I recommend watching this short clip to anyone that likes TED talks.

I like TED talks. They are often very informative and expose you to interesting new areas of human endeavor and research. But if you get past the pretty wrapping, sometimes they’re pretty full of themselves. Other times, they aren’t saying anything more than what is already known, one person’s experience, or make unproven assertions in ways that wouldn’t be allowed in academic circles. Sometimes they even assert speculation as probable, or in the worst cases are thinly veiled business plans. That said, there is nothing inherently wrong with any of this.

The thing that is problematic is I have seen perfectly smart people sometimes check their objectivity and critical thought because … well… it’s a TED talk. There seems to be a culture of getting wrapped up in the culture of TED talks and accepting things too easily as fact. It’s a form of egotistical blindness in which one might subconsciously be saying, “I saw it on a TED talk, so that makes me smarter than others.” Or maybe a touch harshly, they get blinded by the showiness and check their thinking caps at the door.

This video does a PERFECT job of capturing all the presentation tropes and verbal cliché’s that stop even smart people from critically thinking about what they’re being presented. Hopefully, it allows you to separate the wrapping from the content.