by Ron Ploof | Aug 20, 2018 | Storytelling
I’ve been reading about “deep learning,” the subset of artificial intelligence and machine learning that uses neural networks. The more I learn, the more I see a direct relationship between deep learning and storytelling.
Deep learning is split into two steps: training and inference. Have you ever wondered how Facebook knows that you’re in an untagged picture? Essentially, it has trained a neural network model to do so by showing it hundreds of pictures already tagged with your name. Over time, the model starts to “recognize” patterns in this training set. Finally, once the model has been trained to recognize you, Facebook shows it untagged pictures. If the model has been trained well enough, it can infer whether you’re in that untagged picture or not.
I’ve found that this learn-and-infer process also has deep roots in good storytelling.
The best storytellers base their work in inference. They’re masters at delivering just enough facts for us to infer the meaning of them.
For example, storytellers will show us:
- darkness and make a noise come from it
- a young couple in one car while the driver of an oncoming car is texting
- someone about to deliver ice cream and balloons to a sad friend
Storytellers show us these things because of our innate abilities to infer meaning from them.
- Darkness is a metaphor for the unknown. A sound that comes it is always viewed as a threat
- Texting and driving is dangerous, and so we fear for the safety of the young couple
- It’s hard to be sad around ice cream and balloons
Great storytellers say more with less by allowing us to infer from what we already know. Bad storytellers spend too much time teaching us new things.
In other words, bad storytellers describe meaning explicitly. Great storytellers allow their audiences to infer it themselves.
Image Credit: Sperry, R. T., Artist. Homeless and friendless / R.T. Sperry. New York, 1891. Photograph. https://www.loc.gov/item/2012647169/.
by Ron Ploof | Aug 13, 2018 | Business Storytelling
A couple of months ago, my grown daughter prefaced something with, “I forget the story, but this is what I took away from it.”
Her statement gave me pause because it changed my view on the relationship between message and story. Previously, I saw story as a permanent vehicle that delivered meaning from one person to another. Afterward, I saw story as more temporary–and I must admit–I didn’t like this revelation. I work hard to weave messages into my stories and have always considered them inseparable. But now, to think that messages could survive the stories that carried them? That was troublesome.
Then, upon further reflection, I realized that I was being selfish.
For the past three years, I’ve used this little corner of cyberspace to preach how storytellers must have empathy for their audiences. If I’m truly willing to follow my own advice, then I must admit that the audience cares more about the message than the story. As a result, rather than grieving the loss of a story, I should be celebrating the successful delivery of its message.
The role of any story is to pass meaning from one person to another. Good stories present the right words at the right time to both invoke and hold an audience’s interest long enough for them to make meaning. If that happens and wisdom is passed, does the delivery mechanism’s fate really matter? And to expand upon that concept, when enlightened audience members decide to pass their newfound wisdom onto others, do they need the original story to do so, or perhaps it’s best that they wrap the message into stories of their own?
It’s not about the story; it’s about the moral of the story.
The story is a shell whose sole purpose is to deliver the nut. It’s designed to last for as long as it takes to deliver its precious cargo, whether that’s to the ground where it grows roots or to a hungry mouth. Either way, the shell is cracked and discarded. That’s life. Some things give their lives for the sake of others and stories are no different.
The message is the nut. The story is the shell. And that’s alright by me.
Photo Credit: Horydczak, Theodor, Approximately, photographer. Animals. Squirrel side view, eating nut. Washington D.C, None. ca. 1920-ca. 1950. Photograph. https://www.loc.gov/item/thc1995010295/PP/.
by Ron Ploof | Aug 6, 2018 | Business Storytelling
The question “What do you want on your headstone?” is an excercise with deep storytelling roots because it forces you to find your life’s throughline (StoryHow™ Pitchdeck Card # 40). I found my answer to the question many years ago.
He made the complex simple.
That’s what I do. I love to transform complex concepts into fundamental elements of human understanding.
Richard Feynman, the late Nobel Prize winning physicist, had an interesting way of testing his understanding of a complex concept by preparing a freshman lecture on it. If he couldn’t explain the concept to a classroom filled with high-school educated students, he concluded that he didn’t understand it himself, and therefore needed to go back to the drawing board.
I love that philosophy because professor Feynman puts the blame on himself, not the students. He, like all great storytellers, has empathy for his audience and thus takes responsibility for helping his students build upon their prior knowledge to arrive at the new knowledge.
His philosophy runs counter to a phrase that I despise. If you ever want to see me get a little heated, just say the following: “Ron, we need to dumb this down.” I hate this phrase because it belittles an audience. Audiences don’t need oversimplifications, they need someone who cares enough to teach them what they need to learn. Unfortunately, such teaching requires effort. But if done right, the effort is worth it.
Recently, I helped an engineer explain his new machine learning program. As with most brilliant people describing their work, he dove enthusiastically into too many details of how his invention worked instead of what it did. So, I asked him questions. Why was his program important? What problem did it solve? What are the implications of not having it? It took a while, but I began to understand who the program was for and why it was important to them. Finally, by embracing my own learning process, I found the path to help others understand it too. I didn’t dumb-down the concept–I bootstrapped my understanding to his, and then taught others how to do the same.
Dumbing-down is easy. Building up is hard. The human mind can comprehend complex concepts immediately if given the right context and frame of reference. It’s our job as storytellers to find that baseline concept and to build upon it.
Don’t dumb down. Build up.
Photo Credit: Thomas, Henry Atwell, Copyright Claimant. “The good-for-nothing” / W. Una chro. ; Raynor pin. , 1872. [New York City: Published by the American Chromo Co. No. 743 Broadway, New York City] Photograph. https://www.loc.gov/item/2017660748/
