I was speaking to a group of about 300 kids, ages six to eight, at a children's museum, and I brought with me a bag full of legs, similar to the kinds of things you see up here, and had them laid out on a table for the kids. And, from my experience, you know, kids are naturally curious about what they don't know, or don't understand, or is foreign to them. They only learn to be frightened of those differences when an adult influences them to behave that way, and maybe censors that natural curiosity, or you know, reins in the question-asking in the hopes of them being polite little kids. So I just pictured a first grade teacher out in the lobby with these unruly kids, saying, "Now, whatever you do, don't stare at her legs." ( 當時我正與一群約有三百名的小孩說話， 年齡為六至八歲，在一個兒童博物館， 而我帶了一個裝滿了義肢的袋子， 跟你們在這裡看到的差不多， 還將它們擺放在一張桌子上，給小孩看。 然而，就我的經驗而言，孩子通常也是好奇的， 尤其是對於他們不知道的，不明白的， 或是對他們陌生的。 他們只學到對差異性感到害怕， 當成年人影響他們而表現成那樣， 也或許是壓抑了他們本有的好奇心， 又或是，不允許他們問問題， 希望他們變成有禮貌的小孩。 所以，我想像一班老師走出了大堂， 帶著一群不守規矩的孩子，老師會說：”好啦，不管你幹什麼， 就是別盯著她的腿看。“ )
0:54
But, of course, that's the point. That's why I was there, I wanted to invite them to look and explore. So I made a deal with the adults that the kids could come in without any adults for two minutes on their own. The doors open, the kids descend on this table of legs, and they are poking and prodding, and they're wiggling toes, and they're trying to put their full weight on the sprinting leg to see what happens with that. And I said, "Kids, really quickly — I woke up this morning, I decided I wanted to be able to jump over a house — nothing too big, two or three stories — but, if you could think of any animal, any superhero, any cartoon character, anything you can dream up right now, what kind of legs would you build me?" ( 但是，問題就在這兒， 我之所以會在那兒，就是想讓孩子們觀察和探索。 所以我就和成年人達成了協定， 讓孩子們在有成人陪伴下， 自己待兩分鐘。 門打開後，孩子們俯身擺弄起義肢 他們這兒戳戳那兒碰碰，搖搖腳趾頭， 還試著把整個身體壓在短跑義肢上， 看看會有什麼反應。 我說道：”孩子們，我今天早上醒來， 很快地做下決定，要能夠一下子跳過房子， 沒什麼大不了的，不過兩三層的高度， 但是，如果你能想到那些動物、超級英雄、卡通人物， 你能想到的任何一個， 你會給我造一副什麼樣的腿呢？“ )
1:36
And immediately a voice shouted, "Kangaroo!" "No, no, no! Should be a frog!" "No. It should be
Go Go Gadget!" "No, no, no! It should be the Incredibles." And other things that I don't — aren't familiar with. And then, one eight-year-old said, "Hey, why wouldn't you want to fly too?" And the whole room, including me, was like, "Yeah." (Laughter) And just like that, I went from being a woman that these kids would have been trained to see as "disabled" to somebody that had potential that their bodies didn't have yet. Somebody that might even be super-abled. Interesting. ( 立即有孩子 答道：“長頸鹿！” “不對，不 對！應該是青蛙！” “不對，應該是神探佳傑特（上世紀80年代動畫人物）！” “不對，不對，都不對！應該是超人特工隊（迪士尼2004年出品動畫電影）” 還有其他一些我不太熟悉的。 然後，一個8歲的孩子說道， “嗨，為什麼你不想飛呢？” 所有在場的人，包括我，驚歎道“對啊” （笑） 就這樣，我從一個女人， 一個這些孩子被教育成看待的“殘疾人” 變成了一個擁有他們所沒有的潛能的人。 一個很有可能有超人能力的人。 很有趣吧! )
2:16
So some of you actually saw me at TED, 11 years ago. And there's been a lot of talk about how life-changing this conference is for both speakers and attendees, and I am no exception. TED literally was the launch pad to the next decade of my life's exploration. At the time, the legs I presented were groundbreaking in prosthetics. I had woven carbon fiber sprinting legs modeled after the hind leg of a cheetah, which you may have seen on stage yesterday. And also these very life-like, intrinsically painted silicone legs. ( 在座的有些人11年前在TED見過我 當時人們熱烈討論這個會議是如何如何改變人生。 不管你是聽眾還是發言人，我也不例外， TED可以說是開啟了我之後10年的探索。 當時，我展示的義肢是修復術的創新技術。 我當時接上了碳纖維製成， 仿獵豹後肢的短跑義肢。 可能你們昨天有看過。 而這些噴漆矽膠義肢是這樣的栩栩如生。 )
2:52
So at the time, it was my opportunity to put a call out to innovators outside the traditional medical prosthetic community to come bring their talent to the science and to the art of building legs. So that we can stop compartmentalizing form, function and aesthetic, and assigning them different values. Well, lucky for me, a lot of people answered that call. And the journey started, funny enough, with a
TED conference attendee — Chee Pearlman, who hopefully is in the audience somewhere today. She was the editor then of a magazine called
ID, and she gave me a cover story. ( 當時，我有機會 在傳統醫學修復領域創新， 把他們的才智與科學、藝術相結合， 製造義肢。 這樣我們就不必把外觀、功能和美學劃分開來， 並賦予不同的價值。 幸運的是，很多人做出了回應， 旅程就這樣開始了，很有趣的是，有一個TED參會者， 琪˙皮爾曼，希望她今天也在場， 她當時是一本名為《ID》的雜誌的編輯， 她將我的照片放在封面， )
3:31
This started an incredible journey. Curious encounters were happening to me at the time; I'd been accepting numerous invitations to speak on the design of the cheetah legs around the world. And people would come up to me after the conference, after my talk, men and women. And the conversation would go something like this, "You know Aimee, you're very attractive. You don't look disabled." (Laughter) I thought, "Well, that's amazing, because I don't feel disabled." And it really opened my eyes to this conversation that could be explored, about beauty. What does a beautiful woman have to look like? What is a sexy body? And interestingly, from an identity standpoint, what does it mean to have a disability? I mean, people —
Pamela Anderson has more prosthetic in her body than I do. Nobody calls her disabled. (Laughter) ( 接下來我開始了一場奇妙的旅程。 當時我碰到了很多奇妙的人和事， 許多人邀請我去做演講， 並在世界各地討論仿獵豹義肢技術。 人們在演講後找上我， 不論男女。 談話內容不外乎 “要知道，艾美，你很迷人。 一點不像有殘疾的。” （笑） 我想“這還挺神的， 因為我一點也不感到殘疾。” 這真的大大地打開了我對這個主題的眼界， 美也可以被探索。 一個美麗的女人應該長什麼樣？ 什麼是性感的身體？ 很有趣的是，從一個人的角度看， 殘疾意味著什麼？ 我是說，有人—比如帕米拉•安德森（美國豔星，以其碩大的隆胸著稱）的修復程度可大大高過我， 可沒人說她殘疾。 )
4:28
So this magazine, through the hands of graphic designer
Peter Saville, went to fashion designer
Alexander McQueen, and photographer Nick Knight, who were also interested in exploring that conversation. So, three months after TED I found myself on a plane to
London, doing my first fashion shoot, which resulted in this cover — "Fashion-able"? Three months after that, I did my first runway show for Alexander McQueen on a pair of hand-carved
wooden legs made from solid ash. Nobody knew — everyone thought they were wooden boots. Actually, I have them on stage with me: grapevines, magnolias — truly stunning. Poetry matters. Poetry is what elevates the banal and neglected object to a realm of art. It can transform the thing that might have made people fearful into something that invites them to look, and look a little longer, and maybe even understand. ( 後來這期《ID》雜誌，經美術設計師皮特•薩維耶之手 傳到了時裝設計師亞歷山大•麥昆和攝影師尼克•奈特手中， 他們也對探索相關方面很感興趣。 參加完TED幾個月後，我就搭上了前往 倫敦的航班，攝製我的第一組時尚雜誌照片。 結果可以從這本雜誌封面看出。 時尚?! 3個月後，我為亞歷山大•麥昆做了第一場時裝秀， 穿戴著一副硬木手工義肢。 沒有人知道—大家都以為這是木靴， 事實上，它們現在就在臺上。 葡萄藤、木蘭花，令人驚艷。 詩意很重要， 詩歌能把陳腐和受忽視的東西提升到高層次， 進入藝術的境界。 能把令人生畏的東西轉化成 引人入勝的東西， 讓人駐足良久， 也許甚至能讓人們理解。)
5:34
I learned this firsthand with my next adventure. The artist
Matthew Barney, in his film opus called the "
The Cremaster Cycle." This is where it really hit home for me — that my legs could be wearable sculpture. And even at this point, I started to move away from the need to replicate human-ness as the only aesthetic ideal. So we made what people lovingly referred to as glass legs even though they're actually optically clear polyurethane, a.k.a. bowling ball material. Heavy! Then we made these legs that are cast in soil with a potato root system growing in them, and beetroots out the top, and a very lovely brass toe. That's a good close-up of that one. Then another character was a half-woman, half-cheetah — a little homage to my life as an athlete. 14 hours of prosthetic make-up to get into a creature that had articulated paws, claws and a tail that whipped around, like a gecko. (Laughter) And then another pair of legs we collaborated on were these — look like jellyfish legs, also polyurethane. And the only purpose that these legs can serve, outside the context of the film, is to provoke the senses and ignite the imagination. So whimsy matters. ( 這些是我從我的下一個冒險中學到的。 藝術家馬修•巴尼在他的影片《懸絲》， 也就是這部影片讓我真正地察覺到 我的雙腿竟可以成為雕塑品。 這時，我就跳脫以模仿人體的需求 作為理想美學的框架。 後來我們研製了人們稱為玻璃腿的義肢， 雖然它們實際上是剔透的聚亞安酯製作的， 也就是製造保齡球的材料。 很重！ 後來我們用根與土壤的東西塑造這種義肢， 把馬鈴薯植入其中，把甜菜根種在上頭， 還裝上了很可愛的銅質腳趾。 就這樣完成了一個傑作。 另一個造型是半人半獸， 是對我運動員生涯的小小致敬。 14個小時的義肢彩繪， 才看起來像有靈活爪子、 搖來搖去的尾巴的生物， 有點像壁虎。 （笑） 另一副我們合作的是這一雙腳， 看起來有那麼一點像水母， 同樣也是聚亞安酯製成的。 這副義肢唯一的用途就是 除了電影裏的展示， 就是給人們感官刺激並激發人們的想像。 所以多變性很重要。)
6:56
Today, I have over a dozen pair of prosthetic legs that various people have made for me, and with them I have different negotiations of the terrain under my feet, and I can change my height — I have a variable of five different heights. (Laughter) Today, I'm 6'1". And I had these legs made a little over a year ago at Dorset Orthopedic in England and when I brought them home to Manhattan, my first night out on the town, I went to a very fancy party. And a girl was there who has known me for years at my normal 5'8". Her mouth dropped open when she saw me, and she went, "But you're so tall!" And I said, "I know. Isn't it fun?" I mean, it's a little bit like wearing stilts on stilts, but I have an entirely new relationship to door jams that I never expected I would ever have. And I was having fun with it. And she looked at me, and she said, "But, Aimee, that's not fair." (Laughter) (Applause) And the incredible thing was she really meant it. It's not fair that you can change your height, as you want it. ( 今天，我帶了至少12副義肢， 它們是由不同的人為我製作的， 不同的義肢給了我腳下大地的不同體驗。 我還可以改變身高， 我有5個身高。 （笑） 今天，我有6呎1（約186cm） 我身上這副義肢大概是一年前做的， 在英國的多西特整形外科做的， 當我把它們帶回曼哈頓的家裏， 我回來後第一次出來是去一個高級宴會。 舞會上有個我認識多年的女士， 不過那時我只有5尺8（約177cm） 她看到我驚訝不已。 她說道“你怎麼那麼高！” 我說道“是啊，挺好玩的，不是嗎？” 有點像站在高蹺上踩高蹺， 我從此對門的高度有了全新體驗。 這是始料未及的新天地， 我樂在其中。 她看著我， 說道：“但是，艾美，這可不公平。” （笑） （鼓掌） 最奇妙的是她是認真的， 能隨意改變身高， 可不公平。)
8:04
And that's when I knew — that's when I knew that the conversation with society has changed profoundly in this last decade. It is no longer a conversation about overcoming deficiency. It's a conversation about augmentation. It's a conversation about potential. A prosthetic limb doesn't represent the need to replace loss anymore. It can stand as a symbol that the wearer has the power to create whatever it is that they want to create in that space. So people that society once considered to be disabled can now become the architects of their own identities and indeed continue to change those identities by designing their bodies from a place of empowerment. And what is exciting to me so much right now is that by combining cutting-edge technology — robotics, bionics — with the age-old poetry, we are moving closer to understanding our collective humanity. I think that if we want to discover the full potential in our humanity, we need to celebrate those heartbreaking strengths and those glorious disabilities that we all have. I think of Shakespeare's Shylock: "If you prick us, do we not bleed, and if you tickle us, do we not laugh?" It is our humanity, and all the potential within it, that makes us beautiful. Thank you. (Applause) ( 那時我才知道— 也就是這時我才知道社會上人們的對話 在近10年來， 已有了重大變革。 不再只是克服先天障礙， 是關於增量。 是關於潛能。 義肢的作用不再僅局限於代替身體缺失部分， 它們可以作為佩戴者身份的象徵， 可以創造佩戴者天馬行空的想像， 在屬於他們的空間中。 所以那些社會一度認為是殘障的人， 可以成為塑造自己身份的建築師， 並且切實繼續改變身份， 僅憑設計自己的身體， 從一個強大的源泉獲取靈感。 現在令我激動不已的是， 通過尖端科技， 機器人技術、仿生學— 及由來已久的詩意， 我們向自身的集體人性邁進了一步。 我認為要發掘自身 人性的的潛質， 我們要讚美那些令人心碎的力量， 那些光榮的殘缺，人人都有這些， 我想起了沙士比亞筆下的夏洛克: “你們要是用刀劍刺我們，我們不是也會出血的嗎？ 你們要是搔我們的癢，我們不是也會笑起來的嗎？” 這就是我們的人性， 及其所有的潛質， 也正是這些讓我們熠熠生輝。 謝謝 (鼓掌)
