文︰子慧
Optimist是乐观的人。 Optimistic是形容词，解乐观的。 Optimistic是tends to be hopeful and confident about the future or the success of something，凡事向好的方面看，对未来抱有信心和希望。
Pollyanna是an excessively cheerful or optimistic person。 Excessive解过度的，例如︰Excessive eating could damage health.（暴饮暴食有损健康。）Excessively解过分地、过量地。字典解Pollyanna为过度开心和乐观、盲目乐观的人。
Pessimist是a person who tends to see the worst aspect of things or believe that the worst will happen，凡事向坏的一面看，相信最坏的事情都会发生。
Naysayer是one who denies, refuses, opposes, or is skeptical or cynical about something，凡事都唱反调的人。
凡事唱反调
Cheerful和optimistic都是好的，开心和乐观不是应该愈多愈好吗？当然，“乐观”得对可能发生的问题视而不见，这自然有问题，或可能就是所谓的excessively optimistic。 Naysayer凡事唱反调，没有什么可以令其满意。什么事也寸步难行，因为naysayer只会指出无数的问题，却永不会提出解决办法。
海伦凯勒说：”No pessimist ever discovered the secrets of the stars, or sailed to an uncharted land, or opened a new heaven to the human spirit.”（从来没有悲观的人会洞悉星辰的奥秘，航行到新天地，又或为人类精神领域闯开新天堂。）
美国着名传道人和励志演讲家Robert H. Schuller就说︰”Optimism refuses to believe that the road ends without options.”（相信天无绝人之路，那就是乐观。）
Winston Churchill说：”A pessimist sees the difficulty in every opportunity; an optimist sees the opportunity in every difficulty.”（悲观者只会在机遇中挑问题，乐观者则在问题中找机遇。）
进步缔改变
其实我们身边有很多naysayers，觉得今天的世界一团糟、经济不好、社会动荡、恐袭频仍。但Gregg Easterbrook在It’s better than it looks中，就告诉我们其实今天的世界比历史上任何一个时期都要好。
他说很多人有相反的印象，可能是因为进步会带来改变：
Change may benefit some more than others; even universally（普遍地） desirable change may be greeted with trepidation（惊悸、不安）. As changes occur more frequently, these negative feelings rise, regardless of whether, on balance, changes serve the common good .
他又解释：
Then pessimism became fashionable（流行的）, starting in academia（学术界）and expanding to the public square, brought there by politicians, social media, and our apprehension（忧虑）regarding change. Today the conventional wisdom（传统智慧）is that any informed person should feel the world is falling apart. If you don’t think everything is awful, you must not understand the situation.
