科技狂人構造“超環路”

????拋開媒體炒作談超環路（Hyperloop）是不可能的，這是特斯拉公司（Tesla）和Space X公司創始人兼首席執行官埃隆?穆斯克提出的前衛超高速交通系統。它是真的，如今有太多的新聞報道一直在談超環路。而從本質上說，它只不過是一項被披露出來的計劃，而且很有可能永遠無法變成現實。不過，如果將重點放在媒體炒作上，可能就忽略了任何雄心壯志背后所蘊藏的力量，尤其這個雄心壯志是來自一位運營兩家成功公司的人——一家公司的業務是向國際空間站（ISS）運送貨物（運送對象很快會拓展到人），另一家公司制造了有史以來最暢銷的電動跑車。

????埃倫?穆斯克公布了在鋼制管道內使用鋁制吊艙運載乘客的計劃：人們將乘坐吊艙在雙管獵槍一樣的管道內以800英里的時速旅行。周一下午，穆斯克在接受《彭博商業周刊》（Bloomberg Businessweek）采訪時表示，他還設想了一種運載汽車的吊艙：“只需要把車開上去，然后吊艙就會啟程?！?/p>

????今年5月，穆斯克首次提到了超環路。當時，他將之形容為“協和飛機、磁軌炮以及空氣曲棍球桌的結合體”。協和飛機的比喻似乎尤為貼切。這種超音速商用客機在1969年、也就是人類登月的那一年開始運載乘客。協和飛機只建造了20架，它們飽受系統故障的困擾，2003年——也就是在“9?11”事件造成乘客人數銳減以及2000年發生協和飛機墜毀事件之后——協和飛機停止了商業飛行。然而，想一想，那些在萊特兄弟首次成功飛行之前出生的乘客能夠突破音障，在不到三小時內跨越大西洋，這是多么驚人的事情。

????去年的《財富》頭腦風暴技術大會期間，風險資本家/好奇頑童彼得?泰爾將谷歌（Google）的埃里克?施密特以及所有胸無大志的人斥為懶惰的無夢者。他認為，那樣我們會在重大技術飛躍中開歷史的倒車。泰爾多次提到了協和飛機（這讓人難為情，但這里應該不是特指，就是說全體協和飛機）。起初這個話題很有趣，然后變得奇怪和令人不安。協和飛機是否屬于某種巨大的成就？它并不是一個非常出色的商業項目，它一直虧損，但乘坐協和飛機的消費者稀松平常就突破了音障。比之人們乘坐時速800英里的吊艙在舊金山和洛杉磯之間往返，更加奇怪的事情早已發生。（財富中文網）

????譯者：王燦均??

????It is impossible to spell Hyperloop—Tesla (TSLA) and Space X founder and CEO Elon Musk's incredibly fast and extremely out-there transportation system—without hype. And it's true. There have been many, many, many news stories today about what, essentially, is nothing more than a revealed plan that may very well never see the light of day. But to focus on the hype misses the power behind any hugely ambitious idea. And, in particular, hugely ambitious ideas from a guy running two successful companies, one that delivers cargo (and soon, people) to the International Space Station and another that makes the best selling electric sports car of all time.

????So Elon Musk has released plans to transport people in aluminum pods in steel tubs: a double barrel shotgun where we travel in the shells, at 800 miles per hour. He told Bloomberg Businessweek this afternoon that he also envisions pod filled with cars: "You just drive on, and the pod departs."

????In May, when Musk first mentioned the Hyperloop, he described it as a "cross between a Concorde, a railgun, and an air hockey table." The comparison to Concorde seems especially apt. The supersonic commercial airliner began carrying passengers in 1969—the same year as the first lunar landing. Only 20 were built, they were riddled with system failures, and in 2003—after a sharp decline in passengers post-9/11 and a Concorde crash in 2000—the program was scrapped. Still, it's a staggering thing to consider that some of those passengers breaking the sound barrier and crossing the Atlantic in less than three hours had been born before the first flight at Kitty Hawk.

????Last year, at Fortune Brainstorm tech, venture capitalist/enfant terrible Peter Thiel took Eric Schmidt, Google, and basically anyone not dreaming-up hugely ambitious projects to task for being lazy non-dreamers. He thought we'd moved backwards, actually, in the scope of grand technological leaps. And Thiel kept mentioning Concorde. (It's awkward, but the styling is supposed to be without a definite article. Just: Concorde.) At first it was funny, then it was strange and uncomfortable. Was Concorde some huge achievement? It wasn't a good business, it broke all the time, but paying customers pretty routinely cracked the sound barrier. Stranger things have happened than a double barreled shotgun shooting folks between San Francisco and Los Angeles at 800 miles per hour.