In 1990, as NASA’s Voyager I spacecraft traveled beyond Neptune’s orbit on the way to becoming the first human-made object ever to leave our solar system, its imaging team implemented an idea originally proposed by astronomer Carl Sagan, turning the camera around for one last look at Earth before entering interstellar space.
1990年，美国国家航空航天局(NASA)的旅行者一号(Voyager I)宇宙飞船越过海王星的轨道，成为有史以来第一个离开太阳系的人造物体，它的成像团队实施了天文学家卡尔·萨根(Carl Sagan)最初提出的一个想法，在进入星际空间之前，将相机转过头最后一次看地球。
The image it beamed back showed Earth as nothing more than a pale blue dot.
它传回的图像显示地球只不过是一个淡蓝色的点。
Sagan observed: “Our planet is a lonely speck in the great enveloping cosmic dark. In our obscurity, in all this vastness, there is no hint that help will come from elsewhere to save us from ourselves.”
萨根观察到：“我们的星球是巨大的宇宙黑暗中的一个孤独的斑点。在我们的默默无闻中，在这一切浩瀚之中，没有任何迹象表明会有来自别处的帮助将我们从自己手中拯救出来。“
So, how are we faring as custodians of the blue part of our planet, Earth’s oceans? Unfortunately, the answer seems to be: very poorly.
那么，作为地球上蓝色部分-地球海洋的保管者，我们的情况如何？不幸的是，答案似乎是：非常糟糕。
In a new study published in One Earth, we aimed to assess what is needed to save Earth’s marine biodiversity and ensure our oceans have some level of health.
在“一个地球”上发表的一项新研究中，我们的目标是评估拯救地球海洋生物多样性所需的东西，并确保我们的海洋有一定程度的健康。
To do so, we first had to grapple with challenges now facing global marine life.
要做到这一点，我们首先必须努力应对全球海洋生物现在面临的挑战。
Commercial fishing now takes place over a surface area four times the size of land-based agriculture.
现在商业捕鱼的面积是陆地农业面积的四倍。
Much of this has been completely unsustainable, as we have depleted 90 percent of important species.
其中很大一部分是完全不可持续的，因为我们已经耗尽了90%的重要物种。
Large fish have been harvested so heavily that they have been virtually wiped out in many places.
大鱼的捕获量如此之大，以至于它们在许多地方几乎被消灭了。
Indeed, studying coral reefs today has been compared to trying to understand the Serengeti by studying termites and locusts while ignoring the wildebeest and lions.
事实上，今天研究珊瑚礁被比作试图通过研究白蚁和蝗虫来理解塞伦盖蒂，而忽略了牛羚和狮子。
It is clear to scientists that this scale of extraction cannot go on forever.
科学家们很清楚，这种规模的开采不可能永远持续下去。
Despite their immensity, Earth’s oceans can and will be irreversibly depleted of life if nothing is changed.
尽管海洋浩瀚无边，但如果没有任何改变，地球的海洋可能并将不可逆转地耗尽生命。