The case against "good" and "bad" - Marlee Neel

View full lesson: http://ed.ted.com/lessons/the-case-ag...

Don't take the easy route! Instead, use this little trick to improve your writing -- let go of the words "good" and "bad," and push yourself to illustrate, elucidate and illuminate your world with language.

Lesson by Marlee Neel, animation by The STUDIO.

• Category

  Education

[Don Ren]

This video is pretty good, not bad at all.

[John Myung]

Also, I feel like this lady doesn't understand language very well.

Good and bad is simply used to describe if something is pleasant or unpleasant to a person, and isn't necessarily a lie or laziness. It sounded like she just wants everything to be described with a simile rather than brief adjectives.

[ThatGuyWithADD]

yea............ they are, but i would say that the simplicity is dangerous because those words are giving a scale by each person that might be hard to interpret; context!

i say how good is good and how bad is bad.

your shirt looks bad.

murder of the whole human race is bad.

in both of these simple examples, bad is scaled differently. each bad represent a different level of "bad"

as the human race evolves so must out language to help better stultify a solid communication between individuals

[John Myung]

There's nothing vague about describing something as being good or bad. It's completely objective.

She was saying in this video that she wants everything to be described as a simile. "I feel like a herd of wombats have taken up in my chest."

Not to mention this painfully drags on and on. After the first minute, it's like, "I get it. You don't need to keep on repeating your statement. We know. We get it."

This is just unfunny, dull, and inaccurate.

[Kamal Dhillon]

this is one of my favourite videos, very eye opening.

[nutmugable]

I was gobsmacked on the amount of desperation this woman wanting to find faults in vocabulary.

[darkchakara]

this one was bad.like i didnt like it at all.I dont even agree with the concept. The words good and bad arent bad words,words dat make us lazy and not ineffective communicators.We as ppl are the ones who are lazy or not wanting to take all dat time to say something and learn and use bigger words.not everyone is creative and full of vigor. keep it simple,and cherish d folk who are special and can use all these dazzling words

[test123ok]

english majors ....hmph... back to the science videos !

[pazful]

I guess her point is that these words are so vague that no longer mean anything at all. Even your words pleasant and unpleasant are more descriptive.

Plus, she's just using this video to exaggerate her message of "be more descriptive", and not being literal

[Sophie R]

This is seriously one of the best videos I've ever seen! In all my years at school I've never learned anything nearly as useful as this, nor were my previous lessons as captivating and well-organized. Your voice drew me in and encouraged me to expand my knowledge of writing, so thank you very much! Fantastic job!

[I.Özgür Sucu]

nah...

[MrSharkwings]

This video is bad