English Speech Bill Gates I do have one big regret with Big Subtitles
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 an 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 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 it would have the
greatest impact in saving and improving
lives where would you spend it for
Melinda and I 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 B 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 talk to skeptics
who claimed there is no hope they say
inequity is 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% or 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
or 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 lifelong 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 a life 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
grasp at 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 up 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 inequity
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 we have
nothing in common with you but their
humanity
good luck
you
you