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Parents have a bunch of catchphrases.
父母们都有些口头禅。
Things like “don’t eat with your mouth open” or “don’t run with scissors”.
比如“吃东西不要张着嘴巴”或者“不要揣着剪刀跑步”。
Another one you might recognize is “don’t sit too close to the TV, it’ll hurt your eyes”.
另一句常听到的可能是“不要离电视太近，这样会伤害你的眼睛”。
But it turns out that the science behind that one isn’t actually true — at least, not anymore.
但事实证明其背后的科学道理并不是真的—至少不再是真的了。
Your eyes might start to feel tired, but the TV won’t actually hurt them. That idea came from some faulty televisions back in the late 1960s.
你的眼睛可能已经开始疲惫了，但电视不会真的伤害到它们。这种想法来源于1960年代后期一批有缺陷的电视。
About 50 years ago, General Electric accidentally released a line of color televisions that emitted X-rays — from 10 to 100,000 times more than was considered safe.
约50年前，通用电气意外上市了一批释放X射线的彩色电视—从10次都100,000次，其远超安全程度。
Talk about a manufacturing flaw.
说说其中的一个制造瑕疵。
Like most other old, boxy TVs, the GE ones used cathode ray tubes, or CRTs, to generate a picture.
像大多数其他老式四方电视一样，通用电气的电视利用阴极射线管（CRT）产生画面。
Inside these glass vacuum tubes, electrons were fired at a screen covered in red, green, and blue phosphors, a type of material that glows when hit by something like electrons.
在这些玻璃真空管里，电子冲击着被红色、绿色以及蓝色荧光粉覆盖的屏幕，一种被电子类的东西撞击时会发光的材料。
And when fast-moving electrons strike something in a vacuum, it generates X-rays.
当快速移动的电子在真空中撞击时，就会产生X射线。
To protect people from this radiation, engineers mixed lead into the glass ray tubes — but this batch of GE televisions was produced with faulty tubes.
为了保护人们不受这种辐射伤害，工程师将混合物导入玻璃射线管中—但这批通用电视用的是有缺陷的极管制造的。
Two pieces were misaligned, which meant that the X-rays were deflected out the bottom of the TV set and toward the ground right under the television
两个零件不成直线，这就意味着X射线偏离了电视机的底部并朝着电视正底下的地面
where some kid was probably singing along to The Flintstones theme song.
而一些孩子可能在这块地方跟着唱《摩登原始人》的主题曲。
A recall notice estimated that sitting under the TV for a total of 40 hours would expose someone to so much radiation that their skin would turn red and painful.
收回通知书中评估到，坐在电视机下40小时将会将自己暴露在过多辐射之中，皮肤会发红且疼痛。
Which is... not great. But the good news is, it doesn’t seem like anyone was hurt.
这...就不好了。但是好消息是，似乎没人因此受伤。
Thankfully, modern LCD TVs don’t emit harmful radiation at all, so you can sit as close as you want.
所幸现代液晶电视完全不会释放有害的射线，所以你想坐多近就多近。
But if you do spend too much time binging Netflix, you might still develop a headache.
但你话太多时间看Netflix，可能还是会头痛。
If you stare at the TV — or basically anything, including a book or your smartphone — for too long, you can tire out the muscles in and around your eyes and develop eye-strain.
如果你盯着电视—或者盯着任何东西，包括书或手机—太长时间，你眼周的肌肉会疲劳并产生眼疲劳。
After a while, whatever you’re staring at will start to get wobbly and fuzzy, and you might get a headache or feel tired.
过一会，不论你在看什么都会开始东倒西歪且模糊，你可能或头痛或感觉劳累。
Fortunately there’s an easy fix: Go do something else — or at least just look away for a few seconds.
还好有解决办法：去做点别的事情—或者少扭头看别处几秒。
Now, kids can focus on things close up much better than adults can without developing eye-strain,
现在孩子们近距离看东西后，不会像大人一样产生眼疲劳，
which is why they tend to get into the habit of sitting super close to screens — like televisions.
这就是为什么它们形成了坐在超近距离看东西的习惯—比如电视。
And, in the 1960s, that might have been a problem. But today, kids won’t get radiation burns by doing it, no matter what their parents say.
在1960年代这一点很成问题。但如今，不论父母怎么说，孩子们都是不会因此被辐射所伤的。
So the next time you’re in the mood for a vintage movie marathon, you can sit wherever you’d like.
所以下一次想看经典的电影马拉松时，坐哪都行。
But when Netflix asks you if you’re still watching, it might be time to give your eyes a break.
但下一次当Netflix问你是否继续观看时，是时候让你的眼睛休息一下了。
Thanks for asking, and thanks to all our patrons on Patreon who keep the answers coming.
感谢提问，谢谢Patreon赞助人的支持。
If you’d like to submit a question to be answered, you can go to patreon.com/scishow.
如果你想提问，请登录patreon.com/scishow
