So many TED Talks are great. This is the best TED Talk I've seen in years (it's funny too) and I'm personally implementing the steps outlined at the end of this talk in my own life. Today, February 4, 2012, is day one of "creating lasting positive change" in my life.
The method consists of doing the following daily activities for 21 days in a row:
- 3 Gratitudes (writing three unique things that we're grateful for each day helps develop positive attitude by teaching us to scan the world each day for something positive in our lives)
- Journaling (writing about one positive experience daily helps re-create happy feelings that perpetuate)
- Exercise (doing daily physical activity helps to reinforce positive behavior)
- Meditation (doing daily meditation helps to focus intention)
- Random Acts of Kindness (performing random acts of kindness every day ripples the effects of positive behavior)
The Revolution in Education Isn’t Radical - It’s a Pretty Basic Idea that Works
A former hedge-fund manager created a tutoring system almost entirely by accident when helping his cousins with their math lessons. The TED video below is a great summation of his work and its demonstrable effects tracked over time; it’s effective because the learning is done A) at the self-pace of the student and B) because there isn’t a penalty for failure, rather there is an emphasis on trial and error until mastery is achieved. The article from Wired.com below the video provides a more thoroughgoing look at how and why the teaching model he’s pioneered with video works so well. This is how I wished I’d been taught and how I believe we should be teaching our children in the future. In addition, I’ve posted the link the Khan Academy itself so that if you have children in school they can have access to the resource. I, frankly, have even used it to refresh myself on some basic concepts in Algebra. It’s truly superb.
[ Wired.com Article on Salman Khan’s “Khan Academy” ] or [ Displayed on my Blog Pages ]
[ Link to the Khan Academy ]
What Secular Humanism can Take From Religion
Although I am not an athiest (I'm an agnostic), the older I have become the more overtly hostile I've become toward religion. Particularly, as the witless, hateful evangelical brand of Christian that seems to populate so much of America is left to run amok. This TED talk, is a wonderful bridge between secular life and what good religion can offer secular humanity. At the same time, its a great reminder on how you can "harmoniously disagree" because of what religious and secular life can offer one another.
Dan Savage on Monogamy
My own personal attitudes about monogamy, open relationships and how open is healthy and how open is destructive has evolved greatly over the years. I think I have transitioned from an “intellectual Victorian” who had (like everyone else) a libido that was in conflict with my “Victorian idea” of relationship and what that should be. My beliefs have changed in light of experience so they are more in line with my personal desires but still recognize the benefit of moderation and commitment. I’ve come to a place that is healthier and where both sides of my sexual and emotional personality are in greater harmony. Dan Savage’s thoughts on the matter in the video below match my own beliefs nearly identically. In his words, the “adulterous impulse should be harnessed for the benefit of the relationship” and “monogamy should be treated like sobriety.”
Democratic Socialism versus Unregulated Capitalism: A Rant by a Pissed-Off Liberal
Democratic Socialism (think Denmark, Sweden, Germany) is not an evil. It is a good. Rampant, unregulated capitalism is not a good (think Mexico, Indonesia, Nigeria). It is an evil.
Until recently, America has charted a course between the two. I favor the former, conservatives favor the latter. I would like us to be more like Denmark or Germany, Conservatives would love us to be like Mexico. Conservatism the world-over is winning. Just look at yesterday's news: Britain's Tory government is slashing services in the name of deficit reduction. The conservative trick has always been to bloat the military budgets of the countries they are in when they exercise control. Then they claim no money is available for services that will benefit the peoples of their respective countries so domestic services must be cut to keep the budget "in line". We balance our budgets on the backs of the weak, not the strong. This is a moral wrong.
You cannot tell me that here in the U.S. with a defense budget larger than all of the countries of the world COMBINED, cannot do more to shore up our economy and provide for its people's fundamental needs. We can do this and more. And none of this will interfere with the functioning of the lightly-regulated marketplace we have in this country.
But I would be remiss not to point out, that in America these issues have always been a "theoretical argument". Liberals like me and conservatives fight the idea of a "public good" in a vacuum. The levers of power are controlled by corporations who effectively co-opt the process with financial contributions to the election coffers of the members of Congress. Subsequently, the market IS, in fact, highly regulated: regulated to provide all the decision-making power about our national economic policy to the hands of the companies who finance our elections. That means they have socialized all of their risk, and privatized all of their profit (remember the bank bailouts everyone hated so much, or the GM bailout, et al.). I'm not against profits, but I am against making the public pay for private losses because of malfeasance or negligence. I am also opposed to the wealthiest among us (corporations included) paying little or no taxes.
In addition, conservatives own the six companies that own ALL of the national media in the U.S. How is it possible to have an informed electorate when that electorate is fed "infotainment" nonstop? The media are another arm of control in the battle for power over our institutions. In effect, to wrest control of the government from the plutocratic institutions that control it now, we must amend our Constitution to publicly finance elections, else this theoretical debate will never result in policy decisions that reflect either democratic socialist policies or laissez-faire capitalist principles. That's a debate I'd love our country to have, because I believe my side would win.
In addition, we must end the fiction that corporations are people, endowed with the same rights and privileges. How many people do you know of that have multiple-billions of dollars and live on indefinitely? Corporations are different entities in the world and should be governed differently than individual citizens. They are designed to do one thing: make money for their shareholders. Which is fine. But to permit them access, influence, and control over the levers of power, speech, and regulation in our political economy is insanity; it is, in effect democratic suicide. Decisions like Citizens United v. FEC, must be overruled by legislation (constitutional amendment).
There is one other related item that is crucial to my argument here: the global environment. If the people of the industrialized world (and the U.S., in particular) truly exercised power over their political economy we would have had electric cars and solar & wind power production decades ago; long before peak oil became a reality in our lives. The fact that we do not and that it is only happening in small fits now is direct evidence of the paralysis the monied interests of our country have an interest in creating. This has consequences for the environment, not just the economy. Corporations in their self-interest have lead our planet to the edge. I suspect, based on the climate models we've known about for years, that we've passed the "tipping point". We are in for a world of hurt in the coming decades. My hope is that our environmental pressures will force political changes that are for the good, not the bad.
But at the moment, conservatives are more effectively using political paralysis and economic crisis more effectively than liberals/social democrats, and are continuing to take us off the cliff. They are the ones making their theoretical arguments of unregulated capitalism and "government is bad" for the people into real laws. The irony is, as stated already, "government is bad" is the mantra they get elected on; and, indeed, they do nothing for the people in the name of the government. But "government is very, very good" for their corporate benefactors and patrons, for whom they give large, lucrative government contracts, tax breaks, repeal regulations for, and give bailouts to when times get tough.
When law school is finished for me, I hope to be a huge problem for those in the world who would undermine Social Democracy.
The needs of citizens & democracy first. The needs of small business second. The needs of corporations and the rich, dead last: they can take care of themselves.
America deserves a democratic socialist government. I want us to be the Denmark of North America. Not the Mexico of the North.
Google Voice
I have a new Google Voice Number. I think this has a lot of potential and am kicking it around as a test for now. I still have the same phone number as before, but I’ve added this one as a feature; I’ll likely use it as my business phone. You can reach me through that number, by clicking the widget below: