目录哈佛校长叠buff 哈佛校长2022年毕业演讲 哈佛大学本科毕业时间
President Bok, former President Rudenstine, incoming President Faust, members of the Harvard Corporation and the Board of Overseers, members of the faculty, parents, and especially, the graduates:
乎老稿尊敬的Bok校长,Rudenstine前校长,即将岁孝上任的Faust校长,哈佛集团的各位成员,监管理事会的各位理事,各位老师,各位家长,各位同学:
I've been waiting more than 30 years to say this: "Dad, I always told you I'd come back and get my degree."
有一句话我等了三十年,现在终于可以说了:“老爸,我总是跟你说,我会回来拿到我的学位的!”
I want to thank Harvard for this timely honor. I'll be changing my job next year … and it will be nice to finally have a college degree on my resume.
我要感谢哈佛大学在这个时候给我这个荣誉。明年,我就要换工作了(注:指从微软公司退休)……含戚我终于可以在简历上写我有一个本科学位,这真是不错啊。
I applaud the graduates today for taking a much more direct route to your degrees. For my part, I'm just happy that the Crimson has called me "Harvard's most successful dropout." I guess that makes me valedictorian of my own special class … I did the best of everyone who failed.
我为今天在座的各位同学感到高兴,你们拿到学位可比我简单多了。哈佛的校报称我是“哈佛大学历史上最成功的辍学生”。我想这大概使我有资格代表我这一类学生发言……在所有的失败者里,我做得最好。
But I also want to be recognized as the guy who got Steve Ballmer to drop out of business school. I'm a bad influence. That's why I was invited to speak at your
graduation. If I had spoken at your orientation, fewer of you might be here today. 但是,我还要提醒大家,我使得Steve Ballmer(注:微软总经理)也从哈佛商学院退学了。因此,我是个有着恶劣影响力的人。这就是为什么我被邀请来在你们的毕业典礼上演讲。如果我在你们入学欢迎仪式上演讲,那么能够坚持到今天在这里毕业的人也许会少得多吧。 Harvard was just a phenomenal experience for me. Academic life was fascinating. I used to sit in on lots of classes I hadn't even signed up for. And dorm life was terrific. I lived up at Radcliffe, in Currier House. There were always lots of people in my dorm room late at night discussing things, because everyone knew I didn't worry about getting up in the morning. That's how I came to be the leader of the anti-social group. We clung to each other as a way of validating our rejection of all those social people.
对我来说,哈佛的求学经历是一段非凡的经历。校园生活很有趣,我常去旁听我没选修的课。哈佛的课外生活也很棒,我在Radcliffe过着逍遥自在的日子。每天我的寝室里总有很多人一直待到半夜,讨论着各种事情。因为每个人都知道我从不考虑第二天早起。这使得我变成了校园里那些不安分学生的头头,我们互相粘在一起,做出一种拒绝所有正常学生的姿态。 Radcliffe was a great place to live. There were more women up there, and most of the guys were science-math types. That combination offered me the best odds, if you know what I mean. This is where I learned the sad lesson that improving your odds doesn't guarantee success.
Radcliffe是个过日子的好地方。那里的女生比男生多,而且大多数男生都是理工科的。这种状况为我创造了最好的机会,如果你们明白我的意思。可惜的是,我正是在这里学到了人生中悲伤的一课:机会大,并不等于你就会成功。
One of my biggest memories of Harvard came in January 1975, when I made a call
from Currier House to a company in Albuquerque that had begun making the world's first personal computers. I offered to sell them software.
我在哈佛最难忘的回忆之一,发生在1975年1月。那时,我从宿舍楼里给位于Albuquerque的一家公司打了一个电话,那家公司已经在着手制造世界上第一台个人电脑。我提出想向他们出售。
I worried that they would realize I was just a student in a dorm and hang up on me. Instead they said: "We're not quite ready, come see us in a month," which was a good thing, because we hadn't written the software yet. From that moment, I worked day and night on this little extra credit project that marked the end of my college education and the beginning of a remarkable journey with Microsoft.
我很担心,他们会发觉我是一个住在宿舍的学生,从而挂断电话。但是他们却说:“我们还没准备好,一个月后你再来找我们吧。”这是个好消息,因为那时还根本没有写出来呢。就是从那个时候起,我日以继夜地在这个小小的课外项目上工作,这导致了我学生生活的结束,以及通往微软公司的不平凡的旅程的开始。
What I remember above all about Harvard was being in the midst of so much energy and intelligence. It could be exhilarating, intimidating, sometimes even discouraging, but always challenging. It was an amazing privilege – and though I left early, I was transformed by my years at Harvard, the friendships I made, and the ideas I worked on.
不管怎样,我对哈佛的回忆主要都与充沛的精力和智力活动有关。哈佛的生活令人愉快,也令人感到有压力,有时甚至会感到泄气,但永远充满了挑战性。生活在哈佛是一种吸引人的特殊待遇……虽然我离开得比较早,但是我在这里的经历、在这里结识的朋友、在这里发展起来的一些想法,永远地改变了我。
But taking a serious look back … I do have one big regret.
但是,如果现在严肃地回忆起来,我确实有一个真正的遗憾。
I left Harvard with no real awareness of the awful inequities in the world – the appalling disparities of health, and wealth, and opportunity that condemn millions of people to lives of despair.
我离开哈佛的时候,根本没有意识到这个世界是多么的不平等。人类在健康、财富和机遇上的不平等大得可怕,它们使得无数的人们被迫生活在绝望之中。
I learned a lot here at Harvard about new ideas in economics and politics. I got great exposure to the advances being made in the sciences.
我在哈佛学到了很多经济学和政治学的新思想。我也了解了很多科学上的`新进展。
But humanity's greatest advances are not in its discoveries – but in how those discoveries are applied to reduce inequity. Whether through democracy, strong public education, quality health care, or broad economic opportunity – reducing inequity is the highest human achievement.
但是,人类最大的进步并不来自于这些发现,而是来自于那些有助于减少人类不平等的发现。不管通过何种手段——民主制度、健全的公共教育体系、高质量的医疗保健、还是广泛的经济机会——减少不平等始终是人类最大的成就。
I left campus knowing little about the millions of young people cheated out of educational opportunities here in this country. And I knew nothing about the millions of people living in unspeakable poverty and disease in developing countries.
我离开校园的时候,根本不知道在这个国家里,有几百万的年轻人无法获得接受教育的机会。我也不知道,发展中国家里有无数的人们生活在无法形容的贫穷和疾病之中。
It took me decades to find out.
我花了几十年才明白了这些事情。
You graduates came to Harvard at a different time. You know more about the world's inequities than the classes that came before. In your years here, I hope you've had a chance to think about how – in this age of accelerating technology – we can finally take on these inequities, and we can solve them.
在座的各位同学,你们是在与我不同的时代来到哈佛的。你们比以前的学生,更多地了解世界是怎样的不平等。在你们的哈佛求学过程中,我希望你们已经思考过一个问题,那就是在这个新技术加速发展的时代,我们怎样最终应对这种不平等,以及我们怎样来解决这个问题。 Imagine, just for the sake of discussion, that you had a few hours a week and a few dollars a month to donate to a cause – and you wanted to spend that time and money where it would have the greatest impact in saving and improving lives. Where would you spend it
为了讨论的方便,请想象一下,假如你每个星期可以捐献一些时间、每个月可以捐献一些钱——你希望这些时间和金钱,可以用到对拯救生命和改善人类生活有最大作用的地方。你会选择什么地方?
For Melinda and for me, the challenge is the same: how can we do the most good for the greatest number with the resources we have.
对Melinda(注:盖茨的妻子)和我来说,这也是我们面临的问题:我们如何能将我们拥有的资源发挥出最大的作用。
During our discussions on this question, Melinda and I read an article about the millions of children who were dying every year in poor countries from diseases that we had long ago made harmless in this country. Measles, malaria, pneumonia,
查理芒格师出名门,毕业于哈佛大学法学院,也是历史级的投资大师!作为伯克希尔哈撒韦的副主席,查理芒格的投资策略和沃伦巴菲特互补!查理芒格的投资思想侧重进攻,并且强调跨学科学习,因此具有广泛的能力圈!
下面是查理芒格作为哈佛大学董事会成员,在1986年哈佛大学毕业典礼上的致辞。让我们来欣赏这位大投资家的的智慧吧!
既然贝里斯福德校长在最老、服务年限最长的董事中挑选出一人来作毕业典礼演讲,那么演讲者有必要向大家交待两个问题:
1.为什么作出这种选择?
2.演讲有多长?
凭着我与贝里斯福德多年交往的经验,我先回答第一个问题。就像有人很自豪地向人们展示自己的马可以数到七,他正是以这种方式为我们学校寻求更高的声誉液斗。马主人知道能数到七并非什么数学壮举,但是他期待得到首肯,因为马能够如此表现是值得炫耀一番的。
第二个问题,关于演讲有多长,我并不想预先透露答案。我怕说了之后,你们仰起的脸庞将不再充满好奇和满怀期待的神色,而你们现在的表情,正好是我喜欢看到的。
但我会告诉你们,我是怎样在考虑讲多久的过程中想到这次演讲的主题的。接到邀请的时候,我有点飘飘然。虽然缺乏在重要的场合公开发表演讲的经验,但我的胆量倒是练得炉火纯青;我立刻想到要效仿德摩斯梯尼和西塞罗,而且还期待得到西塞罗所给予的赞誉。当问到最喜伏埋李欢德摩斯梯尼的哪一次演讲时,西塞罗回答:“最长的那次。”
不过,在座的各位很幸运,因为我也考虑到塞缪尔·约翰逊的那句著名评语,当问及弥尔顿的《失乐园》时,他说得很对:“没有谁希望它更长。”这促使我思考,我听过的20次哈佛学校的毕业演讲中,哪次曾让我希望它再长些呢?这样的演讲只有约翰尼·卡森的那一次,他详述了保证痛苦人生的卡森药方。所以呢,我决定重复卡森的演讲,但以更大的规模,并加上我自己的药方。毕竟,我比卡森演讲时岁数更大,同一个年轻的有魅力的幽默家相比,我失败的次数更多,痛苦更多,痛苦的方式也更多。我显然很有资格进一步发挥卡森的主题。
那时卡森说他无法告诉毕业的同学如何才能得到幸福,但能够根据个人经验,告诉他们如何保证自己过上痛苦的生活。卡森给的确保痛苦生活的处方包括:
1.为了改变心情或者感觉而使用化学物质;
2.妒忌,以及
3.怨恨。
我现在还能想起来当时卡森用言之凿凿的口气说,他一次又一次地尝试了这些东西,结果每次都变得很痛苦。
要理解卡森为痛苦生活所开处方的第一味药物(使用化学物质)比较容易。我想补充几句。我年轻时最好的朋友有四个,他们非常聪明、正直和幽默,自身条件和家庭背景都很出色。其中两个早已去世,酒精是让他缺迟们早逝的一个因素;第三个人现在还醉生梦死地活着——假如那也算活着的话。
虽然易感性因人而异,我们任何人都有可能通过一个开始时难以察觉直到堕落之力强大到无法冲破的细微过程而染上恶瘾。不过呢,我活了60年,倒是没有见过有谁的生活因为害怕和避开这条诱惑性的毁灭之路而变得更加糟糕。
妒忌,和令人上瘾的化学物质一样,自然也能获得导致痛苦生活的大奖。早在遭到摩西戒律的谴责之前,它就已造成了许多大灾难。如果你们希望保持妒忌对痛苦生活的影响,我建议你们千万别去阅读塞缪尔·约翰逊的任何传记,因为这位虔诚基督徒的生活以令人向往的方式展示了超越妒忌的可能性和好处。
就像卡森感受到的那样,怨恨对我来说也很灵验。如果你们渴望过上痛苦的生活,我找不到比它更灵的药方可以推荐给你们了。约翰逊说得好,他说生活本已艰辛得难以下咽,何必再将它塞进怨恨的苦涩果皮里呢。
对于你们之中那些想得到痛苦生活的人,我还要建议你们别去实践狄斯雷利的权宜之计,它是专为那些无法彻底戒掉怨恨老习惯的人所设计的。在成为伟大的英国首相的过程中,狄斯雷利学会了不让复仇成为行动的动机,但他也保留了某种发泄怨恨的办法,就是将那些敌人的名字写下来,放到抽屉里。然后时不时会翻看这些名字,自得其乐地记录下世界是怎样无须他插手就使他的敌人垮掉的。
我们任何人都有可能通过一个开始时难以察觉直到堕落之力强大到无法冲破的细微过程而染上恶瘾。
好啦,卡森开的处方就说到这里。接下来是芒格另开的四味药。
第一、要反复无常,不要虔诚地做你正在做的事。只要养成这个习惯,你们就能够绰绰有余地抵消你们所有优点共同产生的效应,不管那种效应有多么巨大。如果你们喜欢不受信任并被排除在对人类贡献最杰出的人群之外,那么这味药物最适合你们。养成这个习惯,你们将会永远扮演寓言里那只兔子的角色,只不过跑得比你们快的不再只是一只优秀的乌龟,而是一群又一群平庸的乌龟,甚至还有些拄拐杖的平庸乌龟。
第二、我必须警告你们,如果不服用我开出的第一味药,即使你们最初的条件并不好,你们也可能会难以过上痛苦的日子。我有个大学的室友,他以前患有严重的阅读障碍症,现在也是。但他算得上我认识的人中最可靠的。他的生活到目前为止很美满,拥有出色的太太和子女,掌管着某个数十亿美元的企业。如果你们想要避免这种传统的、主流文化的、富有成就的生活,却又坚持不懈地做到为人可靠,那么就算有其他再多的缺点,你们这个愿望恐怕也会落空。
说到“到目前为止很美满”这样一种生活,我忍不住想在这里引用克洛伊斯的话来再次强调人类生存状况那种“到目前为止”的那一面。克洛伊斯曾经是世界上最富裕的国王,后来沦为敌人的阶下囚,就在被活活烧死之前,他说:“哎呀,我现在才想起历史学家梭伦说过的那句话,‘在生命没有结束之前,没有人的一生能够被称为是幸福的。’”
我为痛苦生活开出的第二味药是,尽可能从你们自身的经验获得知识,尽量别从其他人成功或失败的经验中广泛地吸取教训,不管他们是古人还是今人。这味药肯定能保证你们过上痛苦的生活,取得二流的成就。
只要看看身边发生的事情,你们就能明白拒不借鉴别人的教训所造成的后果。人类常见的灾难全都毫无创意——酒后驾车导致的身亡,鲁莽驾驶引起的残疾,无药可治的性病,加入毁形灭性的邪教的那些聪明的大学生被洗脑后变成的行尸走肉,由于重蹈前人显而易见的覆辙而导致的生意失败,还有各种形式的集体疯狂等等。你们若要寻找那条通往因为不小心、没有创意的错误而引起真正的人生麻烦的道路,我建议你们牢牢记住这句现代谚语:“人生就像悬挂式滑翔,起步没有成功就完蛋啦。”
避免广泛吸取知识的另一种做法是,别去钻研那些前辈的最好成果。这味药的功效在于让你们得到尽可能少的教育。
如果我再讲一个简短的历史故事,或许你们可以看得更清楚,从而更有效地过上与幸福无缘的生活。从前有个人,他勤奋地掌握了前人最优秀的成果,尽管开始研究分析几何的时候他的基础并不好,学得非常吃力。最终,他本人取得的成就引起了众人的瞩目,他是这样评价他自己的成果的:
“如果说我比其他人看得更远,那是因为我站在巨人的肩膀上。”
这人的骨灰如今埋在西敏斯特大教堂里,他的墓碑上有句异乎寻常的墓志铭:“这里安葬着永垂不朽的艾萨克·牛顿爵士。”
我为你们的痛苦生活开出的第三味药是,当你们在人生的战场上遭遇第一、第二或者第三次严重的失败时,就请意志消沉,从此一蹶不振吧。因为即使是最幸运、最聪明的人,也会遇到许许多多的失败,这味药必定能保证你们永远地陷身在痛苦的泥沼里。请你们千万要忽略爱比克泰德亲自撰写的、恰如其分的墓志铭中蕴含的教训:“此处埋着爱比克泰德,一个奴隶,身体残疾,极其穷困,蒙受诸神的恩宠。”
“反过来想,总是反过来想。”雅各比说。他知道事物的本质决定了许多难题只有在逆向思考的时候才能得到最好的解决。
为了让你们过上头脑混乱、痛苦不堪的日子,我所开的最后一味药是,请忽略小时候人们告诉我的那个乡下人故事。曾经有个乡下人说:“要是知道我会死在哪里就好啦,
那我将永远不去那个地方。”大多数人和你们一样,嘲笑这个乡下人的无知,忽略他那朴素的智慧。如果我的经验有什么借鉴意义的话,那些热爱痛苦生活的人应该不惜任何代价避免应用这个乡下人的方法。若想获得失败,你们应该将这种乡下人的方法,也就是卡森在演讲中所用的方法,贬低得愚蠢之极、毫无用处。
卡森采用的研究方法是把问题反过来想。就是说要解出X,得先研究如何才能得到非X。伟大的代数学家雅各比用的也是卡森这种办法,众所周知,他经常重复一句话:“反过来想,总是反过来想。”雅各比知道事物的本质是这样的,许多难题只有在逆向思考的时候才能得到最好的解决。例如,当年几乎所有人都在试图修正麦克斯韦的电磁定律,以便它能够符合牛顿的三大运动定律,然而爱因斯坦却转了个180度大弯,修正了牛顿的定律,让其符合麦克斯韦的定律,结果他发现了相对论。
作为一个公认的传记爱好者,我认为假如查尔斯·罗伯特·达尔文是哈佛学校1986届毕业班的学生,他的成绩大概只能排到中等。然而现在他是科学史上的大名人。如果你们希望将来碌碌无为,那么千万不能以达尔文为榜样。
达尔文能够取得这样的成就,主要是因为他的工作方式;这种方式有悖于所有我列出的痛苦法则,而且还特别强调逆向思考:他总是致力于寻求证据来否定他已有的理论,无论他对这种理论有多么珍惜,无论这种理论是多么得之不易。与之相反,大多数人早年取得成就,然后就越来越拒绝新的、证伪性的信息,目的是让他们最初的结论能够保持完整。他们变成了菲利普·威利所评论的那类人:“他们固步自封,满足于已有的知识,永远不会去了解新的事物。”
达尔文的生平展示了乌龟如何可以在极端客观的态度的帮助下跑到兔子前面去。这种态度能够帮助客观的人最后变成“蒙眼拼驴尾”游戏中惟一那个没有被遮住眼睛的玩家。
如果你们认为客观态度无足轻重,那么你们不但忽略了来自达尔文的训诲,也忽略了来自爱因斯坦的教导。爱因斯坦说他那些成功的理论来自“好奇、专注、毅力和自省”。他所说的自省,就是不停地试验与推翻他自己深爱的想法。
最后,尽可能地减少客观性,这样会帮助你减少获得世俗好处所需作出的让步以及所要承受的负担,因为客观态度并不只对伟大的物理学家和生物学家有效。它也能够帮助伯米吉地区的管道维修工更好地工作。因此,如果你们认为忠实于自己就是永远不改变你们年轻时的所有观念,那么你们不仅将会稳步地踏上通往极端无知的道路,而且还将走向事业中不愉快的经历给你带来的所有痛苦。
这次类似于说反话的演讲应该以类似于说反话的祝福来结束。这句祝语的灵感来自伊莱休·鲁特引用过的那首讲小狗去多佛的儿歌:“一步又一步,才能到多佛。”我祝福1986届毕业班的同学:
在座各位,愿你们在漫长的人生中日日以避免失败为目标而成长。
出自《穷查理宝典》!
比尔盖茨的演讲全文 President Bok, former President Rudenstine, incoming President Faust, members of the Harvard Corporation and the Board of Overseers, members of the faculty, parents, and especially, the graduates:
尊敬的Bok校长,Rudenstine前校长,即将上任的Faust校长,哈佛集团的各位成员,监管理事会的各位理事,各位老师,各位家长,各位同学:
I've been waiting more than 30 years to say this: "Dad, I always told you I'd come back and get my degree."
有一句话我等了三十年,现埋族在终于可以说了:“老爸,我总是跟你说,我会回来拿到我的学位的!”
I want to thank Harvard for this timely honor. I'll be changing my job next year … and it will be nice to finally have a college degree on my resume.
我要感谢哈佛大学在这个时候给我这个荣誉。明年,我就要换工作了(注:指从微软公司退休)……我终于可以在简历上写我有一个本科学位,这真是不错啊。
I applaud the graduates today for taking a much more direct route to your degrees. For my part, I'm just happy that the Crimson has called me "Harvard's most successful dropout." I guess that makes me valedictorian of my own special class … I did the best of everyone who failed.
我为今天在座的各位同学感到高兴,你们拿到学位可比我简单多了。哈佛的校报称我是“哈佛大学历史上最成功的辍学生”。我想这大概使我有资格代表我这一类学生发言……在所有的失败者里,我做得最好。
But I also want to be recognized as the guy who got Steve Ballmer to drop out of business school. I'm a bad influence. That's why I was invited to speak at your graduation. If I had spoken at your orientation, fewer of you might be here today.
但是,我还要提醒大家,我使得Steve Ballmer(注:微软总经理)扒正也从哈佛商学院退学了。因此,我是个有着恶劣影响力的人。这就是为什么我被邀请来在你们的毕业典礼上演讲。如果我在你们入学欢迎仪式上演讲春液悔,那么能够坚持到今天在这里毕业的人也许会少得多吧。
Harvard was just a phenomenal experience for me. Academic life was fascinating. I used to sit in on lots of classes I hadn't even signed up for. And dorm life was terrific. I lived up at Radcliffe, in Currier House. There were always lots of people in my dorm room late at night discussing things, because everyone knew I didn't worry about getting up in the morning. That's how I came to be the leader of the anti-social group. We clung to each other as a way of validating our rejection of all those social people.
对我来说,哈佛的求学经历是一段非凡的经历。校园生活很有趣,我常去旁听我没选修的课。哈佛的课外生活也很棒,我在Radcliffe过着逍遥自在的日子。每天我的寝室里总有很多人一直待到半夜,讨论着各种事情。因为每个人都知道我从不考虑第二天早起。这使得我变成了校园里那些不安分学生的头头,我们互相粘在一起,做出一种拒绝所有正常学生的姿态。
Radcliffe was a great place to live. There were more women up there, and most of the guys were science-math types. That combination offered me the best odds, if you know what I mean. This is where I learned the sad lesson that improving your odds doesn't guarantee success.
Radcliffe是个过日子的好地方。那里的女生比男生多,而且大多数男生都是理工科的。这种状况为我创造了最好的机会,如果你们明白我的意思。可惜的是,我正是在这里学到了人生中悲伤的一课:机会大,并不等于你就会成功。
One of my biggest memories of Harvard came in January 1975, when I made a call from Currier House to a company in Albuquerque that had begun making the world's first personal computers. I offered to sell them software.
我在哈佛最难忘的回忆之一,发生在1975年1月。那时,我从宿舍楼里给位于Albuquerque的一家公司打了一个电话,那家公司已经在着手制造世界上第一台个人电脑。我提出想向他们出售。
I worried that they would realize I was just a student in a dorm and hang up on me. Instead they said: "We're not quite ready, come see us in a month," which was a good thing, because we hadn't written the software yet. From that moment, I worked day and night on this little extra credit project that marked the end of my college education and the beginning of a remarkable journey with Microsoft.
我很担心,他们会发觉我是一个住在宿舍的学生,从而挂断电话。但是他们却说:“我们还没准备好,一个月后你再来找我们吧。”这是个好消息,因为那时还根本没有写出来呢。就是从那个时候起,我日以继夜地在这个小小的课外项目上工作,这导致了我学生生活的结束,以及通往微软公司的不平凡的旅程的开始。
What I remember above all about Harvard was being in the midst of so much energy and intelligence. It could be exhilarating, intimidating, sometimes even discouraging, but always challenging. It was an amazing privilege – and though I left early, I was transformed by my years at Harvard, the friendships I made, and the ideas I worked on.
不管怎样,我对哈佛的回忆主要都与充沛的精力和智力活动有关。哈佛的生活令人愉快,也令人感到有压力,有时甚至会感到泄气,但永远充满了挑战性。生活在哈佛是一种吸引人的特殊待遇……虽然我离开得比较早,但是我在这里的经历、在这里结识的朋友、在这里发展起来的一些想法,永远地改变了我。
But taking a serious look back … I do have one big regret.
但是,如果现在严肃地回忆起来,我确实有一个真正的遗憾。
I left Harvard with no real awareness of the awful inequities in the world – the appalling disparities of health, and wealth, and opportunity that condemn millions of people to lives of despair.
我离开哈佛的时候,根本没有意识到这个世界是多么的不平等。人类在健康、财富和机遇上的不平等大得可怕,它们使得无数的人们被迫生活在绝望之中。
Unlike any other creature on this planet, humans can learn and understand, without having experienced. They can think themselves into other people's minds, imagine themselves into other people's places.
罗琳在哈佛演讲的全文
人类和在这个星球上的其他生物不同,人类能够在没有自我经历的情况下学习和理解。他们可以设身处地的思他人所思,想他人所想。
Of course, this is a power, like my brand of fictional magic, that is morally neutral. One might use such an ability to manipulate, or control, just as much as to understand or sympathise.
当然,这是一种力量,如同我虚构的魔法,这种力量是道德中立的。有人可能常运用这种能力去操作和控制,就像用于理解和同情一样。(from Part2 )
And many prefer not to exercise their imaginations at all. They choose to remain comfortably within the bounds of their own experience, never troubling to wonder how it would feel to have been born other than they are. They can refuse to hear screams or to peer inside cages; they can close their minds and hearts to any suffering that does not touch them personally; they can refuse to know.
而且,许多人根本不喜欢训练他们的想象力。他们宁愿在自己的经验范围内维持舒适的状态,也不愿麻烦地去思考这样的问题:如果他们不是现在的自己,那么应该是什么感觉呢?他们拒绝听到尖叫,拒绝关注囚牢,他们可以对任何与他们自身无关的苦难关上思维与心灵的大门,他们可以拒绝知道这些。
I might be tempted to envy people who can live that way, except that I do not think they have any fewer nightmares than I do. Choosing to live in narrow spaces can lead to a form of mental agoraphobia, and that brings its own terrors. I think the wilfully unimaginative see more monsters. They are often more afraid.
我可能会羡慕那些以这种方式生活的人,但我不认为他们的噩梦比我少。选择在狭小的空间生
活会导致精神上的恐旷症(对于陌生人、事物的恐惧),而且会带来它自身形成的恐怖。我想那些任性固执的缺乏想象力的人会看到更多的怪物,他们常常更容易感到害怕。
What is more, those who choose not to empathise may enable real monsters. For without ever committing an act of outright evil ourselves, we collude with it, through our own apathy.
甚至于,那些选择不去想他人所想的人可能激活真正的恶魔。因为,虽然我们没有亲手犯下那些昭然若揭的恶行,我们却以冷漠的方式和邪恶在串谋。
One of the many things I learned at the end of that Classics corridor down which I ventured at the age of 18, in search of something I could not then define, was this, written by the Greek author Plutarch: What we achieve inwardly will change outer reality.
十八岁时,为了寻找那时我无法描述的目的,我踏上了古典文学的探险道路;当走到尽头的时候,我学到了很多东西,其中之一就是希腊作家Plutarch的这句话:我们在内心的所得,将改变外界的现实。
That is an astonishing statement and yet proven a thousand times every day of our lives. It expresses, in part, our inescapable connection with the outside world, the fact that we touch other people's lives simply by existing.
这是一个令人惊讶的说法,然而它在我们生命中每一天会被证明一千多次。这句话部分地说明了我们和外部世界不可分离的联系,我们只能通过生命存在来接触别人生命的事实。
But how much more are you, Harvard graduates of 2008, likely to touch other people's lives? Your intelligence, your capacity for hard work, the education you have earned and received, give you unique status, and unique responsibilities. Even your nationality sets you apart. The great majority of you belong to the world's only remaining superpower. The way you vote, the way you live, the way you protest, the pressure you bring to bear on your government, has an impact way beyond your borders. That is your privilege, and your burden.
但是你们,2008哈佛大学的毕业生们,到底有多么得愿意来感受他人的生命呢?你们对付困难工作的智慧与能力,你们赢得和接受的教育,给了你们独特的地位和责任。甚至你们的国籍也使你们与众不同。你们中的很大一部分人属于这个世界剩下的唯一超级大国(美国)。你们投票、生活、抗议的方式,你们给政府施加的压力,会产生超越国界的影响。那是你们的特权,更是你们的负担。
If you choose to use your status and influence to raise your voice on behalf of those who have no voice; if you choose to identify not only with the powerful, but with the powerless; if you retain the ability to imagine yourself into the lives of those who do not have your advantages, then it will not only be your proud families who celebrate your existence, but thousands and millions of people whose reality you have helped transform for the better. We do not need magic to change the world, we carry all the power we need inside ourselves already: we have the power to imagine better.
如果你们选择用你们的地位和影响力来为没法发出声音的人说话;如果你们选择不仅认同有权的强势群体,也认同无权的弱势群体;如果你们保留你们的能力,用来想象那些没有你们这些优势的人的现实生活,那么不仅是你们的家庭为你们的存在而感到自豪,为你们庆祝,而且那些因为你们的帮助而生活得更好的数以千万计的人,会一起来为你们祝贺。我们不需要魔法来改变世界,我们已经在我们的内心拥有了足够的力量:那就是把世界想象成更好的力量。
I am nearly finished. I have one last hope for you, which is something that I already had at 21. The friends with whom I sat on graduation day have been my friends for life. They are my children's godparents, the people to whom I've been able to turn in times of trouble, friends who have been kind enough not to sue me when I've used their names for Death Eaters. At our graduation we were bound by enormous affection, by our shared experience of a time that could never come again, and, of course, by the knowledge that we held certain photographic evidence that would be exceptionally valuable if any of us ran for Prime Minister.
在我的演说快要结束的时候,我对大家还有最后一个希望,这是我在自己21岁时就明白的道理。毕业那天和我坐在一起的朋友后来成了我终生的朋友。他们是我孩子的教父母;他们是我碰到麻烦时能求助的人;他们是非常友善的,不会为了我以他们的名字给食死徒(书中反面角色)命名而控告我。在我们毕业的时候,我们沉浸在巨大的情感冲击中;我们沉浸于这段永不能重现的共同时光内;当然,如果我们中的某个人将来成为国家首相,我们也沉浸于能拥有极其有价值的相片作为证据的兴奋中。
So today, I can wish you nothing better than similar friendships. And tomorrow, I hope that even if you remember not a single word of mine, you remember those of Seneca, another of those old Romans I met when I fled down the Classics corridor, in retreat from career ladders, in search of ancient wisdom:
所以今天,我最希望你们能拥有同样的友情。到了明天,我希望即使你们不记得我说过的任何一个字,但能记住塞内加,我在逃离那个走廊,回想进步的阶梯,寻找古人智慧时碰到的另一个古罗马哲学家,说过的一句话:
As is a tale, so is life: not how long it is, but how good it is, is what matters.
“生活如同,要紧的不是它有多长,而在于它有多好。”
I wish you all very good lives.
我祝愿你们都有幸福的生活。
Thank you very much.
谢谢大家