May 20, 2013
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Scalar verus Vector Inspiration
I’ve been getting back into TED talks lately. I like them and I dislike them– depends on my mood.
Fundamentally, TED talks are a really cool idea. However in practice, sometimes I think it amounts to fashionable subscription without action. It’s a lot like other events, talks, and lectures about things that would be good for society that people go to– it gives them a warm, fuzzy feeling to hear an inspirational story, because it makes them feel like a part of this abstract sense of love and togetherness that is the human race. Yet, applied in every day life, where is the reflection of that practice?
This is probably one of my biggest problems with media in general– the way that it allows us to externalise involvement in human life.
There are two sides to this coin.
Something bad int he world happens, and the media reports it. You feel bad about it. You think its tragic.
Alternatively, something good happens. This could be some inspirational story, or something like a TED talk. You think it’s great.
This is what the media can give us– the idea of media may be that it’s the intermediary between events in the human race and us. Media is meant to connect a distant event or person to us– to bridge the gap so that we can be affected.
I do believe that we are affected by many things– but I think that the convenience of media has diminished the effect of the affectation. By that, I mean that emotional responses are incredibly cheap. There’s little difference, biochemically speaking, between your brain’s response to a news event and a completely fictitious movie– one might just have a more sustained effect because you attribute permanence to the real world, whereas movies end.
The problem as I see it is that, while sometimes a TED talk does inspire, talk is still cheap. And to hear that someone else is doing great things for the world might actually absolve us of a deeper sense of need for us, ourselves, to take responsibility for our society and do it ourself.
This comes down to the question of what we mean by “feeling inspired.” To some, it’s a vector quantity of warm fuzzy feelings (or alternatively, fiery, burning emotion), with the importance being a direction that comes with it. For others, it’s a scalar quantity of the same feelings, but without direction.
I don’t believe that social change occurs simply because of scalar quantities without direction.
And what TED talks do, in one way, is to give us ready access to scalar quantities of inspiration, which fulfills our need to feel connected– but does nothing for the need for actual action. Somehow, by attending these sorts of lectures, we might feel that we’re better people and it might assuage our guilt at not participating actively for actual change.
Of course– is the world better off with less scalar inspiration? Is vector quanity inspiration the only way to go?
I suppose what I’m getting at is that at the end of the day, if we are considering our place in pushing society forward, we should be guaging ourselves in terms of what we do, not just what we think or say. Joining a bunch of mailing lists or reading a bunch of blogs is just fooling yourself if you purport to subscribe to a belief but don’t do anything to act on it.
Comments (2)
What an amazing post! You’re a great writer.
my professor put on Amanda Palmer on tedtalk and i almost cried during class.
you are so talking about me in this entry lol. i read and watch and i dont do anything, and yes, i do feel like im a better person for it bc i am making myself aware that there is still good humanity in this world. my motivation and intent behind it is to comfort me and not so much bc i want to do something. livingin nyc has desensitized me and at many points, i wanted to go on a psychopathic rampage and off random strangers bc im sick of how inconsiderate ppl are. im sick of how uncivilized and selfish many ppl seem..that it makes me hate people i dont even know. i never even thought i could be like that. before i moved there, at age 23, i used to think i could change the world with a smile. no matter who treated me like shit, i wouldnt take it personal bc i believed there was good in everyone. after ny…im starting to believe im just as shitty as everyone else around me and i didnt believe in helping ppl or society bc i think most ppl truly dont deserve it. i wanted to remove myself from society and live offgrid or maybe even die. i know its just my personal bad experiences that lead me that way and every now and then i witness kindness among strangers and it makes me tear up on the subway/in public but it still hasnt brought me back to where i was when i was jaded.
my question is how do you make people want to help others? im not donating a cent to homeless advocates when theyre accusing ethnic minorities of “its like its a sin to give, minorities never want to give to homeless”, some black guy said that towards all asians, spanish and indians on the train. i should have taken the high road and not be affected but i was offended. thats how you ask for donations? making racial stereotypes belittling people? he may have been trying to raise money but i couldnt tolerate the ignorance spewing out his mouth. i always loved ny’s diversity but it seems w it just encourages ppl to stay segregated and racism. in ny, ppl always see color. in my small town, theres less diversity and culture but ppl are mostly repectful and see you for your character and worth before they make a judgement about you and if they ever do judge you, it wont be based on color. it will be based on what you do. at least that was my experience.
i forgot my point. #1- i dont help bc no one i know helps. i dont push myself to be different bc i like to blend in. i could find new philanthropic buddies or i could push myself to be different and do what i believe is right and rewarding for the soul. but #2 reason is the ppl i see on a daily basis in the city appear to be shitty, uncivilized, greedy, selfish, con-like and they dont help themselves to begin with. obviously im making biased judgements without knowing them and there are always exceptions but this is the majority of what i see. how do we encourage ppl to live like civilized humans to have a soul so ppl will want to help them when they need it? how can we bring back good manners into the world and emphasize the importance of having a good heart as opposed to buying expensive things to pretend youre better than others, making money for corporations, leading oversexualized lives publicly and proudly, and being negligent parents? i hate the media. if you want to see something good and real you have to dig deep and search. then theres the abundance of garbage on the internet and media to entertain and brainwash us from being better ppl. how do we stop that?
sorry, i really just wanted to say i watched amanda palmer’s tedtalk and how i dig her music. then it seemed so empty just to write one line but i didnt mean to rant. i do appreciate your views though