Writing, Dyselxia, Relationships & The Creative Process w/ Director SOPHIE BROOKS

Writing, Dyselxia, Relationships & The Creative Process w/ Director SOPHIE BROOKS

/

Writer Director
Oh, Hi! · The Boy Downstairs

In reality, we're all complex people with feelings and our own sets of baggage. I do think we are very good at self-sabotage, all of us. It's a very easy road to go down. It's safe because it's comfortable, and we know it. When you can find the ways you self-sabotage and try to stop that, it will hopefully lead to a happier life and things that are meaningful. When I was in my late twenties, I got out of a serious relationship and kind of reentered the dating scene. I was shocked by the simplification of a lot of complicated feelings around dating and how women are so easily labeled crazy, and men are so easily labeled assholes.

How to Fight for Truth & Protect Democracy in A Post-Truth World? - Highlights - LEE McINTYRE

How to Fight for Truth & Protect Democracy in A Post-Truth World? - Highlights - LEE McINTYRE

/

Philosopher · Author of On Disinformation: How To Fight For Truth and Protect Democracy · How to Talk to a Science Denier

One thing people don't realize is that the goal of disinformation is not simply to get you to believe a falsehood. It's to demoralize you into giving up on the idea of truth, to polarize us around factual issues, to get us to distrust people who don't believe the same lie. And even if somebody doesn't believe the lie, it can still make them cynical. I mean, we've all had friends who don't even watch the news anymore. There's a chilling quotation from Holocaust historian Hannah Arendt about how when you always lie to someone, the consequence is not necessarily that they believe the lie, but that they begin to lose their critical faculties, that they begin to give up on the idea of truth, and so they can't judge for themselves what's true and what's false anymore. That's the scary part, the nexus between post-truth and autocracy. That's what the authoritarian wants. Not necessarily to get you to believe the lie. But to give up on truth, because when you give up on truth, then there's no blame, no accountability, and they can just assert their power. There's a connection between disinformation and denial.

Environmental Crisis, Philosophy & the Search for Meaning - ROBERT PIPPIN - Highlights

Environmental Crisis, Philosophy & the Search for Meaning - ROBERT PIPPIN - Highlights

/

Author of The Culmination: Heidegger, German Idealism, and the Fate of Philosophy
Modernism as a Philosophical Problem · Hegel’s Idealism

Philosophy is both an academic discipline and also something that everybody does. Everybody has to have reflective views about what's significant. They also have to justify to themselves why it's significant or important. The nature of justice itself, and the various opinions that have been written about in philosophy about justice, can get to a very high level. So there's this unusual connection between philosophy and human life. We've inherited from the middle ages, this incredible tradition that's now developed into a chance for young people to spend four or five years, in a way, released from the pressures of life. The idea to pursue your ideas a little further in these four years you have, exempt from the pressures of social life, allows philosophy to have a kind of position unique in the academy. In confronting what the best minds in the history of the world have had to say about these issues, the hope is that they provide for the people who are privileged enough to confront philosophy a better and more thoughtful approach to these fundamental questions that everybody has to confront.

Reflections on Philosophy, Art & Crisis in the 21st Century with ROBERT PIPPIN

Reflections on Philosophy, Art & Crisis in the 21st Century with ROBERT PIPPIN

/

Author of The Culmination: Heidegger, German Idealism, and the Fate of Philosophy
Modernism as a Philosophical Problem · Hegel’s Idealism

Philosophy is both an academic discipline and also something that everybody does. Everybody has to have reflective views about what's significant. They also have to justify to themselves why it's significant or important. The nature of justice itself, and the various opinions that have been written about in philosophy about justice, can get to a very high level. So there's this unusual connection between philosophy and human life. We've inherited from the middle ages, this incredible tradition that's now developed into a chance for young people to spend four or five years, in a way, released from the pressures of life. The idea to pursue your ideas a little further in these four years you have, exempt from the pressures of social life, allows philosophy to have a kind of position unique in the academy. In confronting what the best minds in the history of the world have had to say about these issues, the hope is that they provide for the people who are privileged enough to confront philosophy a better and more thoughtful approach to these fundamental questions that everybody has to confront.

Highlights - Philip Fernbach - Cognitive Scientist - Co-Director, Ctr. for Research, Consumer Financial Decision Making - Co-author, “The Knowledge Illusion”

Highlights - Philip Fernbach - Cognitive Scientist - Co-Director, Ctr. for Research, Consumer Financial Decision Making - Co-author, “The Knowledge Illusion”

/

Co-author of The Knowledge Illusion: Why We Never Think Alone
Cognitive Scientist · Co-Director of Center for Research on Consumer Financial Decision Making, CU Boulder

The human mind is both genius and pathetic, brilliant and idiotic. People are capable of the most remarkable feats, achievements that defy the gods. We went from discovering the atomic nucleus in 1911 to megaton nuclear weapons in just over forty years. We have mastered fire, created democratic institutions, stood on the moon, and developed genetically modified tomatoes. And yet we are equally capable of the most remarkable demonstrations of hubris and foolhardiness. Each of us is error-prone, sometimes irrational, and often ignorant… How is it that people can simultaneously bowl us over with their ingenuity and disappoint us with their ignorance? How have we mastered so much despite how limited our understanding often is?

Philip Fernbach - Co-author of “The Knowledge Illusion” - Cognitive Scientist - Co-Director of Ctr. for Research on Consumer Financial Decision Making

Philip Fernbach - Co-author of “The Knowledge Illusion” - Cognitive Scientist - Co-Director of Ctr. for Research on Consumer Financial Decision Making

/

Co-author of The Knowledge Illusion: Why We Never Think Alone
Cognitive Scientist · Co-Director of Center for Research on Consumer Financial Decision Making, CU Boulder

The human mind is both genius and pathetic, brilliant and idiotic. People are capable of the most remarkable feats, achievements that defy the gods. We went from discovering the atomic nucleus in 1911 to megaton nuclear weapons in just over forty years. We have mastered fire, created democratic institutions, stood on the moon, and developed genetically modified tomatoes. And yet we are equally capable of the most remarkable demonstrations of hubris and foolhardiness. Each of us is error-prone, sometimes irrational, and often ignorant… How is it that people can simultaneously bowl us over with their ingenuity and disappoint us with their ignorance? How have we mastered so much despite how limited our understanding often is?

Highlights - William Irvine - Author of “The Stoic Challenge”, “A Guide to the Good Life”

Highlights - William Irvine - Author of “The Stoic Challenge”, “A Guide to the Good Life”

/

Author of The Stoic Challenge & A Guide to the Good Life: The Ancient Art of Stoic Joy

Happiness is another interesting thing. I've been thinking about this lately. You know, people take aim at happiness. I don't know if you can actually do that, if you can have a recipe for attaining happiness. Happiness is something that just happens as a byproduct of something else going on in your life, and that is having a day where you're experiencing equanimity. You don't have this abundance of negative emotions, where you value the things you've already got, where you value the relationships you've got, where you feel good inside your own body. You like being who you are. And I think, if all that happens, then suddenly, you know, it'll dawn on me. 'Gosh, I guess I'm happy...'

William Irvine - Author of “The Stoic Challenge”, “A Guide to the Good Life”

William Irvine - Author of “The Stoic Challenge”, “A Guide to the Good Life”

/

Author of The Stoic Challenge & A Guide to the Good Life: The Ancient Art of Stoic Joy

Happiness is another interesting thing. I've been thinking about this lately. You know, people take aim at happiness. I don't know if you can actually do that, if you can have a recipe for attaining happiness. Happiness is something that just happens as a byproduct of something else going on in your life, and that is having a day where you're experiencing equanimity. You don't have this abundance of negative emotions, where you value the things you've already got, where you value the relationships you've got, where you feel good inside your own body. You like being who you are. And I think, if all that happens, then suddenly, you know, it'll dawn on me. 'Gosh, I guess I'm happy...'

(Highlights) AZBY BROWN

(Highlights) AZBY BROWN

/

Author of Just Enough · Small Spaces · Lead Researcher for Safecast
Authority on Japanese Architecture, Design & Environmentalism

In Edo Japan, basically life was pretty good, and they recycled everything. Everything was reused, upcycled. Waste was considered taboo. A person who was wasting was considered an ugly person. So there’s a lot that we could talk about design, the layout, scale. Buildings were rarely taller than two storeys. Very good use of environmental features, microclimates, use of wind for cooling, passive solar heating. Good use of planting, gardens, etc. But regarding cities of the future, I think the main thing is it needs to be a place where people feel like they belong and want to take responsibility.


AZBY BROWN

AZBY BROWN

/

Author of Just Enough · Small Spaces · Lead Researcher for Safecast
Authority on Japanese Architecture, Design & Environmentalism

In Edo Japan, basically life was pretty good, and they recycled everything. Everything was reused, upcycled. Waste was considered taboo. A person who was wasting was considered an ugly person. So there’s a lot that we could talk about design, the layout, scale. Buildings were rarely taller than two storeys. Very good use of environmental features, microclimates, use of wind for cooling, passive solar heating. Good use of planting, gardens, etc. But regarding cities of the future, I think the main thing is it needs to be a place where people feel like they belong and want to take responsibility.


(Highlights) MERLIN DONALD

(Highlights) MERLIN DONALD

/

Psychologist, Neuroanthropologist & Cognitive Neuroscientist
Author of Origins of the Modern Mind, & A Mind So Rare

Lots of people have written books both optimistic and pessimistic about the Internet. It's a wonderful thing, it gives an opportunity to broaden our experience. I think in many ways the Internet is the only hope if you want to eliminate racism and want to raise the bar across the world, but at the same time, the inequalities are completely ridiculous. They've reached a point of insanity, and we have a moral issue. Is one person ever worth twice as much as another person? Can you justify one human being owning 10 times as much as another person? I don't think you can. I don't think that the president of the biggest cooperation in the world is worth 10 times the poorest person in the world, but that's not what we have. Sometimes he may be “worth” a million times more, a hundred thousand times more. That’s crazy.

(Highlights) EARL K. MILLER, Ph.D.

(Highlights) EARL K. MILLER, Ph.D.

/

Picower Professor of Neuroscience
MIT’s Picower Institute for Learning and Memory & Department of Brain & Cognitive Sciences

There are a lot of distractions in cities. So it's always good to maybe take some time out, be in a quieter place with no distractions so you can let your thoughts run. And that leads into the creative process because new ideas, new thoughts and where they come from. They come from following the garden path of associations in your mind. One thought leads to another, leads to another until your mind is in a new place it's never been before. Or you put two thoughts together that were never together before, but now they are because you managed to somehow follow this garden path of thoughts from one thought to the other. That's where creativity comes from, that's where your ideas come from, seeing things in a new way, seeing things that were never together before. And if you have constant distractions that interferes with that process.

EARL K. MILLER, Ph.D.

EARL K. MILLER, Ph.D.

/

Picower Professor of Neuroscience
MIT’s Picower Institute for Learning and Memory & Department of Brain & Cognitive Sciences

There are a lot of distractions in cities. So it's always good to maybe take some time out, be in a quieter place with no distractions so you can let your thoughts run. And that leads into the creative process because new ideas, new thoughts and where they come from. They come from following the garden path of associations in your mind. One thought leads to another, leads to another until your mind is in a new place it's never been before. Or you put two thoughts together that were never together before, but now they are because you managed to somehow follow this garden path of thoughts from one thought to the other. That's where creativity comes from, that's where your ideas come from, seeing things in a new way, seeing things that were never together before. And if you have constant distractions that interferes with that process.

MERLIN DONALD

MERLIN DONALD

/

Psychologist, Neuroanthropologist & Cognitive Neuroscientist
Author of Origins of the Modern Mind, & A Mind So Rare

Lots of people have written books both optimistic and pessimistic about the Internet. It's a wonderful thing, it gives an opportunity to broaden our experience. I think in many ways the Internet is the only hope if you want to eliminate racism and want to raise the bar across the world, but at the same time, the inequalities are completely ridiculous. They've reached a point of insanity, and we have a moral issue. Is one person ever worth twice as much as another person? Can you justify one human being owning 10 times as much as another person? I don't think you can. I don't think that the president of the biggest cooperation in the world is worth 10 times the poorest person in the world, but that's not what we have. Sometimes he may be “worth” a million times more, a hundred thousand times more. That’s crazy.

(Highlights) GEORGE ELLIS

(Highlights) GEORGE ELLIS

/

Cosmologist, Theoretical physicist & Star of South Africa Medal Recipient

Artistic creativity and it’s crucial to artistic creativity amongst many other things. In artistic creativity, from my viewpoint, is that you start off with an idea and you’re shaping and you’re totally in control and it doesn’t matter if it's music or sculpture or painting or a novel, eventually the thing sparks its own life, becomes itself, and at that point, the role of the artist is to stand back and let it become what its got to become. And that’s where you get the great art.

GEORGE ELLIS

GEORGE ELLIS

/

Cosmologist, Theoretical physicist & Star of South Africa Medal Recipient

Artistic creativity and it’s crucial to artistic creativity amongst many other things. In artistic creativity, from my viewpoint, is that you start off with an idea and you’re shaping and you’re totally in control and it doesn’t matter if it's music or sculpture or painting or a novel, eventually the thing sparks its own life, becomes itself, and at that point, the role of the artist is to stand back and let it become what its got to become. And that’s where you get the great art.

(Highlights) SIRI HUSTVEDT

(Highlights) SIRI HUSTVEDT

/

Novelist and Essayist

The reason I think you should read in these other disciplines is because it will help you in your own work. Now I really mean that. I think what has happened with the fragmentation of disciplines is that when problems arise. ...the people working in the discipline are unable to see avenues out of the problem that they would easily see if they had worked through problems in other disciplines.

SIRI HUSTVEDT

SIRI HUSTVEDT

/

Novelist and Essayist

The reason I think you should read in these other disciplines is because it will help you in your own work. Now I really mean that. I think what has happened with the fragmentation of disciplines is that when problems arise. ...the people working in the discipline are unable to see avenues out of the problem that they would easily see if they had worked through problems in other disciplines.

(Highlights) IAN BURUMA

(Highlights) IAN BURUMA

/

Ian Buruma is the author of many books, including A Tokyo Romance, The Churchill Complex,Their Promised Land, Year Zero, The China Lover, Murder in Amsterdam, Occidentalism and God’s Dust. He teaches at Bard College and is a columnist for Project Syndicate and contributor to The New Yorker, The New York Times, and other publications. He was awarded the 2008 Erasmus Prize for making "an especially important contribution to European culture" and was voted one of the Top 100 Public Intellectuals
by the Foreign Policy magazine.

Ian Buruma · Public Intellectual & Erasmus Prize-Winning Author of A Tokyo Romance, The Churchill...
The Creative Process Podcast · Arts, Culture & Society

This interview was conducted by Mia Funk & Lexi Kayser with the participation of collaborating universities and students. Digital Media Coordinator is Phoebe Brous.

Mia Funk is an artist, interviewer and founder of The Creative Process & One Planet Podcast (Conversations about Climate Change & Environmental Solutions).

IAN BURUMA

IAN BURUMA

/

Ian Buruma is the author of many books, including A Tokyo Romance, The Churchill Complex,Their Promised Land, Year Zero, The China Lover, Murder in Amsterdam, Occidentalism and God’s Dust. He teaches at Bard College and is a columnist for Project Syndicate and contributor to The New Yorker, The New York Times, and other publications. He was awarded the 2008 Erasmus Prize for making "an especially important contribution to European culture" and was voted one of the Top 100 Public Intellectuals
by the Foreign Policy magazine.

Ian Buruma · Public Intellectual & Erasmus Prize-Winning Author of The Churchill Complex...(54 mins)
The Creative Process Podcast · Arts, Culture & Society

This interview was conducted by Mia Funk & Lexi Kayser with the participation of collaborating universities and students. Digital Media Coordinator is Phoebe Brous.

Mia Funk is an artist, interviewer and founder of The Creative Process & One Planet Podcast (Conversations about Climate Change & Environmental Solutions).