Omnibus: The Know-It-All, The Year of Living Biblically, My Life as an Experiment

by A. J. Jacobs

  The details of the story are sad and bizarre. The rebellion started with Hung Hsiu Chuan, a peasant from a small town in southern China. His early life was a disappointment—he took the Confucian civil service exam several times, but failed repeatedly. After the third failure, he suffered a breakdown, and experienced a vision in which he saw an old man with a golden beard, who told him the world was overrun with evil demons and presented him with a sword.

  After the fourth failure, Hung found a book that was written by a missionary, basically a Chinese-language Christianity for Dummies. He read the book and decided that the golden-bearded man in his vision was God, and he was the new Jesus Christ. Hung didn’t have the best grasp of Christianity—he ignored the kindness and humility of the Christian God and instead focused on his vengefulness—but that didn’t stop him from declaring himself Heavenly King.

  His message—a mix of primitive socialism, spiritualism, and Puritanism—struck a chord. He demanded an equal distribution of land; the abolition of gambling, prostitution, and opium smoking; and an end to the repressive Manchu rulers.

  He started out with hundreds, then thousands of followers. As the rebels passed through the countryside, says the Britannica, whole towns and villages joined them, till their ranks swelled to more than a million. Taiping followers were both men and women, but no sexual relations were permitted. Oh, except for the Taiping leaders, who had huge harems. That’s Cult Leader 101—always have a huge harem for yourself.

  Hung took Nanking and made the city his capital. He became increasingly erratic, and began killing off his lieutenants—one for demanding that Hung be whipped because he had kicked a concubine, another for just being generally haughty. In 1860, the Taiping troops failed to take Shanghai, which was defended by a Western-trained army. (One of the leaders of the anti-Taiping forces was a fearsome and ruthless man named General Tso, now reduced to a chicken entree.) Then in 1862 Nanking was surrounded. Hung—who had withdrawn to his harem—committed suicide, and Nanking fell in 1864.

  It’s an amazing tale. I imagine the million stories that have gone untold—what life was like if you were one of Hung’s lovers, how the world looked from inside besieged Nanking. But above all, I’m disillusioned with the Britannica. I’m not sure it’s equipped to deal with just how crazy people are.

  terrorism

  More horrible human behavior. Nearly two solid pages on the history of murdering innocent people.

  The entry is one of the most disturbing—and oddest—in the encyclopedia. It starts with terrorism in biblical times, then ticks off terrorism through the centuries, ending with four sentences on September 11. It was a disorienting feeling, to read just a few sentences on September 11.

  I happen to know from the Britannica publicist that the encyclopedia was at the printer when the World Trade Center towers fell. They had to pull the books off the presses and insert a couple of paragraphs. I’m sure next year’s edition will have much more on the attack.

  So maybe it’s not fair to draw any conclusions based on this edition. Still, seeing the September 11 attack in historical context had a calming effect. It gave me hope that, as my parents’ friend said, this too shall pass. I don’t mean to trivialize September 11, which was probably the most awful thing I’ve witnessed in my lifetime. But seeing it among the thousands of other horrible—and great—events gives me hope that we can overcome it.

  My reaction was, ironically, the exact opposite of the one I had to the Taiping Rebellion. The dispassionate tone I found so outrageous a few entries ago, I now found soothing. Such is the mental whiplash of reading the Britannica.

  Tesla, Nikola

  Our pregnancy books say that I should talk to my gestating boy so he’ll get used to my voice. Tonight, I decide to read to him about electronics pioneer Nikola Tesla, the main rival of Thomas Edison and the inventor of alternating current. Embryos love electronics pioneers.

  I lean toward Julie’s stomach—which has just recently started to swell, and now resembles the gut of a man who drinks too many Bud-weisers on the weekends. I begin to read:

  “He was quite impractical in financial matters and an eccentric.” I’m using my best singsongy, reading-to-kids voice. I hope he likes it. “He was driven by compulsions and a progressive germ phobia.”

  “Just like Dad!” says Julie.

  “Yes, just like Dad.” I continue with the Tesla bio: “Caustic criticism greeted his speculations concerning communication with other planets, his assertions that he could split the Earth like an apple, and his claim of having invented a death ray capable of destroying 10,000 airplanes at a distance of 250 miles.”

  I look up at Julie. “Is he kicking?”

  She shakes her head. No movement.

  “He’s probably rapt with attention.”

  “Yeah, that’s probably it.”

  I realize I can’t wait for this boy to come out. I can’t wait for him to fall in love with learning and knowledge like the rest of the Jacobs men. The poor guy.

  theater

  In the 19th century, theaters featured a genre called “the racing drama,” where live horses galloped on treadmills set into the stage floor. The chariot race from Ben Hur was staged this way in 1899. Too bad this was discontinued. Even I’d go to the theater to see that.

  thing

  In medieval Iceland, the parliament was called a thing. If I ever hang out with Icelandic historians, I’m prepared for some serious punning: “all things considered,” “wild thing,” “ain’t no thing.” I should call my Mensa friends—they’d appreciate that.

  thinking

  I’ve been thinking a lot about thinking lately. Or more specifically, I’ve been thinking a lot about thinking and knowledge and intelligence, and the relationship among the three. It comes back to that old question that my aunt Marti put to me—will stuffing my head with knowledge actually make me smarter, or is this a yearlong fool’s errand?

  I decide to contact one of America’s foremost authorities on intelligence, a Yale professor named Robert J. Sternberg, who also wrote the Britannica’s entry on intelligence. The perfect source. I e-mail Dr. Sternberg that I am reading the entire Britannica in my quest to become the smartest person in the world. I want to talk intelligence with him. A couple of days later, my computer gives its telltale “pling” to indicate that an e-mail has arrived. It’s from Dr. Sternberg. He says: “I have read your e-mail. If you are familiar at all with my theory of intelligence, then you will know that I would not view this quest as worthwhile, nor would I view it as turning you into the smartest person in the world. Quite the contrary, I think it is a waste of time. Best, Bob.”

  Well. Dr. Sternberg may claim to know about intelligence, but he could learn a thing or two about etiquette. He’s what I might call a complete German airplane (a total Fokker).

  A second e-mail from Dr. Sternberg suggests that I read up on theories of intelligence. In spite of the snooty tone, I decide to do just that. I buy a couple of Dr. Sternberg’s own books, namely the ones called Successful Intelligence and Handbook of Intelligence. The first thing I learn is that intelligence is notoriously hard to define. As a concept, it’s as slippery as a pig covered in white, brown, yellow, bone, and garbage grease. Different cultures have different definitions. In Zimbabwe, intelligence means “to be prudent and cautious.” In the Taoist tradition, humility is a key part of it. In Zambia, intelligence is linked to “cooperativeness and obedience.” And the Western emphasis on verbal ability is far from universal—one African tribe thinks of reticence as wisdom.

  Even in our own culture, the perception of intelligence is constantly shifting. The first “scientific” intelligence theorist was a man named Francis Galton, a cousin and friend of Charles Darwin. He believed intelligence meant better sensory discrimination, so he devised a test that measured, among other things, how well we hear high-pitched whistles, guess the weights of objects, and smell roses. Since Galton and his roses, there have been dozens and dozens of attempts to d
efine it. One recent theorist broke intelligence down into such categories as muscle intelligence, musical intelligence, and kinesthetic intelligence (how well you move). Another theory boasted no less than 150 categories.

  Perhaps the most famous intelligence theorist is Alfred Binet, a French psychologist who invented the precursor to the modern IQ test in the early 1900s. He devised his test to try to weed out mentally retarded children from regular classrooms. Dr. Sternberg thinks the IQ test is defective because it tests only one type of intelligence—analytical intelligence (the ability to solve problems). It neglects creative intelligence (the ability to come up with new problems) and practical intelligence (the skill of incorporating solutions into real life). I’ve got to like Dr. Sternberg for his IQ bashing, seeing as I did a belly flop on the Mensa IQ test.

  On the other hand, I don’t appreciate the harsh tone he takes toward what some call crystallized intelligence. Crystallized intelligence is the accumulation of knowledge—the kind of intelligence that I happen to be soaking up from the Britannica. Sternberg seems to hold crystallized intelligence in lower regard than fluid intelligence, which is the ability of people to mentally adapt to the situation and remain flexible when reasoning and problem solving. Most modern theorists agree flexibility is a major key to intelligence.

  Fine. I’m all for flexibility. But here’s one thing Dr. Sternberg should consider—the more knowledge I accumulate, the more I see the importance of flexibility. The two are linked. Flexibility is one of the major lessons of the Britannica. The Romans became a seafaring power because they were flexible—they adapted their land tactics to naval warfare by having their troops board the enemy’s boats. Alexander the Great conquered the much larger Persian army because his soldiers were more mobile. Britain beat France in the Hundred Years War because the French were too heavily armed and couldn’t move quickly. In warfare, in economics, in math, flexibility always wins out.

  My second problem with Dr. Sternberg is that my greater pool of knowledge allows me to come up with more creative solutions to problems. I have more examples to draw on, more metaphors I can make. To give an example: I was recently typing on my Macintosh laptop, and the battery started to overheat. It seemed in serious danger of turning into a bubbling gray soup. Most people have probably already figured out a solution, but I’m not a very handy person by nature. I recently had to call the building handyman to open our washer/dryer. So my insight took longer. And it came in a roundabout way—thanks to my knowledge of machine guns. I remembered that machine guns, when they first were invented, got so hot they had to be cooled by water. A soaked Macintosh didn’t sound like a good idea. But what about the fan? I trained one of our oscillating fans on my computer and, voilà, saved my laptop.

  I e-mail Dr. Sternberg with my argument. Thanks to the Britannica, I have in fact become more intelligent by his definition, as evidenced by the computer battery incident. Dr. Sternberg writes me back speedily. He starts his e-mail: “Great story!” All right! So maybe he’s not such a Fokker after all. He continues: “I doubt that any of the great contributors in history—in the arts and letters, sciences, music, business—became great contributors because they read this or that encyclopedia.” Damn. Well, that doesn’t seem necessary—especially the detailed list of areas in which I won’t contribute greatly. He goes on: “If it were me, I could think of many more useful ways to spend my time. But perhaps the encyclopedia will work for you, as the Bible or the Koran has worked for others. It gives one a certain security that is lacking in other methods.” So he ends it on an upbeat, if slightly condescending, note.

  Dr. Sternberg didn’t really address my argument. Still, I have to admit: the man is intelligent. His theory about the encyclopedia-as-Bible is an insightful one. I’ve thought the same thing over the last few weeks. (See? I’m just as smart as Sternberg!) Consider: I read the Britannica every day, like a ritual. I criticize it here and there, but overall I take what it says as gospel. And most of all, the Britannica gives me a sense of stability and peace; the world may shift at a scary pace, but these paper-and-ink volumes have a permanence about them. When I look at them, I feel safe. Maybe that feeling is just as important as feeling smart.

  time

  The hour has not always been sixty minutes. In ancient civilizations—Greek, Sumerian, Roman, and so forth—daylight was divided into twelve hours. Thus, depending on the season, the length of an hour oscillated between about forty-five and seventy-five present-day minutes. I like this system. At least during winter, no Andy Rooney.

  Tolstoy

  I’m a big fan of the Britannica’s coverage of great books. It’s like the Cliffs Notes—but the summaries are even shorter and the level of shame while reading them is slightly lower. No need to trudge your way through all the characters and dialogue—the EB will give you the whole book in a paragraph, along with a neat little moral. A beautiful time-saver. I’m not really kidding; I do find it helpful.

  Consider its coverage of Anna Karenina, a book I never got around to finishing. Or starting. The Britannica gives an elegant description of Anna’s brother Stiva, who is “genial and sybaritic.” It says, “Stiva, though never wishing ill, wastes resources, neglects his family and regards pleasure as the purpose of life. The figure of Stiva is perhaps designed to suggest that evil, no less than good, derives from the small moral choices human beings make moment by moment.”

  Though I can’t be sure it’s an accurate analysis of the book, this sentence in the Tolstoy section strikes me as a profound one. It’s a gem of a sentence, the wisest one I’ve seen in hundreds of pages. I’m reading about Tolstoy at a little Formica table at a deli, eating a low-fat muffin. I mention this because, when it is time for me to go, I am about to leave the used napkin on the table. But then I think, that’s the kind of small moral choice the EB is talking about. That’s what Stiva would do. So I pick up the napkin and throw it away. I know, I’m a saint.

  Over the next few days, I adopt a new mantra, my own version of “What would Jesus do?” I tell myself, Remember Tolstoy. (Incidentally, speaking of Jesus and Tolstoy: the Russian novelist published a “corrected” version of the Gospels in which he referred to Jesus as “the man Jesus.” Not that it’s relevant.) When leaving my office, I make sure to turn off the lights. Remember Tolstoy, I say. When I borrow a sweater from Esquire’s vast closet of clothes to be used in photo shoots, I return it the next day. It’s not enough to be moral about the big things, I decide. It’s not enough that I refrain from murdering and robbing banks and giving PowerPoint presentations. I’ve got to be mindful of my smallest decisions.

  We’ll see how long this lasts. It crosses my mind that, as I approach the end, I’m scrounging for profundity, desperately searching for meaning. Maybe I am. But for now, I’m pleased with my new and improved Tolstoyan self.

  training

  As my son gets ready to make his out-of-the-womb debut, I go to Mom and Dad’s apartment to pick up some of my own childhood toys—a big yellow Tonka truck, a Lego set, a pillow in the shape of a football. (That last one makes me nervous. What if it sways him to become a football player? I won’t know what to say to him, except for Teddy Roosevelt’s influence on the development of the forward pass.) While I’m over at the apartment, my dad does something surprising. Astounding, even. He asked me for help with their new DVD player.

  This had never happened before. He’s the engineer and I’m the mechanical imbecile. It’s as if Bob Woodward called me and asked for tips on investigative journalism. “I just want a lesson from someone who’s used it,” he says. I had indeed used it. I pop in the Casablanca DVD and show him the fast forward, the pause, how to negotiate the menu—basic stuff he probably would have figured out in about four seconds without my aid.

  “You know how Bogart got that stiff lip, right?”

  “I think it was a war injury,” says my dad.

  “No, it was a wooden splinter, weirdly enough. Also, it’s thought that Bogart originated the phrase ‘Ten
nis, anyone?’ ”

  Dad is busy testing the remote control. I felt good. Important. Here was my dad asking me for assistance. He wasn’t too proud. Maybe someday I’ll ask my son for tips on how to set up the holographic toaster.

  triumphal marches

  I am taking a break from my studies and I flip on my old pal the E! channel, a network devoted to twenty-four-hour breathless coverage of Hollywood. I hadn’t watched this channel in months.

  It seems stranger than I’d remembered it. The correspondents use an overabundance of hair gel and superlatives (“greatest, sexiest, hottest”). They move their facial features a lot. They talk about these events as if they have the historical importance of the Berlin airlift. I begin to feel a little ill, as if I’ve eaten some bad chicken marsala or something. Which I think might be a good sign, actually.

  The E! channel is covering a story that involved Bruce Willis walking down a red carpet. He was smiling, perhaps winking, allowing his ecstatic public to touch his hands, his team of publicists and agents and hangers-on in tow.

  Not long ago, I had read about the Romans and their official triumphal marches, and this seemed a weird modern echo, but without the slaves in chains, at least not visible ones. The Roman triumph was given when a general had slain at least five thousand of the enemy. That was the minimum. The victorious general, says the Britannica, rode on a chariot festooned with laurel, wearing a purple-and-gold tunic and toga, clutching a laurel branch in his right hand and an ivory scepter in his left.

  But here’s the part that fascinated me: “A slave held a golden crown over the general’s head while repeatedly reminding him in the midst of his glory that he was a mortal man.”

  Brilliant. That’s exactly what we need on our red carpets. We need some production assistant following behind Bruce Willis, whispering in his ear: “You’re a mortal man. You’re just some putz with good orthodonture who says lines from a script. You are not a god.” We need some enforced humility in today’s society. It seems to be a lost virtue.