Wednesday, March 18, 2009

Wisdom at TED 2009

For some time now I have been concerned about a general abandonment of wisdom in our society, in favor of a focus on intelligence alone. It was this concern which actually led to creating this blog, thinking I could use the practice towards perhaps writing a book. As such, I am suggesting yet another (short this time!) presentation...this one from TED 2009.

In this presentation, psychologist Barry Shwartz looks at the importance of balancing intelligence with wisdom. In watching this video, I was struck again and again by the similarities between Shwartz's offering and what I have been attempting to share.

I will be sharing this video with many friends and family, hoping that it helps to explain what I have been ranting about for all these years.

Please do watch and, I hope, enjoy.

3 comments:

Anonymous said...

Another interesting link to thank you for. You know, as a web and graphic design student, I had to learn a great deal about how people accumulate information and to what purpose. The ideal is that a person should go from data to wisdom. Wisdom is the goal, knowledge is just a step. So you are making excellent observations with this post.
Specialization is the one culprit I blame for the lack of wisdom. When one gears an education to the ultimate goal of learning and excelling at one very specific skill, real knowledge takes a back seat. You can see this in the quality of general education in trade schools in the U.S.
That isn't to say that high end education produces wisdom either, just the focus is very apparent in trade schools and in fact, as a mother I can say it is also apparent in high school, where the path to wisdom begins to unwind. Can you tell this is a pet peeve?

Jerry said...

Thank you Linda. I tend to agree in regards to specialization and education. We aren`t taught to learn, we are mostly taught to jump through hoops and to never consider anything that is outside our area of expertise. This drives me batty. Its definitely a pet peeve for me as well.

Did you happen to look at my prior post that I had linked to as well? It`s a discussion I was trying to start on AI and its potential integration with humanity.

Anonymous said...

I haven't yet looked at that post but I will. Thanks for pointing it out.