Overpopulation.
This one of the hottest and most debated about issues in today's world. It is a situation/problem that has been steadily progressing at a fast pace and has evoked controversies and debates worldwide.
I found this a video that is actually a public speaking speech by Moataz Al Israwi from Lebanon who was the 2010 winner of the English Speaking Union International Public Speaking Competition which was held in London, and saw 50 participants from around the world battling their public speaking talents. In his winning speech , he manages to address some of the problems of overpopulation and the possible solutions to it, albeit in an entertaining and informative way. This is the video :
So did you guys enjoy the speech? How did the speaker present his information? Were his analogy and examples effective in conveying the information? How did he address the 3 impromptu questions in the end?
Here are some of the questions related to the context of overpopulation that went through my mind after watching this video :
- Some people think overpopulation is a problem and some are not bothered by it...but it does affect the development of third world and developing countries such as India, China and Africa...so what are the possible solutions and steps that can be taken to alleviate or solve this problem? and who should take the responsibility?...
- How will overpopulation affect the world if it gets out of control ?
- Do you think overpopulation is a myth altogether?We would like to hear your opinions and thoughts on this video and the topic itself.
So enjoy yourselves and we're looking forward to see what you guys think :)
18 comments:
i really enjoyed how he presented his argument. It was somewhat humorous and was really attention grabbing. He transitioned very smoothly into his main arguments from his personal story.
it was very interesting hearing how much the population has increased over the years, and really makes you wonder if we are "over populated" or in the process of being so.
His solutions of education and awareness are also interesting. I'm not sure if knowing that the world is overpopulated would actually stop people from having babies unless the conditions were very severe.
Moataz seems to be a very good speaker. His style of speech is a perfect balance between formal and informal. He cracks jokes and talks light-heartedly to keep the audience interested, but at the same time, he sounds academic and displays enough conviction to be taken seriously. As Brooke pointed out, his transitions back and forth from his main point to his anecdotal story are very smooth. Also, his story doesn't seem too positive and surreal, but sounds like a real-life situation as he talks about it from both positive and negative viewpoints. The speaker reserves his confidence and composure during the question-answer session. His answers to the questions are not very comprehensive or universally agreeable, but he addresses the questions fairly quickly with meaningful answers, which highlights his excellent speaking skills.
I believe the problem of over-population is genuine. Being from India, I have viewed it from a close angle. India's current population is about 1.1 billion, which is over 15% of the total world population. To sum it up, there are too many people in too less space. Some things that are common and regular occurrences in my country, such as traffic jams, poverty, inequality, lack of basic commodities like food, crime, pollution, unemployment, corruption etc. are definitely less common in the countries with optimum or under-population. I believe these problems are all linked to overpopulation in some way or the other. I have read about and observed the major causes of overpopulation, but I would not like to discuss them, because they would lead me to march into religious, social, political and psychological grounds, and that might not turn out to be too good! But I do believe that the solutions proposed by Moataz (education and awareness)seem to be very logical, and should be very effective in countering this problem, especially in countries like mine, where the literacy rate is close to 74%, and the women in the rural and backward areas have it ingrained in their minds that the primary purpose of their lives is to start a family, and serve their husbands and families. Only education can annihilate this thinking!
How interesting and methodic the speech is! At the first beginning, by using anecdote in a humorous way, the speech attracted my attention instantly. Then, Moataz mentioned his grandmother attitudes towards pregnancy, more children means more love, care and happiness. The reference of the words was meaningful. It foreshadows what he would discuss later, which made the speech more coherently and smoothly. Put the situation seriously, the term, overpopulation, came into our mind. Later, according to statistics, he concluded the phenomenon, mentioned the bad effect of it, and came up with his own advice to deal with this problem.
Observing his usage of rhetoric, I learned a lot that can be applied to my writing. Anecdote is likely to convince audience and draw people’s attention. Besides, the anecdote may not only simply function as the introduction, but also as hints for intended argument later, which make the paper coherent. Also, reference of statistics renders reader a direct feeling on topic analyzed.
Return to the speech, though the education especially for women and awareness resulting from education and official propaganda are able to buffer the severe problem, but I think they work efficiently in the long term. In another word, in the short term, we may need some regulations about child birth since overpopulation may be more severe during the process of education and raising awareness. However, to some extent, the regulations of birth control harm some people’s right indeed, even though it comes into effect promptly.
You guys picked up a very interesting topic, which is a harsh reality at present.
Moataz Al Israwi comes across as an enchanting speaker as he is able to captivate his audience with his light-hearted comical statements and his scientifically verified facts.
As an Indian, as much as I am proud of the development and technological advancements that have taken place in my country, illiteracy, poverty and overpopulation are still prevalent realities.
Moataz's well crafted statement about education having 'no sex' really interested me. As a feminist myself, I feel that empowering women and providing equal education to all can definitely solve the problem.
Archit certainly went into detail about both the speaker and the speech, and I agree with a lot of what he said. The speaker did a great job utilizing both a personal anecdote to start with and then a comparison with his inflammation and infection idea. He also sounded academic and established credibility with his material.
However, given that we have never truly had a chance to test what our planet's limit for population and resources are, I don't know if I agree that overpopulation is an issue. I think a lot of it is that medical technology has outpaced the normal rate of life for a bit so that is catching up, and developing countries have exploding populations, so I think we will ultimately be fine.
Obviously, though, more research, education, and awareness are important.
I think this relates to the discussion that we had in class about the last blog post involving terraforming. We talked a lot about world population and birthrates have a lot to do with that.
I really like how charismatic the speaker is, and his anecdotes really help him to make his points.
He relays his ideas well, and while his accent is distracting at first, it eventually starts to keep my attention.
I liked how the speaker started with a story since this catches our attention. I don't think his speech would have been as effective had he started his speech with statistics.
I think in order to overcome overpopulation we need to educate the lower class, since they still believe in the misconception that more children mean more family income. They do not take into account the fact that they actually need to feed and educate these children before they can start contributing to the family income. This often leads to malnourishment and neglect of the children.
I'd like to point out that I disagree with Ben on his claim that "Overpopulation is not an issue."
The facts about the pace at which resources are getting depleted and on the other hand, the ideology with which people are making babies is absolutely astounding and unacceptable.
This video about overpopulation was good and made a lot of key points. I think the intended audience for the video are women and couples who are thinking about having children. Even though this video make some suggestions on the key to overpopulation, I do not think it is very convincing. I do not think it is convincing because his ideas are too general. The people are still allowed to decide how many children they want to have even if they were educated so they may or may not listen.
I realized one thing while reading all the comments. To those people who live in countries where overpopulation has not yet become an issue, the whole idea of overpopulation is not so worrying. However, for those of us from countries where overpopulation is becoming a growing concern, it is certainly a major issue and problem. Overpopulation might now be a epidemic but give it a few years it might turn into a global pandemic. History has shown that what was once an epidemic always becomes a pandemic sooner or later. Of course, there is always a possibility that it might not, but who knows? but the statistics that he pulled up is real and this shows that overpopulation is happening... One day there might not be enough food or other resources to feed the world as a result of this as well..
I feel that Moataz Al Israwi presented some good facts on over population, but obviously didn't clearly state his opinion over equality. I thought it was good that he included the CIA stats on population to give his argument credibility. On the other hand I don't think he had enough facts to back up his claim over the education and its role in solving over population. Overall his argument seemed incomplete because of lack of fact supporting his solutions.
I really liked the post from this week! I enjoyed the topic and found it pretty interesting, the title was catchy & drew me in. I immediately wanted to play the video and figure out what this was all about. The speaker did a great job of presenting his concerns, the mini personal story at the start was great! It was a wonderful way to grab my attention! He also made his speech sound more factual and correct by quoting the CIA and not just estimating numbers. Another thing the speaker did that i believe gave his arguement a solid back bone was the fact that he not only stated his concern, but also gave a realistic approach to solving the problem. By doing this he established himself not as simply another man with a microphone complaining, but as someone that had put in the time and research into an idea and bettering society! Since his public speaking skills are so strong and he did a great job backing up his complaint, the speaker made me listen and understand his views on overpopulation!
I like how the speaker presented his argument. He begins with a story from his own life,which makes his speech personal and draws us in as listener. Next he transitions into a brief summery of what he believes is the problem. He presents his argument with enough evidence for the audience to be convinced he knows what he is talking about but not too much that he looses our attention. Then, I really like how he also presents his own vague description of how he may go about solving the problem. It is obvious to see by the questions at the end he has done his job by creating an argument. He also goes on to answer the questions very well using points from his short, well written speech, and from other research he has conducted. He also uses the "common sense" factor, saying thing like "it takes two!" which everyone knows. These common sense statements can engage a listener by bringing the information down to a more simple language that everyone agrees with and understands.
I think the speaker delivers his messages very well and there are many factors that contributed to his success. First of all, as almost everybody mentioned above, the little anecdote in the beginning. He started out with an interesting and intriguing story to lead us into a more serious and relatively boring issue, overpopulation, which is a clever move because if he popped the word "overpopulation" at first I would have lost interest immediately.
Secondly is his attitude or overall tone. He seems like a very delightful guy, always smiling, and talking in a casual mood. This makes his argument more easily to be accepted than it would if he were to deliver his speech in a preachy way.
Thirdly, he provided a solution to the problem, rather than simply pointing it out. This makes people believe that he actually put a lot of thoughts in the issue he's talking about, which in turn added more overall credibility to his speech.
He has a very attention grabbing style of presenting his arguement. It is very clever to use humor to grab your audiences attention and then make your points. I do feel however that education about over population would not help has much as education about birth control and education about the dangers of unprotected sex. I feel that would be a much more useful tool when it comes to trying to control over population.
I loved the way Moataz started his speech by initially narrating a childhood story. This story as well as the topic he captured everyone's attention.
I think the speaker won the 2010 English Speaking Union International Public Speaking Competition because of his interesting comments he made in the questionnaire as well as during the speech. The speech was complete with all the necessary components for eg the data from CIA, start with a story to get everyone's attention, and giving the necessary information that can help to overcome the issue.
Being an Indian I can definitely related to the issue of overpopulation. I am from New Delhi and I feel that there is a lack of proper resources in the city due to a high population of 22.2 million residents. I agree with the speaker that an increase in education among the Indian people can lower this education.
The speaker delivered his message in a great and effective way! Like most of my classmates, I think it is important that he began with a humorous anecdote. Because of this, I was "hooked" and ready to care about what he had to say next. In describing his tone, I can not find a word which fits it exactly. While it is definitely not a colloquial ethos, it isn't an entirely academic one either. I believe that the speaker was wise in using this particular style of language because it appeals to almost any audidence. The way he spoke has a low probability of offending anyone for being too casual or too formal.
First, as everyone else thinked about this video, it is really interesting and fascinating, attacting people's attention. The style of this man's making presentation is very free, giving no pressure to his listeners. And I like smile on his face, no matter in the period of doing presentation or in the time answering others' questions, smile always on his face. This shows that he had suffcient confidence on him and welcomed all kinds of questions or suspicions, and this kind of spirit really made people focused on his speech. Introduced by an interesting story to attact listens? YES! Great Job!
I do think he introduced his speech with a story or say personal experience is a great enlightenment to me to do presentation and write nonacademic essays.
Besides, what I want to talk about is with regard to the classmates' comments. From the classmates' commets, I found there were stratification between developed countries and developing countries, between the rich class and poor class. So, I really wonder overpopulation is only a problem existed in development countries or poor class? The answer is apparently NO! Overpopulation is a issue faced with the whole world, and only by the entire world can solve this issue. Only focusing on a single point without a integral view, I really do not this issue would be solved successfully and satisfied to people. Now that overpopulation a issue of the whole world, then the solution to it also depends on the efforts of the whole population.
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