[Bonus] Brian Keating on Humility, Chutzpah, and the Arrow of Time

Today on the James Altiger Show. In order to become the best writer in the world, You have to spend many years as a horrible writer believing you're the best writer in the world. Because to write a book, as you know, is really hard. I usually tell them only do it if you'll you know regret it for the rest of your life. Cause that's the You know, regrets the dying, so to speak. I'm gonna have a quest, I'm gonna figure out what happened at the beginning of time. So now okay, what are the steps? I'm gonna build this I'm gonna this quest fills me with joy and progress on this quest fills me with with joy and I'm gonna make progress and

Feel joy every step of the way. There are so few books about non-nonsense nowadays, like not about string theory or not about like e multiple universes. Most of the science books are about those things because they can't be proven. So the author will never be proven wrong in his lifetime. This isn't your average business podcast, and he's not your average host. This is the James Alteger Show. So James, there's a famous statement by Talmudic scholars that really echo what I think it takes to be a great scientist is to have both humility and be humble, but also a lot of Hutzpah and courage. Because if you're only like humble, you won't feel that you can accomplish and take on

the greatest warrior of all time, which is Mother Nature. Like Mother Nature does not give up her secret. It's very hard to win a Nobel Prize, to discover something new, to prove a new law theorem or or whatever. But on the other hand, you know, if you're only humble, you you won't have that, you know, that kind of swagger, let's just say what swagger, not arrogance. Arrogance gets a bad name. So there's a famous passage in the Talmud and it says, A man should have two pockets. On one pocket he should have the statement from the Bible that the whole world was created for me, just for me. And the other pocket should say I'm nothing but dust and ashes. Because if you don't have that, you will not be humble and you will be arrogant and then you're prone to the fall that pride always goes before. So it's very interesting to know that you are also equating that. That like you in some ways you are the best writer in the world, right? I mean, let's not be falsely humble, but you're not only the you're not the best writer in all categories in the world, right? You wouldn't say that.

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