Why Do Things Exist?

2022-07-19 · explainer · John · 3:58 · watch on YouTube

Topic: Science & nature · mode: Personal essay · tags: self promotion

Answering his five-year-old nephew Orin's question 'Why do things exist?', John explains what we know about the universe (stardust, galaxies, expansion, the Big Bang) and argues that we don't know why anything exists, which is exciting: the urge to know is the human superpower and we are the universe trying to understand itself.

What is said

The parts of the video and what is said in each (★ — how much it matters to the video).

00:00:00 — Orin's question; big questions occur to humans; the urge to know as the human superpower

• ★★ John addresses the video to Hank's son, who recently asked why things exist, and calls it a really good and really big question. — 00:00:00 · Orin Green, Hank Green
• ★★ John finds it strange that big questions occur to humans even when they don't seem to affect day-to-day life. — 00:00:13
• ★★★ We don't need to know why zinc exists for Hot Wheels to be fun or to survive, but we still want to know; John thinks this urge to know is kind of the human superpower. — 00:00:35 · curiosity

00:00:58 — What we know: stardust, Earth, Sun and Milky Way, the expanding universe, atoms

• ★★ We are made of the universe, even our thinking parts: people, cats and the Earth are mostly stardust, made of stuff stars produced long ago as they burned. — 00:00:58 · Earth
• ★★ Stars turning into humans tells us more about how things exist and what exists than about why they exist, John says. — 00:01:13
• ★★ Earth rotates around the Sun, one of billions of stars in the Milky Way, which is one of billions of galaxies in the universe. — 00:01:27 · Earth
• ★★ The universe follows a set of rules and is expanding: everything is getting further away from everything else at an accelerating rate. — 00:01:40
• ★ Things are made of atoms, which are made of subatomic particles such as protons and electrons. — 00:01:50

00:01:56 — Feeding the chickens: coffee grounds as fertilizer and coop litter, a pitch for the coffee club

• ★ Breaking off to feed his chickens, John says leftover coffee grounds can be used as garden fertilizer or as a kind of litter for a chicken coop. (playful) — 00:01:56

00:02:30 — We don't know why things exist: the Big Bang, matter, why we exist

• ★★★ A little less than 14 billion years ago everything now in the universe was in an unfathomably dense point that exploded into being, the Big Bang, but we don't know why. — 00:02:30
• ★★ We don't know why there is stuff in the universe at all: according to our models the same universe is just as likely, maybe more, to exist without any matter. — 00:02:45
• ★★★ We don't know why there is as much stuff as there is or why the universe exists, which means we don't know why we exist. — 00:02:55
• ★★★ Not knowing is weird but exciting: the biggest questions are still waiting to be answered, and Orin is one of the people exploring them. — 00:03:09 · Orin Green

00:03:24 — We are participants in the universe, which is trying to understand itself; sign-off and Awesome Coffee Club P.S.

• ★★★ We are made of the universe, participants in it rather than observers; that is why Orin's question is beautiful: he is the universe trying to understand itself. — 00:03:24 · Orin Green
• ★★ In a P.S. John jokes it is probably illegal to market to Orin, who doesn't drink coffee anyway, and points viewers to AwesomeCoffeeClub.com, their new coffee subscription. (playful) — 00:03:40 · Awesome Coffee Club, Orin Green

In the description and comments

• ★★ In a channel comment answering a viewer who called the video stealth sponsored content, John says the brothers are paid nothing for the coffee club; it is one path to fund the Maternal Center of Excellence. — creator comment · Awesome Coffee Club, Maternal Center of Excellence

Threads in this video

• refine · What is the greatest or most distinctive human quality? — We don't need to know why zinc exists for Hot Wheels to be fun or to survive, but we still want to know; John thinks this urge to know is kind of the human superpower. (00:00:35)
• restate · Is learning worthwhile for its own sake? — We don't need to know why zinc exists for Hot Wheels to be fun or to survive, but we still want to know; John thinks this urge to know is kind of the human superpower. (00:00:35)
• restate · Does human life have real meaning, given oblivion, cosmic scale and an indifferent universe? — We are made of the universe, participants in it rather than observers; that is why Orin's question is beautiful: he is the universe trying to understand itself. (00:03:24)
• milestone · Awesome Coffee Club: the brothers' coffee subscription for charity (2022) — In a channel comment answering a viewer who called the video stealth sponsored content, John says the brothers are paid nothing for the coffee club; it is one path to fund the Maternal Center of Excellence. (creator comment)

Where the stories that moved here went next

• Awesome Coffee Club: the brothers' coffee subscription for charity (2022) — completed; last: looked back, 2024-10-30

Mentioned

Central: Orin Green · universe

Also: Projects: Awesome Coffee Club

Concepts: atom · baryon asymmetry · Big Bang · coffee · curiosity · expansion of the universe · stellar nucleosynthesis

Places: Earth · Milky Way · Sun (star)

Products: Hot Wheels

Only in the description or credits: Maternal Center of Excellence

Also centred on universe: How Big is the Universe? · The Universe is Weird: A Song · Thoughts From the Universe - Woah · The Hottest Place and the Coldest Place in the Universe are the SAME PLACE

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