????說到塑造未來，阿斯特羅?泰勒鮮有對手。他的正式頭銜是谷歌 “登月隊長”——一個頗具谷歌風范的稱謂；他的日常工作是負責Google X實驗室的運營，谷歌將其稱為“登月工廠”。在這里，谷歌正在開發無人駕駛汽車、谷歌眼鏡、Loon項目（通過高空氣球提供上網服務）、Makani項目（通過高空風輪機發電）以及用于檢測癌癥和其他疾病的納米膠囊。在工作上和泰勒密切配合的有谷歌首席執行官拉里?佩奇（《財富》雜志2014年年度商人），以及谷歌聯合創始人、管理著Google X和其他一些專業項目的謝爾蓋?布林。最近，泰勒接受了《財富》雜志的采訪，介紹了Google X如何獲取突破性創新。

????《財富》：Google X的“登月”項目是怎么來的？

????事先聲明一下，這并不簡單，但我覺得在看待那些難以企及的事情時我們至少有幾條原則。

????要從概念上成為“登月”項目，得具備三個要素。這并不是說有了這三個要素我們就一定會去做這件事，它的意思是如果沒有這三個要素我們就一定不會去做。

????首先，它得是一個重大問題。這看上去是顯而易見的事情，但實際上這一概念模糊的令人難以置信。

????其次，得有人提出某種激進的解決方案。這種產品或服務聽起來得像是科幻小說里的東西。顯然，它聽起來是否真的像來自艾薩克?阿西莫夫的科幻小說并不重要。重要的是，我們不能步別人的后塵，因為覺得自己比以前那些人聰明，擁有更好的資源，或者付出更多努力的想法一點也不靠譜。

????最后，我們有理由相信它不是空中樓閣。我們將其稱為突破性科學或技術。

????這種科技可能來自于谷歌，也可能來自于他人。它可能已經在某個領域發揮了作用，但從未移植到其他領域。在很多情況下，我們最終都會恍然大悟，從而意識到這件看起來近乎不可能的事也許并非不可能。

????這三個要素不會一下子都出現，對吧？

????是這樣。因此，在某些情況下找到其中一個要素比較容易，而找到另外兩個比較困難。有時候我們覺得已經找到了其中兩個，甚至三個要素都已具備，但一段時間后，其中一個就會消失。

????以Loon項目[通過高空氣球在全球范圍內提供網絡連接]為例，這三個要素非常明顯。全球有50億人上不了網。就促進世界和平、繁榮而言，還有什么事業能夠與為50億人提供上網渠道相比呢？

????非常籠統地講，用氣球而不是衛星來實現這個目標可以算是一種激進的解決方案。

????因此，在近一年的時間中，我們的工作并不是證明“這行得通”，而是證明“這行不通，以及我們怎樣才能盡快發現為什么它行不通？這樣就可以放棄它，然后轉向別的項目。”我們努力嘗試了一年，連續失敗了很多次，然后才開始認真對待這個項目。

????There are few people more qualified to talk about shaping the future than Google’s Astro Teller. His official title the oh-so-Googley “Captain of Moonshots.” His day job is running Google X, which the company calls its “moonshot factory.” It’s where Google GOOG -0.30% is developing self-driving cars, Glass (its glasses-like wearable computer), Loon (a project to deliver Internet access worldwide through high-altitude balloons), Makani (an effort to generate energy through high-flying wind turbines), and ingestible nanoparticles that would detect cancer and other diseases. Teller works closely with CEO Larry Page, which Fortune named 2014 businessperson of the year, and Sergey Brin, the Google co-founder who oversees X and other special projects. He recently spoke with Fortune about his lab’s approach to breakthrough innovation.

????Fortune: How do moon shots come together at Google X?

????Well, with the caveat that it’s not simple, I think that there are some principles, or some ways of seeing, at least, things that don’t work.

????You have to have three things in order for it to conceptually be a moon shot. That doesn’t mean we’ll necessarily do it, but it means necessarily we won’t do it if it doesn’t have these three things.

????The first one is that it’s a huge problem. That sounds pretty obvious, but it’s incredibly not obvious in fact.

????Then the second thing is that there has to be some kind of radical proposed solution. It should be a science fiction-sounding product or service. Obviously whether it really sounds like it comes out of [Isaac] Asimov isn’t important. What’s important is that we be not treading the same ground that other people have tread before because thinking that we’re going to be smarter or better resourced or work harder than people who’ve come before us is just not a good bet.

????Then the third one is some reason to believe that this isn’t just pie in the sky. We would call this breakthrough science or tech.

????This could be something we’ve discovered. It could be something someone else has discovered. It could be something that has worked in one domain but has never been transplanted to this other domain. There are lots of different ways of ending up having an “Aha!” moment where you believe that something looks nearly impossible might not be impossible.

????These three things don’t happen all at once, right?

????That’s right. So in some cases one of these is easy and the others are hard. Sometimes we will think we have a bead on two or even three of these things, but after awhile one of them will fall away.

????Take Loon [the Google X project to deliver Internet connectivity worldwide through high-altitude balloons], for example. This was super obvious. There are 5 billion people in the world who don’t have Internet connections, and there’s very little that would cause the world to be more at peace, more prosperous than getting the other 5 billion people on the planet connected.

????Very generally, doing this from balloons rather than from satellites sort of has the form of a radical solution.

????And so we went through a process for almost a year where the mantra was not “This is going to work” but “This is not going to work. How can we discover why this won’t work as fast as possible so that we can discard this and move on to something else?” And it was only having tried rigorously for a year and having failed to fail many times in a row that we got to the point where we were starting to take this project really seriously.