時差N小時:飛碟攻擊 UFO

June. Nineteen sixty-nine. Not one airliner but two,plus the pilot of an Air National Guard fighter plane,report being harassed by a team of UFOs.

1969年6月，有兩架飛機和空中國民警衛(wèi)隊?wèi)?zhàn)斗機的飛行員，報告受到一組不明飛行物的干擾。

One man estimates the glowing ships have come within a few hundred feet.

一個目擊者估測那些發(fā)光的飛船已經(jīng)來到了距離他們數(shù)百英尺以內(nèi)。

The pilot of the fighter plane even declares a near-collision.

戰(zhàn)斗機的飛行員甚至還稱跟它有近距離碰觸。

What were these UFOs really?

這些真的是不明飛行物嗎?

It turned out they were fragments of a meteor coming apart in the upper atmosphere.

事實證明，它們是流星在高層大氣瓦解后的碎片。

Now here's the most interesting part: the meteor fragments were at least one hundred andtwenty five miles from the planes.

有趣的是：這些流星碎片距離飛機至少有125英里。

How could you possibly think something over a hundred miles away was about to hit you?

你怎么會想到一百英里之外的東西會砸得到你?

Objects in the sky confuse our perceptual abilities.

天空中的物體會混淆我們的感知能力。

With no visual cues to help calculate distance, our brains rely on size and speed instead. How?

沒有參照物來判斷距離，于是人類大腦依靠尺寸和運動速度來判斷物體的大小。怎么判斷呢?

By using a simple fact: far-away things look like they are going slower than close-up things.

通過一個很簡單的道理：遠處的東西運動起來看起比近處的東西慢。

You may have noticed this when driving: those distant phone poles pass sluggishly while theones on the road go zooming by.

你或許會在開車時有這種感覺：遠處的電線桿移動的很慢，而路邊的電線桿則移動的很快。

In a blank white sky, our brains default to a simple strategy: the bigger it looks and the fasterit goes, the closer it probably is.

在空曠的白天，我們的大腦默認了一個簡單的道理：看起來越大、運動的越快的東西，距離我們就越近。

This is a smart way to proceed, and it generally works.

這倒是個很聰明的方法，而且通常都能起到作用。

Still, our perception can be fouled by rare situations in which we find ourselves looking atsomething far away that nevertheless moves extremely fast, such as an incoming meteor.

然而當(dāng)我們在觀察那些離我們很遠卻移動很快的事物的時候，例如轉(zhuǎn)瞬即逝的流星。我們的感知可能會被混淆。

At thousands of miles an hour, that flaming object speeds across your field of vision, and yourbrain can easily conclude it must be much closer than it is--maybe even about to abduct you.

發(fā)光的流星以一小時數(shù)千公里的速度穿過你的視野，你的大腦很容易覺得它離你比實際距離要近得多?；蛟S它是來綁架你的!