书也有很多，也应该有一本关于香农的书。香农的突破并非一蹴而就。

In the spring of 1936, while at the University of Michigan, he spotted a job posting on a bulletin board inviting students to help build a mechanical brain at MIT.

1936年春天，在密歇根大学读书期间，他在公告栏上看到一则招聘启事，邀请学生帮助麻省理工学院建造一个机械大脑。

It was a postcard in engineering department He later recalled, "I pushed hard for that job and got it. That was one of the luckiest things in my life." Vannevar Bush, one of the most powerful scientists in America, saw Shannon's potential and hired him to work on his Differential Analyzer, One of the earliest mechanical computers that relied on gears, wheels, and rotating shafts to solve equations in calculus.

那是工程系的一张明信片。他后来回忆道：“我拼尽全力争取这份工作，最终得到了它。那是我一生中最幸运的事情之一。”美国最杰出的科学家之一范内瓦·布什看到了香农的潜力，聘请他参与微分分析仪的研发。微分分析仪是最早的机械计算机之一，依靠齿轮、轮子和旋转轴来解微积分方程。

He's in this grey room with this giant machine at all hours. The thing breaks down all the time, so he's responsible for fixing it and keeping it up.

他整天待在灰色的房间里，和这台巨大的机器待在一起。这台机器经常出故障，他负责修理和维护。

So it's not the most glamorous work. Although the work wasn't glamorous, it led to his greatest insight.

这并不是一份光鲜亮丽的工作。虽然这份工作并不光鲜亮丽，但却让他获得了最伟大的洞察力。

Shannon saw firsthand that the gears and wheels were slow, prone to errors, and required constant manual adjustments.

香农亲眼目睹了齿轮和轮子运转缓慢、容易出错，并且需要不断手动调整。

After solving one equation, an operator had to manually reset the gears before the machine could solve the next.

解完一个方程后，操作员必须手动重置齿轮，机器才能解下一个方程。

So, he started thinking… What if there was a better way? Instead of clunky mechanical parts, what if flipping electrical switches could do the job?

于是，他开始思考……是否有更好的方法呢？如果不用笨重的机械零件，只需拨动电子开关就能完成这项工作，那会怎样？

In 1937, Shannon wrote a master's thesis that changed the world - What Harvard University Professor Howard Gardner called "possibly the most important, and also the most famous, master's thesis of the century." He proved that any circuit - no matter how complex - could be represented by a set of equations.

1937年，香农撰写了一篇改变世界的硕士论文——哈佛大学教授霍华德·加德纳称之为“可能是本世纪最重要的、也是最著名的硕士论文”。他证明了任何电路——无论多么复杂——都可以用一组方程来表示。

He took Boolean algebra and applied it to circuit design - proving that logical operations could be executed automatically using electrical switches.

他将布尔代数应用于电路设计，证明了逻辑运算可以通过电子开关自动执行。

It was the first time that anybody had made that direct connection and it opened the door to a different way to design circuits.

这是人类首次将两者直接联系起来，也为电路设计开辟了新的途径。

Before Shannon - circuit design was inefficient-built in an ad hoc way.

在香农之前，电路设计效率低下，而且是临时搭建的。

Engineers wired circuits for specific tasks without a standard method to optimize or simplify them.

工程师们为特定任务布线电路，缺乏优化或简化电路的标准方法。

Shannon's work changed that forever. At MIT, word spread quickly about the young man from Michigan.

香农的研究彻底改变了这种现状。在麻省理工学院，这位来自密歇根的年轻人迅速成为热议话题。

His flight instructor refused to teach him to fly propeller planes, not wanting to risk losing a brain like his - but MIT's president overruled the decision. Shannon's brilliance extended beyond circuits.

他的飞行教练拒绝教他驾驶螺旋桨飞机，不愿冒险失去像他这样的天才——但麻省理工学院的校长否决了这一决定。香农的才华远不止于电路。

Vannevar Bush encouraged him to explore population genetics for his PhD thesis, which uses math to predict how genes are passed down through generations.

范内瓦·布什鼓励他以种群遗传学为博士论文主题，该论文运用数学来预测基因是如何代代相传的。

Despite having no background in genetics, he quickly mastered the field, even developing a formula to predict how frequently any three alleles would appear in a population over time. Genetics would only be a short detour.

尽管没有遗传学背景，他却很快掌握了这一领域，甚至开发出一个公式，用于预测任意三个等位基因在一个种群中随时间推移出现的频率。遗传学不过是他短暂涉足的领域。

When Shannon wrote to Bush for career advice, Bush was certain his calling lay in applying mathematics to real-world problems: "The only point I have in mind is I feel that you are primarily an applied mathematician, And that hence your problem ought to lie in this exceedingly broad field rather than in some field of pure mathematics." Shannon took his advice seriously, spending two summers at Bell Labs - the research arm of the telephone company where scientists built the future and also a fellowship at the Institute for Advanced Study in Princeton.

当香农写信给布什寻求职业建议时，布什确信他的使命在于将数学应用于现实问题：“我唯一想到的是，我觉得你主要是一位应用数学家，因此你的研究领域应当属于这个极其广阔的范畴，而非局限于某个纯数学领域。”香农认真听取了他的建议，在贝尔实验室度过了两个夏天——那里是电话公司的研究部门，科学家们在那里构建未来，同时还获得了普林斯顿高等研究院的奖学金。

But then came the draft. Shannon grew nervous about being sent off to fight in the world war, but he saw the writing on the wall.

但随后，征兵令来了。香农对可能被派去参加世界大战感到紧张，但他看清了形势。

"I could smell the war coming along. And it seems to me I would be safer working full-time for the war effort, safer against the draft, which I didn't exactly fancy.

“我能预感到战争即将来临。在我看来，全职投入到战时工作中会更安全，也能避开兵役。

I was a frail man, as I am now…But not only that, I thought I'd probably contribute a hell of a lot more." He felt his greatest contribution wouldn't be on the battlefield but in the lab.

我当时体弱多病，就像现在一样……但不仅如此，我还以为自己可能会做出更多贡献。”他觉得自己最大的贡献并非在战场上，而是在实验室里。

His mentor at Bell Labs, Thornton Fry, secured him a contract with the National Defense Research Committee, Where he helped design machines to shoot down enemy planes - critical in defending England during the Blitz.

他在贝尔实验室的导师桑顿·弗莱为他争取到了一份国防研究委员会的合同，在那里他帮助设计了击落敌机的机器——这在闪电战期间保卫英国至关重要。

His work impressed Fry, who hired him as a full-time research mathematician at Bell Labs.

他的工作给弗莱留下了深刻的印象，弗莱聘请他担任贝尔实验室的全职研究数学家。

It was a huge relief for Shannon, who had felt not only the pressure of war but also pressure in his personal life.

这对香农来说无疑是一个巨大的安慰，因为他不仅感受到了战争的压力，还承受着个人生活的重担。

He had married Norma Levor, a liberal arts student, after three months of dating But besides their love of jazz and shared atheism, they had little in common and soon divorced.

他与文科生诺玛·莱沃（Norma Levor）交往三个月后结婚，但除了对爵士乐的热爱和共同的无神论信仰外，两人几乎没有共同语言，很快就离婚了。

Shannon's mental and emotional health suffered, as a senior figure at the National Defense Research Committee, later recalled: "For a time it looked as though he might completely crack up nervously and emotionally.

香农的精神和情绪健康受到了影响，正如国防研究委员会一位资深人士后来回忆的那样：“有一段时间，他似乎要完全崩溃，神经紧张，情绪失控。

It is Thornton Fry who deserves the primary credit for getting him out of that state, and for offering him work in the Bell Laboratories. The rest of it is history."

正是桑顿·弗莱让香农摆脱了那种状态，并为他提供了在贝尔实验室的工作机会。接下来的事便众所周知了。”

来源：英语东