DEEP DIVES

One of the most useful items in Minecraft is the compass – an item we featured about a year ago in our Taking Inventory column. “They serve a single purpose – pointing to the world spawn point,” we wrote. “If you’re planning on wandering off into the wilderness, then it’s highly recommended to take one with you so you can actually find your way back home again.”
指南针或许是我们游戏里最有用的东西之一了。大概一年之前我们在背包盘点系列之中介绍过这个物品。“这东西只有一个用途——指向世界的出生点。如果你准备野外漫游，那么就非常推荐你带上指南针，这样你就能找到回家的路了。”我们是这样介绍道的。
But compasses have a downside – they only work in the Overworld. The same mysteries of Minecraft physics that cause blocks to stay suspended in the air when you mine out the block below them also cause compasses to go haywire in the Nether and the End.
但是指南针也有它的不足之处——它只能在主世界起作用。我的世界的物理学真是奇妙，方块可以悬空，而下界和末地里的指南针会失灵。
So in the most recent patch, the Nether Update, we added something new. Lodestone is a block that lets you alter the place compasses point to, and it can be used in all three dimensions, making it suddenly worth taking a compass with you again.
所以在最近的游戏更新，下界更新之中，我们加入了一点新元素。磁石是一种可以改变你指南针方向的方块，你可以在任意的维度使用这个方块，一下子就让指南针的使用价值提高了不少。

You’ll often find lodestone in chests in bastion remnants, but you can also make it yourself with a netherite ingot surrounded by chiseled stone bricks in a crafting grid. To make netherite, you’ll need gold and netherite scraps, which in turn are smelted from ancient debris. You’ll need a diamond pickaxe to collect ancient debris.
你可以在堡垒遗迹的箱子里找到磁石，但是同样你也可以在工作台上合成出磁石，你只需要将下界合金锭放在正中，四周围一圈錾制石砖即可。至于下界合金锭嘛，你需要黄金与下界合金碎片，你要从远古残骸中熔炼出下界合金碎片，你也需要一把钻石镐才能采掘这种远古残骸。
Once you’ve got a lodestone block, plop it down on the group, whip out your compass, and mash the “use” button. You’ll know it worked if the compass gets an enchantmenty sheen to it. If the lodestone gets broken, or is in another dimension, the compass won’t work at all.
一旦你合成出了磁石方块，你可以把他放在地上，拿出你的指南针对其狠砸右键。如果你的指南针泛出附魔般的光泽，那么恭喜你你成功了。但是一旦磁石被挖掉，或者你在另一个维度的话，这指南针就没用了。

In the real world, lodestones are another name for naturally-occurring magnets. These rare finds, made of the mineral magnetite, attract both pieces of iron and curious onlookers.
现实之中，磁石算是一种自然形成的磁体的称呼，这些稀有物源自于磁铁矿，不仅会吸引铁器，还会吸引不少好奇的探知者。

Most magnetite isn’t actually magnetic, and if you magnetise it then it doesn’t stay that way for very long. But occasionally impurities in their crystalline structure allow them to stay magnetised for much longer. This leads to the question of how they become magnetised in the first place. This is something science doesn’t have a very good answer to yet. The leading theory is that they capture the extreme magnetic fields generated when lightning strikes the ground, which is supported by the fact that lodestones are only really found near the surface of the Earth, not far underground.
大部分磁铁矿其实并没有磁性，即使你将其磁化，也保持不了太久。但是有些夹杂在他们晶体结构中的杂质使其能够更久的保持磁力。这首先要考虑一个问题，它们是如何被磁化的，科学界还没有一个比较好的答案。最主流的理论认为，闪电击中地面时产生的强磁场磁化了它们，最近其实有一个实际依据可以支撑这种理论，就是磁石只存在于地表，而非远在地下。

However they’re formed, humans have been using lodestones since at least the 6th century BC, when Ancient Greek philosopher Thales of Miletus wrote about them. Independently, Chinese scholars wrote about them in the 4th century BC “Book of the Devil Master Valley”, and were using them for geomancy by the 2nd century BC.
先不论生成方式，至少远在公元前六世纪，古希腊哲学家泰勒斯就有描述过磁石了。而中国的学者在公元前四世纪就有在鬼谷子里记载过相关事项，并在约两百年后开始用于卜算风水。

The discovery of a lodestone artefact created by the Olmec people of what is now Mexico suggests they may have been using them for more than a thousand years prior to that too, but history doesn’t record what they were used for – perhaps to orient their temples, dwellings or tombs.
如今，在墨西哥的奥尔梅克人聚居处有发现一件磁石制品，这代表着一千多年前他们可能就在使用磁石了，但是并没有留存下来相关的记录——或许这磁石的作用是为了确定他们的神庙、居住所或者坟墓的方位吧。

So next time you set off on a journey through the Nether, do yourself a favour and set a compass on a lodestone next to your portal so you can find your way home again. You’ll be glad you did.
所以下次当你出发去下界的时候，给自己留个心眼，在传送门边上放块磁石，设置一下指南针，这样你就能不迷失方向，相信我，这很管用。

【伊8 译自官网 2020 年 08 月 20 日发布的 Block of the Week: Lodestone；原作者 Duncan Geere】
【本文排版借助了：SPX】