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The question of why we have children, why we're motivated to have children, is kind of from a Darwinian point of view, a little bit of a no-brainer;
从达尔文学说的角度来说，我们为什么要生孩子，为什么愿意生孩子这个问题似乎无需思考；
which is that those animals that were not predisposed to have children in some way or another, did not leave behind children, and not as many children as those that wanted to have children.
也就是说，那些倾向于不生孩子的动物，不会留下孩子，也不会像想生孩子的动物那样有那么多孩子。
There were probably some primate ancestors of ourselves that as soon as they saw children, they thought, "How delicious, what a source of fat and protein," and ate them all up.
也许，我们有一些原始祖先，他们看到孩子的时候，会想“多美味啊，多么好的脂肪和蛋白质来源啊”，然后把孩子都吃掉。
The genes that motivated them to do that did not prosper as much as the genes that motivated our other primate ancestors to say, "How adorable, I will love them and protect them."
促使他们这么做的基因不如那些认为“多可爱啊，我要爱他们保护他们”的原始祖先的基因那样强大。
Now that we're reflective beings, now we could think about what we do, we could choose, for instance, to have sex without the idea of having kids.
我们是善于思考的生物，现在我们可以考虑自己所做的事，比如，我们可以选择有性生活却不要孩子。
We have this flexibility.
我们有了灵活性。
And then the question of why people choose to have kids becomes more complicated.
所以人们为什么选择生孩子这个问题就更复杂了。
The negatives of having children are obvious- you don't need a psychologist to tell you about 'em.
生孩子的负面影响不言而喻，这一点不需要心理学家来告诉你。
Money, anxiety, sleepless nights, sleep deprivation, all the time they take up.
金钱、焦虑、无法安睡的夜晚、睡眠剥夺、孩子所占用的那些时间。
Studies find that for couples who have kids, the number one source of fighting and argument and tension- it's not relatives, it's not sex, it's not money, it's kids.
研究发现，在有孩子的夫妻中，争吵和压力的第一大来源不是亲戚，不是性，不是金钱，而是孩子。
It's a really hard question.
这是个很难的问题。
From a hedonic point of view, are children a positive, a negative?
从享乐主义的角度来说，孩子是积极的产物还是负面的产物？
And I think that answers are going to differfrom person to person in perhaps unpredictable ways.
我觉得，对不同的人来说，答案也不尽相同。
But people don't seem to say, "Wow, what a disaster that was. What a bad move."
但人们一般不会说：哦，真是场灾难呀。真是非常错误的决定。
And I think if you tell parents, "You know, there's a lot of evidence saying that kids don't make you overall happier?"
如果你跟父母们说：有很多证据表明，孩子总体上并不会让你更幸福。
Their response will often be, "That's not why I have kids. That's not why I love my kids."
他们可能会回答：那不是我生孩子的原因，也不是我爱孩子的原因。
And I think the reason goes back to the idea of 'motivational pluralism.'
原因可能还要回到“动机多元化”上面。
So motivational pluralism is the fact that humans want many things:
动机多元化是指人们想要很多东西：
We want pleasure. We want to be good.
我们想要快乐，想要美好。
We want meaning, we want purpose.
我们想要意义，想要目的。
So if you ask parents whether their lives are meaningful, they tend to say "yes" more than non-parents.
如果你问父母们，他们的生活是否有意义，他们会比没有孩子的人更倾向于回答“有意义”。
Meaning, in the broad sense, is intimately related to the more heavy duty suffering and difficulty.
从广义上来讲，意义本身就与更重的责任、痛苦和困难联系在一起。
So Danny Kahneman talks about two different kinds of happiness- one is 'experienced happiness,' which is, you know, you're doing something and I tap you on the shoulder and say, "How happy are you, how's it going?"
丹尼·卡尼曼提到了两种不同的幸福：一种是“体验幸福”，指的是你做某件事的时候，我拍着你的肩膀告诉你“你有多快乐，怎么样了？”
The other one is 'remembered happiness.'
另一种是“记忆幸福”。
"Remember when you were doing that thing, how much did you like it?"
“记得你做那件事的时候，你有多喜欢它？”
The experienced happiness with children is complicated, and often lower than you'd expect, while the remembered happiness could be higher.
与孩子相关的体验幸福是很复杂的，而且通常比预期的要低，而记忆幸福却会更高。
One explanation for this proposed by Jennifer Senior, who's a science writer who's written a lot about this, is that our memories are distorted in interesting ways.
对此，詹妮弗·西尼尔（一名科学作家，写过很多这方面的内容）提出了一种解释：我们的记忆被有趣地扭曲了。
And we often remember the peaks- we remember the good times.
我们通常会记得巅峰，记得美好的时光。
I think back on having my kids, and I have a million memories of these wonderful things which I go back to over and over again and kind of nurture.
我回忆起养育孩子的经历，记得无数件美好的事情，我会一遍遍的回想，像是在滋养它们一样。
So my remembered happiness might be high.
所以我的记忆幸福可能比较高。
The experienced happiness, the day-to-day stuff, the million diaper changes, and getting up in the middle of the night, you just forget all that.
我的体验幸福，那些日常琐事，换的无数次尿不湿，半夜起床，统统被遗忘了。
If somebody asks me, "Do you recommend I have a kid or not,"
如果有人问我：你建议我生孩子吗？
I would say, "Hey, this is a tough call."
我会说：嘿，这是个很难的抉择。
But what I would advise is explore what it is to have a kid.
但我会建议你去研究一下有了孩子到底是什么样子。
Look at some of the research into how people describe their lives.
看一些人们描述自己生活的研究。
Talk to parents, not with an eye towards saying, "Oh, plainly, this is a good decision," or, "Plainly, this is a bad decision," 'cause the data's not going to be there.
跟父母们交谈，并不是要你直接说：“哦，很明显，这个决定很好”，或者“哦，很明显，这个决定很糟糕”，因为根本没有这方面的数据支撑。
It's just too mixed.
它太复杂了。
But what you could find is how well it meshes with how you are or how you wanna be.
但你可以找到的是，孩子与你是什么样的人以及你想成为什么样的人有多契合。
Having children is what my friend and colleague, the philosopher, Laurie Paul, calls a 'transformative experience.'
生孩子被我的朋友兼同事，也是哲学家，劳里·保罗称为“改造体验”。
It's the kind of experience that changes you in such a way that right now you can't project what it would be like to be a parent.
这种体验会改变你，让你现在完全预测不到成为父母后，会是什么样子。
'Cause when you are a parent, you'll be a different kind of person than you are now.
一旦成为父母，你就会是一个和现在截然不同的人。
You'll have different priorities, different interests, different drives, different experiences.
你会有不同的优先级，不同的兴趣，不同的动力，不同的经历。
Now, I'll add a caveat, which is there's other ways to get meaning in life.
在这里，我要提醒一下，要找到生活的意义，还有其他方式。
Some people I love very much are non-parents, either due to circumstance or due to choice.
一些我很爱的人没有要孩子，要么是因为环境，要么是出于选择。
And they live very rich and fulfilling lives.
他们的生活非常富有，非常充实。
There's more than one route to meaning.
想要有意义，道路不止一条。
But I do want to suggest that that's one reason, one argument-forget about populating a universe, forget about perpetrating the species.
但我还想说明，那只是一个理由，一个论点，管他的增加全球人口、管他的延续物种。
One argument in favor of having kids is that not that it scratches the itch of happiness, but that it's part and parcel of a meaningful life.
支持人们生孩子的一个理由是，并非因为它能让我们幸福，而是因为它是人生意义的一部分。
