世界越发变得难以理解了。 虽然大选之前，俺是希望特朗普当选的，因为特朗普至少比希拉里多了些不可预见性，不像希拉里那样注定是让人讨厌的政客的老套和对华不友好，但一旦大选结果出来，仿佛要倒吸一口冷气似的惊奇！选举之前，希拉里一直民调领先，哪怕FBI重新启动希拉里“邮件门”调查时！甚至在开始点票的时候，主流媒体仍然预测希拉里赢的概率高达85%！为什么所有主流媒体都错了呢？而且错的不是一点点：特朗普是以较大的优势获胜（选举人票218:289）。是主流媒体的预测水准都不行吗？还是主流媒体故意误导公众、诱导选民？不管怎样，美国的主流媒体这次掉价大了去了！ 更令人惊奇的是多数的美国选民竟然选择了这么一个有明显瑕疵的总统！他口无遮拦，对女性不尊，从无从政经验，但多数美国选民却投票给他！不愧为伟大的美国人民！ 特朗普无疑是美国政客的异类，是历史传统的变数，是过去世界的叛逆。当年奥巴马的竞选口号是转变（Change We Can Believe I ），但八年总统任期过去并无实质性的改变。倒是宣称要让美国再伟大（Make America Great Again）的特朗普已经带来了巨大的改变。但他能真地带来一个新的美国、新的世界吗？ 有人说特朗普代表了肯尼迪、马丁路德金和平精神的回归，预示美国要放弃过去二十几年的好战路线，把主要精力用于国内建设和治安，尤其要改变与中俄为敌的战略、转而与中俄合作共同对付日益猖獗的恐怖主义。果如此，则世界幸甚！
Events That Changed The World These are ten events from the Twentieth Century that changed the world. Undoubtedly, there are other significant world changing events we could have included. For example, other world changing events Stock Market crash of 1929 and subsequent Great Depression. Dunkirk and the escape of the British army. Battle of Britain Operation Barbarossa and the invasion of Russia. Creation of State of Israel Iranian Revolution Freedom of Nelson Mandela from jail in South Africa. It is always hard to choose a top ten. But, this is a few we have chosen. Assassination of Archduke F. Ferdinand and Outbreak of World War I June 28, 1914, In 1914, Europe was a tinder box of tension and military rivalry. The spark for war could have been many incidents; but, as it happened the assassination of an Austrian archduke - Franz Ferdinand by a Serb provoked widespread declarations of war and the fulfillment of treaties which led to the horrendous conflict of the First World War. The war was to last four years and cost the lives of millions of men from all corners of the world. Russian Revolution 1917 Lenin addresses a crowd. 25 October 1917 - Start of October Uprising by Bolsheviks Since the publication of Marx's Communist Manifesto , there had been sporadic Communist revolutions in European countries, but nothing had really succeeded. But in October 1917, the Bolshevik revolution, led by Lenin, brought about a radical new form of government with world wide implications. Lenin was a fervent Marxist and wasted little time in implementing his version of a 'dictatorship of the Proletariat'. Communist Russia divided the world. It was seen by some as an alternative to the inequities of Capitalism and by others as an embodiment of totalitarianism and lack of freedom. Invasion of Poland 1st September 1939 On 1st September, 1939, Hitler's Nazi Germany invaded Poland, ostensibly for 'lebensraum' and to redress the imbalances of the Treaty of Versailles, but the invasion of a sovereign nation finally convinced the allies - Great Britain and France of Hitler's wider intentions for the occupation of Europe. After appeasing Hitler over Austria and Czechoslovakia, Poland proved the final straw and on September 3rd, 1939, Great Britain declared war on Nazi Germany. The Second World War was to last until May 1945, costing the lives of approximately 50 million people. Less well known is that, under a secret Nazi-Soviet pact the Soviet Union also occupied parts of Poland at the same time as Germany's invasion. Pearl Harbour 1941 December 7, 1941 "A day that will live in infamy" - President Franklin D. Roosevelt In 1941, the axis powers held a supremacy over Europe and parts of Asia. Great Britain stood undefeated, but, without the strength to win against an overpowering enemy. The bombing of Pearl Harbour, led to the escalation of the world war into the Pacific arena and also brought American into war with both Japan and Germany. Three years later, it was American troops who provided the majority of the manpower in the liberation of occupied Europe. Atomic Bomb Hiroshima August 6, 1945 The US atomic bombs of 1945, devastated the cities of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. The devastation finally brought the Japanese to surrender, bringing to an end a fierce and costly Pacific war. The surrender of Japan had at one time seen unthinkable. But, the atomic bomb hastened the Japanese surrender. The atomic bomb had implications beyond just the end of the Second World War. It showed the world the potential devastation a third world war could cause. Even now the legacy of Hiroshima and the threat of nuclear war hangs over the world. Indian Independence 1947 Gandhi and Lady Mountbatten 1947 15 August 1947 India had stood as the crowing jewel in the crown of the British Empire. It was the second most populous nation in the world. After many years denying Indian calls for independence, Britain finally agreed to full Indian independence in 1947. Indian independence was accompanied by a painful separation and the birth of a new nation - Pakistan. The separation led to painful incidences of sectarian violence and killing; it led to the migration of many millions of people who found themselves on the wrong side of the border. The independence of India also created a new independent nation which claimed allegiance to neither US or the Soviet Union - but a third way as Nehru called it. With economic development, India has the potential to become a new superpower in the coming century. The Establishment of Maoist China October 1, 1949 In the aftermath of the Second World War, China was involved in a bitter civil war between the Communists led by Mao Tse Tung, and the Nationalists by Chiang Kai-shek. On October 1st, 1949, the triumphant Communist Party established the People's Republic of China. This created another powerful Communist State in the most populated country in the world. The Communist hold on power, profoundly influenced the lives of the Chinese who suffered under the great famine of the 1960s and Cultural Revolution of the 60s and 70s. Even now, the Chinese Communist party retains strong political power - even if it has adapted its economic policies. Assassination of John F Kennedy November22, 1963 One of the most shocking and unexpected moments of world history. John F Kennedy had been President since his election in 1960. He was young, liberal and Catholic and had inspired many with his positive vision of the world. "My fellow Americans, ask not what your country can do for you -- ask what can you do for your country." (JFK from Inauguration speech Jan 1961) After his assassination, Lyndon Johnson became President and American involvement in Vietnam grew, leading to a bitter conflict that came to divide America. Although Lee Harvey Oswald was arrested for the assassination, evidence points to a wider conspiracy and the involvement of more than one lone gunmen. Fall of the Berlin Wall November 9, 1989 For decades, the Berlin wall had stood as a symbol of the 'Iron Curtain' splitting West and Eastern Europe. On the one side Communist authoritarian states, on the other side liberal democracies. The wall had been built to prevent East Germans escaping into West Germany, indeed many had been shot trying to escape. But, more than anything else its presence was symbolic. The fall of the Berlin wall was an iconic moment when the Soviet Union gave up its grip on Eastern Europe. In the 50s and 60s the Soviet Union had sent tanks to quell independence movements in Hungary and then Czechoslovakia. But, this time, Mikhail Gorbachev , the proponent of Perestroika and Glasnost approved the request for freedom. 9/11 Terrorist Attacks. 11th September 2001 The US had experienced sporadic terrorist attacks before. But, the sheer audacity and scale of these terrorist attacks shocked the US and the world. The loss of life was estimated at just under 3,000. The event changed American foreign policy. It was a motivating factor behind the controversial invasion of Iraq and led to a 'war on terror' symbolised by Guantanamo Bay and a debate over the justification of torture.
看到一片博文，突然也想看看这些书到底是什么书，所以就在此，稍做了一下整理，留作自己能够看看这些书，现在，先放在这里，备份使用 From The Sunday Times （星期日泰晤士报） July 19, 2009 Books that helped to change the world Big ideas from Vance Packard, Edward de Bono, Germaine Greer, Richard Dawkins and Stephen Hawking altered modern thinking Bryan Appleyard 改变世界的书籍 来自凡思帕克， 爱德华德博诺，杰曼格里尔，理察道金斯，史蒂芬.霍金的伟大思想转变着人类现代思考 长久以来，人们渴望能够用一种更好的思想来认识和理解世界，在没有宗教、文化、政治的驱动下，人们需要一种有思想的完整人生，需要一种最简单的视角和观点。 伟大的思想可以是任何东西--生活或者工作方式、一种为维护理想或者潜在真理的运动或者新理论，但是，最重要的是，它必须首先是一本书籍，不论科学技术如何的竞争发展，书籍仍然是最有说服力最权威的传播媒介；其次，它必须给人类思想带来充分的惊奇或者决心。因此，马尔科姆格拉德威尔（《New Yorker》的著名撰稿人）的《引爆点》（The tipping Point）理论提供了成功思想传播的一种全新理解方式，理察道金斯的《上帝的迷思》将提供了一种工具将世俗主义转变成一种事业。 H.G.威尔斯可能是我们这个时代第一位伟大的智力推广家，领导整整20世纪的前半叶，他是英国半官方伟大绘画作品家，在他的享誉世界的传世书籍中，如《人类命运》和《世界史纲》，他把科学世俗主义带给了大众，成功地开创了新的领域。 在共产主义和资本主义冲突为主导的后战争时期，共产主义和资本主义是尖锐对峙的两种伟大思想，共产主义的消亡，结束了两种思想对峙的，伴随而来的是混乱、理论、冲突、对峙的猖獗的混合。接下来，互联网的发展史无前例地将整个世界联系在了一起，成为了实际意义上的地球村， 同时来自于能源消耗的温室（hothouse），进入了人类的头脑。 现在，每周，一些伟大思想的书籍都会被出版社发行，我翻阅这些书，带给我的不是一种智力上的问题，而是一种很棘手的理解难题。刻画这些伟大思想的权威人物马尔科姆格拉德威尔，克里斯安德森（《长尾理论》The Long Tail and Free），理察道金斯等，出于巨大的金钱诱惑和市场需求，纷纷将他们的思想包装派送给普通大众。 充分理解这些令人眩晕的学术文章是不可能的一件事情，但是这种眩晕本神则说明了这些新的领域只不过是一种信息，最根本的事实在于这些书籍是我们所失去的一种标志，一种更好地理解世界的基础。另外，这种眩晕也显示一种困难，除非能够清晰地阐述，否则将难以成为应用于整个世界万物的伟大思想。 契科夫曾经说过， 如果对于一种疾病有很多治疗方法，那么也就无药可治。 以下列举的是我收集的二战以来的12本最有效的伟大书籍，这里的有效是已经成功地塑造了世界上大部分人的思想或者思维方式，当然，这也不能简单等同于真理或者正义。 这些列举的并不一定包括这一时期最重要或者最持久的观点的书籍， 如埃尔温薛定谔 的 《生命是什么》，路德维希维特根斯坦的《哲学研究》，詹姆斯.洛夫洛克的《盖亚》， 玛丽琳罗宾逊的《亚当之死》都没有被包括在内，仅仅因为这些官邸啊思想并没有在世界范围内具有成功的影响力。 因此，以下的列举都是一些成功的实现，告诉我们更多的是我们是谁？ The Power of Positive Thinking （正面思考的力量） Norman Vincent Peale, 1952 This is the great precursor of all self-help books. Full of boundless American optimism, it offered a way through, as Bill Clinton said after Peales death, the antagonisms and complexities of modern life. Though Peale was a preacher, his books importance lies in its very secular belief in a therapeutic system that would lead to success and in its burdening of the individual, rather than an institution, with executing a demanding programme for his own salvation. The Hidden Persuaders （隐藏的劝诱者） Vance Packard, 1957 The date is important. This was when the anxieties that lay behind post-war affluence began to emerge. Packard exposed the conspiracy beneath the good life of 1950s suburbia by showing how advertisers manipulated consumers with quasi-scientific methods derived from psychology and sociology. Its obvious now; it wasnt then. The current television series Mad Men, set in the New York advertising world of the early 1960s, derives its power from the conflict, defined by Packard, between the innocence of the public and the cynicism of the admen. Silent Spring （中译本：寂静的春天，吉林人民出版社， 1997 ） Rachel Carson, 1962 From what seemed to be a small technical insight that the pesticide DDT caused thinning of the shells of birds eggs Carsons book launched modern environmentalism. The fate of the birds, symbolised by the possibility of a silent spring, dramatised the interconnectedness of nature that is at the heart of all greenery. DDT had been thought to be present in such small quantities that it would do no harm, but the food chain focused and intensified its effects. Some say this book cost millions of lives because it led directly to the banning of DDT. Used judiciously, it could have wiped out malaria in Africa. The Use of Lateral Thinking （中译本：水平思考法，山西人民出版社， 2008 ） Edward de Bono, 1967 The idea that we are not using our innate capacities to the full is a central feature of contemporary paranoia. People commonly feel there must be some trick to getting more out of life. De Bono brilliantly provided one answer in a phrase lateral thinking that has become a clich. Best summarised by the current term thinking out of the box, his idea was simply to come at problems from unexpected angles. It bridged the gap between the self-help genre and the business book. The Female Eunuch （中译本：被阉割的女性，江苏人民出版社， 1990 ） Germaine Greer, 1970 A scholarly polemic that remains the best of the primary feminist texts. Rude and raucous, it redefined womanhood as aggressive, self-determining, sexually potent and outspoken. It was a crusading work, a call to arms. It sprang from the alternative society of the late 1960s and it was, perhaps, the most effective subverter of the mores of postwar affluence. After Greer, no husband could reasonably expect to cry Honey, Im home and find dinner on the table. In Search of Excellence （中译本：追求卓越，中央编译出版社， 2003 ） Tom Peters and Robert H Waterman Jr, 1982 Management theory is like Marxism in the last years of the Soviet Union nobody believes it, but everybody must pretend that they do. As a result, it has been an incubator for a series of more or less mandatory bestsellers. This book, coming at the beginning of the right-wing Reagan-Thatcher resurgence, is the primary specimen of the genre. It codified the idea that there is a single transmissible method of business success. Quaint. The Closing of the American Mind （中译本：走向封闭的美国精神，中国社会科学出版社， 1994 ） Allan Bloom, 1987 This is another primary right-wing text of the 1980s. Here, however, the politics is cultural conservatism rather than the hard capitalist right-wingery of management and economic theorising. Bloom attacked American universities for abandoning western culture in favour of various destructive ideologies that destroyed critical judgment. Though this was unarguable at the time, the book had the unintended consequence of firing neoconservatives with the gross delusion that this must mean violently imposing western culture on the rest of the world. A Brief History of Time （中译本：时间简史，湖南科学技术出版社， 2001 ） Stephen Hawking, 1988 Usually either bought but unread or read in total incomprehension, this book tried to explain the state of contemporary physics to the common reader. Its huge success inspired a wave of popular-science writing. At its heart was the assumption in the event, wrong that physicists were on the verge of a theory of everything that would account for the entire history of matter. Its scientific triumphalism led directly to the antireligious tirades of books such as Richard Dawkinss The God Delusion. The End of History and the Last Man （中译本：历史的终结及最后之人，中国社会科学出版社， 2003 ） Francis Fukuyama, 1992 Fukuyamas neoconservative text was a direct product of the collapse of communism. The West having triumphed, he argued that this represented the end of all ideological conflict. Liberal, democratic capitalism was the end of history. This no longer seems credible. Not only has history restarted in countless other ways, it is also clear that the system Fukuyama defined is only really an American version of politics. Yet he inspired the neoconservatives in the Bush administration though he broke with them over Iraq and he ignited a global debate about whether there was any credible alternative to the American way. The answer was always yes. The Tipping Point （中译本：引爆流行，中信出版社， 2002 ） Malcolm Gladwell, 2000 The book is more important than the ideas it contains. It made Gladwell the supreme modern big-ideas merchant. A brilliant storyteller, he became an auditorium-filling speaker, able to dramatise ideas previously inaccessibly academic. Neither The Tipping Point nor his subsequent books, Blink and Outliers, are intellectually remarkable. But Gladwells role as an ideas entrepreneur is the clearest demonstration of the contemporary hunger for the grand, explanatory narrative. The God Delusion （中译本：上帝的迷思，海南出版社， 2010 ） Richard Dawkins, 2006 Dawkins could also have been in this list for The Selfish Gene (1976), a brilliant popularisation of one interpretation of Darwinism, but Hawkings A Brief History is a better example of science as the faith of our age. The God Delusion is the flip side of that faith a savage assault on religion. Thanks primarily to Dawkins, militant atheism is now the noisiest cult of our time. It was inspired by the mounting influence of two fundamentalisms Christian in America and Islamic across the Muslim world. Neither defines the mainstream faith and, as a result, the targets of the militant atheists appear rather narrow and specialised. The Black Swan （中译本：黑天鹅――如何应对不可知的未来，中信出版社， 2008 ） Nassim Nicholas Taleb, 2007 This is the book that forecast the banking meltdown. It is unique in this list in that it promotes an anti-idea. All our big ideas are wrong, argues Taleb, because all are subject to the workings of uncontrollable chance. The banks crumbled because they used demonstrably false mathematics as a way of controlling the future. We crumble when we apply our always deficient theories to the unending sea of randomness on which we sail. But the book has a message rise above it all, adopt a classical composure in the face of defeat. If you are to be executed, remember to shave. The Black Swan could be a valedictory to the idea of the big idea, to the folly of hoping we can be made well, better, more successful or more wise by the next bestseller, But I fear not. Another fat book has just arrived The Evolution of God by Robert Wright to tell me there is a hidden pattern within the sacred texts of Judaism, Christianity and Islam. Im sure there is, but Im afraid I have this thing that prevents me finding out what it is. I call it a life.
标签: 改变世界
