Ted Talk Summary Essay

Addiction is a word that, despite being used on a daily basis, is misconstrued by the public. Johann Hari addresses this issue in a Ted Talk he calls, “Everything we know about addiction is wrong,” which he performed to the public in 2015. Merely based upon the title of the Ted Talk, it was evident Hari’s intention was to raise awareness on the subject of addiction. The crowd was more apt to be open-minded to the argument, considering the fact that they paid to attend the Ted Talk, and as a result of this, Hari did not fail in achieving the proper audience. Hari argued that addiction isn’t all as it seems, and thus went about the Talk explaining how, if we went about treating addiction and addicts differently, the number of recovering addicts would increase. Hari began his argument strongly by providing the audience with

personal information as a hook, and he continued to build his credibility with statistical evidence as well as ethical appeals. Hari’s argument was substantially weakened throughout the Ted Talk purely from the use of a passive voice. Although there were areas of Johann Hari’s Ted Talk that may not have been as strong as others, he still administered a notable argument, especially in regards to his logos, pathos, and ethos appeals.
Johann Hari used multiple reputable sources to support his ethical appeal throughout the Ted Talk. In an argument, it is a necessity to gain the audience’s respect because people tend to listen to those they respect. He began to build his credibility to the audience by bringing up similar studies executed by notable researchers. Bruce Alexander, a psychology professor from Vancouver was brought to the scene with great elocution. He performed a series of experiments called ‘Rat Park’ regarding heroin and how environments play into addiction. Hari’s use of diction was supplementary to his ethos appeal, i.e. he introduced Professor Alexander to the audience with the words, “...I just thought it couldn’t be right, until I met a man called…” Hari’s diction contained subliminal words to encourage the audience to view Bruce Alexander as a credible man. Further into the talk, Hari brought the Prime Minister of Europe to the subject as a form of an authoritative appeal. Again, Hari devoted much of his diction to instill that the listener agreed with the ethos appeal. Upon mentioning Dr. Joao Goulao, a man that altered the way addicts were treated in much of Europe as well as a man Hari wished the audience to think highly of, was addressed as ‘...an amazing man.’ Therefore, by using acclaimed professors to as a basis to his ethical appeal, Hari was able to gain the respect of the audience in an honorable manner.
Johann Hari carefully structured his speech in order to gain the audience's appeal. The claims he made were stated with the purpose of pertaining to the thoughts and feelings of the audience; a pathos appeal. He did a notable job of talking ‘to’ the people rather than talking ‘at’ them, in other words: Hari was considerate of the audience's’ perspective. Through the use of the word ‘we,’ he became one of the audience members. In this way, he neglected to make the audience feel imprudent for not knowing given information about addiction by explaining how he was once in their place. The relatability of a subject adds to the amount of responsiveness from an audience. Addiction, in itself is already an engaging topic, however Hari took an additional step in making sure the crowd could sympathize with the subject. He brought up diamorphine usage in hospitals and how everyone can unknowingly fall victim to the effects of heroin because of it. Hari used various other methods to appeal to pathos in his argument. He brought up the War on Drugs chain gang scandal in Arizona with the motive of extorting unpleasant emotions from the audience. “We punished them. We shamed them,” this was stated after Hari explained the hostile ways in which addicts were treated because they once led addiction related lives. The upbringing of these unpleasant emotions was done to validate why the the treatments of addicts is unjust and to ultimately give audience a reason for listening to Hari’s argument. It was a solid method on Johann Hari’s part as he achieved his goal of pertaining to the thoughts and feelings of the intended audience.
In addition to having a well balanced ethical and emotional appeals, Hari did a remarkable job referring to the reader's sense of logic and reasoning.

Bringing statistical evidence to an argument is an effective form of persuasion as it gives the audience explicit reasoning for the supported claim. Hari, for the most part, uses inductive reasoning to create his logical appeal, and he begins this form of logos by providing the audience with various premises leading to a definitive conclusion: that environment contributes to the need for drug usage. An allusion was made to the heroin usage in the Vietnam war and how 95% of previous heroin users were able to quit using once the war ended, or, in other words, once their environment was altered. This same conclusion is reached when Hari talks of the ‘Rat Park’ study, the Dr. Joao Goulao panel in Portugal, Bill McKibben’s study on connections between people, etc. Each piece of statistical evidence Hari fed the audience was related to the next in regard to the claim. Hari’s method of inductive reasoning stands as the building blocks to the logos appeal and ultimately strengthens the overall

argument.
When building an argument, nearly every speaker has faults within each of their appeals. Although Hari delivered an impressive argumentative spiel, his credibility faltered in a few aspects of his appeals. Hari ultimately lacked having a strong didactic tone. This made it difficult to maintain the desired level of superiority over the audience. When making an argument, the phrase “I think” can be a risky statement due to its capability to make the author appear unsure of themselves, thus giving the author a passive voice, and the use of a passive voice in an argument can lead to faulty credibility. Nevertheless, it is impractical to think one can create a faultless argument, and given this, Hari still delivered an impressive argumentative spiel. By the end of the Ted Talk, Hari came to the conclusion that “...the opposite of addiction is not sobriety. The opposite of addiction is connection.” This claim was drawn after multiple references to various studies and is based wholly on the audience appeals:logos, pathos, and ethos. His main goal was to raise awareness to the general public on the subject of addictions and that the current methods being taken to treat addicts are not beneficial nor successful to society. Hari’s intended audience, other than the general public, was both those suffering with addiction and those who know someone suffering with addiction.