In the dying minutes of the 2006 World Cup final match between France and Italy, Italian defender Marco Materazzi had grabbed at the shirt of French player, Zinedane Zidane.
Disgusted, Zidane told Materazzi, “If you want my shirt so much, I’d give it to you afterward”
Materazzi replied, “I’d prefer the whore that is your sister!”
That was all it took to set Zidane off.
He made the decision to butt the Italian defender Marco Materazzi in the chest, got himself sent off for violent conduct, and France went on to lose the match after a penalty shootout.
Here’s the million-dollar question: Would France have won if Zidane hadn’t gotten the red card?
We’ll get back to that. First, let’s lay the groundwork.
I. The 8th Wonder of the World
Albert Einstein, the 20th-century theoretical physicist known for his theory of relativity, is said to have quipped, “Compound interest is the 8th wonder of the world. He who understands it earns it; he who doesn’t pays it.”
There are two things wrong with that quote. First, there’s no evidence that Albert Einstein ever said that. Einstein died in 1955 and the first appearance of that quote was in 1983. Two, there are 2 other forces in the physical universe that are infinitely more powerful than compound interest: They are Time and Probabilities.
A short, ancient Hebrew book, called the Qoheleth, introduces these two forces as the cause of every phenomenon you see on this side of eternity.
“I returned and saw under the sun that the race is not to the swift nor the battle to the strong, neither is bread to the wise nor riches to men of intelligence and understanding nor favor to men of skill; but time and chance happen to them all.”
If you pause and reflect on this carefully, you’d realize that success is impossible without understanding and partnering with these 2 forces.
Unfortunately, in every human, there is a nagging desire to explain the causes of events without acknowledging the roles of probabilities (chance) and time.
When a person wins a race, humans say it’s because he’s fast
When an army wins the battle, we say, it’s because the army had superior military strategies
When a person accumulates wealth or obtains valuable outcomes in their lives, we say it’s because the person had certain traits that made such results more likely
Yet we conveniently forget the stories of people who were fast but still lost a race.
We forget about powerful armies that succumbed to smaller and weaker armies
We forget about the hardworking men and women who apply all the tricks in the success guru’s playbook but still end up struggling to make ends meet.
As it turns out, our perception of causality is fractured because we don’t understand probabilities and time. Living life with such a fractured perception of causality is like crossing a busy highway blindfolded – you may make it to the other side, in every sense of the phrase.
So, what’s the way out? You must understand probabilities and time.
II. People Do Not Inherently Understand Probabilities
In 1979, Daniel Kahneman and Amos Tversky published a journal article titled, “Prospect Theory: An Analysis of Decision Under Risk”.
One of the big ideas in the article is the manner in which people think about probabilities.
People do not think about the probability of an event, but rather the impact of that event. And this is reflected in their decision-making process.
For instance, assume I’m about to toss a coin.
If I asked you to choose between head and tails, you will probably pick one side at random. Why? Because you know that every coin has a 50% chance of giving you a Head and a 50% chance of giving you a Tail.
What if, before flipping the coin, I told you that I will give you $1000 if the outcome is Heads?
Most people will subconsciously weigh “Heads” more valuable than “Tails” – even though the probability of either option is still 50% each!
The same thing happens in other kinds of decision-making.
For instance, the probability of winning the lottery is very small, but the impact $1,000,000 can have on a person’s life is high. As a result, gamblers overestimate their chances of winning and continue to gamble. Similar patterns occur in the way people handle their health and finances. Below a particular age, the probability of developing high blood pressure, or experiencing a financial emergency is reasonably low. This time, most people underweigh or even ignore these probabilities and continue to make decisions that can have bad outcomes. By the time they realize the error of their ways, it’s often already too late.
But that’s only just the tip of the iceberg.
III. Probabilities Are Wider Than You Realize
Back to the million-dollar question: Would France have won the World Cup if Zidane hadn’t gotten the red card?
That is one of the several alternative histories we will never get to see. What we do know is that Zidane’s absence had an impact on the game’s final outcome.
The same thing plays out in your day-to-day individual decision-making.
Right before you commit to any decision, there are a ton of potential outcomes that are available to you. Before you choose a spouse, there are tons of potential spouses out there in the universe that can complement you. Before you choose a job, there are tons of potential jobs out there that can be a good fit for you. Before you invest your hard-earned money, there are multiple opportunities vying for your attention. However, once you choose, you will only experience the outcomes attached to your choice.
And what happens to the other alternative histories? They may or may not be available to you again at a later time. In the context of our football example, it took France another 12 years before the opportunity to win the World Cup presented itself again.
Many will not be that fortunate. Why? In addition to not thinking in terms of probabilities, very few people think about the alternative histories and the potential outcomes of these histories.
IV. Errors and Alternative Histories
The quality of your life is a function of the probabilities you are aware of at the point of decision making. These probabilities are not merely limited to the outcomes of your decisions, but also to the outcomes in your alternative histories.
But how can we access these alternative histories when we cannot see them?
The answer is something the writer of the Qoheleth understood:
“There is an evil I have seen under the sun, like an error which proceeds from the ruler—folly is set in many exalted places and in great dignity while the rich sit in humble places.”
To the laity, the word “error” implies a mistake – something that should not happen, or something that one must avoid at all costs.
On the other hand, to scientists, “error” has a second layer of meaning, which describes a variation/deviation from one’s expectations. That’s why you won’t see researchers freaking out when they see errors in their data. Sometimes, scientists, unlike laymen, are humble enough to acknowledge that their expectations may be built on faulty assumptions about reality. At other times, certain statistical tests WILL NOT even be valid unless there is some variation (i.e., ‘error’) in the observations. In other words, errors are desirable!
What determines your stake at the table of honor is neither your wisdom, nor your wealth, but how much error (variation) you permit in your life.
Take a moment to think about how the day-to-day existence of the average person in the 21st-century is devoid of deviation.
In the name of productivity and personal development, many people lead machine-like lives. They plan their day to the microsecond and leave little to no gap for anything else. Because of their ill-advised adherence to their tasks and to-do lists, these people rarely break routine. As a result, there is little room for them to experience potential outcomes from their alternative histories. You see the same thing play out in the deadbeat, who wakes up, eats, plays videogames all day, watches porn, and sleeps – only to repeat the cycle the next day. Like his type A counterpart, there is very little “error” in his life that could bring him in contact with life-changing outcomes in his alternative histories.
People who benefit from probabilities have consciously or unconsciously acknowledged its impact by embedding variability in their lives. This takes different forms. For instance, some read books outside their fields that expose them to cutting-edge knowledge which is often commonplace concepts in other fields. For others, it’s their willingness to do something as simple as talking with strangers. Over time, such people develop a wide network that often proves invaluable in the long run.
Understand this: Whenever you introduce variability in your routine, you are exposing yourself to more happy accidents from your alternative histories.
V. Understanding the Times
The language we speak heavily influences the way we think. Unfortunately, many modern languages, including English, do not do justice to the concept of “time”. This is why many people lack an understanding of the times.
In Ancient Greek, there were two major words used to describe the concept of time.
The first word was “chronos” which implied the passage of time from morning to evening, day to day, month to month, or year to year. Chronos dealt with the quantity of time. The second word was “kairos” which described an opportune time where you needed to act with decisiveness. Kairos was qualitative and it varied from person to person. Your actions during kairos can affect the trajectory of your life.
Many people fail to understand the times because they cannot distinguish between chronos time and kairos time. Here are three reasons why this is so:
First, people put their emotions in the driving seat of their lives. It is easy for this to play out today because of the relationship people have with information abundance. On one hand, you have the news media bombarding your mind with violence, gore, and death. On the other hand, you have the noise from modern-day pharisees and influencers who profit from your attention on social media. Of course, you can never meet their standards. This is why a lot of people’s actions are reactive – only informed by the emotions of fear and anxiety. In this state, it is hard to distinguish between chronos and kairos time.
Second, people are not patient. This is where the Yoruba maxim, roughly translated, ‘Don’t run on another man’s clock’ rings true. Kairos time varies from individual to individual. By focusing on your neighbor’s journey, you will miss out on your kairos when it inevitably arrives. Refuse to allow impatience and resentment to build in your heart. Here’s one more verse from the Qoheleth, “To everything there is a season, and a time for every matter or purpose under heaven”. When you are patient, life-changing opportunities will inevitably come your way. This is an immutable principle on this side of eternity.
Third, people do not know when to be decisive. Some people may appear to be models of patience, but deep down in their hearts, they are afraid of taking action. Kairos is like a portal that can give you access to alternative histories with life-changing outcomes. If, in the name of patience, you fold your arms and stay put, that portal of opportunity will be closed and you will remain at the same level.
VI. Tying it all Together
For the last time, let’s go back to the 2006 World Cup final between Italy and France.
We’re in the dying moments of the game with the scores tied at 1-1.
Both teams have an almost equal shot at winning the cup.
Now, Materazzi has just grabbed Zidane’s shirt, to which a disgusted Zidane has replied, “If you want my shirt so much, I’d give it to you afterwards”
Pause.
Materazzi understands that in the current timeline, Italy and France are equally matched. However, the Italian hardman is somehow aware that there is an alternative history where the Italian team has a higher probability of winning the World Cup.
The portals of kairos open up and Materazzi jumps in ‘heart first’.
“I’d prefer the whore that is your sister!”
In less than 30 minutes, an alternative history has played out and the Italian team is crowned World Champions.
And what about Zidane, one of the most skillful playmakers of his generation?
I bet he was wondering how differently everything could have played out if he had paid more attention to the 8th wonder of the physical universe – time and probabilities!
“I returned and saw under the sun that the race is not to the swift nor the battle to the strong, neither is bread to the wise nor riches to men of intelligence and understanding nor favor to men of skill; but time and chance happen to them all.”
