How I made friends with reality
-
0:01 - 0:04I'm going to first tell you something that
in my grandmother -
0:05 - 0:07would've elicited a five-oy alarm:
-
0:07 - 0:09"Oy-oy-oy-oy-oy."
-
0:09 - 0:10(Laughter)
-
0:10 - 0:13And here it is ...
are you ready? -
0:14 - 0:15OK.
-
0:16 - 0:19I have stage IV lung cancer.
-
0:20 - 0:22Oh, I know, "poor me."
-
0:22 - 0:23I don't feel that way.
-
0:23 - 0:25I'm so OK with it.
-
0:25 - 0:28And granted, I have certain advantages --
-
0:28 - 0:30not everybody can take
so cavalier an attitude. -
0:30 - 0:32I don't have young children.
-
0:32 - 0:36I have a grown daughter who's
brilliant and happy and wonderful. -
0:37 - 0:40I don't have huge financial stress.
-
0:41 - 0:43My cancer isn't that aggressive.
-
0:43 - 0:45It's kind of like
the Democratic leadership -- -
0:45 - 0:49(Laughter)
-
0:49 - 0:51not convinced it can win.
-
0:51 - 0:52It's basically just sitting there,
-
0:52 - 0:55waiting for Goldman Sachs
to give it some money. -
0:55 - 0:56(Laughter)
-
0:56 - 1:01(Applause)
-
1:01 - 1:03Oh, and the best thing of all --
-
1:03 - 1:07I have a major accomplishment
under my belt. -
1:07 - 1:08Yes.
-
1:08 - 1:12I didn't even know it until someone
tweeted me a year ago. -
1:12 - 1:14And here's what they said:
-
1:14 - 1:16"You are responsible
-
1:17 - 1:20for the pussification
of the American male." -
1:20 - 1:22(Laughter)
-
1:22 - 1:26(Applause)
-
1:26 - 1:29Not that I can take
all the credit, but ... -
1:29 - 1:33(Laughter)
-
1:33 - 1:37But what if you don't have my advantages?
-
1:37 - 1:40The only advice I can give you
is to do what I did: -
1:41 - 1:43make friends with reality.
-
1:44 - 1:47You couldn't have a worse relationship
with reality than I did. -
1:48 - 1:50From the get-go,
-
1:51 - 1:53I wasn't even attracted to reality.
-
1:53 - 1:56If they'd had Tinder when I met reality,
-
1:56 - 1:57I would have swiped left
-
1:57 - 1:59and the whole thing would have been over.
-
1:59 - 2:01(Laughter)
-
2:01 - 2:03And reality and I --
-
2:03 - 2:06we don't share the same values,
the same goals -- -
2:06 - 2:07(Laughter)
-
2:07 - 2:10To be honest, I don't have goals;
-
2:10 - 2:12I have fantasies.
-
2:12 - 2:16They're exactly like goals
but without the hard work. -
2:16 - 2:18(Laughter)
-
2:18 - 2:20(Applause)
-
2:20 - 2:23I'm not a big fan of hard work,
-
2:23 - 2:25but you know reality --
-
2:25 - 2:28it's either push, push, push, push, push
-
2:28 - 2:32through its agent,
the executive brain function -- -
2:32 - 2:34one of the "yays" of dying:
-
2:34 - 2:37my executive brain function
won't have me to kick around anymore. -
2:37 - 2:41(Laughter)
-
2:41 - 2:45But something happened
-
2:45 - 2:49that made me realize
-
2:49 - 2:53that reality may not be reality.
-
2:54 - 2:55So what happened was,
-
2:55 - 3:00because I basically wanted reality
to leave me alone -- -
3:00 - 3:03but I wanted to be left alone
in a nice house -
3:03 - 3:06with a Wolf range
and Sub-Zero refrigerator ... -
3:06 - 3:09private yoga lessons --
-
3:09 - 3:13I ended up with
a development deal at Disney. -
3:13 - 3:16And one day I found myself
in my new office -
3:16 - 3:18on Two Dopey Drive --
-
3:18 - 3:21(Laughter)
-
3:21 - 3:24which reality thought
I should be proud of ... -
3:24 - 3:26(Laughter)
-
3:26 - 3:30And I'm staring at the present
they sent me to celebrate my arrival -- -
3:30 - 3:35not the Lalique vase or the grand piano
I've heard of other people getting, -
3:35 - 3:39but a three-foot-tall,
stuffed Mickey Mouse -
3:39 - 3:40(Laughter)
-
3:40 - 3:42with a catalog, in case I wanted
to order some more stuff -
3:42 - 3:44that didn't jibe with my aesthetic.
-
3:45 - 3:46(Laughter)
-
3:46 - 3:47And when I looked up in the catalog
-
3:47 - 3:52to see how much
this three-foot-high mouse cost, -
3:52 - 3:55here's how it was described ...
-
3:56 - 3:58"Life-sized."
-
3:58 - 4:03(Laughter)
-
4:03 - 4:04And that's when I knew.
-
4:05 - 4:07Reality wasn't "reality."
-
4:07 - 4:09Reality was an imposter.
-
4:10 - 4:14So I dived into quantum physics
and chaos theory -
4:14 - 4:17to try to find actual reality,
-
4:17 - 4:18and I've just finished a movie --
-
4:18 - 4:21yes, finally finished --
-
4:21 - 4:22about all that,
-
4:22 - 4:23so I won't go into it here,
-
4:23 - 4:26and anyway, it wasn't until
after we shot the movie, -
4:26 - 4:28when I broke my leg
and then it didn't heal, -
4:28 - 4:30so then they had to do
another surgery a year later, -
4:30 - 4:31and then that took a year --
-
4:31 - 4:33two years in a wheelchair,
-
4:33 - 4:39and that's when I came
into contact with actual reality: -
4:39 - 4:40limits.
-
4:41 - 4:44Those very limits I'd spent
my whole life denying -
4:44 - 4:46and pushing past and ignoring
-
4:47 - 4:49were real,
-
4:49 - 4:51and I had to deal with them,
-
4:51 - 4:57and they took imagination,
creativity and my entire skill set. -
4:57 - 5:02It turned out I was great
at actual reality. -
5:02 - 5:04I didn't just come to terms with it,
-
5:04 - 5:06I fell in love.
-
5:06 - 5:07And I should've known,
-
5:07 - 5:11given my equally shaky
relationship with the zeitgeist ... -
5:12 - 5:16I'll just say, if anyone
is in the market for a Betamax -- -
5:16 - 5:18(Laughter)
-
5:19 - 5:23I should have known that the moment
I fell in love with reality, -
5:23 - 5:26the rest of the country would decide
to go in the opposite direction. -
5:26 - 5:28(Laughter)
-
5:28 - 5:33But I'm not here to talk about Trump
or the alt-right or climate-change deniers -
5:33 - 5:35or even the makers of this thing,
-
5:35 - 5:37which I would have called a box,
-
5:37 - 5:40except that right here, it says,
-
5:40 - 5:43"This is not a box."
-
5:43 - 5:47(Laughter)
-
5:47 - 5:49They're gaslighting me.
-
5:49 - 5:51(Laughter)
-
5:51 - 5:54(Applause)
-
5:55 - 5:59But what I do want to talk about
-
5:59 - 6:05is a personal challenge to reality
-
6:05 - 6:07that I take personally,
-
6:07 - 6:14and I want to preface it
by saying that I absolutely love science. -
6:14 - 6:16I have this --
-
6:16 - 6:18not a scientist myself --
-
6:18 - 6:23but an uncanny ability to understand
everything about science, -
6:23 - 6:24except the actual science --
-
6:24 - 6:25(Laughter)
-
6:25 - 6:27which is math.
-
6:27 - 6:31But the most outlandish concepts
make sense to me. -
6:33 - 6:34The string theory;
-
6:34 - 6:39the idea that all of reality emanates
from the vibrations of these teeny -- -
6:39 - 6:40I call it "The Big Twang."
-
6:41 - 6:42(Laughter)
-
6:42 - 6:44Wave-particle duality:
-
6:44 - 6:48the idea that one thing
can manifest as two things ... -
6:48 - 6:49you know?
-
6:49 - 6:53That a photon can manifest
as a wave and a particle -
6:53 - 6:55coincided with my deepest intuitions
-
6:55 - 6:57that people are good and bad,
-
6:57 - 6:59ideas are right and wrong.
-
6:59 - 7:02Freud was right about penis envy
-
7:02 - 7:04and he was wrong about who has it.
-
7:04 - 7:08(Laughter)
-
7:08 - 7:10(Applause)
-
7:10 - 7:12Thank you.
-
7:12 - 7:13(Applause)
-
7:13 - 7:16And then there's this slight
variation on that, -
7:16 - 7:19which is reality looks like two things,
-
7:19 - 7:23but it turns out to be the interaction
of those two things, -
7:23 - 7:25like space -- time,
-
7:25 - 7:27mass -- energy
-
7:27 - 7:30and life and death.
-
7:30 - 7:32So I don't understand --
-
7:32 - 7:35I simply just don't understand
-
7:35 - 7:39the mindset of people who are out
to "defeat death" and "overcome death." -
7:39 - 7:41How do you do that?
-
7:41 - 7:44How do you defeat death
without killing off life? -
7:45 - 7:47It doesn't make sense to me.
-
7:47 - 7:49I also have to say,
-
7:49 - 7:53I find it incredibly ungrateful.
-
7:53 - 7:55I mean, you're given
this extraordinary gift -- -
7:55 - 7:57life --
-
7:57 - 8:01but it's as if you had asked Santa
for a Rolls-Royce Silver Shadow -
8:01 - 8:04and you had gotten
a salad spinner instead. -
8:05 - 8:07You know, it's the beef --
-
8:07 - 8:11the beef with it is that it comes
with an expiration date. -
8:11 - 8:13Death is the deal breaker.
-
8:14 - 8:15I don't get that.
-
8:15 - 8:16I don't understand --
-
8:16 - 8:18to me, it's disrespectful.
-
8:18 - 8:20It's disrespectful to nature.
-
8:20 - 8:23The idea that we're going
to dominate nature, -
8:23 - 8:25we're going to master nature,
-
8:25 - 8:29nature is too weak
to withstand our intellect -- -
8:30 - 8:33no, I don't think so.
-
8:33 - 8:36I think if you've actually read
quantum physics as I have -- -
8:36 - 8:39well, I read an email
from someone who'd read it, but -- -
8:39 - 8:43(Laughter)
-
8:43 - 8:45You have to understand
-
8:45 - 8:48that we don't live in Newton's
clockwork universe anymore. -
8:48 - 8:52We live in a banana peel universe,
-
8:52 - 8:55and we won't ever be able
to know everything -
8:55 - 8:57or control everything
-
8:57 - 8:59or predict everything.
-
8:59 - 9:01Nature is like a self-driving car.
-
9:01 - 9:04The best we can be is like
the old woman in that joke -- -
9:04 - 9:06I don't know if you've heard it.
-
9:06 - 9:09An old woman is driving
-
9:09 - 9:13with her middle-aged daughter
in the passenger seat, -
9:13 - 9:15and the mother goes
right through a red light. -
9:15 - 9:19And the daughter doesn't want to say
anything that makes it sound like, -
9:19 - 9:21"You're too old to drive,"
-
9:21 - 9:23so she didn't say anything.
-
9:23 - 9:26And then the mother
goes through a second red light, -
9:26 - 9:28and the daughter,
as tactfully as possible, -
9:28 - 9:30says, "Mom, are you aware
-
9:30 - 9:33that you just went through
two red lights?" -
9:33 - 9:35And the mother says, "Oh, am I driving?"
-
9:35 - 9:39(Laughter)
-
9:39 - 9:43(Applause)
-
9:43 - 9:45So ...
-
9:46 - 9:50and now, I'm going to take a mental leap,
-
9:50 - 9:54which is easy for me because
I'm the Evel Knievel of mental leaps; -
9:54 - 9:56my license plate says,
-
9:56 - 9:59"Cogito, ergo zoom."
-
9:59 - 10:02I hope you're willing
to come with me on this, -
10:02 - 10:08but my real problem with the mindset
that is so out to defeat death -
10:08 - 10:12is if you're anti-death,
-
10:12 - 10:14which to me translates as anti-life,
-
10:14 - 10:18which to me translates as anti-nature,
-
10:18 - 10:21it also translates to me as anti-woman,
-
10:21 - 10:26because women have long been
identified with nature. -
10:26 - 10:28And my source on this is Hannah Arendt,
-
10:28 - 10:32the German philosopher who wrote
a book called "The Human Condition." -
10:32 - 10:36And in it, she says that classically,
-
10:36 - 10:38work is associated with men.
-
10:38 - 10:41Work is what comes out of the head;
-
10:41 - 10:42it's what we invent,
-
10:42 - 10:43it's what we create,
-
10:43 - 10:46it's how we leave our mark upon the world.
-
10:47 - 10:52Whereas labor is associated with the body.
-
10:52 - 10:55It's associated with the people
who perform labor -
10:55 - 10:56or undergo labor.
-
10:57 - 11:00So to me,
-
11:00 - 11:04the mindset that denies that,
-
11:04 - 11:08that denies that we're in sync
with the biorhythms, -
11:08 - 11:11the cyclical rhythms of the universe,
-
11:11 - 11:17does not create a hospitable
environment for women -
11:17 - 11:19or for people associated with labor,
-
11:19 - 11:21which is to say,
-
11:21 - 11:24people that we associate
as descendants of slaves, -
11:24 - 11:27or people who perform manual labor.
-
11:28 - 11:34So here's how it looks
from a banana-peel-universe point of view, -
11:34 - 11:37from my mindset, which I call
"Emily's universe." -
11:38 - 11:39First of all,
-
11:40 - 11:46I am incredibly grateful for life,
-
11:46 - 11:48but I don't want to be immortal.
-
11:48 - 11:52I have no interest in having
my name live on after me. -
11:52 - 11:54In fact, I don't want it to,
-
11:54 - 11:56because it's been my observation
-
11:56 - 11:59that no matter how nice and how brilliant
-
11:59 - 12:00or how talented you are,
-
12:00 - 12:0350 years after you die, they turn on you.
-
12:03 - 12:05(Laughter)
-
12:05 - 12:07And I have actual proof of that.
-
12:07 - 12:10A headline from the Los Angeles Times:
-
12:10 - 12:14"Anne Frank: Not so nice after all."
-
12:14 - 12:19(Laughter)
-
12:19 - 12:22Plus, I love being in sync
-
12:22 - 12:25with the cyclical rhythms of the universe.
-
12:25 - 12:27That's what's so extraordinary about life:
-
12:27 - 12:29it's a cycle of generation,
-
12:29 - 12:31degeneration,
-
12:31 - 12:32regeneration.
-
12:32 - 12:36"I" am just a collection of particles
-
12:36 - 12:39that is arranged into this pattern,
-
12:39 - 12:42then will decompose and be available,
-
12:42 - 12:44all of its constituent parts, to nature,
-
12:44 - 12:47to reorganize into another pattern.
-
12:48 - 12:50To me, that is so exciting,
-
12:50 - 12:55and it makes me even more grateful
to be part of that process. -
12:55 - 12:57You know,
-
12:57 - 13:03I look at death now from the point of view
of a German biologist, -
13:03 - 13:05Andreas Weber,
-
13:05 - 13:08who looks at it as part
of the gift economy. -
13:08 - 13:11You're given this enormous gift, life,
-
13:11 - 13:13you enrich it as best you can,
-
13:13 - 13:15and then you give it back.
-
13:16 - 13:19And, you know, Auntie Mame
said, "Life is a banquet" -- -
13:19 - 13:21well, I've eaten my fill.
-
13:22 - 13:24I have had an enormous appetite for life,
-
13:24 - 13:26I've consumed life,
-
13:26 - 13:28but in death, I'm going to be consumed.
-
13:28 - 13:32I'm going into the ground
just the way I am, -
13:32 - 13:35and there, I invite every microbe
-
13:35 - 13:36and detritus-er
-
13:36 - 13:38and decomposer
-
13:38 - 13:39to have their fill.
-
13:40 - 13:42I think they'll find me delicious.
-
13:42 - 13:43(Laughter)
-
13:43 - 13:45I do.
-
13:46 - 13:51So the best thing about my attitude,
I think, is that it's real. -
13:51 - 13:52You can see it.
-
13:52 - 13:53You can observe it.
-
13:53 - 13:55It actually happens.
-
13:55 - 13:58Well, maybe not my enriching the gift,
-
13:58 - 14:00I don't know about that --
-
14:00 - 14:04but my life has certainly
been enriched by other people. -
14:04 - 14:05By TED,
-
14:05 - 14:08which introduced me
to a whole network of people -
14:08 - 14:11who have enriched my life,
-
14:11 - 14:14including Tricia McGillis,
my website designer, -
14:14 - 14:16who's working with my wonderful daughter
-
14:16 - 14:20to take my website
and turn it into something -
14:20 - 14:22where all I have to do is write a blog.
-
14:22 - 14:24I don't have to use
the executive brain function ... -
14:24 - 14:28Ha, ha, ha, I win!
-
14:28 - 14:29(Laughter)
-
14:29 - 14:32And I am so grateful to you.
-
14:33 - 14:35I don't want to say "the audience,"
-
14:35 - 14:40because I don't really see it
as we're two separate things. -
14:40 - 14:45I think of it in terms
of quantum physics, again. -
14:46 - 14:51And, you know, quantum physicists
are not exactly sure what happens -
14:51 - 14:54when the wave becomes a particle.
-
14:54 - 14:55There are different theories --
-
14:56 - 14:57the collapse of the wave function,
-
14:57 - 14:58decoherence --
-
14:58 - 15:00but they're all agreed on one thing:
-
15:00 - 15:03that reality comes into being
through an interaction. -
15:06 - 15:08(Voice breaking) So do you.
-
15:09 - 15:11And every audience I've ever had,
-
15:11 - 15:13past and present.
-
15:14 - 15:17Thank you so much for making my life real.
-
15:18 - 15:19(Applause)
-
15:19 - 15:20Thank you.
-
15:20 - 15:21(Applause)
-
15:21 - 15:22Thank you.
-
15:23 - 15:24(Applause)
-
15:24 - 15:25Thank you.
-
15:25 - 15:26(Applause)
-
15:26 - 15:27Thank you.
- Title:
- How I made friends with reality
- Speaker:
- Emily Levine
- Description:
-
With her signature wit and wisdom, Emily Levine meets her ultimate challenge as a comedian/philosopher: she makes dying funny. In this personal talk, she takes us on her journey to make friends with reality -- and peace with death. Life is an enormous gift, Levine says: "You enrich it as best you can, and then you give it back."
- Video Language:
- English
- Team:
- closed TED
- Project:
- TEDTalks
- Duration:
- 15:27
Oliver Friedman edited English subtitles for How I made friends with reality | ||
Brian Greene edited English subtitles for How I made friends with reality | ||
Brian Greene edited English subtitles for How I made friends with reality | ||
Brian Greene approved English subtitles for How I made friends with reality | ||
Brian Greene edited English subtitles for How I made friends with reality | ||
Brian Greene edited English subtitles for How I made friends with reality | ||
Krystian Aparta accepted English subtitles for How I made friends with reality | ||
Krystian Aparta edited English subtitles for How I made friends with reality |