英语八级考试(TEM-8)选材主要来自英美报刊杂志、广播电台或网站。其中一个包括:TED2018年和2016年听力讲座(Mini-lecture)就来自TED演讲。建议平时多看多听。TED演讲。
演讲者：Simone Giertz
演讲题目:为什么要发明没用的东西？
Hello. My name is Simone. You know how people tell you if you get nervous when onstage, picture people in the audience naked? Like its this thing thats supposed to make you feel better.
你好。我的名字是西蒙娜。你知道人们怎么告诉你，如果你在舞台上感到紧张，观众会裸体拍照吗？喜欢它的东西应该会让你感觉更好。
But I was thinking — picturing all of you naked in 2018 feels kind of weird and wrong. Like, were working really hard on moving past stuff like that, so we need a new method of dealing with if you get nervous onstage.
但我在想 – 2018年想象你们所有人的裸体感觉有点奇怪和错误。就像我们过去一样，如果你在舞台上感到紧张，我们需要一种新的方法来处理它。
And I realized that what Id really like is that I can look at you as much as youre looking at me — just to even things out a little bit. So if I had way more eyeballs, then wed all be really comfortable, right? So in preparation for this talk, I made myself a shirt.
我意识到我真正喜欢的是，我可以看着你，就像你在看着我一样 – 只是为了解决一些问题。所以，如果我有更多的眼球，我们都会很舒服，对吧？所以为了准备演讲，我给自己做了一件衬衫。
Its googly eyes. It took me 14 hours and 227 googly eyes to make this shirt. And being able to look at you as much as youre looking at me is actually only half of the reason I made this. The other half is being able to do this.
这是一双糟糕的眼睛。我花了14个小时和227只眼睛做这件衬衫。能像你看着我一样看着你，其实只是我这样做的一半原因。另一半能做到这一点。
So I do a lot of things like this. I see a problem and I invent some sort of solution to it. For example, brushing your teeth. Like, its this thing we all have to do, its kind of boring, and nobody really likes it. If there were any seven-year-olds in the audience, theyd be like, “Yes!” So what about if you had a machine that could do it for you?” So what about if you had a machine that could do it for you?
所以我做了很多这样的事情。我看到了一个问题，我发明了一些解决方案。例如，刷牙。就像，这是我们每个人都必须做的，它有点无聊，没有人真正喜欢它。如果观众中有七岁的孩子，他们会说，是的！ 那么，如果你有机器为你做呢？
I call it … I call it “The Toothbrush Helmet.”
我称之为…我称之为牙刷头盔。
So my toothbrush helmet is recommended by zero out of 10 dentists, and it definitely did not revolutionize the world of dentistry, but it did completely change my life. Because I finished making this toothbrush helmet three years ago and after I finished making it,
所以我的牙刷头盔是由10名牙医中的零推荐的。它永远不会完全改变牙科世界，但它确实完全改变了我的生活。 因为我三年前完成了这个牙刷头盔的制作，所以我完成了它，
I went into my living room and I put up a camera, and I filmed a seven-second clip of it working. And by now, this is a pretty standard modern-day fairy tale of girl posting on the internet, the internet takes the girl by storm, thousands of men voyage into the comment sections to ask for her hand in marriage —
我走进客厅，然后拍了个相机，拍了7秒的照片。 到目前为止，这是一个非常标准的现代童话故事，在互联网上张贴女孩，互联网与女孩风暴，成千上万的男人航行到评论部分，要求她结婚——
She ignores all of them, starts a YouTube channel and keeps on building robots. Since then, Ive carved out this little niche for myself on the internet as an inventor of useless machines, because as we all know, the easiest way to be at the top of your field is to choose a very small field.
她忽略了一切，开始了一个YouTube频道，并继续建立机器人。从那以后，我在互联网上为自己创造了这个小利基，作为无用机器的发明者，因为我们都知道，在你的领域中最简单的方法是选择一个非常小的领域。
So I run a YouTube channel about my machines, and Ive done things like cutting hair with drones —
所以我操作了一台关于我机器的机器YouTube频道，我做过像无人机一样剪头发的事情——
To a machine that helps me wake up in the morning —
早上醒来上醒来的机器——
(Video) Simone: Ow!
西蒙娜：哦！
To this machine that helps me chop vegetables.
来这台机器帮我切菜。
Im not an engineer. I did not study engineering in school. But I was a super ambitious student growing up. In middle school and high school, I had straight As, and I graduated at the top of my year. On the flip side of that, I struggled with very severe performance anxiety. Heres an email I sent to my brother around that time.
我不是工程师。 我没有在学校学工程。 但我是一个超级雄心勃勃的学生。 在初中和高中，我直接A，我一年毕业。 另一方面，我在非常严重的焦虑中挣扎。 这是我当时发给哥哥的电子邮件。
“You wont understand how difficult it is for me to tell you, to confess this. Im so freaking embarrassed. I dont want people to think that Im stupid. Now Im starting to cry too. Damn.” And no, I did not accidentally burn our parents house down. The thing Im writing about in the email and the thing Im so upset about is that I got a B on a math test.
你不明白我告诉你承认这有多难。我很尴尬。我不想让别人觉得我傻。现在我开始哭了。 该死的。” 不，我没有意外地烧毁我们父母的房子。 我在电子邮件里写的东西和我心烦意乱的东西是我在数学考试中得到的B.
So something obviously happened between here and here.
所以这里和这里之间发生了明显的事情。
One of those things was puberty.
其中一件事是青春期。
Beautiful time indeed. But moreover, I got interested in building robots, and I wanted to teach myself about hardware. But building things with hardware, especially if youre teaching yourself, is something thats really difficult to do. It has a high likelihood of failure and moreover, it has a high likelihood of making you feel stupid. And that was my biggest fear at the time.
真是美好时光。 但另外，我对建造机器人感兴趣，我想自学硬件。 但是用硬件建东西，尤其是自己教的话，很难做到。 它很可能会失败，也很可能会让你感到愚蠢。 那是我当时最大的恐惧。
So I came up with a setup that would guarantee success 100 percent of the time. With my setup, it would be nearly impossible to fail. And that was that instead of trying to succeed, I was going to try to build things that would fail.
所以我想出了一个可以保证100%成功的设置。 几乎不可能通过我的设置失败。 也就是说，我没有试图成功，而是试图建造失败的东西。
And even though I didnt realize it at the time, building stupid things was actually quite smart, because as I kept on learning about hardware, for the first time in my life, I did not have to deal with my performance anxiety.
即使我没有意识到这一点，建立愚蠢的东西实际上是非常聪明的，因为当我继续学习硬件时，这是我一生中的第一次，我不需要处理我的焦虑。
And as soon as I removed all pressure and expectations from myself, that pressure quickly got replaced by enthusiasm, and it allowed me to just play.
一旦我消除了所有的压力和期望，这种压力很快就会被热情所取代，这让我只能玩。
So as an inventor, Im interested in things that people struggle with. It can be small things or big things or medium-sized things and something like giving a TED talk presents this whole new set of problems that I can solve. And identifying a problem is the first step in my process of building a useless machine.
所以作为发明家，我对人们挣扎的事情很感兴趣。 它可以是小事或大事或中等大小的东西，比如TED演讲提出了我能解决的新问题。 识别问题是我构建无用机器的第一步。
So before I came here, I sat down and I thought of some of the potential problems I might have in giving this talk. Forgetting what to say. That people wont laugh — thats you. Or even worse, that youll laugh at the wrong things — that was an OK part to laugh at, thank you.
所以在我来这里之前，我坐下来想到了一些潜在的问题。 忘了说什么。 人们不会笑 – 那就是你。 更糟糕的是，你会嘲笑错误的事情 – 这是一个可以嘲笑的部分，谢谢你。
Or that when I get nervous, my hands start shaking and Im really self-conscious about it. Or that my fly has been open this entire time and all of you noticed but I didnt, but its closed so were all good on that one.
或者当我感到紧张时，我的手开始颤抖，我真的很有意识。 或者我的苍蝇已经打开了整个时间，你们都注意到了，但我没有注意到，但它已经关闭了，所以我们对那个人很好。
But one thing Im actually really nervous about is my hands shaking. I remember when I was a kid, giving presentations in school, I would have my notes on a piece of paper, and I would put a notebook behind the paper so that people wouldnt be able to see the paper quivering. And I give a lot of talks.
但其实我真正紧张的一件事就是我的手在颤抖。 我记得当我还是个孩子的时候，当我在学校做演讲时，我会在一张纸上做笔记，然后我会在纸上放一张笔记本，这样人们就不会看到纸在颤抖。 我进行了很多会谈。
I know that about half of you in the audience are probably like, “Building useless machines is really fun, but how is this in any way or form a business?” And giving talks is a part of it. And the arrangers always put out a glass of water for you onstage so you have something to drink if you get thirsty, and I always so badly want to drink that water,
我知道大约有一半的观众可能会说，建造无用的机器真的很有趣，但如何以任何方式形成企业呢？ 会谈是其中的一部分。 安排人总是在舞台上为你准备一杯水，这样如果你口渴了就喝点东西，我总是想喝那水，
but I dont dare to pick the glass up because then people might be able to see that my hands are shaking. So what about a machine that hands you a glass of water? Sold to the nervous girl in the googly-eye shirt.
但我不敢拿起玻璃，因为人们可能会看到我的手在颤抖。 那么一台给你一杯水的机器呢？ 卖给那件衣服googly-eye紧张的女孩衬衫。
Actually, I need to take this off because I have a thing —
事实上，我需要取消它，因为我有一件事 –
Oh.
噢。
I still dont know what to call this, but I think some sort of “head orbit device,” because it rotates this platform around you and you can put anything on it. You can have a camera; you can get photos of your entire head. Like its really — its a very versatile machine.
我还是不知道怎么称呼这个，但是我觉得某个头部轨道装置会绕着你旋转这个平台，你可以把它放在上面。 你可以有相机； 你可以得到整个头部的照片。 就像它真的一样 – 它是一台多功能机器。
OK, and I have — I mean, you can put some snacks on it, for example, if you want to. I have some popcorn here. And you just put a little bit like that. And then you want to — theres some sacrifices for science — just some popcorn falling on the floor. Lets do the long way around.
好吧，我有 – 我的意思是，如果你愿意，你可以在上面放一些零食。 这里有爆米花。 而且你只是有点像这样。 然后你想 – 为科学做出一些牺牲 – 地板上只有一些爆米花。我们还有很长的路要走。
And then you have a little hand. You need to adjust the height of it, and you just do it by shrugging.
然后你有一只手。 你需要调整它的高度，你只需要耸耸肩。
It has a little hand.
它有一只小手。
I just bumped my mic off, but I think were all good. OK, also I need to chew this popcorn, so if you guys could just clap your hands a little bit more —
我只是把麦克风弄掉了，但我觉得我们都很好。 嗯，我也需要咀嚼这个爆米花，所以如果你能再拍一次你的手 ——
OK, so its like your own little personal solar system, because Im a millennial, so I want everything to revolve around me.
所以它就像你自己的小个人太阳系，因为我是千禧一代，所以我希望一切都围绕着我。
Back to the glass of water, thats what were here for. So, I promise — I mean, it still has — it doesnt have any water in it, Im sorry. But I still need to work on this machine a little bit because I still need to pick up the glass and put it on the platform, but if your hands are shaking a little bit, nobodys going to notice because youre wearing a very mesmerizing piece of equipment.
回到一杯水，这就是我们的目的。 所以，我保证 – 我的意思是它还有 – 我很抱歉它没有水。 但我仍然需要在这台机器上工作一点，因为我仍然需要拿起玻璃，把它放在平台上，但如果你的手摇晃一点，没有人会注意到，因为你穿着迷人的设备。
So, were all good. OK.
所以，我们都很好。 好。
Oh no, it got stuck. Isnt it comforting that even robots sometimes get stage fright? It just gets stuck a little bit. Its very human of them. Oh wait, lets go back a little bit, and then —
哦不，它卡住了。 机器人有时会怯场，这不是很令人欣慰吗？ 它只是卡住了一点。 他们很人性化。 等等，让我们回去一点，然后——
Isnt it a beautiful time to be alive?
活着不是美好的时光吗？
So as much as my machines can seem like simple engineering slapstick, I realize that I stumbled on something bigger than that. Its this expression of joy and humility that often gets lost in engineering, and for me it was a way to learn about hardware without having my performance anxiety get in the way.
所以，虽然我的机器看起来像一个简单的工程，但我意识到我偶然发现了比这更大的东西。 正是这种快乐和谦逊的表达经常在项目中迷失。对我来说，这是一种学习硬件而不影响我表现焦虑的方法。
I often get asked if I think Im ever going to build something useful, and maybe someday I will. But the way I see it, I already have because Ive built myself this job and its something that I could never have planned for, or that I could —
我经常被问及我是否认为我想建立一些有用的东西，也许有一天我会。 但我已经有了看到它的方式，因为我为自己建立了这份工作，这是我从未有过的计划，或者我可以——
Its something that I could never have planned for. Instead it happened just because I was enthusiastic about what I was doing, and I was sharing that enthusiasm with other people.
这是我从未有过的计划。 相反，它发生的原因只是因为我对我正在做的事情充满热情，我和别人分享了这种热情。
To me thats the true beauty of making useless things, because its this acknowledgment that you dont always know what the best answer is.
对我来说，这是创造无用事物的真正美，因为正是这种承认，你并不总是知道最好的答案是什么。
And it turns off that voice in your head that tells you that you know exactly how the world works. And maybe a toothbrush helmet isnt the answer, but at least youre asking the question.
它会关闭你头脑中的声音，告诉你世界是如何工作的。 也许牙刷头盔不是答案，但至少你提出了问题。
Thank you.
谢谢。
【特别声明】除原创或授权转载外，公共平台上的其他文章均为转载，版权归原作者或平台所有。为了传递信息，没有商业目的。公众号尊重知识产权。如果您无意中侵犯了您的权益，请及时联系后台，公众号将及时删除。
