going some magic shows like Penn &
Teller whenever I visited Las Vegas and
people like them inspired me to learn a
bit of magic myself I was really bad at
magic and I only knew really simple
tricks but I still managed to amaze a
few people and that made it fun to me I
remember sitting in a class back in
eighth grade
performing card magic for my classmates
none of them knew how it worked
so whenever a card appeared somewhere
new or I correctly guessed the card that
they chose they were amazed it wasn’t as
fun when someone understood how the
magic worked the trick was still there I
was still able to make a card appear
somewhere new or figure out which card
they picked but they weren’t amazed
anymore I mean it had lost its magic
well sometimes there is value in knowing
how magic works there’s a trick called a
three-card Monte that magicians would
use to lure victims into taking a bet
that they can never win that is unless
the victim knew what the magic trick was
it’s a really common scam and has quite
a few variations so just knowing the
basic technique behind a single trick
can save you from a lot of different
scams on that note I’m going to be
showing you guys a pretty simple magic
trick but it’s going to be a different
kind of magic watch the screen closely 3
2 1
did you guys see you thought maybe it’s
not obvious but something really cool
just happened I’m going to do it again
3 2 1 the magic trick here is that your
brain was able to instantly identify
that both of those pictures were birds
without you even noticing what’s even
cooler to me was that your brain was
able to go from picking out the bird
from all the different shapes and colors
in the image to knowing that it was a
bird instead of a stapler or a beach
ball in a matter of a fraction of a
second almost everything that we do
relies on what we can see
from creating microscopic artwork on the
tip of a pin to explore in the cosmos
through the Hubble telescope as a result
a lot of our first impressions are based
on well what we can see because we can
gather so much information with their
eyes we tend to judge books by their
covers before even getting a chance to
sit down and read them through this is
just how we instinctively process and
perceive the world around us let me show
you what I mean this is a picture of
corn in case you didn’t know and we make
a lot of assumptions when we look at
something like corn I mean if you were
to take an ear of corn and buy it into
it and then it started to scream you’d
be really surprised and we don’t run
around the supermarket poking every ear
of corn to make sure they’re not
screaming because well we know that corn
doesn’t scream we associate corn with
things like plants and flavors instead
of screaming those are just things that
we instantly know about corn we’re not
only doing this one we’re shopping for
corn at the grocery market we’re doing
this one we’re riding our bikes and we
see a squirrel when we’re looking for
our car keys on a messy table even when
we’re meeting new people for the first
time you probably had a few thoughts
about me when I stepped on the stage we
never stopped and this process is so
fundamental to our brains that our
perception and processing and
understanding of the world around us
relies almost entirely upon it but as
amazing as it is that we can do
something so complex so effortlessly and
so incessantly there is a darker side I
was at a lecture about programming a few
years ago and after the lecture was over
a couple of us stayed behind and started
talking to the lecturer herself one of
us asked her what her biggest hardship
was on being in a high-tech field about
programming and she saw that one of them
was her race she’s black you see her
biggest hardship personally for her was
showing everyone that she wasn’t a
stereotypical black woman that she could
exceed every single expectation that
people placed on her because of her race
something I distinctly remember her
telling us was how much she hated it
when people said things like well you’re
really articulate for a black woman
and this is the dark side I was talking
about as useful as it is to
know that corn is a vegetable and won’t
scream we’ve taken this ability to make
snap judgments and applied it to places
that simply don’t need it we’re never
going to need to make assumptions about
lecturers in our life but we do it
anyways the person who made that remark
to the lecture I was talking about
earlier never thought that someone black
could be articulate because well similar
to how we don’t expect corn and
screaming to be on the same object she
never expected the trait of being black
and articulate to be on the same person
it’s perfectly normal but I think this
forms the core of racism it’s because
we’ve taken this process and applied it
to race in humans that we are racist and
this has been going on ever since
history has started I mean if we go back
in time to 19th century America anyone
who saw a black person walking around on
the streets would instantly know that
they were slave even though that may not
have been true fast forward to World War
two everyone was terrified of the
Russians and the Japanese because they
thought they were you know Communists or
spies or something worse even today a
lot of people think that Muslims are
terrorists when that’s simply not true
about every single Muslim so what’s the
solution
well first I want you guys to take a
look at this optical illusion and notice
how square a looks a lot darker than
Square B well they’re actually the same
color but knowing that they’re the same
color won’t change how we look at the
optical illusion it doesn’t matter if we
know that they’re the same color or if
we understand how the optical illusion
works squares a and B are always going
to look different to us you see we can’t
beat our instinct there’s just no way to
get an unfiltered view of reality
squares a and B are always going to be
different we’re always going to think
that corn is a vegetable no matter what
that’s always going to be a bird no
matter what we tell ourselves you know
we’re also always going to be racist
because that’s just how our instinct
works that’s what our instinct is
telling us but we don’t have to see what
reality is to know what reality is we
don’t have to always see that squares a
and B are going to be the same to know
that they are the same we don’t always
have to check every single ear of corn
at the supermarket to know that none of
them are going to scream and we don’t
have to look at every single race in
person the same way to know how to treat
them properly so my solution to racism
is pretty simple we just have to know
that we’re racist I think our approach
of just trying to shut away our racist
instinct and say every single person is
the same on the inside is wrong because
our instinct tells us that they’re
different we’re trying to beat the
undefeatable opponent that is our
instincts what’s more I think modern
racism is mostly unintentional or
instinctive you see the wage gap the
unemployment gap and police brutality I
think all of those exist not because
people are actively Trenton and I erased
their rights rather because people are
just unaware of the subconscious
attachment of stereotypes and
misconceptions to their race
automatically it’s just a byproduct of
what our instinct is and I think just
being aware that we are instinctively
racist will allow us to adjust our
actions accordingly see perception and
instinct is like a big magic trick the
difference between screaming corn and
articulate lecturers is like the
difference between me performing really
bad magic for my classmates and a con
artist on the streets of New York
exploiting the three-card Monte
sometimes it’s okay to sit back and be
amazed by the magic in our minds but
sometimes not even knowing that it’s
magic is really going to hurt us
remember sometimes there’s value in just
knowing how the magic works thank you
[Applause] [Music]