Kathryn Schulz starts off her talk with a little story of a road trip she once took with a friend. The whole way she had been seeing a sign on the side of the road; she finally decided to ask her friend what it meant. Schulz asked the friend, "What is that Chinese character I keep seeing on the side of the road?" The friend was completely befuddled until she realized what Schulz was talking about, and started laughing uncontrollably. What Schulz had been thinking was a Chinese character was actually a picnic area sign. Being wrong feels just the same as being right, and that is the problem behind it. No one knows they are wrong until they realize it, and that is when the earth tumbles down around you and swallows you up; it is not the act of being wrong, but its aftermath. From this point on, she launches into the next main purpose of her talk: the miracle of the human mind is a person does not see the world for what it is, but what it is not. Human beings are set in their ways and want others to think exactly as they do; when they believe they are right, they also believe that they can perfectly reflect reality. When they try to convince others that their view is correct and the others disagree, that person assumes three things about them: they are ignorant, they are idiots, or they are evil because they may know the truth and are secretly plotting to use it against you. Schulz says that these assumptions destroy human nature and cause people to treat one another horribly. Not surprisingly, others' "ignorance," "idiocy," and "evil" are what people thrive on; we love seeing how incompetent another person is because we love surprises and good stories love wrongness. The surprises and mistakes reflect real life and that is why we love them so.
From the get go, Schulz is the most relatable talker I have seen; she is completely at home up on that stage and knows exactly how everything will play out. Simultaneously, she talks as though she is speaking directly to each member of the audience; Schulz even asked a section to respond to a question that she asked, giving live feedback to the entire crowd. She interacted very well and incorporated the crowd's response into what she was talking about, almost using it as a transition into her next point. Through out the entirety of her speech, she subtly mocked both herself and the crowd, getting some laughs and breaking the seriousness of the importance of her message. Story was deeply intertwined within Schulz talk (which is probably why it is so relatable), and, quite frankly, being wrong should not be illustrated in any other medium. It will not be able to capture the essence and humanity behind mistakes.
The topic of her TED Talk already had my interest, and after listening to her speak, my interest has strengthened greatly. Society has a serious problem on their hands; they cannot see that, despite valiant efforts, we cannot try to change another person without some sort of backlash. Look at the United States, look at religion, look at the person sitting next to you in class, look at your parents. Not one of these people will change their view because you think you are right. Schulz said we put too much confidence in the feeling of being right. I believe the feeling of being right is what causes a skewed view of reality; ideas play our well in our heads, but we cannot predict how it will turn out elsewhere. Not realizing this, we try to force our opinions down the throats of others and end up hurting more than helping. What seems right to us may be completely wrong for another person, country, or civilization. And when they reject what we are preaching, they automatically are ignorant and evil idiots. Silly as it sounds, this happens all over the world today via religion and United States roll in other countries. Their intentions are good, but I am not confident that the change will do much good. On the completely unrelated other hand, we have the affects of mistakes on a personal level, meaning how society relates to being wrong. Schulz says that before we even know we are making a mistake, we are in trouble; we just do not realize that we are doing this because it feels exactly like being right. Then we look around and the floodgates break and are engulfed by a flood of emotions: inferiority, devastation, immense embarrassment. But why does this happen? From an early age we are taught that mistakes are associated with stupidity and laziness and that the way to succeed in life is to never make any mistakes. When I was little, I had a tendency to knock over full cups of liquids at almost every meal. This little accident symbolizes the feelings associated with making a mistake. You are a glass of apple juice sitting there on the kitchen table, just an inch or two away from the edge. And you sit there, content and oblivious to the world, knowing only what you have experienced. Then all of the sudden, you feel the blow of an elbow, sending you spiraling through the air with nothing to hold on to, nothing to support the only concept you knew until you smack down on the wood floor. That elbow is reality striking you and you can do nothing about the horrifying descent down to a new and unknown situation. Wrong is where people are comfortable; wrong is where people can hold on to what they believe in and reject what reality has proven. Wrong is where people stay until they have a rude awakening into a scary unknown place. We associate those feelings of fear to be proven wrong with the act of being wrong and forget how content we were when we thought we were right. As society, and as an individual, we need to accept that humans make mistakes and embrace the beauty and growth that may come from them.
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