The Problem of Meaning

By David Brooks

“要過有意義的人生”，多年來，我們沒少聽這句話。但是，什么樣的人生才算“有意義”呢？可能我們做了一些好事，內(nèi)心覺得激動(dòng)，便覺得自己過得有意義了?！坝幸饬x”變成了一種主觀感受，不知不覺中取代了恒久成立的客觀道德準(zhǔn)則和道德框架。這樣的“意義”哲學(xué)，是不是有點(diǎn)問題？

Not long ago, a friend sent me a speech that the great civic leader John Gardner gave to the Stanford Alumni Association 61 years after he graduated from that college.1. civic: 市民的，公民的；alumni association: 校友會(huì)。The speech is chock-full2. chock-full: 滿的，滿當(dāng)當(dāng)?shù)摹f practical wisdom. I especially liked this passage:

“The things you learn in maturity3. maturity: （性格、情感）成熟。aren’t simple things such as acquiring information and skills. You learn not to engage in self-destructive behavior.You learn not to burn up energy in anxiety.4. 你學(xué)會(huì)不去焦慮，徒耗精力。burn up:消耗，耗費(fèi)；anxiety: 憂慮，焦慮。You discover how to manage your tensions. You learn that self-pity and resentment are among the most toxic of drugs.5. self-pity: 自憐，自哀；resentment: 怨恨，憤慨；toxic: 有毒的，毒性的。You find that the world loves talent but pays off6. pay off: 有回報(bào)，得到好結(jié)果。on character.

“You come to understand that most people are neither for you nor against you; they are thinking about themselves.7. 你漸漸明白，大多數(shù)人既不護(hù)著你，也不跟你作對，他們只關(guān)心自己。You learn that no matter how hard you try to please, some people in this world are not going to love you, a lesson that is at first troubling and then really quite relaxing.”8. 你懂了，不管你多么努力地去取悅他人，這個(gè)世上總有人不會(huì)喜歡你；這個(gè)教訓(xùn)一開始讓你苦惱不堪，后來卻讓你感覺如釋重負(fù)。relaxing: 愉快的，放松的。

Gardner goes on in this wise way. And then, at the end, he goes into a peroration9. peroration:（演講的）結(jié)束語，總結(jié)語。about leading a meaningful life. “Meaning is something you build into your life. You build it out of your own past, out of your affections and loyalties,10. affection: 喜愛，喜歡；loyalty: 忠誠，忠心。out of the experience of humankind as it is passed on to you... You are the only one who can put them together into that unique pattern that will be your life.”

Gardner puts “meaning” at the apogee11. apogee: 頂峰，頂點(diǎn)。of human existence. His speech reminded me how often we’ve heard that word over the past decades. As my Times colleague April Lawson puts it, “meaning” has become the stand-in concept for everything the soul yearns for and seeks.12. stand-in: 臨時(shí)替代者，頂替者；yearn for: 渴望，渴求。It is one of the few phrases acceptable in modern parlance to describe a fundamentally spiritual need.13. parlance: 說法，用語；fundamentally: 根本地，基本地。

Yet what do we mean when we use the word meaning?

The first thing we mean is that life should be about more than material success. The person leading a meaningful life has found some way of serving others that leads to a feeling of significance.

Second, a meaningful life is more satisfying than a merely happy life. Happiness is about enjoying the present; meaning is about dedicating oneself to the future.14. 快樂只關(guān)乎享受當(dāng)下，而有意義的人生需要投身于未來。dedicate oneself to: 投身于，致力于。Happiness is about receiving; meaningfulness is about giving. Happiness is about upbeat15. upbeat: 達(dá)觀的，樂觀的。moods and nice experiences. People leading meaningful lives experience a deeper sense of satisfaction.

In this way, meaning is an uplifting16. uplifting: 振奮人心的，鼓舞人心的。state of consciousness. It’s what you feel when you’re serving things beyond self.

Yet it has to be said, as commonly used today, the word is flabby and vacuous, the product of a culture that has grown inarticulate about inner life.17.flabby:（言語、性格等）軟弱的，無力的；vacuous: 無意義的，空洞的；inarticulate:不善言辭的，不善表達(dá)的。

Let me put it this way: If we look at the people in history who achieved great things—like Nelson Mandela or Albert Schweitzer or Abraham Lincoln—it wasn’t because they wanted to bathe luxuriously in their own sense of meaningfulness.18. Nelson Mandela: 納爾遜·曼德拉（1918—2013），前任南非總統(tǒng)，被尊稱為南非國父；Albert Schweitzer: 阿爾貝特·施韋澤（1875—1965），德國哲學(xué)家、神學(xué)家、醫(yī)生及人道主義者，1952年諾貝爾和平獎(jiǎng)得主；Abraham Lincoln: 亞伯拉罕·林肯（1809—1865），美國第16任總統(tǒng)，黑人奴隸制的廢除者；luxuriously: 愜意地，舒適地。They had objective and eternally true standards of justice and injustice.19. eternally: 永恒地，不朽地；justice: 正義，公正。They were indignant when those eternal standards were violated.20. indignant: 憤怒的，憤慨的；violate: 違反，違背。They subscribed to moral systems—whether secular or religious—that recommended specific ways of being, and had specific structures of what is right and wrong, and had specific disciplines about how you might get better over time.21. subscribe to: 同意，贊成；secular: 世俗的，現(xiàn)世的；discipline: 紀(jì)律，行為準(zhǔn)則。

Meaningfulness tries to replace structures, standards and disciplines with self-regarding22. self-regarding: 利己主義的。emotion. The ultimate authority of meaningful is the warm tingling we get when we feel significant and meaningful.23. ultimate: 最強(qiáng)大的，至高的；tingling: 強(qiáng)烈的感受。Meaningfulness tries to replace moral systems with the emotional corona that surrounds acts of charity.24. 意義試圖以伴隨慈善之舉的那種情感來取代道德體系。corona: 日冕，日華；charity: 仁慈，寬厚。

It’s a paltry substitute.25. paltry: 可鄙的，卑賤的；substitute: 替代品。Because meaningfulness is built solely on an emotion, it is contentless and irreducible.26. solely: 只，僅僅；contentless: 無實(shí)質(zhì)內(nèi)容的； irreducible: 無法簡化的，無法減少的。Because it is built solely on emotion, it’s subjective and relativistic.27. subjective: 主觀的，非客觀的；relativistic: 相對論的。You get meaning one way. I get meaning another way. Who is any of us to judge another’s emotion?

Because it’s based solely on sentiment28. sentiment: 態(tài)度，情緒。, it is useless. There are no criteria29. criteria: 標(biāo)準(zhǔn)，criterion的復(fù)數(shù)形式。to determine what kind of meaningfulness is higher. There’s no practical manual that would help guide each of us as we move from shallower forms of service to deeper ones.30. 我們服務(wù)他人的層次由淺入深時(shí)，沒有使用手冊對我們進(jìn)行指導(dǎo)。manual: 使用手冊，說明書；shallow: 膚淺的，淺薄的。There is no hierarchy31. hierarchy: 等級體系，分級結(jié)構(gòu)。of values that would help us select, from among all the things we might do, that activity which is highest and best to do.

Because it’s based solely on emotion, it’s fleeting32. fleeting: 短暫的，飛逝的。. When the sensations of meaningful go away then the cause that once aroused them gets dropped, too. Ennui33. ennui: 倦怠，厭倦。floods in. Personal crisis follows. There’s no reliable ground.

The philosophy of meaningfulness emerges in a culture in which there is no common moral vocabulary or framework.34. 關(guān)于意義的哲學(xué)萌生于一個(gè)沒有共同的道德詞匯和道德體系的文化之中。framework: 體系，框架。It emerges amid radical pluralism,35. radical: 完全的，徹底的； pluralism:多元化，多元性。when people don’t want to judge each other. Meaningfulness emerges when the fundamental question is, do we feel good?

Real moral systems are based on a balance of intellectual rigor36. rigor: 嚴(yán)謹(jǐn)，縝密。and aroused moral sentiments. Meaningfulness is pure and self-regarding feeling, the NutraSweet37. NutraSweet: 阿斯巴甜，一種人造甜味劑。of the inner life.