比爾蓋茨在哈佛大學畢業典禮上的演講

今天小編想和大家一起閲讀的是比爾蓋茨在哈佛大學畢業典禮上的演講，是中英文版哦，有興趣的小夥伴們過來閲讀吧。

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: I've been waiting more than 30 years to say this: “Dad, I always told you I’d come back and get my degree.”

尊敬的博克校長，前校長魯登斯坦，即將上任的佛斯特校長，哈佛集團和監察理事會的各位成員。各位老師，各位家長，各位同學：有句話我憋了30年，今天終於能一吐為快了：““爸 我沒騙你吧，文憑到手了!”

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 résumé.

我由衷地感謝哈佛這個時候給我這個榮譽。明年我要換工作(退休)。 我終於能在簡歷裏註明自己有大學學歷了。

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.

我要恭喜今年的畢業生們，因為你們畢業比我順利多了。其實我倒是很樂意克萊姆森把我喚作“哈佛大學最成功的輟學生”。這大概是我脱穎而出的法寶……我是輟學生中的領頭羊。

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.

我還要檢討一下史蒂夫-鮑爾默也是受我蠱惑從商學院退學。我劣跡斑斑。這就是為什麼我會受邀參加畢業演講。如果是開學典禮，恐怕今天的人會少很多。

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 antisocial group. We clung to each other as a way of validating our rejection of all those social people.

哈佛是我生命裏的一段非凡經歷。校園生活格外充實，我旁聽過很多沒有選過的課程。住宿的日子也很爽我當時住在拉德克利夫的柯里爾宿舍，總是很多人在我的寢室討論到深夜。 大家知道我屬於夜行動物。就這樣，我成為了這堆人的頭目。我們粘在一起，擺出拒絕社交的姿態。

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.

拉德克利夫是個好地方。那裏的女生比男生多，男生們大多都是科學怪人。所以我的機會來了，你懂的。可同時我也明白了一個道理——機會大也不能保證成功。

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.

1975年1月在哈佛打出的一通電話讓我畢生難忘。我打給位於阿爾伯克基的一個公司，那家公司當時着手製造世界上第一台個人電腦。我説我想出售軟件給他們。

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.

我擔心他們會因為我學生身份而掛掉電話。但他們只是説：“現在還沒有準備好 請一個月後再聯繫我們。”我長舒一口氣，壓根我們就沒開工。從那時起 我不分晝夜地趕工 它是我大學生活結束的標誌，也是微軟偉大旅程的開始。

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.

哈佛的獨特氛圍讓我充滿精力和智慧。這裏的日子可能振奮快樂、也可能令人退縮沮喪，但永遠充滿了挑戰，神奇的體驗!雖然我提前離開了這裏，但是這段經歷對我影響重大。

But taking a serious look back … I do have one big regret.

不過説心裏話……我確實有一點遺憾。

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.

我離開哈佛時，根本沒有意識到這個世界是多麼地不平等。健康、財富、機遇差異懸殊，數以百萬計的人生活在絕望之中。

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.

我在哈佛觸摸着經濟政治中的新思想，探索科學技術的未知前沿。

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，人類的進步不在於這些新發現，而在於如何運用這些發現減少社會不公。不管是通過民主政策、健全的公共教育、高質量的醫療保健還是廣泛的商機，消除不平等始終是人類最大的目標。

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. It took me decades to find out.

離開校園的時候，根本不知道在美國上百萬年輕人沒有接受教育的機會。也對發展中國家被貧困和病痛折磨的人們一無所知。我花了幾十年才明白這些事情。

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.

如今，在座的各位應該比我更瞭解世界上的這些不平等現象。在你們的求學之路上我希望你們已經思考過這個問題——如何在這個高速發展的時代解決不平等現象。

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?

試想一下如果你每週捐出幾個小時，幾塊錢，來參與一項能夠拯救生命和提高生活品質的項目，你會如何選擇?

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.

我和妻子梅琳達就面臨着這樣一個問題：怎樣才能充分利用我們擁有的資源。

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, hepatitis B, yellow fever. One disease I had never even heard of, rotavirus, was killing half a million kids each year- none of them in the United States.

舉棋不定時我們讀到一篇文章，文章裏説在貧困的國家裏，每年有數百萬，兒童死於於美國早已戰勝的疾病——麻疹、瘧疾、肺炎、乙肝、黃熱病，還有一種從未聽説的輪狀病毒每年會奪走五十萬兒童的生命，而在美國沒有一例死亡病例。

We were shocked. We had just assumed that if millions of children were dying and they could be saved, the world would make it a priority to discover and deliver the medicines to save them. But it did not. For under a dollar, there were interventions that could save lives that just weren’t being delivered.

當時我們就震驚了。我以為全世界會不遺餘力地拯救這些在死亡線上掙扎的兒童們，然而這些不值錢的救命藥卻沒有送到他們手中。

If you believe that every life has equal value, it’s revolting to learn that some lives are seen as worth saving and others are not. We said to ourselves: “This can’t be true. But if it is true, it deserves to be the priority of our giving.”

如果你堅信人生而平等，把生命分等級的做法簡直令人髮指。我們對自己説：“這絕不可能。但萬一這是真的，那麼這將成為我們慈善事業的首要任務。

So we began our work in the same way anyone here would begin it. We asked: “How could the world let these children die?”

於是我們開始行動了 我相信這也會是你們的選擇。我們疑惑：“這個世界怎麼可以眼睜睜看着這些孩子死去?”

The answer is simple, and harsh. The market did not reward saving the lives of these children, and governments did not subsidize it. So the children died because their mothers and their fathers had no power in the market and no voice in the system. But you and I have both. We can make market forces work better for the poor if we can develop a more creative capitalism.

答案簡單卻殘酷。市場經濟中，拯救兒童沒有利潤，政府也不會給予補貼。父母無財無權 孩子們就死了。我們不一樣，我們可以讓市場更好地為窮人服務，如果我們可以改進現有資本主義制度。

If we can stretch the reach of market forces so that more people can make a profit, or at least make a living, serving people who are suffering from the worst inequities. We also can press governments around the world to spend taxpayer money in ways that better reflect the values of the people who pay the taxes.

改善市場環境，讓更多的人賺到錢、維持生計，緩解苦難。給世界各地的政府施壓 讓他們把納税人的錢花到最值得的地方。採取一些既滿足滿足窮人的需求，又能帶來商業利潤併為政治家帶來選票的措施。

If we can find approaches that meet the needs of the poor in ways that generate profits for business and votes for politicians, we will have found a sustainable way to reduce inequity in the task is open-ended. It can never be finished. But a conscious effort to answer this challenge will change the world.

採取一些既滿足滿足窮人的需求，又能帶來商業利潤併為政治家帶來選票的措施，我們就摸索到了減少世界不平等的可持續發展道路。然而這項任務並沒有終點，我們也許無法徹底解決。但只要不懈努力，就可以改變世界。

I am optimistic that we can do this, but I talk to skeptics who claim there is no hope. They say: “Inequity has been with us since the beginning, and will be with us till the end – because people just … don’t … care.” I completely disagree.

我始終保持樂觀。但也聽到過消極的言論。他們認為：“這種不平等現象會伴隨我們一生，因為人們漠視這一切。”但我不苟同。

I believe we have more caring than we know what to do with. All of us here in this Yard, at one time or another, have seen human tragedies that broke our hearts, and yet we did nothing, not because we didn’t care, but because we didn’t know what to do. If we had known how to help, we would have acted.

雖然我們不知道該如何幫助他們，但我們絕對有這份心。我們都有過這樣的經歷，看到令人心碎的悲劇，卻沒有伸出援手。不是因為冷漠 而是我們不知道該怎麼做。如果我們知道如何去幫，就一定會採取行動。

The barrier to change is not too little caring; it is too much complexity. To turn caring into action, we need to see a problem, see a solution, and see the impact. But complexity blocks all three steps.

阻礙援助步伐的並非冷漠，而是世界太複雜。要把愛心轉變為行動，我們首先要發掘問題，然後尋找解決方案，並且監測效果。然而世界的複雜性阻礙着這些步驟的實施。

Even with the advent of the Internet and 24-hour news, it is still a complex enterprise to get people to truly see the problems. When an airplane crashes, officials immediately call a press conference. They promise to investigate, determine the cause, and prevent similar crashes in the future.

即使有了互聯網和24小時不間斷的新聞，人們仍然很難看到真正的問題。一架飛機發生墜毀事故，官員們會立刻召開新聞發佈會，承諾調查起因，以避免今後發生類似的事故。

But if the officials were brutally honest, they would say: “Of all the people in the world who died today from preventable causes, one half of one percent of them were on this plane. We’re determined to do everything possible to solve the problem that took the lives of the one half of one percent.” The bigger problem is not the plane crash, but the millions of preventable deaths.

但如果那些官員敢講真話，他們會説：“全世界每天會有好多人含恨而終，這起空難只是冰山一角。我們會不惜一切代價解決削平這一角冰山，此外的問題我們無力解決。” 可是與空難相比，那些奪走數百萬生命的問題則更為嚴重。

We don’t read much about these deaths. The media covers what’s new – and millions of people dying is nothing new. So it stays in the background, where it’s easier to ignore. But even when we do see it or read about it, it’s difficult to keep our eyes on the problem. It’s hard to look at suffering if the situation is so complex that we don’t know how to help. And so we look away.

事實上那些人的死輕如鴻毛，司空見慣，連媒體都不屑於報道。更無法吸引我們的注意。即使我們知道了 它也很難刺痛我們的神經。世間最痛苦的事莫過於看着他人經受苦難的卻無能為力，於是我們選擇了逃避。

If we can really see a problem, which is the first step, we come to the second step: cutting through the complexity to find a solution.

發現問題，只是邁出了第一步，接下來我們還要：尋找解決方案。

Finding solutions is essential if we want to make the most of our caring. If we have clear and proven answers anytime an organization or individual asks “How can I help?,” then we can get action – and we can make sure that none of the caring in the world is wasted. But complexity makes it hard to mark a path of action for everyone who cares — and that makes it hard for their caring to matter.

如果不想讓愛心變成空談，就必須找到問題的解決方案。如果有清晰可靠的方案，那麼政府或個人組織就能立刻採取行動，將愛心落實。但是世界的複雜性使找尋方案的過程無比艱難 於是愛心才淪為空談。

Cutting through complexity to find a solution runs through four predictable stages: determine a goal, find the highest-leverage approach, discover the ideal technology for that approach, and in the meantime, make the smartest application of the technology that you already have whether it’s something sophisticated, like a drug, or something simpler, like a bednet.

打破複雜性需要四個步驟：確定目標、找到最有效的途徑、尋找最理想的技術，併合理利用現有技術。無論是製作複雜的藥物，還是利用簡單的蚊帳，都行。

The AIDS epidemic offers an example. The broad goal, of course, is to end the disease. The highest-leverage approach is prevention. The ideal technology would be a vaccine that gives lifetime immunity with a single dose. So governments, drug companies, and foundations fund vaccine research. But their work is likely to take more than a decade, so in the meantime, we have to work with what we have in hand – and the best prevention approach we have now is getting people to avoid risky behavior.

以艾滋病為例。我們的目標是消滅它。最有效的途徑是預防，最理想的技術是注射一劑疫苗實現終身免疫。所以現在政府、製藥公司、基金會都在資助疫苗的研究。但可能要十幾年才能研究出來，所以目前的最好的預防措施就是避開那些可能傳播艾滋病的行為。

Pursuing that goal starts the four-step cycle again. This is the pattern. The crucial thing is to never stop thinking and working – and never do what we did with malaria and tuberculosis in the 20th century – which is to surrender to complexity and quit.

四步循環直達目標。記住永遠不要停止思考和行動——永遠不要像人們在20世紀對待瘧疾和肺結核那樣，向疾病投降。

The final step – after seeing the problem and finding an approach – is to measure the impact of your work and share your successes and failures so that others learn from your efforts.

在發現問題並找到解決方法後，還需監測結果，並與他人分享成功的經驗和失敗的教訓，讓別人也能從中受益。

You have to have the statistics, of course. You have to be able to show that a program is vaccinating millions more children. You have to be able to show a decline in the number of children dying from these diseases. This is essential not just to improve the program, but also to help draw more investment from business and government.

當然，你還得有統計數據。用來證明你的項目為上百萬兒童接種了疫苗，證明這些孩子的死亡率降低了。這不僅有利於項目的改進，也有助於吸引更多的企業和政府投資。

But if you want to inspire people to participate, you have to show more than numbers. You have to convey the human impact of the work – so people can feel what saving a life means to the families affected.

但如果想吸引更多的人蔘與進來，光靠數字還遠遠不夠。你需要展示出項目承載的價值，讓他們明白挽救一個生命對其家庭的意義。

Remember going to Davos some years back and sitting on a global health panel that was discussing ways to save millions of lives. Millions! Think of the thrill of saving just one person’s life – then multiply that by millions. Yet this was the most boring panel I’ve ever been on – ever. So boring even I couldn’t bear it.

我記得幾年前去達沃斯參加全球健康討論會，關於如何挽救數百萬人的生命。數百萬人!只要想想挽救一條生命帶來的震撼，再把這種震撼乘上幾百萬倍是什麼感覺!然而，那是我見過的最無聊的討論會。

What made that experience especially striking was that I had just come from an event where we were introducing version 13 of some piece of software, and we had people jumping and shouting with excitement. I love getting people excited about software – but why can’t we generate even more excitement for saving lives?

之所以銘記在心是因為我最近參加的一款軟件發佈會的現場氛圍異常火爆。人們激動地歡呼雀躍。看到人們因為軟件興奮，我也很開心——但我們為什麼無法對挽救生命更感興趣呢?

You can’t get people excited unless you can help them see and feel the impact. And how you do that – is a complex question.

除非人們能感知到行動的影響力，否則人們就不會動心。如何做到這一點並不簡單。

Still, I’m optimistic. Yes, inequity has been with us forever, but the new tools we have to cut through complexity have not been with us forever. They are new – they can help us make the most of our caring – and that’s why the future can be different from the past.

儘管如此，我還是很樂觀。是的，不平等現象一直存在，但我們總會想出新的解決辦法。新技術可以幫助我們傳播愛心，我對未來充滿信心。

The defining and ongoing innovations of this age – biotechnology, the computer, the Internet--give us a chance we’ve never had before to end extreme poverty and end death from preventable disease.

創新技術不斷湧現，比如生物技術、計算機、互聯網。讓我們有機會終結救極度貧困和非惡性死亡。

Sixty years ago, George Marshall came to this commencement and announced a plan to assist the nations of post-war Europe. He said: “I think one difficulty is that the problem is one of such enormous complexity that the very mass of facts presented to the public by press and radio make it exceedingly difficult for the man in the street to reach a clear appraisement of the situation. It is virtually impossible at this distance to grasp at all the real significance of the situation.”

六十年前，喬治-馬歇爾在哈佛的畢業典禮上宣佈了一項協助戰後歐洲的計劃。他説：“我認為推動這項計劃的困難在於，報紙和廣播源源不斷地提供各種事實，使得公眾難以清晰地判斷形勢。事實上，經過層層傳播，想要真正地把握形勢，是根本不可能的。

Thirty years after Marshall made his address, as my class graduated without me, technology was emerging that would make the world smaller, more open, more visible, less distant.

馬歇爾發表演講三十年後，我的同學畢業了，科技開始發展，這個世界變得更小、更開放、更透明、人們之間的關係拉得更近。

The emergence of low-cost personal computers gave rise to a powerful network that has transformed opportunities for learning and communicating.

低成本個人電腦和互聯網為人們提供了更多學習和交流的機會。

The magical thing about this network is not just that it collapses distance and makes everyone your neighbor. It also dramatically increases the number of brilliant minds we can have working together on the same problem and that scales up the rate of innovation to a staggering degree.

神奇的是，網絡不僅縮短了人與人之間的距離，也增加了精英們集思廣益共同解決難題的機會。加快了創新的規模和速度。

At the same time, for every person in the world who has access to this technology, five people don’t. That means many creative minds are left out of this discussion smart people with practical intelligence and relevant experience who don’t have the technology to hone their talents or contribute their ideas to the world.

然而世界上只有六分之一的人能夠接觸互聯網，很多精英不能參與我們的討論，很多人無法把它們解決問題的智慧和經驗分享出 來。

We need as many people as possible to have access to this technology, because these advances are triggering a revolution in what human beings can do for one are making it possible not just for national governments, but for universities, corporations, smaller organizations, and even individualsto see problems, see approaches, and measure the impact of their efforts to address the hunger, poverty, and desperation George Marshall spoke of 60 years ago.

如今，新技術將引發一場革命，讓儘可能多的人與世界接軌，科技不僅為政府，也為大學、企業、小團體甚至個人帶來了機會，而今這些機構和個人能夠運用科技找到有效的解決60年前喬治•馬歇爾談到的饑荒、貧困和絕望。

Members of the Harvard Family: Here in the Yard is one of the great collections of intellectual talent in the world. What for?

各位哈佛大家庭的成員，你們是世界上少有的精英。我們為什麼要上哈佛?

There is no question that the faculty, the alumni, the students, and the benefactors of Harvard have used their power to improve the lives of people here and around the world. But can we do more? Can Harvard dedicate its intellect to improving the lives of people who will never even hear its name?

毫無疑問，我們的教員、學生、校友都曾盡其所能改善全球人類的生活。我們還能更進一步嗎?哈佛能夠為不知道哈佛名氣的陌生人奉獻智慧，伸出援助之手嗎?

Let me make a request of the deans and the professors the intellectual leaders here at Harvard: As you hire new faculty, award tenure, review curriculum, and determine degree requirements, please ask yourselves: Should our best minds be dedicated to solving our biggest problems?

請院長和教授接受我的不情之請，各位哈佛大學的精英領導者們，在你們僱用新教員、授予教授終身教職、評估課程安排和決定學位要求時，請問自己一個問題：最優秀的人才是否應該致力於解決人類的困境?

Should Harvard encourage its faculty to take on the world’s worst inequities? Should Harvard students learn about the depth of global poverty … the prevalence of world hunger … the scarcity of clean water …the girls kept out of school the children who die from diseases we can cure?

哈佛是否應該鼓勵教授解決世界上存在的嚴重不平等?哈佛的學生是不是應該多關注一些全球貧富不均、糧食短缺、水資源稀缺、女童輟學的問題?以及那些因無法接受有效治療而死亡的孩子?

Should the world’s most privileged people learn about the lives of the world’s least privileged?

世界上最衣食無憂的人是否應該瞭解那些掙扎在死亡邊緣的人們的生活?

These are not rhetorical questions – you will answer with your policies.

這並非言語修辭，這些問題只能用行動回答。

My mother, who was filled with pride the day I was admitted here – never stopped pressing me to do more for others. A few days before my wedding, she hosted a bridal event, at which she read aloud a letter about marriage that she had written to Melinda. My mother was very ill with cancer at the time, but she saw one more opportunity to deliver her message, and at the close of the letter she said: “From those to whom much is given, much is expected.”

我的母親一直為我考上哈佛而自豪，也一直督促我回報社會。我結婚的前幾天的儀式上，她高聲朗讀自己寫給我妻子的信。當時我母親已經是癌症晚期，但她堅持要用這個機會表達自己的觀點。信的最後 她念道：“獲益越多，責任越大。”

When you consider what those of us here in this Yard have been given – in talent, privilege, and opportunity – there is almost no limit to what the world has a right to expect from us.

想想我們獲得了什麼——天賦，特權，機遇——世界寄予殷切的期望。

In line with the promise of this age, I want to exhort each of the graduates here to take on an issue –a complex problem, a deep inequity, and become a specialist on you make it the focus of your career, that would be you don’t have to do that to make an impact. For a few hours every week, you can use the growing power of the Internet to get informed, find others with the same interests, see the barriers, and find ways to cut through them.

我希望每位畢業生承擔起這樣一種責任—— 參與解決人類不平等的問題，如果你獻身這項事業，你的影響力將會是驚人的。既便不打算以此為業，你一樣可以有所作為。每週只需要花幾個小時，就可以利用互聯網獲取信息、找到志同道合的朋友、設法解決一兩個問題。

Don't let complexity stop you. Be activists. Take on the big inequities. It will be one of the great experiences of your lives.

不要畏難，儘管放手去做。它將是你生命中最寶貴經歷。

You graduates are coming of age in an amazing you leave Harvard, you have technology that members of my class never had. You have awareness of global inequity, which we did not have. And with that awareness, you likely also have an informed conscience that will torment you if you abandon these people whose lives you could change with very little effort. You have more than we had; you must start sooner, and carry on longer.

這是一個神奇的時代。今天的科技是我年輕時不曾體驗的。你們對不平等現象的認識遠遠超過我們這代人。面對這種不平等，你們更容易受良心的譴責。行動起來，時不我待。

And I hope you will come back here to Harvard 30 years from now and reflect on what you have done with your talent and your energy. I hope you will judge yourselves not on your professional accomplishments alone, but also on how well you have addressed the world’s deepest inequities … on how well you treated people a world away who have nothing in common with you but their humanity.

30年後當你再次回到哈佛的時候，我希望看到你用自己的天賦和精力做了哪些事。不僅用專業成就來衡量成功，還要看你是如何解決人類根深蒂固的不平等問題。你是怎樣對待那些與你相隔萬里、迥然不同的人的。

Good luck.

同學們，祝你們好運!