 按照惯例，每年此时，美国各大名校都会邀请校长或名人，用他们丰富的阅历和人生经验，给毕业生提供有价值的建议和指导。 永远不要让外界的喧嚣 ▼  6月12日，斯坦福大学举行2022年毕业典礼，校长 Marc Tessier-Lavigne 发表激励人心的毕业演说。  他讲到世界瞬息万变，人生不是一条直线。鼓励大家在不同阶段，都要有改变和适应环境的能力，以此寻求人生价值并服务社会。 以下是校长演讲的精华： 那天，我描述了在斯坦福大学接下来岁月里，你们将意识到生活不是一条从始点到终点的直线，它有你无法预见的曲折、转折和背离。 我们任何人都无法预见这些年的变化。因为疫情，我们被迫关闭校园，大家学习新的合作方式，创建社区，以及在非常时期相互支持。 所有人都在颠覆和适应中，学会了重要一课，明白世界瞬息万变，而每个人都应该学会适应变化。  当我想到生活充满意外时，常说：生命是漫长的，生命是分章节的。 每个人的生活，都有不同的时代。有些即将到来，另一些则会意外开始。而毕业典礼标志着学生时代的结束，也标志着新篇章的开始。 你可以开始家庭生活的全新篇章，可以搬到世上任何地方，进入个人发展、失落和变化的时代。这些变化将持续终生，就像每个生命都会发生意想不到的曲折一样。  我想跟你们分享斯坦福大学校友 Milt McColl 的故事，他的人生道路，证明了生命是分阶段的。 Milt 是才华横溢的运动员，1977-1980年曾在斯坦福 Cardinal 队担任后卫，并获生物学学士学位。毕业后他与旧金山49人队签约。同一周，被斯坦福医学院录取。  橄榄球后卫 Milt McColl 1981年到1987年，他在49人队担任外线后卫，赢得过两界超级碗锦标赛！淡季则就读斯坦福医学院，并于1988年获得医学博士学位。  在完成NFL职业生涯后，Milt 全身心投入医学领域。但在他开始住院实习前的几个月，接受医疗初创公司的挑战，决定将住院实习推迟一年。谁料到，这一推迟就是30年。 在医疗器械行业的三十年，Milt 非常成功，并最终成为高斯外科公司Gauss Surgical 的首席执行官，开发了手术的实时失血测量设备。  在这期间，Milt 继续利用他的行医执照，在旧金山免费诊所做义务志愿者。在此期间，他深刻意识到，自己最期待的是呆在诊所的日子。 因此经过深思熟虑，Milt 辞去首席执行官的职务，并在56岁时重返斯坦福医学院，开始住院实习。 这是一项艰苦的工作。Milt 已经离开医学院三十年了。他在56岁的年纪，还需要投入精力陪医生查房并应付繁重学业，但他获益匪浅。  Milt 于2019年完成住院实习，之后恰逢新冠疫情。期间他一直在圣克拉拉谷医疗中心社区诊所治疗患者，与医疗资源不足的弱势群体合作，实现了服务社会的人生价值。  另一个真实故事，来自斯坦福1993年新闻专业学生 Sylvia Jones。 Sylvia Jones 毕业之后，开始了电视新闻制片人生涯，曾参与报道了从曼德拉首次访问美国，直至9·11事件，再到奥巴马总统大选的一切。  然后她转入照顾家庭的角色。先是照顾患有绝症的母亲，然后收留了两个无家可归的幼年亲戚。几乎瞬间就从单身变成两个孩子的父母。 这个阶段过去后，多年来，Sylvia 第一次有了专注于自己和想要的东西的时间和空间。她在此意识到，真正渴望的是写作电影和电视剧。 Sylvia 申请了加州大学洛杉矶分校的编剧课程，并在开课前九天从候补名单中转正。所以40多岁时，她重新出发，从芝加哥搬到洛杉矶。 她觉得自己没有时间浪费了，所以敲遍能想到的好莱坞的每一扇门。如今，她是艾美奖作家和知名电视制作人，作品包括《终结者The Endgame》《芝加哥故事 The Chi》《珍惜此日 Cherish the Day》。 他们的故事，完美说明生命是分篇章的，而且是鼓舞人心的篇章！ 重要的是：我们都有这样的能力，去改变人生方向，以新的方式运用天赋和能力，找到全新意义，并帮助解决世界所面临的问题。 我知道，疫情打乱了计划，每个人都被迫改变方向，然而如今你们依旧顺利完成学业。随着生活的故事不断展开，我相信你们都能够随着环境的变化而作出适应和改变。 基于此，我想分享三点建议：首先是终身学习和探索的重要性。 这些年，你们已经掌握了继续学习、探索和适应变化的技能。除了所学的知识，还能利用技能，通过服务来解决现实世界的问题。 我希望你继续使用技能和知识，为社会服务。它除了能够为你们提供成就感之外，还能让你保持敏锐，并在未来探索全新的想法。 这就引出了我的第二点：在保持知识和技能的同时，还应该继续寻找不同的观点，并在头脑中留出空间，来容纳不同的观点。 大学你们遇到各种各样的观点，参与不同领域的对话，这绝非易事。但校园之外，世界日益分裂，而接纳不同是时代的必备技能。 当进入人生的全新篇章时，我鼓励你们继续与不同声音接触，寻求讨论和辩论。尊重自己的价值观的同时，以开放的心态向他人学习，并继续在讨论中，展示最好的一面。 第三，我敦促每个人想象更加光明的未来，并做出自己独特的贡献。 世界面临许多挑战，从新出现的疾病到虚假信息，再到气候危机和地缘政治的紧张。你们每人都有能力应对这些挑战，让世界变得更好。 在过去两年的混乱中，我们都有机会重新评估价值观，反思什么能带给我们的真正的意义和成就感。 因此，即使你们在庆祝你们所取得的一切成就，我也敦促你们每个人花时间反思并问问自己—— 我讲如何塑造，能够反映我价值观和理念的未来？我怎样才能帮助社区和世界，创造更光明的未来？ 当你沿着道路迈出下一步时，将带着大学的印记。这里所学到的一切将贯穿一生，推动你开启职业生涯，并为未来生活提供无限可能。 Today’s ceremony marks the culmination of all you have accomplished at Stanford. We are so proud of you, and we celebrate you as you embark on the next stage of your journey. The first time I met with many of you was to celebrate Convocation on a very hot September day in the Main Quad in 2018. That day, I described how you would begin to realize, during your years at Stanford, that life is not a straight path from beginning to end. It has twists, turns, and departures that you cannot foresee. Little did I – or any of us – foresee those that would arise during your years here, as the pandemic closed our campus and forced us all to learn new ways of working together, of creating community, and of supporting one another during an extraordinary time. All of us learned a hard-won lesson in disruption and adaptability, in how our world can change in an instant, and in how every one of us is called on to adapt throughout our lives.When I think about the unexpected directions that our lives can take, I often like to say that life is long and lived in chapters. Your life – and every life – has distinct eras. Some you will see coming, and others will begin suddenly and unexpectedly.Childhood is one, and your college years are another. This Commencement marks the end of an important chapter as a trainee and the beginning of a new chapter out in the world.But you’ll experience distinct eras throughout your lives and professional careers, too. The career you begin right after college is not likely to be the one you have forever. In fact, I predict that the vast majority of you, if not all of you, will have multiple chapters in your professional life. You may begin a family, and parenthood and family life will be a new chapter. You may move to new places in our country or in the world. You will enter eras of personal and career growth, of uncertainty, of caretaking, and of loss and of sudden change. Those changes and evolutions will continue throughout your life – as will the sudden, unexpected twists and turns that are a part of every life. I’d like to tell you the story of Stanford alum Milt McColl, whose own path exemplifies the idea that life is lived in chapters.Milt was a talented student athlete. He played linebacker for the Cardinal from 1977 to 1980, as he earned his bachelor’s degree in biology.Graduating in 1981, Milt signed with the San Francisco 49ers. That same week, he was accepted into the Stanford School of Medicine. From 1981 to 1987, he played with the 49ers as an outside linebacker, including on two Super Bowl championship teams. In the off-season, he attended medical school here at Stanford, graduating with an MD in 1988. After completing his NFL career, Milt planned to devote himself entirely to medicine. But with a couple of months to fill before his residency was set to begin, he was offered a job at a medical device startup. He accepted, delaying his residency for what he thought would be a year. It ended up being nearly 30 years.Over those three decades in the medical device industry, Milt built a hugely successful career. He eventually became CEO of Gauss Surgical, which developed a real-time blood loss measuring device for operating rooms. Throughout all of those years, Milt continued to make use of his medical license by volunteering at a free clinic in San Francisco. And eventually, he realized that he looked forward to his days in the clinic above all else.So after much thought and reflection, Milt stepped down as CEO. He left his career and returned to Stanford Medicine at the age of 56 to begin a residency in family medicine.It was hard work. Milt had been away from medical school for a long time, and he needed to put in extra time, accompanying doctors on additional rounds and studying in his spare moments.But he found it deeply rewarding. Milt completed his residency in 2019 – with impeccable timing – just in time for the arrival of COVID-19. Throughout the pandemic, he has treated COVID patients in a community-based clinic at the Santa Clara Valley Medical Center, where he works with a traditionally underserved population.Or take the example of Sylvia Jones, an award-winning journalist from the Class of 1993. Sylvia began her career as a TV news producer, covering everything from Nelson Mandela’s first visit to the U.S., to 9/11, to President Obama’s election.Then she entered a chapter of caregiving, first for her mother, who was diagnosed with a terminal illness. Then for two young relatives, whom she took in when they had nowhere else to go. Sylvia went from single and unattached to parenting two children in an almost an instant.When that chapter was resolved, for the first time in years, she had the space to focus on herself and what she wanted.And she realized that what she wanted was to write movies and TV shows. Sylvia applied to UCLA’s screenwriting program and was accepted off the waitlist nine days before classes began. So, now in her early 40s, she picked up and moved from Chicago to Los Angeles.She figured she had no time to lose, so she knocked on every door in Hollywood she could think of. Today, she’s an Emmy-winning writer and producer of TV shows like The Endgame … The Chi … and Cherish the Day. Milt and Sylvia’s stories are wonderful illustrations of the idea that life is lived in chapters. And what inspiring chapters they have been.The important thing about these examples is this: We each have this ability to pivot through the years, to use our skills in new and different ways, to find new meaning, and to help solve the problems that our world faces. Let me be clear: Each of you has that ability to pivot. I know, because each of you had to pivot as the pandemic upended your plans – yet you pushed through to complete your studies and graduate today. As the story of your own life continues to unfurl, I am confident that each of you will adapt as our world changes and as your own priorities and goals evolve, too.Reflecting on the examples of Milt and Sylvia, I’d like to offer you three thoughts about the foundation you have built here at Stanford and how that foundation will support you through the chapters to come. First is the importance of lifelong learning and of continuing to explore.In your years here, you have acquired the tools and skills to continue learning, exploring, and adapting as the world changes. You’ve learned to experiment with ideas, explore challenging issues, and test solutions to problems in every field. And beyond what you’ve learned in the classroom, you’ve used your skills to address real-world problems through hands-on service work.Like Milt, who kept up his medical skills through volunteer work, I hope you continue to use your skills and knowledge to serve your community. Beyond the fulfillment it will provide you, it will allow you to keep your skills sharp and to explore new ideas, now and in the years to come. That brings me to my second point: As you keep up your knowledge and skills, you should also continue to seek out different perspectives and hold space in your mind for competing views.Throughout your time here at Stanford, you’ve encountered a diversity of perspectives and engaged in conversations across areas of disagreement. It hasn’t always been easy. But as you look beyond Palm Drive to the division and polarization that grip our country and our world, it’s clear that this is a skill that our world desperately needs.The friends and mentors you have met here at Stanford have broadened your perspective. As you enter the next chapter of your lives, I encourage you to continue to engage with many voices and to seek out discussion and debate. Honor your own values, but keep an open mind to learning from others’ perspectives and continue to bring the best version of yourself to those discussions. Third, I urge each of you to imagine a brighter future and to figure out what your own unique contribution will be.Our world faces many challenges – from emerging and chronic diseases, to disinformation, to the climate crisis and geopolitical tensions. Each of you has the knowledge and the ability to rise to these challenges and to help transform our world for the better, for your own future and for the generations that follow.I know you are up to the challenge. I’ve seen it. As just one example, this spring, I’ve been so proud of the ways in which the Stanford community has responded to the war in Ukraine – from our scholars at the Freeman-Spogli Institute and across the university, who have played a major role in advising U.S. policymakers and providing knowledge and insight into the conflict, to our Stanford students, who worked with a local nonprofit to organize a shipment of more than $120,000 worth of medical and humanitarian relief to Ukrainian refugees in Poland. The invasion of Ukraine by Russia was another stark reminder of how the world can change in an instant and how each of us – each of you – can contribute, in ways big and small.So I encourage each of you to reflect on the challenges we face and to consider what your own contributions will be. Through the disruption of the last two years, each of us has had an opportunity to reassess our values and to reflect on what pursuits give us true meaning and fulfillment. So even as you celebrate all that you have accomplished, I urge each of you to take time to reflect and to ask yourself:How can I shape a future that reflects what I’ve learned about my values and priorities? And how can I help create a brighter future for my own community and for the world? As you take your next steps along your own path, you’ll carry Stanford with you. The work you’ve done here will ripple forward through your life, propelling you through the early years of your career and providing you a foundation for a life of change and transformation. 5月24日，哈佛大学举行2022届本科生毕业典礼，时任哈佛校长 Lawrence S. Bacow 发表演说。 讲述疫情造成前所未有影响的同时，指出人生道路的无限可能。鼓励学生相信自己，抓住预期之外的机会，带着激情和热情拥抱未知。 以下是演讲精华节选： 我坚信你们终会找到属于自己的道路，并在世界上留下自己的印记。 当开始人生旅程的下一章程时，你会为所有等待你的未知感到兴奋，并对这段旅程可能带你去向何方感到焦虑。会在纠结担心这是否是正确的道路，抑或自己是否会成功。 但职业生涯只有在回顾时才能明了。退休那天回顾过去，才知道一切是否具有意义。而正是那些拐点时刻的决定，最终将你带到终点。 但当你此时此刻，面对这些决定时，内心依旧会充满挣扎和犹豫。 回顾过去35年的职业生涯，如果我对曾经的任何一段经历说「不」，今天就不会站在这里。这并不意味着我有先见之明或勇敢，只因为：我愿意主动接受此前从未考虑过的选择，并让它将我引向未知。 这种开放的心态将我带到精彩绝伦的地方，例如现在我所站的讲台。 未来，无数机会会以出人意料的方式出现在面前。你要学会主动迎接，相信自己，而不是畏首畏尾。 曾几何时，当我担心某个决定时，母亲总会说：「最糟糕的情况是什么？你能忍受吗？如果可以，就去做吧。」我希望你们能像我一样，从这个建议中获益并彻底解脱。 一些无法预料的机会，将对你产生深远的影响，而拒绝将是一场悲剧。 哈佛演讲和修辞学教授 Jorie Graham 曾在纽约大学专注电影制作。 一天，她路过诗歌课堂，听到 J. Alfred Prufrock 爱情诗的台词：「我听到美人鱼在唱歌，他们彼此歌唱。我想他们不会为我而唱。」 那一刻，让 Jorie Graham 成为美国最杰出的诗人之一，普利策奖获得者，哈佛最受欢迎的教员之一。 诗人 Jorie Graham 今年哈佛艺术奖获得者 Ruben Blades，曾就读巴拿马法律专业。一个周末，院长看到他和乐队表演，告诉他，如果他想体现律师的职业尊严，就必须停止唱歌。 Ruben 选择了音乐，在迈阿密推出个人专辑，并获得17项格莱美奖。 音乐人Ruben Blades Ray Hammond 毕业于哈佛大学和哈佛医学院，是一位成功的外科医生。直到有一天，他听到一个声音在召唤他。如今他成为著名牧师，是波士顿最有影响力的领袖之一。 我之所以选择这些例子，是因为它们展示了新道路的随机性。Jorie、Ruben和Ray都无法想象，一个声音会把他们带到哪里。但他们都在倾听，在密切留意着周围的世界。 我希望你们记住： 对人生有深远影响的随机事件，永远不会发生在屏幕上，只会发生在生活中。 想象某人停下来，被一首陌生的诗触动；想象某人在意想不到的警告中，意识到内心的渴望；想象某人感知到远超越自身的伟大力量。 想想这些事情可能发生的地点和方式，带着激情和热情去拥抱这个真实的世界。如果足够幸运，你也许也会在某天，受到意外的启发。 愿你充分考虑未来的机遇。愿你体验诗歌和音乐的甜美，跨越人生道路的重重障碍。愿你免于焦虑、恐惧和不确定，愿你永远被爱包围。 英文演讲全文 Welcome, members of the Class of 2022—and soon-to-be-graduates of Harvard College. Exactly 1,359 days ago, we met at Convocation, and we began our first year together—you as undergraduates, me as president. I spoke about the merits of academic regalia, and I challenged you to use your waking hours as undergraduates—some 21,000 of them—to explore all that the University had to offer. Little did we know then that we would all confront a global pandemic that would test us in ways that we could not have imagined. I find it fitting that we are gathered here in these billowing robes, a symbol not only of our membership in a community of learning but also of our experience these past four years, our experience of a Harvard—of a world—blown about by winds that never existed before. And all of us carried along with them—and into the unknown.It has been a wilder ride than any of us could have expected. Candidly, when I made the difficult decision to send you all home on such short notice in March of 2020, I never imagined that two years later—and after one million people had succumbed to this virus in the US alone—we would still be dealing with this public health crisis. Your class has been tested as few others have been. You have demonstrated extraordinary resilience and patience, both skills that will serve you well as you prepare for life after Harvard. Based on what I have seen of you and how you have met this moment, I have great faith that you, like those who came before you, will find your way, and will make your mark on the world. Let me take this moment to thank you for your perseverance, for your flexibility and your understanding. I don’t think I have ever been prouder of any graduating class at any university than I am of the Harvard College Class of 2022. One day, there will be enough distance for us to contemplate the enormity of what we have been through as a community, but that day is not today—and that is okay. For now, we can share a quiet moment to say goodbye to whatever we imagined these last 1,359 days might have held for us. For now, we can be grateful that we are here—together—on the verge of your commencement and all that awaits you in the years ahead. It is quite common for students at this precise moment in time—a day before your College graduation—to feel a combination of excitement and anxiety. Excitement for all that awaits you as you begin the next chapter in the journey called life, and anxiety over where that journey is likely to take you. Some of you entered Harvard convinced of exactly where you wanted to go—law school, medical school, a career in public service, for example. Some of you found your passion on this campus and are now going to pursue academic careers or opportunities in journalism, the arts, or entertainment. And some of you are still searching. You may have a job lined up that will pay you well, but, if you are honest with yourself, you are still worried if it is the right path for you or if you will succeed.One of the problems in trying to plan your career is that a career is only knowable in retrospect. On the day you retire you can look back and it all makes sense. You can identify the inflection points, the decisions, that brought you to where you ultimately wound up. But when confronting these decisions in real time, you will struggle. You will make lists of pros and cons. You will consult with friends and family. And you will agonize over these choices long into the night. I know what I am talking about because I have been there.As I was completing my PhD here at Harvard, Adele and I thought we were headed to Washington, DC. It was the start of the Carter administration, and we were excited by the prospect of getting in on the ground floor. But then an unexpected opportunity came up:Would I like to return to my alma mater, MIT, to fill in for someone going on leave for two years? The salary was a fraction of what I would have made in DC and there was no guarantee of a job two years hence.A number of years later, I was still at MIT—now on the tenure track but disheartened because my fabulously talented co-author didn’t get tenure. I had concluded that if he did not get it, I wouldn’t either, and I had just made up my mind to leave MIT and academia altogether when my department chair came calling:Would I consider taking on major administrative responsibility to launch a new academic program?Flash forward 35 years. I was a member of a presidential search committee, trying to find a leader for a university I care a lot about. I had been comfortably semi-retired—more or less—for almost seven years when the chair of the search committee approached me on behalf of the group:Would I consider becoming a candidate for the job?If I had said “no” to any one of those questions, I would not be standing here today. This is not to say that I am prescient or wise, or brave—just that I was open to seeing where roads I hadn’t considered might lead me. That way of moving through the world has taken me to some pretty interesting places—being here, behind this podium, is one of them. You, too, will have chances to consider other paths for yourself, paths that will appear to you unexpectedly—even inconveniently. Be willing to take those chances. Believe in yourself. And don’t be too concerned about failure. My late mother, Ruth, was a very wise woman. Whenever I worried about a decision, she would always say, “What’s the worst that can happen? Can you live with that? If you can, go for it.” I hope you are as liberated by this advice as I have been throughout my life. Other discrete moments will influence you so profoundly that denying them would be a tragedy.Jorie Graham, Boylston Professor of Oratory and Rhetoric, was once an undergraduate at NYU with her heart set on filmmaking. One day, walking past an open door of a poetry class, she heard lines from The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock: “I have heard the mermaids singing, each to each. / I do not think they will sing to me.” But sing they did—and, because of that moment, Jorie went on to become one of America’s most distinguished poets, a Pulitzer Prize winner, and one of Harvard’s most beloved faculty members. Rubén Blades, a musical giant and this year’s Harvard Arts medalist, was once a law student in Panama. One weekend, the dean of the school he attended saw him performing with his band. The dean took him aside and told him that if he wanted to be a lawyer—to reflect the dignity of that profession—he would have to quit singing. Rubén ended up in Miami with a demo album—a wild talent and ambition—and, eventually, seventeen Grammys. Ray Hammond, a graduate of Harvard College and Harvard Medical School, was a very successful surgeon. Then he heard another voice calling him. Today he is Reverend Ray Hammond, one of Boston’s most influential spiritual leaders.I chose these examples because they demonstrate the randomness with which new roads will appear to you. Neither Jorie nor Rubén nor Ray could dream of where a single voice would take them, but they listened nonetheless, paying close attention to the world around them as they imagined how and where they wanted to focus their attention and time.Now, I will say something that you may shrug off as nostalgia. But I hope you will remember it: Random events of profound influence don’t happen on a screen. Think of a person stopping in her tracks to listen to lines of unfamiliar poetry. Think of a person recognizing his desire in an unexpected and unwelcome ultimatum. Think of a person tuning into something greater than himself. Think of where and how those things happen—and where and how they can’t or won’t. Engage and embrace the world personally with passion and enthusiasm and, if you are lucky, you too will someday be inspired by the unexpected. Members of the Class of 2022: May you consider fully the paths that reveal themselves to you in the years ahead. May you experience the sweetness of both poetry and song, and marvel at the refrains that emerge as you make your way through life. May you be spared anxiety, dread, and uncertainty—and may you always be surrounded by people who love you. Best of luck to each of you—and Godspeed. 耶鲁大学 Yale University 5月22日，耶鲁大学校长 Peter Salovey 发表了致2022届毕业生的毕业演讲，主题为「论思想上的谦逊」On Intellectual Humility。 以下视频来源于 耶鲁北京中心 以下是演讲的精华节选： 南非前总统曼德拉曾说：「如果你没有改变自己，就永远无法对社会产生影响… 伟大的和平缔造者都是正直、诚实但谦逊的人。」 在这个充满成就感的时刻，我希望你们认识到，思想的谦逊无比重要。你们所受的优秀教育使你们能够认真听取他人的意见，思虑他人的言论，这会带来新的洞见。 所以我的演讲将聚焦在承认未知的勇气，承认错误和改变想法。 60年前，在战争阴影笼罩下，美国前总统肯尼迪在此发表演讲。他看到的局势与今天的动荡类似，他在演讲中呼吁：要保持思想的谦逊。 我们常将事实置于预设的解释之下。我们常乐于接受观点，而不愿思考。但历史告诉我们：确信不疑带来的严重危害以及滋生的狂妄。 然而演讲后半个世纪，我们依然看到：隔阂让未经证实的观点肆意横行，无根据的推测不胫而走，不和谐的氛围让真诚的交流举步维艰。 简而言之，加强我们已有的共识愈来愈成为某种「舒适圈」，而试图质疑它们，则变得难上加难。 但我想向你们呼吁：拒绝接受这种安逸，因为只有愿意探索新的想法，才有可能让事情有所不同。 正如当年肯尼迪总统所言：「一所伟大的大学，总会选择站在传播谬误的对立面，和真相站在一边。」 教育的力量，不在于承诺教给你们一切，而在于让你们准备好，以有益的怀疑态度来应对各种假设，包括自身处境的假设。它不在于回答的能力，而在于敢于质疑的能力。 作为毕业生，你们有责任将这种探究精神带向世界；有责任坚持将各种观点推出接受的舒适圈之外；有责任带着追求理性的决心前行。 事实上，智慧植根于接受不同想法的意愿。仔细聆听，批判思考，挑战原有观点，为发现真理而改变。 正如伟大的中世纪哲学家 Mōsheh ben-Maimōn，在其著作《Pirkei Avot》的导论中的劝诫：「接受真理，无论出自谁之口」。 与视角不同的人互动交流，并不会让我们背弃信仰；倾听可能不认同的观点并非妥协，而是对真理的忠诚；承认我们的错误并不意味着失败，而是走向博学的必经之旅。 伟大教育的标志，不仅在于对新知识的探索，还在于对现有观点的重新思考；并不一定意味着收获了多少新知，而在于放弃了多少假设。 只有当我们严格的审视那些「预设的解释」，才能摒弃局限而获得真理。只有谦逊基础上的勇于承认错误，才能使我们在追求真理的道路上，攀登至难以企及的高度。 But I would like you, graduating seniors from Yale College, to depart from this place with a somewhat different mindset. I am going to urge you to recognize that your excellent education allows you to listen to others carefully, consider what they have to say, and sometimes come to a new point of view. I am suggesting today—a day filled with pride of accomplishment—to recognize, at the same time, the value of intellectual humility. Today, I wish to focus on the courage to acknowledge all we do not know, to admit when we are wrong, and to change our minds.Sixty years ago, President John F. Kennedy spoke to a capacity audience seated right where you are now. He saw a similar state of unrest as the specter of war loomed. And I suspect he gained a similar sense of optimism atop this platform from members of the Class of 1962. President Kennedy’s historic Commencement address at Yale was sweeping in its rhetoric and in its scope. And more than a half-century later, there is still much for us to heed from his message, including the abiding but now especially relevant value of seeking new perspectives.“Too often,” President Kennedy told the graduates in a rousing appeal for intellectual humility, “we subject all facts to a prefabricated set of interpretations.” Too often, he continued, “we enjoy the comfort of opinion without the discomfort of thought.”History teaches us the grave hazard of certitude and the hubris from which it germinates. When I was a graduate student here, Professor Irving Janis, a social psychologist, was one of my teachers. He formulated the concept of groupthink and linked the suppression of dissent to a series of foreign policy debacles such as the escalation of the Vietnam War and the Bay of Pigs invasion.The Bay of Pigs invasion—a decision by Kennedy to have the CIA lead a group of armed Cuban exiles in a failed attempt to overthrow Fidel Castro—was described by Kennedy aide Arthur Schlesinger as rooted in a “curious atmosphere of assumed consensus, [in which] not one spoke against it.”And as President Kennedy himself disclosed to TIME magazine, “there were 50 or so of us, presumably the most experienced and smartest people we could get, to plan such an operation. Most of us thought it would work…I wasn’t aware of any great opposition.” Yet “when we saw the wide range of the failures,” Kennedy continued, “we asked ourselves why it had not been apparent to somebody from the start. I guess you get walled off from reality when you want something to succeed too much.”The invasion was an embarrassment to the United States, and in those Cold War days, it pushed Cuba closer to the Soviet Union.In the many years since President Kennedy spoke at Yale, the silos in which unchecked opinion can find refuge have become both ubiquitous and more easily accessed; they act as echo chambers that reaffirm beliefs in real-time. Within these silos, speculation travels great distances without scrutiny. And the spirit of discord between these silos discourages the honest exchange of ideas across them. In short, clinging to our circles of consensus has grown more comforting—and questioning them, more difficult. I encourage you to reject that comfort, because a willingness to explore new ideas is what makes all the difference. You know this perfectly well, I realize. The diversity of academic experiences available here at Yale ensured that you were not limited to learning from those who already shared your outlook. Indeed, President Kennedy chose to speak of such matters at Yale “because of the self-evident truth that a great university is always enlisted against the spread of illusion and on the side of reality.”Another social psychologist, Mark Leary, who recently retired from the faculty of Duke University, closely examined the intellectual humility I seek to nurture in higher education generally and in you today. His review of this attribute—a recognition that “one’s beliefs and opinions might be incorrect”—reveals that it is associated with gratitude, altruism, empathy, and more satisfying relationships. And intellectually humble people are more likely to be forgiven by others for their mistakes.As extremism, polarization, and resulting gridlock plague our politics at a time when pressing challenges call on us to harness our shared humanity, Professor Leary details equally substantial advantages of intellectual humility for society, including “lower acrimony that is based on differences in beliefs and ideology…[and] greater negotiation and compromise.” When we first met four years ago in Woolsey Hall, I described a series of obligations that would accompany your Yale education, including the responsibility to be constantly curious—and to listen carefully to others. At that 2018 Opening Assembly, I encouraged members of this class to remember that “you have come to Yale because you don’t know everything—not yet.”Now, even as you prepare to depart Yale four years later, I will again declare that your acquisition of knowledge is unfinished. You will leave Yale despite not knowing everything. The transformative power of a liberal education lies not in a promise to teach you everything but in the preparedness to meet presumptions—including those we harbor ourselves—with a healthy measure of doubt. It lies not in the ability to answer but in the audacity to question.As graduates, it behooves you to carry forth the inquisitive attitude you have forged here at Yale into the world; to carry forth your insistence on pushing opinions—including your own—beyond the confines of comfort; your resolve to strengthen your reasoning through personal investigation and civil discourse.In thinking of these trademarks of the academic enterprise, I am reminded of a dictum from Rabbi Moses ben Maimon, the great medieval philosopher known as Maimonides. In his introduction to Pirkei Avot, Ethics of our Fathers, Maimonides urges readers to “accept the truth from whoever speaks it.” Indeed, wisdom is rooted in this willingness—this responsibility—to entertain ideas brought to you by others. To listen carefully. To think critically. To challenge your views—and then to change them when the discovery of truth demands it. As Justice Sonya Sotomayor said recently, “It is, I fear, too easy for people to fail to listen when what they’re hearing is different than what they think.As we know, engaging with those who hold profoundly different perspectives threatens not to betray our beliefs, but to broaden them. Listening to that with which we may disagree is an act not of conciliation, but of fidelity to truth. And admitting what we got wrong is no sign of failure, but a necessary step toward knowledge.The mark of a great education consists not only of the new frontiers of knowledge we reach, but of the existing viewpoints we reconsider; not necessarily of the understanding we gain, but of the assumptions we shed. For only when we subject the “prefabricated set of interpretations” President Kennedy spoke of here at Yale to scrutiny,can we elevate our limitations into points of strength. Indeed, humility—that willingness to say we are wrong—enables us to scale otherwise unattainable heights in the lifelong pursuit of knowledge.***As Yale graduates, you are allegiant to truth. You know that breakthroughs are byproducts of the questions you raise, the conventions you dispute, the fallacies you uncover. But, also, the mistakes you own. You know that the “new ideas and solutions” I spoke of when we first assembled as a class four years ago—ideas and solutions to fight disease, alleviate suffering, and find justice—are made better when they endure the rigors of critical inquiry.Perhaps now more than ever, the world into which you will soon enter needs you to search for these solutions. It needs your expertise. But it also needs your example as a graduate of this inspiring learning environment. It needs you to continue probing the preconceptions held by others and, with equal vigor, those you hold yourself. It needs your answers and your questions. It needs your scholarship and your skepticism. It needs your intellectual prowess. And it needs your intellectual humility.It needs you, Class of 2022. That privilege feels even more special than usual this year. It is an honor to speak to the Great undergraduate and graduate Classes of 2022. Earning a Princeton degree is an exceptional achievement in any year, but you have overcome challenges that none of us could have imagined when you began your studies here.You, your families, and your friends can be very proud of what you have accomplished. And you can be sure that the strength you have demonstrated will serve you well in the years ahead.Earlier this year, a Princeton alumnus in Atlanta asked me what quality or characteristic I considered the best predictor for success in college and beyond. I began by saying that I was reluctant to generalize across a very diverse student body with a dazzling array of talents. Princeton students succeed in many and inspiring ways, a fact that all of you have vividly confirmed during your time here.Still, I said to our alum, if I had to name one quality that mattered across the many dimensions of achievement and talent, it would be persistence: the ability and drive to keep going when things get hard. All of us go through difficult times. To achieve our goals we have to find ways to continue even when—indeed, especially when—obstacles seem insurmountable or endless, and pressing onward feels exhausting, daunting, or just plain dull. Persistence is, I admit, a rather unglamorous virtue by comparison to, say, genius, creativity, or courage. An old adage, often but perhaps erroneously attributed to the nineteenth century humorist Josh Billings, praises persistence by comparing it to the postage stamp, which achieves success simply by “sticking to one thing until it gets there.”Modest though it may be, however, persistence is at least as important to achievement, including academic achievement, as are any more celebrated characteristics.You earned your degrees today in many ways and for many reasons, but not least because you persisted brilliantly throughout your time on this campus and away from it. You persisted not only through a world-altering pandemic, but through problem sets, writing assignments, laboratories, midterms, finals, senior theses, dissertations, and the personal crises and doubts that are an inevitable part of college life and, indeed, of life more generally.Getting to and crossing the finish line is hard, which is why we celebrate college degrees so enthusiastically.The degree you earn today matters tremendously. And it really is the degree that matters most, far more than the honors or other decorations that go with it. I do not know if this comes as welcome news or bad tidings, but I must tell you that there is surprisingly little correlation between grade point average and success in later life. But getting a college degree? That correlates with everything from higher incomes to better health to greater civic engagement—and the list goes on.Persisting through college matters, which is why we celebrate Commencement day with admiration and exuberant joy.At Princeton, students have taken different paths through the challenges of the pandemic. Some took a year off, some did not. One way or another, however, graduation rates for Princeton students remain sky-high.We should recognize, however, that is not true everywhere. At college Commencements around the country, there are missing chairs and missing students this year, and there will likely be more missing chairs in the years to come.Some students left school during the pandemic and have not returned. Some high school students who might have gone to college have made other choices instead. Though the data is incomplete, both problems appear to have a disproportionate effect on students from less advantaged backgrounds and those who attend community colleges and other public, two-year institutions. That is a tragedy. A tragedy because, as I said a moment ago, the degree matters. All of us who attend ceremonies like this one, all of us who celebrate students who have earned a college degree, should recognize the urgent need to bring back those who have found the path to a college degree blocked or unpassable. It is especially damaging when students drop out of college after incurring debt, even if the amount of debt is small. When media outlets cover student debt, they like to focus on the eye-popping loans some students accumulate. In fact, though, most student loan defaults involve students with small debts who leave college without getting a degree. If students persist to graduation, their earning power goes up, and they can often pay back even large loans. Without a degree, they see no increase in earning power, and often find no way to pay back even small loans. Half a degree does not get you half the earning power: unfortunately, it gets you almost nothing.We need policies to help those who have left college. New Jersey Governor Phil Murphy, for example, has proposed a new “Some College, No Degree” program to assist the more than 700,000 New Jerseyans who left school without finishing. I hope that the legislature will fund the proposal. At the federal level, a bipartisan group of senators sponsored legislation, called the “ASPIRE Act,” that would have provided colleges and universities with incentives to improve their graduation rates and to increase their representation of low-income students. That bill did not pass; no proposal is perfect. One way or another, however, we need to make sure that talented students from low-income families get the support they need to make it to and through college. One way or another, we need to add back the chairs missing from graduation ceremonies around the country.I hope that today and in the week ahead, as you celebrate your degree, you will take time to thank the friends, family members, teachers, mentors, and others who helped you to persist across the finish line. None of us succeed on our own, in normal times or in difficult ones. And, in that spirit, I hope, too, that as all of you pursue quests and adventures beyond this campus, you will help others to persist across the finish line as you have done so remarkably yourselves.I know that, whatever you do, you will make Princeton proud, and that you will put your talents, creativity, and character to work in ways that we can scarcely imagine today.All of us on this platform are thrilled to be a part of your celebration. We applaud your persistence, your talent, your achievements, and your aspirations. We send our best wishes as you embark upon the path that lies ahead, and we hope it will bring you back to this campus many times. We look forward to welcoming you when you return, and we say, to the Great Class of 2022, congratulations! Rafael Reif 希望学生也能够带着这样独特的价值观进入社会，发现和解决社会问题，努力弥补社会创伤，让这个世界变得更加美好。 以下是演讲的精华节选： MIT的学生善于发现未阐明的问题，敢于尝试疯狂的想法，并非常努力地工作以付诸实践。这种精神正是我今天向你们传递的使命。 在离开学校，开始全新的人生旅途之时，我希望你们能够拥抱世界，让这个世界更友爱、更有激情、更严格、更有创意、更有抱负、更谦虚、更尊重、更慷慨、更友好！ 我们的社会就如同复杂的大家庭，正处于可怕的争论之中。 而我相信每个人都可以通过自己的方式，以同理心认真倾听，专注于实现共同目标，并不断提醒对方共同的人性，从而使世界变得更好。 而当你努力拥抱世界的同时，也请修复这个世界所经受的创伤。 To everyone who came here this morning, to celebrate our graduates – welcome to MIT!
It has always puzzled me when events like this are referred to as “Commencement Exercises,” because they involve so much sitting down! So I am going to start with a little something to get our hearts moving.At MIT, one thing we understand is the importance of distinguishing the signal from the noise. But sometimes, if the noise is noisy enough, it actually becomes the signal!We all know that getting through MIT is not a “solo performance.” In fact, it usually takes an orchestra of loving assistance! So I would like each of you to hold in your mind now all the people who helped you along the way: your family, your role models, your professors and teaching assistants, your friends. In a moment, I hope that, together, we can send them a signal – in a very noisy way. To do that, you will need to say two words, as loud as you can: “Thank you!” You got it? Just those two words, “Thank you!” OK, now, ready? On the count of three: One, two, three – THANK YOU!Hmm. You are lucky I had already agreed to grade this Pass/No Record. That first attempt was pretty good, but you can do better. I believe in you! so I am going to give you another chance.And this time, let’s try it with your hands up in the air! All the way up! Now, nice and loud, so it’s even noisy for the people online. OK – one, two, three: THANK YOU!And thank you right back!So, why did I ask you to do that? I knew it would create a brief pleasant sensation for the people you love. But I was also after something deeper. Just ask anyone from Brain and Cognitive Sciences (Course….? That’s right, Course 9!). As anyone from Course 9 can tell you, research indicates that simply expressing gratitude does wonderful things to your brain.It gets different parts of your brain to act in a synchronized way! It lights up reward pathways! It even gives you a little shot of dopamine! In other words, expressing gratitude and appreciation for other people is good for our brains – and it is very good for our hearts.We are living in a difficult and complicated moment in history. All of us could use a reliable device for feeling better. So now – thanks to brain science! – you have one! The Gratitude Amplifier is unbreakable. Its battery never dies, and it will never try to sell you anything. You can use it every day, forever – and it’s free! It is a graduation present you can take with you anywhere, even if all your moving boxes are already taped shut. I am so extremely grateful to have all of you here on Killian Court, on this wonderful day, for this tremendously important occasion.I expect that those of you graduating may come to this day with mixed feelings: with excitement for your next steps, but with the sense that you did not get enough time on campus – time with your professors, and especially with each other.For that reason, I am particularly grateful that you are here in person. And, looking back, I am also grateful for how much I have learned from members of this class.I want to focus on one effort that several of today’s graduates helped to lead – an effort to create an antidote to intensity. We all know that MIT is intense. That is part of why we love it: MIT attracts intense people (like all of you!) – and then we push each other, and we inspire each other, intensely.But everyone needs a break from the intensity sometimes. Different students find different ways to relieve it – Music! Sports! Ballroom dancing! And some students even find relief by inventing ways to relieve stress for other people.A few years ago, before the pandemic, a group of students on the Undergraduate Association looked around and concluded that what MIT really needed was a casual place, in the middle of campus, where students could stop, relax, hang out, study if need be and get free food, 24 hours a day.When a space freed up in Room 26-110, the Banana Lounge was born! Yes, the Banana Lounge. For those who have not been there yet: The Banana Lounge is a long, sunny room, near the main campus crossroads. It is full of colorful paintings, great big leafy plants, Lego sets, bean-bag chairs – and boxes and boxes of bananas.Now, as a native of Venezuela, I take certain things very seriously, and one of them is tropical fruit. If they had asked me, it would have been all about mangoes! But of course, with a mango, there is that huge, slippery, ridiculous seed; as the students determined very quickly, the mango simply cannot compete with the elegant engineering of the seedless, self-packaged banana.In its charming quirkiness, the Banana Lounge is “very MIT.” And it turns out to be “very MIT” in every other way, too.The students began with a prototype lounge, tested it in real-world conditions and optimized it for efficiency and comfort. They evaluated competing fruit for comparative nutritional content, analyzed alternative supply chains, determined the ideal green/yellow ratio in purchasing and worked to minimize the per-banana unit cost.They tracked and calibrated the temperature and humidity of their banana inventory in real time, online, and they established protocols to freeze excess supply and to capture the valueas banana bread.They secured funding from a very generous member of the Class of 1987, Brad Feld (who paid for all of this year’s bananas! Thank you, Brad!) And they developed the cutting-edge concept of “free coffee,” which, in their words, was “critical to stimulating the lounge atmosphere and promoting conversation.”Already, the lounge has served more than five-hundred-thousand bananas! (Two of which were mine…) And it has generated a very significant number of banana-induced naps as well.The students have done all this essentially themselves… applying their MIT skills and the most delightful MIT values. They identified an unarticulated problem, dared to try a “crazy” idea, worked incredibly hard – and in the process, they built a wonderful, tropical, perfectly improbable new MIT institution. And we could not be more grateful.So it is in that spirit that I deliver my charge to you. I’m going to use a word that feels very comfortable at MIT – although it has taken on a troubling new meaning elsewhere. But I know that our graduates will know what I mean.After you depart for your new destinations, I want to ask you to hack the world – until you make the world a little more like MIT: More daring and more passionate. More rigorous, inventive and ambitious. More humble, more respectful, more generous, more kind.And because the people of MIT also like to fix things that are broken, as you strive to hack the world, please try to heal the world, too. Our society is like a big, complicated family, in the midst of a terrible argument. I believe that one way to make it better is to find ways to listen to each other with compassion, to focus on achieving our shared objectives and to try constantly to remind each other of our common humanity. I know you will find your own ways to help with this healing, too.This morning, we share with the world almost thirty-seven-hundred new graduates who are ready for this urgent and timeless problem set. You came to MIT with exceptional qualities of your own. And now, after years of focused and intense dedication, you leave us, equipped with a distinctive set of skills and steeped in this community’s deepest values: A commitment to excellence. Integrity. Rising on your own merits. Boldness. Humility. An open spirit of collaboration. A strong desire to make a positive impact. And a sense of responsibility to make the world a better place.So now, go out there. Join the world. Find your calling. Solve the unsolvable. Invent the future. Take the high road. Try always to share your bananas! And you will continue to make your family, including your MIT family, proud.On this wonderful day, I am proud of all of you. To every one of the members of the graduating Class of 2022: Congratulations!!!! Please accept my best wishes for a happy and successful life and career. 最后，送上名校历史上最著名的毕业演讲之一： 乔布斯2005年，在斯坦福大学演讲的几段话： 时间有限，不要浪费在重复和消耗上。不要被教条束缚，那意味着你在以他人视角生活。不要让外界的喧嚣，掩盖你内心真实的声音。 最重要的是，有勇气去听从你的直觉和内心的指示。它们在某种程度上知道你内心真正想要成为的样子，而所有其他事都是次要的。 我曾在杂志封底，看到一张乡村公路的照片写着：求知若饥，虚心若愚。这是他们停止发刊的告别语。我总希望自己能够那样，在你们即将开始全新旅程的时刻，我也希望你们能够：求知若饥，虚心若愚。 Reference |
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