- Hey, welcome back. Today I'll be reacting to a little piece of a Jordan Peterson lecture. So this is not one of his
political conversations. This is just a few minutes
of a lecture that he's giving in one of his high level classes
on intelligence as a trait. It's a fairly sophisticated topic, we really won't be trying
to figure out exactly what he's saying, 'cause
he's in the middle of this. But the point is I'm not picking a political speech for a reason. That's not what this channel's about, I don't comment on it, I don't make videos about politics. There are plenty of
other channels for that. And if you're interested in
that, then please go find them. We're gonna talk about
his communication skills. Jordan Peterson is known to be a very compelling communicator, and I'd like to unpack
exactly why that is. And that's what this channel is all about. Communication, leadership
skills, public speaking. So let's get into this and see how he does and what makes him so compelling. - So the first issue is how
should you look at things? Well, that's a problem that
intelligence has to solve. So that's one of the problems
that intelligence goes after. And then I think what happens is we have the thing in itself, and then we simplify it with a perception, and that's like an iconic representation. And then we nail the iconic
representation with a word. And that's how we compress
the world's complexity into something that we can manage. We take the complex thing, make it into an icon, and
represent the icon with a word. And then when I throw
you the word so to speak, you decompose it into the icon, and then decompose it even
further into the thing. If you can, if you know the
icon, and you know the thing. - Okay, so right away he's really illustrative with
his gestures and his body. He's bringing everything
to life through the way he moves his hands to make
something a little bit abstract, which is intelligence as a trait. And he's trying to decode it and illustrate it with his gestures. In fact, these gestures
are called illustrators. They don't have a specific meaning. This doesn't mean anything
apart from the words he's using. There's another kind of
gesture called an emblem, like a peace sign. It has a specific meaning. He's just using lots of illustrators. Now I would say one out of 10, one out of 20 people would say, oh he's talking with his hands too much. That tends to bother a
small percentage of people. Most people, however, in the
lecture hall and watching, like gestures because it's animated and it's more engaging to look at. So he's doing excellent gestures. - Well, then we can use shorthand, right? Because you have representational
structures and so do I, and I'm just tossing you markers about your representational structures and you can unfold them. That's what you do when
you're reading a novel. Because the novel comes
alive in your imagination in your own idiosyncratic way. And it wouldn't if you didn't understand the references of the novel, right? The novelist has to assume that your basic perceptual
structures, and your intuitions, and your instincts are basically
the same as his or hers, because otherwise they
have to assume that, because otherwise they would
be lost in an infinite regress. - Okay, so here's
another thing he's doing. In addition to the gestures he's using his movement really well. So he's working the room, you might say. He's starting on one
side, he makes a point. And then he walks a few paces, stands there and makes a point, walks a little further, makes a point. So he's connecting with people in different parts of the room. He's working the room, working the stage. This would be, imagine what it was like if he were standing behind
that podium the whole time. This would have a whole different feel, a real lower energy level. But his moving around, his
walking around with a purpose really emphasizes his message. He's not simply pacing. I noticed that he's stopping
when he makes the key point. He's not just walking through
and pacing through key points. He stops when he wants to say
something really important and looks at people. - The explanation. So it's problematic often, for example, if you start reading Victorian novels you may find that it takes a while to get into them because
the presuppositions, the expectations are slightly different and so is the language. - Okay look at him right here. He is looking right at people. His eye contact is excellent. So he's moving his body and stopping, and he's also looking at
people when he makes a point. And I always recommend, he's doing exactly what I would recommend. And that is, he is looking at someone long enough to make a point, let's say half a sentence to a sentence, three to five seconds. And then he's moving
on to the next person, three to five seconds. And he's moving onto the next person. He's not staring at one
person for a minute. That would make people uncomfortable. And he's also not just
darting around the room. Some people will say, oh, just
look over everybody's heads, and that way it'll seem
like you're looking at 'em. That doesn't really work. That's like a very beginner level tip to look over their heads to
help you with your nerves. He's looking right at people
and he's connecting with them. And no doubt, they feel that connection. You can see this accumulating, why he's such a compelling speaker - Have to update the representations. But anyway, so that's roughly,
as far as I'm concerned, that's roughly a representation of what intelligence
is doing in the world. It's a big part of it. It's how in the world
do you look at things so that you can use them for the purposes that
you need to use them for? And then the next problem
that intelligence has to solve which is related is, once you've got the perceptual
landscape sorted out how do you abstractly represent the action patterns that you're going
to implement in the world? So it's, how do you
perceive where you are now? How do you perceive where you're going? And how do you construct up, and then implement strategies
that enable you to move from where are to where you're going? - Okay see, we see this
all coming together now. His illustrative gestures, his movement, his solid eye contact. Now, one thing I wanna
mention that he's not doing is he's not staring
back at his visual aids. You notice that he's, some
speakers will look back at their visual aid the whole time. And there is a visual aid up there because earlier in the
video they showed it. But he's not looking back at it. Some people just turn,
literally turn their body, and they'll stare at the
visual aid the whole time. And they'll use it as notes. They'll sort of read off
it as if it's their notes. And that's really boring, it totally disconnects the
speaker from the audience. So keep in mind, there's
a visual aid up behind him this whole time that his
students may be glancing at. And that you'll see him
point at it here and there, but he's not staring at it. He's keeping that connection. I think that's one of the
reasons why he's so compelling. He is like the visual aid, right? He's coming to life here. Okay, let's keep watching,
this is excellent. - So it's a continual process
of mapping and movement. And so it's navigation. That's what we're doing
in the world all the time, is navigating through it
because we're mobile creatures. We're navigating through it, attempting to make the
world manifest itself in accordance with our wishes. And that's the fundamental problem that intelligence has to solve. And animals have their
perceptions to rely on, but we have our perceptions
and our ability to abstract from those perceptions multiple times, and then to abstract
finally into language. So we live in a very abstracted world. And it also means that
we can learn the lesson in one place and generalize
it across many other places, which is also something that
animals have a hard time doing. - So one last thing I'll notice is that if there's one sort of
criticism of Jordan Peterson is that he speaks in long
sentences, long thoughts. But as I've been listening, I'm noticing that he
is pausing for emphasis after key ideas. He gives a little one second beat, or a two second beat after key ideas and he lets them sink in a little bit. So he is breaking up his message somewhat, and that's a good tip for
all of us as public speakers. Make sure after you hit an important idea, you pause, and let it
sink in a little bit. Now if I were to give
him one little minor tip and who am I to give him a tip, you know, maybe pause a little more
often, but he is pausing. I've been listening and he
does pause after key ideas, and he really leans into those key moments so that you understand what
some of the main ideas are. So overall, I am really impressed with Jordan Peterson speaking. If I were in a lecture with him, think about the normal
teachers you've had, I would be on the edge of my seat. I don't even really follow
all of what he's saying here but I would be on the edge of my seat. Like, wow, this guy is passionate, he really believes in what he's saying, and he wants me to understand it. He wants me to get on board
and get excited about it too. And that's much easier to get excited about what a speaker is saying if they're coming across
like they're excited. So I can see why he gets
really high marks as a speaker. I've seen other presentations
and speeches by him, and they're very similar. He has a ton of energy, obviously
loves his subject matter. So I wanna tell you before we leave that I have a website, online classes, Communication Coach Academy that I would invite you to check out. I will put a link to that in the description below the video. And also, what are your comments on Jordan Peterson's presentation style? How he comes across. I would love to hear
your comments and also anybody else that you would
like to see me react to. I welcome those suggestions, I wanna give you stuff that you'll enjoy. And I look forward to
reading your comments below. Until next time, thanks, God bless,
