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george lockwood
Fort Worth, TX
United States

TEDCRED 20+

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Urban society has it's gifts. Being around people all the time - What have we lost?

Once people could understand carrying capacity, getting food,
and resources in general. Now we have lost that.

Topics: Hunger The environment poverty

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george lockwood 20+
- 0
Jun 16 2012: sPEAKING FOR WAITING FOR GODOT - I feel like that sometime is all. I think it may be a good
choice for me, and maybe it sounds like for you. However, a lot of these get back to an idea
Jung and so many others have had _ personality types. Some people can read a book and
understand carrying capacity others have to raise goats or whatever. Of course, there is
always the person who asks "what's in it for me.", and the other person "there are other people?"
Thank you.
MR T
- +1
Jun 15 2012: We have lost patience
george lockwood 20+
- 0
Jun 15 2012: I am not sure that was what I meant. In fact, iI may not have said what I meant.
There are choices we can make and choices that we can"t. The U.S. is growing in
unnecessary ways and in ways designed to lower wages as it did before the Great
Depression. Also, I am merely suggesting that as we become more disconnected from
nature, we lose some aspects of understanding reality. As somone who did some
graduate work in physics before becoming an attorney, I understand that most people
don't have much of a grasp on the physical sciences. Probably not much either on biology,
psyuchology, mathematics, or basic business education.
Comment deleted
- george lockwood 20+
  - 0
  Jun 15 2012: That's what I didn't expect. I was mainly concerned about a disconnect from reality. Of course, I am not advocating a reaise iit to eat it concept of life - I am just observing the lack of understanding about nature and reality some people have . They live in Beckett's "waitng for Godot" or something. Yours is an informative
  comment.
Aja Bogdanoff 20+
- +1
TED Staff Host TED Attendee

Jun 14 2012: I think a lot of this is up to the individual. I've lived in small towns and (very) big cities, and in each I've found people who are connected to others, people who aren't... some who are connected to nature, some who aren't. I once lived in a town with amazing access to the outdoors, spectacular scenery, etc.... and had a coworker who'd lived there for almost a decade and didn't even know any of it existed.
- george lockwood 20+
  - 0
  Jun 15 2012: Everyone seems to see something different, but your woworker is shocking. It's like thatg
  coworker has no interest outside himself. Maybe, this is a limited personality type thing.
Kevin Jacobson
- +1
Jun 14 2012: We have lost the ability to be our own person. Society has it's expectations. You just have to adapt.
- george lockwood 20+
  - 0
  Jun 15 2012: Outstanding, but you refuse to bend completely. I believe that you'll do a good job in the quest of
  being your own person. The physical sciences and mathematics are good places for those
  with a tendency to think. Keirsey in Please Understand Me III suggests thatg philosophy is
  the same. As Sinston Churchill said never, never never give upl
Yogna V.
- +1
Jun 13 2012: Though living in urban spaces people are inches close but what basically is happening is they are being ripped apart mile. You may not even know the name or gender of the person staying just a feet’s away from your apartments. But contrary to this in a country side community the entire village will be known to each other on their first name basis
You may find superficial peace in a closed apartment but may never find the inner tranquility which one experiences in the fields where there is a river flowing by and birds chirping.
What we have basically lost is competence of being humane towards humans and nature and while in the chase of urban materialistic handouts.
- george lockwood 20+
  - 0
  Jun 14 2012: While I was concerned about losing touch with nature, etyc. This is another interesting aspect
  of the angst of urban lifew. Good job.
- Salim Solaiman 50+
  - 0
  Jun 14 2012: Beautifully said Yogna....can't agree more.
  Just giving a personal example.....I didn't grew up in village ....but as a customary requirement in my country while filling different forms (e.g. to open a bank account or applying for passport etc) we need to mention permanent address & for me my village address was my such address....
  
  After couple years of me leaving my university , they needed to send a letter to me for some reason and as they have no record of my current address....they posted it to my village address (that was very rudimentary address, i.e. no Zip code , no House # etc).........right that time I had not gone to my village home for close to decade....but the letter rightly went to my distant uncle at my village home who send it to me to my current address....
  
  In my urban setting even if Apt # is missing all other is right the letter doesn't reach to me.......these days that risk went down as we seldom write letter or even less we post it through postal service...
Comment deleted
- george lockwood 20+
  - 0
  Jun 14 2012: Very good, but I do think you know that it is hard to feel really close to more
  than 200 or 300 people.
Stephanie Sandifer
- 0
Jun 13 2012: I live in an urban area, but grew up in rural Louisiana and I am constantly reflecting on how my life now is so different from what it was in a smaller, rural community. For me personally there is a lost sense of connection to nature and the land (growing/gathering one's own food) and a lost sense of deep-rooted trusting & supportive community. While it's not impossible to maintain these things in urban society, it is much more difficult. I miss those connections... and I also miss the "silence" (not only in terms of actual sound, but also in terms of pace, space, place...) that allows for deeper reflection on life, community, etc.
Richard Kroll
- 0
Jun 12 2012: If you have not heard, due to the economic crisis in Greece people are starting to migrate back to the country side where they grew up. Troubled times could mean a shift from parasitic virtual professions which concentrate in cities to essential ones like farming in the country. I suspect things will solve themselves (although it might take several generations) as our closed earth system moves us to non-growth, steady-state economies.
- george lockwood 20+
  - 0
  Jun 14 2012: What concerns me is some of our big men and big women do not want what you have
  suggested is man"s ultimate destination.
  - Richard Kroll
    
    0
    Jun 14 2012: They might not want it, but they cannot stop it. But, they could help us prepare for it while we still have time to use available resources for our future structures. A good start would be for the politicians and the economists to admit, like the physicists did over 100 years ago, that all closed systems move to equilibrium.
Jamie G
- 0
Jun 12 2012: We have also lost the necessity to tailor ourselves to our environment and to the people around us. Now it seems that we just include and exclude the environment and people to our taste rather than adapting.
- george lockwood 20+
  - 0
  Jun 14 2012: Outstanding, It.s a crazy Life like suggested by the movie based on a Hopi Indian word
  spelled something like Kianastasie.
Scott Koenraadt
- 0
Jun 12 2012: I think the most important thing we have lost is the spiritual connection and closeness to nature.
- george lockwood 20+
  - 0
  Jun 14 2012: This allows us to understand certain aspects of realty.
- george lockwood 20+
  - 0
  Jun 14 2012: this is true I believe.
Raluca Chiorescu
- +1
Jun 11 2012: We have lost communication! We are around people all the time, but we are too busy and stressed to find the time to get to know those people and to really communicate with them (and "hi, how are u? fine, thanks" does not count as communication)
We have lost the touch with nature and environment. That's why so few of us care about things like recycling, pollution, being environmental friendly, etc... because we are too far from nature to actually see the effects of our actions on it.
We have lost the sense of solidarity. There are too many people in the urban society to care for each and every single one of them, so we ended up caring only for ourselves.
- george lockwood 20+
  - 0
  Jun 11 2012: very good. You and the three(3) others have pointed out our lo0ss in contact with people,too.
  See what Yash has to say. It iis so similiar to your thoughts. All the comments are good.
- Bing Zhang
  - 0
  Jun 12 2012: I can't agree with you any more~~You are just expressed what in my mind.
Yash Doshi
- 0
Jun 11 2012: George! Glad to discover there are people like you who even think about this question!

The gifts of the urban society are like sleeping pills... It just gives you the feeling of relaxation, but from within, it hampering you... killing you!
Today we have last connection with "HUMAN". By this i mean
We have lost "Connection with the Self":
the inner soul...
the inner voice - you can barely hear it, maybe you have even forgotten it exists
the driving energy - you can hardly feel what is it that drives you to move on in life. Because these days people seem to be driven by money and fame rather than love or respect.
the purpose - you dont know what you're doing, why you're doing... and you dont realize that hundreds, thousands or million others are doing what you are. every person is unique and has his unique purpose for his life... no one seems to realize this or even try to realize it....
we try to earn money rather than respect...!
we try to impress bosses rather than helping colleagues or clients...
we have no time to thank the almighty even after knowing our lives could have been a disaster had things gone differently...
we spend hours on the internet, socialing, gathering information, keeping ourselves updated with the news, debate about goverments and discuss politics.... but rarely do we take some time... Stop... and think about the life, the soul, the existence!

i would conclude by a fact that haunts me:
There was a time when there were friends... the best of them who stayed at different places, but managed to meet each other at the same place, same time and they had no TELEPHONES then!
- george lockwood 20+
  - 0
  Jun 11 2012: This adds several other dimensions to what I was concerned about in the question.
  Now you are telling me that we are losing contact with real people.
  so sad and so true.
pratham parekh
- 0
Jun 11 2012: for me .. we are loosing out element trust, everything in urban space is in form of contract, we don't generally trust people, we trust systems made by economy and polity, and because because of this urban spaces are submitted to state and market institutions, we have civilized life but we lack in cultured life :)
- george lockwood 20+
  - 0
  Jun 11 2012: This adds in the dimension about which we are talking. Synthetic life has removed so much.
Ripley Bullock
- 0
Jun 10 2012: The thing that pains me the most is the loss of the written word. Letters used to be a main method of communication. now things are so fast , emails facebook and twitter people don't stop about what to write. The second would be the developing lack of ability to defer gratification. The must have now attitude that is developing is repressive and harmful in my opinion. The third issue I see ties into the second and that is the ''throw away culture'' that is developing in all of society but can prodmanantly be seen in fashion. Not only are there different fashions every week and the cloths are built to last short periods of time people are losing the skills to fix things, mend socks, tailor cloths... etc This is one example of this... electronics built with faults is another.
- george lockwood 20+
  - 0
  Jun 11 2012: Outstanding, you've outframed this People no longer live in communities of a few hundred and
  see what their actrions. do., but it is nice to write to an intelligent person. Thanks.

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