美国国家公共电台 NPR Larissa MacFarquhar: How Far Would You Go To Help Others?

 

LARISSA MACFARQUHAR: Most of us feel that we want to spend our lives doing the right thing. But certainly, for my purposes, I was more interested in people who give until it hurts.

GUY RAZ, HOST:

This is a Larissa MacFarquhar She's a staff writer at The New Yorker. And Larissa spent years researching and writing about extreme altruists, people who devote their entire lives to helping³ others, even if it means putting themselves at risk.

MACFARQUHAR: It's a sense that they are required to help - that a life of duty requires them to do the most that they can. They don't wait for something to be thrust upon them. They calculate. They plan. They go out looking for trouble.

RAZ: Like in the case of one man Larissa wrote about, a man named Baba Amte.

MACFARQUHAR: He had been a lawyer. He grew up as a very rich young man and kind of a playboy in India and right in the center of India in Nagpur. And he one day was walking along in the rain when he saw a leper lying by the side of the road, and this man was in the last stages of the disease, crawling with maggots, flesh caved in. And he was horrified⁴ by the sight. And he was scared of catching⁵ the disease, so he ran away.

RAZ: Which would be the end of the story for a lot of people. But what happened next would completely redefine Baba Amte's life.

MACFARQUHAR: The thing about Baba Amte is that he was a very macho guy. He was always fighting. Being a courageous⁶ macho guy was at the core of his self-image. So when he realized that he had run away, he'd been a coward, he couldn't stand this thought. And he decided⁷ that he would have to - in order to restore his sense of self of himself as this brave man, he would have to steer⁸ right into this fear.

And so the first thing he did was go back to that man by the side of the road, and there wasn't much he could do for him. He was almost dead, but he covered him to protect him from the rain. And then he made leprosy his life's work.

RAZ: Larissa Macfarquhar picks up the story from the TED¹ stage.

MACFARQUHAR: The first thing he did was enroll⁹ in a school of tropical medicine, and he discovered that one of the reasons there was as yet no cure for leprosy was that it seemed to be impossible to transmit the disease to animals for the purpose of experiments. He thought about this for a day, and then he offered himself as a human experimental subject. And he was injected with the leprosy bacillus, but he didn't catch the disease.

As it happened shortly after he graduated from the school, there was a cure found, the drug dapsone. But the symptoms of leprosy were so terrifying to people and so unmistakable that even once a cure had been found, leprosy patients had many of the same problems they'd had before. They were thrown out of their families, thrown out of their villages, forced to beg, sometimes even burned alive. And so even after a cure had been found, leprosy colonies were still necessary. And Baba decided to found one. He was given a tract¹⁰ of land by the state, a total wilderness¹¹. And he moved out there with several leprosy patients, his wife, their two baby sons and four dogs to protect them from the wild animals because at first there was nothing there at all - no water, nothing.

And they were living in shelters that had no walls. And one by one, every single one of the dogs was carried off and eaten by a panther. Baba's two baby sons were not carried off and eaten by a panther as the dogs were, but they might have been. And they did not catch leprosy, but they might have done. Now, I've visited this leprosy colony many decades later after he founded it, and it's now a flourishing community. It's an extraordinary place. Several thousand people live there. And this is not just a refuge for the desperate anymore. It's a place where people live their whole lives. They have children. They get married. There are many schools there. There are workshops. There's even a college.

But this is what I mean when I talk about preparedness to sacrifice family for strangers. This willingness to sacrifice for a cause - many people find it strange and unnatural¹². And it's this sense that I think is a deeper reason why some of us don't give more than we do.

RAZ: I mean, to be honest, this story is kind of uncomfortable, right? I mean, like, it doesn't seem right for him to have injected himself with the disease and to put his family at risk.

MACFARQUHAR: Yeah. And that's what people have a problem with. They think you should draw the line somewhere. You should not be so devoted¹³ to strangers that you are prepared to sacrifice your family. And I think it's interesting to think about how we would have evaluated Baba Amte's achievement if those sons had died or gotten sick.

RAZ: Yeah.

MACFARQUHAR: And that's - that was the most difficult part of altruism¹⁴ for everyone I spoke¹⁵ to was this question of how much do I give? At what point do I protect my family? Do I give to the point where not only I, but they are making unbearable¹⁶ sacrifices?

RAZ: In your book, you also talk about this extremely altruistic¹⁷ couple Hector and Sue. Can you tell us about them?

MACFARQUHAR: Hector and Sue are extraordinarily¹⁸ compassionate¹⁹, but not the way that most of us think of that word. It's not just a person in pain in front of them that moves them, but the idea of someone who needs their help, specifically a child who needs a family.

(SOUNDBITE OF TED TALK)

MACFARQUHAR: Sue had always wanted to adopt when she grew up. She thought it would be so much fun to bring in kids who needed a family and love them and make them happy. And so when she and Hector decided to get married, they decided to have two kids and adopt two, and they did. But then they got involved in the adoption²⁰ world, and they discovered how many children there are who are unlikely ever to be adopted.

And when they thought - Sue and Hector thought about all those children who were likely to spend their childhoods going from foster home to foster home to foster home, they could not bear it. And so they started to adopt more and more and more, and they ended up adopting 20 of these special needs children in addition to the two biological kids they had. And as the family grew larger, and they started asking the older kids to help take care of the younger kids, they started to complain. They said, Mom and Dad, we cannot adopt all the children in the world. You have to stop. We don't get enough of your time and attention as it is. Now, I think for most ordinary parents that would be the end of it. It's making my kids unhappy; I'm going to stop. And this hurt Sue and Hector very deeply, too - because I want to emphasize, this is a real family. This was not an orphanage²¹. And they loved their children as much as any parents do.

But this is what makes them different. They could not stop thinking about that child out there, the child who was still a stranger to them, but who would not have a family unless they took him in. And they thought even if it makes our children a little less happy, if it dramatically changes the life of that child, then it's worth it.

RAZ: Do Sue and Hector, do they think that they live their lives in a more moral way? Are they - do they look around the world, do they look around their communities and then sort of cast judgment²² on the ways other people live their lives?

MACFARQUHAR: You know, I'm very glad you asked me about judgmentalness because I think this is another big part of why people are ambivalent²³ about people with a very strong sense of moral duty. They think, oh, they're - are they judgmental? Are they self-righteous? That's a bad thing. And I do think we overestimate²⁴ how bad being judgmental is. You know, it's annoying.

People who are judgmental are annoying, but, you know, imagine somebody who spends their life trying to alleviate²⁵ homelessness and is kind of priggish about others who spend a lot of money on luxury goods. And then on the other hand, imagine someone who's this delightful²⁶ cynic who's very fun to have dinner with but never does a thing for anyone. Do we really want to say that the second person is better because they are not judgmental? I think judgmental is an annoying quality, but it's not such a big thing.

RAZ: So, I mean, so maybe we can, you know, all be like Hector and Sue, right? But, I mean, but why don't more of us do more of that? Like, why aren't we more altruistic?

MACFARQUHAR: I think that part of the reason is that we are ambivalent towards very good people. We suspect them of being puritanical²⁷, unfun, annoying. But also I think there's a genuine ambivalence²⁸ in most of us about what is the best way to live? And what are the proper values to live by? I think that if you are a truly devoted altruist², you are at some point going to start giving to the point where it requires sacrifices, not only of yourself, but of your family and the people you love.

And I think most of us are not sure that's the right thing to do. Is it right to give to others, to strangers at the expense of your family of your own people?

(SOUNDBITE OF TED TALK)

MACFARQUHAR: People would ask Sue and Hector why they'd chosen to live the way they did. And what they didn't understand those people is that Sue and Hector never wanted an easy life. They didn't just love their children. They loved the challenge. They didn't just love their life in spite of its difficulties, but in part because of them. And this is another difference between people like Sue and Hector and Baba Ampte and the rest of us. For them, it is always wartime.

By that, I mean that they know not just intellectually, but vividly²⁹ and urgently that there is always somewhere a need for help. And they feel that even though the people who need the help may be strangers to them, they are also in some sense their people. The thing about Sue and Hector and Baba Ampte is that they have a deep and happy sense of purpose. Of course, they have sacrificed many comforts, but in exchange, they know that they have changed many lives for the better. And they believe that they are living their own lives the way they ought to. And how many of us can say that? Thank you.

(APPLAUSE)

RAZ: Larissa Macfarquhar is a staff writer at The New Yorker. Her book on this is called "Strangers Drowning." You can see her entire talk at tedmed.com.

(SOUNDBITE OF SONG, "IT'S BETTER TO GIVE THAN TO RECEIVE")

HELEN HUMES: (Singing) It's better to give than to receive. Yes, it's better to give than to receive.

RAZ: Hey, thanks for listening to our show on altruism this week. If you want to find out more about who is honest, go ted.npr.org to see hundreds more TED talks, check out ted.com or the TED app. Our production staff here at NPR includes Jeff Rogers, Sanaz Meshkinpour, Jinae West, Neva Grant, Rund Abdelfatah, Casey Herman and Rachel Faulkner with help from Thomas Lu and Daniel Shukin. Our partners at TED are Chris Anderson, Kelly Stoetzel, Anna Phelan and Janet Lee.

If you want to let us know what you think about the show, you can write us at [email protected] And you can follow us on Twitter. It's @tedradiohour. I'm Guy Raz. And you've been listening to Ideas Worth Spreading right here on the TED Radio Hour from NPR.

(SOUNDBITE OF SONG, "IT'S BETTER TO GIVE THAN TO RECEIVE")

HUMES: (Singing) Yes, it's better to give than to receive. Can't I help you see the light? Everything's going to be all right. It's better to give than to receive.

1 ted   

vt.翻晒，撒，撒开

参考例句：

• The invaders gut ted the village.侵略者把村中财物洗劫一空。
• She often teds the corn when it's sunny.天好的时候她就翻晒玉米。

2 altruist   

n.利他主义者，爱他主义者

参考例句：

3 helping   

n.食物的一份&adj.帮助人的，辅助的

参考例句：

• The poor children regularly pony up for a second helping of my hamburger. 那些可怜的孩子们总是要求我把我的汉堡包再给他们一份。
• By doing this, they may at times be helping to restore competition. 这样一来, 他在某些时候,有助于竞争的加强。

4 horrified   

a.(表现出)恐惧的

参考例句：

• The whole country was horrified by the killings. 全国都对这些凶杀案感到大为震惊。
• We were horrified at the conditions prevailing in local prisons. 地方监狱的普遍状况让我们震惊。

5 catching   

adj.易传染的，有魅力的，迷人的，接住

参考例句：

• There are those who think eczema is catching.有人就是认为湿疹会传染。
• Enthusiasm is very catching.热情非常富有感染力。

6 courageous   

adj.勇敢的，有胆量的

参考例句：

• We all honour courageous people.我们都尊重勇敢的人。
• He was roused to action by courageous words.豪言壮语促使他奋起行动。

7 decided   

adj.决定了的，坚决的；明显的，明确的

参考例句：

• This gave them a decided advantage over their opponents.这使他们比对手具有明显的优势。
• There is a decided difference between British and Chinese way of greeting.英国人和中国人打招呼的方式有很明显的区别。

8 steer   

vt.驾驶，为…操舵；引导；vi.驾驶

参考例句：

• If you push the car, I'll steer it.如果你来推车，我就来驾车。
• It's no use trying to steer the boy into a course of action that suits you.想说服这孩子按你的方式行事是徒劳的。

9 enroll   

v.招收；登记；入学；参军；成为会员（英)enrol

参考例句：

• I should like to enroll all my children in the swimming class.我愿意让我的孩子们都参加游泳班。
• They enroll him as a member of the club.他们吸收他为俱乐部会员。

10 tract   

n.传单，小册子，大片(土地或森林)

参考例句：

• He owns a large tract of forest.他拥有一大片森林。
• He wrote a tract on this subject.他曾对此写了一篇短文。

11 wilderness   

n.杳无人烟的一片陆地、水等，荒漠

参考例句：

• She drove the herd of cattle through the wilderness.她赶着牛群穿过荒野。
• Education in the wilderness is not a matter of monetary means.荒凉地区的教育不是钱财问题。

12 unnatural   

adj.不自然的；反常的

参考例句：

• Did her behaviour seem unnatural in any way?她有任何反常表现吗？
• She has an unnatural smile on her face.她脸上挂着做作的微笑。

13 devoted   

adj.忠诚的，忠实的，热心的，献身于...的

参考例句：

• He devoted his life to the educational cause of the motherland.他为祖国的教育事业贡献了一生。
• We devoted a lengthy and full discussion to this topic.我们对这个题目进行了长时间的充分讨论。

14 altruism   

n.利他主义，不自私

参考例句：

• An important feature of moral behaviour is altruism.道德行为一个重要特点就是利他主义。
• Altruism is crucial for social cohesion.利他主义对社会的凝聚是至关重要的。

15 spoke   

n.（车轮的）辐条；轮辐；破坏某人的计划；阻挠某人的行动 v.讲，谈（speak的过去式）；说；演说；从某种观点来说

参考例句：

• They sourced the spoke nuts from our company.他们的轮辐螺帽是从我们公司获得的。
• The spokes of a wheel are the bars that connect the outer ring to the centre.辐条是轮子上连接外圈与中心的条棒。

16 unbearable   

adj.不能容忍的；忍受不住的

参考例句：

• It is unbearable to be always on thorns.老是处于焦虑不安的情况中是受不了的。
• The more he thought of it the more unbearable it became.他越想越觉得无法忍受。

17 altruistic   

adj.无私的，为他人着想的

参考例句：

• It is superficial to be altruistic without feeling compassion.无慈悲之心却说利他，是为表面。
• Altruistic spirit should be cultivated by us vigorously.利他的精神是我们应该努力培养的。

18 extraordinarily   

adv.格外地；极端地

参考例句：

• She is an extraordinarily beautiful girl.她是个美丽非凡的姑娘。
• The sea was extraordinarily calm that morning.那天清晨，大海出奇地宁静。

19 compassionate   

adj.有同情心的，表示同情的

参考例句：

• She is a compassionate person.她是一个有同情心的人。
• The compassionate judge gave the young offender a light sentence.慈悲的法官从轻判处了那个年轻罪犯。

20 adoption   

n.采用，采纳，通过；收养

参考例句：

• An adoption agency had sent the boys to two different families.一个收养机构把他们送给两个不同的家庭。
• The adoption of this policy would relieve them of a tremendous burden.采取这一政策会给他们解除一个巨大的负担。

21 orphanage   

n.孤儿院

参考例句：

• They dispensed new clothes to the children in the orphanage.他们把新衣服发给孤儿院的小孩们。
• They gave the proceeds of the sale to the orphanage.他们把销售的收入给了这家孤儿院。

22 judgment   

n.审判；判断力，识别力，看法，意见

参考例句：

• The chairman flatters himself on his judgment of people.主席自认为他审视人比别人高明。
• He's a man of excellent judgment.他眼力过人。

23 ambivalent   

adj.含糊不定的；(态度等)矛盾的

参考例句：

• She remained ambivalent about her marriage.她对于自己的婚事仍然拿不定主意。
• Although she professed fear of the Russians,she seemed to have ambivalent feelings toward Philby himself.虽然她承认害怕俄国人，然而她似乎对菲尔比本人有一种矛盾的感情。

24 overestimate   

v.估计过高，过高评价

参考例句：

• Don't overestimate seriousness of the problem.别把问题看重了。
• We overestimate our influence and our nuisance value.我们过高地估计了自己的影响力和破坏作用。

25 alleviate   

v.减轻，缓和，缓解(痛苦等)

参考例句：

• The doctor gave her an injection to alleviate the pain.医生给她注射以减轻疼痛。
• Nothing could alleviate his distress.什么都不能减轻他的痛苦。

26 delightful   

adj.令人高兴的，使人快乐的

参考例句：

• We had a delightful time by the seashore last Sunday.上星期天我们在海滨玩得真痛快。
• Peter played a delightful melody on his flute.彼得用笛子吹奏了一支欢快的曲子。

27 puritanical   

adj.极端拘谨的；道德严格的

参考例句：

• He has a puritanical attitude towards sex.他在性问题上主张克制，反对纵欲。
• Puritanical grandfather is very strict with his children.古板严厉的祖父对子女要求非常严格。

28 ambivalence   

n.矛盾心理

参考例句：

• She viewed her daughter's education with ambivalence.她看待女儿的教育问题态度矛盾。
• She felt a certain ambivalence towards him.她对他的态度有些矛盾。

29 vividly   

adv.清楚地，鲜明地，生动地

参考例句：

• The speaker pictured the suffering of the poor vividly.演讲者很生动地描述了穷人的生活。
• The characters in the book are vividly presented.这本书里的人物写得栩栩如生。