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The writer is a science commentator
作者是一位科學評論員
The scientist Helen Fisher once revealed how she ended up marrying the love of her life at 75. After months of chaste socialising, she and her beau played a game of pool, each having written down on a cocktail napkin what they wanted as a prize if they won.
科學家海倫•費舍爾(Helen Fisher)曾透露，她是如何在75歲時嫁給她一生摯愛的。經過幾個月的純潔社交後，她和她的男友玩了一局撞球，每個人都在雞尾酒餐巾紙上寫下了他們獲勝後想要的獎品。
After he triumphantly potted the winning ball, she opened his napkin to reveal the words: “sex and clarity”. Her napkin read: “a real kiss”. The eventual arc of their relationship — from friends to bed mates to spouses — would have been little surprise to Fisher, an anthropologist who studied the science of love and attraction. Both friendship and lust, she believed, could blossom into romantic love and then a deeper attachment.
在他得意洋洋地打進位勝球后，她打開他的餐巾紙，發現上面寫著「性和關係的明確」。她的餐巾紙上寫著「一個真正的吻」。他們的關係最終的發展軌跡——從朋友到牀伴再到夫妻——對費舍爾來說並不令人意外，她是一位研究愛情和吸引力科學的人類學家。她相信，友誼和慾望都可以發展成浪漫的愛情，然後進一步形成更深的依戀。
Fisher, who died of endometrial cancer last month aged 79, left a striking legacy: legitimising love as a subject worthy of scholarly inquiry while somehow not diminishing its magic. Early on, science did not quite know what to make of her: as she told it, a reviewer rejected one of her papers on the basis that love was a supernatural phenomenon. Her punchy response was a string of books bearing such titles as The Sex Contract: The Evolution of Human Behavior and Anatomy of Love: the Natural History of Monogamy, Adultery and Divorce.
費舍爾上個月因子宮內膜癌去世，享年79歲，留下了令人矚目的遺產：將愛情作爲值得學術研究的主題合法化，同時又不減弱其魔力。早期，科學界對她有些摸不著頭腦：據她所說，一位審稿人以愛情是超自然現象爲由拒絕了她的一篇論文。她的有力回應是一系列書籍，如《性契約：人類行爲的演化》和《愛的解剖：一夫一妻制、通姦和離婚的自然歷史》。
In 2005, while at Rutgers University in New Jersey, Fisher and colleagues used MRI technology to scan the brains of the besotted. Photos of a sweetheart, she found, prompted a rush of dopamine in the brain. Love was indeed not supernatural: it was an all-consuming, primal, hard-wired drive, akin to hunger and thirst, especially for the rejected. Being in love, she memorably quipped, was like having someone “camping inside your head”.
2005年，費舍爾和同事在新澤西(New Jersey)的羅格斯大學(Rutgers University)使用MRI技術掃描了熱戀者的大腦。她發現，戀人的照片會引發大腦中多巴胺的激增。愛情確實不是超自然的：它是一種全身心的、原始的、與生俱來的驅動力，類似於飢餓和口渴，尤其是對於被拒絕的人來說。她曾經形象地說，戀愛就像有人「在你的腦海中露營」。
Fisher spent her career trying to figure out what we all long to know: how do we find that special someone who triggers our circuits? She divided people into four personality types, which she tied to their brain chemistry: risk-taking “explorers”; rule-loving “builders”; logical and analytical “directors”; and imaginative, empathetic “negotiators”. If you met your partner through match.com, you probably have Fisher to thank: the dating site, which she advised from 2005 until her death, used her inventory to play Cupid to millions.
費舍爾在她的職業生涯中一直試圖弄清楚我們都渴望知道的事情：我們如何找到那個能觸發我們情感迴路的特別的人？她將人們分爲四種性格類型，並將其與大腦化學聯繫起來：喜歡冒險的「探險家」；熱愛規則的「建設者」；邏輯嚴密、善於分析的「主管」；富有想像力和同理心的「談判者」。如果你是透過match.com認識了你的伴侶，你可能要感謝費舍爾：這家約會網站從2005年到她去世一直接受她的建議，利用她的研究成果爲數百萬人扮演丘位元的角色。
Importantly, she took her insights out of the laboratory, dispensing unstuffy advice in Ted talks and interviews. Go ahead and use artificial intelligence in online dating to write a profile, she said in a podcast earlier this year: it can boost your confidence about making initial contact. “Then you go out, and your ancient human brain kicks into action . . . and you assess [potential partners] the way you always did,” she reassured.
重要的是，她把她的見解帶出了實驗室，在Ted演講和採訪中提供了不拘束的建議。她在今年早些時候的一次播客中說，可以在在線約會中使用人工智慧來撰寫個人資料，這可以增強你對初次聯繫的信心。她安慰道：「然後你出去，你古老的人腦開始行動……你會像往常一樣評估[潛在伴侶]。」
She also advised online daters not to binge. Infinite choice simply paralyses our ancient brains. Her tip: pick between five and nine potential matches who are “in the ballpark” and give them a go. And don’t give up too soon; just because they don’t roar at your first joke doesn’t mean they lack a GSOH. Always a progressive, she praised younger generations, including those in polyamorous relationships, for taking longer to settle down. But there was also wise counsel to those in long-established relationships casting around to recall the passion of the early days. Staying together, she insisted, entailed working at all three phases of love that she identified: sex-based lust, romantic love and then attachment.
她還建議在線約會者不要過度沉迷。無限的選擇只會讓我們古老的大腦癱瘓。她的建議是，在「合適範圍內」選擇五到九個潛在的匹配對象，並試一試。不要太快放棄；他們不會因爲你的第一個笑話而不激動，並不意味著他們缺乏幽默感(GSOH)。作爲一個進步的人，她讚揚了年輕一代，包括那些進行多元關係的人，因爲他們需要更長時間來安定下來。但她也給那些在長期關係中尋找早期激情的人提供了明智的建議。她堅持認爲，維持關係需要在她所確定的三個階段中努力：基於性慾的慾望、浪漫的愛情，然後是依戀。
“Have sex,” she advised bluntly, on the same podcast. “Don’t tell me you don’t have time. You have time to get your hair cut.” To sustain romantic love, share novel experiences; maybe take up a new hobby together. As for attachment: hug, kiss and sit next to each other on the sofa when you watch TV. Closeness stokes the feel-good chemicals that keep couples roped companionably together.
在同一檔播客中，她直言不諱地建議：「做愛吧。別告訴我你沒時間。你有時間去理髮。」爲了維持浪漫的愛情，分享新奇的經歷，也許一起培養一個新的愛好。至於依戀，當你們一起看電視時，擁抱、親吻並肩坐在沙發上。親密會激發讓情侶之間保持愉悅關係的化學物質。
Still haven’t finalised your weekend plans? It’s time to cancel the haircut.
週末計劃還沒敲定嗎？是時候取消理髮了。