比尔．盖茨在哈佛大学毕业典礼上的演讲

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.
我始终保持乐观。但也听到过消极的言论。他们认为：“这种不平等现象会伴随我们一生，因为人们漠视这一切。”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.
虽然我们不知道该如何帮助他们，但我们绝对有这份心。我们都有过这样的经历，看到令人心碎的悲剧，却没有伸出援手。不是因为冷漠 而是我们不知道该怎么做。如果我们知道如何去帮，就一定会采取行动。

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.
阻碍援助步伐的并非冷漠，而是世界太复杂。要把爱心转变为行动，我们首先要发掘问题，然后寻找解决方案，并且监测效果。然而世界的复杂性阻碍着这些步骤的实施。

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.
即使有了互联网和24小时不间断的新闻，人们仍然很难看到真正的问题。一架飞机发生坠毁事故，官员们会立刻召开新闻发布会，承诺调查起因，以避免今后发生类似的事故。

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.
但如果那些官员敢讲真话，他们会说：“全世界每天会有好多人含恨而终，这起空难只是冰山一角。我们会不惜一切代价解决削平这一角冰山，此外的问题我们无力解决。” 可是与空难相比，那些夺走数百万生命的问题则更为严重。

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.
事实上那些人的死轻如鸿毛，司空见惯，连媒体都不屑于报道。更无法吸引我们的注意。即使我们知道了 它也很难刺痛我们的神经。世间最痛苦的事莫过于看着他人经受苦难的却无能为力，于是我们选择了逃避。

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.
发现问题，只是迈出了第一步，接下来我们还要：寻找解决方案。

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.
如果不想让爱心变成空谈，就必须找到问题的解决方案。如果有清晰可靠的方案，那么政府或个人组织就能立刻采取行动，将爱心落实。但是世界的复杂性使找寻方案的过程无比艰难 于是爱心才沦为空谈。

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.
打破复杂性需要四个步骤：确定目标、找到最有效的途径、寻找最理想的技术，并合理利用现有技术。无论是制作复杂的药物，还是利用简单的蚊帐，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.
以艾滋病为例。我们的目标是消灭它。最有效的途径是预防，最理想的技术是注射一剂疫苗实现终身免疫。所以现在政府、制药公司、基金会都在资助疫苗的研究。但可能要十几年才能研究出来，所以目前的最好的预防措施就是避开那些可能传播艾滋病的行为。