Youth Youth is not a time of life; it is a state of mind; it is not a matter of rosy cheeks, red lips and supple knees; it is a matter of the will, a quality of the imagination, a vigor of the emotion
In less blatant cases, there's still a kind of negotiation that often goes on. 在不那么明显的例子中，还是有一种磋商在进行着 In the workplace, for example, 比如说在工作场所 there's often a tension over whether an employee can socia
The global economic financial crisis has reignited public interest 全球金融危机让人们对早在亚当·斯密时代 in something that's actually one of the oldest questions in economics, dating back to at least before Adam Smith.
Well, we chose the second option, and language is the result. 我们选了第二条路，语言就是产物 Language evolved to solve the crisis of visual theft. 语言的进化解决了观察性窃取的危机 Language is a piece of social technology for enhanc
Once we have language, we can put our ideas together and cooperate to have a prosperity 一旦我们有了语言，我们可以分享想法并合作，从而创造繁荣 that we couldn't have before we acquired it. 没有语言这是无法完成的 And this is why our species
So imagine that you're a retired household in Belgium and someone comes to your front door. 想象一下你是一个比利时的退休老人，有一天有人跑来敲你家的门。 "Excuse me, would you mind if I peruse your stock portfolio? “打扰了，你能跟我说下你的股票投
Holding down the right flank of the OECD, all the way on the other side, is Greece. 在图右侧的这些国家，最右边的是希腊， And what you can see is that over the last 25 years, 我们看到在过去25年 Greece has barely managed to save
I know what you're thinking. 我知道你们在想什么。 You think I've lost my way, 你们想我迷路了， and somebody's going to come on the stage in a minute and guide me gently back to my seat. 有人马上会上台，把我领回到我的座位。 I get that al
So -- now, when you think about this, what we have here is a ham butt problem. 所以，现在，当你想到这些，我们面对的问题其实是火腿屁股的问题。 Does everyone know the ham butt problem? 有人知道火腿屁股的问题吗？ Woman's making a ham for a big, fa
Now the reason the chimpanzees don't do that 黑猩猩不那么做的原因 is that they lack what psychologists and anthropologists call social learning. 是它们缺乏心理学家和人类学家所谓的社会学习能力 They seem to lack the ability to learn fr
Language really is the voice of our genes. 语言的确是我们基因的声音 Now having evolved language, though, we did something peculiar, even bizarre. 尽管我们有发达的语言，但我们也做了件特殊，甚至可以说是件奇怪的事 As we spread out around the world
Okay, so what this tells us is that, contrary to the old adage, "monkey see, monkey do," 这与我们所知的，“有样学样”（猴子见什么学什么）的谚语完全相反 the surprise really is that all of the other animals really cannot do that -- a
Growing up in Taiwan as the daughter of a calligrapher, 我在台湾长大。作为一位书法家的女儿， one of my most treasured memories was my mother showing me the beauty, the shape and the form of Chinese characters. 我最珍贵的记忆之
Interestingly enough, when you start to crank the data, 有意思的是，当你开始收集数据时， these pockets of futureless language speakers all around the world turn out to be, by and large, some of the world's best saver
This is a picture of Maurice Druon, 照片里的人是Maurice Druon the Honorary Perpetual Secretary of L'Academie francaise, the French Academy. L'Academie francaise的荣誉终身秘书长--也就是法兰西学院 He is splendidly attired in
Five years ago, I experienced a bit of what it must have been like to be Alice in Wonderland. 五年前，我曾有过一个有如漫游爱丽丝仙境的经历。 Penn State asked me, a communications teacher, to teach a communications class for
You can't do that while you're texting, and so ways are developing of doing it within this medium. 你没有办法在短信里这么做，所以在这个交流媒介里产生了各种转换话题的方法。 All spoken languages have what a linguist calls a new informatio
Now don't get me wrong, writing has certain advantages. 大家不要误会，文字写作确实有它自己的优势。 When you write, because it's a conscious process, because you can look backwards, 当你写字的时候，因为这是一个有意识的过程，因为你可以回顾过去， you can
The simplest example of this is in the polite request. 最简单的例子出自于礼貌的要求 If you express your request as a conditional -- "if you could open the window, that would be great" 倘若你用一个条件句表达请求：“您要是能开一下窗子就太好了，”
And of course, a few of us are saying: okay, computers! 当然，你们中的有些人会说，计算机！ Computers! What about computers? 计算机！计算机是新东西吧？ The thing about computers is, I love computers. 不要误会，我喜欢计算机， I mean, I'm a huge
