第一辑 安乐与自在 Volume 1: Inner Peace and Freedom
第十五章 凡是让你爽的东西，一定会让你痛苦
Chapter 15: Anything that makes you feel pleasure
will surely make you suffer
如果一个人的贪欲可以被无限地满足，他离灭亡就不远了...
If a person's desires can be endlessly satisfied, their destruction is not far away.
人性有一种基本特征，会对那些让我们感到“爽”的东西产生依赖。那么“爽”是如何产生的呢？
Humanity has a basic characteristic: we tend to rely on things that make us feel pleasure. So, how does pleasure arise?
人的大脑里有一种叫多巴胺的神经传导物质，它是用来帮助细胞传送脉冲的化学物质。当人被外界刺激、潜藏的贪著心、贪爱心、贪欲心、贪婪心被满足的时候，多巴胺会大量地爆发出来。比如一个拥抱、一句赞扬的话、一个幻想，都会引发多巴胺的升高。
In the human brain, there is a neurotransmitter called dopamine, which is a chemical that helps cells send signals. When individuals experience external stimuli and their latent attachment, desire, greed, and avarice are satisfied, dopamine will be released in large amounts. For instance, a hug, a compliment, or a daydream can trigger an increase in dopamine levels.
当外界的刺激够强烈，人的贪心被满足，潜藏的求不得苦被暂时缓解，在感官上获得一种放松、解脱的体验，就会感到很“爽”。
When the external stimuli are strong enough to satisfy a person's desires and temporarily alleviate the hidden suffering of not getting what one wants, they experience a sense of relaxation and relief in their senses, which is pleasure.
阿尔维德·卡尔森（Arvid Carlsson）确定多巴胺为脑内信息传递者的角色，使他赢得了2000年诺贝尔医学奖。多巴胺与各种上瘾行为有关，多巴胺分泌过多，对人的大脑、心脏、血管都有损伤。
Arvid Carlsson's discovery of dopamine as a neurotransmitter in the brain earned him the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine in 2000. Dopamine is associated with various addictions. Excessive dopamine release can cause damage to the brain, heart, and blood vessels.
“爽”，浅层次的体验有笑话、美食、挑逗、赞美、看热闹，甚至惊恐；中等层次的体验有抽烟、游戏、整容；深层次体验有性行为、豪赌、毒品，就是俗称的“黄赌毒”。
The shallow experiences of pleasure include jokes, delicious food, teasing, praise, rubbernecking, or even fear. Moderate experiences include smoking, gaming, or undergoing cosmetic surgery. Deeper experiences include sexual activities, excessive gambling, or drug use, commonly referred to as "sex, gambling, and drugs".
对比这三者，如果说sex让多巴胺含量提升100%，可卡因让多巴胺上升350%，冰毒带来的是接近1200%，所以毒品上瘾是很难戒掉的。
Comparing these three, if sex increases dopamine levels by 100%, cocaine elevates dopamine by 350%, and methamphetamine leads to nearly 1200% increase. Thus, it's very hard to quit drugs.
现在的世界越来越开放无度，人们时刻都在互联网上追求“爽”的各种体验，约会、娱乐、游戏、八卦、秘闻等。
The world is becoming increasingly open and unrestrained. People are constantly seeking various pleasurable experiences on the internet, such as dating, entertainment, gaming, gossip, and secrets.
可怕的是，凡是让你“爽”的东西，一定也会让你痛苦。
What is alarming is that anything that brings you pleasure will surely bring you suffering as well.
比如美女、美食、美言、烟酒和毒品，都能让人有“爽”的体验，但都会给人带来伤害：美食让人发胖、失去健康，美言让人迷失自我、脱离现实，美女让人产生欲望、失去理智，烟酒、毒品的副作用就更不用说了。这也是《道德经》里所说的“五色令人目盲，五音令人耳聋”。
For example, beautiful women, delicious food, sweet words, tobacco, alcohol, and drugs can bring a sense of pleasure, but they can also cause harm: delicious food can lead to weight gain and health issues, sweet words can make people lose themselves and disconnect from reality, beautiful women can trigger desire and make people lose their minds. Not to mention the side effects of tobacco, alcohol, and drugs.
This is also mentioned in the Tao Te Ching: "The five colors blind eyes, the five sounds deafen ears."
更可怕的是：当人的多巴胺经常分泌过量时，产生“爽”的体验的临界值会被超越，就会对“爽”的体验脱敏。
Even more terrifying is that when dopamine is often overproduced, the threshold for experiencing pleasure will be surpassed, leading to desensitization to pleasure.
当临界值不断提升时，一个人想一直获得“爽”的体验，就得不断地加强刺激的程度，你需要被更持续、更强烈地刺激，才能继续获得“爽”的体验。
As the threshold keeps rising, if a person wants to continuously experience pleasure, they must constantly intensify the level of stimuli. They need to be stimulated more continuously and intensely to continue experiencing pleasure.
比如有的人抽烟，从刚开始是两天一包，到一天一包，再到后来要一天两包，最后甚至要两根烟一起抽才有感觉；再比如喜欢吃辣的人，会越吃越辣。
For example, some people start smoking at one pack every two days, then progress to one pack per day, two packs per day, and eventually reach a point where they even need to smoke two cigarettes at once to get the feeling. Similarly, those who enjoy spicy food may find themselves craving increasingly spicier dishes.
游戏、吸毒、赌博等一切上瘾的行为都遵循这个规律。
This pattern applies to all addictions such as gaming, drug use, and gambling.
有这样一个实验：在老鼠的脑中埋一个电极，让老鼠踩踏板放电。每踩一次，电极就会刺激产生多巴胺的神经元兴奋。结果老鼠以每分钟几百次的速度踩踏，直至力竭而亡。
There is an experiment like this: an electrode is implanted in the brain of a mouse, and the mouse is allowed to press a pedal to deliver an electrical stimulation. With each press, the electrode stimulates the dopamine-producing neurons, causing excitement. As a result, the mouse presses the pedal at a rate of several hundred times per minute until it becomes exhausted and dies.
“爽”的感觉可以被设计出来。这个时代最最可怕的是：这种“爽”的感觉竟然可以被现代技术和算法设计出来。
The feeling of pleasure can be engineered. What is most terrifying in this era is that the feeling of pleasure can be engineered by modern technology and algorithms.
比如各种娱乐APP越来越多，大多数APP的本质是什么呢？每个APP背后都有一个强大的运营团队，他们用尽最前沿的科技（AR+VR），用更大的运算和数据处理能力（云计算+大数据），通过声、光、交互、反馈等全方位的途径，再在各种心理学、消费行为学、神经科学等理论指导下，采用算法主导的自动精准推荐机制，无限满足你的胃口，对你轮番轰炸，不断地给你刺激，让你持续地“爽”，越离不开它们越好。
For instance, there are more and more entertainment apps, and what lies at the core of most apps? Behind each app, there is a powerful team employing cutting-edge technology (AR+VR) and leveraging greater computing and data processing capabilities (cloud computing+big data). Through various means such as sound, light, interaction, and feedback, they use algorithm-driven precise recommendation systems guided by various theories in psychology, consumer behavior, neuroscience, etc. They continuously bombard you with stimuli, satisfy your every desire, and give you constant pleasure, making you increasingly dependent on them.
在资本的眼中只有金钱和利益，没有人性和正义。用户数量、日活、月活和平均在线时长等等数据决定了一个APP的价值。如今没有一个APP不以此为衡量标准。
In the eyes of capitalists, there is only money and profit, but no humanity and righteousness. Metrics such as registrations, daily active users (DAU), monthly active users (MAU), and average online time determine the value of an app. Nowadays, there is no app that is not measured by these standards.
如果一个人的贪欲可以被无限地满足，他离灭亡就不远了。
If a person's desires can be endlessly satisfied, their destruction is not far away.
互联网是一把双刃剑，一方面给我们提供了各种便捷，但同时也提供了各种垃圾内容，比如直播平台里低俗无聊的表演、各大卫视里故弄玄虚的选秀或真人秀、云里雾里的玄幻修真小说等等形形色色的垃圾内容。
The internet is a double-edged sword. On one hand, it provides us with various conveniences; on the other hand, it also offers various junk content, such as vulgar shows on live streaming platforms, misleading talent shows or reality shows, perplexing fantasy novels, etc.
这些内容的设计逻辑都是以无限满足人性偏好为标准。从来没有任何一种东西能像互联网这样对人性洞察得如此彻底。
The logic behind them is based on endlessly satisfying human desires. Never before has anything been able to comprehend human nature as thoroughly as the internet.
《娱乐至死》前言里有这样的话：人们在汪洋如海的信息中日益变得被动和自私……真理被淹没在无聊繁琐的世事中……我们的文化成为充满感官刺激、欲望和无规则游戏的庸俗文化……
The foreword of Amusing Ourselves to Death says: "Those who would give us so much that we would be reduced to passivity and egoism... the truth would be drowned in a sea of irrelevance.... we would become a trivial culture, preoccupied with some equivalent of the feelies, the orgy porgy, and the centrifugal bumble puppy..."
那些资本家或商人利用话语权的优势，在你周围制造出一个“信息包围圈”，让你身陷在他们给你创造的世界里，比如各种节日大促销、各种洗脑的广告语、各种套路的诱导等等。
Those capitalists or businessmen take advantage of their discourse power to create an "information bubble" around you, trapping you in the world they create, such as various holiday sales, brainwashing advertisements, and manipulative tactics designed to lure you in.
在这个信息自由传播的时代，那些粗俗下流的内容无孔不入，诸如好战、追星、炒股、八卦、暴力、围观、虐待等人性的各种阴暗面和贪求心都被激发并满足。
In this era of free information dissemination, all kinds of vulgar information permeate every corner, such as belligerence, idolizing celebrities, stock trading, gossip, violence, rubbernecking, and abuse, all triggering and fulfilling various dark aspects of human nature and desires.
人人都喜欢自由，但是，如果缺乏法律和道德方面的教育和制约，人们缺乏自律的学习和锻炼，自由只能导致堕落、疾病，还有灭亡。
Everyone yearns for freedom, but if there is no education and constraints in law and morality, and no study and practice in self-discipline, freedom can only lead to decadence, diseases, and even destruction.
多巴胺的作用是调控中枢神经系统的多种生理功能。但是，当多巴胺长期过量分泌，导致神经系统调节紊乱，引发帕金森病、精神分裂症、慢性多发性抽动综合症、注意力缺陷多动综合症和垂体肿瘤等等各种疾病。
Dopamine plays a role in regulating various physiological functions of the central nervous system. However, when dopamine is overproduced for a long period, it can lead to disruptions in neural regulation, resulting in various disorders such as Parkinson's disease, schizophrenia, chronic multiple tic disorder, attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD), pituitary tumors, etc.
只靠自律和修养是不够的，社会上必须有一种监管机制来抑制人性的阴暗面、激发人性光辉的一面。
Relying solely on self-discipline and self-cultivation is not enough; there must be a regulation mechanism in society to restrain the dark side of human nature and nurture its bright side.
我们坚决支持国家对互联网和娱乐行业的管控，如果没有这些管控，人们的生活将污秽不堪，越陷越深。
We firmly support the state's control over the internet and entertainment industry because without such regulations, people's lives would become polluted and they would sink deeper and deeper.
中国文化最基本的教导就是克己，克己的本质就是要适当地控制自己的欲望，但是现在主动克制自己欲望的人很少了。当绝大部分人选择被麻醉的时候，只有极少一部分人选择自律和忍耐。
The most fundamental teaching in Chinese culture is self-discipline, which essentially means to properly control one's desires. However, nowadays, very few people proactively restrain their desires. When most people choose to be numbed, only very few people choose self-discipline and patience.
只有用坚强的意志力克服内心的贪求和怨恨的人，他们的灵魂才能顿悟、超越和升华；往往都是这些有志向的人，从不会随波逐流，能够成就一番事业。
Only those who use strong willpower to overcome desire and anger can achieve spiritual awakening, transcendence, and elevation. It is often these determined individuals who never follow the crowd and can accomplish great things.
良药苦口、忠言逆耳。希望每一个看完这个短片的人都能努力地学习克己自律，不贪图享乐和刺激，形成和巩固自己的独立思考能力，在自己专注的领域里不断深耕和精进，成为未来时代的中流砥柱。
Good medicine tastes bitter, and honest advice is hard to accept. I hope you who watch this lecture will strive to learn self-discipline, not cling to pleasure and excitement, cultivate and strengthen your independent thinking ability, continuously study and work hard in your dedicated fields, and become pillars of the future.
易明之光 Mini读书@2023