TED Community » Manolis Polychronides

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• +1

  A comment on Talk: Renny Gleeson on antisocial phone tricks

  May 11 2012: A revelant effort to the speaker's last minute request about humanizing technology can be found here: http://bigthink.com/blogs/humanizing-technology
  
  Just like any human action, the use of technology has meaning. it is up to us to be aware and act, rather than re-act mindlessly...

• A comment on Talk: Sebastian Wernicke: 1000 TEDTalks, 6 words

  Jan 6 2012: laconic distillation haiku of 1000 TED talks !

• A comment on Talk: Antonio Damasio: The quest to understand consciousness

  Dec 20 2011: If conciousness occurs when a sense of self operates in (occupies) the mind then can we assert that when we are not self-conscious we are unconcious? Hardly so. It is just another state of consciousness.
• +5

  A reply on Talk: David Brooks: The social animal

  Mar 15 2011: Even though I believe that his introductory jokes were unecessary (and probably a cultural barrier to a non-American audience and a turn-off to certain Americans) I felt very warmly at the end of his speech. This feeling is very well captured by Jon's comment above and this is why I am replying here.
  
  Aristotle wrote 25 centuries ago that we are political animals and this corroborrates very well with the insights that David Brooks offers in his talk, insights that are based on neuroscience and the observation that our Western civilization has overplayed its confidence on reason. All the traits described (mindsight, equipose, metice, sympathy, blending and limerance) can be blended into Aristotle's "phronesis" or wisdom. (Barry Schwartz's TED talk on this is pertinent)
  
  The Socratic "know-thyself" is a call to understand our emotions, accept our limitations, cultivate our rational abilities and act collectively.
  
  I feel more and more confident that humanity is progressing in a faster pace in developing, calibrating and putting to use the tools that are useful in understanding the human condition and its difficulties.
  
  "You may say I' m a dreamer, but Im not the only one, I hope some day you'll join us, and the world will be as one" [Imagine by John Lennon]
• +2

  A comment on Talk: Patrick Chappatte: The power of cartoons

  Nov 30 2010: Cartoons have power. They can convey so much with so little. Kudos to cartoonists that capture the complex and the ineffable in a few simple lines.
  
  And I find the ideas of cartoon-journalism and ethnic divisions common projects really inspiring.
  
  It is a shame that cartoons can be exploited... but, then again, all communication mediums can and have been exploited.
• +5

  A comment on Talk: Mechai Viravaidya: How Mr. Condom made Thailand a better place

  Nov 30 2010: This candid talk was quite an inspiring example of a set of effective social interventions that countries all over the world have to seriously consider adopting in order to combat similar social ills. I was positively surprised to see such a lack of prudishness and a positive public reception in such a wide-scale project . Kudos to Mr. Condom :-) and to Thailand.
• +2

  A reply on Talk: Jason Fried: Why work doesn't happen at work

  Nov 30 2010: A closer reading of Steven Johnson's thought provoking speech suggests that his points on where great ideas come from (long incubation time and informal networked environments that foster novel connections) actually lend support to Jason's suggestions of killing (mundane) meetings and allowing uninterrupted work time.
  
  Steven does mention Google's policy of giving its employees 20% time off to pursue their own projects, that, as I understand, enhance their creativity (through uninterrupted time) and productivity (through work satisfaction) adding value to their output for the organization.
  
  The bottom line is that meetings, if they are to worth the organizational cost of the collective time being devoted to them, should not be mundane and task oriented (topics which can be well addressed through asynchronous means of communication orchestrated by thoughtful and non-"control freak" managers) but rather informal, loose and non-criticizing thus allowing ideas to be shared and nurtured.
• +9

  A reply on Talk: Birke Baehr: What's wrong with our food system

  Nov 30 2010: Tricia Baehr's response definitely offered a more complete view on the picture that Yasser's original comment chose to highlight.
  
  This is a great example of how internet access of the parties directly involved in an issue, can, over time, deliver better understanding to those patient enough to follow it through. And kudos to Yasser for recognizing that his comments could have been perceived as a bit harsh.
  
  If I may, I would like to point out that some of the negative responses on his comments were not always very thoughtful. It is better to refrain from automatically clicking ' thumbs down' or commenting negatively without allowing the parties involved to express their views. In my view, this is one aspect of the art of polite deliberation that is missing, to a large extend, even to TED.com comments.
  
  Commenting sheds light more on the commenter than on the view being commented ...