Category Archives: musings

What would happen

musings

What would happen if the whole country permanently lost electric power? What would happen if there were no supermarkets? What would happen if the Internet went down for days? What would happen if the planet’s oil reserves suddenly dried up? What would happen if money became devalued and worthless? What would happen if there were no media, no news, no weather, no radio? What would happen if there were no pharmacies or drugstores? What would happen if there were no water treatment facilities, no sanitation laws?

In this day and age, in the US and many other countries, we take for granted how easy and convenient and cushy our lives really are. I’m extremely grateful for all of the conveniences and scientific and technological advances that are a part of today’s society. I just wish more people would ponder questions like the ones above and take the time to appreciate how fortunate they are and how thrilled they should be to be living at this point in human history.

The fallacy of the future

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The ideas I’m about to discuss are not new. In fact, perhaps the best expression of the core idea happened over 2,000 years ago, in 23 BC, when Horace wrote (in Odes 1.11): “carpe diem.” Everyone knows the meaning of that phrase—”seize the day.” What most people don’t know, however, is the full line: “carpe diem, quam minimum credula postero” (“seize the day, put as little trust in the future as possible”). You can’t beat carpe diem for succinctness, but I think the second part of the line really drives the point home. And it’s a perfect synopsis of what I’ve come to call “the fallacy of the future.”

I call it “the fallacy of the future” because I think it sounds good. Technically speaking, using the term “fallacy” is not exactly the most accurate choice of wording. What would be better would be to say “the risk of the future,” or “the uncertain existence of the future.” But those don’t sound as good, so I’m sticking with “the fallacy of the future.” What’s important is the fundamental concept: Tomorrow is not guaranteed for anyone.

That notion is another one of “those things” that I mentioned in my previous post (“On driving“)—those things that people tend to discount or disregard because they are unpleasant to think about. Unfortunately, the consequence of not thinking about the uncertainty of everyone’s future tends to be a failure to act on it—a failure to seize the day. We want to do so many things—get back in touch with an old friend, take up a new hobby, travel abroad—but when it comes to actually doing them, we think, “Oh, well, I’m too tired,” or “I have to run these errands…but there’s always tomorrow” or “this weekend” or “next month” or whenever we convince ourselves we’ll do it. I’m not saying that I don’t do this; I do it too. I’m also not saying that all people are this way. But I do know that I’m not alone.

Of course, the problem with saying that “there’s always tomorrow” is that, well, there isn’t always tomorrow. Naturally we hope that there is a long and bright future ahead for ourselves and our loved ones, but the problem is when we allow that hope to ferment into belief in the idea that “there’s always tomorrow.” Instead, we should “quam minimum credula postero“…put as little trust in the future as possible! I think Robin Williams (whose death last year at age 63 was a perfect example of the uncertainty of the future) said it brilliantly as John Keating in this beautiful clip from Dead Poets Society.

Now, carpe diem is a lovely adage, but I have also wondered if there might be any psychological phenomenon behind “the fallacy of the future.” I have done some searching but haven’t turned up anything promising so far. The closest thing I found was optimism bias, or (as Wikipedia states) a person’s tendency to believe “that they are less at risk of experiencing a negative event compared to others.” Then, just last week, Derek (the owner of a YouTube channel called Veritasium) published an incredibly insightful video called “Would You Take This Bet?“. I highly recommend watching the video and contemplating how much money it would take for you to accept the bet he proposes. During the video, Derek explains the bet as a metaphor for life, and I thought the way he explained the metaphor was simply fantastic. He says:

“[The bet construct] is a metaphor for all the little risks and opportunities that come our way in our lives. I mean, if you view each one as an independent event, you will often say no even to very good bets because you are afraid of the loss. So if, instead, you can see each little bet as one of a series of bets, then you realize that if you take that bet every time, you may win and you may lose, but overall—on the aggregate—you will come out ahead.”

Sounds to me like a good reason to seize the day!

On driving

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For many people, driving is such a common activity that it has become second nature. I live in Atlanta, a fairly large city (urban pop. 4.5 million) where a majority of people drive (for various reasons), and here it seems that bad driving has become second nature for many. The interstates expand up to six or eight lanes as they pass through the city. Impatient drivers speed, tailgate, and weave between the lanes constantly. Other drivers contribute to the problem by driving slowly in the passing lane, distracted by the conversations they are having on their cell phones.

Every time I get in the car, I think about the fact that driving is one of the most dangerous activities we undertake on a regular basis. My approach to driving is shaped by that fact. I think others would do well to modify their approaches to driving accordingly.

People seem to become so impatient to get where they are going, or so frustrated with traffic, that they decide to put their lives and the lives of others at risk to save a few seconds or minutes on their travel time. They forget that traffic laws exist to promote safe, orderly driving. The speed limit is not the “suggested speed” that you “should” go; it is the maximum safe speed for that particular section of road. When you get ticketed for speeding, it is not because the police just want to meet a quota for pulling people over; it is because traveling faster than the maximum safe speed is, well, unsafe. The faster you are going, the less time you have to react to what’s happening around you, and the more likely you are to die in the event of a crash. Other driving rules exist for similar reasons.

To my mind, the biggest example is drunk driving. I cannot fathom how people can repeatedly drive under the influence and see no problem with it, or even brag about it. What’s worse, their biggest concern always seems to be not getting pulled over. They think that the worst possible outcome of driving drunk is being caught, arrested, and having a DUI on their records. What they evidently fail to consider is the reason why drunk driving is against the law in the first place. It’s because it’s unbelievably dangerous! The worst possible outcome of driving drunk is NOT getting arrested; it’s dying, or even dying in the process of inadvertently killing one or more other people. It is always worth the price of a cab to avoid putting your life and others’ lives at risk. (If you can’t afford the price of a cab to ensure your own safety after a night of drinking, perhaps you don’t need to be going out and buying drinks in the first place.)

The next frighteningly common dangerous driving habit is using cell phones while driving. This includes talking on the phone, texting, hands-free talking, and using apps (including maps). The common problem with all of these activities is the fact that they distract you from the road. The act of holding a phone up to your head is not what makes talking on the phone and driving dangerous. It’s the fact that part of your brain is focused on listening to and interpreting what the person you’re talking to is saying, and another part of your brain is trying to decide what you’re going to say next. Your brain has limited resources, so this listening and thinking detracts from your ability to watch the road and react when you get cut off, or the car in front of you brakes suddenly.

If you don’t believe me, watch a TV sitcom you’ve never seen before while talking on the phone, and then try to describe in detail what happened in the TV show. The point is, cell phones distract you from your primary goal when driving: carefully watching what is happening around you and responding appropriately. No text message is important enough to take your eyes off the road for as long as it takes to type it. You may think that you’re a great multitasker, and that these claims don’t apply to you. Wake up. You’re wrong. And even if you’re right, is it worth taking the chance that you’re not? I say no.

I don’t mean for this post to sound preachy, although it almost certainly does. I just think that sometimes people overlook the cold hard facts of driving (among other things) because they are unpleasant and difficult. Or maybe they never even think about it in the first place, and they don’t realize how dangerous driving is until they’re in a serious accident or someone they know is killed in a car crash. The way I see it, if you can drive more safely and be less likely to hurt or kill anyone while driving … why not?

Ten totally terrific TED Talk life hacks

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I love TED Talks. I think TED is great, and the concept of spreading ideas that are…well, worth spreading…is wonderful. (If you don’t know what TED is, check out their Web site. It’s probably wise to have a clear schedule when visiting for the first time, because you will get sucked in for a few hours.)

The only problem with browsing TED Talks on the Web site is that there are just too many of them! That’s why I was pleased to discover that Netflix has created some thematically-grouped collections of TED Talks. Some of these collections include “Smart Laughs,” “On Life Lessons and Confessions,” “Head Games,” and “Rad Invention.” One such collection is called “Life Hack”; it contains 10 talks, each of which provides a small tip or trick that everyone can do to improve some aspect of their lives—a “life hack.”

Although these are not my original ideas, in the spirit of “ideas worth spreading,” I have decided to compile a list describing the TED Talks in the Netflix “Life Hack” collection. Honestly, this list is primarily for my own reference, so that I can return to it as needed to remind myself of this great advice. If you would like to benefit from it as well, click below to read on.

Continue reading Ten totally terrific TED Talk life hacks →

The Collatz Conjecture

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Here’s something I’ve been puzzling about ever since I first heard of it a few weeks ago. It involves a very simple algorithm to apply to a natural number n. Let’s call it COLLATZ:

function COLLATZ(n):
if n is even: return n/2
else: return 3n + 1

The Collatz conjecture states that, for any natural number n > 1, repeated applications of the COLLATZ procedure will eventually yield 1. Continue reading The Collatz Conjecture →