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perspective-taking

concept · in 73 videos (2008–2026)

Cognitively modelling another person's point of view and inner life; the brothers' phrase 'imagine others complexly' is imagine others complexly about=perspective-taking. Use empathy when the point is feeling with someone. The exact surfaces 'imagine/imagining others complexly' belong to the term; the failure 'imagining someone as something other than a person' is dehumanization.

Videos by year: 2008: 3 · 2009: 5 · 2010: 2 · 2011: 2 · 2012: 2 · 2013: 2 · 2014: 6 · 2015: 8 · 2016: 7 · 2017: 8 · 2018: 3 · 2019: 1 · 2020: 4 · 2021: 2 · 2022: 7 · 2023: 3 · 2024: 2 · 2025: 3 · 2026: 3

Also known as: understanding people complexly, imagine people as they imagine themselves

Questions

Often together

What comes up in the same parts of the videos; the number is how many parts.

Paper Towns (11) · empathy (3) · A Beautifully Foolish Endeavor (3) · Daniel Biss (2) · celebrity (2) · Looking for Alaska (novel) (3) · Esther Earl (2) · An Absolutely Remarkable Thing (2) · The Fault in Our Stars (3) · tuberculosis (3)

What the videos say

The most important statements of each year; all statements.

2008

  • 2008-08-26 · The Catcher in the Rye, Part 2 — John finds hope in the narrating Holden, who a year later writes about who he was in a way that makes readers care, listen and empathize. — 00:02:45
  • 2008-10-17 · Vital Status Report from NYC — John says Paper Towns is about people who constantly misimagine each other because they think of one another as something other than a person. — 00:00:00
    • John says that, stuck inside our own skins, it is very difficult to imagine another person as they imagine themselves; nobody sees himself as a guy whose thoughts don't matter. — 00:00:29
  • 2008-11-05 · On Loving One Another or Dying — John says the problem with finding Margo, for Q and the other characters, is not the mystery: they don't see Margo, only a funhouse-mirror reflection of themselves. — 00:00:58
    • John believes this results from not doing a good job of imagining what it's like to be other people. — 00:02:24

2009

  • 2009-02-10 · Paper Towns Tastic Question Tuesday — John: Song of Myself is central because it is a beautiful poem deeply involved with how we can imagine other people more effectively (and, he jokes, Whitman is hot). — 00:00:00
    • Margo is the book's mirror maker: people looking at her see a funhouse-mirror reflection of themselves, not what is true of her, hence the two different, equally inaccurate covers. — 00:00:46
    • Q's misimagining of Margo resembles Pudge's of Alaska; John argues that imagining someone as more than a person does them and ourselves a profound disservice. — 00:01:22
    • The book is about how we misimagine other people and our stories; Radar's parents own the world's largest Black Santa collection because John finds it funny and it asks us to imagine the world more complexly. (hedged) — 00:02:36
  • 2009-03-08 · PEEPS for Bangladesh — John confesses he worried more about the Bozeman explosion than the situation in Bangladesh, and argues that intimacy leads to empathy. — 00:01:15
    • John says he has work to do on his 'caveman brain' about people he doesn't physically know, and suggests maybe using people you know to connect you to strangers, like poor people in Bangladesh. (hedged) — 00:01:15
  • 2009-06-23 (said on 2009-06-22, implied) · Fighting the Flame War! — Hank defines Nerdfighters as people who fight for awesome, love learning and discovering, and try to understand others complexly; anyone who wants to be one probably is. — 00:02:54
  • 2009-09-15 · Internetless in Maine — Hank notes the brothers talk about understanding people complexly yet spend about 10 hours a day at a computer, and asks how you can understand people you know nothing about. — 00:02:06
    • Hank argues we should spend as much time as possible with people as different from us as possible, but do the opposite because similar people are easier to understand. — 00:02:06
  • 2009-10-28 · We Win When Everyone Wins — Hank says this can shrink the world's boundaries: watching YouTube videos makes him care about people, but few Congolese make them, so it's harder to understand them complexly. — 00:01:50

2010

  • 2010-09-20 · Life Is Like Pizza — John says the job of reading is to use stories to see other people as we see ourselves; then the world looks like endless beautiful variations of pizza. — 00:03:23
  • 2010-11-11 · REIGN OF TERROR: The French Revolution, Part III — John says that more than that, the study of history is essentially an exercise in empathy: imagining being a peasant, Louis XVI, Marie Antoinette or Robespierre. (hedged) — 00:04:17

2011

  • 2011-06-23 · Do You Believe in God? — Hank says our pattern-seeking is something to work against: going out of our way to gather data points to shove people into little boxes is worse than ordinary prejudice. — video description
    • On meeting someone Hank would rather not know their politics, religion or upbringing: first impressions drawn from pattern bias, prejudice and in-group bias do us and them a disservice. — video description
    • The second reason is a shortcut to think you know a person from a very simple answer, which Hank calls dangerous: categorising is useful until you apply it to people. — 00:02:32
    • Hank says being asked whether he believes in God sometimes feels like a blind person asking whether he is black, so as to put him in the right category. — 00:02:54
    • Hank calls it really dangerous that people hunt for markers ('gay people, Christians, atheists are all like this'); his biggest fear is being judged by a one-word answer. — 00:02:57
  • 2011-10-12 · Coming Out and Sperm Spikes — Hank: electrons are as elementary as it gets yet hard to categorise as wave or particle; humans are orders of magnitude more complicated, yet we still try to categorise ourselves and each other. — 00:01:11
    • If an electron were a person, Hank would want to know a lot more about it than whether it was a particle or a wave before judging what kind of person it was. — 00:03:15

2012

  • 2012-02-03 · An Awful Lot of Touring — Hank argues this is the only way to really understand different perspectives; without that understanding people start to hate each other and accuse each other of ruining the country. — 00:02:33
  • 2012-07-13 · An Army of Mindless Drones — In the description Hank worries that, since Bradbury seems to think humanity can be stripped from people, some will assume it has been; in his discussions with all sorts of people he hasn't found that possible. — video description
    • Hank says reading the characters as symbols is fine, but as real people they invite thinking of others as TV-brainwashed drones who are never people at all, which dehumanizes people we don't know. — 00:02:26
    • Hank says the book is a tool for examining yourself and your culture, but fears it is sometimes used to feel like one of the few enlightened ones above the mindless drones, because there are none. — 00:02:55

2013

  • 2013-01-15 · An Evening of Awesome at Carnegie Hall — John says Paper Towns is about empathy and trying to imagine other people complexly, and hopes his books can jump into the abyss to be with readers. — 00:53:07
    • John introduces a Paper Towns reader's theater, a book about imagining other people and our myths complexly: John as Q, Hannah Hart as Angela, Grace Helbig as Ben, Neil Gaiman as Radar. — 02:30:51
  • 2013-11-19 · On Middle School Misery — John now sees his bullies were not evil but kids with their own fear and pain, some facing trauma and abuse; that doesn't justify it but shows it wasn't about him. — 00:01:31

2014

  • 2014-02-11 · A Middle Aged Man — John toasts sober driving, imagining others complexly, and not paying attention to the colour of someone else's rented Lamborghini. — 00:03:29
  • 2014-04-22 · Understanding the Central African Republic — John says people, especially in the US, imagine Africa monolithically as poor, undeveloped and other, though it is a large continent of very different nations. — 00:00:04
  • 2014-04-29 · Influence, Airports, and the Nerdfighter Book Club — John says readers should resist the urge to extrapolate: the book is about a few people in one community, not about slums or India in general. (hedged) — 00:02:05
  • 2014-06-10 (said on 2014-06-07, implied) · Our Old Friend Complexity: Behind the Beautiful Forevers — John says outsiders imagine slum residents monolithically, but the book shows much diversity of class and status in Annawadi, a Mumbai slum: not all poverty is equal. — 00:00:45
  • 2014-09-09 · Going to College (in Ethiopia) — John says the common picture of Africa as one poor, disease-ridden place ruled by an aid-embezzling elite is a ridiculous stereotype: Africa isn't one place. — 00:00:18
    • John says there isn't just one Ethiopia: the library without water, the future engineers, the kids, a doctor, farmers and the presidential marching band are all Ethiopia. — 00:03:12
  • 2014-12-23 · Agloe, New York — John says Paper Towns is about how we hurt ourselves and each other when we imagine other people as less than or more than human. — 00:01:44
    • John says what interests him most is how our incomplete imaginings of other people, and theirs of us, profoundly shape our lives. (hedged) — 00:01:51

2015

  • 2015-03-10 · Travel Tips (and Paper Towns Movie Updates) — John says he really feels the Paper Towns movie is about learning to imagine others complexly. (hedged) — 00:02:05
  • 2015-03-17 · What Are Paper Towns? — John tentatively says it is humans' official responsibility to imagine the world as complexly and interestingly as possible, and urges: let us not be esquivalient. (hedged) — 00:02:46
  • 2015-04-14 · A Long Good Day — John: In turn, John says, it is hard to see the photographers as people who, in Whitman's words, contain multitudes; they feel like clicking objects, and you worry only about the captured object-version of you. — 00:01:37
  • 2015-04-28 · Is the Paper Towns Movie Like the Book? Thoughts on Adaptations — John says the idea he wanted to tell visually is that putting people on a pedestal, failing to imagine them complexly, is tremendously destructive. — 00:02:07
  • 2015-06-09 · What Does It Mean to Be Human? — John argues personhood is more than a species category because people deny others' humanity: governments refuse to acknowledge ethnic minorities, and he dehumanizes people by imagining them as less complex than himself. — 00:00:37
    • John believes acknowledging each other's consciousness and complexity makes lives better and less lonely; we are human because we believe in each other's humanness, listen, and work to alleviate suffering. — 00:02:55
  • 2015-06-19 · 19 Ways to Not Suck on the Internet — Hank says every person is complicated and impossible to fully understand; anyone who thinks they have pegged someone from a short comment is wrong. — 00:00:47
  • 2015-07-28 · Paper Towns, Agloe, and Touring: Thoughts from (Many) Places — John says Paper Towns is about the challenge of understanding that others are as complex as you, which is especially hard inside the publicity machine, since it commodifies everyone it touches. — 00:00:37
  • 2015-10-02 · Awkward Stranger Conversations — Hank says people seen on the internet or the news tend to be less nice than those met in real life, so to get an accurate picture of people, talk to strangers. — 00:02:00

2016

  • 2016-03-08 · Aida and Majeeda: Thoughts from the Azraq Refugee Camp — John insists Aida and Majeeda have rich, complex lives that aren't mere tragedies: warm kids who joked, played with their little brothers and taught him a Syrian hide-and-seek. — 00:02:07
  • 2016-03-11 · The Politics of "Parks and Rec" — Hank says we now see the opposition monolithically and negatively, can live without knowing anyone who would vote the other way, and stay in bias-affirming filters, thinking opponents ignorant or evil. — 00:03:07
  • 2016-05-10 · On Pain — John says it is very hard, if not impossible, to bridge that empathy gap. — 00:01:46
  • 2016-06-07 · Zaatari: Thoughts from a Refugee Camp — John says he cannot truly picture that: he can try to imagine war and dislocation but does not know what it is like to be a bombed-out 13-year-old who drops out to earn $3 a day. — 00:01:15
    • John says we cannot imagine those things, but still need to know that they are real and that this is happening. (hedged) — 00:01:37
  • 2016-07-15 · On Lives and Mattering — Hank says he can never fully understand that experience, but he can listen, be open and do some research himself. — 00:01:21
  • 2016-10-07 · Changing Our Business a Bit — Hank says themes emerged, formats and ideas; the most important was when John distilled what the world needs into three words: 'imagine others complexly'. — 00:01:27
    • Hank says imagining others complexly is really hard, but whenever he does it he feels better and is better. — 00:01:53
    • Hank gives the name's reasons: the world is not simple, we will never fully understand the universe, each other or ourselves, the process matters as much as the outcome, and they want to help others imagine complexly. — 00:03:18
  • 2016-10-21 · Coming Out, Goats, Government, and Attack Ads with Denise Juneau — Hank wanted to talk with someone who knows government and has faith in it; no politician is blameless for hyper-partisanship, but we cannot move past it without humanizing politicians and asking them to humanize each other. (hedged) — video description
    • Hank says he wants to discuss not policy or her campaign but government, being an elected official and how partisanship affects her, because we often forget politicians are people. (hedged) — 00:00:36
    • Hank tells John with so many serious issues, talking with a candidate as a person can feel hard to justify, but he thinks imagining these people as people really matters. (hedged) — 00:07:18

2017

  • 2017-01-24 · On Motivation — John says he still hasn't learned that when he wants to roll his eyes, he should be alive to the possibility that the object of his disdain is more complex than he imagines. (hedged) — 00:02:17
  • 2017-01-31 · Understanding Trump's Executive Order on Immigration — John says it is hard to imagine people complexly, especially when told to fear them, but he has found listening helpful. — 00:07:02
  • 2017-03-07 · Hoping for an Airport Reunion: One Refugee Family's Story — John says the conversation must instead start by seeing refugees as people with individual stories who love their families and want them safe. — 00:04:28
  • 2017-04-18 · Framing — John: Invoking 'This is not a pipe', John says this is his life but not all of it, and if he remembers that about himself, maybe he can understand it about other people. (hedged) — 00:02:14
  • 2017-08-18 · What I've Been Thinking About — Hank also thinks tribalism is innate: we find it much easier to empathise with people who are like us, however we define that. (hedged) — 00:02:13
  • 2017-08-22 · The Causes of Cholera — John admits he pays more attention to crises in distant Europe or Australia than elsewhere because people there feel close to him: he watches them on YouTube and reads their Reddit posts. — 00:03:24
  • 2017-10-03 · Let's Talk about Books — recommendation: John: City of Thorns by Ben Rawlence follows refugees in Dadaab camp over many years; a difficult book without easy answers, it shows that refugee stories are human stories. — 00:01:57
  • 2017-12-26 · LEAVE IT IN 2017 — John: Leave in 2017 the notion that the avatar is the person; remember that everyone we meet online and off is fighting battles we don't know about. — 00:02:37

2018

2019

  • 2019-09-24 · I, Too, Dislike It — John also needs poetry because it helps him imagine other people and their experiences more complexly. — 00:01:40

2020

  • 2020-02-14 · Ending The Great Airplane Seat Debate — Hank adds that he cannot truly know the other person's story. — 00:03:04
  • 2020-05-01 · I Need to Get Myself Away from this Place — Hank felt he was no longer in his own story but in the young visitors', an extraordinarily minor character in their road trip: the guy who painted the other half of the ball. — 00:02:40
  • 2020-07-07 · You're a Rock Star — John: Fiction is a way out of himself: John sees even spouse, children and brother in his own context, but Robin, Maya and Andy aren't his anything, and seeing through their eyes is magic. — 00:01:27
  • 2020-09-29 · How 'bout Yours? — John says the real trick of living among other souls as valuable and multitudinous as your own is to really listen to another's answer and believe in their experience as fully as our own. — 00:01:32

2021

  • 2021-03-26 · Why I'm Worried about 2021 — Hank: Not every mom has the same money and free time, and people understand the world differently: some see fast food as simple and tasty, others as cruel garbage. — 00:00:00
  • 2021-04-06 · How Do You Do, Fellow Kids? — John doesn't know what it is like to be a teen or twenty-something today; he can listen and try to empathize but can't know it from the inside. — 00:00:29

2022

  • 2022-01-11 · The Fault in Our Stars - Ten Years Later — John: His first three books were about failing to imagine others as full persons; it interested him because as a teenager he often failed to imagine others complexly, and he saw it in the culture. — 00:00:29
  • 2022-03-29 · An H of G — John restates it: even with strangers he assumes goodness unless strongly shown otherwise, because almost everyone is trying their best and sees their own actions generously. — 00:00:58
  • 2022-04-05 · Celebrities I've Met and Whether I'd Vote for Them??? — John: So John tries to remember, with famous people, that they may be having a bad day and are under a lot of pressure in public. — 00:02:55
  • 2022-04-15 · Are You Stuck in The Sad Gap — Hank says learning more reveals complexity: fossil fuel workers see themselves not as Darth Vader supervillains but as people who keep your house warm and refrigerator cold. — 00:01:28
  • 2022-05-03 · My Religion and My Banned Books — John says stories also invite us into other lives and help us understand the richness and complexity of people who aren't like us. — 00:01:56
  • 2022-08-19 · What if a lot of the Cynicism is Unjustified??? — Hank suggests that leaders who must listen to millions are mostly big bags of well-meaning worry, trying to do right when the right thing is never clear. (hedged) — 00:00:00
  • 2022-10-28 · I'm Changing the Way I Think About Politics — Hank says research backs Tranel: people see themselves as about 60-40 on issues but see opponents as 100-0 on everything. — 00:02:15

2023

  • 2023-02-28 · Empathy and its Limits — John says if he felt all those deaths as strongly as a death in his family he couldn't function, so he understands empathy needs limits. — 00:00:29
    • John feels his own empathy is too limited. — 00:00:29
    • John says he can't know what it's like to be a bird or to have someone else's pain, but he can listen to people when they tell him of their pain and believe them. — 00:02:47
  • 2023-10-27 · I Keep Thinking About Taylor Swift — The description says the company is called Complexly because imagining the world and each other complexly is better for the world and for individuals. — video description
  • 2023-12-15 · Cat...I Farted. — Hank says language divergence causes extraordinary beauty and diversity but is also one of the greatest barriers to cross-cultural empathy. — 00:01:00

2024

  • 2024-04-19 · I Closed My Boob in a Door — Hank says that writing a woman's perspective without having been one, you will get things wrong, so it is great to have people read the book before publication and give feedback. — 00:03:47
    • Hank says the world is full of different perspectives, it is amazing to get to see them, and this makes him want to write more fiction. — 00:04:09
  • 2024-12-10 · On Writing — John says an artist can imagine an audience but not a future one; he does not know what it is like to be other people now, and barely knows himself. — 00:01:44
    • John says tuberculosis speaks to his recurring theme of how we imagine and misimagine each other: we see our own lives as complex and multitudinous but imagine others' lives simplistically. — 00:03:08

2025

  • 2025-06-03 · My Lies — John says trying to shrink the empathy gap through imagination turns out to be a worthwhile endeavor, even in 2025. — 00:03:18
  • 2025-07-04 · This Graph Changed My Life — Hank says that seeing such comments, most people think all Fox News viewers, all Republicans and half of Americans think this way: imagining a group, we assume all its members believe the same things. — 00:01:28
  • 2025-08-29 · Does Anyone Else Have This? — Hank says this reminds him that we all move through subtly different worlds: two people in the same circumstance have different experiences, which is obvious but hard to remember. — 00:02:26

2026

  • 2026-02-03 · Does the truth still matter? — John says he can't reach across the aisle: the other side won't hear him, he hears only their most outrageous takes, and he extrapolates them to everyone, hardening his silo. — 00:00:58
  • 2026-02-13 · Project for Awesome 2026 Kickoff! — John says he desperately wants to be a proper mystery and romance novelist but can't write a proper mystery: Turtles All the Way Down mostly became about OCD, and Paper Towns about imagining other people complexly. — 03:07:36
  • 2026-05-05 · Noted Brother Hank Green — John says those who have never been to Kono must bridge the empathy gap other ways: through imagination and believing people's stories, even through a screen. — 00:03:14
    • John says what he finds most impressive about Hank is his ability to truly imagine the world, and the lives of people in it, complexly. — 00:03:38