you are a chicken

yes you you look around and sometimes

wonder why your owner takes such good

care of you

at first you're not sure you're

skeptical what if he sends you to the

slaughterhouse

you've never been there but you know

very well none of your friends have ever

come out of that place

you remain on high alert for when that

fateful day might arrive

but it never does

days go by and then weeks months even

years

you are now convinced your owner loves

you more than any of these other

chickens and he would never do anything

bad to you

each passing day is additional evidence

to say that you will live for the next a

thousand days go by like this a thousand

beautiful days

until of course the thousand and first

day when the illusion of safety breaks

and you end up on someone's dinner plate

you should have never crossed the road

now imagine how betrayed the chicken

must have felt when it was being taken

to that terrifying part of the farm

given the thousand days worth of

evidence the chicken's trust in its

owner was ironically at its highest

level when it was eventually slaughtered

perhaps if it wasn't so foolish to

believe that it was special or unique

maybe it would have at least been spared

the feelings of betrayal

that one final day completely changed

the Outlook of the chicken's life that

one piece of evidence outweighed the

previous thousand days and it's not even

a contest this is something known as a

Black Swan a single event or observation

that comes as a surprise with

disproportionate consequences radically

changing our Outlook about something

people used to think that swans could

only be white

until they saw a Black Swan which

basically reshaped the way people

thought about what is out there

Nasim Nicholas taleb wrote a book called

The Black Swan the impact of the highly

improbable to study this very phenomenon

and shine light on how vulnerable we are

to black swans and how we are only

becoming increasingly more vulnerable

with each passing day

in his book he talks about some

fundamentals of epistemology that limit

our ability to understand the black

swans before they happen

but first let's talk about why our

modern society as technologically

advanced as it is is the perfect nesting

place for a Black Swan event

let's say we're going to weigh a few

thousand people and at the extreme end

of that sample contains the heaviest

person in the world

so long as that person is subject to

biological constraints like the rest of

us it doesn't really matter how much he

or she weighs let's say two thousand

pounds now how much do you think that

accounts for in the total weight of all

the people we weighed

the answer is probably less than half a

percent
shows that even a crazy outlier like a 2

000 pound person doesn't really

overwhelm the average

taleb calls this ecosystem mediocristin

to refer to how the mediocre

measurements of the average person do

mostly represent all measurements quite

well

now let's conduct the same experiment

but with wealth let's gather a few

people and include just one of the three

thousand or so billionaires in that list

how much do you think that billionaire

accounts for in the total wealth of all

the people in that sample

an overwhelming majority almost always

close to 99 percent

contrary to the first scenario here the

outlier overwhelms everything else

taleb calls this world extremiston as it

rewards a few people extremely well but

leaves basically nothing for the others

taleb says that the modern world is

composed of circumstances that are

geared towards extremist not

mediocristin because money for all

intents and purposes is just a number in

someone's book the vast majority of

money is completely digital it's not

subject to physics laws or biology to

constrain it to minimal variance sure

most people don't make that much money

but a few people can make a lot of money

similarly if you want to consider

musicians most musicians don't sell that

many albums but a few artists sell quite

a few

you can conduct the same thought

experiment with Book Sales scientific

Publications shoe brands and so on

point is the modern economy is a very

much a winner take all system that

rewards a very small number of people

with a disproportionately large portion

of the pie

if it was more like the weight example

we just talked about you wouldn't expect

the outliers to be so wild but the fact

that they really are indeed so wild just

goes to show how unpredictable the

environment we're living in really is

the forecast we take for granted today

often fail to take into account the true

nature of this unpredictability these

Black Swan events

you might be inclined to say that no

these billionaires put in the work day

in and day out and therefore they can

enjoy the fruits of their labor

indeed most of them probably worked

really hard some of their Innovations

might later pave the way for a better

future for all of us I'm not discounting

that

however the system is not rewarding them

proportionately

more importantly it's hard to say how

much of their efforts are the fruits of

their labor and how much of it is due to

Pure chance

if you were to run a few simulations

with extremist and type circumstances

you would inevitably have a few Jeff

Bezos like outliers

we may be biased into thinking that we

understand what causes bezos-like

outliers in our society you know the

usual think out of the box start a

revolutionary company worked extremely

hard for a few years and then smelled

the roses happily ever after

we've all read the autobiographies we've

all watched the documentaries however

when was the last time you read about a

person who did all of those things and

failed

when was the last time you saw shelves

of books about people who failed

chances are probably never these stories

just never really quite make it there is

an epistemic bias in all of this taleb

says now take a look at the cemetery it

is quite difficult to do so because

people who fail don't seem to rate

Memoirs and if they did those business

Publishers I know would not even

consider giving them the courtesy of a

return phone call

this is despite the fact that often

advice about what not to do is more

useful than what to do but that's just

the economy that's just one facet of

society

[Music]

we also don't understand the

socio-political aspects take 911 for

example which is certainly a Black Swan

event after it happened you had tons of

experts come out and say that they had

known for years that it was about to

happen

well why didn't they say anything

this retrospective Distortion of the

understanding of a problem is one of the

Hallmarks of a Black Swan event

none of them really knew if they did

cockpit doors would have been

bulletproof long ago pocket knives would

have never been allowed in the cabins

and the TSA would have been invented

much earlier

after 9 11.

suggest such policies in 1991 for

example you would probably not be taken

too seriously or would have been shown a

spreadsheet that suggested Airlines

don't have the money for bulletproof

doors

but inevitably they did

thankfully the likelihood of a 911 style

event is much lower now than it used to

be countries around the world are more

prepared more vigilant

however that also makes these

precautions somewhat lose their

relevance

you've all know a Harari in his book

homodeus cites a paradox about knowledge

he says knowledge that does not change

behavior is useless but knowledge that

changes Behavior loses its relevance

the more data we have and the better we

understand history the faster history

Alters its course and the faster our

knowledge becomes outdated

despite the measures we have taken for a

Black Swan event like 911 that does

nothing to improve our odds against the

future Black Swan if anything it might

lure us into a false sense of security

and in fact worsen our chances of coping

with the impacts of the next highly

improbable event

we tend to convince ourselves that we

understand risks once we have understood

a game of dice or blackjack

however trying to approximate the risks

in real life with the same methods used

in a closed-loop artificial game is

simply oversimplification a mistake that

we commit daily

this telep cause is the ludic fallacy

we learn simple games and immediately

conclude that the stock market works in

the same way even though one of these

things lives in mediocriston and the

other lives in extremists if the markets

were well understood do you think

something like GameStop or AMC would

have ever been allowed to happen

sure short squeezing is not a

particularly new phenomenon and yet even

a non-black swan event such as this one

left even the smartest hedge fund

managers scratching their heads and

practically chasing bankruptcy

this false sense of understanding makes

Black's ones that much more dangerous

there are other reasons why we are

increasingly more vulnerable to black

swans taleb said whereas in the past

people might have been studying

different kinds of literature and Diving

deep into a locally developed set of

ideas
today arguably the most read book is

Harry Potter

that's of course not to say Harry Potter

is a bad book or anything when it goes

to show that we are much less in tune

with each other's ideas for Better or

For Worse

for the most part everyone is dealing

with generally the same ideas that

coupled with the rising complexity and

reach of technology means when something

fails it fails for more people than ever

before

the Pakistani government tried to shut

down YouTube in Pakistan it ended up

shutting down YouTube worldwide to

website it

we don't understand these things that's

just one way for technology to fail when

it goes to show how interconnected

things are and while it is often touted

as a plus given sufficiently poor luck

that can really spell Doom for us all

take coronal mass ejections as an

example these are regular bursts of

radiation from the Sun that scientists

on Earth know and expect

the largest coronal mass ejection ever

on record is the Carrington event in

1859.

mostly felt by Telegraph operators who

had some of their equipment burnt from

the sudden surge

most of the world went on without a

hitch

on the other hand if a Carrington class

event were to occur today with all the

grids electric cars and equipment that

we now have the damages would be in the

trillions of dollars and repair could

take decades if at all possible and with

each passing day with each little

transition into an electric future we

were becoming more and more vulnerable

to such an event

the thing is this isn't even a Black

Swan event

in 2012 the likelihood of a Carrington

event in the next decade was calculated

to be around 12 percent

and yet despite that high probability

we're not particularly prepared for such

an event
given the esoteric nature of its risk

assumingly low probability but high

impact despite all the mounting evidence

you'll have a very hard time convincing

governments to make modifications to

power grids to avoid catastrophic

failures so if that's how little we care

about an event that we know is bound to

occur eventually imagine how unaware we

are of a true Black Swan

the chicken in the farm were it to

somehow be spared by some miracle would

never trust another human being ever

after the Betrayal it endured however

few were ever so lucky

meanwhile for the owner the chicken's

death comes as no surprise it is a

routine event and therefore no Black

Swan

the idea of a Black Swan is therefore

relative to the knowledge one possesses

hence our objective is to try and be in

the position of the butcher not the

butchered Talib says I worry less about

advertised and Sensational risks more

about the vicious hidden ones

of course the idea of a Black Swan also

incorporates good things such as wildly

unlikely positive outcomes of chance

otherwise known as life

the odds of being born are 1 in 400

trillion but to be fair I just

unfollowed my own advice

such a thing can't really be predicted

can it

for all we know and for all we don't

being born is an unimaginably unlikely

event that nobody really predicted

so if you are alive whatever that means

in the end

we're actually all the black swans we've

been trying to avoid the entire time

ironic isn't it

in the year 1925 Einstein shared with

the student his burning desire to

understand the universe

I want to know how God created this

world he said as they stroll along

I'm not interested in this or that

phenomenon in the spectrum of this or

that element I want to know his thoughts

the rest are just details

this one conversation expresses the core

of Einstein's guiding principle one that

has driven humidity to inquire discover

experiment and most importantly learn

about this universe we call home

but what was Einstein really talking

about and consumer knowledge ever reach

a point where we understand everything

since the discovery of the world of

quantum mechanics in the early 20th

century scientists have been racking

their brain trying to understand how it

works

even a century later we're still not

sure how and why subatomic particles

behave the way they do

but that's just half the problem

the discovery of quantum theory posed a

more serious issue that Einstein Stephen

Hawking and other world-renowned

physicists have been working tirelessly

to solve

that challenge can be summarized in one

word

unification

you see

modern physics is split into two pillars

classical physics the physics of Newton

Einstein and Galileo which predicts

gravity and describes the motion of

massive things in our Cosmos like stars

and planets and quantum physics which

governs the world of subatomic particles

according to his own set of laws and

rules

both pillars describe their respective

worlds accurately

but fail when applied to each other's

subject matter

Einstein's preoccupation was that there

must be a way that these two worlds

could reconcile there has to be a theory

that unifies the world of the subatomic

or the world of the massive

a theory that can predict

well

everything

now you might be thinking so why should

we care

well a unified theory that can Bridge

both of these worlds could potentially

unlock many of our universe's secrets

and answer some of the deepest

philosophical and Theological questions

that we've been asking since the days of

Galileo

what are we truly made of what happened

before the Big Bang are we living in a

Multiverse the unified theory or The

Theory of Everything

might just have the answers to all of

these questions

the universe and everything in it is

glued together by four fundamental

forces I made an entire video on these

four forces so if you really want to

fully understand all of them I suggest

you check it out

but for the sake of this video here is

the gist of what they do

big objects like stars planets humans

and cats are all governed by the force

of gravity and thanks to Einstein and

his general theory of relativity we now

know that gravity isn't a force that

magically pulls objects together

instead it's the curving and warping of

the fabric of our universe

space time while all these big objects

are governed by just one fundamental

Force subatomic particles on the other

hand are governed by three fundamental

forces as if they weren't already

confusing enough

these three fundamental forces are

electromagnetic weak nuclear and strong

nuclear

electromagnetism holds atoms together

the strong force holds nuclei together

and the weak force is responsible for

some type of nuclear decay

these particles along with their

respective forces make up what we call

the standard model

standard model describes the world of

the very small

we know that everything in the universe

is made of subatomic particles from

planets and stars to humans and dogs

we know that all of these things are

made of atoms and atoms are made of

protons neutrons and electrons

in the 1960s we discovered that even

protons and neutrons are made of even

smaller particles called quarks and

electrons from leptons

using different combinations of these

particles and the respective forces we

can build atoms molecules humans planets

and even Stars so it seems that the

standard model is a comprehensive

interpretation of our universe

but it doesn't include everything

the truth is finding the smallest

subatomic particles is only the first

step to getting to a Theory of

Everything

the Second Step would be finding a place

for gravity in this model

there were two reasons why gravity isn't

included

the first is that when it comes to small

particles the force of gravity is so

weak that it doesn't have any effect on

a Quantum system the second reason is

that we don't really know how to

incorporate general relativity which

describes the motion of large objects

into the world of quantum that governs

subatomic particles

many great minds including Einstein

tried tirelessly

it's said that even on his deathbed

Einstein Revisited his notes on the

theory of everything and tried one last

time to find an elegant solution to

explain the fundamental differences

between the world of the small and that

of the large

but unfortunately he ran out of time

[Music]

so that's that right

while we still haven't found a theory

that can explain everything we have made

significant progress and maybe the most

groundbreaking was that of another

brilliant mind Stephen Hawking

in 2014 a movie was made on the

impactful life of Stephen Hawking as a

result Hawking became one of the most

revered physicists in the world and one

of the most admired by pop culture

away from the Limelight however Hawking

like Einstein had an obsessive yearning

to understand the universe and never

cease to challenge our knowledge of it

one of his greatest contributions was

the discovery of what is now known as

Hawking radiation

in 1974 Hawking discovered one of the

biggest breakthroughs of the 20th

century

a groundbreaking interpretation of black

holes as well as an unprecedented

interaction between the world of quantum

and gravity

Hawking's Discovery was so ingenious

that it gave us hope that The Theory of

Everything the Holy Grail of physics is

still a human possibility

black holes are densely packed regions

of space where the gravitational pull is

so strong that nothing can escape not

even like

Einstein predicted the presence of black

holes through his general theory of

relativity in 1916 and we confirmed his

predictions in 1974 when we observed our

first black hole in the Milky Way

in the same year Hawking discovered that

black holes are like a vitamin tablet

placed in water they can dissipate in

time and release energy

this is what we know as Hawking

radiation today

but how can energy escape a black hole

when nothing else can

Hawking used a Quantum understanding to

explain this

when we think of space we imagine large

cold empty places but in reality space

is alive with the act of creation and

destruction of energy at the subatomic

stage

particles are created in pairs matter

and antimatter and they are constantly

created and destroyed in a concept known

as Annihilation Hawking imagined a pair

of particles created very close to the

event horizon of a black hole

this is the boundary around a black hole

from which nothing can escape

he then showed that these particles

don't need to annihilate each other

since one of them can be sucked into the

black hole

if the black hole is receiving negative

energy then it has to release energy in

order for the law of conservation of

energy to hold

Hawking also proves that black holes

lose Mass with time and they don't last

forever
but more importantly he was able to

arrive at this discovery by merging a

Quantum principle with the concept of

gravity

this is by far the closest we've come to

a Theory of Everything a unified field

Theory or quantum gravity

but as with most things in science the

fact that we haven't found that one

elegant equation does not mean that we

have failed in fact maybe the real

treasure was the discoveries we made

along the way

many of which have paved the way for a

brighter future for humankind

string theory is one of the most

prominent ones it suggests that

subatomic particles such as electrons

and quarks are made of tiny vibrating

strings or filaments that twist and fold

creating everything in our universe

just like the strings of a violin they

can vibrate in various patterns creating

different kinds of particles including

the graviton a hypothetical particle

that according to Quantum Mechanics

should carry the force of gravity

on paper string theory could unite

gravity and quantum mechanics under one

framework once and for all

the theory was popularized in the 60s

and 70s and its mathematics predicts

small bundled up extra Dimensions that

give rise to a network of universes

or a Multiverse

while this theory is prominent it's

highly untestable even with access to

the latest technology

String Theory though is only the

beginning

after almost two decades of tireless

research we've discovered the Higgs

boson this proved that electrons and

quarks inside the atom get their Mass

from an invisible field that spreads

throughout space

the discovery took an effort from a

group of three thousand scientists that

dedicated endless hours to the calls

that would surely bring our species one

step closer to understanding our

universe

we've also discovered that all the atoms

and light in the universe only make up

less than five percent of the total

content of the cosmos

the remaining 95 is composed of dark

matter and dark energy which are

invisible but whose effects dominate the

evolution of our universe

Dark Matter provides the gravitational

pull that keeps galaxies together while

dark energy is responsible for the ever

accelerating expansion of our universe

for thousands of years we've looked at

the heavens and wondered what Mysteries

are hiding beyond the clouds

since 1970 there have been more than 90

telescopes placed in orbit by NASA in

the esa to bring the universe closer to

us

and with the James Webb Telescope that

launched on December 25th 2021

we entered a new era of discovery

this telescope is the largest and most

powerful one ever built

and its daunting task is to find the

first galaxies that formed in the early

universe and appear through Dusty clouds

to see stars forming planetary systems

we may not have found the theory that

unites Quantum with gravity yet but

every Discovery brings us one step

closer to the ultimate goal of

unification

throughout our time on this planet we've

pushed the boundaries of existence by

asking tough questions and working

tirelessly to find the answers

our species has been defined by its

incessant thirst for knowledge and

unwavering hope in a unified universe

350 years have elapsed since our first

big successful step in this journey when

Newton unified the heavens with the

Earth revealing that planets stars and

apples are Guided by the same set of

laws

200 years later James Clerk Maxwell

coupled electricity with magnetism and

then Einstein linked space and time and

warped them into one fabric that we now

know as space-time

looking at the timeline of these events

it shouldn't be surprising that the road

ahead could be much longer

Einstein died dreaming of a physical

world governed by one set of laws a

unified framework that can unlock the

mysteries of our universe and Hawking

never ceased to look up at the stars and

wonder what Mysteries lie ahead waiting

to be found

whether The Theory of Everything is a

realistic Quest or a delusional attempt

to make sense of the absurdity of the

universe one thing is certain

our unwavering hope in the search for

unification will only lead to Humanity's

advancement as a species

if you feel you're in a black hole

don't give up

there's a way out

[Music]

if a tree falls down in the forest and

no one is there to hear it does it make

a sound

how do you know

taking it one step further

if you hear the tree hit the ground but

don't see it why do you trust your sense

of hearing

this might seem like a ridiculous

question but the truth is that despite

our total Reliance on them our senses

deceive us all the time

you hear this audio and some of us hear

yenny while the others hear Laura Laurel

you think you hear your friend laughing

in the other room only to come out and

see it's just the TV

a stick that looks bent in the water

turns out to be straight when you pull

it out you spend what seems like hours

walking through a dark and creepy Forest

but then wake up and realize you were

just dreaming

the world is a strange place and for all

the knowledge we've managed to gather as

a species there's still a lot more that

we don't

here is everything we don't know too

[Music]

I think therefore I am

you've likely heard this phrase before

coined by 17th century French

philosopher Renee Descartes the simple

declaration serves as the foundation of

all modern philosophy

it's a statement of knowledge and

assertion that if I know nothing else I

at least know I exist

while this may not seem like a

revolutionary idea at first glance it's

actually quite significant

philosophers since the time of Socrates

have wondered whether or not it's

possible to know anything

because it always seems that the more

questions we ask the fewer answers we're

left with

Descartes himself was renowned for his

astonishing ability to doubt everything

no matter how trivial no matter how

seemingly obvious he treated all of his

ideas with a radical level of skepticism

believing that doing so would eventually

lead him to the truth

this skepticism led him to ask a

question that science still hasn't been

able to answer

how do I know I'm not dreaming right now

or even more frightening how do I know

that my mind isn't being deliberately

misled by some Evil Genius

think of it like the movie The Matrix

it's possible that at this very moment

you're hooked up to a giant machine that

is feeding you all the sensory data

you're currently experiencing you aren't

really watching this video it's just the

machine making you think that you are

while unlikely technically it is

possible and there's no way we can

disprove it this is why some people

argue that we live in a simulation do we

or don't we

we just don't know

Descartes argues that our inability to

rule out this scenario forces us to

doubt everything we think we know a

state of radical skepticism in which we

can't trust anything we experience or

think

fortunately Descartes offers us a way

out even if we are forced to doubt

everything the one thing we cannot doubt

is the fact that we're doubting if we

can doubt then we can think and if we

can think then there must be a mind

doing the thinking

so while we may never know whether or

not the world around us is an illusion

or if we even have physical bodies we

can rest easy in the knowledge that we

have Minds that we exist right

well not so much

later philosophers from Kierkegaard to

Heidegger criticized Descartes claim

arguing that the existence of thoughts

does not necessarily imply the existence

of a thinker Friedrich nietzsch even

went so far as to say that the idea that

there was something called thinking is

itself an assumption

all we can really say then is that

something is happening what that thing

is we just don't know

if you're rolling your eyes at this

point it's understandable to most people

this all sounds like a bunch of other

intellectual wise nonsense with no

bearing on the actual world

even if we do live in The Matrix I still

know that two plus two equals four that

the sun is going to rise tomorrow and

that the Earth beneath my feet is solid

well hold up on the last Point part of

the reason why it's so difficult to say

whether we truly know anything is

because we live in a dynamic Universe

where nothing is ever stable

everything in existence is always moving

in always changing

including the Earth itself

even as you watch this video The Very

face of the planet is evolving

plate tectonic theory is a relative

newcomer to science first pioneered in

the 1960s our understanding of how the

Earth shifts and moves is still fairly

Limited

we've discovered certain things like the

fact that the Earth's Rocky crust is in

the form of plates that sits on top of a

mantle of liquid magma as this magma

circulates and turns it pushes the

plates around knocking them into each

other and creating earthquakes volcanoes

and mountains what this means is that

contrary to what we think the ground

beneath our feet isn't solid it's

constantly changing and if it is how can

we say we know it

tomorrow an earthquake could reshape our

continents and so the best we can ever

have is a rough approximation of what we

think it used to be not what it actually

is

maybe I'm just trying to strong arm a

metaphor here but it seems like whenever

we investigate what we think we know our

ideas start to crumble

it's an interesting Quirk of reality

really the simpler a question is the

harder it can be to answer

it's for this reason that many people

fear death because we simply don't know

anything about what happens after it yet

I cannot help but think that the fear

that we don't know anything about death

presupposes that we know what life is

because in reality we don't know either

well it's easy for us to tell the

difference between living in non-living

materials say like in apple versus a

rock but when we try to pin down a

precise definition of life things get

complicated

all life forms whether a plant or animal

bacteria or fungus are composed of cells

and are able to meet certain basic

fundamental conditions

these include responsiveness metabolism

energy transformation growth and

reproduction

for instance when you smell food you

respond to by feeling hungry

eating a sandwich then starts your

metabolic process which allows you to

convert calories into energy this energy

is then used to do things like grow

muscles or attract a mate

but this is what life does not what life

is the main problem is that the primary

feature of life is that it's always

changing in definitions by their nature

are meant to be static

perhaps if we knew where life came from

we'd have a better sense of what exactly

it is

unfortunately we don't know this either

of course one day science will figure

this stuff out the secrets to life the

Earth and everything else will be

unlocked all it takes is more advanced

technology more sophisticated methods

and will be able to know the answers for

certain won't we

here's the thing though science isn't

ever 100 certain

when researchers at the European

Organization for nuclear research

otherwise known as CERN announced the

discovery of the Higgs boson in 2012.

they did so by stating that their

observations had passed the crucial

threshold of five Sigma certainty

to most people this term is nothing more

than academic jargon but Sigma in this

context is the statistical unit of

measurement used to determine how

probable it is that a given result is

correct the higher the value the more

likely a particular finding is true with

five Sigma being the gold standard

representing a one in a million chance

that a given observation is inaccurate

though there's still a chance

you may think I'm splitting hairs here

after all one in a million is as good as

true isn't it

well no

a 2011 experiment conducted by CERN

reportedly found that a series of nearly

massless ghost particles called

neutrinos had traveled faster than the

speed of light

this was of course impossible as the

finding violated Einstein's principle of

Relativity yet the experiment passed

with a Six Sigma confidence meaning that

it had a staggering one and a half

billion chance of being false and yet it

was

for later experiments all failed to

replicate the original results and the

first experiment was written up as a

fluke

science is very good at explaining what

is happening and how it happens but not

really why it's happening

pass any scientific Revelation through a

series of why questions and you'll

always get to a point where we just

don't know

take gravity for instance when an apple

falls from a tree and hits Isaac Newton

on its head we know its gravity we can

even measure it as 9.8 meters per second

but when it comes to explaining why this

happens almost 350 years later we're

still clueless every other physical

force in the universe electromagnetism

strong and weak nuclear force has a

corresponding subatomic particle yet we

still don't know what the particle

responsible for gravity is

physicists have derived the existence of

something called a graviton that similar

to the Higgs boson requires massive

amounts of energy to detect in fact it's

predicted that it would take a mass

spectrometer to the size of Jupiter

operating at 100 capacity to identify

one

but why is a graviton so hard to find

why is it that physics behaves like this

and is it possible that it could work

differently

the notion of alternate physics is most

commonly associated with the Multiverse

Theory the idea that there isn't a

single universe but an infinite array of

different universes we don't know if

this is true of course but if it is then

it's possible that among these countless

variations there exists other types of

physics

maybe in another Universe gravity isn't

so difficult to measure maybe instead

the electromagnetism is the Rogue Force

confounding their scientists

but it isn't just other universes that

may operate under alternative sets of

physical laws even our own universe may

be subject to alternate forms of physics

that we've yet to discover

in 2022 researchers at Columbia

University programmed an AI to study

video footage of different physical

phenomena and then search for the

minimal set of variables that described

its observations

footage included things like a pendulum

a lava lamp and a fireplace

when the AI returned its results the

researchers found that they could

identify some of the variables that the

artificial intelligence had defined but

not others the belief is that the AI was

applying novel sets of physical laws

currently unknown to humans

unfortunately since the program can't

communicate what it's thinking the exact

variables remain a mystery

however it does raise an interesting

question if we were to meet an alien

species is it possible that they might

use alternate laws of physics Ted

Chang's Novella story of your life the

inspiration for the 2016 film arrival

explores this idea

fair warning there's spoilers ahead

in the story humans make first contact

with aliens after dozens of spaceships

suddenly appear in orbit but rather than

wanting to take over the planet it seems

that the Extraterrestrial visitors just

want to talk

to get the conversation going both

humans and the aliens work together to

slowly decipher one another's language

as well as their respective approaches

to physics

it quickly becomes apparent that the

scientific and mathematical Concepts

that are Advanced to us like calculus

are Elementary to them surprisingly

though the reverse is also true

the aliens deploy strange seemingly

convoluted methods to describe basic

principles like velocity

while both methods provide accurate

results each is highly specific to the

species that developed them eventually

it's explained that the aliens don't

perceive our universe as causal instead

they witness all events as happening

simultaneously

this accounts for their weird set of

physics Chang's story of your life

raises interesting questions surrounding

Concepts like time perception Free Will

and subjectivity forcing us readers to

wonder if there's such a thing as

objective reality

how do we know that the reality we

experience is independent of our own

consciousness

this problem has plagued philosophers

since antiquity

Plato in particular is known for having

proposed the idea of the realm of forms

a non-physical immaterial plane from

which the physical world manifests

science actually functions on a similar

principle assuming that there is an

objective reality that exists beyond our

senses which can be observed and

measured

despite our best efforts though no one

has ever confirmed the existence of an

objective reality in fact given that

everything we know has to come first to

us through our senses and therefore our

own subjective perception it's

impossible to approve an objective

reality

we'll just never know

in his book The spell of the sensuous

philosopher David Abram argues that the

very idea of an objective reality isn't

representative of the universe we live

in in actuality Abram says we exist in

the realm of inner subjectivity a term

he borrows from the German philosopher

Edmund Hospital

this form of reality rather than being a

separate and isolated phenomenon is

created by the collective experience of

all its participants

the universe doesn't exist as an object

of our subjective perceptions

instead it rises out of our very

interaction with it if this idea sounds

a little out there consider quantum

mechanics where our mere observations

literally affect the state of matter

just by measuring a photon of light

we're able to change it from a wave to a

particle so maybe there's no such thing

as objective reality maybe all that

exists is our Collective inner

subjective experience there's simply no

way of knowing plunging into the depths

of uncertainty is never Pleasant that's

why humans came up with reason in

science in the first place

we want to feel as though we know things

it gives us a sense of control when it

otherwise chaotic unpredictable and

sometimes dangerous universe

for the majority of my life I was

agnostic about most things if there

wasn't what I deemed to be rational

scientific proof to support an idea I

just didn't believe it

but the more I learned the more I

realize how limited my own experience is

and just how much we as a species don't

know

ordinary matter accounts for just five

percent of the entire universe the rest

of it 95 of everything that exists is a

complete and total mystery

we just don't know

it seems naive if not outright arrogant

to close myself off to new ideas just

because they don't fit within my current

understanding of how things work

tomorrow the Earth could shift Life as

we know it could completely change in

everything that scientists taught us

could turn out to just be a fluke

but rather than meeting this dilemma

with fear or outright rejection of

scientific principles we should take it

as an opportunity to learn embracing

uncertainty as a means of Transforming

Our perception

to me this seems like the only rational

path forward

because as it turns out

everything we don't know is

well

everything
we've all experienced it

you're sitting around at the table for a

family dinner

across the table from you is the cousin

you haven't seen since the last family

get-together

and the most confident fashion he opens

his mouth and starts talking

passionately on a subject he clearly

knows very little about

you look down at your phone and in one

quick Google search you find out

everything he's saying is completely

wrong but he doesn't seem to know it

everyone else at the table doesn't seem

to know it either his confidence is so

strong and unwavering that you start to

wonder

does this guy know how wrong he really

is

this is the Dunning Kruger effect

people who know very little about a

subject tend to overestimate how much

they know because they just don't know

how much they don't know

as a result the people who are most

confident in their ability are not

usually the ones who should be

[Music]

the term dunning-kruger is named after

The two scientists who first discovered

the psychological phenomenon David

Dunning and Justin Krueger

in 1999 They carried out research titled

unskilled and unaware of it where they

tested a group of people on grammar

humor and logic

in the first experiment the 65

participants were asked to rate jokes

they thought people would find funny

the people who personally felt they were

excellent judges of humor were the ones

who did the worst on the test

Dunning and Kruger then put the same

participants through varying degrees of

grammar and logic tests and the results

always came out the same

for the most part the people who scored

the least were the most confident going

into the test and overestimated how well

they did afterwards while those who

scored the most overestimated how well

everyone else did

now you might think how does this really

happen surely you should just know when

you fail a test right you have that gut

feeling and after all you're the one who

wrote it yourself

but that only happens when you know

nothing about the subject at all

when we learn just a little bit about

that subject we start overestimating how

much we actually know we are aware that

we know about the subject however we

don't know enough to know that there is

still so much more to learn we are not

yet skilled enough to accurately assess

our knowledge and abilities so we think

we know much more than we actually do

imagine you're given a test about the

culture of extraterrestrial life you've

just watched a 30 minute YouTube

documentary and you're feeling pretty

good about your knowledge of things that

haven't been proven to exist but apart

from this documentary you haven't done

any other research about

extraterrestrial life you haven't been

to space and you certainly don't have

any alien friends you're handed to test

and in it you're asked to answer 20

questions about life as an

extraterrestrial

I know what you're thinking you're not

entirely ignorant you just watched a 30

minute documentary about aliens so

you'll certainly Ace this test or at

least do better than the average right

well that is the Dunning Kruger effect

at work because the truth is just one

documentary is not nearly enough you've

only just discovered the tip of the

iceberg but because you don't know how

big the ice under the water is you'll

keep living in the illusion that you've

explored all of it and we see this every

day from your cousin sitting across the

room to that one co-worker that gets

really annoyed when someone else gets

the promotion they feel they so

desperately deserve performance reports

at work give us an unbiased view on how

well we've done

however when people who truly don't know

all that much get these results

they aren't satisfied with it

because in their minds they've done a

lot better than what the report says so

they make up excuses like the boss

didn't like me or looked down on the

co-worker they got the promotion over

them not stopping for once to think that

maybe they still have a lot to learn all

the engineers in a company were once

asked to rate their work and determine

how well they were doing compared to the

rest of their colleagues 42 percent of

the engineers believed that they were

among the top five percent in the

company in another scenario professors

were asked whether they did average

below average or above average work

94 of all the professors in the survey

believe that they do above average work

a figure that defies mathematical

plausibility

you would think that professors who are

always greeting people would be able to

come up with a more accurate

self-assessment but the reality is we

are all victims of the don't improveer

effect both as professor and student

some scientists argue that the

dunning-kruger effect might not be

because of poor self-assessment but

rather just the poor performers wanting

to paint a fluffed up report of their

performance and while you can get where

this argument is coming from it doesn't

make sense because there are a lot of

places where we observe the

dunning-kruger effect even when there's

no reason for the person to want to look

good the truth is we can't give an

accurate Judgment of skills we know only

very little about because we simply

don't know what is good and what is not

we haven't seen both ends of the

spectrum

metacognition is the awareness of your

own thought processes it's being able to

plan Monitor and access your own

performance and understanding it's like

your brain's way of grading itself

in their research Dunning and Krueger

discovered that the less people know

about a subject the Lesser their

metacognitive ability around that

subject
this is what makes them unaware of their

own incompetence

and this is a very strange thing because

it means that oftentimes the loudest

person in the room is usually the one

who knows the least

[Music]

Bertrand Russell said this in 1951 and

it still Rings true today even now more

than ever because although he thought it

was just a thing of his time

it wasn't it was simply the

dunning-kruger effect at work

the sad thing is that people who know

the least are also the people who are

least likely to take up a learning

opportunity

think about the 42 percent of Engineers

who believe that they were in the top

five percent

they'll most likely ignore any

opportunities to learn from their

colleagues because they already believe

that they're the best

on the other hand the people who are the

best don't realize that they're so

special so they don't try to teach

others even when they're the ones that

should be doing that

in the end the company remains stagnant

life is very much like this company

go on the internet today and the loudest

voices are the ones who know the least

everywhere you turn there's a fake Guru

trying to teach you how to become a

billionaire overnight

they have very little knowledge but that

doesn't stop them from selling thousand

dollar courses with the same basic

information that you can get just by

Googling the right things the sad thing

is is that most people buy into their

confidence and certainty only to realize

too late that it was all bravado and no

substance

now more than ever misinformation is a

bigger problem than ignorance

people briefly glance through a topic

and they instantly want to start

teaching others they don't take their

time to actually read past the first

page of the instruction manual before

screaming at the rooftops about how much

they know

or how much they think they know

so more often than not we're listening

to the most confident people and not the

most reputable

we accept information from the person

who speaks the loudest rather than the

person who is the most knowledgeable

from 5G death scares to antivax

campaigns people are constantly

satisfied with knowing the bare minimum

not only are they satisfied they are

confident that they know it all and they

waste no time in sharing that

information with others

the loudest voices are ignorant why

aren't the knowledgeable speaking of

them again it's the dunning-kruger

effect

when the 65 participants were given the

three tests by Dunning and Krueger the

people who scored the best often knew

they did pretty well in the test

however they felt everyone else did too

they overestimated the scores of the

other people in the tests and didn't

think anything special of their own

results

when asked to place themselves on a

percentile more often than not the

people who did the best placed

themselves lower than they actually were

because of this the people who have any

imagination and understanding are filled

with doubt and indecision

the people who are most knowledgeable

don't realize that they are so they find

it difficult to speak up

it's easy for us to think that because

something comes so easily and naturally

to us it does to others as well

it's easy to think that we're not

special and that everyone can do as well

as we've done

but in reality that's not true

in fact if you think your work is not

good enough then it's already probably

better than most

because unlike the people at the bottom

of the percentile you know what you

don't know so you are more willing to

improve

the dunning-kruger effect is not

entirely a bad thing

in fact it's the reason most of us can

take a leap of faith

I started this channel without knowing

how difficult running a YouTube channel

is how badly an algorithm can beat you

down how the numbers on the screen

affect the value you placed on your work

I didn't know all of that at first all I

knew was to make a video and upload it

I feel like if I had known how difficult

it would be in the long run I might have

never even started

so in a way

the Dunning Kruger effect helps us to

make the first move without worrying too

much about everything we don't know yet

it gives us the confidence to start

once we take that first step though it's

up to us to not get comfortable and

confident in the little that we know

we must fight the cognitive biases and

realize that we've only scratched the

surface and there's still a long way to

go

we're often taught not to compare

ourselves with others and most of the

time that's excellent advice constantly

pitting yourself against others can

leave you unhappy and unmotivated

but the truth is comparison isn't always

a bad thing

when we compare ourselves with others

we're able to better assess how well

we're doing

think about the participants of Dunning

and Krueger's experiment if the people

who had scored the lowest were shown the

scores of all the participants afterward

they would have been able to understand

that they weren't as knowledgeable as

they thought they were

if you're very confident about how much

you know

pause for a minute take your time before

sharing that information with others

question your long-standing views and

opinions because there might just be new

information that has come to light to

disprove what you hold so dearly to your

heart

be open to feedback and criticism while

it's true that people shouldn't

discourage your dreams

you need to understand that sometimes

you may be overestimating your skills so

take the criticism and consider it

carefully if you do you're most likely

going to learn a thing or two that you

didn't already know

when you're fully aware of the medic

cognitive bias that is the

dunning-kruger effect you'll know when

to ask for objective criticism and

feedback and when to trust your own

abilities and realize that you might

just be special after all

don't be satisfied with the little

knowledge you have keep improving

continue learning always ask questions

and be curious

your curiosity will be rewarded

whether you realize it or not

foreign

video on this channel in July 2017.

after months of going back and forth on

whether or not I actually wanted to

create a YouTube channel what would

people think what if people hate the

videos and tell me that I don't know

what I'm talking about

who am I to talk about these topics

these were the thoughts that flooded my

head

if you've ever been in a situation where

you have to start something or give a

presentation in front of a group of

people then I'm sure you've had a

similar emotion it's the fear of being

judged the fear that keeps us in Chains

and holds us bound from achieving our

true potential

to understand why we care so much about

what others think about us we have to go

back to the beginning of human history

man like many other animals evolved to

be social

our survival was dependent on close-knit

communities tribes and clans we would

hunt together make shelter and protect

one another from predators should they

dare strike

being together made us Thrive so at the

time being cast out of the clan almost

always meant death

without the Technologies we have today

making shelter hunting and protecting

yourself from Wildlife was almost

impossible for one person to do alone

sadly even now that our society has

evolved to a point where we no longer

have to worry about Predators then we

have the tools and resources to provide

food clothing and shelter for ourselves

the need to be part of a group still has

been maladapted to our current reality

then we were scared of being left out in

the cold today we're scared of getting

canceled on Twitter because of something

we said or getting insulted for

repeating clothes on Instagram or

getting hate comments on your YouTube

video of people telling you your voice

is becoming redundant and boring

you see this feeling of being ostracized

has worsened woefully because of social

media by creating likes and dislikes we

brought to light this need to feel

validated and seen

in an instant you can see just how many

people support you and that number can

be addicting
it gets to the point where we stop

saying what we really want to say and

instead start saying the things we know

will get us the most likes

before you know it you're posting

certain thoughts photos and writing

specific statements to get that

attention and validation from others

how many times have you seen your

favorite influencers and creators online

suddenly sell out where it feels like

they're no longer authentic only doing

or saying the things they know will

please the algorithm

I made a video about Unit 731 and the

Despicable things the Japanese

government did in the Second World War

however because it was not Advertiser

friendly content according to YouTube

the video didn't perform extremely well

and that's fine

this is the kind of authorization and

social conditioning that makes people

fall in line and stop saying anything

that might offend the people with money

it's like they tell you there's freedom

of speech but only when your microphone

is turned off

growing up I always felt different

of course I had friends and wanted to be

part of the social group

what I had questions about the universe

that people just didn't like to discuss

who wants to talk about death and the

afterlife on the school playground after

all

because of that I felt different from

everyone else a piece of a puzzle but

from another set

and so I grew up worried that everyone

would look at me as weird and different

so I tried my best to hide my

existential dread to fit in like

everyone else

if you're watching this video right now

there's a high chance that you also once

a kid like me who was so worried about

being disliked that you Shield the real

you just so you wouldn't be thought of

as different

still in that position

stop caring so much about what other

people think and start living your life

authentically

yes caring what others think is healthy

however it becomes hurtful when we try

to change ourselves just to be liked by

others

you would enjoy your time on this

floating Rock far more if you choose to

live your authentic self and if someone

rejects you because of it you'll know

that they were never meant for you in

the first place

now if that sounds like a lofty dream

and not really grounded in reality I

understand

because the sad truth of this entire

thing is that we do need to be judged

fairly by others at its core that's what

makes our society work

we agree that something is Law and

whoever breaks it gets judged we agree

on certain moral principles and whoever

breaks them gets socially ostracized

were judged in our places of work in

school in our society as a whole

as sad as it sounds gossip and ostracism

help the greater good of the group

in 2014 Sanford Professor Rob Willer led

a study that explored the relation of

gossip and ostracism to the Harmony and

functionality of experimental groups in

this study Rob found out that groups

that allowed their members to gossip and

vote out underperforming members were

able to sustain cooperation and prevent

selfishness much better than groups that

weren't allowed to do so

when we think of ostracism we almost

always see it in a bad light however the

study proved that it does have a much

more important role in preventing the

weak and vulnerable from being bullied

and written upon

have you ever been in a group for a

school project only to quickly realize

that there's one person who just

wouldn't do anything because they know

the group will pick up their slack

how's that make you feel

now imagine you could remove these

people from the group and then gossip to

other groups about how bad of a team

player they are

it might seem harsh at first but because

of our innate fear of being ostracized

more often than not these people would

see the reality of what they're doing

and actually act better when reinvited

into the group

it also prevents these selfish people

from exploiting the more vulnerable

people in the group and allows them to

reach their full potential without fear

of being taken advantage of

the researchers concluded that exclusion

compelled participants to conform to the

more Cooperative behavior of the rest of

the group

so yes we need to be good team players

for the proper functioning of society

however being part of a group should

never be at the expense of our own

individuality

we should never get so scared of being

ostracized that we do not say the things

that matter to us for the fear of being

judged we need to realize that we will

get to a point in our lives where we'll

begin to assess everything that would

have been taught as children

when you start to outgrow old beliefs

and walk into new ones do not be held

back by the fear of what everyone who

you grew up with would think

caring about what other people think is

necessary for the proper functioning of

society but when caring what other

people think affects our abilities to

make decisions for ourselves that's when

you need to pause and reconsider

you're a person with their own thoughts

ideas dreams and goals don't let the

fear of being disliked hold you back

from expressing that you want to drop

out of school to become a comedian what

would people think you want to start a

YouTube channel what would people think

you want to be with someone from a

different culture or religion what would

people think

this one question holds so many people

back from doing what they love it's like

a chain that binds our neck and leaves

us no room to breathe we're like circus

elephants held back by rope that might

only exist in our imagination

ultimate freedom is Having the courage

to be disliked the boldness to stand

firm in what you believe in even when

the crowd is saying something else

the courage to stand when everyone else

is sitting and run when everyone else is

standing the courage to be your

authentic self regardless of what

everyone around you tells you to be

instead

developing the courage to be disliked is

not easy remember that it's in our

nature to care what other people think

sort of stray from that even minutely

would mean going against our very own

biology and that's never very easy

but the good news is is that we can

actually do it the first and most

important thing to realize is that

everyone just like you is worried about

their own insecurities when we go on

into the world we're often so consumed

with our own insecurities that we feel

like everyone else is thinking about us

and condemning us

but the reality is more often than not

just like you people are so worried

about themselves that they aren't really

thinking about anyone else and when they

do speak out against us they're often

projecting their insecurities on us

trying to bring us down to feel better

about themselves

don't let them do that

the difference between ostracization and

early humans and what we have today is

that with the early humans it was only

your closest relatives and members of

your clan that could cast you out

however today because of social media

anyone and everyone can have an opinion

about us share that opinion and we're

forced to take notice of it

the problem with this is that we're

taking criticism from people we wouldn't

take advice from

think about it if you wouldn't let this

stranger into your house for fear of

invading your privacy

why would you let them into your head

the most private place of all

sometimes the people judging you and not

letting you live your true potential

aren't strangers their childhood friends

and relatives

when that's the case we need to remind

ourselves of the consequences of living

outside the group is not as Sinister as

it used to be

you have the tools and resources to

thrive away from your primary group and

in fact you can find another group to

join one that would accept you for who

you are and not try to force you into

being something you're not I know I've

said some negative things about social

media in this video and many others but

there are some positives as well in this

scenario where you no longer feel part

of the group you were born into or grew

up in

the internet offers you a community of

people who are willing to accept you

from all over the world

you just have to take the time to find

them Lao Zoo wrote in Tao teaching care

about people's approval and you will be

their prisoner

the courage to be disliked is the key

that opens the prison doors and sets you

free to be the person you've always

wanted to be

you look out the window into the empty

streets

no sounds of kids running around no

noise of busy streets littered with both

cars and pedestrians

the city is silent the pigeons don't

even group up anymore because there's no

one to feed them

you ask yourself where am I

[Music]

your alarm rings it's 9am

time to resume work at the office for

the day

with a sad face you walk to your desk

open up your computer

inside

I miss the old days you say to yourself

this is nostalgia

it's the burning desire to go back to

the past to live the life we once had or

perhaps only a romanticized version of

it we want experiences places things

people and even ourselves to go back to

being what they once were we remember

our childhood memories without all the

awkwardness our first love without the

reason we're no longer with them our

first kiss without the terrible acne we

had we remember a romanticized version

of our past one without the flaws one

where we know what's going to happen

next and one where we can tell what

consequences our actions will have

before we take them

it often happens when we see hear or

even smell something that reminds us of

the past and the life we once had the

best example of this is in relationships

people often leave relationships because

it wasn't a good experience for them but

a few months down the line and they

begin to start missing the connection

they feel like maybe it wasn't as bad as

they remember their memories began to

filter out all the bad that happened and

they're left with feelings of a

Nostalgia about a romanticized version

of what the relationship was

oftentimes they go back

only to get hurt all over again

Nostalgia can be pleasant but as we've

seen it can also often cause us a lot of

emotional distress

the 17th century Swiss physician

Johannes Hoffer who came up with this

name classified Nostalgia as a mental

disorder no one could understand why

anyone would want to dwell in the past

without that being the case

for a long long time that's what

Nostalgia was until one lunch in 1999 in

Southampton England Constantine said

ikutis had just recently moved to the

University of Southampton and was having

lunch with a colleague he explained to

this colleague that he was generally

doing well but a few times a week he was

hit with Nostalgia of his former home at

the University of North Carolina he

longed for the time with his friends the

basketball games he longed for his old

life his colleague who was a clinical

psychologist made an immediate diagnosis

depression he said just like the 17th

century Swiss position this psychologist

couldn't fathom why anyone would want a

time that was already gone the life they

had already lived

but he knew this wasn't true Constantine

denied being depressed explaining to his

colleague that he didn't feel any pain

he said I told him I did live my life

forward but sometimes I couldn't help

thinking about the past and it was

rewarding Nostalgia made me feel that my

life had roots and continuity it made me

feel good about myself and my

relationships it provided a texture to

my life and gave me strength to move

forward and this was the start of a

drastic change everything we knew about

Nostalgia was about to take on a new

form

perhaps it wasn't as bad as we thought

it might not even be bad at all through

Constantine's research the word

nostalgia has slowly lost its negative

reputation but not entirely

you see Nostalgia is a Bittersweet

emotion on one hand it brings us comfort

and makes us feel loved and connected

when we remember all the times our loved

ones cared for us or of a time in our

life where everything was going right

on the other hand it makes us feel sad

that those things are gone and scared

that we might never experience them

again

a great example of this is when Abraham

Lincoln visited his child home after 20

years he arrived and found the place in

ruin

saddened by what he saw he wrote this

poem

my childhood home I see again and

saddened with the view as still as

memory clouds my brain there's pleasure

in it too

because although it saddened him to see

that he would never be able to

experience those emotions again

remembering the times he spent in the

house and the happiness it brought him

when he was younger brought happy

thoughts to his memory

positive feelings of nostalgia make you

thankful for what you've had and give

you the desire to keep moving forward

perhaps you might even be able to

recreate that amazing feeling or even

experience something better in the

future

negative feelings of nostalgia however

make you feel like your life was better

in the past you might even start to beat

yourself up for choices you made in the

past because you think whatever

decisions you made or negatively

affecting your life today you get stuck

in a cycle of thoughts about the past

that basically leaves you frustrated

defeated and stuck when things like that

happen it's often because you haven't

taken the time out to process that

experience it has happened but you

didn't give your brain enough time to

mourn it and move on from it you put up

a wall you seal it away as many of us do

however once you can truly process the

experience and come to terms with what

came from it you'll stop experiencing

the negative nostalgic feeling that's

associated with that particular memory

one of the best things about the feeling

of nostalgia is that it's all about you

and people love themselves more than

anything else

most human emotions we feel are felt as

a result of external forces we get sad

when something doesn't go our way we get

disappointed in people when they do

something unexpected that we'd rather

they didn't we get angry at people when

they do something to agitate us but

Nostalgia nobody does anything to us in

fact oftentimes we can't pinpoint the

trigger for our Nostalgia all we know is

that a few times a week we remember our

old life with friends family and times

we shared with loved ones and as

memories Cloud our brain there's

pleasure in it too

now this does not mean that outside

forces can't trigger Nostalgia as we all

know advertisers have discovered the

power of nostalgia and they use it to

their advantage all the time that's why

you have Disney remaking all of their

best cartoons they're trying to make

people nostalgic so they flock to the

cinemas trying to recapture a moment of

their previous lives

but unlike trying to make someone feel

happy or sad for a character in a movie

trying to make someone feel nostalgic is

very tricky and can often backfire like

just look at the Lion King live action

movie the first Sonic the Hedgehog

trailer and more recently Tom and Jerry

all three of these movies tried to make

people nostalgic but they failed

completely in their goal

why because Nostalgia is a very complex

emotion

the question who am I has plagued

Humanity for Millennia every five years

every single atom in your body will have

been replaced by a different atom your

thoughts opinions and feelings about

things will have also changed sometimes

where you live and your friends may have

even changed so who are you

is there one true aspect to your being

that stamps you as being one of one

what part of us acts as the random seed

hash that is tied to our existence

the best philosophers scientists and

psychologists have had a go at the

question but all to no avail

and while Nostalgia certainly doesn't

answer the question it helps us calm the

anxiety it causes we can say that what

makes you you are your specific memories

about the past all of which tell you

about how you've changed and become the

person you are today they tell you that

you are a continuous being one whose

existence grows linearly with time

when we're feeling like a failure like

we don't have any purpose in life like

we have no value or any meaning we can

often tap into our nostalgic memories

for Comfort to calm our worrying minds

and remind us that we do have intrinsic

value that we are not failures with no

purpose we have friends family and

healthy experiences we can cling on to

Nostalgia usually happens when there's a

major life transition like when you're

going off to college moving to a new

city traveling across the world or

getting married it's like our brains are

trying to grab hold of who we were even

as we're still learning who we are and

discovering who we want to be

right now people are feeling nostalgic

more than ever and honestly that's

exactly what a year in lockdown will do

to you we begin to feel nostalgic when

we see live performances we went to in

the past large family gatherings we used

to detest and even little things like

the noise of a busy grocery store or

kids screaming on airplanes

maybe not the last one because we're

limited in our ability to go out and

create new experiences our brain is

re-running the old ones again and again

and again to give us that sense of

warmth and connection that many of us

are missing in our daily lives right now

the internet has modified everything we

used to do as a society

mobs have morphed into cancel culture we

no longer have to be physically present

at work or school and we now even have a

dedicated day to feel nostalgic social

media calls it TBT or throwback Thursday

every Thursday people post nostalgic

photos of both themselves and of a time

period to sit back and reflect on what

once was

we also have things like Snapchat

Facebook and Google photos bringing us

memories of pictures we've taken from a

few years ago having all of these

memories flood not just our minds but

also our phone screens without having

the ability to make new ones and you can

see why people are feeling nostalgic now

more than ever before

we also see nostalgia in sports for

years there's been the very heated

debate of who's The Goat Who is the

greatest athlete of all time in the NBA

we often hear of Lebron vs Jordan but in

reality even if LeBron James ends his

career with more titles than Michael

Jordan MJ will always still have the

Nostalgia Factor on his side he's many

people's childhood and no one will ever

argue that their Sports Idol the one who

they watched while they were growing up

isn't the goat however with enough time

the modern day goats turn into Old

Legends and slowly but surely get

outshined by new and Rising Talent the

arguments we have today will be the same

arguments we have in the future only

with different people and different

nostalgic factors

Nostalgia is a very interesting emotion

because we all in some way want to feel

it even if it brings us both happiness

and pain

oftentimes the best memories are the

ones we remember with both happiness and

sadness

on days when we feel our worst it makes

us feel sad angry and even scared that

we might never get those things those

feelings again but even on those days

Nostalgia has the power to bring us hope

and make us realize that we all have a

story that is still being written

why do we remember the past and not the

future do we exist in time or does time

exist in US

what does it really mean to say time

passes

wonder is the source of our desire for

knowledge and Nostalgia helps us to

remember how far our curiosity can take

us

from where we were to where we are to

where we will be

Nostalgia will be there all along the

way

you were on your way home when you died

it was a car accident

nothing particularly remarkable but

fatal nonetheless

you left behind a wife and two children

it was a painless death

the EMTs tried their best to save you

but to no avail

your body was so utterly shattered that

you were better off

trust me

and that's when you met me

wait what happened you asked

where am I

you died I said matter of factly no

point in mincing words

there was a

a truck and it was skidding

yep I said

I died

yup

but don't feel bad about it everyone

dies I said

you looked around

there was nothingness

just you and me

what is this place you asked is this the

afterlife

more or less I said

are you God you asked

yep I replied

I'm God

a few things capture our imagination

quite like death

it's going to happen to us we know it's

going to happen to us and yet we live

our lives pretending that it's not going

to happen

not to us at least we think not right

now

we run away from it every chance we get

and yet somehow we are preoccupied with

it

almost simultaneously we ignore death

and worship its possibility

we write books about how life is short

but we never really live like it is

who are we

what do you think happens after death

my kids my wife you said

what about them

will they be all right

that's what I like to see I said

you've just died and your main concern

is for your family that's good stuff

right there

you looked at me with fascination to you

I didn't look like God I just looked

like some man or possibly a woman some

vague authority figure maybe more of a

grammar school teacher than the Almighty

don't worry I said they'll be fine your

kids will remember you as perfect in

every way

they didn't have time to grow contempt

for you

your wife will cry on the outside but

will be secretly relieved

to be fair your marriage was falling

apart

if it's any consolation she'll feel very

guilty for feeling relieved

oh

you said

so what happens now

do I go to heaven or hell or something

neither I said
you'll be reincarnated

ah you said

so the Hindus were right

all religions are right in their own way

I said

walk with me

you followed along as we Strode through

the void

never was there a time when I did not

exist nor you nor all these Kings nor in

the future shall any of us cease to be

as the embodied Soul continuously passes

in this body from childhood to youth to

old age the soul similarly passes into

another body at death

a sober person is not bewildered by such

a change

and worn out garments are shed by the

body worn out bodies are shed by the

dweller within the body

new bodies are dawned by the dweller

like garments

these are the words from the

bahagavad-gita one of the Holy

scriptures of Hinduism

in it are verses about the seemingly

unending cycle of life and of

reincarnation

every version of a being acts and reacts

and their actions determine how they are

going to be manifested in the next life

we commonly refer to this as karma

this continues nearly eternally to the

soul yearns for a higher sense of being

which it can ultimately achieve once it

rids itself of all desires ego or

pleasure

the yearning for a higher being is only

truly meant when no such yearning exists

so is this life the one we're living

right now

just a mere test

where are we going

nowhere in particular I said it's just

nice to walk while we talk

so what's the point then you asked when

I get reborn I'll just be a blank slate

right a baby so all my experiences and

everything I did in this life won't

matter

not so I said

you have within you all the knowledge

and experiences of all your past lives

you just don't remember them right now

I stopped walking and took you by the

shoulders

your soul is more magnificent beautiful

and gigantic than you can possibly

imagine

a human mind can only contain a tiny

fraction of what you are

it's like sticking your finger in a

glass of water to see if it's hot or

cold

you put a tiny part of yourself into the

vessel and when you bring it back out

you've gained all the experiences it had

you've been a human for the last 48

years so you haven't stretched out

enough yet and felt the rest of your

immense consciousness

if we hung out here for long enough

you'd start remembering everything

but there's no point in doing that

between each life

how many times have I been reincarnated

then

oh lots and lots and into lots of

different lives I said

this time around you'll be a Chinese

peasant girl in 1540 A.D

wait what you stammered you're sending

me back in time

well I guess technically

time as you know it only exists in your

universe

things are different where I come from

where do you come from you said

oh sure I explained I come from

somewhere

somewhere else

and there are others like me

I know you want to know what it's like

there but honestly you wouldn't

understand

oh you said a little letdown

but wait if I get reincarnated to other

places in time I could have interacted

with myself at some point

sure happens all the time

and with both lives only aware of their

own lifespan you don't even know what's

happening

other religions such as Islam or

Christianity don't quite preach the idea

of reincarnation but when you look

through the pages they too treat this

life as a test

it is the afterlife where life achieves

completion and we get to live truly

what you do in this life determines the

fate of what your soul will be

while the concept of death is slightly

different across certain religions and

theologies in that some of it happens

over and over again and in others you

die once but Live Twice

nearly all religions encourage followers

to think about the cascading effects of

their actions at a macro scale

there are more famous ideas in this

realm of course the simulation theory is

just one of the more famous ones where

reality is potentially reduced to a high

definition video game running at some

scrawny teenager's basement

it's his reality and you and I are

living in it

this certainly is not as grandiose of a

possibility as something from scripture

but the logic that leads one to the

simulation theory is ironed clad

what does this all mean then so what's

the point of it all

seriously I asked

seriously you're asking me for the

meaning of life I mean isn't that a

little stereotypical

well it's a reasonable question you

pestered

I looked you in the eye

the meaning of life the reason I made

this whole universe

is for you to mature

you mean mankind you want us to mature

no

just you

I made this whole universe for you

with each new life you grow and mature

and become a larger and greater

intellect

just me

what about everyone else

there is no one else I said

in this universe there's just you

and me

you stared blankly at me

but all the people on earth

all you
different incarnations of you

wait I'm everyone

now you're getting it I said with a

congratulatory slap on the back

I'm every being who ever lived

or who will ever live yes

I'm Abraham Lincoln

and you're John Wilkes Booth too I added

I'm Hitler you replied and you're the

millions he killed

I'm Jesus and you're everyone who

followed him

you fell silent

every time you victimize someone I said

you were victimizing yourself

every act of kindness you've done

you've done to yourself

every happy and sad moment ever

experienced by any human was

or will be experienced by you

you thought for a long time

why you asked me

why do all of this

because someday you will become like me

because that's what you are

one of my kind

you're my child
you mean I'm a God

no not yet you're a fetus you're still

growing

once you've lived every human life

throughout all time you will have grown

enough to be born

so the whole universe you said it's just

an egg

I answered

now it's time for you to move on to your

next life

and I sent you on your way

whether you believe in an organized

religion or not

we've all wondered what happens when our

eyes closed for that one last time

maybe we watch our lifeless bodies as

our souls float away

maybe we try to call upon our loved ones

to let them know it's all going to be

okay

but they just never listen

maybe nothing happens at all

maybe there is no meaning

Andy Weir short story supposedly written

in less than an hour does talk about an

afterlife scenario but that's not really

the message it's trying to deliver

maybe his point is to highlight the

ability of every person to be both the

worst manifestation of humanity but also

be the best of it

Andy poses this when he says that the

protagonist was both Hitler and the

people he killed

it's hypothetical of course

but then again

how far are we at any given time from

the worst version of ourselves

I often find myself looking at pictures

of famous or inFAMOUS people for that

matter as babies

in the backdrop of reality these baby

faces can remind us about the Innocence

every human is capable of

perhaps one of the lessons from the egg

theory is to remind people of the power

of a situation to turn us into Who We

Are

this is not to absolve any one of the

wrongdoing or take away from the gravity

of their actions but a chance to shed

light on the fact that a lot of who we

are is quite simply circumstance and

that we might be better able to prevent

future atrocities if we're able to

foresee the circumstances that lead to

them

this was in large part the focus of the

now Infamous Stanford Prison experiments

college students were hired to play

either guard or prisoner and their

behavior would then be studied

in just over a day the power imbalance

had manifested into near total tyranny

where the guards would abuse the

prisoners to such an extent that a lot

of them had to be discharged from the

experiments

this ultimately led to the termination

of the study after just six days

some say the guards behave like this

because these guards were inherently bad

people others say it was the power

imbalance that was always set for an

outcome like this

I urge you to read into it yourself but

these studies do demonstrate and quite

reassuringly so that there may be more

bad circumstances than bad people in

this world

the egg theory also need not only be

about righteousness or evil it can also

be about looking at Life Through The

Eyes of others

perhaps we would think of life

differently if we could see ourselves

Through The Eyes of a loved one

we often tend to be harsh on ourselves

for mistakes but if a friend were to

make the same mistake we would try and

support them

why should we treat ourselves harsher

than we would treat friend

imagine being a parent and finally

getting to understand their worries for

when they said they couldn't sleep when

you didn't call

imagine how we might rethink Our World

Views if we could look at things through

the eyes of someone who disagrees with

us

in fact that is supposedly the origin of

the story not some near-death experience

that Andy Weir had but rather a

disagreement with his aunt

what would a world like that be

when empathy becomes more than just

leaving words unsaid and turns into a

feeling an emotion that you don't have

to interpret but rather feel yourself

there is also the concept of being

reborn and carrying over your lessons

into the next life

what would you become if you could live

again

if you knew then what you know now

how would you do things differently

what if you never got that chance

who am I kidding

luckily

we get that chance every day

as Confucius once said

every man has two lives

and the second starts when he realizes

he has just one on the 23rd of March

2016 Microsoft released a new chatbot

named Tay on Twitter

described by Microsoft as an experiment

in conversational understanding Tay was

built to have conversations with people

through tweets and DMS with the slang of

the internet

in the words of its creators Tay was

meant to be and I quote Microsoft's AI

fam from the internet that's got zero

chill

I don't know

Tay was designed to learn more about

human language as she interacted with

people through their tweets she was to

learn the patterns of our communication

and then emulate it when trying to

create her own speech

tei's first few tweets were fun and

harmless

however in just a few hours everyone was

in horror as Tay started tweeting the

most offensive things imaginable

things along the lines of and again I

quote

Bush did 911 and Hitler would have done

a better job

in just 16 hours he tweeted 95 000 times

what the majority of her tweets being

extremely abusive and offensive

in less than a day Microsoft had to

suspend the account in the entire

experiment a complete social failure if

you ask me

but it did do his job the way it was

programmed to do

Tay was not designed to think for

herself she was built to learn from the

language that was spoken to her and so

when people recognized that she was

nothing more than a parent bought they

intentionally started tweeting the most

insensitive and offensive things at her

tweets she echoed right back into the

world

sadly many people today are like Tay

we constantly feed ourselves with the

same type of information and without

pausing for a minute to verify what is

fact and form an unbiased opinion

many of us simply Echo everything we

think right back into the world although

we'd like to think that every opinion we

have in every decision we make is down

to our own best judgment and independent

assessment that's simply not true more

often than not our opinions beliefs

views and thoughts about the world are

influenced by a larger group of people

research has shown that when presented

with multiple options we often mimic the

choice of the people around us

rather than spending time researching

asking questions or learning about the

different options to find out the best

one for us we often defer to the social

Norm

this is how humans have always been we

are social animals After All

however now more than ever it's becoming

more and more important to think for

yourself a few decades ago we only had a

handful of different thoughts that we

were exposed to so it was easy to filter

all of them and figure out what was

right for us

but thanks to the internet and social

media there are billions of people with

Completely Different World Views

ideologies and beliefs and the societal

Norm is changing so rapidly that there's

no time to pause and think wait is this

really right for me

if you're not subscribed to my channel

there's a high chance that the YouTube

algorithm brought you here if that's the

case

hi

see algorithms are great they bring

everything we want right to our

doorsteps but there's one big problem

slowly they're beginning to dictate Our

Lives

they're starting to think for us

first it's content-based platforms like

YouTube and Netflix suggesting things to

you to watch

soon you're watching everything not

because you searched for it but because

the algorithm suggested it

and to a large extent this looks

harmless it exposes you to content you

otherwise might not have seen and give

smaller creators the chance to blow up

without having an established pedigree

it's literally the reason aperture has

grown to the size it's at today

but then you have Amazon's algorithm

that tells you all the products you

should add to your cart alongside the

one purchase you made then Gmail smart

reply telling you how to reply to emails

and Tinder telling you who you're

supposed to spend the rest of your life

with before you know it we give the

algorithm the driver's seat and we

become passengers in our own lives

merely coasting through the roads we are

suggested

this in and of itself is a problem but

the fact that the algorithm is not

perfect makes it an even bigger one

the algorithms that are now thinking for

us don't actually think

they simply find patterns and parrot

them

once they realize we like or agree with

a certain thing we are constantly fed

with that one thing and in a short while

we find ourselves in an echo chamber

where everything we see in here are only

things we've agreed with in the past

it doesn't give much room for change for

growth for the opportunity to listen to

opposing arguments and learn

think about it how many times have you

randomly found a video on YouTube that

you completely disagreed with

compare that to how many times you've

found a video that you enjoyed and

completely agreed with

the difference is probably incredible

and the better the algorithms become the

better they would be at serving you that

information that you already agree with

this leads to a confirmation bias the

tendency to search for interpret favor

and recall information in a way that

confirms or supports your prior beliefs

or values

because these algorithms constantly

surround us with ideas that we already

agree with we quickly block our minds to

every shred of evidence that contradicts

this bias

there's a subtle difference between the

desire to have been right in the desire

to be right

the desire to have been right prevents

us from seeing the real truth causing us

to hold on to ideas that might be

illogically and factually flawed we

failed to see how we're wrong and so we

fail to learn and grow

we hold on to beliefs that we have been

surrounded by so much so that we start

to seek out evidence to back up our bias

and not to find out the truth

the truth is that humans find it very

difficult to process information in an

unbiased and rational manner once

they've developed strong feelings or

sentiments about the issue

so people interpret everything they see

in a way that already agrees with

everything they know and believe about

the world

some people believe in something called

extra sensory perception

so for example they remember all the

times they were thinking about their mom

and picked up their phone only to see

that she was calling

it seems like fate in a way but yet they

forget all the times when Mom called

when they weren't thinking about her and

the other times when they were thinking

about mom but she never called

because they believe so strongly in

extrasensory perception they are far

more likely to remember instances that

back up their claims even when the

instances that don't agree with those

claims occur far more frequently

to make her confirmation bias even worse

social media has created the influencer

culture people like me apparently

now not only do we look to each other

for guidance we look to influencers

gurus and thought leaders because we

consider these people part of our packs

more so than traditional celebrities we

often place them on incredibly High

pedestals

giving them the opportunity to

well influence us

people buy a product because an

influencer said so even when the product

might not be the best option for them

they employ unsafe dieting practices and

workout routines just because an

influences that it'll work without doing

the research for what works for their

own body

people listen to fake gurus and

influencers and without taking the time

to think for themselves they do exactly

what these people tell them to do

even if it's unhealthy and potentially

dangerous

one of the biggest reasons people no

longer seem to think for themselves is

because they are scared of the

repercussions

how can you think for yourself when

sharing ideas that are not in accordance

with the societal Norm gets you exiled

from society

when you could lose your job your

education everything you've ever worked

for

simply for thinking differently and

expressing those different opinions

yes I'm talking about cancer culture the

real victims of cancel culture are the

ideas that will be left unsaid the

thoughts left in the mind for fear of

extreme backlash

it's the beliefs that are only expressed

in the dark or the Big Bright Eyes of

Big Brother cannot see

to prevent the rats from coming out Big

Brother urges you to double think to

prevent yourself from getting canceled a

relatively new phenomenon Society urges

you to group think

coined by Irving Janus in 1972 group

think simply means avoiding Conflict by

swiftly reaching an agreement without

evaluating other options or alternative

ideas

it means to bend your back to the

societal Norm without giving other ideas

a second thought

the danger of this is that our

individuality and uniqueness dies and

the world moves to a point where we all

collectively agree on the same ideas

no difference in thought no individual

ideas just group think

but it doesn't have to be this way to

think for yourself is a skill you must

learn else you become a puppet of

someone else's programming

to think for yourself is to challenge

your existing ideas beliefs and

decisions

ask yourself

are my thoughts mine or are they simply

influenced by everyone around me my

friends my parents society influencers

and so on

to think for yourself is to look at the

evidence to investigate and to use

thoughtful analysis

understand that all of us battle with

confirmation bias we all want to seem to

fit in and so remember to not shy away

from ideas that might negate your

existing bias

to think for yourself is to battle with

your mind go out there and find the

roots of the ideas you support and then

find opposing arguments

look at your newfound beliefs as

diamonds encased in a rock before you

get to the Fine jewel in the middle you

must break through the rock with a lot

of force but carefully and diligently

before you fully accept a new way of

thinking make sure that you've broken

through the Rock by wrestling with these

new ideas in a way that might take you

out of your comfort zone

to think for yourself is to go out there

in search of information don't wait for

an algorithm to keep echoing the things

you already know

acquire new knowledge

feed your mind continuously by reading

listening and discussing these big new

ideas with a view from both sides

break your pattern of thought and view

everything the world has to say through

your own lenses

to think for yourself is to be humble in

your knowledge

one of the reasons people fall into the

Trap of confirmation bias is that they

don't want to be wrong

we've built this idea for some reason

that we have to protect ourselves from

being wrong

people seem to Pride themselves as

intellectuals and knowledgeable and

disconfirming evidence goes against that

notion

so they shy away from it keeping

themselves in the dark about the truth

simply because they want to keep up the

facade of being right

don't be scared of being wrong there's

literally nothing wrong with it

remember we used to think that the Earth

was the center of the universe and that

everything revolved around us

we're egocentric we enjoy feeling

important and being right gives us that

sense of superiority but in my mind I

feel as if you should be more concerned

about finding out what's right and not

craving the state of being right

to think for yourself is to be

courageous to not Buckle under fear

pressure or guilt to stand up for what

you believe in as long as you have come

to see it as the truth for yourself

to think for yourself is standing out

and not going along with the crowd

simply for the sake of keeping the

so-called peace and avoiding

confrontation

because the truth is we would have no

new scientific discovery if the old

ideas were never challenged

everything we believe about the world

today is a product of someone thinking

outside of the box

challenging the status quo

we must do the same

being a free thinker opens the avenue to

ideas that some of us may never truly

experience and new ideas are something

we can all benefit from as individuals

there is no progress without change

and there is no change without admitting

there's a problem in the first place

you are a chicken

yes you you look around and sometimes

wonder why your owner takes such good

care of you

at first you're not sure you're

skeptical what if he sends you to the

slaughterhouse