good morning John so lies they've always
been around there was once a woman who
convinced the entire medical
establishment of Britain that she was
giving birth to rabbits was a great
tricks that I see these days is
something I call a head lie where I will
tell you a true fact but when that true
information hits your brain it becomes
alive it's sneaky it's tricky and we're
really getting good at it I call it a
head lie because it only becomes alive
when it hits your head and also because
it often happens inside of headlines
you're gonna want some examples to
understand what's happening here
here are three that I saw this very week
lies that were put into my brain by
truth statements number one us birth
rates plummeted first it seems to be
indicating that something bad is
happening I'm not entirely sure what it
is I guess they're like we're gonna go
extinct as a species or as Americans or
something at first it's not really
plummeting decreasing a little bit more
importantly the birth rate for people
over the age of 25 has actually been
pretty steadily and substantially
increasing so what's going on here the
headline I've been told is that
something bad is happening the reality
is that fewer teenagers are having
babies but we don't want to write a
headline about that cuz no one cares
about good news moving on to number two
Tesla's safety status headlines
do not have to be headlines Tesla
releases safety reports every quarter
they are extremely limited here's the
most recent one and in it we see that
there's one accident for every 2.8
7,000,000 auto pilot miles driven and
one accident for every 1.76 non auto
pilot miles driven these are true things
the lie that has been inputted into my
head is that autopilot is preventing
crashes is it I don't know because
Tesla's autopilot is mostly used on
highways and crashes per mile are much
lower on highway to us this the effect
of the autopilot or the effect of like
the autopilot is just on in situations
where crashes are less likely and I'm
not saying that autopilot doesn't
prevent crashes I bet it does to some
extent what I am saying is that every
car company should be legally required
to compile and release safety data
especially with regard to autonomous
driving and it's really worrying that
governments do not require them to do
that when car crashes are one of the
most significant public health threats
in the world number three
carnival cruises released ten times more
pollution than all of the cars in Europe
come by I'm not saying that we shouldn't
be paying attention to the pollution
caused by the shipping industry
generally Cruise Lines specifically this
is kind of obviously created a lie in
your head without being technically
incorrect so there are many different
types of pollution one of them is sulfur
dioxide which basically isn't produced
by cars anymore at all especially in
Europe where they've done a really good
job of removing sulfur from fuels so yes
Carnival Cruise Lines does release more
sulfur dioxide than all of the cars in
Europe because all of the cars in Europe
for the most part don't release any
sulfur dioxide I do want us to burn
cleaner fuel in cruise ships and they
think that ultimately safety features
like Tesla's autopilot though it should
not be called that will save a lot of
life but I also think that there isn't
actually that much of a difference
between giving people information that
makes them think an untrue thing and
just telling them an untrue thing and if
you provide information to people if
that's part of your job you have an
obligation to not lie to them and here's
a truth for you I'm going to be doing a
very quick tour to celebrate the release
of the paperback edition of an
absolutely remarkable thing and for
everybody who can't come to that tour
I'm showing you this very cute deer that
was in my neighbor's yard the first
night on July 30th I'm doing a bunch of
fun weirdness at the stateside theater
in Austin with Burnie burns of Rooster
Teeth and at that event will be live
streamed to theaters all over the place
look at all these places and then I'll
be in Houston on the next night I'll be
signing and saying hi to everybody who
wants to do that after the events it's
gonna be fun I'm gonna share I think a
little bit of my next book there's more
information in the description John I'll
see you on Tuesday