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OK well give your responses and time to think about it, yes I suppose in the back of my head I am thinking "what the?". If I was at MIT I would want the speech
by hoodoof 10y ago
OK well give your responses and time to think about it, yes I suppose in the back of my head I am thinking "what the?".
If I was at MIT I would want the speech to be from someone respected for their achievement in the world of intellectual endeavor.
It feels like it cheapens the institution to bring in an actor.
Now I will say I like Matt Damon's acting, and as far as Hollywood stars go, he comes across to me as if not the smartest, then one of the smartest, and that is certainly something to offset the cheapening of the MIT address.
My original observation remains the same though - actors are at the top of our society in terms of the amount of attention and adoration given by the community, sports stars a close second.
And may I say "The Martian" ..... well no-one does onscreen intellect/science like Matt Damon. What a great movie.
I think maybe somewhere deep down the thing that bothers me about this is that MIT is saying in an indirect way "if you can act really smart then you are on equal footing with people who are really smart". i.e. we value "the appearance of smart".
- enraged_camel 10y agoHe dropped out of Harvard and wrote an Oscar-winning movie script. I'd say that's quite an "intellectual" achievement.
- ScottBurson 10y agoAs an MIT alumnus, I think this is an excellent commencement speech. Broadly, though, you're right -- we Americans do love our screen stars.
- pen2l 10y agoIt's also worth noting that he most likely didn't quite right the speech. He had helpers write the speech. Everyone gets helpers to write/help write speeches. My favorite example is Steve Jobs calling a lot of people to get help on writing the commencement speech from folks like Aaron Sorkin and others (yes, the same Sorkin that made the Steve Jobs movie which framed him not an entirely positive light).