1
00:00:00,019 --> 00:00:05,355
Are any of you people members of the World Future Society?

2
00:00:10,636 --> 00:00:13,257
I'm sure most of you've heard of Arthur C. Clarke.

3
00:00:13,397 --> 00:00:16,633
Would you raise your hands? Good.

4
00:00:16,773 --> 00:00:20,159
He said that if he wrote a book

5
00:00:20,299 --> 00:00:23,598
that everybody enjoyed and understood

6
00:00:24,111 --> 00:00:26,962
he said he wouldn't be saying anything new.

7
00:00:27,102 --> 00:00:28,879
Think about that.

8
00:00:29,019 --> 00:00:33,346
What I'm going to talk about is going to change some of your lives:

9
00:00:33,486 --> 00:00:37,521
the way you look at yourself and the way you look at the world around you.

10
00:00:37,661 --> 00:00:40,482
The subject matter is not the kind

11
00:00:40,622 --> 00:00:44,666
you get from ordinary sources or books

12
00:00:45,160 --> 00:00:49,624
so I would like your participation in an experiment.

13
00:00:49,764 --> 00:00:53,430
Some of you might be able to tell what it is

14
00:00:53,570 --> 00:00:57,174
that I draw on the board before I finish

15
00:00:57,314 --> 00:01:01,173
and if you know what it is, interrupt, say "I got it!"

16
00:01:01,313 --> 00:01:04,680
I'm going to start. Can all of you see the board?

17
00:01:04,820 --> 00:01:07,785
I don't think I can make it with this.

18
00:01:12,032 --> 00:01:15,745
Can all of you see the board? Can you hear me all right?

19
00:01:17,461 --> 00:01:21,098
The minute you know what it is, interrupt.

20
00:01:29,018 --> 00:01:31,061
(Audience member) Sinking ship, the Titanic.

21
00:01:31,201 --> 00:01:34,170
- What is it? - Titanic. - OK, great.

22
00:01:34,310 --> 00:01:38,648
If he didn't call that (remember, there's no ship there at all)

23
00:01:38,788 --> 00:01:43,086
there were enough bits for his associative memory

24
00:01:43,226 --> 00:01:46,621
to put that together. You know that's not a ship.

25
00:01:46,761 --> 00:01:50,961
Now, what is this? Some of you older people might guess this.

26
00:01:53,606 --> 00:01:56,568
(Audience member) - An alarm clock - Who did that?

27
00:01:56,708 --> 00:01:58,820
You are amazing!

28
00:01:58,960 --> 00:02:02,411
That's not an... Where's the alarm clock? Well, anyway

29
00:02:02,551 --> 00:02:06,212
if she didn't call that, if she wasn't able to call that

30
00:02:06,352 --> 00:02:10,329
I would have put the little legs on it, the clock, the hammer

31
00:02:10,469 --> 00:02:12,535
everything until somebody called it.

32
00:02:12,675 --> 00:02:16,976
Now, there is still some that cannot see the ship.

33
00:02:17,116 --> 00:02:21,007
So I would have gone all along, put all the windows in Titanic

34
00:02:21,147 --> 00:02:25,349
everything until somebody got up to said "Yeah, Titanic!"

35
00:02:27,222 --> 00:02:31,256
This is an attempt to prove that all of us

36
00:02:31,396 --> 00:02:36,224
are capable of making decisions and arriving at a conclusion

37
00:02:36,774 --> 00:02:40,335
without all of the information prepared for us.

38
00:02:40,475 --> 00:02:45,553
That is a unique quality in human beings: We can put things together.

39
00:02:45,693 --> 00:02:50,753
We do not require the accumulation of a great deal of information.

40
00:02:50,893 --> 00:02:54,375
In this system, if you understand the system quite well

41
00:02:54,515 --> 00:02:57,494
who would you say, this is?

42
00:03:11,886 --> 00:03:15,830
(Audience member) Lincoln? - Who said that?

43
00:03:15,970 --> 00:03:19,598
Who said that? Someone said Lincoln.

44
00:03:20,411 --> 00:03:23,861
I don't see Lincoln, but it is. It would have been Abraham Lincoln.

45
00:03:24,001 --> 00:03:29,175
When I got through with it, I would have gone on with the beard and all the rest.

46
00:03:29,315 --> 00:03:33,324
This is just to prove that people can put something together

47
00:03:33,464 --> 00:03:36,708
and I'm going to try to explain to you

48
00:03:36,848 --> 00:03:40,294
just what creative thinking really is.

49
00:03:40,434 --> 00:03:44,376
I'm going to use old language, the language that I use

50
00:03:44,516 --> 00:03:47,813
with people who are not familiar with this way of thinking.

51
00:03:47,953 --> 00:03:52,644
The old language is that people can think and reason.

52
00:03:53,305 --> 00:03:55,854
I do not believe that is possible.

53
00:03:55,994 --> 00:03:59,831
I have many inventions. I've worked on many different things

54
00:03:59,971 --> 00:04:04,061
but I don't believe that human beings can think or reason.

55
00:04:04,201 --> 00:04:07,946
This is what I do believe. By the way, you don't have to accept anything I say.

56
00:04:08,086 --> 00:04:11,202
During the question period, don't be polite!

57
00:04:11,342 --> 00:04:14,606
Come at it from all angles. Break it down if you can.

58
00:04:14,746 --> 00:04:17,835
This helps me and it helps you.

59
00:04:17,975 --> 00:04:22,707
When I talk about thinking, reasoning and putting things together

60
00:04:22,847 --> 00:04:26,679
we're talking about the forces that shape human behavior.

61
00:04:26,819 --> 00:04:31,081
I believe that all human behavior is lawful

62
00:04:32,954 --> 00:04:37,092
that the reactions and values that all people have

63
00:04:37,232 --> 00:04:40,883
are perfectly lawful to the environment that they come from.

64
00:04:41,023 --> 00:04:44,784
Every human being is perfectly well-adjusted

65
00:04:45,353 --> 00:04:47,484
from where they are coming from

66
00:04:47,624 --> 00:04:49,747
from their background and experience.

67
00:04:49,887 --> 00:04:53,713
If you as a baby were raised by the Seminole Indians

68
00:04:53,853 --> 00:04:58,006
you would behave (if you never saw anything else) like a Seminole Indian.

69
00:04:58,146 --> 00:05:00,658
If you were brought up in any other Indian group

70
00:05:00,798 --> 00:05:04,390
and you had feathers in your headgear

71
00:05:04,530 --> 00:05:07,390
and you were dancing around the fire and I walked over and said

72
00:05:07,530 --> 00:05:10,498
"That's ridiculous! Why are you dancing around the fire with the feathers?"

73
00:05:10,638 --> 00:05:12,823
You don't take your hat, throw it on the ground and say

74
00:05:12,963 --> 00:05:16,019
"I never thought about it that way." We can't do that.

75
00:05:16,159 --> 00:05:18,796
We are victims of culture.

76
00:05:18,936 --> 00:05:22,230
We look at the world with our background.

77
00:05:22,370 --> 00:05:24,438
We have no other way of doing it.

78
00:05:24,578 --> 00:05:28,438
Psychology is kind of a rudimentary form today

79
00:05:28,578 --> 00:05:33,504
an attempt to grasp at the factors that shape human behavior

80
00:05:33,644 --> 00:05:37,286
the facts that are responsible for the way we look at ourselves

81
00:05:37,426 --> 00:05:41,971
other people and the way we behave or, if you wish, misbehave.

82
00:05:42,111 --> 00:05:45,342
I don't believe that any human being misbehaves.

83
00:05:45,482 --> 00:05:48,244
They use whatever tools they know of

84
00:05:48,384 --> 00:05:52,816
whatever tools they're familiar with. Language is a tool.

85
00:05:53,711 --> 00:05:57,327
If someone were to show you a picture of an airplane

86
00:05:57,467 --> 00:06:00,530
(what appeared to be an airplane) without wings;

87
00:06:00,670 --> 00:06:03,146
people look at it, they stand by and they say:

88
00:06:03,286 --> 00:06:06,043
"It will never fly!" but they don't say "How do you propose

89
00:06:06,183 --> 00:06:08,625
to lift off the ground without wings?"

90
00:06:08,765 --> 00:06:11,822
That's the key to communication.

91
00:06:11,962 --> 00:06:14,620
A very famous scientist

92
00:06:14,760 --> 00:06:18,313
(deceased now) tried to get the government and people

93
00:06:18,453 --> 00:06:23,092
to put up sufficient funds to monitor outer space

94
00:06:23,232 --> 00:06:27,071
to try to make contact with extraterrestrial life.

95
00:06:28,175 --> 00:06:31,697
I want to try to say this to you and think about what I say.

96
00:06:31,837 --> 00:06:34,304
Toss it around. I'm using the old language

97
00:06:34,444 --> 00:06:38,182
because you're not that familiar with these values.

98
00:06:39,463 --> 00:06:42,042
If people, beings or things

99
00:06:42,182 --> 00:06:45,151
can travel a hundred million light years

100
00:06:45,291 --> 00:06:49,169
through time and space, they are not humanoid.

101
00:06:50,679 --> 00:06:54,971
The storage system for water would occupy miles

102
00:06:55,628 --> 00:06:58,889
and all of the facilities required by humans

103
00:06:59,029 --> 00:07:01,653
would take up tremendous amounts of space

104
00:07:01,793 --> 00:07:05,432
and require tremendous amounts of energy.

105
00:07:05,572 --> 00:07:08,635
There are people that talk of flying saucers that land

106
00:07:08,775 --> 00:07:12,256
here on Earth and they go to some farmer.

107
00:07:12,396 --> 00:07:16,884
They take him into the saucer and they do all kinds of experiments on him.

108
00:07:17,024 --> 00:07:19,090
First of all

109
00:07:19,230 --> 00:07:23,233
people do not travel hundreds of millions of light years

110
00:07:23,373 --> 00:07:28,586
to pick up some farmer and ask him what kind of suspenders he wears.

111
00:07:30,417 --> 00:07:34,135
Carl Sagan wanted to communicate with extraterrestrials.

112
00:07:34,275 --> 00:07:37,849
He hoped that they, in turn, would communicate with us.

113
00:07:37,989 --> 00:07:42,972
Now you know, that Republicans can't communicate with Democrats.

114
00:07:43,529 --> 00:07:47,825
You know that husbands and wives have difficulty in communicating.

115
00:07:47,965 --> 00:07:52,477
Children and parents have difficulty because the language we use

116
00:07:52,617 --> 00:07:55,490
was designed a long time ago.

117
00:07:55,630 --> 00:08:00,954
It is inherently difficult to get ideas across

118
00:08:01,094 --> 00:08:03,779
in the language that we use today.

119
00:08:03,919 --> 00:08:07,260
However when engineers meet and talk

120
00:08:07,400 --> 00:08:10,257
they speak a different language.

121
00:08:10,397 --> 00:08:12,743
One engineer might present a very thin cable

122
00:08:12,883 --> 00:08:17,481
and say "This can support 5,000 tons"

123
00:08:17,883 --> 00:08:20,949
and the other engineer says "What's its tensile strength?"

124
00:08:21,089 --> 00:08:24,522
He's given that information, then he puts it in a machine

125
00:08:25,718 --> 00:08:30,022
and he snaps it to make sure that it holds to that.

126
00:08:30,162 --> 00:08:33,843
When engineers design an airplane

127
00:08:41,069 --> 00:08:44,929
they do all the calculations (this is a front view

128
00:08:45,069 --> 00:08:48,528
a very rapid drawing of a front view of an airplane.)

129
00:08:48,668 --> 00:08:51,443
They do all the rapid calculations and they figure

130
00:08:51,583 --> 00:08:54,649
what that wing will be able to support.

131
00:08:54,789 --> 00:08:58,225
After all their calculations and after they are certain

132
00:08:58,365 --> 00:09:01,901
they then pile sandbags on the wing

133
00:09:03,013 --> 00:09:08,450
until it breaks off, to make damn sure that it does the job.

134
00:09:09,466 --> 00:09:12,696
That does not exist in everyday language.

135
00:09:12,836 --> 00:09:15,682
In everyday language you don't have that ability.

136
00:09:15,822 --> 00:09:18,033
When an engineer meets another engineer, he says

137
00:09:18,173 --> 00:09:21,942
"I can illuminate an area with this tiny point of light

138
00:09:22,082 --> 00:09:25,933
that has 50,000 square feet.

139
00:09:26,073 --> 00:09:29,604
The engineer says "That's not possible!" he doesn't talk like that.

140
00:09:29,744 --> 00:09:32,751
He says "How do you power that unit?

141
00:09:32,891 --> 00:09:35,251
What kind of voltage does it take?

142
00:09:35,391 --> 00:09:38,963
How do you illuminate that spot?" They ask questions.

143
00:09:39,103 --> 00:09:42,674
The average person says "No, not in a thousand years..."

144
00:09:42,814 --> 00:09:47,324
That's been around for a long time. That is a language of war

145
00:09:47,464 --> 00:09:50,723
hatred, bigotry, prejudice:

146
00:09:50,863 --> 00:09:54,140
the inability to ask questions.

147
00:09:54,411 --> 00:09:57,311
We've got to be very careful about that.

148
00:09:57,451 --> 00:10:01,695
At one lecture I remember at Princeton I was trying to say

149
00:10:01,835 --> 00:10:04,857
that human beings cannot think or reason

150
00:10:04,997 --> 00:10:08,329
(this was the psychology and sociology department).

151
00:10:08,469 --> 00:10:13,127
One of the individuals stood up (one of the staff) and he said "All right

152
00:10:13,267 --> 00:10:16,603
where did the camera come from? There were no cameras at one time.

153
00:10:16,743 --> 00:10:19,351
Someone had to think about a camera.

154
00:10:19,491 --> 00:10:21,694
It just doesn't come out of thin air!"

155
00:10:21,834 --> 00:10:25,639
After doing a lot of work many years ago

156
00:10:25,779 --> 00:10:27,785
in ancient Egypt

157
00:10:27,925 --> 00:10:30,941
or if you have lived out in the country

158
00:10:31,081 --> 00:10:34,633
if there was a hole in a barn wall

159
00:10:34,773 --> 00:10:37,314
that was knocked out

160
00:10:37,454 --> 00:10:42,609
the cows on the outside appeared on the wall of the barn upside down.

161
00:10:42,749 --> 00:10:48,211
In Egypt, you went in this dome to see the upside down world.

162
00:10:48,351 --> 00:10:51,461
There was a little hole here. Day light came in

163
00:10:51,601 --> 00:10:54,533
and you saw people walking upside down on the wall.

164
00:10:54,673 --> 00:10:58,803
How many of you have experienced that kind of phenomenon?

165
00:10:59,238 --> 00:11:02,062
That is essentially the box hole camera.

166
00:11:02,202 --> 00:11:07,356
A simple camera without a lens is just a little hole in a box.

167
00:11:07,496 --> 00:11:12,036
Somebody said "How can I see that image?"

168
00:11:12,176 --> 00:11:14,902
and they used a transparent membrane back here

169
00:11:15,042 --> 00:11:19,930
and they could see the upside-down head, a person or cow

170
00:11:20,460 --> 00:11:25,170
and they asked this question "If only I can retain that image."

171
00:11:25,310 --> 00:11:27,918
That isn't the answer. That's just a question.

172
00:11:28,058 --> 00:11:31,203
"I wonder how I could retain that image."

173
00:11:31,343 --> 00:11:35,250
Years before that, the American Indians

174
00:11:35,390 --> 00:11:38,626
and other primitives have taken tapa cloth

175
00:11:38,766 --> 00:11:43,925
or they'd weave natural materials into a kind of fabric

176
00:11:44,626 --> 00:11:48,799
and then they would take berry juices and dye it different colors.

177
00:11:48,939 --> 00:11:52,932
Sometimes a leaf would fall upon that surface

178
00:11:53,072 --> 00:11:57,364
and after the sun dried it, they had an image of the leaf.

179
00:11:57,504 --> 00:12:02,153
So they began to use dyes from this background.

180
00:12:02,843 --> 00:12:06,844
That all human beings, to understand me better

181
00:12:07,483 --> 00:12:13,086
the first human being that jumped off a precipice with wings, he died.

182
00:12:13,636 --> 00:12:18,270
His brother-in-law wrote "Next time, make the wings larger."

183
00:12:19,571 --> 00:12:23,445
No one starts out right away and solves a problem

184
00:12:23,585 --> 00:12:27,603
unless you have a tremendous background in many different areas.

185
00:12:27,743 --> 00:12:31,582
The next guy that jumped off, he jumped off with larger wings.

186
00:12:31,722 --> 00:12:33,882
He flew a little and then he went [wings collapse]

187
00:12:34,022 --> 00:12:37,499
and the old fisherman said "You gotta brace them wings

188
00:12:37,639 --> 00:12:39,774
like a boat, like a mast.

189
00:12:39,914 --> 00:12:42,566
They're not going to hold!" So they braced them.

190
00:12:42,706 --> 00:12:45,543
Then this individual jumped off the precipice.

191
00:12:45,683 --> 00:12:48,846
He flew but hit a tree

192
00:12:48,986 --> 00:12:51,529
and hurt his leg really badly.

193
00:12:51,669 --> 00:12:55,568
His wife said "You know, John, a fish has a rudder."

194
00:12:56,316 --> 00:13:00,449
"Good point!" And they stuck the rudder on the airplane.

195
00:13:00,589 --> 00:13:04,365
No one ever sat down and invented a television set

196
00:13:04,505 --> 00:13:07,336
an airplane, the electric light, wireless.

197
00:13:07,476 --> 00:13:12,547
None of that came about by man walking in deep concentration

198
00:13:12,687 --> 00:13:15,755
and then through some ethereal substance.

199
00:13:15,895 --> 00:13:19,906
Bingo! The idea is formulated. It doesn't work that way.

200
00:13:20,046 --> 00:13:22,321
It's hard work.

201
00:13:22,461 --> 00:13:25,288
I make more mistakes than anybody I know

202
00:13:25,428 --> 00:13:27,942
because I try more things.

203
00:13:29,647 --> 00:13:32,604
There's nothing wrong with building something

204
00:13:32,744 --> 00:13:36,906
and finding out that it doesn't work. This is where you get your experience.

205
00:13:37,046 --> 00:13:39,098
There's nothing wrong with criticism.

206
00:13:39,238 --> 00:13:41,555
I remember the first model airplanes I built

207
00:13:41,695 --> 00:13:45,408
went nosing into the ground and I was ashamed of them

208
00:13:46,077 --> 00:13:50,098
and a young engineer told me that my center of gravity had to be corrected;

209
00:13:50,238 --> 00:13:52,857
that is, move the wing forward.

210
00:13:53,116 --> 00:13:57,622
All of us stand on the shoulders of one another

211
00:13:58,527 --> 00:14:00,529
and we shape the future.

212
00:14:00,669 --> 00:14:02,522
Another question that was asked:

213
00:14:02,662 --> 00:14:04,761
"Somebody had to invent the bow and arrow!

214
00:14:04,901 --> 00:14:08,401
Somebody had to think of it! It didn't just come out of nowhere!"

215
00:14:08,541 --> 00:14:13,080
I talked to many Indians and after talking to many Indians

216
00:14:13,220 --> 00:14:15,536
this is what I found out:

217
00:14:15,676 --> 00:14:18,212
Indians used to skin animals

218
00:14:18,352 --> 00:14:21,969
(and this is a lousy drawing of the skin of an animal)

219
00:14:22,109 --> 00:14:25,177
stretched out in the sun.

220
00:14:25,317 --> 00:14:27,799
When the Indians got back

221
00:14:27,939 --> 00:14:31,153
the skin was half the size. It shrunk and became thicker

222
00:14:31,293 --> 00:14:36,574
and they didn't like that at all, so they cut leather into thin strips.

223
00:14:37,605 --> 00:14:41,735
They took an existing frame and they tied that skin

224
00:14:41,875 --> 00:14:44,660
to the frame (some of you may have seen this)

225
00:14:44,800 --> 00:14:48,300
with lace of leather all around to prevent it from shrinking.

226
00:14:48,440 --> 00:14:50,568
When they cut the strips of leather

227
00:14:50,708 --> 00:14:54,520
and put them out in the sun, they shrunk and became fat and short

228
00:14:54,660 --> 00:14:57,032
and they were displeased with that.

229
00:14:57,172 --> 00:15:02,113
After many years, one Indian tied that strand of leather

230
00:15:02,760 --> 00:15:06,383
to a piece of wood, a stick:

231
00:15:06,858 --> 00:15:10,335
he split the top, tied a knot and tied the leather to the stick.

232
00:15:10,475 --> 00:15:14,682
When he came back, hoping that it would dry and not shrink

233
00:15:14,822 --> 00:15:18,317
the stick took this form; it was bent.

234
00:15:20,166 --> 00:15:22,678
He plucked that; it went 'Bung!'

235
00:15:23,744 --> 00:15:26,791
After many years, somebody took another piece of wood

236
00:15:26,931 --> 00:15:29,847
put it in, pull the string and off it went.

237
00:15:30,374 --> 00:15:34,989
"Well if man can't think or reason, where did the movie camera come from?

238
00:15:35,129 --> 00:15:37,913
Somebody had to think of that! It doesn't exist out there."

239
00:15:38,053 --> 00:15:40,024
Here's where it came from.

240
00:15:40,164 --> 00:15:43,794
Thousands of years ago in China

241
00:15:44,571 --> 00:15:47,131
they used to take a candle

242
00:15:47,662 --> 00:15:51,405
and they'd take some bamboo paper at the time

243
00:15:51,545 --> 00:15:54,125
put it in front of the candle and then they'd cut out

244
00:15:54,265 --> 00:15:58,033
a little figurine of a human being and put the candle behind it.

245
00:15:58,173 --> 00:16:00,207
As the candle undulated

246
00:16:00,347 --> 00:16:03,181
the little person would dance and they'd play music.

247
00:16:03,321 --> 00:16:06,123
That was the beginning. How did that happen?

248
00:16:06,263 --> 00:16:09,106
Some guy had a candle and a piece of paper

249
00:16:09,246 --> 00:16:11,633
and he just happened to be behind it

250
00:16:11,773 --> 00:16:14,060
and his finger appeared to move on the screen

251
00:16:14,200 --> 00:16:18,245
and so he extracted or built upon that phenomenon.

252
00:16:18,385 --> 00:16:21,234
Then later something interesting occurred.

253
00:16:21,374 --> 00:16:23,693
The Chinese used to

254
00:16:23,833 --> 00:16:26,771
take these tremendous scrolls and open them up

255
00:16:26,911 --> 00:16:31,593
while they then later taped or wired or used gut

256
00:16:31,733 --> 00:16:35,837
and tied many pages together and built a kind of pad

257
00:16:36,267 --> 00:16:39,841
but in order to get to a particular page

258
00:16:40,241 --> 00:16:43,899
the Oriental would mark the corner of the page

259
00:16:44,039 --> 00:16:46,423
so that they could find it with a symbol.

260
00:16:46,563 --> 00:16:49,037
As you flipped through the pages fast

261
00:16:49,177 --> 00:16:52,761
that little dot would jump all over the place.

262
00:16:53,352 --> 00:16:56,430
Years later, an individual drew

263
00:16:56,570 --> 00:17:00,571
various successive pictures of a bird in flight

264
00:17:00,711 --> 00:17:03,758
and put them down on the corner of the paper and flipped it.

265
00:17:03,898 --> 00:17:06,563
The little bird wings began to move up and down.

266
00:17:06,703 --> 00:17:09,453
A Frenchman saw that

267
00:17:09,593 --> 00:17:13,027
and he took little pieces of cardboard

268
00:17:13,167 --> 00:17:16,053
and he put them in a circular pattern

269
00:17:17,131 --> 00:17:20,492
(I'm going to try to get it down as clear as I can, quickly)

270
00:17:20,632 --> 00:17:24,002
and he put a crank up here that you turned

271
00:17:24,142 --> 00:17:26,957
and the little pictures would go around the circle.

272
00:17:27,097 --> 00:17:31,541
The Chinese also had something like this. They had a bamboo interrupter

273
00:17:31,681 --> 00:17:35,585
that would just hold the picture for a second, less than a second.

274
00:17:35,725 --> 00:17:39,302
As you turned it, a man appeared to move across the screen.

275
00:17:39,442 --> 00:17:42,447
The Frenchman machined that out of brass.

276
00:17:42,587 --> 00:17:45,205
He did a beautiful job and when you turned the crank

277
00:17:45,345 --> 00:17:48,196
the person walked with smoother motions

278
00:17:48,336 --> 00:17:50,881
rather than these abrupt motions.

279
00:17:51,021 --> 00:17:54,863
Edison saw that unit that the Frenchman designed

280
00:17:55,003 --> 00:17:59,091
and he turned it into this position.

281
00:17:59,767 --> 00:18:03,103
I guess I can't work with that microphone.

282
00:18:05,930 --> 00:18:08,376
Can you hear me back there?

283
00:18:12,660 --> 00:18:14,775
What happened is...

284
00:18:19,631 --> 00:18:22,287
He turned it into a vertical position

285
00:18:22,427 --> 00:18:24,629
and all the pictures

286
00:18:26,640 --> 00:18:28,908
were set in a circular fashion.

287
00:18:29,048 --> 00:18:30,996
You turned the crank here...

288
00:18:31,136 --> 00:18:33,487
(Roxanne) Excuse me, they won't get the audio and the camera...

289
00:18:33,627 --> 00:18:37,358
- I'm sorry - Why don't you just put it in your pocket or something?

290
00:18:37,498 --> 00:18:39,500
- I'll try.

291
00:18:42,899 --> 00:18:45,709
Thanks. Roxanne is my associate.

292
00:18:45,849 --> 00:18:49,786
She works on all the buildings and all the things we've developed

293
00:18:49,926 --> 00:18:53,091
in The Venus Project which I'll talk to you about later.

294
00:18:53,231 --> 00:18:56,917
Edison purchased it, put a magnifying glass in front of it.

295
00:18:57,057 --> 00:19:01,183
You put a nickel in, you turn the crank and you saw people moving;

296
00:19:01,323 --> 00:19:03,689
a bunch of still photographs.

297
00:19:03,829 --> 00:19:06,528
It was a long, slow process.

298
00:19:07,579 --> 00:19:10,055
No individual invented the camera.

299
00:19:10,195 --> 00:19:13,991
A little bit here, a little there, add it to that and eventually

300
00:19:14,131 --> 00:19:17,992
the Wright Brothers read about experimental aircraft

301
00:19:18,615 --> 00:19:22,606
where thousands of people died, trying to develop a flying machine.

302
00:19:23,247 --> 00:19:25,665
After picking up bits of this information

303
00:19:25,805 --> 00:19:30,318
(including man-carrying kites in China, thousands of years ago)

304
00:19:30,956 --> 00:19:33,382
they built the first flying machine.

305
00:19:33,522 --> 00:19:36,014
They were called 'The Father of Flight'. Again

306
00:19:36,154 --> 00:19:39,186
there's no father of anything.

307
00:19:39,326 --> 00:19:43,138
You may take an idea so far, you add to it and gradually, it's built up.

308
00:19:43,278 --> 00:19:47,145
Genius! A genius is a person that has been exposed

309
00:19:47,285 --> 00:19:51,081
to many different systems. Therefore, they can come up

310
00:19:51,221 --> 00:19:53,912
with a wide range of solutions.

311
00:19:54,052 --> 00:19:56,471
A man like Leonardo da Vinci:

312
00:19:56,611 --> 00:19:59,268
You think that he just evolved out of nothing?

313
00:19:59,408 --> 00:20:02,663
He spoke to people that were interested in mechanics in his time.

314
00:20:02,803 --> 00:20:07,756
They gathered, they shared ideas, but you'll only hear of Da Vinci.

315
00:20:08,346 --> 00:20:12,116
Unfortunately, guys like Nikola Tesla

316
00:20:12,885 --> 00:20:16,806
Edison, all the great innovators of the past

317
00:20:16,946 --> 00:20:19,686
have been influenced by other people.

318
00:20:19,826 --> 00:20:23,390
The mythical structures that we build around inventors

319
00:20:23,530 --> 00:20:26,574
that they inherit special abilities: They are geniuses

320
00:20:26,714 --> 00:20:29,062
or they're in tune with the infinite mind

321
00:20:29,202 --> 00:20:32,763
and the ideas somehow filter in.

322
00:20:32,903 --> 00:20:34,826
This is a kind of nonsense.

323
00:20:34,966 --> 00:20:39,862
It's the same story about "Is there intelligent life out there?"

324
00:20:40,400 --> 00:20:44,691
The real question is "Is there intelligent life here?"

325
00:20:46,496 --> 00:20:49,510
We don't think so, not yet.

326
00:20:49,650 --> 00:20:51,775
I'm serious. I'm not kidding.

327
00:20:51,915 --> 00:20:54,262
What is intelligence?

328
00:20:56,775 --> 00:21:00,694
The ability to reason things out? You can't have that ability

329
00:21:00,834 --> 00:21:04,265
unless you've had experience in particular areas.

330
00:21:04,405 --> 00:21:07,297
An Eskimo never dreams

331
00:21:07,817 --> 00:21:11,688
(I repeat this) of walking on a palm-fringed beach.

332
00:21:12,220 --> 00:21:14,630
Can you understand that? It is not possible

333
00:21:14,770 --> 00:21:19,573
unless he has seen motion pictures or something about the beach.

334
00:21:20,364 --> 00:21:24,833
It is not possible for any human being to build a frame of reference

335
00:21:24,973 --> 00:21:27,810
of any kind without experience.

336
00:21:27,950 --> 00:21:32,285
I know where every invention I ever made came from.

337
00:21:32,425 --> 00:21:35,845
I know the influence, the books I've read, the people I've known

338
00:21:35,985 --> 00:21:38,471
everything that shaped those values.

339
00:21:38,611 --> 00:21:42,386
Sometimes people say "When did you think of that wonderful idea?

340
00:21:42,526 --> 00:21:44,799
It was February the 1st?" No.

341
00:21:44,939 --> 00:21:47,277
It's cumulative bits of information

342
00:21:47,417 --> 00:21:50,392
that we put together with experience.

343
00:21:51,165 --> 00:21:55,916
All of the artificial structures and artificiality of all societies

344
00:21:56,339 --> 00:22:00,066
they are all primitive today. They are all backward.

345
00:22:00,206 --> 00:22:03,279
The very fact that we use political systems

346
00:22:03,419 --> 00:22:06,613
the very fact that there are Democrats and Republicans

347
00:22:06,753 --> 00:22:11,194
and notions about how the world ought to be governed.

348
00:22:11,334 --> 00:22:13,777
Scientists could not do a thing with that.

349
00:22:13,917 --> 00:22:17,139
If you want to put a man on the Moon, you have to know

350
00:22:17,279 --> 00:22:19,454
what the distance is precisely.

351
00:22:19,594 --> 00:22:24,096
You have to know how much material you're lifting up toward the Moon.

352
00:22:24,236 --> 00:22:27,996
You have to know how much force a human body can stand.

353
00:22:28,136 --> 00:22:31,080
To start with, they don't have that information

354
00:22:31,220 --> 00:22:35,538
so they build special devices, a big centrifuge.

355
00:22:35,678 --> 00:22:38,671
They put in a human being in it and whirl it around. They say

356
00:22:38,811 --> 00:22:41,313
"How are you doing?" and the guy conks out

357
00:22:41,453 --> 00:22:45,255
and they say "This is how fast you can rotate

358
00:22:45,859 --> 00:22:49,898
certain groups of people." They build data

359
00:22:50,587 --> 00:22:54,591
and from that data, they plan the Moon voyage.

360
00:22:55,004 --> 00:22:59,091
The question then is, what kind of world do we want?

361
00:23:00,736 --> 00:23:04,169
How is it that we want our social system to operate?

362
00:23:04,309 --> 00:23:07,114
What makes criminal behavior?

363
00:23:07,254 --> 00:23:10,396
What are the factors that make a Jeffrey Dahmer?

364
00:23:10,536 --> 00:23:15,132
I'm sure you know who that was. Before Jeffrey there was Albert Fish.

365
00:23:15,272 --> 00:23:18,589
I don't know if any of you remember Albert Fish.

366
00:23:19,008 --> 00:23:21,954
Albert Fish was a fine-looking gentleman.

367
00:23:22,094 --> 00:23:24,717
He ate 45 children.

368
00:23:24,857 --> 00:23:28,897
You wonder, how can anyone do that kind of thing?

369
00:23:29,037 --> 00:23:34,060
I'm going to try to give you some idea of the background of Albert Fish.

370
00:23:34,200 --> 00:23:37,331
When he was a youngster, about 10 years old

371
00:23:37,471 --> 00:23:39,693
he was touching his private parts.

372
00:23:39,833 --> 00:23:42,512
His mother was an old-time Baptist.

373
00:23:42,652 --> 00:23:47,719
She'd say "You are going straight to hell. You will burn eternally!"

374
00:23:47,859 --> 00:23:52,359
That kid, Albert Fish, stuck needles into his genitals

375
00:23:52,716 --> 00:23:55,091
because he didn't want to burn in hell.

376
00:23:55,231 --> 00:23:58,803
He took other children into empty lots and cut off

377
00:23:58,943 --> 00:24:02,175
their private parts because he wanted to save them.

378
00:24:02,315 --> 00:24:05,130
If you're brought up in a distorted environment

379
00:24:05,270 --> 00:24:08,135
(which we all live in today) any judge

380
00:24:08,275 --> 00:24:10,932
that raps the gavel and says "30 years!"

381
00:24:11,072 --> 00:24:14,018
is an ignoramus because he has no idea

382
00:24:14,158 --> 00:24:17,181
of the factors that shape human behavior.

383
00:24:17,321 --> 00:24:21,278
When you become aware... If you bring up a healthy boy

384
00:24:21,988 --> 00:24:24,745
with about six women and one of the girls say

385
00:24:24,885 --> 00:24:26,758
"Oh did I see the gorgeous hat!"

386
00:24:26,898 --> 00:24:29,498
that boy will pick up the same mannerisms

387
00:24:29,638 --> 00:24:34,045
same facial expressions and say "Oh, I just love that hat!"

388
00:24:34,185 --> 00:24:37,089
because that's the environment. If you're brought up in Italy

389
00:24:37,229 --> 00:24:39,945
you say "Hey, watsa matta he? You like or no like?".

390
00:24:40,085 --> 00:24:42,555
In other words it depends on where we're brought up.

391
00:24:42,695 --> 00:24:46,978
Did you know that Lincoln was Irish? It depends on your group

392
00:24:47,118 --> 00:24:49,778
and the values that you exchange.

393
00:24:49,918 --> 00:24:52,615
If you want a world without war

394
00:24:52,755 --> 00:24:57,161
without hatred, crime and stupidity

395
00:24:57,301 --> 00:24:59,872
it can be arranged

396
00:25:00,012 --> 00:25:02,479
if you follow this bit.

397
00:25:02,619 --> 00:25:06,089
If we consider at some time (which society will

398
00:25:06,229 --> 00:25:09,589
at a later time, I hope it would be sooner)

399
00:25:09,964 --> 00:25:15,119
that all of the Earth become the common heritage of all nations.

400
00:25:15,986 --> 00:25:20,338
All of the resources of the Earth: the common heritage of all nations.

401
00:25:20,478 --> 00:25:25,620
If you believe in God, if you understand the teachings of all religions

402
00:25:26,182 --> 00:25:28,796
there are no property lines in heaven

403
00:25:28,936 --> 00:25:32,481
no banks, no personal positions

404
00:25:32,894 --> 00:25:36,226
in which one person is elevated above another

405
00:25:36,608 --> 00:25:39,831
that if the Earth were common heritage of all nations

406
00:25:39,971 --> 00:25:44,368
and all of the artificial boundaries removed that separate people

407
00:25:44,508 --> 00:25:47,175
there would be no basis for war

408
00:25:47,315 --> 00:25:49,503
no basis for armament.

409
00:25:49,643 --> 00:25:52,629
The world you live in is an old world. Its language is old

410
00:25:52,769 --> 00:25:56,741
its values are old and our institutions of education

411
00:25:56,881 --> 00:26:01,352
fail to touch the social system. "You want to be careful, don't touch that!

412
00:26:01,492 --> 00:26:04,766
This is an area that you don't want to get involved in."

413
00:26:06,492 --> 00:26:10,817
In order for you to grow and make the world a better place

414
00:26:10,957 --> 00:26:13,710
you have to face this situation.

415
00:26:13,850 --> 00:26:16,843
I don't say that people are going to sit back and do that.

416
00:26:16,983 --> 00:26:19,709
According to all historical records

417
00:26:19,849 --> 00:26:23,077
no civilization (to my knowledge anyway)

418
00:26:23,217 --> 00:26:25,739
has ever set out to plan the future:

419
00:26:25,879 --> 00:26:28,128
exactly what we're going to do, how we're going to live

420
00:26:28,268 --> 00:26:30,594
how we're going to work out transportation. No!

421
00:26:30,734 --> 00:26:34,430
We just build highways all over the place. Although you go to school

422
00:26:34,570 --> 00:26:38,532
and you learn something, you learn that a straight line

423
00:26:38,672 --> 00:26:42,332
is the shortest distance between two given points.

424
00:26:42,472 --> 00:26:46,420
Well look at a road map of the United States

425
00:26:46,560 --> 00:26:50,512
and I think you'll find spaghetti all over the place.

426
00:26:51,269 --> 00:26:53,262
Rarely do you see that.

427
00:26:53,402 --> 00:26:57,116
Look at your cities, every building, a different size and shape;

428
00:26:57,256 --> 00:27:00,387
this does not express individuality.

429
00:27:00,527 --> 00:27:02,510
It's utter chaos.

430
00:27:02,650 --> 00:27:05,242
At 4 o'clock, all the cars come out of this building

431
00:27:05,382 --> 00:27:09,459
and they can't get across that bridge, so you've got to build another bridge.

432
00:27:09,599 --> 00:27:14,076
You elect people to political office that are totally incompetent.

433
00:27:14,216 --> 00:27:18,094
They are neurally bankrupt. I don't care whether you're Democrat or Republican.

434
00:27:18,234 --> 00:27:23,278
They don't have the value system to solve these problems that exist.

435
00:27:23,643 --> 00:27:26,060
They are not educated in that way.

436
00:27:26,200 --> 00:27:29,566
They are brought up with a uniform set of values

437
00:27:29,706 --> 00:27:35,199
and they go out into the world and this is the sad story of coming events.

438
00:27:36,157 --> 00:27:39,889
There are computers today, there are machines in existence today

439
00:27:40,029 --> 00:27:45,126
that can handle 500 trillion bits of information per second.

440
00:27:48,636 --> 00:27:51,225
No human comes anywhere near that

441
00:27:51,365 --> 00:27:54,357
and you think that in the next 15 or 20 years

442
00:27:54,497 --> 00:27:58,329
there's going to be people in government? No way!

443
00:27:58,469 --> 00:28:00,700
For example, if you took a group of computers

444
00:28:00,840 --> 00:28:03,173
and arrange them in a special fashion

445
00:28:03,313 --> 00:28:05,640
and ran the electrical tentacles

446
00:28:05,780 --> 00:28:08,549
out to the agricultural belt

447
00:28:08,689 --> 00:28:11,567
with probes into the soil

448
00:28:11,707 --> 00:28:13,664
when the water table drops

449
00:28:13,804 --> 00:28:16,855
that will turn on the pumps and bring the water into the area.

450
00:28:16,995 --> 00:28:20,796
If the nutrients change, it would pump nutrients into the area.

451
00:28:20,936 --> 00:28:22,970
What kind of world do you want?

452
00:28:23,110 --> 00:28:26,403
I don't think any of you here, maybe a few of you might remember

453
00:28:26,543 --> 00:28:29,388
when human beings used to operate elevators.

454
00:28:29,528 --> 00:28:33,520
They turned a crank; they never quite got to the floor, up and down.

455
00:28:33,660 --> 00:28:35,796
Finally, they became automated:

456
00:28:35,936 --> 00:28:39,600
"Step back. It's a lovely day today! How are you, Mr. Jones?"

457
00:28:39,740 --> 00:28:43,634
(if they scan your face) and they'll take you exactly to that floor.

458
00:28:43,774 --> 00:28:45,722
After that comes the transveyor:

459
00:28:45,862 --> 00:28:49,110
an elevator that moves up and down, sideways, in all directions.

460
00:28:49,250 --> 00:28:51,972
You get on it and verbalize "I want to go to the art center

461
00:28:52,112 --> 00:28:55,500
the music center" and it will take you there.

462
00:28:56,044 --> 00:28:59,171
The kind of world you live in and the automobiles

463
00:28:59,311 --> 00:29:02,988
that exist as transportation units are dangerous

464
00:29:03,128 --> 00:29:07,775
because they have a bumper in front and one in the back.

465
00:29:08,586 --> 00:29:12,371
I'm sure that if an extraterrestrial visited the Earth they'd say

466
00:29:12,511 --> 00:29:15,483
"What are those shiny things in the front and back of the vehicles?"

467
00:29:15,623 --> 00:29:18,196
"They're bumpers; they're there to prevent damage."

468
00:29:18,336 --> 00:29:20,918
"Well, don't you ever hit on the side?

469
00:29:21,519 --> 00:29:23,791
Why aren't there bumpers all around the car?"

470
00:29:23,931 --> 00:29:27,582
Then they came with the airbag. They put an airbag in front of you.

471
00:29:27,722 --> 00:29:30,915
If you get hit on the side, your head goes right through the glass.

472
00:29:31,055 --> 00:29:33,650
The automobile companies had a long time

473
00:29:33,790 --> 00:29:36,046
to solve those problems.

474
00:29:36,186 --> 00:29:38,730
Then you see motorcycle policeman "Pull over!

475
00:29:38,870 --> 00:29:40,855
What do you think you're doing?"

476
00:29:40,995 --> 00:29:44,957
All you have to do in a car if you wanted to (I wouldn't do it

477
00:29:45,097 --> 00:29:49,065
I wouldn't even put this in a car) is put a sort of cameragraph

478
00:29:49,205 --> 00:29:51,790
or a cylindrical recorder.

479
00:29:51,930 --> 00:29:56,480
When you go through a 30 mph zone at 50 mph, it's recorded on there.

480
00:29:56,620 --> 00:29:59,050
Every month you have to tear that strip out of your car

481
00:29:59,190 --> 00:30:02,541
and mail it to the police department.

482
00:30:02,681 --> 00:30:04,941
Though the police wouldn't like that

483
00:30:05,395 --> 00:30:07,970
but how many violations do you think you'd have?

484
00:30:08,110 --> 00:30:10,262
There are better ways than that.

485
00:30:10,402 --> 00:30:13,131
You just make a car intelligent.

486
00:30:13,271 --> 00:30:17,661
Here's what that means. How intelligent can machines be?

487
00:30:18,480 --> 00:30:22,601
There's a little gadget called a pressure transducer.

488
00:30:22,741 --> 00:30:25,800
If you squeeze it, it generates electricity.

489
00:30:25,940 --> 00:30:30,802
So let's put one in each tire. Let's say that you kick the front right tire.

490
00:30:30,942 --> 00:30:34,687
It goes to a recording that says "Ouch, my front right tire!"

491
00:30:35,377 --> 00:30:39,179
Of course, if you kick any tire, it'll verbalize

492
00:30:39,319 --> 00:30:43,298
but if you kick it hard it'll say "OUCH! My front right tire!"

493
00:30:43,438 --> 00:30:46,174
If you kick it again it'll say "Who do you think you are?"

494
00:30:46,314 --> 00:30:48,430
Do you want to give a machine feelings?

495
00:30:48,570 --> 00:30:52,697
Do you want to give a machine compassion, love, warmth?

496
00:30:53,028 --> 00:30:57,652
I'll tell you why they leave it out of machines: because it doesn't work.

497
00:30:57,792 --> 00:31:00,810
Human emotions that you learn are the most significant

498
00:31:00,950 --> 00:31:04,908
most important differences between men and machines.

499
00:31:05,599 --> 00:31:07,940
Human emotion is a very touchy subject.

500
00:31:08,080 --> 00:31:11,293
It's like racing your engine at a stop light.

501
00:31:11,433 --> 00:31:15,035
It doesn't take you anywhere. It doesn't serve any purpose.

502
00:31:15,175 --> 00:31:19,490
If you get a lump in your throat when you see hungry people, that's emotional

503
00:31:19,630 --> 00:31:24,609
but when you get increase the agricultural yield per acre, that's caring

504
00:31:24,749 --> 00:31:28,891
that's love. Love is transforming

505
00:31:29,031 --> 00:31:34,020
all of the verbal and paper proclamations to a way of life.

506
00:31:35,524 --> 00:31:40,358
The shameful thing about our century is that there was only one Edison

507
00:31:40,498 --> 00:31:45,239
one Luis Pasteur, one Nikola Tesla, one Madame Curie.

508
00:31:46,168 --> 00:31:49,716
We should have had thousands of them and we will

509
00:31:49,856 --> 00:31:55,121
once we get rid of the artificial boundaries that separate people;

510
00:31:55,434 --> 00:31:58,810
once we get rid of nationalism, patriotism...

511
00:31:58,950 --> 00:32:02,102
Again, I do not mean to offend anybody.

512
00:32:02,242 --> 00:32:06,940
All that I ask you to do is to think about this, toss it around

513
00:32:07,428 --> 00:32:10,163
this is what The Venus Project advocates.

514
00:32:10,303 --> 00:32:14,303
The Venus Project is a design for culture

515
00:32:15,038 --> 00:32:18,033
in which we bridge the difference between all nations.

516
00:32:18,173 --> 00:32:22,450
How is that done? By universal language, the blueprint.

517
00:32:22,590 --> 00:32:27,030
If you open a blueprint in Japan, they know what you're talking about.

518
00:32:27,424 --> 00:32:31,060
If you write a prescription for England, Japan, France

519
00:32:31,200 --> 00:32:34,718
the pharmacologist understands that. There's no discrepancies.

520
00:32:34,858 --> 00:32:38,020
There's no ambivalence "I wonder what he meant by that."

521
00:32:38,160 --> 00:32:42,128
It's clear. The language we use daily is not.

522
00:32:42,610 --> 00:32:47,280
The language of warmth and love are verbal excuses

523
00:32:47,962 --> 00:32:50,587
and verbal outlets for some people

524
00:32:50,727 --> 00:32:53,453
for avoiding their responsibility

525
00:32:53,593 --> 00:32:57,034
to make the world a better place for everyone.

526
00:32:57,174 --> 00:33:00,122
The smarter your kids are, the richer my life.

527
00:33:00,262 --> 00:33:04,000
Every kid on a corner, shooting up drugs, going nowhere

528
00:33:04,140 --> 00:33:06,778
you're going to have to pay for in the future.

529
00:33:07,379 --> 00:33:12,184
Therefore, it is efficient and functionally selfish

530
00:33:12,591 --> 00:33:15,180
to build a better world for everyone.

531
00:33:15,320 --> 00:33:17,740
People come to me all time and they say

532
00:33:17,880 --> 00:33:21,241
"Can you design a city with a wall high enough

533
00:33:21,381 --> 00:33:25,713
so when the Y2K problems come or the system breaks down

534
00:33:25,853 --> 00:33:29,089
or the banks fail, we will be protected?"

535
00:33:29,229 --> 00:33:33,162
I say "Sure I can design that, but there are people that will drive by

536
00:33:33,302 --> 00:33:36,505
with launching mechanisms right over your little wall."

537
00:33:36,645 --> 00:33:38,820
There's no place you can hide.

538
00:33:38,960 --> 00:33:43,450
We have 25 acres. People call it 'Eden 2'. It's beautiful

539
00:33:43,980 --> 00:33:46,835
but if the bottom falls out of this culture

540
00:33:46,975 --> 00:33:49,439
there will be people on my front gate with children:

541
00:33:49,579 --> 00:33:53,868
"How about some food just for the kids?" The next day, 50 people.

542
00:33:54,008 --> 00:33:57,757
Everything looks solid to you, everything looks solid and stable

543
00:33:57,897 --> 00:34:01,027
and the future looks promising but here's the truth:

544
00:34:01,167 --> 00:34:03,384
I have seen an XY plotter

545
00:34:03,524 --> 00:34:06,322
(that is a machine that moves in three dimensions).

546
00:34:06,462 --> 00:34:09,652
They put a scalpel in that machine

547
00:34:09,792 --> 00:34:12,135
and an X-ray of a brain tumor.

548
00:34:12,275 --> 00:34:14,366
This machine removed the brain tumor

549
00:34:14,506 --> 00:34:17,770
on a cadaver in about 1/10th the time.

550
00:34:17,910 --> 00:34:21,750
The doctors think "Just the industrial worker on the production line

551
00:34:21,890 --> 00:34:25,210
he's on the way out, but not me, I can think."

552
00:34:25,350 --> 00:34:29,070
Let me say this again, the typewriters that work to speech...

553
00:34:29,210 --> 00:34:32,053
Today you talk to your computer and you get it typed

554
00:34:32,193 --> 00:34:35,715
and also corrects your English, restructures your sentences

555
00:34:35,855 --> 00:34:38,118
makes recommendations.

556
00:34:38,258 --> 00:34:41,780
How much longer do you think people are going to be

557
00:34:41,920 --> 00:34:45,488
in positions in industry and government

558
00:34:45,628 --> 00:34:49,072
making their own decisions?

559
00:34:49,779 --> 00:34:53,350
We don't believe that anyone ought to make decisions.

560
00:34:53,490 --> 00:34:56,286
We believe that people ought to arrive at decisions.

561
00:34:56,426 --> 00:34:58,170
Here's what that means:

562
00:34:58,310 --> 00:35:01,089
You go across the country and pick up samples of the soil

563
00:35:01,229 --> 00:35:04,395
from all over the nation. You bring it to central agriculture

564
00:35:04,535 --> 00:35:07,817
analyze that soil, and then turn to the health department

565
00:35:07,957 --> 00:35:11,830
and ask them what people need: manganese, whatever they need.

566
00:35:11,970 --> 00:35:14,991
What is the soil good for? What should we grow?

567
00:35:15,131 --> 00:35:18,433
Tomatoes and then rotate the crop, move to something else;

568
00:35:18,573 --> 00:35:21,500
that's what I mean by surveying the conditions.

569
00:35:21,640 --> 00:35:23,950
Not "what's your opinion?"

570
00:35:24,110 --> 00:35:27,853
Democracy is a crude and vulgar system

571
00:35:27,993 --> 00:35:31,567
and should have been phased out centuries ago

572
00:35:32,024 --> 00:35:34,818
but we don't have enough outside points of view

573
00:35:34,958 --> 00:35:37,180
on radio and television.

574
00:35:37,320 --> 00:35:40,092
When I talked this way on the Larry King show, he said to me

575
00:35:40,232 --> 00:35:43,919
"Just a minute, I depend on those people that you're attacking."

576
00:35:44,059 --> 00:35:46,231
I wasn't attacking the automobile companies.

577
00:35:46,371 --> 00:35:49,791
I just said that if you did that, it would be safer.

578
00:35:49,931 --> 00:35:52,570
If you put proximity units on automobiles

579
00:35:52,710 --> 00:35:55,557
(most of you have them in your home now, when you walk over the building

580
00:35:55,697 --> 00:35:58,373
the light goes on, that's a proximity unit)

581
00:35:58,513 --> 00:36:02,572
put that in your car and if you're backing up and a child is crawling behind you

582
00:36:02,712 --> 00:36:06,320
it stops, no matter how much you step on the gas.

583
00:36:06,460 --> 00:36:09,653
I don't want any signs 'Slippery when wet'.

584
00:36:09,793 --> 00:36:13,530
I want an abrasive put in the highway and take that sign down

585
00:36:13,670 --> 00:36:16,288
so it's not slippery when wet.

586
00:36:16,428 --> 00:36:19,226
I don't want to say to kids "Stay away from drugs."

587
00:36:19,366 --> 00:36:21,697
I want to make life so interesting for people

588
00:36:21,837 --> 00:36:25,192
that they don't want drugs. They don't want to dull their senses.

589
00:36:25,332 --> 00:36:29,336
They want to become keen and they want to become fully aware

590
00:36:29,476 --> 00:36:34,053
(I'm using older language) and conscious of their surroundings.

591
00:36:34,193 --> 00:36:38,863
It's painful to deaden your awareness when life is beautiful

592
00:36:39,383 --> 00:36:43,350
when what you do goes out to people and makes their lives better.

593
00:36:43,490 --> 00:36:47,561
In one session at Princeton, I changed the values of many people.

594
00:36:47,701 --> 00:36:50,974
They walked out discussing this for years thereafter

595
00:36:51,114 --> 00:36:53,280
and I still get letters today.

596
00:36:53,420 --> 00:36:56,747
I went into an area of New York called 'Hell's Kitchen'.

597
00:36:56,887 --> 00:37:00,090
The kids there were considered very bad.

598
00:37:01,301 --> 00:37:05,011
The social worker used to wear a necktie and eyeglasses.

599
00:37:05,151 --> 00:37:08,481
Anyone who wore eyeglasses when I was a kid was a sissy.

600
00:37:08,621 --> 00:37:10,995
When you wear a necktie and a suit

601
00:37:11,135 --> 00:37:15,105
and you're talking to these kids in rags in the slums

602
00:37:15,525 --> 00:37:18,660
they look at you as an outsider. You're unacceptable to them.

603
00:37:18,800 --> 00:37:22,060
I put a wire recorder out in the front office and

604
00:37:22,200 --> 00:37:25,515
after the social worker talked to the young boy... By the way

605
00:37:25,655 --> 00:37:27,856
they made guns out of water pipe in New York.

606
00:37:27,996 --> 00:37:31,112
how many of you knew that? They didn't go and buy guns, they made them.

607
00:37:31,537 --> 00:37:33,408
The social worker picked up the gun and said

608
00:37:33,548 --> 00:37:36,854
"You're gonna take someone's eye out with it, wind up in state penitentiary

609
00:37:36,994 --> 00:37:39,130
hurt your mother and father. Do you wanna to do that?"

610
00:37:39,270 --> 00:37:41,199
The kid said nothing at all.

611
00:37:41,339 --> 00:37:43,910
When the kid walks out I make a wire recording of the way

612
00:37:44,050 --> 00:37:48,633
he talks to his friend "He's a jerk!" (The guy up front, the social worker.)

613
00:37:48,773 --> 00:37:51,880
Then I walk over to the social worker "How did you make out with Johnny?"

614
00:37:52,020 --> 00:37:56,644
"I had a good talk with the boy. I believe we established rapport."

615
00:37:56,784 --> 00:38:01,045
"How do you know that?" He says "I felt it intuitively."

616
00:38:01,185 --> 00:38:04,148
Then I played the tape (by the way, it was a wire recorder)

617
00:38:04,288 --> 00:38:07,800
I played the tape of the kid's answers

618
00:38:07,940 --> 00:38:11,700
and he says "That ungrateful so and so!" I said "No, no, just say

619
00:38:11,840 --> 00:38:14,714
I don't know how to get to Johnny (I know how to get to Billy)

620
00:38:14,854 --> 00:38:18,078
I tried 8 different methods, none of them worked."

621
00:38:18,218 --> 00:38:22,412
I said "Watch what I do next week." I walked in the office

622
00:38:22,800 --> 00:38:25,454
picked up the gun and said "I understand you made this gun?"

623
00:38:25,594 --> 00:38:28,891
"I told the guy I made it last week!" (this is New York City

624
00:38:29,031 --> 00:38:33,424
I used to make recordings of this; I wanted to use it in a film later).

625
00:38:33,920 --> 00:38:37,529
I picked up the gun, I'm looking at it and I'm shaking my head.

626
00:38:37,904 --> 00:38:40,849
He said "What's a matter with it?" I said "Come here.

627
00:38:40,989 --> 00:38:44,741
The damn pin is an 8th of an inch off center."

628
00:38:45,495 --> 00:38:49,675
He says "Yeah!" I said "If you put a couple of washes on the side

629
00:38:49,815 --> 00:38:53,980
you can move the pin right on center." He says "Hey, do you work here?"

630
00:38:54,120 --> 00:38:57,451
I said "What? With those jerks? Naah!"

631
00:38:58,620 --> 00:39:01,765
"Can I bring my friends over to meet you?"

632
00:39:02,228 --> 00:39:05,034
That's people like him with similar values.

633
00:39:05,174 --> 00:39:09,439
Then you go to work in their terms, not your terms.

634
00:39:09,579 --> 00:39:13,679
Real psychology has to be related to the real world.

635
00:39:13,819 --> 00:39:17,470
Not theory, not lab experiments in schools

636
00:39:17,610 --> 00:39:21,393
where you're not in touch with people, where you don't get the feel of people

637
00:39:21,533 --> 00:39:24,672
where you don't get the sense

638
00:39:24,812 --> 00:39:27,786
of their identification with the world around them.

639
00:39:27,926 --> 00:39:29,921
I have changed many of those kids.

640
00:39:30,061 --> 00:39:34,679
I've brought a gun in for them to look at and I said "I made this gun."

641
00:39:34,819 --> 00:39:38,400
"Wow!" they said. "I sure would like to be able to make a gun like that."

642
00:39:38,540 --> 00:39:41,333
I said "Well, I can help you do it." "You can?

643
00:39:41,473 --> 00:39:46,674
What do I have to do?"  You have to learn how to draw a front view of a gun

644
00:39:46,814 --> 00:39:49,066
a side view of a gun

645
00:39:51,311 --> 00:39:53,665
(I know I'm going fast, making a lot of drawings).

646
00:39:53,805 --> 00:39:57,423
You have to make three views to the gun so it can be made.

647
00:39:57,563 --> 00:40:02,027
He says "I'm gonna learn to do that!" So I set him up on a drafting table

648
00:40:02,167 --> 00:40:06,189
and I took him from guns to water skis, to other things.

649
00:40:06,329 --> 00:40:09,143
Today, a lot of them are engineering draftsmen.

650
00:40:09,283 --> 00:40:13,920
Because they told me that the kids only had an IQ of 24 or something

651
00:40:14,060 --> 00:40:15,937
"You can't get to them."

652
00:40:16,077 --> 00:40:18,980
I said to one of these kids with an IQ of 24

653
00:40:19,120 --> 00:40:22,270
"Suppose you wanted to rob that jewelry store across the way

654
00:40:22,410 --> 00:40:25,024
how would you go about it?"
- "Any way at all."

655
00:40:25,164 --> 00:40:28,070
He said "I'd throw a bag of fecal matter in there.

656
00:40:28,210 --> 00:40:30,703
The guy gets mad at my friend, he runs after him

657
00:40:30,843 --> 00:40:34,950
and I clean off the counter."
That's where they live.

658
00:40:35,090 --> 00:40:37,970
"And suppose you wanted to rob the 3rd story?

659
00:40:38,110 --> 00:40:41,703
No ladders, no ropes, no weights

660
00:40:42,210 --> 00:40:45,119
how would you get up to the 3rd story?"

661
00:40:45,259 --> 00:40:49,723
After several days, one of the youngsters came up with a piece of wood:

662
00:40:49,863 --> 00:40:52,368
(he didn't even know what a wedge was)

663
00:40:52,508 --> 00:40:54,630
"Do you see that hunk of wood?

664
00:40:54,770 --> 00:40:57,028
I could stick it in bricks and it gets tight

665
00:40:57,168 --> 00:41:00,497
no matter how far the bricks are.

666
00:41:00,637 --> 00:41:03,231
Then I can climb up the gutter (he didn't use that language

667
00:41:03,371 --> 00:41:07,252
he used much stronger language)... I'd climb up the building

668
00:41:07,392 --> 00:41:10,186
and take whatever I want to take. That's how I do it.'"

669
00:41:10,326 --> 00:41:13,772
How do you give people an IQ test that comes from a different environment?

670
00:41:13,912 --> 00:41:15,870
How do you know what they sense?

671
00:41:16,010 --> 00:41:20,407
Do you think that the formalist who tries to structure the nature of intelligence

672
00:41:20,547 --> 00:41:25,000
the nature of creativity without being creative can do it?

673
00:41:25,992 --> 00:41:29,553
In order to teach children how to become creative

674
00:41:29,693 --> 00:41:34,570
I make a Martian out of rubber with eyes on tentacles

675
00:41:34,710 --> 00:41:37,616
and a pointed rear end.

676
00:41:37,756 --> 00:41:40,180
They look at it and they think "Ugh!"

677
00:41:40,320 --> 00:41:44,034
and I say to them "What good are four eyes on tentacles?"

678
00:41:44,174 --> 00:41:48,104
Eventually [they said] "You can look at the back, front, side and the top at the same time!"

679
00:41:48,244 --> 00:41:50,545
"And what if the guy had six arms?"

680
00:41:50,685 --> 00:41:54,755
"He can shave, read a book, eat a doughnut and drink coffee"

681
00:41:54,895 --> 00:41:57,840
instead of "Ugh!!" as we're brought up.

682
00:41:57,980 --> 00:42:01,546
Have you met a Martian? They have an opening here.

683
00:42:01,686 --> 00:42:05,089
They say "What's that?" Notice the attitude? "What is that?"

684
00:42:05,229 --> 00:42:07,495
"If we eat anything that's bad for us

685
00:42:07,635 --> 00:42:10,279
it's ejected right away. Not in your system!

686
00:42:10,419 --> 00:42:12,554
It goes through your whole system."

687
00:42:12,694 --> 00:42:16,710
You are taught in medical school how 'wonderful' the human body is.

688
00:42:16,850 --> 00:42:20,523
How wonderful it is? This isn't true at all.

689
00:42:20,663 --> 00:42:25,237
That you're indoctrinated to a set of values that are unreal.

690
00:42:25,931 --> 00:42:29,436
In order for me to get these ideas out there

691
00:42:29,576 --> 00:42:32,781
it's extremely difficult, because we need films

692
00:42:32,921 --> 00:42:36,442
we need equipment in order to do that.

693
00:42:36,582 --> 00:42:40,478
What The Venus Project has to offer is a way of life

694
00:42:40,618 --> 00:42:44,138
without ambiguity, a language that has

695
00:42:44,278 --> 00:42:47,410
a much more precise form of communication

696
00:42:47,550 --> 00:42:50,210
to change the relationship between people

697
00:42:50,350 --> 00:42:54,063
where the male and female are not given separate roles

698
00:42:54,203 --> 00:42:57,130
where the female says "I want to be a biochemist or a physicist"

699
00:42:57,270 --> 00:43:00,521
and she goes that way. When you hand a girl a doll

700
00:43:00,661 --> 00:43:04,241
you're placing a set. You're beginning to manipulate people.

701
00:43:04,381 --> 00:43:07,115
Everybody's afraid of controlling human behavior.

702
00:43:07,255 --> 00:43:11,100
You're always controlling behavior! When you pick up your little girl

703
00:43:11,240 --> 00:43:14,383
and say "Don't play with that little Lutheran boy across the way!"

704
00:43:15,523 --> 00:43:18,259
or "Don't talk to that little Catholic girl across the way!"

705
00:43:18,399 --> 00:43:20,614
you are always indoctrinating children:

706
00:43:20,754 --> 00:43:23,128
"Who loves you more than anything in the world?"

707
00:43:23,268 --> 00:43:27,203
"The candy store man." "No, your mommy and your daddy."

708
00:43:27,939 --> 00:43:32,275
Indoctrination continuously! Then all of us together sing

709
00:43:32,415 --> 00:43:35,686
"We are free! We are free!"

710
00:43:35,826 --> 00:43:38,607
Beware! Whenever you hear of freedom

711
00:43:38,747 --> 00:43:41,783
and all that sort of thing, watch out.

712
00:43:42,283 --> 00:43:45,702
A real free society, the closest I've ever come to it

713
00:43:45,842 --> 00:43:49,707
was in Polynesia. I lived in the South Pacific islands for a while

714
00:43:49,847 --> 00:43:54,044
and the natives gave me bananas, coconuts and all that. They were very generous

715
00:43:54,184 --> 00:43:57,761
and they had no word for work. Would you believe that?

716
00:43:57,901 --> 00:44:01,454
They went fishing all day, they played, they had luaus

717
00:44:01,594 --> 00:44:05,022
and they said "Jacque, whatcha want?"

718
00:44:05,162 --> 00:44:10,463
and I said "I would like an outrigger canoe" and they built one for me.

719
00:44:11,173 --> 00:44:16,709
A few days after they brought it to my hut, I heard some rustling outside

720
00:44:16,849 --> 00:44:20,402
and they were all carrying the canoe away. I said "What's going on?"

721
00:44:20,542 --> 00:44:24,289
They said "You no use!" It's a different value system.

722
00:44:24,750 --> 00:44:27,390
The men and women walked around nude on the island

723
00:44:27,530 --> 00:44:30,477
when I got there, a long time ago

724
00:44:30,617 --> 00:44:33,656
and I never saw a native poke another native:

725
00:44:33,796 --> 00:44:37,825
"Hey, get a load of that chick!" None of that.

726
00:44:38,241 --> 00:44:40,963
They looked at the eyes of women when they talked to them.

727
00:44:41,103 --> 00:44:44,280
Never "Hey, look at that," never at the legs.

728
00:44:44,420 --> 00:44:48,086
The motion picture cameras and all your movie theaters are 'dolly up and down

729
00:44:48,226 --> 00:44:52,670
the hindquarters' and you wonder why men are like that. They are not like that.

730
00:44:52,810 --> 00:44:55,941
They are made like that by culture.

731
00:44:56,081 --> 00:44:58,444
Then the missionaries arrive

732
00:44:58,584 --> 00:45:02,741
and the little girls used to come to church, innocent, listening.

733
00:45:03,336 --> 00:45:05,959
They put the t-shirts on them

734
00:45:06,284 --> 00:45:09,490
and the girls had no idea why they were putting t-shirts on them.

735
00:45:09,630 --> 00:45:12,020
"What's it for?" It's like me, covering your nose:

736
00:45:12,160 --> 00:45:14,829
"You can't go in a room unless your nose is covered!"

737
00:45:14,969 --> 00:45:19,910
Well, the girls cut two holes in the t-shirts and came to church.

738
00:45:21,069 --> 00:45:25,786
We're dealing with many different cultures, subcultures and values.

739
00:45:25,926 --> 00:45:30,232
Our culture, if we are to grow and build a civilization

740
00:45:30,372 --> 00:45:34,258
worthy of humankind, we have to have a quantum jump

741
00:45:34,398 --> 00:45:39,303
in the way we look at our world, people and ourselves.

742
00:45:39,443 --> 00:45:44,156
The Venus Project is the redesign of a culture

743
00:45:44,296 --> 00:45:48,383
in which the elements that comprise that culture are different.

744
00:45:48,523 --> 00:45:53,200
For example, our cities are round, not because I like round cities.

745
00:45:53,340 --> 00:45:58,770
The city is round, the center of the city has a socially integrated computer.

746
00:45:58,910 --> 00:46:02,810
This may be a medical center; this might be an engineering center.

747
00:46:02,950 --> 00:46:06,383
If you work in the medical center, you live in beautiful gardens

748
00:46:06,523 --> 00:46:08,691
with running streams and waterfalls.

749
00:46:08,831 --> 00:46:12,620
Every district is the same distance from the center.

750
00:46:12,760 --> 00:46:15,163
There are no cars in the city. You get on a conveyor

751
00:46:15,303 --> 00:46:19,563
and dial where you want to go to. There's no crime in the city.

752
00:46:19,703 --> 00:46:23,280
Just before the public library in the United States

753
00:46:23,420 --> 00:46:25,593
people said "You can't really do that.

754
00:46:25,733 --> 00:46:28,316
The people never bring back the books; they'll keep them.

755
00:46:28,456 --> 00:46:31,378
They won't return them!" All that was incorrect.

756
00:46:31,518 --> 00:46:36,400
I want to build a library where any child can walk in, check out a camera

757
00:46:36,540 --> 00:46:40,143
check out art materials, check out water skis.

758
00:46:40,283 --> 00:46:43,129
Make things available [and] people don't steal.

759
00:46:43,269 --> 00:46:48,112
No one's going to hit you on a head to take your watch off, if it's available.

760
00:46:48,252 --> 00:46:52,016
"How are you going to pay for this central library

761
00:46:52,156 --> 00:46:55,711
that gives children these things, for nothing?"

762
00:46:57,879 --> 00:47:02,370
It costs about 50,000 bucks to keep a kid in jail one year.

763
00:47:02,510 --> 00:47:06,740
An adult: 75,000 bucks a year.

764
00:47:06,880 --> 00:47:10,354
Food, clothing, shelter, dental care...

765
00:47:10,494 --> 00:47:13,953
Isn't it easier to do it in a different way?

766
00:47:14,093 --> 00:47:17,588
I would love to go to Mexico and say "What's your problem?"

767
00:47:17,728 --> 00:47:21,921
They'd say "Well señor, we don't have the modern machinery you have."

768
00:47:22,061 --> 00:47:24,287
Give them modern machinery.

769
00:47:24,427 --> 00:47:27,990
Build schools for them and they won't be coming over the border.

770
00:47:28,130 --> 00:47:32,735
What makes them come over the border? Hunger, lack of employment.

771
00:47:32,875 --> 00:47:35,990
They say "It's the god damn Mexicans. You know what they're like!"

772
00:47:36,130 --> 00:47:40,770
It's nothing like that! Everything is shoved by something else.

773
00:47:40,910 --> 00:47:44,010
You are told that a tree falls over.

774
00:47:44,684 --> 00:47:49,082
You were told that a sailboat sails. A sailboat cannot sail

775
00:47:49,222 --> 00:47:53,351
unless acted upon by a resident force called the wind.

776
00:47:53,491 --> 00:47:57,390
A tree doesn't fall. If it rains and it's asymmetric

777
00:47:57,530 --> 00:48:00,541
and the soil becomes loose, gravity does the rest.

778
00:48:00,681 --> 00:48:04,477
The tree doesn't fall. Plants do not grow.

779
00:48:04,617 --> 00:48:08,281
They require radiant energy, nutrients, water.

780
00:48:08,421 --> 00:48:11,661
Stop any of those things and the plant stops.

781
00:48:11,801 --> 00:48:16,080
Human beings are not self-operating entities.

782
00:48:17,045 --> 00:48:19,894
We are operated by many resident forces.

783
00:48:20,034 --> 00:48:23,975
Of course many of us are not aware of that. It looks like we're perfectly free

784
00:48:24,115 --> 00:48:27,384
making our own decisions. "I know I think for myself.

785
00:48:27,524 --> 00:48:30,095
I'm sure you do." That's an illusion.

786
00:48:30,235 --> 00:48:33,637
If you're brought up to believe in the Kennedy Rocker

787
00:48:33,777 --> 00:48:36,664
and you want one for your home, it'll injure your back

788
00:48:36,804 --> 00:48:38,898
distort your anatomy

789
00:48:39,038 --> 00:48:42,320
"but Kennedy had one like that and I want one like that."

790
00:48:42,460 --> 00:48:44,877
When you break the patterns

791
00:48:45,017 --> 00:48:48,559
that have been established by existing society

792
00:48:48,699 --> 00:48:52,131
you begin to move people in a new direction.

793
00:48:52,650 --> 00:48:55,789
I admit I could get up here and give a very pleasant lecture

794
00:48:55,929 --> 00:48:59,756
of how wonderful everything will be in the future:

795
00:48:59,896 --> 00:49:03,770
a helicopter in every garage, a house in suburbia

796
00:49:03,910 --> 00:49:06,867
another on the beach, maybe one in Hawaii

797
00:49:07,007 --> 00:49:09,765
this is the future... That is not the future!

798
00:49:10,283 --> 00:49:14,848
Those are the illusion generators and there are lots of them.

799
00:49:14,988 --> 00:49:17,888
Dick Gregory once told me

800
00:49:18,028 --> 00:49:21,369
that being Black and living in the South

801
00:49:22,601 --> 00:49:27,040
he said "Whenever I was late for work, I couldn't run to the bus

802
00:49:27,180 --> 00:49:31,652
because they would wonder what that blackie was up to, running."

803
00:49:32,300 --> 00:49:36,564
In other words, we project our value system into others

804
00:49:36,704 --> 00:49:40,185
we project characteristics into others.

805
00:49:41,045 --> 00:49:44,819
We have to find out what we are really like.

806
00:49:44,959 --> 00:49:47,976
Many people tell me they want to find themselves.

807
00:49:48,116 --> 00:49:51,280
This is another ridiculous thing. Who you are going to find?

808
00:49:51,420 --> 00:49:55,444
Some jerk at 18? And a different value system at 23?

809
00:49:55,584 --> 00:49:59,187
You can never find yourself. If you read, keep up with new ideas

810
00:49:59,327 --> 00:50:02,723
what 'self'? Your self of 20?

811
00:50:03,148 --> 00:50:05,649
When I was 15, I was a jerk.

812
00:50:05,789 --> 00:50:09,949
As time went on, I learned more about many different things

813
00:50:10,089 --> 00:50:13,765
and knew how much I had to learn in order to move forward.

814
00:50:13,905 --> 00:50:16,146
There is no 'finding yourself'.

815
00:50:16,286 --> 00:50:20,907
People come over at me and say "I want to know how I relate to the cosmos."

816
00:50:21,047 --> 00:50:24,300
We don't even know how a single cell splits

817
00:50:24,440 --> 00:50:27,184
and they want to know how they relate to the cosmos.

818
00:50:27,324 --> 00:50:30,091
What a bunch of verbal crap!

819
00:50:30,231 --> 00:50:32,694
Really, it's meaningless.

820
00:50:32,834 --> 00:50:35,700
I'm sorry that I only have one hour

821
00:50:35,840 --> 00:50:40,062
to try to give you ideas along different lines.

822
00:50:40,202 --> 00:50:45,354
Generally it takes seminars. It takes a lot of demonstration and films.

823
00:50:46,161 --> 00:50:49,087
I didn't mean to offend any of you.

824
00:50:49,227 --> 00:50:51,735
I hope that I didn't.

825
00:50:52,200 --> 00:50:54,100
Thank you for your time.

826
00:50:54,240 --> 00:50:56,635
[Applause]

827
00:51:03,426 --> 00:51:07,975
(Audience member #1) I'm sure the audience has some questions? Fire away.

828
00:51:08,115 --> 00:51:11,531
(Audience member #2) I teach middle school kids, and what do you see...

829
00:51:11,671 --> 00:51:14,277
- I'm a little hard of hearing, I'm sorry about that.

830
00:51:14,417 --> 00:51:19,219
- I teach middle school kids and I wondered... Some of your philosophies of education...

831
00:51:19,359 --> 00:51:24,918
- OK, I got the point. For example in our city design we have big lakes.

832
00:51:25,058 --> 00:51:27,808
We've made all these lakes. They exist. It's real.

833
00:51:27,948 --> 00:51:30,580
We have modern structures there, all different.

834
00:51:30,720 --> 00:51:33,165
Roxanne, my associate, said to me

835
00:51:33,305 --> 00:51:36,264
"Jacque, I just don't want to draw pretty pictures of buildings

836
00:51:36,404 --> 00:51:40,453
I want to build them. I want to make them." She did all the cement work.

837
00:51:40,593 --> 00:51:43,561
One day she came over and said "How about a swimming pool?"

838
00:51:43,701 --> 00:51:46,863
She was with a girlfriend and I said "When are you girls are going to start?"

839
00:51:47,003 --> 00:51:50,708
"We've never built a pool!" They built it in two weeks, a beautiful pool.

840
00:51:50,848 --> 00:51:53,115
We'll show you pictures of it.

841
00:51:53,255 --> 00:51:55,599
So we built a big lake in the city

842
00:51:55,739 --> 00:51:59,617
and there's a hill in the middle of the lake about 80 feet up out of the water.

843
00:51:59,757 --> 00:52:01,940
On top of the hill is a craft shop

844
00:52:02,080 --> 00:52:04,600
where children can build anything they want to build

845
00:52:04,740 --> 00:52:07,844
but in order to get there, you have to get in the boat and row it.

846
00:52:07,984 --> 00:52:12,522
Instead of lining them up and saying "Come on, everybody together, forward, backward"

847
00:52:12,662 --> 00:52:16,510
arrange the environment so you have to row to get to the hill.

848
00:52:16,650 --> 00:52:19,006
You have to climb the hill to get to craft shop.

849
00:52:19,146 --> 00:52:22,242
An automobile or anything you build will not go together

850
00:52:22,382 --> 00:52:25,533
unless four children pick up the car and the others put the wheels on.

851
00:52:25,673 --> 00:52:28,333
Instead of saying "I want you people to work together, cooperate

852
00:52:28,473 --> 00:52:32,309
and stop fighting!" arrange things so that it works that way.

853
00:52:32,449 --> 00:52:34,330
That's what nature does.

854
00:52:34,470 --> 00:52:37,752
When a baby fox sees a porcupine

855
00:52:38,384 --> 00:52:41,095
it says "What have we here? I don't know."

856
00:52:41,235 --> 00:52:44,277
It gets closer to the porcupine and finally it gets a quill

857
00:52:44,417 --> 00:52:46,417
and he stays away from the porcupine

858
00:52:46,557 --> 00:52:49,694
If you raise your children and try to avoid

859
00:52:49,834 --> 00:52:53,121
experiences that had hurt you

860
00:52:53,261 --> 00:52:56,010
and you buy them every toy that they want

861
00:52:56,150 --> 00:52:58,832
you produce a blob of jello.

862
00:52:59,871 --> 00:53:04,655
Some degree of challenge, some degree of stress is necessary

863
00:53:04,795 --> 00:53:09,138
so we build an environment (to try to answer your question)

864
00:53:09,278 --> 00:53:14,750
where the elements so arranged, has to produce what you call, creativity.

865
00:53:14,890 --> 00:53:18,499
Can I give you one more bit on that? All right.

866
00:53:18,639 --> 00:53:22,479
Is there anyone else interested in creativity in children?

867
00:53:22,619 --> 00:53:24,690
Would you raise your hands?

868
00:53:24,830 --> 00:53:29,401
What we do is,  I ask a child to make a drawing

869
00:53:30,289 --> 00:53:32,885
anything they want to draw and this is what they usually do...

870
00:53:33,025 --> 00:53:35,957
Can everybody see the blackboard? I'll draw it up here.

871
00:53:36,097 --> 00:53:38,941
They draw something like this.

872
00:53:39,081 --> 00:53:42,508
I'm talking about about 4 and 5-year olds.

873
00:53:46,062 --> 00:53:49,250
Then they draw something like this.

874
00:53:51,586 --> 00:53:55,772
Then most of them do something like this.

875
00:53:57,795 --> 00:54:00,258
I'm sure you've all seen those drawings.

876
00:54:00,398 --> 00:54:03,864
In fact, I'm sure many of you draw that way today.

877
00:54:04,298 --> 00:54:08,635
The teacher gives them some crayons. They color it and she hangs it up.

878
00:54:08,775 --> 00:54:10,800
"This is little Billy's drawing..."

879
00:54:10,940 --> 00:54:14,931
but when she tells Billy that this is the way we spell 'cat'

880
00:54:15,879 --> 00:54:20,809
Billy says "I see" and he comes back with something like this.

881
00:54:23,615 --> 00:54:27,603
Can you see that? The teacher says "That's wrong!" That isn't wrong.

882
00:54:27,816 --> 00:54:32,003
Most of it is appropriate. It's just this that we change.

883
00:54:32,143 --> 00:54:36,416
So I say "Very close. We just substitute this

884
00:54:36,556 --> 00:54:38,747
with something like this."

885
00:54:38,887 --> 00:54:43,176
Then the child comes back again with something like this.

886
00:54:44,452 --> 00:54:47,424
I say "Much closer, much better!

887
00:54:47,564 --> 00:54:51,437
Only we turn this around so you can put the 'A' inside of it."

888
00:54:51,577 --> 00:54:55,535
Say whatever you have to say to get the idea across.

889
00:54:55,675 --> 00:54:58,673
Instead of saying "That isn't what I told you!"

890
00:54:58,813 --> 00:55:03,467
You're just using that child as an outlet for insufficiency.

891
00:55:04,281 --> 00:55:09,045
Then, I do this with the children. I have them draw the letter 'T'.

892
00:55:09,536 --> 00:55:13,465
Then I say "Which one of these looks like a peach pit?"

893
00:55:14,604 --> 00:55:17,804
The child generally picks this.

894
00:55:17,944 --> 00:55:20,463
Those of you back there, I'm sure you can't see that.

895
00:55:20,603 --> 00:55:22,879
The blackboard is fully cluttered.

896
00:55:23,019 --> 00:55:26,964
and I don't have... Here, I'll try to clear the area

897
00:55:27,104 --> 00:55:29,581
where most of you can see.

898
00:55:30,683 --> 00:55:33,492
The child draws the letter 'T'.

899
00:55:34,014 --> 00:55:36,298
He draws a peach pit in the middle.

900
00:55:36,438 --> 00:55:39,427
Then he draws a peach pit here and one there

901
00:55:39,567 --> 00:55:42,063
and he takes out the middle peach pit.

902
00:55:42,464 --> 00:55:45,026
Then I say "What is this?"

903
00:55:45,166 --> 00:55:48,407
They say "That's a bunch of birdies, flying!" I say "Good.

904
00:55:49,121 --> 00:55:52,181
You move down a peach pit and a half

905
00:55:52,321 --> 00:55:56,399
and draw the letter 'V' upside down"

906
00:55:57,038 --> 00:56:00,105
and the child draws the letter 'V' upside down.

907
00:56:00,245 --> 00:56:03,283
Then he draws a birdy

908
00:56:03,423 --> 00:56:06,974
under the 'V' one peach pit down.

909
00:56:08,842 --> 00:56:11,273
Then he joins another birdie to that

910
00:56:11,413 --> 00:56:14,767
and a half round beneath that. One peach pit above

911
00:56:14,907 --> 00:56:18,236
he does this. Then I say to the child "What is this?"

912
00:56:18,427 --> 00:56:22,025
"That's a heart!" I say "Good. Half a heart

913
00:56:22,165 --> 00:56:25,275
from the top of the eyebrow to the bottom of the nose.

914
00:56:25,415 --> 00:56:28,174
They move from that

915
00:56:28,533 --> 00:56:31,415
offensive drawing made by the child to this

916
00:56:31,555 --> 00:56:34,393
in less than a half hour.

917
00:56:35,566 --> 00:56:38,116
I'm talking about 5 and 6-year olds

918
00:56:38,256 --> 00:56:42,980
moving into this realm, drawing sports cars, turning them around.

919
00:56:43,408 --> 00:56:46,324
We give them crayon and chalk

920
00:56:46,464 --> 00:56:49,744
because we want them to bring out their artistic ability.

921
00:56:49,884 --> 00:56:54,795
You can't bring out anything if there's no basis or structure for it.

922
00:56:55,383 --> 00:57:00,276
If you sit in the woods and meditate on your navel for 3 years

923
00:57:00,416 --> 00:57:05,534
you'll have a tremendously clear picture of the navel and nothing more.

924
00:57:06,150 --> 00:57:10,609
You have to work to get information. You have to arrange things

925
00:57:10,749 --> 00:57:14,478
so that it generates what you call creativity.

926
00:57:17,074 --> 00:57:19,480
A psychologist in one session said

927
00:57:19,620 --> 00:57:22,915
"I know two children that came from the same environment.

928
00:57:23,055 --> 00:57:27,528
If environment is everything, one turned out to be a gangster, the other a minister.

929
00:57:27,668 --> 00:57:31,282
If environment is everything, how do you get those differences?"

930
00:57:31,422 --> 00:57:33,787
The minute you pick up one child

931
00:57:33,927 --> 00:57:37,226
and start playing with him and the other stands there with his lip out

932
00:57:37,366 --> 00:57:39,590
you're making jealousy and envy.

933
00:57:39,730 --> 00:57:41,927
There's no such thing as the same environment.

934
00:57:42,067 --> 00:57:46,307
When I pick up my little girl, I pick up my older little boy.

935
00:57:46,447 --> 00:57:48,941
You never work with one child

936
00:57:49,081 --> 00:57:52,889
"Why can't you keep your area clean? Your brother does, all the time.

937
00:57:53,029 --> 00:57:56,626
You leave all your things around..." When he trips and falls down the stairs

938
00:57:56,766 --> 00:58:01,471
his brother smiles. An inhibited smile, but he does smile.

939
00:58:02,441 --> 00:58:07,277
We build these artificialities in the world we live in today.

940
00:58:07,915 --> 00:58:10,412
We've got to interfere and change things.

941
00:58:10,552 --> 00:58:13,474
Those of you who would like to know more about The Venus Project

942
00:58:13,790 --> 00:58:16,203
we have a video, a tape and a book introducing

943
00:58:19,321 --> 00:58:22,768
the basic conceptual layout of what it's about.

944
00:58:23,166 --> 00:58:27,239
Any other questions? I can't go into more detail. Yes?

945
00:58:27,379 --> 00:58:30,168
(Audience member #2) I find your views about the future interesting

946
00:58:30,308 --> 00:58:32,817
but how do you account for human nature?

947
00:58:32,957 --> 00:58:36,250
How do I account for what? - Human nature.

948
00:58:36,823 --> 00:58:40,743
Human nature is the way people

949
00:58:41,472 --> 00:58:46,336
have found other people to behave over many long years.

950
00:58:46,708 --> 00:58:50,856
They appeared to manifest greed, jealousy

951
00:58:51,219 --> 00:58:55,043
envy, even animals. If you take a cat

952
00:58:55,183 --> 00:58:59,106
and put it on your lap in the presence of the dog

953
00:58:59,525 --> 00:59:01,909
the dog may growl.

954
00:59:02,049 --> 00:59:06,576
And the psychologist [says]: "That's what I mean by the nature of the beast."

955
00:59:07,336 --> 00:59:10,395
So I said "Come on down to my lab in about a week."

956
00:59:10,535 --> 00:59:15,509
I picked up my cat put it on my lap and the dog's tail starts wagging

957
00:59:15,649 --> 00:59:19,973
because you reinforce the dog before you pick up the cat.

958
00:59:20,113 --> 00:59:23,154
The cat is a threat to the dog's security.

959
00:59:23,548 --> 00:59:27,572
The dog wants you to pet it, not the cat.

960
00:59:27,712 --> 00:59:30,628
You give the dog these ambivalent feelings

961
00:59:30,768 --> 00:59:33,978
but you can have 15 kids in the room without jealousy

962
00:59:34,118 --> 00:59:36,963
without envy. It is not human nature

963
00:59:37,103 --> 00:59:41,057
it's human behavior that's shaped by culture.

964
00:59:42,602 --> 00:59:45,145
If you were brought up in China, years ago

965
00:59:45,285 --> 00:59:49,571
you'd walk with your hands in your sleeves, shuffle and wear a long pigtail.

966
00:59:49,887 --> 00:59:52,068
They say "Well, that's human nature." It's not.

967
00:59:52,208 --> 00:59:55,211
That's the influence of environment on your behavior.

968
00:59:55,646 --> 00:59:58,406
Dancing is the same thing.

969
00:59:58,546 --> 01:00:02,819
Dances change over a period of time. Music changes overtime.

970
01:00:03,883 --> 01:00:07,212
There is really no human nature.

971
01:00:07,352 --> 01:00:12,780
Think about it. Toss it around. There are varying degrees of human behavior.

972
01:00:12,920 --> 01:00:17,856
If we wish to understand the factors that generate our value system

973
01:00:18,288 --> 01:00:20,775
that generate the way we look at the world

974
01:00:20,915 --> 01:00:23,543
we have to go back in time and study these things.

975
01:00:23,683 --> 01:00:27,079
I'm sorry I can't go into much more detail

976
01:00:27,219 --> 01:00:31,942
just a general overview of The Venus Project. Yes?

977
01:00:32,242 --> 01:00:35,934
(Audience member #3) You mention a universal language. Are you speaking about Esperanto?

978
01:00:36,074 --> 01:00:38,890
- No that wouldn't do. Or interlingua?

979
01:00:39,030 --> 01:00:43,431
No that wouldn't do. The language has to have a physical reference.

980
01:00:43,979 --> 01:00:47,270
That means that...

981
01:00:48,208 --> 01:00:51,218
Suppose we took some tungsten

982
01:00:51,358 --> 01:00:53,817
and hit it with high pitch sound.

983
01:00:54,121 --> 01:00:57,553
Bouncing off that tungsten, a pattern occurred

984
01:00:57,693 --> 01:01:00,790
on a screen that looked like that.

985
01:01:01,754 --> 01:01:04,791
Now if this was the nickel, this was the iron

986
01:01:04,931 --> 01:01:08,089
and we learned how to chart that pattern

987
01:01:08,229 --> 01:01:12,125
when you wrote tungsten, you'd do this in the future

988
01:01:12,265 --> 01:01:16,916
so it's always like chemistry, like a pharmacologist

989
01:01:17,056 --> 01:01:20,653
reads a prescription (assuming the doctor's handwriting is good):

990
01:01:20,897 --> 01:01:23,619
He looks at that prescription and picks up the same product.

991
01:01:23,816 --> 01:01:27,054
We don't want individuality in that area.

992
01:01:27,194 --> 01:01:29,497
We want uniformity.

993
01:01:29,637 --> 01:01:32,953
Is there a place for individuality?

994
01:01:33,325 --> 01:01:36,567
In the next few years, the word individuality

995
01:01:36,707 --> 01:01:41,190
will go the way all the other crude and vulgar terms went.

996
01:01:41,972 --> 01:01:45,369
Individuality... When you buy a Mercedes, if you can afford it

997
01:01:46,032 --> 01:01:49,808
and you turn the key, you want it to start. Not sometimes, all the time.

998
01:01:49,948 --> 01:01:52,035
When you turn, you want it to turn.

999
01:01:52,175 --> 01:01:54,911
When you put the breaks on, you want it to stop.

1000
01:01:55,051 --> 01:01:58,386
It's called quality control.

1001
01:01:58,967 --> 01:02:01,330
Variations in human behavior

1002
01:02:01,470 --> 01:02:04,357
which we call individuality today

1003
01:02:04,497 --> 01:02:07,091
is poor quality control.

1004
01:02:07,629 --> 01:02:13,047
In the future, the question people will ask is: Then wouldn't everybody be uniform?

1005
01:02:13,579 --> 01:02:17,311
The question of uniformity is essentially this: They will uniformly

1006
01:02:17,451 --> 01:02:22,557
like anyone they meet. Uniformity: share ideas and resources.

1007
01:02:23,077 --> 01:02:25,886
Uniformity: share knowledge with everyone else.

1008
01:02:26,171 --> 01:02:28,805
Uniformity: courteous to everyone else.

1009
01:02:28,945 --> 01:02:33,425
That's the only kind of uniformity. As far as the accumulation of wealth

1010
01:02:33,688 --> 01:02:37,949
property and power, this would be considered part of the age

1011
01:02:38,089 --> 01:02:41,829
of the vulgarians. To us, this is all normal!

1012
01:02:41,969 --> 01:02:45,366
This is a thing to do: to become successful.

1013
01:02:46,001 --> 01:02:49,405
In my early days, I wanted to be successful

1014
01:02:49,545 --> 01:02:51,766
and a company came to me and said

1015
01:02:51,906 --> 01:02:55,975
"We have a bunch of Mexican and Indian women that sit at a conveyor belt.

1016
01:02:56,115 --> 01:03:00,022
They pick the black beans. They pick the white beans, throw them in another box"

1017
01:03:00,162 --> 01:03:02,962
and they said "Can you improve that?"

1018
01:03:03,102 --> 01:03:05,713
I said "How far do you want to go?

1019
01:03:06,542 --> 01:03:09,646
How many beans can you deliver?" What I did in the early days

1020
01:03:09,786 --> 01:03:13,109
is I built a big bicycle wheel with hollow spokes

1021
01:03:13,249 --> 01:03:16,215
that turned like an airplane propeller into a vat of beans

1022
01:03:16,355 --> 01:03:20,024
sucking up one bean to each vacuum tube.

1023
01:03:20,164 --> 01:03:22,362
Then there was a photoelectric cell here.

1024
01:03:22,502 --> 01:03:24,991
If the bean was black it tripped it with a wire.

1025
01:03:25,131 --> 01:03:28,622
As you sit and watch, those beans went up like this in a big vat

1026
01:03:28,762 --> 01:03:32,178
and in eight hours we did the work that 50 women

1027
01:03:32,318 --> 01:03:34,686
took three months to do.

1028
01:03:35,315 --> 01:03:38,434
I would like my machines to come in

1029
01:03:38,574 --> 01:03:40,877
but I would like them to get a shorter work day

1030
01:03:41,017 --> 01:03:43,779
an increase in purchasing power. If machines

1031
01:03:43,919 --> 01:03:47,654
don't improve the lives of people who work in automobile factories

1032
01:03:47,794 --> 01:03:51,239
if they're automated out of existence, so will you be

1033
01:03:51,379 --> 01:03:54,045
automated out of existence.

1034
01:03:54,185 --> 01:03:59,137
All of us can be automated out... Roxanne recently had some area...

1035
01:03:59,488 --> 01:04:02,460
She does architectural renderings and site plans.

1036
01:04:02,600 --> 01:04:06,567
There are machines that do that, some years ago, CAD.

1037
01:04:06,707 --> 01:04:08,903
There are machines today that make models.

1038
01:04:09,213 --> 01:04:12,930
If you take a vase, you put it on the table and it's scanned

1039
01:04:13,070 --> 01:04:15,110
they have a laser beam

1040
01:04:15,250 --> 01:04:18,448
that penetrates a fluid and solidifies that fluid

1041
01:04:18,588 --> 01:04:21,085
in the exact shape of that vase.

1042
01:04:21,225 --> 01:04:24,372
You can do in England, China, anywhere in the world.

1043
01:04:24,900 --> 01:04:30,231
I want to repeat this: Machines today (that is three months ago)

1044
01:04:30,371 --> 01:04:34,708
could handle 500 trillion bits of information per second.

1045
01:04:34,848 --> 01:04:38,653
I don't care how many humans you get together. There's no place

1046
01:04:38,793 --> 01:04:42,357
for human behavior in the next 20 years. There's no place

1047
01:04:42,497 --> 01:04:46,564
for human participation in the next 20 years, or maybe less.

1048
01:04:47,261 --> 01:04:50,193
No one can predict the future precisely.

1049
01:04:50,333 --> 01:04:53,963
I'm not gentle. I don't pull my punches, I can't afford it.

1050
01:04:54,103 --> 01:04:56,459
I respect you. I like you too much.

1051
01:04:56,599 --> 01:04:58,949
I would rather tell you things as they are

1052
01:04:59,089 --> 01:05:01,510
not generate additional illusions.