Learn English with Bill Gates Speech at Harvard Commencement Address English Subtitle

Thank You president Bach former

president rudenstine incoming president

Faust members of the Harvard Corporation

and the Board of Overseers members of

the faculty parents and especially the

graduates

I’ve been waiting more than 30 years to

say this dad I always told you I’d come

back and get my degree

I want to thank Harvard for this honor

I’ll be changing my job next year and it

will be nice to finally have a college

degree on my resume I applaud the

graduates for taking a much more direct

route to your degrees from our my part

I’m just happy that the Crimson called

me Harvard’s most successful dropout I

guess that makes me valedictorian of my

own special class I did the best of

everyone who failed but I also want to

be recognized as the guy who got Steve

Ballmer to drop out of Business School

I’m a bad influence that’s why I was

invited to speak at your graduation if

I’d spoken at your orientation fewer of

you might be here today

[Applause]

Harvard was a phenomenal experience for

me

academic life was fascinating I used to

sit in on lots of classes that I hadn’t

even signed up for and dorm life was

terrific I lived up at Radcliffe in

career house there were always a lot of

people in my dorm room late at night

discussing things because everyone knew

that I didn’t worry about getting up in

the morning that’s how I came to be the

leader of the antisocial group we clung

to each other as a way of validating our

rejection of all those social people

Radcliffe was a great place to live

there were more women up there and most

of the guys were math science types the

combination offered me the best odds if

you know what I mean

that’s where I learned the sad lesson

that improving your odds doesn’t

guarantee success one of my biggest

memories of Harvard came in January 1975

when I made a call from courier house to

a company in Albuquerque New Mexico that

had begun making the world’s first

personal computer I offered to sell them

software I worried they would realize I

was just a student in a dorm and hang up

on me instead they said we’re not quite

ready come see us in a month

which was a good thing because we hadn’t

written the software yet

from that moment I worked day and night

on the extra-credit project that marked

the end of my college education and the

beginning of a remarkable journey with

Microsoft what I remember above all

about Harvard was being in the midst of

so much energy and intelligence

it could be exhilarating intimidating

sometimes even discouraging but always

challenging it was an amazing privilege

and though I left early I was

transformed by my years at Harvard the

friendships I made and the ideas I

worked on but taking a serious look back

I do have one big regret I left Harvard

with no real awareness of the awful

inequities in the world the appalling

disparities of

health and wealth and opportunity that

condemned millions of people the lives

of despair I learned a lot here at

Harvard about new ideas in economics and

politics

I got great exposure to the advances

being made in the sciences but

humanity’s greatest advances are not in

its discoveries but in how those

discoveries are applied to reduce

inequity

whether through democracy strong public

education quality healthcare abroad

Economic Opportunity

reducing inequity is the highest human

achievement

I left campus knowing little about the

millions of young people cheated out of

educational opportunities here in this

country and I knew nothing about the

millions of people living in unspeakable

poverty and disease in developing

countries it took me decades to find out

you graduates came to Harvard at a

different time you know more about the

world’s inequities than the classes that

came before in your years here I’ve hope

you’ve had a chance to think about how

in this age of accelerating technology

we can finally take on these inequities

and we can solve them imagine just for

the sake of discussion that you had a

few hours a week and a few dollars a

month to donate to a cause and you

wanted to spend that time and money

where would have the greatest impact in

saving and improving lives where would

you spend it for Melinda Nye the

challenge is the same how can we do the

most good for the greatest number with

the resources we have during our

discussions on this question Melinda and

I read an article about the millions of

children were dying every year in poor

countries from diseases that we had long

ago made harmless in this country

measles malaria pneumonia hepatitis P

yellow fever one disease that I had

never heard of rotavirus was killing

half a million children each year none

of them in the United States we were

shocked we had assumed that if millions

of children were dying and they could be

saved the world would make it a priority

to discover and deliver

the medicines to save them but it did

not for under a dollar

there were interventions that could save

lives - just weren’t being delivered if

you believe that every life has equal

value it’s revolting to learn that some

lives are seen as worth saving and

others are not we said to ourselves this

can’t be true

but if it is true it deserves to be the

priority of our giving so we began to

begin our work

in the same way anyone here would begin

it we asked how could the world let

these children buy the answer is simple

and harsh the market did not reward

saving the lives of these children and

governments did not subsidize it so the

children died because their mothers and

fathers had no power in the market and

no voice in the system

but you and I have both we can make

market forces work better for the poor

if we can develop a more creative

capitalism if we can stretch the reach

of market forces so that more people can

make a profit our least earn a living

serving people who are suffering from

the great inequities we can also press

governments around the world to spend

taxpayer money in ways that better

reflect the values of the people who pay

the taxes if we can find approaches that

meet the needs of the poor in ways that

generate profits for business and votes

for politicians we will have found a

sustainable way to reduce inequity in

the world now this task is open-ended

it can never be finished but a conscious

effort to answer this challenge can

change the world I am optimistic that

we can do this but I talked to skeptics

who claim there is no hope

they say inequity has been with us since

the beginning and will be with us until

the end because people just don’t care I

completely disagree I believe we have

more caring than we know what to do with

all of us here in this yard at one time

or another have seen human tragedies

that broke our heart and yet we did

nothing not because we didn’t care but

because we didn’t know what to do if we

had known how to help we would have

acted the bereted change is not too

little caring it is too much complexity

to turn caring into action we need to

see a problem see a solution and see the

impact but complexity blocks all three

steps even with the advent of the

Internet and 24-hour news it is still a

complex Enterprise to get people to

truly see the problems when an airplane

crashes officials immediately call a

press conference

they promise to investigate determine

the cause and prevent similar crashes in

the futures but if the officials were

brutally honest they would say of all

the people in the world who died today

from preventable causes 1/2 of 1% were

on this plane we’re determined to do

everything possible to solve the problem

that took the lives of the 1/2 of 1% the

problem is not just the plane crash but

the millions of preventable deaths we

don’t read much about these deaths the

media covers what’s new and millions of

people dying is nothing new so it stays

in the background where it’s easy to

ignore

but even when we do see it or read about

it it’s difficult to keep our eye eyes

on the problem it’s difficult to look at

suffering if the situation is so complex

that we don’t know how to help and so we

look away if we can really see a problem

which is the first step we come to the

second step

cutting through the complexity to find a

solution finding solutions is essential

if we want to make the most of our

caring if we have clear improvement

answers anytime an organization or

individual asks how can I help then we

can get action and we can make sure that

none of the caring in the world is

wasted

but complexity makes it hard to mark a

path of action for everyone who cares

and makes it hard for their caring to

matter

cutting through complexity to find

solutions runs through four predictable

stages determine a goal find the highest

impact approach deliver the technology

ideal for that approach and in the

meantime use the best application of

technology you already have whether it’s

something sophisticated like a new drug

are something simple like the bed net

the AIDS epidemic offers an example the

broad goal of course is to end the

disease the highest leverage approach is

prevention the ideal technology would be

a vaccine that gives life long immunity

with a single dose so governments drug

companies and foundations are funding

vaccine research but their work is

likely to take more than a decade so in

the meantime we have to work with what

we have in hand and the best prevention

approach we have now is getting people

to avoid risky behavior pursuing that

goal starts the poor step cycle

again this is the pattern the crucial

thing is to never stop thinking and

working and never do what we did with

malaria and tuberculosis in the 20th

century which is to surrender to

complexity and quit the final step after

seeing the problem and finding an

approach is to measure the impact of the

work and to share that success or

failure so that others can learn from

the efforts you have to have the

statistics of course you have to be able

to show for example that a program is

vaccinating million more millions more

children you have to be able to show for

example a decline in the number of

children dying from the diseases this is

essential not just to improve the

program but also to help draw more

investment from business and government

but if you want to inspire people to

participate you have to show more than

numbers you have to convey the human

impact of the work so people can feel

what saving alike means to the families

affected I remember going to the World

Economic Forum some years back and

sitting on a global health panel that

was discussing ways to save millions of

lives millions think of the thrill if

you could save just one person’s life

then multiply that by millions yet this

was the most boring panel I’ve ever been

on ever so boring even I couldn’t stand

it

what made that experience especially

striking was that I had just come from

an event where we were introducing

version 13 of some piece of software and

we had people jumping and shouting with

excitement I loved getting people

excited about software but why can’t we

generate even more excitement for saving

lives you can’t get people excited

unless you can help them see and feel

the impact

the way to do that is another complex

question still I’m optimistic yes and

equity has been with us forever but the

new tools we have to cut through

complexity have not been with us forever

they are new they can help us make the

most of our caring and that’s why the

future can be different from the past

the defining and ongoing innovations of

this age biotechnology the personal

computer and the Internet give us a

chance we’ve never had before to end

extreme poverty and end death from

preventable disease 60 years ago

George Marshall came to this

commencement and he announced a plan to

assist the nations of post-war Europe he

said I quote I think one difficulty is

that the problem is one of such enormous

complexity that the very mass of facts

presented to the public by press and

radio make it exceedingly difficult for

the man in the street to reach a clear

appraisement of the situation it is

virtually impossible at this distance to

harass but all the real significance of

the situation thirty years after

Marshall made his address which was 30

years ago as my class graduated without

me

technology was emerging that would make

the world smaller more open more visible

less distant the emergence of low-cost

personal computers gave rise to a

powerful network that has transformed

opportunities for learning and

communicating the magical thing about

this network is not just that it

collapses distance

and makes everyone your neighbor it also

dramatically increases the number of

brilliant minds we can bring in to work

together on the same problem and it

scales up the rate of potential

innovation to a staggering degree at the

same time for every person who has

access to this technology five people

don’t that means many creative minds are

left out of this discussion smart people

with practical intelligence and relevant

experience who don’t have the technology

to hone their talents or contribute

their ideas to the world we need as many

people as possible to gain access to

this technology because these advances

are triggering a revolution in human in

what human beings can do for one another

they are making it possible not just for

national governments but for

universities corporations small

organizations and even individuals to

see problems see approaches and measure

the impact of their efforts to address

the hunger poverty and desperation

George Marshall spoke of 60 years ago

members of the Harvard family here in

the yard is one of the great collections

of intellectual talent in the world for

what purpose

there is no question that the faculty

the Alumni the students and the

benefactors of Harvard have used their

power to improve the lives of people

here and around the world but can we do

more can Harvard dedicate its intellect

to improving the lives of people we’ll

never even hear its name let me make a

request of the deans and the professors

the intellectual leaders here at Harvard

as you hire new faculty award tenure

review curriculum and determine degree

requirements please ask yourself should

our best minds be more dedicated to

solving our biggest problems should

Harvard encourage its faculty to take on

the world’s worst inequities

should Harvard students know about the

depth of global poverty the prevalence

of world hunger the scarcity of clean

water the girls kept out of school the

children who died from diseases we can

cure should the world’s most privileged

learn about the lives of the world’s

least privileged these are not

rhetorical questions

you will answer with your policies my

mother who is filled with pride the day

I was admitted here never stopped

pressing me to do more for others a few

days before I was married she hosted a

bridal event at which she read aloud a

letter about marriage that she had

written to Melinda my mother was very

ill with cancer at the time but she saw

one more opportunity to deliver her

message and at the close of the letter

she said from those to whom much is

given much is expected

when you consider that those of us here

in this yard have been given in talent

privilege and opportunity there is

almost no limit to what the world has a

right to expect from us in line with the

promise of this age

I want to exhort each of the graduates

here to take on an issue a complex

problem a deep inequity and become a

specialist on it if you make it the

focus of your career that would be

phenomenal but you don’t have to do that

to make an impact for a few hours every

week you can use the growing power of

the Internet to get informed find others

with the same interests see the barriers

and find ways to cut through them

don’t let complexity stop you be akkad

activists take on big inequities I feel

sure it will be one of the great

experiences of your lives you graduates

are coming of age in an amazing time as

you leave Harvard you have technology

that members of my class never had you

have awareness of global inequity which

we did not have and with that awareness

you likely also have an informed

conscience that will torment you if you

abandon these people whose lives you

could change with modest effort you have

more than we had you must start sooner

and carry on longer and I hope you will

come back here to Harvard 30 years from

now and reflect on what you’ve done with

your talent and your energy I hope you

will judge yourselves not on your

professional accomplishments alone but

also on how well you have addressed the

world’s deepest inequities on how well

you treated people a world away who have

nothing in common with you but their

humanity

good luck

[Applause]