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And I liked drinking too, but it was obvious that alcohol was really the more dangerous of the two,but my friends and I could get busted for smoking a joint.
我也很喜歡喝酒，但是很顯然這兩者中酒精確實更加危險，可是我和我的朋友是有可能因為吸食大麻而被抓的。
Now, that hypocrisy kept bugging me,so I wrote my Ph.D dissertation on international drug control.
這個表里不一的概念不停地纏著我，所以我寫的博士論文就是研究國際藥物管制。
I talked my way into the State Department.
我想辦法進入了政府部門。
I got a security clearance.
我得到了安全許可。
I interviewed hundreds of DEA and other law enforcement agents all around Europe and the Americas,and I'd ask them,
我采訪了數百名在歐洲和美洲等地工作的藥品管制局和執法人員。我會問他們：
What do you think the answer is?
你認為答案是什么？
Well, in Latin America, they'd say to me,you can't really cut off the supply.
好吧，在拉丁美洲，他們會跟我說，你真的沒辦法切斷供應。
The answer lies back in the U.S.,in cutting off the demand.
答案在于美國，在于切斷需求。
So then I go back home and I talk to people involved in anti-drug efforts there, and they'd say,You know, Ethan, you can't really cut off the demand.
于是我回到家鄉，我問那些參與禁毒工作的人，他們卻說，你知道嗎，Ethan，你無法真正切斷需求。
The answer lies over there. You've got to cut off the supply.
答案在那邊。你必須得切斷供應。
Then I'd go and talk to the guys in customs trying to stop drugs at the borders,and they'd say, You're not going to stop it here.
然后，我去跟海關那邊的家伙聊能否在邊境阻止毒品進入。他們說，你不可能在這里把它堵住的。
The answer lies over there,in cutting off supply and demand.
答案在那邊，你得切斷供應和需求。
And it hit me:
在那一刻，我終于明白了，
Everybody involved in this thought the answer lay in that area about which they knew the least.
每一個參與其中的人都認為答案在別的領域而他們自己，對其知之甚少。
So that's when I started reading everything I could about psychoactive drugs: the history, the science,the politics, all of it,and the more one read,the more it hit you how a thoughtful,enlightened, intelligent approach took you over here,whereas the politics and laws of my country were taking you over here.
于是我開始盡可能閱讀一切關于精神藥物的資料：它的歷史、科學、政治…所有的一切。而讀的越多，你就越會意識到，一個深思熟慮、有啟發性、聰明的方向把你引向這里，而我們國家的政治和法律卻把你帶到這里。
And that disparity struck me as this incredible intellectual and moral puzzle.
這懸殊的差異令我震驚這真是個令人難以置信的智力和道德難題。
There's probably never been a drug-free society.
這世上可能從來不存在一個沒有毒品的社會。
Virtually every society has ingested psychoactive substances to deal with pain, increase our energy, socialize,even commune with God.
幾乎每一個社會都有使用精神藥物用來解決疼痛、提升精力、社交應酬、甚至是用來與神對話。
Our desire to alter our consciousness may be as fundamental as our desires for food, companionship and sex.
我們這種對于知覺改變的渴望可能和我們對食物、友誼、性的渴望一樣基本。
So our true challenge is to learn how to live with drugs so they cause the least possible harm and in some cases the greatest possible benefit.
因此，我們真正的挑戰在于學會如何與精神藥物共存從而使它造成的傷害最小并且在某些情況下，帶來最大的益處。
I'll tell you something else I learned,that the reason some drugs are legal and others not has almost nothing to do with science or health or the relative risk of drugs,and almost everything to do with who uses and who is perceived to use particular drugs.
讓我告訴你們我學到的另一件事，之所以有些藥物是合法的，有些則不是，這跟科學、健康或藥物相應的風險幾乎沒有任何關系；而是跟誰在使用、或誰被視作在使用特定藥物有關。
In the late 19th century,when most of the drugs that are now illegal were legal,the principal consumers of opiates in my country and others were middle-aged white women,using them to alleviate aches and pains when few other analgesics were available.
在19世紀后期，當大多數現在非法的藥物都還是合法的時候，我國和其他國家，鴉片的主要消費者是中年白人婦女她們用鴉片來緩解疼痛當時很少有別的止痛藥可用。
And nobody thought about criminalizing it back then because nobody wanted to put Grandma behind bars.
而且沒人想過把它定為刑事犯罪，因為沒有人希望把奶奶關進監獄。
