Being Wrong is not Always a Bad Thing Watching Kathryn Schulz’s Ted Talk “On being wrong” is an outlook on reality that people these days don’t look at or even have considered. What Schulz does is explain why overachievers or people who want to be perfect are stuck in this little box of perfection and that we need to get out. Being Wrong is one of the most natural things us as humans can do. It is something that everyone of us has done at one time or another, no one is ever perfect. And if so why don’t we accept our wrongness, ignore or even get embarrassed by it. Schulz says that we have been taught perfection all the way back to grade school, and that if we as people didn’t get everything right or perfect that we were stupid or someone who didn’t do their homework a loser. So eventually as students grow up they want to be that perfect person and since people think they are right almost all the time that when the moment comes where we are proven wrong, we feel that something is not only wrong but something is wrong with us. Schulz states that we as people are so obsessed with trying to figure things out and to her that this obsession is the foundation of our creativity. Ronald Hoffman author of essay “The Tense Middle” is a Chemist that believes in the tense middle. Hoffman tells us about his experience of being in the “middle”. He was born in Poland in 1937 out of a Jewish family during this time was the nazi regime. Most of his family was killed, besides him and his mother. They took shelter in the attic of a Ukrainian teacher and at the time Ukraine was a big allie of the Nazi regime. He knows that there is either good or evil but understands that we as human beings have a decision to pick either one or the other bu... ... middle of paper ... ...e completely different angles, but the meaning behind each are the same. Ted Gup, Allan Barger and Kathryn Shulzs tells us that it is okay to be wrong, okay to be different, or simply uncertain of what you believe; meanwhile, most people have been taught at a young age that being perfect is the only way to succeed, or not knowing what you believe in is strange. I think these three authors make great valid points and each give good meaning behind the reasons why they believe what they believe. I feel the most compelling and convincing story is Ronald Hoffmans, about his childhood hiding from the Nazi Regime. How he was stuck in The Tense Middle of true good and true evil. shared is A To succeed we as people try to find some sort common ground, or understanding of ourselves and sometimes its not always the right answer but it is the answer that we believe is right.
between the two authors, they share similarities towards the message they try to send out.
We were not born with the ability to do everything and we must allow ourselves to take our lessons as we go and learn from them. In my life there are many things that I have learned, whether it be from the trial and error of working on vehicles to me submitting an uncited English paper. We are taught from the moment we are born what failure is, we are asked to do things as simple as to say a word and we are told that is not correct. Even though that example is in the context of teaching, we still are being taught what it feels like to be told we are doing something wrong. Failure is something that we become so familiar with it becomes a natural view, seeing someone attempt to throw paper in the trash and they miss; fail or a failure as big as Chernobyl and everything in between, we are immediately taught to look down on what falls into the category of
Overall, both of these stories are wonderful. They really get you engaged as a reader to understand the concept of the story and find the moral meaning of why the story is being told. These stories really helped me understand why it is so important for me to search for my meaning because I will never know where I am going if I don’t suffer and understand the bad things in life before receiving any good things in life. I would recommend any and every body to experience both of these magnificent stories because they are both extremely powerful and joyful to comprehend.
In The Meaning of Lives by Susan Wolf, she states, “They [people] want to be important, to have an impact on the world, to make a mark that will last forever. When they realize that they cannot achieve this, they are very disappointed. The only advice one can give to such people is: Get Over It”(846). Which is a statement I do not agree with. Many people are determined on making a difference in this world, whether it is small or large. Although, of course, every journey isn’t easy and it consists of many bumps along the way, which, in one of those bumps, could easily bring one down to think one cannot achieve our goal. That we cannot make a difference in this world. But no one should simply say to them “get over it” and make them think this.
Ken informs us that of the fifteen-hundred children that were studied, ninety-eight percent had a capacity for divergent thinking. Five years later the same children were retested, of the original fifteen-hundred, this time only fifty percent had a capacity for divergent thinking(Robinson). This argument helps Ken to prove that instead of stimulating the creativity, somehow we create a sense of assimilation, as in there is only one way to think or there is only one solution to every problem. This becomes problematic, because it creates a sense of linear thinking, in a world that rarely only has one right solution, and sometimes the one solution that people can come up with isn’t always the best solution. In making this argument Ken tries to further his appeal to the logos of the speech, which he does very well, because it’s a logical thought that we should nourish the creativity of our youth, rather than squash
close with a great quote from Mrs. Ida. B. Wells-Barnett “the way to right wrongs is to
As American journalist and former first lady of California, Maria Shriver, once stated, “perfectionism doesn’t make you feel perfect; it makes you feel inadequate.” This quote reflects upon the negative side effects of being the infamous, “perfectionist.” A perfectionist is commonly defined as someone who accepts none other than true precision, and will cease at nothing to obtain it. Throughout my academic career, I had struggled with this type of mental state.
Albert Einstein once said “Everybody is a genius. But if you judge a fish by its ability to climb a tree, it will live its whole life believing that is it stupid.” Sir Ken Robinson stated that schools are destroying children 's creativity with their curriculum, there are many facts that support this idea. Students are required to think a specific way, prepare the way teachers want them to be prepared. Students also have their own opinion, because they are not afraid to be wrong, and need a way to move forward.
The story that intrigued me the most was, A Good Man Is Hard To Find, by Flannery O’ Connor. I think there are some interwoven conflicts in this story, the main one being, the grandmothers inter conflict between what she thinks is morally the appropriate way of thinking and dealing with someone else 's(the misfits) idea of what is morally correct. I think what these folks are saying about the fundamental problems of being a human is, there is a difficulty in the fact that everyone has a different moral system that they live by, based on their life experience. There were many questions in our discussion that I found very interesting. Like, “Why do you think the mother decided to freely walk into the woods when asked "would you and that little
Nothing in the world is completely wrong or, for that matter, completely right. While it may seem that in any given situation, there are only two outcomes, a right solution or a wrong solution, that doesn’t always mean the right one is obvious or even “right” at all. Instead, right and wrong are not absolutes that are applicable to every situation. In other words, not every wrong is equal. It is in fact possible for one thing to be more wrong than another. Isaac Asimov’s “The Relativity of Wrong” offers an insight to what makes something more wrong than something else. He explains in his essay that a common misconception exists in the belief that if something isn’t completely right, then it is wrong. Asimov debunks this belief by explaining
Though their beliefs were different, there are similarities in their findings of our social world.
If This Is a Man or Survival in Auschwitz), stops to exist; the meanings and applications of words such as “good,” “evil,” “just,” and “unjust” begin to merge and the differences between these opposites turn vague. Continued existence in Auschwitz demanded abolition of one’s self-respect and human dignity. Vulnerability to unending dehumanization certainly directs one to be dehumanized, thrusting one to resort to mental, physical, and social adaptation to be able to preserve one’s life and personality. It is in this adaptation that the line distinguishing right and wrong starts to deform. Primo Levi, a survivor, gives account of his incarceration in the Monowitz- Buna concentration camp.
These books show that though the relationships between humans might be different, the principals are the same. These principals include the fact that humans will stand-alone when they have the truth on their side because truth cannot be changed. Secondly, when friendships are tried, they will break because of one's love of him self. Moreover, the death sentence is not a necessary way to punish one's enemies. Lastly, being part of a group can be helpful because an individual belongs, yet harmful because of blind loyalty. The relationships people build with others are a reflection of their beliefs of truth and humanity.
Everyone, at some point in their life, has made a mistake. Sometimes we get lucky and only falter a little, making it through the problem relatively intact. Other times, we mess up a lot and have to fix what was damaged over a long period of time. However, the same is true for most, if not all cases—those who make the mistake learn from it. Often times, our failures teach us valuable lessons that we only gained because of the experience we gathered after messing up. I have personally achieved a wealth of knowledge and experience just from all of my own little mishaps, and a few major ones.
There is an overwhelming amount of evidence of the human race realtion to, creativity and that we all have an interest in education. Education is so important to us because it is the only thing we can use for this unpredicted future. All children have talents, but the education system crushes our creativity because we are taught to think a certain way. Due to the fear of being wrong has led children to no longer be creative which is why many adults lose that “capacity” to be able to be creative. The very few children who are allowed to continue using their creativity tend to not to be as dissatisfied their lives as much as other adults who were not able to pursue passions they truly enjoyed.