托福口语中经常会问到大家关于科技类的话题：

　　Some people believe that modern technology has made our lives simpler. Others believethat modern technology has made our lives more complicated. What is your opinion?

　　让我们首先一起来阅读罗素的这篇On science and good life.

　　既可以积累素材，也可以激发灵感：

　　There is probably no limit to what science can do in the way of increasing positive excellence. Health has already been greatly improved; in spite of the lamentations of those who idealize the past, we live longer and have fewer illnesses than any class or nation in the eighteenth century. With a little more application of the knowledge we already possess, we might be much healthier than we are. And future discoveries are likely to accelerate this process enormously.

　　科学在增加美好的积极因素方面所能做的事情，很可能是没有止境的。卫生条件已经得到极大的改善；不管那些怀旧者如何哀叹，与十八世纪任何阶级和民族相比，我们毕竟延长了寿命并减少了疾病。只要把我们已有的知识稍加广泛地应用，我们就会比现在更加健康。未来的发现很可能会极大地加快这方面的进程。

　　So far, it has been physical science that has had most effect upon our lives, but in the future physiology and psychology are likely to be far more potent. When we have discovered how character depends upon physiological conditions, we shall be able, if we choose, to produce far more of the type of human beings that we admire. Intelligence, artistic capacity, benevolence—all these things no doubt could be increased by science. There seems scarcely any limit to what could be done in the way of producing a good world, if only men would use science wisely.

　　迄今为止，对我们生活影响最大的当数自然科学，但是在将来，生理学和心理学的影响很可能远在它之上。当我们发现了性格如何依赖于生理条件时，只要我们愿意，我们就能产生出大量我们所称羡的那种人。智力，艺术能力，仁慈---所有这些东西无疑可因科学而增加。只要人们明智地利用科学，在创造美好世界方面所能做的事情，几乎是没有止境的。

　　There is a certain attitude about the application of science to human life with which I have some sympathy, though I do not, in the last analysis, agree with it. It is the attitude of those who dread what is ‘unnatural.’ Rousseau is, of course, the great protagonist of the view in Europe. In Asia, Lao-Tze has set it forth even more persuasively, and 2400 years sooner. I think there is a mixture of truth and falsehood in the admiration of ‘nature, which it is important to disentangle. To begin with, what is ‘natural?’ Roughly speaking, anything to which the speaker was accustomed in childhood. Lao-Tze objects to roads and carriages and boats, all of which were probably unknown in the village where he was born

　　关于科学应用到人生这个问题，存在着一种观点，对这种观点，我有些同感，但是最后分析起来，我是不能同意的。 它是那些害怕‘不自然的’东西的人所持有的观点。当然，卢梭是欧洲这一观点的伟大创始人。在亚洲，老子对这一观点的阐述，更是动人心弦，而且要早两千四百年。我认为，他们对于‘自然’的赞美，不过是真理与谬误的混合物，而理清这一问题是很重要的。首先要问，什么东西是‘自然的？’泛泛说来，是说话者幼年时所习惯的东西。老子反对车道和舟车，这恐怕是他所出生的那个村子不知车道和舟车为何物的缘故。

　　Rousseau has got used to these things, and does not regard them as against nature. But he would no doubt have thundered against railways if he had lived to see them. Clothes and cooking are too ancient to be denounced by most of the apostles of nature, though they all object to new fashions in either. Birth control is thought wicked by people who tolerate celibacy, because the former is a new violation of nature and the latter an ancient one. In these ways those who preach ‘nature’ are inconsistent, and one is tempted to regard them as mere conservatives.

　　卢梭对这些东西习以为常，所以并不认为它们是违反自然的。但是，假如他在有生之年看见铁路，他无疑会大加指责。服装和烹饪由来已久，大多数提倡自然的人都不提出异议，虽然它们一致反对花样翻新。节育被当成犯罪，而独身则被宽容，因为前者是违反自然的新事物，而后者则古已有之。在所有这些方面，那些提倡‘自然’的人都是自相矛盾的，这只能使人把它们看成是守旧之士。

　　Nevertheless, there is something to be said in their favor. Take for instance vitamins, the discovery of which has produced a revulsion in favor of ‘natural’ foods. It seems, however, that vitamins can be supplied by cod-liver oil and electric light, which are certainly not part of the ‘natural’ diet of a human being. This case illustrates that, in the absence of knowledge, unexpected harm may be done by a new departure from nature, but when the harm has come to be understood it can usually be remedied by some new artificiality. As regards our physical environment and our physical means of gratifying our desires, I do not think the doctrine of ‘nature’ justifies anything beyond a certain experimental caution in the adoption of new expedients. Clothes, for instance, are contrary to nature, and need to be supplemented by another unnatural practice, namely washing, if they are not to bring disease. But the two practices together make a man healthier than the savage who eschews both.

　　然而，他们并非一无是处。例如，维生素的发现使人们复而赞成‘自然的’食物。不过，维生素似乎也可由鱼肝油和电光提供，此二者无疑不是人类‘自然的’食物。这个例子表明，如果缺少知识，一种违反自然的新做法也许会带来意想不到的危害，但是当那危害被认识到时，往往可以用某种新的人造物去补救。就我们的自然环境和满足我们欲望的物质手段而言，我认为，有关‘自然’的这套理论，除了证明在采取某种新的做法时应谨慎外，并不能证明别的什么。例如，衣服是违反自然的，如果不想让衣服引起疾病，就需要增加另一种不自然的行为，即洗涤。但是，穿衣与洗涤加在一起却可使人比与此二者无缘的野蛮人要健康。

　　To respect physical nature is foolish; physical nature should be studied with a view to making it serve human ends as far as possible, but it remains ethically neither good nor bad. And where physical nature and human nature interact, as in the population question, there is no need to fold our hands in passive adoration and accept war, pestilence, and famine as the only possible means of dealing with excessive fertility. The divines say: it is wicked, in this matter, to apply science to the physical side of the problem; we must (they say) apply morals to the human side, and practice abstinence. Apart from the fact that everyone, including the divines, knows that their advice will not be taken, why should it be wicked to solve the population question by adopting physical means for preventing conception?

　　尊重物质的自然是愚蠢的； 物质的自然应当加以研究，以便使其尽可能地服务于人类的目的，但它在道德上是无所谓好坏的。在物质的自然和人类的天性相互影响的地方，如人口问题，我们无须束手被动地敬畏并接受战争，瘟疫和饥荒为解决过度繁殖的问题的唯一可能的方法。神学家们说，在此事上，应用科学于这一问题的物质方面是罪恶的；我们应当（他们说）应用道德于人的方面，并且实行禁欲。每个人，这些神学家也不例外，都知道他们的劝告无人理睬，撇开这个事实不谈，通过避孕的物质手段来解决人口问题究竟何罪之有？

　　No answer is forthcoming except one based upon antiquated dogmas. And clearly the violence to nature advocated by the divines is at least as great as that involved in birth control. The divines prefer a violence to human nature which, when successfully pracised, involves unhappiness, envy, a tendency to persecution, often madness. I prefer a ‘violence’ to physical nature which is of the same sort as that involved in the steam engine or even in the use of an umbrella. This instance should show ambiguous and uncertain is the application of the principle that we should follow ‘nature.’

　　除了这是以古代教义为根据的，尚无别的答案。而且显而易见，这对于神学家所提倡的自然的违反，至少不在节育之下。神学家们宁可选择违反人类天性的做法，而这种做法的成功产生的却是不幸，嫉妒，迫害的倾向和经常性的疯狂。我更喜欢‘违反’物质自然的做法。这是一种类似使用蒸汽机或雨伞的做法。这个例子表明，我们应遵循‘自然’这一原则，它的应用是何等的含混和不确定。

　　Nature, even human nature, will cease more and more to be an absolute datum; more and more it will become what scientific manipulation has made it. Science can, if it chooses, enable our grandchildren to live the good life, by giving them knowledge, self-control, and characters productive of harmony rather than strife.

　　(What I Believe, 1925)

　　自然，甚至人性，将越来越不再是一种绝对的材料，而将逐渐成为科学所造成的东西。科学如果愿意，它能使我们的子孙过上美好的生活，方法是给他们以知识，自制力能产生和谐而非斗争的品性。