今天推薦的演講者是：Lisa Feldman，發(fā)布于2017年的TED演講大會！

你能看著別人的臉，知道他們在想什么嗎？每個人都會經(jīng)歷同樣的快樂、悲傷和焦慮嗎？情緒到底是什么東西？Lisa是一位心理學教授，一起來看她的研究成果！

You aren't at the mercy of your emotions -- your brain creates them

Lisa FeldmanMy research lab sits about a mile from where several bombs exploded during the Boston Marathon in 2013. The surviving bomber, Dzhokhar Tsarnaev of Chechnya, was tried, convicted and sentenced to death.

我的研究實驗室外大約一英里處就是2013年波士頓馬拉松時，數(shù)個炸彈爆炸的地方。存活下來的炸彈客，車臣的佐哈爾札涅夫，受到審判、被定罪、被判死刑。

Now, when a jury has to make the decision between life in prison and the death penalty, they base their decision largely on whether or not the defendant feels remorseful for his actions. Tsarnaev spoke words of apology, but when jurors looked at his face, all they saw was a stone-faced stare. Now, Tsarnaev is guilty, there's no doubt about that. He murdered and maimed innocent people, and I'm not here to debate that.

當陪審團要做決定，選擇要判終生監(jiān)禁或死刑時，他們的決定基礎(chǔ)主要是看被告是否對他的行為有悔意。佐哈爾札涅夫說了道歉的話，但當陪審團成員看著他的臉，他們看到的只有面無表情的凝視。佐哈爾札涅夫是有罪的，這點無庸置疑。他謀殺、重傷了無辜的人，我并不是來爭辯這一點。

My heart goes out to all the people who suffered. But as a scientist, I have to tell you that jurors do not and cannot detect remorse or any other emotion in anybody ever. Neither can I, and neither can you, and that's because emotions are not what we think they are. They are not universally expressed and recognized. They are not hardwired brain reactions that are uncontrollable. We have misunderstood the nature of emotion for a very long time, and understanding what emotions really are has important consequences for all of us.

我的心與那些受苦的人同在。但身為科學家，我必須告訴你們，陪審團永遠不能，也不可能，偵測任何人的悔意或任何其他情緒。我也不行，你們也不行，那是因為情緒和我們所想的不一樣。它們并沒有普遍的表現(xiàn)方式，也沒有被普遍認可。它們并不是無法控制的天生大腦反應。我們誤解了情緒的天性，長年以來一直如此，了解情緒到底是什么，對我們所有人來說，都有很重要的后果。

I have studied emotions as a scientist for the past 25 years, and in my lab, we have probed human faces by measuring electrical signals that cause your facial muscles to contract to make facial expressions. We have scrutinized the human body in emotion. We have analyzed hundreds of physiology studies involving thousands of test subjects. We've scanned hundreds of brains, and examined every brain imaging study on emotion that has been published in the past 20 years.

身為科學家，過去二十五年間，我一直在研究情緒，在我的實驗室中，我們探究人類面孔的方式是測量電訊號，電訊號會造成肌肉收縮，做出表情。我們已經(jīng)仔細觀察過人有情緒時的身體反應，我們已經(jīng)分析過數(shù)百篇生理研究，這些研究涉及數(shù)千名實驗對象。我們已經(jīng)掃瞄過數(shù)百個大腦，探討在過去二十年間所出版的每一篇關(guān)于情緒的大腦成像研究。

And the results of all of this research are overwhelmingly consistent. It may feel to you like your emotions are hardwired and they just trigger and happen to you, but they don't. You might believe that your brain is prewired with emotion circuits, that you're born with emotion circuits, but you're not. In fact, none of us in this room have emotion circuits in our brain. In fact, no brain on this planet contains emotion circuits.

所有這些研究的結(jié)果都有非常驚人的一致性。你可能會覺得你的情緒是天生的，它們就是會被觸發(fā)，然后你就會有情緒，但不是這樣的。你可能會認為你的大腦內(nèi)建有情緒電路，你生出來就有情緒電路，但實情并非如此。事實上在這演講廳里沒有任何人的腦中有情緒電路。其實地球上沒有任何一顆腦袋含有情緒電路。

So what are emotions, really? Well, strap on your seat belt, because ... emotions are guesses. They are guesses that your brain constructs in the moment where billions of brain cells are working together, and you have more control over those guesses than you might imagine that you do.

那么，情緒到底是什么？嗯，系上你的安全帶，因為……情緒是猜測。情緒是你的大腦在當下建立的猜測，在大腦中，數(shù)十億個腦細胞合作進行，而你能控制那些猜測的程度比你想像的還要高。

Now, if that sounds preposterous to you, or, you know, kind of crazy, I'm right there with you, because frankly, if I hadn't seen the evidence for myself, decades of evidence for myself, I am fairly sure that I wouldn't believe it either. But the bottom line is that emotions are not built into your brain at birth. They are just built.

如果你覺得這聽起來很荒謬，或是有點瘋狂，我也有同感，因為坦白說，如果沒親自看過證據(jù)，數(shù)十年來的證據(jù)，我很確定我自己也不會相信。但結(jié)果就是，情緒并不是你出生時就內(nèi)建在你的大腦中的。情緒只是被建立起來。

To see what I mean, have a look at this. Right now, your brain is working like crazy. Your neurons are firing like mad trying to make meaning out of this so that you see something other than black and white blobs. Your brain is sifting through a lifetime of experience, making thousands of guesses at the same time, weighing the probabilities, trying to answer the question, "What is this most like?" not "What is it?" but "What is this most like in my past experience?" And this is all happening in the blink of an eye. Now if your brain is still struggling to find a good match and you still see black and white blobs, then you are in a state called "experiential blindness," and I am going to cure you of your blindness. This is my favorite part. Are you ready to be cured?

若想了解我的意思，看看這個。此刻，你的大腦正在瘋狂運作。你的神經(jīng)元火力全開，試著找出這張圖的意義，想讓你能看到黑白斑以外的東西。你的大腦正在篩選你一生的經(jīng)驗，同時做出數(shù)千種猜測，權(quán)衡各種可能性，試圖回答這個問題：「這最像什么？」不是「這是什么？」而是「依我過去的經(jīng)驗，這最像什么？」上述這一切都在一眨眼間發(fā)生。如果你的大腦還在努力著想要找到符合的資訊，而你仍然只看到黑白斑，那么你就是處在所謂「經(jīng)驗盲目」的狀態(tài)中，而我要來治愈你的盲目。這是我最喜歡的部分。你們準備好被治愈了嗎？

All right. Here we go.

好極了，來吧。

All right. So now many of you see a snake, and why is that? Because as your brain is sifting through your past experience, there's new knowledge there, the knowledge that came from the photograph. And what's really cool is that that knowledge which you just acquired moments ago is changing how you experience these blobs right now. So your brain is constructing the image of a snake where there is no snake, and this kind of a hallucination is what neuroscientists like me call "predictions."

好。現(xiàn)在，很多人能看到了一條蛇了，為什么會這樣？因為當你的大腦在篩選你過去的經(jīng)驗時，有找到新的知識，來自剛才蛇的照片的知識。而很酷的一點是，你剛剛才取得的那些知識正在改變你現(xiàn)在對于這些黑白斑的經(jīng)驗感受。所以，你的大腦正在沒有蛇的地方建立出一條蛇的影像，而這種幻覺就是像我這樣的神經(jīng)科學家所謂的「預測」。

Predictions are basically the way your brain works. It's business as usual for your brain. Predictions are the basis of every experience that you have. They are the basis of every action that you take. In fact, predictions are what allow you to understand the words that I'm speaking as they come out of my --

預測，基本上是你大腦運作的方式。你的大腦「照常營業(yè)」時就是這樣。你擁有的所有經(jīng)驗，都以預測為基礎(chǔ)。你采取的所有行動，都以預測為基礎(chǔ)。事實上，你現(xiàn)在也是靠著預測，來了解我現(xiàn)在說的字句，這些字句出自我的──

Audience: Mouth. Lisa Feldman Barrett: Mouth. Exactly.

觀眾：嘴巴。講者：嘴巴，完全正確。

Predictions are primal. They help us to make sense of the world in a quick and efficient way. So your brain does not react to the world. Using past experience, your brain predicts and constructs your experience of the world.

預測是原始的。預測能協(xié)助我們用很快速有效的方式來賦予這個世界意義。所以，你的大腦并不是對這個世界做出反應。你的大腦使用過去的經(jīng)驗，預測并建立出你對于世界的經(jīng)驗。

The way that we see emotions in others are deeply rooted in predictions. So to us, it feels like we just look at someone's face, and we just read the emotion that's there in their facial expressions the way that we would read words on a page. But actually, under the hood, your brain is predicting. It's using past experience based on similar situations to try to make meaning. This time, you're not making meaning of blobs, you're making meaning of facial movements like the curl of a lip or the raise of an eyebrow. And that stone-faced stare? That might be someone who is a remorseless killer, but a stone-faced stare might also mean that someone is stoically accepting defeat, which is in fact what Chechen culture prescribes for someone in Dzhokhar Tsarnaev's situation.

我們怎么去看待別人的情緒，也是深根在預測上的。所以，對我們來說，感覺就像是我們只是看著某人的臉孔，然后我們就去讀出在他們面部表情中的情緒，和我們讀紙上的文字是一樣的方式。但其實在表面之下，你的大腦正在做預測。它會根據(jù)相似的情境，采用過去的經(jīng)驗，來試著建構(gòu)出意義。只是這次，你不是在找出黑白斑的意義，你是在找出面部動作的意義，比如噘嘴或是揚眉的意義。那面無表情的凝視呢？有可能代表著一個沒有悔意的殺手，但面無表情的凝視也代表著一個泰然地接收自己被打敗的人，事實上，在車臣文化里，人們在佐哈爾札涅夫所處的情境中會做出的就是這種表情。

So the lesson here is that emotions that you seem to detect in other people actually come in part from what's inside your own head. And this is true in the courtroom, but it's also true in the classroom, in the bedroom, and in the boardroom.

所以，這里的教訓是，當你似乎從別人身上察覺到情緒時，那情緒其實有部分來自你自己的腦袋。在法庭上是如此，但在教室亦是如此，在臥室、會議室都是如此。

And so here's my concern: tech companies which shall remain nameless ... well, maybe not. You know, Google, Facebook -- are spending millions of research dollars to build emotion-detection systems, and they are fundamentally asking the wrong question, because they're trying to detect emotions in the face and the body, but emotions aren't in your face and body. Physical movements have no intrinsic emotional meaning. We have to make them meaningful.

所以我會擔心一件事：科技公司，就保持匿名好了……也許不用。你們知道的，Google、臉書……它們花了數(shù)百萬美元在研究上，想要建立情緒偵測系統(tǒng)，而他們基本上就問錯了問題，因為他們試圖偵測面部和身體中的情緒，但情緒并不在你的面部和身體中。身體動作并沒有內(nèi)在固有的情緒意義。是我們要讓動作有意義。

A human or something else has to connect them to the context, and that makes them meaningful. That's how we know that a smile might mean sadness and a cry might mean happiness, and a stoic, still face might mean that you are angrily plotting the demise of your enemy. Now, if I haven't already gone out on a limb, I'll just edge out on that limb a little further and tell you that the way that you experience your own emotion is exactly the same process. Your brain is basically making predictions, guesses, that it's constructing in the moment with billions of neurons working together.

一個人或是其他東西，必須要把動作和情境連結(jié)，這樣動作才會有意義。因為這樣，我們才能知道微笑意味的可能是悲傷，而哭泣意味的可能是開心，而不露出任何表情的面孔可能意味著你正在氣憤地計畫要如何殺死你的敵人。如果這番話還沒嚇跑你，那我要再進一步告訴各位，你經(jīng)歷你自己情緒的方式，是完全一樣的過程?；旧?，你的大腦會做出預測、猜測，都是在當下那個時刻建立起來的，靠數(shù)十億的神經(jīng)元合作完成。

Now your brain does come prewired to make some feelings, simple feelings that come from the physiology of your body. So when you're born, you can make feelings like calmness and agitation, excitement, comfort, discomfort. But these simple feelings are not emotions. They're actually with you every waking moment of your life. They are simple summaries of what's going on inside your body, kind of like a barometer.

你的大腦確實天生就會制造某一些感覺，即那些來自你身體生理狀況的簡單感受。所以，在你出生時，你可以制造出一些感受，如冷靜、激動、興奮、舒服、不舒服。但這些簡單的感受并不是情緒。其實在你人生中醒著的每一刻，它們都與你同在。它們只是你體內(nèi)所發(fā)生之狀況的簡單總結(jié)而已，有點像是氣壓計。

But they have very little detail, and you need that detail to know what to do next. What do you about these feelings? And so how does your brain give you that detail? Well, that's what predictions are. Predictions link the sensations in your body that give you these simple feelings with what's going on around you in the world so that you know what to do. And sometimes, those constructions are emotions.

但它們沒有什么細節(jié)資訊，你需要細節(jié)資訊才能知道接下來要怎么做。你要如何處理這些感受？而你的大腦要如何提供你細節(jié)資訊？那就是預測了。預測的功能是把那些讓你有簡單感受的身體感知和你身邊環(huán)境發(fā)生的事情連結(jié)起來，這樣你才會知道該怎么做。而有時，那些建造出來的東西就是情緒。

So for example, if you were to walk into a bakery, your brain might predict that you will encounter the delicious aroma of freshly baked chocolate chip cookies. I know my brain would predict the delicious aroma of freshly baked chocolate cookies. And our brains might cause our stomachs to churn a little bit, to prepare for eating those cookies. And if we are correct, if in fact some cookies have just come out of the oven, then our brains will have constructed hunger, and we are prepared to munch down those cookies and digest them in a very efficient way, meaning that we can eat a lot of them, which would be a really good thing.

比如，如果你走進一家面包店，你的大腦可能會預測你會聞到新鮮出爐巧克力脆片餅干的美好香味。我知道我的大腦會預測有新鮮出爐巧克力餅干的美好香味。而我們的大腦可能會造成我們的胃稍微攪動，來準備吃那些餅干。如果我們預測正確，如果確實有一些餅干剛出爐，那么我們的大腦就會建立飢餓感，而我們會準備好要津津有味地嚼那些餅干，然后用非常有效的方式消化它們，也就是說我們能吃很多餅干，這是很棒的事。

You guys are not laughing enough. I'm totally serious.

你們笑得不夠大聲。我是非常認真的。

But here's the thing. That churning stomach, if it occurs in a different situation, it can have a completely different meaning. So if your brain were to predict a churning stomach in, say, a hospital room while you're waiting for test results, then your brain will be constructing dread or worry or anxiety, and it might cause you to, maybe, wring your hands or take a deep breath or even cry. Right? Same physical sensation, same churning stomach, different experience.

但重點是，那正在攪動的胃，如果發(fā)生在不同的情況當中，它可能就會有完全不同的意義。如果你的大腦預測會有攪動的胃，且情境是在醫(yī)院中，當你在等待檢查結(jié)果時，那么你的大腦就會建立懼怕感、憂心感，或焦慮感，那可能會造成你去……也許，擰著你的手，或是深呼吸，或甚至哭泣。對吧？同樣的身體感知，同樣是攪動的胃，不同的經(jīng)歷。

And so the lesson here is that emotions which seem to happen to you are actually made by you. You are not at the mercy of mythical emotion circuits which are buried deep inside some ancient part of your brain. You have more control over your emotions than you think you do. I don't mean that you can just snap your fingers and change how you feel the way that you would change your clothes, but your brain is wired so that if you change the ingredients that your brain uses to make emotion, then you can transform your emotional life. So if you change those ingredients today, you're basically teaching your brain how to predict differently tomorrow, and this is what I call being the architect of your experience.

所以，這里的教訓是，情緒看似是發(fā)生在你身上的，但其實情緒是你制造的。你并沒有受到深埋在大腦古老區(qū)域的神話情緒電路所控制。你對你的情緒有更高的控制權(quán)，比你想的還高。我的意思并不是你可以彈一下手指就改變你的感覺，像換衣服一樣，但你的大腦是設(shè)定好的，如果你能改變你的大腦用來制造情緒的原料，那么你就可以轉(zhuǎn)變你的情緒生活。如果你今天就改變那些原料，基本上，你是在教你的大腦如何用不同的方式預測明天，我稱之為：成為建造你自身經(jīng)驗的建筑師。

So here's an example. All of us have had a nervous feeling before a test, right? But some people experience crippling anxiety before a test. They have test anxiety. Based on past experiences of taking tests, their brains predict a hammering heartbeat, sweaty hands, so much so that they are unable to actually take the test. They don't perform well, and sometimes they not only fail courses but they actually might fail college. But here's the thing: a hammering heartbeat is not necessarily anxiety. It could be that your body is preparing to do battle and ace that test ... or, you know, give a talk in front of hundreds of people on a stage where you're being filmed.

這里有一個例子。我們所有人都曾經(jīng)在考試之前感到緊張，對吧？但有些人在考試之前，經(jīng)歷到的是會影響到他們能力的強烈焦慮。他們有考試焦慮癥。根據(jù)過去參加考試的經(jīng)驗，他們的大腦預測會有強烈心跳、掌心冒汗，強烈到讓他們無法去進行考試。他們的表現(xiàn)不會好，有時，他們不只是選的課沒過，還可能被退學。但重點是：強烈的心跳不見得就是焦慮。也有可能是你的身體在準備要打仗，準備在考試中得第一……或你正要做一場演說，站在臺上面對數(shù)百個人，同時還被拍攝。

I'm serious.

我是認真的。

And research shows that when students learn to make this kind of energized determination instead of anxiety, they perform better on tests. And that determination seeds their brain to predict differently in the future so that they can get their butterflies flying in formation. And if they do that often enough, they not only can pass a test but it will be easier for them to pass their courses, and they might even finish college, which has a huge impact on their future earning potential. So I call this emotional intelligence in action.

研究顯示，當學生學會制造出這種充滿能量的決心，而不是制造出焦慮時，他們考試的表現(xiàn)就會更佳。那決心在他們的大腦中播種，讓大腦用不同的方式去預測未來，所以他們能讓自己不會亂了陣腳。如果他們常常這么做，他們不僅能通過考試，他們也會更容易通過他們選的課，他們甚至可以大學畢業(yè)，這對他們未來賺錢的潛能有很大的影響。所以我稱之為：作用中的情緒智慧。

Now you can cultivate this emotional intelligence yourself and use it in your everyday life. So just, you know, imagine waking up in the morning. I'm sure you've had this experience. I know I have. You wake up and as you're emerging into consciousness, you feel this horrible dread, you know, this real wretchedness, and immediately, your mind starts to race.

你們可以自己培養(yǎng)這種情緒智慧，把它用在你們的日常生活中。所以你可以試著想像在早晨醒來──我相信你們有過這種經(jīng)驗，我知道我有──你們在早晨醒來，慢慢進入到意識，感覺到一種糟透的懼怕感，真的很悲慘的感覺，立刻，你的大腦就會開始賽跑。

You start to think about all the crap that you have to do at work and you have that mountain of email which you will never dig yourself out of ever, the phone calls you have to return, and that important meeting across town, and you're going to have to fight traffic, you'll be late picking your kids up, your dog is sick, and what are you going to make for dinner? Oh my God. What is wrong with your life? What is wrong with my life?

你開始想到你工作時要處理的所有鳥事，有一大堆未讀的電子郵件，你永遠都不可能讀完，還有待回覆的電話，還有在市區(qū)另一頭的會議，你還得要對抗塞車，你接孩子就一定會遲到，你的狗生病了，還有，晚餐要煮什么？噢，我的天?。∧愕娜松窃趺椿厥?？我的人生是怎么回事？

That mind racing is prediction. Your brain is searching to find an explanation for those sensations in your body that you experience as wretchedness, just like you did with the blobby image. So your brain is trying to explain what caused those sensations so that you know what to do about them. But those sensations might not be an indication that anything is wrong with your life. They might have a purely physical cause. Maybe you're tired. Maybe you didn't sleep enough. Maybe you're hungry. Maybe you're dehydrated. The next time that you feel intense distress, ask yourself: Could this have a purely physical cause? Is it possible that you can transform emotional suffering into just mere physical discomfort?

那大腦的快速思考，就是預測。你的大腦在尋找一種解釋，用來解釋那種被你體驗為「悲慘」的身體感知，就像剛剛看到黑白斑圖像時，你的大腦也是這樣做的。所以，你的大腦在試著解釋是什么造成那些感知，這樣你才會知道如何處理它們。但那些感知，可能并沒有在暗示你的人生有什么問題?？赡軉渭兪巧眢w造成的。也許你是累了。也許你睡眠不足。也許你餓了。也許你脫水了。下一次你感覺到強烈的煩惱時，問問自己：這有沒有可能單純是身體造成的？你有沒有可能把情緒上的苦惱轉(zhuǎn)變成只是身體上的不舒服？

Now I am not suggesting to you that you can just perform a couple of Jedi mind tricks and talk yourself out of being depressed or anxious or any kind of serious condition. But I am telling you that you have more control over your emotions than you might imagine, and that you have the capacity to turn down the dial on emotional suffering and its consequences for your life by learning how to construct your experiences differently. And all of us can do this and with a little practice, we can get really good at it, like driving. At first, it takes a lot of effort, but eventually it becomes pretty automatic.

我并不是在暗示各位你們可以施展幾項絕地武士的心靈招術(shù)，就可能可以讓自己不再沮喪、不再焦慮，或不再有其他嚴重的狀況。但我要告訴各位的是，你比你想像中的還要更能掌控你的情緒，且你有能力把情緒上的苦惱給調(diào)低一點，因而降低它對你人生造成的后果，做法就是要學習如何用不同的方式來建立你自己的經(jīng)驗。我們所有人都能辦到，透過一點練習，我們還能夠精通它，就像開車一樣。一開始，要很努力去做，最終，會變成像是自動的一樣。

Now I don't know about you, but I find this to be a really empowering and inspiring message, and the fact that it's backed up by decades of research makes me also happy as a scientist. But I have to also warn you that it does come with some fine print, because more control also means more responsibility.

我不知道你們怎樣，但我覺得這個訊息非常振奮人心，能讓我覺得自己有能力，而且它背后還有數(shù)十年的研究在支持，讓身為科學家的我也感到很高興。但我也得警告你們，它上面還有小字的警告訊息，因為越多的控制就意味著越多的責任。

If you are not at the mercy of mythical emotion circuits which are buried deep inside your brain somewhere and which trigger automatically, then who's responsible, who is responsible when you behave badly? You are. Not because you're culpable for your emotions, but because the actions and the experiences that you make today become your brain's predictions for tomorrow. Sometimes we are responsible for something not because we're to blame but because we're the only ones who can change it.

如果你不受到深埋在你大腦內(nèi)某處且會自動觸發(fā)的神話情緒電路所擺布，那么，是由誰在負責？當你的行為不當?shù)臅r候是誰在負責？是你。并不是你應該要因為你的情緒而受責備，而是因為你今天的行為和經(jīng)驗會變成你的大腦為明天做的預測。有時候，我們要為某些事負責，并不是因為要怪罪我們，而是因為我們是唯一能改變它的人。

Now responsibility is a big word. It's so big, in fact, that sometimes people feel the need to resist the scientific evidence that emotions are built and not built in. The idea that we are responsible for our own emotions seems very hard to swallow. But what I'm suggesting to you is you don't have to choke on that idea. You just take a deep breath, maybe get yourself a glass of water if you need to, and embrace it. Embrace that responsibility, because it is the path to a healthier body, a more just and informed legal system, and a more flexible and potent emotional life. Thank you.

「責任」是個很有分量的詞。事實上，它的分量大到讓人們有時候會覺得需要去抗拒那些情緒是后天建造出來而非天生內(nèi)建的科學證據(jù)。我們要為自己的情緒負責的這個想法，似乎非常難消化。但，我想要告訴你們的是，你們不需要被那個想法噎到。只要深深吸一口氣，如果需要的話，給自己倒杯水，然后擁抱它。擁抱那責任，因為這條路會通往更健康的身體、更公平和富有資訊的司法制度，以及更有彈性、更強大的情緒生活。謝謝你們。