Hi. This is my mobile phone. A mobile phone can change your life, and a mobile phone gives you individual freedom. With a mobile phone, you can shoot a crime against humanity in Syria. With a mobile phone, you can tweet a message and start a protest in Egypt. And with a mobile phone, you can record a song, load it up to SoundCloud and become famous. All this is possible with your mobile phone.
I'm a child of 1984, and I live in the city of Berlin. Let's go back to that time, to this city. Here you can see how hundreds of thousands of people stood up and protested for change. This is autumn 1989, and imagine that all those people standing up and protesting for change had a mobile phone in their pocket.
Who in the room has a mobile phone with you? Hold it up. Hold your phones up, hold your phones up! Hold it up. An Android, a Blackberry, wow. That's a lot. Almost everybody today has a mobile phone.
But today I will talk about me and my mobile phone, and how it changed my life. And I will talk about this. These are 35,830 lines of information. Raw data. And why are these informations there? Because in the summer of 2006, the E.U. Commission tabled a directive.
This directive [is] called Data Retention Directive. This directive says that each phone company in Europe, each Internet service company all over Europe, has to store a wide range of information about the users. Who calls whom? Who sends whom an email? Who sends whom a text message? And if you use your mobile phone, where you are. All this information is stored for at least six months, up to two years by your phone company or your Internet service provider.
And all over Europe, people stood up and said, "We don't want this." They said, we don't want this data retention. We want self-determination in the digital age, and we don't want that phone companies and Internet companies have to store all this information about us. They were lawyers, journalists, priests, they all said: "We don't want this."
And here you can see, like 10 thousands of people went out on the streets of Berlin and said, "Freedom, not fear." And some even said, this would be Stasi 2.0. Stasi was the secret police in East Germany.
And I also ask myself, does it really work? Can they really store all this information about us? Every time I use my mobile phone? So I asked my phone company, Deutsche Telekom, which was at that time the largest phone company in Germany, and I asked them, please, send me all the information you have stored about me. And I asked them once, and I asked them again, and I got no real answer. It was only blah blah answers.
But then I said, I want to have this information, because this is my life you are protocoling. So I decided to start a lawsuit against them, because I wanted to have this information. But Deutsche Telekom said, no, we will not give you this information. So at the end, I had a settlement with them. I'll put down the lawsuit and they will send me all the information I ask for. Because in the mean time, the German Constitutional Court ruled that the implementation of this E.U. directive into German law was unconstitutional.
So I got this ugly brown envelope with a C.D. inside. And on the C.D., this was on. Thirty-five thousand eight hundred thirty lines of information. At first I saw it, and I said, okay, it's a huge file. Okay. But then after a while I realized, this is my life. This is six months of my life, into this file.
So I was a little bit skeptical, what should I do with it? Because you can see where I am, where I sleep at night, what I am doing. But then I said, I want to go out with this information. I want to make them public. Because I want to show the people what does data retention mean.
So together with Zeit Online and Open Data City, I did this. This is a visualization of six months of my life. You can zoom in and zoom out, you can wind back and fast forward. You can see every step I take. And you can even see how I go from Frankfurt by train to Cologne, and how often I call in between.
All this is possible with this information. That's a little bit scary. But it is not only about me. It's about all of us. First, it's only like, I call my wife and she calls me, and we talk to each other a couple of times. And then there are some friends calling me, and they call each other. And after a while you are calling you, and you are calling you, and you have this great communication network.
But you can see how your people are communicating with each other, what times they call each other, when they go to bed. You can see all of this. You can see the hubs, like who are the leaders in the group. If you have access to this information, you can see what your society is doing. If you have access to this information, you can control your society.
This is a blueprint for countries like China and Iran. This is a blueprint how to survey your society, because you know who talks to whom, who sends whom an email, all this is possible if you have access to this information. And this information is stored for at least six months in Europe, up to two years.
Like I said at the beginning, imagine that all those people on the streets of Berlin in autumn of 1989 had a mobile phone in their pocket. And the Stasi would have known who took part at this protest, and if the Stasi would have known who are the leaders behind it, this may never have happened. The fall of the Berlin Wall would maybe not [have been] there. And in the aftermath, also not the fall of the Iron Curtain. Because today, state agencies and companies want to store as much information as they can get about us, online and offline. They want to have the possibility to track our lives, and they want to store them for all time.
But self-determination and living in the digital age is no contradiction. But you have to fight for your self-determination today. You have to fight for it every day. So, when you go home, tell your friends that privacy is a value of the 21st century, and it's not outdated. When you go home, tell your representative only because companies and state agencies have the possibility to store certain information, they don't have to do it. And if you don't believe me, ask your phone company what information they store about you.
So, in the future, every time you use your mobile phone, let it be a reminder to you that you have to fight for self-determination in the digital age. Thank you.
(Applause)
Malte Spitz: Your phone company is watching
In Summary
- In the job market for example, one of the growing careers is language translation. Due to growing economic relations between slovakia and various countries of the world, knowing a foreign language gives one the much-needed edge.
- But for some people, learning a new language may be boring and tedious, but for others a new language is their passion.
- It can also be very expensive and time consuming as you may have to enrol in a course. We all know that in this age of technology, big text books are not always fun; instead they can put you to sleep.
If your work involves regular contact with speakers of foreign
languages, being able to talk to them in their own languages will help
you to communicate with them.It may also help you to make sales and to
negotiate and secure contracts. In sum, it will help you to better
interact with citizens of the world. There has always been a growing importance for
languages, whether native or foreign, especially in today’s era where
communication has reached its peak and the world has become a smaller
place.
Learning a foreign language gives students an opportunity to appear for international examinations like TOFEL, JLPT and DELE and so on.In the job market for example, one of the growing careers is language translation. Due to growing economic relations between Slovakia and various countries of the world, knowing a foreign language gives one the much-needed edge.But for some people, learning a new language may be boring and tedious, but for others a new language is their passion.
Learning a foreign language gives students an opportunity to appear for international examinations like TOFEL, JLPT and DELE and so on.In the job market for example, one of the growing careers is language translation. Due to growing economic relations between Slovakia and various countries of the world, knowing a foreign language gives one the much-needed edge.But for some people, learning a new language may be boring and tedious, but for others a new language is their passion.
It can also be very expensive and time consuming as you may have to enrol in a course. We all know that in this age of technology, big text books are not always fun; instead they can put you to sleep. Technology however, has found a way of making a new language fun and easy to learn. Digital technology creates new learning opportunities and introduces new elements into the cognitive process of foreign language learning.Rather than having to pore over a book and answer multiple-guess questions, you can find sophisticated apps to help. The app that I have found most powerful is Babbel available on Babbel.com. It’s a companion to the bigger Babbel online package and covers 11 languages.
The different language apps are all similar, and they’re free on iOS and Android. You can set up a free account to keep track of your learning, and this will let you try the full fee-carrying online programme. These study aids are also easy to take everywhere as we move across the globe. If Babbel’s doesn’t appeal, then you may like apps from Busuu.org. It has a similar style of teaching words and phrases alongside an image and with recordings of native speakers, combined with games and exercises to really carve the language into your memory. There’s even a bit of gamification as the apps award you “busuu-berries” if you complete an exercise. Learning a language sometimes seems as difficult as dieting. The solution is to figure out how to stay interested after the novelty wears off.
To counter boredom, online language programmes
have introduced crossword puzzles, interactive videos and other games to
reward users for making progress.There are also many websites that provide you with
the facility of learning a new language. Not only do you learn by
reading but you can also learn by using interactive games and lessons
each website provides. This way you can learn through phonics which
improves your vocabulary and fluency when speaking.
How do you know your progress? Well, most websites will require you to sign up for free in order to keep a track of your progress. It will show you your strong and weak points and identify areas where you need to improve. There are many websites that help one to learn new languages. For example, on BBC.com, users will find instruction for 40 languages, including French, Spanish, Greek, Chinese, German, Italian and Portuguese. According to the BBC, the syllabus conforms to the first level of the Common European Framework of Reference for Languages.
Apps make learning new languages fun and easy
Transcipt
How do you explain when things don't go as we assume? Or better, how do you explain when others are able to achieve things that seem to defy all of the assumptions? For example: Why is Apple so innovative? Year after year, after year, after year, they're more innovative than all their competition. And yet, they're just a computer company. They're just like everyone else. They have the same access to the same talent, the same agencies, the same consultants, the same media. Then why is it that they seem to have something different? Why is it that Martin Luther King led the Civil Rights Movement? He wasn't the only man who suffered in a pre-civil rights America, and he certainly wasn't the only great orator of the day. Why him? And why is it that the Wright brothers were able to figure out controlled, powered man flight when there were certainly other teams who were better qualified, better funded ... and they didn't achieve powered man flight, and the Wright brothers beat them to it. There's something else at play here. About three and a half years ago I made a discovery. And this discovery profoundly changed my view on how I thought the world worked, and it even profoundly changed the way in which I operate in it. As it turns out, there's a pattern. As it turns out, all the great and inspiring leaders and organizations in the world -- whether it's Apple or Martin Luther King or the Wright brothers -- they all think, act and communicate the exact same way. And it's the complete opposite to everyone else. All I did was codify it, and it's probably the world's simplest idea. I call it the golden circle.
Why? How? What? This little idea explains why some organizations and some leaders are able to inspire where others aren't. Let me define the terms really quickly. Every single person, every single organization on the planet knows what they do, 100 percent. Some know how they do it, whether you call it your differentiated value proposition or your proprietary process or your USP. But very, very few people or organizations know why they do what they do. And by "why" I don't mean "to make a profit." That's a result. It's always a result. By "why," I mean: What's your purpose? What's your cause? What's your belief? Why does your organization exist? Why do you get out of bed in the morning? And why should anyone care? Well, as a result, the way we think, the way we act, the way we communicate is from the outside in. It's obvious. We go from the clearest thing to the fuzziest thing. But the inspired leaders and the inspired organizations -- regardless of their size, regardless of their industry -- all think, act and communicate from the inside out.
Let me give you an example. I use Apple because they're easy to understand and everybody gets it. If Apple were like everyone else, a marketing message from them might sound like this: "We make great computers. They're beautifully designed, simple to use and user friendly. Want to buy one?" "Meh." And that's how most of us communicate. That's how most marketing is done, that's how most sales is done and that's how most of us communicate interpersonally. We say what we do, we say how we're different or how we're better and we expect some sort of a behavior, a purchase, a vote, something like that. Here's our new law firm: We have the best lawyers with the biggest clients, we always perform for our clients who do business with us. Here's our new car: It gets great gas mileage, it has leather seats, buy our car. But it's uninspiring.
Here's how Apple actually communicates. "Everything we do, we believe in challenging the status quo. We believe in thinking differently. The way we challenge the status quo is by making our products beautifully designed, simple to use and user friendly. We just happen to make great computers. Want to buy one?" Totally different right? You're ready to buy a computer from me. All I did was reverse the order of the information. What it proves to us is that people don't buy what you do; people buy why you do it. People don't buy what you do; they buy why you do it.
This explains why every single person in this room is perfectly comfortable buying a computer from Apple. But we're also perfectly comfortable buying an MP3 player from Apple, or a phone from Apple, or a DVR from Apple. But, as I said before, Apple's just a computer company. There's nothing that distinguishes them structurally from any of their competitors. Their competitors are all equally qualified to make all of these products. In fact, they tried. A few years ago, Gateway came out with flat screen TVs. They're eminently qualified to make flat screen TVs. They've been making flat screen monitors for years. Nobody bought one. Dell came out with MP3 players and PDAs, and they make great quality products, and they can make perfectly well-designed products -- and nobody bought one. In fact, talking about it now, we can't even imagine buying an MP3 player from Dell. Why would you buy an MP3 player from a computer company? But we do it every day. People don't buy what you do; they buy why you do it. The goal is not to do business with everybody who needs what you have. The goal is to do business with people who believe what you believe. Here's the best part:
None of what I'm telling you is my opinion. It's all grounded in the tenets of biology. Not psychology, biology. If you look at a cross-section of the human brain, looking from the top down, what you see is the human brain is actually broken into three major components that correlate perfectly with the golden circle. Our newest brain, our Homo sapien brain, our neocortex, corresponds with the "what" level. The neocortex is responsible for all of our rational and analytical thought and language. The middle two sections make up our limbic brains, and our limbic brains are responsible for all of our feelings, like trust and loyalty. It's also responsible for all human behavior, all decision-making, and it has no capacity for language.
In other words, when we communicate from the outside in, yes, people can understand vast amounts of complicated information like features and benefits and facts and figures. It just doesn't drive behavior. When we can communicate from the inside out, we're talking directly to the part of the brain that controls behavior, and then we allow people to rationalize it with the tangible things we say and do. This is where gut decisions come from. You know, sometimes you can give somebody all the facts and figures, and they say, "I know what all the facts and details say, but it just doesn't feel right." Why would we use that verb, it doesn't "feel" right? Because the part of the brain that controls decision-making doesn't control language. And the best we can muster up is, "I don't know. It just doesn't feel right." Or sometimes you say you're leading with your heart, or you're leading with your soul. Well, I hate to break it to you, those aren't other body parts controlling your behavior. It's all happening here in your limbic brain, the part of the brain that controls decision-making and not language.
But if you don't know why you do what you do, and people respond to why you do what you do, then how will you ever get people to vote for you, or buy something from you, or, more importantly, be loyal and want to be a part of what it is that you do. Again, the goal is not just to sell to people who need what you have; the goal is to sell to people who believe what you believe. The goal is not just to hire people who need a job; it's to hire people who believe what you believe. I always say that, you know, if you hire people just because they can do a job, they'll work for your money, but if you hire people who believe what you believe, they'll work for you with blood and sweat and tears. And nowhere else is there a better example of this than with the Wright brothers.
Most people don't know about Samuel Pierpont Langley. And back in the early 20th century, the pursuit of powered man flight was like the dot com of the day. Everybody was trying it. And Samuel Pierpont Langley had, what we assume, to be the recipe for success. I mean, even now, you ask people, "Why did your product or why did your company fail?" and people always give you the same permutation of the same three things: under-capitalized, the wrong people, bad market conditions. It's always the same three things, so let's explore that. Samuel Pierpont Langley was given 50,000 dollars by the War Department to figure out this flying machine. Money was no problem. He held a seat at Harvard and worked at the Smithsonian and was extremely well-connected; he knew all the big minds of the day. He hired the best minds money could find and the market conditions were fantastic. The New York Times followed him around everywhere, and everyone was rooting for Langley. Then how come we've never heard of Samuel Pierpont Langley?
A few hundred miles away in Dayton Ohio, Orville and Wilbur Wright, they had none of what we consider to be the recipe for success. They had no money; they paid for their dream with the proceeds from their bicycle shop; not a single person on the Wright brothers' team had a college education, not even Orville or Wilbur; and The New York Times followed them around nowhere. The difference was, Orville and Wilbur were driven by a cause, by a purpose, by a belief. They believed that if they could figure out this flying machine, it'll change the course of the world. Samuel Pierpont Langley was different. He wanted to be rich, and he wanted to be famous. He was in pursuit of the result. He was in pursuit of the riches. And lo and behold, look what happened. The people who believed in the Wright brothers' dream worked with them with blood and sweat and tears. The others just worked for the paycheck. And they tell stories of how every time the Wright brothers went out, they would have to take five sets of parts, because that's how many times they would crash before they came in for supper.
And, eventually, on December 17th, 1903, the Wright brothers took flight, and no one was there to even experience it. We found out about it a few days later. And further proof that Langley was motivated by the wrong thing: The day the Wright brothers took flight, he quit. He could have said, "That's an amazing discovery, guys, and I will improve upon your technology," but he didn't. He wasn't first, he didn't get rich, he didn't get famous so he quit.
People don't buy what you do; they buy why you do it. And if you talk about what you believe, you will attract those who believe what you believe. But why is it important to attract those who believe what you believe? Something called the law of diffusion of innovation, and if you don't know the law, you definitely know the terminology. The first two and a half percent of our population are our innovators. The next 13 and a half percent of our population are our early adopters. The next 34 percent are your early majority, your late majority and your laggards. The only reason these people buy touch tone phones is because you can't buy rotary phones anymore.
(Laughter)
We all sit at various places at various times on this scale, but what the law of diffusion of innovation tells us is that if you want mass-market success or mass-market acceptance of an idea, you cannot have it until you achieve this tipping point between 15 and 18 percent market penetration, and then the system tips. And I love asking businesses, "What's your conversion on new business?" And they love to tell you, "Oh, it's about 10 percent," proudly. Well, you can trip over 10 percent of the customers. We all have about 10 percent who just "get it." That's how we describe them, right? That's like that gut feeling, "Oh, they just get it." The problem is: How do you find the ones that get it before you're doing business with them versus the ones who don't get it? So it's this here, this little gap that you have to close, as Jeffrey Moore calls it, "Crossing the Chasm" -- because, you see, the early majority will not try something until someone else has tried it first. And these guys, the innovators and the early adopters, they're comfortable making those gut decisions. They're more comfortable making those intuitive decisions that are driven by what they believe about the world and not just what product is available.
These are the people who stood in line for six hours to buy an iPhone when they first came out, when you could have just walked into the store the next week and bought one off the shelf. These are the people who spent 40,000 dollars on flat screen TVs when they first came out, even though the technology was substandard. And, by the way, they didn't do it because the technology was so great; they did it for themselves. It's because they wanted to be first. People don't buy what you do; they buy why you do it and what you do simply proves what you believe. In fact, people will do the things that prove what they believe. The reason that person bought the iPhone in the first six hours, stood in line for six hours, was because of what they believed about the world, and how they wanted everybody to see them: They were first. People don't buy what you do; they buy why you do it.
So let me give you a famous example, a famous failure and a famous success of the law of diffusion of innovation. First, the famous failure. It's a commercial example. As we said before, a second ago, the recipe for success is money and the right people and the right market conditions, right? You should have success then. Look at TiVo. From the time TiVo came out about eight or nine years ago to this current day, they are the single highest-quality product on the market, hands down, there is no dispute. They were extremely well-funded. Market conditions were fantastic. I mean, we use TiVo as verb. I TiVo stuff on my piece of junk Time Warner DVR all the time.
But TiVo's a commercial failure. They've never made money. And when they went IPO, their stock was at about 30 or 40 dollars and then plummeted, and it's never traded above 10. In fact, I don't think it's even traded above six, except for a couple of little spikes. Because you see, when TiVo launched their product they told us all what they had. They said, "We have a product that pauses live TV, skips commercials, rewinds live TV and memorizes your viewing habits without you even asking." And the cynical majority said, "We don't believe you. We don't need it. We don't like it. You're scaring us." What if they had said, "If you're the kind of person who likes to have total control over every aspect of your life, boy, do we have a product for you. It pauses live TV, skips commercials, memorizes your viewing habits, etc., etc." People don't buy what you do; they buy why you do it, and what you do simply serves as the proof of what you believe.
Now let me give you a successful example of the law of diffusion of innovation. In the summer of 1963, 250,000 people showed up on the mall in Washington to hear Dr. King speak. They sent out no invitations, and there was no website to check the date. How do you do that? Well, Dr. King wasn't the only man in America who was a great orator. He wasn't the only man in America who suffered in a pre-civil rights America. In fact, some of his ideas were bad. But he had a gift. He didn't go around telling people what needed to change in America. He went around and told people what he believed. "I believe, I believe, I believe," he told people. And people who believed what he believed took his cause, and they made it their own, and they told people. And some of those people created structures to get the word out to even more people. And lo and behold, 250,000 people showed up on the right day at the right time to hear him speak.
How many of them showed up for him? Zero. They showed up for themselves. It's what they believed about America that got them to travel in a bus for eight hours to stand in the sun in Washington in the middle of August. It's what they believed, and it wasn't about black versus white: 25 percent of the audience was white. Dr. King believed that there are two types of laws in this world: those that are made by a higher authority and those that are made by man. And not until all the laws that are made by man are consistent with the laws that are made by the higher authority will we live in a just world. It just so happened that the Civil Rights Movement was the perfect thing to help him bring his cause to life. We followed, not for him, but for ourselves. And, by the way, he gave the "I have a dream" speech, not the "I have a plan" speech.
(Laughter)
Listen to politicians now, with their comprehensive 12-point plans. They're not inspiring anybody. Because there are leaders and there are those who lead. Leaders hold a position of power or authority, but those who lead inspire us. Whether they're individuals or organizations, we follow those who lead, not because we have to, but because we want to. We follow those who lead, not for them, but for ourselves. And it's those who start with "why" that have the ability to inspire those around them or find others who inspire them.
Thank you very much.
Simon Sinek: How great leaders inspire action
How great leaders inspire action
… and does Google and Wikipedia make it better or worse? Studies show
that other people and tools influence our brain power as much as our own
minds.
I’ve written before about whether or not the internet is rewiring our brains, but here the question is about how we seek to define intelligence itself. And the answer appears to be an intriguing one. Because when you look at the evidence from psychological studies, it suggests that much of our intelligence comes from how we coordinate ourselves with other people and our environment.
An influential theory among psychologists is that we're cognitive misers. This is the idea that we are reluctant to do mental work unless we have to, we try to avoid thinking things though fully when a short cut is available. If you've ever voted for the political candidate with the most honest smile, or chosen a restaurant based on how many people are already sitting in there, then you've been a cognitive miser. The theory explains why we'd much rather type a zipcode into a sat-nav device or Google Maps than memorise and recall the location of a venue – it's so much easier to do so.
Research shows that people don't tend to rely on their memories for things they can easily access. Things like the world in front of our eyes, for example, can be changed quite radically without people noticing. Experiments have shown that buildings can somehow disappear from pictures we're looking at, or the people we're talking to can be switched with someone else, and often we won't notice – a phenomenon called “change blindness”. This isn't as an example of human stupidity – far from it, in fact – this is an example of mental efficiency. The mind relies on the world as a better record than memory, and usually that's a good assumption.
As a result, philosophers have suggested that the mind is designed to spread itself out over the environment. So much so that, they suggest, the thinking is really happening in the environment as much as it is happening in our brains. The philosopher Andy Clark called humans "natural born cyborgs", beings with minds that naturally incorporate new tools, ideas and abilities. From Clark's perspective, the route to a solution is not the issue – having the right tools really does mean you know the answers, just as much as already knowing the answer.
Society wins
A memory study by Daniel Wegner of Harvard University provides a neat example of this effect. Couples were asked to come into the lab to take a memorisation test. Half the couples were kept together, and half were reassigned to pair up with someone they didn't know. Both groups then studied a list of words in silence, and were then tested individually. The pairs that were made up of a couple in a relationship could remember more items, both overall and as individuals.
What happened, according to Wegner, was that the couples in a relationship had a good understanding of their partners. Because of this they would tacitly divide up the work between them, so that, say, one partner would remember words to do with technology, assuming the other would remember the words to do with sports. In this way, each partner could concentrate on their strengths, and so individually they outperformed people in couples where no mental division of labour was possible. Just as you rely on a search engine for answers, so you can rely on people you deal with regularly to think about certain things, developing a shared system for committing items to memory and bringing them out again, what Wegner called “transactive memory”.
Having minds that work this way is one of the great strengths of the human species. Rather than being forced to rely on our own resources for everything, we can share our knowledge and so pool our understanding. Technology keeps track of things for individuals so we don't have to, while large systems of knowledge serve the needs of society as a whole. I don't know how a computer works, or how to grow broccoli, but that knowledge is out there and I get to benefit. And the internet provides even more potential to share this knowledge. Wikipedia is one of the best examples – an evolving store of the world's knowledge for which everyone can benefit from. I use Wikipedia every day, aware of all the caveats of doing so, because it supports me in all the thinking I do for things like this column.
So as well as having a physical environment – like the rooms or buildings we live or work in – we also have a mental environment. Which means that when I ask you where your mind is, you shouldn’t point toward the centre of your forehead. As research on areas like transactive memory shows, our minds are made up just as much by the people and tools around us as they are by the brain cells inside our skull.
Courtesy
Article by Tom Stafford @tomstafford.
What makes us intelligent?
We’ve all been there – the directions sounded so clear when we were told them. Every step of the journey seemed obvious, we thought we had understood the directions perfectly. And yet here we are miles from anywhere, after dark, in a field arguing about whether we should have gone left or right at the last turn, whether we’re going to have to sleep here now, and exactly whose fault it is.
The truth is we shouldn’t be too hard on ourselves. Psychologically speaking giving good directions is a particularly difficult task.
The reason we find it hard to give good directions is because of the "curse of knowledge", a psychological quirk whereby, once we have learnt something, we find it hard to appreciate how the world looks to someone who doesn't know it yet. We don’t just want people to walk a mile in our shoes, we assume they already know the route. Once we know the way to a place we don't need directions, and descriptions like "its the left about halfway along" or "the one with the little red door" seem to make full and complete sense.
But if you've never been to a place before, you need more than a description of a place; you need an exact definition, or a precise formula for finding it. The curse of knowledge is the reason why, when I had to search for a friend's tent in a field, their advice of "it's the blue one" seemed perfectly sensible to them and was completely useless for me, as I stood there staring blankly at hundreds of blue tents.
This same quirk is why teaching is so difficult to do well. Once you are familiar with a topic it is very hard to understand what someone who isn't familiar with it needs to know. The curse of knowledge isn't a surprising flaw in our mental machinery – really it is just a side effect of our basic alienation from each other. We all have different thoughts and beliefs, and we have no special access to each other's minds. A lot of the time we can fake understanding by mentally simulating what we'd want in someone else's position. We have thoughts along the lines of "I'd like it if there was one bagel left in the morning" and therefore conclude "so I won't eat all the bagels before my wife gets up in the morning". This shortcut allows us to appear considerate, without doing any deep thought about what other people really know and want.
“OK, now what?”
This will only get you so far. Some occasions call for a proper understanding of other people's feelings and beliefs. Giving directions is one, but so is understanding myriad aspects of everyday conversation which involve feelings, jokes or suggestions. For illustration, consider the joke that some research has suggested may be the world's funniest(although what exactly that means is another story):
This will only get you so far. Some occasions call for a proper understanding of other people's feelings and beliefs. Giving directions is one, but so is understanding myriad aspects of everyday conversation which involve feelings, jokes or suggestions. For illustration, consider the joke that some research has suggested may be the world's funniest(although what exactly that means is another story):
Two hunters are out in the woods when one of them collapses. He doesn't seem to be breathing and his eyes are glazed. The other guy whips out his phone and calls the emergency services. He gasps, "My friend is dead! What can I do?" The operator says "Calm down. I can help. First, let's make sure he's dead." There is a silence, then a shot is heard. Back on the phone, the guy says "OK, now what?"
The joke is funny because you can appreciate that the hunter had two possible interpretations of the operator's instructions, and chose the wrong one. To appreciate the interpretations you need to have a feel for what the operator and the hunter know and desire (and to be surprised when the hunter's desire to do anything to help isn't over-ruled by a desire keep his friend alive).
To do this mental simulation you recruit what psychologists call your“Theory of Mind”, the ability think about others' beliefs and desires. Our skill at Theory of Mind is one of the things that distinguish humans from all other species – only chimpanzees seem to have anything approaching a true understanding that others' might believe different things from themselves. Us humans, on the other hand, seem primed from early infancy to practice thinking about how other humans view the world.
The fact that the curse of knowledge exists tells us how hard a problem it is to think about other people's minds. Like many hard cognitive problems – such as seeing, for example – the human brain has evolved specialist mechanisms which are dedicate to solving it for us, so that we don't normally have to expend conscious effort. Most of the time we get the joke, just as most of the time we simply open our eyes and see the world.
The good news is that your Theory of Mind isn't completely automatic – you can use deliberate strategies to help you think about what other people know. A good one when writing is simply to force yourself to check every term to see if it is jargon – something you’ve learnt the meaning of but not all your readers will know. Another strategy is to tell people what they can ignore, as well as what they need to know. This works well with directions (and results in instructions like “keep going until you see the red door. There’s a pink door, but that’s not it”)
With a few tricks like this, and perhaps some general practice, we can turn the concept of trying to read other people’s minds – what some psychologists call “mind mindedness” – into a habit, and so improve our Theory of Mind abilities. (Something most of us remember struggling hard to do in adolescence.) Which is a good thing, since good theory of mind is what makes a considerate partner, friend or co-worker - and a good giver of directions.
courtesy of bbc.
Why is it so hard to give good directions?
Steve has the golden touch. Everything he does makes money. As an employee at a furniture store, he gets fast promotions and raises. After five years, he is the top manager and makes a deal with the owner to buy the business. He makes several improvements and triples the income. He has no debt, saves money every month and has a lot of fun.
Andy never has any money. He works hard at the same furniture company, but never gets ahead. He can't remember his last raise and is terrified of starting a business. He spends more than he makes, so his debts are steadily increasing. Because he constantly worries about money, he has health problems, as well.
What is the greatest difference between Steve and Andy?
"Man is having trouble with finance? Obviously, he is unwilling to confront* money." -- L. Ron Hubbard (*Confront has two common definitions: 1) meet face-to-face in hostility or defiance. 2) face up to and deal with a problem; to be courageous. In this article, we are using the second definition.)
To resolve money troubles, you confront or face all aspects of money. To really confront something, you have no resistance, no hesitation and no emotion. You courageously, but simply face it.
For example, you can probably confront an apple. The apple does not scare you or upset you. You can easily control and enjoy the apple.
However, a credit card bill, a financial disagreement or a problem with taxes may not be as easy for you to face. These areas of low confront actually hurt your ability to earn money.
When you face something completely, the area starts to improve. It's amazing how much money you can make when you improve your ability to confront money problems.
Using our example above, Steve is a financial success because he faces all financial problems. For example, he fearlessly sells big packages of office furniture to the toughest customers.
Andy gets so nervous when talking to big-shot customers that he prefers to stay in the store instead of going to customer's offices. If he were willing to confront tough customers, and went to see them despite his fear, he would conquer his fear and earn more money.
Two Steps for Increasing Your Financial Confront
If you are not making as much money as you like, what about money are you not confronting?
Non-confront comes in many forms: fear, avoidance, shyness, laziness, procrastination, terror, pretense, anxiety, stress, worry, upsets, forgetfulness, disorganization, hatred, lies, shame, blame, regret, critical thoughts and excuses. Do you experience any of these forms of non-confront regarding money?
If you are willing to increase your ability to confront money, you will have more of it. All you need to do is:
1. Identify an aspect of money you are not confronting.
2. Confront it: face it, deal with it, be courageous, take responsibility for it; invest the hard work and persistence required to resolve it.
20 Questions
To help you get started, these questions can help you identify the areas of money you should confront.
1. How much money do you owe?
2. How much loan interest do you pay per month?
3. How much money do you spend per month? On what?
4. How much money do you waste per month?
5. Is your checkbook balanced?
6. Do you avoid preparing tax forms?
7. Are you not paying money you promised to pay?
8. Are you avoiding anyone who owes you money?
9. Are you involved in a financial disagreement?
10. What are you doing with money that you should not be doing? That you should be doing?
11. Do you have a long-term financial plan?
12. What work skills should you improve?
13. How could you produce a better service or product?
14. What about your income are you avoiding?
15. What do you lie about regarding money?
16. What bad habits do you have with money?
17. What scares you about money?
18. What are you putting off?
19. What do you hate about money?
20. What steps would be needed for you to increase your income? Which of these steps seem too difficult for you to face?
Pick one thing you are willing to confront, confront it today and see what happens!
courtesy of tips4life L. Ron Hubbard
Andy never has any money. He works hard at the same furniture company, but never gets ahead. He can't remember his last raise and is terrified of starting a business. He spends more than he makes, so his debts are steadily increasing. Because he constantly worries about money, he has health problems, as well.
What is the greatest difference between Steve and Andy?
"Man is having trouble with finance? Obviously, he is unwilling to confront* money." -- L. Ron Hubbard (*Confront has two common definitions: 1) meet face-to-face in hostility or defiance. 2) face up to and deal with a problem; to be courageous. In this article, we are using the second definition.)
To resolve money troubles, you confront or face all aspects of money. To really confront something, you have no resistance, no hesitation and no emotion. You courageously, but simply face it.
For example, you can probably confront an apple. The apple does not scare you or upset you. You can easily control and enjoy the apple.
However, a credit card bill, a financial disagreement or a problem with taxes may not be as easy for you to face. These areas of low confront actually hurt your ability to earn money.
When you face something completely, the area starts to improve. It's amazing how much money you can make when you improve your ability to confront money problems.
Using our example above, Steve is a financial success because he faces all financial problems. For example, he fearlessly sells big packages of office furniture to the toughest customers.
Andy gets so nervous when talking to big-shot customers that he prefers to stay in the store instead of going to customer's offices. If he were willing to confront tough customers, and went to see them despite his fear, he would conquer his fear and earn more money.
Two Steps for Increasing Your Financial Confront
If you are not making as much money as you like, what about money are you not confronting?
Non-confront comes in many forms: fear, avoidance, shyness, laziness, procrastination, terror, pretense, anxiety, stress, worry, upsets, forgetfulness, disorganization, hatred, lies, shame, blame, regret, critical thoughts and excuses. Do you experience any of these forms of non-confront regarding money?
If you are willing to increase your ability to confront money, you will have more of it. All you need to do is:
1. Identify an aspect of money you are not confronting.
2. Confront it: face it, deal with it, be courageous, take responsibility for it; invest the hard work and persistence required to resolve it.
20 Questions
To help you get started, these questions can help you identify the areas of money you should confront.
1. How much money do you owe?
2. How much loan interest do you pay per month?
3. How much money do you spend per month? On what?
4. How much money do you waste per month?
5. Is your checkbook balanced?
6. Do you avoid preparing tax forms?
7. Are you not paying money you promised to pay?
8. Are you avoiding anyone who owes you money?
9. Are you involved in a financial disagreement?
10. What are you doing with money that you should not be doing? That you should be doing?
11. Do you have a long-term financial plan?
12. What work skills should you improve?
13. How could you produce a better service or product?
14. What about your income are you avoiding?
15. What do you lie about regarding money?
16. What bad habits do you have with money?
17. What scares you about money?
18. What are you putting off?
19. What do you hate about money?
20. What steps would be needed for you to increase your income? Which of these steps seem too difficult for you to face?
Pick one thing you are willing to confront, confront it today and see what happens!
courtesy of tips4life L. Ron Hubbard
Make More Money by Confronting Money
Have you ever ended a very busy day only to realize you accomplished nothing?
You were probably distracted. Ever wonder why you feel frustrated at work? Distractions might be stopping you.
Ever feel stress? Distractions may be the cause.
Distractions are not just irritating, they are destructive forces that ruin your productivity. Examples: Chatty coworkers, personal problems, sunny days, rainy days, Facebook, holidays, earthquakes, debts, political news, salespeople, money concerns, health problems and more.
How do you handle distractions?
You get organized.
"THOSE INDIVIDUALS OR AREAS THAT ARE THE LEAST WELL-ORGANIZED ARE AFFECTED THE MOST BY DISTRACTIONS." -- L. Ron Hubbard
A well-organized business understands distractions and organizes to deal with them.
For example, a key worker calls in sick. In a well-organized group, the manager calls in a temporary worker from an agency, gives the worker a written list of instructions and everyone gets their work done. A poorly-organized group discusses the problem for 20 minutes without coming to a solution. The group members are then distracted all day because they have to do the missing worker's job.
When a well-organized business owner gets a legal notice, he or she delegates the problem to a lawyer and focuses on making a prosperous day. A poorly-organized business owner drops everything and worries about it all day.
Well-organized groups handle emergencies, disasters and sudden increases in production without breathing hard. Poorly-organized groups are overwhelmed by them.
Personal Organization
Organizing your personal life so you are not distracted
boosts your productivity and income!
For example, you don't need to talk to everyone who calls you and it's silly to read every piece of e-mail or every electronic message when it comes in.
If you are organized, your communications are organized so you only receive information that is relevant to your job. Except for emergencies, you ignore family problems, personal problems and even your health problems. All superior producers do this and are not easily distracted. While working, nothing is more important than the work itself.
If your car won't start, your computer crashes or other small disaster occurs, you have backup plans. You are organized and not distracted by these problems. You get your work done despite everything that gets in your road.
For example, you don't need to talk to everyone who calls you and it's silly to read every piece of e-mail or every electronic message when it comes in.
If you are organized, your communications are organized so you only receive information that is relevant to your job. Except for emergencies, you ignore family problems, personal problems and even your health problems. All superior producers do this and are not easily distracted. While working, nothing is more important than the work itself.
If your car won't start, your computer crashes or other small disaster occurs, you have backup plans. You are organized and not distracted by these problems. You get your work done despite everything that gets in your road.
How to Get Better Organized
1. Write
down five of your biggest distractions or potential distractions.
2. Next to the first distraction, write down how you can get organized so you are not affected by the distraction.
3. Do the same for the other items on the list.
4. Follow your plans and get organized!
5. Write down permanent rules or policies for yourself or your work so you stay organized.
Personal examples: "I will only take personal calls during my lunch hour." "If I get hungry during the afternoon, I will chew gum and keep working until 5:00." "If Joe tries to upset me, I will pretend he is three years old, not get into an argument and get back to work."
Business examples: "If someone asks me to do their job, I will ask them for their pay." "If you have a suggestion for the company, please e-mail all the details to me." "Each summer, we will do the following program to keep our sales up, despite the vacations."
Because you are well-organized, you make faster progress toward your goals and ultimate success as you are not easily distracted.
2. Next to the first distraction, write down how you can get organized so you are not affected by the distraction.
3. Do the same for the other items on the list.
4. Follow your plans and get organized!
5. Write down permanent rules or policies for yourself or your work so you stay organized.
Personal examples: "I will only take personal calls during my lunch hour." "If I get hungry during the afternoon, I will chew gum and keep working until 5:00." "If Joe tries to upset me, I will pretend he is three years old, not get into an argument and get back to work."
Business examples: "If someone asks me to do their job, I will ask them for their pay." "If you have a suggestion for the company, please e-mail all the details to me." "Each summer, we will do the following program to keep our sales up, despite the vacations."
Because you are well-organized, you make faster progress toward your goals and ultimate success as you are not easily distracted.
How to Increase productivity by Handling Distractions
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