Are you able to deeply focus on one specific activity, such as rolling up in a spiky ball and sleeping through the winter?

你是否能夠深深地專注於一項具體的活動，如捲起成尖球睡過冬？

Or are you alert to changing circumstances and keep your eyes and ears open to new threats and opportunities?

還是對身邊周遭的變化保有警覺，並對新的威脅和機會留心。

My name's David Spiegelhalter, and I'm a statistician and fascinated by the problems of risk and prediction.

我的名字叫大衛．史匹格哈特爾，我是一個統計學家，且著迷於風險和預測的問題。

Philosopher Isaiah Berlin wrote a famous essay, The Hedgehog and the Fox, after a famous poem by the Greek poet, Archilochus, who said " The fox knows many things, but the hedgehog knows one big thing."

哲學家以撒．柏林寫過一篇著名的文章—刺蝟和狐狸，在希臘詩人亞基羅古斯的一首著名詩句中說：「狐狸知道很多事情，刺蝟知道一件重要的事。」

Think of the people you know, either privately or public figures.

想想你認識的人，無論是私底下的還是公眾人物。

Are they hedgehogs, with one overarching way of looking at the world, through which they interpret all around them?

他們是以一種整體性的方式看待世界，並通過它們來解讀身邊一切的刺蝟嗎？

Or are they foxes, with no big principles of philosophy, who muddle along adapting to what turns up and changing their minds along the way?

還是，他們是沒有大哲學原則、隨遇而安，並沿途改變想法的狐狸？

Politicians, of course, tend to be hedgehogs.

政治家通常往往是刺蝟。

But some are more pragmatic and foxy than others.

但有些人比其他人更務實、更狡猾。

Now, who would you trust most to make predictions about the future?

現在，你最相信誰能對未來做出預測？

A confident hedgehog or an uncertain and vacillating fox?

是充滿自信的刺蝟還是充滿不確定性、猶豫不決的狐狸？

This was put to the test in a long series of experiments by political scientist, Philip Tetlock, who studied 284 experts, making 28,000 predictions about long term events.

這在政治學家菲利浦．泰特洛克一系列漫長的實驗中得到了驗證，他研究了 284 名專家，進行了多達 28000 次的預測。

Tetlock was looking at who predicted best.

泰特洛克在看誰能預測的最好。

And mainly it made no difference whether the forecaster was an optimist or a pessimist, conservative or liberal.

而且這主要跟預測者樂觀或悲觀、保守或自由沒有區別。

The only consistent pattern was how they thought, not what they thought.

唯一符合的模式是他們怎麼想，而不是他們在想什麼。

He found that foxes were much better at predicting than were hedgehogs.

他發現狐狸的預測能力比刺蝟強得多。

And hedgehogs were particularly poor at subjects at which they were experts.

刺猬在他們擅長的科目上，表現特別差。

They were just too confident in their forecasts.

他們只是對自己的預測太過自信。

A classic hedgehog was the historian Arnold Toynbee, who in 1947 was declared TIME magazine's Man of the Year.

歷史學家阿諾爾德．湯因比是典型的刺蝟，他在 1947 年被《時代》雜誌宣佈為年度人物。

Others wrote that he was the most renowned scholar in the world or a universal sage, largely because his great work, A Study of History, spoke to the biggest fear of the time that nuclear weapons were going to end civilization.

其他人寫道，他是全世界最著名的學者或稱眾所皆知的智者，主要是因他的著作《歷史研究》聞明，書中闡述當時最令人恐懼的是核武器將終結文明。

Toynbee made the confident and comforting prediction that this wouldn't happen.

湯因比做出了自信而又令人欣慰的預測：這是不會發生的。

Because it was an opposition to his self-proclaimed scientific theory of history.

因為這是與他自稱為科學的歷史理論完全相反。

Toynbee thought that Western civilization wasn't nearly done yet, because it hadn't reached the stage of universal government and a religious renaissance.

湯因比認為西方文明還不夠完整，因為它還沒有經歷過共同的政府和宗教復興的階段。

All 23 civilizations he had studied had done so before they collapsed, and so would the West.

他研究的 23 個文明在崩塌之前都是如此，西方也會如此。

He thought the golden age of universal government and religious observance would start around the year 2000.

他認為共同政府和宗教儀式的黃金時代將在 2000 年左右開始。

His peers were skeptical and they were right.

他的同儕們都持懷疑態度，而他們是對的。

Today Toynbee is hardly remembered, except perhaps as a classic hedgehog.

今天，幾乎沒有人記得湯因比，除了可能是因為他是個經典的刺蝟。

In his book, Future Babble, Dan Gardner identifies three characteristics of good forecasters.

在他的著作 Future Babble 中，丹‧賈德納指出了優秀預測者的三個特點。

Number one: aggregation.

第一：聚合。

They use multiple sources of information, are open to new knowledge and are happy to work in teams.

他們使用多種資訊來源、樂於接受新知識，也樂於在團隊中工作。

Number two: metacognition.

第二條：元認知。

They have an insight into how they think and the biases they might have, such as seeking evidence that simply confirms pre-set ideas.

他們對自己的思維方式和可能存在的偏見都有深刻見解，例如尋求簡單證實預設想法的證據。

Number three: humility.

第三條：謙虛。

They have a willingness to acknowledge uncertainty, admit errors and change their minds.

他們願意面對不確定性、承認錯誤，並加以改正它。

Rather than saying categorically what is going to happen, they are only prepared to give probabilities for future events.

而不是斬釘截鐵地說要發生什麼，他們只能算出未來事件發生的概率。

Acknowledging, in the words of that great sage, Donald Rumsfeld, both the known unknowns and unknown unknowns.

關於承認，套用偉大的聖人唐納．倫斯斐說的話：既有已知的未知數，也有未知的未知數。

So when someone is telling you what is in store for you, the country, the world, just ask yourself, are they a hedgehog or a fox?

所以當別人預測你的、國家的或世界的未來時，你得問問自己，他們是刺蝟還是狐狸？