You know, I'm struck by how one of the implicit themes of TED is compassion, these very moving demonstrations we've just seen: HIV in Africa, President Clinton last night. And I'd like to do a little collateral thinking, if you will, about compassion and bring it from the global level to the personal. I'm a psychologist, but rest assured, I will not bring it to the scrotal.
Viete, udivuje ma, že jednou z implicitných tém na TEDe je súcit, dojemné prejavy, ktoré sme práve videli: HIV v Afrike, prezident Clinton včera večer. Ak dovolíte, rád by som sa zamyslel nad súcitom a preniesol ho z globálnej úrovne na osobnú. Som psychológ, ale buďte pokojní, budem sa kontrolovať.
(Laughter)
(smiech)
There was a very important study done a while ago at Princeton Theological Seminary that speaks to why it is that when all of us have so many opportunities to help, we do sometimes, and we don't other times. A group of divinity students at the Princeton Theological Seminary were told that they were going to give a practice sermon and they were each given a sermon topic. Half of those students were given, as a topic, the parable of the Good Samaritan: the man who stopped the stranger in -- to help the stranger in need by the side of the road. Half were given random Bible topics. Then one by one, they were told they had to go to another building and give their sermon. As they went from the first building to the second, each of them passed a man who was bent over and moaning, clearly in need. The question is: Did they stop to help?
Na Teologickom seminári v Princetone nedávno urobili veľmi dôležitú štúdiu, ktorá tvrdila, že všetci máme mnoho príležitostí pomáhať, tak prečo to niekedy urobíme a inokedy nie? Skupina študentov teológie na Princetonskom Teologickom seminári mala pripraviť cvičnú kázeň. Každý z nich dostal tému kázne. Polovica dostala tému: podobenstvo o Milosrdnom Samaritánovi – mužovi, ktorý sa zastavil, aby pomohol neznámemu v núdzi na okraji cesty. Druhej polovici bola zadaná náhodná téma z Biblie. Potom postupne mali ísť do druhej budovy predniesť svoju kázeň. Cestou z jednej budovy do druhej každý z nich prešiel popri zhrbenom stonajúcom mužovi, ktorý bol v núdzi. Otázkou je: zastali, aby mu pomohli?
The more interesting question is: Did it matter they were contemplating the parable of the Good Samaritan? Answer: No, not at all. What turned out to determine whether someone would stop and help a stranger in need was how much of a hurry they thought they were in -- were they feeling they were late, or were they absorbed in what they were going to talk about. And this is, I think, the predicament of our lives: that we don't take every opportunity to help because our focus is in the wrong direction.
Ešte zaujímavejšia otázka je: Záležalo na tom, či sa zamýšľali nad podobenstvom o Milosrdnom Samaritánovi? Odpoveď: Nie, vôbec nie. Čo sa ukázalo ako rozhodujúce, či niekto zastal a pomohol neznámemu v núdzi, bolo ako veľmi si mysleli, že sa musia ponáhľať, že meškajú, alebo či boli zaujatí tým, o čom sa chystali rozprávať. A toto je kameň úrazu našich životov: to, že nepomôžeme pri každej príležitosti, pretože naša pozornosť je zameraná nesprávnym smerom.
There's a new field in brain science, social neuroscience. This studies the circuitry in two people's brains that activates while they interact. And the new thinking about compassion from social neuroscience is that our default wiring is to help. That is to say, if we attend to the other person, we automatically empathize, we automatically feel with them. There are these newly identified neurons, mirror neurons, that act like a neuro Wi-Fi, activating in our brain exactly the areas activated in theirs. We feel "with" automatically. And if that person is in need, if that person is suffering, we're automatically prepared to help. At least that's the argument.
Existuje nový odbor vedy o mozgu, sociálna neuroveda, študujúca prepojenia aktivované v mozgoch dvoch ľudí pri vzájomnej interakcii. Sociálna neuroveda prináša nový názor na súcit, hovorí, že sme prirodzene nastavení pomáhať. Čiže, ak sa staráme o niekoho, automaticky sme empatickí, vcítime sa do neho. Existujú novoobjavené neuróny, zrkadlové neuróny, ktoré sa správajú ako neurónové Wi-Fi, aktivujúc v našom mozgu presne tie oblasti, ktoré sú aktivované u toho druhého. Automaticky sa vcítime. A ak je tento človek v núdzi, ak trpí, sme automaticky pripravení pomôcť. Aspoň sa to tvrdí.
But then the question is: Why don't we? And I think this speaks to a spectrum that goes from complete self-absorption, to noticing, to empathy and to compassion. And the simple fact is, if we are focused on ourselves, if we're preoccupied, as we so often are throughout the day, we don't really fully notice the other. And this difference between the self and the other focus can be very subtle.
Ale potom otázkou je: Prečo to nerobíme? A myslím si, že to hovorí o celom spektre: od úplného ponorenia sa do seba, cez povšimnutie, empatiu až po súcit. Faktom je, že ak sme zahĺbení do seba, a to počas dňa často sme, nevšímame si skutočne ostatných. Tento rozdiel medzi pozornosťou zameranou na seba a druhých môže byť veľmi jemný.
I was doing my taxes the other day, and I got to the point where I was listing all of the donations I gave, and I had an epiphany, it was -- I came to my check to the Seva Foundation and I noticed that I thought, boy, my friend Larry Brilliant would really be happy that I gave money to Seva. Then I realized that what I was getting from giving was a narcissistic hit -- that I felt good about myself. Then I started to think about the people in the Himalayas whose cataracts would be helped, and I realized that I went from this kind of narcissistic self-focus to altruistic joy, to feeling good for the people that were being helped. I think that's a motivator.
Jedného dňa som si prechádzal účtami a keď som spisoval zoznam príspevkov, ktoré som daroval, zrazu mi napadlo, práve keď som sa dostal k šeku pre Seva Foundation: páni, môj priateľ Larry Brilliant by bol skutočne šťastný, že som venoval peniaze nadácii Seva. Potom som si uvedomil, že odmenou za dar mi bol úder narcizmu – že som mal dobrý pocit sám zo seba. Potom som začal uvažovať o ľuďoch v Himalájach trpiacich šedým zákalom, ktorým bude doskytnutá pomoc a uvedomil som si, že som sa posunul od narcistického zamerania sa na seba k altruistickej radosti, k dobrému pocitu z pomoci druhým. A toto považujem za skutočný motivátor.
But this distinction between focusing on ourselves and focusing on others is one that I encourage us all to pay attention to. You can see it at a gross level in the world of dating. I was at a sushi restaurant a while back and I overheard two women talking about the brother of one woman, who was in the singles scene. And this woman says, "My brother is having trouble getting dates, so he's trying speed dating." I don't know if you know speed dating? Women sit at tables and men go from table to table, and there's a clock and a bell, and at five minutes, bingo, the conversation ends and the woman can decide whether to give her card or her email address to the man for follow up. And this woman says, "My brother's never gotten a card, and I know exactly why. The moment he sits down, he starts talking non-stop about himself; he never asks about the woman."
A tento rozdiel medzi zameraním sa na seba a zameraním sa na druhých je niečo, čomu by sme všetci mali venovať pozornosť. Istým spôsobom sa to dá vidieť aj vo svete randenia. Pred nejakým časom som bol v sushi reštaurácii a započul som rozhovor dvoch žien o bratovi jednej z nich, ktorý nebol zadaný. Tá žena povedala: „Môj brat má problém zoznámiť sa s niekým, tak skúša speed dating.“ Neviem, či poznáte „speed dating“. Ženy sedia pri stolíkoch a muži prechádzajú od jedného k druhému, a po piatich minútach zaznie zvon, rozhovor skončí a každá žena sa môže rozhodnúť, či mužovi dá svoju vizitku, alebo e-mailovú adresu, aby sa s ňou neskôr skontaktoval. „Môj brat nikdy nedostal vizitku“, pokračovala, „a ja presne viem, prečo. V momente ako si prisadne, začne non-stop rozprávať o sebe, vôbec sa tej ženy nespýta na ňu.“
And I was doing some research in the Sunday Styles section of The New York Times, looking at the back stories of marriages -- because they're very interesting -- and I came to the marriage of Alice Charney Epstein. And she said that when she was in the dating scene, she had a simple test she put people to. The test was: from the moment they got together, how long it would take the guy to ask her a question with the word "you" in it. And apparently Epstein aced the test, therefore the article.
Keď som zbieral materiál pre nedeľnú prílohu The New York Times a skúmal som príbehy manželstiev, tie sú veľmi zaujímavé, naďabil som na manželstvo pani Alice Charney Epsteinovej. Povedala, že keď si hľadala známosť, testovala ľudí jednoduchým spôsobom. Išlo o to, ako dlho trvalo od chvíle, keď sa stretli, po moment, keď sa muž spýtal otázku obsahujúcu slovo „ty“. Je jasné, že pán Epstein prešiel testom s vysokým hodnotením.
(Laughter)
(smiech)
Now this is a -- it's a little test I encourage you to try out at a party. Here at TED there are great opportunities. The Harvard Business Review recently had an article called "The Human Moment," about how to make real contact with a person at work. And they said, well, the fundamental thing you have to do is turn off your BlackBerry, close your laptop, end your daydream and pay full attention to the person. There is a newly coined word in the English language for the moment when the person we're with whips out their BlackBerry or answers that cell phone, and all of a sudden we don't exist. The word is "pizzled": it's a combination of puzzled and pissed off.
Toto je malý test, ktorý odporúčam, aby ste vyskúšali na večierku. Tu na TEDe máte skvelú príležitosť. V Harvard Business Review nedávno uverejnili článok s názvom Ľudský moment, o tom ako nadviazať skutočný kontakt s kolegom v práci, a písali, že zásadná vec, ktorú musíte urobiť, je vypnúť svoj smartfón (BlackBerry), zatvoriť laptop, prestať snívať s otvorenými očami a danej osobe venovať plnú pozornosť. Existuje novovytvorené slovo v angličtine pre moment, keď človek, s ktorým sme, vytiahne BlackBerry alebo prijme telefonát a zrazu pre neho neexistujeme. To slovo je „pizzled“: spojenie puzzled – zmätený a pissed off – nahnevaný.
(Laughter)
(smiech)
I think it's quite apt. It's our empathy, it's our tuning in
Myslím, že je celkom výstižné.
which separates us from Machiavellians or sociopaths. I have a brother-in-law who's an expert on horror and terror -- he wrote the Annotated Dracula, the Essential Frankenstein -- he was trained as a Chaucer scholar, but he was born in Transylvania and I think it affected him a little bit. At any rate, at one point my brother-in-law, Leonard, decided to write a book about a serial killer. This is a man who terrorized the very vicinity we're in many years ago. He was known as the Santa Cruz strangler. And before he was arrested, he had murdered his grandparents, his mother and five co-eds at UC Santa Cruz.
Ide o našu empatiu, o naše naladenie, ktoré nás odlišuje od machiavelistov alebo sociopatov. Mám švagra, je expert na horor a teror – napísal knihu Annotated Dracula, the Essential Frankenstein – vyštudoval anglickú literatúru, ale narodil sa v Transylvánii a myslím, že to ho trochu poznačilo. Raz sa môj švagor, Leonard, rozhodol napísať knihu o sériovom vrahovi. Išlo o muža, ktorý pred mnohými rokmi vyčíňal v našom susedstve, bol známy ako škrtič zo Santa Cruz. Predtým ako ho zatkli, zavraždil svojich starých rodičov, matku a päť študentiek z univerzity Santa Cruz.
So my brother-in-law goes to interview this killer and he realizes when he meets him that this guy is absolutely terrifying. For one thing, he's almost seven feet tall. But that's not the most terrifying thing about him. The scariest thing is that his IQ is 160: a certified genius. But there is zero correlation between IQ and emotional empathy, feeling with the other person. They're controlled by different parts of the brain.
A tak sa môj švagor vybral urobiť rozhovor s týmto zabijakom a keď sa s ním stretol, uvedomil si, že ten chlap bol úplne desivý. Bol takmer dva metre vysoký. Ale to nebola na ňom tá najhrôzostrašnejšia vec. Najdesivejšie bolo, že jeho IQ bolo 160: génius. No medzi IQ a emočnou empatiou (vcítenie sa do pocitov druhých) nie je žiadne prepojenie. Sú kontrolované rôznymi časťami mozgu.
So at one point, my brother-in-law gets up the courage to ask the one question he really wants to know the answer to, and that is: how could you have done it? Didn't you feel any pity for your victims? These were very intimate murders -- he strangled his victims. And the strangler says very matter-of-factly, "Oh no. If I'd felt the distress, I could not have done it. I had to turn that part of me off. I had to turn that part of me off."
A tak v jednej chvíli môj švagor nabral odvahu opýtať sa otázku, na ktorú chcel naozaj vedieť odpoveď, a to: Ako si to mohol urobiť? Necítil si žiadnu ľútosť nad svojimi obeťami? Boli to veľmi intímne vraždy – svoje obete uškrtil. A škrtič odpovedal bez emócií, „Och, nie. Keby som sa dal rozrušiť, nedokázal by som to urobiť. Túto časť mňa som musel vypnúť. Túto časť mňa som musel vypnúť.“
And I think that that is very troubling, and in a sense, I've been reflecting on turning that part of us off. When we focus on ourselves in any activity, we do turn that part of ourselves off if there's another person. Think about going shopping and think about the possibilities of a compassionate consumerism. Right now, as Bill McDonough has pointed out, the objects that we buy and use have hidden consequences. We're all unwitting victims of a collective blind spot. We don't notice and don't notice that we don't notice the toxic molecules emitted by a carpet or by the fabric on the seats. Or we don't know if that fabric is a technological or manufacturing nutrient; it can be reused or does it just end up at landfill? In other words, we're oblivious to the ecological and public health and social and economic justice consequences of the things we buy and use. In a sense, the room itself is the elephant in the room, but we don't see it. And we've become victims of a system that points us elsewhere. Consider this.
Myslím si, že je to veľmi znepokojivé, tu chcem poukázať na vypínanie tejto časti nášho ja. Ak sa pri akejkoľvek činnosti zameriavame na seba, vypíname túto časť nášho ja v prítomnosti iných ľudí. Zamyslite sa nad nakupovaním, nad možnosťami uvedomelého konzumerizmu. Práve teraz, tak ako poukázal Bill McDonough, veci, ktoré kupujeme a používame, majú skryté dôsledky. Všetci sme nevedomými obeťami kolektívnej slepej škvrny. Nevšímame si a nevšímame si, že si nevšímame toxické molekuly, ktoré uvoľňuje koberec alebo látka na sedadle. Nevieme, či tá látka je technologicky alebo priemyselne spracovateľná, či môže byť opäť použitá alebo jednoducho skončí na skládke. Inými slovami, nevšímame si ekologické a verejné zdravie, a sociálnu a ekonomickú spravodlivosť vyplývajúcu z vecí, ktoré kupujeme a používame. Všetci to vidíme, ale nikto o tom nechce hovoriť. Stali sme sa obeťami systému, ktorý nás vedie iným smerom.
There's a wonderful book called Stuff: The Hidden Life of Everyday Objects. And it talks about the back story of something like a t-shirt. And it talks about where the cotton was grown and the fertilizers that were used and the consequences for soil of that fertilizer. And it mentions, for instance, that cotton is very resistant to textile dye; about 60 percent washes off into wastewater. And it's well known by epidemiologists that kids who live near textile works tend to have high rates of leukemia. There's a company, Bennett and Company, that supplies Polo.com, Victoria's Secret -- they, because of their CEO, who's aware of this, in China formed a joint venture with their dye works to make sure that the wastewater would be properly taken care of before it returned to the groundwater. Right now, we don't have the option to choose the virtuous t-shirt over the non-virtuous one. So what would it take to do that?
Existuje prekrásna kniha s názvom Veci: Skrytý život každodenných predmetov. Rozpráva príbeh pôvodu jedného trička. Hovorí o tom, kde vypestovali bavlnu, o hnojive, ktoré bolo použité, o jeho vplyve na pôdu. A uvádza, napríklad, že bavlna je veľmi odolná voči textilným farbivám, asi 60 percent z nich sa dostáva do odpadových vôd. A epidemiológovia dobre vedia, že výskyt leukémie u detí, ktoré žijú v blízkosti textilných fabrík, je vysoký. Spoločnosť Bennett and Company, dodávateľ pre značky Polo.com a Victoria's Secret, vďaka svojmu výkonnému riaditeľovi vytvorila v Číne spoločný podnik s miestnymi farbiarňami, aby zaistila, že odpadová voda sa riadne vyčistí predtým ako sa vráti do podzemných vôd. Teraz nemáme možnosť vybrať si „svedomito vyrobené“ tričko. Takže čo by sa muselo stať, aby sme takúto možnosť mali?
Well, I've been thinking. For one thing, there's a new electronic tagging technology that allows any store to know the entire history of any item on the shelves in that store. You can track it back to the factory. Once you can track it back to the factory, you can look at the manufacturing processes that were used to make it, and if it's virtuous, you can label it that way. Or if it's not so virtuous, you can go into -- today, go into any store, put your scanner on a palm onto a barcode, which will take you to a website. They have it for people with allergies to peanuts. That website could tell you things about that object. In other words, at point of purchase, we might be able to make a compassionate choice.
Trochu som o tom premýšľal. Po prvé, máme novú technológiu elektronických štítkov, ktorá umožňuje akémukoľvek obchodu spoznať celú históriu každej položky na ich regáloch. Dá sa vystopovať až k výrobcovi. A keď poznáme výrobcu, môžeme sa pozrieť na použité výrobné procesy. Ak bol tovar „vyrobený svedomito“, môže tak byť označený. A ak nebol, môžete zájsť do akéhokoľvek obchodu čítačkou prejsť čiarový kód, ktorý vás spojí s webovou stránkou. (ako to používajú ľudia s alergiou na oriešky). A táto webová stránka by vám poskytla informácie o danej veci. Inými slovami, pred zakúpením by sme si mohli vybrať uvedomele.
There's a saying in the world of information science: ultimately everybody will know everything. And the question is: will it make a difference? Some time ago when I was working for The New York Times, it was in the '80s, I did an article on what was then a new problem in New York -- it was homeless people on the streets. And I spent a couple of weeks going around with a social work agency that ministered to the homeless. And I realized seeing the homeless through their eyes that almost all of them were psychiatric patients that had nowhere to go. They had a diagnosis. It made me -- what it did was to shake me out of the urban trance where, when we see, when we're passing someone who's homeless in the periphery of our vision, it stays on the periphery. We don't notice and therefore we don't act.
Vo svete informatiky majú jedno príslovie: Napokon všetci budú vedieť všetko. A otázkou je: zmení sa tým niečo? Pred nejakým časom, keď som pracoval pre New York Times, bolo to v 80. rokoch, pracoval som na článku o vtedy novom probléme v New Yorku – bezdomovci na uliciach. Strávil som niekoľko týždňov pochôdzkami so sociálnymi pracovníkmi, ktorí mali na starosti bezdomovcov, a vidiac bezdomovcov ich očami som si uvedomil, že takmer všetci z nich boli pacientami z psychiatrie, ktorí nemali kam ísť. Boli chorí. Otriaslo to mnou a zobudilo ma to z mestského tranzu, v ktorom keď vidíme, keď prechádzame popri niekom bez domova, vnímame ho iba periférne. Nevšímame si, a preto nekonáme.
One day soon after that -- it was a Friday -- at the end of the day, I went down -- I was going down to the subway. It was rush hour and thousands of people were streaming down the stairs. And all of a sudden as I was going down the stairs I noticed that there was a man slumped to the side, shirtless, not moving, and people were just stepping over him -- hundreds and hundreds of people. And because my urban trance had been somehow weakened, I found myself stopping to find out what was wrong. The moment I stopped, half a dozen other people immediately ringed the same guy. And we found out that he was Hispanic, he didn't speak any English, he had no money, he'd been wandering the streets for days, starving, and he'd fainted from hunger. Immediately someone went to get orange juice, someone brought a hotdog, someone brought a subway cop. This guy was back on his feet immediately. But all it took was that simple act of noticing, and so I'm optimistic.
Jedného dňa krátko po tom – bol piatok, deň sa končil, schádzal som do metra. Bolo rušno, tisíce ľudí prúdili dolu schodmi. A zrazu, ako som schádzal dole, všimol som si muža ležiaceho bokom. Bol bez košele, nehybný a ľudia ho iba tak prekračovali – – stovky a stovky ľudí. A keďže môj mestský tranz bol akosi oslabený, pristihol som sa, ako sa zastavujem, aby som zistil, čo sa stalo. V momente, ako som zastal, pol tucta iných ľudí okolo neho urobilo kruh. Zistili sme, že to bol Hispánec, nerozprával anglicky, nemal žiadne peniaze, hladoval, už niekoľko dní sa potuloval po uliciach, a odpadol od hladu. Ihneď niekto išiel po džús, niekto priniesol hotdog, niekto priviedol policajta. Ten muž bol ihneď späť na nohách. Stačilo si len všimnúť, a preto som optimistický.
Thank you very much.
Ďakujem pekne.
(Applause)
(potlesk)