Transcript for Speaker Jonathan Harris

[Applause and Music]

Jonathan Harris. Artist.

So, despite all the things that divide us

all the differences in our world

there's one thing that we all share, which is that

we all feel something.

You know, whether you're a billionaire or a refugee

or a prisoner or a president

you have something that make you happy

something that makes you sad, and that's just true.

And with that in mind, I made a project called We Feel Fine

which is a website that harvests human feelings from the internet

every few minutes from people's blogs.

And We Feel Fine collects around twenty thousand feelings per day

and has been running for nearly three years now

having found more than ten million feelings in all.

That's a lot of feelings, and this is what those feelings look like:

So all those colored dots represent a real person's feelings

stated on the internet in the last few hours.

The brighter ones are happier people

and the darker ones are more sad people.

Inside each dot is a sentence

and here's what people are feeling right now:

I feel so much better lately/I feel nothing/I feel like a hack

I feel like giving up, honestly

I feel by the time I give birth I'm going to be lugging around basketballs

I feel a great disturbance in the force

I feel I can be doing more

And these just go on and on.

And sometimes, when people are talking about their feelings

they also post photographs to their blogs.

And when that happens We Feel Fine automatically creates

a "montage composition", combining the photograph

with its corresponding sentence.

And here's some of my favorites:

If we could go back.

I feel so much of my dad alive in me that there isn't even room for me.

I feel like Andrew has abandoned me.

I understand how it feels to be rejected.

I know about feeling alone.

I just want to feel alive for the first time in my life.

I remember feeling alive.

I cried in my pillow that night for hours feeling angry, disappointed

and frustrated knowing I would never get to see my father again.

I feel loved.

I feel pretty.

I need to be in some backwoods redneck town so I can feel beautiful.

I started to feel like I wanted an abortion and that's definitely

definitely, definitely not me

I feel so happy. Man, this had better last.

I feel so sexy.

I feel these weirdos are actually an asset to college life.

I feel like I'm in the center of that light circle.

I love how I feel today.

So as you can see We Feel Fine collects human feelings

but what it really collects are human stories.

And, you know, I believe in stories

I think stories are the glue that holds the world together

and when we stop telling stories that's when we tear ourselves apart.

So talk to your friends, talk to your neighbors

even talk to your enemies. Ask them what's in their mind

what's in their heart. And if we can do that just a little bit each day

I think we'll be just fine. Thanks very much.