在寂静的土壤中发掘美丽的故事|阅读

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我猜想，如果土壤“有思想”，他们将对你们讲述的大多数故事感到满意。

文/美国农业部水土保持司原主任Dick Arnold

译/黄标（中国科学院南京土壤研究所研究员）

来源：生态环境学报（2017年第2期）

Dear friend and colleague Gong Zitong:

Your book arrived a day ago and I enjoyed going through the pages, seeing the many nice pictures and the format of the book. Congratulations to you and your co-authors for preparing a legacy for future people interested in soil science in China. It is well done and the format of the 3 sections is outstanding.

Philosophy, Culture and Dreams is a clever way to put together the stories you want to present. I believe that very few people ever hear about soils being silent, but we have yet to hear one in our own languages. Mankind has dealt with soils forever in its journey of life and always will as long as the earth's environment will permit human life.

I keep thinking about how pedologists, especially, have learned to cleverly gain insights into the layering of soils and make stories about their evolution and changes over time come to life. I guess if soils 'thought' they would be pleased with most stories that have been offered up. You have a long history to compress into your book and from the 5 soil monument to the broad view of all regions it is nice to see. Thanks for such and interesting book, even to an English-only reader such as myself.

Zitong, recently I was thinking about creativity in pedogenesis and whether it is special or not. As I read articles I realized that all humans by natural development are creative. They had to be to survive and our brains have the frontal lobes that are thought to handle choices. Choices are what creativity is all about as we consider what the layers and integral components in those layers might mean. You have some data, some facts, and you propose stories that seem satisfactory. New techniques come along, like some of the ones in Pedometrics, and we have new and more information, and we have to test our stories, to evaluate what they may mean, and so on as we evaluate, improve, maybe even change our minds about soils and their evolution.

It seems that soil survey and pedogenesis are like an archeology of those silent soils. I like it a lot and am even pleased that we can never know everything based on the results. That is the creativity that keeps us going. Wonderful. We are the voices of those silent soils, with our made up stories, and encouraging others to better understand and maybe even comprehend the beauty, the value, the need to care about those silent soils that support our civilization.

And so Gong Zitong, Chen Hongzhao, and Zhang Ganlin, I salute you and am very grateful for your sharing of such great news.

Sincerely, Dick Arnold

亲爱的子同，我的老朋友和老同行：

几天前收到你寄来的书，逐页欣赏，看到了很多精美的照片和版式。祝贺你和你的合作者，为未来中国对土壤科学感兴趣的人们准备了这样一部传世之作。很精彩，三部分的结构也非常完美！

你们将理念、文化和梦想融合在故事中，这是一种灵巧的方法。我相信很少有人听说土壤是寂静的，但我们可以通过我们自己的语言听到。人类在生命旅途中会永远与土壤打交道，并且，只要地球环境适合生命存在，还将与土壤相处下去。

我时常想，土壤学家，特别地说，是如何学会巧妙地洞察土壤的分层，并生动地将土壤的演变过程编成故事。我猜想，如果土壤“有思想”，他们将对你们讲述的大多数故事感到满意。令人愉快见到，你们将历史上土壤学的研究凝聚于此书中，从五色土到所有区域的土壤分布。感谢这样一本有趣的书，即使对于像我这样的英语读者。

子同，我最近正在思考土壤发生研究的创新性，它有何独特之处。当我阅读文献，我意识到，通过自然发展的所有人类都具有创新性。他们无疑是为了生存。我们的大脑前叶被认为用来处理各种各样的选择。选择是到处存在的创新，正如我们思考土壤层次及其整体组分可能赋予的意义。你们既有数据又有事实，所叙述的故事似乎令人满意。

新技术不断进步，如计量土壤学某些方面的进展，我们有更多的新信息，因而，我们在评价、提高或许乃至改变我们对土壤及其演变的认识的过程中，我们就必须检验我们所讲的故事，评价这些故事可能表达的意义，等等。

土壤调查和成土过程的研究看起来像是对那些寂静土壤的考古。我很喜欢乃至高兴，依据现有的结果我们并不能知道万物。然而，这就是推动我们去创新的动力。太美妙了！我们用我们所构思的故事作为寂静的土壤之声，鼓励他人更好地理解或许乃至领悟那些支撑我们文明的寂静的土壤的美丽、价值和关怀的需要。

所以，子同，我向作者们致敬，非常感谢你们与我分享如此好的消息。

诚挚的迪克·阿诺德

（美国农业部水土保持司原主任Dick Arnold）

（黄标译）

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