I don't think the story of / all of our mayhem // and unnecessary suffering // has much to do with bad people doing bad things, / I think, for the most part, / it's good people, or at least normal people / under the influence of bad ideas. // These ideas were communicated // by people // and acted upon // on the basis of / concepts. / It's a set of arguments, / it's a rehearsal of history and expectations about the future. And if you're rational, // those reasons can be explained. / If your beliefs are not falsifiable, / if there's no scenario / that could convince you that your / most cherished opinions are / in error, / well then, / that's proof / that you didn't get them by being in contact with reality. // If most of // human misery // and inequality and conflict / and violence is a matter of the stories that people are telling themselves, / then you see that virtually all of human suffering / and chaos is just tissue thin, // I mean, it's a bad dream. // It's just thoughts / that people are finding compelling / and they could cease to find those thoughts / compelling. So the consequence of all of that is that it really matters / what you believe. // It certainly matters / what millions and billions of us believe in any given moment, / because it's our beliefs that will / dictate what we do next.