Question

Thompson Walker entitled "What Fear Can Teach Us."

Please answer the following questions about the TED Talk.

1. What is the speaker's main argument? Or what is her thesis?
2. Name at least 3 specific examples/pieces of evidence she uses to support her argument?
3. What was the biggest takeaway that you had from this video? What interested you the most?

Answer 1

1. The speaker argues that fears can be equated to stories about the future we tell ourselves.

2. In order to support her analogy between fear and stories, the author uses the following points:

• Like all stories, fears have characters. In our fears, the characters are us.Fears also have plots. They have beginnings and middles and ends.
• Fears also tend to contain imagery that can be every bit as vivid as what one might find in the pages of a novel.
• Fears also have suspense and provoke in us a form of suspense similar to a storyteller.

3. This talk enabled me to change my perspective of fear altogether. The analogy of fear being nothing more than a story makes so much sense to me because fears are oriented to the future, they have never actually taken place. Yet their effects can be so drastic and delibitating that it risks ruining our present moment. The next time I experience fear, I would definitely attempt to remember what was shared in this talk.