DISPUTES about science in Western countries can sometimes be heated. Seldom, though, do they descend into fisticuffs. But this is what seems to have happened in China on August 29th. That day Fang Shimin, a well-known scientific blogger and self-proclaimed “science cop”, was attacked in the street by a gang. Nor was this the first such incident. In June Fang Xuanchang (no relation), a science journalist on Caijing magazine, was on the receiving end of similar treatment.
在西方国家，科学上的争论有时也可以很激烈，但几乎没有上升至互殴的。但在8月29日似乎在中国却发生了。那天，一位著名的科学博客作家，自称是“科学警察”的方世民（即方舟子---译者），在街头被一个混混袭击。这种事已不是第一次发生了，在6月，《财经》杂志科学记者方玄昌（与前者无亲戚关系）也遭受过类似的袭击。

So far, it might be thought by smug Westerners, so depressing. But then there was a twist in the tale. One of the objects of the two Fangs’ criticisms, Xiao Chuanguo, a urologist at Huazhong University of Science and Technology in Wuhan, was arrested and charged with organising the assaults. Even more extraordinary (or perhaps not, considering that he had been detained for seven days without access to a lawyer), he confessed his guilt on television, on September 28th.
至此，自命不凡的西方人可能感到很郁闷。但接着故事出现了转折。二位方先生的批评对象之一，武汉华中科技大学泌尿科医生肖传国因组织这两次攻击而被捕。更不寻常的是，他于9月28日在电视上公开认罪。（考虑到他已被扣押七天而且无权见律师，这可能没什么不寻常了）

Virtue, then, has prevailed. And Chinese science has taken a step towards the standards of civilised discourse that Westerners like to think prevail in their own countries. Maybe. For the more you dig into this strange tale, the more illuminating it is of the need for Chinese science to clean up its act.
然后，正义一方获胜了。中国的科学界向着文明化的讨论标准迈进了一步，西方人认为这种文明化的讨论只在他们的本国盛行。也许吧。你对这个奇怪的故事钻的越深，越能明显发现中国科学界实在需要洁身自律了。

Fang Shimin claims that Xin Yu Si (New Threads), the website he runs, posts about 100 allegations of scientific fraud a year, and he has become a folk hero as a result. China has no proper procedures for dealing with such fraud and Dr Fang believes that, in the absence of such official channels, a platform of the sort his website provides is indispensable to the fight against misconduct in science.
方世民宣称，他主持的网站“新语丝”，每年要登出100起学术造假指控，结果他已经成为一位民间英雄。中国对于这种造假没有合适的处理程序，方博士认为，由于官方管理渠道的缺失，像他的网站这类平台，在和学术不当行为的斗争中是必不可少的。

Some of the accusations undoubtedly stand up and shine a light on the often-murky business of Chinese science. Many, however, are anonymous and lack specifics, making it difficult for those accused to mount a rebuttal even when they are innocent. Indeed, New Threads reminds some of those with longer memories of the hysteria of the Cultural Revolution, when anybody could post any accusation on da zi bao (big-character posters), and countless lives were ruined as a consequence. Not surprisingly, Dr Fang has many enemies.
一些指控的确是站得住脚，并给经常处以黑暗的中国学术界点起了一盏明灯。但是还有许多指控是匿名的而且缺乏细节，造成即便被指控者是清白的，也很难作出反驳。实际上，“新语丝”让一些记忆相对久远的人想起了文革那样的歇斯底里，那时任何人都可以通过贴大字报来对别人任意指控，结果毁了无数人的一生。无疑，方舟子的敌人很多。


Threadbare?
还是老一套？

The bad blood between him and Dr Xiao in particular goes back to New Threads’ foundation in 2000. Almost immediately Dr Xiao, writing under the pseudonym of Hun Jiao Shou (Confused Professor), began criticising Dr Fang for the way New Threads went about its business. In 2001 Dr Xiao wrote to Science accusing Dr Fang of plagiarism. Dr Fang had written an article that drew on a paper in Science without, Dr Xiao felt, proper acknowledgment of the original researcher. Science’s editors, however, disagreed after they had looked into the matter.
方世民和肖博士的芥蒂尤其要追溯到2000年“新语丝”刚建立的时候。几乎和“新语丝”建立同时，笔名为“昏教授”的肖博士就开始批评其运作方式。2001年，肖写信给《科学》杂志，指方世民剽窃。方世民在科学杂志上发表了一篇论文，肖博士认为，该文未对原始资料作者进行适当的声明。《科学》的编辑们在调查此事之后，没有同意肖的观点。

In 2005, after several bitter exchanges, Dr Fang managed to identify the Confused Professor as Dr Xiao. Around the same time, Dr Xiao applied to be elected to the Chinese Academy of Engineering. Dr Fang got hold of a copy of Dr Xiao’s application and made several allegations in New Threads, in newspapers and on television. He said that Dr Xiao held full-time positions in America as well as China, thus showing insufficient loyalty to his Chinese institution, and also that he included conference abstracts as well as proper, peer-reviewed papers in his publication list—though neither of these is a mortal sin.
2005年，经过几次激烈交锋之后，方得以确认昏教授就是肖。就在那段时间，肖申请入选中国工程院院士。方拿到了肖的申请表，在新语丝、报纸和电视上提出几项指控。他表示，肖在美国和中国都是全职，由此表明他对供职的中国研究机构没有足够的忠诚度，方公布的事项中还包括了会议纪要和正式而用心加以审阅的论文。尽管这些都不能算是道德犯罪。

More seriously, Dr Fang alleged that Dr Xiao had exaggerated the efficacy of a potentially revolutionary surgical procedure he had invented. This operation is intended to restore bladder function to people with spina bifida, a congenital defect that causes nerve damage and a loss of sensation and muscle function below the waist. Dr Xiao’s response was to take Dr Fang to court for libel—frequently. He won two cases, lost two, and several others remain undecided. Then, last autumn, Science News, a Chinese-language magazine of which Fang Xuanchang was then executive editor, devoted two issues to articles questioning the safety and efficacy of the Xiao procedure—using as a source Fang Shimin’s lawyer Peng Jian, a man with no scientific or medical background.
更严重的是，方声称，肖夸大了自己发明的潜在革命性外科手术的疗效。该手术旨在为脊柱裂的患者恢复膀胱功能，脊柱裂是一种先天性缺陷，可以导致神经损伤，腰部以下知觉和肌肉功能丧失。肖对此事的回应是将方频繁地告上法庭。肖赢了两起官司，输了两起，还有其他几起尚未判决。接着，在去年秋天，一本由方宣长时任主编的名为“科学新闻”的中文杂志，在两期杂志上刊载了质疑肖手术的安全性和疗效的文章，资料来源是方的律师彭健，其人并无科学和医学背景。

Meanwhile, similar accusations were posted under the pseudonym xysergroup (xys are the initials of Xin Yu Si) on two patient-support websites in America, SpinaBifidaConnection and CareCure, apparently trying to warn patients away from clinical trials based on Dr Xiao’s procedure that are being undertaken in the United States. These accusations were odd because an independent pilot study of the technique, whose results were published formally in the August issue of the Journal of Urology, but which have been common knowledge since 2008, suggests most of the patients involved have indeed experienced improvements in bladder function.
与此同时，类似的指控以“新语丝人”的笔名发表在美国的两个名为“脊柱裂患者连线”和 CareCure的患者康复网站上，明显是警告患者远离正在美国进行的，基于肖的手术方式的临床实验。这些指控很奇怪，因为对这项技术的独立初步研究在8月号的《泌尿学期刊》上已经发表，而且该技术早自2008年以来就为常人所知了，研究结果表明，大多数参加实验的患者，膀胱功能确实有了改善。

If this were a lone spat, it would hardly matter. But it seems symptomatic of something wider. In 2006, for example, 120 Chinese scientists, many working in the United States, wrote to the country’s science-policy officials warning of the risks of unfounded allegations and anonymous personal attacks. They called for the establishment of independent expert committees to investigate claims of scientific misconduct. In particular, they argued, investigations should be carried out in confidence and innocence should be presumed until guilt was proven.
如果这只是单单的一场争执，倒也没什么大不了的。但这争执却有扩大化的征兆。比如在2006年，120名中国科学家，其中有许多在美国工作，写信给国家的科学界管理机构，警告无理由的指控和匿名的人身攻击的风险。他们要求成立独立的专家委员会来调查声称的学术不端行为。他们特别指出，调查应秘密进行，并实行无罪推定。

Unfortunately, nothing has yet happened. No one, then, comes out looking good. What started as an attempt to lighten a dark corner of Chinese life has turned into something that looks suspiciously like a witch-hunt. The upshot is that Chinese science needs to get its house in order. Measured by the number of published papers, China is the second most productive scientific nation on Earth. Incidents like this, though, call into question how trustworthy that productivity is. And that is not a trivial matter. If China does not have honest science, its development will be impeded. Considering how many of the men who run China are engineers, it is surprising this message has not yet got through.
不幸的是，目前为止这些都未落实。每个人看上去都不干净了。开始时是为了照亮中国人生命中黑暗角落的尝试，已经变成了一场类似政治迫害似的运动。结果是中国科学界还要再收拾局面。从发表的论文数量这一标准来看，中国是世界上第二高产的科学大国。然而，这种事件的发生却让人怀疑这种高产的可信度。而这可不是小事。如果中国没有诚信的科学界，国家的发展就会停滞。鉴于执掌中国大权的人里工程师的数量颇多，这一危险仍未受高层所知就显得令人吃惊了。