“Stay hungry. Stay foolish.”是苹果公司前总裁Steve Jobs生前欣赏的一句名言。

有译者翻译为中文是：“求知若渴，虚心若愚。”

不过有好多种用英文对原话的解释和理解，列在下面。相比之下，上面的中文翻译就是小巫见大巫了。岂止如此，简直就是驴唇不对马嘴。

这说明，由于美中文化的巨大差异，有时候要完全准确的翻译，几乎是不可能的，有些意思，只可意会、不可言传。

比如，美国独立宣言中的“人人生而平等”，原文是这么说的：

“that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights……”最恰当的翻译是“造物主创造了平等的个人，并赋予他们若干不可剥夺的权利。”

意思首先是：人是由造物主创造的，造物主赋予人若干不可剥夺的权利………

像中国这种土匪流氓国家，认为人是猴儿变的，根本就不承认什么神的存在，岂止是神，天地都不在话下。再扯什么人权、自由、平等，那不是放屁吗？

川普总统上任以来，“美国优先“的原则，也包括了这方面的内涵。国务卿蒂勒森说：美国的外交政策应当服务于本国的国家安全和经济繁荣，而不应当将美国的外交政策同自身“价值观”捆绑。尽管美国将坚持围绕“自由、人类尊严和如何对待他人”等方面的“价值观”，但在制定外交政策时，不能过度期待其他国家一定会遵循这些价值观，也不能过度追求一定要让其他国家的处事方式与美国保持一致。

下面是“Stay hungry. Stay foolish.”的相关英文解释：

1、It was Steve Jobs's ending comment in the Stanford Commencement in 2005，and Jobs mentioned:

What does this phrase mean? I understand this may also seem philosophical, but when studying English, often we not only study the words, but we often study what the meaning is, and what a phrase or writing may mean or imply.

Never be satisfied, and always push yourself.

2、Do (or be willing to keep trying) the things people say cannot be done.

3、Stay hungry can be interpreted as "stay eager", and stay foolish can be interpreted as "be ready to try new things" or "be ready to step out of your comfort zone".

4、This phrase purposefully uses negative adjectives in a positive way. This is what gives this phrase its "punch." Taking a word, phrase, or situation and contrasting how it is normally used versus how it is used in a given case is a common rhetorical device.

Hungry here means "wanting something more", as in "He was hungry for a raise." Jobs is putting forward that being dissatisfied with what you have and wanting more is a good thing.

Likewise, someone who is foolish acts without thinking and takes unnecessary risks. Jobs is saying that you SHOULD take stupid risks and throw caution to the wind.

Taken together, Jobs is simply saying: "You only live once, so make it count and go after what you want no matter what."

5、If you're "hungry" and "foolish," you are willing to learn. So Jobs was telling people always be willing to learn new things.

Stay hungry = Always be curious to learn more and achieve more.

Stay foolish = Dare to make unconventional decision as Steve Jobs did when he quit his college to persue his quest, as Gandhi did when he adopted satyagraha against oppression, as Buffet did early in his career when he made some well calculated investments in low priced high potential companies. In this case some people might call you foolish but Providence will prove that it pays to stay foolish. Here I humbly beg to differ from an interpretation of stay foolish (that we should be ready to learn more) because interpretation of stay hungry naturally includes this thought.

The opposite of being foolish is being smart. And being smart usually means you know everything. Being foolish is kind of "not knowing everything" and still willing to learn.