[翻译]你相信谁？

在InfoQ上看到一篇文章，讲了Linda Rising博士在敏捷开发2008大会上的演讲，题目是“你相信谁？”。这个演讲很有趣，或者用Linda Rising自己的话说，很怪异。

现在尝试翻译一下，不过这还不是终稿，个别词句仍需推敲。欢迎您多提宝贵意见。

 

"Who Do You Trust?" by Linda Rising

你相信谁？Linda Rising博士

During Agile 2008, Dr. Linda Rising held a presentation centered on experiments conducted many years ago, presenting how deep, powerfully affecting, and difficult to avoid are human “prejudices” and “stereotypes” as seen from the perspective of psychology and cognitive science. In the second half of the session, she explained how it is possible to minimize and overcome the impact of prejudice. This article is a summary of that presentation.

在敏捷开发2008大会期间，Linda Rising博士作了关于很多年前的一组实验的一个报告，从心理学和认知学的角度来出发，揭示人们的偏见和成见是多么根深蒂固，影响深远而又难以避免。在报告的第二部分，她解释了如何减小和克服偏见的影响。本文是这个报告的总结。

The following experiment was mentioned throughout the session, an experiment conducted in 1954 and known as the Robbers Cave Experiment:

在报告中提到了下面的这个实验，这是1954年进行的称为Robbers Cave的实验。

Two groups of 12-year-old boys were taken to a Boy Scouts camp, but neither group knew of the other’s existence and believed that their group was the only group in the camp. (Of course, they traveled to the camp by different buses.) During the first week, the two groups carried out their activities separately. They swam in the lake, built hide-outs, and pitched tents. The accompanying adults (who were actually the researchers conducting the experiment) ensured that there was no contact between the two groups. The members of each group bonded as a team.

参加试验的是两组12岁的男孩儿。他们被带到一个童子军营地，但是彼此都不知道另一组男孩儿的存在，以为他们是营地中唯一的一组男孩儿。（当然，他们是坐不同的汽车到达营地的。）第一个星期，这两组男孩儿分别活动。他们在湖里游泳，修建hide-outs，以及搭建帐篷。陪伴的大人（实际上是进行实验的研究人员）确保这两组男孩儿之间没有接触，而且每个组的男孩儿们紧密融合成一个团队。

After one week, the two groups became aware of each other’s presence (as contrived by the adults). At this point, despite their not actually seeing each other, the two groups began distinguishing between “us” and “them” and saying “they (the other group) intruded on our territory”. The researchers were surprised by the extremes in boys’ reactions: how quickly the members of each group had bonded initially with each other and how quickly both groups had seen the other as “the enemy.”

一 个星期之后，这两组男孩儿逐渐意识到了对方的存在（在大人们的刻意安排之下）。这时，即使他们没有看到对方，这两组男孩儿也开始区分“我们”和“他们” 了，并且说“他们（另一组男孩儿）入侵了我们的地盘“。研究人员惊讶于男孩儿们的极端反应：开始每一组男孩儿多么迅速地彼此融合在一起，而后又很快地视另一个组男孩儿为“敌人”。

The two groups were then brought together. In a plan set-up by the “adults”, the two groups participated in competitive games such as baseball and tug-of-war, and the total scores for various games were recorded for each group, with the adults acting as judges. The group that won with the highest total score for the day was awarded prizes. When that happened, the losing group burned the flag of the winning group and raided their camp; the two groups were on the verge of declaring all-out war on each other.

然后这两组男孩儿被带到了一起。在“大人们”的安排之下，他们参加了竞争性的游戏，比如棒球和拔河，每个组在各种比赛中的成绩都被记录下来，而大人们担任裁判。当天总成绩最高的队伍被授予奖品。随后，输了的那组男孩儿焚烧了获胜组的旗帜，突袭了他们的营地；两组男孩儿处于一种一触即发的战争边缘的状态。

Dr. Rising broke off her story about the experiment here and turned to the topic of people’s prejudices. Humans are born with an instinctive ability to instantly determine whether what is in front of them is safe or dangerous, edible or inedible, enemy or friend. Since this ability is instinctive, it is an ability that humans acquired through competition for survival and the process of evolution. For humans in primitive times, slowness in distinguishing whether the person in front of them is a member of their own tribe or a member of an enemy tribe was a life-or-death issue. However, because of this instinctive ability, humans also came to categorize other humans — in other words, stereotyping them — the moment they laid eyes on them.

Rising博士在此处打断了她关于实验的描述，转而讲起人们的偏见。人类与生俱来就有一种本能，能够迅速识别他们面临的是安全的还是有危险的，是可以吃的还是不可以吃的，是敌人还是朋友。这种能力是天生的，是人类通过生存竞争和进化过程获得的。在人类的初级阶段，如果不能迅速视识别面前的人是属于自己部落的还是敌对部落的，那将是致命的。然后，正是由于这种本能，人类学会了看到一个人的第一眼，就把他/她分类--或者说，按照成见归类。

People categorize other people: enemy or friend; family or stranger; insider or outsider. This decision is made in an extremely short period of time, and categorizing then leads to stereotyping and simplification, with people making presumptions about others based on first appearances. Prejudice has two characteristics:

• Everyone has prejudices
• Nobody realizes that they are prejudiced

人们将其他人分类：敌人或朋友；家人或陌生人；自己人或外人。这种判断是在极短的时间内完成的，而如此分类又导致成见和简单化，对他人根据第一印象作出推测。偏见有两个特征：

• 每个人都有偏见
• 没人意识到他们是有偏见的

In other words, everybody mistakenly believes that they are not prejudiced. Consequently, while people believe themselves to be making rational decisions, they in fact constantly justify their behavior and that of their friends, family, and colleagues, and constantly presume the actions of strangers and outsiders to be “bad.”

换句话说，每个人都错误的以为自己是没有偏见的。结果就是，当人们以为他们在做出合理的决定时，实际上他们是在为他们的行为以及他们的朋友/家人和同事的行为进行辩护，而且总是假定陌生人和外人的行为是“坏的”。

Stereotypes simplify the way people view others. Despite the rich and complex individuality inherent in each person, people label others focusing on general outward appearance and ignoring details and difficult-to-observe features. Dr. Rising gave this example during her explanation:

成见简化了人们看待他人的方式。尽管每个人都有丰富的个性，但是人们只是注意通常的外表，而忽略了细节和更难观察的特征。为了说明这个问题，Rising博士举了下面这个例子：

“People who are married tend to use presumptive expressions when talking about their spouses, don’t they? They ‘never’ tidy up the kitchen, or they’re ‘always’ complaining. This is another kind of labeling due to prejudices.”

结了婚的人在谈论他们的配偶时，倾向于使用主观的表达方式，不是吗？他们‘从来’不整理厨房，或者他们‘总是’抱怨个不停。这是另一种因为偏见而贴的标签。

Moreover, when supervisors and managers evaluate the abilities of the staff working under them, the same prejudices and stereotyping occurs. In many cases, a supervisor “determines” the ability of a worker in about three weeks, labeling them as either “can do” or “can’t do” workers. Once a prejudice has been formed, the supervisor views all the actions of that worker through this filter. If two workers make the same mistake, in the case of the “Can’t do” worker, the supervisor will think, “There he/she goes again, making the same mistakes,” while in the case of the “Can do” worker the supervisor will think, “Maybe he/she wasn’t feeling well.” Eventually, the supervisor can only recognize actions that affirm their prejudice.

不仅如此，当主管和经理们评价他们的手下时，有着同样的偏见和成见。 多数情况下，主管会在三个星期内“决定”一名员工的能力，把他们归于“能干”或者“不能干”的类别。一旦一种偏见形成了，主管就会戴着这种有色眼镜去看员工的所有行为。如果两名员工犯了同样的错误，对于“不能干”的员工，主管就会想，“你看，他/她又犯同样的错误了吧”，而对于“能干”的员工，主管就会认 为，“也许他/她只是身体不适”。最终，主管只会注意到肯定偏见的那些行为。

Not only this, prejudices can also cause people to lose the capacity to demonstrate their own abilities. Here Dr. Rising introduced another experiment. In general, females are believed to be less proficient in mathematics than males (in the case of the United States). In this experiment, the subjects were given a mathematics test. If no mention of gender was made before the test was administered, there was no difference in the results between males and females. However, if comments were made about the relationship between mathematical ability and gender before the test was administered, the females scored lower than the males. Furthermore, the same results were obtained by simply having a column on the test paper for subjects to fill in their gender, without any comments about gender being made. This is an example of consciousness of their own gender activating prejudices and inhibiting a person’s natural abilities.

更糟糕的是， 偏见会使人们无法表现自己的才能。这里Rising博士引述了另外一个实验。通常，女性被认为比男性更不擅长数学（仅就美国的情况而言）。在这个实验中， 对参加试验者进行数学考试。如果在考试开始之前没有提到性别，男性和女性的成绩没有差别。但是，如果在考试之前，提及数学能力和性别的关系，女性的考试成 绩就会低于男性的考试成绩。更为甚者，如果仅在考卷上要求受试者填写他们的性别，而并不提及关于性别的任何评语，那么结果仍然是这样。这个例子说明性别意识引起偏见，并阻碍了个人能力的表现。

Prejudices and stereotyping are rooted in human instincts, and so influence everyone. However, these can also be obstacles when many people are attempting to work together to complete a complex job or reach a common objective, missing chances for people to display their individual abilities, inviting mistakes, and in some cases even lowering the capabilities of the people who have prejudices. How is it possible to escape from these prejudices and/or lessen their impact?

偏见和成见根植于人类的本能之中，因而影响每一个人。而且，当人们合作以完成一项复杂的工作或者达成一个共同的目标，这也可能阻碍人们无法发挥个人的能力，或者导致错误，甚至在某些情况下削弱那些秉持成见者的能力。那么，怎么才能够摆脱这些偏见，或者降低它们的影响呢？

Continuing the story of the first experiment, Dr. Rising said:

Rising博士继续讲述第一个实验：

The researchers tried to stop the conflict between the two groups, but simply making the two groups carry out activities together produced no noticeable results. The researchers then staged an “incident” in which the camp’s water supply was cut off and all the boys had to check the water pipe (more than 1 km long) to see where it was blocked. When the blockage was found and removed, the members of both groups joined together in celebrating. By involving all the boys in the resolution of an “incident” that affected the entire camp, the conflict between the two groups evaporated.

研究人员尝试平息两组男孩儿之间的冲突，但是仅仅使他们在一起活动并没有任何改善。这时研究人员制造了一起“事故”，造成营地供水中断，然后所有的男孩儿们不得不一起检查超过一公里长的水管，找出哪里被堵住了。当堵住的地方被找到并且被修好之后，两组男孩儿一起欢庆胜利。通过使所有的男孩儿一起参与解决影响整个营地的“事故”，两个组之间的冲突被化于无形之间。

Humans can cooperate. Given a common objective, they can work together to tackle the task at hand. In a study using monkeys, the experiment was set up so that two monkeys obtained food by cooperating with each other. Initially both of the monkeys obtained food, but the experiment was changed so that only one monkey obtained food even when the two monkeys cooperated. However, even when one of them realized that it would not receive any food, it cooperated with the other, and the monkey who received the food shared it with the other monkey.

人 们能够合作。只要给他们一个共同的目标，他们就能一起合作完成任务。在一个用猴子进行的研究中，被设计成两只猴子只有合作才能获得食物。开始的时候，两只 猴子都能得到食物，但是实验改变了，使得即使当它们合作时也只有一只猴子能得到食物。然而，当其中一只猴子意识到它无法得到食物时，它仍然与另一只猴子合 作，而另一只得到食物的猴子会和它分享。

Humans can cooperate. Dr. Rising says that this human ability is also instinctive. In order to cooperate, there is no need for the two parties to like each other. All that is necessary is that one party acknowledges the efforts of the other, and the other party recognizes the efforts of the first. A relationship of mutual respect for the ability and contribution of the other party is born from that. People feel happy to be respected and trusted; such instincts are inherent to human nature.

人类能够合作。Rising博士说人类的这项能力也是天生的。为了合作，双方完全没有必要必须喜欢对方。所需的只是一方认可另一方的努力，而另一方也认可对方的努力，如此便产生了互相对对方的能力和贡献的尊重。被人尊重和信任使人感到高兴，这样的反应是符合人类本性的。

Taking advantage of these natural human instincts, Dr. Rising points out that Agile practices are outstanding from the standpoint of enabling people to display their abilities, especially the fact that face-to-face communication promotes cooperation.

Rising博士指出，由于利用了人类的本能，敏捷开发是尤其突出的，因为它能够使人展示他们的才能，特别是因为当面交流促进合作。

For her last slide, Dr. Rising used a very striking image, a photograph of a boss monkey eating, surrounded by females and youngsters staring intently at him. The title of the slide was “Reason for Hope”. The females and youngsters had hope because they thought the boss will share the food with them. However, I felt that was not all; I felt the photograph also contained the message that hope lies in the ability of humans to cooperate.

在她的最后一页幻灯片中，Rising博士用了一张很特别的照片，一只公猴在吃东西，周围是一群母猴和小猴眼巴巴地看着。这页幻灯片的标题是“希望的理由”。母猴和小猴们心存希望是因为它们以为公猴会和它们分享食物。然而，我觉得那并不是全部；我觉得照片中透露出另外的信息是，希望也存在于人类合作的能力。

At the start of the session, Dr. Rising said that this presentation was the third of her “weird talks.” At Agile 2006, she examined the cooperative behavior of Bonobo apes from an ethological perspective and spoke about how “natural” the cooperative aspects of Agile are. At Agile 2007, she examined the “ability” of humans to deceive themselves, considering how this “ability” affected the preparation of business estimates.

在演讲开始的时候，Rising 博士说这是她的第三次“怪异的演讲”。在2006年的敏捷开发大会上，她从行为学的角度详细分析了倭黑猩猩的合作行为，谈到敏捷开发在合作方面是多 么的“自然”。在2007年的敏捷开发大会上，她分析了人类自我欺骗的“能力”，讨论了这种“能力”如何影响商业预算的准备。

Dr. Rising’s presentation at Agile 2008 discussed how tied up in prejudices humans are, how the capacity of teams is diminished by stereotyping, and how Agile teams overcome these negative impacts. In the opinion of the author, such knowledge cuts through the workings of the human spirit and brain and seems somehow excitingly close to the human limit.

在2008年的敏捷开发大会上，Rising博士的演讲讨论了人类如何囿于自己的偏见，团队的能力如何因为成见而被削弱，而为何敏捷开发能够克服这些负面影响。笔者认为，这种研究揭示了人类的内心和大脑的工作方式，而且接近人类的极限，这是令人兴奋的。

后记：在se-radio的一次关于回顾(Retrospectives)的访谈中，Linda Rising谈及自己的兴趣在于模式(Patterns)、回顾(Retrospectives)、敏捷开发(Agile Development Processes)、变更过程(Change Processes)，近期对灵长目动物(primates)以及大脑产生了兴趣。