評論
打印
Some supposed sources of progress now appear almost quaint.
有些曾經被認為是進步的動因的東西，現在看來似乎都有點古怪了。
Take language: many 18th-century thinkers believed that superstitions and past errors were imprinted in words...
以語言為例：很多18 世紀的思想家認為，迷信和過去的眾多錯誤都印刻在文字里……
Purge the language of rotten thinking, they believed, and truth and reason would prevail.
他們相信，只要從文字中清除掉腐敗的思想，真理和理智就能勝利。
The impulse survives, much diminished, in the vocabulary of political correctness.
這種沖動，盡管已經大大減少了，但仍然還殘存在政治上正確的詞匯里。
But these days few people believe in language as an agent of social change.
然而，現在已經很少有人相信語言是社會變革的動因了。
Other sources of progress are clothed in tragedy.
其他進步的動因籠罩在悲劇當中。
The Germanic thought that individual progress should be subsumed into the shared destiny of a nation is fatally associated with Hitler.
日耳曼人認為個人的進步應該從屬于國家的整體命運，這種想法致命地和希特勒聯系在一起。
Whenever nationalism becomes the chief organizing principle of society, state violence is not far behind.
民族主義一旦成為一個社會的指導思想，距離國家暴力就不遠了。
Likewise, unspeakable crimes were committed by the ruling elite in the pursuit of progress, rather as they had been in the name of God in earlier centuries.
同樣，統治精英在追求進步的過程中也會犯下惡劣的罪行，就如同此前幾個世紀里以上帝的名義犯下的罪行那樣。
