Short-termism is killing us: it's time for longpath | Ari Wallach | TEDxMidAtlantic
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0:29 - 0:34October 16, 1993,
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0:34 - 0:351:17am.
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0:35 - 0:39The phone rang at my parents' home.
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0:39 - 0:41I answered on the second ring.
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0:41 - 0:43I pretty much knew who was calling.
-
0:43 - 0:47The voice on the other end
spoke for maybe 10 seconds. -
0:48 - 0:50My reply was even shorter.
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0:51 - 0:52"Do not resuscitate."
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0:53 - 0:56I was 18 years old when I lost my father.
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1:00 - 1:01Several years later,
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1:01 - 1:04I was reading the book by Ernest Becker,
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1:04 - 1:05"The Denial of Death."
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1:05 - 1:07He won the Pulitzer prize for it in 1972.
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1:08 - 1:11And I'll paraphrase an entire book
in three sentences. -
1:11 - 1:14Man is the only sentient species,
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1:14 - 1:18who, at a very early point in his life,
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1:18 - 1:20knows that he will cease to exist,
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1:21 - 1:27and that he does everything he can
to run, shield and hide himself -
1:27 - 1:28from that inevitable truth.
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1:30 - 1:34And so, now you know
how I became a futurist. -
1:35 - 1:36That was my running.
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1:38 - 1:41So I've been "futuring,"
which is a term I made up -- -
1:41 - 1:42(Laughter)
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1:42 - 1:44about three seconds ago.
-
1:44 - 1:46I've been futuring for about 20 years,
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1:46 - 1:50and when I first started,
I would sit down with people, -
1:50 - 1:53and say, "Hey,
let's talk 10, 20 years out." -
1:53 - 1:54And they'd say, "Great."
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1:55 - 1:57And I've been seeing that time horizon
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1:57 - 1:59get shorter and shorter
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1:59 - 2:01and shorter,
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2:01 - 2:04so much so that I met
with a CEO two months ago -
2:04 - 2:07and I said -- we started
our initial conversation. -
2:07 - 2:11He goes, "I love what you do.
I want to talk about the next six months." -
2:11 - 2:12(Laughter)
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2:13 - 2:16We have a lot of problems
that we are facing. -
2:16 - 2:19These are civilizational-scale problems.
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2:21 - 2:23The issue though is,
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2:23 - 2:25we can't solve them
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2:25 - 2:27using the mental models
that we use right now -
2:27 - 2:29to try and solve these problems.
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2:29 - 2:32Yes, a lot of great
technical work is being done, -
2:32 - 2:37but there is a problem that
we need to solve for a priori, before, -
2:37 - 2:40if we want to really
move the needle on those big problems. -
2:42 - 2:44"Short-termism."
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2:44 - 2:46Right? There's no marches.
There's no bracelets. -
2:46 - 2:50There's no petitions that you can sign
to be against short-termism. -
2:51 - 2:54I tried to put one up, and no one signed.
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2:54 - 2:55It was weird.
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2:57 - 3:00But it prevents us from doing so much.
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3:00 - 3:03And, by the way, this is on policy,
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3:03 - 3:05this is at home,
this is on the major issues. -
3:05 - 3:08Short-termism, for many reasons,
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3:08 - 3:11has pervaded every
nook and cranny of our reality, -
3:11 - 3:13yet it's something
that we don't actually talk about, -
3:13 - 3:15but it prevents us from doing so much.
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3:17 - 3:18I just want you to take a second
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3:19 - 3:22and just think about an issue
that you're thinking, working on. -
3:22 - 3:24It could be personal, it could be at work
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3:24 - 3:26or it could be
move-the-needle world stuff, -
3:26 - 3:29and think about
how far out you tend to think -
3:29 - 3:31about the solution set for that.
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3:35 - 3:39Because short-termism prevents the CEO
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3:39 - 3:42from buying really
expensive safety equipment. -
3:43 - 3:45It'll hurt the bottom line.
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3:45 - 3:46So we get the Deepwater Horizon.
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3:48 - 3:51Short-termism prevents teachers
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3:51 - 3:55from spending quality
one-on-one time with their students. -
3:55 - 3:57So right now in America,
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3:57 - 4:00a high school student
drops out every 26 seconds. -
4:02 - 4:04Short-termism prevents Congress --
-
4:05 - 4:07sorry if there's anyone
in here from Congress -- -
4:07 - 4:09(Laughter)
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4:09 - 4:11or not really that sorry --
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4:11 - 4:13(Laughter)
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4:13 - 4:16from putting money
into a real infrastructure bill. -
4:16 - 4:19So what we get
is the I-35W bridge collapse -
4:19 - 4:21over the Mississippi a few years ago,
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4:21 - 4:2213 killed.
-
4:24 - 4:27It wasn't always like this.
We did the Panama Canal. -
4:29 - 4:31We pretty much
have eradicated global polio. -
4:31 - 4:34We did the transcontinental railroad,
the Marshall Plan. -
4:35 - 4:39And it's not just big, physical
infrastructure problems and issues. -
4:39 - 4:41Women's suffrage, the right to vote.
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4:41 - 4:44But in our short-termist time,
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4:44 - 4:47where everything seems to happen right now
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4:47 - 4:51and we can only think out
past the next tweet or timeline post, -
4:51 - 4:53we get hyper-reactionary.
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4:53 - 4:54So what do we do?
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4:57 - 5:00We take people who are fleeing
their war-torn country, -
5:00 - 5:01and we go after them.
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5:01 - 5:05We take low-level drug offenders,
and we put them away for life. -
5:05 - 5:07And then we build McMansions
without even thinking -
5:08 - 5:10about how people are going
to get between them and their job. -
5:10 - 5:12It's a quick buck.
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5:13 - 5:15Now, the reality is,
for a lot of these problems, -
5:15 - 5:18there are some technical fixes,
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5:18 - 5:19a lot of them.
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5:19 - 5:23I call these technical fixes
sandbag strategies. -
5:23 - 5:24So you know there's a storm coming,
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5:24 - 5:27the levee is broken,
no one's put any money into it, -
5:27 - 5:29you surround your home with sandbags.
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5:29 - 5:31And guess what? It works.
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5:33 - 5:35Storm goes away,
the water level goes down, -
5:35 - 5:36you get rid of the sandbags,
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5:36 - 5:39and you do this storm
after storm after storm. -
5:40 - 5:41And here's the insidious thing.
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5:42 - 5:44A sandbag strategy
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5:44 - 5:45can get you reelected.
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5:46 - 5:48A sandbag strategy
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5:48 - 5:50can help you make your quarterly numbers.
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5:50 - 5:53Now, if we want to move forward
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5:53 - 5:56into a different future
than the one we have right now, -
5:56 - 5:58because I don't think we've hit --
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5:58 - 6:002016 is not peak civilization.
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6:00 - 6:01(Laughter)
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6:01 - 6:03There's some more we can do.
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6:04 - 6:07For the issue of short-termism, yeah,
there's a lot of technical fixes. -
6:07 - 6:10I could spend the next four hours
going down a list -
6:10 - 6:13of tax policy, insurance,
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6:13 - 6:17just a litany of things
that we could do to tackle short-termism. -
6:17 - 6:21But my argument is that unless we shift
our mental models and our mental maps -
6:21 - 6:24on how we think about the short,
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6:24 - 6:25it's not going to happen.
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6:25 - 6:28So what I've developed
is something called "longpath," -
6:28 - 6:30and it's a practice.
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6:30 - 6:34And longpath isn't
a kind of one-and-done exercise. -
6:34 - 6:37I'm sure everyone here
at some point has done an off-site -
6:37 - 6:39with a lot of Post-It notes
and whiteboards, -
6:39 - 6:42and you do --
-
6:42 - 6:44no offense to the consultants
in here who do that -- -
6:44 - 6:46and you do a long-term plan,
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6:46 - 6:48and then two weeks later,
everyone forgets about it. -
6:50 - 6:53Right? Or a week later.
If you're lucky, three months. -
6:53 - 6:57It's a practice because
it's not necessarily a thing that you do. -
6:57 - 7:01It's a process where you have
to revisit different ways of thinking -
7:01 - 7:03for every major decision
that you're working on. -
7:03 - 7:06So I want to go through
those three ways of thinking. -
7:07 - 7:08So the first;
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7:08 - 7:11I'm going to say it slow,
so I can say it properly. -
7:11 - 7:13Trans-generational thinking.
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7:14 - 7:16I love the philosophers:
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7:16 - 7:18Plato, Socrates, Habermas, Heidegger.
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7:18 - 7:19I was raised on them.
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7:21 - 7:23But they all did one thing
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7:23 - 7:25that didn't actually seem like a big deal
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7:25 - 7:27until I really started
kind of looking into this. -
7:27 - 7:29And they all took,
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7:29 - 7:32as a unit of measure
for their entire reality -
7:32 - 7:34of what it meant to be virtuous and good,
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7:35 - 7:36the single lifespan,
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7:37 - 7:39from birth to death.
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7:40 - 7:42But here's a problem with these issues:
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7:42 - 7:43they stack up on top of us,
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7:43 - 7:47because the only way we know
how to do something good in the world -
7:47 - 7:49is if we do it between
our birth and our death. -
7:49 - 7:50That's what we're programmed to do.
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7:51 - 7:53If you go to the self-help section
in any bookstore, -
7:53 - 7:54it's all about you.
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7:56 - 7:57Which is great,
-
7:58 - 8:00unless you're dealing
with some of these major issues. -
8:02 - 8:05And so with transgenerational thinking,
-
8:06 - 8:08which is really kind of
transgenerational ethics, -
8:08 - 8:12you're able to expand
how you think about these problems, -
8:12 - 8:15what is your role
in helping to solve them. -
8:16 - 8:21This isn't something that just has to be
done at the Security Council chamber. -
8:22 - 8:25It's something that you can do
in a very kind of personal way. -
8:25 - 8:30So every once in a while, if I'm lucky,
my wife and I like to go out to dinner, -
8:30 - 8:33and we have three children
under the age of seven. -
8:33 - 8:35So you can imagine
it's a very peaceful, quiet meal. -
8:35 - 8:36(Laughter)
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8:36 - 8:42So we sit down and literally
all I want to do is just eat and chill, -
8:42 - 8:45and my kids have a completely
and totally different idea -
8:45 - 8:46of what we're going to be doing.
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8:46 - 8:49And so my first idea
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8:49 - 8:51is my sandbag strategy, right?
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8:51 - 8:53It's to go into my pocket
and take out the iPhone -
8:53 - 8:54and give them "Frozen"
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8:54 - 8:57or some other bestselling game thing.
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8:59 - 9:02And then I stop
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9:02 - 9:07and I have to kind of put on
this transgenerational thinking cap. -
9:07 - 9:10I don't do this in the restaurant,
because it would be bizarre, -
9:10 - 9:11but I have to --
-
9:11 - 9:14I did it once, and that's how
I learned it was bizarre. -
9:14 - 9:15(Laughter)
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9:15 - 9:19And you have to kind of think,
"OK, I can do this." -
9:20 - 9:21But what is this teaching them?
-
9:25 - 9:27So what does it mean
if I actually bring some paper -
9:27 - 9:29or engage with them in conversation?
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9:29 - 9:31It's hard, and I'm making this
very personal. -
9:31 - 9:33It's actually more traumatic
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9:33 - 9:36than some of the big issues
that I work on in the world -- -
9:36 - 9:37entertaining my kids at dinner.
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9:37 - 9:41But what it does is it connects them
here in the present with me, -
9:41 - 9:42but it also --
-
9:42 - 9:45and this is the crux
of transgenerational thinking ethics -- -
9:45 - 9:49it sets them up to how they're
going to interact with their kids -
9:49 - 9:51and their kids and their kids.
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9:53 - 9:55Second, futures thinking.
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9:57 - 10:00When we think about the future --
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10:01 - 10:02Don't close your eyes,
-
10:02 - 10:04everyone always says that and no one does.
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10:04 - 10:06Pretend to close your eyes.
-
10:06 - 10:07(Laughter)
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10:07 - 10:09Think 10, 15 years out,
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10:10 - 10:12give me a vision of what the future is.
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10:13 - 10:16You don't have to give it to me,
but think in your head. -
10:16 - 10:18And what you're probably going to see
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10:18 - 10:20is the dominant cultural lens
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10:20 - 10:23that dominates our thinking
about the future right now: -
10:23 - 10:24technology.
-
10:25 - 10:27So when we think about the problems,
-
10:27 - 10:29we always put it through
a technological lens, -
10:29 - 10:32a tech-centric, a techno-utopia,
and there's nothing wrong with that, -
10:32 - 10:35but it's something that we have to
really think deeply about -
10:35 - 10:38if we're going to move
on these major issues, -
10:38 - 10:40because it wasn't always like this. Right?
-
10:40 - 10:43The ancients had their way of thinking
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10:44 - 10:45about what the future was.
-
10:47 - 10:52The Church definitely had their idea
of what the future could be, -
10:52 - 10:55and you could actually pay your way
into that future. Right? -
10:55 - 10:56And luckily for humanity,
-
10:57 - 11:00we got the scientific revolution.
-
11:02 - 11:03From there, we got the technology,
-
11:03 - 11:05but what has happened --
-
11:05 - 11:07And by the way, this is not a critique.
-
11:08 - 11:11I love technology.
-
11:11 - 11:13Everything in my house talks back to me,
-
11:13 - 11:15from my children
to my speakers to everything. -
11:15 - 11:18(Laughter)
-
11:18 - 11:24But we've abdicated the future
from the high priests in Rome -
11:24 - 11:27to the high priests of Silicon Valley.
-
11:28 - 11:31So when we think, well,
how are we going to deal with climate -
11:31 - 11:33or with poverty or homelessness,
-
11:33 - 11:36our first reaction is to think about it
through a technology lens. -
11:37 - 11:42And look, I'm not advocating
that we go to this guy. -
11:42 - 11:44I love Joel, don't get me wrong,
-
11:44 - 11:46but I'm not saying we go to Joel.
-
11:46 - 11:48What I'm saying is we have to rethink
-
11:48 - 11:53our base assumption about
only looking at the future in one way, -
11:53 - 11:55only looking at it
through the dominant lens. -
11:55 - 11:57Because our problems
are so big and so vast -
11:57 - 12:00that we need to open ourselves up.
-
12:00 - 12:04So that's why I do everything in my power
not to talk about the future. -
12:04 - 12:06I talk about futures.
-
12:07 - 12:08It opens the conversation again.
-
12:08 - 12:11So when you're sitting and thinking
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12:11 - 12:14about how do we move forward
on this major issue -- -
12:14 - 12:16it could be at home,
-
12:16 - 12:18it could be at work,
-
12:18 - 12:20it could be again on the global stage --
-
12:20 - 12:25don't cut yourself off from thinking
about something beyond technology as a fix -
12:25 - 12:28because we're more concerned
about technological evolution right now -
12:28 - 12:31than we are about moral evolution.
-
12:31 - 12:33And unless we fix for that,
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12:33 - 12:35we're not going to be able
to get out of short-termism -
12:35 - 12:37and get to where we want to be.
-
12:37 - 12:40The final, telos thinking.
This comes from the Greek root. -
12:40 - 12:43Ultimate aim and ultimate purpose.
-
12:43 - 12:45And it's really asking one question:
-
12:47 - 12:48to what end?
-
12:49 - 12:52When was the last time
you asked yourself: To what end? -
12:54 - 12:58And when you asked yourself that,
how far out did you go? -
12:58 - 13:01Because long isn't long enough anymore.
-
13:02 - 13:04Three, five years doesn't cut it.
-
13:04 - 13:06It's 30, 40, 50, 100 years.
-
13:08 - 13:14In Homer's epic, "The Odyssey,"
-
13:14 - 13:17Odysseus had the answer to his "what end."
-
13:17 - 13:18It was Ithaca.
-
13:19 - 13:21It was this bold vision
of what he wanted -- -
13:21 - 13:22to return to Penelope.
-
13:22 - 13:25And I can tell you,
because of the work that I'm doing, -
13:25 - 13:28but also you know it intuitively --
we have lost our Ithaca. -
13:28 - 13:31We have lost our "to what end,"
so we stay on this hamster wheel. -
13:31 - 13:34And yes, we're trying
to solve these problems, -
13:34 - 13:36but what comes after we solve the problem?
-
13:37 - 13:40And unless you define what comes after,
people aren't going to move. -
13:41 - 13:44Thomas Kuhn, who gave us
the famous term "paradigm shift" -- -
13:44 - 13:49the part about that book
that isn't as famous -
13:49 - 13:51is where he said, "People don't shift
-
13:51 - 13:54unless they have a vision
of what it is they're shifting to." -
13:55 - 13:59The frog won't leap from one lily pad
to the next without seeing it. -
14:01 - 14:04And you can't tell the frog
a one-sentence telos statement. -
14:04 - 14:06It needs to be fully fleshed out.
-
14:06 - 14:09This was the power
of what Martin Luther King, Jr. did. -
14:10 - 14:13He went through the list
of problems and issues, -
14:13 - 14:16but then, he gave you
a strong understanding -
14:16 - 14:20of what it was; "I have a dream" --
what will come after? -
14:20 - 14:22This isn't just about business,
-
14:22 - 14:26but the businesses that do consistently,
who break out of short-termism -
14:26 - 14:28not surprisingly
are family-run businesses. -
14:28 - 14:31They're transgenerational. They're telos.
They think about the futures. -
14:31 - 14:35And this is an ad for Patek Philippe.
They're 175 years old, -
14:35 - 14:38and what's amazing
is that they literally embody -
14:38 - 14:41this kind of longpathian sense
in their brand, -
14:41 - 14:44because, by the way,
you never actually own a Patek Philippe, -
14:44 - 14:46and I definitely won't --
-
14:46 - 14:47(Laughter)
-
14:47 - 14:50unless somebody wants to just
throw 25,000 dollars on the stage. -
14:50 - 14:53You merely look after it
for the next generation. -
14:57 - 14:59So it's important that we remember,
-
14:59 - 15:02the future, we treat it like a noun.
-
15:02 - 15:04It's not. It's a verb.
-
15:05 - 15:06It requires action.
-
15:06 - 15:08It requires us to push into it.
-
15:08 - 15:10It's not this thing that washes over us.
-
15:10 - 15:12It's something that we
actually have total control over. -
15:12 - 15:15But in a short-term society,
we end up feeling like we don't. -
15:15 - 15:17We feel like we're trapped.
-
15:17 - 15:18We can push through that.
-
15:20 - 15:23Now I'm getting more comfortable
-
15:23 - 15:25in the fact that at some point
-
15:26 - 15:27in the inevitable future,
-
15:29 - 15:30I will die.
-
15:31 - 15:35But because of these new ways
of thinking and doing, -
15:35 - 15:39both in the outside world
and also with my family at home, -
15:39 - 15:42and what I'm leaving my kids,
I get more comfortable in that fact. -
15:42 - 15:45And it's something that a lot of us
are really uncomfortable with, -
15:45 - 15:47but I'm telling you,
-
15:48 - 15:49think it through.
-
15:49 - 15:52Apply this type of thinking
and you can push yourself past -
15:52 - 15:54what's inevitably
very, very uncomfortable. -
15:54 - 15:58And it all begins really
with yourself asking this question: -
15:59 - 16:00What is your longpath?
-
16:02 - 16:04But I ask you, when you ask yourself that
-
16:04 - 16:07now or tonight or behind a steering wheel
-
16:07 - 16:10or in the boardroom or the situation room:
-
16:12 - 16:14push past the longpath,
-
16:14 - 16:18quick, oh, what's my longpath
the next three years or five years? -
16:18 - 16:21Try and push past your own life if you can
-
16:21 - 16:24because it makes you do things
a little bit bigger -
16:24 - 16:25than you thought were possible.
-
16:27 - 16:30Yes, we have huge,
huge problems out there. -
16:32 - 16:34With this process, with this thinking,
-
16:35 - 16:36I think we can make a difference.
-
16:37 - 16:40I think you can make a difference,
-
16:40 - 16:41and I believe in you guys.
-
16:41 - 16:42Thank you.
-
16:42 - 16:46(Applause)
- Title:
- Short-termism is killing us: it's time for longpath | Ari Wallach | TEDxMidAtlantic
- Description:
-
We are facing huge problems in the world today, civilizational-scale problems. However, we cannot solve them using short-term thinking. If we want to move forward into a different future, we must adopt what Ari Wallach calls the “longpath.” Ari shares three ways of thinking to approach the major problems we’re tackling.
Applied futurist and innovation strategist Ari Wallach is CEO of New York City based Synthesis Corp. and is Fast Company’s expert on emergent macro-trends in business and culture. Combining a grasp of new technology and business models with a broader understanding of social, political, economic, and demographic transformations, Wallach helps leaders understand, and shape, the future — of their organizations, their industries, and the world.
This talk was given at a TEDx event using the TED conference format but independently organized by a local community. Learn more at http://ted.com/tedx
- Video Language:
- English
- Team:
- closed TED
- Project:
- TEDxTalks
- Duration:
- 16:46
Krystian Aparta edited English subtitles for Short-termism is killing us: it's time for Longpath | Ari Wallach | TEDxMidAtlantic | ||
Krystian Aparta edited English subtitles for Short-termism is killing us: it's time for Longpath | Ari Wallach | TEDxMidAtlantic |