WEBVTT 00:00:00.207 --> 00:00:03.723 (Dan Ariely) ♫ Wise men say...♫ 00:00:03.723 --> 00:00:07.381 No. Should I sing? Not really, uh? 00:00:07.381 --> 00:00:10.290 (A woman, off, laughs, then:) No, really you shouldn't sing, no. 00:00:10.290 --> 00:00:11.998 (Ariely) This is Aileen saying I shouldn't sing. 00:00:13.529 --> 00:00:18.013 So, I try all kinds of things, sometimes they work, sometimes they don't. 00:00:18.013 --> 00:00:19.922 Singing, clearly, is not one of them. 00:00:21.250 --> 00:00:24.980 I wanted to thank you for taking this class. 00:00:25.461 --> 00:00:28.625 As you can see, I'm unshaved and tired. 00:00:28.625 --> 00:00:31.705 It's because it has been a very long period. 00:00:32.803 --> 00:00:37.354 It was taxing and demanding, but also very enjoyable. 00:00:37.765 --> 00:00:42.126 But I want to link something, kind of broad, about the experience, 00:00:42.613 --> 00:00:44.917 to something we learned about. 00:00:45.728 --> 00:00:47.327 So you remember the principle of loss of urging. 00:00:47.327 --> 00:00:52.237 The principle of loss of urging is that we suffer more from negative things 00:00:52.237 --> 00:00:53.696 than we enjoy positive things. 00:00:53.696 --> 00:00:57.708 And it is this asymmetry that going below is painful, 00:00:57.708 --> 00:01:01.112 going above is just not that happy. 00:01:01.370 --> 00:01:05.277 And I discovered that, of course, we all experience it in our day-to-day lives. 00:01:05.277 --> 00:01:10.150 For me, one of the strongest case was when I wrote my first book. 00:01:10.150 --> 00:01:12.031 Mostly, I got very good reviews, 00:01:12.031 --> 00:01:15.796 but there was one review that was just terrible. 00:01:15.796 --> 00:01:16.759 And you know what? 00:01:16.759 --> 00:01:22.340 I remember that review in much more detail than I remember the positive ones, 00:01:22.340 --> 00:01:25.819 which is our tendency to focus on the negative things. 00:01:26.304 --> 00:01:30.781 And actually, the same thing, basically, happened in the class. 00:01:30.781 --> 00:01:34.797 You know, from time to time, we had people in the class who complained. 00:01:35.299 --> 00:01:37.671 And we had people who complained on the fora, 00:01:38.633 --> 00:01:40.496 we had people who called Duke, 00:01:40.496 --> 00:01:45.025 we had a few people who kind of made our lives very, very difficult 00:01:45.025 --> 00:01:47.244 and if I think about the balance, 00:01:47.571 --> 00:01:51.305 then most of you have been appreciative, and fantastic, and helpful, 00:01:51.663 --> 00:01:53.675 very few have been negative, 00:01:53.675 --> 00:01:58.475 but the problem is that the negative comments loom so large. 00:01:58.475 --> 00:02:03.110 The vast, vast, vast majority of you were so helpful, and 00:02:04.242 --> 00:02:08.234 kind of, I felt, came to the rescue, then basically tried to even out 00:02:09.454 --> 00:02:15.962 the forces of ev--- no, tried to even out the negative comments. 00:02:15.962 --> 00:02:19.419 And I really appreciated this, you know, this is an effort that we're doing 00:02:20.429 --> 00:02:26.757 out of our feeling of camaraderie and participation and helpfulness 00:02:26.757 --> 00:02:32.073 and we are delighting in participating in this community 00:02:32.073 --> 00:02:36.376 that formed together for a few weeks to study together social science 00:02:36.376 --> 00:02:38.715 and learn and reflect and think together, 00:02:38.715 --> 00:02:40.511 and it's been a great experience. 00:02:41.127 --> 00:02:45.002 And there is no question that I'm paying much more attention 00:02:45.468 --> 00:02:47.310 to the negative comments, and there is no question 00:02:47.310 --> 00:02:50.726 that they've impacted my well-being in the last few weeks, 00:02:50.726 --> 00:02:55.226 and all the people who have been involved in the class for the last few weeks 00:02:55.226 --> 00:02:59.474 to a larger degree, but I do think incredibly fondly about 00:02:59.474 --> 00:03:01.570 the people who have been positive 00:03:01.570 --> 00:03:06.477 and I think, this has been such a force of good and you know, 00:03:06.477 --> 00:03:08.801 I think this is one of the things that is incredibly important: 00:03:09.367 --> 00:03:11.178 how do we create a community? 00:03:11.178 --> 00:03:14.365 How do we create a community that, even when there's some outliers 00:03:14.801 --> 00:03:18.074 who try to make things not as good for everybody, 00:03:18.074 --> 00:03:22.549 how do we make sure the community strives and continues and so on? 00:03:22.549 --> 00:03:25.084 And you know, we do learn from the bad, so that's good, 00:03:25.427 --> 00:03:28.987 but I do want to remember the positive. 00:03:29.747 --> 00:03:33.049 So, what is the big positive positive? 00:03:33.772 --> 00:03:37.238 I'll tell you, when I look at the activity around, 00:03:37.461 --> 00:03:41.090 I feel that we've created a community of people who care about research 00:03:41.090 --> 00:03:42.863 and people who care about each other, 00:03:42.863 --> 00:03:45.219 and people who are interested in the same topic: 00:03:45.219 --> 00:03:49.720 we gathered around the world, and people spent a substantial amount of time 00:03:50.811 --> 00:03:55.252 listening to me, talking to each other, reading papers. 00:03:55.728 --> 00:03:58.240 And that kind of activity, 00:03:58.240 --> 00:04:01.882 that kind of ability for people to get together across the world and do something 00:04:01.882 --> 00:04:05.897 together in social science is really exciting. 00:04:06.523 --> 00:04:11.754 And that, for me, is the biggest positive impact, and I thank you all 00:04:12.249 --> 00:04:14.896 -- save for a few of you -- for participate in it. 00:04:15.696 --> 00:04:18.496 So thank you very much. Now I'm going to sleep for a few days 00:04:18.858 --> 00:04:22.019 and hopefully, we'll see you online at some point. 00:04:22.419 --> 00:04:23.734 Bye for now. 00:04:23.734 --> 00:04:34.351 ♫ Wise men say: only fools rush in♫ ♫but I...♫ 00:04:34.351 --> 00:04:40.481 [cah Center for Advanced Hindsight an advanced insight production]