塔伊穆尔发现历史的价值

是的。大家好，欢迎回到《不过度思考》的又一期节目。Taymor，你今天怎么样？

Yes. Hello, and welcome back to another episode of Not Overthinking. Taymor, how are you doing today?

还不错，兄弟。我抱着女儿，所以这次是站着、轻晃着、踱步着录播客。不过用了无线麦克风，希望效果应该

Doing good, man. I've got the girl on me, so I'm doing a bit of a standing and bouncing and pacing kind of podcast. I But got the wireless microphone, so hopefully, should

会不错。非常好。对，这期会有点像深夜电台播客的风格。没错。

be good. Very good. Yeah. It's gonna be one of those kind of like a late night radio podcast. Exactly.

我也不能 用舒缓的慢语调。是啊。我也不能大声说话，因为不想吵醒女儿。所以我得用这种略带诡异、轻柔、耳语般的声音，我们可以在YouTube上给它打上ASMR标签之类的。

I also can't Soothing soothing in slow tones. Yeah. I also can't speak super loud because I don't wanna wake the girl. So I'm gonna have to speak in this, like, slightly creepy, airy, whispery voice, and we can tag it as ASMR on YouTube or something.

不错。太棒了。评论区的小伙伴们，你们可以告诉我们觉得Tae Mo的ASMR声音如何。不过，对了，最近有什么新鲜事？

Nice. Fantastic. And people in the comments, you can let us know what you think of Tae Mo's ASMR voice. But, yeah, what's been going on?

最近有什么新鲜事？让我想想。过去几周我因工作去了趟柏林，挺有意思的。

What's been going on? Let me think. I've had a lot of travel in the last few weeks to Berlin for work, so that's been kind of interesting.

离开宝宝是什么感觉？我马上也要出差了。

What's it like leaving the baby? I'm going traveling for work.

是的。我是说，我做过一日游，也做过两晚左右的短途旅行，还有三四晚的那种。从伦敦到柏林的一日游出乎意料地顺利。当然，更长时间的旅行离开女儿，对露西亚来说肯定更难熬。

Yeah. I mean, I've done like a day trip and then some two night type trips and then some like three, four night type trips. And the day trip was surprisingly smooth from London to Berlin. Sure. The longer trips, leaving the girl, I mean, I think it's definitely harder for Lucia.

是啊。不过我会收到照片和视频的更新。只要一拿起手机，我就忍不住看女儿的照片，懂吗？这比刷推特有意思多了。我花在看她照片上的时间，大概能有刷推特时间的25%左右。

Yeah. But, you know, I get little picture and video updates. And whenever I'm on my phone, I just look at pictures of the girl, you know? It's like it's like almost better than Twitter. Almost I probably look at pictures of the girl for about like 25% of the time that I spend on Twitter or something.

哇哦，那还挺不错的。

Oh, wow. So that's pretty that's pretty good.

确实挺...我是说，好吧。那么这种行为的动机是什么？当你滑动屏幕看宝宝照片而不是推文时，你心里涌动着怎样的情感？我很好奇。

That's pretty I mean, okay. So what's what's the feeling that prompts that? Like, what's what's going through your mind and heart when you're scrolling through pictures of of little baby rather than tweets? I'm here.

她就是特别可爱啊，不是吗？那种可爱劲儿让人看着照片就开心。她还开了个私人Instagram，亲友们都爱得不行。很多人都说需要提神时，就去翻她的照片，看完就开心了。非常神奇。

I think she's just really cute, isn't she? She's just super cute and it just kinda makes you happy to look at her pictures. And she's got she's got a private Instagram that friends and family are really loving. And lots of people have said that whenever they they need a little pick me up, they just go on her Instagram and look at the pictures and then they they feel happy. Very good.

不过确实，可爱婴儿就是有种魔力...我也说不清。总之就是...这会让你...

But, yeah, I think there is something about a cute baby that just I don't you. Anyway. Yeah. And does it make

如果换成其他陌生新生儿的主页，效果会不同吗？我是说假如你关注了个随机婴儿的Instagram。

a difference that it's your cute baby versus any other if you if you would follow on the random Instagram of a random newborn baby.

是的，我觉得这是我的孩子确实有所不同。不过，我也能想象从其他可爱宝宝身上获得快乐，尤其是与宝宝有某种联系时，比如是家人或朋友的孩子。但除此之外，我不认为会有额外的兴奋感。

Yeah. I think it does make a difference that it's my baby. But, like, I can imagine I can imagine getting a good kick out of just another cute baby. Especially if you have some connection to the baby, like if it's someone in the family, a friend or something. Then, you know, I can't imagine getting an extra kick out of it.

非常好。是的，我一直在这样做。现在已经开始封斋了，昨天是禁食的第一天。

Very good. Yeah. So I've been doing that. Rolodhan has started now. So yesterday was first day of fasting.

进行得相当顺利，时间也不算太长。整体感觉很平静。昨天我保持了良好的作息节奏，我在思考斋月期间该如何安排。昨天封斋饭后我没再睡觉，我大约四点四十五分起床吃东西，之后就保持清醒。前一晚我是九点左右睡的。

Went went pretty smoothly, not too not too long. Yeah. Generally feeling quite zen. Yesterday I stayed my grind set well, I was trying to figure out what's my Ramadan grind set. And yesterday I stayed up after Sehri so I I got up at like quarter to five to eat and then I just like stayed up and I'd I'd gone to bed around 9PM the night before.

我大概睡了七个半小时，我觉得足够了。日落时间大约是五点四十五分，那时可以再次进食。但到了六点半左右，我感到特别疲惫。所以今天我尝试在封斋饭后小睡，想补两小时睡眠，但最终没能睡着。期间艾萨克还哭闹了一阵。

I probably got like seven and a half hours sleep which I think was fine But then around like so sunset was at like quarter to six so that's when I could eat again. And then around maybe 06:30, I just felt like super tired. And so today, well today I tried to go to sleep after Sehri. So try and get a couple of hours sleep but didn't actually manage to fall back to sleep. And Isaac was doing some screaming as part of that.

所以之后我可能干脆就不尝试睡觉了，直接保持清醒。

So I might just not bother trying to sleep afterwards. Just stay awake.

不错啊，看来你是那种适合凌晨五点起床的人。

Nice. I think we're one of those like 5AM guys.

对，对，我确实挺喜欢五点起床的节奏。这就是最近的情况，你那边怎么样？

Yeah. Yeah. I do quite like the 5AM thing. But yeah, that's what's been going on. How about you?

我看到我正在看你和阿曼的一个视频。哦对，你最近看了是吧。我和阿曼去年在伦敦碰过面，那时他刚好在城里。之后我就一直关注他的动态，因为他是不过度思考的老粉了。那个视频真的很棒。

I saw I was listening to one of your videos with Aman. Oh yeah. You've you've recently watched yeah yeah. So Aman and I met up in London last year at some point when he was in town And I kind of just sort of follow him online since he's he's been a long time fan of not overthinking. But, yeah, I thought it was I thought it was a really cool video.

是啊，谢了兄弟。他来过香港，我们还一起玩了。

Yeah. Oh, thanks, man. Yeah. No. He he he came to Hong Kong and we hung out.

我们先去健身，然后吃午饭。我就想，这可是四年前看过我视频的人啊，长期关注播客，采纳了视频里的建议，一直照着那些YouTube导师说的做。这方法对他真管用。四年间经历起伏，现在月入两万，辞掉了工作。所以我们请他上频道做了个访谈，展示普通人按建议执行最终成功的案例。

We went for a little workout, went for lunch, and then I was like, oh, you know, this is someone who watched a video of mine four years ago and has been a long time follower of the pod and took the advice in that video and has just continued basically following the playbook of that all of the YouTube gurus say. And it's worked for him. Four years later, through consistency and ups and downs and stuff, he's now making 20 k a month. He was able to quit his job. And so, yeah, we had him on the channel as a bit of an an interview to show what does it look like when a normal person actually follows the advice and succeeds

顺便说句，我觉得超棒。这类内容再多些就好了，虽然不知道算法会不会推，但我觉得特别有意思。

kind of by the way. Yeah. I think that was great. Yeah. I think more content like that would be I mean, I don't know how it how it does on the on the algorithm, but I find that kind of content quite interesting.

还有你团队好几个人离职后开始做YouTube视频，讲为什么离开以及近况。我经常看到Tint的，昨天还听了Saps的。挺酷的。

And also a bunch of your team have started leaving leaving your team and then making YouTube videos about why they've left your team and what they're up to and stuff. So I've I've seen Tint Tints a lot and then I I was listening to Saps one yesterday. Yep. That was cool.

这种事嘛...难免的。人们进来学创业门道，

Yeah. It's one of those things where, you know yeah. It just happens. People come in. They learn the ropes of entrepreneurship.

然后就想着：干嘛不单干呢？就这样。

They'll and they're like, Why don't I just do this on myself? So. Yeah.

很好。我有个话题已经反复思考了几个月，很想聊聊。完美。就是这样。好的。

Nice. So this I have a topic that I've I've been mulling over the last few months that I'm keen I'm keen to chat through. Perfect. That's it. Okay.

那么好吧。这里有几个相关的想法，但最重要的可能是我最近迷上了历史。我认为阅读和学习历史相当重要，而我以前从不这么想。就是这个概念。它确实...是的。

So Okay. So there's a there's a couple of related ideas here, but I think probably the the big one is that I recently become history pilled. I I think reading and learning about history is quite important, and I never used to think that before. Just the idea. Like it's it's Yeah.

是的。是的。这是我改变看法的一个重大转折，终于明白了这一点——真希望我十五年前就能理解。但在学校时，历史看起来毫无意义，就像亨利八世有几个妻子之类的。

Yeah. Yeah. This has been a big thing that I've changed my changed my mind on and finally understood that That I wish I understood like fifteen years ago or something. But yeah, in school, you know, history just seemed kind of pointless. It was like, okay, you know, Henry the eighth had his wives or whatever.

还有，你知道，维多利亚时代的英格兰人用粪便盖房子之类的。然后他们有土岗-城廓城堡，还有维京人...对，维京人有那种造型的船。这就是学校教的历史。

And you know, this is they used to make the houses in Victorian England out of dung and whatever. And then they had the Motte And Bailey castles and, you know, the Vikings yeah. The Vikings had a boat that looked like this. And, you know, this this was history. This is history at school.

对吧？感觉就像...好吧。懂我意思吗？我对那些根本不感兴趣。

Right? It was like it's like, okay. You know? I'm that interested in that stuff. No.

我没选GCSE的历史课，一有机会就放弃了，因为觉得它太死板了。

I didn't do it at GCSE. I dropped history as soon as I could just because I found it so dead.

但我觉得它变成了一个

But I feel like it became a

要有趣得多。它变成了一个

lot more interesting. It became a

对于国际听众来说，GCSE阶段的历史要有趣得多。这大概是在你十五、十六岁的时候，因为内容更偏向现代史。比如第一次世界大战、第二次世界大战、冷战这些，你知道的，还在人们记忆中的事情。对，对。

lot more interesting at GCSE level for international listeners. This is sort of when you're, like, fifteen, sixteen because it was less it was more like modern history. Like World War one, World War two, the Cold War, stuff that is, like, you know, in living memory. Yeah. Yeah.

而且，直接塑造了我们现在的世界，感觉比亨利八世有几个妻子之类的要相关得多。

And, like, has directly shaped the world Yeah. That we are now in, which is way more feels way more relevant than how many wives Henry the eighth had or whatever the thing was.

是啊。我觉得我可能会更喜欢现代史的内容。如果教学顺序倒过来可能会更有趣。

Yeah. Yeah. I think I would have enjoyed the modern history stuff more. Yeah. Think if they'd almost have worked backwards, that would have been more interesting.

但说实话，我当时觉得历史完全没用。我完全无法理解为什么会有人去大学读历史。后来我才有点明白，好吧，有些人就是单纯对历史感兴趣。

But, yeah, I just found history completely pointless. And then I'd I'd be completely baffled as to why, like, people would study history at university. It's like well, you know, I I kind of had this sense. Okay. Some people are just, like, interested in history.

就像有些人痴迷罗马帝国，有些人热衷于研究一战武器，你知道的，人们就是会有各种奇怪的兴趣。如果你恰好对某个历史时期特别着迷，觉得它很酷很宏大，那去大学读历史也无可厚非。

Like, some people are just, like, really into the Roman Empire. Some people are just, like, really into, like, World War one weapons, you know. Like, people people just have random interests. And if you're one of those guys who's like really into one of these, you know, eras of history or whatever because it's like cool and epic and whatever, then, yeah, fine. Study history at uni.

但这并不是我们其他人需要操心的事。我这个观点其实是在过去一两年里慢慢改变的，最近几个月意识更清晰了。后来我还读到一篇文章——我去柏林旅行的一个好处就是能在机场和飞机上用Instapaper看囤积的文章...

But like, this is not something that the rest of us need to need to be need to be worried about. And so this is this is something that I've I've come to change my mind on over the last maybe the last like maybe like the last year or two but like more consciously aware of it in the last few months. And then I also I also read this article. So one of one of the nice things about my Berlin trips is that I can catch up on my Instapaper reads while I'm, like, at the airports and on the on the plane and So I guess so much

你没在用Readwise Reader吗？

You're not using Readwise Reader?

是啊。我是说，Readwise Reader现在什么情况？我记得前阵子还是测试版来着。

Yeah. I mean, what's the situation with Readwise Reader? I I remember it was in beta a while ago.

Readwise Reader太棒了。比Instapaper好太多了。呃，我是说，我已经好几年没用Instapaper了，因为Readwise Reader就是更好用。

Readwise Reader is amazing. It's so much better than Instapaper. Well, I mean, haven't used Instapaper in years because Readwise Read Reader is just better.

哦，天哪。等等。那它具体...

Oh, damn. Wait. So what does

能为我做什么？它基本上就像Instapaper，但整合了Readwise的功能。

it do for me? It's basically like Instapaper, but integrated with Readwise.

好吧。有道理。因为我的Instapaper已经和Readwise联动了。但它还有什么其他功能吗？仅仅是界面更美观？

Okay. Fair. Because my Instapaper is linked to my Readwise. But, like, what else does it do? Is it just nicer?

它很好用。呃，确实很好用。我多年没用Instapaper了，相信它现在应该也不错。Readwise还像个RSS阅读器聚合器，你可以订阅不同博客和新闻简报之类的内容，它们会出现在你的订阅流里。

It's nice. Well, it's nice. I haven't used Instapaper in years. I'm sure it's it it's also good. Readwise Readwise is also like an RSS feed aggregator, so you can sign up to different blogs and newsletters and stuff, and it will appear in your, like, feed.

然后你可以选择将订阅源的内容保存到你的库中，我想。它还能阅读PDF文件。而且

And then you can choose to to save stuff from your feed to your library, I guess. And it can also read PDFs. And

它在处理PDF方面也一样出色吗？

Is it as good at PDFs?

相当不错

It's pretty good

当我开发我的PDF阅读器时，是的。我给Read Gutwise的一位成员发了消息，说，嘿，你们怎么看这个PDF阅读功能。我一直在研究一些AI处理PDF的东西。他们说他们有办法阅读PDF。

at When when I made my PDF reader Yeah. I I messaged one of the Read Gutwise guys and was like, yo, how you guys like looking into this PDF stuff. I've been working on some AI PDF thing. They said that they have a yeah. They have a way of reading PDFs.

他们还没有使用AI，但他们正在考虑类似的东西

They're not using AI yet, but it's something that they're, like, sort of

开发 它基本上就像一个在线阅读PDF的网页界面。但它确实允许你高亮标记，这还挺不错的。总之，抱歉。继续。所以你可以看到甚至

working It's basically like a web interface for reading PDFs. So but it does let you highlight them, which is kinda nice. Anyway, sorry. Go on. So you can see even

正在赶上

catching up

Instapaper阅读。是的。

Instapaper reads. Yeah.

所以在补看Instapaper上的文章。我在Twitter上关注这个人有段时间了，他的账号是scholars_stage。让我再确认一下。对，scholars_stage。

So catching up on Instapaper reads. And this guy that I've been following on Twitter for quite a while, his his his handle is scholars underscore stage. Let me just double check that. Yeah. Scholars underscore stage.

老实说，我不知道他是做什么的。他看起来像是...我完全不知道他...我不清楚他在忙什么。嗯。他基本上...好吧。

I don't know what he does, to be honest. He seems like a I have no idea what he I don't know what he what he's up to. Yeah. He basically has okay. So yeah.

过去几年我一直尝试做的一件事，就是试图理解这个世界是如何运作的。你知道的，去理解。我...我觉得有一点是，我一直觉得新闻有点难以理解。我是说，有很长一段时间我认为新闻完全毫无意义。但最近我开始意识到新闻并非全然无用，只是觉得它相当晦涩难懂。

One one thing that I've been trying to do over the last couple of years is just kind of understand how the world works. You know, understand. I well, I I I think one one thing is that I've always found the news a bit like impenetrable. I mean, I had a long phase where I thought the news was just completely pointless. But like, more recently, when I've started to realize that the news isn't completely pointless, I find it quite impenetrable.

比如说现在移民是个热门话题。有人会说移民很好，也有人认为移民很糟糕之类的。我实在找不到方法来理清这些争论。我缺乏一个框架去...嗯...把握这类讨论的脉络。这适用于几乎所有话题。

You know, like there'll be something about like, oh you know, like for example immigration's a big thing right now. And some people are like, oh you know, immigration's really good and some people are like, oh immigration's really bad or whatever. I just don't really have a way to make sense of these debates. I don't really have a way to, yeah, kind of understand where the discussion is at sort of thing. And this goes for like all sorts of topics.

几乎所有事情都是如此。外面有太多你听到的不同叙事，太多人表达的不同观点。我想我人生大部分时间不愿接触新闻的部分原因，就是找不到理解它的方式。感觉就像...好吧。

This goes for like pretty much anything. Know, there's just like so many narratives out there that you hear. There's so many like points of views that different people are expressing. And I think partly why I never bothered engaging with the news for most of my life is that I just didn't really have a way of making sense of it. It just felt like, okay.

我得花很大功夫才能搞明白发生了什么，然后...即便如此，又有什么意义呢？但过去几年我一直在做这种努力，试图找到理解某些事情的方法。我基本上...我的基本结论是：我需要补上从未接受过的人文教育，因为我以前从不觉得这有意义。所以这两年我一直在尝试自学一种广义的人文类课程体系。有个很棒的讲座系列叫《西方思想传统中的伟大头脑》。

Like, I'd I'd have to do a lot of work to kind of understand what's going on and then and and even then, you know, what's the point? But over the last few years, I've been trying to do that work and trying to sort of figure out how to make sense of some of these things. And I basically well, my basic conclusion was like, okay, I need to essentially catch up on a humanities education that I never really never really had because I never really saw the point of it. And so I've been trying to just sort of self teach myself a broad sort of humanities type curriculum over the last couple of years. There's a really good lecture series called Great Minds of the Western Intellectual Tradition.

它在Audible上，大部分内容在YouTube上也能找到，但主要是在Audible。基本上是一个60讲的系列讲座，从古希腊一直讲到大概二十世纪九十年代左右。涵盖所有重要思想，是的，所有重要思想家、理念，涉及政治、哲学等等。每讲大约四十分钟到五十分钟。

It's on Audible and then there's like some random most of them are on YouTube as well, but it's on Audible. And it's basically like a 60 part lecture series all the way from like the ancient Greeks to like maybe the nineteen nineties or something. And all the big ideas and yeah. All big sort of thinkers, ideas, and politics, philosophy, etcetera. And, you know, each lecture is like maybe four forty to fifty minutes or something.

有点像一个小播客，按时间顺序从苏格拉底之前的时代讲到二十世纪的伟大人物，再到两千年代。非常有趣。在历史这方面，确实非常非常有意思。

There's kind of like a little podcast about like, you know, in chronological order all the way from, you know, pre pre Socrates to like, you know, the big people from the nineteen hundreds and, you That's fun. Coming up to the two thousands. Down at the So that's that's like that's been like super super interesting. But yeah, on the on the history thing. Yeah.

所以我认为这是我教育中很大的一部分。还有一些我在播客里提到过的书，比如阿拉斯代尔·麦金泰尔的《追寻美德》、查尔斯·泰勒的《世俗时代》，这些也是偏历史类的书。它们不是那种提供某些普遍现象的数据和研究，而是讲述事物如何经过长时间发展演变，以及我们为何会处于现在的位置。我觉得我以前常陷入的一个误区，现在也看到很多人陷入其中——就是我们需要彻底改变对这些问题的思考方式。

So I think so that that's that's been a big big part of my education. And then there's been some books that I've mentioned on the pod before, After Virtue by Alastair MacIntyre, A Secular Age by Charles Taylor, which are also like kind of pretty historical type books where it's not like it's not like, hey, here's some like data and some study about some like universal thing or whatever. It's more like, hey, this is how a thing has developed over a long period of time and that's how we've ended up why ended up in the in the place that we are. And I think one one trap that I think I used to fall into and that I see loads of people falling into now. Now now that now that you can now that I I can sort of see it, I'm like, wow, this is like, you know, we need to completely change the way we think about this stuff.

基本上，如果你缺乏历史意识，不清楚自己在历史中的位置，当你试图解释人类事务时——这和杰森·布莱克利在《迷失在意识形态与重建现实》一书中提到的观点很相关——我认为，如果你没有历史意识，不真正接触历史，那么你能得到的解释只能是那些试图普遍化的解释。杰森·布莱克利经常谈到，在自然科学中我们可以提出放之四海皆准的普遍规律，不受时空限制。

It's basically that if you don't really have any sort of historical consciousness, if you're not really aware of where you are in history, when you try to explain something regarding human affairs so, you know, I'll I'll make it it's it's kind of very related to Jason Blake Leishtig from his book, Lost in Ideology and Rebuilt Reality. But basically, I think if you if you have no historical consciousness, if you don't if you're not really engaged with history, then the only kinds of explanations that are gonna be open to you are explanations that try and be really universal about things. Okay? And and, you know, Jason Jason Blakely shtick kind of talks about this a lot where, you know, in the natural sciences, we can come up with these universal law like generalizations that work wherever you are, you know, regardless of place and time and etcetera etcetera. You know, you can come up with these laws that seem to just sort of hold in all times and all places.

我认为，除非你认真对待人文学科，否则这几乎会成为你所有解释的模板。举个例子，几个月前我们在朋友家聚会时——

And I think if that's I think unless you have taken the humanities somewhat seriously, that's going to be your model for all explanation, pretty much. You know? And so let me give you an example. So this came up a few months ago. We were just at a friend's house.

当时在吃晚饭，有人提到最近参加婚礼遇到些大学老同学，发现他们中不少人还在抽烟。我已经很久没和抽烟的人来往了。这群抽烟的老友当年都是学人文学科的，而我那些学STEM专业（科学、技术、工程、数学）和医学的朋友没有一个抽烟的。

We were like having dinner or something and someone was ref someone was reflecting on like, oh, know, I went to went to a wedding recently and caught up with some like old people from university And man, like, a bunch of them, like, smoke and stuff, you know. It was like I hadn't hung out with people who smoked in ages. But like there was one group of, like, old friends from university who who smoked cigarettes. And that was like, know, hadn't kinda hadn't seen that in a while because it's kind of out of fashion now. And and they went on to say that, you know, it's kinda weird that like all of all of the people in that like smoking crew studied humanities at university and, you know, none of my STEM friends, you know, who did, you know, science subjects and medicine whatever, like none none of them smoked at all, you know.

我们回想大学时光，人文学科的学生确实有更多抽烟、吸毒的现象，外在表现出的心理健康问题也明显多于理科生。这很有趣——我们都在英国上的大学，这是共同的经历，大家都深有同感。

And then we were kind of reflecting on like, you know, thinking back to university, like, it did seem like among the humanity students, there was probably a lot more like, you know, smoking, drugs, things like this, and also a lot more outward sort of, you know, mental health issues and stuff like that than there were among the science students. Right? And so this is kind of interesting, know, all went to university in The UK. This was kind of a shared experience. We were like, yeah.

是的。你知道，就是这样。这也是我的经历。然后，当你只是讨论这些事情时，你就会停止试图弄清楚，哦，你知道，为什么会这样？我认为现代的非历史思维会立即试图找到某种普遍的解释。

Yeah. That is, you know, that that does it. That was my experience as well. And then, you know, when you're just sort of discussing these things, then you you sort of stop trying to figure out, oh, you know, why might that be? And I think the I think the modern ahistorical mind immediately tries to find some universal explanation for this.

所以问题就变成了，是什么让人文学科吸引这些人或把人变成这样？而自然科学又是什么吸引或把人变成另一种样子？对吧？所以这有点像提出一个普遍性的问题，然后各种解释就会被抛出来。实际上，通过阅读相关资料，我认为在这种情况下的第一个问题不应该是人文学科或STEM学科本身有什么内在特质导致人们变成这样或吸引这些人。

And so then the question, you know, the question then was, what is it about the humanities that either attracts these people or turns these turns people into Yeah. And what is it about the science, you know, the natural sciences that attracts or turns people into this other thing? Right? So it was kinda this like universal type question being posed and, you know, then explanations will be thrown out. And the the actual the actual explanation from having done some reading around this is that well, I think that basically the the the first question that should be asked in that kind of situation is not, you know, what what is inherent to the humanities that causes people to become this way or attracts these people or what is inherent to this, you know, to the STEM subjects.

问题是，好吧，我们都在谈论2010年代初的英国大学生活。第一个问题应该是，2010年代的英国大学文化有什么可能导致这种现象？然后，当涉及到人类事物时，解释的起点我认为基本上应该总是非常情境化、历史化和文化化的。然后你从那里开始，也许有时能找到一些普遍性的解释，比如男人就是这样，女人就是那样。对吧？

The question is, okay, we we are all talking about UK university life in the early twenty tens, you know. The stop the first question should be, what is it about, you know, what is it about UK university culture in the twenty tens that that kind of might create this kind of thing? And then, you know, the the basic when it comes when it comes to human stuff, the starting point of an explanation, I think should basically always be very contextual, very historical, and and very cultural. And then you kind of work from there and maybe maybe you can sometimes find some universal type explanation of like, oh, well, you know, men are just a certain way and women are just a certain way. Right?

也许确实存在这类解释。但我认为在Twitter或播客等讨论中，总是这样：哦，这里有一个关于人们行为的观察。是什么普遍法则意味着这必然发生，而且事情总是这样？你明白我的意思吗？所以是的。

Like, maybe there are some of these kinds of things out there. But I think in discussions on Twitter or on podcasts or whatever, it's always like, oh, here's an observation about how people are behaving. What is the universal law that means that this had to happen and that this, you know, is just like the way things always are or something like this. Do you get what I mean? And so yeah.

我是说，关于人文学科和科学的事情。看起来从20世纪初到今天的英国大学文化非常特殊，有这种人文与科学的对立。我们对人文与科学的理解等等，都是如此。是的。

I mean, the yeah. Well, with regards to the humanities and the the sciences thing, Yeah. I mean, it it seems like UK university culture from the nineteen hundreds from early nineteen hundreds to today is, like, very specific where there's this whole, like, humanities versus science. You know, the just the the way we conceive of, like, humanities versus sciences, etcetera etcetera. And, yeah.

这一切都非常特定于英国文化的发展，特别是剑桥大学的影响。比如，剑桥有一个非常著名的数学考试，在20世纪初，仅仅因为成为剑桥数学年级第一的荣誉，太多人把所有精力都投入其中，因为这被视为荣耀的事情。所以这是一个例子，说明我认为对人类事物的真正解释总是历史和文化性的。

It's it's all it's all very particular to how the culture developed in The UK, particularly driven by, I think, Cambridge where there was, like, you know, for example, there was a there was a certain maths exam at Cambridge that was like really prestigious. And in like the early nineteen hundreds, just because of the prestige of, like, being top of the year in Cambridge in maths. Like, way too many people were just, like, channeling all of their efforts into being top of the year in maths just because it was, like, the prestigious thing to do, you know, and and and stuff like this. Like yeah. So that that was an example of like how I think the the real explanations for human stuff are always historical and cultural.

有时候，如果你真的做了功课，也许有资格提出一个普遍性解释。但人们往往急于跳到普遍性解释，并且通常会依赖几个来源。典型的起点会是某种观察、研究或社会科学数据，比如这些人这样行为，那些人那样行为。然后人们通常会依赖几个来源。

And, you know, sometimes you you you you might sometimes earn yourself the right to throw out a universal type explanation if you like really know if you've like really done your homework, you know, and can come up with something really compelling. But I think people tend to jump to universal type stuff. And and and you can draw and people tend to draw on a few sources for these universal type explanations. So, you know, typically typically, the starting point will be some sort of observation or some sort of study or some sort of like social science data type thing about like, oh, you know, these people behaving this way, those people behaving that way, you know, that'll be that'll be the thing. And then you'll you'll people typically draw on a couple of sources.

有人会说，哦，大概就是关于激励的问题，基本上是经济激励，比如，哦，当然，那些人那么做。他们只是被市场的无形之手或其他什么激励去那么做。所以你经常会听到试图用激励来解释一切的普遍性说法。某种程度上，在某些情况下这可能是对的。但我觉得，人们通常谈论这些的方式太过单一维度，也太，嗯，怎么说呢。

One will be like, oh, something about something about like incentives, basically like economic incentives of like, oh, well, of course, those people are doing that. They are simply incentivized to do that by, you know, the invisible hand of the markets or whatever. So that that you you you often hear attempts at universal explanations that draw on incentives. And, you know, partially partially that might be true in some of these cases. But I think the well, the I I think the way people usually talk about that stuff is like way too one dimensional and way too, like yeah.

我觉得是缺乏历史和文化视角的。然后人们还会援引另一种解释，某种进化生物学、进化心理学的说法，比如，哦，当然，那些人会那样行事。当然，男人或女人会那样行事，因为，你知道，在原始人时代，为了生存你必须那么做。而那些繁殖更多的人，你知道，这种行为与某种进化适应性有关。所以我认为这些往往是那些解释的典型来源。

I I think ahistorical and and acultural. And then the other thing people and and then the other thing people draw on is some kind of, like, evolutionary biology, evolutionary psychology type explanation of like, oh, well, of course, you know, of course, those people behave in that certain way. Of course, men or or women behave in that certain way because, you know, back in the in the caveman days, you had to, like, do that, man, in order to survive. And those were the people who were breeding more and, know, there's some evolutionary fitness associated with it with with this kind of thing. And so I think those tend to be the kinds of exponent yeah.

人们用来为事物寻找普遍解释的那些来源。我认为它们几乎总是错的。更好的解释应该更注重历史和文化。好吧，就是这样。

The kinds of sources that people draw on to produce their universal explanations for things. And I think they're just almost always wrong. And the much better explanation is much more historical and cultural. Okay. Right.

所以所以

So so

好的。我听到的是，如果我们用这个科学与人文的对比，大多数人在那种情况下会倾向于，或者至少你的朋友们会倾向于假设人文学生比理科生更可能吸烟。他们会倾向于认为那是个普遍现象。而不是质疑，嘿，我想知道是否所有地方、所有时代的人文学生都比理科生更可能吸烟。这几乎不在他们的考虑范围内，作为应该思考的一部分。

okay. So what I'm hearing is, like, if we if we use this science and humanities thing, most people in that situation would be tempted, or at least your friends would have been tempted to sort of assume that this humanities students are more likely to be smokers than science students thing. They were they would be they would would be liable to assume that that is a universal. That like so so rather than questioning, hey, I wonder if all humanity students everywhere and at all times have been more likely to be smokers than all science students at all times and at all places. It's sort of like that is it's it's almost not even on the radar as part of the as part of something you should think about.

对。是的。人们会急于跳到解释，比如，无论是什么导致了这种现象。而你说的是，既然这是人类事务，你基本上得从这个问题开始：好吧，这真的是一个在所有人和所有时代都成立的普遍现象吗？

Right. Yep. And the mind wants to jump to explanations of, like, whatever it is that causes this to happen. And what you're saying is that given that this is a matter of human affairs, you kinda have to start with the basic question of like, okay. Is this actually is this a universal that is true of all people and at all times?

是的。或者它是否仅限于英国大学文化的小圈子？对，正是这样。

Yeah. Or is it a is it confined to the microcosm of, like, UK university culture? Yeah. Yeah. Exactly.

而我

And I

我想，如果最终证明这确实是一个适用于所有人和所有时代的普遍真理，那么好吧，可以接受。现在我们可以开始探讨为什么会这样了。

suppose I suppose if it turns out that it is indeed a universal that is applicable to all people and and all times, at that point, you're like, alright. Cool. Fair enough. Let's now start opining about why that might be.

对，对，对。但我觉得，如果你想对人类行为给出好的解释，出发点应该是高度情境化的，然后从那里展开。

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. But, like, you have I think I think if you if you want to produce like good explanations for human stuff, I think your starting point should be highly contextual and kinda, you know, work from there.

当你了解到实际情况和背景后，也许在极少数情况下，会有理由说，比如研究英国文学就会让人想抽烟。当然这不是真的，但可能有类似的情况。

And then when you find out real facts on the ground about, you know, the context, etcetera, then, you know, maybe some of maybe in very rare instances, there will be a good case for like, oh, you know, there's just something about studying English literature that, like, makes me wanna stroke a cigarette, you know? Like, I mean, obviously, that's not true, but, like, you know Well, I know. Maybe there are some, like

我想罗宾会是。嗯，

I think, Robin, would be. Well,

是的。我们可以想出一些观点。回想讨论时，有人提到人文学科与现实脱节。

yeah. You oh, yeah. We can come up with some ideas. Right? And, yeah, I think in I if I think back to the discussion, there was something around like, oh, you know, well, yeah, the humanities are they they kinda like detach from reality.

它们比较抽象。如果你整天思考这些脱离现实、没有实际意义的抽象事物，你的思维可能会变得奇怪，可能需要毒品或抽烟之类的东西来应对。

They're kind of these abstract things. And, you know, if you're like mulling over, you know, this kind of weird abstract stuff that's kinda detached from reality that isn't like super, you know, practically significant, then, you know, your mind can get to like a weird place and maybe you need like some, you know, drugs and smoking and stuff like to like, you know, to like get through it or something. But yeah. I mean To which you would

知道数学也是如此吗？比如，为什么数学专业的学生吸烟的可能性更低？

know that is that not true of maths as well? Like, why are maths students less likely to be smokers?

对，没错。但你看，问题是这样的。我的意思是，显然，这就像人们在餐桌上讨论一样。

Yeah. Exactly. But, like but then we were I mean, look. The thing is yeah. I mean, obviously, it's it's just like people having a discussion at dinner table.

所以这就像，你知道，没什么大不了的。就像，好吧，随便吧。我们只是在这里进行有趣的讨论。但如果有人真的想弄清楚这个问题，我觉得他们不会采用餐桌上那种随意的讨论方式。

So it's like, you know, there's not much at stake. It's like, fine, whatever. We're just having a fun discussion here. But like, if someone did care about getting to the bottom of that, yeah, I I don't think they'd go they take this take the the approach of whatever the the conversation was that that happened at the dinner table.

所以，帮我理解一下为什么这意味着我们应该关心历史。

So so help help me understand why this means that we should care about history.

好的。那么，我认为如果我们想理解人类事务，想理解事情为何如此运作，为什么某些事情在我们的社会中发生，为什么某些事情在世界各地发生，为什么某些人关心某些事情等等。如果我们想理解所有这些，历史基本上提供了数据，让你可以测试任何你可能有的理论。

Yes. Okay. So let me just Yeah. So I think if we want to if we if we want to understand human affairs, if we want to understand why things work the way they work, why certain things are happening in our society, why certain things are happening around the world, why certain people care about certain things, etcetera. If we wanna understand all of this stuff, his history is basically I mean, if you if you want to use the, like, sort of stem type metaphor, history kind of provides the data that lets you test whatever theory you might have or whatever.

举个例子，哦，对了。有一句很好的引语。我想我在Jason Blakely的播客中提到过。我想这是经济学家约翰·梅纳德·凯恩斯说的，大意是——我来转述一下。

And for example oh, yeah. There was a there was a good quote. I think I mentioned this on the Jason Blakely pod. I think it was from John Maynard Keynes, The Economist. It was something something along the lines of I'll paraphrase.

但他基本上是说，任何认为自己独立思考、不受任何意识形态或理论影响的人，实际上只是不知不觉地遵循着某种过时经济学家的理论，比如五十年前的理论。我们并不是凭空想出想法的，而是从我们的媒体、我们所处的时代和地点吸收这些想法。而这些想法是由其他人产生的，这些人并不是以一种普遍的方式产生这些想法的。

But he basically said, like, any any guy out there who thinks he's, like, independently minded and outside of the influence of, you know, anyone's ideology or theory or whatever is really just a sort of unknowingly kind of following the theory of some kind of defunct economists from, like, fifty years ago or whatever. I basically you know, we we don't just come up with ideas. Ideas we kind of absorb ideas from our media, you know, the place time and place that we're in. And these ideas are produced by other people. And those other people are not producing these ideas in in this kind of, you know, universal way.

这些人之所以产生这些想法，是对其所处环境的回应，也是对前人思想的回应，诸如此类。所以你看，比如现代关于移民之类议题的辩论，或者任何政治、社会学领域的讨论。驱动人们的因素，无非是其背景与脑中某些观念的混合体。而他们的背景又是由先前的社会语境塑造的。

These other people are producing these ideas in response to their milieu and in response to the people who had the ideas before them, etcetera etcetera. And so, you know, if, you know, for example, you know, modern debate about like, I don't know, probably like, say, something like immigration or whatever or yeah. Just any anything anything in politics, anything sociological. The thing the thing that drives people is some, you know, some combination of their context and some ideas that are in their head. And their context is produced by sort of the context of their society, you know, that that was before them.

他们脑中的观念则源自更早的人们，可以说一路追溯都是如此。因此若缺乏这种历史意识，当你试图寻找解释时，就会陷入所谓的'路灯效应'——你会怎么做呢？

And the ideas that are in head are produced by other people before them, you know, all the way back really. And so if you don't really have that kind of historical consciousness, then when you when you try and search for these explanations, you'll kind of do you know the streetlight effect? Which way you do?

基本就是'丢失的钥匙'那个比喻？

Basically Lost keys?

对，对。这个心理模型是说：有人在黑暗的户外丢了钥匙，路灯亮着，他就只在路灯下找。旁人问'老兄你为什么只在这儿找？'

Yeah. Yeah. So, you know, the the the sort of the mental model is that someone has lost their keys in the dark outside. And there's a street light on and they're like looking looking for their keys under the street light. And someone else is like, bro, why are you like why are you looking for your keys there?

要知道钥匙可能掉在街上任何地方。那人却说'但只有这里有光啊'。同理，如果你的知识储备里只有心理学模型——比如大五人格理论，加上基础的经济学激励思维，再掺点粗浅的进化论皮毛，然后硬套出个'进化型X理论'之类...

And like like, if you know, your keys could be anywhere on the street, strata thing. And then the guy goes, oh, well, this is where I can see. This is where the light is. So this is where I'm looking, you know. And so if if you're only if in your sort of intellectual arsenal, all you have is some like, you know, mental models and frameworks related to psychology, you know, like big five personality or whatever, you know, plus some like, basic on you know, a very basic level of, like, economic thinking around, you know, incentives or something, you know, plus some very basic understanding of, like, you know, roughly, you know, what one small part of evolutionary theory says from which you can then, you know, produce something like evolutionary type x.

我觉得这就像典型的'科技精英思维套装'。这类人总带着从社会科学、大众心理学、通俗经济学搬来的抽象模型，再随意混搭些进化论观点。

Yeah. I I I think if if you're I mean, let's just characterize it as the sort of the tech bro arsenal. Right? In the tech bro arsenal, you've got these kind of abstract mental models and frameworks from social science perhaps, from like psychology, from like popular economics type things, plus some, like, evolutionary, you know, type arguments thrown in. Oh, that's true.

若仅凭这套思维工具去理解人类事务，就永远只在路灯下找钥匙——因为你根本看不见街上其他区域。你的解释永远局限在那四五个其实并不适用的工具里。真正的解释力应该来自历史文化意识，那里才有更优质的答案。好，接下来我可以读...哦对了。

If that if that's the only stuff in your arsenal and you're trying to understand something around human affairs, then you will always be searching for your keys under the streetlight because you you just have no, you know, you have no access to all of the other stuff on the street. And your explanations are gonna be, you know, just just using those four or five tools, which are actually not that useful when trying to understand human affairs rather than rather than being able to access some level of historical and cultural consciousness where I think the true, you know, the much better explanations lie. Okay. So And okay. I can read let me so oh, yeah.

嗯对。另一个工具库里的手段是关于相关性的，比如，有些人会让你知道，他们就像...我该怎么说，那种技术极客原型的人会带着一堆相关性结论到处说，比如'哦这个和那个有关联'，所以'你看这就是为什么...'。对，比如女性更倾向于做X、Y、Z，而男性更倾向于做这个之类的。

An yeah. Another tool in the arsenal is something around, like, correlations of, like, you know, some people just let you know, they're, like I yeah. I'd say, like, the the sort of tech bar archetype walks around with, like, you know, some list of, like, correlations in the head of, like, oh, well, you know, this thing correlates with that thing. So, you know, that's you know, this is why, you know oh, yeah. You know but, yeah, women tend to, like, you know, do x, y, z more and men tend to do this more or whatever.

所以这就是为什么会出现这种情况，或者类似的说法。有些人就是带着一堆这种相关性结论到处走，把这当作...

And and so that's why this thing is happening or something or like, you know, like some people just like walk around with a bunch of these correlations and like add that, you know, that's part

他们工具箱的一部分。不过...

of their toolbox as well. But it

但再说一次，相关性完全不具备背景或历史维度。哦就在这儿。好的，继续睡吧宝贝。嗯。

but again, correlations are like not not at all contextual or historical. Oh, right here. Okay. Just stay asleep, baby. Yeah.

我给你读篇文章，我之前提到过这位学者舞台人士写的很棒的文章。我来给你读些重点内容。

Let me read you so there's a really good article that I mentioned from this scholar stage guy. So let me read you some highlights from there.

亲爱的。

Sweetie.

为什么加载不出来？哦不。好吧，你能暂停一下吗？好的。

Why is it not loading? Oh, no. Okay. Can you can you pause the thing? Yeah.

没关系。

That's fine.

好的，我们回来了。你刚才在说什么？

Alrighty. We are back. What were you saying?

我们回来了。是的，我正准备读一下这家伙博客文章的一些亮点。这篇博文名为《人类社会学习指南第一部分》，是他几年前写的，但他至今没发表第二和第三部分，我对此感到非常遗憾。

We're back. Yes. So I was about to read out some highlights from this guy's blog post. So the blog post is called A Study Guide for Human Society Part one. And he wrote it a few years ago, but he hasn't published parts two and three, I was really sad about.

我...我在推特上私信问过他这件事。那么重点来了：历史是你所能阅读的最重要的内容——如果你关心理解人类社会、人类事务这类事情的话。这就是本文的语境。

And I I I DM'd him about it on Twitter. So okay. This is the highlights. History is the most important thing you can read. So that this is if you care about understanding, you know, human society, human affairs type stuff, you know, And that's the context here.

他说：'历史是你所能阅读的最重要的内容。为什么？因为只有扎实的历史功底能让你识别其他领域作者何时在胡扯。我数不清有多少次发现某个政治论点，甚至是备受推崇的社会科学著作，在宏观层面看似有说服力，但一旦对照具体的历史事实——从微观视角审视——就会漏洞百出。人类是动机驱动的推理者。

He says, history is the most important thing you can read. Why? Only a strong background in history can tell you when writers in other fields are full of crap. I cannot tell you the number of times I found a political argument or even fairly even a fairly well regarded work of social science that reads compelling at the 10,000 foot view, but falls apart when you stack it up against concrete facts of history seen seen from the ground. Humans are motivated reasoners.

我们会扭曲数据来迎合理论。如果你不熟悉原始数据，就意识不到它何时被曲解或滥用。'他强调，若你真正关心理解人类社会这类事务，建议按以下优先级安排阅读：1.历史 2.文学

We bend our data to fit our theories. If you're not familiar with the data, you will not realize when it's being distorted or misused. And he so he says that if if you are someone who cares about understanding human society, human affairs type stuff, He says, I prioritize my reading in the following categories and in the following order. One, history. Two, literature.

3.行为科学 4.政治/道德哲学 5.社会科学。但他认为历史始终是最重要的，随后他还讨论了不同类型的历史书籍。

Three, behavioral science. Four, political slash moral philosophy. And five, social science. But he says history is basically the most important one. And then and then within that, he kind of talks about sort of different types of, you know, different types of history books.

要知道，有些历史书籍会极其细致地描述某个特定小镇在1705年至1730年左右发生的事情。这类书籍确实存在。而另一些历史书则试图构建宏大的叙事框架，解释数千年来的某种理念，比如《人类简史》、《枪炮、病菌与钢铁》或福山的《政治秩序》。他说，最后一类历史书恰恰是你最渴望阅读的。

And, you know, there are types of history books that are like super specific about like, you know, this is this is like what happened in this particular town from like, you know, seventeen o five to like 1730 or something. You know, there's like history books like that. And then there's history books that are kinda like, you know, these sort of grand narratives that are trying to sort of explain like, you know, thousands of years and some idea there. You know, maybe something like Sapiens, something like Guns, Germs and Steel, something something like Fukuyama's Political Order. So he says, the last group of history books that you should read are the ones you are likely the most eager to read.

比如贾雷德·戴蒙德的《枪炮、病菌与钢铁》、弗朗西斯·福山的《政治秩序》，还有伊恩·莫里斯的...抱歉我记错了重点。他指出：虽然从方法论上这些书应归类为历史著作，但就本系列而言，我把它们归入社会科学范畴。它们探讨的问题与《国家为什么会失败》《繁荣与贫困》等社会科学著作相同——试图解答为何某些国家富裕而其他国家停滞不前。

These are books like Jarrod Diamond's Guns, Germs and Steel, Francis Fukuyama's political order, Ian Morris's while Ian Morris's something. I got the highlight wrong. He says, while methodologically these books are properly considered histories, for the purpose of this this series, I group them with the social sciences. They are concerned with the same questions that animate works of social science like, you know, why nations fail, prosperity, poverty, know, etcetera. You know, are trying to answer questions like, you know, why do some countries become wealthy while others do not?

文明兴衰的根源是什么？为何是西方国家征服世界而非相反？他强调：这些书读来有趣且发人深省，但若从此入门就走错了路。我曾收集过15部400页以上的专著，都在探讨'西方为何先富起来'这个问题——而那已是七年前的事了。

What explains the rise and fall of civilizations? Why did western countries conquer the world instead of the other way around, you know, etcetera? He basically says he says, these books are fine to read and fun to comp contemplate, but if you start here, you are doing it wrong. I have collected 15 separate 400 plus page books that try to answer the question, why did the West get rich first? And that was seven years ago.

探讨该问题的优秀著作只增不减。但若止步于此，你将陷入困境。没有广博的历史和人类学知识，你如何判断各家观点的真伪？比如，若缺乏评估其模型是否符合史实的背景知识，读某位学者的著作就毫无意义。

The number of good books tackling this question has only grown larger. But if if that is all you read, you are in trouble. How will you know who is right and who is wrong? If you are not if you have not read widely in history and anthropology, who are you to judge? There is absolutely no point, for example, in reading one of the some one guy's books.

若对中欧历史一无所知，去读他人关于'中国为何停滞而欧洲为何崛起'的论述也毫无价值。文明宏观理论应放在书单末尾——它们值得一读，但必须在你掌握足够史实基础、能辨别优劣之后。

If you don't have the background knowledge needed to assess whether his models match the historical record. There is no point reading some other guy's explanation for why China stagnated and why Europe did not, if you do not know anything about Chinese or European history yourself. Grand theories of civilization should be at the bottom of your list. They're worth reading, but not before you have the foundation in facts that you need to distinguish between the good work and the ill.

但问题在于...

Here's the problem, though.

你怎么看？

What do you think?

事实很无聊。

The facts are boring. The

事实很无聊？

facts are boring?

我们如何绕过这一点？比如，事实就是很无聊。就像，我们更像是，如果有人愿意把理解社会如何运作当作毕生使命，就像这位先生一样，我正在浏览他的网站，保存了他的一堆链接。看起来挺酷的。

How do we get around that? Like, the facts are just boring. Like, we are much more like, if sure. If someone if someone wants to make it their their life's mission to understand how societies work like this guy does, I'm on his website, and I've saved a bunch of his links. Seems cool.

但是，然后，好吧。你从基础事实开始。如果有人想成为医生，那当然要从生物化学、生理学、病理学等等开始。但大多数人不想当医生，却可能对看《实习医生格蕾》这样的剧或读《疼痛难免》这样的书感兴趣——这是由一位喜剧演员兼产科医生写的，讲述医疗世界的疯狂。

But, like, then, okay. Fine. You start with you start with the basic facts. If someone wants to be a doctor, then sure, you start with biochemistry, physiology, pathology, etcetera, etcetera. But most people don't wanna be doctors, but they would be interested in watching a drama like Grey's Anatomy or reading a book like This Is Gonna Hurt, which is written by a comedian obstetrician who talks about how insane things are in the medical world.

是啊。

Yeah.

我挺喜欢《枪炮、病菌与钢铁》，因为它像在讲故事。这是我第一次对历史产生兴趣。感觉不错。书里用叙事线索贯穿始终。如果我要以此谋生或真正理解世界，我可能会去深究，比如他告诉我火是在公元前8000年发现的，但考古记录究竟怎么说？我们怎么确定是八月发现的？

I quite enjoy Tip Yitz because it's like, oh, it's a story. It's the first time I've cared about history. It's kinda nice. I started testing Guns, Germs and Steel, and the fact that it was telling a story with a narrative through line going through it. If I was basing my whole life or if I was really trying to understand the world and I really, really cared about it, then sure, I might go and be like, okay, You know, he's telling me that, like, fire was discovered in, I don't know, 8,000 BC, but, like, how what does the archaeological record really say about when fire was really like, how do we know it was discovered in August?

那八万年前呢？美索不达米亚呢？古埃及呢？诸如此类。我没兴趣深究到那种程度，但我确实想要一个大家普遍认可、大体合理的好故事。也许吧，我也不确定。

What about 80,000? What about in Mesopotamia? What about in ancient Egypt, etcetera, etcetera? I don't care enough about it at that level, but I do care about it at the level where I'm like, you know, I I want a nice story that most people agree is, like, broadly reasonable, I suspect, maybe. I don't know.

嗯，好的。那么

And yeah. Okay. So

这是他对这个问题的回应。我直接引用他的博客文章。他说，历史的问题在于它太庞大了。想要细致了解地球上每个民族和时代的全貌是不可能的。历史实在太多了。

here's his response to that. So I'm just reading from his blog post. He says, the problem with history is that it is too big. It is impossible to get a fine grained picture of every people and era on the planet. There is just too much of it.

我的建议是选择三个你觉得非常迷人且截然不同的历史时期。具体选哪三个都可以，但理想情况下，它们在地域、时间和文化上应该有所间隔。比如你可以选择前哥伦布时期的中美洲、阿拔斯帝国和革命时期的俄国。或者你对罗马共和国、宗教改革和二十世纪的印度感兴趣也行。这些组合都很好。

My recommendation is to pick three very historic very different historical periods that you find fascinating. They can be any three really, but ideally, they will be a bit separated from each other in space, time, and culture. For example, you might choose pre Columbian Mesoamerica, the Abbasid Empire, and revolutionary Russia. Or maybe your interests lie with Republican Rome, the Protestant Reformation, and twentieth century India. That all works.

选择什么其实并不重要，只要分布合理就行。至少要有一个现代时期，一个古代时期，一个非西方文明。关键是你对这些社会有真正的兴趣，强烈到可以愉快地读完关于它们的四到六本书而不觉得无聊。因为这就是你应该做的——读四到六本书。

It does not really matter what you choose, as long as you have a decent spread. So at least one that is modern, at least one that is ancient, and at least one that is from a non western civilization. The important thing is that you have a genuine interest in these societies, strong enough that you could gladly read four to six books about each of them without getting bored. Because that is what you should do. Read four to six books.

我们是安排十分钟吗？好的。能延迟大约十分钟吗？

Are we doing ten minutes? Yeah. Can we delay about ten minutes?

好的。没问题。谢谢。抱歉，请继续。嗯。

Okay. Cool. Thanks. Sorry, go on. Yeah.

所以他说关键在于，你要找到一些你真正感兴趣的历史片段或世界角落，无论出于什么原因，这种兴趣要强烈到能让你读完关于它们的四到六本书，并且对三个差异很大的时期都这样做。他说，这样做的目的是积累对特定时期或事件的细致认知，可以用来检验和评估你遇到的各种理论和叙事。比如某著名学者X提出Y导致了Z，你就可以思考：在我真正了解的这三个领域里，Y是否导致了Z？当你能够回答以下这类关于某个专业领域的问题时，你就知道自己具备了正确判断的背景知识。比如：历史学家们对这个时代或事件最大的分歧是什么？

So he says the important thing is that, you know, find find some, you know, little, you know, pockets of history or the world that you have a genuine interest in for whatever reason, enough to read four to six books about each of them and do that for like three quite different one, three quite different periods. He says, your goal here is to build up a fairly granular knowledge of a particular time or event that can be called on to test and assess theories and narratives that will be thrown at you. So a famous scholar x proposes that y leads to zed, you can think, did y lead to zed in like these three areas that I actually know something about? You will you will know you have the background knowledge to do this right when you can answer questions like the following for a given area of expertise. You know, questions like, you know, what are some of the biggest disagreements historians have about this era or this event?

历史学家或考古学家主要利用哪些资源来试图理解这段历史？比如说，如果要你选择一个看似微不足道、实则能深刻反映当时社会运作的小事件，你会选什么？正如他所言，这些问题并不需要博士级别的答案，只需比维基百科页面更有洞见的见解即可。当你对某些历史片段有了细致入微的了解后，自然就能拓展到更宏观的领域。

What are the main sources historians or archaeologists use to try and understand this? You know, if you had to pick one small incident about the era that seems insignificant at first, but is actually a very revealing example of how the society worked, what would it be? So it's, you know, he says you don't you don't need PhD level answers to these questions. Just something more insightful than than you would get from the Wikimedia page. And so once, you know, once you have like some granular knowledge of like a few pockets of history that you find inherently interesting, then you can broaden out to more sort of general stuff, basically.

市面上有涵盖印度通史、日本通史之类的书籍，你可以逐步涉猎这类内容。

And, you know, there are books that cover, like, the whole history of India, the whole history of Japan, you know, whatever. And, yeah, you can move on stuff like that.

我还是不太明白——你开场时说'真希望十五年前有人告诉我这些'。那么，你会对当年那个对历史毫无兴趣的15岁Tamor说些什么，才能让他意识到历史的重要性？

I'm still struggling to understand what so you said you opened to this conversation with the gambit of like, man, I wish someone had told me this fifteen years ago. Yeah. What what would you have what would you tell to 15 year old Tamor who doesn't give a shit about history to convince him that, like, he really should care about history?

好的，稍等。其实我写过一篇相关的博客文章，可以找出来看看。

Yeah. I mean okay. Wait. So I I had started writing up a blog post about this. I can dig it up.

关键在于，15岁的Tamor应该会想弄懂世界运行的逻辑，不想被他人关于历史成因的叙事所操控，诸如此类。

Yeah. I mean, the main thing is that if, you know, 15 year old Tamor would probably like to understand why the world works, 15 year old Tamil would like to not be psyoped by other people's narratives of how the world works or why certain things have happened, etcetera etcetera.

然后呢？

And

我们之前讨论过'路灯效应'等现象。人类事务本质上是历史与文化的产物，并非由普世法则主导，而是由具体历史事件塑造的，对吧？

and we, you know, we've kind of talked about the streetlight effect, etcetera. And why human affairs are inherently historical and cultural. They're not they're not primarily driven by universal laws. They are primarily driven by very specific things that happened. Right?

是的，我认为如果你关心理解这个世界的能力，如果你关心能整合新信息——无论是新闻中的内容、你所在社会发生的事情，还是美国正在发生的事件等等。如果你在意这些，就需要具备一定的历史意识。否则，你得到的将只是一堆零散孤立的信息片段。这些随机的碎片可能涉及历史、政治之类的话题。要知道，我们讨论过意识形态领域的复杂性。

And yeah, I think if you if you care about being able to make sense of the world, if you care about being able to integrate new information about, you know, something from the news or something that's happening in your society or something that's happening in The US, whatever. If you care about these things, you need to have some historical consciousness. And if you don't have some historical consciousness, you're gonna have a smorgasbord of like random isolated snippets. And these random isolated snippets, you know, something like history, something like politics. You know, we've talked about the ideological arena.

这些零散的信息片段并非来自某个中立客观、试图揭示真相的人。它们来自那些怀有各自动机的传播者等等。所以你的第一种选择——我们姑且称之为'科技派方案'——就是接收这些很大程度上受意识形态驱动的零碎信息。我这么说并非贬义。

You know, this is you're not getting these random isolated snippets from, like, you know, someone neutrally and dispassionately trying to, like, uncover the truth of something. You're getting these random snippets from people who have their own motivations, etcetera etcetera. Their own yeah. And and and so your option option a, we we can call the tech pro option, is to have random snippets which are, you know, in large part ideologically driven. I don't say that in a bad way.

我的意思是这是不可避免的。你会得到来自不同人群的零碎信息，它们都带着各自不同的意识形态倾向，且都高度特定于某些具体情境。这类'科技派'的武器库里既有所谓的历史事实碎片，也可能包含某些宏大叙事——比如《枪炮、病菌与钢铁》这类书中提出的有趣观点。他们会收集这些零散内容，同时配备一套号称普适的工具来解释人类行为。

I say that in a you know, it's just inescapable. You can have random snippets from different people which are all slightly ideologically driven in different ways and and are all, you know, very particular to like specific circumstances. So the the the tech bro sort of arsenal will have these like random snippets of like, you know, let's call it the facts of history or like, you know, maybe there's some like grand grand narrative from a book like Gundrums and Straw or something that's kind of interesting. So Segura will have some of those random things. And then alongside it, they'll have this arsenal of like supposedly universal tools for making sense of why humans behave the way they do.

这些工具包括来自社会科学的理论（你很可能无法验证其可靠性）、心理学发现、行为经济学框架等思维模型，可能还掺杂着进化论式的解释，以及类似'已知X与Y相关，Y又与Z相关，因此可以三角定位事态'的逻辑。所以方案A就是：一堆意识形态驱动的事实加上这个所谓的认知框架工具箱。而需要大量工作的方案B，则是构建一个关于世界如何运作的连贯认知体系。

And these will include these will include things from the social sciences, which you know, you you probably have no idea whether they really hold up. As we're finding out, they probably include things from psychology, behavioral economics type stuff of like some frameworks, mental model, whatever. Probably include some level of like evolutionary type attempt to explanation and some level of like, okay, I know x correlates with y and y correlates with zed and so you kinda triangulate what's going on. So option a is to have a bunch of like ideologically motivated facts plus this, you know, toolbox of, like, frameworks, let's just call it, to try and make sense of the world. And option b, which I think takes a ton of work, is to have a is to develop a sort of coherent view of how the world works.

这个体系当然会存在许多空白，但我认为你能在大方向上基本正确，至少在大局观上更准确。然后你才能真正深入理解某些特定领域的细节。采用方案A的'科技派'思路，你更容易被时代浪潮裹挟——不是指《纽约时报》，而是你所处的时代氛围和别人鼓吹的内容。

They will have like lots of gaps, etcetera etcetera. But I think you can get sort of directionally correct or you you you'll be much directionally better on big picture things. And then you will actually be able to really make sense of a few small picture things that you that are your particular areas where you know more about. And I think if you're in if if I think in in the tech in in in the tech pro approach of option a, I think you are much more likely to get caught up in the times. Not the newspaper, but just like the time, you know, the time the time that you're living in and whatever stuff other people are pushing around.

而采用方案B的认知体系，你就不太容易随波逐流，因为你有自己的理解框架。我认为关键在于：既要理解你所在社会现状的历史成因（我提到的那套有声书很适合补全这部分认知），又要像这位学者建议的那样掌握某些历史领域的专门知识。这样15岁的塔米尔或任何听众都能获得更清醒的认识。

Whereas in world b, I think you are much less likely to just get caught up in like whatever the thing is because you have some understanding. I I I think with a combination of a big picture understanding of like why your particular society is the way it is and how it got here. And I think that like audiobook series that I mentioned is like quite good for filling in parts of that picture. With a combination of that big picture understanding plus like some specialized understanding of pockets of history like this guy suggests. I think 15 year old Tamil or, you know, whoever's listening will be will will have a much better understanding of things.

这种认知方式能让你不易被那些看似合理的新奇主张带偏——特别是当你对背景知识知之甚少时。它还能让你将新信息有机整合到世界观中。你不认同这个观点吗？我

Will will be less prone to getting sort of swept away by some some new random thing that's being proposed that like seems kinda plausible if you don't know anything about much. And it'll also let you integrate new information coherently into this in into your picture of the world. You're not convinced? I

我觉得我...我觉得，呃，很大程度上这取决于真正的目标是什么。老实说，我不认为你能用那个论点说服15岁的泰曼。15岁的泰曼只想回家，蜷缩在电脑前，一边和朋友打Skype电话一边玩英雄联盟。对，就是这样。

I think I I think I think, like, a lot of this feels like it depends on what the goal really is. I honestly, I don't think you could have convinced 15 a 15 year old Taiman with that argument. What 15 year old Taiman wanted to do is go home, hunch over on his computer, play League of Legends with his friends while on a Skype call. Yeah. Yeah.

我同意。嗯。好吧。是的。对。

I agree. Yeah. Fine. Yeah. Yeah.

是啊。李，但如果你...

Yeah. Lee, but if you'd

说过 但我说过

said But I said

塞缪尔·泰莫，你在乎理解这个世界吗？不如去读四到六本历史书，选三个你真正喜欢的历史时期，这样当你从媒体获取信息时，就不会像现在这样容易被愚弄。他会说：老兄，我连视频都不看。我干嘛要在乎？我只想打英雄联盟。

Samuel Taymor, do you care about understanding the world? How about you read four to six history books of, like, three different eras of history that you really like such that when you get information from the from the media, it won't, like, fool you to the degree that it currently is. It'd be like, bro, I don't even watch videos. It's like, why do I care? I don't wanna play League of Legends.

不。我是说，不行。不。我们聊过

No. I mean, no. No. We talked

我在想这是不是...

I wonder if it's

和你很像。我确实...青少年时期的某个阶段，我完全不在乎这些，只想打游戏或者随便建些网站。但我想也有那么个时期，我会在意不被别人的想法洗脑。

similar to you. I Yeah. Was definitely yeah. There but at some point in my teenage years, there was definitely a point at which I wouldn't have cared about any of this, and I wanted to play video games and, like, make random websites or something. But I think there was also some point at which I would have cared about not being psyoped by other people's ideas.

而且我会在意...是的，想要理解这个世界。我是说，可能不像15岁时的我。有些15岁孩子更关心这些。

And I would have cared about, yeah. Wanting to make sense of world. I mean, yeah. Maybe not like 15 year old me. There are some 15 year olds who care more about that.

我不是那种人。但大概...18岁左右吧，大学那会儿。对，我记得是这样。

I was not one of them. But probably, I would say, like, 18 year old me. Like, around the time of university or something. Yeah. I think I was remember.

是啊。那时你正忙着完成学位，尽可能多看动漫，偶尔参加些编程马拉松。哦对了，你当时真的在意吗？你真正关心的是什么？

Yeah. At the time you were trying to get through your degree, watch as much anime as you could, and I think you're doing some hackathons here and there. Oh, yeah. Did you really care? What do you really have cared about?

比如，你是否在寻找解释世界的方式...感觉你后来变成了那种...两年前在播客里对社会学产生兴趣的「扶手椅理论家」

Like, were you seeking out explanations for how the world I feel like this you became a sort of armchair, you know, I'm interested in sociology, like, two years ago on the pod. Two

两三年前吧。我觉得...如果我当时明白这些事情的重要性，可能早就被说服了。15岁估计不行，但18、19岁应该可以。

or three years ago. I think I think I could have been convinced to do I think I could have yeah. Yeah. I think I could have been convinced if I if I understood why this stuff is important, I think I could have been convinced much sooner. Probably not convinced at age 15, but I think probably at age, like, 18 or 19 rather

而不是...比如用看六部动漫的时间...去读那四到六本历史书

than, like to not watch six. I mean, instead read these four to six history books about

你完全可以兼顾两者。老兄，你真的可以。我十几岁时也看《火影忍者》，说实话，那时候要让我啃完四到六本历史书简直天方夜谭，但我觉得你或许真能说服我读下去。

You could do both. Dude, you could do both. I mean, I I was I was watching Naruto as a teenager. Like, I don't yeah. I don't know how you would have gotten me to, like, read four to six history books, but I think you would've you could've gotten me to it.

其实我对这类知识还是感兴趣的。你看，我以前就爱看《QI》这类电视节目，因为它们总有些稀奇古怪的冷知识。某种程度上我确实在乎这些内容。大学期间就更不用说了，我整天都在接触各种杂七杂八的东西。

Like, I mean, look, did care about this stuff. Right? Like, I, you know, I was I I used to enjoy watching watching, like, TV show like QI or something because it just has, like, random interesting facts or something like this. Like, you know, I cared about it to some extent. And I'd say, yeah, definitely around at at university, like, sure, I was up to a lot of random stuff.

不过如果有人当时能给我讲明白这些事的重要性——我觉得我的态度可能会变成：好吧，这确实是件值得终身学习的大事。我会调整有限的阅读时间往这方面倾斜，或者对某些观点保持更批判的态度。

But, like, I think if someone had explained these things to me Yeah. He might have I think I think my position might have been, okay. Yeah. This is this is actually, like, quite a quite an important thing, a kind of lifelong learning type project. And, you know, I will, you know, for the little amount of time I have to do reading, I will, you know, change it based on this or whatever or I will be more skeptical of x y zed or, you know, something like this.

懂我意思吧？嗯，就这样。

You know? And yeah. Okay.

我得就此打住了，因为赶时间。但非常期待在下期《Not Overthinking》里听你选择哪三个历史时期作为研究课题。感谢各位听众，我们下次节目再见！

I'll be stopping there because I because I need to run, but I'm sure I'll I'll I'll I look forward to hearing which three eras of history that you are choosing as part of your study in the next episode of Not Overthinking. Thank you, everyone, for listening, and we will see you next time. Bye.