- Ryan Alexander
- Philadelphia, PA
- United States
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What is the biggest fault in today's society? What can we do to fix this fault?
I always ask myself, what is something that I can change today. As a young adult I feel like the I can do anything with the time I have left and I really want to commit my life to making a positive impact on the world. There is so much out there that we could change. What do you think is the most important change that we can start to accomplish today?
Topics:
life
Erik Richardson 500+
Robert Winner 50+
We have lost faith in the ability to individually influence anything. We are numbers ... not people. We show up at meetings and must listen to "leaders" tell us what is good for us. Even if we respond the "leaders" do what they want so Joe Citizen becomes apathathetic.
The cure: Become involved. Become part of the solution instead of remaining part of the problem. Join, organize, stand-up and be counted. It is thought that 85% of Americans are Christians but the 15% who are not are very vocal and are driving religion to the background. If the "silent majority" cast votes in favor of any issue it would carry by a 85% margin. Break the silence.
All the best. Bob
Robert Galway 20+
Balance the quality of your life today with the amount of time you spend preparing for or investing time for an improved life in the future.
Ryan Alexander
Barry Palmer 50+
Too few people go out of their way to understand the experience of other people that are not in their social circle. The media are a very poor substitute for conversation. As Pat pointed out, one definition of reality is what people agree it is. If your circle of people consists of people like yourself, your agreed reality will be very limited. I suspect this is especially true of successful people. Success is taken as a sure indicator that they have a good understanding of reality.
Fixing this requires education in critical thinking. We must hunt for the assumptions that frame our thinking and the thinking of the people around us..
This may not be the biggest fault, but it must be high on the list.
pat gilbert 50+
Often this is stopped by preconceived notions (memes), functional illiteracy, a poor understanding of grammar, and an inadequate vocabulary, inability to concentrate, which adds up to an inability to listen.
In other words you should understand what you are disagreeing with before you disagree with it.
Ryan Alexander
I'm looking for ways that groups or organizations can try and reach people in this way. Do you guys have any suggestions?
pat gilbert 50+
Shokrullah Amiri 10+
Krisztián Pintér 200+
try to look at people's arguments through these glasses to get shocked. you will see how frequent this is.
Ryan Alexander
So, your saying that we should all do the same things and stick together?
I'm sorry your ending statement and your initial statement confused me.
I do agree that our society has this idea that you mentioned
"many have this idea that things are either good or bad, and if good everyone has to do it, if bad, it should be banned or otherwise eliminated."
Life is about balance and I can definitely see this black and white ideology taking affect in society.
Your saying that we should not make decisions? I'm very confused...not closed to the idea I just feel like I need more elaboration! I'm intrigued.
Krisztián Pintér 200+
Ryan Alexander
Krisztián Pintér 200+
Ryan Alexander
Krisztián Pintér 200+
pat gilbert 50+
This is what I was trying to get you to do the other day on the money thread.
In my experience most people have bench marks, true north's that they use to navigate through life. They hold onto these benchmarks very hard.
One of the reasons for this is that when a person becomes confused he will look for something that is stable that can act as their true north. As a baby this is mama and papa, notice when a child get separated from his mother watch what his reaction is, it will be confusion. As one gets older this true north might be money or a house or a job.
Reality is what people agree it is. If you don't agree with reality people tend to avoid you as they do with the crazy guy on the street who sees pink elephants. It is poor survival to be alienated by the group. Remember how much emphasis is put on this in high school? Do you notice how it has become good survival for younger people to join a gang? This intention or group morality is palpable have you sensed it? Here on TED the mores are to be nice and care about ecology and the poor and equality.
So what can you do about this???
I think the best thing you can do is to learn logic, not math but the scientific method from this you can see the root causes of situations.
Secondly as I have said before read basic economics by Thomas Sowell (the epitome of applied logic) and the Fountain Head by Ayn Rand
Ryan Alexander
The problem is the people that would join are already probably thinking so the audience are people that already are trying to look for new alternatives. It's like writing a book on current events. The people that your reaching are people that are already informed.
I suppose Ted does a pretty decent job at challenging all of us. Maybe, the key is making TED the best it can be and sharing it with as many people possible! The more ideas the better. Maybe they could have live discussions with a devil's advocate or something. Even that has problems though. This is a great fault that I see in society too. I'll continue to meditate on it. It's hard to bring open minded thinking into a world about WINNING arguments more over than actually trying to understand.
Ryan Alexander
I love the TED's environment, it seems to be so supportive. Which is a really great comfort to me!
Salim Solaiman 50+
Even if in a pseudo way society accepts diversity.....it doesn't make diversity to be inclusive.
Ryan Alexander
In other words what programs or groups can one support or be a part of to try and bring the human race together as a society of diverse people?