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Science and Technology
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Psychology
心理學
How dead is dead?
怎樣死才算死？
Sometimes, those who have died seem more alive than those who have not
有時，死人似乎比活人更"活"。
IN GENERAL, people are pretty good at differentiating between the quick and the dead.
通常，人們都比較擅長分辨生者與死者。
Modern medicine, however, has created a third option, the persistent vegetative state.
然而，現代醫學技術創造了第三個選項——永久性植物人狀態。
People in such a state have serious brain damage as a result of an accident or stroke.
處于這種狀態的人，其大腦因意外或中風而嚴重受損。
This often means they have no hope of regaining consciousness.
這經常意味著他們沒有希望再恢復意識。
Yet because parts of their brains that run activities such as breathing are intact, their vital functions can be sustained indefinitely.
但是，由于他們大腦里負責某些生理活動（如呼吸）的部分仍然完好，所以他們的生命機能可以被永遠維持下去。
When, if ever, to withdraw medical support from such people, and thus let them die, is always a traumatic decision.
何時撤走維持他們生命的醫療手段，任其死去（如果真的要這樣做的話）？
It depends in part, though, on how the fully alive view the mental capacities of the vegetative-an area that has not been investigated much.
這是個痛苦的決定。不過，這在某種程度上取決于真正活著的人如何看待植物人的心智活動能力，這個領域人類還未作過深入研究。
To fill that gap Kurt Gray of the University of Maryland, and Annie Knickman and Dan Wegner of Harvard University, conducted an experiment designed to ascertain just how people perceive those in a persistent vegetative state. What they found astonished them.
為了填補這個領域的空白，馬里蘭州大學的庫爾特?格雷和哈佛大學的丹?魏格納進行了一個實驗，旨在確定人們如何認知植物人。實驗結果令他們大吃一驚。
They first asked 201 people stopped in public in New York and New England to answer questions after reading one of three short stories.
首先，他們在紐約和新英格蘭的公眾場所選擇201個人，讓他們閱讀三個小故事的其中一個，然后回答一些問題。
In all three, a man called David was involved in a car accident and suffered serious injuries.
三個故事當中，都講到一個名叫大衛的男人遭遇車禍并嚴重受傷。
In one, he recovered fully.
在第一個故事里，大衛完全康復了。
In another, he died.
在第二個里，他死了。
In the third, his entire brain was destroyed except for one part that kept him breathing.
第三個中，除了維持呼吸的那一部分外，他的大腦完全受損。
Although he was technically alive, he would never again wake up.
雖然嚴格來講，大衛仍然活著，但他再也不會蘇醒了。
After reading one of these stories, chosen at random, each participant was asked to rate David's mental capacities, including whether he could influence the outcome of events, know right from wrong, remember incidents from his life, be aware of his environment, possess a personality and have emotions.
隨機閱讀一個小故事后，每位被試都被要求對大衛的心智能力作出評價，評價內容包括：他能否影響外界發生的事物，能否判斷是非和記憶過去的事，能否對他所在的環境有所意識，是否擁有個性和情感。
Participants used a seven-point scale to make these ratings, where 3 indicated that they strongly agreed that he could do such things, 0 indicated that they neither agreed nor disagreed, and -3 indicated that they strongly disagreed.
被試們用七個等級來進行評分，3表示非常同意大衛能夠完成這些事，0表示既不同意亦不反對，-3表示強烈反對。
The results, reported in Cognition, were that the fully recovered David rated an average of 1.77 and the dead David -0.29.
在《認知》雜志上報道的結果顯示，完全康復的大衛得到的評價均值為1.77，死去的大衛得到的評價均值為-0.29。
That score for the dead David was surprising enough, suggesting as it did a considerable amount of mental acuity in the dead.
死去的大衛得到這樣的分數已經令人甚感驚奇了，因為這表明死者大衛的心智仍相當敏銳。
What was extraordinary, though, was the result for the vegetative David: -1.73.
但離奇的是變成植物人的大衛得到的平均分為-1.73。
In the view of the average New Yorker or New Englander, the vegetative David was more dead than the version who was dead.
在紐約和新英格蘭的普通市民眼中，變成植物人的大衛比死去的大衛"死"得更徹底。
The researchers' first hypothesis to explain this weird observation was that participants were seeing less mind in the vegetative than in the dead because they were focusing on the inert body of the individual hooked up to a life-support system.
為了解釋這個奇怪的觀察結果，研究者們作出的第一個假設是被試認為植物人的心智活動比死人更少，因為被試關注的是大衛那連接著維持生命的系統、呆滯的身體。
To investigate that, they ran a follow-up experiment which had two different descriptions of the dead David. One said he had simply passed away.
為了研究這個假設，他們又進行了一個后續實驗，這次對于大衛的死亡有兩個不同版本的描述。
The other directed the participant's attention to the corpse. It read, "After being embalmed at the morgue, he was buried in the local cemetery.
一個只說他去世了。另一個則使被試聯想到大衛的尸體，它寫到："大衛的尸體在太平間作過防腐處理后，便被埋葬在當地的公墓中。
David now lies in a coffin underground." No ambiguity there.
如今他正躺在地下的一個棺材中。"描述非常清晰，毫不含糊。
In this follow-up study participants were also asked to rate how religious they were.
在后續實驗里，被試也被要求對自己的宗教虔誠度作出評價。
Once again, the vegetative David was seen to have less mind than the David who had "passed away".
這次，植物人大衛的心智活動仍然被認為少于"去世"的大衛。
This was equally true, regardless of how religious a participant said he was.
不論被試對自己的宗教虔誠度評價有多高，結果仍是如此。
However, ratings of the dead David's mind in the story in which his corpse was embalmed and buried varied with the participant's religiosity.
但是，被試讀過描述大衛被作防腐處理并埋葬的故事后，對其心智活動作出的評價會隨被試的宗教虔誠度而改變。
Irreligious participants gave the buried corpse about the same mental ratings as the vegetative patient (-1.51 and -1.64 respectively).
無宗教信仰的被試對被被埋葬的大衛的尸體和植物人大衛的評價大致相同（分別為-1.51和-1.64）。
Religious participants, however, continued to ascribe less mind to the irretrievably unconscious David than they did to his buried corpse (-1.57 and 0.59).
但是，有宗教信仰的被試仍然認為意識已經一去不返的植物人大衛其心智活動比死去的大衛少（分別為-1.57和0.59）。
That those who believe in an afterlife ascribe mental acuity to the dead is hardly surprising.
相信來世的人認為死人仍有精神活動，這一點都不奇怪。
That those who do not are inclined to do so unless heavily prompted not to is curious indeed.
但那些不相信來世的人也傾向于這樣認為（除非被強烈提示避免如此），實在是相當奇怪。
