Ted英語演講：Do schools kill creativity?教育扼殺創造力嗎

• 2026考研英語全程班 6班
• 26考研全科上岸規劃營「擇校▪規劃▪備考」
• 2026考研專業課復習資料「真題▪筆記▪講義▪題庫」

Good morning. How are you? It's been great, hasn't it? I've been blown away by the whole thing. In fact, I'm leaving. (Laughter) There have been three themes, haven't there, running through the conference, which are relevant to what I want to talk about. One is the extraordinary evidence of human creativity in all of the presentations that we've had and in all of the people here. Just the variety of it and the range of it. The second is that it's put us in a place where we have no idea what's going to happen, in terms of the future. No idea how this may play out.

早上好. 還好嗎?很好吧,對不對? 我已經飄飄然了! 我要飄走了.(笑聲) 這次會議有三個主題 這三個主題貫穿會議始終,并且和 我要談的內容有關 其中之一就是人類創造力的偉大例證 這些例證已經體現在之前的演講當中 以及在座各位的身上. 從這些例證中我們看到了創新的多樣化 和多領域. 第二點-- 這些創新也讓我們意識到我們不知道未來會發生什么 完全不知道 未來會如何

I have an interest in education -- actually, what I find is everybody has an interest in education. Don't you? I find this very interesting. If you're at a dinner party, and you say you work in education -- actually, you're not often at dinner parties, frankly, if you work in education. (Laughter) You're not asked. And you're never asked back, curiously. That's strange to me. But if you are, and you say to somebody, you know, they say, "What do you do?" and you say you work in education, you can see the blood run from their face. They're like, "Oh my God," you know, "Why me? My one night out all week." (Laughter) But if you ask about their education, they pin you to the wall. Because it's one of those things that goes deep with people, am I right? Like religion, and MONEY and other things. I have a big interest in education, and I think we all do. We have a huge vested interest in it, partly because it's education that's meant to take us into this future that we can't grasp. If you think of it, children starting school this year will be retiring in 2065. Nobody has a clue -- despite all the expertise that's been on parade for the past four days -- what the world will look like in five years' time. And yet we're meant to be educating them for it. So the unpredictability, I think, is extraordinary.

我對教育感興趣 事實上,我發現每個人都對教育感興趣 難道不是嗎? 我發現這很有趣 如果你參加一個晚宴,你說 你在教育部門工作 坦白的講，如果你在教育部門工作，事實上你不會經常參加晚宴, (笑聲) 所以你不會被問及你是做哪行的。 你永遠不會被問到，很奇怪。 但是如果你被問及， 他們問:"你從事什么行業?" 你說你在教育部門工作 你會發現他們漲紅了臉,那意思好像是 “我的天啊，”“為什么讓我碰上?整整一周我才出來一次” (笑聲) 但如果你要他們談談他們的受教育經歷， 他們會把你“釘到墻上”. 因為這些事情都涉及 個人的隱私,對嗎? 比如宗教信仰,薪水等 我對教育特別感興趣,我認為我們都是如此 我們對此有巨大的既得利益 部分因為教育旨在 將我們帶入我們無法掌握的未來 大家想想,今年入學的小孩 2065將退休. 沒人知道會怎樣-- 雖然過去四天會議進程里都是關于這方面的專業討論-- 但我們還是無法預知這個世界 五年后的樣子。這就是為何我們要讓這些孩子 接受教育。我認為正是未來的不確定性 決定其非同尋常。

And the third part of this is that we've all agreed, nonetheless, on the really extraordinary capacities that children have -- their capacities for innovation. I mean, Sirena last night was a marvel, wasn't she? Just seeing what she could do. And she's exceptional, but I think she's not, so to speak, exceptional in the whole of childhood. What you have there is a person of extraordinary dedication who found a talent. And my contention is, all kids have tremendous talents. And we squander them, pretty ruthlessly. So I want to talk about education and I want to talk about creativity. My contention is that creativity now is as important in education as literacy, and we should treat it with the same status. (Applause) Thank you. That was it, by the way. Thank you very much. (Laughter) So, 15 minutes left. Well, I was born ... no. (Laughter)

第三點就是 我們都認同一個觀點-- 這些孩子的特別之處正是 他們的創新能力。我覺得昨晚Sirena的表現令人驚奇， 對嗎? 她很出色，但是我認為 她在孩提時代時沒顯得與眾不同。 現在的教育提倡的是一個有奉獻精神的老師 能發現一個天才學生。但我認為 所有孩子都是偉大的天才。 而我們卻無情地扼殺了他們的才能。 所以我想談談教育和 創造力。我認為 創造力和文化知識在教育中占同樣比重， 所以這兩方面我們應同等對待。 (掌聲)謝謝。而且， 非常感謝。(笑聲)還剩15分鐘。 我出生于--說錯了(笑聲)

I heard a great story recently -- I love telling it -- of a little girl who was in a drawing lesson. She was six and she was at the back, drawing, and the teacher said this little girl hardly ever paid attention, and in this drawing lesson she did. The teacher was fascinated and she went over to her and she said, "What are you drawing?" And the girl said, "I'm drawing a picture of God." And the teacher said, "But nobody knows what God looks like." And the girl said, "They will in a minute." (Laughter)

最近我聽到一個很不錯的故事--我很愿意講講這個故事-- 說的是一個小女孩正在上繪畫課。小女孩只有六歲 她坐在教室的后排，正在畫畫， 而她的老師評價她幾乎從不 注意聽講，但在繪畫課上她卻聽得很認真。 老師饒有興趣地走過去 問她：“你在畫什么?” 她說：“我畫的是上帝。” 老師說：“可是沒人知道上帝長什么樣。” 這時小女孩說：“他們馬上就能知道上帝的樣子了。” (笑聲)

When my son was four in England -- actually he was four everywhere, to be honest. (Laughter) If we're being strict about it, wherever he went, he was four that year. He was in the Nativity play. Do you remember the story? No, it was big. It was a big story. Mel Gibson did the sequel. You may have seen it: "Nativity II." But James got the part of Joseph, which we were thrilled about. We considered this to be one of the lead parts. We had the place crammed full of agents in T-shirts: "James Robinson IS Joseph!" (Laughter) He didn't have to speak, but you know the bit where the three kings come in. They come in bearing gifts, and they bring gold, frankincense and myrrh. This really happened. We were sitting there and I think they just went out of sequence, because we talked to the little boy afterward and we said, "You OK with that?" And he said, "Yeah, why? Was that wrong?" They just switched, that was it. Anyway, the three boys came in -- four-year-olds with tea towels on their heads -- and they put these boxes down, and the first boy said, "I bring you gold." And the second boy said, "I bring you myrrh." And the third boy said, "Frank sent this." (Laughter)

我兒子四歲時在英國-- 實際上他那會兒在哪都四歲(笑聲) 嚴格地說他四歲那年在哪個國家記不清了，只記得他四歲那年 去演舞臺劇《基督誕生》 你們記得那部劇的情節嗎?應該記不得，情節太長。 故事太長。梅爾.吉布森演過那部劇的續集。 你們也許看過，叫《基督誕生II》。我兒子James在那部舞臺劇里演Joseph, 我們為此很興奮。 我們以為那是個主要角色。 我們給觀眾們發了T恤： 上面印著“James Robinson 扮演 Joseph"(笑聲) 他的角色不一定有臺詞，劇情是 三個國王拿著禮物走進來 他們分別拿著黃金，乳香精油，沒藥精油。 演出開始了。我們坐在觀眾席上 我認為他們應該按順序出場， 演出結束后我們對James說： “你們剛才演的對嗎?”他說：“對啊，怎么了，哪錯了嗎?” 其實他們把劇情改了。 他們是這么演的：三個小演員出場， 四歲的小家伙們頭上戴著擦杯子用的毛巾， 他們放下手上拿的盒子 第一個孩子說：“我帶來了黃金。” 第二個孩子說：“我帶來了沒藥精油。” 第三個孩子說：“Frank帶來了這個”(笑聲)(注：“frankincense乳香精油”英文發音和“Frank sent this”英文發音相似)

What these things have in common is that kids will take a chance. If they don't know, they'll have a go. Am I right? They're not frightened of being wrong. Now, I don't mean to say that being wrong is the same thing as being creative. What we do know is, if you're not prepared to be wrong, you'll never come up with anything original -- if you're not prepared to be wrong. And by the time they get to be adults, most kids have lost that capacity. They have become frightened of being wrong. And we run our companies like this, by the way. We stigmatize mistakes. And we're now running national education systems where mistakes are the worst thing you can make. And the result is that we are educating people out of their creative capacities. Picasso once said this -- he said that all children are born artists. The problem is to remain an artist as we grow up. I believe this passionately, that we don't grow into creativity, we grow out of it. Or rather, we get educated out if it. So why is this?

以上例子的共同點就是孩子們愿意冒險。 對于未知的事物，他們愿意去嘗試。 難道不是嗎?即使嘗試的結果是錯誤的，他們也不懼怕。 當然，我并不認為錯誤的嘗試等同于創新。 但我們都知道 如果你不打算做錯誤的嘗試 你永遠不會創造出新東西。 如果你不想讓孩子們做錯誤的嘗試，等他們長大了， 多數孩子就會喪失創新的能力。 那就會使他們也變得懼怕錯誤的嘗試。 這種情況也存在于公司經營方面。 我們不能容忍任何錯誤。這就使得現在的 教育體系成為 最不能容忍錯誤的領域。 這樣做的后果就是我們的教育體制正在扼殺 孩子們的創造力。畢加索曾說過: “孩子們是天生的藝術家” 問題是我們長大后能否繼續保有藝術靈感。我堅信： 我們隨著年齡的增長而喪失了創造力， 甚至可以說，是我們所受的教育讓我們喪失了創造力。 為什么會這樣?

I lived in Stratford-on-Avon until about five years ago. In fact, we moved from Stratford to Los Angeles. So you can imagine what a seamless transition that was. (Laughter) Actually, we lived in a place called Snitterfield, just outside Stratford, which is where Shakespeare's father was born. Are you struck by a new thought? I was. You don't think of Shakespeare having a father, do you? Do you? Because you don't think of Shakespeare being a child, do you? Shakespeare being seven? I never thought of it. I mean, he was seven at some point. He was in somebody's English class, wasn't he? How annoying would that be? (Laughter) "Must try harder." Being sent to bed by his dad, you know, to Shakespeare, "Go to bed, now," to William Shakespeare, "and put the pencil down. And stop speaking like that. It's confusing everybody." (Laughter)

五年前，我住在Stratford-on-Avon(注：英國市鎮，莎士比亞出生與埋葬之地)。 現在我已經搬到了洛杉磯。 可想而知，這是個多么合乎邏輯的移居。 (笑聲)其實， 那時我們住在Snitterfield 就在Stratford郊外，那里是 莎士比亞父親的出生地。你有過靈感嗎?我曾經有過。 你沒把莎士比亞和他的父親聯想在一起，對嗎? 因為你忽略了 莎士比亞也曾經是個孩子，對嗎? 莎士比亞七歲時什么樣?我從沒想過--他七歲時 的某個特定場景。比如他在上 英語課，想想他在上英語課--多么不可思議 (笑聲)“你要努力學習”你能想象他父親邊說邊把他抱上床， “現在該睡覺了” 他父親又說：“放下筆， 別再寫那些東西了，別人都看不懂。” (笑聲)

Anyway, we moved from Stratford to Los Angeles, and I just want to say a word about the transition, actually. My son didn't want to come. I've got two kids. He's 21 now; my daughter's 16. He didn't want to come to Los Angeles. He loved it, but he had a girlfriend in England. This was the love of his life, Sarah. He'd known her for a month. Mind you, they'd had their fourth anniversary, because it's a long time when you're 16. Anyway, he was really upset on the plane, and he said, "I'll never find another girl like Sarah." And we were rather pleased about that, frankly, because she was the main reason we were leaving the country. (Laughter)

話說遠了，剛才說到我們從Stratford搬到洛杉磯， 我想說的是，對于這次搬家， 我兒子并不愿意。 我有兩個孩子。兒子現在21歲了，女兒16歲。 我兒子不愿搬到洛杉磯。雖然他喜歡這， 但在英國，他有個女友，是他的最愛，叫Sarah. 他們認識只有一個月后就開始交往了。 我們要搬家時他們已交往了4年。 這對于16歲的年齡來說已經很長了。 我兒子上了飛機后很郁悶， 他說：“我再也找不到像Sarah那樣的女孩了。” 但說實話，做為家長的我們為此很慶幸。 因為那個女孩是我們搬家的主要原因。 (笑聲)

But something strikes you when you move to America and when you travel around the world: Every education system on earth has the same hierarchy of subjects. Every one. Doesn't matter where you go. You'd think it would be otherwise, but it isn't. At the top are mathematics and languages, then the humanities, and the bottom are the arts. Everywhere on Earth. And in pretty much every system too, there's a hierarchy within the arts. Art and music are normally given a higher status in schools than drama and dance. There isn't an education system on the planet that teaches dance everyday to children the way we teach them mathematics. Why? Why not? I think this is rather important. I think math is very important, but so is dance. Children dance all the time if they're allowed to, we all do. We all have bodies, don't we? Did I miss a meeting? (Laughter) Truthfully, what happens is, as children grow up, we start to educate them progressively from the waist up. And then we focus on their heads. And slightly to one side.

但搬到美國后，有些事使我印象深刻 如果你周游世界 你會發現每個國家的教育體系都存在相同的學科等級制度。 沒有例外。不論哪個國家。 你認為也許會有例外，但沒有。 排在最前面的學科是數學和語言， 接下去是人文學科，藝術排在最后。 世界上所有國家都是如此。 而且相同的還有 就是在藝術學科范圍內也有等級制。 通常學校把美術課和音樂課看的較重要 然后是戲劇課和舞蹈課。沒有哪個國家的教育體系 天天安排舞蹈課 但卻每天都安排數學課。為什么? 為什么不是每天安排舞蹈課呢?我認為舞蹈課很重要。 我認為舞蹈課和數學課同樣重要。 如果有允許，孩子們會不停地跳舞，我們也一樣。 我們都有體會，對嗎? (笑聲)事實上， 隨著孩子年齡增長，我們開始教導他們 別的東西，(以前是教他們走和跑)，而隨著他們長大，我們更關注的是他們的頭腦。 而且略微偏重大腦的一側。

If you were to visit education, as an alien, and say "What's it for, public education?" I think you'd have to conclude -- if you look at the output, who really succeeds by this, who does everything that they should, who gets all the brownie points, who are the winners -- I think you'd have to conclude the whole purpose of public education throughout the world is to produce university professors. Isn't it? They're the people who come out the top. And I used to be one, so there. (Laughter) And I like university professors, but you know, we shouldn't hold them up as the high-water mark of all human achievement. They're just a form of life, another form of life. But they're rather curious, and I say this out of affection for them. There's something curious about professors in my experience -- not all of them, but typically -- they live in their heads. They live up there, and slightly to one side. They're disembodied, you know, in a kind of literal way. They look upon their body as a form of transport for their heads, don't they? (Laughter) It's a way of getting their head to meetings. If you want real evidence of out-of-body experiences, by the way, get yourself along to a residential conference of senior academics, and pop into the discotheque on the final night. (Laughter) And there you will see it -- grown men and women writhing uncontrollably, off the beat, waiting until it ends so they can go home and write a paper about it.

如果你以一個外國人的身份來參觀我們的教育體系， 帶著這樣的問題：“公辦教育的目的是什么?” 那么當你看到我們的教育體系產業化的發展，我相信，你就會明白 是誰在真正從中受益， 是誰被教導著該做什么不該做什么， 是誰得了滿分，誰是第一名-- 關于公辦教育的目的，我想你會得出這樣的結論 世界上所有的公辦教育 都以培養大學教授為目的。難道不是嗎? 因為大學教授是象牙塔尖上的人。 我也曾是一名大學教授，也是塔尖上的人。(笑聲) 我傾慕大學教授的學識，但 我們不應該用這樣一個頭銜作為衡量一個人成功與否的分水嶺。 其實大學教授只是360行中的一行， 只不過他們比較好求知， 我這樣說不是因為對他們的傾慕。 在我看來，大學教授有個特點-- 雖然不是共性，但很典型--他們只用腦子生活。 而且偏重于大腦的一側。 用書面語來說就是--他們腦體分離。 他們只是把身體當作 大腦的載體而已，難道不是嗎? (笑聲)這個載體可以載著大腦去開會。 如果你想親身體驗 你就去參加一次會議 --學術研討會， 然后在會議結束后再去迪廳蹦迪。 (笑聲)在那你會看到，成年男女 在不和樂拍地瘋狂搖擺。 期待夜晚的結束好回家寫篇關于蹦迪的論文。

Now our education system is predicated on the idea of academic ability. And there's a reason. The whole system was invented -- around the world, there were no public systems of education, really, before the 19th century. They all came into being to meet the needs of industrialism. So the hierarchy is rooted on two ideas. Number one, that the most useful subjects for work are at the top. So you were probably steered benignly away from things at school when you were a kid, things you liked, on the grounds that you would never get a job doing that. Is that right? Don't do music, you're not going to be a musician; don't do art, you won't be an artist. Benign advice -- now, profoundly mistaken. The whole world is engulfed in a revolution. And the second is academic ability, which has really come to dominate our view of intelligence, because the universities designed the system in their image. If you think of it, the whole system of public education around the world is a protracted process of university entrance. And the consequence is that many highly talented, brilliant, creative people think they're not, because the thing they were good at at school wasn't valued, or was actually stigmatized. And I think we can't afford to go on that way.

注重培養學術能力的觀點根植于我們的教育體系之中。 形成這種狀況還有個原因-- 所有國家的教育體系在最初建立時 也就是在19世紀之前--那時教育還不是公共事業。 那時建立教育體系 是為了滿足工業化發展的需要。 所以有兩點基本的等級原則。 第一點，對工作最實用的科目 是最重要的科目。這樣就能輕易地避開 孩子們喜歡的科目，從小就不讓他們碰觸。 理由就是 不這樣學就找不到工作。對嗎? 別玩音樂了，你成不了音樂家; 別畫畫了，你成不了藝術家。 這些溫和的忠告--筑成現在的大錯。全世界 都被卷入了工業革命的熱潮。 第二點，學術能力已經成為 衡量好學生的主要標準 這種標準是那些大學自己制定的。 只要你思考一下就會發現整個教育體系 不論哪個國家的公共教育都是一種按部就班的程序 最終目標是為了考入大學。 造成的后果就是許多很有天才的 有創造力的學生被鈍化了。 因為這些學生發現他們的專長在學校 并不受重視甚至還受到蔑視。 我認為我們不能再這樣扼殺孩子們的天才了。

In the next 30 years, according to UNESCO, more people worldwide will be graduating through education than since the beginning of history. More people, and it's the combination of all the things we've talked about -- technology and its transformation effect on work, and demography and the huge explosion in population. Suddenly, degrees aren't worth anything. Isn't that true? When I was a student, if you had a degree, you had a job. If you didn't have a job it's because you didn't want one. And I didn't want one, frankly. (Laughter) But now kids with degrees are often heading home to carry on playing video games, because you need an MA where the previous job required a BA, and now you need a PhD for the other. It's a process of academic inflation. And it indicates the whole structure of education is shifting beneath our feet. We need to radically rethink our view of intelligence.

根據聯合國教科文組織的統計，今后30年 全世界畢業的學生將超過 過去的總和。 這就是人口增長造成的，人口增長關系到 我們談論的許多話題-- 包括技術和技術變革對生產力的影響、人口統計學 及人口爆炸。 很快，文憑就不再有含金量了。是這樣吧? 我上學那會兒，有文憑就有工作。 那時候如果你沒工作，那是因為你不想找。 說實話，我那時候就是這樣。(笑聲) 但現在的狀況是，孩子們有文憑卻經常 呆在家里打電腦游戲， 因為以前只要學士學位的工作崗位現在需要碩士學位， 現在還沒畢業的孩子將來就得有個博士學位才好找工作。 這就是學術學位的通貨膨脹。 這是整個教育體系 坍塌的前兆。我們必須從根本上反思 我們評價好學生的標準。

We know three things about intelligence. One, it's diverse. We think about the world in all the ways that we experience it. We think visually, we think in sound, we think kinesthetically. We think in abstract terms, we think in movement. Secondly, intelligence is dynamic. If you look at the interactions of a human brain, as we heard yesterday from a number of presentations, intelligence is wonderfully interactive. The brain isn't divided into compartments. In fact, creativity -- which I define as the process of having original ideas that have value -- more often than not comes about through the interaction of different disciplinary ways of seeing things.

培養人才有三個原則 第一，多樣化。我們認知世界的角度不同 有的從視覺角度， 有的從聽覺角度，有的從美學角度 有的從抽象的角度，有的從動態的角度。 第二，好學生應該是充滿活力的。 如果觀察一下人類大腦的內部組織，就像我們 昨天所看到的演講中演示的， 大腦發育具有關聯性。 大腦不應被分成幾部分。 其實我認為應該創造性地把大腦看作一整套工序-- 生產有價值的原創想法的工序-- 這種原創想法往往來自互動的思考方式 而不是呆板的常規模式。

The brain is intentionally -- by the way, there's a shaft of nerves that joins the two halves of the brain called the corpus callosum. It's thicker in women. Following off from Helen yesterday, I think this is probably why women are better at multi-tasking. Because you are, aren't you? There's a raft of research, but I know it from my personal life. If my wife is cooking a meal at home -- which is not often, thankfully. (Laughter) But you know, she's doing -- no, she's good at some things -- but if she's cooking, you know, she's dealing with people on the phone, she's talking to the kids, she's painting the ceiling, she's doing open-heart surgery over here. If I'm cooking, the door is shut, the kids are out, the phone's on the hook, if she comes in I get annoyed. I say, "Terry, please, I'm trying to fry an egg in here. Give me a break." (Laughter) Actually, you know that old philosophical thing, if a tree falls in a forest and nobody hears it, did it happen? Remember that old chestnut? I saw a great t-shirt really recently which said, "If a man speaks his mind in a forest, and no woman hears him, is he still wrong?" (Laughter)

大腦本來就是 由神經來連接左腦和右腦 這個連接部分叫胼胝體(醫學名詞)。女性大腦中的這個部分比男性的要厚。 昨天聽了Helen的演講受到啟發，我認為 腦部特征可能使女性更善于應對頭緒紛亂的事情。 對嗎? 雖然關于這方面的研究有很多，但我對于這方面的了解其實來源于我的親身體驗。 我妻子在家做飯時-- 感謝上帝，她不常做飯，(笑聲) 雖然她不擅廚藝但很擅長其他一些事-- 不過她做飯時總是 打打電話， 和孩子們說說話，給天棚刷刷漆， 還在旁邊做開胸手術。 而我做飯時就會關上廚房門，不讓孩子們進來打擾， 不打電話，這時如果我妻子進來我會很生氣。 我會這樣對我妻子說：“Terry，我在煎雞蛋，請你別打擾。”(笑聲) 大家都知道那句有哲理的話-- 如果森林里有棵樹倒了可沒人聽到， 那是否意味著沒發生過?記得這句話嗎? 最近我看到一件很棒的T恤，上面印著：“如果一個男人說出他的心聲 卻是在森林里說的，而且沒被女人聽到， 那應該不算犯錯吧?”(笑聲)

And the third thing about intelligence is, it's distinct. I'm doing a new book at the moment called "Epiphany," which is based on a series of interviews with people about how they discovered their talent. I'm fascinated by how people got to be there. It's really prompted by a conversation I had with a wonderful woman who maybe most people have never heard of; she's called Gillian Lynne -- have you heard of her? Some have. She's a choreographer and everybody knows her work. She did "Cats" and "Phantom of the Opera." She's wonderful. I used to be on the board of the Royal Ballet in England, as you can see. Anyway, Gillian and I had lunch one day and I said, "Gillian, how'd you get to be a dancer?" And she said it was interesting; when she was at school, she was really hopeless. And the school, in the '30s, wrote to her parents and said, "We think Gillian has a learning disorder." She couldn't concentrate; she was fidgeting. I think now they'd say she had ADHD. Wouldn't you? But this was the 1930s, and ADHD hadn't been invented at this point. It wasn't an available condition. (Laughter) People weren't aware they could have that.

培養好學生的第三個原則就是-- 個性化。我目前在寫本書-- 書名叫《頓悟》，素材來自一些 訪談，訪談內容是關于怎樣發現 自身的才能。對于這點我很感興趣。 激發我寫這本書的原因是一次對話 我采訪了一位很優秀的女士，也許很多人 沒聽說過這個人，她叫Gillian Lynne, 你們知道這個人嗎?應該有人知道吧。她是一個舞蹈編劇 所有人都知道她的作品。 她編舞的作品有《貓》、《歌劇魅影》。 她很有才華。我在英國看過由皇家芭蕾舞團演出的她的作品。 你們也看過她的作品。 有一次，我和Gillian 吃午飯，我問她： “Gillian,你是怎樣成為舞蹈家的?她回答說： 說起來很有意思，她上學的時候， 覺得自己完全沒有希望。她上學那會兒是1930年代， 老師給她家長寫信說：“我們認為 Gillian患有學習障礙癥。”她無法集中注意力， 她老是坐不安生。用現在的話講，那意思就是 她有多動癥。你們也這么想吧?但那時候是1930年代， “多動癥”這個詞還沒出現。 那個老師用詞不當。(笑聲) 那時候人們還不知道用“多動癥”這個詞。

Anyway, she went to see this specialist. So, this oak-paneled room, and she was there with her mother, and she was led and sat on this chair at the end, and she sat on her hands for 20 minutes while this man talked to her mother about all the problems Gillian was having at school. And at the end of it -- because she was disturbing people; her HOMEWORK was always late; and so on, little kid of eight -- in the end, the doctor went and sat next to Gillian and said, "Gillian, I've listened to all these things that your mother's told me, and I need to speak to her privately." He said, "Wait here. We'll be back; we won't be very long," and they went and left her. But as they went out the room, he turned on the radio that was sitting on his desk. And when they got out the room, he said to her mother, "Just stand and watch her." And the minute they left the room, she said, she was on her feet, moving to the music. And they watched for a few minutes and he turned to her mother and said, "Mrs. Lynne, Gillian isn't sick; she's a dancer. Take her to a dance school."

于是，Gillian去看病。 她媽媽帶她去的， 醫生讓她坐在椅子上， 她把手壓在腿下，這樣過了20分鐘 她媽媽一直在向醫生講述 Gillian在學校的表現： 她在學校不安生， 她總是晚交作業，等等， 其實不過是個才8歲的孩子--最后，醫生走過去坐到 Gillian的旁邊對她說：“Gillian, 你媽媽跟我說了很多 現在我想和你媽媽單獨談談。” “你在這兒等一下，我們馬上談完。” 醫生和她媽媽出去了。 但醫生在出去時把收音機打開了 收音機在醫生辦公桌上。在他們 走出房間后，醫生對她媽媽說: “我們就站在這兒觀察一下她。”他們離開房間后， Gillian站起來，隨著音樂跳起舞來。 她媽媽和醫生在門外看了幾分鐘 醫生對她媽媽說： Lynne太太，Gillian沒病，她是個舞蹈天才。 讓她去上舞蹈學校吧。”

I said, "What happened?" She said, "She did. I can't tell you how wonderful it was. We walked in this room and it was full of people like me. People who couldn't sit still. People who had to move to think." Who had to move to think. They did ballet; they did tap; they did jazz; they did modern; they did contemporary. She was eventually auditioned for the Royal Ballet School; she became a soloist; she had a wonderful career at the Royal Ballet. She eventually graduated from the Royal Ballet School and founded her own company -- the Gillian Lynne Dance Company -- met Andrew Lloyd Weber. She's been responsible for some of the most successful musical theater productions in history; she's given pleasure to millions; and she's a multi-millionaire. Somebody else might have put her on medication and told her to calm down.

話說到這，我問Gillian：“后來怎么樣了?” 她回答道：“我媽媽送我去了舞蹈學校。我無法形容那里有多棒。 那里有很多像我這樣的人--坐不住的人。 我們必須在動態中才能思考。”他們跳芭蕾，跳踢踏舞，跳爵士舞， 跳現代舞。后來她考入皇家芭蕾舞學校，成為芭蕾舞女主演，事業發展很成功 從那畢業后 從皇家芭蕾舞學校畢業后 她成立了自己的公司--Gillian Lynne 舞蹈公司遇到了Andrew Lloyd Weber(注：歌舞劇《貓》的編曲者)。她負責擔任過一些極其成功的音樂劇的編舞 她給數以萬計的觀眾帶來了藝術享受， 她也是個億萬富翁。可是，有人也許曾認為她有多動癥命令她 “冷靜。”

Now, I think ... (Applause) What I think it comes to is this: Al Gore spoke the other night about ecology and the revolution that was triggered by Rachel Carson. I believe our only hope for the future is to adopt a new conception of human ecology, one in which we start to reconstitute our conception of the richness of human capacity. Our education system has mined our minds in the way that we strip-mine the earth: for a particular commodity. And for the future, it won't serve us. We have to rethink the fundamental principles on which we're educating our children. There was a wonderful quote by Jonas Salk, who said, "If all the insects were to disappear from the earth, within 50 years all life on Earth would end. If all human beings disappeared from the earth, within 50 years all forms of life would flourish." And he's right.

現在，我想說的是--(掌聲) AL Gore(注：美國前副總統) 曾在這里做過一次演講 內容是關于生態學以及Rachel Carson(注：美國海洋生物學家)引發的那次環境保護運動。我相信對于未來，我們的唯一出路 是貫徹一種新的人性化生態的思想，也就是說我們應重新定義 人類能力的多樣化。 我們的教育體系培養我們的方式 正如我們開采地球的方式--以功利為目的。 但這種方式對于未來將不再適用。我們必須重新思考那些最基本的準則 也就是我們教育孩子的準則。Jonas Salk(注：美國生物學家、醫學家)曾說過：“如果所有的昆蟲 都從地球上消失的話，那么50年之內，所有生命也將從地球上消失。而如果人類從地球上消失的話，那么50年之內，其他物種會活得更好。”他說的很對。

What TED celebrates is the gift of the human imagination. We have to be careful now that we use this gift wisely and that we avert some of the scenarios that we've talked about. And the only way we'll do it is by seeing our creative capacities for the richness they are and seeing our children for the hope that they are. And our task is to educate their whole being, so they can face this future. By the way -- we may not see this future, but they will. And our job is to help them make something of it. Thank you very much.

TED倡導的是人類的創造性思維。現在，我們必須運用這種思維方式小心地 避開那些按部就班的規則 達到這個目的唯一的方法 就是運用創造力最大限度地發揮創造力，而且用孩子們喜歡的方式培養他們。我們的任務是全方位地培養孩子，這樣他們才能面對未來的社會。順便說句--我們可能活不到未來那天但孩子們會。而我們要做的就是幫助他們能在未來有所作為。謝謝大家。