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Name of nominator and nominee: Erik Engdahl

E-mail address: engdahl.erikREMOVE.THESE.FOUR.WORDS@gmail.com

Sex: Male

Nominated as speaker

More about the nominee:

Master of Science in Engineering Physics, electrophysics, at Uppsala University (1982)
Dr.Techn. in Quantum Chemistry at Uppsala University (1988)
Postdoc in France, Israel and Great Britain (1989-95)
Student in other fields, independent scholar and professional in Sweden (1995-)
Website: www.erikengdahl.se
A selection of of webpages on the site:

• Self-presentation
• Dedogmatisation
• Interview on dedogmatisation
• Lecture notes to a 20 minutes course on the Unconditional Thinking of Everything (UTE), the nominee's own provisional favourite conceptual apparatus
• Schematic description of dedogmatisation, the nominee's own scientific method
• Application for a ticket to the first TEDxUppsalaUniversity event in the autumn of 2013

I would like to nominate myself as I think I have an important message in pipeline.

During the first part of the 90ies I had a kind of personal U-Turn when turning from a successful graduate student in Quantum Chemistry to an unsuccessful postdoc . During that bad period I came in communication with some people who inspired me to work out my favourite conceptual apparatus which I name "The Unconditional Thinking of Everything" (UTE) and somewhat later dedogmatisation. (See below!)

Although I consider the UTE to be excellent, it is not important in itself. However, the UTE serves as a convenient provisional mean to describe the important matter which is my scientific method which I name "dedogmatisation". It is an intellectual aikido method (a U-Turn!) to work on theories about human action in a broad sense. One identifies which are the prejudices that one needs to acquire in order to behave in the stiff-legged way that the theories predict and the ideologies prescribe. Dedogmatisation makes it more difficult to misuse theories - as guidance to actions.

Only stiff-legged and more or less harmful actions are possible to to some extent predict by theories. Harmless actions derive directly from the original wisdom which we all are complete carrier of from conception until death. However, it is more or less put into oblivion during early childhood as we are still living in the prehistory of mankind.

During our current prehistory of mankind, adult people are generally afraid of the pains of life. Thus they symbiotically mislead the infants and young children to no longer completely affirmatively receive pains of life. What the latter would need are empathic nothing-doing trust environments such that they could step by step - by affirmatively receiving pains of life - increase their quantitative trust while keeping the qualitative trust uncorrupted.

The theme of the upcoming TEDx event is U-Turn. On the mankind level, I consider U-turns to be centered around the concept MAJORITY MISUNDERSTANDINGS. Here are some examples where I claim that those are involved:

• The primary aspect of communication is a kind of nothing-doing. In our prehistorical era of mankind, adult people have generally acquired a neurotypical syndrome, the mildest condition in an extended autism spectrum, in the robust end. Thus they communicate under the constraint of a cramped state of commucation shutdown, an on-going kind of "isometric" activity. Open communication is achieved if at least one of the communication parties releases its cramp, a kind of nothing-doing


• In order to achieve peace, there is no need to FIGHT for peace. Instead a kind of nothing-doing will lead to peace. It is related to the previous point.


• Adult people are generally involved in an eternal satisfaction-of-needs pursuit never leading to a state of internal peace. An important U-Turn would be to recover the original wisdom with the ability to return to a state of internal even before a need is satisfied or a problem is solved. Then a decoupling in the sense of Tim Jackson would be possible. See my application for the ticket to the first TEDxUppsalaUniversity event in the autumn of 2013 whose theme was sustainable development.


• The sole meaning of life is to live it. Thus the purpose of life is not live it in any particular way, e.g. to live it well.

I think I fulfil most of of the criteria in the stated nomination policy. Here a few paragraphs on this issue:

I consider myself able to deliver an engaging presentation with an accurate content. My ideas and messages would communicate well through the TED format as I have given about 150 courses of 20 minutes on my favourite conceptual apparatus, the UTE.

My personal U-turns as first succesful graduate student in Uppsala and predoc in Israel (1983-89), then unsuccessful postdoc in France, Israel and Great Britain (1989-1995), then student in other fields, independent scholar and professional in Sweden (1995-) contributes to a diverse background for the speakers at the upcoming TEDxUppsalaUniversity event.

During the first part of the 90ies, I worked out on the first round the UTE and dedogmatisation. Then I formulated the "Golden Rule of Help" (GRH) which reads out "Do not help on unsolicited matters!". (Harmful actions originate from what in dedogmatised Psychoanalysis is named unconscious mental processes). The GRH ensures that my talk would not present any inflammatory or polarizing political or religious agenda.

I would be a local voice that few have heard before.

I would contribute with new perspectives on issues that have long been debated traditionally.

Well!

My invented scientific method, dedogmatisation, is not yet established. It is "forbidden" to research according to a new own method. I claim that a great deal of "fetischism of methodology" is prevailing in those sciences which involve human action in a broad sense. Occasionally, there are, however, people who acquire the authority to introduce a new method.

I want to establish dedogmatisation as research method. After many years of waiting and postponing, I am now taking useful contact initiative towards the research community. This is a U-Turn for me, switching från natural sciences to (psycho-)social sciences! Since a month or so, I have discussed my project with several directors of study at research level at Uppsala University.

The organising committee chose not to engage Erik Engdahl as a speaker, see TEDxUppsalaUniversity Talks.