Slashdot Mirror
TED Wants To Remind Us That Ideas -- Not Politicians -- Shape the Future (qz.com)
An anonymous reader shares a Quartz report: Amid global political upheavals, TED curator Chris Anderson argues that ideas have never mattered more. "Ideas changes how people act and [shape] their long term perspective," he said in during a April 17 press briefing. "Politicians come and go and ideas are forever." He said TED -- two segments of which will be broadcast live in movie theaters this year -- wants to re-introduce civility into political discourse. "We want to avoid the zero sum game we see on cable television every day," said Anderson, noting that TED is a non-partisan organization and has historically featured controversial and intriguing thinkers from both sides of the political divide. In place of the shrill, headline-bait tenor of political spectacles, TED wants to take viewers to a place of "reasoned discourse" where big ideas can act as a bridge between opposing views. By creating an eclectic program -- including an entire session delivered in Spanish and another on artificial intelligence -- Anderson said he wants to steer the conversation away from government and politics. "With so much focus in politics, the world is in danger of forgetting that so much of what really changes the future happens outside completely of politics. It happens inside the mind of dreamers, designers, inventors, technologists, entrepreneurs," he said.
Do you mean that dialogue and not violence is a better way to solve problems? Most intelligent people know this. The problem is that most people aren't, intelligent.
09 F9 11 02 9D 74 E3 5B - D8 41 56 C5 63 56 88 C0 45 5F E1 04 22 CA 29 C4 93 3F 95 05 2B 79 2A B2
helps though
"It happens inside the mind of dreamers, designers, inventors, technologists, entrepreneurs," and meee.
TED is fucking overrated. Pablum.
TED's been posting some hopelessly feminist content lately, and they know it, too, because they've disabled ratings and comments on those vids. They're also abusing the DMCA to shut down criticism:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?...
The DMCA-censored vid:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?...
And an update:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?...
"With so much focus in politics, the world is in danger of forgetting that so much of what really changes the future happens outside completely of politics. It happens inside the mind of dreamers, designers, inventors, technologists, entrepreneurs," he said.
Until the politicians ban, mandate or regulate the science, technology or business.
Taking guns away from the 99% gives the 1% 100% of the power.
The staff at ted might like lofty ideals but they are to be consumed not discussed - Bearing an Australian youtuber and others have been dmca'ed and Ted lost the fair use test.
To call them communicators is a paradox when they censor too.
As long as rulers exist, they shape your future, often with force. Try out resisting their efforts and correct me if I'm wrong.
He's one hell of an idea. :D
Freedom?
Individual and Inalienable rights?
Personal Responsibility?
Limited Government?
"I say we take off, nuke the site from orbit. It's the only way to be sure."
There has been an ongoing debate in history comparing the macroscopic idea of history and the "Great Man" idea of history.
From a macroscopic level, things like the industrial revolution (or more specifically, things like the invention of the Spinning Jenny) made societal changes inevitable. It was only a matter of time before the Monarchies feel in Europe. It could have been earlier or later by a few decades or centuries, but it was inevidible.
From the "Great Man" level... it's hard to imagine if Nepolian didn't exist that "meh, somebody else would have conquered Europe."
It's hard to accept the assertion that politicians have no impact and it is only ideas. Can anybody honestly say, "If George Washington had decided to become King of the fledgling United States, to the applause and approbation of all his contemporaries, the United States would absolutely still have become a republic?"
Is it the fifth of November?
You should try TEDx, it's a bold new direction for their brand.
The format is a bit different. Instead of curating the speakers, they just rent a room with a microphone and send a guy with a gopro there. Said guy then records every homeless person who thinks they have something intelligent to speak about getting up on stage for their 15 minutes of fame.
Gopro guy then emails the raw video to someone at TEDhq who edits "Why farts are oppressing my gender" into Youtube gold.
Lets get real. Any idea big enough to scare big business or possibly deter the globalist agenda is bought up to ensure it's used appropriately (i.e. the new mass censorship on Google's Youtube).
Over the past 10 to 20 years, most Western nations have been subjected to a potent form of political correctness that has stifled free thought and free expression, especially within academia.
We see this in how false accusations of "racism", "sexism", "bigotry", "intolerance", "homophobia", and "transphobia" are used to shut down free and open discussion.
We see this in how "safe spaces" are used to prevent free and open discussion from even happening in the first place.
We've mainly seen this driven by those on the left side of the political spectrum.
Anything that conforms to their own set of beliefs is fine to discuss, but anyone who holds differing opinions is violently attacked. Recently we've even seen these leftists start using physical violence, such as during the the Ferguson "protests" (riots), and during the recent Berkeley incidents.
I think that society at large is waking up, though. They're seeing how those on the political right protest responsibly and maturely, while it's those on the political left who start using violence and riots.
People watch videos on YouTube and they see how President Trump's rallies are peaceful, fun, and encouraging events. They feature lots of people coming together to work for real improvement. And these people also watch videos on YouTube showing leftist protesters intentionally resorting to violent, destructive behavior.
You say that "most people aren't intelligent", but I think you're wrong about that. Most people may not be rocket scientists, but they sure are smart enough to know that it's leftists resorting to censorship, violence and rioting, and not those on the political right.
That's why President Trump won the election in the USA. That's why we're seeing strong support for right wing parties in Europe and Australia. Society at large is really beginning to see that it's a violent and extremist fringe leftist element of society that's responsible for so many of the problems we have today.
I think that's the main point of the whole TED thing -- even if it is mostly a bunch of attention-seeking folks and academics desperately trying to promote themselves. The analysis is correct -- there isn't a lot of mainstream substantive discussion of things beyond politics and pop culture. You really have to go seek it out, and things like social media amplify the divide between intellectual and entertaining conversation.
One of the things I really don't like about social media is its tendency to separate the easily led among us into little camps. Because Facebook and other platforms know exactly what stimuli we will respond to, content they know we like is fed our way with little chance to break out of the echo chamber. Add to that the constant drumbeat of bad news, regardless of political side/opinion, and people can't be faulted for assuming the world is going to end tomorrow. It also doesn't help that there's a very strong current of anti-intellectualism among some sectors of the population. For some, universities are seen as bastions of evil, liberal progressive ideas -- not exactly the kind of opinion that fosters the sharing of ideas.
I have mentioned previously on here (and been blasted for it!) that social media is destroying the ability for the average person to relate to others. I've been told I'm too politically correct and everyone should be allowed to shout whatever they want at each other. If politically correct means "I don't want people's default posture to be acting like a bunch of hyenas to each other" then I guess I'm PC. I just want to see my technocratic government implemented at least once before I die -- instead of a bunch of lying politicians, hire the people with the best ideas and make rules based only on facts. Life would be much more peaceful with a bunch of engineers running things. People might actually study things like STEM without thinking about whether their careers will end when they turn 40, or whether all the work will be offshored by the time they graduate.
What would be new or different is the application of these ideas. I can't speak for where you're at but the difference between what's a good idea or a bad idea in the US is who says it or acts on it. A lot of tight lips happen each time administrations change and the new boss is so much like the old boss but we still got 90%+ of the voters who still fill out their dancing card the same way at every ball.
A good idea is a good idea regardless of the number of times that it's discussed and as long as the public fails to act on those good ideas the good ideas still just remain ideas.
No matter how much you think this, it shows that you missed the point. The reason that Politicians will ALWAYS shape the future is because there will ALWAYS be two people disagreeing on something. And when that happens, there is always a politician or a hundred just around the corner ready to take the "highest bidders" side.
So until you can find a way to get people or keep people from bringing their problems to a politician, then you can remind us all you like, it will only fall upon deaf ears.
We get reason into politics most bid ideas will be snuffed out. Humans can not multitask. So correcting one broken thing at a time is very efficient for us. Correcting our current political problem is our first order. After which we can concentrate on implementing the big ideas.
People do things -only some of which are ideologues.
What is the most resilient parasite? Bacteria? A virus? An intestinal worm?... An idea. Resilient--highly contagious. Once an idea has taken hold of the brain it's almost impossible to eradicate. An idea that is fully formed, fully understood--that sticks; right in there somewhere.
A list of some of the topics from the next TED conference has been leaked:
"How Driving My Maserati Reduces Global Climate Change"
"WATER - It's good to have"
"We need to repurpose the ISS to grow truffles in zero G."
"This video of a cat running from a cucumber can teach us all about how to make the world a better place."
"Using quantum filament nanoparticles to get an A on my science paper."
"I once was a waitress in a restaurant. No! It's really true! Here's my incredible story!"
"Using artificial intelligence and voice recognition to check on the status of your valet-parked vehicle, and solve world hunger."
Yes, the people on the right protest responsibly. By taking over the Mlheur Wildlife Refuge. Or shooting Dee Gifford and a bunch of other people. Or bombing abortion clinics
But of course, you're going to play the no true Scotsman card on shit like that, I'm sure. Just like those on the left are going to do the same about the about the things you're pissed off about.
Face it. You're just as much of a problem as the "leftists" because you are busy pigeonholing everyone else to support whatever personal beliefs you have.
In order to matter the degree to which an idea is put to use must be considered. The fabulous idea of "Liberty, Equality, Fraternity" may be super important but it certainly has not been widely accepted or implemented. Just as we have very ignorant and greedy forces trying to keep things the same or turn back the clock to another era the French had a mater class that resisted like crazy the idea of liberty, equality and fraternity. The way the idea grew a bit was by slaughtering the ruling class. England and the US were similar. For out ancestors getting out of Europe was not all that far from the 1970 era when people tuned in, turned on and dropped out. How did one drop out of Ireland, Italy, Germany or Hungary? It was simple that ran for the New World.
Politicians willing to support the people with ideas would be nice.
Laws are rules for the court, but merely a bottom bar to hit for life. Think beyond laws in your actions always.
What shapes the world is needs, needs and requirements and interests and benefits.
Ideas only happen to be a side-effect of the aforementioned, a side-effect of thinking on how to fulfill a goal/ambition.
Ideas for the sake of ideas never work and often go down a path of suffocating in piss and shit.
If there's anything history has taught us, it's that there was no technological or scientific or social advancement without some politicians engineering
the needs and interests and benefits that would motivate the sudden surge of ideas.
More often than not, war and violence were precisely the motivators, whether cit-state wars and Persian wars of Classical Greek advancement;
the world domination wars of Roman Empire advancement; the religious wars of middle age advancement which saw architecture, medical, and warring advancement coming from both the West and the Middle East; the Renaissance born of violence and political scheming and warring in Italy; up to WW1 and 2 with technological and social advancement forced unlike ever before in history; and finally Cold war with massive financial influx into technology and science and social research as a competitive political jerk-off game between USA and its allies and the Soviets.
An idea which is reshaping the entire Muslim world for the worse and the Muslim communities in Europe with it. Of course not, he thinks social progressiveness is the only way forward as long as white politicians just get out of the way and open the borders.
TED, where PC morons spew pseudo-intellectual bullshit at other PC morons and where they present mundane, pie in the sky and just plain ridiculous technology as revolutionary.
I know that you're trying to be funny, but they actually have TEDx talks now which are basically smaller and privately organized versions of a TED talk.
Maybe you should call your version TEDxx or TEDxs. We'll leave TEDxxx for the obvious porn parody that someone will eventually make of these shows.
Whenever I picture a guy with a title of "TED Curator" I imagine a hipster with an ironic beard and horn rimmed glasses wearing a $250 plaid shirt.
A fucking convicted fucking murderer, who was almost certainly a habitual murdering scumbag. Any individual Puerto Rican who wants to improve the view prejudiced people have of Puerto Ricans should not be a complete idiot and not pick this fucking scumbag as a martyr.
Those links expose TED as censor-happy authoritarians, who (despite their "Ideas Worth Spreading" slogan) abuse the DMCA to prevent fair use of their content for criticism. The claims in the summary of TED being a "non-partisan organization" and wanting to "steer the conversation away from government and politics" are laughable, given TED's repeated attempts to suppress dissent.
They do not want to start a "civil" conversation or "reasoned discourse" or a "bridge between opposing views" or any of the sounds-good buzzword BS rattled off in the summary; they want start a monologue of approved ideas while everyone else (especially wrongthinkers) has to shut up and unquestionably accept what they're hearing.
TED Wants to Remind Us that They Still Exist.
#DeleteChrome
The big problem that I have with TED talks is that almost nobody who watches them acts on what they learned. Most people will get briefly inspired about some guy making a 10 minute speech about something like making affordable public housing out of shipping containers or using drone technology to stop Elephant poachers, but then 99.9% of the people who watched will do little more than give the video a thumbs up or maybe share it with their friends. And yes... I'm just as guilty of this as everyone else.
Someone should probably have a TED talk where they give people a homework assignment at the end. Perhaps they should ask people write a short paper on how they put at least one of the ideas that they learned into action. Better yet, make part of the TED ticket price refundable once that paper is turned in. Otherwise, this is just a waste of time for most people.
TED remains breathlessly naïve, and seems to want to relegate itself to those facebook posts by people who quote never heard of poets making meaningful comments about the feels.
Ideas are worth precisely shit. Ideas+execution shape the future. Execution is frequently heavily influenced by politicians who make the rules that govern the corporate and legal landscape in which your execution may take place, if it isn't strictly forbidden, construed as patent infringing (esp. by trolls), defunded by competitive interests or otherwise squashed, stolen or prevented.
Politicians are not the only problem, to be sure, access to capital required to execute is also a major issue, but one in which politicians are paid to play in less.
to North Koreans
I'm yet to see one of their talks where they discuss something actually new or different.
Here you go - a great, informative, and insipring TED talk from a while back.
#DeleteChrome
TEDxx
Hosted by The Most Interesting Man in the World? "I don't always give talks, but when I do, it's at TED Dos Equis."
We'll leave TEDxxx for the obvious porn parody that someone will eventually make of these shows.
I'd be surprised if Japan hasn't done this already. I'm just not sure whether it will be of the "unstoppable public speaker" or "crowd of couples" genre.
"When information is power, privacy is freedom" - Jah-Wren Ryel
Your pretty dense aren't you? 99% of TEDx talks are just as the GP describes.
John McAfee 'It was like that time I hired that Bangkok prostitute; to do my taxes, while I fucked my accountant'
...is that the first thing people want to do with them - especially in the TED crowd - is use politics to force them on everyone.
And some of the ideas actually are good - for certain people in certain situations. The problem with using politics is that you're applying these ideas to everyone, by force. This usually results in an overall net negative impact.
We live in a world of incredibly diverse values, beliefs, and practices. Much of the goodness or badness in these areas is fairly subjective. For example, some people prefer more leisurely lifestyles and others value high productivity. Some people want to work and function in highly communal environments, and others are more individualistic. None of these things are wrong, but when you start building strict sets of societal rules around them then you create strong and completely unnecessary conflict.
There are less subjective areas that involve hard science and scientific experimentation, but these are relatively rare and usually uncontroversial. There are also plenty of ideas labeled as "science" that do not involve the scientific method; these tend to be extremely controversial and because the "science" label is misapplied their proponents tend to be very quick to pull out the political guns.
In any case, we also live in a world where far too many people want to force their beliefs and lifestyles on everyone else. The political left and right are fairly equally guilty of this - the left from an economic standpoint, and the right from a religious standpoint, and both from an overall values standpoint. It's deeply sad that virtually none of these people are capable of saying "Hey, it's OK that you're different - go be your crazy-ass self over there and as long as you're not in my face about it then we'll ignore each other and everything is fine." But instead, they demand strict enforcement. These days the left demands that we memorize sixty new gender pronouns a week, and the right loses their shit if you don't say "Merry Christmas."
We don't need 50 new TEDxasfaz talks a week. We need a planet full of people to chill the fuck out.
Help save the critically endangered Blue Iguana
I see you too have been modded into oblivion for having a (gasp!) opinion and expressing it thoughtfully.
Article is wrong. The news media shapes the future, that is why we must shut down fuex news now!
Sam Hyde had a great TEDx talk, "2070 Paradigm Shift". Really empowering and thought provoking stuff.
Nice sentiment...almost certainly wrong. Syria is exhibit 1 in the "what politicians say and do matters a lot" argument. From what I've seen: no-warrant arrests and detention, torture and barrel bombs beat Powerpoint slides. Every. Single. Time.
A way to feel like you're doing the right thing, without any of the mental or physical challenges that come with actually attempting to change anything.
Rule 35 of the internet: "If it can be hacked, it will be". - Charles Stross
When being tolerant, let's be as generous as possible. When we start making exceptions and putting qualifiers on freedom, that's when things start to go belly-up.
"We receive as friendly that which agrees with, we resist with dislike that which opposes us" - Faraday
Politicians come and go and ideas are forever.
The problem is that while politicians may go, the bureaucracy they create does not. That essentially lasts forever, and has a great impact on what ideas are possible, if for no other reason than it drains funds form making some other idea possible.
Rather than term limits we need the concept of department limits, where each arm of a large bureaucracy must be voted to continue every ten years or so after justifying what it has done.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
Ideas are great, but in a representative system ("government") CHANGE only comes when people imbued with sufficient power make the effort to evolve an idea into policy. Even if today's politicians/leaders don't like an idea and get removed from office, someone is going to have to take a leadership position to make changes to the official way things are done.
"With so much focus in politics, the world is in danger of forgetting that so much of what really changes the future happens outside completely of politics. It happens inside the mind of dreamers, designers, inventors, technologists, entrepreneurs,"
No. Your personal interpretation and your world view change *internally* with ideas. How you and others are physically affected relies on what "ideas" politicians have and put forth as policy. Politics, however fatiguing, is not unimportant.
Ideas are worthless without implementation.
And ideas being forever, bullshit. How many ideas does one have during the day? How many are around the next day? Of those that stick around how many are realized?
Hell you can't even wipe your ass with an idea until it's written down.
Remember, remember, the Fifth of November, the Gunpowder Treason and Plot. I know of no reason why the Gunpowder Treason should ever be forgot... But what of the man? I know his name was Guy Fawkes and I know, in 1605, he attempted to blow up the Houses of Parliament. But who was he really? What was he like? We are told to remember the idea, not the man, because a man can fail. He can be caught, he can be killed and forgotten, but 400 years later, an idea can still change the world. I've witnessed first hand the power of ideas, I've seen people kill in the name of them, and die defending them... but you cannot kiss an idea, cannot touch it, or hold it... ideas do not bleed, they do not feel pain, they do not love... And it is not an idea that I miss, it is a man... A man that made me remember the Fifth of November. A man that I will never forget.
we need more H1B's to get the ideas from and the min wage is to high.
I don't see the folks on the right trying to actively suppress the liberal views being presented in public.
The only way you can't be seeing it is if your head is so far up your ass you'll never see daylight again.
Conservatives are VERY actively trying, in many ways, across many states, to MAKE PROTEST ILLEGAL.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/wonk/wp/2017/02/24/republican-lawmakers-introduce-bills-to-curb-protesting-in-at-least-17-states/
So much for that pesky bit in the constitution about the right to protest.
Someone remind TED that people with the money shape the future, mostly via goverments.
kthx.
Oh and second point.
TED is basically like a teenager, its full of stupid ideas about how the world works, or should work, or might work oneday, we just have to believe!
Calling BS here. I've seen a few TED talks, and don't know WTF you're talking about. Please point to what makes them in any way elitist, or in an echo chamber.
Just another day in Paradise
Ideas, patents, concepts mean nothing without the capital and labor to bring them to fruition.
Stolen or borrowed, in the end, that is always what you need.
One of the problems of the modern age is the inability of the Too Big To Fail banks to provide capital to small businesses to hire labor and create new products. Nowadays, it's not capitalism we work beneath, but mercantalism, as Adam Smith, the Father of Capitalism warned us in his seven books (not three, read the other ones). Mercantalism is not that efficient.
-- Tigger warning: This post may contain tiggers! --
TED you do realize the amount of money you have is practically non-existent to what the US Chamber of Commerce has in its collective coffers right?
We'll make great pets
Wow....
Not many years ago, this would have been taken as "common sense", now it gets modded troll....?
Why?
Light travels faster than sound. This is why some people appear bright until you hear them speak.........
On the other hand, speaking for about 15 minutes implies thinking for about 15 minutes...which happens to be about 15 minutes more thought than goes into the typical /. post!
Yay, slacktivism. You didn't expect me to actually do something to feel smug, did you?
I was going to mod this troll, but then I started to think about it. When my head started to spin, about 5 seconds later, I figured you must be right.
TED is well known for complete SJW takeover. It makes total sense. English is racist.
Just not in good ways. The best they can contribute is to not make things worse, although that takes an exceptionally good politician. On the side of making things worse, they sometimes have tremendous potential and accomplishments. Just look at Trump, Erdogan, Orban, Johnson, etc. for a really long list of politicians making things a lot worse and sometimes giving away their peoples future, all because of ego, religious fanaticism, general stupidity and so on.
So while politicians can shape the future, it is really, _really_ important to prevent them from doing it.
Most ACs are not even worth the keystrokes to insult them. Be generically insulted by this and ignored otherwise.
For a start, left = workers vs right = bosses. What has happened is a pack of self serving egoistic asshats have jumped on the left with the backing of corporate owned main stream media, to push a bunch of fringe issues, to fracture and break up the left, the break up the workers. Those arse holes are not the left, the scream with the backing of mainstream media that they are but the fact is they oppose the issues of the workers and have blocked core social equality for worker issues. So no universal health care, blocking a living wage, huge loss in terms of equal access to democracy for workers, huge loss in terms of equal access to justice for workers.
Those SJWs are not the left, they are the whack doodles, screaming about their own individual egos, genitals and fucked up identities, whilst main stream media owned by the corporations champions those idiotic causes in order to actively break up the left = workers. The left is issues for all workers, that is all and not who does what with whose genitals or colour genetic or artificial or religion.
Left = workes vs right = bosses, everything else is a lie, SJWs = whackdoodles (an idiotic tool of the bosses).
Chaos - everything, everywhere, everywhen
Because there are more than 50 million Spanish speakers in the US.
Wow..really? 2 for 2 troll?
When did it become unpopular to be proud of the US being an English speaking country?
This just used to be common sense...or, have we been "invaded" successfully at this point?
It's sad to see what used to be unwritten truths, values and common sense overridden.
But seriously....it is well known, in the US, if you are an English speaking person, you will be more successful in the country, and what's wrong with that? Learning the most common language would seem to be in everyones' best interest, no?
Light travels faster than sound. This is why some people appear bright until you hear them speak.........
All I did was call them whores and bitches, and question why it is they say NO to me but sleep with other men all the fucking time. They CENSORED me because they are lesbians, probably, and hate having their dyke bullshit questioned. They'd prefer to quief all over each other than deal with the reality that is their CENSORSHIP of honest and frank debate.
Exactly. There's so many very small changes that people could make which would make a huge difference. People with desk jobs could dramatically cut their risk of a heart attack by taking a walk during their lunch break. Even more so if they skipped it as a real meal and just had a piece of fruit or the like instead while they stretched their legs. Cooking at home a little more would give people a huge boost to their health and reduce the amount of non biodegradable waste associated a meal. Even just using reusable bags instead of plastic when going to a market would have a big impact in the long term. And everyone is already aware of all of that. But even those small changes are too much for most people. The idea that anyone is going to actually act on the larger ideas in a TED talk when they can't be assed to make even those kinds of minor changes is laughable.
Frankly, I find the quality and content of TED talks embarrassing. Hmm, why should I feel embarrassed about that? I don't know, but I do. So often verging on intellectual fraud. A venue for self-promotion and mutual intellectual masturbation. Well, I guess it keeps them off the street.
When all you have is a hammer, every problem starts to look like a thumb.
as if politics can't eliminate great ideas, or at least pester them so that either you or the inventor don't want to use them anymore.
what's the deal with those tesla stores again? or uber & airbnb around the whole world?
On a long enough timeline, the survival rate for everyone drops to zero.
Yeah, I've seen a few of them. Some of them are pretty bad, but not quite as bad as you're making them out to be.
Cinema is a way for TED to preach its peach-and-civility message to the middle and upper-middle classes. However, it will not reach the mostly-white, poor and unchurched mob (read the Atlantic article for this: Breaking Faith) who fuel the angry political screaming, who ensured Trump's victory, and who neither go to theaters nor will listen to TED. In that way, TED's mission is futile.
--- Andy West http://andywest.org
Politicians will give up their elementary school sand box manipulation games.
That is how so many aspects of the system work.
How would they ever get anything done if they can't sling poo.
Rick B.
Learning more languages would seem to be in everyones' best interest, no?
horror vacui