Let’s meet Toby! Uncovering how Philosophy, Empathy, and Intuition intertwine

Hello and welcome to the Sim Serotonin podcast. Today we're calling live from Dubai and from London. On the podcast Sim Serotonin we're all about inspiring you to action 3Gs to grow, grow and go after your passions and your purpose. And today to do that we're going to speak with a special guest. I will leave it to Toby to introduce himself. Toby, tell us about yourself and who you are. How are you really doing today? I am doing great. I'm very excited to be here. I was quite humbled when you asked me because I wasn't sure if there would be anything for me to say, but I'll do my best to have an interesting knowledge. Don't say that. Okay. I'll try embody the wise old man, that persona. So I'm an intern here at Adobe, much like Seema was until recently. Back in the day. Back in the day. Good odd days. Yeah, I'm really enjoying it here. It's my first sort of proper job, so it's quite intimidating. But yeah, I'm a maths, stats and data science student at the University of Bath. I feel like sometimes that pigeon holds me into certain sort of character, but I do really enjoy. I did really enjoy pretty much every school subject. Yeah, I'm outside of that interested in philosophy. I hope we don't go too deep into that because you'll realise I don't know much. And I do like maths in my free time. I like thinking, I like politics, economics, very much into thinking about how other people think and why they act the way they do. I love that intro. Okay, Toby, I have to ask, and this is something that I question with every math student I meet. Why did you choose to study math at uni? What do you like about maths? And I'm really curious to hear how you link that to your love for philosophy. That is a, yeah, that's a strong question. I, yeah, so I do really enjoy maths. I think initially it was the fact that I was good at it. I mean, I think that's probably where most math students start. But I have learned to really love it more and more over the years. I think at GCSE, I was definitely not a big fan and then kind of, yeah, so I think it's kind of grown on me. I think as you move on from like the learning, kind of like the tools and how to do the basic things in maths, and you move on to like deep problem solving and using it to understand the world, I think that's when it becomes really interesting. So for me, I picked Math, Statistics and Data Science. Oh, that's a full degree name. Yeah, so it's not three degrees. It does sound like it. So basically what it's not three degrees. Yeah, scratch that it is three degrees. I'm doing three degrees at once. No, yeah, so basically the reason I chose this degree is because I, I kind of have the freedom to do whatever I want as long as it's somewhat related to maths, which has allowed me to explore the other subjects which I really do enjoy. So, for example, I'm doing a math bio course. So, and what the coursework which was used to grade me was you are allowed to study any mathematical system you want and use the tools that you learn in the course to create a paper and find some real world insights. What did you choose for a system? So I chose predator prey models in coral reefs and how coral degradation can lead to instability in those populations. Don't? I tried to translate it on the fly, but yeah, it was really, really interesting. And I think the thing which I enjoyed most about it is I got to learn all these really interesting, complex mathematical tools and kind of translate that in something in the real world. So what I found is that with low amounts of coral, the prey have nowhere to hide and then the predators eat them and then the prey die out, then the predators die out. And I did this simply by building up from mathematical equations and then I visualized it and I found it fascinating personally. That's pretty cool that you can do all that with math. I mean, I didn't realize you could until I did it. Yeah, I think it's really, really amazing. Nice. And what about philosophy? Do you feel like math overlaps a lot with philosophy? I think the connection, the bridge that you have between math and philosophy is logical. The thing is that with philosophy, I think the additional thing which you have is the emotion to math is very, very logical. Whereas philosophy feels like a mix of combination of logic and emotion. You don't feel like maths involves emotion at all? I mean, I guess when I'm doing like a math paper, I can get very frustrated. I'll count that as emotion. I'm not sure. That's an interesting one. I wouldn't say so. If you had to write an essay about how math, how emotion can be integrated into maths, exclusive of your feelings about it, what would you say your argument would be? If I were to write an essay about how emotion would be integrated into maths. Yeah. I have no idea. I have absolutely no clue. I think you can definitely do something like complex with how the brain works and then take brain waves and how they correlate to different emotions. And then analyze those waves with, I believe it's called foray transforms. You're using math to analyze emotions. That's the only thing I can think of. I can't think of anything really deep and philosophical where you can link the two. I'm not sure if you can. Do you think math is purely objective or also subjective? I mean, I think math is grounded by the logic of the universe, right? And I think the way your brain perceives this logic is very much filtered through your senses. I'm not sure if it's, no, I'm not going to try quite a philosopher because I'm going to get it absurdly wrong. It's fine. You can do it. Oh, no. I'm going to say David Hume talked about filtering the world through your senses, but that's probably off of a podcast I watched last night at 3am. So anyone who is... Why are you watching a podcast? I'm interested in velocity. I was clearly preparing for this podcast. Oh, you were just on ahead of time. You know what you're going to talk about despite me giving you no clue. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Of course. I'm very well prepared, trust me. No, yeah, I... And he talks about how... Or some philosopher talks about how the world and the logic is filtered through your senses and everyone has their own subjective view on the world and linking it back to math. I think people can... I'm not sure how to link it back to math, actually. I can't remember where we started. Yeah, I forgot. Oh, no, we're talking about objectivity and subjectivity. Yeah. I'm trying to think, is math subjective? I'd say grounded in our logical understanding of the universe, math is pretty objective. I would love to have an interesting view and say it's subjective, but I don't think I have anything to say on that. That's fair. I'll get you. I feel like it can be... I mean, I'm no mathematician, but I feel like when you look at figures and you have to make an analysis, that involves subjectivity. But that's because we play that role. So I don't know if... I would argue that's because of how it's represented in figures. So how the graphics come out and then what you spot in them and if you spot patterns. I guess it's more like there are patterns and it's about whether you can uncover them. I guess that's similar to what IQ is. It's pattern recognition, isn't it? Yeah, oh my god, IQ tests. Me too, me too. Really? Well, I'm not a fan of IQ tests. I think they're so fixated on pattern recognition. I mean, to me, that's all they are. And I think that that puts a nominal value to someone's intelligence, which doesn't take into the full picture of someone. Yeah, and that's why I was so very grateful that Adobe did not have a psychometric. Because half of the companies I applied to during placement did have a psychometric. And the thing is, it's not only numerical reasoning. There's verbal reasoning, situational and all of this. And it's just, I don't feel like to your point, it's an accurate reflection of one's abilities. But then equally, I feel some people aren't as good as like depicting their ability to act in like, like socially and like how they can perform in a workplace through an interview. So then maybe that's arguably not super fair too. But I feel like it's more realistic than a psychometric test, right? I think psychometric tests can be very useful. I think trying to assign some sort of value to how well someone performs at very specific tasks, which get used on your day to day. So pattern recognition you're using all the time. I think there is value to that. And someone with higher pattern recognition will generally be better at doing things than someone with a lot lower. But, and I also think that the reason that people don't, there isn't any sort of test for how good someone is at social skills is because it's incredibly nuanced social interaction. And it's incredibly different to boil that down and shrink it into one value where you can rate someone. Yeah. But if companies could do it, they would do it. Like they wouldn't bother with interviews. They'd just do like another psychometric test. Let's say you were the CEO of a future company like, I don't know, Toby, Toby LTD. What would you do to hire people? How would you, if you could think of like a really cool crazy way to interview, like assess people, what would you do? Because for example, I heard that there used to be this, I don't know if it actually happened, but I saw online that companies would, like when it was an in-person interview, they would test, like if they were given a coffee, whether the person took the coffee back with them and like on their way out, offered to wash it or something. And that would be determined as to whether they go hired or not. Would you do something like that? Or would you do something different? I think that something like that is so interesting. And it's so interesting to see what different people do. Because you can have someone who's like a really good person, who just forgets to do it and then suddenly they're like thrown out of the interview. Well, it's probably not that dramatic, but yeah, I would absolutely have some sort of weird way of interviewing people. I think one interesting thing to do would be to ask someone, what is a really strong view that you have about the world? And then ask them to take you through it logically step by step. I think that not only you understand whether someone is quite stubborn, if you ask them that, you can understand whether someone's really thought through some of their ideas about the world or whether they're quite flexible in their brain. I think the only problem you'd find with that is you'd get some quite controversial opinions and then you kind of have to separate. And then you'd get some people saying like a very vanilla opinion, then you can't really, you know, analyze it at all. But you could almost use that as an indicator as to whether you actually want to hire the person, like how real are they being, if they're just being vanilla. Yeah, true. I mean, I would want interesting people. Okay, I have a question for you, Toby. What's a really, what was your question? Basically, I'm asking you your question. What was my question? What was my question about the world? What exactly did you say? What was a strong opinion you have about the world and talk logically through it? Go for it. Wow, so I'm in the interview now. You need to answer. Cool. I believe that everybody should be treated with empathy despite how they seem on the surface. I mean, that's quite a vanilla one, I'd say. Everyone, even criminals. I think initially you should treat them with an open mind. I think that's a tough one because some people you can see clearly by their actions. I was going to say some people you can see clearly the type of people they are by their actions, but I don't even think that's true. I'm not sure what you think about it. I don't know. I feel like it's a very difficult one because actions don't always tell a person's intention entirely because some people can't really, well, I mean, maybe it does, but I think people who have certain mental conditions, for example, they do things that maybe yes they intend to do, but not that they want, it's more like the brain takes over, their condition takes over. Yeah, you know what I mean. I have two brothers, one of them is 10, he's younger than me, he's like a mini-me, and my other brother is 22 and he has Down syndrome. So I think maybe where this view has come from is personal experience. So I think as I grew up, so I had him as my older brother, and I think I used to get quite frustrated about the way he acts because I didn't really understand it. So he would, I don't know, I would have like a stash of sweets and he would eat it and I'd be like, "Why would you do that? That's completely unfair." And on the surface, an action like that, if you stole someone else's, a kid stole another kid's sweets, you'd be like, "Well, that's not very nice, doesn't seem like a very nice kid." But you don't understand that some people just don't see the world in that way and don't understand consequences. And that may be because of a mental disability like Down syndrome, so that's what he has. Or maybe because they haven't been afforded the opportunities of education. But the reason I say you have to treat everyone with empathy is because you don't know what they've been through, what opportunities they've been afforded, and you don't know, let's say you weren't able to go to school, or you weren't able to go to university, how your brain would think differently about situations, and how different of a person you would be. That's a really good point, yeah. And I really like the word empathy that you use because empathy means like being able, or it links to being able to consider someone else's perspective, like put yourself on their shoes, feel for them. And I resonate with you on the experience of not always understanding because I have people in my wider family with autism, and I've been in situations where like we're in the elevator, for example, in the hotel, and then they'll like maybe touch someone's bag or you know what I mean, but another person will be bothered, they'll be like, "Why are you doing that?" But they don't know that they have autism and that's just how they act sometimes, you know, it's totally normal for them. And I was like, "I'm used to it, but this stranger doesn't know." Yeah, exactly, it's the experiences you've been afforded which shape the way you view the world. I think some people forget that that's so, like, that happens to such an extent and you don't realise it. I think being with my brother when I was younger has forced me to be understanding, otherwise I just get frustrated at him, and it's forced me to think about why he does the things he does. Yeah, it's all, it's good, it's eye-opening to expose yourself to different types of people and different like, different like mental conditions or disabilities. Absolutely. And yeah, I mean, how did we reach this? Where did we, we were talking about math. I don't even know, I'll probably listen to this back and see, but yeah, no, I think it's something I think about quite a lot. Yeah, enough about answer. Empathy wins. Empathy wins. Yeah, I like that too. Toby, when I asked you who you are, how you are, you said you talked about your job, you talked about what you study at uni. What do you like to do in your free time? So you listen to podcasts, what podcast were you listening to? I was listening to this guy called Alex O'Connor. That sounds so familiar. So he is a, so he studied theology at Oxford University, so he's a quote-unquote philosopher. I'd say, I'd say more of like a, he's probably more entertainment than a philosopher, but I think the reason why I resonate with him in particular is because he has quite, it seems like he has quite an objective view on things. He doesn't seem to, he tries to avoid personal bias and break it down logically. So I would describe myself as agnostic, so I assume quite a few people know what that means, but for people who don't, it means that I don't, I'm kind of on the fence about whether God exists. Really? Yeah, I would say so. I think I've definitely switched between being a theist and atheist throughout my life, but at the moment I wouldn't be able to tell you either or. Wait, what's a theist? I know what an atheist is. So it's like, it's like believing in God. So, so Christians are theists. Yeah. Yeah. So I think, to be honest, it's just jargon, yeah, jargon saying believing in God to make people seem smarter. Yeah, so despite me being agnostic, he's an atheist, and I think the interesting thing about him is he did study theology, so the study, I believe it's the study of God at Oxford University. So he has this interesting perspective where he knows so much about different religions, particularly Christianity, yet still doesn't believe in God. And he studied that throughout his life for years and years, and he studied something he doesn't believe in, which I think is incredibly interesting. Yeah. I mean, I would have loved to do that in an alternate life. Maybe I could. You're still good. You could always do a masters in it or even another degree. Yeah. I mean, one of the things I wanted to do was study philosophy and mathematics at Oxford, but turns out I didn't work hard enough to get in. So kind of gave up halfway. Why Oxford? I think, honestly, I like the look of the library. Do you know the one I'm talking about? The amazing like circular library. It's not Oxford. I remember seeing something like that in Kings, but it's probably very different and much prettier at Oxford. I don't know. Well, I didn't get in, so I wouldn't know. I think I didn't end up applying. But I would have loved to study that. I just think at that point in my life, I didn't work hard enough and wasn't smart enough to have that combination together. When you say when you weren't smart enough, what do you think? It's funny because I did an episode with Jonathan. Oh, okay. We were talking about smart and with Jonathan and Esther. What do you think smart means? Because I'll let you talk first. I think the reason I say that is because to get into somewhere like Oxford, purely academically, you have to have a combination of working really, really hard and being academically being very, very smart. And I think you can lack in one of those things, like you can be slightly less smart or intelligent, however you want to frame it. I mean, it links back to IQ tests, like being academically intelligent is a very narrow pigeon-holed way of viewing someone's ability to think. Or you can be naturally a lot more intelligent and probably work a bit less hard. And I think maybe at this point in my life, I work hard enough that I might be able to get in. But back then, I was not the dedicated intern that I am now. Okay, so a combination of smartness coming from academia and IQ with effort, essentially. Yeah, I mean, that's what you need, I guess. Because I always had the word smart always bothered me because I feel like smartness doesn't stem entirely from IQ, but also effort. Which is interesting because then you kind of separated them. You're like smartness from IQ and then also effort with it to get into somewhere in Oxford. I think someone who works hard is probably more mature than someone who does. That's a broad statement. Maybe I take that back. I think the ability to dedicate yourself to a long-term goal is quite mature. And I guess you could call someone disciplined. I think discipline is a kind of intelligence. The ability to think of long-term goals. So I would say that both of them contribute to someone who's smart. Yeah, I don't know. It's a loaded term. There's a lot which comes along with that. I asked about why Oxford, because I was curious as to whether it was because of the prestige of the uni. Absolutely. You've got to remember that it is Oxford University. That is a title. I don't know about you, but I feel like the more time passes, the more the names and not lose credibility. But the more I'm like, okay, of course it's great. I would love the opportunity to one day maybe study there. If there's a topic that is regarded highly at Oxford that I've become very passionate about. But I feel like, I don't know, I just sense that the older I've grown, the more I've realized that, and the more I've been exposed. I realized that. For example, Kings College London. Maybe it's because I didn't grow up in the UK, but it was always one of the big unis that everyone talked about. And I was like, oh my god, they went to Kings, they graduated from Kings. And again, maybe it's because my degree is not as wow there. But when I actually learned more about it and looked into it and spoke to people who went, I didn't hear the most wow experiences, even with placement. I won't say the name of the company, but there's this one company that everyone wanted to apply to in my degree. It was everyone's dream to get in. But when I spoke to people who did their placement there, they were like, oh yeah, to be honest, it wasn't the best. Culture isn't the best. It's kind of all, I'm not a facade. Of course people learned from their experience, but the name holds so much power that labels can constrain the true impression sometimes. I mean, I think people are just so desperate to have success in life. And I think the safe option is to go with whatever people are saying is the best place to go. I think Sosima, we're both a bath. And I don't know about you. I absolutely love it there. I think I'm so glad I picked Bath. And when I was applying to different degrees, of course, I was thinking about going to Oxford. That fell apart, but I was also thinking about going to Warwick. So when I was weighing up these two options, I was thinking, okay, Warwick, it's probably, it's quite, quite higher ranked in the global university. Is Bath not a Russell group? No, it's officially not. Yeah, I'm not sure. Bath definitely isn't. I'm not sure about Warwick. No, Warwick is Warwick. Warwick is, yeah, yeah, yeah. So I was thinking Russell group, non-Russell group, I should go for Warwick. This is high ranking, this is high ranked, I should go for Warwick. Then I actually visited both universities and I found that when I was walking around Warwick, I just felt a lot, my baseline of how comfortable I felt was a lot lower. I was like, this doesn't seem like a place for me. And when I was walking around Bath, I was looking at the buildings, I was looking at the river, I was like, I went around the campus. I was like, what an amazing city and place this would be studying. So I had this dilemma between, should I go with the objective, like better university, or should I go somewhere where my gut says I think I'll be happier. And I did end up not going with Bath. I dropped Warwick and only had Bath as my only university option. I think that was absolutely the right decision. People are scared to make the wrong decisions in life. And people try to get some sort of objective pros and cons list or number or something to choose one thing over the other. And I don't think you should live your life like that personally. I found I'm a lot happier. It's a bit cheesy, but I'm a lot happier going with my gut and going with what makes me happy. Yeah, no, it's cheesy, but it's true. I was actually in the exact same situation as you. It was like, okay, Bath, I feel like my heart belongs there, it's calling me and my gut says to go with it. And from my work was Kings. I was like, oh, like the name living in London as well. I don't know, but then I went to both similar to you and like when I saw when I walked around campus at night, because I saw like the dorms, everyone in their kitchens. I was like, I have to choose Bath. How can I not choose Bath, the campus. So yeah, I think at the end of the day, you do have to go with your gut. And I know some people don't always like, for example, my sister sometimes when I tell her, oh, like, my gut told me like my, I got a gut feeling. She's like, what do you mean you got a gut feeling? Like, I don't really get a gut feeling. Yeah. So like, I've heard that sometimes people don't entirely resonate with the idea of going with your gut. I just, I feel like your gut, like, I don't know, like, how do you not know when you're gut? Well, I think, I think the reason why it's so hard to understand a gut feeling is because it's a deep rooted emotional reaction to something. And that's, that's something really difficult to pick apart. So if you go through, like, let's say I was walking through Bath, I was feeling more connected to it. If I really break that down, that's probably from like, you know, I'm looking at the trees. I'm like, that looks really nice. Whenever I've walked through trees is made me happy. And then that's kind of added to the gut feeling. And I think, I think all of these, like, like it all comes from a combination of your life experiences in your brain. And that putting together this feeling of whether you like something or not. And I don't think it's worth trying to break that down. It's worth trusting it. Ooh, I love that. I never thought about gut feelings that way, like a combination of like your lived experiences. Yeah. Just feelings and emotions are associated with them. And then this overall of it coming all together. And it's worth trusting it rather than breaking it down. That's deep Toby. I mean, I just That should be the book that's like caption. Yeah. Hey, go for it. Go for it. I like that. I mean, the thing is, I think the reason I say something like this is because I've, being someone who's quite quote, quite logical, I've gone through my life trying to break things down and treat them objectively. And it's just so much more. Honestly, it's a waste of time. You need to trust that your brain, which has been the result of evolution over millions of years, can take loads of experiences together and tell you which one you're going to like more. Yeah. I'm not sure if you understand if I make it. No, I get you fully. Yeah. You just, you need to not exhaust your mind sometimes. Just, just, you know. Yeah. It's a lot of effort to try think, try make decisions by really thinking about them. Just, just make a decision and see what happens. Yeah. I used, I can be a mega overthinker with like assessing two different possible scenarios. I really feel like sometimes by the time you've taken, by the time that you've made a decision, like this is especially something I think would like with business, for example. By the time you've, the time you've decided what you want to do, someone has probably already done it and done like three versions of it. Yeah. So quit like being an over, like, what's it called? And quit, take yourself out of analysis paralysis. Yeah. That's your show. And so that's something I changed a lot in Adobe throughout my last place in the year. I feel like before placement, I was so much more like hyper analytical when I did something, but through Adobe, I kind of just started doing things. And seeing what happened. And like, even if it turned out to be a mistake, at least I learned from it, you know what I mean? See, that's really interesting because that's exactly what I've experienced so far. Really? Yeah. No, that I've been through the exact same thing. How do you feel about it? I mean, I, I feel like it's kind of like weight off your shoulders. The fact that you don't have to try analyze everything to come up with something objective. I think, yeah, that trust in yourself is so freeing. Yeah. And I think especially, I mean, going into something like this, you can be quite like insecure. You can be like, what if I do this wrong? What if I'm not good at it? And I think realizing that everyone working here is just another person like you. Yeah. No one knows at all. Yeah. No one knows at all. When you met him, I'm sure he would tell you that. Met who? When you met Shantanu. Oh, yeah. Yeah. Of course. Yeah. No, I mean, I, I thought Shantanu was a fascinating guy. What do you want to be in that position? Shantanu's job. I mean, as, as he said in the Q&A, it is the best job in the company. But there is the, you have to be a certain type of person to go for that sort of role. I think the thing which I do like about it is the freedom of it and the control and the ability to think big picture. I really like big picture thinking. I don't like, like tweaking things tediously, which weirdly doesn't fit with maths, but whatever. But I, yeah, I really like that bit. I think the bit which I couldn't do is the work-life balance. I don't think I could spend my whole life working, which I assume he does. I mean, I guess he has the freedom not to, but yeah. No, I would need some free time to enjoy my life. Yeah. I mean, he likes golfing. I like golfing. Do you? Well, I played golf yesterday. Really? I, I, I generally throughout life, I've been, I've loved my sports. I haven't played it as much recently, but yesterday I decided to go with some of my friends and play an 18-hole of golf, which was great. Have you done golfing in Bath? There's a golf course right next to the university. It's stunning. You should go. Yeah. I've walked through. I've walked through. It's an amazing course, but I have not played it, which is really weird. Well, this is on your final year bucket list, Toby. You need to go play golf in Bath. Okay. I'll note it down. Have to play on that course. I mean, I mean, it is literally next to one of my lecture halls. So kind of have to. No excuses, man. Well, this is a very fun chat, but before we wrap up, I would love for you to share with the audience what, Toby, what is one way you would encourage everyone to spread their serotonin, to spread happiness in the world? I mean, going back to what I said, so being empathetic, I think in, in a world which is getting increasingly more tribal, so political parties are getting more and more extreme either side, we need to understand that people have had their own experiences. And I, I, I'm a big believer on most people want to do good in the world. And so people think that those views that they have are their way of doing good to the world. And I think you need to understand that and break it down and talk to someone like they're human. I'm not sure if that made any sense. Empathy is the big, empathy is the big word, big word which I'd like to encourage. In essence, go for empathy. Empathy wins. In essence, go for empathy. That's the, that's the podcast name. There you go. Oh, well, thanks so much for being a guest today, Toby. It was a pleasure to have you and to hear your insights from math, to empathy, to golfing, to questioning being a CEO and all the other things we talked about, which are now slipping my mind. Thanks so much. Yeah, so grateful. Yeah, no, I was, I was really surprised when you asked me, but super grateful to be here and get my, get some of my random thoughts out into the world. Yeah. Awesome. Thanks everyone for listening and have a great day. We hope this gave you some serotonin. Bye. Bye. Bye.