“Everything you know is a story you’ve been told”. – Princely Glorious
In 2009, American journalist and writer Rob Walker and his buddy Joshua Glenn performed a daring experiment: They went through tens of thrift shops and flea markets in New York City looking for anything cheap, of low quality, or poor condition. Basically, the junk that might be found behind the back of anyone’s sofa or bedroom closet. Items included plastic toy Mustangs and planes, old tin badges, unused boxes of birthday candles, pez dispensers, and even some lost keys. Altogether, they purchased 200 items at a total cost of 129$.
The duo then found a fleet of writers and had them craft a story for each of their 200 items. Several weeks later, they had 200 items and 200 stories. Then they put the items back for sale on eBay and in place of the boring, stolid “item description” column; they put a fictional short story involving the item. The experiment was to test their hypothesis: does the emotional value of an object increase when a story is added to it?
The answer was a solid YES. When Rob and Joshua put the items along with their stories for sale on eBay, they pulled in over 8000$ from the original 129$! Meaning their values had increased by a total of 6395%. There is no doubt therefore that storytelling and narratives have a huge impact on the emotional investment of anything you put your mind to – including physics. I believe the reason students aren’t invested in physics from an early age is because of the way it’s taught; a boring, abstract, stolid subject.
The mission here at Probing the Universe is to try and change that. We are trying to tell physics as a story; putting narrative and physics together into a beautiful story.
About Me
“I want to be a scientist!”
That’s what I excitedly told my Dad when he asked about my career plans over breakfast when I was 14. But he only stared at me inquisitively. So I promptly added, “Like Isaac Newton!”
Again, neither the profession nor the name meant anything to him. In the end, I settled for an “engineer”, it was the closest to a scientist that I could think of at that moment.
Fast forward ten years later, I am indeed an engineer and have made my dad very proud. But there was still a sense of dissatisfaction in me. The passion for physics that I had when I was 14 is still burning in me, and that’s what has driven me to start this blog.
I’m from Tanzania, a country located in the Eastern part of Africa. I’m sure you’ve heard of us! Mt Kilimanjaro? Serengeti? Lake Victoria?… ring a bell? No?
Anyways, it’s hard to find a blogger around here, and even harder to find a science blogger. So, whether by chance or intentional, from wherever you are; I really appreciate you checking out my blog.
About Probing Physics
Merriam-Webster defines the word probe as “to search into and explore very thoroughly”
Wikipedia defines physics as “a natural science … whose main goal is to understand how the universe works.”
Putting the two together, we get, “to explore thoroughly how the universe works”. This is the mission of this website.
Simply put, this is a personal blog with a mission to explain physics in “English”. I use a narrative-based, story-telling approach to accomplish this. I hope you will enjoy it.
Disclaimer
I feel obligated to inform you that I am not a physics teacher or a professional “physicist”. I do not impose any authority over you on this subject, and at any point, you are welcome to disagree with my views with absolutely no offense taken. Feel free to verify my content at any time.
Read my Privacy Policy for full disclaimers. Any questions, concerns, or opinions, feel free to contact me.