Free Fall to Faith: Einstein’s Elevator and Spinoza’s God
Dear Magicians,
Picture this: It’s 1907, and Albert Einstein just had the best idea of his life. (No, it wasn’t about getting a better haircut!) He imagined someone falling in an elevator — not your typical happy thought, but stay with me here.
Think about it: when you’re falling, you feel weightless, like an astronaut floating in space. Einstein realized something mind-blowing: you can’t tell the difference between falling and floating. It’s like trying to tell if you’re moving when you’re on a super-smooth train — impossible without looking out the window!
Here’s where it gets wild: Einstein figured out that gravity and acceleration are like identical twins. You can’t tell them apart! It’s as if the universe is playing a cosmic game of “spot the difference” with us.
But wait — there’s more! Just like you can’t tell if you’re falling or floating in that elevator, humans have a tough time seeing the big picture of reality. We’re like ants trying to understand the internet. Some things stay the same no matter how you look at them (like the speed of light — it’s the universe’s speed limit, no exceptions!).
Einstein wasn’t big on the idea of a white-bearded guy in the sky throwing lightning bolts. Instead, he vibed with another deep thinker named Spinoza, who saw God more like the universe’s operating system. Not writing code in the clouds, but built into everything around us, like the math that makes galaxies spin.
Think about your phone’s GPS. It works because Einstein was right about gravity bending space and time. Wild, right? The same laws that help you find the nearest pizza place might be showing us glimpses of something bigger than ourselves.
So next time you’re in an elevator, remember: you’re standing in the spot where Einstein had his greatest “Aha!” moment. Just don’t try to recreate his experiment — the building manager probably wouldn’t appreciate it!
The universe is like one giant cosmic puzzle, and Einstein showed us that sometimes the pieces that seem the most different — like science and spirituality — might fit together in ways we never expected. Maybe finding faith isn’t about looking up to the heavens, but understanding the amazing patterns woven into everything around us.
And hey, if all this makes your brain feel like it’s doing backflips, you’re in good company. Even Einstein took breaks from pondering the cosmos to play his violin!
Until next time, have a M.A.G.I.C. Christmas and Hanukkah Week,
Brian
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Appearance
Speaking of Albert Einstein, I was delighted to get a shout-out from my friend David Kipping on his fabulous Cool Worlds Lab channel. This time, I gave a spicy take on why, as a physicist, I’m not feeling threatened by Artificial Intellengence hype.
Look for David’s episode on The INTO THE IMPOSSIBLE Podcast coming soon.
Genius
Have you ever wondered why humans can only do one thing at a time?
Scientists at Caltech recently have discovered something fascinating about our brains: even though our eyes and ears can take in huge amounts of information (like billions of pieces of data per second), our brains can only process about 10 bits of information per second. That’s super slow — like trying to drink a swimming pool through a tiny straw!
In their recent paper, The Unbearable Slowness of Being: Why do we live at 10 bits/s?, Zheng and Meister write about the paradoxical slowness of human behavior. While our senses gather data at one billion per second, our overall information throughput is 100 million times slower!
This stark contrast touches on many fundamental aspects of brain function. Think about playing a video game — you can only make one move at a time, even though you see lots of things happening on screen. This is true for everything we do, from typing to solving puzzles. Even the world’s best memory champions can’t go faster than this speed. This discovery helps explain why we can’t multitask and why we sometimes feel like time moves too slowly. Hopefully, you’ll find some time to slow down this holiday season!
Image
I had the pleasure of showing Andrew Huberman the four Galilean moons of Jupiter this week. It’s safe to say, for all of his stress on the importance of breathwork, these celestial sights truly took his breath away.
And, thanks to Capitalism you can do the same, for less that I paid for my first telescope in 1984 — under $100.
Conversation
In this epic conversation, Neil deGrasse Tyson takes us on a journey through the cosmos, blending his unique brand of humor with deep scientific insights. From quantum mechanics to astrology, to AI’s role in education — this episode has it all. So grab your favorite stargazing gear (or just your earbuds) and join us for a tour you won’t forget!
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Upcoming Episode
Richard Panek will be on The INTO THE IMPOSSIBLE Podcast soon. He’s an award-winning science writer whose latest book “Pillars of Creation” reveals how the James Webb Space Telescope is transforming our view of the cosmos. His work masterfully bridges human stories with cutting-edge astronomy, from dark matter to the search for life in the universe. What would you like to ask this celebrated explorer of cosmic mysteries?
