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Finding common ground: What do we all agree upon?
I have during the past couple of months seen a wide range of different topics being disussed here on TED by a much more diverse group of people, with a much more diverse set of skills and interests, than I have ever witnessed in a single internet community before. People with different believes, from different parts of the world, and with very different backgrounds have engaged in dialouges that sometimes have been quite heated, but almost allways civilized, and to an astonishing extent very constructive.
So after all exchange that has happened, I can't help but wondering. What do we all agree upon? Can we create a collection of statements that we all seem to agree upon?
Edit: A list to add statements to and vote on statements with Google moderator has been created at http://goo.gl/mod/0073
Instructions: Click the link above, then "View ideas" and mark the statments you agree upon, or press "Add an idea" to add a completely new statement.
Nevin Elgendy
Of wrong doing and right doing
There is a field
I’ll meet you there. "
Let’s all accept Rumi, the Muslim Sufi poet, accept his invitation and meet him there in the field of acceptance, tolerance and coexistence, THE COMMON GROUND.
S.R. Ahmadi 20+
the only common ground of all humans is:
WISDOM
Nicholas Lukowiak 50+
What it entails to be happy, what is involved, what can make you more happy, or anything happiness related, seem to be where a lot of traffic goes.
I find there are many wise people on TED, even in the youth of TED, our future. Wise people usually seem to pull out the humanistic values in any topic they participate into. I would say wisdom and happiness go hand in hand, but so can the opposite. However the wise appreciate and do not take their happiness for granted.
This is just an observation I had.
This conversation has a lot of ideas around what makes us happy to discuss and to think about, but no one directly states happy-filled conversations, interesting.
Lindsay Newland Bowker 50+
It's fascinating thing Ted Conversations has going here. And I see changes. I saw a woman whose birther comments used to be peppered everywhere all of a sudden quoting rumi. It's magical. Defies Analysis but its magical.
Dave Ashman
Debra Smith 200+
I am so impressed by the efforts being made by many people to help us all gain compassion and understanding of places and of societies many of us know little about. The Taste of series started out as Wongmo r's idea. It has been taken up by others as well and we now have three sites to enjoy and learn from:
http://www.ted.com/conversations/3131/a_taste_series_to_explore_t.html
http://www.ted.com/conversations/3350/a_taste_of_iran.html
http://www.ted.com/conversations/3403/a_taste_of_laos_the_land_of.html
http://www.ted.com/conversations/3132/a_taste_of_afghanistan_can_
Please check them out!
Kristofer Björnson 10+
Debra Smith 200+
""Children have the right to live in a safe environment, protected by the adults around them. They are ours to guide, not to use or abuse.""
The bar indicates about a 50% approval rating (What's that about??)
It scored at about the same level as this one:"in a modern world , a global community, we cannot tolerate the continuing resurgence of enmity, war and oppression arising from ancient cultural and religious vendettas of any kind."
And this one is at less than 50% !!!!
"Women have the right to live as free, independent human beings without fear of being harmed"
Lindsay Newland Bowker 50+
It says "what do we think the common values are here at Ted ..in our community..in other words not what we personally hold as values but what we see fromour daily gathering here the Ted Camp Fire as shared values. Very different question.
I haven't seen any discussion of childen's right in the Td Community..it is one the issues nearest to my heart and a long term focus of my work and avicacy but by the "what have you observed in Ted standard" I didn't vote yes for that or the womens rights one. on my favorites personally Karen's "harmony rather than one" I
So if we clarify eactly what we are asking for the results will be more understandable perhaps.also asked Sietse to open up the comments and questions to other han the moderator if possible. ( see my post below)Also I had some confusion about the bars being longer for some things that are further back in the list..a sort by popular vote should have all those that have longer affirmative bars at the top, no?I think a clarifying opening comment would help reslve what you are pointing to..and having more people able to question and comment would certainly get at that.
Lindsay Newland Bowker 50+
(1) Yes means I hold that belief or value too or
(2) Yes,my expereince at Ted i s that these are widely held values, common ground, in the ted Community .
gen we finsh this version..we should do a second on ofn the other dimension. Would be really interesting to compare the match between what we as indoviduals hold as our highest values, opinions, beliefs and what whether we see that in the Ted Community based onour daily work here.
Kristofer Björnson 10+
Lindsay, my intentention was to see if we as humans had any values in common. I also think some of the statements with long bars that seems to be pushed back have been so because they also have some negative votes. The list seems to be ordered according to how they score on "agree minus disagree" which I find fine.
Lindsay Newland Bowker 50+
also I think we want to try and make nay sense our of this daya we need to clarify whether people are simply agreeing with the statements there or syaing they see these vaues on Ted..
Kristofer Björnson 10+
In my opinion people should vote on their own values. The idea behind this conversation was to make away with some assumptions we may have about other peoples values. For example; If I assume that most people here at TED except me thinks greed is a good thing and I was taking into account what I thought others here at TED valued in my voting, I would not vote for "greed is bad". But it was these kind of assumptions about others values that I wanted to get around, and therefore it is better if people just agree or disagree without thinking about what others may value.
Jim Moonan 30+
Julie Ann 10+
Meher Like Spring Rabbit 10+
Kristofer Björnson 10+
Steve Graeff
Debra Smith 200+
Steve, given that I have given you my answer- its very easy to get a google account. Why not participate?
Lindsay Newland Bowker 50+
They are both along the lines of the very great difference between "everyone is hungry" and "freedom from hunger is a basic human right".
Too early to analyse but I am interested to note that folk dont seem to resonate with the idea that freedom from exploitation, and a gurantee of fair wages and safe working conditions are basic human rights.
Karine AUBRY 50+
Great idea you got here, i just voted and added a few statements. I hope a lot of people will join the experience.
Special thanks to Debra for pulling my french sleave ;)
Debra Smith 200+
Who is with me?
I have contacted four already- One young, One sci fi, One in France, One eclectic. Your turn!
Lindsay Newland Bowker 50+
I think we are going to have from this a basis for a follow up question with out top 10 "shared values" asthe centerpiece.
I see thi swhole google moderator thing as a possibly useful extension to our ted community in general and to facilitating/furthering many disciussions.
We should add toour outreach that those who have alreday voted should cjeck back as newitems are added as people vote. We want all items to have an equal chnace to be considered by all who come to the moderator.
Debra Smith 200+
Hope its OK with you that I put the survey in the 'what can TED do better?' question and suggested that there be an update box where exciting developments from TED converstations could be posted. I am hoping a few people will notice it because I do not think anyone but us has used the survey yet (we are all being given credit for each click and choice.)
Kristofer Björnson 10+
Seems like a few more actually have taken the survey now. So thanks!
Sietse Sterrenburg 10+
"we learn by exchanging ideas"
"(small groups of) individuals can initiate global change"
I think it would be really helpful to feed the statements/ideas/items, that were posted already, into a system were each individual item can be reacted to, for example google moderator.
I started it here as an example with my two items: http://goo.gl/mod/0073
Love to hear what you think about it (and feel free to add to it).
Lindsay Newland Bowker 50+
.couldn't connect with your link though..
could you recheck or advise?
Thnaks....sounds fruitful
Sietse Sterrenburg 10+
@Lindsay, I guess it's because you need a google-account. I have changed this setting, it should be open for everybody now, can you try again?
Lindsay Newland Bowker 50+
But again, thnak you for assisting me.
Kristofer Björnson 10+
I added the list Debra compiled in another post and voted on your items.
Debra Smith 200+
Kristofer- how will we let the TED community know to vote and add?
Kristofer Björnson 10+
Debra Smith 200+
Sietse Sterrenburg 10+
Sietse Sterrenburg 10+
Lindsay Newland Bowker 50+
Lindsay Newland Bowker 50+
Rights aren't ehat are granted or recognized..rights are inherent.
In other words..it is still an inherent right even if there is no law or supoortive structure toprotect it.
I framed all of mine in term sof universal rights really to ask what we all consider universal human rights..things that we as individuals and our many diffrent nation states should stand for and further and protect.
Kristofer Björnson 10+
Debra Smith 200+
Have all the ideas represented on this page been transferred over for voting?
Kristofer Björnson 10+
My hypothesis is that we as humans actually are quite similar in our values, but that we differ much in the secondary opinions that we build upon these values, partly because of diffent emphasis on the relative importance of different values, partly because we attack the problem from different angles and holds different ideas about the problem.
In discussions about certain opinions I think we often fail to see that behind the disagreement we actually have built both of our opinions on the same set of basic values. An example; In the case of abortion the anti-abortion part overwhelmingly seems to believe that pro-abortion people just want to have sex without having to think about the consequences, while they actually are basing their argument on something much more similar to the anti-abortion part: the right to a life worth living. Another problem I see is that religious often seems to assume that atheists main reason for critizising religion is that the atheist wants to pursue their egoistic drive, while that very often not is the case, and the critique much more often are along the lines that there is side to religion that seems to be harmful to humanity
Missconceptions about the underlying motivation behind a certain opinion often makes dialouges not get as deep as they need to attack the real problem, and both parts seems to feel missundersood. No wonder as both holds missconceptions about the other persons underlying motivation.
So my hope were to find if there actually is a set of values that we can assume almost every person shares, so that in the future we can avoid assuming that others don't hold these values and move dialouges behind the point of missconception of the underlying motivation.
Lindsay Newland Bowker 50+
Kristofer Björnson 10+
Wongmo,I agree.
Debra, I try to make a push, but then I see where everyone else goes and tries to follow. :) And yes, or at least all the ideas you collected in your thread has been transfered.
Debra Smith 200+
I would not know how to put in the Charter of Compassion,
These two are Sietse's:
we learn by exchanging ideas"
"(small groups of) individuals can initiate global change"
Kristofer Björnson 10+
I read through the charter for compassion but could not come up with a condensed sentence that summarized it.
http://charterforcompassion.org/site/#
Lindsay Newland Bowker 50+
I think our ljumbled list is very good for priposes of this conversation but I would like to see us viist the Charter for Compassion as its own Ted Conversation... we could post each element exactl as it is as a separatee comment in Ted Convestaions and ask people to shpw agreement with a thumbs up and disagreement with a comment below. Would be very interesting and I thnk we could make it work within a Ted Convesration framework
I see we have stalled out on our google moderator for this conversation..nogrowth or change in a few days.
Sietse Sterrenburg 10+
Kristofer Björnson 10+
But I would certainly agree on "treat others as you want to be treated" and adding it is probably a good idea.
Lindsay Newland Bowker 50+
also how come when there is a sort by popularity the length of the bar doesn't correlate with position in the list? Doesn't the length of the bar indicate the number of afformative votes?
I have referred people in two of my conversations ( freedom of religion and foundations for a global alliance) to the moderator here and a few have visited.
I invite those who have posted here to join those two conversations.
The freedom of religion ones explores in depth one of the "values" posted at our moderator..whether freedom of religion protects "hate speech"
the foundations for global alliance is exploring two specific questions closely interconnected with our google moderator list.
(1) global concerns that supercede soverignty ( one of the specific values in our list)
(2)foundations for a global alliance is exploring what we would consider tobe universal human rights. All of my addition son our list and may of the others are being explored there. Provides a good opporunity to look at some o what we have listed in our moderator in depth ina context of universal human rights.
Debra Smith 200+
Lindsay Newland Bowker 50+
another quote from the same source..perhaps a little more accessible
http://www.cadi.ph/Editorials/Editorial_Butterfly_Effect.htm
I apologize that some of the language in both of these quotes may be initial barriers for the humanists amongst us. I hope you can just leap over that, or set it asude just for a moment, suppress your woo factor recation, just for one second... and get to the heart of what I am suggesting we consider as our common ground.. that is bound in stewardship for the earth now and in the future, that it is fluid, dynamicc. chnaging every moment with every encounter we have with one anoher..that what happens here we take into our lives different that we were before, more deeply connected ti thta stewardship.
Comment deleted
Lindsay Newland Bowker 50+
I guess. simply put I am saying that the common ground is both the process we engage in with each every day here at Ted and the way that changes us in our "real lives"..what we take back to our real lives..and hopefully also a common commitment to stewardship for this world..the poeple and ceatures we have with us right now..and to the peoples and creatures who will inherit the earth we leave behind"
I would say that for me personally ,the process of engaging here at Ted oustide of a community where there is clear consensus, clear shared values ( My international conetmplative community) has expanded and stretched and honed me in ways that enable me to engage in my tiny little bit of stewardship for the world more effectively, with more wisdom, with more awareness and importantly with a better skill set/mindset for navigating difference and opposition. The more willing we are to engage here on important ideas in a settimg of differences and opposition, in a setting where theer is no clear consensus the more we grow as individuals and the more valuable our lives will be to others in even the simplest exchanages
.The common ground is our engagement in that process.
Lindsay Newland Bowker 50+
http://www.cadi.ph/Editorials/Editorial_Butterfly_Effect.htm
In otherwords, I guess I am saying that "common ground" is a fluid, mercurial, process whereby we somehow begin to move from wherever we are, whatever our lives are about to an engagement that is about the human condition, about being mindful that what we do now affects not just us and the creatures we have with us now on earth but all who follow us all the creatures of tomorrow.Here we seem to be looking to a steady state model of common ground..we seem to think that it's important to agree of the particulars, to state our common values ( and that is soi f we are forming a community ora government..even here ta Ted we are bound by the values of the Ted Agreement). But if we are about what Ted is about in the wolrd we are not about anything that is steady state in any way. We are about growing awareness that is beyond our own self interest, we are about becoming imaginal cells in a world that is broken and needs every one of us.,Our community , our common ground is our commtment to become imaginal cellsin all we do, in all we say, wherever we are, whatever we do.
Jason Kather 10+
"Beauty is in the eye of the beholder"
"Anything worth having is worth working for"
Are statements universally accepted? I believe them to be true and don't see an obvious arguement to either. I am finding it difficult to come up with an original thought that may not have a dissenting opinion.
Ed Schulte 50+
observing TED idea/question/dedate "flow"
I would tend to lean towards this service being a living / breathing / indicator of what the so-called "Shift in gobal Consciousness" entails. This is happening NOT by seeking Agreement but by sharing (be they onesided or not) Consciousness thought forms relating to Technology/Entertainment/Design .....and since these three all involve "Creativity"
the short answer IMO is ..."we agree to share "Creative thoughts" creatively, (but NOT necessarily agree on them)"
Lindsay Newland Bowker 50+
Kristofer Björnson 10+
Lindsay Newland Bowker 50+
http://www.iheu.org/node/352
Kristofer Björnson 10+
Tim Colgan 50+
Kristofer Björnson 10+
From Wikipedia[1]:
"4. A secular ideology which espouses reason, ethics, and justice, whilst specifically rejecting supernatural and religious dogma as a basis of morality and decision-making."
I don't think we can assume that everyone (most) is willing to accept that.
[1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Humanism
Lindsay Newland Bowker 50+
Debra Smith 200+
Debra Smith 200+
Can I go ahead and add Christophe's and Lee's points to my own to begin to make a aggregate list that we believe to be common ground? And people can then respond to what they cannot support from the list if they wish?
If this is not the direction you wish- no problem, I have no wish to overstep.
Kristofer Björnson 10+
I allways think it is interesting to see in what direction people take any subject and I don't want to restrict the conversation in any way as long as it seems relevant. I posted the proposal because I thought there had to be a lot of other people that was thinking about similar things. One motivation for it was because I many times have been a passive listener in many discussion where I have realized that two people that claim to have completely opposing views very often in reality seems to share very similar values, and rather only disagree in the details or the relative weight that should be given to any particular issue.
Maybe Jonathan Haidt's presentation on moral roots of liberals and conservatives[1] explains what kind of questions I am trying to center the discussion around. Not restricting the discussion liberal vs conservative though.
[1] http://www.ted.com/talks/lang/eng/jonathan_haidt_on_the_moral_mind.html
Debra Smith 200+
PS and your common ground ideas too!
Tim Colgan 50+
"4. A secular ideology which espouses reason, ethics, and justice, whilst specifically rejecting supernatural and religious dogma as a basis of morality and decision-making."
And drop a few words:
"A[n] ideology which espouses reason, ethics, and justice, as a basis of morality and decision-making."
Kristofer Björnson 10+
Helen Hupe 30+
Debra Smith 200+
Kristofer Björnson 10+
Helen Hupe 30+
Kristofer Björnson 10+
Comment deleted
Debra Smith 200+
Kristofer Björnson 10+
Lindsay Newland Bowker 50+
Debra Smith 200+
I am a resiliant optimist. I see that we all keep coming back and working to address questions. In my mind I am showing you all my marbles and pieces and toys and facts and I am hoping to see all of yours so we can see what we can build together.
In just being willing to come to the table and to share ideas, I think we take a valuable step on common ground and as we build that common ground it could become the sacred ground on which a better humanity is formed. As with the construction of any building or bridge there are many phases. The earliest ones all have to do with the exchange of visions and of ideas. From there we get to blueprints but even at that early date we might have people making the steel that will become the girders (our contributors with scientific knowledge) or people with ideas for the style and function (our artists, architects, designers and engineers).
I could go on with the analogy but I hope my point becomes clear that huge humanly conceived projects cannot be judged in the early stages where order begins to be formed from the chaos of many sincere and invested minds coming together.
Lindsay Newland Bowker 50+
"In just being willing to come to the table and to share ideas, I think we take a valuable step on common ground and as we build that common ground it could become the sacred ground on which a better humanity is formed" ( debra Smith
It says very simply and very eloquently what I was trying to say with all my words to which you have replied.
Kristofer Björnson 10+
I do think that in the spirit of your comment "[...] we will eventually discover that we have been on common ground all along [...]", we as humans very often have much more in common than we at first believe. And that a big problem in discussions with each other is that we interpret what the other persons means according to what we believe that he/she is saying. And that we make a lot of extra assumptions about the other persons intentions.
Comment deleted
Debra Smith 200+
Christophe Cop 500+
piece over war
abundance over shortage
pleasure over pain
love over hatred
health over disease
succes over failure
And we can make other very broad universals in humans....
Though I don't know why one needs a broad-based agreement... as that will lead to a low common denominator.
And there is so much more on which we ought to agree upon (when it comes to facts) while we don't...
That said... can we all agree on math? or thermodynamics?
Debra Smith 200+
I do not see this as the lowest common denominator but rather as a lifeboat in a wide ocean where people can stand to build their lives in harmony.
Christophe Cop 500+
though how small do we allow this subset to be?
(this touches upon principles that relate to democracy vs technocracy... very interesting!)
Debra Smith 200+
I think that is what is happening here on TED conversations in a unique way. We vote with our attention and choice to argue our view points on this site. There are some questions that I consider fools bait and I avoid them- as they are building a very different kind of raft. I know there is a point of view or agenda that I do not choose to invest my time in. ( I used to tell my kids when they were frustrated that your knowledge belongs to you and it is a gift when you share it with others. The flip side is that it is also a precioius gift when they share theirs with you.)
However, where there is good will but wildy opposing views I am very keen to discuss why a person sees things so differently from the way I do. What do they know that I don't or that I did not rightly see. That is fabulously productive for me and I grow and I learn and sometimes I agree to see the world differently but always I come away better for it (even if some others observing on the site have heart attacks because I ask the questions that are at the heart of the matter and deemed to hot to handle!)
We cannot control the size of the subset. We just get busy doing our own thing, leave them to do theirs with a eye out for radical stuff that we can confront and time and science are on our side. We can hope that their raft floats with good will. Having said that - our case is best won by being truly fine examples of human behaviour ourselves.
Kristofer Björnson 10+
Even though there are more things we ought to agree upon than we are able to. I think a good starting point for understanding each other are to get rid of a few false presumptions that we have towards each other.
I have many times to often listened to friends debating right vs. left wing politics with the left side accusing the right of only wanting to make monies, at the same time as the right accuses the left of only wanting "the system" to take care of them without them having to work. At the same time as the left and right wing themself would like to argue that their corresponding motivation actually is that "we should take care of each other" and that "a free market is the quickest way to development that benefits everyone". But discussions never geting that far because each part assumes that the other is arguing from egoism alone.
Similarly I find religious people assuming that non-religious only are interested in fulfilling their own pleasures. While non-religious assumes that religious people are utterly unwilling to accept facts.
Very often preasumptions like these seems to make us unable to get past the very first step in a conversation and is a hurdle to getting to understand what the other persons critique of a certain ideology, religion, etc. actually is. I think most people in the conversations here at TED have been very able to listen to, and consider other persons perspectives. And I therefore thought it would be worthwile to explore what I actually can assume that most people do agree upon wherever in the world I would travel, or whoever I would like to engage in dialouge with.
Debra Smith 200+
Debra Smith 200+
Because we are all human-
Everybody gets hungry.
Everybody needs water.
Everybody needs to be loved.
Everybody needs to be warm enough.
Everybody needs to feel and be safe.
Everybody loves to laugh.
There is a lot of beauty in this world.
Something needs to be done to change the outcomes we are now headed for.
Everybody needs freedom and slavery is just plain wrong.
I am starting at the most common denominator and I hope we can add more common ground.
Edit and addition from Christophe Cop (above)
we prefer
piece over war
abundance over shortage
pleasure over pain
love over hatred
health over disease
succes over failure
edit and addition from Lee Wilkinson (above):
That a good and appropriate education is needed and is a good place to start.
2. Love will conquer many problems
3. Empathy towards ones friends and foes is a good starting point in solving problems
4. War is a terrible but sometimes necessary evil
5. That creativity and not more of the same will take us forward out of this mess
6. A good TED Talk can inspire us to be better than we thought we were
7. Inspiration looks like many things to many different people
8. That we can agree to disagree
Lindsay Newland Bowker 50+
"add more common ground"
Debra Smith 200+
Krisztián Pintér 200+
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cgps85scy1g
Kristofer Björnson 10+
Debra Smith 200+
Great minds.........(but i like to remember that it ends with ..........but fools seldom differ!)
Lindsay Newland Bowker 50+
Kristofer Björnson 10+
Lee Wilkinson 20+
1. That a good and appropriate education is needed and is a good place to start.
2. Love will conquer many problems
3. Empathy towards ones friends and foes is a good starting point in solving problems
4. War is a terrible but sometimes necessary evil
5. That creativity and not more of the same will take us forward out of this mess
6. A good TED Talk can inspire us to be better than we thought we were
7. Inspiration looks like many things to many different people
8. That we can agree to disagree
Bob Shingles 10+
I've never had love fix a broken computer and shareholders of a Defense Contractor probably hope for small wars.
Lindsay Newland Bowker 50+
I think so far most of us her have assumed the framer of his conversation did so with refernce to our expereince here at TED.
It's a kind of grand social expereiment.. a meta conversation..
Lees list I recognize as arising dircetly out of our shared expereince in this meta conversation that is Ted..thi big social expereiment that is Ted. I like Lees list becauseit points our diversity as a community..how it plays into and across different conversations we take up..and what we as individuals take home with us from that.
So is your comment..agree to dsagree all that youhave expereinced here at TED as common ground?
What have you seen here at Ted?
Kristofer Björnson 10+
Lee didn't say Love solves all problems, right? Don't you agree that it is an important ingredient in solving many problems?
Bob Shingles 10+
TED is a great environment that brings together great minds and distinctive ideas from around the globe to talk about large and small problems.
-Education reform
-The place of technology in our world and our lives
-Climate and environmental concerns
-Entrepreneurial endeavors
While I have only been a member for a short time. I have been watching TED presentations for years. Throughout all those presentations, love was almost never an ingredient in the resolution of the problem.
The reason I respect the TED site and community is not because of love but because of an open-minded devotion to creativity and adaption. A curiosity about the world and the desire to make it a better place is truly refreshing.
I suppose one could argue that TED is a place for the love of creativity and that helps solve problems. In that case, one would have to better define love.
note: I missed #7. I can agree with that since it is variable to each person.
Kristofer Björnson 10+
In my definition of love that desire is included as long as I don't only want to make the world a better place for myself, but also for others.
Kristofer Björnson 10+