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One of history’s recurring themes is that technology sometimes outruns society, leaving politicians gasping to catch up with the consequences. So it was with the impact of the printing press, the steam engine and the computer. Arguably, so it is again today with gene editing, social media and artificial intelligence.
历史上反复出现的一个主题是，科技发展有时会超前于社会，让政治人士满头大汗地跟在后面处理随之而来的后果。印刷机、蒸汽机和电脑的出现就是如此。如今，基因编辑、社交媒体和人工智能的出现可以说同样如此。
While technologists often rail that politicians just do not “get” technology, politicians counter that technologists all too rarely grasp politics.
技术专家经常抱怨政治人士不“懂”技术，政治人士则反击道，技术专家大多数时候也不懂政治。
One fascinating example of both sides of the debate was the history of the technocracy movement that briefly flourished in North America in the 1930s. The “revolt of the engineers”, as it was called, holds some interesting lessons for today.
对辩论双方都适用的一个有趣例子是上世纪30年代在北美短暂兴盛的技术治国(technocracy)运动。这场当时被称为“工程师起义”(revolt of the engineers)的运动，有不少地方值得今天的人们思考。
It was understandable that radical movements emerged in the US in the 1930s in response to the Great Depression, just as communism and fascism proliferated in Europe. The technocracy movement argued that the best way out of the crisis was to reject the messiness of the market and old-fashioned politics and adopt a “modern scientific point of view”.
可以理解的是，上世纪30年代，各种回应“大萧条”(Great Depression)的激进运动在美国兴起，正如共产主义和法西斯主义当时在欧洲兴起。技术治国运动提出，摆脱危机的最佳方法是拒绝乱糟糟的市场体系以及老式的政治，采用一种“现代、科学的观点”。
