I recently learned I got name checked by
Terrence Howard on his recent appearance
on Joe Rogan I reached out to Neil
Degrassi Tyson Neil degrass Tyson he was
like hey man yeah I'd love for you to
come on my show do my radio do my TV
thing would love that I was like yeah
but let me I've got something I want to
introduce to you I got name checked
because 8 years ago he sent me a 36 page
treaties and it was only 36 pages so
this is Terence
Howard attempting to reinvent
mathematics and physics a little
backstory there I took initial interest
in Terrence because my mother said to me
do you know Terrence Howard I said yeah
I know you mean the actor she said yeah
well I heard him interviewed on NPR on
there he said that like when he was a
kid he wanted to be like a scientist and
study the Universe I said well that's
cool okay maybe we'll get him on Star
Talk we love talk to celebrities who
have a soft geek underbelly at the time
I didn't quite know how to get in touch
with him but we met at a something
called the upfronts which is where
networks present their next season's TV
shows I saw him at an event um uh
upfront and then this came in in my
inbox in this particular case since I
basically solicited it from him I
actually spent time reading every line
of all 36 pages and I commented my
comments are in red here you see that so
I spent a lot of time on it and I
thought out of respect for him what I
should
do is give him my most informed critical
analysis that I can in my field we call
that a peer review you come up with an
idea you present it either at a
conference or you first write it up and
you send it to your colleagues it is
their duty to alert you of things about
your ideas that are either misguided or
wrong or or there's a Mis the
calculation doesn't work out or the the
logic doesn't comport that's their job
not all ideas will turn out to be
correct most won't be but to get to that
point you need to know things like what
has everyone else said about this same
subject am I repeating someone else's
work is this a new insight that no one
else has had but has foundations that
are authentic or legitimate or
objectively true am I making a false
assumption am I makinging an assumption
that someone else has already shown to
be false all of this goes on on the
frontier of science let me make it clear
that I'm delighted when I see people
with active Minds trying to tackle the
great unknowns in the universe it's a
beautiful thing that people want to
participate on this Frontier what can
happen is if you're a fan of a subject
let's say a hobbyist let's call it it's
possible to know enough about that
subject to think you're right but not
enough about that subject to know that
you're wrong and so there's this sort of
Valley in there a valley of false
confidence this has been studied by
others and it's called the Dunning
Krueger effect it's the phenomenon where
a little bit of knowledge you over
assess how much of that subject you
actually know and then when you learn
even more you realize no I didn't know
as much as I thought I did so then
there's a sort of a lull there and then
when you learn even more you come back
up ultimately learning enough to know
whether you are right or wrong to become
an expert means you spend all this time
it doesn't happen overnight you can't
just sit in an armchair and say I'm now
an expert it requires years and years of
study especially looking through
journals where new ideas are published
and contested that's what we have
learned learned is the most effective
means of establishing that which is
objectively true or determining that
which is objectively false both of those
work hand in hand to move the needle on
our understanding of the universe I'm
going to read you just my opening line
here it's titled 1 * 1 equal 2 so I lead
off by saying this is an ambitious work
that is a clear indication of a Restless
active mind with in these Pages however
there are many assumptions and
statements that are underinformative
greater than the initial number squared
for that would expose a loose thread
within the fabric of our understanding a
loose thread capable of unraveling the
very ground rules of mathematics that's
a bold statement so then I I just say
this opening thesis is false there are
plenty of examples of this that have
escaped your attention his statement is
shown to be false for every number
that's less than one and greater than Z
for example the square root of 64 is8 8
is bigger than 64 and it's a larger
number than the original and 64 squared
=
496 a smaller number than the original
to the extent that the next 35 Pages
depends on your stated
thesis this fact undermines your claims
and assumptions and conclusions it's not
about feelings here it's about objective
reality so at the time I I considered
Terren a strong acquaintance and we hung
out a bit and had much exchange we
haven't spoken much since then but go to
page two and in here he mentions people
who he declares were persecuted because
their Vision exceeded the myopic view of
their contemporaries and he mentions
Walter Russell Nicola Tesla John Keeley
and many many more regarding you L your
list of people who have made Brave
sacrifices I note that to be a genius is
to be misunderstood but to be
misunderstood is not to be a genius the
work of Russell Walter Russell has
eluded any experimental support and the
work of Keeley is generally not
reproducible science is about
reproducibility I can have the most
brilliant crazy fun idea ever and if I
perform an experiment and no one else
can duplicate that experiment it belongs
in the trash Heap it's me in my own
world think I have landed on an
objective truth when in fact I haven't
that's how science works the
reproducibility of results as for the
work of Tesla much of it had very real
value to physics and our understanding
of electromagnetism and that value is
duly recognized by my community in the
naming of a unit of electromagnetism
after him you can't get more badass than
having a unit named after you Newton has
a unit named after him for example the
metric unit of force is a Newton much of
the rest of his work was Fringe and
unrealized either for violating known
laws of physics or for being simply
impractical just because you do some
good stuff doesn't mean everything you
ever did is going to be great I will
further affirm that just because an idea
sounds crazy doesn't make it wrong the
system of research and Publications in
peer-review journals has the capacity to
spot crazy but true ideas provided they
supporting by compelling arguments and
ultimately supported by experiments and
observations Newton's Laws Einstein's
relativity quantum physics were all
revolutionary ideas that appeared in
peer-review settings or journals
meanwhile most of the work of Russell
and Keeley had no such success with
their ideas so I think on Rogan Terren
said that I trashed those three
researchers attack that I had immediate
that I talked about Walter Russell and
Victor Shaw Berger and John Keeley as
and Tesla as the people that I looked up
to so he threw on on he was like
well Tesla Tesla stuff worked but Tesla
was never really respected and out there
when I'm just simply stating the fact I
don't think of that as trashing I think
of that as being honest I mean I could
have softened it but I don't think
that's what people who care about you
should do people who care will be honest
with you about ideas about thoughts the
world is changing so quickly and so is
everything around us unfortunately we
have chosen to remain handcuffed to
Antiquated and obsolete beliefs we have
put an enormous amount of faith faith
into the methods and practices of old
that are as dead today as The Men Who
propagated the notion that the world was
flat so I say here regarding your world
was flat reference
it's not widely appreciated that the
idea of a flat Earth predates the
introduction and development of the
methods and tools of science as we
practice them today those processes date
back to around 1600 coincident with the
invention of the microscope and
Telescope before then truths were
whatever seemed right to the senses
afterwards and to this day truth was
whatever the verified data obtained by
your instruments forced you to believe
if your senses otherwise contradicted
the data this fact means that there's no
such misunderstanding on the scale of
the Flat Earth in the era of modern
science and in multiple places
throughout the
treaties he's attaching a number to a
physical idea or a physical object that
idea goes way back by the way go back to
Pythagoras famous for the Pythagorean
theorem which we all learned in 8th
grade was it or nth grade Pythagoras was
also a philosopher who tried to
understand how things worked he felt
among others in his group that if you
assign a number to something the number
can abue that object with certain
meaning and significance which means
then if you manipulate the numbers that
you gain insight into the objects
themselves once you've assigned a number
to it there's a lot of that that
permeates this document uh but it's a
long disproven approach to the world
again there's nothing wrong with a
failed idea now other people know to not
do it right that has value if we place a
candle in front of a mirror the
measurement of light is doubled is it
not it does not measure as only one
light source we actually see two lights
a light meter will show twice the
intensity of light this is false he
attacked it so with such
vitro maybe that's too blunt what else
should I say I'm a scientist that's what
I would tell a colleague a colleague who
then say would thank you and then we go
out for beer after cuz that's how that
works and there's an old saying I first
heard it from Michael Dell of Dell
Technologies if one day you find
yourself the smartest person in the room
change rooms I say this is false the
light in the mirror appears dimmer than
the source of light itself for several
reasons starting with the fact that no
mirror is 100% reflective but more
importantly the candle in the mirror is
always is farther away from you than the
candle itself so the light meter will
always read less than twice the actual
value of the candle itself I will
note that from this work Terren produces
art sculptural art which I find to be
intriguing even beautiful to me more
intriguing than beautiful because you
got to look at it and you keep looking
at it what is that and what's going on
there I just want to read you my end and
comments here I could not follow the
reasoning on these last few pages but
the illustrations that derive from them
are beautiful regardless of how they
were derived my notes have been strongly
critical of your reasoning and
conclusions I was candid and blunt out
of respect for the energy you have
clearly invested in this work but if
you're sure that you are still right and
that I have completely misunderstood
your thesis then you will need to look
for another person to evaluate what you
have done and solicit their comments in
any case like I say above the images and
illustrations in your final pages are
beautiful works of art unlike any I have
seen best to you Neil so in case people
wanted to know what actually went down 8
years ago just always be cautious of the
Dunning Krueger effect you put in a
little bit of work and you have an idea
and then you think your idea is right
and that Einstein is wrong and Newton is
wrong and that everybody's wrong and
that all of modern astrophysicists are
wrong that's
bold that's B audacious
Bodacious when continental drift was
proposed it was like what land masses
are moving on Earth Sur that's a weird
idea that's going to be a hard cell we
think there's sort of up swelling of the
yes locally but whole continence move
that's crazy it would take a few decades
until ultimately when we're mapping the
bottom of the ocean we find that there's
a Mid-Atlantic Ridge that the ridges are
separating it's like bada bing so the
resistance to jumping on the idea that
continents
move was not because people were
stubborn it was because people are
cautious any new idea needs to be put
through the ringer that's how science
works you put it through the ringer
every possible test you can not just cuz
it happens to look like South America
fits with Africa any better evidence
than that oh wait a minute fossils
matched between the west coast of South
America and the east coast of Africa not
recent fossils fossils from millions of
years ago that's interesting things that
make you go hm that brought some more
people over to the camp you keep that up
and you reach a point where enough
evidence is brought to bear on the
question and then you have a new
emerging truth but at the the vibrant
energy that goes on it conferences and
the contest of ideas that's how we roll
that's how it works when Einstein came
out with relativity saying SpaceTime
curves Albert Al what are you saying
what are you doing well you can test it
the total solar eclipse so the idea
comes out in 1915 is published in 1916
1919 we measured light around the edge
of a total so during a total solar
eclipse cuz you can't see the stars
during the daytime you see the light the
light rays bent from their actual
coordinate positions on the sky Sir
Arthur Edington an astrophysicist
provided the first experimental evidence
for Einstein's general theory of
relativity which by the way was
published in a peer-review journal crazy
idea the platform to be accepted for the
ideas is not social media it is not Joe
Rogan it is not my podcast it is
research journals
where attention can be given on a
level that at the end of the day offers
no higher respect for your energy and
intellect than by declaring that what's
in it is either right or wrong or worthy
of publication or not I wanted to post
this to my website so you can see my
comments mixed in with his treaties but
uh you got the sense of it thanks for
listening thanks for watching
Neil degrass Tyson here as always keep
looking up
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