0:00 1:17

Translator: Jeesun Youn Reviewer: Lisa if you hit Run and again you weren't
Thompson successful,
0:19 1:20
About a year ago, I asked my YouTube we showed this slightly different message,
followers to play 1:23
0:22 stating that you lost five points from your
a simple computer programming puzzle that I starting 200 points.
made with a buddy. 1:26
0:26 That was the only difference.
The object of the puzzle was to get your car 1:28
across the maze In one version, if you failed,
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by arranging these code blocks we simply took away five no-value-in-the-real-
0:32 world,
that represent typical computer programming 1:33
operations, no-one-will-ever-see-these,
0:34 1:35
such as if-else statements and while loops. completely meaningless, fake internet points.
0:37 1:37
Once you thought you had a good code, you (Laughter)
would hit Run, 1:38
0:40 That minor difference is crucial to keep in
and your car would move based on the mind
commands you had in the program. 1:41
0:44 for the results I'm about to show you from the
I asked my YouTube followers to play it 50,000 data points we collected.
because I said I wanted to prove 1:47
0:48 For those who were penalized for failed
that anyone from any background could learn attempts,
to code. 1:49
0:51 their success rate was around 52%.
Fifty thousand of them took the challenge and 1:53
attempted the puzzle. For those who were not penalized, their
0:56 success rate was 68%.
But the truth was 1:59
0:57 That statistically significant delta of 16% was
that I didn't actually care about proving that really surprising
anyone could learn to code. 2:03
1:01 and almost seemed too hard to believe
What they didn't know is that we actually 2:05
randomly served up until we looked at another piece of data that
1:04 we collected,
two slightly different versions of the puzzle. 2:08
1:08 which was attempts to solve before finding
In one version, if you hit Run and you weren't success.
successful, 2:11
1:11 It's shown in orange right here.
you didn't lose any of your starting 200 points. 2:12
1:14 So, those who didn't see failing in a negative
We showed you this message. light
1:15 2:15
[Please try again.] nearly had two and a half times more
1:16 attempts to solve the puzzle.
However, in the other version, 2:19
As a result, naturally, they saw more success 3:21
and therefore learned more. we discover so many more new capabilities
2:23 within ourselves,
So if you think about that and sort of unpack 3:24
these results, and it's not even close to any other time in
2:26 our life.
the trick to learning more and having more 3:29
success But maybe using a toddler is sort of cheating
2:29 3:31
is finding the right way to frame the learning because their brains are different than ours.
process. 3:34
2:32 To make the case that perhaps they aren't
And this observation seemed really profound that different than us,
to me. 3:37
2:35 I'd like to tell you about a plumber I first met
It made me wonder, What if you just frame when I was eight years old.
the learning process in such a way 3:42
2:38 He was Italian.
that you did not concern yourself with failure, 3:44
2:41 (Power up sound effect)
how much more successful could you be, 3:45
how much more could you learn? (Laughter)
2:45 3:48
The next thought was that if this is a real When Super Mario Bros. came out, my
effect, friends and I became obsessed -
2:47 3:52
clearly there must be some evidence for this like, we wanted to get to the castle and
in real life. rescue the beautiful Princess Peach
2:50 3:55
It made me think of toddlers. from the evil Bowser.
2:52 3:56
That's my boy; I helped make that. We'd get to school and ask each other,
2:54 3:58
(Laughter) "Dude, what level did you make it to? Did you
2:56 pass the game?"
They are constantly trying new things, 4:01
2:58 We never asked each other about details on
and they certainly aren't concerned with all the different ways we might have died.
failure. 4:05
3:01 When it comes to games like this,
When my son learned to walk, 4:07
3:02 no one ever picks up the controller for the first
he didn't think about how dumb he might look time
if he fell down, 4:09
3:06 and then after jumping into a pit thinks,
and as his parents, we didn't punish him if he 4:11
wasn't successful either. "I am so ashamed; that was such a failure,"
3:09 4:13
The focus was always on the end goal, and and they never want to try again, right?
we celebrated the successes with him. 4:15
3:15 What really happens is they think, "I've got to
As a result of constantly failing and trying remember there's a pit there;
3:18 4:19
and discovering new things during that phase next time, I'm going to come out with a little
of our life, more speed
4:22 (Audience) (Laughter)
and jump a bit later." 5:32
4:23 That's my niece.
The focus and the obsession is about beating 5:35
the game, Those are my nephews.
4:26 5:37
not how dumb you might look if you get hit by (Laughter)
a sliding green shell. 5:38
4:29 I haven't quite figured it out,
And as a direct result of that attitude 5:40
4:32 but when it comes to me, their uncle, they
of learning from but not being focused on the seem to have some trust issues.
failures, 5:43
4:35 (Laughter)
we got really good, and we learned a ton in a 5:47
very short amount of time. So, these builds usually take me about two to
4:39 three months,
We were the right side of this graph. 5:51
4:42 but there was one that took me three years.
This is what I call the Super Mario Effect: 5:54
4:45 Basically, I wanted to make a dartboard
focusing on the princess and not the pits to where you could get a bullseye every time.
stick with a task and to learn more. 5:58
4:50 The idea was that if you throw a dart, we
This caused me to reflect and realize that could track it through the air,
there were lots of other examples 6:02
4:54 and then we'd move the board to sort of catch
from my own personal experience where this a bullseye.
attitude of life gamification, 6:04
4:58 (Laughter)
this Super Mario Effect led to more success 6:06
and therefore more learning. And so, once we did the math, we realized
5:03 that if we wanted to track the dart
I have a science YouTube channel 6:09
5:05 for a typical, like, game of darts, typical
where I will sometimes use my engineering velocity,
skills 6:13
5:07 we would basically have to both track the dart
to build things such as the world's largest and move the board
Super Soaker 6:17
5:14 in the same amount of time it takes for a
or the Guinness World Record world's largest human to blink once.
Nerf gun. 6:20
5:16 No big deal, right?
(Video) (Screaming) 6:21
5:18 I'm not going to bore you with all the details
(Audience) (Laughter) 6:23
5:23 and the failures and the setbacks
(On stage) Mark Rober: Or maybe this 6:25
snowball machine gun. from a lot of metaphorical sliding green shells
5:26 6:27
(Video) MR: Ha, ha, ha. Yes! and those pesky Hammerhead Bros,
5:28 6:30
(On stage) MR: Fashioned from a leaf blower. but eventually we figured out
5:31 6:32
it would take something that looks like this, you actually want to do it.
6:34 7:41
which is six stepper motors and motion It feels natural to ignore the failures and try
controllers, again,
6:36 7:44
a Vicon motion capture system with six in the same way a toddler will want to get up
cameras, and try and walk again
6:39 7:49
and just a ton of tweaking and rewriting the or in the same way you want to keep playing
code. Super Mario Bros.
6:42 7:52
But finally, eventually, we arrived here. or in the same way the group on the right had
6:51 a desire to stick with that puzzle
(Applause) 7:57
6:58 two and a half times longer.
What's interesting is when I look back on that 7:59
process, They weren't getting paid to do that.
7:00 8:01
like, I can honestly say my attitude towards Nobody was forcing them or watching them.
that 8:03
7:03 It was just them on their computer, alone in
was the same attitude I had toward, like, their house.
rescuing the princess from Bowser. 8:06
7:08 Their outlook made it so they wanted to keep
Like, of course, each failure and setback trying and learning.
sucked; it stung. 8:10
7:12 The icing on the cake for the dartboard
But it was no different than falling in that pit 8:12
on Level 8-1, was I took it on Jimmy Kimmel and
7:16 challenged him to a game of darts.
and you're like, "Argh," and you got to go 8:15
back and try again. I'll just set this clip up by saying two things.
7:18 8:17
It was always like, "OK, that sucked, but what The first is we also had a mode on the board
did we learn from that? 8:19
7:22 where if your buddy had it and threw a dart,
What can we do next for it? Let's hit it again." 8:21
7:25 the board would move the other way.
And this concept of life gamification 8:23
7:27 (Laughter)
is more than just, like, "Have a positive 8:24
attitude" And the second is that we couldn't get this
7:29 thing working during rehearsal,
or "Never give up" 8:29
7:31 and it was just barely kind of creeping along.
because those sort of imply 8:32
7:32 I get up to stand in the elevator,
you're having to endure against your true 8:34
desire to quit. which is the door that moves up before you
7:36 go down out on stage.
I feel like when you frame a challenge or a 8:37
learning process I look to the right, all six cameras had failed.
7:38 8:39
in the way I'm describing, So my buddy John is feverishly, like,
7:40 restarting all the cameras
8:42 So, like, after that, I haven't even touched the
as I'm going out onto stage knowing this, and board since.
there's, like, four things and bits, 9:44
8:46 I'm like, "I'm so done with it."
and I work up to the dartboard as the sort of 9:45
grand finale. (Laughter)
8:50 9:48
So just keep that in mind as this clip starts. And I really believe that if you reframe, like,
8:52 the challenges,
Like, that's where my headspace is. 9:51
8:54 it can make all the difference.
Three freaking years, and it comes down to 9:53
this moment. I have a simple thought experiment to sort of
8:57 showcase this.
(Video) MR: What you're going to do is give 9:56
this dart to your buddy, Let's say I gave you a test
9:01 9:57
and you're going to challenge him just to, like, and it had instructions on it that you would
hit the board. carry out,
9:04 10:00
Jimmy Kimmel: Just try to hit the board. OK. and to do that, it had sort of buttons like this.
Alright. 10:03
9:07 And the instructions would say something
(Laughter) like, "Push button 3 for 5 seconds"
9:10 10:06
MR: Alright, hot shot. Double or nothing? and then, "Push button 6 for 1 second,"
9:13 10:08
JK: Alright, yeah, yeah, alright. Ready? then, "Push buttons 3 and 5 for 6 seconds,"
9:16 and so on.
(Laughter) 10:11
9:17 And unless you carried out the instructions on
OK. page one exactly,
9:18 10:14
MR: Alright. And so, then I step up here. JK: you couldn't see the other 32 pages of the
This does this automatically? test.
9:21 10:16
MR: That's right. JK: And you built this? How much would I have to pay you to take
9:23 that test for an hour?
MR: That's right. I step up. 10:20
9:26 Now suppose I change the word "test" here to
Here we go. "game,"
9:28 10:24
(Cheers) (Applause) and I rotated this,
9:32 10:26
(On stage) MR: Fake it till you make it. and for the input device, I shrunk the buttons
9:34 and moved them here,
(Laughter) 10:30
9:35 and I gave it a cool paint job
I will say, in all of our testing, 10:32
9:37 and maybe different button styles.
literally, we never had a dead-center bullseye 10:34
9:39 And then instead of using words,
as much as that one right there. 10:36
9:41 I represented the tasks you needed to
accomplish visually like this.
10:41 into learning something through something
Note the output is the exact same: cool:
10:43 11:40
you have to push these buttons in a very basically to go from this to this.
specific manner 11:44
10:46 So for example, in this video, I made a hot
to move on to the next page or level, as it tub with liquefied sand.
were. 11:48
10:49 And this is another one of my nephews with
Now picture it's 1986. unexplained trust issues.
10:51 11:53
How much would you pay me to take this test (Laughter)
just for an hour? 11:56
10:56 I explain in the video that it's a fluidized bed,
If you have a very bad imagination, here's a 11:58
hint to the right answer. and then we talk about the principle of
10:59 buoyancy
I know. I was there. 12:00
11:00 and how it makes the whole thing work,
(Video) Boy: Nintendo! 12:02
11:02 and I use several examples,
(Crying) 12:03
11:03 like, you know, the blow-dryer with a ping-
Oh, Dad, thank you. pong ball like this.
11:07 12:06
Thank you! I like to think my approach to science is
11:10 similar to Velociraptor hunting patterns.
Dad: Don't come and hug me, go play with it! 12:11
11:12 So, I get people to come in with something
Boy: (Crying) cool and amazing like the sand hot tub,
11:13 12:16
(Audience) (Laughter) and then when they least expect it -
11:15 12:18
(On stage) MR: That has to be the greatest (Video) (Music)
YouTube clip of all time. 12:19
11:18 (Growling)
(Laughter) 12:21
11:19 Robert Muldoon: Clever girl.
So, as a science YouTuber, 12:24
11:21 (On stage) MR: Admittedly, the analogy
sometimes I feel people have framed the act breaks down a little bit
of learning science 12:27
11:24 right there at the end.
in a negative way. 12:29
11:26 But by reframing the learning process and
It's been taught poorly, so it feels scary to focusing on the cool end goal,
them. 12:33
11:29 the fear of failure is often taken off the table,
It feels something more like this. 12:36
11:31 and learning just comes more naturally.
And my approach is to take the same physics 12:39
lessons you might have hated I'll close with this thought.
11:35 12:41
and to try and sort of trick you Someone came up with this cartoon, and I
11:37 totally love it.
12:44 we want our life's challenges to look like the
This is so true, top one,
12:45 13:37
but often in life we tell ourselves that the top but that's boring.
version is what we want; 13:38
12:49 If that were a real video game or a book or a
that's what we expect. movie
12:51 13:41
But then something happens. and that went out to the market,
12:52 13:42
Maybe it's a really bad grade on a test it would be a total failure.
12:54 13:44
or a meeting with a client that goes horribly Nobody would buy it.
wrong. 13:45
12:56 Where's the risk and the reward? Where's the
Maybe it's a bad breakup. challenge?
12:58 13:48
Maybe we miss a wide-open shot. There's no feeling of satisfaction.
12:59 13:50
Some kind of green shell hits you. The bottom picture is real life, and that's not a
13:02 bug, that's a feature.
And so, at that first setback or sign of failure, 13:55
doubt creeps in. Think about anything that means anything to
13:05 you in life,
We tell ourselves we're not good enough or 13:58
we're not smart enough. whether it's a degree,
13:09 13:59
And yet, if the bottom rectangle here is a a relationship with a friend or someone in
game where now your bikes crash your family,
13:13 14:02
and you have to get your bike across to the maybe a professional accomplishment.
flag, 14:04
13:16 I can guarantee you it came from something
it's not, "Oh, I hit these rocks. I'm just going to that looks like the bottom
leave my bike here. 14:08
13:19 and not the top:
I'm not good enough," and you quit and walk 14:09
away. failing and failing and failing and eventually
13:21 succeeding
You see that flag to the right, 14:13
13:23 to the point that it now holds value,
and you're like, "Nah, what did I just learn? 14:16
13:25 just like the most meaningful high-fives of my
OK, next time, I'm going to come out with adolescence were those when I said,
more speed 14:20
13:27 "Dude, I finally beat Bowser last night."
and lift the front of my bike up." 14:25
13:29 I feel like a lot of the successes in my life
You want to try it again. 14:27
13:31 have come down to the Super Mario Effect,
You're immediately excited to go for it again. 14:29
13:33 and while framing challenges like this has
We sort of tell ourselves worked for me,
13:34 14:32
of course, results may vary.
14:33
Everyone is going to be different,
14:35
and I don't know exactly what it looks like for
you to take this principle
14:39
and map it into your life.
14:40
But if we got these very real results
14:43
from a very different cross-section of very
unique people,
14:46
clearly I'm not alone.
14:48
There's some universal principle at play here.
14:51
By shifting your focus to the princess
14:53
and treating your life's challenges like video
games,
14:55
you can trick your brain and actually learn
more
14:58
and see more success.
14:59
Thank you.
15:01
(Applause)