Name: 如果下週五人類滅絕了怎麼辦？| 灰色地帶 (What if humans went extinct next Friday? | The Gray Area)
Uploaded: 2025-07-28T17:08:44.000Z
Duration: 57 min 53 s

Hey, I'm Sean, host of The Gray Area. For the show this week, I talked to Mark C. Taylor.

嘿，我是《灰色地帶》的主持人肖恩。在本週的節目中，我採訪了馬克-C-泰勒。

反身代名詞

He's the author of this book right here. It's called After the Human. It's an incredible, ambitious book about the history of modern philosophy and where it went wrong and why we need a new story about ourselves, about our species, and really about our relationship to everything and everyone. It's a great read. It's a great conversation. I hope you enjoy it.

他就是這本書的作者。書名叫《人類之後》。這是一本令人難以置信的、雄心勃勃的書，講述了現代哲學的歷史，以及它出錯的地方，還有為什麼我們需要一個關於我們自己、關於我們的物種，以及關於我們與萬事萬物和每個人的關係的新故事。這是一本偉大的讀物。這是一場偉大的對話。希望大家喜歡。

情態副詞

Support for this episode comes exclusively from Upwork, the world's largest human and AI-powered freelance marketplace helping businesses reimagine how work gets done. Later in the show, we'll hear from a real-life Upwork customer, a business owner who says that his company would not be what it is today without the professionals he hired using Upwork. You can see how Upwork is helping to reinvent work in the AI era at Upwork.com updates. Mark Taylor, welcome to the show.

Upwork 是全球最大的人工智能自由職業市場，幫助企業重新想象如何完成工作。在節目的稍後部分，我們將聽到一位真實的 Upwork 客戶，一位企業主說，如果沒有他使用 Upwork 僱用的專業人士，他的公司就不會有今天。您可以在Upwork.com的更新中看到Upwork如何幫助重塑人工智能時代的工作。馬克-泰勒，歡迎來到節目。

I'm excited you're here. This is going to be a doozy of a conversation because it's a doozy of a book. I was thinking about how to anchor this conversation, and I just decided that the best way to do it is to start where you start the book, which is with a pretty jarring thought experiment, we'll call it. You write on the,

很高興你能來這將會是一場蕩氣迴腸的對話，因為這是一本蕩氣迴腸的書。我一直在思考如何讓這場對話有條不紊地進行，我覺得最好的方式就是從書的開頭開始，我們稱之為 "令人震驚的思想實驗"。你寫道

I think it's on the very first page, and now I'm quoting, how would your understanding of the meaning of your life change if you knew that next Friday at precisely 12 o'clock midnight, the human race would become extinct, end quote.

我想它就在第一頁上，現在我引用一下，如果你知道下週五午夜 12 點整，人類將滅絕，你對自己生命意義的理解會發生怎樣的變化，引用完畢。

That's a hell of a way to kick off a book, Mark. I love it. So why come out swinging like that?

開場白寫得真好，馬克我喜歡那為什麼要這樣開場？

Why pose that question? Why do you want us right out of the gates, thinking about total extinction next Friday?

為什麼要提出這個問題？為什麼要讓我們一出大門就想到下週五的全面滅絕？

Because I think it's a realistic possibility. The real urgency of this book comes out of my concern about climate change because there's absolutely no doubt that we are facing catastrophic effects in the very near future. And there's a complete blindness or unwillingness to confront the actuality of that problem and to address what needs to be done to dodge it if we can. But it's not just that. It's also the intersection of new technologies, which are related to this, and the ways in which those new technologies have transformed the social, economic, and political systems. And all of this is, they're all interrelated. And the problem isn't just that people are not connecting the dots.

因為我認為這是一種現實的可能性。這本書真正的緊迫性源於我對氣候變化的擔憂，因為毫無疑問，我們在不久的將來將面臨災難性的影響。而人們卻完全視而不見，或者不願意正視這一問題的實際情況，也不願意解決我們需要做的事情，以儘可能地避免這一問題。但問題不僅如此。與此相關的還有新技術的交叉，以及這些新技術改變社會、經濟和政治體系的方式。所有這些都是相互關聯的。問題不僅僅在於人們沒有把這些點聯繫起來。

People do not know the dots that need to be connected. And that's partly related to our educational system, and it's partly related to the new media ecological system that has emerged with this technology. But it's also even more fundamentally related to, I mean, and this is the conceit of the book, right? To the way we've come to think of ourselves, the story we've come to tell ourselves about ourselves and what and who we are in the world and how we relate to everything around us. So, I mean, that's hence the title, After the Human. This book is very much about what we think being human means. Correct. So let's just start very simply.

人們不知道需要把這些點連接起來。這部分與我們的教育體制有關，部分與隨著這項技術出現的新媒體生態體系有關。但從根本上說，這也是本書的主旨所在，對嗎？我們是如何看待自己的，我們是如何講述自己的故事的，我們在這個世界上是什麼，我們是誰，我們是如何與周圍的一切聯繫在一起的。所以，我的意思是，這就是書名《人類之後》的由來。這本書在很大程度上是關於我們認為作為人類意味著什麼。沒錯。那我們就從簡單的開始吧

Very simply. What is the human? This class, After the Human, that I taught,

非常簡單。人類是什麼？我教的這門課《人類之後》、

I began by asking the students two questions. One, the question you just asked me, what is the human? And two, the question of whether the students think that human beings as they are now constituted are the end of the evolutionary process, or if there will be other forms of life that will evolve from us. Answering what is the human is a difficult question to answer without falling into the trap I'm trying to escape, and that is the distinctiveness and uniqueness of the human. Because historically, part of what has made humans distinctive is their propensity to distinguish themselves from all else, right?

我首先向學生們提出了兩個問題。一是你剛才問我的問題，什麼是人類？第二個問題是，學生們是否認為現在的人類是進化過程的終點，還是會有其他形式的生命從我們進化而來。回答 "人類是什麼 "是一個很難回答的問題，因為它很難不落入我試圖擺脫的陷阱，那就是人類的獨特性和唯一性。因為從歷史上看，人類之所以與眾不同，部分原因就在於他們傾向於將自己與其他人區分開來，不是嗎？

Right. To distinguish themselves on one side from the animal and on the other side from the machine.

對。把自己與動物和機器區分開來。

And that is collapsing now. That is collapsing. And that part of what distinguishes the human is that we can ask the question what it means to be human. That's a level of self-consciousness and self-reflectivity, I think, that is important. So it's that level of self-reflexivity that I see as, in some ways, distinctive of the human. So what you're saying is we have come to think of human consciousness as something special, something distinct, something almost separate from nature, as though we are outside of the natural world, looking down at it, trying to make sense of it. Correct. I mean, that begins in the Bible in certain ways. I mean, I think there's a philosophical foundation to the Anthropocene. And I think, in many ways, that philosophical foundation begins with modern philosophy, which begins with Descartes. And Descartes, as everybody knows, said, I think therefore I am. And what Descartes does is to identify human being with thinking, and everything else is a machine, including the human body. From that point on, there's always this effort to distinguish the human from the non-human. And that can be the animal, that can be the plant. And philosophers all the way down to Heidegger will distinguish the human in certain ways. For Heidegger, the distinction of the human is the awareness of death. He says, animals expire, humans die. Dying is knowing there is such a thing as death.

而這一切正在崩潰。正在崩潰。人類與眾不同的部分在於，我們可以提出 "做人意味著什麼 "的問題。我認為，這是一種重要的自我意識和自我反思。是以，在某種程度上，我認為這種自我反思是人類的獨特之處。所以你的意思是，我們已經開始把人類意識視為一種特殊的、與眾不同的、幾乎與自然分離的東西，就好像我們置身於自然世界之外，俯視著它，試圖去理解它。沒錯我的意思是 這在某些方面始於《聖經》我的意思是 我認為人類世有其哲學基礎我認為，在許多方面，哲學基礎始於現代哲學，始於笛卡爾。眾所周知，笛卡爾說："我思故我在"。笛卡爾將人

So is it best for us to think of Descartes as the philosophical father of the modern world, the guy who gave us this subject-object split, the guy who convinced us that we are all little tiny private islands of subjectivity, bopping around in a world of objects and things?

那麼，我們是否應該把笛卡爾視為現代世界的哲學之父，是他讓我們看到了主客體的分裂，是他讓我們相信我們都是主觀性的小小私人島嶼，在一個物與物的世界裡四處遊蕩？

Yes, I think so. He begins the argument of defining human uniqueness in terms of human consciousness and self-consciousness. That identification of the human in terms of cognition and everything else is not being cognitive in any way. I mean, that becomes the heart of anthropocentrism. And the anthropocentrism is the basis of this anthropocene, that everything is directed toward, in this evolutionary process, its culmination in human being. But it separates man as being unique in this sense, and human being is not unique, completely unique. So that's anthropocentrism, the idea that human beings are at the center of things. Correct. He states this in one of the best ways I've ever heard. He says, everywhere that man, and I use that word, everywhere man turns, he sees only himself.

是的，我認為是這樣。他一開始就從人類意識和自我意識的角度來定義人類的獨特性。從認知的角度來確定人類，而其他一切都不具有認知性。我的意思是，這就是人類中心主義的核心。人類中心主義是 "人類世 "的基礎，在這個進化過程中，萬事萬物都以人類為最終目標。但從這個意義上講，它把人分離成了獨一無二的，而人類並不是獨一無二的，完全是獨一無二的。這就是人類中心主義 認為人類是萬物的中心沒錯。他用我聽過的最好的方式之一來闡述了這一點。他說，無論人走到哪裡，我用了這個詞，無論人走到哪裡，他都只看到自己。

That is the world in which we are living. It's a selfie world.

這就是我們生活的世界。這是一個自拍的世界。

I'll just stick with Descartes for a second to just make sure his villainy is appreciated here.

我還是先說說笛卡爾吧，以確保他的惡行在這裡得到讚賞。

And to put it in plain language, what Descartes really does is he helps drive a wedge between the self and the world so that the self or self-consciousness becomes the only thing we really know for certain. And everything outside our minds becomes this external thing. So with

用通俗易懂的話來說，笛卡爾真正做的是在自我和世界之間打入一個楔子，使自我或自我意識成為我們唯一真正確定知道的東西。而我們頭腦之外的一切都變成了外在的東西。是以

Descartes, we really think ourselves into alienation, or we think ourselves out of the natural world. Is that a decent summary of his contribution to this? Correct. He sets up what I call an oppositional ontology, that everything defines itself in opposition. So you're right, the human is not this, not that, separates us out from, or to use your language, alienates us from the natural world. So just to bring everyone along with us here, how does that lead us to this situation where we are exploiting nature and wrecking our environment, which is obviously where we started with the ecological catastrophe and climate change? I just want to draw a line from one thing to the other for the audience so they know why this is more than a why this is more than a bad idea, right? This actually had really terrible consequences for us in the world. It's consequences, yes, with respect to the natural world, but also social and political and economic world. What does that mean? So we view the individual as what is most concrete and most real. And we see groups as formed of individuals, right? That's wrong, because there is no such thing as an isolated individual. Every individual is what it is by virtue of its interrelationship to other individuals and entities.

笛卡爾說，我們真的認為自己異化了，或者說我們認為自己脫離了自然世界。這是對他的貢獻的恰當概括嗎？是的他建立了我所謂的對立本體論 一切事物都在對立中定義自身所以你是對的，人類不是這個，也不是那個， 把我們從自然世界中分離出來， 或者用你的話說，把我們從自然世界中分離出來。那麼，為了讓每個人都參與進來，這又是如何導致我們陷入這樣一種境地：我們正在開發自然，破壞環境，而這顯然正是生態災難和氣候變化的起點。我只是想給觀眾們劃一條線，讓他們知道為什麼這不僅僅是一個壞主意，對嗎？這實際上給我們這個世界帶來了非常可怕的

Can I ask you, Mark, why is it so hard to see that? Why is the illusion that we are just disconnected and separate so powerful?

馬克，我可以問你，為什麼要看到這一點這麼難嗎？為什麼我們只是互不聯繫、各自為政的幻覺會如此強大？

It's one of many things that puzzles me. But here's what's also so puzzling, is that interrelationship affirms itself in the very effort to negate it.

這是令我困惑的諸多問題之一。但同樣令人費解的是，在試圖否定相互關係的過程中，這種相互關係卻得到了肯定。

That's the thing, right? We're so conditioned to think of ourselves this way, but it really isn't that hard to see why it isn't true, right? I mean, the idea of an individual or the idea of an I is kind of nonsensical, right? If there isn't another, what could it possibly mean to be an individual if you're not already in a world of others? The only thing you can say about the individual is negative. The only thing that you can say about your individuality is as such, is that it's not this, not that, not something else. But anything positive you say, you're a man, you're a woman, you're an absurd name, whatever. Here's the issue. Identity is difference.

這就是問題所在，對嗎？我們總是習慣於這樣想自己，但其實這並不難理解為什麼這不是真的，對嗎？我的意思是，個體的概念或 "我 "的概念是無稽之談，對嗎？如果不存在另一個我，那麼如果你不是已經身處他人的世界中，成為一個個體又意味著什麼呢？關於個體，你唯一能說的就是負面。關於你的個體性，你唯一能說的就是，它不是這個，不是那個，不是別的什麼。但你說的任何正面的東西，你是個男人，你是個女人，你是個荒謬的名字，什麼的。問題就在這裡。身份就是差異。

We're in the midst of this political, we're talking about politics right now. We're talking about the politics that are being debated on the floor of the Congress as we now speak, right?

我們正在談論政治，我們正在談論政治。我們現在談論的是國會正在辯論的政治，對嗎？

Because the only way in which you can establish your identity is by your difference from others.

因為只有與他人不同，才能確立自己的身份。

Right? By defining yourself against which you're not. Yeah, or in relationship to.

對不對？通過定義你自己，而你不是。是的，或者說與之相關

So we think we're separate, but the reality is that we exist in this web of interdependence.

是以，我們認為自己是獨立的，但事實上，我們存在於這個相互依存的網絡中。

Web, exactly. But if you come back to climate, we're parasites on the earth.

網絡，沒錯。但如果回到氣候問題，我們就是地球上的寄生蟲。

It's a parasite host relationship. And we are in the process of destroying the host upon which we depend. Right? You cut down all the trees in order to serve the economy, and we die. That's simple. Right? So in that sense, right, the interrelationship is confirmed. I mean, when the current politicians pull out of all climate accords, reinforce fossil fuel, they're destroying the planet without which we can't live.

這是一種寄生蟲與宿主的關係。而我們正在摧毀我們賴以生存的宿主。對吧？為了經濟發展，你砍掉所有的樹，我們就會死。這很簡單就這麼簡單所以，從這個意義上說，相互關係得到了證實。我的意思是，當現在的政客們退出所有氣候協議，加強化石燃料的時候，他們就在摧毀我們賴以生存的地球。

Yeah, we'll get there. I don't want to get too far ahead of ourselves.

是的，我們會成功的我不想把事情想得太遠

Because I want to get to what is more or less your alternative or your answer, right? So where we are at this point in the conversation in the book is with this philosophical problem we have, which is the problem of modernity, the problem of the modern human, right? This conception of ourselves as separate from each other and from the world as outside of nature. And nature is this external thing that we can manipulate, control, whatever, right? That leads to a situation where we're both isolated from each other and from the natural world, which makes it easier for us to destroy the very thing on which we rely. Destroy the host, as you say, the parasite. So if that's the problem, that's the diagnosis, what is the answer? What kind of vision of the self do we actually need? And what are the ideas that are going to get us there?

因為我想知道你的選擇或答案是什麼，對嗎？在本書的對話中，我們現在所面臨的哲學問題是現代性問題，也就是現代人的問題，對嗎？這個概念認為我們自己是彼此分離的 也是世界的一部分，是在自然之外的自然是我們可以操縱、控制的外在事物，對嗎？這就導致了一種我們既彼此隔離 又與自然世界隔絕的情況 這讓我們更容易摧毀我們賴以生存的東西摧毀宿主，就像你說的，寄生蟲。如果這就是問題所在，這就是診斷結果，那麼答案是什麼？我們究竟需要什麼樣的自我願景？我們需要什麼樣的自我願景？

First thing I want to say is that I think ideas will help us get out of it. Ideas matter.

我想說的第一件事是，我認為想法會幫助我們走出困境。想法很重要。

And these issues, they should already be really complicated. We can say it in this way. Another way to think about what Descartes does is that he takes mind out of nature, right?

而這些問題，應該已經非常複雜了。我們可以這樣說另一種思考笛卡爾所作所為的方式是，他把思想從自然中抽離出來，對嗎？

Makes everything but the human mind a machine. So part of what you have to do is put mind back into nature, right? And to do that, you need an expanded notion of mind and of consciousness.

除了人類的思想，其他一切都變成了機器。所以，你要做的部分工作就是讓心靈迴歸自然，對嗎？而要做到這一點，你需要擴大心靈和意識的概念。

So then if you're going to have an expanded notion of mind, you have to rethink what we mean by knowledge, what we mean by cognition, what we mean by intelligence and the like. So part of what I've tried to do in this, I mean, it's a meta, meta book. I mean, the layers of abstraction,

是以，如果你想擴展心智的概念，就必須重新思考我們所說的知識、認知、智力等的含義。所以，我在這本書裡所做的部分嘗試，我的意思是，這是一本元、元的書。我是說，抽象的層次、

I know. But what I've wanted to do is to start at the actual physical subatomic level and look at quantum mechanics and try to understand quantum mechanics in terms of relationality and information processing, which I think can be done. There's a very important theoretical physicist by the name of Carlo Rovelli, who understands quantum mechanics through this notion of relationality or relativity, that you begin to see the way in which everything is interconnected. I mean, we are organisms of organisms, right? And all the way down at the cellular level, you know, the cell engages in cognitive processing and making certain, because it makes distinctions, different, within its environment, which is the rest of the cell.

我知道但我想做的是從實際的物理亞原子層面入手，研究量子力學，並嘗試從關係性和信息處理的角度來理解量子力學，我認為這是可以做到的。卡洛-羅維利（Carlo Rovelli）是一位非常重要的理論物理學家，他通過 "關係性 "或 "相對性 "這一概念來理解量子力學。我的意思是，我們是有機體的有機體，對嗎？在細胞層面上，細胞會進行認知處理，並在其所處的環境（即細胞的其他部分）中進行區分。

So you begin to think through the ways in which this notion of relationality, right, works itself out from this most rudimentary level of the physical, and you look at the biological level, right? And biological systems are information processing systems, right? I have diabetes, and that's one of the ways in which I began to understand this. When you understand how autoimmune disease works, right, you see that it's a coding problem and a misreading problem. And one way to understand the mess we're in now is as autoimmune disease, because what autoimmunity involves is that the body turns, the body or the body politic turns on itself and destroys itself, and certainly because it misreads itself. And you can trace this notion of information processing all the way through the physical, the biological, the ecological, try and understand ecological systems as information processing systems, and then extend that all the way up into plant and animal cognition, and finally, technology and artificial intelligence.

所以，你開始思考這種關係性的概念是如何從最基本的物理層面發展到生物層面的，對嗎？生物系統是信息處理系統，對吧？我有糖尿病，這是我開始理解這一點的方法之一。當你瞭解了自身免疫性疾病的原理，你就會發現這是一個編碼問題和誤讀問題。理解我們現在所處的混亂局面的一種方法就是將其視為自身免疫性疾病，因為自身免疫所涉及的是身體轉向，身體或政治體轉向自身並摧毀自身，這當然是因為它誤讀了自身。你可以通過物理、生物、生態學來追溯信息處理的概念，嘗試將生態系統理解為信息處理系統，然後將其延伸到植物和動物認知，最後延伸到科技和人

Can we stick with this idea for a minute of, how did you put it, putting the mind back in the world?

我們能不能堅持一下這個想法，你是怎麼說的？

Right. Because you have this idea in the book, the networked self.

對因為你在書中提出了 "網絡化的自我 "這一概念。

Right. The networked self. And you're talking about the mind and even identity, not as something we have, but something that happens, something that emerges in this web, right? What is the simplest way to describe this? What does it actually mean to think of the mind as something that extends beyond the individual human? Because again, it just feels so counterintuitive. It's so hard for us to do that, even if it is the case.

對網絡化的自我你說的心智甚至身份，不是我們所擁有的東西，而是發生的東西，是在這個網絡中出現的東西，對嗎？最簡單的描述方式是什麼？將心靈視為超越人類個體的東西，這究竟意味著什麼？因為同樣的，這感覺太違反直覺了。即使事實如此，我們也很難做到這一點。

So, I will use the image as the web of webs for a lot of this, or networks.

是以，我將把影像作為很多方面的網中之網，或者說網絡。

You know, think of yourself as a node within an ever-expanding and changing network. That is, things are events. Everything's in motion. Everything's a process.

要知道，把自己看作是一個不斷擴展和變化的網絡中的一個節點。也就是說，事情就是事件。一切都在運動中。一切都是一個過程。

Everything's in motion. And what I am constantly becoming is a functionality of what I have been and what I anticipate, but of my relationships to others at this particular moment, to my relationship with others in there. And ultimately, the whole entire web.

一切都在運動中。我所不斷變成的，是我過去和我所預期的功能，也是我在這一特定時刻與他人的關係，以及我在那裡與他人的關係。最終，整個網絡都是如此。

I mean, there are different ways in which you can understand part and whole.

我的意思是，你可以通過不同的方式來理解部分和整體。

To understand the part, you have to understand its relationship within the whole, and how that is constantly changing, constantly moving, constantly shifting. And so, you know, what you are and what I am is changing as we speak. Everything is what the Buddhists—and

要理解部分，就必須理解它在整體中的關係，以及整體是如何不斷變化、不斷移動、不斷轉變的。是以，你知道，你是什麼，我是什麼，就在我們說話的同時，也在發生著變化。一切都是佛教徒--以及

I hesitate to get into a lot of Buddhism because I haven't studied it in detail—everything is co-dependent and co-emergent. I am what I am by virtue of my place within this web.

我猶豫是否要深入研究佛教，因為我還沒有詳細研究過--萬事萬物都是相互依存、相互影響的。我之所以是我，是因為我在這個網絡中所處的位置。

Well, look, part of the problem here is, I think you alluded to this earlier, we're sort of trapped in our language. I mean, if I think of my head or my mind, again, the word's right there, my. I think of my mind. It is my head and my brain as the container for this thing we call my mind. And is that what you're talking about here? We're shifting away from this idea of the mind as a container to mind as connection.

嗯，聽著，這裡的部分問題是，我想你之前也提到過， 我們被困在了我們的語言中。我的意思是，如果我想到我的頭或我的頭腦，同樣，這個詞就在那裡，我的。我想到的是我的頭腦。我的腦袋和大腦就是我們所說的 "我的思想 "的容器。你說的就是這個意思嗎？我們正在從 "心智是容器 "轉變為 "心智是聯繫"。

I mean, it's simple. I mean, another way to put this is, I mean, this sounds simple, but it's complicated. Everything is connected. Everything is interconnected. And you need an expanded notion of the mind to understand that there are alternative intelligences.

我是說，這很簡單。我的意思是，另一種說法是，我的意思是，這聽起來很簡單，但其實很複雜。萬物相連。萬事萬物都是相互關聯的。你需要擴大思維的概念，才能理解存在另一種智能。

Right? There are different forms of intelligences, of which ours is a part, right? Of which ours is one particular kind. I mean, I know it sounds off the wall, but there's some really interesting scientific work being done on plant communication. I mean, Richard Power's Overstory is an example of that. But that book is based upon the work of Susan Simard, whose book Searching for the Mother Tree, in which she does develop the scientific study of how these trees interrelate. And she had a lot of trouble getting any acceptance of that. And to think differently is to be different.

對不對？有不同形式的智能，我們的智能是其中的一部分，對嗎？我們只是其中一種我知道這聽起來很離譜 但在植物交流方面 有一些非常有趣的科學研究理查德-鮑爾的《故事大綱》就是一個例子但那本書是基於蘇珊-西瑪爾的研究成果 她的《尋找樹媽媽》一書 對這些樹木之間的相互關係進行了科學研究但她的研究卻很難被接受。與眾不同的想法就是與眾不同。

And there has to be some kind of a, you know, a recognition of this vital interrelationality, or 99.9% of the species that ever existed go extinct. So we're not unique. And we can go extinct as well.

必須要有某種，你知道的，對這種重要的相互關係的認識，否則99.9%的物種都會滅絕。所以我們並不是獨一無二的我們也會滅絕

Brian Goldsman says his company started the way most do, as a side hustle.

布萊恩-戈德曼（Brian Goldsman）說，他的公司和大多數人一樣，是靠副業起家的。

What we say is we're a physical marketing company, liquid screen design, merch, or promotional products, or swag, whatever anybody calls it, that's what we do.

我們所說的是，我們是一家實體營銷公司，液體螢幕設計、商品、促銷產品或禮品，不管別人怎麼稱呼，這就是我們的工作。

But after seven years of profit, Brian and his business partner had to decide if liquid screen design could become more than a hobby. We're talking about and we said, we have to make $300,000 in the year in sales. Okay, how are we ever going to do $1,000 a day in sales? We realized it could not just be the two of us and we needed to start hiring additional support. We started hiring artists through Upwork. It has been such a game changer for us.

但在盈利七年後，布萊恩和他的商業夥伴不得不決定，液晶屏設計是否能不僅僅是一種業餘愛好。我們在討論，我們說，我們必須在一年內實現 30 萬美元的銷售額。好吧，我們怎麼才能做到每天銷售 1000 美元呢？我們意識到不能只靠我們兩個人，我們需要開始僱用額外的支持。我們開始通過 Upwork 聘請藝術家。這改變了我們的命運。

You know, it's not just fixing the logo that you already have, but it's also full custom design, anything from caricatures of people, to logo redesigns, to unique products that we're specking out. We can do things that a lot of other people in our industry can't do because we basically have created our own art department. It's about getting the best possible talent wherever they are in the world. What started out as a side hustle turned into a thriving business. At this point, we have 30 employees. Nine of them are what we call global talent. They're full-time employees of liquid screen design, but they've been hired and we manage the whole process through Upwork.

你知道，這不僅僅是修復你已有的徽標，還包括全面的定製設計，從人物漫畫到徽標的重新設計，再到我們推出的獨特產品。我們可以做到很多同行業的人做不到的事情，因為我們基本上建立了自己的藝術部門。無論人才在世界的哪個角落，我們都能找到最好的人才。從最初的小打小鬧到現在的生意興隆。目前，我們有 30 名員工。其中九名是我們所說的全球人才。他們是 Liquid Screen Design 的全職員工，但我們通過 Upwork 來管理整個招聘過程。

We could not be what liquid screen design is today without our Upwork freelancers.

沒有 Upwork 的自由職業者，就沒有我們今天的液晶屏設計。

Smarter work starts here. See how Upwork can help your business grow at upwork.com slash updates.

更智能的工作從這裡開始。請訪問 upwork.com slash 更新，瞭解 Upwork 如何幫助您的企業發展。

For me, the relationship between thought and action isn't always so neat. I've spent a lot of time, you mentioned woo-woo type, right? Like I've spent a lot of time around Western woo-woo new agey types. Boy, they love to talk about Buddhism and meditation and how transformative it is. But I have seen time and again, how easily these same people manage to take on all this wisdom and wear it like an ornament only to end up even more self-centered. So I guess I'm asking, if even if people chasing wisdom fall in or fall back into these ego traps, what does it really take to move from theory to practice or from belief to behavior? Because the theory part is easy, the practice part I find to be much harder. I'm not so sure the theory part is all that easy.

對我來說，思想和行動之間的關係並不總是那麼整齊劃一。我花了很多時間，你提到了 "胡鬧型"，對吧？就像我花了很多時間在西方 "胡鬧 "的新時代類型周圍。孩子們，他們喜歡談論佛教和冥想，談論它有多大的改變。但我一次又一次地看到，這些人是多麼容易接受這些智慧，並把它當作裝飾品一樣佩戴，最終卻變得更加以自我為中心。所以我想問的是，即使追逐智慧的人陷入或重新陷入這些自我陷阱，從理論到實踐或從信念到行為到底需要什麼？因為理論部分很容易，實踐部分我覺得要難得多。我不確定理論部分是否那麼容易。

I mean, it's easy to say. It's easy. Let me put that differently. It is easy to say that we live in this world of interdependence and codependence and I am not an I. I am related eternally to everything around me and how transformative that belief is. But then I'll get up and I'll have my coffee and then I will moonwalk into a world, into a culture, almost every part of which is designed to reinforce the illusion that I am an ego, that I am separated. And so you can read the books, you can recite the ideas, you can even believe them, but then you go out into the world and you just kind of go back into the default, if you know what I mean. So that's what I'm asking. I mean, it's a vision. I mean, Hume always said he was a skeptic as long as he didn't study, but he stepped out in the world and he no longer maintains skepticism. I mean,

我是說，說起來容易。很簡單讓我換一種說法。我們生活在這個相互依存、相互依賴的世界裡，我不是一個 "我"，我與周圍的一切都有著永恆的聯繫，這種信念是多麼具有變革性。但是，當我起床，喝完咖啡後，我就會步入一個世界，步入一種文化，幾乎每一部分都是為了強化我是一個自我，我是分離的這一幻覺。是以，你可以閱讀這些書籍，可以背誦這些觀點，你甚至可以相信它們，但當你走到外面的世界時，你又會回到默認的狀態，如果你明白我的意思的話。這就是我要問的。我的意思是，這是一個願景。我是說，休謨總是說，只要他不讀書，他就是個懷疑論者，

I want to say two things. One is that I think, I believe, thinking is a form. It's not a sharp, thinking is a form of action in certain ways, but your point is well taken.

我想說兩件事。一是我認為，我相信，思考是一種形式。這並不尖銳，思維在某些方面是行動的一種形式，但你的觀點很有道理。

And I guess one of the ideas I wish I could get more people to understand is positive feedback.

我想，我希望能讓更多人理解的一個理念就是積極反饋。

So positive feedback isn't getting good reviews on your book, your podcast, your classes.

是以，積極反饋並不是讓你的書、播客、課程獲得好評。

Positive feedback is related to these complex systems where change accelerates.

正反饋與這些變化加速的複雜系統有關。

And the popular term for that is reaching the tipping point. And then there's a major shift.

流行的說法是達到臨界點。然後會發生重大轉變。

There's a pile of sand, you add grain after grain, you know there's going to be an avalanche, but you don't know when it's going to occur. And it's that, I mean, that's the bind we're in now, not just with respect to climate, but with respect to these systems work the same way.

有一堆沙子，你一粒一粒地加入，你知道會發生雪崩，但你不知道什麼時候會發生。我的意思是，這就是我們現在所處的困境，不僅是在氣候方面，在這些系統的運作方面也是如此。

They're isomorphic across media, financial bubbles and climate change work the same way.

它們在不同媒體間是同構的，金融保麗龍和氣候變化也是如此。

So my problem is how do you convey the urgency of the situation without making the situation hopeless and using these ideas then to enact the kinds of changes that need to be made?

是以，我的問題是，如何在不使情況變得無望的情況下傳達形勢的緊迫性，然後利用這些想法來實施需要進行的變革？

But until you understand the nature of the problem, you don't see the urgency with it all.

但是，在你瞭解問題的本質之前，你不會意識到這一切的緊迫性。

We're talking about a problem that may have began as an individual problem, which raises the difficult question, how the hell do you solve a cultural problem? It's easier for an individual to change what they do and how they think, but it is a lot harder to change a culture. And if what you're saying is true, and I think it is for the most part, if we don't change at a cultural level, then nothing matters really.

我們所討論的問題最初可能是個人問題，這就提出了一個棘手的問題：如何解決文化問題？對個人來說，改變自己的行為和思維方式比較容易，但要改變一種文化卻難上加難。如果你說的是真的，而且我認為大部分情況下是真的，如果我們不在文化層面上做出改變，那麼一切就都不重要了。

Look, I graduated in 1968 and the world was pretty dark at that time.

聽著，我是 1968 年畢業的，當時的世界非常黑暗。

The war in Vietnam was going on, draft deferments, racial riots in the town I grew up in, you know, students' suspicion of the university and so on. There are very, very interesting similarities between the student left of the 60s and the far right today. When you look at it, it's weird. But one of the differences between where we were in 1960, people I knew and was involved with, as a Wesleyan and then at Harvard, and my students in the last years of my teaching is, we believe fundamental change could occur.

當時越戰正酣，徵兵延期，我成長的小鎮發生種族騷亂，學生對大學的懷疑等等。60年代的學生左翼和今天的極右翼之間 有著非常非常有趣的相似之處。當你看到這一點時，你會覺得很奇怪。但1960年的我們，我所認識並參與其中的人，作為衛斯理學院的學生，以及後來在哈佛的學生，與我在教學生涯最後幾年的學生之間的區別之一在於，我們相信會發生根本性的變化。

Young people today, many of the young people today whom I have contacted, don't. And my question, as I taught, and yet they're smart and they know when I back off and when I'm not being honest with them. But how can I be honest with them about about how, about the crisis I believe we're in without leaving them hopeless?

現在的年輕人，我接觸過的很多年輕人，都不這麼想。我的問題是，在我教書的時候，他們很聰明，他們知道我什麼時候退縮，什麼時候沒有對他們誠實。但我怎樣才能坦誠地告訴他們，我認為我們正處於怎樣的危機之中，而又不讓他們感到絕望呢？

And hopelessness is a self-fulfilling prophecy. It's a self-fulfilling prophecy.

絕望是一種自我實現的預言。這是一個自我實現的預言。

So, you know, for my students, my children and my grandchildren and others, you know, either we figure this out, the way in which we need to address this, or they have no future. You know, my grandchildren just came last night here in Massachusetts for a visit. And my grandson, Jackson, is now 11. And during COVID, they were here for a while. And one day he was sitting on the deck. We live in the mountains. And Jackson, who was only seven at the time, said to me, Grandpa, maybe the world would be better if there were no humans. And I said, Jackson, what do you mean? He said, well, Sadie, that's their dog, we keep her on a leash. And we eat turkeys and cows and pigs.

所以，你知道，對於我的學生、我的孩子、我的孫子和其他人來說，你知道，要麼我們解決這個問題，我們需要解決這個問題的方式，要麼他們就沒有未來。你知道，我的孫子們昨晚剛來馬薩諸塞州看望我。我的孫子傑克遜現在11歲了。在 COVID 期間，他們在這裡待了一段時間。有一天，他坐在甲板上。我們住在山上。當時只有七歲的傑克遜對我說，爺爺，如果沒有人類，也許世界會更好。我說，傑克遜，你什麼意思？他說，薩迪是他們家的狗，我們用繩子拴著它。我們吃火雞、牛和豬

And if we weren't here, they could roam freely. And I said, where did you think? Why are you thinking that? Did you talk about this at school? He said, no, I just thought about it. Now, what does that say? That a seven-year-old is thinking, I don't know where he got it. But it's in the ether. And how do we convey a sense of hope and mission? Because that's what it is. It's mission in a way that will, you know, I mean, and writing a book like this, granted, it's not going to change it. But it's an effort to say, if we look at the world this way, different kinds of actions follow.

如果我們不在這裡，他們就可以自由行動。我說，你想到哪裡去了？你為什麼會這麼想？你在學校說過嗎？他說，沒有，我只是想想而已。這說明了什麼？一個七歲的孩子在想 我不知道他從哪兒想出來的但它就在醚中那我們該如何傳達希望和使命感呢？因為這就是它的本質。我的意思是，寫這樣一本書，當然，它不會改變它。但這是一種努力，如果我們這樣看待世界，就會有不同的行動。

In these sorts of conversations, I'm trying to imagine myself on the other side as an audience member listening and wondering, okay, now what? What do you want me to do? And I guess what I'm wondering is, if someone reads your book, or someone listens to this conversation, and they think, okay, I am intellectually going to make this shift from individualism to relationalism, right? I'm going to stop thinking of myself as this separate I in a world of others, and think of myself as part of this web, as codependent on all of this.

在這種對話中，我試圖把自己想象成另一方的聽眾，一邊聽一邊想：好吧，現在怎麼辦？你想讓我做什麼？我猜我想知道的是，如果有人讀了你的書，或者有人聽了這場對話，他們會想，好吧，我在思想上要從個人主義向關係主義轉變，對嗎？我將不再把自己看成是他人世界中獨立的我，而是把自己看成是這個網絡的一部分，是所有這一切的共同依賴者。

What then? What, concretely, how differently should someone live? Like, what do they do differently in their life once they've made this shift? Right? What does it look like?

然後呢？具體來說，一個人的生活應該有什麼不同？比如，一旦他們做出了這種轉變，他們的生活會有什麼不同？對不對？它看起來像什麼？

Well, again, let me speak as a teacher and one of the experience in that way.

好吧，還是讓我以一個教師的身份，以這樣的經歷之一來發言吧。

I taught most of my career at Williams College, which is an undergraduate liberal arts college.

我職業生涯的大部分時間都在威廉姆斯學院任教，這是一所大學文理學院。

And the last 20 years, I taught at Columbia, which is, everybody knows Columbia these days, right? And in all honesty, I always enjoyed teaching undergraduates more than graduate students. Because, and I've written a lot of heavy duty criticisms of higher education, a lot of them got me in big time trouble. But one of my criticisms of college of university teaching, this is the process of cloning. You produce people to do what you do.

在過去的 20 年裡，我在哥倫比亞大學任教，現在大家都知道哥倫比亞大學了吧？說實話，比起教研究所學生，我更喜歡教大學生。因為我寫過很多對高等教育的嚴厲批評 很多都給我惹了大麻煩但我對大學教學的責備之一，就是克隆的過程。你培養人做你做的事

And for ever since I was in the business, the job market in academia dried up in 1970.

自從我進入這個行業，1970 年學術界的就業市場就枯竭了。

And there hadn't been a realistic possibility to have a job. So I would always tell my students, don't do what I do. Do what I could never imagine doing, and come back and tell me about it.

而且也沒有找到工作的現實可能性。所以我總是告訴我的學生，不要做我做的事。去做我想都不敢想的事，然後回來告訴我。

And when I stopped teaching two years ago, we had to gather about 50 of my former students, dating from my first year to my last year. So people range from 72 to 22, which is really an interesting kind of thing. And there are countless others that you don't know what happened. But they have gone into, I mean, some went into teaching. There are doctors, there are lawyers, but they're not doing what a lot of doctors and lawyers are doing.

兩年前，當我停止教學時，我們不得不召集了大約 50 名我以前的學生，從第一年到最後一年。他們的年齡從 72 歲到 22 歲不等，這真是一件有趣的事情。還有無數你不知道發生了什麼的人。但他們都去了，我是說，有些人去教書了。有醫生，有律師，但他們並沒有像很多醫生和律師那樣。

One of the most remarkable students I ever had is a refugee from Cuba. He works in media, Telemundo, and the like. We had some working in theater. I mean, they're different ways. And then I think there are enormous possibilities in these technologies that also pose a significant danger. And so there are corners, there are startups.

我曾經帶過的最出色的學生之一是從古巴來的難民。他在 Telemundo 等媒體工作。我們有一些學生從事戲劇工作。我的意思是，他們的方式各不相同。我認為這些技術具有巨大的可能性，但同時也帶來了巨大的危險。是以，有一些角落，有一些初創公司。

I mean, you fail sometimes. Steve Case, who introduced, who was the head of AOL, he was a student of mine, right? He could have done different things with what he created.

我的意思是，你有時會失敗。史蒂夫-凱斯是美國在線的創始人，他是我的學生，對吧？他本可以用他的創造做不同的事情。

I started, I mean, the most political, if you will, or form of action that I took, based on these ideas, was that I started a company with a big New York investment banker by the name of Herbert Allen in 1998 called Global Education Network. And I started webcasting my classes in 1996 when nobody was doing it. And in 1992, I taught a course using teleconferencing with Helsinki. And at that time, I thought that the world would be a better place if everybody could sit down around the table and talk about Hegel or Nietzsche, right? And that this would bring us together. Who among us hasn't had that thought?

我是說，我基於這些想法所採取的最具政治性的行動，就是在 1998 年與一位名叫赫伯特-艾倫（Herbert Allen）的紐約投資銀行家創辦了一家公司，名為 "全球教育網絡"（Global Education Network）。1996 年，我開始在網上直播我的課程，當時還沒有人這麼做。1992 年，我在赫爾辛基通過遠程會議教授了一門課程。當時我想，如果每個人都能圍坐在桌邊，談論黑格爾或尼采，世界會變得更美好，對嗎？這將使我們走到一起。我們當中有誰沒有過這樣的想法？

Right. And we tried. And the man I did this with, he put $27 million into that effort, and we failed. And I had a vision, and it was all based upon this idea of networks to make education more widely available through these technologies. Now, what I didn't understand, and I don't think many, if any, did, was that these technologies that connect also separate, right? But there was an example of trying to put the ideas into action in a way that would bring us together in certain ways. There are ways in which you can do it if you understand, if I may put it this way, the nature of reality and the urgency of the problem.

是的我們試過和我一起做這件事的那個人 他投入了2700萬美元 我們失敗了我有一個願景，那就是通過網絡，讓更多人通過這些技術接受教育。現在，我不明白的是，我想很多人都不明白，這些連接的技術也是分離的，對嗎？但有一個例子是，我們試圖將這些想法付諸行動，以某種方式將我們聚集在一起。如果你能理解現實的本質和問題的緊迫性，你就有辦法做到這一點。

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Do you worry that AI might change our understanding of humanity in even worse ways?

你是否擔心人工智能會以更糟糕的方式改變我們對人性的理解？

That we will just gradually come to think of ourselves more and more as machine-like?

我們會逐漸認為自己越來越像機器嗎？

Absolutely. I mean, this is a longer conversation in terms of-

當然可以。我的意思是，從以下方面來說，這是一個更長的對話--

Yeah. I mean, look, this man, Herbert Allen, that I mentioned, not many people have heard about him, but he's my neighbor here in Williamstown.

我提到的赫伯特-艾倫 沒多少人聽說過他 但他是我在威廉斯敦的鄰居

And he has a conference that he and now his son have been running in Sun Valley that brings together the people running the world, technology, media, entertainment, sports, for five days, and their families for five days. And we were there when Bezos, before Bezos was

他和他的兒子在太陽谷舉辦了一次會議，將世界科技、媒體、娛樂、體育界的掌舵人和他們的家人聚集在一起，為期五天。在貝索斯之前，我們也在那裡。

Bezos, in all of that. Gordon Buffett. These are really smart guys, but they have a very narrow vision of the world. And they know what they're trying to create, right? And Trump does not, in my judgment. Vance does. Vance is the bigger problem. But it's Peter Thiel. I don't know if you've run across him or not. You should. He's a follower of Rene Girard, Stanford. Thiel is a really powerful person. There's a philosophy behind that. Marc Andreessen and these people, they have a vision. And I think that what they understand is that whoever controls AI runs the world. Well, no. Thiel is just-

貝索斯戈登-巴菲特他們都是非常聰明的人，但他們的世界觀非常狹隘。他們知道自己要創造什麼，對吧？我認為特朗普不知道萬斯知道萬斯的問題更大但彼得-蒂爾才是我不知道你是否見過他你應該見過他他是斯坦福大學勒內-吉拉德的追隨者泰爾是個非常厲害的人這背後有他的哲學馬克-安德森和這些人 他們有自己的願景我認為他們明白 誰控制了人工智能 誰就控制了世界不對泰爾只是