"Time to be more culturally fluid"
Every individual lives in their own world - in their own perception. This perception however is highly influenced by external factors. Factors that can be learnt or factors that people learn by experience.
PERCEPTION IS HIGHLY SUBJECTIVE AND MADE of two things: awareness and organization. Vitaly Golomb, who usually talks about startups, entrepreneurships and trends in technology as well as investment, focuses during his session at TEDx Talks on identity, culture and understading and presents on a very personal level, how these three are correlated.
Regarding the awareness aspect, the human brains works in an interesting way. It filters or better said it pre-selects information quite effectively and by doing so, the brain avoids an over-stimulation caused by multiple impulses and stimuli, i.e. one is not constantly aware of the clothes they are wearing or of the chair they are sitting on. These notions get filtered out as they are not important for the understanding of a certain situations or behaviours and would cloud the perception of what really matters. The world is not simple movements but a unit of meaning.
After the registration of impulses, the brain bundles these information and stores things that are similar together. The way people perceive things is driven by the knowledge each individual already has and which is highly influneced by each individual's cultural and behavioral background. This knowledge gets passed on to people through their ancestors but also through the media, TV, movies, books, etc. Another way to expand someones knowledge is by experience. How to behave in certain situations such as an job interview or a first date is based on experience. Knowledge and experience tell people what is normal, what is unusual or even special. This naturally differs between culturs, between countries, but also on a much smaller level between each and single on of the people on the planet. These differences might be less severe but can be noticeable. Information that get registered and consequently leads to a certain perception can involve behavior but also the physical surrounding such as clothes or architecture.
The first part of the presentation which was sumed up in the section above defined the theoretical basis. In the second part Vitaly Golomb has dealt very exemplarily with the concept of identity and mutual understanding. In a world characterized by internationality and gloablization, life becoms much more complex. These leads to many challenges - especially with regard to peaceful coexistence. Vitaly Golomb sees the solution in a more open and tolerant approach that is not limited to one's own identity. To understand how this can be achieved, watch the video below.