hey it's me Destin welcome back to
smarter every day you've heard people
say it's just like riding a bike
meaning it's really easy and you can't
forget how to do it right but I did
something I did something that damaged
my mind it happened on the streets of
Amsterdam and and I got really scared
honestly I can't ride a bike like you
can anymore before I show you the video
of what happened I need to tell you the
back story
like many six-year-olds with a MacGyver
mullet I learned how to ride a bike when
I was really young I had learned a life
skill and I was really proud of it
everything changed though when my friend
Barney called me 25 years later where I
worked the welders are geniuses and they
like to play jokes on the engineers he
had a challenge for me he had built a
special bicycle and he wanted me to try
to ride it he had only changed one thing
when he turned the handle bar to the
left the wheel goes to the right when he
turned it to the right the wheel goes to
the left I thought this would be easy so
I hopped on the bike ready to
demonstrate how quickly I could conquer
this and here he is ladies and gentlemen
mr. Destin Sandlin first attempt riding
the bicycle
yeah yeah I couldn't do it you can see
that I'm laughing but I'm actually
really frustrated in this moment I had a
really deep revelation my thinking was
in a rut
this bike revealed a very deep truth to
me I had the knowledge of how to operate
the bike but I did not have the
understanding therefore knowledge is not
understanding look I know what you're
probably thinking
Destin's probably just an uncoordinated
engineer and can't do it but that's not
the case at all the algorithm that's
associated with riding a bike in your
brain
it's just that complicated think about
it downwards force on the pedals leaning
your whole body pulling and pushing the
handlebars gyroscopic precession in the
wheels every single force is part of
this algorithm and if you change any one
part it affects the entire control
system I do not make definitive
statements that often but I'm telling
you right now you cannot ride this
bicycle you might think you can but you
can't I know this because I'm often
asked to speak at universities and
conferences and I take the bike with me
it's always the same people think
they're gonna try some trick or they
were just gonna power through it
it doesn't work your brain cannot handle
this for instance this guy I offered him
$200 just to ride this bike 10 feet
across the stage everybody thought he
could do it
so whatever you know then you have to
keep your feet together
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like just our own beliefs
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keep your feet on the pedal
[Applause]
once you have a rigid way of thinking in
your head sometimes you cannot change
that even if you want to here's what I
did it was a personal challenge I stayed
out here in this driveway and I
practiced about five minutes every day
my neighbors made fun of me I had mini
wrecks but after eight months this
happened one day I couldn't ride the
bike and the next day I could it was
like I could feel some kind of pathway
in my brain that was now unlocked it was
really weird though it's like there's
this trail in my brain but if I wasn't
paying close enough attention to it my
brain would easily lose that neural path
and jump back onto the old road it was
more familiar with any small
distractions at all like a cell phone
ringing in my pocket would instantly
throw my brain back to the old control
algorithm and I would Rep but at least I
could ride it my son is the closest
person to me genetically and he's been
riding a normal bike for three years
that's over half his life I wanted to
know how long it would take him to learn
how to ride a backwards bike so I told
him if he learned how to ride a
backwards bike he could go with me to
Australia and meet a real astronaut are
you gonna give up go ahead
this is how it starts look at this this
is such a big deal
get up you got it did you see his brain
get it so he in how many weeks we've
been doing this two weeks in two weeks
he did something that took me eight
months to do which demonstrates that a
child has born neural plasticity am I
even saying that right that an adult
it's clear from this experiment that
children have a much more plastic brain
than adults that's why the best time to
learn a language is when you're a young
child all right today's bike log I can
ride smooth I can ride fast I'm thinking
the experiment is over okay now I'm in
Amsterdam a city that has more bicycles
than people the question is can I ride a
normal bike now I mean I haven't spent
all this time on learning how to ride a
bike if I go back and try to ride a
normal one will my brain mess up so I've
tweeted a smarter every day Meetup if
you will and I'm gonna see if somebody
brings a bicycle and I'm gonna try to
ride a normal bike this was one of the
most frustrating moments of my life and
ridden a normal bike since I was six but
in this moment I couldn't do it anymore
I had set out to prove that I could free
my brain from a cognitive bias but at
this point I'm pretty sure that all I
proved is that I can only read Eze
ignite that bias so what you're not
seeing is just a group of people they're
looking at me looking at the strange
American that can't ride a bike because
they think I'm dumb but I'm actually two
levels deep into this because I've
learned and unlearned all right after 20
minutes of making a fool out of myself
suddenly my brain clicked back into the
old algorithm I can't explain it but it
happened in a very specific moment
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gotta get it I'm back
Oh click it clicked I got it I got it
okay there it is there was a moment okay
I I tried to explain this to the people
around me and they just didn't get it
they thought I was faking the previous
20 minutes and I couldn't get anybody to
believe you think I'm lying
no I'm not lying I felt like the only
person on the planet who had ever
unlearned how to ride a bike and I
couldn't articulate it to anyone because
everybody just knew that you can't
forget how to ride a bike
so I learn three things from this
experiment I learned that welders are
often smarter than engineers I learned
that knowledge does not equal
understanding and I learned that truth
is truth no matter what I think about it
so be very careful how you interpret
things because you're looking at the
world with a bias whether you think you
are or not I'm Destin you're getting
smarter every day have a good ok if you
want to support smarter every day you
can download a free audio book at
audible.com slash smarter I recommend
commander Hatfield's book which is an
astronaut's guide to life on Earth I
read it it was awesome if you think
about it I had to learn how to write a
different kind of bicycle and my son did
as well but commander had to I've had to
learn how to ride a different spaceship
not only that but a different type of
space station he was on Mir and the
international space station anyway your
instance supporting smarter every day
audible.com slash smarter an astronaut's
guide to life on Earth I'm Destin
getting smarter every day
have a good one
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why don't you write it you just build it
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you