政治语言如何被操控 —— 与德鲁·韦斯顿和弗兰克·伦茨的对话

让我们来了解一下旨在塑造政治的语言。

Let's take a tour of language designed to shape politics.

左派痴迷于向儿童灌输性与性别认同的知识。

The left is obsessed with teaching children about sexual and gender identity.

把运动鞋或那些滑稽的鼠耳卖给孩子们，这是一回事。

Marketing sneakers or those goofy mouse ears to kids, that's one thing.

但把性与性别的复杂话题推销给儿童，那就是诱骗。

But marketing complicated topics of sexuality and gender, that's grooming.

这是我对于《平价医疗法案》所存在的问题。

Here's the problems I have with the Affordable Care Act.

第一，法案中有一项规定，任何年满74岁的人必须接受一个实际上相当于死亡委员会的审查。

Number one, there is a provision in there that anyone over the age of 74 has to go before what is effectively a death panel.

但现在，佛罗里达州州长罗恩·德桑蒂斯决心让这个地球上最快乐的地方变成人间地狱。

But now Florida governor Ron DeSantis is determined to make the happiest place on earth a living hell.

小MAGA因为迪士尼反对他的‘别谈同性恋’法案而生气。

Baby MAGA is mad that Disney opposes his don't say gay bill.

民主依赖于我们自主选择对政治问题的看法。

Democracy depends on us choosing our views on political issues.

但当描述这些政治问题的语言是在实验室中被设计成具有分裂性，并能让我们对政治问题的看法产生15个百分点的差异时，我们是在自主选择观点，还是语言在替我们选择观点？

But when the language used to describe those political issues is engineered in a laboratory to be divisive and can produce a 15 difference in what we think about the political issues, Are we choosing our views, or is the language choosing our views for us?

我是特里斯坦·哈里斯，欢迎收听来自人类技术中心的播客《你的注意力不分裂》。

I'm Tristan Harris, and this is your undivided attention, the podcast from the Center for Human Technology.

今天我们邀请的嘉宾是政治沟通领域的绝地大师。

Our guests today are Jedi masters of political communication.

德鲁·韦斯顿是埃默里大学的政治心理学家和沟通顾问，弗兰克·伦茨是政治传播顾问、民调专家和时事评论员。

Drew Weston is a political psychologist and messaging consultant based at Emory University, and Frank Luntz is a political communications consultant, pollster, and pundit.

在某些情况下，我们的嘉宾曾运用他们语言上的绝地之力加剧了党派对立。

And in some cases, our guests have used their Jedi master powers of language in ways that increased partisanship.

然而，无论我们如何看待他们的政治立场，我们都可以问：我们该如何解读语言的分裂力量？

And yet, whatever we might think of their politics, we can ask, how can we decode the divisive power of language?

我们又该如何运用这些绝地之力，设计出不制造分裂、反而促进团结的语言？

And how can we use those Jedi powers to design language that doesn't divide but unifies?

欢迎弗兰克·伦茨和德鲁·韦斯顿来到《你的专注力》节目。

Frank Luntz and Drew Weston, welcome to your undivided attention.

我非常、非常、非常期待这次对话。

I'm so, so, so excited to have this conversation.

我一直想和你们聊一聊。

I've wanted to have it for a while.

我之前分别认识你们两位。

I've known both of you separately.

对于不了解的人，弗兰克长期从事共和党的民调和政治话语框架工作，而德鲁则为民主党做过类似的工作。

For those who do not know, Frank has been in the Republican polling and and language political framing business for a long time, and Drew has done similar work for the Democratic Party.

我只想欢迎你们两位来到节目，也许可以说说关于对方的一句赞美或调侃的话。

I just wanna welcome you both to the program and maybe say something nice or unflattering about each other.

你们可以自行选择。

You get to pick.

不行。

No.

我来开始吧。

I'll I'll I'll start.

德鲁，我一直担心民主党真的会听从德鲁的意见。

Drew, I was always afraid that the Democrats would actually listen to Drew.

在民主党这边，没有人比你更了解我们的行为方式和内心最深处的优先事项。

Nobody on the Democratic side has a better feel for how we behave and a better feel for our innermost priorities than you do.

所以，特里斯坦，我必须称赞我的这位同事，他真正理解了这一点。

So Tristan, I have to give credit to my colleague here for really getting it, for understanding it.

德鲁，你做得最好。

That drew you the best.

嗯，你知道，这听起来像是一个相互的怪癖协会，但弗兰克，过去十年里，我一直用你的书《有效的话语》来教学。

Well, you know, this is gonna sound like a mutual aberration society, but, Frank, I've been using your book Words That Work in teaching for the last decade.

我在埃默里大学教授一门关于政治说服、心理学和政治说服的课程。

I teach a course on political persuasion, psychology, political persuasion at Emory.

我告诉我的学生，这是市面上最好的书。

And I tell my students, it's the best book out there.

没有人写过比这本更好的书，教人如何运用语言、如何与人沟通，你在这方面确实是先驱。

No one's ever written as good a book on on how to use words and how to speak to people, and you were really pioneering at this.

你有一种倾听和理解他人的能力，在你这一派中，也无人能及。

You have a way of listening and hearing people that, there's no incomparable on on your side of the aisle either.

所以我感谢你的夸奖，我也同样赞美你。

So I appreciate the compliment and right back at you.

嗯，这真是一个绝佳的起点。

Well, and this is a wonderful place to start.

事实上，我记得上一次你们聚在一起，大概是在十年前，纽约公共图书馆。

And I there's actually a famous the last time I think you guys were together was about ten years ago at the New York Public Library.

当时我们讨论了政治如何具有分裂性，以及你们如何看待如何以不同的方式使用语言，评论各政党是如何运用语言的。

And we were talking about how politics was divisive then and what you all were thinking about how we might use language in a different way, commenting on how the different parties were using it.

我认为这是另一个历史性的时刻，因为不管过去发生了什么，我都认为你们两位是最擅长举起这根调音叉的人，能够识别并找到人们内心共鸣的频率。

I consider this another historic moment because, you know, whatever things have happened in the past, I consider you both to be the best in terms of holding up this tuning fork that can identify and find those resonant frequencies in people.

你不能凭空创造一种语言。

You can't invent the language from scratch.

你得知道它在与什么产生共鸣，但这既是一门艺术，也是一门科学，而你们两位我认为都是这方面的顶尖人物。

You have to know what it's resonating with, but it's an art and a science and both of you are I think the best at it.

有没有哪个时刻让你意识到语言的力量？

What was a moment that had you recognize the power of language?

我的意思是，也许是你发现某个关键短语的时候，或者是什么关键经历或时刻，让你真正理解了语言的力量？

I mean, it could be, you know, when you discovered one of these key phrases or just what was sort of a key experience or moment where you understood the power of language?

德鲁？

Drew?

对我来说，就是听到我这边的人把这件事做得太糟糕了。

For me, was listening to people on my side of the aisle do it so poorly.

如果非要说有一个让我印象深刻的时刻，那就是1988年观看杜卡基斯和乔治·H·布什的辩论时。

It was the if if if there's one moment that that I remember, it's actually was 1988, watching the debate between Dukakis and George H.

W。

W.

布什。

Bush.

当他被伯纳德·卡利布问到一个著名的问题时，问题是：如果凯蒂·杜卡基斯遭到强奸并被杀害，你是否支持不可撤销的死刑？

And when he got into his famous response to the question that Bernard Calib asked him about, you know, if if Kitty Dukakis were raped and murdered, would you would you favor an irrevocable death penalty?

他的回答是：不，伯纳德。

And and his response was, no, Bernard.

我想你知道，我一生都反对死刑，而且我没有看到任何证据表明死刑具有威慑作用。

I think you know that I've been an opponent of the death penalty my whole life, and you I see no evidence that it's a deterrent.

我当时对着电视大喊起来。

And I I just screamed at the television.

又一个失败的例子，你知道吗？在那种情况下，你第一句话应该是：伯纳德，如果这事发生在凯蒂身上，我第一件事就是想掐住那个家伙的脖子，第一个亲手了结他。

Another one bites the dust, you know, that the the first thing that you say in in a situation like that is, Bernard, if that happened to Kitty, the first thing I'd wanna do is I'd wanna get my hands around that guy's throat and be the first one to do it.

但让我告诉你我为什么不会这么做。

But let me tell you why I wouldn't.

然后真诚地解释你为什么不会，因为你确实不会。

And then just talk genuinely about why you wouldn't because you wouldn't.

弗兰克，我很好奇，对你来说是怎样的，我想是的。

Frank, I'm curious for for you and I think yeah.

说吧。

Go ahead.

我首先想到的是关于奥巴马医改的辩论期间。

The one that comes to mind first is during the debate about Obamacare.

我当时在圣路易斯。

And I was in St.

圣路易斯。

Louis.

我仍然记得那个焦点小组。

And I still remember the focus group.

我记得那扇窗户。

I remember the window.

我记得那个场所。

I remember the facility.

我们正在讨论，公众对奥巴马试图推行的政策持中等程度的认可。

And we're having this conversation, and the public kinda liked moderately liked what Barack Obama was trying to do.

我们进行了大约两个小时，这时一位坐在我右前方的女士举起了手，我甚至还记得她穿着红色的衣服。

And we've been through about two hours when someone raised their hand, a woman who was sitting in the front to my right, and I even remember she was dressed in red.

她说，我们一直在谈论医疗保健，我并不反对他们试图做的事情，因为他们是在帮助我。

And she said, you know, we've been talking about health care, and I'm not really against what they're trying to do because they're trying to help me.

但我真的不希望它变成政府接管。

But I really don't want it to become a government takeover.

于是我问她：你这话是什么意思？

And I said to her, what do you mean by that?

她说：政府控制，意味着他们有影响力；

She says, well, government control, it means that they've got influence.

但政府接管，就意味着我完全没有任何影响力了。

But government takeover, it means I have no influence at all.

我环顾四周，所有人都在点头，我总是关注肢体语言。

And I look around the room and everyone's nodding their heads and and I'm always looking at body language.

我会观察参与者的身体反应。

I look at the physical reaction of my participants.

他们是身体前倾还是后仰？

Are they leaning forward or backwards?

他们是双臂交叉还是更显开放？

Do they have their arms folded or are they more welcoming?

他们开始点头。

And they start to nod their heads.

坐在她左边的下一个人说，这正是问题所在。

And the next person behind her to her left said, that's exactly what this is.

这确实是一次政府接管。

It is a government takeover.

然后我听到房间里30个人的低语。

And then I hear this murmur from the 30 people in the room.

是的。

Yeah.

是的。

Yeah.

是的。

Yeah.

是的。

Yeah.

确实是。

It is.

这是一种接管。

It's a takeover.

我不希望政府来管理我的医疗保健。

I don't want government running my health care.

就在那一刻，我知道我有了挑战奥巴马医改的表达方式，我有了能让它们难以成功的语言。

It's and I knew at that moment that I had the language to challenge Obamacare, that I had the language that would make it very difficult for them to be successful.

我从未创造过那个短语。

And I never created that that phrase.

它来自一个焦点小组的参与者。

It came from a focus group participant.

我的语言不是在实验室里创造出来的。

My language, I'm not creating in a laboratory.

我的语言来自于选民本身。

My language comes from the voters themselves.

我只是知道如何在我听到时识别出某些东西。

I just know how to identify something when I hear it.

那显然产生了重大影响。

And that was clearly impactful.

那么在这个例子中，那个短语是什么？

And so in that example, what was the phrase?

这个短语是政府接管医疗保健吗？

The phrase is government takeover of health care?

是的。

Yes.

在此之前，我们一直使用‘政府控制’这个词，而‘政府控制’这个说法影响很大。

We had been using government control up to that point, and government control was significant.

政府接管令人震惊。

Government takeover was mind blowing.

坦白说，我知道这句话来自焦点小组，但我以为它更多出自你的想法，而不是参与者的口中。

To be frank, I knew it came out of focus group, but I I thought it came out of more of your head than the than a participant's mouth.

我之前不知道这一点。

I didn't know that.

但你知道，民主党人最引人注目的是，他们往往要么采纳对方的措辞，要么陷入对方使用的隐喻或意象，这些本来是用来攻击他们的。

But, you know, what's so striking about Democrats is that they tend to either pick up language from the other side or they step in stuff that into a metaphor or an image that's come from the other side that's, you know, that's been used against them.

比如，政府接管就是一个很好的例子——当民主党试图讨论将医疗补助扩展到没有医疗保险的人群时，他们称之为医疗补助扩展。

That, for example, government takeover is a great example where in trying to talk about extending Medicaid to people who don't have health care, Democrats call it Medicaid expansion.

我常说的是，想想‘扩展’这个词意味着什么。

And what what I always say is that think about what expansion is.

你直接进入了罗纳德·里根曾经谈论过的隐喻核心——政府正在接管你的生活。

You're you're going right in the heart of a metaphor that Ronald Reagan talked about, about government is taking over your life.

这规模很大。

It's big.

我认为‘大政府’这个词是右翼用了四十年的表述。

I think big government is the phrase that's used by the right for forty years.

那为什么你要说‘扩展’呢？

So why would you want to talk about expansion?

你应该说把医疗补助延伸给那些做三份工作还是负担不起的人。

You want to talk about extending Medicaid to people who are working three jobs and still can't afford it.

我的意思是，‘延伸’和‘扩展’是两个完全不同的词，会在你脑海中激活完全不同的认知网络。

I mean, extending versus expansion are two completely different things that activate completely different networks in your in your head.

我举个民主党的最大失败例子，就是‘取消警察经费’这个说法。

I'll give you the best example of democratic failure was the phrase defund the police.

whoever 想出这个说法，导致了那么多参议院席位和众议院席位的丢失，而且这个说法至今挥之不去。

Whoever came up with that cost so many senate seats, so many house seats, and that phrase doesn't go away.

它现在依然很有力量。

It's still powerful right now.

我听拜登谈论通货膨胀时，他称之为暂时性的。

And I'm listening to Joe Biden talk about inflation, and he called it transitory.

首先，没人明白‘暂时的’是什么意思。

First, no one understands what transitory is.

其次，人们会认为这是暂时的。

And second is people will think it's temporary.

但如果肉类价格上涨了22%，汽油价格上涨了33%，二手车价格上涨了40%，那‘暂时的’有什么用呢？顺便说一句，注意我并没有使用‘通货膨胀’这个词。

Well, what good is temporary if meat prices have gone up 22%, if gas prices have gone up 33%, if used car prices have gone up 40%, and by the way, notice I don't use the word inflation.

它们只是价格。

They're prices.

它们是成本。

They're costs.

普通老百姓走进超市时，并不会说：‘天啊，看看这通货膨胀。’

The average individual does not walk into a supermarket and say, oh my god, look at that inflation.

他们会说：‘我买不起。’

They say, I can't afford that.

所以我搞不懂。

So I don't get it.

顺便说一句，经过这么长时间，相信我，你会惊讶于共和党人对我告诉他们的内容关注得多么少。

After all this time by the way, believe me, you'd be shocked at how little Republicans pay attention to what I tell them.

实际上我认为，德鲁，你向共和党人传道会更有效，而我向民主党人传道会更有效。

I actually think that you would do better, Drew, preaching to Republicans, and I would do better preaching to Democrats.

这很有趣，因为在我私下与你们俩的交谈中，你们经常提到，那些负责沟通的人实际上很少倾听像你们这样的人，他们才是真正能阐明这些问题的人。

It's funny because in my conversations with both of you in private, you you actually speak very often about how little those who who are communicating actually listen to people like you at really framing these things.

当你当着大家的面说出来，弗兰克，听起来是那么显而易见。

When you say it, Frank, out loud, it sounds so obvious.

当然，人们比起‘通货膨胀’这个说法，更容易对‘价格上涨’产生共鸣。

Of course, people don't relate to the phrase inflation as much as they would relate to the phrase prices that are going up.

当然，如果你用摄氏度来谈论全球变暖，而大多数美国人根本不知道摄氏度是什么，或者谈论海平面上升两米，我们其实用错了计量单位。

Course, if you talk about global warming in terms of Celsius when most Americans don't know what Celsius is or, you know, even talking about two meters of sea level rise, like, we're in the wrong unit of measure.

从隐喻的角度来说，我们一直在这么做。

And metaphorically, that's what we're doing all the time.

我们使用的术语不够通俗易懂。

We're using phrases that are not as accessible.

你知道吗，为了好玩，也许只是让你们两位稍微发泄一下，你们觉得政党一再犯错的地方在哪里？

You know, just for fun, maybe just to allow you both to go on a little rant for a second, where do you see the parties just screwing up over and over again?

因为我们的听众可能还会想，如果这能带来改变，但只有2%，那也没关系。

Because one other thing our listeners might be thinking is, if it makes a change, but if it's only 2%, then it doesn't matter.

但如果它真的改变了结果，那就开始变得重要了。

But if it actually transforms the outcome, then then it starts to matter.

哦，这就有意义了。

Oh, that makes it.

我的意思是，当你用‘扩张’、‘扩展’还是‘延续’这些词时，公众支持率的差异能达到15个百分点。

That makes I mean, you're looking at the difference of 15 points in public approval when you say expansion versus or expanding versus extending.

同样，即使像在信息中先提‘医疗补助’还是‘医疗保险’这样简单的事情，也是如此。

The same thing actually is true of of something as simple as whether you've mentioned Medicaid or Medicare first in the message.

普通民众都知道医疗保险。

The average person knows Medicare.

他们知道这是他们的父母、祖父母所享有的东西。

They know that it's something that their parents, their grandparents have.

他们非常喜欢。

They really like.

除了社会保障之外，这是联邦政府推行过的最受欢迎的两个项目。

It's the most popular other than Social Security, those are the two most popular programs that the federal government has ever put into place.

如果你提到医疗保险，人们都会支持你。

If you talk about Medicare, people are right with you.

如果你提到医疗补助，他们脑海中浮现的是长长的队伍、拥挤的诊所，以及在美国给有色人种提供的糟糕医疗服务。

If you talk about Medicaid, what they are picturing is long lines, crowded clinics, poor health care given to people of color in The United States.

无论他们是自觉还是无意识地，都会这样想。

That's what they picture either consciously or unconsciously.

所以，如果你说，我们必须确保每个人都能获得与医疗保险同等优质的医疗服务，无论是通过私人保险，还是直接获得医疗保险本身。

So if you say, we need to make sure that everyone has the opportunity to get care as good as Medicare, whether through their private insurance or whether, whether they get it they get Medicare itself.

或者作为补充，我们可以将医疗补助扩展到那些为了生存不得不打两份或三份工的人，让他们和他们的孩子也能享有医疗保障。

Or as a backup, we can give we can extend Medicaid to people who are having to take two or three jobs just to get by so that they've got health care for themselves and for their kids.

如果你按这个顺序来说，效果会非常好。

If you do it in that order, you do great.

如果你反过来做，先谈医疗补助计划。

If you do it in the other order, you first say something about Medicaid.

我们必须确保每个人都能获得医疗补助计划。

We need to make sure that everyone has access to Medicaid.

你只要留意一下，就会看到弗兰克提到的肢体语言。

You just watch as, you watch the body language Frank is talking about.

气氛一下子就低落了。

It just gets deflated.

弗兰克以将风格测试引入我们的政治话语体系以及语言开发与测试工具箱而闻名。

Frank is known for having introduced style testing into our political lexicon as well as into our toolbox for developing and testing language.

我经常进行在线拨号测试，人们在聆听各种信息。

And I do a lot of online dial testing where what people are doing is they're listening to messages.

在聆听时，他们会将屏幕上的滑块向一个方向移动，比如向右。

And as they're doing that, they're moving a bar on their screen one direction, like, say, to the right.

如果他们喜欢听到的内容，就向右滑；如果不喜欢，就向左滑。

If they like what they're hearing second by second to the left, if they don't.

它生成的是一张图表，一条上下波动的线，总结了所有人或群体的反应，无论是民主党人、共和党人、独立选民，还是按性别分开的群体等等。

What it produces is is a is a graph, a line that goes up and down that summarizes everybody's responses or everybody in a group, whether it's Democrats, Republicans, independents, whether it's separated by males and females, etcetera.

你可以看到，如果你先谈医疗补助，人们的滑块会明显下滑，然后你必须尽力用医疗保险把他们拉回来；但如果你先说医疗保险，再补充说每个人都应该能获得医疗补助，情况就完全不同了。

And you can see just these enormous differences from if you start with Medicaid, you'll watch the dials drop, and then you have to do your best to pull people back up with Medicare versus if you say Medicare first, and then you say, and as a backup, everybody ought to be able to get Medicaid.

你会看到滑块持续上升，甚至包括那些原本对扩大医疗补助根本不满意的保守派。

You watch the dials keep going straight up, and that's including for conservatives who otherwise wouldn't have been happy with hearing about extending Medicaid at all.

弗兰克？

Frank?

我们也有一个类似的例子。

We have this, a similar example.

如果你谈论透明度，没人能理解。

If you talk about transparency, nobody understands it.

没人能准确定义透明度，但每个人都能理解问责制，这就是为什么问责制更受重视、优先级更高。

Nobody can define transparency, but everybody can define accountability, which is why accountability is much more appreciated, much higher priority.

另一个例子是‘以证据为基础’和‘以事实为基础’之间的区别。

Another example is the difference between evidence based and fact based.

如果是基于证据的，听起来你像个律师，而律师在这个国家很不受欢迎。

If it's evidence based, it sounds like you're a lawyer, and lawyers are very unpopular in the country.

但这是基于事实的。

But it's fact based.

这些是统计性的。

These are statistical.

这些是可以证明的。

These are provable.

因此，如果你采取基于事实的方法，你处理的是硬性信息。

And so if you take a fact based approach, you're dealing with hard information.

如果你采取基于证据的方法，你处理的更像是意图而非现实。

If you take evidence based, you're dealing with something that's more like intent rather than reality.

我插一句，我们只是在

Just to jump in, we're just kind

互相举例、彼此呼应。

of riffing off each other with different examples.

但另一个例子是，左派人士喜欢使用‘失业者’或‘没有保险的人’这样的说法。

But another example, people on the left like to use phrases like the unemployed or the uninsured.

当你说到‘失业者’时，你实际上是把那些面容痛苦的真实人物，变成了无名无姓的抽象概念。

And what you're doing when you say the unemployed is you're taking real people with pain lined faces and you're turning them into nameless, faceless abstractions.

而你真正应该做的，恰恰相反。

And what you want to do is exactly the opposite.

你应当把抽象的概念，还原成真实的人，就像弗兰克说的，你能想象出他们的样子。

You want to take abstractions and turn them into real people who, just as Frank said, you could visualize.

所以，你应该谈论那些失去工作的人，或者那些非因自身过错而失去工作的人。

So you want to talk about people who've lost their jobs or people who've lost their jobs through no fault of their own.

当你这样表达时，你会注意到，我的语气中能注入情感，而当你说到‘失业者’时，却无法在语气中传达这种情感。

When you talk about it that way, you notice how I can put feeling in my voice in a way that you can't put intonation in your voice when you say the unemployed.

我的意思是，我该说什么？

I mean, what do I say?

‘失业者’？

The unemployed?

失业者。

The unemployed.

但英语对于抽象概念来说，并不是一种靠语调表达的语言。

It doesn't, you know, English isn't a tone language that way for abstractions.

但你是可以做到的。

But you can do it.

同样，对于没有保险的人，或者更糟的是，保险不足的人。

Similarly with the uninsured or worse still, the underinsured.

没人知道保险不足的人是谁。

No one knows who the underinsured are.

他们不清楚这到底意味着什么，或者就业不足的人。

They don't know exactly what that means or the underemployed.

这到底是什么意思？

What does that mean?

这是否意味着你不想像自己能做的那样多工作？

Does that mean you don't feel like working as much you could?

这意味着你找不到足够的工作吗？

Does it mean you couldn't get enough jobs?

这意味着你从事的工作低于你的能力吗？

Does it mean you're getting a job that's below your capacity?

所以，你为什么不直接说，如果你的意思是那些必须打两份或三份工才能养家糊口的人呢？

So why don't you just say if what if what you mean is people who have to work two or three jobs just to put food on the table for their family?

如果你所说的‘就业不足’就是指这个，那就明说吧，这样人们才能明白。

If that's what you mean by the underemployed, say that and people will get it.

他们能想象出来，你还可以在语气中加入那种情感，让他们也感受到，从而产生完全不同的情绪反应。

They can picture it, and you could put that intonation in your voice that they in turn will feel, and it creates a completely different emotional response.

所以我们现在要短暂休息一下，我和Eze聊一聊，然后我们再回到我和Frank与Drew的对话。

So we're gonna take a quick interlude here with Eze and I talking, and then we'll go back to my conversation with Frank and Drew.

我们之所以想做这一期节目，你知道，我们在这档播客里已经谈了很多关于分裂、冲突加剧，以及朝着内战方向发展的话题。

The reason we wanted to have this episode, you know, we've talked a lot about division and increasing conflict and, you know, driving towards civil war and things like this on this podcast.

当我们听到政治话语中使用的语言时，常常会以为这仅仅是社会文化的一种反映。

And when we hear the language used politically, we often think that that's just kind of a read on what culture is.

我们忽视的是，许多这种语言是在政治实验室中精心设计的，几乎像是为激发民众愤怒而生成的政治煽动性内容。

And what we miss is that a lot of this language is engineered in a political laboratory, almost like laboratory generated political red meat that we hand to the, you know, the masses of society to be as angry as possible.

而且，我们的嘉宾在某些情况下，确实利用了这种语言的高超技巧，加剧了政治对立。

And, you know, our guests have had, in some cases, a role in some of this divisiveness by using these Jedi Master powers of language for increasing the partisanship.

那么，我们该如何运用这些能力来治愈文化，而不是让情况变得更糟呢？

And it's like, how do we use these capacities for healing culture to heal our device as opposed to worsen them?

这同样是一个绝佳的过渡。

This is also an excellent bridge.

我们曾经历过这些政治实验室，像德鲁·韦斯顿和弗兰克·伦茨这样的人，策划并识别出了具有病毒性的修辞策略。

We've had these political laboratories where the Drew Westins and Frank Luntzes of the world have crafted and identified viral strains of rhetoric.

重要的是要意识到，现在这种手段正在被大众化，但这并不意味着对民主有利。

And the important thing to realize is that's now being democratized, which is, of course, not the same thing as saying is good for democracy.

也就是说，现在每个人都能接触到焦点小组了。

Meaning, everyone now has access to a focus group.

每当你在网上发言时，都像是在向一个被录像、分析和量化的焦点小组讲话。

Whenever you speak online, it's as if you're speaking to a focus group that's videotape, analyzed, measured.

那里有个人拿着 clipboard，明确告诉你什么才有效。

There's someone there with a clipboard telling you exactly what's effective.

无论你是否愿意，你都会受到这些数据的影响。

And whether you want to or not, you are influenced by those measurements.

这一集真正探讨的是对人类心理进行逆向工程的军备竞赛，为了

This episode is really about the arms race for reverse engineering human psychology, for

什么有效，而不是什么是对的。

what is effective as opposed to what is good.

而真正我们需要深入探讨的关键区别，在于什么能在人类心智上引发反应，和什么对我们的社会有益之间的差异。

And that that's that's the key difference we really need to explore is the difference between what works on the human mind at generating a response versus what's good for our society.

能够分辨这种区别，就是洞察力。

Being able to tell that difference is discernment.

那就是智慧。

That is wisdom.

这让我想到罗伯特·斯波尔斯基，一位行为学家，他称人类大脑前额叶皮层的作用是帮助我们在更难做到的事情上坚持做正确的事。

And what that makes me think about is Robert Spolsky, a behavioralist, and he calls the role of the prefrontal cortex of the human brain, its role is to help us do the writer thing when it is also the harder thing to do.

从某种意义上说，这种动态就像对社会进行了一次额叶切除术。

So in some sense, this dynamic is sort of like a frontal lobotomy for a society.

它让我们去做那些有效但并不正确的事情。

It's making us do the thing that works even though it's not the thing that's right.

我很喜欢这个说法。

I like that a lot.

这是一个很好的描述。

That's a good description.

是的。

Yeah.

我们的前额叶皮层通常是我们抑制冲动或执行控制功能的部分。

Our prefrontal cortex is the part of us that usually is the inhibiting force or the executive control function.

如果前额叶皮层的作用是帮助我们做更正确但更困难的事，那么正如你所说，这种额叶切除术让我们去做更容易但更错误的事。

If the prefrontal cortex is the thing that helps us do the righter but harder thing, then, like you said, this is the frontal lobotomy that makes us do the wronger thing because it's easy.

所以我认为，从更宏观的角度来看，这一集你可能会说，哦，它只是关于语言和政治框架的问题。

And so I think just to zoom out, you know, this episode, you could say, oh, it's just about language and political framing.

但事实上，这关乎当我们 democratize 了那种洞察人类大脑共鸣的神一般能力时会发生什么。

But really it's about what happens when we democratize godlike powers of seeing what resonates with human brains.

我们可以选择使用这样的说法：‘他们在驯化我们的孩子’，这无疑是一种极具力量的框架。

And we can choose that the word, oh, they're grooming our children, you know, and that's a very powerful kind of frame.

他们在驯化？你说他们驯化我的孩子是什么意思？

They're grooming What do you mean they're grooming my children?

这立刻激发了愤怒和负面反应。

That just like evokes this anger, this negative reaction.

我不希望他们以任何方式驯化我的孩子。

I don't want them to be grooming my children for anything.

别碰我的孩子。

Get your hands off my kids.

对吧？

Right?

我们必须增强自身免疫力，以应对这种日益增长的、对人类意志主权的对抗性威胁。

And we we have to inoculate ourselves to this growing adversarial interest to the sovereignty of human will.

我想到2018年的一个时刻，当时那位广为人知的剑桥分析公司举报人克里斯托弗·韦利来到我们在旧金山人性科技中心的办公室。

I'm reminded of this moment when in 2018, Christopher Wiley, the Cambergenolica whistleblower that people know, came to our office at Center for Humane Technology in San Francisco.

他跟我讲述了他当时亲自走访美国中部地区拖车公园的经历。

And he told me about this moment when he was physically touring trailer parks in the middle of The US, in the middle of the country.

那是特朗普2016年当选之前的事。

This is before the twenty sixteen election of Trump.

他们发现了诸如‘把她关起来’或‘建墙’这样的短语。

And they discovered phrases like lock her up or build the wall.

尤其是当他们发现‘建墙’这个短语时。

And when they discovered especially this phrase build the wall.

一旦你发现某个短语有效，你就会每天在你的政治钢琴上反复弹奏这个和弦。

Once you discover that a phrase like that works, you just play that chord every day on your political piano.

对吧？

Right?

你就会眼睁睁看着人们不断被卷入其中。

And it you just watch as people just churn in.

而且这在左翼和右翼上都是真的。

And it's on it's true on the left as it is on the right.

我们和德鲁、弗兰克正在探索的这些内容，代表了一种更大的范式转变：如果我们找到了一条入侵人类情感的后门，就不能再把人类感受放在中心位置。

This this, like, stuff that we're exploring with Drew and Frank represents this bigger phase change that we can't put human feelings at the center if we found a backdoor into hacking human feelings.

这就像把所有的安全措施都放在一家银行里，而我们突然释放了所有的黑客工具，现在任何人都能进入这家银行。

It's sort of like putting all of your security in a bank that we suddenly just we we released all the hacking tools, so now anybody can go into the bank.

既然我们现在知道它容易被入侵，为什么还要把最珍贵的财产放在这家银行里呢？

So why would you put your most sacred possessions in that bank when we now know it's hackable?

所以我们需要提升思维的安全性。

So we need to increase the security of the mind.

这集节目部分探讨的就是：通过提高人们对这些机制如何影响我们的认识，以及我们自己的语言如何影响我们，我们不仅能更有力地掌控自己的生活，还能对这种实验室制造的政治煽动性言论更具免疫力——这些言论不断激发我们天性中更低劣的一面。

And that's what this episode is partly about is that by creating more awareness about how these things influence us and also how our own language influences us, we can both better empower ourselves in living our lives in a more empowering way and be more immune to this lab generated political red meat that's constantly stoking our lower angels of our nature.

德鲁，我知道你做过一项著名研究，通过fMRI扫描观察人们阅读政策时的反应，以及他们所属的政党。

Drew, I know you did a famous study on the power of pre framing people reading policies in an fMRI scanner and which which party they were part of.

你能谈谈这项研究，或者分享一下你的研究体验吗？

Could you maybe speak to that research or, you know, what was that experience like for you?

当时正值克里与布什选举的中期，我和我的同事们决定开展这项研究，因为我一直研究动机性推理对政治的影响，换句话说，就是我们如何推理出自己希望得出的结论。

That it was motivated by it was right in the middle of the of the Kerry Bush election, and and my colleagues and I decided I had been studying for a while the impact of motivated reasoning on politics, or just to put it another way, the impact of how it is that we reason to conclusions that we want to come to.

这项研究是一项新的成像研究，我们将双方的党派支持者放入扫描仪中，并向他们展示了一系列推理任务。

And the study was a new imaging study where we put partisans on both sides into the scanner, and we presented them with a series of reasoning tasks.

其中一些任务直接取自政治话语。

Some of them were taken directly out of political discourse.

还有一些是人们说过的话。

Some of them were things that had been said.

换句话说，我们稍作修改，使它们更具说服力。

In other words, we doctored a little bit to make them stronger.

他们躺在扫描仪里。

So they're lying down in the scanner.

他们一边听，一边在扫描仪内看到这些内容的图像。

They're both hearing this, and they're seeing it as an image inside the scanner.

第一张幻灯片出现了，是约翰·克里。

And a first slide comes up, and it's John Kerry.

屏幕上显示：1996年，约翰·克里说，我们必须全面审视并重新审视社会保障的各个方面。

And it says, in 1996, John Kerry said, we have to have every aspect of Social Security examined and reexamined.

我们有代际责任来修复社会保障体系，以确保它能为现在的老年人以及未来的老年人提供保障。

We have a generational responsibility to fix Social Security, so it'll be around for our seniors and for the seniors to come.

接着下一张幻灯片显示：就在今年2004年，约翰·克里在《与媒体见面》节目中表示，我们绝不能对社会保障进行经济状况调查。

And then the next slide comes up and it says, just this year, in 2004, John Kerry said on Meet the Press, we should never means test Social Security.

我们有代际责任来保护我们的老年人。

We have a generational responsibility to protect our seniors.

然后下一张幻灯片显示：请考虑克里先生的言论。

And then the next slide comes up and says, consider Mr.

克里的言论相互矛盾、自相冲突。

Kerry's words are are conflicting, and contradictory.

因此，受试者的任务很简单：在四分量表上评估这些言论的矛盾程度。

So the task of the subjects was simply to say, rate on a four point scale the extent to which they were contradictory.

在这个任务中，民主党人很难给出接近四分的评分，正如共和党人在面对乔治·W·布什时也很难给出高分一样。

And in that task, Democrats had a tough time giving it anywhere near a four, just as Republicans had a tough time when it was about George W.

布什在这件事上几乎没给任何接近四分的评价。

Bush giving anything anywhere near a, near a four.

事实上，当时我们已经从数千项使用神经影像技术的推理研究中了解到，当人们进行推理时，大脑中某些特定区域和回路会被激活。

And in fact, what was going on was we knew from thousands at that point of reasoning studies using neuroimaging that there are certain parts of the brain and certain circuits that turn on when people are reasoning.

我们的预测——后来被证明是正确的——是，在这个推理任务中，这些大脑回路根本就没有被激活。

And our prediction, which turned out to be accurate, was those circuits of the brain didn't turn on at all in this reasoning task.

被激活的是首先涉及负面情绪的回路。

What did turn on were first circuits involved in negative emotions.

它们就像失控一样疯狂地闪现。

They were just flashing like wild.

此外，还有一些我们假设位于颅骨最前端、眼睛正上方及周围区域的回路也被激活了，我们认为这些区域参与了无意识的情绪调节，人们试图以此来控制那种情绪感受。

And then what also got activated were some circuits that we had hypothesized were involved towards the very front of the skull, right above your eyes and around your eyes, we believe were involved in unconscious emotion regulation, that people are trying to basically regulate that emotional feeling.

还有一些位于其后方的回路，即大脑中称为前扣带回的区域，它负责监控和处理冲突。

And some circuits right behind it, a part of the brain called the anterior cingulate that's involved in monitoring and dealing with conflict.

当你经历某种冲突时，你会怎么做？

What do you do when you're experiencing some kind of conflict?

所以所有这些就是正在发生的事情。

So all that stuff is what's going on.

没有任何推理相关的神经回路在活动。

None of the reasoning circuits are going on.

但大约二十秒内，当人们给出评分时，如果他们被问到：‘不，我根本没有看到任何矛盾之处’，他们就会开始找各种合理化解释。

But then what happens within about twenty seconds, when people come up with that rating, if they're given it, No, I didn't see anything contradictory at all, What they end up doing is they start coming up with rationalizations.

当他们这么做的时候，所有那些神经回路就都关闭了。

And when they do that, all those circuits turn off.

我们刚才看到的所有现象都完全停止了。

Everything that we've just seen is completely just shut down.

基本上，任务完成得很好。

Basically, job well done.

我不再感受到负面情绪了。

I no longer feel negative emotions.

我不再需要调节自己的情绪了。

I I no longer have to regulate my emotions.

我们开始看到那些通常与推理相关的脑区开始激活，我们原本以为这些区域是用于合理化，因为人们在寻找理由，但这些理由并不真实。

We begin to see the beginnings of activation of circuits that you normally see in reasoning that we think were about rationalization because they were coming up with reasons, but they weren't real reasons.

但另一件相当可怕的事情是，这引导我们走向了如今的状况，因为我们现在在特朗普时代及后特朗普时代看到的这种现象被放大了——之后被激活的还有涉及多巴胺这种神经递质的奖赏回路。

But the other thing that was pretty scary and this leads us to where we are now, because we're looking at this stuff now on steroids in the Trump and post Trump era is that what else got activated afterwards were these circuits involved in reward, involving the neurotransmitter dopamine.

本质上，当人们推理出一个完全虚假、不合逻辑但让他们感觉更好的结论时，不仅负面情绪消失了，他们的大脑奖赏回路还会因多巴胺的激增而得到强化。

And what essentially was happening was once people had reasoned to a completely false conclusion that made no logical sense, but it made them feel better, not only did it turn off the negative emotions, but they got reinforced for it with a burst of dopamine in reward circuitry in the brain.

这意味着，在你推理出一个错误结论之后，你实际上会更喜欢你的候选人。

And what it means is that after you reason to a false conclusion, you actually like your candidate better.

此前有一些研究通过评分发现，当人们面对里根演讲中的矛盾之处时，这些矛盾根本无法回避。

And there had been some research using ratings of people when that when they were confronted with contradictions about Ronald Reagan's speeches, and they were and they there was no way around them.

如果是共和党人，他们在‘合理化’了这些矛盾之后，反而更喜欢里根了。

If they were Republicans, they liked him better after they had, quote, unquote, reasoned about those contradictions.

我曾试图对那些我所合作的候选人、政治家或商人说：最终，你是想发表一个声明，还是想真正带来改变？

I tried to say to the candidates or the politicians or the business people that I work with in the end, do you want to make a statement or do you want to make a difference?

我努力帮助他们实现真正的改变，而不仅仅是为了发表一个声明。

And I'm trying to help them make a difference rather than just a state.

你看，这真是太令人印象深刻了，弗兰克。

See, this what's so impressive, Frank.

你知道，你是想做一个表态，还是想带来改变？这句话脱口而出，只是因为你就是这样思考的。

You know, do you want to make a state or do you want to make a difference that just it rolls off your tongue because it's just the way you think.

这是情绪智力。

It's emotional intelligence.

我们回到能量的例子吧。

You know, come back to energy examples.

如果你谈论可再生能源，这是民主党人经常使用的说法。

If you talk about renewables, it's a phrase that Democrats use all the time.

普通人根本不知道你所说的可再生能源是什么意思。

The average person has no idea what you mean by renewables.

即使你说‘可再生能源’，他们也不太确定你指的是什么。

Even if you say renewable energy, they're not quite sure what you mean.

但如果你改用另一种说法，比如‘可再生能源’，并教给人们，就可以这样说。

But if instead you say, if you want to use the phrase and teach it to people, you can say something like, Renewable energies.

这些是永远不会耗尽的能量，比如风能和太阳能。

That is energies that will never run out, like the wind and the sun.

那么，你实际上是在使用这个词的同时，就在同一句话里给它下定义。

Well, then what you're doing is you're defining them in the same sentence that you're using it.

但你知道，如果你必须引入一个新术语，你很可能已经远离了人们真实的生活体验，远离了厨房餐桌上的语言，而进入了詹姆斯·卡罗尔所说的教职员工休息室那种语言。

But you know, if you have to introduce a term, you're probably getting away from lived experience of the you you want to be at the language of the kitchen table, not in the language of what James Carbull calls the faculty lounge.

如果你想成为班上最聪明的孩子，你就不会是那个带领全班的孩子。

If you want to be the smartest kid in the class, you're not gonna be the kid who's leading the class.

所以有一件事，我们要确保别漏掉，就是关于动机性推理，本质上人们会给自己一方开绿灯。

So one thing just to make sure we don't run past it was talking about motivated reasoning and how essentially people give a free pass to their side.

所以即使当我听到关于约翰·克里那件事时，内心产生了冲突——他以前说过一件事，现在又说另一件事，哦，他是个反复无常的人。

So even though there's that inner conflict coming up when I'm listening to that thing about John Kerry, he said one thing when now, one thing later, oh, he's a flip flopper.

这是那些本来就讨厌他的人会有的想法。

That's what someone on the a side that's predisposed to not like him is gonna think.

而喜欢他的一方则会说，让我找点理由来忽略这一点。

The side that likes him is gonna say, well, let me find some reason to dismiss that.

那可能是之后一段时间了。

It was probably a while later.

你知道的，我们都会成长和改变想法，但这种情况我们经常发生。

He you know, we all evolve and change our minds, but we do this all the time.

所以，弗兰克，也许我们可以听听你的看法。

So, Frank, maybe we can go to you.

在你进行拨号测试或即时反馈工作时，有没有哪个关键时刻或经历让你看到了它的力量，并帮助你创造和开创了一些成为你政治工作中基础性表达的短语？

What was a key moment or experience when you saw the power of your dial testing or the instant response work that you had been doing that that helped create and pioneered some of these phrases that became foundational in some of the political work that you'd done?

可能要追溯到2000年布什对戈尔的选举。

Probably going back to the Bush Gore two thousand election.

那其实并不是拨号测试本身。

And it wasn't really the dials.

而是人们在进行的对话。

It was the conversation that people were having.

我们在选举后、结果公布前的三周内进行了三场焦点小组访谈。

We did three focus groups in the three weeks after the election, but before it was called.

我们做的第一场，有31个人来参加，但只有30个名额。

The first one we did, we had 31 people show up for 30 slots.

我们做的第二场，有38个人来参加，但只有30个名额。

And the second one we did, we had 38 people for 30 slots.

我们做的第三场，有超过50个人到场。

And the third session we did, we had over 50 people show up.

我没有去招募他们。

I didn't recruit them.

他们是听说了这件事，才希望自己的声音被听到。

They heard about it and they wanted their voices to be heard.

我看到了其中的分裂。

And I saw the divisions.

我看到了其中的丑陋。

I saw the ugliness.

我在布什对戈尔的那场较量中，提前二十年就见证了2016年和2020年会发生的一切。

I had a chance to watch 2016 and 2020 play out twenty years ago in the Bush Gore battle.

我观察到人们最初都很有礼貌，对结果感到失望，有些人愿意接受失败，并期待四年后再次较量。

And I watched how people started off respectful, disappointed about the outcome, willing to accept defeat in some cases, and looking forward to fighting again four years later.

但到了这个过程的末尾，人们变得如此愤怒、恶毒和互相攻击，以至于我们不得不安排安保人员。

And by the end of that process, people were so angry and so vitriolic and vicious to each other that we had to have security.

洗手间里爆发了一场打斗。

A fight broke out in the bathroom.

literally，一场需要报警的肢体冲突。

Literally, a fight where they had to call the cops.

看到美国人因为一场已经尘埃落定的选举而彼此动手，这出乎意料，而这正是2016年最终撕裂这个国家的预警信号，此后情况只会越来越糟。

Having Americans start a physical fight with each other over an election that had already been determined was unexpected, and that was the warning sign of what would eventually blow this country apart in 2016, and it's just gotten worse ever since.

这让我经常后悔自己选择了这个职业，因为我真的了解人们的想法和感受，而这种认知并不愉快。

That makes me regret quite often that I'm even in this profession because I actually know how people think and feel, and it's not a pleasant it's not pleasant knowledge.

是的。

Yeah.

完全正确。

Well, completely.