How AI Is Changing Warfare | Palantir CTO

频道: Invest Like The Best
视频: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EB9V8d3ZYbc
原文语言: en
统计: 共 175 轮 · Patrick 56 · Shyam 117

[0:00] Patrick

My guest today is Shyam Sankar, the CTO of Palantir Technologies. I think you'll find by listening to Shyam that the business itself, their [music] mission and how they built it, and indeed him in his life, are completely fascinating. We talk about his entire worldview, which I find personally the most interesting. This need to re-industrialize the United States after decades of moving so much of our production, and as he would argue therefore our learning of how to innovate and make things, off of our own shores. We talk about the history of heretics, people who have against the odds designed solutions that have driven so much of our success around the world.

今天我的嘉宾是 Shyam Sankar，Palantir Technologies 的 CTO。我想你听完 Shyam 的分享就会发现，这家公司本身——他们的使命、他们如何一步步把它建起来，乃至他这个人和他的人生经历——都极其引人入胜。我们聊了他的整套世界观，这也是我个人觉得最有意思的部分：在美国把大量生产环节迁到海外几十年之后——按他的说法，我们也因此把「如何创新、如何造东西」的学习能力一并送出了国门——美国需要再工业化。我们还聊了「异端者」（heretics）的历史：那些逆着大势设计出解决方案的人，正是他们撑起了美国在全世界取得的诸多成功。

[0:35] Patrick

Please enjoy my conversation with Shyam [music] Sankar. So, Shyam, I think the most fun place for me to begin because it's an it's an area that you're interested in that I'm fascinated by is a history of people in American military lore who you call heretics. You refer to them as heretics, people like Hyman Rickover and Andrew Higgins who designed 90% of the boats that landed at Normandy, John Boyd who invented the OODA Loop, which is one of the great biographies of a of a military figure that I've ever read. Talk to us a little bit about how you would define a heretic um in your use of that term and why you're so interested in that group of people in US history.

请欣赏我和 Shyam Sankar 的对话。Shyam，我觉得最有意思的切入点，是一个你很感兴趣、我也着迷的话题：美国军事传奇里那群被你称为「异端者」（heretics）的人。你用这个词来称呼他们——比如 Hyman Rickover，比如 Andrew Higgins，他设计了诺曼底登陆 90% 的登陆艇，还有发明 OODA 循环的 John Boyd——他的传记是我读过的最出色的军事人物传记之一。跟我们讲讲，你所说的「异端者」到底怎么定义？你为什么对美国历史上这群人这么感兴趣？

[1:19] Shyam

Well, I think they're really founders. You know, they they're founder figures uh and they get obsessed with delivering something that it makes no sense because they're fighting in particular in the military context you're like fighting the bureaucracy, you're going to end your career, you pay extreme prices for it. So, there's almost like a pathological obsession with winning, which I really relate to both personally, but also that's what I see in great founders. I think in the present moment it's really important to like encourage the that the hidden heretics who are in there in the military today to recognize like your heresy matters, and frankly if you look back at history, the only that ever worked, the things that helped us win all the wars, were the things that the heretics actually did. Nothing that went through the machine delivered anything. I think all change comes from these these heretics, and they only later become heroes. If you think about like Billy Mitchell who invented the Air Force, you know, he was court-martialed and died penniless and depressed, and only after his death did we invent the Air Force based on his original heresy. I'm just fascinated with what motivates these folks to keep doing this. And I I guess I have relish a little bit in in their rebellion and the victory that the rebellion brings

我认为他们本质上就是创业者。你看，他们是那种创始人式的人物，痴迷于交付某个东西，而这件事从常理看完全说不通——尤其在军队这个环境里，你等于是在跟官僚体系作战，你会断送自己的职业生涯，要付出极高的代价。所以他们身上有一种近乎病态的求胜执念，这一点我个人非常有共鸣，而且这也正是我在伟大创始人身上看到的特质。我觉得在当下，特别重要的一件事是去鼓励今天军队里那些隐藏的异端者，让他们意识到：你的「异端」是有价值的。坦白说，回看历史，真正管用的东西、帮我们打赢所有战争的东西，全都是异端者干出来的。凡是走「机器」流程出来的，什么都没交付出来。我认为所有变革都源自这些异端者，他们只是在事后才变成英雄。想想发明了空军的 Billy Mitchell——他被送上军事法庭，在贫困和抑郁中死去，直到他死后，我们才基于他当初的「异端邪说」建立了空军。我特别着迷的是：到底是什么在驱动这些人坚持不懈地做下去。而且我承认，我对他们的反叛、以及这种反叛最终所带来的胜利，多少有点儿

[2:31] Shyam

about.

乐在其中。

[2:31] Patrick

If you could have people study any one heretic story to understand this kind of general idea, is it his story? Is it someone else's? Which one would you pick?

如果只能让大家研究一个异端者的故事来理解这个总体思路，你会选谁的？是他的故事，还是别人的？你会挑哪一个？

[2:38] Shyam

I'd probably pick Rickover's. So, Hyman Rickover, born in a shado in Poland, came to the US when he was six, had one of these like near miss moments where in those days when you landed at Ellis Island, you had 10 days for someone to come pick you up. And his his mother gave someone money to go send a telegram to the father who'd already been here, and that guy just pocketed the money. And so, it's like the on the on the 10th day, there was another guy who arrived at Ellis Island who said who like bought them one more day, who knew them. And then he like ran out, got the father, got them So, it's like this near miss where this guy almost didn't even end up here. He would have been sent back to Poland.

我大概会选 Rickover 的故事。Hyman Rickover 出生在波兰的一个犹太小村（shtetl），六岁来到美国。他经历过一次千钧一发的时刻：那个年代你在 Ellis Island 登陆后，只有 10 天时间等人来接你。他母亲把钱交给一个人，托他给已经在美国的父亲发电报，结果那家伙直接把钱私吞了。到了第 10 天，另一个认识他们的人正好抵达 Ellis Island，帮他们争取到了多一天的时间，然后飞奔出去找到了他父亲，把他们接了出来。就是这样一次险之又险的经历——这个人差点就来不了美国，差点就被遣返回波兰了。

[3:13] Shyam

Um but he was he was kind of this feisty character. You know, he I think he was like 5'2, very short. He went to the Naval Academy. He was so unlikable that like in the yearbook in the Naval Academy, they'd like torn out his picture. You know, he's just one of these like difficult people. In World War he drove a coal ship. He was not like some exceptionally high-performing senior you know, senior military officer commanding a destroyer or carrier or anything like that. But after the war, he went to Oak Ridge. And and he observed the the vestiges of the Manhattan Project, and he had this idea like we could build nuclear-powered submarines. And he'd had this experience on diesel-powered submarines, which suck. They're basically surface ships that happen to go underwater for like an hour. This became this thing he was obsessed with. And talk about talk about chutzpah, like Oppenheimer himself thought this idea was going to fail. You know, so you have Oppie telling you you're stupid and this isn't going to work and you're just going to go forward, right? Uh so he started on this project and he he built the first nuclear submarine in 7 years, start to finish.

他是个火气很冲的人。我记得他大概只有一米五七，个子很矮。他上了海军学院，招人厌到什么程度呢——海军学院的年鉴里，他那页照片都被人撕掉了。他就是那种很难相处的人。一战的时候他开的是运煤船，并不是那种指挥驱逐舰或航母的顶尖高级军官。但战后他去了 Oak Ridge，亲眼看到了曼哈顿计划的遗产，然后冒出一个想法：我们可以造核动力潜艇。他之前在柴油潜艇上服役过，那玩意儿糟透了——本质上就是恰好能下潜一小时左右的水面舰艇。于是这成了他魂牵梦绕的执念。要说胆量（chutzpah）有多大——连 Oppenheimer 本人都认为这个想法注定失败。你想想，Oppie 亲口告诉你这很蠢、行不通，你还是照样往前冲，对吧？于是他启动了这个项目，从头到尾只用了 7 年，就造出了第一艘核潜艇。

[4:17] Shyam

The Navy hated him so much that his first office for this project was literally the women's restroom. They're like, "What can we do to humiliate this guy into quitting?" Uh but he just kept going. And if you actually look at his personal memoirs, you can see that the humiliation got to him, but in a way that he could channel it to be like motivating. It wasn't like he was somehow immune to the pain of it all, but he could push through it. And I think recognizing like every major project you do is going to push you in these sorts of ways and like how do you dig deep? How do you grind through the pain?

海军恨他恨到什么地步——这个项目的第一间办公室，居然安排在女厕所。他们的心态就是：「我们能想什么招羞辱这家伙，把他挤兑走？」但他就是一直干下去。如果你去看他的私人回忆录，会发现那些羞辱其实伤到了他，但他能把这种伤害转化成动力。他并不是对这一切的痛苦免疫，而是能硬扛着穿过去。我觉得要认识到：你做的每一个重大项目都会这样逼迫你，关键是你怎么挖掘内心深处的力量？怎么在痛苦中咬牙磨过去？

[4:46] Shyam

Um and he created really unique culture in naval reactors, which is alive today. So I think part of what's really cool is that our nuclear submarine force is one of our last remaining asymmetric advantages against the Chinese and we built it in the '50s. What a legacy for this guy to have built. And then the engineering culture that he created, um you know, he was in this unique role of both being a human who would invent the technology and therefore was qualified to think about how to regulate it. So whereas the the Russian submariners, they would send they would spend roughly 6 months at sea and then 6 months in Sochi recovering so their white blood cells could regenerate because the radiation shielding sucked.

他还在海军反应堆部门（Naval Reactors）缔造了一种独一无二的文化，这种文化延续至今。特别酷的一点是：我们的核潜艇部队是我们对中国仅存的几个不对称优势之一，而它是上世纪 50 年代建起来的。这个人留下的是何等的遗产。再说他打造的工程文化——他处在一个很独特的位置：既是亲手发明这项技术的人，因此也是有资格思考如何监管它的人。对比一下，俄国的潜艇兵大约出海 6 个月，然后要去索契休养 6 个月，等白细胞恢复——因为他们的辐射屏蔽做得太烂了。

[5:26] Shyam

We've had no deaths due to nuclear incidents in our submarine force and he designed it to a standard which is really he's like, "I'm designing this thing so my son could be in it." And it's it's a hundred times safer than what we believe the minimum standard to be. And that that sort of obsession, it's like a you know, it's not a manager's view of the world. It is a founder's view of the world. One of his legacies, like he was an admiral for 30 years. And even as an admiral, he was very difficult. You know, Zumwalt, who was the chief of naval operations for a while, he said, "The Navy has three enemies, the Soviet Union, the Air Force, and Hyman Rickover."

而我们的潜艇部队从未有人死于核事故。他把标准定到什么程度——他说：「我设计这个东西，是要让我儿子也能待在里面。」它比我们认为的最低安全标准还要安全一百倍。这种执念，不是经理人看世界的方式，而是创始人看世界的方式。他的另一个「遗产」是：他当了 30 年将军，即便当上将军也依然极其难搞。当过一段海军作战部长的 Zumwalt 说过：「海军有三个敌人：苏联、空军，还有 Hyman Rickover。」

[6:01] Patrick

Most software companies try to maximize your time on their app to juice engagement. Ramp does the exact opposite. Ramp understands that no one wants to spend hours chasing receipts, reviewing expense reports, and checking for policy violations. So, they built their tools to give that time back using AI to automate 85% of expense reviews with 99% accuracy. And since Ramp saves companies 5%, it's no wonder that Shopify runs on Ramp, Stripe runs on Ramp, and my business does, too. To see what happens when you eliminate the busy work, check out ramp.com/invest. Every investor should know about Rogo because Rogo AI's platform is not just another generic chatbot. Instead, it was designed to support how Wall Street bankers and investors actually work, from sourcing, diligence, and modeling to turning analysis into deliverables.

大多数软件公司都想方设法拉长你耗在他们 App 上的时间，好把参与度做上去。Ramp 恰恰反着来。Ramp 明白没人愿意花几个小时追着要发票、审报销单、查合规违规。所以他们打造的工具就是要把这些时间还给你：用 AI 自动完成 85% 的费用审核，准确率高达 99%。而且 Ramp 能帮公司省下 5% 的开支，难怪 Shopify 在用 Ramp，Stripe 在用 Ramp，我自己的公司也在用。想看看消灭繁琐杂务之后是什么样，去 ramp.com/invest 了解一下。每一位投资人都该知道 Rogo，因为 Rogo AI 的平台不是又一个泛泛的聊天机器人。它是围绕华尔街银行家和投资人的真实工作方式设计的——从项目寻源、尽调、建模，到把分析变成可交付成果。

[6:45] Patrick

For me, three key things differentiate Rogo. First, it connects directly to your systems so it can work with your actual data. Second, it understands your workflows, how work really happens across a deal or an investment. And third, it runs end-to-end and produces real outputs the way the best people do. Auditable spreadsheets, investment memos, diligence materials, and slide decks that match your standards. This all comes from the fact that Rogo is built by finance professionals for finance professionals. And it's already being adopted by some of the most demanding institutions in the world. To learn more, visit rogo.ai/invest.

对我来说，Rogo 有三点关键差异。第一，它直接接入你的系统，能基于你的真实数据工作。第二，它理解你的工作流——一笔交易或一项投资里，工作实际是怎么推进的。第三，它端到端地跑完全程，产出真正的成果，就像最优秀的人做出来的那样：可审计的电子表格、投资备忘录、尽调材料，以及符合你标准的幻灯片。这一切都源于 Rogo 是由金融专业人士为金融专业人士打造的，而且它已经被世界上一些要求最苛刻的机构采用。想了解更多，访问 rogo.ai/invest。

[7:17] Patrick

OpenAI, Cursor, Anthropic, Perplexity, and Vercel all have something in common. They all use WorkOS. And here's why. To achieve enterprise adoption at scale, you have to deliver on core capabilities like SSO, SCIM, RBAC, and audit logs. That's where WorkOS comes in. Instead of spending months building these mission-critical capabilities yourself, you can just use WorkOS APIs to gain all of them on day zero. That's why so many of the top AI teams you hear about already run on WorkOS. WorkOS is the fastest way to become enterprise ready and stay focused on what matters most, your product. Visit workos.com to get started. I remember reading the book about John Boyd who three times he was sort of the best fighter pilot then he helped develop the F-16 and then he came up with like the military strategy concept that was instrumental in in in some of the US wars in the 90s and he was sort of a bastard as well like highly disliked really bad father highly disagreeable but incredibly important in in US military history.

OpenAI、Cursor、Anthropic、Perplexity 和 Vercel 有一个共同点：它们都在用 WorkOS。原因是这样的：要实现规模化的企业级落地，你必须交付 SSO、SCIM、RBAC、审计日志这些核心能力。这正是 WorkOS 的用武之地。与其自己花几个月构建这些关键能力，不如直接调用 WorkOS 的 API，第一天就全部拥有。所以你听说过的很多顶级 AI 团队都已经跑在 WorkOS 上。WorkOS 是让你最快达到企业就绪（enterprise ready）的方式，让你专注于最重要的事——你的产品。访问 workos.com 开始使用。我记得读过写 John Boyd 的那本书：他有三重身份——先是当时最顶尖的战斗机飞行员，然后参与研发了 F-16，之后又提出了那套军事战略概念，在美国 90 年代的几场战争中起了关键作用。而他同时也是个混蛋——极不讨人喜欢，是个非常糟糕的父亲，性格极度不合群，但在美国军事史上又无比重要。

[8:16] Patrick

You don't seem to have that kind of personality like you seem you seem very like by all accounts like very likable within Palantir and outside of Palantir. Say a bit about your own disagreeableness like where does it surface? It seems like this is a field in which you have to have a very clear view of how things should be which we'll talk a lot about in a few minutes and then this sort of like disagreeableness and resilience and persistence to like make it happen. And that seems a little bit at odds with with your personality from what I can tell curious how you how you think about that.

你身上似乎没有那种性格——从各方面的说法看，无论在 Palantir 内部还是外部，你都很招人喜欢。聊聊你自己的「不好相处」吧——它会在哪些地方冒出来？这个领域似乎要求你对「事情应该是什么样」有非常清晰的判断（这个我们几分钟后会深入聊），然后还需要那种不合群、韧性和执拗劲儿去把它实现。这跟我所了解到的你的性格似乎有点矛盾，很好奇你自己怎么看。

[8:45] Shyam

It surfaces in certain ways. You know as as Karp would say I'm not everyone's cup of tea. Where you can very clearly see it is like in the early days of Palantir you would you'd be dealing with the government and it's easy to think about it as a monolith but you have you know you have operators who want to use your software but are not in charge of buying it and you have the IT people or the program who's in charge of building what you would be building. So you're you're kind of a structural threat to them. The advice is to go along and get along like hey those guys are the people paying you. Why don't you just do what they want? The problem is if I did what they want it wouldn't work and so that's where the disagreeableness comes in.

它会在某些特定场合冒出来。就像 Karp 会说的：我不是所有人都喜欢的那杯茶。你能非常清楚看到这一点的地方是 Palantir 的早期：你跟政府打交道，人们容易把政府想成铁板一块，但实际上，想用你软件的一线操作人员，并不掌管采购；而 IT 部门或项目办公室，负责的正是自建你要做的那种东西。所以你对他们来说是一种结构性威胁。别人给你的建议是随大流、搞好关系：嘿，那些人才是给你付钱的，你干嘛不照他们说的做？问题在于，如果我照他们说的做，东西就不管用。这就是我「不好相处」的地方。

[9:20] Shyam

It's being ornery about like no I'm going to deliver the thing that actually works for the operator. I'm going to piss off literally everyone along the way. They are knives out going to try to kill you. You know we had to sue the army to compete at some point and I think in that that vein of being truly committed to is the product excellent. What else could it be doing? You could think of it the whole Udalupa for deployed engineering is that is this continuously solving through back propagation of what should the product be and that's like that's like the motor of of innovation.

那是一种执拗：不行，我就是要交付对一线操作人员真正管用的东西，哪怕一路把所有人都得罪光。他们会亮出刀子想干掉你——你知道吗，我们一度不得不起诉陆军才拿到竞标资格。沿着这个思路，真正的承诺是：产品够不够卓越？它还能做什么？你可以把前线部署工程（deployed engineering）的整个 OODA 循环理解为：通过不断的反向传播（back propagation），持续求解「产品应该长成什么样」——这就是创新的发动机。

[9:49] Patrick

If I think about Palantir story and success and and you're part of that story, your personal worldview seems really important and you having a strongly held worldview seems like a key component of being able to do what you've done over the last, you know, 10 plus years. I would love to hear the the formative experiences that contributed to that worldview. I'm curious just like at a high level what your worldview is and but but I'm maybe even more interested in like how you came to it because you've got a very unique personal backstory.

回看 Palantir 的故事和成功——你也是这个故事的一部分——你的个人世界观似乎至关重要。拥有一套坚定的世界观，似乎是你能在过去十几年里做成这些事的关键。我很想听听塑造这套世界观的那些关键经历。我好奇的是，宏观上你的世界观是什么；但也许我更感兴趣的是你如何形成它的——因为你的个人背景非常独特。

[10:18] Shyam

I think there's no kind of singular event. I think it's like there's a combination of family history, the environment that I grew up in and and so, you know, starting with the family history part, you know, we fled violence in Nigeria where my father we frankly almost died to kind of settle in the US and that happened pretty young in my father's life in his in his like early mid 30s. It's a pretty jarring experience where it kind of gives you a whole new lease on life after that point where you think about you have you have a deep amount of gratitude and perspective on the trials and tribulations that may come ahead.

我觉得没有什么单一的决定性事件，而是家族历史加上我成长环境的共同作用。先说家族历史：我们是从尼日利亚的暴乱中逃出来的，我父亲——说实话我们差点丧命——才辗转在美国安顿下来。这件事发生在我父亲人生相当早的阶段，三十岁出头到三十五六岁的样子。那是一段非常震撼的经历，从那以后你等于获得了重活一次的机会，会对往后可能遇到的种种磨难，抱有深深的感恩和更开阔的视角。

[10:52] Shyam

But it also grounds you in a profound understanding of the counterfactual, like what makes this country so special. Sometimes it can be unmooring not to have those experiences actually because it's easy to take it for granted, it's easy to become cynical. Um but that that's like a a really powerful rooting and pretty because my father didn't have the classic immigrant story where he came here and became successful which I think is is a great thing if it happens to you, but it's also a facile journey. It's easy to appreciate. Dad started businesses that went bankrupt. It was very hard, but having that rooting experience that created a graciousness and perspective in him. He was always so thankful for the opportunity. And so I I took a a away from that over time especially as I grew up and could kind of understand and have awareness of what was happening.

但它同时也让你深刻理解「反事实」——如果没来会怎样——从而真正明白这个国家特殊在哪里。说实话，没有这些经历的人有时反而容易漂浮：容易把一切当作理所当然，容易变得愤世嫉俗。而这段经历是一种非常有力量的扎根。而且我父亲并没有那种经典的移民故事——来了美国然后功成名就。那种故事如果发生在你身上当然很好，但它也是一段太顺滑的旅程，好处显而易见。我爸开过好几家公司，都破产了，日子非常艰难。但正是这种扎根的经历，让他生出一种谦逊感恩的心态和开阔的视角，他始终对得到的机会心怀感激。随着我长大、能够理解和意识到发生了什么，我从中慢慢汲取了很多。

[11:35] Shyam

The second thing I think is really important is growing up in Orlando in the '80s and '90s. It was this profoundly optimistic period. I mean, you could say it was probably pretty optimistic everywhere, but in the shadow of the Space Coast, you were you were kind of bombarded with this idea that technology was going to make the world better, that there was a structural positive-sum view of everything. Um and it just it was so motivating, you know, and people had ambition around these things. Uh and so I think that that really kind of set a frame for me for how I thought about things and how did I want to spend my life and energy.

第二件我觉得非常重要的事，是八九十年代在 Orlando 长大。那是一个极度乐观的年代。你可以说当时哪儿哪儿都挺乐观的，但生活在「太空海岸」（Space Coast）的光环之下，你会被一种观念持续轰炸：技术会让世界变得更好，一切在结构上都是正和博弈。这太让人振奋了，人们围绕这些事怀有雄心。我觉得这为我定下了一个基本框架：我怎么看待事情，以及我想把人生和精力花在哪里。

[12:07] Shyam

I think that's really it. It's it's this commitment to building. Part of what's interesting about the heretics that I'm drawn to is that they're all builders of some sort. The conversion from heresy to heroism is a is a result of an empirical thing they built. You know, like John Boyd was alive to see the success of his innovations for Gulf War I, where the US destroyed the fourth largest army in the world. And that it's it's hard to think about now cuz we think about it as almost a foregone conclusion, but leading up to it, there was a lot of uncertainty. So, that that worldview is kind of centered in an understanding like, "Look, I think the US is the greatest force of good that exists in the world." Um that um as a country, we understand that there's something special about founders.

我想核心就是这个：一种对「建造」的执着。我着迷的这些异端者，有意思的一点在于他们全都是某种意义上的建造者。从「异端」到「英雄」的转变，靠的是他们建造出的、经过实证检验的东西。比如 John Boyd 在世时就亲眼见证了自己的创新在第一次海湾战争中的成功——美国摧毁了世界第四大军队。现在回头看，我们几乎把它当成理所当然的结局，但在开战之前，其实充满了不确定性。所以这套世界观的核心是这样一种认知：我认为美国是这个世界上现存的最伟大的善的力量；而作为一个国家，我们懂得创始人（founders）身上有某种特别的东西。

[12:47] Shyam

There's a reason we call them the founding fathers. You know, if you think about just empirically, Europe has created zero zero companies worth more than a hundred billion euro from scratch in the last 50 years. Almost almost an astonishingly bad track record. We've created all of our trillion-dollar companies from scratch in the last 50 years. The primacy of people and being in a culture and environment that allows that to happen, that doesn't subjugate the human, doesn't like snuff out human flourishing, that allows you to pursue these things. That may not seem trivial, but the heretics are all a version of that. And it's not like Pollyannaish where there's no resistance to these creatives. It's like despite the resistance, you can succeed here, which is really not true, I think basically anywhere else.

我们把他们称作「建国之父」（founding fathers）是有原因的。你想想，光从数据上看，过去 50 年里，欧洲从零开始创造出的市值超过一千亿欧元的公司数量是零——零家。这个成绩差得惊人。而我们所有的万亿美元公司，都是在过去 50 年里从零做起来的。「人是第一位的」，再加上身处一种允许这一切发生的文化和环境——不压制人、不掐灭人的蓬勃生长、允许你去追求这些东西——这听起来可能不算什么，但那些「异端」（heretic）其实都是这件事的某种化身。而且这不是那种天真乐观、创造者不会遇到任何阻力的童话。恰恰是：尽管有阻力，你在这里依然可以成功。而这一点，我认为在其他几乎任何地方基本都不成立。

[13:29] Patrick

Hm. What was your dad like, personally?

嗯。你父亲私下里是个什么样的人？

[13:32] Shyam

The kind of pieces of his personality that I said always stuck with me, it's like every spare moment this man had, even though he was so busy and he was just grinding, he would be on the phone trying to help someone. I had this weird memory of someone who almost my dad had this sort of engineering autism that I think a lot of us have, but he met someone who had totally disfigured teeth. And he just had the actually profound kindness to tell him like, you should get a cosmetic surgery. And that guy is so profoundly thankful that no one else had the balls to say that, right? Like, this actually changed his job prospects. It changed his life.

他性格里那些一直留在我心里的东西是这样的：这个人明明那么忙、一直在拼命干活，但只要有一点空闲，他就会在电话上帮别人的忙。我有一段很奇怪的记忆——我父亲身上有一种我们很多人都有的、近乎工程师式的直来直去。他遇到一个牙齿严重畸形的人，然后他带着一种其实非常深刻的善意，直接告诉对方：你应该去做个整形手术。而那个人后来感激得不得了，因为除了他没人有胆量说这句话，对吧？这件事实实在在改变了那个人的求职前景，改变了他的人生。

[14:06] Shyam

And so he's he's just one of these people you clearly can see the positive sumness in him, like, hey, I'm just going to keep paying it forward.

所以他就是那种人——你能清楚地看到他身上那种「正和博弈」的气质，就是：嘿，我就是要一直把善意传递下去。

[14:13] Patrick

If you had to identify the component parts that make America the thing that you think is the greatest country in the world, what are the key components? Obviously, maybe democracy is one, but I don't want to take for granted like the things, given your life experience and your unique perspective, that you think most add up to this being a place worth your life's work to, you know, extend their interests, protect their interests, etc.

如果要你拆解出让美国成为你心目中世界上最伟大国家的那些组成部分，关键的成分有哪些？显然民主可能是其中之一，但我不想想当然。基于你的人生经历和你独特的视角，你认为最主要是哪些东西加在一起，让这个地方值得你用毕生的事业去延伸它的利益、保护它的利益？

[14:37] Shyam

A belief in exceptionalism and greatness. No army that lost its morale ever won the war. And so believing in yourself, believing that greatness is possible, is a precondition to being able to express it and realize it. And a lot of cultures don't have that. The other thing, which I know sounds really simple, but is is a complete plasticity of thought. You know, culturally America is a place where people do change their minds. Like, hey, this isn't working, let's do something different. Or I observe that thing working, even though it goes against the orthodoxy of everything I've learned, we're moving, we're pivoting. In Europe, people are still arguing about that happened 300 years ago. And some of these cultures are so rooted in the past that they can't update their priors. And so a culture that's capable of learning, you could call it plasticity, first derivative of learning, um but how can you make progress without that?

对卓越和伟大（exceptionalism and greatness）的信念。没有哪支丧失了士气的军队打赢过战争。所以相信自己、相信伟大是可能的，是你能够表达并实现伟大的前提条件。很多文化没有这个东西。另一件事，我知道听起来特别简单，但那就是思维上彻底的可塑性。你知道，从文化上讲，美国是一个人们真的会改变想法的地方。就是：嘿，这个不行，那我们换个做法。或者：我观察到那个东西有效，虽然它违背了我学过的一切正统，那我们就转向、就掉头。而在欧洲，人们还在为 300 年前发生的事争论不休。有些文化深深扎根于过去，以至于无法更新自己的先验判断。所以一个有学习能力的文化——你可以叫它可塑性，学习的一阶导数——没有这个，你怎么可能进步？

[15:23] Patrick

What what does greatness mean to you in general and also I'm curious how you think about it personally. Like if you are personally in pursuit of greatness, what has that meant? What does that require?

「伟大」对你来说总体上意味着什么？我也很好奇你个人是怎么看的。比如说，如果你个人也在追求伟大，那对你意味着什么？它需要什么？

[15:34] Shyam

An aspiration that's substantially bigger than oneself. The focus of American greatness is on American prosperity and American worker. Like how can we go do things that are actually enriching our civilization, our people, raising their own aspirations, inspiring them to go on and do great things. There's this unstable equilibrium in civilization that pulls you towards nihilism. Uh, and greatness is the antidote to that. It's the it's the countervailing force to saying like no, like actually it's worth investing in our institutions. It's worth going through this painful journey because what we're going to get on the other end is something better, something that we all aspire for, something that that you will be proud to pass down to your children.

一个远远大于自身的抱负。美国的伟大，焦点在于美国的繁荣和美国的劳动者。就是：我们怎么去做那些真正让我们的文明、我们的人民变得更富足的事，抬高他们自己的抱负，激励他们继续去成就伟大的事情。文明里存在一种不稳定的均衡，会把你往虚无主义那边拽。而伟大就是它的解药，是那股反向的力量，是站出来说：不，投资我们的制度是值得的，走过这段痛苦的旅程是值得的，因为我们在另一头得到的会是更好的东西，是我们所有人共同向往的东西，是你会自豪地传给你孩子的东西。

[16:16] Patrick

Is there an example of greatness that you've witnessed in someone else first hand? That most stands out?

你有没有在别人身上亲眼见证过伟大？印象最深的例子是什么？

[16:22] Shyam

Well, the obvious one to me is um is is Alex Karp. You know, I think his ability to really manage and unlock talent is something like I've never seen before. And those are some of the most profound lessons I've really learned about Palantir, you know, from the very early days he modeled our entire company as an artist colony. And um, it's it's like we have more in common with like a Hollywood talent agency than we do with kind of a a typical software company in terms of our approach to to looking at humans. And this like first principled approach to the individual and how do you grow? This deep resistance to a cargo cult like process in every manner or fashion that kind of corrodes all the things that actually create value. And I think that's important cuz if you drive that to the extreme, you actually get something that looks more like the Soviet Union. And on the other end of this, how do you maximize the potential of the people in front of you.

对我来说，最明显的当然是 Alex Karp。我认为他管理并释放人才的能力，是我从来没见过的。这也是我在 Palantir 学到的一些最深刻的东西。从很早期开始，他就把我们整个公司按「艺术家聚居地」（artist colony）来构建。在看待「人」这件事上，我们其实跟好莱坞的艺人经纪公司更像，而不是一家典型的软件公司。这种对个体的第一性原理式的态度——你要怎么成长？还有那种对「货物崇拜」式流程的深度抵触——那种流程会以各种形式腐蚀掉真正创造价值的东西。我觉得这很重要，因为如果你把流程推到极致，你得到的其实更像苏联。而在另一端，你要做的是：怎么最大化你眼前这些人的潜力。

[17:17] Shyam

And you're advocating for their growth and their ability. Um which also involves a lot of um you have to have a structural personality where you're not threatened by other people's successes. You actually relish in the other people's successes and that's the parallel between Alex and my father.

你在为他们的成长和能力奔走。这也要求你在人格结构上做到一点：不被别人的成功威胁到，反而由衷为别人的成功高兴。这正是 Alex 和我父亲之间的相似之处。

[17:32] Patrick

If I was running an organization where my key goal was to unlock talent in in the way you just described, how does he how do you and he do that? Like what how what's the practice of unlocking talent?

如果我在经营一家组织，核心目标就是像你刚才描述的那样去释放人才，他是怎么做的？你和他是怎么做的？释放人才的具体实践是什么？

[17:42] Shyam

Maybe we could just start with the precept of like how how we think about the talent to begin with. So really talented people are highly uneven. Uh you know, they're very good at some things. They're okay at another set of things and they're really bad at some other set of things. And and usually the trick is where are they in their own journey of understanding what those things are. And particularly for high high-achieving people when they're young they misattribute what their superpower is. They think there's this thing they do that requires a fair amount of effort and therefore they get a dopamine hit when they succeed. It's probably something they're not even bad at.

也许我们可以先从一个前提讲起：我们一开始是怎么看待人才的。真正有才华的人是高度不均衡的。他们有些事情做得非常好，有些事情做得还行，还有些事情做得非常糟。而诀窍通常在于：他们自己在认清这些事情的旅程中走到了哪一步。尤其是那些年轻的高成就者，他们常常会认错自己的超能力。他们以为自己的超能力是某件需要花不少力气去做的事——因为费了劲，成功时就有多巴胺的奖赏。但那件事很可能只是他们不算差而已。

[18:18] Shyam

They're just okay at. Superpowers are effortless and therefore they're in some sense it's almost like not even rewarding to exercise your superpower. My analogy for this is it Superman could fly, he could see through walls, but that wasn't some sort of arduous thing for him to do. It's just something he could do. And that's usually something you learn comparatively. Like you're like, oh this thing that's like lizard brain effortless almost thoughtless for me other people who are really smart can't seem to do or I do just way better. And embracing that is the first step. And then helping them understand like, hey all of your contributions to the world are going to come from your superpower. Like everything else is basically a waste of time. So how do you figure out how to get into that configuration? So there's a there's some releasing of ego around that as well as understanding that okay, like this is what I need to focus on.

只是做得还行。真正的超能力是毫不费力的，所以从某种意义上说，施展超能力甚至几乎没有奖赏感。我对此的类比是：Superman 能飞、能透视墙壁，但这些对他来说并不是什么艰苦的事，就是他天生能做的事。而这通常是通过比较才发现的。你会想：哦，这件对我来说像爬虫脑一样毫不费力、几乎不用过脑子的事，那些非常聪明的人却好像做不来，或者我就是做得好太多。拥抱这一点是第一步。然后帮他们理解：嘿，你对这个世界的所有贡献，都将来自你的超能力，其他一切基本上都是浪费时间。那你要怎么想办法进入那种配置？这里面既需要放下一些自我（ego），也需要认清：好，这才是我该聚焦的地方。

[19:06] Shyam

The other part of this is kryptonite. You know, there are some set of weaknesses you have that aren't just like, hey I'm not like I'm kind of average or I'm maybe a standard D below average." It's like you're like six D's below average here. It's not like something you can work on. The only strategy for Superman around kryptonite was to avoid it. Yeah. And so, how can you Can you be okay with that? Like as the as the artist, what is your process of accepting that and how do we help you accept it? How do we How How do we help you understand that actually at the point of acceptance you become more valuable?

另一部分是「氪石」（kryptonite）。你身上有某一类弱点，不是那种「我一般般」或者「我低于平均一个标准差」的程度，而是你在这方面低于平均六个标准差。这不是能靠努力补上的东西。Superman 面对氪石的唯一策略就是躲开它。对吧。那么，你能接受这一点吗？作为一个「艺术家」，你接受这件事的过程是怎样的？我们怎么帮你接受它？我们怎么帮你理解：其实在你接受的那一刻，你反而变得更有价值了？

[19:35] Shyam

And um and we're going to be able to unleash you further to be able to do things.

然后我们就能进一步释放你，让你去做更多事情。

[19:39] Shyam

And then you have to create an environment that supports them through that because the discovery of kryptonite usually involves you being exposed to it. You're going to make some sort of really bad mistake that probably will have real consequences. Hopefully you learn from that mistake. Um and you know, it may take more than one time to get there. But you don't want to be You don't want to create a culture which is like, "You this up. I got to fire you." Right? It's like, "Oh, I'm so I'm so glad you learned that this is not what you do for the company."

接下来你还得营造一个能支撑他们走过这一切的环境。因为发现自己的氪石，通常意味着你先被它伤到——你会犯某个非常严重的错误，很可能带来实际的后果。但愿你能从错误里学到东西，而且可能要摔不止一次才行。但你不能去营造那种文化：「你把这事搞砸了，我得开了你。」对吧？而应该是：「哦，我真高兴你学到了——这类事不该由你来干。」

[20:03] Shyam

Yeah, [laughter] exactly. And And that I think was I I remember doing something that I really screwed up once that had consequences for the company and I sheepishly went and did Alex and was just completely honest and I didn't I didn't realize at the time there was no grand strategy behind this other than my commitment to just always being honest. He was very appreciative. He was also in pain as he internalized what this was going to mean. But you know, he valued the fact that I wouldn't try to hide it. And I took away from that how important that environment was going to be and how do I How do I scale that through the organization?

对（笑），正是这样。我记得有一次我把一件事彻底搞砸了，给公司带来了后果。我灰头土脸地去找 Alex，完全坦白了。当时我并没有意识到，这背后没有什么宏大策略，只是出于我要始终诚实的信条。他非常感激，同时在消化这件事的后果时也很痛苦。但他很看重我没有试图隐瞒这一点。我从中体会到：这样的环境将会多么重要，以及我要怎么把它扩展到整个组织。

[20:37] Patrick

What do you think your superpower is?

你觉得你自己的超能力是什么？

[20:39] Shyam

I think there's actually kind of a narrow sliver. If you thought about it in the Palantir context, the intersection of forward deployed engineering and product. There's There's an There's a There's like an interface there. It's like 1 in on both sides of that interface, like owning that almost as a dictator, that's my superpower.

我觉得其实是一个相当窄的切面。如果放在 Palantir 的语境里，就是前沿部署工程（forward deployed engineering）和产品的交汇处。那里存在一个接口，接口两侧各深入一英寸——几乎像个独裁者一样把那个接口整个握在手里，那就是我的超能力。

[20:57] Patrick

I'm going to come back to forward deployed engineering, but I want to ask one or two more questions about the creation of an environment for the discovery of superpower and kryptonite and like so doing doing one's best work and unlocking the talent. I heard a story [snorts] once which maybe I wasn't supposed to hear. So I won't I won't say what the exact story was or who the person was at Palantir, but this person joined Palantir and was very quickly given an extraordinarily difficult project uh around which this person had no relevant experience and was given relatively limited resources to solve a problem which was truly global in scale. Meaning the impact of if this person didn't solve the problem would have been bad. And they described it as the most formative and and important professional and most stressful professional experience that they had had. And on the [snorts] one hand, I loved hearing this story cuz wow, how you can learn so much when there's high stakes and lots of autonomy. But it also struck me as quite scary that someone with this person's experience was given this uh this high-stakes opportunity {slash} responsibility.

我等会儿还会回到前沿部署工程这个话题，但我想再问一两个关于「营造环境」的问题——那个让人发现自己的超能力和氪石、做出最好的工作、释放才华的环境。我曾经听到过一个故事，也许本来不该让我听到，所以我不会说具体是什么故事、也不会说那个人是 Palantir 的谁。这个人加入 Palantir 后，很快就被交付了一个极其困难的项目，而他在这方面毫无相关经验，拿到的资源也相当有限，却要去解决一个真正全球规模的问题——意思是，如果这个人解决不了，后果会很糟糕。而他形容那是他职业生涯中最有塑造力、最重要、也是压力最大的一段经历。一方面，我很喜欢这个故事，因为哇，在高风险加高自主权的情况下，人能学到多少东西啊。但另一方面也让我觉得挺吓人的：一个只有这种资历的人，竟然被交付了如此高风险的机会——或者说责任。

[22:00] Patrick

And I'm sure that happens like all the time in Palantir. So some of it seems like letting like kind of going straight into the deep end is a key part of this. In such a high-stakes business with militaries and governments and people's lives and things, how how do you balance how much leash to give someone like that?

我相信这种事在 Palantir 里肯定天天都在发生。所以听起来，直接把人扔进深水区是这套打法的关键一环。但在军队、政府这种事关人命、风险极高的业务里，你怎么拿捏该给这样的人放多长的缰绳？

[22:19] Shyam

Let me start with um an analogy. How did Bruce Banner become the Incredible Hulk? It wasn't like progressive overload. It's not like he lifted a little bit more weight every week, right? It was a near-fatal dose of gamma rays. 50% chance he died, 50% chance he turns into a big green monster. And there's a there's absolutely an element where we're taking people and just irradiating them. Prospectively, you're not sure if they're going to come out the other end, but you have some belief that they have the raw talent and potential. And then you want to create an environment that has enough transparency and flow of information and exhaust that if you see that this thing is really going off the rails with without them having to seek you out, you're able to kind of push in and help them. And a lot of environments don't have that by default, actually.

我先打个比方。Bruce Banner 是怎么变成绿巨人 Hulk 的？可不是靠渐进式超负荷训练，不是每周多举一点重量，对吧？是一次几乎致命剂量的伽马射线照射。50% 的概率他直接死掉，50% 的概率他变成一个绿色大怪物。我们做的事里确实有这么一层：把人抓过来直接「辐照」。事前你并不确定他们能不能挺过来，但你有某种信念，相信他们有那个天赋和潜力。然后你要营造一种环境，有足够的透明度、信息流动和「排气口」，这样一旦你看到事情真的要脱轨了，不用等他们主动来找你，你就能主动介入去帮他们。而实际上，很多环境默认是不具备这一点的。

[23:03] Shyam

Like you would have to like manage them. You have them do reports or check-ins or whatever. You got to create an environment where it's okay to ask for help. The reason this model is really valuable is that I think the alternative model, you judge by the counterfactual, the alternative model doesn't actually work. So this sort of structured career ladder with progressions, it's perfectly designed to make you feel comfortable that you are growing. Like it gives you some belief that there's a linear path to follow and you'll learn these things. But actually it's all fake. Um on the other hand, so if you're willing to just suspend disbelief, throw yourself off the deep end, how do you get, you know, you you're the maximal rate of learning will be coincident with your maximum ability to tolerate pain.

在那些环境里你就得去「管理」他们，让他们写汇报、做定期 check-in 之类的。你要创造的是一个开口求助不丢人的环境。这个模式之所以特别有价值，是因为我认为换个角度看——用反事实来评判——另一种模式其实根本不管用。那种结构化的职业阶梯、一级一级的晋升路径，它的设计目的就是让你「感觉」自己在成长，让你相信有一条线性路径可以照着走、这些东西你都会学到。但其实那全是假的。反过来说，如果你愿意暂时放下怀疑，纵身跳进深水区，那么你的最大学习速率，将恰好等于你忍受痛苦的最大能力。

[23:43] Shyam

Uh so now you're in over your head, you're working on a problem you don't even know. This is the environment that you're going to learn at the fastest possible rate. You're only limited by your motivation and ability to endure through the discomfort of getting there. Uh then you will find that if you look back retrospectively, you're like, "Holy I grew in all these ways. I learned all these things." None of which you could have predicted specifically ex ante. And then if you just are willing to do that serially, just keep jumping off the deep end, go after problems you're frankly not qualified to go after, but you you know, there is some belief you have the raw potential to do, like you turn into a superhero. I think that's actually why Palantir is the Founder's Factory.

此刻你已经力不从心，在解一个你甚至看不懂的问题——这恰恰是你能以最快速度学习的环境。唯一限制你的，是你的动力，以及你熬过那段不适、坚持到彼岸的能力。之后你回头看就会发现：「天哪，我在这么多方面都成长了，学会了这么多东西」——而这些具体收获，没有一样是你事前能预测到的。然后如果你愿意一次又一次这么干，不停地往深水区跳，去追那些坦白说你根本不够格去碰的问题——但你相信自己有那个潜力做成——你就会变成超级英雄。我觉得这才是 Palantir 被称为「创始人工厂」的真正原因。

[24:23] Patrick

Did you have your own gamma ray moment? Like was there an an original moment like that for you where you discovered your own potential?

你自己有过那样的「伽马射线时刻」吗？有没有一个属于你的原点时刻，让你发现了自己的潜力？

[24:31] Shyam

The article talks about the the deployment at the Co-Op. I think that was that was a seminal one where it was it was I was leading the deployment. It was all on me and it was never obvious until basically the last second whether it was going to work or not. And it it it allowed me to learn a lot of the lessons along the way, which is really where I internalized that like oh, success looks like a lot of pain. And that that instinct to figure out how to reduce the pain, like how do I do this the next time with less pain is exactly the wrong instinct.

那篇文章里提到了在 Co-Op 的那次部署。我觉得那是奠基性的一役：整个部署由我来带，全压在我一个人身上，而且几乎到最后一秒都不知道到底能不能成。一路上它让我学到了很多东西，也正是在那时我真正内化了一个道理：成功的样子就是伴随着大量痛苦。而那种想着「怎么减少痛苦、下次怎么少受点罪」的本能，恰恰是完全错误的本能。

[24:57] Patrick

If you're giving a commencement speech to a group of people that that hear heard this conversation, how would you urge people to seek that out? Like if someone is pre-gamma exposure and they're interested in that sort of test for themselves, how can people expose themselves to to that test?

如果你要给一群听过这场对话的人做毕业演讲，你会怎么劝他们主动去寻找这种考验？比如某个人还处在「伽马射线照射前」的状态，又对这种自我测试感兴趣，人们该怎么把自己暴露在那种考验之下？

[25:15] Shyam

I think this is the conspiracy of of the people around you who give you that chance. I don't know why Kevin Hart's hired me as some, you know, Stanford grad student coming to talk to him, but the fact that he took the bet and just threw me out there. Like that was the first time I got to jump off the deep end in many ways. And I think so I I really think that how can you find it? You're you're assessing the people who are hiring you as much as they're assessing you. And it's like, is this an environment that I think is going to bet on me or is this an environment that wants me to be a veal cow? You know, and are they going to be able to tolerate my eccentricities and and um or they're going to try to squash that?

我觉得这靠的是你身边那些愿意给你机会的人的「共谋」。我到现在也不知道 Kevin Hart 为什么会雇我——一个跑去跟他聊的 Stanford 研究生——但他就是下了那个注，直接把我扔了出去。从很多意义上说，那是我第一次真正跳进深水区。所以我真的认为，怎么找到这种机会？面试的时候，你在评估雇你的人，就像他们在评估你一样。你要问的是：这个环境会押注在我身上吗？还是这个环境只想把我养成一头「小牛肉牛」？他们能容忍我的怪癖吗，还是会想方设法把它掐灭？

[25:55] Patrick

How do you know someone's worth betting on? Like the other side of that equation. New unproven talent. How do you know?

那你怎么判断一个人值得押注？也就是这个等式的另一边——面对全新的、未经证明的人才，你怎么看得出来？

[26:01] Shyam

Yeah.

嗯。

[26:01] Shyam

At some point it becomes like lizard brain. You get enough reps in doing it, but I think early on I think the early indicators would be like first derivative, proof of some sort of sui generis, like did they create anything from zero to one that you know, and then expression of agency and initiative. Here's the simplest way I'd say it. If I give this person an inch, can they turn it into a mile? And the worst sort of bet to make is I gave this person a mile and somehow they turned it into an inch.

到某个阶段这就变成一种「蜥蜴脑」式的直觉了——做的次数够多自然就有感觉。但我觉得早期的先行指标大概是这些：看一阶导数；看有没有某种「独一无二」的证明，比如他们有没有从零到一创造过什么东西；再看主动性和自驱力的表现。用最简单的话说就是：如果我给这个人一寸，他能不能把它变成一里？而最糟糕的押注是：我给了这个人一里，他却不知怎么把它缩成了一寸。

[26:27] Patrick

It's an incredibly powerful idea and it seems like the culture Palantir, I mean obviously there's tons of founders that have come out of this that have like mega agency. If you think about Palantir's future for the next 10 years, now 20 years in or 19 years in, what do you hope changes most in the next 10? Like obviously it's now a huge company, it's one of the bigger, you know, bigger companies by market cap in the country and in the world, uh doing lots of really interesting work with lots of interesting customers, but generally speaking like what what are your hopes for it over the next 5 to 10 years?

这是个极其有力的想法，而且看起来 Palantir 的文化——显然从这里走出了大量极具主动性的创始人。如果展望 Palantir 未来 10 年，现在公司已经走过 20 年、或者说 19 年了，你最希望接下来 10 年里改变的是什么？显然它现在已经是家巨头，按市值算是美国乃至全球最大的公司之一，跟很多有意思的客户做着很多有意思的事。但笼统地说，你对它未来 5 到 10 年的期望是什么？

[26:56] Shyam

I think culturally, cuz like all value creation is downstream of the culture. It's like continuing to be an environment where a new person can come in and just have huge responsibility, be in charge of people who've been here 10 years or not. It's like that that the that the org structure I call it a quantum org structure. I don't think a flat org structure is optimal. I think that that doesn't actually work. I think what you want is an org structure that can crystallize is the right structure to solve the problem as it exists today and is able to reform as the problem manipulates tomorrow. And you can kind of see that that the pathology of big companies as they go through some sort of big reorg every 5 years. But even if you just steel man it, probably most of them are wrong even at inception, but if you just steel man and say hey, they just reorg. This is the right org structure for this company today. Every day the entropy is against them and every day is slightly more wrong than it was before. And if if you're so ossified and committed to your structure that you have to wait until it's totally broken before you reorganize it again, that's a fundamental weakness. So, that plasticity in how your your commitment to working backwards from the problems,

我想说的是文化层面，因为所有价值创造都是文化的下游产物。就是要继续保持这样一种环境：新人一进来就能扛起巨大的责任，可以领导在这里干了 10 年的老人。我把这种组织结构叫做「量子组织结构」。我不认为扁平化组织是最优解，那其实行不通。你真正想要的，是一种能「结晶」成解决今天问题的正确形态、又能在明天问题变化时重新塑形的组织结构。你可以看到大公司的病灶就在这里：每 5 年来一次大重组。就算用最善意的解读——姑且不说其中大多数可能在设计之初就是错的——就算你善意地说：好，他们重组了，这就是这家公司今天的正确组织结构。可熵每天都在跟他们作对，结构每天都比前一天更错一点。如果你僵化到死守自己的结构，非要等它彻底崩坏才肯再重组一次，那就是根本性的弱点。所以，这种可塑性，这种从问题出发倒推组织形态的坚持——

[27:56] Shyam

that's that I hope that's that is how we generate value and that has to be consistent. And I think if we can protect that and then engender that, you know, promote that, promulgate that culture in the future generations, like we're going to keep winning.

我希望——那正是我们创造价值的方式，而且必须一以贯之。我认为只要我们能守住它，然后在未来一代代人身上培育它、倡导它、传播这种文化，我们就会一直赢下去。

[28:09] Patrick

What critique of Palantir do you take the most seriously?

对 Palantir 的各种批评里，你最当回事的是哪一条？

[28:13] Shyam

So, when when you have a structure like this, you don't get to spend nearly as much time with people as you'd want. And so, the rate of inradiation is very uh heterogeneous. There's some sort of like bimodal distribution for how long do people stay at Palantir. Like the probability that you'll stay for like a decade plus if you've stayed 3 years is incredibly high. But, you know, roughly around the 3-year mark, everyone faces this crucible where they look around and they say like this place is so up and crazy

在这样一种结构下，你能花在每个人身上的时间远远少于你想要的。所以「辐照」的速率非常不均匀。人们在 Palantir 待多久，呈现出某种双峰分布：如果你已经待满 3 年，那你待上十年以上的概率极高。但大概在 3 年这个节点上，每个人都会遭遇一场「熔炉考验」——他们环顾四周，说：这地方也太他妈疯狂了——

[28:43]

[snorts]

（嗤笑）

[28:44] Shyam

and and they have to understand like oh, but that's the feature of it." And then they'll stay.

然后他们必须想明白：「哦，但这正是它的特性（feature）所在。」想明白了，他们就会留下来。

[28:49] Patrick

Sign up for it or not, right?

要么签下去，要么走人，对吧？

[28:50] Shyam

Or they'll say this is the bug of it and I got to get out of here and like this is this is not, you know, it's not going to work. Um and the the critique I take most seriously because I think with a little bit of help a lot more people can make that hump. And that's the future of the business. It's to those people.

要么他们会说：这是它的 bug，我得赶紧离开这里，这样下去行不通。而我最当回事的那条批评就在这儿——因为我认为只要稍加帮助，就能有多得多的人迈过这道坎。而那正是这家公司的未来，未来就系在这些人身上。

[29:07] Patrick

We kind of have you to blame for how many freaking pitches we have to take that involve some forward deployed something or other in a company these days. You were the one that really pioneered the success of this model at Palantir. Like everyone is saying it now that every company has to have forward deployed engineers or forward deployed so-and-sos to be successful. Obviously, I think that's not true for every company. It's true in in Palantir's case for sure. Can you tell us the story of what this term means, where it came from, and and why it's powerful?

说起来，如今我们要听的创业路演里，动不动就冒出个「forward deployed 什么什么」的岗位，这笔账多少得算在你头上。是你在 Palantir 真正开创并证明了这个模式的成功。现在人人都在说，每家公司都得有 forward deployed engineer 或者 forward deployed 某某某才能成功。显然我认为并不是每家公司都适用，但在 Palantir 的案例里千真万确。能给我们讲讲这个词是什么意思、从哪儿来的、以及它为什么这么有威力吗？

[29:35] Shyam

We could start by maybe thinking about my critique of the conventional software industrial complex, which is that you know, you're sitting let's just say in Palo Alto and you're building this piece of software and your essential feedback loop on is this software valuable is can I sell it? And if someone's willing to pay for it, it must be valuable. That's an okay feedback loop. There's a stronger feedback loop, which is is this software valuable? Did it deliver the outcome? The only way you can assess that is actually in the field with the end user, on the factory floor, in the foxhole. So, in our case, it wasn't going to be enough as I you know, I thought you have this weird division between the IT buyer and the operator. The validation is going to come from the operator.

我们可以先从我对传统软件工业复合体的批评说起。就是说，假设你坐在 Palo Alto，在开发一款软件，你判断「这个软件有没有价值」的核心反馈回路是：我能不能把它卖出去？只要有人愿意付钱，那它一定有价值。这算是一个还行的反馈回路。但还有一个更强的反馈回路：这个软件到底有没有价值？它有没有真正交付成果？而要评估这一点，唯一的办法就是到一线去，和最终用户在一起——在工厂车间里，在散兵坑里。所以对我们来说，光靠前者是不够的。我当时就觉得，IT 采购方和实际操作者之间存在一种很怪的割裂，而真正的验证必须来自操作者。

[30:18] Shyam

So, the the idea was really almost like build software through back propagation. Hey, how do you go to the person who has the problem? You're showing up with your best thesis of what you've built in the metaphorical Palo Alto. But then you are not just sending a sales engineer out there whose job is to try to like ring up the sale. You're sending someone out there who is obsessed with whether it's going to generate an impact in the world or not and is willing to continuously solve backward, and this tech lead will have to understand the full stack. How would we take the specific and learn how to generalize it over time in terms of the product? Uh one way of thinking about this is there really are two types of engineers. There are people who know how to build the right thing, and there are people who know how to build it the right way.

所以这个想法本质上有点像「通过反向传播来做软件」。你怎么走到真正有问题的那个人面前？你带着你在「隐喻意义上的 Palo Alto」里做出来的最佳假设去现场。但你派出去的不是一个只想着把单子签下来的销售工程师，而是一个执着于「这东西到底能不能在真实世界里产生影响」的人，愿意持续地从结果倒推解题。这个技术负责人必须理解整个技术栈。我们怎么从具体的个案出发，逐步学会在产品层面把它泛化？有一种理解方式是：工程师其实分两种。一种人懂得怎么做对的东西，另一种人懂得怎么把东西做对。

[31:02] Shyam

And uh their kind of dopamine hits comes out of different things, right? Like the people who know how to build the right thing, they're more like MacGyver. You know, like their high in life is like I solved the problem. In their minds, solving the right problem is 80% of the work. On the other end, you have engineers who are more like they're like they're like artists in the traditional sense. Like, don't you see how beautiful the thing I built is? And that's what the architectural elegance, the scalability of it, that's what gives them the high. Never mind it doesn't solve a problem anyone cares about. Don't you you know, it's art on its own. It should be appreciated. And I think about this like vector math. So, the forward deployed engineers skew towards this hacker mentality.

这两种人的多巴胺来源完全不同。懂得做对的东西的人，更像 MacGyver（百战天龙）那种类型，他们人生的高光时刻就是「我把问题解决了」。在他们心里，解决对的问题就是 80% 的工作。另一头呢，是那种传统意义上更像艺术家的工程师：「你难道看不出我做的这个东西有多美吗？」架构的优雅、系统的可扩展性，才是让他们兴奋的东西。至于它解决的问题根本没人在乎——那不重要，它本身就是艺术，理应被欣赏。我把这个想成向量数学：前线部署工程师（forward deployed engineers）偏向黑客心态。

[31:43] Shyam

The product engineers skew towards this artist mentality. And you're trying you have an unstable equilibrium where you're trying to align these vectors in a way that you're going to go up upwind. If either side dominates, you don't really have a business. And that's why that that seam between them, you actually kind of need a dictator-like figure to manage and decide. And many of the outcomes, like particularly I think this model is super valuable when you think about your customers existing in some sort of power law in terms of how useful the next marginal thing they're going to be asking for is in terms of the overall development of the product. So, cuz if it's a Gaussian, you should just like survey all your customers and average it out and figure out what to build. That's like a traditional product development process.

产品工程师则偏向艺术家心态。你要做的，是在一个不稳定的均衡里，把这两个向量对齐，让合力朝着逆风向上的方向走。任何一方占了绝对主导，你就没有真正的生意可做。这也是为什么在两者的接缝处，你其实需要一个类似独裁者的角色来管理和拍板。这个模式在什么时候特别有价值呢？当你的客户在「下一个边际需求对产品整体演进有多大用处」这件事上呈幂律分布的时候。因为如果它是高斯分布，你直接把所有客户调研一遍、取个平均值，就知道该做什么了——那就是传统的产品开发流程。

[32:23] Shyam

If on the other hand, you kind of think, you know, some percentage of my customers are living in the future. Yes, only they or only a handful of people have this problem today, but I can assess that this is actually a really valuable thing to solve that no one else has solved. We should solve it now and effectively have a monopoly on the capability to do that. We'll be 5 years ahead of everyone else if we lean into this problem. You can only surface that in this sort of forward deployed engineering way. The other thing about forward deployed engineers that's worth saying in the Tealian sense is is the importance of secrets. You know, Peter talks about the importance of secrets. If you're going to do something really impactful, there has to be something true about the world that you believe that other people disagree with you on. Warp Speed is born out of one of those secrets. For the better part of 15 years,

但反过来，如果你认为「我有一部分客户是活在未来的」——没错，今天只有他们、只有一小撮人有这个问题，但我能判断出这是一个非常值得解决、而且没有任何人解决过的问题。我们现在就该去解决它，从而实际上垄断这项能力。如果我们全力压上这个问题，我们会领先所有人五年。这种机会，你只有通过前线部署工程这种方式才能挖出来。关于前线部署工程师，还有一点值得用 Thiel 式的语言说一下：秘密的重要性。Peter 常讲秘密有多重要——如果你要做真正有影响力的事，你必须相信一个关于世界的真相，而其他人在这一点上不同意你。Warp Speed 就诞生于其中一个秘密。在过去差不多 15 年里，

[33:04] Shyam

our software's been used to make things in the world. The one thing you could not tell anyone before COVID is that their manufacturing software doesn't work. Like, people would point at their ERP system and be like, "Look how great it is. I spent $5 billion, $10 billion doing it." But, as a forward deployed engineer, when I would go to the final assembly line on the factory floor, everyone's using Excel. So, if you're thing is like there there's a contradiction here that no one is somehow forced to reconcile with, which is really what they're saying is the software is so ill-fit for what I'm trying to do, I hit the eject button, and pull the data out to Excel, and I'm like hand-rolling my own solution. That should be an obvious sign that something's not working.

我们的软件一直被用来在真实世界里制造东西。而在 COVID 之前，有一件事你没法告诉任何人：他们的制造软件根本不好用。人们会指着自己的 ERP 系统说：「你看它多棒，我花了 50 亿、100 亿美元搞的。」但作为前线部署工程师，当我走到工厂车间的总装线上，发现所有人都在用 Excel。这里有一个没人被迫去正视的矛盾——他们实际上在说的是：这套软件跟我要做的事严重不匹配，所以我按下弹射按钮，把数据导出到 Excel，自己手搓一套解决方案。这本该是「有东西不对劲」的明显信号。

[33:42] Patrick

What are the limitations of it in the sense of like if you have X, Y, or Z, you shouldn't try this model, or you need this to try this model? One one thought would be the product needs to be expensive cuz it sounds like an expensive process to deploy people on site, you know, highly trained, expensive people, and so on. So, you need to be selling a very expensive product. But, if you were giving advice about use or don't use this concept of forward deployed engineering in your software business, how would you frame it up to other entrepreneurs?

这个模式的局限在哪？比如说，如果你有 X、Y 或 Z 的情况，就不该尝试这个模式；或者你必须具备什么条件才能用它？我的一个想法是：产品必须卖得贵，因为把人派驻到客户现场听起来就是个昂贵的过程——高度训练有素、身价不菲的人等等，所以你得卖一个非常贵的产品。如果让你给其他创业者提建议——什么时候该用、什么时候不该在你的软件生意里用「前线部署工程」这个概念——你会怎么框定？

[34:08] Shyam

I would say this, you have to believe that you're going to be able to capture meaningful value for the problems you're solving. So, your the problems you're solving are really big, and therefore imply there's a lot of value behind them. And if you can solve them in in a deep way, you'll be able to capture that. A lot of the problems we're solving, like to get at that, you're not going to get paid a lot up front. You're actually going to invest a huge amount into the customer to go do that, but you would do that because you believe that actually in the end we'll be able to capture the value, a portion of the value we're creating. Our economics will be downstream of our customers' economics.

我会这么说：你必须相信，你能从你所解决的问题中捕获到可观的价值。也就是说，你解决的问题真的很大，因此背后蕴含着大量价值；而如果你能深入地解决它们，你就能把那份价值拿到手。我们解决的很多问题，一开始你是拿不到多少钱的。你实际上要先在客户身上投入巨大的成本去做这件事，但你之所以愿意，是因为你相信最终我们能捕获价值——我们所创造价值的一部分。我们的经济回报，是客户经济回报的下游。

[34:39] Shyam

The other part is that your ambition extends beyond a linear box. You know, like we always struggled when we came into the commercial world where you had like the Gartners of the world and they have like, "Well, you know, this is this sort of box like this is my enterprise architecture. I've broken up in all these boxes. What box do you fit in?" The answer for us is like, "Well, we don't fit in any box. We fit in all the boxes." It's It's some sort of heterodox thing. You're solving for all the problems in the seams. Like you're basically solving for the fact that that architecture diagram was made by some mid-level product marketing manager.

另一部分是，你的野心要超出一个线性的「格子」。我们刚进入商业市场时一直很挣扎，因为有 Gartner 这类机构，他们会说：「你看，这是我的企业架构，我把它拆成了这一个个格子。你属于哪个格子？」我们的答案是：「呃，我们不属于任何一个格子，我们属于所有格子。」这是一种异端的东西。你解决的是所有接缝处的问题。你本质上是在解决这样一个事实：那张架构图是某个中层产品营销经理画出来的。

[35:13] Shyam

It's never been used or validated in Anchor. It's never actually solved a problem in the real world, but the cargo cult of the IT buyer just keeps believing they should buy it. I think if you fit into that, doing forward deploying engineering would be crazy. Why would you do that? You know, but if you're like us and you don't fit into it, you need some way of like scraping and clawing to deliver enough value that the institution has to confront, but even though it's heterodox, even though it's heresy to my enterprise architecture, it works.

它从来没有在真实场景中被使用或验证过，从来没有真正解决过现实世界里的任何问题，但 IT 采购方的「货物崇拜」让他们一直相信自己就该买这些东西。我觉得，如果你能装进那个格子，那去搞前线部署工程就是疯了——你图什么呢？但如果你像我们一样装不进去，你就需要某种「连滚带爬也要交付价值」的方式，交付到让整个机构不得不正视的程度：尽管它是异端，尽管它对我的企业架构来说是「异教邪说」，但它就是管用。

[35:41] Patrick

It probably took until I read Jeremy's profile of you and Palantir that I really understood how Gotham and Foundry and and the sort of product in the business worked. It's interesting how Palantir has this sort of is somewhat inaccessible from the outside unless you read a fairly detailed description of what is literally going on in the product. And I think the early years of Palantir were especially exploratory trying to figure all this out, you know, with with with all your efforts with Alex and the team. Could you just like explain what Palantir is? It's like such a basic stupid question, but again, until I read like a detailed account, I actually probably couldn't have done so.

大概直到我读了 Jeremy 写你和 Palantir 的那篇特稿，我才真正搞明白 Gotham、Foundry 以及这套产品和生意到底是怎么运转的。很有意思的是，从外部看 Palantir 多少有点难以理解，除非你读到一份相当详细的、描述产品里到底在发生什么的材料。而且我觉得 Palantir 的早期尤其是在探索——你和 Alex 还有整个团队在摸索着把这一切想清楚。你能不能就直接解释一下，Palantir 到底是什么？这问题听起来又基础又蠢，但说真的，在读到那份详细记述之前，我自己大概都答不上来。

[36:15] Patrick

And so, I'd really be curious how you like to frame it or explain it.

所以我很好奇你自己会怎么框定它、怎么解释它。

[36:19] Shyam

This is actually like the hardest question in the world for me. Um we have built an enterprise operating system where our core thesis is what makes this stuff really valuable is decisions, not data. And it's kind of goes to John Boyd's OODA loop. What we're really providing is an operating system that allows you to bring all of your enterprise data together. It could solves for the impedance mismatch between like, yeah, look, all this data I've collected, it was collected and stored in a way that makes sense to the underlying transactional system or makes sense to some part of my institution, but doesn't actually represent how the humans of my institution think about the problems that we're facing. Uh so that we represent in what we call the ontology, which is not just a model of the data, it's also a model of the actions. We call that the kinetics. Like if you're going to make a decision, you might be allocating inventory. How do you do that? So this ontology layer almost becomes like an API layer for the business. It makes the business programmable.

这对我来说其实是全世界最难的问题。我们打造的是一个企业操作系统，核心论点是：让这一切真正有价值的是决策，而不是数据。这有点接近 John Boyd 的 OODA 循环。我们真正提供的，是一个能把你企业里所有数据汇聚到一起的操作系统。它解决的是一种阻抗失配：没错，我收集了这么多数据，但它们的采集和存储方式，要么是为了迁就底层的交易系统，要么是为了迁就机构里的某个部门，并不能真正代表机构里的人是如何思考我们所面对的问题的。这一层我们用所谓的 ontology（本体）来表达——它不只是数据的模型，也是行动的模型，我们把后者叫 kinetics。比如你要做一个决策，可能是分配库存，那具体怎么做？于是这个 ontology 层几乎变成了整个业务的 API 层，它让业务变得可编程。

[37:13] Shyam

And that changes the rate at which you can compound on top of it. So now you have this abstraction layer that you can use to build applications that manage your value chain from the hand of your supplier to the hand of your customer. You can call it a value chain. You can also call that a decision chain. There's a series of Your whole business, almost, if you just squint at it, is just a series of decisions you're making. Every one of those decisions you want to have an OODA loop. Like I want to make the best possible decision I can have today. But I want more importantly, I want the first derivative to be good. I want to learn tomorrow how to make a better decision than the one I had today.

而这会改变你在它之上复利积累的速度。现在你有了这个抽象层，可以用它来构建各种应用，管理从供应商之手到客户之手的整条价值链。你可以叫它价值链，也可以叫它决策链。你的整个生意，眯起眼睛看，几乎就是你在做的一连串决策。而每一个决策，你都希望有一个 OODA 循环。我想在今天做出我能做的最好决策，但更重要的是，我希望一阶导数是正的——我希望明天能学会做出比今天更好的决策。

[37:43] Patrick

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[38:13] Patrick

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[38:44] Patrick

Could you give an example of a customer where you showed up and maybe describe the circumstance of their data or their systems or something? Then what you did, like what the process is of establishing and building the ontology, which is I think a like a very good appropriate but fancy word for like mapping reality onto a system versus jamming reality into a pre-existing system.

你能不能举一个客户的例子？先描述一下你们进场时对方的数据或系统是什么状况，然后你们做了什么——比如建立和构建 ontology 的过程是怎样的。我觉得 ontology 这个词很贴切，虽然听着有点高深，它说的其实是把现实映射到一套系统上，而不是把现实硬塞进一套既有系统里。

[39:06] Shyam

Yeah.

好。

[39:06] Patrick

And then what sort of transformation that enabled at that customer that would have been impossible with the former system? Just to like bring it to life with like a simple example.

然后再讲讲这在那个客户那里带来了什么样的转变——用原来的系统根本不可能实现的转变。就用一个简单的例子把它讲活。

[39:15] Shyam

things I just want to put down that will make this make more sense. The first is that we want to make software that makes you more different, not more similar. We think about it as alpha not beta. The second thing is that we are a wildly inductive company. You know, so we would never show up to a customer with some preconceived notion of this is the aerospace ontology. I'm going to pick an aerospace example in a second here. It's It's rather like all the values and understanding what makes your aerospace company different than all the others. How do I make you more different there? That's the differentiation you're competing on.

有几件事我想先说清楚，能让后面的内容更好理解。第一，我们要做的是让你变得更不同、而不是更趋同的软件。我们把它理解为 alpha 而不是 beta。第二，我们是一家极度归纳式的公司。所以我们绝不会带着某种预设的「航空航天行业 ontology」去见客户——我等下会举一个航空航天的例子。恰恰相反，重点在于所有那些价值，在于理解你这家航空航天公司和其他所有同行到底有什么不同。我怎么让你在那个点上变得更不同？那才是你赖以竞争的差异化。

[39:46] Shyam

So when we when we first came to Airbus, Airbus was in the midst of ramping the A350. You know, the A380 was a wonderful plane, structurally unprofitable program. You know, so the A350 was this bet that the whole company was effectively riding on in 2015. The first time you make an airplane, um you're always going to have issues. The There's a learning curve to the production. And one of the most important things to figure out as quickly as possible is what is what is an issue that is just a non-conformity that like, hey, I'll give this guy some training and he'll learn how to figure it out. It's teething pain, it'll go away. And what is a recurring issue that is actually a design defect that I need to go work with my suppliers or upstream.

我们最初进入 Airbus 的时候，Airbus 正处在 A350 的产能爬坡期。A380 是一架很棒的飞机，但在结构上是个不赚钱的项目。所以 2015 年时，A350 是整个公司几乎押上全部身家的一场豪赌。第一次造一款新飞机，肯定会出各种问题，生产本身有学习曲线。而最重要、要尽快搞清楚的事情之一是：哪些问题只是一次性的不合规项——比如「给这个工人做点培训，他就能学会处理」，属于磨合期阵痛，会自己消失；而哪些是反复出现的问题，实际上是设计缺陷，需要我去找供应商或上游一起解决。

[40:27] Shyam

How quickly you can solve that becomes fundamental to the shape of the ramp and the cost of the ramp. So the first thing we did is we just started sitting with users on the final assembly line in Toulouse. These are These are wrench turners effectively. And understanding hey, what makes your life suck? What's hard about this? What's What's the challenge in working on these non-conformities? And you look at like basically they're going through Excel. They're looking at reports in SAP trying to figure out how do I bucket all these issues that are coming in? So we just help them automate all of that. And the ontology at that point was really related to parts, sequencing of work, uh defect rates, like everything related to quality.

你能多快解决这个问题，直接决定了产能爬坡的曲线形状和爬坡成本。所以我们做的第一件事，就是直接去图卢兹的总装线上跟用户坐在一起。这些人说白了就是拧扳手的一线工人。去搞明白：嘿，你的工作里什么最折磨人？这活儿难在哪？处理这些「不合格项」的挑战到底是什么？你会看到，他们基本上是在翻 Excel，在 SAP 里看报表，试图弄清楚怎么把涌进来的这些问题归类。于是我们就帮他们把这一切自动化了。那个阶段的 ontology（本体模型）主要围绕零部件、工序排程、缺陷率——一切跟质量相关的东西。

[41:08] Shyam

Once you had this immense quality asset though, you're able actually to pivot it to realize okay, so like now I'm not Now I'm up the learning curve. It kind of naturally leads to the next problem, which is production planning. So quality to production planning to then in service. Now you have the greatest data asset possible for this tail. As this plane enters service, how do I help maximize the uptime of this asset for my customers? How am I going to compete against the other aerospace manufacturers? That's the natural evolution that we see with most customers. You start with one problem, but of course they exist in the context of this connected decision chain.

不过一旦你有了这么庞大的质量数据资产，你其实可以把它转过来用——好，现在我已经爬上学习曲线了。它很自然地引出下一个问题：生产计划。从质量到生产计划，再到售后服务。这时你就拥有了针对这个长尾问题所能有的最强数据资产。当这架飞机投入运营后，我怎么帮客户把这台资产的可用率（uptime）拉到最高？我要怎么跟其他航空制造商竞争？这就是我们在大多数客户身上看到的自然演进：你从一个问题切入，但这些问题当然都存在于一条环环相扣的决策链里。

[41:42] Patrick

What's the difference between dealing with military customers and government customers, which you did for a long time, and commercial customers?

跟军方客户、政府客户打交道——你做了很多年——和跟商业客户打交道，区别在哪？

[41:48] Shyam

There's a lot more non-market forces in the military. The military is the only institution in the world that kind of profoundly divides up supply and demand. You know, the beating heart of most companies is that integration, that sales and operation planning process. Right, you have the combatant commands, we call them, that deal with real world events. If you're fighting Russia, that's that's the European command, EUCOM. And then And have the services, like the Army, Navy, Air Force, Space Force, etc. Their job is to man, train, and equip. That's the supply side. So, you you have a group that has no responsibility for demand, essentially deciding what to build, how how much to build, you know, how am I going to man, train, and equip this? And then they present these forces to the combatant commands and say, "This is what you have to solve this problem."

军队里的非市场力量要多得多。军队是世界上唯一一个把供给和需求彻底切割开的机构。你知道，大多数公司跳动的心脏正是那种整合——销售与运营的联动规划流程。而军队呢，一边是我们所说的作战司令部（combatant commands），负责应对现实世界的事件——如果你要打俄罗斯，那就是欧洲司令部 EUCOM。另一边是各军种，陆军、海军、空军、太空军等等，他们的职责是「征兵、训练、装备」，这是供给侧。所以你有一群对需求完全不负责的人，在实质上决定造什么、造多少、我要怎么征兵训练装备。然后他们把这些部队交给作战司令部说：「你就拿这些去解决问题吧。」

[42:31] Shyam

That adds an additional level of complexity. So, if the demand side says, "Hey, I really want this. This is the capability we need." They they can't buy it. So, how do you kind of square this? So, I think you have all these other non-market forces to deal with. Um but, I think one of the things that is really advantageous to being both a commercial and government-oriented company is that the the the intrinsic rewards on the government side are so high, so motivating. It enables you to get through and solve really hard problems in a way that is kind of like a rising tide for the whole business.

这就多了一层额外的复杂性。如果需求侧说：「嘿，我真的很想要这个，这就是我们需要的能力。」——他们没法自己买。所以这个矛盾怎么调和？所以我认为你要应对的是各种各样的非市场力量。不过我觉得，同时做商业和政府业务的公司有一个真正的优势：政府这边的内在回报感太高了，太让人有干劲了。它能让你咬牙解决那些真正难的问题，而这种能力会像涨潮一样抬升整个公司的水位。

[43:04] Patrick

How would you define the state of our military today? Like, I know it's a big question, and but it's an important question. You've gotten to see so many sides of it and serve many aspects of it. Uh what Yeah, how would you describe the state of the US military?

你会怎么定义我们军队今天的状态？我知道这是个很大的问题，但也是个重要的问题。你见过它太多的侧面，也服务过它的很多方面。你会怎么描述美军现在的状态？

[43:17] Shyam

We are the best military in the world. Our uniform service members are better than we deserve. Like, I every day Actually, I had someone tell me like, "Hey, when are you going to stop stop being shocked at how good, you know, this E-4 is at building this app or doing this thing?" And it's like, the amount of talent is eye-watering. I think we encumber them in a lot of process. We deprive them of a lot of agency, and I certainly have a lot of critiques of of the bureaucracy. But, I think the structural challenge we have is actually something that we just need to observe from a distance from the military we have today, per se, which is the whole point of the military is to deter our adversaries from conflict. If you look back over the last 10 years, we've not been able to deter a lot of conflict. We had the annexation of Crimea in 2014, the militarization of the Spratly Islands after they told President Obama,

我们是世界上最强的军队。我们的现役军人好到超出我们配得上的程度。真的，每天——有人跟我说：「嘿，你什么时候才能不再震惊于这个 E-4（下士级士兵）做这个应用、干这件事有多牛？」人才的密度惊人到让人眼眶发热。但我认为我们用一堆流程把他们捆住了，剥夺了他们太多的自主权，我对官僚体系当然也有一大堆批评。不过我认为我们真正的结构性挑战，需要跳出今天这支军队本身、拉开距离去看：军队存在的全部意义，就是威慑对手、让冲突不要发生。回看过去十年，我们没能威慑住多少冲突。2014 年克里米亚被吞并；南沙群岛被军事化——尽管他们跟 Obama 总统说过，

[44:04] Shyam

"We will not militarize it." They militarized the Spratly Islands. We've had a pogrom in Israel. We've had the invasion of Ukraine. We have unprecedented gray zone phase zero operations by the Chinese in the South South China Sea. I would say arguably in the last year we've started to restore deterrence. Whatever you think about it, Midnight Hammer was a massively deterring operation. Maduro is massively deterring. You You have it on multiple levels with With Midnight Hammer, it's obviously the overwhelming strength, the precision of what we're able to do, the incredible complexity of the operations.

「我们不会把它军事化」，结果他们还是把南沙群岛军事化了。以色列遭遇了针对性的大屠杀。乌克兰被入侵。中国人在南海搞着史无前例的灰色地带「零阶段」行动。但我要说，过去这一年我们可以说开始重建威慑了。不管你对它怎么看，「Midnight Hammer」（午夜之锤）行动是极具威慑力的一次行动。Maduro 那件事也是极具威慑力的。这种威慑体现在好几个层面——就 Midnight Hammer 而言，显然是压倒性的实力、我们能做到的打击精度、行动本身令人难以置信的复杂程度。

[44:35] Shyam

No other military in the world could have done that. But we need to view that as like a single strike, you know, and the deterrence capability against a peer adversary is can you generate that strike every single day until the enemy is submits to your will. You think about Maduro, it also shows our capability like literally the raid happened the day the Chinese were in town. Maduro has all these Chinese and Russian weapons, Venezuela, and they don't seem to work at all. And that sends a very strong message to everyone who else who thinks that their security is coming from buying Chinese and Russian weapons.

世界上没有第二支军队能干成那件事。但我们得把它看作只是单次打击。对一个势均力敌的对手，真正的威慑能力是：你能不能天天都打出这样一击，直到敌人屈服于你的意志。再看 Maduro 那件事，它同样展示了我们的能力——那次突袭就发生在中国人访问当地的当天。Maduro 手里全是中国和俄罗斯的武器，委内瑞拉，结果那些武器好像完全不管用。这给所有指望靠买中俄武器换安全感的人，发出了一个非常强烈的信号。

[45:09] Shyam

Now, I think we could we kind of trace back, and this is what I really wrote about in the 18 thesis. So, if we start, we say we we've lost deterrence. Like, let's Let's be clear-eyed about that. I think in the last year we've started to regaining it. What happened? Because we had it for a long time, you know, and we were the sole superpower in the '90s. How do And we spend a fair amount every year on defense. So, I think it'd be a reasonable thing for the American people to expect like that we

那么，我认为我们可以往回追溯——这也是我在《18 条论纲》里真正想写的东西。开头我们先承认：我们失去了威慑力。这一点要看清楚。我认为过去一年我们开始重新找回它了。那到底发生了什么？因为我们曾经长期拥有它，90 年代我们是唯一的超级大国。而且我们每年在国防上花的钱可不少。所以美国民众有理由期待，我们……

[45:35] Patrick

Slowing dollars right here.

钱可没少花。

[45:36] Shyam

Yeah. I think there's something much more profound. People want to talk about narrow things like acquisition reform or the mix of weapons. I think it comes back to people. It comes back to the heretics. So, when we, you know, at the at the dawn of World War II, we were the best at mass production. Effectively, our country invented it. And in order to create an industrial base, we took the number two at GM, who was previously number two at Ford, Bill Knudsen, who was a Danish emigre, who uh who's really the perfecter of mass production, and we direct commissioned him a three-star general, and we put him in charge of war mobilization. And and Knutsen was a world-class engineer. And what do we do?

对。我认为背后有更深层的东西。人们总爱谈一些很窄的东西，比如采购制度改革、武器结构配比。我认为归根结底是人，归根结底是那些「异端」（heretics）。二战前夜，我们是世界上最擅长大规模生产的国家——实际上是我们发明了大规模生产。为了建起一个工业基础，我们把 GM 的二号人物——他之前还是 Ford 的二号人物——Bill Knudsen，一位丹麦移民、大规模生产真正的集大成者，直接授衔为三星中将，让他主管战争动员。Knudsen 是一位世界级的工程师。那我们做了什么？

[46:14] Shyam

We gave him the authority to go meet other world-class engineers all around America. We had one key advantage in World War in terms of timing, which is that we had Lend-Lease. There was a period of time that we actually mobilized production when we were not fighting. We were building stuff that we gave to our allies, to the Brits in particular, and the Soviets. Uh but that allowed us to build factories and retool existing factories and hit a production ramp so that after Pearl Harbor happened, we were basically at full-rate production and were able to to really go after these things. And put this in context of our adversary, the Germans, they were actually better engineers than we were.

我们给了他权力，让他去见全美国其他的世界级工程师。二战里我们在时机上有一个关键优势，就是「租借法案」（Lend-Lease）。有一段时间，我们在还没参战的情况下就已经在动员生产了。我们造出来的东西送给盟友，尤其是英国人，还有苏联人。但这让我们得以新建工厂、改造现有工厂、完成产能爬坡，所以珍珠港事件之后，我们基本上已经处于全速生产状态，可以真正放手大干。再对比一下我们的对手德国人——他们其实是比我们更好的工程师。

[46:51] Shyam

They just made a very small number of very exquisite things. Now, if you come to the present moment, we sell like the Germans. We make a very small number of truly exquisite, eye-wateringly exquisite things, and our adversary is the world's best at mass production. So, this should give us all a little bit of of discomfort here. Uh the second part of this is is that the nature of the industrial base. Like today, we call it the defense industrial base. I think it used to be the American industrial base until the fall of the Berlin Wall. Only 6% of spending on major weapon systems went to defense specialists, i.e. companies that only did business with the Defense Department. Most of that spending, 94%, went to what I call as dual-purpose companies. Look, a a missile is single-use. There's no dual-use missile. But the idea that Chrysler would build missiles and minivans meant that all the R&D that they were doing on production, material, equipment, machine tooling could be leveraged and was subsidizing our national security, that we recognized that freedom and prosperity were two sides of the same coin. We're so far away from that world today, right? Like General Mills, the cereal company, used to build torpedoes and inertial guidance systems. Kodak,

他们只是造极少量的极精尖的东西。而看看当下，我们活得像当年的德国人：我们造极少量的、真正精致到令人咋舌的东西，而我们的对手是世界上最擅长大规模生产的国家。这一点应该让我们所有人都感到一丝不安。第二点是工业基础的性质。今天我们管它叫「国防工业基础」，但我认为在柏林墙倒塌之前，它其实叫「美国工业基础」。当时主要武器系统的开支里，只有 6% 流向了国防专业户——也就是只跟国防部做生意的公司。绝大部分开支，94%，流向了我所说的「军民两用公司」。听着，导弹本身是一次性的，没有什么两用导弹。但 Chrysler 既造导弹又造 minivan，这意味着他们在生产、材料、设备、机床加工上的所有研发都能被复用，等于在补贴我们的国家安全——我们当年认识到，自由与繁荣是同一枚硬币的两面。今天我们离那个世界太远了，对吧？General Mills，那家做麦片的公司，曾经造过鱼雷和惯性制导系统。Kodak，

[48:04] Shyam

film company, also was a key a key supplier to Corona, which was our first spy satellite. But this is this is the industrial base that won World War II, won the early Cold War, and really deterred our adversaries. And it's only a consequence of becoming the sole superpower that everything changed. And it changed in two ways. One, that that 6% number today is 86%. So, 86% of major weapon systems come from defense specialists only. Uh the other part of it is the nature of the industrial base. We think about it as Northrop Grumman. It much more accurately, it was Jack Northrop. It was Leroy Grumman. It was William Lear. It was Henry Ford. It was Henry Kaiser. You had founder figures.

那家胶卷公司，也曾是 Corona 项目——我们第一颗间谍卫星——的关键供应商。这才是那个打赢了二战、打赢了冷战初期、真正威慑住对手的工业基础。而一切的改变，恰恰是我们成为唯一超级大国之后的结果。变化有两方面。第一，当年那个 6% 的数字，今天变成了 86%——86% 的主要武器系统只来自国防专业户。另一方面是工业基础的属性。我们现在想到的是 Northrop Grumman 这样的公司，但更准确地说，当年那是 Jack Northrop 本人，是 Leroy Grumman，是 William Lear，是 Henry Ford，是 Henry Kaiser。那时有一个个创始人式的人物。

[48:45] Shyam

They were their own sort of heretics. They were their own like what we would recognize in the Valley today. That's where this talent was. It was in the industrial companies of America. And we were betting on these people, not just their institutions, to deliver this sort of capability. In 1993, there was a a very famous dinner at the Pentagon called the Last Supper. And you know, we we had won the Cold War. I think in a democracy, it's very reasonable for the people to say, "We want to spend less on defense. So, what exactly is our threat?" So, we slashed the defense budget. And in this dinner, the Secretary of Defense told uh a subset, I think it was 15 of the 51 primes. We had 51 primes. Today, we have five. He told them, "You're all not going to survive. The budget's getting cut. We give you permission to consolidate. Maybe some of you should exit the defense business altogether.

他们本身就是各自领域的「异端」，就是我们今天在硅谷会认出来的那类人。人才就在那里——在美国的工业公司里。我们当年押注的是这些人，而不只是他们的机构，来交付这种能力。1993 年，五角大楼有一场非常著名的晚宴，叫「最后的晚餐」（Last Supper）。你知道，我们打赢了冷战。在一个民主国家，民众说「我们想少花点钱在国防上，我们的威胁到底是谁？」是非常合理的。于是我们大砍国防预算。在那场晚宴上，国防部长对一部分主承包商——我记得是 51 家 primes 里的 15 家；当年我们有 51 家 primes，今天只剩 5 家——说：「你们不可能都活下来。预算要削减。我们准许你们合并。也许你们中有些人应该彻底退出国防生意。

[49:32] Shyam

And know that some of you may go out of business, and we're not going to save you." And this just set off a merger frenzy that led from the consolidation, you know, from 51 down to five. Now, most people look at this, and I think they take away the wrong conclusion, which is like, "Oh, this is when we lost competition. When we had competition, it was much more dynamic." I think the much more profound consequence This is the moment of profound financialization and conformity in the industrial base. You lost the crazy people. You know, they went to tech. They went to other parts of our economy where there was enough kind of positive sum energy and growth and it wasn't just about dividends and buyback ratios and financial engineering. It was about real engineering. The world class engineers, it's like why why should we celebrate a Hyman Rickover or a Kelly Johnson? You know, it's Kelly Johnson was the founder of Skunk Works at Lockheed. In his lifetime, he built 41 airplanes. That is insane. Many of which we still fly today. You know, and he built the U-2 in 13 months. Like the timelines we're talking about are just incredible. You can't look at that and think anything other than this is an artist. Like this guy this is like divine what he's able to do.

还要知道，你们有些人可能会倒闭，我们不会救你们。」这直接引爆了一场并购狂潮，从 51 家一路合并到 5 家。大多数人看这段历史，我认为得出的结论是错的——他们说「哦，这是我们失去竞争的时刻，有竞争的时候市场活跃多了」。我认为更深远的后果是：这是国防工业基础彻底金融化、彻底趋同化的时刻。你失去了那些疯子。他们去了科技行业，去了经济里其他还有正和博弈能量和增长空间的地方——那些地方不是只讲分红、回购比率和财务工程，而是讲真正的工程。世界级的工程师——为什么我们该颂扬 Hyman Rickover、Kelly Johnson 这样的人？Kelly Johnson 是 Lockheed「臭鼬工厂」（Skunk Works）的创始人。他一生造了 41 款飞机。这太疯狂了。其中许多我们今天还在飞。他用 13 个月造出了 U-2。我们在谈的这种时间线简直不可思议。看着这些你只能得出一个结论：这是一位艺术家。这个人做到的事近乎神迹。

[50:35] Shyam

And so much of what I think we've gotten wrong is those things were messy and chaotic and hard and frictionful. And over time we've tried to install lots of process to make these things less messy, less chaotic. As a consequence though, they end up not working. You know, and um we need a little more crazy back to get these things to work.

而我认为我们搞错的很多东西正在于此：那些事情本来就是凌乱的、混沌的、艰难的、充满摩擦的。而这些年我们一直试图装上一层层流程，让它们不那么乱、不那么混沌。可结果就是，它们干脆不管用了。我们需要把那么一点「疯劲」找回来，这些事才能重新运转。

[50:53] Patrick

How do we undo this? I'm reminded of the Churchill quote, won't get it exactly right, something like the US always does the right thing after trying everything else first. And and like a lot of what's happened is that we have shipped the capability to produce physical things off our shores because it to optimize for a variety of things, but it's much cheaper and more scalable and easier and we've become you know, primarily a country with all the market cap that's that rests on technology and IP and extreme talent that the the small number of exquisite things, exquisite people, exquisite researchers. Like we've done an amazing job there. Um but we don't make much here anymore. A lot of it happens in China and overseas. How can we reverse that? Like it seems it seems so imbalanced as to and so daunting as to seem impossible. Um but of course I know you think it's critical. So like what what what is even the first step in being able to do this?

那我们怎么扭转这一切？我想起 Churchill 那句话——原话我记不准了——大意是：美国总会做正确的事，但要先把其他所有办法都试一遍。实际发生的情况是，我们把制造实体产品的能力整个运到了海外，为了优化各种指标——毕竟那样更便宜、更可扩展、更省事。于是我们变成了一个市值主要建立在技术、IP 和极端人才之上的国家——少量的精尖产品、精尖人才、精尖研究者。这方面我们做得确实惊艳。但我们在本土已经不怎么造东西了，大量生产发生在中国和海外。怎么才能逆转？这件事失衡到、艰巨到看起来近乎不可能。但我当然知道你认为它至关重要。那么，能做成这件事的第一步到底是什么？

[51:45] Shyam

And what you said is exactly right. It is daunting but critical. So, we have no choice but to lean into that and start. You know, the best time to start would have been yesterday, the next best time is today. Let me also give the case for why it's critical because I think we're screwed if we don't do this. The biggest lie that we bought from globalization is this concept of we will do the innovation and they will do the production. And what you have to recognize that innovation is itself a consequence of productivity. To put it in terms that I think our audience here would understand most directly, like what motivated Google to write to do the research behind the attention is all you need paper in 2017?

你说得完全对：艰巨，但至关重要。所以我们别无选择，只能迎难而上、开始动手。你知道那句话：最好的开始时间是昨天，其次是今天。让我再讲讲为什么它至关重要——因为我认为不做这件事我们就完蛋了。全球化卖给我们的最大谎言，就是「我们负责创新，他们负责生产」这个概念。你必须认识到，创新本身是生产力的产物。用我们这里的听众最能直接理解的话来说：2017 年是什么驱动 Google 去做《Attention Is All You Need》那篇论文背后的研究的？

[52:23] Shyam

If you ask them, they'll say it's like, "Well, the team was working on an incremental 3% improvement to Google Translate." You cannot think of something more banal leading to something more revolutionary than that. So, if you don't have the input stimulus on improving production, you're actually not going to be able to capture the innovation. And that's literally what we're seeing play out in the marketplace today, which is like, "Okay, they went from making a battery to making the whole car." Um, they WuXi went from being a cheap, you know, basically a cheap pair of hands for pipetting contract research in the pharma industry to actually now 50% of all clinical trials are drugs that are created in China. You know, so you we have seeded the innovation. It's not that It's not that it was taken away from us. We just seeded it because we had completely incorrect precept. So, now we have to re-attack that. Now,

你去问他们，他们会说：「呃，那个团队当时在给 Google Translate 做一个 3% 的渐进式改进。」你想不出比这更平庸的起点，通向如此革命性的结果了。所以，如果你没有「改进生产」这个输入刺激，你其实根本抓不住创新。而这正是今天市场上正在上演的事：他们从造电池，做到了造整车。药明（WuXi）从制药行业里一双廉价的「移液枪之手」——做外包合同研究起家——到如今全球 50% 的临床试验药物是在中国研发创制的。所以说，创新是我们自己拱手让出去的。不是被人抢走的，是我们基于一个完全错误的前提自己让出去的。所以现在我们必须重新夺回来。那么，

[53:10] Shyam

we shouldn't do that We should do this, you know, with some asymmetric advantage. And I think I think we have a couple of them. I don't think it's true that we're not great at building things in this country. Look at Elon and the progeny of Elon. Like, we do know how to manufacture things here. And we're going to have to think about manufacturing things in new and novel ways. In addition, like it's not It doesn't all have to be new. It's like Ford, General Motors, these are world-class manufacturers, too. Like, we have that capability. But, we also have new ways of thinking about this with much deeper vertically integrated production.

我们不该那样做，而应该带着某种不对称优势去做这件事。而且我认为我们手里有好几张这样的牌。说我们这个国家不擅长造东西，我认为不是事实。看看 Elon 和 Elon 带出来的那一批人——我们是知道怎么在这里搞制造的。而且我们将不得不用全新的方式去思考制造。另外，也不是所有东西都得是新的。像 Ford、General Motors，这些同样是世界级的制造商，我们有这个能力。但与此同时，我们也有新的思路，比如纵深得多的垂直整合生产。

[53:38] Shyam

Uh, thinking about the production process itself as something that's more iterative and software-like that you're going to keep upgrading, co-locating R&D with production itself. So, I think these sorts of tradecrafts are the things that we can lean on. And probably the the last piece I'd say is AI is David's slingshot here. You know, we can if we can give the American worker superpowers. If you can make the American worker 50 times more productive than a worker anywhere else, you're going to change the efficient frontier of what can be made here. And I think as a consequence, we should be re-industrialization maximalist. Like the free traders out there like to say like maybe we can friend shore whatever.

呃，把生产流程本身当成一个更迭代、更像软件的东西来看待——你会不断给它升级，把研发和生产放在同一个地方。我认为这一类「手艺」正是我们可以倚仗的东西。最后一点我想说的是，AI 就是大卫手里的投石索。如果我们能给美国工人赋予超能力，让美国工人的生产率是世界上任何其他地方工人的 50 倍，那「什么东西能在这里造」的有效边界就会被改写。因此我认为，我们应该做再工业化的最大化主义者。那些自由贸易派喜欢说，也许我们可以搞「友岸外包」之类的。

[54:12] Shyam

I think that stuff can let us off the hook too easily. And it fails to solve the problem. The other example I'll give you from Patrick McGee's book Apple and China is that great book, right? And you know, people love to say something like well, we don't have the machine tools engineers in America. You could hardly get two people in a room to talk about it. You could fill a whole stadium in China. But then you look like Apple has spent the equivalent on an inflation-adjusted basis in the last 5 years of two and a half Marshall Plans building talent and capacity in China. How about we try to spend one Marshall Plan here? I think the problem is we're not even trying in part because we're daunted, in part because parts of our economy don't recognize that actually this isn't going to keep working. Like we're you're going to lose everything, not just something.

我觉得那种说法太容易让我们给自己找台阶下了，而且它解决不了问题。另一个例子来自 Patrick McGee 那本《Apple in China》，很棒的一本书，对吧？你知道，人们喜欢说：美国没有机床工程师，你想凑两个人坐一屋聊这个都难，而在中国能坐满一整个体育场。但你再看看，Apple 过去 5 年在中国培养人才和建设产能上花的钱，按通胀调整后相当于两个半马歇尔计划。那我们能不能试着在本土花上一个马歇尔计划？我觉得问题在于我们根本没在尝试——一部分是因为被吓住了，一部分是因为我们经济里有些部门不肯承认：这套玩法其实撑不下去了。你会失去一切，而不只是失去一部分。

[54:56] Shyam

Uh and and and it's why I feel a need to urgent call to action to say like we are in an undeclared state of emergency. And it's not just manufacturing the physical things we think about. I even think about this in terms of drugs. 80% of our generic drugs come from China in one way or another, whether it's the APIs or the finished product themselves. That is a huge problem. Uh today your child has an ear infection, that's pretty trivial. You think I'll have some generic antibiotics and it'll go away. If you have great power competition with China and you're the will of the American people to fight when they have to really contemplate hey, my 5-year-old might die of an ear infection. You know, so we we need to take these things kind of much more seriously and and further down the supply chain. I mean, I'm glad we're starting with rare earths, but there you could say we had to get punched in the face to mobilize around it. Maybe one of the galling things we should all think about is we we've been staring at this rare earths problem for the better part of 15 15 years.

呃，这也是为什么我觉得必须发出紧急的行动号召：我们正处在一种未经宣布的紧急状态里。而且这不只是我们通常想到的实体制造。我甚至会从药品的角度想这个问题。我们 80% 的仿制药都以某种方式来自中国——不管是原料药（API）还是成品药本身。这是个巨大的问题。今天你的孩子得了耳部感染，那是小事，你想着吃点仿制抗生素就好了。可如果跟中国进入大国竞争，美国民众的战斗意志就得真切地面对这样的问题：嘿，我 5 岁的孩子可能会死于一次耳部感染。所以我们需要把这些事看得严肃得多，并且沿着供应链继续往深处查。我很高兴我们从稀土开始动手了，但你也可以说，我们是挨了一记闷拳才动员起来的。也许最让人恼火、值得我们所有人反思的一点是：这个稀土问题，我们已经干瞪眼盯了差不多 15 年。

[55:51] Shyam

And we more or less have solved it for like 2 billion bucks. It's roughly a rounding error relative to everything that we're doing. And now we're on a trajectory to do it. So, I think part of it is just starting. I would love to bring everything back. You know, I think making a marginal improvement of even 10% dramatically reduces the adversary's leverage.

而我们差不多花 20 亿美元就把它解决了。相对于我们在做的所有事情，这基本就是个四舍五入的零头。而现在我们已经走上解决它的轨道了。所以我觉得关键之一就是开始动手。我当然希望把所有东西都搬回来。要知道，哪怕只做出 10% 的边际改善，也能大幅削弱对手手里的筹码。

[56:09] Patrick

Can you tell I just was reviewing my notes ahead of our conversation today from Graham Allison's book on on China, Destined for War with China. Can you give your perspective on um how you think about China as an adversary, as a country, as I mean, I highly recommend the book Apple and China. I mean, it really gives you this deep sense of how tightly integrated our most maybe argu- arguably our most important company is with with manufacturing there. It's this very strange circumstance. I have to admit where I've been to China. It's like it's another place filled with human beings and interesting things and amazing interesting culture and all sorts of positives. It's it's a hard thing to wrestle with, right? That they're adversary in the in the traditional sense. Um but I think there are components of that and and the nuance is important. I'd love to just hear you describe how you think about China as a as a political entity, as an adversary,

看得出来吧，我今天对谈之前刚复习了读 Graham Allison 那本讲中国的《Destined for War》时做的笔记。你能不能讲讲你怎么看中国——作为对手、作为一个国家……我是说，我强烈推荐《Apple in China》这本书，它真的让你深切感受到，我们或许可以说最重要的一家公司，跟那边的制造业绑得有多紧。这是个非常奇怪的处境。我得承认，我去过中国，那就是另一个地方，满是活生生的人、有意思的事物、令人惊叹的有趣文化，各种美好的东西。所以这事很难消化，对吧？说他们是传统意义上的对手。呃，但我认为其中确实有对抗的成分，而且细微的分寸很重要。我很想听你描述一下，你怎么看中国这个政治实体、这个对手、

[56:59] Patrick

as a country. Um it just feels like an especially important thing to understand your view on.

这个国家。呃，感觉理解你在这件事上的看法尤其重要。

[57:04] Shyam

You know, when we won World War II, we spent our own money to rebuild Germany and Japan. Microelectronics moved to Southeast Asia as Apple and China documents and chip and chip wars document uh because we helped move it there. Yes, we got cheaper goods in return, but the economic development of these countries, their flourishing in order to create global stability was part of the calculus. Same thing with admitting China to the World Trade Organization. Uh the the problem is they cheated the whole way through and it if you go back to a pre-Deng Xiaoping era, they call us the big enemy. You know, I I think part of it is our own naivety, our own belief that capitalism and human flourishing is a natural consequence of prosperity. So, okay, they're saying these things, but as they get richer, they're going to change their perspective on these things and we're going to all going to find some way of having a positive some view on the world.

你知道，我们打赢二战之后，是自己掏钱重建了德国和日本。微电子产业转移到东南亚——《Apple in China》和《芯片战争》(Chip War) 都写过——是因为我们帮着把它搬过去的。没错，我们换来了更便宜的商品，但这些国家的经济发展、它们的繁荣，本来就是「创造全球稳定」这盘棋的一部分。让中国加入世界贸易组织也是同样的道理。呃，问题在于，他们一路都在作弊。而且如果你回到邓小平之前的年代，他们管我们叫「大敌」。你知道，我觉得一部分原因是我们自己的天真——我们相信资本主义和人类的繁荣是富裕的自然结果。所以，好吧，他们现在嘴上这么说，但等他们富起来，就会改变看法，我们终究都会找到某种正和的世界观。

[57:56] Shyam

That's essentially what didn't happen. So, I think the challenge for us with the CCP is that it's not enough for China to be prosperous, America must fail. You know, you can just see this through simple acts. Like if you look at um agriculture, it is totally their prerogative. It's a business decision whether you want to buy American soybeans or not or you want to buy Brazilian soybeans. I do not begrudge them one bit. It's totally different thing when you're trying to smuggle in agricultural funguses so we can't grow soybeans. Now, if you start going down through the laundry list of what's actually happening, that's that's the shape of what's happening.

而这恰恰就是没有发生的事。所以我认为，我们面对中共 (CCP) 的难题在于：光让中国繁荣还不够，美国还必须失败。你从一些简单的举动就能看出来。比如看农业：要不要买美国大豆，完全是他们的自主权，是个商业决策——买美国大豆还是买巴西大豆，我一点都不怨他们。但你要是想偷偷运进来农业真菌，让我们种不出大豆，那就是完全另一回事了。而你要是把实际正在发生的事一条条列下去，事情就是这个形状。

[58:31] Shyam

And they're very they're a formidable adversary in the sense that, you know, we our conception of of war is kinetic. It's like the lone heroic cowboy against the odds winning through heroism. Their conception of war is deception. It's the the general who tricked the adversary to get into the valley and then flooded it. You want to win without firing a shot. And so, a lot of the things that are happening are below what we would consider the threshold of conflict, but but it absolutely is conflict. It is in their in their system system destruction warfare. You know, it's waging war through all the means because they're going to wage it where they have symmetric asymmetric strength. And until, you know, the American Calvinist sensibility is structurally positive sum. Like and we're going to we're going to turn the other cheek time and time again, over and over again. There will be some line,

而且他们是个难缠的对手，难缠在这个意义上：你知道，我们对战争的想象是动能式的，是孤胆英雄牛仔逆着劣势、靠英雄主义取胜。而他们对战争的想象是欺骗——是那个把敌军诱进山谷、然后放水淹掉的将军。你要不发一枪就赢。所以现在发生的很多事情，都低于我们所认为的「冲突门槛」，但那绝对就是冲突。在他们的体系里，这叫「体系破击战」——用一切手段开战，因为他们会在自己有不对称优势的地方开战。而美国那种加尔文式的性情在结构上是正和的——我们会一次又一次、反反复复地把另半边脸也送上去。但总会有某条线，

[59:23] Shyam

there will be some point at which we just react. And when we react, the the best quote I have from an admiral I like is it's no longer John Boyd's OODA Loop, observe, orient, decide, act. It's the American OODA OODA Loop, observe, um overreact, destroy, apologize. What we want to do is prevent this from happening by having enough deterrence that we're not provoked to being in a position where we need we we even need to react.

总会有某个点，我们会直接爆发。而一旦我们做出反应——我从一位很欣赏的海军上将那里听来的最好的一句话是：那就不再是 John Boyd 的 OODA 循环（观察、调整、决策、行动）了，而是美国版 OODA 循环：观察、反应过度、摧毁、道歉。我们想做的，是通过足够的威慑来防止走到那一步，让我们根本不至于被逼到需要做出反应的境地。

[59:50] Patrick

You've mentioned that the idea of asymmetries a few times, nuclear subs being an example of of our last huge asymmetries versus others. What are the most important asymmetries in your mind for the US and for China? Like where where do where where do they have an asymmetric advantage against us? Where do we have it against them? And what do you hope shifts in in in the

你已经好几次提到「不对称」这个概念，核潜艇就是一个例子——我们相对其他国家最后的巨大不对称优势之一。在你看来，对美国和中国来说，最重要的不对称优势是什么？比如说，他们在哪些地方对我们有不对称优势？我们又在哪些地方对他们有？你希望接下来发生什么样的变化——

[1:00:09] Shyam

This is a great question. So, their their principal asymmetric advantage is long-term planning. Um they actually can't pivot on a dime. So, let's go back to Gulf War One, which we're talking about with John Boyd. They saw the devastating violence we were able to do in basically four days to the fourth largest army in the world, and they they said, "Okay, we have to systematically map all of the critical dependencies of America's military technology and invest against it." And they have been doing that since '91. Uh and so we like the frog is kind of boiled in some sense. And it's a little bit of an easier game because they're playing a home game, but that's the map they've been on. And then it's been a steady journey, and if you look back, they broadcast their intent the whole time. There's no surprises that were there ever.

这是个好问题。他们最主要的不对称优势是长期规划。呃，他们其实没法急转弯。我们回到第一次海湾战争，就是聊 John Boyd 时说的那场。他们看到我们基本上用四天时间，就对世界第四大军队实施了毁灭性的暴力打击，于是他们说：「好，我们必须系统性地摸清美国军事技术的所有关键依赖，然后针对性地投入。」从 91 年起，他们就一直在干这件事。呃，所以某种意义上，我们就像温水里被慢慢煮的青蛙。而且这盘棋对他们来说更好下一点，因为他们打的是主场，但那就是他们一直照着走的路线图。这是一段稳扎稳打的旅程，而且你回头看，他们全程都在广播自己的意图，从来没有过任何意外。

[1:00:54] Shyam

Our asymmetric advantage is that we're crazy. The AI phenomenon was not in their long-range plan. It wasn't in our long-range plan, but when it happened, we all our whole economy pivoted on it on a dime, right? And even the Chinese models, those are a result of distillation. And so our ability then to be unpredictable, cuz we ourselves do not know what we're going to do. That's that's our key strength. That comes back to the heretics. Where does that unpredictability come from? Because it's not our bureaucracy, our bureaucracy is predictable, right? It's not the steady Eddie managed decline, it's it's the crazies.

我们的不对称优势是：我们够疯。AI 这波浪潮不在他们的长期规划里，也不在我们的长期规划里，但它一出现，我们整个经济立刻围绕它急转弯，对吧？就连中国那些模型，也是蒸馏出来的产物。所以，我们的关键优势就在于不可预测——因为连我们自己都不知道自己接下来要干什么。这又回到了那些异端 (heretic)。这种不可预测性从哪来？肯定不是来自我们的官僚体系——官僚体系是可预测的，对吧？不是那种四平八稳的「被管理的衰落」，而是来自那帮疯子。

[1:01:27] Patrick

How do we get more heretics in this part of the American story? Because there's obviously a massive profit [snorts] and I would argue status motivator in the private sector. All these companies that are popping up with amazing founders, the potential rewards are extremely obvious. The heretics that you described at the start of the conversation, that's definitely not true. You mentioned, you know, dying penniless or whatever. How do we create the right set of incentives for more of our most talented people to go be heretics in this part of the American [snorts] story right now?

我们怎么才能在美国故事的这个篇章里得到更多异端？因为在私营部门，显然有巨大的利润动机——我还要说，有地位动机。冒出来的这些公司都有出色的创始人，潜在回报极其明显。而你在对谈开头描述的那些异端，情况显然不是这样——你提到过，有人一贫如洗地死去什么的。我们该怎么设计一套正确的激励机制，让更多最有才华的人，愿意去当此刻美国故事这一篇章里的异端？

[1:02:00] Shyam

There's two incentives. One is just like recognition that we need the heretics. I think Hyman Rickover enjoyed his celebrity for a big period of time and just being known as the guy who did this is itself a sort of reward. Then the second part of this is is definitely financial. Like one of the arguments I've been making is the cynical view of of defense defense industrial complex in particular is something like these are greedy warmongers. Well, they picked the wrong industry then cuz like on the greedy side you should be in tech, you should be in some other business. These are these are crappy businesses, you know, they have like 9% operating margins or something. It's They're not they're they're valued like less than two times revenue. So we actually need to make our primes more valuable and that would help us continue to attract the heretics. How do you make the primes more valuable?

激励有两种。一种就是承认我们需要异端这件事本身。我觉得 Hyman Rickover 在很长一段时间里享受着他的名望，光是被人认作「干成这件事的那个人」，本身就是一种回报。第二部分则肯定是钱。我一直在提的一个论点是：对国防（尤其是国防工业复合体）的那种犬儒式看法，大意是「这帮人是贪婪的战争贩子」。呃，那他们可选错行业了——真贪钱的话你该去搞科技，去干别的生意。这些都是很烂的生意，你知道吗，营业利润率大概只有 9% 左右，估值还不到两倍营收。所以我们其实需要让那些主承包商 (primes) 更值钱，这才有助于我们继续吸引异端。那怎么让 primes 更值钱呢？

[1:02:43] Shyam

The facile critique of the primes is somehow they're the problem. The system's the problem. The primes are just downstream of the consequence of the incentives the government gives and I think the the worst incentive is cost-plus contracting. Your upside is is capitated, you're not supposed to take any risk, the government basically pays for your R&D so you have no skin in the game. And yeah, you're still able to make a small number of exquisite things, but that system is anti-heresy. Like you can only do the conventional thing that the government's agreeing that you should do. You think about the Higgins boat, Andrew Higgins built that boat on his own. There was no spec In In that's why the Navy kept rejecting it. It wasn't Navy's idea. But then 92% of all boats in World War II are the Higgins boat. The Heresy is the boat that won the war. You know, how do you create an economic incentive where that's the case? And I think companies like Anduril are pioneering that on the hardware side where it's like, "Hey, I'm building a product. These are my specs. These are my opinions. I'm absorbing the risk. You should buy it if you like it or not."

对 primes 那种肤浅的批评，是把他们说成问题本身。其实是体制的问题。primes 只是政府给出的激励结出的下游果实，而我认为最糟糕的激励就是成本加成合同 (cost-plus contracting)：你的上行空间被封了顶，你不被允许承担任何风险，研发基本由政府买单，所以你毫无切身利益。没错，你还是能造出少量精致的东西，但那套体制是反异端的——你只能做政府认可你该做的常规事情。想想 Higgins 登陆艇：Andrew Higgins 完全靠自己造出了那条船，根本没有规格书。这正是海军一再拒收它的原因——那不是海军的主意。可后来二战里 92% 的船都是 Higgins 艇。赢下战争的，正是那条「异端」的船。你知道，你要怎么创造出一种经济激励，让这种事能成立？我认为 Anduril 这样的公司正在硬件侧开辟这条路，就像是：「嘿，我在做一个产品，这是我的规格，这是我的判断，风险我自己扛。喜欢就买，不喜欢就算。」

[1:03:36] Shyam

Part of the reason for profound optimism right now is is like I would not have have started all this advocacy if I thought I was just screaming into the wind. It's like having done this for 20 years for the for the first solid 10 years we were alone in the darkness. It was like SpaceX on the launch side and us. And then if you look at the present moment, there are now hundreds of founders who are building in the national interest with a US capital stack, one of our other advantages, of over a hundred billion dollars invested in the projects that they're doing that are actually changing how the department thinks about the future. Like this is the window and the moment for this stuff to happen. I increasingly in conversations that I have in in in the in the Pentagon, I hear some of these new entrants are talked about as plan A.

此刻我深感乐观，部分原因是——如果我觉得自己只是在对着风喊，我根本不会开始做这一切倡导。干了 20 年，头整整 10 年我们是黑暗中的孤军：发射那一侧有 SpaceX，然后就是我们。而你看看当下，已经有数百位创始人在为国家利益而创业，背后是美国的资本堆栈——这是我们的另一项优势——超过一千亿美元投进了他们正在做的项目里，而这些项目正在实实在在地改变国防部对未来的思考方式。这就是这些事发生的窗口和时刻。在我于五角大楼进行的各种对话里，我越来越多地听到，一些新入局者被当作 Plan A 来谈论。

[1:04:19] Shyam

It's not plan B. It's not, "Hey, we'll see. Maybe this will work in the future." It's like, "No, no. This is the plan and we'll we'll have to have backups if that doesn't work." That is unrecognizable from the world I started in 2006.

不是 Plan B。不是「嘿，走着瞧，也许将来能行」，而是「不不，这就是计划本身；如果它不成，我们才需要准备后备方案」。这跟我 2006 年入行时的那个世界相比，已经面目全非了。

[1:04:30] Patrick

If you were the president for a day tomorrow, what would be your executive orders? Like what what would be the things that you think could carry the most freight to create some of the change that that you want to see?

如果明天你当一天总统，你会签哪些行政令？就是说，你觉得哪些事最能发力，带来你想看到的那些变化？

[1:04:40] Shyam

I have narrow ideas. Like this is a narrow idea, but I would try to blow it up. Okay, you want to bring pharmaceutical production back to the US? If you try to do that for generics, the business case will never work. It's it's too hard. It's too much of a subsidy. Um but what you really want is you want to redevelop a skilled workforce that understands how to make drugs again. And you want the production capacity that in a time of crisis you could go from, say, making branded drugs to generics. So, why don't we manipulate patent length and say, "Look, drug companies, if you make your worldwide supply of your branded drugs here in the US, I will extend your patent length such that you recover two extra capex investment to go do that. That's a simple business case that every pharma company would underwrite in a heartbeat and it provides the catalyst to go generate that capacity. I think there are a lot of things in the American economy that look like that. If you go back to the story I was saying between prosperity and freedom that, you know, Chrysler built minivans and missiles and Ford built satellites until 1990, General Mills, Kodak, like you just go down the list that the entire economy looked like that.

我有一些很具体的小主意。比如这是个小切口，但我会试着把它放大。好，你想把制药生产带回美国？如果你从仿制药下手，商业账永远算不过来——太难了，需要的补贴太大。呃，但你真正想要的，是重新培养一支懂得怎么造药的熟练劳动力，并且拥有那种在危机时刻可以从（比如说）生产品牌药切换到仿制药的产能。那我们为什么不在专利期上做文章，说：「听着，各位药企，如果你们把品牌药的全球供应都放到美国本土生产，我就给你延长专利期，让你把为此多花的资本开支赚回来。」这个商业账，每家药企都会毫不犹豫地接下，而它正好提供了催生那种产能的催化剂。我认为美国经济里有很多事情都长这个样子。回到我之前讲的繁荣与自由的故事：Chrysler 既造 minivan 也造导弹，Ford 直到 1990 年还在造卫星，General Mills、Kodak……你顺着名单往下数，当年整个经济都是那个样子。

[1:05:41] Shyam

I think it's a consequence of being the really the sole superpower and the Pentagon, the old Pentagon in particular, being the last bastion of communism except for Cuba. Like like every country gave up on communism including Russia and China except for Cuba and Department of Defense. That made it both a bad business and then seemingly no threat so you could just be a prosperity company. You'd be a single purpose company that just cared about being a company. I'm not sure that's actually like a stable or healthy society or civilization that we have to recognize that we have obligations across freedom and prosperity.

我觉得这是身为世界上唯一超级大国的一个后果——五角大楼，尤其是过去的五角大楼，成了除古巴之外共产主义的最后堡垒。你想想，每个国家都放弃了共产主义，包括俄罗斯和中国，只剩古巴和美国国防部。这让国防既成了一门糟糕的生意，又让人觉得似乎没有威胁，所以你可以只做一家「繁荣公司」——一家单一目的的公司，只关心怎么当好一家公司。我不确定这样的社会或文明真的稳定、健康。我们必须认识到，我们在自由与繁荣两方面都负有义务。

[1:06:15] Patrick

You mentioned that the notion that we are crazy and can pivot and attack opportunity is an amazing part of the US culture. What do you think are what's the other end of that other side of that coin? What are the negative aspects of US culture in your view? And I'm going to ask the same question zoomed in on Palantir specifically of how to cultivate the culture that you want. Palantir seems to have an incredibly distinctive culture. Um, I'm going to ask about Sean Bombs and and things like this inside the inside the company. But first at the at the US level, what are things that you wish were different here about our culture?

你提到过，「我们够疯狂、能随时转向去抓住机会」这个观念是美国文化里了不起的一部分。那你觉得这枚硬币的另一面是什么？在你看来，美国文化有哪些负面的东西？接下来我还会把同样的问题聚焦到 Palantir 上，问你怎么培育你想要的那种文化——Palantir 的文化看起来极其与众不同。呃，我还会问到 Sean Bombs 之类公司内部的事。但先说美国这个层面：关于我们的文化，你希望哪些地方能有所不同？

[1:06:50] Shyam

Some problems require sustained effort, right? So if you can pivot really quickly, maybe you pivot it to solving the problem, but that means you can pivot away from solving the problem and and get distracted and and and lose sight of what you're trying to accomplish here. Um, so that it's like a feature bug, you know, it's it's not an unequivocal feature, but if you're if you're in a competition, you want to play to your strengths and that usually involves things that the adversary is unable to do. You know, it helps that we kind of the nature of populating the US was that all the heretics from the old world came here, right?

有些问题需要持续投入，对吧？如果你能非常快地转向，也许你会转向去解决那个问题，但这也意味着你可以转身离开那个问题，被别的事分心，忘了你到底想在这里达成什么。所以这是个「既是特性又是缺陷」的东西，它并不是一个绝对的优点。但如果你身处一场竞争，你就要发挥自己的长处，而这些长处通常是对手做不到的事情。你知道，美国的建国底色就帮了忙——旧世界所有的异端（heretic）都跑到了这里，对吧？

[1:07:22] Shyam

So, we have an unfair advantage on that. And then, in terms of maintaining a culture, the critical lesson I've learned over and over again is like the entropy of the universe is against you. Like, if you don't invest in your culture every single day, you will lose it. There's nothing about culture that is self-sustaining. That's as true for America, the country, as it is for your company. And then, the best cultures are really almost cult-like. You know, your culture is highly differentiated. It should actually kind of be hard for someone to inorganically insert into your culture, otherwise it's not a very differentiated culture whatsoever. That requires flag-bearers. It requires people who are true believers, you know, you need to So, it starts with the recruiting. Like, not not even not every human has a disposition that they want to be part of a cult, essentially. Some of them are just structurally mercenaries and they're evaluating everything in life really through the lens of what's my next job. And you you want to try to build your company with people who really think of the present job as the calling.

所以在这一点上我们有一种「不公平的优势」。至于维系一种文化，我反复学到的关键一课是：宇宙的熵在跟你作对。如果你不每一天都在文化上投入，你就会失去它。文化没有任何自我延续的成分。这对美国这个国家成立，对你的公司也一样成立。而且最好的文化其实几乎像邪教（cult）一样——你的文化是高度差异化的，别人想「非自然地」混进你的文化里，其实应该是困难的，否则你的文化根本谈不上有什么差异化。这需要旗手，需要真正的信徒。所以，这从招聘就开始了。不是每个人的天性都想加入一个「邪教」——有些人在结构上就是雇佣兵，他们评估人生里一切事情的透镜，其实都是「我的下一份工作是什么」。而你要尽量用那些真正把当下这份工作视为使命（calling）的人来搭建你的公司。

[1:08:20] Shyam

And that engenders the primacy of winning. Like, they're always thinking about how to win today because that's the whole game. If you win today, you have the right to win tomorrow. Rather than, you know, the other side of that is getting lost in what I wish the world could be this. I wish the company could be this way or that way or something, which is unmoored. It's an aesthetic of how you wish the world to work rather than both how the world does work and what is required to win today.

这就催生出「赢字当头」的信条。他们永远在想今天怎么赢，因为这就是整场游戏：你赢下今天，才有资格去赢明天。而它的反面呢，是迷失在「我希望世界是这样的、我希望公司是这样或那样的」——那是没有锚点的，是一种关于「你希望世界如何运转」的审美，而不是既看清世界实际如何运转、又看清今天要赢需要什么。

[1:08:46] Patrick

In a company like Palantir, what do you personally wrestle with the most? Like, what are the tradeoffs that I'm always fascinated by tradeoffs. It just seems like so much so much of what happens hinges on a couple key choices. Can't do everything for everyone. What do you personally wrestle with the most?

在 Palantir 这样的公司里，你个人最纠结的是什么？我一直对取舍（tradeoff）特别着迷——感觉发生的一切，很大程度上都取决于那么几个关键选择，你不可能为所有人做所有事。你自己最常纠结的是什么？

[1:09:02] Shyam

The most important decisions from my seat is really what projects are worth outsized investment that we think are going to define the future of, you know, what our customers need and therefore the future of the business over the next 5 years. Um and so then how do you get the right talent on those projects? How do you discover what those projects are? I like to think about it it's like my backlog is something I re-prioritize dynamically relative to reality. So like yeah, here's my road map. Here's all the things I want. It's like a approximation at a point in time of what I'm what I what I think are the most valuable things to build. The second some new data comes in, I'm going [clears throat] to rip that up and re-prioritize it.

从我这个位置看，最重要的决策其实是：哪些项目值得超额投入——我们认为它们将定义客户未来所需，从而定义公司未来五年的业务。然后就是：怎么把对的人才放到这些项目上？怎么发现这些项目到底是什么？我喜欢这么想：我的 backlog 是一个随现实动态重排优先级的东西。就像，好，这是我的路线图，这是我想要的所有东西——它只是某个时间点上、我认为最值得构建的东西的一个近似。一旦有新的数据进来，我（清嗓子）就会把它撕掉，重新排一遍优先级。

[1:09:44] Shyam

Having a culture that lets you do that cuz that is really painful. Like people don't like it, their world is shaken up, it generates a lot of chaos, but it's the right thing to do. And so then managing that so that your culture enables you to do that and that the conviction of what that the cost of doing it is worth it because the return is so outsized, that's like the whole business.

拥有一种允许你这么干的文化——因为这真的很痛苦。人们不喜欢这样，他们的世界被搅得天翻地覆，会产生大量混乱，但这是正确的事。所以，把这件事管理好，让你的文化能支撑你这么做，并且坚信这么做的代价是值得的、因为回报是超额的——这基本上就是这门生意的全部。

[1:10:03] Patrick

I'm extremely sympathetic to that point of view of changing plans very quickly. I've also experienced the whiplash that it creates in a business. How would you coach someone trying that believes this but understands it's really hard on a business if you're constantly changing your mind and pivoting your resources around? What have you learned about like the ways to talk about that with your team, of implementing it, you know, of communicating around it? I'm I'm curious how you do it.

我对「快速改变计划」这个观点非常有共鸣，但我也亲身体验过它给公司带来的那种「甩鞭效应」。如果有人认同这个理念、但也明白不断改主意、不断挪动资源对公司来说真的很伤，你会怎么辅导他？在怎么跟团队谈这件事、怎么落地执行、怎么围绕它做沟通方面，你学到了什么？我很好奇你是怎么做的。

[1:10:30] Shyam

There there are always degrees of these things, but to to the the first order issue I'd say um is it hard because you want to exist in a business that isn't painful. You know, there's a great Greg LeMond quote who's a world championship cyclist and someone was asking him about a championship performance and he kind of almost looked incredulous and he was like, "You know it doesn't get easier, right? You just go faster." Uh and so what do you think a championship performance feels like? It feels shitty. It's really painful. It's really hard. And your ability to win is basically can you survive more pain than your competitors can?

这些事总有程度之分，但要说最根本的问题，我觉得是：你之所以觉得难，是因为你想待在一个不痛苦的生意里。世界冠军级自行车手 Greg LeMond 有句名言。有人问他冠军级的表现是什么感觉，他几乎一脸难以置信地说：「你知道的吧，它不会变轻松，你只是骑得更快了。」那你以为冠军级的表现是什么感觉？感觉糟透了，真的很痛，真的很难。你能不能赢，基本上就取决于：你能不能比你的对手撑过更多的痛苦？

[1:11:06] Shyam

Uh and so then there's this weird phenomenon where if you're doing something world-class, it's really painful. Also, if you're totally failing, it's really painful. So then having some discrimination to know which of these two worlds am I in? And and the worst world to kind of be in is where you have no signal. It's like you're just plotting along, but it's managed decline is really what's happening. So then is the pain we're experiencing resulting is it generating results or not? And orienting people to that. The other part I'd say is you can't move the whole company at once. Even a company as small as ours is only 4,500 people.

于是就有一个奇怪的现象：如果你在做世界级的事情，会非常痛苦；但如果你在彻底失败，也非常痛苦。所以你需要有分辨力，知道自己身处这两个世界中的哪一个。而最糟糕的处境，是你完全没有信号——你只是在埋头往前挪，但实际上正在发生的是「有管理的衰退」。所以要问：我们正在经历的痛苦，到底有没有产出结果？并且让大家都对齐到这一点上。另一点我想说的是，你没法让整个公司同时转身。即便是我们这样的小公司，也有 4500 人。

[1:11:41] Shyam

Every change is itself a mini insurgency inside the company. Now I would think about it like you're campaigning, and right? It's like who are the people who already believe what you're saying? How do you add incremental weight behind what they're doing? How do you help them succeed more? Are you trying to generate momentum? Are you trying to deal with the drag of bringing everyone along? And my experience has been momentum is the thing that aligns the whole company. And so you should be waking up every day in the in the midst of these pivots just working on momentum. People will catch up.

每一次变革本身，都是公司内部的一场小型起义。我会把它当成打选战来看：谁是那些本来就相信你所说的话的人？怎么给他们正在做的事加码？怎么帮他们取得更多成功？你是在制造势能，还是在应付「把所有人都拖着一起走」的阻力？我的经验是：势能才是让整个公司对齐的东西。所以在这些转向的过程中，你每天醒来就该只干一件事——做势能。人们会跟上来的。

[1:12:10] Patrick

What are your favorite ways to do that? Like to create Is it make kind of a communication question? Palantir gets so much attention now from public markets and everywhere. It's like an It's one of these exciting places. So there's more scrutiny on the company, its choices, what it does. You don't get to operate in obscurity like you did in the first, you know, the first batch of time. What are your favorite methods for that internally or tactically?

你最喜欢用什么方式来做这件事？这算是一个沟通层面的问题吗？Palantir 现在从公开市场到各处都获得了巨大的关注，成了那种令人兴奋的地方，所以公司、它的选择、它做的事都受到更多审视。你们不再能像早年那样在无人注意中默默运作了。在公司内部、在战术层面，你最喜欢的方法有哪些？

[1:12:33] Shyam

Celebrating the heretics, celebrating the successes, creating venues where everyone has some ability to revolt. Every employee's first AMA with me I end it by telling them to tell me to off to my face.

颂扬异端（heretic），庆祝那些成功，创造让每个人都有一定「造反」能力的场合。每位新员工跟我的第一场 AMA，我结束时都会跟他们说：当着我的面骂我「滚蛋」。

[1:12:45]

[laughter]

（笑声）

[1:12:45] Shyam

It's a way of, you know, it's very uncomfortable for them actually. They're almost not sure if this is like I'm like entrapping them in into something that's going to get them in trouble. But, you know, how can you say you have a flat culture if you can't tell the boss to off? It's like a small gesture, but it's trying to set the conditions to understand like, "Hey, we are a company that's committed to taking the very best idea regardless of where it comes from." Um and then putting all of our wood behind those arrows. And it's a it it And most of those ideas are usually some variants from what we're currently doing. Otherwise, it'd already be the current best idea. So, we've institutionalized like you you got to be careful how much you institutionalize but at minimally two times a year we have these these weeks of revolt where people are allowed to go build whatever they want. We're almost I like want the people to have a chip on their shoulder. Like the whole point is to prove that we've been up and doing it wrong and you know inspire us with the thing that you've built. And then if you have a culture that is just profoundly truth-seeking and it's like the truth is so charismatic that like now that I've seen it, I can't unsee it.

这是一种方式——其实这让他们非常不自在，他们几乎不确定我是不是在设套、要害他们惹上麻烦。但你想，如果你连当面骂老板「滚蛋」都做不到，你凭什么说自己有扁平的文化？这只是个小小的姿态，但它是在营造一种条件，让人明白：「嘿，我们是一家承诺采纳最好的想法的公司，不管它来自哪里。」然后把我们所有的资源都押在这些箭上。而且这些想法大多数都跟我们当下正在做的有些不同——否则它早就是当前的最佳想法了。所以我们把它制度化了——你得小心制度化的程度——但至少每年两次，我们有这种「造反周」，大家可以去构建任何自己想做的东西。我几乎是希望大家心里憋着一股劲，整个意义就在于证明「我们一直以来都做错了」，用你做出来的东西启发我们。而如果你的文化是深度求真的，真理本身就极具魅力——一旦我看见了它，就再也无法当作没看见。

[1:13:44] Shyam

Like this is obviously the right answer, let's go. It's not as hard as it may sound to get to to move and pivot on these things.

「这显然就是正确答案，走起。」在这些事情上要动起来、要转向，其实没有听上去那么难。

[1:13:49] Patrick

The AI time is so remarkable. We all have to deal with this new thing at the same time. It's uh probably like any crisis, there's both opportunity and danger bundled in the coming of AI for Palantir, too. How do you receive this new technology and make sure that you get better because of it and don't get disrupted because of it? Like you were a disruptor with this enterprise ontology concept, you know, killing the old like rigid database systems. You had an innovation. Now, like if I wanted to create a Palantir competitor, it would be much easier just by virtue of the technology that's available.

这个 AI 时代太不寻常了，我们所有人都得同时应对这个新事物。就像任何危机一样，AI 的到来对 Palantir 来说大概也是机会与危险并存。你们怎么迎接这项新技术，确保因它变得更强、而不是被它颠覆？要知道，你们当年靠企业本体论（ontology）这个概念当过颠覆者，干掉了那些僵化的旧数据库系统，你们有过一次创新。而现在，如果我想做一个 Palantir 的竞争对手，单凭现有的技术，门槛已经低多了。

[1:14:24] Shyam

only way you can do that is by disrupting yourself. So, to the point of institutionalizing rebellion and holding that up, it's like it is the perpetual motor of self-disruption. I think about it is like the most valuable thing is not to defend a moat or something, but it's to go charge after the new opportunity. Um and one of the things I think is unique about AI is how much it plays to the beginner's mind. Obviously, the first adopters of AI for us were the youngest hires. And um to the point of generating momentum, I didn't really bother with the people who were kind of cynical or dismissive of it. I let the young people generate just overwhelming productivity that almost in some sense humiliated or inspired other people to get on board.

唯一的办法就是自我颠覆。所以回到「把造反制度化并且高高举起」这一点——它就是自我颠覆的永动机。我的想法是：最有价值的事不是去守护什么护城河，而是冲向新的机会。我觉得 AI 有一点很独特：它特别偏爱初学者心态。很显然，我们这里最早采用 AI 的是最年轻的新员工。而说到制造势能——那些对 AI 冷嘲热讽或不屑一顾的人，我根本没去费心搭理。我让年轻人创造出压倒性的生产力，某种意义上几乎是「羞辱」或者说激励了其他人赶紧上车。

[1:15:05] Shyam

Uh and and there's just a similar phenomenon. There was like a weird, almost like out-of-body experience to someone who's been there 20 years, or someone who had been at Palantir 3 years is like, "You know what? The best people are doing this are really the young people." By which he meant people who'd been there like 3 months, you know, and that recognition of of Okay, so here we have someone who's not a gatekeeper. He's actually trying to find the insurgents and empower them and place them in places where they can go forth and and do better and we can all learn together by doing that. It's been actually really fun with the rate of transformation for AI and what it's really enabled to be possible.

还有一个类似的现象。有种奇怪的、几乎灵魂出窍般的体验：一位在 Palantir 待了 3 年的人说：「你知道吗？做这件事做得最好的，其实是那些年轻人。」他指的是入职才 3 个月的人。而这种认知意味着——好，我们这儿有一个人，他不当守门人，而是主动去寻找那些「起义者」，赋能他们，把他们放到能大展拳脚、做得更好的位置上，我们所有人也借此一起学习。说实话，AI 带来的这种变革速度、它让哪些事成为可能，这个过程真的非常有意思。

[1:15:37] Patrick

Everyone's trying to answer this question of like, "Okay, we have AI, like who's going to Where's going to the value going to get captured in the in the whole like stack or chain or however you want to think about it?" What's your answer to that question?

所有人都在试图回答这个问题：「好，我们有了 AI，那价值会在整个技术栈、或者说价值链——随你怎么理解——的哪个环节被捕获？」你对这个问题的答案是什么？

[1:15:47] Shyam

We think that the value is going to accrue at the at the chips layer and at at the ontology layer. If you kind of squint at the stack, I'll skip over some parts of this, but you have chips, you have the model providers, you have AI infrastructure, which is where we think the ontology sits, and then you have AI applications. And what you kind of observe out there is the model companies have to run up the stack away from just providing a pure model, because the model is commoditized. It's really everything they build around the model that is a solution that they're going to try to build value off of.

我们认为价值会沉淀在两个层面：芯片层和 ontology（本体论）层。如果你眯起眼睛看整个技术栈——中间有些环节我先跳过——你有芯片，有模型供应商，有 AI 基础设施（我们认为 ontology 就在这一层），然后是 AI 应用。你在市场上能观察到的现象是：模型公司不得不往栈的上层跑，不能只提供一个纯粹的模型，因为模型已经商品化了。他们真正想构建价值的，是围绕模型搭建的一整套解决方案。

[1:16:19] Shyam

When you look at the AI pure play applications, they're running down. As they start to scale their businesses, have to deal with more customers, more of their customers' data, they're reinventing the AI infrastructure, essentially AIP, from first principles, recognizing why they need it. Now, of course, through some divine intervention, we've built this platform over the last 20 years, and you can say arguably the the meat of it since 2015 with Foundry leading to AIP, that gives us a huge head start on these things. And even if these models help you code faster, there's there's there's the code and there's the the secrets that actually is behind why we built the code. So, where are we going to be in 2 years? Where are we going to be in 2 years and after that? So, I I think that's We feel like we're in a very good position there and that's expressed by like the way we measure this is how quickly can I deliver value for my customers? You know, how quickly can I deliver enterprise autonomy or fundamentally change my customers' businesses? And not only has that number been awesome, like I'd say 2 years ago we could do that inside of 8 weeks. Now,

再看那些纯 AI 应用公司，他们在往下走。随着业务规模扩大、要应对更多客户和更多客户数据，他们正在从第一性原理出发重新发明 AI 基础设施——本质上就是 AIP——因为他们意识到了自己为什么需要它。当然，仿佛冥冥中自有安排，我们在过去 20 年里已经把这个平台建好了，可以说核心部分是从 2015 年开始的，从 Foundry 一路演进到 AIP，这让我们在这些事上有巨大的先发优势。而且就算这些模型能帮你更快地写代码，代码是一回事，代码背后我们为什么这么写的那些秘诀是另一回事。那么两年后我们会在哪里？两年后、以及更远的将来呢？我觉得我们在这方面处于非常有利的位置，而这体现在我们衡量自己的方式上：我能多快为客户交付价值？多快交付企业自主化（enterprise autonomy）、或者从根本上改变客户的业务？这个数字不仅一直很漂亮——大概两年前我们能在 8 周内做到，现在——

[1:17:18] Shyam

it feels like a week, you know, so like that that rate is compounding dramatically.

感觉一周就够了。所以这个速度在以惊人的方式复利增长。

[1:17:23] Patrick

One thing I'm really fascinated about you is for so long you were sort of like an if you know, you know guy, very much behind the scenes, you know, if you asked around like the person or one of the key people making this business work, the forward deployed thing, you know, lots of examples. And it seems like you've chosen to be a everybody knows guy. What is behind that choice? Like why why make that shift?

关于你本人，有件事让我特别着迷：很长时间里你都是那种「懂的人自然懂」的人物，非常幕后。如果你去打听，大家会说你就是让这家公司运转起来的那个人、或者关键人物之一——前沿部署（forward deployed）那套打法，例子很多。而现在你似乎选择成为一个「所有人都认识」的人。这个选择背后是什么？为什么要做这个转变？

[1:17:43] Shyam

I'd say I'm a bit reluctant about the shift, but I can't look my kids in the eye and not say that I'm ringing the bell that we're in an undeclared state of emergency. That really the first major public thing I put out there was the 18 theses, which is to say like we're in emergency, we've lost deterrence. I've been doing this for roughly 19 years at that point. Here's my diagnostic of what's wrong. The shot clock is ticking. Like we've got to coalesce around this problem. Now, on a note of profound optimism, I've seen more change in the Department of War in the last year than the prior 19 years and I think there to the point of Americans do the right thing having exhausted all the other options, like we are definitely in the place where we are starting to do the right things and the first derivative and even the second derivative is positive, going faster and faster here.

我得说，对这个转变我其实有点不情愿。但如果我不敲响警钟、不说出我们正处于一种未经宣布的紧急状态，我就没法直视我孩子们的眼睛。我第一次真正公开发声就是那篇「18 条论纲」（18 theses），核心就是说：我们处在紧急状态，我们已经失去了威慑力。到那时我干这行大概 19 年了，这是我对问题所在的诊断。进攻时限的秒表在滴答作响，我们必须围绕这个问题凝聚起来。不过说一点深切乐观的话：过去一年里我在战争部（Department of War）看到的变化，比之前 19 年加起来还多。正应了那句「美国人总会做正确的事——在把其他选项都试遍之后」，我们现在确实开始做正确的事了，而且一阶导数、甚至二阶导数都是正的，正在越跑越快。

[1:18:31] Patrick

How would you sum up the 18 theses? I know we've talked about lots of component parts of it already. Is there anything from that that was your first kind of big public thing that we haven't talked about that you think is important?

你会怎么概括那 18 条论纲？我知道其中不少组成部分我们已经聊过了。作为你第一次大规模公开发声的东西，里面还有什么我们没聊到、但你觉得重要的吗？

[1:18:41] Shyam

But if I was to synthesize it is we've lost deterrence. The reason this is not going to go the way World War II did is we don't have the industrial base we had in World War II. We have to recognize what are our unique American strengths. The person is the program. Like don't forget that Edward Hall built the Minuteman and Shriver was the Air Force general that oversaw our ICBMs and that we call it the Apollo program, but it was actually Gene Kranz's program and the primacy of those people and getting the right people in those roles is determinative to the success. It would be like thinking you could found a company by recipe as opposed like the company's future is determined by the founders.

如果要我提炼一下，就是：我们已经失去了威慑力。这一仗之所以不会像二战那样打，是因为我们已经没有二战时那样的工业基础了。我们必须认清美国独有的优势是什么。「人即项目」（the person is the program）。别忘了，是 Edward Hall 造出了民兵导弹（Minuteman），Schriever 是主管我们洲际弹道导弹的那位空军将军；我们管它叫阿波罗计划，但它实际上是 Gene Kranz 的计划。这些人的首要地位、把对的人放到对的位置上，对成败起决定性作用。以为可以照着配方创办一家公司是荒谬的——公司的未来是由创始人决定的。

[1:19:15] Shyam

That's like almost like the congenital limiter on what is actually possible. And of all cultures we should understand that. And then downstream of that we should recognize that there is no process out of this. The reason we're screwed right now is we we prayed at the altar of process. We thought if we follow this requirements process or we do this thing if we just let the bureaucracy work or lead to a good result. And the only thing that leads to is decline. And that if you look at all the great military innovations through history like Churchill built the tank as the head of the Royal Navy because the army, the British army wasn't smart enough to realize that horses were not going to win the next war. So he called it a land ship because he could only build ships.

这几乎就是决定「什么是真正可能的」的先天上限。而在所有文化里，我们最应该懂这一点。再往下推，我们应该认识到：靠流程是走不出困境的。我们现在之所以完蛋，就是因为我们跪在了流程的祭坛前。我们以为只要遵循这套需求流程、只要让官僚体系运转起来，就会有好结果。但那只会通向衰落。你去看历史上所有伟大的军事创新——比如坦克是 Churchill 以皇家海军首脑的身份造出来的，因为英国陆军还没聪明到意识到马匹赢不了下一场战争。所以他把它叫做「陆地战舰」（land ship），因为他只有造舰的权限。

[1:19:55] Shyam

So it was a land ship. You know, but that's not a one-off. Like literally every major military innovation including the Sidewinder missile which was like a rogue project that some guy kind of built with lighters with a new sort of seeker that totally humiliated the Air Force's missile in Vietnam and became now we think of it as the standard. You know, when Bill Perry became the the Assistant Secretary of Defense, he was staring down this thing. It's like, "Hey, I can either try to fix the system and lose implied or I can take the two things I really care about and make sure they work GPS and stealth. At every crossroads, it's the person who just wants to engage with the system we lose. And the person who's willing to just put it all on the line to make it work. And it was kind of a call to like if you're a latent heretic in the department, if you're a latent heretic in defense tech, this is the moment to express your heresy.

所以它成了「陆地战舰」。但这不是个例。几乎每一项重大军事创新都是这样，包括响尾蛇导弹（Sidewinder）——那本来是个「野路子」项目，某个人用一种新型导引头自己捣鼓出来的，结果在越南把空军的官方导弹羞辱得体无完肤，如今我们把它当成标配。再比如 Bill Perry 当上国防部副部长级官员时，面对整个体系，他的想法是：「我要么试着修好整个系统、然后注定失败；要么抓住我真正在乎的两样东西，确保它们能成——GPS 和隐身技术。」每到十字路口，那种只想「配合体制走流程」的人，我们就会输；而赢靠的是那种愿意押上一切让事情成的人。所以那篇文章其实是一声召唤：如果你是国防部里潜伏的异端（heretic），如果你是国防科技圈里潜伏的异端，现在就是你表达异端立场的时刻。

[1:20:45] Patrick

Is there anything about your worldview, Palantir, etc. that you think is would be surprising to an outsider that we haven't talked about?

关于你的世界观、Palantir 等等，还有什么是我们没聊到、但你觉得会让外人感到意外的吗？

[1:20:53] Shyam

First of all, we don't really think of ourselves a defense company. Like we're a software company. I think the fact that like half of our business is in government, 2/3 of that half is in defense, is actually more normal to historical kind of pattern that we've talked about here than the present. Um but the part that I think a lot of outsiders misunderstand is they somehow think we're either in the business of collecting data or doing surveillance. And that is is probably the part that's like least well understood about what we're doing. And I think the part I I So you you're we're engaging with the problems as they exist. And so you could say, "What is the problem that exists?" The core problem that we're set up to solve is the legitimacy of our institutions. Why do doors fall off planes? Why does it seem like our basic government services don't work?

首先，我们其实不把自己当成一家国防公司，我们是一家软件公司。我们一半的业务在政府，其中三分之二在国防——我认为这其实更符合我们前面聊过的历史常态，反而是当下才是反常的。但我觉得很多外人误解最深的一点是：他们以为我们要么是做数据收集生意的，要么是搞监控的。这可能是外界对我们所做之事理解最差的部分。我们是在直面现实中存在的问题。那你可以问：现实中的问题是什么？我们要解决的核心问题，是我们各种机构的正当性（legitimacy）。为什么飞机会掉舱门？为什么我们最基本的政府服务好像都不好使？

[1:21:41] Shyam

If you don't address those problems, if you don't build that state capacity, private sector, public sector, if you don't help these institutions get better, it breeds nihilism. It breeds this sense that we should just burn it all to the ground. There's nothing worth investing in. And that doesn't actually work. You know, it's just strictly a worse world. But that sort of energy is what you're fighting against. Our diagnosis of this problem, if you thought about these institutions, let's give the C-suite, government or private sector, the benefit of the doubt. They have the steering wheel, and they're diligently trying to steer the steering wheel.

如果你不解决这些问题、不建设这种国家能力——无论私营部门还是公共部门——不帮这些机构变好，它就会滋生虚无主义，滋生一种「干脆全烧了算了」的情绪，觉得没有任何东西值得投入。而那条路是走不通的，只会得到一个更糟的世界。但你要对抗的正是这种情绪。我们对这个问题的诊断是这样的：想象这些机构，我们先善意地假设——不管是政府还是私营部门的高管层——他们手握方向盘，也在勤勤恳恳地打方向。

[1:22:13] Shyam

What they don't understand is it's a Jungle Cruise prop from Disneyland. Like it's not connected to anything. And then you have the people down below who are kind of looking up and saying, "How could my leaders be so dumb?" You You that is where that neologism starts. And so the the What is the point of this operating system? Why are we trying to make these decisions better? We're trying to create something that's more responsive for the people who are leading these institutions and the people who do the work. And so much of the 20th century has been this wild managerial revolution that has concentrated power away from both these ends to an amorphous middle blob. That's where all the disconnection happens in the steering wheel. So, reasserting that in a way that like our institutions work for the people that they're designed to serve and that our companies are actually the best in the world and functioning and competitive.

他们不明白的是，那是个迪士尼乐园「丛林巡航」（Jungle Cruise）游乐设施上的道具方向盘——根本没连着任何东西。而下面干活的人抬头看着，心想：「我的领导怎么能蠢成这样？」那个新词就是这么来的。所以这套操作系统的意义是什么？我们为什么要让这些决策变得更好？我们想创造的，是对机构领导者和真正干活的人都更灵敏响应的东西。20 世纪的很大一部分，就是一场狂飙的管理革命（managerial revolution），它把权力从这两端抽走，集中到一团面目模糊的中间层。方向盘的所有脱节都发生在那里。所以要重新确立：我们的机构要为它们本该服务的人服务，我们的公司要真正做到世界最强、运转良好、有竞争力。

[1:23:01] Shyam

That's That's how you underwrite freedom and prosperity.

这才是自由与繁荣的底层保障。

[1:23:04] Patrick

This idea of like you have all this data, you're doing surveillance through this like panopticon and you know, in in America or something. Does that weigh on you? Does it weigh on you that like you are sort of cast as like uh as like an easy enemy or villain in in in certain people's stories?

关于那种说法——你们手握海量数据、在美国之类的地方通过一个「全景监狱」（panopticon）搞监控——这会让你有心理负担吗？在某些人的叙事里，你们被塑造成一个现成的敌人或反派，这会压在你心上吗？

[1:23:21] Shyam

It used to weigh on me. Part of it is like okay, you've been doing it for 20 years. Like okay, how long can this stuff keep weighing on you? But I I think it would be fair to say it weighs on every new employee when they come in. There's some journey of dealing with this. But that's I think it's also the the lot of the man in the arena. Like John We can end with John Boyd. Like to do or to be. Are you trying to be someone or you trying to do something? You know? We're trying to do something.

以前会。一方面是，你都干了 20 年了，这种事还能压你多久？但我觉得公平地说，每个新员工入职时都会有这个负担，都要经历一段消化它的心路历程。但我想，这也是「竞技场中人」（the man in the arena）的宿命。就像 John——我们可以用 John Boyd 收尾——to do or to be，你是想「成为个人物」，还是想「做成点事」？我们是想做成点事的。

[1:23:43] Patrick

That was one of my favorite lines from that book. Expand on that one bit more.

那是我在那本书里最喜欢的一句话。再展开讲讲。

[1:23:46] Shyam

So, John Boyd's advice to to other officers, other uniform service members always like, look, you can either be somebody or you can do something. But you can't really have both. And if you're going to be somebody, you got to play this game and it's all kind of theater, but you're going to get promoted and you're going to get the accolades and you're going to get the rewards of doing that and you're going to feel good about yourself. Or you can actually do something and it's going to feel really shitty and no one's going to appreciate it, but you're going to have the intrinsic reward of knowing that you did something.

John Boyd 给其他军官、其他现役军人的忠告一直是：听着，你要么去当个人物（be somebody），要么去做点事（do something），但两者基本不可兼得。如果你选择当个人物，你就得玩这套游戏，一切多少都是演戏，但你会升官、会得到荣誉和回报，你会自我感觉良好。或者你可以真的去做点事——过程会非常难受，没人会领情，但你会获得那种发自内心的回报：你知道自己做成了一件事。

[1:24:12] Patrick

You mentioned your dad earlier in the conversation. There's this visual story where I think he's held up at gunpoint or something early in his life. Went through a lot. I'm curious for you to reflect on the nature of fatherhood in this whole story. It seems like such a key your relationship with your dad seems like such a key part of your story from the outside and you're a dad yourself. Would you be willing to just like reflect on that a little bit?

你前面提到过你父亲。有一个画面感很强的故事，好像是他早年曾被人拿枪指着头之类的，经历过很多。我很想请你聊聊「父亲」这个角色在你整个故事里的意义。从外面看，你和父亲的关系似乎是你人生故事里极为关键的一部分，而你自己现在也是一位父亲。愿意就此稍微展开谈谈吗？

[1:24:34] Shyam

I mean, it would be hard to overstate the impact that dad and his example had on me. Um you had such a selfless man who just gave everything to his family. Could could weather any humiliation in service of his children and his wife. And um I think when you're a kid you don't you like you you you learn this stuff subconsciously and you're like any normal kid, you know, this thing dad did is annoying or you don't you don't fully appreciate it, but it's like the culmination of all these events over time actually profoundly shape who you are and I hope I can set an example that inspires my kids to do the same sort of thing. And I think a lot of fatherhood is is is being a man that inspires your family to be better.

怎么强调父亲和他的榜样对我的影响都不为过。他是一个无比无私的人，把一切都给了家庭，为了子女和妻子可以忍受任何屈辱。我想，人在小时候是在潜意识里学会这些的——你就像任何一个普通孩子一样，会觉得「爸爸做的这事真烦人」，不会真正领会它的分量。但正是这些事日积月累的沉淀，深刻地塑造了你是谁。我希望自己也能树立这样的榜样，激励我的孩子去做同样的事。我觉得为父之道，很大程度上就是做一个能激励家人变得更好的男人。

[1:25:21] Patrick

When I do these my closing question is the same for everybody. What is the kindest thing that anyone's ever done for you?

每次做节目，我的收尾问题对所有人都一样：别人为你做过的最善意的事是什么？

[1:25:26] Shyam

The greatest thing which is covered in in the story is uh Miss Ethel Danhoff was the head of admissions for this private school in Orlando. Uh and you know, my my dad took me for a tour of the school having learned that it's the best school and like that was the that was the other fixation my dad has that education was how you were going to achieve some prosperity. It's like I'm going to give my son every opportunity I possibly can. Turns out we'd missed the admission window by a mile and everything was kind of done and you know, I I was actually very reluctant to go even on this trip and see the school. I was very happy with the school I was at and but I was when I saw the science facilities there, I was like I need to go here. I need to learn this stuff. This is inspiring.

这个故事里最了不起的地方是——Ethel Danhoff 女士，她是奥兰多一所私立学校的招生主任。我爸听说那是最好的学校，就带我去参观。这也是我爸的另一个执念：教育是你通往富足生活的路径。他的想法就是，我要给我儿子我能给的一切机会。结果我们把申请窗口错过了十万八千里，一切基本都尘埃落定了。而且说实话，我当时连去参观都很不情愿，我对当时就读的学校挺满意的。但当我看到那里的科学实验设施时，我心想：我必须来这儿上学，我要学这些东西，这太让人振奋了。

[1:26:09] Shyam

And you know, so now I was all spun up and excited and of course I'm learning, hey, you totally screwed this up and you'll have to wait a year. And Ms. Danhoff, I no data. Like, you know, it's not like I had some standardized test scores or something. She's like, "Give this kid the admission test. Just do it." And maybe she had a modicum of data after that test, but we were a family that needed financial aid. So, it's like, here it is. Like, let's admit a kid that we're going to have to subsidize to come here. And that opened the entire future. And I think, you know, if you look later in life, okay, maybe maybe people have cynical reasons to help you. You're further along. They they think there might be something in it. It's like, there's nothing in it for her. It's just a profound act of kindness that fundamentally changed my life.

于是我整个人都兴奋起来了，当然接着就得知：嘿，你把这事彻底搞砸了，得再等一年。而 Danhoff 女士——我当时没有任何数据可看，又不是说我有什么标准化考试成绩之类的。她说：「给这孩子安排入学考试，就这么办。」考完之后她手里也许有了那么一点点数据，但我们家是需要助学金的家庭。所以等于是：明摆着的，我们要录取一个还得学校倒贴钱资助的孩子。而这打开了我此后的整个人生。我觉得，你看人生再往后的阶段，好吧，也许别人帮你是出于功利的算计——你已经有些成就了，他们觉得可能有利可图。但对她来说，这里面没有任何好处。这纯粹是一次深刻的善举，从根本上改变了我的人生。

[1:26:51] Patrick

Great place to close, John. Thanks for your time.

这是个绝佳的收尾，Shyam。谢谢你抽出时间。

[1:26:52] Shyam

Thank you.

谢谢。

[1:26:57] Patrick

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[1:27:36] Patrick

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Ridgeline 正在重新定义资产管理技术——它是真正的合作伙伴，而不只是一个软件供应商。他们已帮助多家机构实现 5 倍规模扩张，带来更快的增长、更聪明的运营和竞争优势。访问 ridgelineapps.com，看看他们能为你的公司释放什么。OpenAI、Cursor、Anthropic、Perplexity 和 Vercel 有一个共同点：它们都在用 WorkOS。原因是这样的：要实现大规模的企业级采用，你必须交付 SSO、SCIM、RBAC、审计日志这些核心能力。这正是 WorkOS 的用武之地。你不用花几个月自己搭建这些关键能力，直接用 WorkOS 的 API，第一天就能全部拥有。这就是为什么你听说过的许多顶级 AI 团队已经跑在 WorkOS 上。WorkOS 是让你最快具备企业级就绪、并专注于最重要的事——你的产品——的方式。访问 workos.com 开始使用。每位投资人都该了解 Rogo，因为 Rogo AI 的平台不是又一个泛泛的聊天机器人。

[1:28:30] Patrick

Instead, it was designed to support how Wall Street bankers and investors actually work, from sourcing, diligence, and modeling to turning analysis into deliverables. For me, three key things differentiate Rogo. First, it connects directly to your systems so it can work with your actual data. Second, it understands your workflows, how work really happens across a deal or an investment. And third, it runs end-to-end and produces real outputs the way the best people do, auditable spreadsheets, investment memos, diligence materials, and slide decks that match your standards. This all comes from the fact that Rogo is built by finance professionals for finance professionals, and it's already being adopted by some of the most demanding institutions in the world. To learn more, visit rogo.ai/invest.

相反，它是为华尔街银行家和投资人真实的工作方式设计的——从项目挖掘、尽职调查、建模，到把分析变成可交付成果。对我来说，Rogo 有三点关键差异化。第一，它直接连接你的系统，能基于你的真实数据工作。第二，它理解你的工作流——一笔交易或一项投资中工作实际是怎么推进的。第三，它端到端运行，像最优秀的人那样产出真正的成果：可审计的电子表格、投资备忘录、尽调材料，以及符合你标准的幻灯片。这一切都源于 Rogo 是由金融专业人士为金融专业人士打造的，而且它已经被世界上一些要求最苛刻的机构采用。想了解更多，请访问 rogo.ai/invest。