从失败中吸取经验获得成功的演讲稿.docx

?The Spider’s Bite　　When I was in middle school, a poisonous spider bit my right hand. I ran to my mom for help—but instead of taking me to a doctor, my mom set my hand onfire.　　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. Heat quickly penetrated the cotton and began to roast my hand. The searing pain made me want to scream, but the chopstick prevented it. All I could do was watch my handburn - one minute, then two minutes –until mom put out the fire.　　You see, the part of China I grew up in was a rural village, and at thattime pre-industrial. When I was born, my village had no cars, no telephones, noelectricity, not even running water. And we certainly didn’t have access tomodern medical resources. There was no doctor my mother could bring me to seeabout my spider bite.　　For those who study biology, you may have grasped the science behind my mom’scure: heat deactivates proteins, and a spider’s venom is simply a form ofprotein. It’s cool how that folk remedy actually incorporates basicbiochemistry, isn’t it? But I am a PhD student in biochemistry at Harvard, Inow know that better, less painful and less risky treatments existed. So I can’thelp but ask myself, why I didn’t receive one at the time?　　Fifteen years have passed since that incident. I am happy to report thatmy hand is fine. But this question lingers, and I continue to be troubled bythe unequal distribution of scientific knowledge throughout the world. We havelearned to edit the human genome and unlock many secrets of how cancerprogresses. We can manipulate neuronal activity literally with the switch of alight. Each year brings more advances in biomedical research-exciting,transformative accomplishments. Yet, despite the knowledge we have amassed, wehaven’t been so successful in deploying it to where it’s needed most. Accordingto the World Bank, twelve percent of the world’s population lives on less than$2 a day. Mal