VOA标准英语2011-Doing the Right Thing Can Help You Succee

Doing the right thing can help individuals and institutions succeed. But knowing what that right thing is, is not easy.

In "Practical Wisdom: The Right Way to Do the Right Thing," authors Barry Schwartz and Kenneth Sharp explain that it's possible to develop the good judgment¹ that helps people make the right decisions. They say it takes experience, failure and determination.

Practical wisdom

The concept of practical wisdom comes from Aristotle. Schwartz explains that the ancient Greek philosopher made two arguments about behavior.
Authors Barry Shwartz and Kenneth Sharp believe the world will become a better place if people use their judgment to do the right thing.

"One is that there is no set of ethical² rules or principles that tells us the right thing to do in every situation," he says. "The world is too complicated, too varied³, and you need to use your judgment, which is what Aristotle meant by wisdom. And the practical part is that it's the sort of judgment that we need every day, in interacting with our friends, with our children, with our patients or our students. So it is not some high, abstract ideal. It's very concrete and very much about how you treat other people on a day-to-day basis."

Societies and institutions have created rules and regulations, procedures and performance incentives⁴ to guide and encourage people to do the right thing, but Schwartz says blindly following those standards does not cultivate wisdom.

"There is no set of rules that will tell teachers how to teach, or doctors how to doctor," he says. "There is no set of incentives that bankers won't find a way to subvert⁵, as we have witnessed in the last couple of years in the world economic meltdown. So you need people who want to do the right thing because it's the right thing."

Schwartz says rules, regulations and incentives are necessary, but learning how to become wise - how to recognize the right thing and do it - requires experience, trying and failing, learning from mistakes and trying again.

He compares practical wisdom to jazz.

"There are notes on the page and those are like rules, but what makes the heart of jazz is not playing the notes on the page, he says. "It's improvising⁶ around the notes on the page. And a wise practitioner⁷ knows the notes, can read the notes, but also knows how to improvise⁸."

The ‘wise practitioner' is also empathic.

"If a doctor is dealing⁹ with a patient, the doctor needs to ask 'What does this patient need? How does this patient feel? How should I couch the bad news that I'm about to give this particular patient so that it won't be completely devastating¹⁰ and demoralizing, while still being true?'" he says. "So unless you can sort of get into the head and heart of other people, you will get it wrong." 
Len Rubenstein
Dr. David Hirsh, co-founder of Harvard Medical School-Cambridge Integrated Clerkship says the program allows third-year medical students to follow their patients for a whole year under the watchful¹¹ eye of an experienced physician.
Putting wisdom into action

Putting wisdom into action is not always easy, but in "Practical Wisdom," authors Schwartz and Sharp believe it is possible.

"One kind of person we describe as a ‘canny outlaw,'" Schwartiz explains. "This is a person who is operating in a system that discourages wisdom, like a teacher who has to follow a script, but finds ways around the rules. There are plenty of such people around, but they're swimming against the current. They don't get support. In fact they may even lose their jobs if they are caught. More hopeful are whole institutions that appreciate the need to cultivate wisdom in practitioners¹². We describe in detail an example of a medical training program, a relatively¹³ new one at Harvard University."

Dr. David Hirsh is the program's co-founder and director.

"In 2003, that was when we began what's now called the Harvard Medical School-Cambridge Integrated Clerkship," says Hirsh. "The entire reason to take on this rather large innovation was to do something meaningful to change the way that medical doctors were trained, and part of that deeply involves the idea of humanism - their personal development or moral development."

The clerkship allows third-year medical students - who have learned the rules and regulations of their profession - to spend one day a week working with patients in a clinic. Unlike other programs, these young doctors then follow their patients for a whole year under the watchful eye of an experienced physician.

"Patients who come to the hospital, who are seen only in the hospital are really being understood at a particular moment of their life," Hirsh says. "I think one could not imagine that a few days of a hospital experience could in any way define the totality of someone's life. In contrast, our students meet patients who are well or who are sick. They follow them not only through their hospital stays, but back into clinics, or into nursing home or into the community, settings which aren't about healthcare at all. So students will come to know why it is that certain patients don't have access to lead-free water or to fresh vegetables and why certain choices are made by patients in their real lives, not just in a brief, brief moment of their hospital course. So in this way students can see patients in the real context of their lives and understand them fully¹⁴."

And, in the process, gain the practical wisdom Aristotle spoke¹⁵ of.

1 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。

2 ethical   

adj.伦理的，道德的，合乎道德的

参考例句：

• It is necessary to get the youth to have a high ethical concept.必须使青年具有高度的道德观念。
• It was a debate which aroused fervent ethical arguments.那是一场引发强烈的伦理道德争论的辩论。

3 varied   

adj.多样的，多变化的

参考例句：

• The forms of art are many and varied.艺术的形式是多种多样的。
• The hotel has a varied programme of nightly entertainment.宾馆有各种晚间娱乐活动。

4 incentives   

激励某人做某事的事物( incentive的名词复数 )； 刺激； 诱因； 动机

参考例句：

• tax incentives to encourage savings 鼓励储蓄的税收措施
• Furthermore, subsidies provide incentives only for investments in equipment. 更有甚者，提供津贴仅是为鼓励增添设备的投资。 来自英汉非文学 - 环境法 - 环境法

5 subvert   

v.推翻；暗中破坏；搅乱

参考例句：

• The rebel army is attempting to subvert the government.反叛军队企图颠覆政府统治。
• They tried to subvert our state and our Party. This is the crux of the matter.他们是要颠覆我们的国家，颠覆我们的党，这是问题的实质。

6 improvising   

即兴创作（improvise的现在分词形式）

参考例句：

• I knew he was improvising, an old habit of his. 我知道他是在即兴发挥，这是他的老习惯。
• A few lecturers have been improvising to catch up. 部分讲师被临时抽调以救急。

7 practitioner   

n.实践者，从事者；(医生或律师等)开业者

参考例句：

• He is an unqualified practitioner of law.他是个无资格的律师。
• She was a medical practitioner before she entered politics.从政前她是个开业医生。

8 improvise   

v.即兴创作；临时准备，临时凑成

参考例句：

• If an actor forgets his words，he has to improvise.演员要是忘记台词，那就只好即兴现编。
• As we've not got the proper materials,we'll just have to improvise.我们没有弄到合适的材料，只好临时凑合了。

9 dealing   

n.经商方法，待人态度

参考例句：

• This store has an excellent reputation for fair dealing.该商店因买卖公道而享有极高的声誉。
• His fair dealing earned our confidence.他的诚实的行为获得我们的信任。

10 devastating   

adj.毁灭性的，令人震惊的，强有力的

参考例句：

• It is the most devastating storm in 20 years.这是20年来破坏性最大的风暴。
• Affairs do have a devastating effect on marriages.婚外情确实会对婚姻造成毁灭性的影响。

11 watchful   

adj.注意的，警惕的

参考例句：

• The children played under the watchful eye of their father.孩子们在父亲的小心照看下玩耍。
• It is important that health organizations remain watchful.卫生组织保持警惕是极为重要的。

12 practitioners   

n.习艺者，实习者( practitioner的名词复数 )；从业者（尤指医师）

参考例句：

• one of the greatest practitioners of science fiction 最了不起的科幻小说家之一
• The technique is experimental, but the list of its practitioners is growing. 这种技术是试验性的，但是采用它的人正在增加。 来自辞典例句

13 relatively   

adv.比较...地，相对地

参考例句：

• The rabbit is a relatively recent introduction in Australia.兔子是相对较新引入澳大利亚的物种。
• The operation was relatively painless.手术相对来说不痛。

14 fully   

adv.完全地，全部地，彻底地；充分地

参考例句：

• The doctor asked me to breathe in,then to breathe out fully.医生让我先吸气，然后全部呼出。
• They soon became fully integrated into the local community.他们很快就完全融入了当地人的圈子。

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。