Alain de Botton at TED Global in Oxford last week. This must be the second most significant TED presentation after the famous talk by Sir Ken Robinson. Alain de Botton is a cultural synthesizer; he has an incredible range, despite our age of specialization. This enables him to see angles that are hidden for most. Alain de Botton manages effortlessly to highlight the most profound cultural agonies of our time.
Notes to self from Alain’s lecture:
- Snob – defining a person according to one marker – job, race, country of origin, birth town, etc.
- Equality increases envy.
- Meritocracy implies the not only advancement is by merit but the failure is also deserved (This is the argument against meritocracy. Since by definition only small number of people can win and winning is gaining control of scalable resources or scalable creativity (Google), it would mean that for the vast majority of the “losers” meritocracy increases the perceived failure).
- Drama as an artistic way of coping
- Culture is not anchored in the supernatural, nature as an escape from the human anthill
- Can’t have it all. Concede.
Further Reading:
Alain de Botton Imagines Religion without God
Alain de Botton and Nassim Taleb in Quotation Marks
The Three Things worth Doing in Life
{ 5 comments… read them below or add one }
Thanks for making me aware of this Ben. It rings true on so many levels. For me personally as an artist etc., sure. But even more importantly perhaps as a parent. I am sending this to my two twenty-something daughters (And I only get just so many of those “oh jeez another bit from Dad offering advice” pings per year :) …so a measure of just how important I think Alain's presentation is !).
Warm Regards.
wp
Walt, I have been thinking about this presentation most of the day today.I need to watch it again couple of times to comment.
Walt, I am rather preoccupied with the observation that people seek out content that reinforces what they already believe. Hence mass popularly is a sign of mediocre content. Similarly I am watchful of our propensity to like presentations that confirm our own ideas. Is this the example, perhaps? But there are few points that are refreshing, namely the definition of snobbery, the reminder about the flip side of the over-achievement culture and the reminder that we can’t have everything. Now that hurts…
Yours is a timely and important preoccupation; touched on compellingly in your previous post: 'All that Music that Rises to the Middle'. Human nature does indeed tend toward being desirous of confirmation rather than challenge…especially as we grow older.
I was drawn to Alain's TED presentation for the same reason that I spend time seeking out new and interesting people on the web: in order to swim against the creeping tide of complacency. It's hard to put any meat on the bones of this assertion w/o spending time talking about myself and my background, which I am loath to do in this context as it seems a little narcissistic and tedious.Suffice to say that I am so deeply steeped in the cult of the individual and the protestant work-ethic that meritocracy as an organizing principle is more instinctual than learned. Bred in the bone. For me it's a real stretch to empathize w/ someone who claims anything less than 100% agency over his or her lot in life. So I think it's a healthy thing for people like me to be reminded of meritocracy's limitations, and the need for compassion as a balancing force. To bear in mind the distinction between being an “unfortunate” and being a “looser”.
I am also immersed in David Foster Wallace's “Infinite Jest” just now. “Tragedy as an art form devoted to tracing how people fail” struck a chord w/ me for that reason. And of course I share your appreciation of Alain's accurate definition of snobbery ! But being anti-snobbery doesn't necessarily mean accepting mediocrity. It's not elitist to stand up for the notion that rigorous, objectively identifiable quality can exist. And you are right to point out the insidious slippery slope of crowd sourcing popularity contests as a standard setting device.
Walt, I added some of the notes I took away from the video. I also think that you make a very important point about the fine line between snobbery and objecting to the lack of rigor. But rigor naturally is what you do, what you produce as a result of your efforts, unlike job or education labels that give one only a certain expectation.