Beware conflicts of interest | Dan Ariely

翻译人员: Bear Jin 校对人员: Felix Chen

So, I was in the hospital for a long time.

我之前很长一段时间都在住院

And a few years after I left, I went back,

出院的几年后，我故地重游

and the chairman of the burn department was very excited to see me --

烧伤部门的主任激动的接见了我--

said, "Dan, I have a fantastic new treatment for you."

说到 ''丹，我为你准备了一种新型神奇的治疗方法"

I was very excited. I walked with him to his office.

我怀着激动的心情随他走进了他的办公室

And he explained to me that, when I shave,

当我刮胡子的时候，他给我做了具体解释

I have little black dots on the left side of my face where the hair is,

我在左边发髻旁边有些小黑点

but on the right side of my face

而我的脸右侧

I was badly burned so I have no hair,

我曾严重烧伤过 所以几乎没有须发

and this creates lack of symmetry.

这就缺乏对称

And what's the brilliant idea he had?

而他的天才之处在哪儿呢?

He was going to tattoo little black dots

他打算在我脸右边

on the right side of my face

纹上一些小黑点

and make me look very symmetric.

来让我看起来有对称的美感

It sounded interesting. He asked me to go and shave.

这主意听着很有意思 他让我去把胡子剃了

Let me tell you, this was a strange way to shave,

告诉我 这是一种奇怪的剃须方式

because I thought about it

因为我曾想过

and I realized that the way I was shaving then

而且觉得我的剃须方法

would be the way I would shave for the rest of my life --

会定型成后半辈子的剃须方法--

because I had to keep the width the same.

因为我必须要保证两边宽度相同

When I got back to his office,

当我回到他办公司的时候

I wasn't really sure.

我还不是很确定

I said, "Can I see some evidence for this?"

我就问到 "能给我看些样本吗?"

So he showed me some pictures

他给我看了些

of little cheeks with little black dots --

脸上带些小黑点的照片--

not very informative.

消息不是很充分

I said, "What happens when I grow older and my hair becomes white?

我问道 "我老了之后头发变白了 那怎么办?"

What would happen then?"

"到时候 会怎么样?"

"Oh, don't worry about it," he said.

"哦 不用担心这点" 他回答道

"We have lasers; we can whiten it out."

"沃恩能用激光把它变成白色"

But I was still concerned,

但我还是有点担心

so I said, "You know what, I'm not going to do it."

说到 "你猜怎么着 我不打算做了"

And then came one of the biggest guilt trips of my life.

接着 这成为了我生命中最大的罪恶感

This is coming from a Jewish guy, all right, so that means a lot.

这个对于一个犹太教徒来说 意义重大啊

(Laughter)

（笑声）

And he said, "Dan, what's wrong with you?

他说 "丹，你怎么了?"

Do you enjoy looking non-symmetric?

你喜欢这样不对称的样子?

Do you have some kind of perverted pleasure from this?

你有这种畸形的爱好?

Do women feel pity for you

有女人感觉你很可怜

and have sex with you more frequently?"

用频繁的性爱来安慰你?

None of those happened.

所有这些都没有发生

And this was very surprising to me,

这点让我很惊讶

because I've gone through many treatments --

因为我接受过很多治疗--

there were many treatments I decided not to do --

也有很多我决定不接受的治疗--

and I never got this guilt trip to this extent.

我从来没有这么后悔过

But I decided not to have this treatment.

但是我决定还是不接受这个治疗

And I went to his deputy and asked him, "What was going on?

我找到他的助手问到 "发生了什么?"

Where was this guilt trip coming from?"

这种罪恶感从何而来

And he explained that they have done this procedure on two patients already,

他解释到 他们已经在两名患者上进行了治疗

and they need the third patient for a paper they were writing.

他们需要第三个患者 来完成他们的报告

(Laughter)

（笑声）

Now you probably think that this guy's a schmuck.

现在你可能觉得这个人是个白痴

Right, that's what he seems like.

就是 他就是这样个人

But let me give you a different perspective on the same story.

但是我来给大家一个不同的视角来看待相同的故事

A few years ago, I was running some of my own experiments in the lab.

几年前 我在实验室里进行一系列我自己的实验

And when we run experiments,

当我们做实验的时候

we usually hope that one group will behave differently than another.

我们经常希望实验组会表现的和对照组截然不同

So we had one group that I hoped their performance would be very high,

所以我们对实验组的表现有着很高的期待

another group that I thought their performance would be very low,

对对照组的表现 我们的期望则会比较低

and when I got the results, that's what we got --

当我们得到结果的时候 所得到的是--

I was very happy -- aside from one person.

我是非常开心-- 除了一个人之外

There was one person in the group

团队中有个人

that was supposed to have very high performance

本来表现应该很优秀的

that was actually performing terribly.

但是实际上却表现的很糟糕

And he pulled the whole mean down,

他拉下了总体的平均成绩

destroying my statistical significance of the test.

毁了我试验中统计学的作用

So I looked carefully at this guy.

我仔细的看这个人

He was 20-some years older than anybody else in the sample.

他比组内其他人都要大差不多20岁左右

And I remembered that the old and drunken guy

我还记得那个老迈的醉汉

came one day to the lab

走进实验室的那天

wanting to make some easy cash

想赚些简单的钱

and this was the guy.

就是那个人

"Fantastic!" I thought. "Let's throw him out.

"不会吧!" 我想 "把他给我扔出去

Who would ever include a drunken guy in a sample?"

谁同意这种醉鬼参加实验的?"

But a couple of days later,

但是几天后

we thought about it with my students,

我和我学生考虑了这点

and we said, "What would have happened if this drunken guy was not in that condition?

我们说到 "如果这醉汉不在组内的话 会发生什么?

What would have happened if he was in the other group?

如果他去了另外一个组的话 会发生什么?

Would we have thrown him out then?"

那如果我们把他扔出去呢?"

We probably wouldn't have looked at the data at all,

我们甚至无法看到这类数据

and if we did look at the data,

而且如果我们看到这类数据

we'd probably have said, "Fantastic! What a smart guy who is performing this low,"

我们可能会说 "怎么可能! 这么聪明的人怎么会表现的这么糟糕"

because he would have pulled the mean of the group lower,

因为他把组里的平均分拉下一大截

giving us even stronger statistical results than we could.

让我们统计的结果变的更加有根据

So we decided not to throw the guy out and to rerun the experiment.

所以我们决定不把这人排除出去 重新进行了实验

But you know, these stories,

但是 这些故事

and lots of other experiments that we've done on conflicts of interest,

还有很多其他我们完成的实验有着利益冲突

basically kind of bring two points

摆在我面前的

to the foreground for me.

主要是两方面

The first one is that in life we encounter many people

第一点 我们一生中会遇见很多人

who, in some way or another,

用着各种方式

try to tattoo our faces.

来试着粉饰自己的面部

They just have the incentives that get them to be blinded to reality

他们刺激自己逃避现实

and give us advice that is inherently biased.

展示给我们很多固有的偏见

And I'm sure that it's something that we all recognize,

而且我确定有些事情我们都有所了解

and we see that it happens.

我们目睹它的发生

Maybe we don't recognize it every time,

或许我们不能每次都辨识

but we understand that it happens.

但是我们知道它的确发生过

The most difficult thing, of course, is to recognize

当然 最困难的事 是去认清

that sometimes we too

那些有时我们自己

are blinded by our own incentives.

都被自己的定式所遮蔽

And that's a much, much more difficult lesson to take into account.

这是个非常非常艰难的的课程

Because we don't see how conflicts of interest work on us.

因为我们无法看清自身的利益冲突

When I was doing these experiments,

当我在做实验的时候

in my mind, I was helping science.

我觉得 我是在为科学做贡献

I was eliminating the data

我在处理数据

to get the true pattern of the data to shine through.

让真实的数据模式得以闪现

I wasn't doing something bad.

我不是在做坏事

In my mind, I was actually a knight

我觉得 我是像个骑士

trying to help science move along.

试着帮助科学前进

But this was not the case.

但是事实却不是如此

I was actually interfering with the process with lots of good intentions.

我实际上被很多正面的意识所左右

And I think the real challenge is to figure out

我觉得真正的挑战是去认清

where are the cases in our lives

那些我们生活中

where conflicts of interest work on us,

和我们有利益冲突的地方

and try not to trust our own intuition to overcome it,

并试着不去相信自己的直觉来克服这个挑战

but to try to do things

试着做些事

that prevent us from falling prey to these behaviors,

来防止自己陷入不自觉的行为中

because we can create lots of undesirable circumstances.

因为我们能处于一些不愉快的环境下

I do want to leave you with one positive thought.

我真的想留给大家一个正面的想法

I mean, this is all very depressing, right --

我指 这的确很压抑 是的--

people have conflicts of interest, we don't see it, and so on.

人们有利益冲突 我们看不见 摸不着

The positive perspective, I think, of all of this

这些积极的观点 我觉得

is that, if we do understand when we go wrong,

是一种 如果我们清楚我们做错了

if we understand the deep mechanisms

如果我们了解到

of why we fail and where we fail,

我们失败的原因和位置的根本原因

we can actually hope to fix things.

我们就能真正的弥补这些

And that, I think, is the hope. Thank you very much.

而且 我想 这就是希望之所在 谢谢大家

(Applause)

（掌声）