今天这篇大概好多人都看过了，我觉得是篇很好的PS或者SoP，申请的同学们可以参考一下咯。
The Spider’s Bite
曾经有一只蜘蛛咬了我
He Jiang at Harvard's commencement ceremony
何江在哈佛大学毕业典礼的演讲
When I was in middle school, a poisonous spider bit my right hand.
当我上初中的时候，一只有毒的蜘蛛咬了我的右手。
I ran to my mom for help—but instead of taking me to a doctor, my mom set my hand on fire.
我跑向母亲以寻求帮助——但是她没有带我去看医生，而是将我的手放在了火上烤。
After wrapping my hand with several layers of cotton, then soaking it in wine, she put a chopstick into my mouth,and ignited the cotton.
在将我的手用几层棉布缠好后，又把它浸在了酒中，之后她将一根筷子放进了我的嘴里，点燃了棉布。
Heat quickly penetrated the cotton and began to roast my hand.
热浪迅速穿透了棉布并且开始灼烧我的手。
The searing pain made me want to scream, but the chopstick prevented it.
那剧烈的疼痛让我几乎尖叫出声，但那根筷子阻止了此事发生。
All I could do was watch my hand burn - one minute, then two minutes –until mom put out the fire.
我所能做的就是眼睁睁的看着我的手燃烧——一分钟、两分钟——直到母亲将火熄灭。
You see, the part of China I grew up in was a rural village, and at that time pre-industrial.
你看，我所生长于中国的一个偏僻山村，并且当时还处于工业化之前。
When I was born, my village had no cars, no telephones, no electricity, not even running water.
当我出生的时候，我们村没有汽车、没有电话、没有电，甚至没有自来水。
And we certainly didn’t have access to modern medical resources.
显而易见，我们没有现代医疗设施。
There was no doctor my mother could bring me to see about my spider bite.
那里也没有医生，以至于母亲无法让他帮忙处理被蜘蛛咬伤的我。
For those who study biology, you may have grasped the science behind my mom’s cure: heat deactivates proteins, and a spider’s venom is simply a form of protein.
对于那些学过生物的的同学来说，你们大概已经想到了我母亲疗法后的科学道理：高温能使蛋白质失活，而蜘蛛的毒液是蛋白质的一种。
It’s cool how that folk remedy actually incorporates basic biochemistry, isn’t it?
农村的土法子中实际上蕴含着基础生物化学，多酷啊，是不是？
But I am a PhD student in biochemistry at Harvard, I now know that better, less painful and less risky treatments existed.
但是，作为一个哈佛大学生物化学的博士生，现在我知道有更好的，减少痛苦和小风险治疗方法存在。
So I can’t help but ask myself, why I didn’t receive one at the time?
所以我不停的问自己，为什么当时我没有得到这样的治疗？
Fifteen years have passed since that incident.
距离那次意外已经过去了十五年。
I am happy to report that my hand is fine.
我很庆幸的说我的手还好。
But this question lingers, and I continue to be troubled by the unequal distribution of scientific knowledge throughout the world.
但是这个问题依然存在，而我仍旧为科学知识普及依旧不平等的世界而困扰。
We have learned to edit the human genome and unlock many secrets of how cancer progresses.
我们已经学习了如何改变人类基因并解开了很多关于癌症如何产生发展的秘密。
We can manipulate neuronal activity literally with the switch of a light.
我们甚至可以用光束来控制神经元的活动。
Each year brings more advances in biomedical research-exciting, transformative accomplishments.
每一年生物医药学的研究都会给我们带来更多的进步，有变革的成就。
Yet, despite the knowledge we have amassed, we haven’t been so successful in deploying it to where it’s needed most.
然而，尽管我们已经收集了如此多的知识，但却没有将他们分配到最需要的地方。
According to the World Bank, twelve percent of the world’s population lives on less than $2 a day.
据世界银行所说，世界上还有百分之十二的人口人均生活低于两美元一天。
Malnutrition kills more than 3 million children annually.
每年因营养不良而丧命的儿童达到三百万。
Three hundred million people are afflicted by malaria globally.
全球仍有三亿人因疟疾而饱受折磨。
All over the world, we constantly see these problems of poverty, illness, and lack of resources impeding the flow of scientific information.
纵观整个世界，我们依然能看到贫穷、疾病、缺少资源阻止了科学信息的传递。
Life saving knowledge we take for granted in the modern world is often unavailable in these under developed regions.
在现代社会我们习以为常的生命急救常识在那些欠发达地区依旧遥不可及。
And in far too many places, people are still essentially trying to cure a spider bite with fire.
并且在太多的地方，人们还在使用火疗来医治蜘蛛咬伤。
While studying at Harvard, I saw how scientific knowledge can help others in simple, yet profound ways.
在哈佛学习的日子里，我看见了科学知识能以怎样简单并强大的方式帮助他人。
The bird flu pandemic in the 2000s looked to my village like a spell cast by demons.
本世纪初时，对于我的村子来说禽流感如同恶魔的诅咒。
Our folk medicine didn’t even have half-measures to offer.
乡村的土药对此没有丝毫办法。
What’s more, farmers didn’t know the difference between common cold and flu; they didn’t understand that the flu was much more lethal than the common cold.
更有甚者，农民们不知道流感与普通感冒的区别是什么，他们不懂流感比之于普通感冒更为致命。
Most people were also unaware that the virus could transmit across different species.
大部分人同样也不知道这种病毒能够在跨物种间传播。
So when I realized that simple hygiene practices like separating different animal species could contain the spread of the disease, and that I could help make this knowledge available to my village, that was my first “Aha” moment as a budding scientist.
当我意识到像将不同动物隔离开这样简单的卫生措施就能减缓疾病传播，并且我能够将这个知识传递到我的村庄时，那是我第一次感受到成为科学家的使命感。
But it was more than that: it was also a vital inflection point in my own ethical development, my own self-understanding as a member of the global community.
但对我来说并不止于这个，它同样对我个人的道德发展起到了至关重要的作用：我树立起了自己是全球化社会中一份子的认知。
Harvard dares us to dream big, to aspire to change the world.
哈佛鼓励我们心怀远望，并且勇于去立志改变世界。
Here on this Commencement Day, we are probably thinking of grand destinations and big adventures that await us.
在毕业典礼之上，我们很可能会想到远大前程与巨大挑战就在眼前。
As for me, I am also thinking of the farmers in my village.
于我来说，我同样想起来家乡的村民。
My experiencehere reminds me how important it is for researchers to communicate our knowledge to those who need it.
我的经历让我牢记，研究者们将其知识传播给需要它们的人是多么的重要。
Because by using the science we already have, we could probably bring my village and thousands like it into the world you and I take for granted every day.
因为通过使用我们已经拥有的科学技术，我们能带领成数以千计像我家乡一样的村子来到你我所认为理所应当的现代社会。
And that’s an impact every one of us can make!
而这件事是在座的每一个人都能做到的！
But the question is, will we make the effort or not?
但问题是，我们是否愿意这样做？
More than ever before,our society emphasizes science and innovation.
当今我们的社会比以往任何时候都强调科学与创新。
But an equally important emphasis should be on distributing the knowledge we have to where it’s needed.
但同等重要的是如何才能将已有的知识普及到需要它们的地方去。
Changing the world doesn’t mean that everyone has to find the next big thing.
改变世界并不代表着每个人都要去寻找下一个重大发现。
It can be as simple as becoming better communicators, and finding more creative ways to pass on the knowledge we have to people like my mom and the farmers in their local community.
它可以很简单，比如成为一个更好的传播者，去发掘更具有创造性的方式将我们有的知识传播给向我妈妈一样的当地农民。
Our society also needs to recognize that the equal distribution of knowledge is a pivotal step of human development, and work to bring this into reality.
我们的社会同样需要认识到平等的知识传播是人类发展的中枢环节并应为它的实现而不懈奋斗。
And if we do that, then perhaps a teenager in rural China who is bitten by a spider will not have to burn his hand, but will know to seek a doctor instead.
如果我们这样做了，那么大概在中国偏远乡村的孩子被蜘蛛咬后可以去寻找医生，而不是用火来灼烧手。
