This I Believe

I believe that humans are far more unique from one another than we are from any other species, and that this diversity of perspectives fuels our collective progress. Whereas any other species would attack across gene pools, humans have created a global culture that benefits from a diversity of ideas. This tradition of criticism has benefited humanity in many ways (e.g. since the Enlightenment, an incredible amount of scientific progress has been made and it is only accelerating) and forms the foundation for my worldview.

I worked at a Toyota dealership last year where I put my social skills to the test, and any peace in my life I had, to rest. During my last month when I already knew I was quitting, I had no motivation to jump out of my chair and greet new customers with a smile, so I had fun with it. Never has a salesperson ever said "how are you" and meant it until I arrived. I interviewed people who were taking a break from their lives to pretend they were buying a car (happens all the time) and indulged their every question. It got deep fast. I have this uncanny ability to read people really well, it's how I'm good at making new friends, comedy/improv, and selling used cars in Waldorf. But where does this desire to read people come from, and why is it so prominent in my life?

That question eventually led me to become an audio engineer. It's a unique job that is equal parts service (people) and editing audio (art). These are both fundamentally "soft skills" so don't let the "engineer" in the title fool you, we're just artists with more sophisticated tools. This job is made for me because I don't like going too deeply into things (aversion to science and math fields) and I have a pretty short attention span (new clients and music every day). However during conversation, I am far from superficial. I listen more than I talk because I see every conversation as an opportunity for: beauty (eloquence in speech or ideas), fun (sharing laughter), and more fun (indulging in theoreticals and arguments, trying to sound smart, trying to sound dumb). In the studio, my job is to make the artist perform at their highest ability by making them feel comfortable while also criticizing their ideas. It's tricky because people take things quite differently, and it takes me aback sometimes…

People, like books, or any source of knowledge, constantly challenge and surprise us. But people, unlike books, or any other source of knowledge, are unique in that they are able to create it from nothing, across infinite domains, limited only by what they already know. This must be the allure of teaching! Every person, class, and every day is a completely new opportunity to engage in this act of conjecture versus criticism.

I am in constant amazement at my fellow humans. We have achieved so much, and yet we are barely at the beginning of our progress. The infinite monkey theorem states that given infinite time, a monkey sitting down at a typewriter could eventually write Shakespeare's works. But creative knowledge is not random, like the combinatorics of fingers flailing over a typewriter. It is an emergent property from insights, theories, and criticisms—something exclusively human. This epistemology has changed how I think about my education and my relationships. Understanding comes from wanting to understand.

As Edward R. Murrow understood, there is an urgent need for personal philosophies in our rapidly changing world. As a corollary, I will parrot Peter Thiel: "Brilliant thinking is rare, but courage is in even shorter supply than genius." What is also needed is the courage to share our ideas, and I'm not afraid to take risks so long as I am engaging in truth-seeking endeavors.