Games Primates Play-People behave just like the apes they are
灵长类的把戏——人的行为就像猿猴
Generally, junior professors write long and unsolicited emails to senior professors, who reply with short ones after a delay; the juniors then reply quickly and at length. This is not because the seniors are busier, for they, too, write longer and more punctually when addressing their deans and funders, who reply more briefly and tardily. The asymmetry in length and speed of reply correlates with dominance.
在学术界，一般来说年轻的教授会主动地给资深教授写长长的邮件，而后者会在拖延一段时间后简短地回复，然后年轻教授很快又详尽地回复。这并不是因为资深教授们更忙，他们自己也常常会在给他们的院长或研究资金提供者写信时把邮件写得较长较详细，然后在经过漫长的等待后得到一封简短的回复。邮件回复长度和速度上的这种不对称性，和双方关系中支配地位的归属有关。
When a subordinate chimpanzee grooms a dominant one, it often does so for a long time and unsolicited. When it then requests to be groomed in turn, it receives only a brief grooming and usually after having to ask a second time.
在动物界，地位较低的黑猩猩常常自愿为占主导地位的黑猩猩仔细梳理毛发，但当他反过来要求对方帮忙梳理毛发时，通常要一再要求才行，而对方往往也只是简单应付一下了事。
This gorgeous little juxtaposition of tales comes from a new book by Dario Maestripieri of the University of Chicago, who is both a professor and a primatologist (and a primate). His book, called “Games Primates Play,” is devoted to ramming home a lesson that we all seem very reluctant to learn: that much of our behavior, however steeped in technology, is entirely predictable to primatologists.
这两个相互映照的趣味小故事来自一本叫《灵长类的把戏》（Game Primates Play）的新书，作者Dario Maestripieri教授供职于芝加哥大学，是一名灵长类动物学家（也是一头灵长类动物J）。他的书想让我们彻底认清一个我们似乎都极不情愿去了解的事实：尽管人类在科技上已经有了长足的进步，但我们的很多行为仍完全在一个灵长类动物学家的预料之内。
He observes two university colleagues in a coffee shop and notes how the senior one takes the chair with the back to the wall (the better to spot attacks by rivals or leopards), is less attentive to her colleague’s remarks than vice versa, stares down her colleague when a contentious issue comes up and takes the lead on walking out the door at the end-all of it neatly corresponding to the behavior of two baboons when one is dominant.
他在一家咖啡店观察了两位大学同事的举止。他注意到，两人中较资深的一位选择了背靠着墙的椅子（更容易发现对手或者豹子，如果有的话），和对方相比在对话中较不专心，当发生分歧时双眼直盯着对方，最后出门时也走在前面。他们在整个过程中的表现和两只有着支配-从属关系的狒狒毫无二致。
(A new member of a committee on which I served once asked me why a senior colleague was being so horrible to him. I replied: “Oh, it’s because when a new male baboon joins a troop, it’s traditional for the alpha male to beat him up before becoming his best friend-soon he’ll think the world of you.” I was right.)
（有一次，我所在委员会的一位新成员问我为什么一位资深同事对他那么差。我回答说：“哦，这是因为一只新的公狒狒加入一个群体时，群内雄一号通常会先暴揍它一顿，然后再成为它最好的朋友——那位同事不久就会成为处处为你着想的朋友了。”我果然猜对了。）
Dr. Maestripieri’s most intriguing chapter is entitled “Cooperate in the Spotlight, Compete in the Dark.” He describes how people, like monkeys, can be angels of generosity when all eyes are on them, but devils of spite in private. Famously, the citizens of New York City turned to crime when the lights went out in the blackout of July 13, 1977-not because they were evil but because the cost-benefit calculus was altered by the darkness.
Maestripieri博士书中最引人注目的一章名为：“光明促进合作，黑幕导致竞争”。他描述道，人就像猴子一样，在受人瞩目时可以慷慨得像个天使，但私下里却可以恶毒得像个魔鬼。正如广为人知的那样，在1977年7月13日夜晚那次大停电期间，纽约发生了很多恶性犯罪，这并不是因为人性本恶，只是由于黑暗使得犯罪成本降低而已。
Dr. Maestripieri then offers a fascinating analysis of the conundrum of peer review in science. Peer review is asymmetric: The author’s name is known, but the reviewers remain anonymous. This is to prevent reciprocal cooperation (or “pal review”): I’ll be nice about your paper if you’re nice about mine.
然后，Maestripieri博士提供了一个对科学界同行评审机制的有趣分析。同行评审本身是不对称的：论文作者的名字是公开的，而评审者却是匿名的。这种机制是为了防止互惠合作（reciprocal cooperation），或者叫“熟人评审”——如果这次你对我的论文高抬贵手，那下一次我也会投桃报李。
In this it partly works, though academics often drop private hints to each other to show that they have done review favors. But peer review is plagued by the opposite problem-spiteful criticism to prevent competitors from getting funded or published.
这种机制还算发挥了一些作用，尽管学者们常常相互留下隐秘线索，表示自己已经照顾了人情。然而，同行评审中反面的问题却要严重得多：评审者可能用恶意差评来打击同行竞争者，以阻止对方发表论文或得到科研基金资助。
Like criminals in a blackout, anonymous reviewers, in the book’s words, “loot the intellectual property of the authors whose work they review” (by delaying publication while pinching the ideas for their own projects) and “damage or destroy the reviewed authors’ property” (by denying their competitors grants and publications).
就像停电时的罪犯，用书中的话来说，匿名评审者还会“掠夺了被评审作者的知识产权”（借助评审来拖延原作者论文的发表，然后窃取论文中的研究成果，用于自己的研究项目），而且“毁掉了原作者的劳动成果”（通过否决竞争者的研究资金申请和发表申请）。
Studies show that peer reviewers are motivated by tribal as well as individual rivalry. Says Dr. Maestripieri: “I am a Monkey-Man, and when I submit a grant application for peer review, I am terrified that it might fall into the hands of the Rat-People. They want to exterminate all of us…(because our animals are cooler than theirs).”
研究表明，同行评审者利用评审机制进行恶意竞争，既可能出于个人竞争，也可能出于学术派系斗争。Maestripieri博士说道：当我提交研究资金申请给同行评审时，我总是害怕它可能会落到一些卑鄙小人的手中，他们总想着把我们赶尽杀绝。因为他们是一群鼠辈，而我们好歹和猴子同属灵长类，比他们要高级。
His answer (and it applies to far more fields than science) is total transparency with the help of the Internet. The more light you shine, the less crime primates commit. Once everybody can see who’s reviewing whose papers and grant applications, then not only will spite decline, but so will nepotism and reciprocity. Anonymity alters the cost-benefit balance in favor of competition; transparency alters it in favor of cooperation.
（至于如何解决这一问题）他的回答是（还可适用于科研以外的更多领域），我们要利用互联网让评审达到完全公开透明。事情越公开，灵长类能犯的罪恶就越少。如果每个人都可以知道每一篇论文、每一项研究资金评审的评审者和作者，不仅恶意评审会减少，任人唯亲，互惠合作的现象也会减少。匿名机制使得成本收益的天平偏向竞争，而公开透明则使得合作成为较好的选择。
翻译：张三(@老子毫无动静的坐着像一段呆木头)
校对：Drunkplane（@暂时只看书不旅行了-zny），小册子（@昵称被抢的小册子）
编辑：辉格@whigzhou