How would you like to be better than you are? -Harvey Fineberg

http://www.ted.com/talks/lang/eng/harvey_fineberg_are_we_ready_for_neo_evolution.html

Harvey Fineberg starts his TED talk with the rhetorical question written in the title. I would say that this is a very effective way to start (even if your English teacher says otherwise). It gets people thinking right of the bat and there is really no beating around the bush. Another move that really accented Fineberg’s speech was the fact that he had visuals on a PowerPoint of some sort. These pictures, quotes, and graphs gave the audience something to look at while they listened and they also helped him explain his main idea: evolution and how it will continue. He gives a short description of evolution and goes s far back as the Big Bang. Also, he tells the audience of how he found his love for biology in college, expressing his nerdiness and therefore making a connection with the people who are listening. As always, a sense of humor comes into play. He makes a couple simple cracks that go along with his topic just to keep the people on their toes. One sound effect is used in this speech. It is a very short ding that symbolizes how short of a time that humans have been here compared to how long the Earth itself is.

The sole test of survival is adaptation to the environment. According to Harvey Fineberg, there are three possibilities in which evolution could occur.

1. No evolution at all. We could simply be the end of the line. Through medicine, we have preserved genes that we wish to keep. Therefore, preventing the natural occurrence of new genes. Also, human beings have almost stopped adapting to their environments. Instead, we have mad the environment adapt to US.
2. Traditional evolution will continue just as it always has. It has been said that the wheels of evolution grind slowly, but they never quite stop. Evolution will always be there, we just won’t be able to see it as clearly. Evolution also occurs when there is isolation and environmental changes. If and when we migrate to other planets, there will be plenty of both of those things.
3. The last possibility of human evolution is neo-evolution. It is extremely controversial because it deals with making our own genes and deciding what stays or goes. Some work has recently been done on a human skin cell to the point where it reverted back to a human stem cell: the root of all life. With self directed evolution, we can take a process that usually takes 100,000 years and condense it to 100.

With a few changes in your genes, you can make yourself however you want to be. We can get rid of diseases, increase life expectancies, and even add “super attributes”. I can understand the desire to be rid of the world’s crippling diseases of today. They do not bring anything but pain in suffering in most cases. But eliminating diseases would cause the world to have a longer lifespan. This is probably not a good thing. Look at how overpopulated we are right now. Would there be room on this Earth if people continued to reproduce but never died? This also eliminates room for mental and social growth. With new generations come new ideas. If the older generations never went away, the new generations would not get a chance to speak and move forward. Now, the most controversial things about self-directed evolution are so-called “super attributes”. No, this doesn’t mean becoming X-Men. It just means bettering the random aspects of life like memory, fitness, creativity, etc. Who would opt for fitness? Memory? Creativity? Unfortunately, not many people would go for the creative aspect. Most lean towards the vainer of the choices. According to Dan Pink and the books he has written, this isn’t good for the future. The world is getting tired of just getting by in life. They need something else to keep them satisfied. Not just the simple, one use ideas. They need something creative. But getting back to the choosing: What if you could change the cells in your offspring before they are born? Hey, who doesn’t want healthier children? I read this book last year called Double Helix. It was about this intern at a science institute that found out a huge secret about the founder: He had been performing experiments on fertilized eggs in order to better their DNA. In real life, there is a certain point where this kind of experiment just isn’t a good idea anymore.

So, what is the next phase in the human existence? Are we destined to become something different? Or are we already there? If we do end up taking the path of neo-evolution, will we choose a community that is better, kinder, and more successful? What about the “super attributes”? Will only some people get these? Is that a good idea? Will the society we make be boring and uniform or robust and versatile? More importantly, will we develop the wisdom to make these choices wisely? Well?

                                   

It Gets Better- Joel Burns

http://www.ted.com/talks/joel_burns_tells_gay_teens_it_gets_better.html

                Joel Burns spoke at the city council in Fort Worth, Texas. You know what his point is for the entire speech. Burns starts out by telling the room that he is there to educate them about suicide in gay teens and to encourage these teens to not give up. The sympathy card was pulled very early in this talk. One great move that Joel Burns made was the fact that he addressed the struggling teens directly. This helps them to feel as if he is sitting there, right next to them, telling them to hang on. It makes them feel as if someone really does care. Joel chokes up at some point while reciting his speech because it really hit home for him. This, plus the fact that what he says is completely heart-wrenching, then caused me to choke up also. He really makes the room aware of his cause and makes an impact.

                It gets better. This is the key phrase in Burns’ speech. No matter how bad it is now, it gets better. This is a vital idea to believe in as someone who is struggling with their life. Kids sometimes have tunnel vision. This means that they think there is only one side of the story and that nothing will ever change. This is wrong. There is ALWAYS a way to avoid a certain situation and things hardly ever stay the same in ANYTIHNG in life. However, kids continue to think that life is never going to get any better so they decide to just end it. Look at this boy.

Can you see how happy he looks? Does it look like he has a love for life? If you just took one look at him, would you believe that, one day, he was bullied so badly that he had finally had enough of this life? Would you believe that he went home, wrapped one end of a noose around his neck and the other around a tree and jumped? Now look at this boy.

See how young he is? He can’t be any older than 13. This child was also bullied to the point where he believed there was no way out. This child also committed suicide.

                It is not fair that people so young have to deal with these huge aching feelings that people thrust upon them. And, on top of all that, they have to deal with all of the normal stressors in regular teenage life (getting good grades, trying to make friends, trying to figure out where you belong). Bullies form at exactly the wrong moment: the youth. Teenagers are already distressed because they don’t know who they are or what they are supposed to do. Youth is the time to figure this out. If you are told that no one will ever like you and that you aren’t wanted in the world at this crucial point in life, then you will most likely believe it. This is what causes teen suicide. This is why so many lives hang in the balance at this very moment. These people are too young. They haven’t even had a chance to truly live. Joel Burns is not only here to tell children that it gets better. He is here to tell the adults that something needs to be done. The world cannot continue in this way. The kids cannot possibly deal with this on their own.

                How could bullying get this far? It started out as simply arguing in the sandbox. Why did it escalate to this level? Why did we LET IT? Could we not see what was going on? It has been said that ignorance is bliss. I’m positive that this only applies to half of the parties in this day and age. The people who ignore the bad are happy in their own little bubble. The struggling teenagers? This isn’t them. They are obviously not happy. Can we stop this madness? Can we accept others and the decisions that they make? Answer me this: Why can’t people just let each other be?

Dave Eggers- Once Upon A School

http://www.ted.com/talks/lang/eng/dave_eggers_makes_his_ted_prize_wish_once_upon_a_school.html

                One very excellent move on Dave Eggers’ part was the fact that he admitted that he was nervous. If you have the confidence to say that, then you also have to confidence to present a great talk. However, during the telling of his life stories, Eggers definitely uses the word “uh” too many times and gets slightly off topic occasionally. This TED talk is accented by funny one-liners that keep the attention of the audience quite nicely.

Almost every good idea starts as something that may seem ridiculous to the rest of the world. Dave’s idea starts with the building on 816 Valencia in California. He and some business partners decided to open up shop there as a publishing site for a couple quarterlies. For some reason or another, they all decided to open up a free English tutoring site. Hey, there were already writers there. Unfortunately, they had to sell something in order to keep their space and pay the rent. Someone made a crack about the new floorboards making the place look like a pirate ship. And so began the pirate supply shop/publishing office/tutoring center. People should be spilling in right?? Not quite. As Dave explained it, there was a sort of “trust gap”. This inspired them to hire actual teachers to do the tutoring. Soon, business was booming. The one on one attention has really been helping these kids. The creative atmosphere inspires them not to just finish their homework but to also start writing for their own enjoyment. This unique shop even started publishing a collection of works by these students. This causes the students to work harder and generate better pieces of writing because it is permanent up there on the shelf for everyone to see. Strangely enough, after these books were stocked, the pirate supply shop actually started making money. Eventually, other states started to pick up on this idea. New York has a similar space but, instead of pirate stuff, they sell everything you need to become a superhero. LA has something similar to a “7-11”. Think about it. This one little idea has become a full-blown epidemic. Amazing. How far could this go? Could it reach every continent? Every country? Well, just maybe.

                For the past couple weeks, we have all been asking each other: What matters? This question is extremely hard to answer for the entire world as a whole. It would most definitely be ideal to find even one thing that matters deeply to everyone on the entire planet. Right now, that is not entirely possible. We can make fairly decent predictions, but can you think of just one thing? At the moment, the only way to answer this question is by asking the individual. So, what matters to HIM? What does Dave Eggers care about? Obviously, one of the answers is “education”. He wants children to not just get through school, but to have fun while going by with flying colors. He believes that this is definitely possible if the kids give themselves even just one chance to shine. Can kids do this on their own without having to be tutored or walked through every single step? Of course! They just have to have the desire to be great at something and then start down that path. But how are such young people so inspired to get up and go? Could the younger population possibly have a greater intrinsic drive? I honestly have no idea (I’m no scientist). However, I do know that there are so many more opportunities for my generation than there have been ever before. We can do music, dance, publish books, and basically do anything we set our minds to. Can anyone start anything as big as what Dave Eggers did? Most definitely! My fifth grade teacher is a great example. Every day, after the pledge of allegiance, he had us recite this line: I can do anything I set my mind to. By the end of the year, almost every single student believed this. It doesn’t take much to change a life. The question is not: Why are we doing this? The question is: Why not?