Jul 19, 20207 min read

逼自己认真写论文的最强理由

啊哈~ 你以为是这张图吗？

但正经的小E是来分享干货的~

Jordan Peterson的作文写作指南，第一章的介绍的两个章节~

这两章是小E见过的“为什么要写Essay？”的「最强回答」。

看完后，直感叹，诶，我那些年白瞎了~

马上立即，Essay上！

至于《Jordan Peterson’s guide on essay writing》全篇，那更厉害了~

原贴好像发在reddit上，备受推崇。

medium上也有不少人称其是十多年教学工作中看到的最为「有用最棒的写作指南」

介于文章很长，我们此次分享的是第一章的前两节，往后将继续分享后续章节。

英文原版的阅读链接可直接点击【阅读原文】跳转查看。

正文：

Jordan Peterson’s《Essay写作指南》

1.介绍

什么是Essay？

Essay是关于特定主题的短文，可以是简单的探讨，可以是回答某个问题，或者就某个方面简单聊聊。

为什么要写论文呢？

在大多数情况下，学生写论文只是因为老师要求他们写论文。

所以，学生开始觉得论文的重要性主要在于向导师展现自己学业情况。这是幼稚而危险的误解（尽管这话也算是没错）。

❝ 但实际上，写论文的主要意义在于：「作家可以就重要的主题，精准的表达呈现出一套有根据的，连贯的，复杂的思维。」❞

那为什么训练自己的复杂思维能力很重要？

因为对于初学者来说，「这样做和思考之间没有区别。」

思考很重要，因为基于“三思而后行”的行动可能比基于无脑的行动，生产力要高很多。（哪怕做起来不容易）

因此，如果你想拥有一种以高效，生产力，安全性，独创性和敬业度为主的生活，而不是自暴自弃的浅薄生活，就需要好好考虑下自己的问题。「没有比“写下来”更好的方法了。」

写作可以帮助你记忆，整理并阐明你的思路。

写作能更多记录不能单靠记忆整理的内容，这样在相同的时间内能整理更多的想法。此外，一旦将这些想法写下来，就可以逐字，逐句和逐段的修改编辑。

在更仔细地推敲之后，「删除不合适想法，剩下的就是好主意。」 保留并应用它们。这样一来，就可以掌握好原创的观点，并且可以组织和传达这些观点。

想想你人生中那些成功的案例。这是需要考虑的事情：能那些能准确表达和传达出最佳观点的人往往都是赢家。

如果您想找工作，就必须为自己辩护。
如果您想加薪，就必须说服某人这是你应得的报酬。

如果你想试图说服某人你的想法是正确的，那么您就必须成功地辩论这个想法优点，尤其是与其他人的想法相比较时。

通过写作磨炼自己思考和交流的能力是对自己最好的武装。俗话说，笔比剑强。

这不是廉价的“大道理”。思想改变了世界，尤其是被记录下来的思想。

❝ The Romans built buildings, and the Romans and the buildings are both gone. The Jews wrote a book, and they are still here, and so is the book. 古罗马人建造建筑物，而现今那些建筑物和罗马人都已烟消云散。犹太人写了本书，而犹太人和那本书依旧流传至今。 ❞

文字的持续时间可能远比石头长，比一个帝国影响还更深远。

如果你学习写作和编辑，你还可以分辨出哪些是有价值的观点是拧得清的作家，哪些人是在搞垃圾输出。

就像从谷壳中剥离出小麦，这样一来，远离垃圾，接受更深刻而可靠的思想影响。

而不掉入那些哗众取宠的观点、不切实际的幻想和意识形态的陷井中。这些陷阱的危害可大可小，甚至颇为致命。

擅长思考与表达的比不具备这个能力的人更强，某种程度上意味着“能够胜任并高效地做各种各样的事情”。

此外，随着能力的提升，你所接触的阶层也跟着上升，思考和表达的能力也就越重要。

在那些顶尖的领域里（法学届、医学界、学术界、商学届、神学届、政界），没有比拥有这种能力更为必要和有价值的了。

如果你有思考和交流的能力，那么就能在必要时捍卫自己以及你的朋友和家人，同时在生活中的各个方面这种能力都是必不可少的。

最后，值得注意的是，你的心智是通过口头形式来组织的，处于大脑最高级和最抽象的层级。

因此，如果您通过写作学会思考，那么您将培养出逻辑清晰，高效的头脑。

这也意味着您在心理和身体上都会更加健康

因为缺乏清晰的思路和愚昧无知会让你产生不必要的压力。不必要的压力会使您的身体对原本可以被视为微不足道的事情的反应更大。

这将导致「过多的能源消耗，并加速衰老」。（以及随之而来对健康造成的各种负面影响）

因此，除非想持续保持无知，不健康的状态，否则请学习写作（以及思考和交流）。

否则，会跟不上时代竞争。不可避免的堕落阶层，生活变得更加艰难，并且很快就会老去。

永远不要低估文字的力量。

没有它们，人类可能还没走出森林呢~因此，在写论文时，你写的是论文吗？是在发扬上下五千年的古老智慧啊~

这就是为什么你要写论文（即使是分配的作业）的原因。

无视这一点，你就不过是正在做一些愚蠢，琐碎而无聊的事情。而记住它，你就是「conquering the unknown.！」

英语原文：

PART ONE: INTRODUCTION

What is an essay?

An essay is a relatively short piece of writing on a particular topic. However, the word essay also means attempt or try. An essay is, therefore, a short piece written by someone attempting to explore a topic or answer a question.

Why bother writing an essay?

Most of the time, students write essays only because they are required to do so by a classroom instructor. Thus, students come to believe that essays are important primarily to demonstrate their knowledge to a teacher or professor. This is simply, and dangerously, wrong (even though such writing for demonstration may be practically necessary).

The primary reason to write an essay is so that the writer can formulate and organize an informed, coherent and sophisticated set of ideas about something important.

Why is it important to bother with developing sophisticated ideas, in turn? It’s because there is no difference between doing so and thinking, for starters. It is important to think because action based on thinking is likely to be far less painful and more productive than action based upon ignorance. So, if you want to have a life characterized by competence, productivity, security, originality and engagement rather than one that is nasty, brutish and short, you need to think carefully about important issues. There is no better way to do so than to write. This is because writing extends your memory, facilitates editing and clarifies your thinking.

You can write down more than you can easily remember, so that your capacity to consider a number of ideas at the same time is broadened. Furthermore, once those ideas are written down, you can move them around and change them, word by word, sentence by sentence, and paragraph by paragraph. You can also reject ideas that appear substandard, after you consider them more carefully. If you reject substandard ideas, then all that you will have left will be good ideas. You can keep those, and use them. Then you will have good, original ideas at your fingertips, and you will be able to organize and communicate them.

Consider your success over the course of a lifetime. Here is something to think about: the person who can formulate and communicate the best argument almost always wins. If you want a job, you have to make a case for yourself. If you want a raise, you have to convince someone that you deserve it. If you are trying to convince someone of the validity of your idea, you have to debate its merits successfully, particularly if there are others with other competing ideas.

If you sharpen your capacity to think and to communicate as a consequence of writing, you are better armed. The pen is mightier than the sword, as the saying goes. This is no cheap cliché. Ideas change the world, particularly when they are written. The Romans built buildings, and the Romans and the buildings are both gone. The Jews wrote a book, and they are still here, and so is the book. So it turns out that words may well last longer than stone, and have more impact than whole empires.

If you learn to write and to edit, you will also be able to tell the difference between good ideas, intelligently presented, and bad ideas put forth by murky and unskilled thinkers. That means that you will be able to separate the wheat from the chaff (look it up). Then you can be properly influenced by profound and solid ideas instead of falling prey to foolish fads and whims and ideologies, which can range in their danger from trivial to mortal.

Those who can think and communicate are simply more powerful than those who cannot, and powerful in the good way, the way that means “able to do a wide range of things competently and efficiently.” Furthermore, the further up the ladder of competence you climb, with your well-formulated thoughts, the more important thinking and communicating become. At the very top of the most complex hierarchies (law, medicine, academia, business, theology, politics) nothing is more necessary and valuable. If you can think and communicate, you can also defend yourself, and your friends and family, when that becomes necessary, and it will become necessary at various points in your life.

Finally, it is useful to note that your mind is organized verbally, at the highest and most abstract levels. Thus, if you learn to think, through writing, then you will develop a well-organized, efficient mind – and one that is well-founded and certain. This also means that you will be healthier, mentally and physically, as lack of clarity and ignorance means unnecessary stress. Unnecessary stress makes your body react more to what could otherwise be treated as trivial affairs. This makes for excess energy expenditure, and more rapid aging (along with all the negative health-related consequences of aging).

So, unless you want to stay an ignorant, unhealthy lightweight, learn to write (and to think and communicate). Otherwise those who can will ride roughshod over you and push you out of the way. Your life will be harder, at the bottom of the dominance hierarchies that you will inevitably inhabit, and you will get old fast.

Don’t ever underestimate the power of words. Without them, we would still be living in trees. So when you are writing an essay, you are harnessing the full might of culture to your life. That is why you write an essay (even if it has been assigned). Forget that, and you are doing something stupid, trivial and dull. Remember it, and you are conquering the unknown.

点击【阅读原文】阅读 Jordan Peterson’s《Essay写作指南》全文

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