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Length: ~2hrs, 13 lessons

My rating: ★★★★ (5/5)

My one-liner takeaway: It matters little to being right if you’re not effective in communicating that message.

Neil kicks off this series by making it clear that he isn’t here to tell us cool facts about the galaxy; there’s nearly endless hours of him doing so on YouTube. Instead, he uses this as an opportunity to explain how to determine truth for yourself and then share that knowledge out effectively. It’s quite odd that an astrophysicist would become a pop culture figure, but it’s entirely due to how good he is at inspiring curiosity within listeners. It’s a very timely moment to absorb these lessons, with misinformation traveling spreading like a virus and wreaking havoc on our country.

He covers a vast set of communication tactics, even sharing how he prepares for his audience by understanding their perspective first. It may tough realization to accept but it intuitively makes sense: unless you’re willing to understand just how the other side thinks, you’re just flapping your gums. No one in history has been convinced to change a perspective by name-calling. He also warns about our inherent cognitive bias. Humans are wired poorly to understand statistics, not through any fault of our own. It’s just a weakness in our wiring. The most telling illustration is how the power of a single person’s testimony has far more influence on our behavior than the collection of data from a study. For example, you could read a thorough report on a car’s high safety and reliability scores but be totally be swayed by the single person you run into fuming over their experience with that car. Finally, another great reminder is how to use your body to double your effectiveness in communicating. Once he mentioned it, I couldn’t un-see how he goes about this. I decided to mirror his movements alone in my room. It’s not embarrassing if no one’s there to see it.

If you’d like to hear it directly from Neil, check out his course here. As of now there are over 100 instructors to learn from, with more being added every week!

This review is part of a larger series, where I try learning from every single course within the catalog. Find my full list here.