Wednesday, January 13, 2010

Animal Instincts

The following is a great school day talk (similar to commencement talk). The ties to satsang are pretty evident - controlling vishays. If we do not we are just like any other animal. Interestingly Dr. Sapolsky shows how we are in many ways similar to any other mammal, we just take things to an extreme. You may also notice that he does not really follow the no bullets power point guidelines espoused by many who believe in sticky presentations. I think his power point really detracts from this talk, however he makes up for this with his very strong storytelling. The lesson here is that in the Made To Stick hierarchy being strong in one aspect can overcome being weak in another.

This talk is really interesting, but quite long. It may not be suitable for a sabha talk or even an introduction to a goshti. You can always show a clip or cut and paste an abridged version. We have found showing clips can sometimes be a distraction - you have to get the video setup, pause hit play - all for 30 second clip. Another idea would be to simply restate his stories in your own words. Just by citing his work, you get instant Crediblity, tying it to a real world issue (which he does) gives Concreteness, and you are saying a Story that many people will find Unexpected in the context of sabha - this hits 4 out of the 6 MtS SUCCES metrics. How else do you think can this be used?

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