Bina Venkataraman: The power to think ahead in a reckless age
比娜·文卡塔拉曼: 在魯莽的年代裡高瞻遠矚
Bina Venkataraman is an MIT professor and author of the forthcoming book "The Optimist's Telescope." Full bio
Double-click the English transcript below to play the video.
for the blood of the American-born.
有著特別的胃口。
I got an unexpected gift.
at the time I got it,
a powerful metaphor for my work.
我工作的有力隱喻。
like there's no time but the present.
就沒有其他時間。
seems to dominate our lives,
in the number of steps we took today
from a high-profile figure.
in making immediate profits
for future invention.
for governments to stand by
to feed future generations.
to be remembered as good ancestors.
被後人銘記為好的祖先。
our species evolved to think ahead,
進化到了可以提前計劃、
that we have "mental time travel,"
「思想的時間旅行」,
everything we call human civilization,
using this superpower quite enough,
充分地運用這個超能力。
businesses and institutions are designed.
企業和機構的設計。
that's impairing our foresight.
損害了我們的前瞻。
about the three key mistakes
profits of a company
is going to grow its market share
that kids bring back from school,
what's great for those kids' learning
what really matters in the future.
that impairs our foresight
or a business leader
those disasters in the first place,
by protecting communities from floods
透過保護社區免受水災之患、
that impairs our foresight
on predicting exactly what's next,
or algorithms to do that.
all the possibilities the future holds.
想像未來所有的可能性。
emerged in 2014 in West Africa,
開始在西非爆發時,
had early warning signs
都有收到早期的警示訊息,
that outbreak might spread,
in time to intervene,
to kill more than 11,000 people.
and good forecasts
how dangerous they can be.
颶風會多麼危險。
that I've described,
better decisions about the future
能幫助我們前瞻的工具,
like the telescopes
when they scanned the horizon.
across distance and the ocean,
across time to the future.
few of the tools
the long game pay now.
I spent some time with in Kansas.
我在堪薩斯認識的農夫。
are grown around the world today
of the fertile topsoil
with a group of scientists,
which have deep roots
and protecting future harvests.
to grow these crops in the short run,
在短期內種植這些穀物,
the annual yields of the crops
to make cereal and beer using the grains
做麥片和啤酒的公司,
by doing what's good for tomorrow.
並在今天就可以獲利。
by George Washington Carver
after the Civil War
of Carver's 300 uses for the peanut,
花生的三百種用途,
that he came up with
why Carver did that.
卡佛這樣做的原因。
poor Alabama sharecroppers
peanuts in their fields
would be better a few years later.
會在幾年後變好。
to be lucrative for them in the short run.
佃農需要在短期內有利潤。
about another tool for foresight.
高瞻遠矚的另一個工具。
as keeping the memory of the past alive
對過去的記憶的保鮮,
of the nuclear reactor disaster there
and tsunami of 2011.
六週年之際。
about the Onagawa Nuclear Power Station,
to the epicenter of that earthquake
that we all know about.
actually fled to the nuclear power plant
to build that power plant
and with a higher sea wall.
並同時建造了較高的海牆。
in the year 869 after a tsunami.
that allowed him to imagine
as creating shared heirlooms.
創造共享的傳家寶。
on the Pacific coast of Mexico,
太平洋沿岸捕捉龍蝦的漁夫,
their lobster harvest there
by treating it as a shared resource
children and grandchildren.
因此而做到的。
the breeding lobster out of the ocean.
there are more than 30 fisheries
vaguely similar to this.
in the fisheries known as catch shares
「漁獲股票」的長期股權,
from the ocean today
many more tools of foresight
beyond near-term stock prices,
所給予當下利益的州份。
of campaign financiers.
as many of these tools as we can
to imagine what lies ahead.
as you can imagine.
we can pick up in our own lives,
in businesses or in communities,
以社會的面向來使用。
is the instrument I shared with you.
是我剛才分享的樂器。
for my great-grandfather.
music and art critic in India
知名的音樂和藝術評論家。
to protect this instrument
was pawning off all their belongings,
to the next generation,
the sound of this instrument,
in the Himalayan fog.
霧中的漫遊者。
a voice from the past.
playing the dilruba.
在彈奏迪爾魯巴琴 。
like a cat's dying somewhere,
than just owning it for today.
比現在擁有它更有意義。
as both a descendant and an ancestor.
同時也是個傳承者。
bigger than my own.
大得多的故事的一部分。
we can reclaim foresight:
最強大的唯一方式:
as the good ancestors we long to be,
can resonate for generations.
ABOUT THE SPEAKER
Bina Venkataraman - Writer, futuristBina Venkataraman is an MIT professor and author of the forthcoming book "The Optimist's Telescope."
Why you should listen
For more than six years, Bina Venkataraman has been traveling around the world studying how people and communities think about the future. Her curiosity as a former journalist, and her firsthand experience in the Obama White House, led her to question whether the shortsightedness rampant in today's societies is inevitable -- or actually "a choice we're making."
During the Obama years, Venkataraman built partnerships among communities, companies and government to prepare for coming pandemics, wildfires and rising seas. In 2014, she launched the White House Climate Data Initiative to bring actionable climate science to people making decisions around the globe. Previously, she was a science journalist for the New York Times and the Boston Globe. Now, she teaches students at MIT to use scientific knowledge in service of society.
As Venkataraman writes: "For as long as I can remember, I have suspected that the future of humanity depended on the future of the planet. I have since found this to be the most compelling story of our time. As I imagine what lies in our shared future, from gene-editing to the climate crisis, I see both dangers and extraordinary potential."
Venkataraman wrote her first book, The Optimist's Telescope (to be published by Riverhead on August 27, 2019), to help people today better shape their own future and that of coming generations.
Bina Venkataraman | Speaker | TED.com