我想要提醒你們，扶持當(dāng)代知識(shí)分子的這些“巨人肩膀"不必非得具有英文能力，他們不需要通過英語考試。愛因斯坦就是典型的例子。順便說一下，他在學(xué)校還曾被認(rèn)為需要課外補(bǔ)習(xí)，因?yàn)樗鋵?shí)有閱讀障礙。但對整個(gè)世界來說,很幸運(yùn)的當(dāng)時(shí)他不需要通過英語考試，因?yàn)樗麄冎钡?964年才開始使用托?！，F(xiàn)在英語測驗(yàn)太泛濫了，有太多太多的英語測驗(yàn)，以及成千上萬的學(xué)生每年都在參加這些考試?，F(xiàn)在你會(huì)認(rèn)為，你和我都這么想，這些費(fèi)用不貴，價(jià)錢滿合理的。但是對數(shù)百萬的窮人來說，這些費(fèi)用高不可攀。所以，當(dāng)下我們又拒絕了他們。

　　It brings to mind a headline I saw recently: "Education: The Great Divide." Now I get it, I understand why people would focus on English. They want to give their children the best chance in life. And to do that, they need a Western education. Because, of course, the best jobs go to people out of the Western Universities, that I put on earlier. It's a circular thing.

　　這使我想起最近看到的一個(gè)新聞標(biāo)題：“教育：大鴻溝”現(xiàn)在我懂了。我了解為什么大家都重視英語，因?yàn)樗麄兿Ｍo孩子最好的人生機(jī)會(huì)。為了達(dá)成這目的，他們需要西方教育。畢竟，不可否認(rèn)，最好的工作都留給那些西方大學(xué)畢業(yè)出來的人。就像我之前說的，這是一種循環(huán)。

　　Okay. Let me tell you a story about two scientists, two English scientists. They were doing an experiment to do with genetics and the forelimbs and the hind limbs of animals. But they couldn't get the results they wanted. They really didn't know what to do, until along came a German scientist who realized that they were using two words for forelimb and hind limb, whereas genetics does not differentiate and neither does German. So bingo, problem solved. If you can't think a thought, you are stuck. But if another language can think that thought, then, by cooperating, we can achieve and learn so much more.

　　好，我跟你們說一個(gè)關(guān)于兩位科學(xué)家的故事：有兩位英國科學(xué)家在做一項(xiàng)實(shí)驗(yàn)，是關(guān)于遺傳學(xué)的，以及動(dòng)物的前、后肢。但他們無法得到他們想要的結(jié)果。他們真的不知道該怎么辦，直到來了一位德國的科學(xué)家。他發(fā)現(xiàn)在英文里前肢和后肢是不同的二個(gè)字，但在遺傳學(xué)上沒有區(qū)別。在德語也是同一個(gè)字。所以，叮!問題解決了。如果你不能想到一個(gè)念頭，你會(huì)卡在那里。但如果另一個(gè)語言能想到那念頭，然后通過合作我們可以達(dá)成目的，也學(xué)到更多。

　　My daughter, came to England from Kuwait. She had studied science and mathematics in Arabic. It's an Arabic medium school. She had to translate it into English at her grammar school. And she was the best in the class at those subjects. Which tells us that, when students come to us from abroad, we may not be giving them enough credit for what they know, and they know it in their own language. When a language dies, we don't know what we lose with that language.

　　我的女兒從科威特來到英格蘭，她在阿拉伯的學(xué)校學(xué)習(xí)科學(xué)和數(shù)學(xué)。那是所阿拉伯中學(xué)。在學(xué)校里，她得把這些知識(shí)翻譯成英文，而她在班上卻能在這些學(xué)科上拿到最好的成績。這告訴我們，當(dāng)外籍學(xué)生來找我們，我們可能無法針對他們所知道的給予贊賞，因?yàn)槟鞘莵碜杂谒麄兡刚Z的知識(shí)。當(dāng)一個(gè)語言消失時(shí)，我們不知道還有什么也會(huì)一并失去。

　　This is -- I don't know if you saw it on CNN recently -- they gave the Heroes Award to a young Kenyan shepherd boy who couldn't study at night in his village like all the village children, because the kerosene lamp, it had smoke and it damaged his eyes. And anyway, there was never enough kerosene, because what does a dollar a day buy for you? So he invented a cost-free solar lamp. And now the children in his village get the same grades at school as the children who have electricity at home. (Applause) When he received his award, he said these lovely words: "The children can lead Africa from what it is today, a dark continent, to a light continent." A simple idea, but it could have such far-reaching consequences.

　　這是--我不知道各位有沒有看最近的CNN--他們將一座英雄獎(jiǎng)授予一位年輕的肯亞牧童。在他住的村莊里，他和村里其它的孩童一樣無法在夜晚讀書，因?yàn)槊河蜔舢a(chǎn)生的煙霧會(huì)弄傷他的眼睛。再說，他也沒有足夠的煤油——畢竟，每天只有一塊美金的收入，你還能買什么?所以他發(fā)明了不需成本的太陽能燈?，F(xiàn)在他們村里的孩子們的成績都和那些家里有電的孩子相同(掌聲)。當(dāng)他接受獎(jiǎng)勵(lì)時(shí)，說了下面這句話："這些孩子可以帶領(lǐng)非洲這塊黑暗大陸迎向光明"一個(gè)簡單的想法，卻有著深遠(yuǎn)的影響。