Something You Should Know - Your Phone May Not Be the Problem & The Puzzles That Break Your Brain - SYSK Choice

Episode Date: June 13, 2026

Have you ever held a pet up to a mirror and wondered why they don't seem to recognize themselves? Humans usually figure it out very young, but most animals never do. Yet a surprising handful of species appear capable of recognizing their own reflection—a clue that scientists use to explore one of the most fascinating questions in biology: self-awareness. https://www.livescience.com/4272-elephant-awareness-mirrors-humans.html Smartphones have become the villains of modern life. We blame them for distraction, anxiety, shortened attention spans, poor sleep, and endless scrolling. But is the phone itself really the problem? Or are some activities on our phones far more harmful than others? Dr. Faye Begeti, a neurologist, neuroscientist, and researcher at Oxford University Hospitals, says we've been focusing on the wrong question. In our conversation, she explains what the latest research reveals about how smartphones affect the brain, why some forms of phone use can actually be beneficial, and how to build healthier digital habits without throwing your device into a lake. She is author of The Phone Fix: The Brain-Focused Guide to Building Healthy Digital Habits and Breaking Bad Ones (https://amzn.to/3yJUhIM). Paradoxes have a way of making your brain stop and say, "Wait a minute..." If someone says, "I always lie," are they telling the truth? If not, then maybe they are. These strange logical puzzles have fascinated philosophers, mathematicians, and scientists for centuries because they expose flaws in how we think and force us to see the world from a different perspective. George Szpiro, journalist, mathematician, and author of Perplexing Paradoxes: Unraveling Enigmas in the World Around Us (https://amzn.to/4aEASGo), joins me to explore some of the most fascinating paradoxes ever conceived and explain why wrestling with impossible questions can actually make you a better thinker. Learning to juggle might seem like little more than a party trick. But researchers have discovered that mastering this surprisingly challenging skill can create measurable changes in the brain. In fact, a few days of practice may do more for your mind than you would ever expect. https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/10/091016114055.htm PLEASE SUPPORT OUR SPONSORS POCKET HOSE: For a limited time, when you purchase a new Pocket Hose Ballistic, you'll get a FREE 360 degree rotating pocket pivot and a FREE thumb drive nozzle! Just text SYSK to 64000 AIR DOCTOR: Head to ⁠https://AirDoctorPro.com⁠ and use promo code SYSK to get $250 off select AirDoctor air purifiers, including the 3500, 4000, and 5500 models. Plus, you’ll receive a free 3year warranty!  RULA: Thousands of people are already using Rula to get affordable, high-quality therapy that’s actually covered by insurance. Visit ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠https://Rula.com/sysk⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ to get started. QUINCE: Elevate your summer wardrobe. Go to ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠https://Quince.com/sysk⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ for free shipping on your order and 365-day returns. Now available in Canada, too! DELL:  With the Dell Pro laptop powered by Intel Core Ultra with vPro, no matter how many interruptions you have, your laptop won’t be one of them. With battery that’s optimized for the way you work, and built-in intelligence that quiets distractions the moment you’re trying to focus, your tech won’t slow you down.  Find out more at ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠https://Dell.com/Dell-Pro⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ SHOPIFY: It's time to turn those "what ifs" into CHA CHING with Shopify Today! Sign up for your $1 per month trail and start selling today at ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠https://Shopify.com/sysk⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

How can working at your local Timms take you further? Sure, you can level up your teamwork skills. You also get a chance to receive a Tim Hortons Scholarship Award. Ready for what's next? Apply today at careers.timhorins.ca. Today, on something you should know, what happens when your dog or cat sees themselves in a mirror? Then, there's a lot of concern over how much people use their cell phones.

Should we be concerned? So I've got some stats here for you. for you. So the average person picks up their phone around 80 times per day, and the average screen time is around three to four hours. So that's around 25% of our waking time. Also, the benefits of learning to juggle, and they're pretty impressive, and understanding paradoxes. They are weird and confusing, and they make you think. For example, the liar's paradox. If I tell you, I'm a liar. I always tell lies. So when I tell you, I always tell lies, I actually said the truth. And that's a paradox. All this today on something you should know.

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and that is to put your pet in front of a mirror or hold a mirror up to their face and see what their reaction is. And chances are the reaction is disappointing. Because it turns out that elephants, apes, dolphins, and, of course, humans, are the only animals with the natural ability to recognize themselves in a mirror. Research scientist Diana Reese explains that it's a trait, common to animals with large complex brains and social lives. Along with self-recognition, these animals are also capable of empathy and altruism.

So what do other animals see? Well, birds and fish tend to think their reflection is another bird or fish. And the reason most cats and dogs usually don't react much is because their sense of smell is so keen that an odorless image just doesn't really interest them. much. And that is something you should know. If you're like most people, you're probably on your phone a lot, talking, texting, or doing something else. Drive down any street and you'll see a lot of other people on their phones a lot, especially young people. And I know there's been this outcry of concern about how people

are addicted to their phones, that we're isolating ourselves, that we should be more present and mindful and be in the moment. And if we always have our phones in front of our face, well, the whole world is passing you by. Well, maybe. But there is some research into this that I think you will find enlightening. And here to share it is Fay Baggetty. She's a practicing neurology doctor and neuroscientist at Oxford University Hospitals, an author of a book on this topic titled The Phone Fix. Hi, Fay. Thanks for being here today. Thank you for having me. So there does seem to be a lot of, I guess, judging going on, that people make judgments about people who are always on their phone. Oh, see, she's always on her phone, he's always on his phone, can't they get

off the phone, that there's something wrong with that. And I have to admit I've made those judgments about some people myself. And because it does seem to be concerning that if you're on your phone, you're not here in the moment with me. I think it's important. not to be too judgmental when you see somebody on their phone. And it all depends on what they're doing. We all lead increasingly busy lives. You know, we have blurred boundaries between work and rests. There are many working parents trying to pick up their kid up from school,

trying to do the online shop, answering an email. And they may not necessarily have a choice in that matter. I mean, ideally we would all love to relax and be in the moment. but I think it's important to understand that it's not the phones themselves, and there may be forces beyond people's control. Okay, well, I get that, but here's what I've always thought is, if you're on your phone a lot, then you're not doing something else. If you're spending a lot of your day texting or playing Candy Crush

or whatever you're doing, then you're not engaging in like real life. But then again, I don't really know how much of the time. people spend on their phone, do you? Yeah, so I've got some stats here for you. So the average person picks up their phone around 80 times per day. Some studies may even say up to 100 times per day. And the average screen time is around three to four hours. So that's around 25% of our waking time, assuming we all sleep for eight hours.

But I mean, these are just averages. and I think it's important rather than focusing just on screen time, it's important to look at what people are doing, where they're doing it and why they're doing it. And if I explain a bit by what I mean by that, is that if you, let's say, commute to work and you listen to a podcast, that's an hour of screen time. If you do a workout using an app on your phone,

that's another hour of screen time. If you speak to somebody, the screen time adds up. So I think it's more important to think about what you're doing, where, and why you're doing it. And a big part of what comes up in the scientific research is intentionality, to be really intentional with your time. And what many people find problematic is those unintentional, short, automatic checks that they do. one of the concerns I think people have about phone use is how intrusive it is, how you will see people together, walking down the street together. So they're, you know, they've made plans to be together. And they're each on their phone doing something else that has nothing to do with the other person.

Or you can be out to dinner with someone and their phone rings, and all of a sudden, whoever is on the other end of that phone is more important than you are. I mean, it seems rude, but it's disrupting life. So I've been writing and researching this book for over four years, reading scientific studies, and that's given me a really great opportunity to look at and analyze people's behavior. And actually, it is a very, very tiny minority that are actually with people and on their phone. I find that not to be the case at all. And I think if you do see that, what happens is that our brain tends to have something called a confirmation bias, where if we worry about something, if we think about something a lot, then we're more likely to notice it in our environment. So we're not, you know, objective observers of the world.

We are very, very subjective. And some really good examples to do with that, that if you buy a car, suddenly that all you see on the road is cars of the same make and model because it relates to you and your thoughts and your opinions and what kind of car you have. So I think part of what we might see, you know, when we see young people, it's somewhat a judgment call and it reflects many people's opinions and our concerns about technology. It sounds like, if I'm reading you right, It sounds like having research this, you're not that concerned about this. The outcry that we hear from people about people are spending too much time on their phone.

That is not a concern you share, right? Yes, I think we are overly concerned. I think we got very, very excited when technology was released, and we were very, very pro-technology. Technology should be integrated into absolutely everything. And I think the pendulum has swung too far the other way. They were now very anxiety driven and we feel that technology has caused a lot of problems. And I think we could do with just coming back to the centre.

So the way I see, there's certainly many, many challenges with technology. Phones can certainly be habit forming and they can be very distracting depending on how people use them. But it's not the case that the situation cannot be salvaged or it is outside our control. So where's the line? Like what's reasonable use and what's not? I mean, how do you decide is this a problem worth addressing or this is just life? So I think people, this has to be done at an individual level. There is no figure for screen time that comes out in scientific research that I can prescribe for everybody.

some people certainly spend a lot of time on screens and it has no adverse impact on them and some people are negatively impacted despite not spending very much time at all. It all comes down to what you're accessing. Are you accessing content that's detrimental to you? And there are some things in the literature that show a really negative effect and those things are accessing self-harm content and cyber bullying and those things are very negatively impacting on people and certainly if anybody is in that situation that should seek help. But apart from that, it comes down to the

individual and what one person finds motivating, somebody else may well find triggering. So it's important to monitor the content you access. But the second piece of that is to make sure you have good habits. So you are accessing that content in the right situations and for the right reasons. And what I mean by that is that, I mean, you could be accessing amazing content, but if you're accessing it times that you should be focused or times that you should be sleeping or times that you should be spending time with family, that can be detrimental. I think it's okay to take an intentional break to use technology, even for entertainment and to do what you want to do. But unintentional checks, either for avoidance of a difficult task or because it has become some sort of coping

strategy to manage difficult emotions can have a negative impact. It really takes some untangling at the individual level to see what people are doing that may be negative and sort of. start to adjust their pattern to a more beneficial one. We're talking about how our smartphones affect us, the truths, the myths, the science, and my guest is Dr. Fay Begetty. She's author of the book, The Phone Fix. In Toronto, every arrival is a statement, and nothing says it better than this. Cadillac Optic was the number one selling luxury EV in Canada for 2025. Find your rhythm across a seamless 33-inch display and an immersive 19-speaker AKG surround

audio system. This city demands agility and optic delivers with precision to make every drive extraordinary. Let's take the Cadillac. Find out more at Cadillac canada.ca. Luxury sales claim based on S&P Global Mobility Canadian New Vehicle Total Registrations for calendar year 2025 for the Cadillac definition of luxury. Spotify, it's Jay Shetty. Are you one of those media strategy people? Scrolling through spreadsheets, searching for an audience that pays twice as much attention to your ads than they do on social, let me introduce you to fans. And they're here with me on Spotify. Trust me, I know fans. They don't skip. They stay for hours. They don't move on. They manifest. They're not a demographic group. They're fans. Spotify advertising. You're among fans. So, doctor, I wonder, and maybe you've done this,

I wonder if you asked people, do you think your phone use is a problem? How many people would say yes. This is really interesting and certainly a lot of people do. Certainly there was a recent UK study that people recognised that there were challenges and even young people said that they feel that the benefits of being online do outweigh the risks. Now there was a somewhat interesting study actually where they took people and they did anxiety and depression scores and they group them into high risk for depression and high risk for anxiety. And they looked at how worried they were about their phone use. And what they found that people who were very worried about their phone use tend to have this high levels of anxiety and depression. But what's

really, really interesting is that when they measured their phone use objectively, the relationship was much, much smaller. So people who are worried about their phone use do not necessarily spend much longer on their phones than people who are not worried about their phone use. I mean, that could be interpreted in a number of different ways, but one of the things that the authors of the study determined was that the narrative, the constant anxiety and fear-inducing narrative in the media may well be a mediator of why people feel so bad when they're checking their phones. There's nothing worse than scrolling on your phone and thinking is going to do you harm. It ultimately ends up being a self-fulfilling prophecy. I'm not taking away from any of the

challenges and negative impact of technology itself, but certainly the worry and the narrative in the media adds to that. And it's a little bit like in medicine, because I work as a doctor in my medical practice, we have something called the nocebo effect, where somebody who reads the entire list of side effects in a medication is more likely to experience them. And that's not necessarily a trick or that they're lying to us. It's just the brain becomes primed and hypervigilant to notice all these things and then attribute them, rather than being a normal person, of life to attribute them to the medication. And it's very similar in technology.

We all have ups and downs with our mood and our anxiety. But if at the same time you feel that you have really problematic habits that you cannot control and the media is constantly telling you that this is going to do you harm, that situation is being played out in your mind and it's creating a vicious cycle. So one of the ways people that I see people use their phones, and I admit to doing this myself, is really like, I wonder what's happened since I last checked. Who's texted me? Who's emailed me? Who's what's happened to this guy or that guy?

That it's that anxiety of what am I missing if I don't check it? And a lot of times, you say we look at our phones maybe 80 times a day, a lot of times it's like, In the old days, if you went to the doctor and you had to wait in the waiting room, you'd pick up a magazine and read it. Now, nobody does that. They pick up their phone and do stuff because it just fills the time. It's something to do because there's nothing else to do. Right? Yes, absolutely.

And certainly in my waiting room, when I go call patients in, there will be many people on their phones. I mean, we hardly have magazines around anymore. But firstly, they're trying to fill the time, and they're trying to do that with content that's relevant to them, because I remember the old days with the magazines, and there were outdated magazines that I had no interest in reading. So it's not necessarily that picking up a magazine would be a better use of my time in that situation. The second thing is that even though people are in a waiting room

and waiting to see a clinician, they still feel the need to be productive. And part of that is due to work and life pressures. A lot of people actually bring their laptops into hospital when they're admitted and are taking meetings and are answering emails. And how much of that is it external pressure that they don't, we have created a workforce that we are not allowing people to rest and recover? So there is that external pressure, the filling the time, but also coping with difficult emotions. Because our phones have really become coping tools.

And when you're anxious or frustrated in a waiting room and you maybe will be waiting to hear something that's not so pleasant, you can use your phone as a form of digital distraction. This is actually termed, we all have sort of emotion regulation. And using our phone is part of external emotion regulation when we use mechanisms outside our own brain to manage our emotions. And a lot of those people may well be texting a friend. I've actually talked in my book about a time when I was in a waiting room myself. And as a doctor, I see all these people in the waiting rooms using their phones, wondering what they might be doing. but I was about to undergo a procedure and I was waiting.

And you know what? I texted a really good friend of mine because I was fearful. And it really helped. It really, really helped. So I think, again, it's just about seeing past the little device that people have in their hands and just wondering what are they doing and why they're doing it. I would have managed, even if I didn't have the ability to text my phone, friend. But I actually made the whole experience so, so, so much better to be able to distract

myself and, you know, have a little messaging chat and some jokes really helped calm my brain and put me in a better position. But there are times when, let's say, you go out to dinner, you sit down at the restaurant and the person you're with whips out their phone and starts looking at it. Well, they wouldn't do that with a magazine. They wouldn't, you know, sit across the table from you and say, hang on a second and pull out a magazine and hold it up and start reading it, but they'll do it with their phone. But there was a time before smartphones that you couldn't do that. And since you couldn't do that, I think people weren't as anxious about not having something to do because you didn't have it to do. It's like when you, when people can get a

hold of you, you check to see if people are trying to get a hold of you. But there was a time when if you were away on vacation, nobody could get a hold of you. So there was no anxiety because there was no possibility of people getting a hold of you. And therefore, you didn't worry about it. That's a really good point. So before we had mobile phone, phones, we would have either magazine or laptops. And there was certainly, you know, taking them out in certain situations would constitute quite a big move or action. One of the things that makes phone so sticky and so habit forming is that they have checking them has become a really small action. And our brain has an autopilot system where we encode habits, things that we do

automatically. And those habits tend to be really, really small actions. Things like, you know, the way we talk, the way we use our hands, washing our hands, covering our mouth when we cough. These are all habits. And our phones have sort of been integrated in this sort of habitual mechanism in the autopilot brain. And as a result, we have increased the number of situations that we check our phone. And our brain is really an association. machine. So for example, if you never, there'll be, listeners here, if you never check your phone at the dinner table, then you don't have that habit and you feel no urge to check it. But there will be other people, and they are actually a minority, that will check their phone when they're

out to dinner with somebody. And that has essentially become a habit. We have also somewhat normalised this in society that we expect people to be available all the time. And this online vigilance that you talk about, this thing of someone may have contacted me, someone, you know, there may be some things for me to do or to know about. This is called online vigilance because you are always, you are in your physical world, but you're always monitoring your digital world. That can have an impact on your brain. There was a study I remember hearing about, and I can't remember exactly,

but the study, the results of the study were that just having your phone on the table sends a message to the other people in the room that you're not quite as present as you should be or that you're not as engaged as you should be. Not that you're on the phone, just that it's sitting there waiting to ring sends a message to the other people in the room. I'm not surprised by the results of that study

And there was a similar study like that that showed that some people find it more difficult to concentrate when their phone is next to their desk and it impacts their ability to do complex puzzles, when they place their phone on their desk, even though it's face down, and even though they don't receive any notifications. And that effect is ameliorated if they put their phone in a bag or out of sight in a different room. And the people it affects the most of those people that have. have this online vigilance that are constantly monitoring, you know, their phone and what might happen.

So clearly, and the reason I like this conversation is it's not just phone use in general that's a problem. It's what you're doing on the phone, how often you're on the phone, how often you check it, and what are you not doing when you're on the phone that's important? Fay Bighauggetti has been my guest. She's a practicing neurology doctor and neuroscientist. and she's author of the book The Phone Fix, and there's a link to that book at Amazon in the show notes.

Thank you, Faye. It was great to have you. Come on here. Thank you for having me, Mike. It's been a really insightful conversation. Hey, it's Hillary Frank from The Longest Shortest Time, an award-winning podcast about parenthood and reproductive health. We talk about things like sex ed, birth control, pregnancy, bodily autonomy, and, of course, kids of all ages. But you don't have to be a parent to listen. If you like surprising, funny, poignant stories about human relationships and, you know, periods, the longest shortest time is for you.

Find us in any podcast app or at longest shortest time.com. You know what a paradox is, right? It's a seemingly absurd or self-contradictory statement that when investigated or explained may actually prove to be true. For example, deep down, you're really shallow. That's a paradox. What's interesting about paradoxes and why they're important to look at is they force us to question our assumptions and they force us to challenge conventions

and dive deep into some critical thinking. Plus, paradoxes can be fun and eye-opening. Here to help get a better grasp on paradoxes is George Spiro. George is a journalist with a PhD in mathematical economics and author of several books. His latest is called Perplexing Paradoxes, unraveling Enigmas in the World Around Us. Hi, George. Welcome to something you should know. Hi, Mike. Thanks for having me.

So take us a little deeper into the world of paradoxes, what they are, the importance of looking at them, because it's easy to see the absurdity in paradoxes and kind of laugh off the whole time. So help me see paradoxes through your eyes. A paradox is something that usually sounds absurd. And when you analyze it further, either you find out that it's not absurd, it just sounded absurd, but it's actually a true statement, or it's a statement that's based on incorrect assumptions, or the logical arguments are wrong, or something in the basic assumptions is incorrect. But very importantly, paradoxes were the gateway for philosophers to think deeply about questions.

And so an example, a real simple example of a paradox that would explain that or illustrate that is what? For example, the liar's paradox. If I tell you, I'm a liar, I always tell lies, then the question is, did I just say a truth? Because I am a liar, I always say lies. So when I tell you, I always tell lies, I actually say the truth. And that's a paradox. And so how does that help us think deeply about it? things because it almost sounds like a joke. I always tell lies. Well, if I'm lying,

then I don't always tell lies. So how does that help? It's important in order to understand our way of thinking, the theory of knowledge. For example, the liar's paradox. The problem with the Liar's paradox is that I'm violating a law, basic logical law, namely the law of non-contradiction. A proposition cannot be true and false at the same time. Now, if I say, I always lie, then I'm saying something that's both true and false at the same time. And that's the basic basis of this paradox and it teaches us something about logical thinking that we cannot pronounce assertions or statements that are both true and false. And if I say, I'm a liar, then I just violated that law. I pronounce the statement that is both true and wrong and untrue. So throw out just

randomly, just before we get into the different kinds of paradoxes, throw out a few more paradoxes to kind of get people thinking here. A very famous paradox is about Achilles and the turtle. It goes like this. If the turtle stands 10 feet in front of Achilles and they start running, Achilles can never reach and never overtake the turtle. Why? Because by the time he reaches where the turtle started out,

the turtle will have moved on a bit. And when Achilles reaches that point, the turtle will have moved on a bit more, and so on, and so on. And so the Greeks, the ancient Greeks said, well, in that case, Achilles could never reach the turtle. But obviously, Achilles can reach the turtle and he can overtake the turtle.

So that was a conundrum. They didn't know how to solve it. And actually the solution to that paradox is that you cannot subdivide the steps of Achilles into smaller and smaller sub-steps. The whole assertion that he'll always reach where the turtle was. And in that time space, the turtle will have gone a fraction further. And when Achilles overcomes that fraction, the turtle will have gone a bit further and so on. It's actually wrong because Achilles cannot take that small steps.

And this paradox was only solved when Isaac Newton came up with infinitesimal mathematics with calculus, where you speak about the infinitely small. So that's a famous example of a paradox that led to very deep mathematics 2,000 years later. Doesn't seem like a paradox. It seems absurd. It seems ridiculous because obviously he can catch the turtle and go blow past it.

And like who would even think that he couldn't? I mean, it just seems so... Paradoxical. Paradoxical, yeah, right, exactly. So that's the definition of a paradox, I guess. I guess so. It sounds just totally absurd. So talk about the different kinds of paradoxes.

There are three kinds of paradoxes. There are paradoxes which are called veridical paradoxes. They are propositions that sound absurd, but when you dig into them, you find out that in fact they are true. They are simply unintuitive. For example, many of your listeners have probably heard about the Monty Hall problem. That was a television show many years ago. Let's make a deal.

Yes, exactly. So there was Monty Hall and he asked somebody from the audience, to come on stage and he said, here are three doors. Behind one of the doors, there's a car. And if you open the right door, you get the car. So the person just points, let's say, to the left door. Then Monty Hall said, okay, before we open it, I'll open one of the other two doors. And he opens one of the other two doors and it's empty behind.

And then Monty Hall tells the person, well, do you want to change your choice? You chose the left door. I opened the right door. Do you want to change to the middle door? Most people would say, well, it doesn't matter. The chances are half half. There are two closed doors. So half it's the left door, half it's the middle door.

So I don't care. But that's actually wrong. because at the outset there was a one-third chance that the left door had the car and two-third chances that one of the other two doors had the car. So when Monty Hall opened one of the other two doors, the two-thirds probability just went onto the door that was still closed. So actually the correct way to look at it is there's a one third chance that the car is behind the left door that the person chose at the outset. And there's still a two-thirds chance that it's behind the closed door.

So it's worthwhile changing to the other door. And that was a huge outcry at the time. nobody believed it, but actually it sounds paradoxical. There are two closed doors, so the chances should be 50-50. But no, they are 33 and 66, so it's worthwhile changing. So that's a veridical paradox. It sounds paradoxical because you'd think too closed doors, so it should be 50-50. But no, when you dig into it, it's actually correct that it's 33% and 60%.

I've heard that before, explained a long time ago, and I didn't get it then and I don't get it now. Because it doesn't seem, because there are two doors in play. There's a car behind one of two doors. Therefore, there is a 50-50 chance regardless of what happened before right now. Well, yes, that's how most people think about it. But actually, it was one third behind your door and two. thirds behind one of the other two doors. And that probability distribution remains the same even after Monty Hall opened the empty door. What he did was he shifted the one third probability behind

the empty door onto the other door. So that is now a two-thirds probability that it's behind the other door. But even after the explanation, many people don't get it and it took me a while to understand it. Yeah, it may take me a while longer until I don't think I'll ever get it. Okay, so that's a falsitical, I mean, a veridical paradox that sounds absurd but is in fact true. And I can only take your word for it because it still sounds absurd and not true. but so what about a falsitical paradox what is that okay a falsitical paradox is a proposition that sounds absurd and is indeed false or self-contradictory like when i said i always lie that's a falsitical paradox because it is both true and false so there's it's there's fallacious reasoning there i'm

violating the law of non-contradiction. That's a falsetical paradox. Another falsetical paradox would be the famous barber paradox in a village. There are several men in the village and some shave themselves and all those who don't shave themselves are shaved by the barber. Let's call him Figuero. So Figuero shaves all men who do not shave themselves. The question is, does Figuero shave himself or does he not? If he does, then he shaves somebody who shaved himself. And Figuero shouldn't be shaving men who shave themselves. So if he doesn't shave himself, then he should,

because he's shaving all the men in the village who don't shave themselves. So that's a famous paradox. It was Bertrand Russell who discovered it or invented it. And it's a paradox. There are many paradoxes with self-reference when the barber actually refers to himself. Does he shave himself when he should only shave the people who don't shave themselves? So the solution to that. paradox is there is no barber like that. He cannot exist. And that is a falsetical paradox.

Let's talk about some other paradoxes just to throw some more out there. What is the paradox of random numbers? Random numbers are a very important subject in computer science. So let me first say, one cannot speak about a random number. Random numbers are usually sequences of numbers. And random means that there's no rhyme or reason to them. So let me first ask you, which sequence sounds more random? 3, 489 or 1-1-1-1. So most people would say, okay, 3-4-8-9 is more random than 1-1-1-1-1.

Well, they're both equally likely. If you do a lot of numbers with a random number generator, you get approximately as many sequences 3489 as you will get 1-1-1-1. But so how do you know when you see a sequence whether it's random? Well, if you can recognize it as a random sequence, then it can't be. be random because randomness means you can't recognize it. There's no pattern. There's no rhyme or reason to the sequence. So you can never actually recognize or decide whether a sequence of numbers is random or not. The only thing you can do

is investigate how the sequence was produced. If it was produced by a random, process, let's say by throwing dice or flipping coins, then it's random. But actually to see a sequence and say this is random that you cannot do. So can a human being come up with a random sequence because we all have our biases and favorite numbers and things? So are our random number sequences really random or not? No, because you'd never come up, if I'd ask you to produce random numbers, you'd never come up with 1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1. You'd never say that.

And actually, in a really true random number generator, this sequence, 1-1-1-1-1, should actually appear every once in a while. But a human being, we just wouldn't come up with such a number. or 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7. That sounds totally unrandom. But in a random number generator, this sequence should actually appear every once in a while. Talk about the, what is it, Antenemy paradox? Yes.

Okay, so we talked about veridical and falsidical paradoxes. There's a third kind of paradox, which is called an antinomy. it's a statement that seems absurd and the reasoning is correct, but there's something wrong with it, that it just cannot be. Usually it's when two equally valid principles contradict each other. Let's say you have the right to privacy and you also have freedom of speech, and these two contradict each other. So you have an antinomy. It's not the paradox as such, but there are two things.

Two equally valid precepts which contradict each other, the right to privacy, freedom of speech. Or let's say a medical doctor stands in front of a patient who is dying. Now, the Ten Commandments, one of the Commandments says, thou shalt not lie. You must not lie. The Hippocratic oath says, do no harm. Now, the doctor has a problem, let's call it a paradox, an antinamy. He should tell the truth, but he knows if he tells the truth, he will hurt the patient. So what does he do?

I can't answer it. It's an antinomy. It's their equally valid principles. which contradict each other. So you can't really answer that question. Explain, I think, was Jevon's paradox? Because I think it says a lot about human nature. That's something from economics.

Let's say you have an electricity bill every month, let's say $100. And the electric company now decides to lower the price by 30. 30%. So you'd assume that at the end of the month, your electricity bill will only be $70. What happens usually is that the electricity bill is higher. It's $120, let's say. So that's a paradox. The price per kilowatt hour was reduced by 30% and your bill went up. Yes, because what happens when a electricity prices go down, you leave the light on during the night, you don't turn off the air conditioner, you buy more electric appliances. So you use much, much more electricity and you end up paying more than you used to because the price went down. You know what that reminds me of?

And I think it's the same thing. You know when they widen a road because there's too many cars and there's congestion, so they add lanes. So they widen the road. And then when they open up the new lanes, more cars come than used to come because there's now more lanes, and the traffic is as bad or worse than it was before. We've been talking about paradoxes. And my guest has been George Spiro. He is a journalist with a PhD in mathematical economics. And the name of his book is perplexing paradoxes, unraveling enigmas in the world around us. I appreciate you being here. and sharing that, George. Thank you. Do you know how to juggle?

I actually taught myself to juggle over the course of a weekend several years ago, and I'm glad I did. If you've never tried juggling, it's worth learning. Research has found that learning to juggle has significant positive effects on your brain. Volunteers who took the juggling challenge experienced changes in the white matter of the brain. that matter is in the region that governs peripheral vision, concentration, and dexterity. The jugglers even had lower levels of stress after they mastered juggling. Learning any new activity can have similar benefits to juggling, but juggling taps into all the right elements,

and it's something you can do anywhere without any special equipment. You just need something to juggle, and you need at least three of them. And that is something you should know. And now that the episode is over, just take a moment of your time and leave us a rating and review on whatever platform you're listening on. Apple Podcasts, Spotify, CastBox, tune in. Wherever you listen, they usually have someplace where you can leave a rating and review. They really do help us, particularly when they are five stars. I'm Mike Carruthers.

Thanks for listening today to Something You Should Know. Hey, y'all, it's Kelly Clarkson with Wayfair. Ever order furniture online and wonder what if, like what if it doesn't hold up? That sofa was four days old. You should have ordered from Wayfair. With Wayfair, there's no what if. Just style you love and quality you can trust. Visit Wayfair.ca.

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It's a personal story of mine about trying to get my kids school to teach sex ed. Spoiler, I get it to happen, but not at all in the way that I wanted. We also talk to plenty of non-parents, so you don't have to be a parent to listen. If you like surprising, funny, poignant stories about human relationships, and, you know, periods, the longest shortest time is for you. Find us in any podcast app or at longest shortest time.com.