Stephen Pritchard from Adzuna did some digging into the salaries of history's best-known scientists, and updated them to today's currency, based on inflation rates. And the results are pretty surprising.

　　Adzuna网的史蒂芬·普里查德研究了历史上最著名科学家的薪水，并且将数据按照通货膨胀率换算成今天的货币价值，结果相当惊人。

　　Not only are the salaries overall pretty low when you consider just how influential these researchers were - Einstein earned the most at US$173,000, which is pretty impressive, until you compare it to what today's lawyers are earning - they're also incredibly inconsistent.

　　只要想想这些科学家们有多大的影响力，就会发现他们的薪水不仅总体偏低——薪水最高的爱因斯坦虽然挣到了17.3万美元，看起来很高，但和今天的律师相比就不算什么了——而且还非常不稳定。

　　For example, while the undeniably impressive Galileo Galilei earned around US$141,155 back in the 1600s for his contributions to astronomy, German astronomer Caroline Herschel was only paid $7,199 for discovering eight comets in the late 1700s. Obviously sexism was an issue back then, but even between the guys, things don't really add up, with astronomer Edwin Hubble earning just $20,559 in 1919.

　　比如，绝对了不起的伽利略·伽利莱因为其对天文学的贡献能在17世纪拿到大约14万1155美元，而德国天文学家卡罗琳·赫歇尔发现了八颗彗星却只能在18世纪末拿到7199美元。很明显，早在那时候就已经有性别歧视问题了，但即使在男人之间比较，情况也没好到哪儿去，天文学家爱德文·哈勃在1919年只有2万559美元薪水。

　　But before you get too mad, a lot of that inconsistency can be explained by the fact that these salary estimates were taken at different points in each of the researchers' careers - and only reflect one year, not a lifetime, of earnings. Also, simply using inflation data to convert money from hundreds of years ago to today has its problems, so the comparisons aren't as straightforward as they appear.

　　但是先不要太激动，其实不稳定的部分原因是这些估算的薪水取自每位科学家学术生涯的不同时期——只能反映一年而非一生的薪金情况。此外，简单地根据通货膨胀数据把几百年前的钱数换算成今天的钱数也有些问题，所以这种比较并不像表面看起来那么严谨。

　　But even as a rough guide, the infographic is still fascinating insight into how scientists were valued back in their day, and how our earnings today compare. You can see a zoomable version here.

　　但是即便是作为一份粗略的指南，这张信息表仍然很有意思，能让我们看出科学家们在他们的年代身家几何，还能将其与今天的薪金做对比。下面就是一份缩略版，一起来看看吧。

（编辑：何莹莹）