, 6 min read
Are you RIGHT? (...probably not) |Night Thoughts | Podcast Episode 2
Out of 7.6 billion people on the planet, and they all think that they're right, what are the chances that you're right? This is what I've been thinking about tonight, and for me, it's such, such a fascinating thought. For me, it makes me very excited to think about. And that is, I've been thinking a lot about the pursuit of truth, or just trying to figure out what you believe, and what you believe in, and trying to figure out the world, and, and how you, like, your opinions on things, and what is right. You know, I think every human, especially in their early 20s, we're trying to figure out what's right. Like, what do we believe in? What's right? Like, what political party do we belong to? What values do we agree on?
So, I love to think about everything from a psychological perspective. And from everything that I've researched, and from everything that I've learned, I know that one of the brain's main functions, or one of the brain's main jobs, is to make sense of the world. Your brain's purpose is to interpret everything that you see and smell and taste and feel in the world, and it needs to interpret those things and then come to conclusions about them. That's what your brain does every day. It's how you see things, it's how you hear music, because your brain is interpreting things and making sense of it.
So, a lot of neuroscientists say that your reality is actually just a controlled hallucination. And, and everybody can perceive the same reality in a different way. And also, that the way that your brain perceives each thing every day, your brain is using all of the knowledge that it has learned and garnered over the course of your life. So, it uses everything it's learned in the past to kind of predict what it is seeing, and to interpret what it is seeing in the present.
So, that is fascinating. What I just said is kind of a theory, so some neuroscientists believe that, others don't. But I believe that that makes sense to me. So, keeping that in mind, what does that mean for the pursuit of truth?
So, for me, it means that your brain is constantly trying to figure out what's going on. And one thing your brain hates is chaos and not knowing. So, it tries to make sense of everything, even if it has no idea. It just tries to make its best guess, and it kind of tricks you into believing that that is right. So, most people kind of decide what they believe in, and what they think is right, at a pretty early age. And take, for example, teenagers. It's a stereotype that teenagers seem to act like they know everything. Some do, some think that, some don't. But it is, I think, it's natural, because it's their brain trying to make sense of everything, because that's the brain's job. If—if you didn't know what was going on around you, and you didn't have any opinion on anything, you'd kind of go crazy.
But as we get older, we understand that we don't know everything. Usually, in our early 20s, we realize we actually know nothing. And we have to kind of re-figure out what is right, and what—what flaws we've had in our thinking over the course of our lives. And then it seems like throughout our 20s and 30s, and probably beyond, you start to realize, "Uh, where you went wrong," and you make new ideas or perceptions of the world.
Basically, the point I'm making is that what we think is true and right, and our opinions on things, are based on only our experiences and what we've learned. And it almost doesn't matter how much we've learned, because we—I don't believe that we, individuals, can ever learn enough. Even if we read all the books we can, I don't think we can learn enough to fully know what the truth is, ever.
And if you think about how many people there are in the world—out of the seven and a half billion people on the planet—most of them have a strong opinion or a belief in what the truth is, and what is right, and what they value. And everyone has their own opinions on things, and it's all based on their subjective experiences, or even at best is based on what they've learned from others. But I still think you can't learn enough to fully comprehend what the truth is. So, out of 7.6 billion people on the planet, and they all think that they're right, what are the chances that you're right?
Because everybody disagrees. We know this. Everybody disagrees. And you have your own opinion, and you disagree with others. But if everybody disagrees, and everybody believes that their opinion is right, or they know it's right, because their experience tells them they're right, and they are right in a way, chances are slim that you're right.
There's another thing about truth that I find very interesting, and that is that psychologically, people tend to believe the thing that other people believe. So, it's really hard to believe something is true if only you believe it. But it becomes easier and easier to believe that it is true based on how many other people believe it. I think that's a fascinating thing about the human brain, where you think that something is more true the more people believe it. And that kind of explains how cults work. If you're surrounded by people who all believe something, you're going to start believing it. And it almost doesn't even matter what it is. So, be careful about that. Know how much people can be influenced. That's something that I have been fascinated by, is how weak and impressionable the human brain is, and how we can start to believe almost anything if enough people believe it, or if enough people tell you that it is true.
Fascinating. The point of everything that I'm saying is to take a step back and understand—not just to think about—think about the things I mentioned, that truth and what you believe is simply your brain trying to make sense of your experience, trying to make sense of the world, and how you feel about the world, and how you fit into the world. And also, it tries to make sense of your own experiences. Like, your opinions are mostly based on your subjective experiences. And, and the cool thing is, everybody can experience reality completely differently. So, in a way, you are right. You are right, but because you're right because you experienced it, it doesn't mean that other people's experiences are wrong.
And just like you may scoff at teenagers for thinking that they know everything, we could be in the same boat where once you come to some sort of conclusion where you know for sure what the right is, maybe just keep your mind open to the possibility that you may not be right, which might offend people. But the thing is, I'm not trying to tell people that they're not right. I'm—what I'm thinking about is simply being able to keep your mind and your heart open to other people, and listen to their experiences, listen to their perspective, and learn. Keep your mind open to learning from other people. That's the cool thing. It's not about telling people they're wrong. I think most people are not wrong, because they've come to their conclusions based on their own experiences and their own reality. So, they're right. But you can still keep your mind and your heart open to listening and learning to others, from and to others.
I hope I made my thoughts relatively clear. I hope that this will be a quick, cool thought that will hopefully open up your mind just a little bit. These are all things that I've learned over the years of listening to neuroscientists and TED Talks, and also psychologist Dr. Jordan Peterson, who often shares very insightful things. So, you can feel free to do all your own research about this, but absolutely fascinating stuff.
All right, thanks for being here. Thanks for listening. And you should comment
"Night"
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