Craig Wright talks about public speaking

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In his latest blog post, titled “On Talking,” Dr. Craig Wright explores public speaking and how we can apply concepts that relate to speaking to other areas of life and the economy. If you are reading this, then you have probably seen at least one of Dr. Wright’s presentations, and if you have not, you can watch one here:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Jc8u7bwsXJM&feature=emb_title&ab_channel=BitcoinAssociation

Dr. Wright is no stranger to public speaking;  

“I gave my first public speech more than 30 years ago,” he said. “Since then, I have given academic presentations and presentations to Parliament, talked to the House of Lords, and much more. I spoke at the invitation of the Oxford Union, and I do remember it well. Yet, it is not my speech that I remember, it is the room, and the people that had been there before, and what they had said as it would resound from the past…Every time I speak, I try to analyse what I said, and how, and how the audience reacted. And over time, as with every skill, you get better.”

Dr. Wright’s philosophy on speaking can be adopted and implied by anyone in areas of their life beyond speaking. When you take the time to analyze what you said or did, how it was delivered, and how it was received, you can indefinitely improve for the future based on your actions in the past.

Results speak louder than effort

Of course, would it really be an article from Dr. Wright if he did not find a way to draw parallels between the topic at hand and communism? 

“Thomas Sowell comes to mind as one of the better speakers whom I remember. I could also call out Churchill and even numerous others, whom no one would remember, though they should be remembered,” said Dr. Wright. “Sowell’s speech was vital. The socialist and Marxist concept that effort would matter more than output needs to be addressed, and he did it with tremendous style and grace.”

On that topic, Sewell says, 

The philosopher Pascal said that morality included a duty to think clearly. Clear thinking, in turn, included not confusing effort with results. If I practice singing as long and as conscientiously as Pavarotti, I will have as much merit as Pavarotti—but I will still not sing as well as Pavarotti. What other people can judge, in this case all too easily, is who sings better. That is all they should try to judge. Neither my personal effort nor his is known to them.

To which Dr. Wright notes,

“We don’t seem to say it any more, yet it is a message that needs to be repeated over and over again: it is not the effort that you make; it is the value you create for others. It does not matter how much labour you expend, but it is the quality of the output and how much other people value it which matters most.”

You might be wondering what this all means? If I had to guess, we should be thinking of this article in terms of producing in an economy. You can give an endeavor all the effort you want, but unless you have respectable results that you can show for, how hard you tried will not exactly matter—at least, not to most observers, especially when it comes to putting a value on your work and the impact it has on the world around you. That being said, maybe Dr. Wright is simply saying, talk is cheap, and that value creation is where we should begin the conversation on what something is worth, or rather, when we can actually begin to appraise whatever it is at hand.

That is just my take on the article; I recommend that you read Dr. Wright’s latest blog post “On Talking” so that you can decide for yourself.