So, I'm in Chile, in the Atacama desert, sitting in a hotel lobby, because that's the only place that I can get a Wi-Fi connection, and I have this picture up on my screen, and a woman comes up behind me. She says, "Oh, that's beautiful. What is it? Is that Jackson Pollock?" And unfortunately, I can be a little too honest. I said, "No, it's -- it's penguin shit."
話說,我在智利, 阿塔卡馬沙漠,坐在某個酒店大堂, 因為那是唯一能無線上網的地方, 然後我在電腦上展示出這張照片, 一位女士來到我身後, 她說:「哎呦,真漂亮。 這是什麼?是Jackson Pollock(美國藝術家)的大作嗎?」 不幸的是,我這人說話可能太直了。 我說:「不,這是─企鵝的便便。」
(Laughter)
(觀眾笑聲)
And, you know, "Excuse me!" And I could sense that she thought I was speaking synecdochically.
可想而知,她說:「你說什麼!」 而且我能感覺到 她以為我在表達對Pollock作品的看法。
(Laughter)
(觀眾笑聲)
So, I said, "No, no, really -- it's penguin shit."
於是,我說「不不,真的,真是企鵝便便。」
(Laughter)
(觀眾笑聲)
Because I had just been in the Falkland Islands taking pictures of penguins. This is a Gentoo penguin. And she was still skeptical. So, literally, a few minutes before that, I downloaded this scientific paper about calculations on avian defecation, which is really quite interesting, because it turns out you can model this as something called "Poiseuille flow," and you can learn an awful lot about the physics of the avian rectum. Actually, technically, it's not a rectum. It's called a cloaca.
因為我剛從福克蘭群島回來, 拍了一些企鵝的照片。 這是一隻巴布亞企鵝。而她還是將信將疑。 其實就在幾分鐘前, 我剛剛下載了這篇科學論文, 關於鳥類排便的計算。 這個問題真的很有意思,因為研究發現 你可以建立鳥類糞便排出時的「泊肅葉流」模型, 你能學到很多很多 關於鳥類直腸的物理學。 事實上,嚴格說來,那不是直腸,那叫泄殖腔。
At this point, she stops me, and she says, "Who are you? Wha -- what do you do?" And I was stuck, because I didn't have any way to describe what I do. And so, in some sense, this talk today is my answer to that. It's a selection of a random bunch of the stuff that I do. And it's very hard for me to make sense of it, so I'm not sure that you can. It's the kind of thing that I sit up late at night thinking about sometimes -- often at four in the morning.
說到這裡,她打斷了我, 她說:「你是什麼人?」 「你,你是做什麼的?」 然後我就無語了, 因為我無法解釋我是幹什麼的。 因此,從某個意義上, 今天的演講 就是我對這個問題的回答。 我隨便挑了些我所做的事出來。 我很難說出做這些有什麼意義, 我不也敢肯定你們能看出其中的意義。 這些就是我晚上不睡覺苦苦思索的事,有時─ 經常折騰到早上4點。
So, some people are afraid of what I do. Some people think I am the nerd Tony Soprano, and in response, I have ordered a bulletproof pocket protector. I'm not sure what these people think, because I don't speak Norsk.
所以,有些人對我的所作所為感到擔心。 有人認為我是HBO影集《黑道家族》裡的Tony Soprano,書呆子版。 有鑑於此,我已經訂購了 一個可防彈的胸袋筆插。 我不太清楚這些人怎麼想的, 因為我不會說挪威語,
(Laughter)
(觀眾笑)
But I'm not thinking "monsteret" is a good thing. I don't know, you know? So, one of the things that I love to do is travel around the world and look at archaeological sites. Because archaeology gives us an opportunity to study past civilizations, and see where they succeeded and where they failed. Use science to, you know, work backwards and say, "Well, really, what were they thinking?"
但是我不覺得這裡用來形容我的「怪物」是個好詞。 我不覺得,你們呢? 那麼,我的愛好之一就是 到處旅行,參觀那些考古遺址。 因為考古學讓我們有機會 研究過去的文明 看看他們的成功 以及他們的失敗。 用現在的科學水平 回看過去,想:「唉,真的,他們那時在想什麼?」
And recently, I was in Easter Island, which is an incredibly beautiful place, and an incredibly mysterious place, because no matter where you go in Easter Island, you're struck by these statues, called the moai. The place is 64 square miles. They made, so far as we can tell, 900 of them. Why on Earth? And if you haven't read Jared Diamond's book, "Collapse," I totally recommend that you do. He's got a great chapter about it. Basically, these people committed ecological suicide in order to make more of these. And somewhere along the line, somebody said, "I know! Let's cut down the last tree and commit suicide, because we need more identical statues."
最近我去了復活節島, 那個地方美得讓人難以置信, 也神秘得讓人難以置信, 因為在這個島上,無論你走到哪裡, 你都會看到這些令人震驚的雕像,叫做MOAI 這個地方一共64平方英里。 目前我們大致能看到900個雕像。 這到底是幹啥用的?如果你沒讀過 戴蒙的書《大崩壞》 我強烈推薦。 其中很精彩的一章就是關於這個問題。 大致的意思就是這些人 是在生態自殺 就是為了製造更多的雕像。 話說某日某個傢伙說: 「我知道了!讓我們砍掉最後一棵樹, 然後自殺,因為 我們需要更多一模一樣的雕像。」
(Laughter)
(觀眾笑聲)
And, one thing that isn't a mystery, actually, was when I grew up -- because when I was a little kid, I'd seen these pictures -- and I thought, "Well, why that look on the face? Why that brow?" I mean, it's such a powerful thing. Where did they get that inspiration? And then I met Yoyo, who is the native Rapa Nui-an guide, and if you look at Yoyo's face, you kind of figure out where they got it.
不過 有個事其實不算是秘密, 當我還是小孩子時,我就看過這些照片, 我想「哎呦,為什麼是這種表情? 眉毛為啥是那樣的?」我的意思是,這麼有衝擊力的作品。 從哪裡來的靈感? 長大後,我遇見了YOYO, 他是復活節島當地的嚮導, 如果你看看YOYO的臉, 你大概就能瞭解到他們從哪裡得到的啟發。
There's many mysteries, these statues. Everyone wants to know, how did they make them, how did they transport them? This woman in the foreground is Jo Anne Van Tilberg. She's the leading archaeologist working Easter Island today. And she has studied the statues for 20-some years, and she has detailed records of every single statue. The one on the page here is the same that's up there. One interesting problem is the stone isn't very hard. So, this used to be completely smooth. In fact, in many of the statues, when you excavate them, the backs are totally smooth -- almost glass smooth. But after 1,000 years out in the weather, they look like this.
關於這些雕像有很多秘密。 大家都想知道,它們是怎麼雕刻出來的, 怎麼運輸的? 照片裡這位女士叫Jo Anne Van Tilberg。 她是目前在復活節島上工作的首席考古學家。 她研究這些雕像已經20多年了, 而且她有每個雕像的具體資料。 紙上畫的和那邊立著的是同一個雕像。 一個有趣的問題是這種石頭不大硬。 所以雕像曾經是完全光滑的。 事實上,當你挖掘出它們時,其中的很多雕像 背部是完全光滑的─幾乎像玻璃那麼光滑。 但是當風吹日曬1000年以後, 它們成了這樣。
Jo Anne and I have just embarked on a project to digitize them all, and we're going to do a very high-res digitization, first because it's a way of preserving them. Second, we have these ideas about how you can algorithmically, then, learn a few of the mysteries about them. How long have they been standing in what positions? And maybe, indirectly, get at some of the issues of what caused them to be the way they are. While I was in Easter Island, comet McNaught was there also, so you get a gratuitous picture of a moai with a comet.
Jo Anne和我剛剛開始著手一個計畫:將它們全都數位化, 而且是相當高解析度的數位化, 首先,因為這是保存它們的一種方式。 其次,我們有一些關於如何能夠以演算法 瞭解這些雕像一些秘密的想法。 它們在什麼位置站立多久了? 也許還能間接瞭解到 是什麼使它們成了這個樣子。 當我在復活節島時,正好麥克諾特彗星也來了, 所以你免費得到一張 同時有石像和彗星的照片。
I also have an archaeological project going on in Egypt. "Going on" is perhaps a little bit strong. We're trying to get all of the permissions to get everything all set, to get it going. So, I'll talk about it at a future TED. But there's some amazing opportunities in Egypt as well. Another thing I do is I invent stuff. In fact, I design nuclear reactors. Not a joke. This is the conventional nuclear fuel cycle. The red line is what is done in most nuclear reactors. It's called the open fuel cycle. The white lines are what's called an advance fuel cycle, where you reprocess.
我進行著另外一個考古計畫 在埃及。 說「進行」可能有點過了。 我們還在努力獲取所有的許可 以便讓一切就緒,準備開動。 所以這個我在以後的TED演講再說。 不過在埃及有很多很好的機會。 我做的另一件事就是發明小東西。 事實上,我在設計核反應爐。 沒開玩笑。 這個是傳統的 核燃料循環。 紅線是大多數核反應爐的 運轉方式:一次通過式燃料循環系統。 白線是一種所謂「先進燃料循環系統」, 可以對用過的核燃料再處理。
Now, this is the normal way it's done. It's got the huge advantage that it does not create carbon pollution. It has a lot of disadvantages: each one of these steps is extremely expensive, it's potentially dangerous and they have the interesting property that the step cannot be performed in anyone's backyard, which is a problem. So, our reactor eliminates these steps, which, if we can actually make it work, is a really cool thing. Now, it's kind of nuts to work on a new nuclear reactor. There's -- no reactor's been even built to an old design, much less a new one, in the United States for 25 years. It's the kind of very high-risk, but potentially very high-return thing that we do.
目前這是常規的做法。 它最大的優點就在於 不造成碳污染。 它也有很多缺點─ 這裡的每個環節都非常費錢, 它有安全隱患, 它的一個有趣的特點就是它的處理步驟 無法在普通人後院實施, 這就很成問題了。 所以,我們的反應爐淘汰了這些步驟 如果我們真的能成功,那就太酷了。 這個,研究新型的核反應爐是有點瘋狂。 現在,沒人在製造反應爐 無論是舊式的,更別提新式的了,整個美國都沒有 已經25年了。 這是一項高風險,但是可能是更高回報的 研究,這就是我們在做的。
Changing into a totally different field, we do a lot of stuff in solid state physics, particularly in an area called metamaterials. A metamaterial is an artificial material, which manipulates, in this case, electromagnetic radiation, in a way that you couldn't otherwise. So, this device here is an invisibility cloak. It may not seem that, but if you were a microwave, this is how you would view it. Rays of light -- in this case, microwave light -- come in, and they just squish around the cell, and they come back the other side. Now, you could do that with mirrors from one angle. The cool thing is, this does it from all angles. Metamaterials, unfortunately -- A, it only works on microwave, and B, it doesn't work all that well yet. But metamaterials are an incredibly exciting field. It's -- you know, today I'd like to say it's a zero billion dollar business, but, in fact, it's negative. But some day, some day, maybe it's going to work.
現在切換到另一個完全不同的領域, 我們研究很多固態物理學的東西, 尤其是一個稱為「超材料」的領域。 所謂超材料就是一種人工製造的材料, 我們想做的這種可以控制電磁輻射, 它的特性是獨一無二的。 因此,這裡這個儀器就叫隱形斗篷。 看上去可能不太像,但是如果你是一束微波, 你看到的就是這樣的。 光線─在這裡就是微波光線─ 照過來,然後它們繞過這個小室 然後從另一頭出來。 嗯,你可以用鏡子從某個角度做到這樣。 但更酷的是,這個儀器能做到全方位。 這個超材料,很不幸─ 第一,它只適用於微波, 第二,它時靈時不靈。 但是超材料是一個極其激動人心的領域。 它是,你知道目前我喜歡這麼說, 它是一個0億產業,但是 事實上,還要倒貼錢。 說不定哪天,有那麼一天,它也許就成功了。
We do a lot of work in biomedical fields. In this case, we're working with a major medical foundation to develop inexpensive ways of diagnosing diseases in developing countries. So, they say the eyes are the windows of the soul -- turns out they're a window to a whole lot more stuff. And these happen to be my eyes, by the way.
我們還做很多生物醫學領域的東西。 這裡我們和一個大型醫藥研究基金合作 開發一種便宜的診斷方法 在開發中國家使用。 有人說眼睛是靈魂之窗─ 事實上它們是很多東西的窗口。 順便說一下,這是我的眼睛。
Now, I'm also very interested in cooking. While I was at Microsoft, I took a leave of absence and went to a chef school in France. I used to work, also while at Microsoft, at a leading restaurant in Seattle, so I do a lot of cooking. I've been on a team that won the world championship of barbecue. But barbecue's interesting, because it's one of these cult foods like chili, or bouillabaisse. Various parts of the world will have a cult food that people get enormously attached to -- there's tremendous traditions, there's secrecy. And I'm trying to use a very scientific approach. So, this is my latest cooker, and if this looks more complicated than the nuclear reactor, that's because it is. But if you get to play with all those knobs and dials -- and of course, really the controller over there does it all on software -- you can make some terrific ribs.
還有,我對烹飪也很有興趣。 當我在微軟時,我曾經請大假 跑去法國上一個廚師學校。 當我在微軟工作時,我同時還在 西雅圖一個很出名的餐廳幹活, 所以說,我燒過不少菜呢。 我曾經加入一個團隊,贏得 燒烤世界冠軍。 燒烤很有意思,因為它是人們瘋狂熱愛的食物 類似辣椒,或馬賽海鮮湯。 不同的地方會有自己的一種狂熱食物 有超多的人吃得上癮。 關於這類食物有驚人的傳統,也有秘方, 而我走的是一條非常 科學的路線。 這就是我最新的爐子, 可能它看上去比核反應爐還複雜, 因為確實如此。 但是如果你真玩起這些旋鈕和轉盤─ 當然真正在那兒控制整個過程的都是電腦軟體─ 你能做出無與倫比的大肉排。
(Laughter)
(觀眾笑聲)
This is a high-speed centrifuge. You should all have one in your kitchen, beside your Turbochef. This subjects food to a force about 50,000 times that of normal gravity, and oh boy, does it clarify chicken stock. You would not believe it! I perform a series of ghoulish experiments on food -- in this case, trying to calibrate a mathematical model so that one can predict exactly what the internal cooking times are. It turns out, A, it's useful, and for a geek like me, it's fun. Theory is red, black is experiment. So, I'm either really good at faking it, or this particular model seems to work.
這是一個高速離心機。 你們每個人都應該在廚房裡裝一個 就放在你的急速烤箱旁邊。 它讓食物承受5萬倍 重力的力量, 我的老天爺啊,它能不能做出清澈的高湯? 結果令人難以置信。 我還做過一系列極其殘忍的實驗 針對食物的─ 在這裡,我試圖校驗出一套數學模型 可以讓人精確預測 內部的烹煮時間。 結果確實管用,而且對我這種科技迷來說也很有趣。 理論是紅色線條, 黑色是實驗結果。 所以我要不就是非常精於作弊, 要不就說明這個模型是有用的。
So, another random thing I do is the search for extraterrestrial intelligence, or SETI. And you may be familiar with the movie "Contact," which sort of popularized that. It turns out there are real people who go out and search for extraterrestrials in a very scientific way. In fact, almost everybody in the movie is based on a real character, a real person. So, the Jodie Foster character here is actually this woman, Jill Tarter, and Jill has dedicated her life to this. You know, a lot of people risk their lives in a brief act of heroism, which is kind of cool, but Jill has what I call slow heroism. She is risking her professional life on something that her own calculations show may not work for a thousand years -- may not ever. So, I like to support people that are risking their lives.
嗯,我做的另一件事 就是尋找外星人 簡稱SETI。 可能你們都熟悉一個電影叫《接觸未來》, 這電影使SETI被大家瞭解。 事實上真的有人 以非常科學的方法尋找外星人。 其實,電影裡幾乎每個人 都取材於某個真實的角色,一個真人。 所以,茱蒂‧福斯特扮演的 其實是這位女士,Jill Tarter, Jill畢生都在找尋外星人。 要知道,有很多人可能會冒著生命危險在 一時的英勇行為上, 這也很酷, 但是Jill的所作所為 我稱為緩發的英雄主義。 根據她自己的計算 她將她的學術生涯花在一個 一千年─也可能是永遠─都可能沒結果的研究。 所以我喜歡支持這些拿自己的一生冒險的人。
After the movie came out, of course, there was a lot of interest in SETI. My kids saw the movie, and afterwards they came to me and they said, "So, Dad, so -- so -- that character -- that's Jill, right?" I said, "Oh, yeah, yeah -- absolutely." "And that other person, that's someone -- " I said, "Yes." They said, "Well, you know that creepy rich guy in the movie? Is that you?" I said, "Well, you know, it's just a movie! Come on."
電影上映以後,當然,很多人開始對SETI感興趣。 我的孩子也看了電影, 看完以後他們跑來問我, 「所以,爸爸,所以所以─ 那個女的─就是Jill,對不對?」 我說:「啊,對對─當然是啊。」 「那,另外那個人,也是真人─」我說「沒錯。」 他們又問:「那,你知道電影裡那個古里古怪的有錢人嗎? 就是你吧?」 我說,哎呀,你知道,那只是個電影呀!別亂說!
(Laughter)
(觀眾笑聲)
So, the SETI Institute, with a little bit of help from me, and a lot of help from Paul Allen and a variety of other people, is building a dedicated radio telescope in Hat Creek, California, so they can do this SETI work. Now, I travel a lot, and I change cell phones a lot, and the one person who always gets updated on all my cell phones and pagers and everything else is Jill, because I really don't want to miss "the call."
因此,SETI學會, 在我的小小幫助,以及Paul Allen 的大力支持下, 還有一大群別的人參與, 建造了一個專門的電波望遠鏡, 位於加州的Hat Creek, 從而可以展開這項SETI計畫。 如今,我到處旅行,而且經常換手機, 有一個人總是得到及時更新 我所有的手機,call機,以及各種通訊工具, 那就是Jill,因為我真的不想錯過 外星人打來的「那通電話」。
(Laughter)
(觀眾笑聲)
I mean, can you imagine? E.T.'s phoning home, and I'm not, like, there? You know, horrible! So, I do a lot of work on dinosaurs. I'm known to TEDsters as the guy that has sex with dinosaurs. And I resemble that remark. I'm going to talk about a different aspect of dinosaurs, which is the finding of them. Now, to find dinosaurs, you hike around in horrible conditions looking for a dinosaur. It sounds really dumb, but that's what it is. It's horrible conditions, because wherever you have nice weather, plants grow, and you don't get any erosion, and you don't see any dinosaurs. So, you always find dinosaurs in deserts or badlands, areas that have very little plant growth and have flash floods in the spring. You know, skiers pray for snow? Paleontologists pray for erosion.
我的意思是,你能想像嗎?ET打電話到我家, 而我竟然不在?知道了吧,太糟糕了! 另外,我還研究恐龍。 TED人都知道我是那個和恐龍穿一條褲子的人。 我差不多就是那樣。 我要說說關於恐龍不同方面的話題, 尋找恐龍(化石)。 為了尋找恐龍(化石),你要在艱苦的環境中,靠步行 來尋找牠們。 這聽上去真的很蠢,但事實就是如此。 環境艱苦是因為 凡是氣候好的地方, 植物也茂盛。 而沒有侵蝕風化,就看不到恐龍。 所以你要找恐龍 就必須去沙漠或戈壁─ 那裡幾乎寸草不生 而且春天還會發洪水。 你知道嗎,滑雪的傢伙求雪, 古生物學家求風化。
So, you hike around and -- this is after you dig them up, they look like this. You hike around, you see something like this. Now, this is something I found, so look at it very closely here. You've got this bentonite clay, which is -- sort of swells up and expands. And there's some stuff poking out. So, you look at that, and you look up close, and you say, "Well, gee, that's kind of interesting. What are all of these pieces?" Well, if you look closely, you can recognize, actually, from the shape, that these are skull fragments. And then when you look at this, you say, "That's a tooth. It's a big tooth." It's about the size of a banana. It has a big serration on the edge. This is what Tyrannosaurus rex looks like in the ground. And this is what it's like to find a Tyrannosaurus rex, which I was lucky enough to do a few years ago.
所以就得到處走 而這就是挖掘出來以後─它們就是這樣的。 你走來走去,看到類似這樣的東西。 這個就是我發現的,要非常非常仔細看這裡。 你看到的這個是由火山灰分解而得的膨潤土 它有點膨脹隆起。 這裡有什麼東西伸出來。於是你看著它, 再湊近了看,然後說, 「哎呦喂,有點意思─這些小片片是啥?」 嗯,如果你離近了看,你就能辨認出來,真的 根據它的形狀可以看出,這些是頭骨碎片。 而當你看到這個時, 你會說「這是一顆牙。 一顆很大的牙。」 這個大約有香蕉那麼大。 在邊緣有巨大的鋸齒。 這就是暴龍埋在土裡時的樣子。 這就是發現暴龍的場景, 我很幸運在幾年前找到了。
Now, this is what Tyrannosaurus rex looks like in my living room. Not the same one, actually. This is a cast, which I had bought, and then, after buying the cast, I found my own, and I don't have room for two. You know. So, the thing that's wonderful for me about finding dinosaurs is that it is both an intellectual thing, because you're trying to reconstruct the environment of millions of years ago. It's something that can inform all sorts of science in unexpected ways. The study of dinosaurs led to the realization that there's a problem with asteroid impact, for example. The study of dinosaurs may, literally, one day save the planet.
這個就是暴龍在我家的樣子。 當然不是我發現的那個。是我之前買的石膏模型。 後來,在買了這個模型之後,我才發現我自己的那個。 而我沒地方放兩個暴龍。 是吧。 那麼對我來說尋找恐龍的美妙之處就在於 它同時也是一個思考的過程, 因為你要嘗試重現的地理環境 可是數百萬年前的。 它能以意想不到的方式 提供資訊給科學各學門。 對恐龍的研究讓我們認識到 小行星撞擊會造成問題, 就是一個例子。 研究恐龍可能真的 在某天就拯救了地球。
Study of the ancient climate is very important. In fact, the Mesozoic, when dinosaurs lived, had much higher CO2 than today, was much warmer than today, and is one of the interesting proof points for the effects of CO2 on climate. But, besides being intellectually and scientifically interesting, it's also very different than the other things I do, because you get to hike around in the badlands. This is actually what most dinosaur research looks like. This is one of my papers: "A pygostyle from a non-avian theropod." It's not as gripping as dinosaur sex, so we're not going to go into it further.
研究遠古時期的氣候也很重要。 事實上,恐龍生存的中生代 二氧化碳的含量要遠遠高於現在, 也比現在溫暖很多,這是一個有趣的證據指明 二氧化碳對氣候的影響。 但是除了智識 和科學上的興趣,它還不同於我做的其他事 因為你必須在不毛之地靠步行尋找。 這恰恰就是研究恐龍的大部份工作。 這是我的一篇論文《非鳥獸腳類恐龍的尾綜骨》 這些沒有恐龍性生活那麼吸引人, 所以我們就此打住了。
Now, I'm also really big on photography. I travel all over the world taking pictures -- some of them good, most of them not. These days, bits are cheap. Unfortunately, that means you've got to spend more time sorting through them. Here's a picture I took in the Falkland Islands of king penguins on a beach. Here's a picture I took in Alaska, a few years ago, of Orcas. I'd gone up to photograph Orcas, and we had looked for a week, and we hadn't seen a damn Orca. And the last day, the sun comes out, the Orcas come, they're right by the boat. It's fantastic. And I get lots of pictures like this. Then, a little bit later, I start getting some pictures like this. Now, to a human audience, I need to explain that if Penthouse magazine had a marine mammal edition, this would be the centerfold. It's true. So, there's more and more activity near the boat, and all of a sudden somebody shouts, "What's that in the water?" I said, "Well, I think that's what you call a free willy."
現在,我還特喜歡攝影。 我環遊世界到處拍照─ 有些不錯,大部份都很爛。 這年頭存儲材料很便宜。不幸的是那意味著 你得花費更多的時間整理這些照片。 這張照片是我在福克蘭群島拍的 海灘上的國王企鵝。 這是我幾年前在阿拉斯加拍到的殺人鯨。 我是特意跑去拍殺人鯨的, 然後我們找了一星期 連個殺人鯨的鬼影都沒見到。 到了最後一天,太陽出來了, 殺人鯨也出現了,它們就在船邊,一切都無比神奇。 結果我就拍了一堆這類的照片。 然後,過了一會兒, 我開始拍到這樣的照片。 嗯,針對人類觀眾,我需要解釋一下 如果閣樓雜誌有一個海洋哺乳動物版, 那這個就是中心彩色折頁。 千真萬確。 然後在船周圍這樣的活動越來越多, 突然某人喊了起來, 「水裡的那個是什麼?」 我回答:「唉,我想這就是你們說的威鯨闖天關。」
(Laughter)
(電影名諧音「自由的陽具」)(觀眾笑聲)
There's a variety of things you can learn from watching whales have sex.
你能從觀看鯨魚做愛的過程學到很多各種各樣的東西。
(Laughter) The first thing you learn is the overwhelming importance of hands. They don't have them.
(觀眾笑聲) 你學到的第一件事就是 手的重要性是壓倒一切的。 它們沒手。
(Laughter)
(觀眾笑聲)
I think Paul Simon is in the audience, and he has -- he may not realize it, but he wrote a song all about whale sex, "Slip-Slidin' Away." That's kind of what it's like. The other interesting thing that I learned about whale sex: they curl their toes too.
我想Paul Simon 今天也來了, 他曾經─ 他可能自己沒意識到,但是他的確寫了一首關於鯨魚愛愛的歌: 〈漸滑漸遠〉 唱的就是這個。 我從鯨魚性愛中學到的另一個有趣的事就是: 它們也會勾腳趾。
(Laughter)
(觀眾笑聲)
So -- where do you go putting all of these disparate pieces together? You know, there's a tremendous amount of wisdom in finding a great thing, passion in life, and focusing all your energy on it, and I've never been able to do that. I just -- you know, because, yes, I'll focus passion on something, but then there will be something else, and then there's something else again. And for a long time I fought this, and I thought, "Well, gee, I really ought to buckle down." And you know, when I was at Microsoft, that was so engrossing, and the whole industry was expanding so much, that it did tend to crowd out most of the other things in my life.
那麼─ 所有這些東拉西扯的東西應該歸到何處呢? 你們都知道,有很多很多聰明的人 都是尋找一生中一件偉大的東西,一個愛好, 然後把所有的精力都投入在上面, 而我就一直做不到這樣。 我就是─你們都知道,是的, 我老是對某個東西非常有熱情, 但是之後又會對別的東西有興趣,然後又會有別的東西出現。 很長時間我都為此而掙扎,我想: 「唉,好了,我真得應該定下心了。」 而要知道,當我還在微軟的時候, 那時是多麼引人入勝, 整個產業正在急速擴張 那時這個工作的確擠掉了我生活中大部份的其他事情。
But ultimately, I decided that what I really ought to do is not fight being who I am, but embrace it. And say, "Yeah, you know, I -- this whole talk has been a mile wide and an inch deep, but that's really what works for me." And regardless of whether it's nuclear reactors or metamaterials or whale sex, the common -- or lowest common denominator -- is me. That's it, thank you.
但是最終, 我決定 我真正應該做的就是不要再跟自己對抗, 而是接受這樣的自己。 然後說:「對,你們也知道,我─ 這整個演講博雜有餘,但是專精不足,. 但這真的很適合我。」 不管是核反應爐還是超材料 還是鯨魚愛愛, 其共同之處─或說最小公分母─就是我。 就是這樣,謝謝大家。
(Applause)
(觀眾掌聲)