The Subtle Art of Not Giving a Fck

specific sequence of behaviors required to net more points. It’s usually
something weird like standing on one foot or memorizing a long sequence of
buttons pressed in a specific amount of time while facing a certain direction.
But here’s the funny part: the points really are random. There’s no
sequence; there’s no pattern. Just a light that keeps coming on with a ding,
and people doing cartwheels thinking that what they’re doing is giving them
points.
Sadism aside, the point of the experiment is to show how quickly the
human mind is capable of coming up with and believing in a bunch of
bullshit that isn’t real. And it turns out, we’re all really good at it. Every
person leaves that room convinced that he or she nailed the experiment and
won the game. They all believe that they discovered the “perfect” sequence
of buttons that earned them their points. But the methods they come up with
are as unique as the individuals themselves. One man came up with a long
sequence of button-pushing that made no sense to anyone but himself. One
girl came to believe that she had to tap the ceiling a certain number of times
to get points. When she left the room she was exhausted from jumping up and
down.
Our brains are meaning machines. What we understand as “meaning” is
generated by the associations our brain makes between two or more
experiences. We press a button, then we see a light go on; we assume the
button caused the light to go on. This, at its core, is the basis of meaning.
Button, light; light, button. We see a chair. We note that it’s gray. Our brain
then draws the association between the color (gray) and the object (chair) and
forms meaning: “The chair is gray.”
Our minds are constantly whirring, generating more and more
associations to help us understand and control the environment around us.
Everything about our experiences, both external and internal, generates new
associations and connections within our minds. Everything from the words on
this page, to the grammatical concepts you use to decipher them, to the dirty
thoughts your mind wanders into when my writing becomes boring or
repetitive—each of these thoughts, impulses, and perceptions is composed of
thousands upon thousands of neural connections, firing in conjunction,
alighting your mind in a blaze of knowledge and understanding.
But there are two problems. First, the brain is imperfect. We mistake
things we see and hear. We forget things or misinterpret events quite easily.