If you felt you needed an antidote to any of the previous videos, Eric Whitacre is here to help.
This is yet another presentation from TED, an organisation responsible for a large number of inspiring talks on a magnificently diverse set of topics.
Whitacre is a composer who effectively fell into this impressive project: to assemble a massive virtual choir from audition videos submitted to YouTube. Generalising from the videos seen, a large number of mainly 15 to 25-year-olds from all over the world watched him conduct, listened to the music on their iPods, and sang to their webcam from the privacy of their bedrooms.
The competition was quite strong, aided no doubt by an offer of singing scholarships to the top performers.
The most resonant part of his talk for me was his description of hearing a choir singing Kyrie for the first time, after years of listening to pop music and aspiring to pop stardom. He compared it to seeing in colour for the first time after a lifetime of living in black and white.
The two virtual choir projects underpin some seriously good choral composition, and Whitacre is definitely due credit for that, and for directing such a successful result.
I had a look for one of the winning soloists he mentioned, Melody Myers. I found her on YouTube giving a rendition of White Christmas that clearly demonstrates she is a particularly accomplished singer. Enjoy this, and seek out that.
Showing posts with label TED. Show all posts
Showing posts with label TED. Show all posts
Saturday, July 16, 2011
Tuesday, September 01, 2009
Hans Rosling: health insights, presentation excellence
Insights - wisdom and knowledge - are precious. Too often information is lacking context, or context is lacking information. News media is particularly guilty of this; most reports give scant weighting to the why over the what, and the event becomes mere spectacle.
Hans Rosling is a Swedish professor of global health. I stumbled across his presentations in the context of software tools, but found myself riveted by Rosling's ability to communicate on his subject matter - something he brings alive, even for those who may not have an immediate interest.
Those presentations, available on the website of the excellent organisation TED (devoted to "ideas worth spreading"), are every one of them worth watching: entertaining yet full of information and insight.
In the first presentation in the above series, Rosling's discussion revolves around four dimensions: time, health, wealth, and location (region/country). He gives his audience a good understanding of how the other three factors affect health outcomes, yet argues cogently for a more complex perspective on factors that affect health.
His second presentation is briefer, but includes an impressive feat which might seem gratuitous, yet he does it with purpose: to illustrate his point on achieving better health outcomes that "the seemingly impossible is possible". I won't divulge the climax: something that has to be seen for itself.
Rosling is, first and foremost, a Subject Matter Expert. But crucially he is a very effective communicator. He presents with knowledge and clarity, in a way that engages the audience. Part of the 'wow' factor lies in the fluid use of the presentation software he uses, which leaves the world's Powerpoints for dead. And if you explore the links, you'll find out that that software was originally developed by Rosling's foundation, no doubt to achieve the sort of communication at which Rosling excels.
Those presentations, available on the website of the excellent organisation TED (devoted to "ideas worth spreading"), are every one of them worth watching: entertaining yet full of information and insight.
In the first presentation in the above series, Rosling's discussion revolves around four dimensions: time, health, wealth, and location (region/country). He gives his audience a good understanding of how the other three factors affect health outcomes, yet argues cogently for a more complex perspective on factors that affect health.
His second presentation is briefer, but includes an impressive feat which might seem gratuitous, yet he does it with purpose: to illustrate his point on achieving better health outcomes that "the seemingly impossible is possible". I won't divulge the climax: something that has to be seen for itself.
Rosling is, first and foremost, a Subject Matter Expert. But crucially he is a very effective communicator. He presents with knowledge and clarity, in a way that engages the audience. Part of the 'wow' factor lies in the fluid use of the presentation software he uses, which leaves the world's Powerpoints for dead. And if you explore the links, you'll find out that that software was originally developed by Rosling's foundation, no doubt to achieve the sort of communication at which Rosling excels.
Friday, August 08, 2008
Cognitive tricks 1: mind creating meaning
I've been listening to Led Zeppelin backwards and let me tell you, it's the work of the devil.
Well, I should let other people tell you that; Believers will do so anyway. Yet it's the people in the middle that concern me the most, those who are too easily swayed by a stunning coincidence.
Michael Shermer, founder of the US Skeptics Society (and a former fundamentalist Christian), gave a talk for TED, an annual US conference for the "spreading of ideas".
The talk, available here on TED.com and here on LiveLeaks.com, in the course of debunking a few junk beliefs, showed how and why people often believe rubbish. A few examples he gave of those reasons:
1) People notice the "meaningful" results and ignore the failures - eg a US company sells a dowsing rod for detecting marijuana. If it can "occasionally" prove successful in finding it in high school lockers, administrators may be duped.
2) Taking something on face value without asking "what's the most plausible explanation" with all available evidence - viz crop circles.
3) Untestable explanations for existing events or outcomes - viz miracles, creation, divine intervention. (Contrast this with untested reports of individual happenings.)
4) Reading meaning into random patterns - eg seeing Mother Teresa in the shape of a bun.
That last point was the most interesting, and perhaps one of the most overlooked type of credulence-inducing phenomena. The brain has a natural tendency to interpret what one sees or hears. Where the data is incomplete, the mind can fill in the gaps. If a picture of Mars, or tree bark, or sandwich contains random patterns that are suggestive of something else, a little nudge can help convince some people - squint more, for example (it reduces even more the received data), while someone tells you what it is you're looking for. Does it look more like the Virgin Mary - or Jane Russell? Since more mysticism is attached to the former, the latter is "seen" less often.
But the most amazing example from Shermer was a section of Stairway to Heaven played backwards. When he first did this, I could hear the word Satan - but that was because I was listening for something, having been primed by Shermer - and also having heard of people claiming devil messages encoded backwards in music.
Still, I wasn't prepared for playback the second time, when Shermer put up a specific set of words to accompany. What a match! (once my mind was guided.)
How could Led Zep possibly record something that made sense backwards, yet was so musically integral in the forwards direction that no doctoring could be detected? That must take genius. Or Satan.
It's a bit tragic then, that part of the backwards lyric included '666'. The number of the beast? Not quite. Although popular culture has come to associate that number with the devil, more recent research has found the earliest reference to the number in the Book of Revelation gave it as 616.
Hold on, isn't that all a trick by Satan to mislead us?
Well, by this point people are simply going to believe what they want to believe.
Interestingly, there's a holy roller who interprets those same backwards words somewhat differently, on this video - start at 7.53 if you don't want to wade through the lot. A good illustration of the power of suggestion to help fill in the "data" gaps; it also illustrates that the desire to locate (create) interpretations is the driving force: - if not for Led Zeppelin, those preachers would be finding satan elsewhere - as they do.
(Thanks to Bill for the original web reference. It made my day to listen to that Led Zep backwards while my brain was guided by the printed "lyrics". Sad satan will never be the same.)
Well, I should let other people tell you that; Believers will do so anyway. Yet it's the people in the middle that concern me the most, those who are too easily swayed by a stunning coincidence.
Michael Shermer, founder of the US Skeptics Society (and a former fundamentalist Christian), gave a talk for TED, an annual US conference for the "spreading of ideas".
The talk, available here on TED.com and here on LiveLeaks.com, in the course of debunking a few junk beliefs, showed how and why people often believe rubbish. A few examples he gave of those reasons:
1) People notice the "meaningful" results and ignore the failures - eg a US company sells a dowsing rod for detecting marijuana. If it can "occasionally" prove successful in finding it in high school lockers, administrators may be duped.
2) Taking something on face value without asking "what's the most plausible explanation" with all available evidence - viz crop circles.
3) Untestable explanations for existing events or outcomes - viz miracles, creation, divine intervention. (Contrast this with untested reports of individual happenings.)
4) Reading meaning into random patterns - eg seeing Mother Teresa in the shape of a bun.
That last point was the most interesting, and perhaps one of the most overlooked type of credulence-inducing phenomena. The brain has a natural tendency to interpret what one sees or hears. Where the data is incomplete, the mind can fill in the gaps. If a picture of Mars, or tree bark, or sandwich contains random patterns that are suggestive of something else, a little nudge can help convince some people - squint more, for example (it reduces even more the received data), while someone tells you what it is you're looking for. Does it look more like the Virgin Mary - or Jane Russell? Since more mysticism is attached to the former, the latter is "seen" less often.
But the most amazing example from Shermer was a section of Stairway to Heaven played backwards. When he first did this, I could hear the word Satan - but that was because I was listening for something, having been primed by Shermer - and also having heard of people claiming devil messages encoded backwards in music.
Still, I wasn't prepared for playback the second time, when Shermer put up a specific set of words to accompany. What a match! (once my mind was guided.)
How could Led Zep possibly record something that made sense backwards, yet was so musically integral in the forwards direction that no doctoring could be detected? That must take genius. Or Satan.
It's a bit tragic then, that part of the backwards lyric included '666'. The number of the beast? Not quite. Although popular culture has come to associate that number with the devil, more recent research has found the earliest reference to the number in the Book of Revelation gave it as 616.
Hold on, isn't that all a trick by Satan to mislead us?
Well, by this point people are simply going to believe what they want to believe.
Interestingly, there's a holy roller who interprets those same backwards words somewhat differently, on this video - start at 7.53 if you don't want to wade through the lot. A good illustration of the power of suggestion to help fill in the "data" gaps; it also illustrates that the desire to locate (create) interpretations is the driving force: - if not for Led Zeppelin, those preachers would be finding satan elsewhere - as they do.
(Thanks to Bill for the original web reference. It made my day to listen to that Led Zep backwards while my brain was guided by the printed "lyrics". Sad satan will never be the same.)
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)