《中国科学技术史·语言与逻辑》选译（三）

【译者言】上一期的“译者言”里留下一个问题：为什么“乘举办冬奥会的东风”可以违反翻译的真值标准，译成更符合英文表达习惯的riding the waves of hosting the Winter Olympic Games，而to have been interested in explicit logic for its own sake却不能译成更符合中文表达习惯的“对显性逻辑本身产生了兴趣”？我的回答是，前者是隐喻，后者是一般表达式，隐喻的译法不同于一般表达式的译法。当我们说“乘举办冬奥会的东风”时，我们把“举办冬奥会”比作“东风”，用修辞学的说法，“举办冬奥会”是主体（tenor），“东风”是喻体（vehicle），言者借喻体的某一典型属性（attribute），形象地传达某种喻义（metaphorical meaning）。此处“东风”的喻义即“推动力或有利条件”。比较“乘举办冬奥会的东风”和riding the waves of hosting the Winter Olympic Games，隐喻的主体相同，都是举办冬奥会，喻体的词义和意象虽然截然不同，前者是“东风”，后者是waves，二者的喻义却完全相同，都是“推动力或有利条件”。可以说中英这两个表达式是同一个隐喻的两种说法，因此翻译时可以变通处理。由此我们可以得出一条原则：当保留原文隐喻字面意义的译法不能有效传达原文的喻义或有可能造成读者误解时，最好将原文的喻体变成译入语已有的对应喻体。牺牲原文无关紧要的字面意思，正确传达原文的喻义，是符合真值标准的翻译策略。至于for its own sake为何不宜译成“对……本身”，那是因为严格地讲，“为了……的缘故”和“对……本身”的意思有重要区别。当李约瑟说Twice the Chinese appear to have been interested in explicit logic for its own sake时，他的意思是，中国人对显性逻辑产生兴趣，原因不在于这门学问有什么实际用处、能给研究者带来什么其他好处，而在于能让他们开眼界、长见识。对比下面A和B两种译法，我们不难看出二者的意思有何不同：

A. 先后有两次，中国人似乎都因为显性逻辑本身的缘故而对之产生了兴趣。

B. 先后有两次，中国人似乎都对显性逻辑本身产生了兴趣。

本书作者何莫邪（Christoph Harbsmeier）1946年出生于德国哥廷根。他天资聪颖，从小就对哲学、逻辑学和外语有着浓厚兴趣;少年时就学了希腊文、拉丁文、法文、英文、俄文、波兰文;1966年被牛津大学墨顿学院（Merton College）录取并获奖学金。他原本打算攻读西方哲学，入学后不久认识了该校汉学教授霍克斯（David Hawkes，1923—2009），对中国古代文化产生了极大兴趣，决定师从霍克斯，改学古典中文。后来他又师从伦敦大学亚非学院研究中国古代哲学的著名教授葛瑞汉（A. C. Graham， 1919—1991），1973年获汉学硕士学位，同年被马来西亚理科大学（Universiti Sains Malaysia [University of Science， Malaysia]）聘为东方哲学讲师;1980年被挪威奥斯陆大学聘为资深讲师;1981年获丹麦哥本哈根大学博士学位，同年其博士论文《古汉语语法四论》（Aspects of Classical Chinese Syntax）出版;1985年，他的心爱之作《丰子恺：一个有菩萨心肠的现实主义者》（The Cartoonist Feng Zikai： Socialism with a Buddhist Face）出版，同年他晋升教授，还应李约瑟之邀撰写本书;1989年成为挪威皇家科学院院士，同年与北京大学蒋绍愚教授一同创建国际数据库“汉学文典”（http：//hxwd.org），并一直任总编。他曾任挪威东方学会会长，奥斯陆大学东欧与东方学系主席，加州大学伯克利分校、芝加哥大学、密歇根大学、香港中文大学等多所大学访问教授;现为奥斯陆大学荣休教授、哥本哈根大学中文系兼职教授，北京大学、复旦大学、浙江大学等多所中国大学永久客座教授。何莫邪教授的主要研究领域是语言哲学、文法和概念史。他多次访华，与语言、文化、艺术界的多位老一辈学者和艺术家，包括吕叔湘、俞敏、梁漱溟、杨宪益、丁聪、方成等，结下深厚情谊，他的中文名字“何莫邪”就是著名历史语言学家、校雠家王叔岷帮他起的。

2009年，香港凤凰卫视《我的中国心》节目曾为他制作了一期专题节目《挪威的夫子——何莫邪》。

AUTHOR’S NOTE （I）

The Chinese were1 superficial

— out of profundity2.

There is only one culture in the world which has developed systematic logical definitions and reflections on its own and on the basis of a non-Indo-European language. This is the Chinese culture. The history of logical reflection in China is therefore of extraordinary interest for any global history of logic and hence for any global history of the foundations of science.

It has become an unquestioned assumption that3 there is one golden age of rational logical inquiry in China： the –5th to –3rd centuries， the later part of the Warring States period. The present volume will correct this assumption. It4 will demonstrate that there are two such periods of intense logical activity in China， by far the most productive5 being the +7th and early +8th centuries， where Buddhist logic made tremendous headway in China and produced a significant literature both in terms of sheer size and of philosophical quality. Buddhist logic was Indian in origin， and the Chinese language turned out to be no obstacle for a remarkable intellectual efflorescence6 of Buddhist logic in China. For an empirical global account of the natural relations between logical theorising7 and the language in which this theorising is going on， again， the case of China is of unique importance.

Chinese Buddhist logic remained limited to a small subculture. This is why it could be so largely overlooked by students8 of Chinese intellectual history. But then， even the Later Mohist achievements of the Warring States period， for all their sparkling intellectualism9 on many points represented a highly marginal subculture. The Later Mohist texts have been transmitted to us in a shape that bears witness to10 the fact that the Chinese transmitters did not understand much of what they were transmitting11.

The Later Mohists and sophists like Kungsun Lung did have a certain influence on the philosophy of their times， but on the whole their achievements were not absorbed into the mainstream of Chinese intellectual culture. Mohist ethics maintained at least some， albeit highly marginal， presence， Mohist logic was simply12 forgotten. Buddhist logic， though not forgotten in Buddhist circles， was disregarded. It never became a central discipline for large numbers of Chinese Buddhists as it did among Tibetan and Indian Buddhists.

One cannot emphasise enough13： logic， no matter whether Buddhist or Mohist， remained marginal in Chinese culture until modern intellectuals14 needed to demonstrate that China had its own logical traditions， just like the West. Chinese logic was rediscovered in an attempt to prove that China was the intellectual equal of the West. The result was a large modern indigenous literature on indigenous Chinese logic.

At a very elementary level， logical thought originates as a theoretical concern with certain logically crucial words such as negations like ‘not’ and various logical conjunctions15 and quantifiers16 like ‘or’ or ‘all’. The Chinese clearly developed such specific logical concerns. From a global perspective， the Chinese general comments on their own language （b， 3） are of concern because there are very few cultures17 indeed whose comments on their own languages are not directly or indirectly inspired by the Greek and Latin or the Sanskrit tradition. The Chinese are also the only people operating with a non-Indo-European language who18 developed an entirely indigenous interest in some grammatical features of their own language： a global history of grammar would have to accord a central place to19 Chinese traditional grammar as the only non-Indo-European pre-modern tradition20. Chinese civilisation is the only non-Indo-European civilisation in the world which has developed independently of outside influences an indigenous and powerful lexicographic tradition and a sustained systematic interest in the definition of terms. Chinese interest in the lexicon of their own language is paralleled in Europe by that of the French in more modern times.21 I trace the Chinese development in Sections （b， 4） and （b， 5）.