Massimo Pigliucci

We know that both the genetics and early development, even intrauterine development before you're born, and certainly the first few months of development, those are crucial to determine how you're going to respond long-term to certain things.

And I had no control over those.

I can't rearrange my genes.

I didn't pick my genes and so on and so forth.

So the general idea then becomes that, look, on the one hand, you accept from the get-go the notion that you do not have full control over anything, anything that is external, none of those things.

And you need to be okay with it because what are your choices?

There's only two choices.

You're either okay with it or you throw a tantrum.

Throwing a tantrum doesn't help.

It's the kind of thing that children do because they're not emotionally mature.

An adult is not supposed to do that sort of stuff.

Also, throwing a tantrum not only doesn't help, but actually gets in the way because now you're adding the actual injury from the external to an internal imposed injury.

The fact that now you feel bad because you've lost control, you are anxious, and so on and so forth.

So you need to focus on what actually you can do, which is empowering children.

Because the idea is not that you can't do anything about anything.

You can do quite a bit.

It's just that you need to be very clear on the limits and what exactly it is that you can and cannot do.

And once you are clear on that, your interventions become much more efficacious and therefore you feel better.

And broadly speaking, you get better outcomes.

Yeah, Marcus's reign was made very difficult by a number of issues.