Prologue
Professor Patrick Henry Winston is best known for teaching 6.034 (Artificial Intelligence) at MIT. He was also renowned for his wildly popular IAP (Independent Activities Period) talk, “How to Speak”.
How to Speak
About 40 years ago, the late Professor Patrick Henry Winston started his first talk on ``How to Speak’’.
By the end of the next 60 minutes you will have been exposed to a lot of ideas, some of which you will incorporate into your own repertoire, and they will ensure that you get the maximum opportunity to have your ideas valued and accepted by the people you speak with. —— Patrick Henry Winston
He gave the talk annually. Every year he improved upon the talk.
There is much more now, of course, because I keep learning new things. I’ve added techniques for passing oral exams, delivering successful job-interview talks, and ensuring that ideas become as famous as they ought to be. —— Patrick Henry Winston
His talk became so popular that it had to be limited to the first 300 participants.
Video
Contents
Now his talk is MIT OpenCourseWare.
| Topic | Starts at |
|---|---|
| Introduction | @00:16 |
| Rules of Engagement | @03:11 |
| How to Start | @04:15 |
| Four Sample Heuristics | @05:38 |
| The Tools: Time and Place | @10:17 |
| The Tools: Boards, Props, and Slides | @13:24 |
| Informing: Promise, Inspiration, How to Think | @36:30 |
| Persuading: Oral Exams, Job Talks, Getting Famous | @41:30 |
| How to Stop: Final Slide, Final Words | @53:06 |
| Final Words: Joke, Thank You, Examples | @56:35 |
The transcripts is here
Epilogue
Professor Patrick Winston died July 19 at Massachusetts General Hospital in Boston at the age of 76.