How Physics Affects Your Emotional State | Brian Greene

This is a clip from our recent podcast release with physicist Brian Greene. In it, he and Dr. Jordan B. Peterson discuss the connections between the physical sciences and emotional entropy.

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[NCVII]

A technical instance of this in my life comes forth in my study.When all is smooth and sailing in the function of understanding, im filled with enthusiasm and curiosity but once something complex comes up, I get worried plus my cognition lessens.
Once I pick up on the concept, my system returns me to the positive state.

[themorningmist]

It doesn't help (if fact, I'd say it reinforces the problem) when we personalize sicknesses or psychological conditions such as anxiety. When you personalize them, you create a psychological attachment to the very thing you want to be free from. I recognize the absurdity of this with the psychiatrists who were treating me for schizophrenia, and there's a lot of anxiety with schizophrenia. Something inside had me feeling that personalizing the condition would make it worse. So, I'd always be careful not to do so and then to always rephrase it or don't answer when they personalized it for me. For example, "How are your sympoms,

My response would be, "THE symptoms or THE anxiety (if we were talking about that particular one) is or I'd just keep silent. I never explained to them the reasons for my responses or lack thereof.

The effects of your words and how you choose to describe yourself in relation to the condition shouldn't be understated. Unfortunately, not many professionals understand this aspect of these conditions. I have yet to meet one who understands the power of your words and the bond they create between you and what you're struggling against. Your words can create a closeness or maintain a separation that can keep you struggling longer or have you recover more quickly. This mindset helped me to recover from a treatment resistant form of schizophrenia. Don't underestimate the power of your words in helping to either hold you captive or set you free; to curse your life or bless it.

A good way to overcome anxiety is to become conscious of it when it strikes. Follow it as it moves through your body. Don't sink beneath it. Stand above and speak where it is as it travels. Breathe, and follow it. You'll come to see the only power it has is making you feel afraid. Keeping your breath flowing, your eyes open, smile, and step forward because the anxiety tells you not to. The anxiety will then transform into the excitement that comes from positive adrenaline. Anxiety is simply adrenaline that is influenced by negative thoughts and perceptions. Essentially, these negatives lead the mind instead of the intent of the mind leading the way. Schizophrenia symptoms work in a similar manner.

[delarow]

Absolutely fascinating conversation! The parallel between psychological entropy and physical entropy really makes you think about how our brains are wired to handle unpredictability. Brian Greene's explanation of how systems naturally evolve towards disorder, while we psychologically strive for order, creates such an interesting connection between the mental and the physical world. It's amazing to see how concepts from physics can offer deeper insights into emotions like anxiety, and how small obstacles can feel like huge disruptions to our mental 'path length.' Loved the breakdown on how entropy helps predict system behavior without having to dive into every microscopic detail. Mind-blowing stuff!

[curlyfryactual]

If you've ever sat through even one physics exam you know very well how physics affects your anxiety 📈💯

[richardburns]

Order to disorder, entropy. Is fascinating, but it leaves out the creative influence. Given to us by a creative Higher power.

[TomJones-opnj]

It’s the zeitgeist…weak people are elevated …..maybe even morphic fields….I had a massive panic attack at the age of 27 ….I am 56 now it took years to get over it (lots of drugs and alcohol…that only pushed my problem further down the road) embarrassing something larger than yourself …MOVE …do new things ….learn to juggle …play chess ….take up an instrument…start learning a new language….YOU have to change your inner monologue….the mind can help change the brain ….all the best to one and all 🙏❤️🙏

[Lakoda]

First time someone has explained entropy in a way I understood.

[pauliewalsh]

Anxiety. Catastrophic thoughts about what may occur in the future whilst ruminating on negative aspects of the past that not be undone.

[williamthesling]

There is a branch of Mathematics (also in Electrical Engineering) called "Information Theory". That also uses the term "Entropy". In Information Theory, the term Entropy refers to the content of Information. It can thought of as a measure of "surprise". In both thermodynamics a Information Theory, it is perhaps best conceptualized as a "change" of state. Interestingly, in both thermodynamics and Information Theory, the two definitions of Entropy are essentially measuring the same thing!

[AstorsonofEl]

'The Tao of Chaos ' 1 and 2, are a great introduction into quantum psychology. It allowed me to place a color coded physical construct, in my minds eye, of my physical and intellectual bodies as a whole. Through active dreaming, I am able to manipulate this construct under the clear understanding that "all is self".

Change self and change the world.

Namaste, eh🎉

[meggysaurusrex]

Anxiety is a state of neurotic spiralling, fundamentally It is a circular energy that either builds up or spirals down! - it is a fundamental reaction against stillness.

[iestynjones]

Some lovely analogies there from Brian Greene to explain entropy and order. Great discussion.

[shirleygriffin]

Thanks for sharing the gym, spinning class and lifting weights

[Somekidhasmyphone]

We all have our own timelines and our own manifestations and once in a while, we interrupt those things creating anxiety and chaos. Based on our expectation of what we believe it’s supposed to happen because we put those things in place and somebody interrupted it causing you to start over or to take a step back.

[logosfocus]

Blessed is the King of the Angels baby 👑

[RilkeForum]

2:47, I would say, reaching the other side of the street represents a state of low entropy because it's a well-defined, orderly outcome with fewer possibilities—just one direct, straightforward path to the goal.

When someone steps in his way, the man has to adjust his movement, creating more possibilities for how he can proceed. He might move left, right, slow down, speed up, or even stop. This introduces complexity and uncertainty, which corresponds to higher entropy.

The interruption increases the number of possible "microstates" or variations in how he can navigate the situation to still achieve his goal. Does this make sense?

[garysangiacomo]

I appreciate Dr. Green’s description of violating the second law of Entropy with the sand castle analogy.

[SusanBloemhof]

We've been working in Publishing for 30jrs. 'Order' is from a psychological point of view such an almost hesitant word I would use carefully. Interesting talk...

[TeresaMorgan]

Jordan Peterson always has interesting suits, but so far this one wins the prize.

It’s covered in Saints.

[geraldowens]

Enthropy is a measure of the number of sub-groupings of a region that are “similar” with respect to some property of the members of a group. Using the air analogy, if the property is the number of similar molecules of air in a cubic centimeter, the ball of air naturally has lower entropy than the room because the volume of the ball is less than that of the room: it doesn’t matter that there are more molecules per CC in the ball than the room: enthropy measures the number of SIMILAR groupings.

I think that what Dr. Peterson is saying is that the mind of individuals have different capacities for number of groupings and the kinds of thoughts that make up a group.

In a sense, if one measures things by threat level, a lot more things can hurt us than can help us, so a high number of threats constitute a large number of groupings, so the enthropy is high, and thus exceeds a person’s ability to cope mentally.

One way to think of this is to look at a phenomenon known in Computer Science as thrashing: to handle multiple tasks, a single processor works for a small number of milliseconds on each task, switching from one task to another. However, the more tasks there are (processes), the CPU spends more time switching between tasks, yielding less time for processing to be divided up between the tasks. Thrashing happens when almost all the time is spent in the overhead of switching between processes than letting the processes do actual work.

High mental enthropy->high amount of overhead spent thinking and worrying about the problems than being spent solving the problems. Low mental enthropy->more time spent solving the problems occupying one’s thinking rather than worrying (a process of thinking itself) about the problems.

Solution? Prioritization and focus.