At Yale,Thinking Like a Fox在耶魯，像個狐貍一樣思考

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掃我，朗讀給你聽

耶魯大學校長、社會心理學家彼得·沙洛維（Peter Salovey）在8月26日的耶魯大學新生入學演講上，提到了兩種類型的學習者和思想者：刺猬和狐貍。他鼓勵同學們成為狐貍型學習者。

A few years ago, I helped a friend teach a Yale College seminar①seminar 英 ['sem?nɑ?] 美 ['s?m?nɑr] n. 討論會，研討班called "Great Big Ideas". Each week, students in the seminar considered a "big idea" from a different fi eld of study.For homework, they watched video lecturesdelivered②deliver 英 [d?'l?v?] 美 [d?'l?v?]vt. 交付；發(fā)表；遞送；釋放；給予（打擊）；給……接生vi. 實現(xiàn)；傳送；履行；投遞 n. 投球by various experts and read primary sources. Then they came to class ready to debate each week's "big idea". By the end of the course, they had become conversant in major debates and questions in art history, political philosophy,evolutionary biology, and other fi elds.

Great Big Ideas reminded me of the story of the fox and the hedgehog③hedgehog 英 [' hed?h?g] 美 [' hed?h?:g; ' h?d??hɑɡ]n. 刺猬. Now, this is a distinction attributed to④attribute to 把……歸因于Archilochus, the seventh century B.C. Greek poet and warrior,who said, "a fox knows many things, but a hedgehog one important thing."

The philosopher Isaiah Berlin described the hedgehog as a thinker who sees the world through a single, grand idea—a focused lens. Someone like Karl Marx or Ayn Rand might be considered a hedgehog. The fox, on the other hand, draws on a multitude of ideas and experiences depending on the situation or issue at hand. Perhaps Confucius and Aristotle are best described as foxes.

This dichotomy is an over-simplification. Yet the story of the fox and the hedgehog may help you today, right now, as you consider how to approach your time at Yale.

幾年前，我?guī)鸵粋€朋友上了一門名叫“偉大的思想”的課（實際上是研討會）。每周，研討會上的學生都會學習不同領域的知識，從不同領域理解何為“偉大的思想”。學生的作業(yè)就是觀看不同專家的視頻講座，并讀取主源資料。然后，他們又聚集在一起，就“偉大的思想”進行新一輪的探討。到課程結(jié)束時，他們已經(jīng)能非常熟悉藝術(shù)史、政治哲學、進化生物學等領域的主要內(nèi)容與問題了。

“偉大的思想”讓我想起了狐貍與刺猬的故事。公元前7世紀，希臘詩人阿爾奇洛克斯提出，“狐貍知道很多的事，刺猬則只知道一件大事。”

身兼哲學家及知識史學家的賽亞·柏林爵士則將刺猬描述為一個思想家：以某個觀點為中心來“感受”現(xiàn)實世界。卡爾·馬克思和安·蘭德都是刺猬。而狐貍會根據(jù)當前狀況汲取大量他人的想法和經(jīng)驗。孔子與亞里士多德就是最好的代表。

這種二分法過于簡單化了。但不管怎樣，希望狐貍與刺猬的故事，能夠讓每一個在耶魯學習的人有所思考：要以何種方式度過在耶魯?shù)臅r間。