诺贝尔奖得主的人生故事激发了"美丽心灵"

John Nash in 1994, the year he won the Nobel ineconomic sciences. (Charles Rex Arbogast/AP)ByEmily Langer May 24 Follow @emilylangerWP

1994年的约翰·纳什，这年他获得了诺贝尔经济学奖。(查尔斯·雷克斯·阿伯加斯特/美联社)

艾米丽·兰格·梅，5月24日，Follow @emilylangerWP

John F. Nash Jr., who revolutionized themathematical field of game theory, was endowed witha mind that was highly original and deeplytroubled. But it became known to most people byHollywood's description. His mind was beautiful.

小约翰福布斯路纳什，这个彻底改变了博弈论数学领域的人，具有高度原创和深刻焦虑的头脑。但这为大多数人知晓 却是因为好莱坞的描述，他的心灵是美丽的。

Dr. Nash, a Nobel Prize-winning mathematician whose descent into and recovery from mentalillness inspir ed the Academy Award-winning film "A Beautiful Mind, died May 23 in a two-caraccident on the New Jersi Turnpike. He was 86. His wife, Alicia, who was 82, also died.

获得诺贝尔奖的数学家纳什博士曾经深陷精神疾病而又从中康复，激发了奧斯卡获奖影片“美丽心灵。他死于5月23日在新泽西收费公路的两车相撞,享年86岁。他82岁的妻子艾丽西亚也死了。

According to preliminary findings by the New Jersey State Police, the Nashes were in a taxicabtraveling southbound near Monroe when their driver lost control of the vehicle. The taxidriver's injuries were not considered life-threatening, New Jersey police said. The Nashes livedin Princeton Junction, N.J.

根据新泽西州警方的初步调查结果，当司机失去对车辆的控制时，纳什夫妇正在门罗镇附近南行的出租车内。出租车司机的伤势没有危及生命，新泽西州警方说。纳什夫妇住在新泽西州的普林斯顿中转站。

In 1994, when Dr. Nash received the Nobel Prize in economic sciences, the award marked notonly an intellectual triumph but also a personal one. More than four decades earlier, as aPrinceton University graduate student, he had produced a 27-page thesis on game theory — inessence, the applied mathematical study of decision-making in situations of conflict — thatwould become one of the most celebrated works in the field.

1994年，纳什博士获得了诺贝尔经济科学奖，该奖项不仅标志着知识的胜利，而且也是个人的胜利。40多年前，作为普林斯顿大学的研究生，他写了一篇27页的博弈论论文 - 从本质上讲，这是一项在冲突情形下做决策的应用数学研究 - 将要成为本领域内最杰出的作品之一。

Before the academic world could fully recognize his achievement, Dr. Nash descended into acondition eventually diagnosed as schizophrenia. For the better part of 20 years, his oncesupremely rational mind was beset by delusions and hallucinations.

在学术界充分认识他的成就之前，纳什博士陷入了最终被确诊为精神分裂症的困境。在20年的大部分时间里，他曾经无比理性的头脑被妄想和幻觉困扰。

By the time Dr. Nash emerged from his disturbed state, his ideas had influenced economics,foreign affairs, politics, biology — virtually every sphere of life fueled by competition. But hehad been absent from professional life for so long that some scholars assumed he was dead.

在纳什博士出现精神紊乱状态时，他的思想却影响了经济、外交、政治和生物学 - 生活的几乎所有受竞争推动的方面。但他缺席职业生涯这么久，有些学者认为他已经死了。

"We helped lift him into daylight," Assar Lindbeck, the former chairman of the committee for theNobel Prize in economics, told Sylvia Nasar, Dr. Nash's biographer. "We resurrected him in away."

"我们把他抬到阳光下。"诺贝尔经济学奖委员会的前主席阿萨·林德贝克告诉纳什博士的传记作者西尔维娅·纳萨。"我们以某种方式使他复活了。"

Nasar's book, titled "A Beautiful Mind," was published in 1998 and adapted for the big screenthree years later. The film, although criticized by some for presenting a romanticized version ofthe mathematician's life, won four Oscars, including for best picture. Portrayed by RussellCrowe, Dr. Nash became an international celebrity — perhaps the most famous mathematicianin recent memory.

纳萨的书名为"美丽心灵"，出版于1998年，三年后搬上了大银幕。这部电影，尽管受到了一些对数学家生活进行浪漫化的批评，却荣获四项奥斯卡大奖，包括最佳影片。罗素·克洛描绘的纳什博士成为国际名人 - 也许是近来最有名的数学家。

Complexity in competition

竞争中的复杂性

Modern game theory was first articulated by mathematician John von Neumann and economistOskar Morgenstern in the 1944 volume "Theory of Games and Economic Behavior."

现代博弈论最早由数学家约翰·冯·诺伊曼和经济学家奥斯卡·摩根斯坦在1944年的著作《博弈论与经济行为》中表述。

Its objective: to understand and ultimately predict the interactions between rivals in givencircumstanc es. During the Cold War standoff between the United States and the Soviet Union,game theory became in asingly fashionable and immensely useful.

其目标是：理解并最终预测给定情况下竞争对手之间的相互作用。在美国和苏联之间的冷战对峙期间，博弈变得越来越 时尚,非常有用。

Von Neumann and Morgenstern had assumed the existence of a "zero-sum" game such ascheckers, in wP e party's loss was the adversary's gain. Dr. Nash 狄 who, ironically, was said tohave struggled since ch ildhood with social interactions 狄 observed that few human rivalriesfunction in so simple a fashion.

冯路诺依曼和摩根斯坦曾假定存在“零和博弈,就像在跳棋中，一方的损失就是对手的收益。具有讽刺意味的是,据说在从小就与社会互动艰难的纳什博士观察到人类竞争活动很少会如此简单。

expanded game theory to include cooperative games (in which binding agreements can bemade) and n ooperative games (in which they cannot), and to allow for the possibility of mutualgain. Such an outcome became known as the Nash equilibrium.

他将博弈论扩展到包含合作博弈(其中可以达成有约束力的协议)和非合作博弈(其中达不成协议),并允许有共同获益的可能。这祥的结果是著名的纳什均衡。

Nash equilibriums, which he described in the hieroglyphics of mathematical symbols, existeverywhere. Two magazines might charge the same price so that each may achieve maximumprofit. Two rival nations might agree to arms treaties that limit each of their stockpiles butguarantee both countries a measure of security.

他以数学符号的天书描述的纳什均衡无处不在。两本杂志可能会采取相同的价格，以便双方都可以实现最大的利润。两个敌对国家可能会同意武器条约来限制他们的军备，但同时保证双方某种程度的安全。

The utility of Dr. Nash's work had limitations. One is that rivals frequently do not fully knoweach other's strategies, as his theories assumed. Another limitation is that in many cases,there is not a single possible outcome for a conflict but rather many potential outcomes.Game theorists John Harsanyi and Reinhard Selten shared with Dr. Nash the 1994 Nobel Prizefor contributions in those areas of the field. The prize citation recognized all three men for their"pioneering analysis."

纳什博士的工作的效用有其局限性。其中之一是，对手通常并不完全知道对方的策略，而他的理论有此假设。另一个限制是，在许多情况下，冲突可能有许多潜在的可能性，而不止是单个结果。博弈论专家约翰·海萨尼和莱因哈德·泽尔滕因为此领域的贡献与纳什博士分享1994年诺贝尔奖。颁奖词认可了他们三人"开创性的分析。"

Dr. Nash was described as having insights before he could hammer out the proofs of theiraccuracy, the thoughts coming to him more like revelations than like scholarly findings. Asearly as 1958, Fortune magazine had ranked him among the greatest mathematicians of theera.

纳什博士被描述为更富于洞察力，而非准确的证明，他的思想更像是天启，而非学术成果。早在1958年,《财富》杂志就将他排为那个时代最伟大的数学家之一。

"Everyone else would climb a peak by looking for a path somewhere on the mountain," Nasarquoted a former colleague as saying. "Nash would climb another mountain altogether and froma distant peak would shine a searchlight back on the first peak."

"其他人会通过查找山里的某处路径来攀登高峰，"纳萨援引一位前同事的话说。"纳什会完全爬到另一座山，从遥远的山峰用探照灯来回照第一个峰。"

The emperor of Antarctica

南极洲的皇帝

His mental illness came on when he was about 30, during what might have been one of therichest periods of his career. Dr. Nash was working at the time at the Massachusetts Instituteof Technology and was studying quantum theory.

他30岁左右时精神病来袭，这时候可能是他职业生涯中最丰富的时期之一。纳什博士当时在麻省理工学院工作，正在研究量子理论。

As his condition worsened, Dr. Nash suffered delusions, hallucinations and impressions of beinghunted. Men wearing red ties, he came to believe, were part of a "crypto-Communist Party."

由于病情恶化，纳什博士苦于妄想、幻觉和被追杀的印象。他开始相信，带红色领带的男人很可能是"地下GCD"。

He thought that the New York Times was publishing messages from extraterrestrials and thathe could understand them. He gave a student an intergalactic driver's license, Nasar wrote.

他认为《纽约时报》正在由外星人发布消息，并说他能理解他们。他给了学生一个星际驾照，纳萨写道。

At one point, he declined a prestigious appointment to the University of Chicago because hebelieved that he was in line to become emperor of Antarctica. At another point, he concluded,according to Nasar, that he was a "messianic figure of great but secret importance" andsearched numerals — once the object of his brilliance — for hidden messages.

在某个时刻，他拒绝了久负盛名的芝加哥大学的任命，因为他认为他即将成为南极洲皇帝。根据纳萨的说法，在另一个时刻他得出结论，他是一个"救世主式的重要人物，伟大而又神秘"，并开始搜索具有隐秘信息的数字 —— 这些数字一度成为他出色才华的对象。

"I felt like I might get a divine revelation by seeing a certain number; a great coincidencecould be interpreted as a message from heaven," Dr. Nash said years later in the PBS "AmericanExperience" documentary "A Brilliant Madness."

"我觉得我能通过观察一个数来得到神的启示，一个伟大的巧合可以解释为从天上来的消息，"纳什博士多年后在PBS的纪录片"美国经验"中说，"才华横溢的疯狂"。

He let his hair grow long. He traveled abroad and attempted to give up his U.S. citizenship, andat various times considered himself a Japanese shogun, the biblical figure Job and a Palestinianrefugee, among other identities.

他头发留得长长的。他在国外旅行并试图放弃美国国籍，还在不同时期认为自己是日本幕府将军、圣经人物、巴勒斯坦难民以及其他身份。

During one of his stays in mental institutions, a former colleague came for a visit.

在他待在精神病院的一个时期，一个以前的同事来探望他。

"How could you, a mathematician devoted to reason and logical proof . . . how could youbelieve that extraterrestrials are sending you messages?" he asked, according to Nasar.

"作为一个致力于理性和逻辑证明的数学家，你怎么这样…你怎么能相信外星人在给你发信息呢?"根据纳萨的说法，他问道。

"Because," Dr. Nash responded, "the ideas about supernatural beings came to me the sameway that my mathematical ideas did. So I took them seriously."

纳什博士回答说，"因为关于超自然物的思想就如同数学思想一样来到，所以我把它们当回事。"

‘Big Brains'

"大头"

John Forbes Nash Jr. was born June 13, 1928, in Bluefield, W.Va. His father was an electricalengineer and his mother was an English and Latin teacher.

小约翰·福布斯·纳什1928年6月13日出生在西弗吉尼亚州的蓝田。他的父亲是一个电气工程师，母亲是英语和拉丁语教师。

As a child, John Jr. acquired a nickname: "Big Brains." His family encouraged education, but herecalled in his Nobel biographical sketch the need to "learn from the world's knowledge ratherthan from the knowledge of the immediate community."

作为一个孩子，小约翰获得了一个绰号："大头。"他的家庭鼓励教育，但他在他的诺贝尔小传中回忆，"从世界的知识中学习，远甚于从附近社区中学习。"

In 1945, he enrolled at what is now Carnegie Mellon University in Pittsburgh and completed hisundergraduate work after switching from chemical engineering to chemistry and finally tomathematics. So great was his progress that he received a master's degree in addition to hisbachelor's degree, both in mathematics, upon his graduation in 1948. He then moved toPrinceton University, where, as a second-year student, he wrote the thesis that became theintellectual underpinning of his contributions to game theory.

1945年，他就读于位于匹兹堡的现在的卡内基梅隆大学，从化学工程转到化学，最后转到数学后完成了他的本科学业。他的进步是如此之大，以致在1948年毕业时除学士学位外还获得硕士学位，都在数学学科。随后他去了普林斯顿大学，在那里，他作为一个二年级学生写下的论文成为对博弈论所作贡献的知识基础。

Dr. Nash was "handsome as a god," a former classmate told Nasar, but deeply unusual. Herode a bicycle in figure-eights. He joined a group of students that carried on the long traditionat Princeton of playing complex games and even invented a game of his own.

纳什博士"英俊得像个男神，"但极不寻常，一个以前的同学告诉纳萨。他骑自行车走8字形。他加入了有悠久传统的玩复杂游戏的普林斯顿学生团体，甚至自己发明了一个游戏。

Dr. Nash received his doctorate in 1950, joined the MIT faculty and soon took a researchposition at the Rand Corp. in California. In that period of his career, he untangled what hedescribed as a "classical unsolved problem" related to differential geometry and to generalrelativity.

纳什博士在1950年获得博士学位，加入了麻省理工学院，并很快获得加州兰德公司的研究职位。在他职业生涯的这一时期，他解决了一个他描述的"经典未解问题"，这与微分几何与和广义相对论相关。

Also during that period, Dr. Nash met Eleanor Stier, a nurse with whom he had a son, JohnDavid Stier, in 1953. A year later, Dr. Nash was arrested for indecent exposure at a men'srestroom in Santa Monica, Calif., and was immediately dismissed from Rand. According toNasar's biography, he denied that he was gay, showing a picture of Stier and their infant sonto Rand officials as evidence.

也是在此期间，纳什博士遇见了护士埃莉诺·斯蒂尔，他与她在1953年生了一个儿子约翰·大卫·斯蒂尔。一年后，纳什博士涉嫌猥亵暴露而在加州圣莫尼卡的一个男厕内被捕，并立即被兰德解雇。按照纳萨的传记，他否认自己是同性恋，并向兰德官员展示斯蒂尔和他们幼子的照片作为证据。

He then returned to MIT, where he met Alicia Larde, a physics student from El Salvador, andthey married in 1957. Shortly thereafter, Alicia became pregnant with their son, John CharlesMartin Nash, and Dr. Nash began to show signs of mental instability.