Translator: Daria Weryńska Reviewer: Rhonda Jacobs
So, I'm happy to be here,
but it's quite selfish on my part because I don't know if you will be happy
because I saw the little thing at the introduction about TED
at the beginning, and it said 'This is exciting thing!
[You're going to hear] exciting things!'
And that's not exactly my cup of tea.
(Laughter)
I was explaining - I think there was a little misunderstanding
between the organisers and me
because they saw me yesterday and said, 'How much time you want?'
'Oh, okay, 18 minutes, I'll take 18 minutes.'
And then yesterday, they said, 'Okay, do your thing.' I did my thing.
And after they told me,
'You sure you don't want to reduce it to, like, 12 minutes?'
You know, they -
'Oh, so this is kind of boring what I'm doing', you know?
'Yeah, we would not use these words.'
'Yeah, I know you wouldn't use these words', you know?
Human beings have a habit,
when they see a cat, they don't want to call it a cat.
You know, they want to call it, like, a dog with a little moustache,
it does 'meow', you know?
(Laughter)
We have a habit of -
well, there is a philosopher,
American philosopher who wrote an article -
re-description; we re-describe.
I'll give you an example, for people who think it's a bit abstract.
You know, somebody is a miser, you know, a scrooge,
somebody that gives nothing to no one.
So, everybody calls him the miser, the scrooge.
But him? If you ask him 'Are you a miser?'
He says, 'No, I would not use this word.
I would say I'm prudent; I am rational.
I think about the future, but I'm not a miser.'
The Greeks had a word for that, they called it 'tragic irony'.
Now, what is tragic irony?
It comes from the Greek theater,
where you had a play with actors,
and each actor has a 'persona', a person - it's a mask.
The persona was a mask, and each actor has a mask
and this mask tells who he is,
like, 'I'm Zeus, I have a Zeus mask.'
I don't know what he looks like but 'I have a Zeus mask.'
Now, the thing with tragic irony
is that everybody knows how this person is.
Like Zeus is a horny bastard, just call it like that.
He's a horny bastard.
But Zeus doesn't think he's a horny bastard.
He thinks he's a nice guy, he's fun ...
but everybody calls him the horny bastard.
The tragic irony is that the other gods know Zeus is a horny bastard.
The spectators know Zeus is a horny bastard.
There's only one person that doesn't know he's a horny bastard.
It's Zeus himself, you see?
(Laughter)
That reminds you of something? Because you laugh so hard, you know, wow!
You remember, right? Okay.
So anyway, this tragic irony is like we don't want to call a cat a cat,
especially when we are a cat, you see?
We want to call it anything what sounds good, you know?
So that comes the idea of expectations, you see?
I'm being very prudent because you have expectations.
You want to be excited.
I saw the thing before - it's very exciting, you know?
You're going to reproduce in your own house, your drugs.
You might even reproduce yourself, you know, did you see this?
Next, you're going to have a 3-D printer,
and say, 'Okay, I'll make a couple of me today, you know?'
Probably you might fight with them, that's the only problem,
because in general we're rather unbearable for ourselves, right?
But, anyway, that's very exciting. It's true, it's exciting.
So, to be a little bit blunt, I'm going to invite you to be bored now.
Experience in boredom - to be bored, alright.
Now, I know one of the previous speakers says it's not good to be bored,
and children don't learn when they're bored.
That is true, but at the same time it's some of the rare experiences
I think can be interesting, so -
And that's why I didn't want to reduce it to 12 minutes, you see?
Because to be really bored, it's like an experience
you have to - it needs some time.
You have to install yourself in boredom.
If boredom lasts, like, one minute, you know, you don't really get bored.
But, like, 18 minutes, which was a maximum?
If I could have taken 3 hours, I would have taken it,
then you really get into profound boredom, you know?
Like you're stuck with yourself.
All you have is you.
This is pretty horrible, you know?
That's why most people, they like a lot of stuff, you know?
People love all kinds of exciting stuff - company, friends.
And with the Internet, you know, that's what's amazing now,
you can never be alone.
And the phone - there's a thing they call the cellular phone.
I don't know if you heard about it.
I call it the devil's instrument.
I think the devil really invented it, the cellular phone.
The devil does good things, you know? It's not only bad things, you know?
Some say that the devil invented sex, for example.
So, that's possible.
So it's a devil's instrument
because I heard, I don't know if it's true, and it happens in Poland,
but people are so addicted to their telephone
that they actually sleep with it.
You know, some people, they actually sleep with their telephone!
Who believes that?
Maybe that doesn't happen here. They put it under their pillow, or ...
I don't know what they do. I don't want to get into dirty details.
But they sleep with their phone! You know?
Once, I met a person like that, I said, 'Do you actually sleep with your phone?'
And she said, 'Yes!' I said 'Why?'
And she said, 'Well, because I use it to wake up.'
Well, yeah, right, give it to me -
Like, you know, 'I slept with this guy.'
'Why did you sleep with him?'
'So he would wake me up in the morning.'
(Laughter)
I mean, wow, this sounds, like, really credible, you know?
'I cannot wake up in the morning, so I pick up guys, I go to a night club,
I pick up people - "Just wake me up. I cannot wake up"', you know?
It's quite amazing.
What people would invent to lie to themselves, right?
So anyway, they've got this phone with them, right?
Now, this phone, from what I understand,
they're connected to, like, seven billion people -
it's exciting, that's true -
including one billion, three hundred million Chinese,
who can call you at any time, you know?
At night - you don't feel lonely anymore, you know, that's true.
But you don't get bored, you see, and that's the problem.
Although, the paradox, you might get bored of your phone, you know?
But I see some people - they walk around with their phones in their hands.
They walk in the street, they have the phone -
For some moment when I've seen this,
I thought the person actually was, like, part of the [apparatus]
just to hold the phone.
It's actually a walking phone.
And there was somebody who was like, you know -
reproduced by a 3-D machine,
that's supposed to walk the phone around, you know?
This phone has autonomous life.
It walks around, and there's someone, you know, like -
Some people are paid to walk dogs, you know this?
You pay them, and they take a walk with your dog to take a little shit.
So apparently they have people now, they walk your phone.
So the phone goes around and you see them -
And actually it's well organised
because when the phone rings they answer it, say, 'Hello' - so anyway.
So human beings do anything not to get bored.
You know, to face yourself, it's like to get up in the morning,
you go in the mirror, you see yourself.
Most people get depressed, you know?
And how do you know? Is that they rush to do things, you know?
They comb their hair, they shave.
Apparently some even put make-up.
You know, they put red, green, purple, all kinds of stuff, you know?
Some even put rings, you know, like in the nose, in ears, in anything.
Anything not to see yourself.
Anything to make yourself special.
Anything not to be tête-à-tête with yourself.
So I hope you're starting to get bored a little bit, you know?
If you're not, I'll try harder.
(Laughter)
So anyway -
well, it's already almost half the time,
maybe I should start what I was supposed to do.
(Laughter)
Preambles are nice,
but sometimes you've got to go get to the real stuff, you know?
I guess that the translation in Polish
of a preamble and the real stuff was not exactly good.
It was a sex joke.
You're supposed to laugh when there's something about sex.
People are supposed to laugh but nobody laughed.
Translation is a problem.
Translation: it was about sex.
First, preambles, but then get to the real stuff.
It's not working, it doesn't matter.
One thing I discovered about Poland - it's a very moral country - very moral.
I hope you don't mind.
I travel a lot all over the world,
and I try to, when I go to someplace, figure out how it works, you know?
And if you don't mind, I check Wikipedia, like everybody.
The truth is in Wikipedia.
So you check Wikipedia. It's true, plus it's short, you know?
That's what's good about Wikipedia truth, you know?
You know all the truth, like, in couple of pages.
And you can know all the truth about Poland in two pages,
so, you know, this way you look smart.
So I found two very interesting things about Poland in Wikipedia.
First thing they put, you know, they start with the history.
And what's a title of Poland history? 'A tragic history', you know?
So when I come to Poland, I know I come in a tragic historical place.
And this was confirmed because I did many workshop with children.
And I've done it in many countries,
and it's probably the country where most children cried.
It's true, yes, they cried.
And you know the funny thing?
When children cry here in Warsaw, you don't have to do much.
You ask them - like, what I do, I write books about problems,
so I ask the child, 'Is there a problem in your life?'
And they start crying!
(Laughter)
I say, 'What happened? I thought problems were fun.'
You know, you say, 'I have a problem', right?
But no, they cried, and when they cried, the adults, they started going (Exhales),
you know, they're going to cry too.
Or, the reverse, they get angry, which is the same thing, right?
It's forbidden to cry in Poland, for some reason.
So they cry a lot, but it's forbidden to cry.
So it's a very strong moral thing.
I have to start. This thing keeps going.
6:31, 6:30, okay.
So why did we kill Socrates, you know?
Well, that's a good question.
Why did we kill Socrates? Did we actually kill Socrates?
So really, I realise this may be a strong presupposition in the questions.
But we do this a lot, right?
We ask someone, 'Did you stop beating up your wife?'
The guy says, 'Well, maybe I never beat up my wife but ...'
we do this, we ask questions.
I call them teacher's questions - full of presupposition.
There's all kinds of knowledge, then we ask questions.
Socrates, he likes stupid questions, really stupid.
He calls it ignorance.
And there's a philosopher called Cusa, who says you have to learn to be ignorant.
So let's suppose that we accept the proposition that we killed Socrates.
Well, we're not Athenians here,
so we know we were not responsible despite the original sin, you know?
It's very important, I'm in a Catholic country, I'm conscious of that.
But why we killed Socrates?
Well, there were a few accusations on Socrates.
One: He was perverting the youth.
Now, how did he pervert the youth?
By asking questions, right?
So I have been writing books, philosophy, but they're not for children.
I think - the very nice man that presented, he believes lies.
This is not truth. This is a publishers' lie.
It's actually made for their parents.
But if I say it's for the parents, they will never buy the books,
and I have to sell those books, I have to feed my children, right?
In fact, you can buy them outside, you know.
(Laughs)
So I say, 'It's for the children', so the parents say,
'Oh, good it's for the children,
let's buy the questions for the children.'
But no, I hope that the parents will read the questions, ask themselves,
like 'Is your life worth anything?'
'Do you make children for yourself or for themselves?'
Because we all know the big lie that we love our children.
We don't love our children. We love ourselves!
And we make children because we want to exist a little bit more.
And probably in a few years we won't make children,
we'll reproduce ourselves directly.
Because our children are very disappointing,
they're not exactly what we want, you know?
We wanted a doctor and we get, I don't know, a pop singer, you know?
Not good, right?
So anyway, perverting the youth, yes, he was perverting youth.
The second thing, because I won't have time.
This is frightening, this time thing.
I'm sorry, this feels stressed.
And now the very important accusation:
'You force me to say what I don't want to say.'
Now, I don't trust the translation. I'll repeat:
'You force me to say what I don't want to say.'
Now, if you notice -
and I travel all over, try to confirm that in every country,
it's definitely the case in Poland as well -
if you ask important important questions to people, they will not answer you.
They will answer anything, but - sounds a bit like this story.
You know, 'Are you going fishing?'
'No, I'm going fishing.'
'Oh, sorry, I thought you were going fishing.'
Like standard - this was supposed to be funny, sorry.
(Laughter)
You know, I asked the people in Warsaw, 'How come you don't laugh at my jokes?'
They said, 'Well ...' finally - nobody spoke.
They go, (Brrr), like that.
Finally somebody said, 'We have to explain to you something.
You're a philosopher, so we think things are deep.
We want deep things, we expect you to be deep.
Like, you say deep things; we say deep things.
We're still trying to think what's deep in your joke.'
Well, never mind the deep, just listen.
It's running out of time.
Why did we kill Socrates?
Well, he wanted the truth.
It's simple. He wanted the truth.
And what's the first truth with him?
Know thyself. Know who you are.
He says,'Know who you are, you will know the gods and the universe.'
That's a condition.
Not only is it a condition, but that's sufficient in itself -
if you know yourself.
But to know yourself doesn't mean
'When I was a little boy, my grandmother gave me chocolate cookies.'
No. That's to know what is essential in you.
You know, all the stuff you forget.
Because you go to work, you make children, you fall in love,
you go shopping, you play with your computer -
You forget, who the hell are you?
Why are you here?
Why don't you kill yourself?
You have one good reason not to kill yourself?
All these people that complain and complain,
how they're victims of society,
of their family, of their boss ...
Why don't you kill yourself?
Unless you have a good reason,
why do you decide that you will live every day, right?
So, stupid questions. Simple questions.
And this was unbearable.
Now, Socrates made a mistake but it's not his fault.
He stayed in Athens, all his life, you know?
And so they killed him, because people were tired.
You cannot go to the supermarket, or others: 'I have a question for you!
What is good, what is bad?'
But today, it is easier to travel. Like, tomorrow I'm gone.
So if anybody wants to kill me here, tomorrow I'm gone.
By the time he realises that it's a poisoned gift,
this Socratic tradition, I'll be gone.
So you do what everybody can to kill me, and I have to protect myself.
I'm a father, I need to take care of my children.
So I don't want to die right away, and I have 56 seconds left to fill.
So anyway, we kill Socrates because truth is unbearable.
This is for the ones who still did not understand.
Truth is unbearable, and most of our life we build expectations
about who we would like to be - I'd like to be Batman, well ...
And we start confusing what we want to be with who we are.
And so if anybody asks you a question to check who you are
and not what you want to be - this is unbearable.
And you want to kill.
And that's the reason, I'm sure, for most divorces,
and most parents disappointed with their children.
So since there's 13 second left, you're going to have 13 second of free time.
Thank you very much.
(Applause)