The most important concept in life: Compound interest. 人生中最重要的概念：复利
Einstein once said: 爱因斯坦曾经说过：
“Compound interest is the eighth wonder of the world. He who understands it, earns it … he who doesn’t … pays it.”
“复利是世界第八大奇迹。谁理解它，谁就赚到它……不这样做的人……付钱。
For the vast majority of people, compound interest is just a concept in high school math textbooks. After doing a few application problems, it seems to have no relevance to their lives. In fact, for many people, even the concept of interest is not fully understood.
对于绝大多数人来说，复利只是高中数学教科书中的一个概念。在做了一些应用问题之后，似乎与他们的生活无关。事实上，对于很多人来说，连兴趣这个概念都没有完全理解。
Interest is undoubtedly a very simple concept in today’s world, but precisely because of this, it serves as a great example to illustrate that even the simplest concepts took humans many years (even thousands of years) to fully understand through repeated forgetting, education, and revision.
在当今世界，兴趣无疑是一个非常简单的概念，但正因为如此，它是一个很好的例子，说明即使是最简单的概念，人类也需要很多年（甚至数千年）才能通过反复的遗忘、教育和修改来完全理解。
The general acceptance of the existence of interest (or “simple interest calculation”) is actually a phenomenon of the last hundred years. In the Chinese impression, the evil act of “compound interest” was something that only despicable individuals like Huang Shiren would do for personal gain. In the eyes of Westerners, characters like Shylock from Shakespeare’s plays symbolize evil.
普遍接受利息的存在（或“单利计算”）实际上是最近一百年的现象。在中国人的印象中，“复利”的恶行是只有像黄实仁这样卑鄙的人才会为谋取私利而做的事情。在西方人眼中，莎士比亚戏剧中的夏洛克等角色象征着邪恶。
Imagine if, thousands of years ago, someone borrowed a few seeds from another person in the village in spring, and when returning the seeds in the autumn, naturally would give back some extra grain. Or if someone borrowed a hen, and after the hen hatched and produced chicks, it would be natural to return extra chicks. Borrowing money, however, people are not willing to pay interest. The fundamental reason is that throughout history, people have always had a tendency to think they are comprehensive even without full understanding. They often fail to grasp that even a slightly more complex layer becomes completely incomprehensible, let alone anything more complex after that.
想象一下，如果几千年前，有人在春天向村里另一个人借了几粒种子，秋天归还种子时，自然会多还一些粮食。或者，如果有人借了一只母鸡，在母鸡孵化并产下小鸡后，自然会归还额外的小鸡。然而，借钱，人们不愿意支付利息。根本原因在于，纵观历史，人们总是倾向于认为它们是全面的，即使没有完全理解。他们往往没有意识到，即使是稍微复杂的一层也会变得完全无法理解，更不用说在那之后更复杂的东西了。
In general, even today, the majority of people do not have a proper understanding of interest. Throughout history, there seems to be only one group of people who, from ancient times to the present, have a thorough understanding of interest: the Jews—Einstein was a Jew. Unfortunately, the Jews have been persecuted for a long time, and one of the fundamental reasons they have been subjected to ethnic cleansing several times is because of their involvement in usury, arousing the hatred of the ignorant. And among these ignorant people, there are almost all kinds including scientists, philosophers, religious leaders, politicians, criminals, and common people.
总的来说，即使在今天，大多数人对兴趣也没有正确的理解。纵观历史，从古至今，似乎只有一类人对利益有透彻的了解：犹太人——爱因斯坦就是犹太人。不幸的是，犹太人长期受到迫害，他们多次遭受种族清洗的根本原因之一就是因为他们参与高利贷，引起了无知者的仇恨。而在这些无知的人中，几乎有各种各样的人，包括科学家、哲学家、宗教领袖、政治家、罪犯和普通人。
Every religion on Earth still strictly prohibits the charging of interest. Even the Jews, who are proficient in interest theory, do not necessarily believe that charging interest is “legitimate.” This is the reason why their doctrine stipulates no interest can be charged to fellow Jews, but interest can be charged to outsiders. This has led outsiders to uniformly regard the intelligent Jews as a “conscienceless money-making race.” People call those who engage in usury “Loan Sharks,” which, in Cantonese, translates to “greedy individuals.” Listening to the concept of compound interest sounds even more sinister.
地球上的每一个宗教仍然严格禁止收取利息。即使是精通利息理论的犹太人，也不一定相信收取利息是“合法的”。这就是为什么他们的教义规定不能向犹太人同胞收取利息，但可以向外人收取利息的原因。这导致外人一致认为聪明的犹太人是“没有良心的赚钱种族”。人们称那些从事高利贷的人为“高利贷者”，在粤语中，意思是“贪婪的人”。听复利的概念听起来更加险恶。
Even today, although the foundation of modern finance recognizes and accepts the existence of interest and applies the principle of compound interest everywhere, most banks around the world pay only simple interest when attracting deposits, not compound interest. This is their deliberate attempt to take advantage. Taking unfair advantage is not ethical. Therefore, they spare no effort to educate the public that usury is bad, which is partially true. Consequently, the general public has consciously or unconsciously equated compound interest with usury. Moreover, all governments are the same in their need to strictly control interest rates to aid the banks, thus it is quite normal for ordinary people to not have a clear understanding of interest. What’s even more unfortunate is that no one actually believes that they do not even understand what interest is.
即使在今天，尽管现代金融的基础承认并接受利息的存在，并在处处应用复利原则，但世界上大多数银行在吸引存款时只支付单利，而不是复利。这是他们蓄意利用的企图。利用不公平的优势是不道德的。因此，他们不遗余力地教育公众高利贷是坏的，这在一定程度上是正确的。因此，公众有意识或无意识地将复利等同于高利贷。而且，各国政府在需要严格控制利率以帮助银行方面都是一样的，因此普通人对利息没有清晰的认识是很正常的。更不幸的是，没有人真正相信他们甚至不明白什么是兴趣。
Yet “compound interest” is a very normal concept. If a deposit can earn compound interest, its growth in the end typically looks like this: [The text concludes with an unfinished sentence]
然而，“复利”是一个非常正常的概念。如果存款可以赚取复利，那么它最终的增长通常如下所示：
Therefore, a loan, if calculated with compound interest, the longer it is overdue, the more likely it is to become forever unpayable. So, from this perspective, not being able to repay a debt can only be attributed to foolishness and incompetence, so it’s no wonder other people blame us — it’s a harsh statement, but the logic behind it is sound. The same goes for having money but not earning more money – that’s the only way to understand it.
因此，如果用复利计算贷款，逾期时间越长，就越有可能永远无法偿还。所以，从这个角度来看，无法偿还债务只能归咎于愚蠢和无能，所以难怪别人责怪我们——这是一个严厉的说法，但背后的逻辑是合理的。有钱但没有赚更多的钱也是如此——这是理解它的唯一方法。
From another perspective, the advantage of inheriting assets (a benefit that most people cannot enjoy) is the possibility of understanding the principle of interest and the magical power of compound interest at an early age. Personally, I have almost never directly received the magical power of compound interest from money, why? Because I simply have no assets to inherit. Not only that, before the age of thirty-five, everything was repeatedly reset…
从另一个角度来看，继承资产的好处（大多数人无法享受的好处）是有可能在很小的时候就理解利息的原理和复利的神奇力量。就我个人而言，我几乎从未直接从金钱中获得过复利的魔力，为什么？因为我根本没有资产可以继承。不仅如此，在三十五岁之前，一切都被反复重置……
However, fortunately, and also fairly, everyone is the same, and the effect of compound interest still exists in intelligence, knowledge, and experience — what an unexpectedly delightful fact! Anything that can be accumulated will eventually generate the effect of compound interest. If there are no inherited assets, then let’s continue to accumulate knowledge, we are really lucky.
然而，幸运的是，公平地说，每个人都是一样的，复利的影响仍然存在于智力、知识和经验中——这是一个多么出乎意料的令人愉快的事实！任何可以累积的东西最终都会产生复利效应。如果没有继承的资产，那么让我们继续积累知识，我们真的很幸运。
We are living in an era where it is particularly easy for knowledge to bring about significant returns, and it is becoming increasingly more accessible, with the potential to generate even greater returns.
我们生活在一个知识特别容易带来巨大回报的时代，而且知识正变得越来越容易获得，并有可能产生更大的回报。
In 2015, there was a very popular article titled “Why are many celebrities like Bill Gates, Musk, Hawking, etc. making people wary of artificial intelligence?” I personally do not agree with the main point of the article, but there was an interesting and correct argument in it:
2015年，有一篇非常火爆的文章，标题是《为什么比尔·盖茨、马斯克、霍金等众多名人都让人们对人工智能持谨慎态度？我个人不同意文章的要点，但其中有一个有趣且正确的论点：
“We are standing at the turning point of human social development…”
“我们正站在人类社会发展的转折点上……”
This is one of the significant reasons why we consider ourselves living in the best time (not the worst time). Human knowledge and experience after long and repeated corrections and accumulations are finally entering a period of rapid development, and we happen to be born in this era (not the Stone Age)…
这是我们认为自己生活在最好的时代（而不是最坏的时代）的重要原因之一。人类的知识和经验经过长期反复的修正和积累，终于进入了快速发展的时期，而我们恰好诞生在这个时代（不是石器时代）……
At the end of 2013, I started working in angel investment – something I had never thought I could do. With the passage of time, I gradually formed my own relatively stubborn views, one of which is:
2013年底，我开始从事天使投资工作，这是我从未想过自己能做到的事情。随着时间的流逝，我逐渐形成了自己比较固执的观点，其中之一就是：
“A business plan that cannot quickly earn a lot of money is garbage.”
“一个不能快速赚很多钱的商业计划书就是垃圾。”
Please note: “quickly” here, if not carefully and comprehensively explained, will definitely cause misunderstandings. Because some people may wonder, Amazon did not start turning a profit until 2014, does that mean Amazon’s business plan before going public was garbage?
请注意：这里的“快”，如果不仔细全面解释，肯定会引起误会。因为有些人可能会想，亚马逊直到2014年才开始盈利，这是否意味着亚马逊上市前的商业计划是垃圾？
Originally posted 2024-04-05 11:24:18.