Professor Renee Baillargeon from the University of Illinois.
in a dream world when the physical laws of the universe appear to have changed. When gravity has been turned off at the socket, objects seem to have no inertia and vanish when they are out of view. Dreams can be surprising and unsettling precisely because we're so used to how the waking world works.
Perhaps young infants, brand new in the world, experience their environment as a kind of nonsensical dream in which even the simplest properties of objects surprise them. Wow, they wonder, where does the world go to when I close my eyes?
Or perhaps they do have some intuitive understanding that objects continue to exist even when they can't be directly experienced? This is the question psychologists have been trying to answer while researching what infants in their first year of life understand about 'object permanence'.
Object permanence
Object permanence is the understanding that objects continue to exist even when we can't actually see them. Famous Swiss psychologist Jean Piaget thought that children couldn't properly grasp this concept until they were at least 12 months of age.
This idea was challenged by a series of studies carried out by Professor Renee Baillargeon from the University of Illinois and colleagues. These studies used children's apparent surprise at 'impossible' events to try and work out whether they understood object permanence.
A blocked road
In one study infants as young as 6.5 months watched a toy car travelling down a ramp. Half way through its journey, though, it went behind a screen out of the baby's view before exiting the other side, once more visible.
In one condition the infants saw a block placed behind the screen in the way of the toy car. And yet when the car was released, experimental trickery was used so that the block didn't stop the car's progress. Miraculously it still appeared from the other side of the screen.
This 'impossible' condition was compared with another condition where the block was placed near, but not in the way of, the car's progress - the 'possible' condition.
Baillargeon found that the infants looked reliably longer at the seemingly impossible scenario. This suggested they understood that the block continued to exist despite the fact they couldn't actually see it. They also must have understood that the car could not pass through the block. This seems like reasonable evidence that infants can understand object permanence.
Simple explanation
In further studies Professor Baillargeon tested all sorts of variations on this theme. Toy rabbits, toy mice and carrots were all used, with some defying the laws of nature in the 'impossible' conditions and others studiously following them in the 'possible' conditions. Each time, though, infants looked longer at the apparently impossible events, perhaps wondering if they were dreaming.
These studies have now shown that infants as young as 3.5 months seem to have a basic grasp of object permanence. While others have argued for alternative explanations and interpretations, when all these studies are taken together the idea that children understand object permanence is arguably the simplest explanation.
Intuitive physicists
Using these results Baillargeon and others have argued that young infants are not necessarily trapped in a world of shapes which have little meaning for them. Instead they seem to be intuitive physicists who can carry out rudimentary reasoning about physical concepts like gravity, inertia and object permanence.
So, perhaps infants don't perceive the world as a completely nonsensical dream. Sure, they have many new things to learn and many things surprise them, but they do seem to understand some fundamentals about how the world works from very early on.
译文:
婴儿是直观的物理学家：客体永久性
你在一个宇宙物理定律好像已经改变了的世界。当重力在插口处被关闭，当它们看不见了的时候物体好像没有了惯性，消失了。梦想是那么地令人惊讶和让人不安因为我们是如此的习惯于这个清醒的世界的变化节奏。
可能新生的婴儿在这个全新的世界对它们所生存的环境的体验是，这是一个连最简单对象的特性都会令他们惊讶的一种无意义的梦。它们惊讶，好奇，但我闭上眼睛后这个世界会变成什么样子？
或者可能当它们不能直接体验到的时候它们对物体的继续存在性有一些自觉的知性？研究婴儿在它们出生的第一年对什么是物体存在性的理解这一问题是心理学家们一直试图去寻求答案的问题。
物体存在性
物体存在性是当我们不能看到它们的时候我们对物体继存性的理解。著名的瑞士心理学家Jean Piaget 认为儿童无法正确地理解它的概念直到它们至少12岁的时候。
这一观点受到了由来自伊利若斯大学的Renee Baillargeon 教授及其同仁所带领的学生们的质疑。这一研究试着对儿童对不可能的事情的明显的好奇来弄清楚它们是否理解物体存在性。
不切实际的办法
在一项研究中，6.5个月大的婴儿盯着一辆玩具小车从斜坡上滑下。虽然只滑行一半，但是当它出现完全颠倒的境况时，有可能再一次出现在儿童面前时，儿童的视野却看不到了。
在一种情况下，婴儿看见一个空心快被放置在玩具车所在的路面的下面的屏风的后面。然而当车被释放的时候，实验性的诡计被运用了以便使玩具车因受木块的阻挡而停止。奇怪的是从屏风的另一边仍然可以看见。
这种不可能的情况与把木块放在附近地方的情况相比，不是妨碍车的前进。--“可能”情况。
Baillargeon发现婴儿确实注意这看起来几乎不可能的场景更持久些。这表明它们知道障碍物依然存在即使事实上它们无法看到它。它们一定还知道玩具车不可能通过障碍物。这看起来似乎是有理由的证明婴儿了解物体存继性。
简单解释
在进一步的研究中Baillargeon教授对这一主题进行了各种变更的研究尝试。玩具兔子，玩具老鼠和胡萝卜都试过了，在“可能"情况中用了具有挑衅性的自然法则和别的故意地跟随它们。虽然每次婴儿们对明显的不可能事件关注得更长的时间，但是，可能它们感觉自己好像在梦中吧。
这些研究已经表明3.5岁的婴儿看起来好像对物体存继性有着基本的理解。然而当这些研究总的说明儿童理解物体存继性这一观点被认为是最简单的解释的时候，有些人就争论到还有别的一些说明和解释。
直觉物理学家
通过这些研究结果Baillargeon教授和一些学者争论到年轻的婴儿们没有必要陷入到对他们来说没有多大意义的大量图形形状中。相反，它们看起来像是可以完成关于物理概念比如说重力，惯性和物体继存性基本推理的直觉的物理学家。
因此，可能婴儿们并没有觉察到这个世界完全是一场荒谬的梦。当然，它们有许多新东西要学，许多事情另它们好奇，但是它们确实好像知道一些关于世界从最开始是怎么运行的基本理论。