In this TED talk essay on “How Bees Can Keep the Peace Between Elephants and Humans” by Lucy King, the paper describes the speaker’s experience of designing a solution for resolving the conflict between humans and elephants. Basically, her speech is well-developed and provides ideas with specific examples. Also, the experience she shares with listeners is vital for realizing the message. In turn, her ideas are unbiased and multipurpose as she describes them from different perspectives, focusing the attention of the audience on the significance of solving animal-related problems.
Sharing Experience
The speaker of the video effectively delivers her message by implementing a variety of techniques. In the video, it stands out how Lucy King combines her personal experience with scientific data. For instance, King remembered young times when it was divisive to face the tall electric fences (00:01:50-00:02:00). Basically, the speaker demonstrates her attitude, which makes the audience feel related to the issue. Then, the way King operates scientific data is evident from her phrase. For example, King said that, in the 1970s, about 1.2 million elephants were in Africa, while the last number of animals was about 400,000 (00:03:13-00:03:20). In this case, statistics appeal to the logic of listeners, which makes the speech persuasive. Hence, King successfully manages to make her TED talk forceful by describing her experience and reinforcing her arguments with scientific data.
Explaining Ideas
King succeeds in making her speech not biased by meticulously explaining her ideas from different points of view. Basically, the speaker understands that there are a few ways to look at the problem. For instance, she says that people start to build more and more electric fences in Africa (King 00:04:42-00:04:50). In this case, King admits that there are other attempts made for protecting elephants and farms. Therefore, Lucy King demonstrates an impartial attitude mentioning several points of view.
Similar Views
The speech of Lucy King is witty because her messages are thought-provoking and relate to a wide variety of issues. Basically, it is interesting how the attitude of the speaker towards elephants is close in meaning to the attitude of the protagonist of the novel Moby Dick towards whales. In the novel, Ishmael stated that the motive was the overwhelming idea of the mysterious monster for the curiosity feeling (Melville 6). In turn, King says that elephants are one of the biggest mammals in the world, while they are potential sources of a sense of complete awe (00:00:08-00:00:20). Both King and Ishmael are impressed by elephants and whales, respectively, which emphasizes how perennial are issues related to human and animal interactions. Also, this similarity allows listeners to compare the situation discussed with other stories, an example of which is Moby Dick. Hence, the ideas are versatile, as they are not limited to the partial case.
Resolving Animal Conflicts
The TED talk emphasizes the importance of developing ways to solve problems of animals becoming endangered and biodiversity loss. Basically, conflicts between animals and humans are crucial, as they ubiquitously cause damage for both. According to the research, results showed that, from 853 bags of 50kg crops, about 55.6% of crops were harvested becasue the rest was destroyed by primates (Gemeda 2). In this case, resolving conflicts with wild animals is vital because it would reduce the damage and, hence, increase the quality of life. Then, preventing biodiversity loss is another reason for solving conflicts with wild animals. For example, the relevancy of the issue of biodiversity loss is evident from statistics because, in the last 40 years, the population size is redueced by 52 percent (WWF par. 2). In turn, numerous species are becoming extinct, which is another reason for prioritizing problems similar to one described in the video. Therefore, the significance of protecting animals is justifiably accentuated by King since these issues can affect both animals and humans.
Summing Up
King makes listeners realize the significance of solving human-animal conflicts by making her talk forceful through using figures and practical knowledge, Also, she holds listeners’ attention by meticulously organizing her speech. Moreover, the way her particular idea can fit in the bigger picture of relations between people and animals makes the speech thought-provoking. Thus, the effectiveness of the TED Talk is evident from the combination of factors implemented in the speech.
Works Cited
Gemeda, Dessalegn, and S. K. Meles. “Impacts of Human-Wildlife Conflict in Developing Countries.” J. Appl. Sci. Environ. Manage., vol. 22, no. 8, 2018, pp. 1233-1238, https://dx.doi.org/10.4314/jasem.v22i8.14.
King, Lucy. “How Bees Can Keep the Peace Between Elephants and Humans.” TED, 2019, www.ted.com/talks/lucy_king_how_bees_can_keep_the_peace_between_elephants_and_humans.
Melville, Herman, and A. S. M. Ronaldson. Moby Dick. Longman, 1986.
WWF. “Living Planet Report 2014.” World Wildlife Fund, 2014, www.worldwildlife.org/pages/living-planet-report-2014.