Tenelle Porter’s job is to study humility. Specifically the intellectual kind — the idea that we might be wrong or mistaken about some of our beliefs. Tenelle talks with How to Be a Better Human host Chris Duffy about why she thinks intellectual humility is so important, how to cultivate it, and why it’s the missing piece in so many conversations these days. Whether it’s in politics, academia or social media, Tenelle argues discovering you are wrong doesn’t have to be a painful realization; rather it can lead to positive discovery.
This is an episode of TED’s How to Be a Better Human podcast. Listen on your favorite podcast app:
For the full text transcript, visit go.ted.com/BHTranscripts
Join us in person at a TED conference:
Become a TED Member to support our mission:
Subscribe to a TED newsletter:
Follow TED!
X:
Instagram:
Facebook:
LinkedIn:
TikTok:
The TED Talks channel features talks, performances and original series from the world’s leading thinkers and doers. Subscribe to our channel for videos on Technology, Entertainment and Design — plus science, business, global issues, the arts and more. Visit to get our entire library of TED Talks, transcripts, translations, personalized talk recommendations and more.
Watch more:
TED’s videos may be used for non-commercial purposes under a Creative Commons License, Attribution–Non Commercial–No Derivatives (or the CC BY – NC – ND 4.0 International) and in accordance with our TED Talks Usage Policy: . For more information on using TED for commercial purposes (e.g. employee learning, in a film or online course), please submit a Media Request at
#TED #TEDTalks #HowToBeABetterHuman
@AlexanderXVIII
July 9, 2025 at 11:02 am
AWSOME!
@MatteomankDiastonon
July 9, 2025 at 11:04 am
I watch your channel with pleasure. Your videos are always so easy and entertaining.🚘😜💴
@Ify-i9fy
July 9, 2025 at 11:08 am
❤❤
@JustinMBailey
July 9, 2025 at 11:15 am
It’s ok to be wrong about not wanting to be wrong.
@FastKD6
July 9, 2025 at 11:32 am
I think on of the things that hold us back from intellectual humility is our ego, knowing I’m not less than for knowing or better for knowing. Now I can be truly uncertain.
@prepped8551
July 9, 2025 at 2:08 pm
It’s always ok to be wrong…
@NicoleAniston-l9y
July 9, 2025 at 6:04 pm
We live in a society that punishes being wrong, especially publicly. From school to work to social media, we are trained to fear mistakes instead of learning from them. For years I was terrified of being wrong , I avoided speaking up, second-guessed everything, and lived in constant anxiety. Then I read Your Mind Was A Target by Dr Tessa Voss and it made me realize that this fear is not natural it’s conditioned. The book helped me understand how the system creates emotional pressure that keeps us quiet, small, and compliant. Since then, I’ve learned that growth only starts when you stop fearing imperfection.
@eric212234
July 9, 2025 at 10:01 pm
If we simplify the situation, in a polarized society like the one we find ourselves in now, you have a bout a 50/50 chance of being right about any given thing. You’re born to a family and taught what to believe. Both sides think they’re 100% right and the other side is 100% wrong. That seems a bit mental to me, but I digress. If you never consider the possibility you’re wrong, you’ll always be right about 50% on things, and 50% wrong. Improving that, if you care to, requires considering the possibility you may have been wrong about something. I don’t call that intellectual humility, I call it objectivity. And if you apply that over time in a systemized fashion, say with science, you will slowly become more right about things than wrong. That’s something to aspire to… The problem is many people define THEMSELVES by specific beliefs, and so make it near impossible to consider those beliefs objectively. There are reasons for this, good and bad. Both evolution and culture are emergent and behavioral diversity is often a strength. Youth put themselves in danger and take passionate hard stances on things because evolution has programed them to. It has the function of creating a kind of self-driven additional selective pressure. They place ‘themselves’ in situations where they have to survive. But it’s a numbers game. In prehistoric times when we had many children, this was actually beneficial to our species. Natural selection IS horrible. Today, when we may have only one child, this atavistic instinct can cause tragedy in a family.
@BonnieShadow33
July 10, 2025 at 7:17 pm
But it takes humility to remove your ego, so that you can be objective.
@eric212234
July 10, 2025 at 10:03 pm
@@BonnieShadow33 That depends on what you mean, how you define humility. If you are consciously ‘trying’ to be humble, that’s false humility in my book. You might have good intentions in doing it, but you don’t genuinely believe it, you’re not genuinely humble. Whereas with pure objectivity, and a little epistemology, I know nothing I believe can be known with 100% certainty, save for the fact that I exist in ‘some’ capacity. I know nothing I do in life can make me ‘better’ than another person. I am the product of circumstance. If someone had the same genetics as me, the same experiences, they would be me. And these are things I did not give myself, or earn. Even if I derived some amazing piece of wisdom, this is just something I found along my path. And if had and not walked along that specific path, I would not have found it. I could be smarter, stronger, wealthier, more empathetic, more artistic than any other person in the world, and I still would not be better than anyone. How is this objective knowledge not humility? ‘Feeling’ that you’re some how lesser than others seems dangerous. But in any useful philosophy there is balance, and different people achieve that balance in different ways. If your humility is different than mine, or you use a different word, and it works for you, that’s the only thing that matters. But for some, like me, too ‘much’ ego isn’t the problem.
@todaycountsshow
July 9, 2025 at 11:05 pm
Such a great reminder that being open to being wrong is a real strength!
@LifeLessons7-c6q
July 10, 2025 at 5:32 am
“This video just changed my perspective on life lessons. Well done! If anyone wants to learn what lessons do the 1% ultra-rich, $1 Billion people like MrBeast use? Just find out from the LIFE LESSONS ICON. Thank you. Good luck!”
@mocomputers
July 10, 2025 at 7:22 am
THANK YOU😎
@SyddG
July 10, 2025 at 12:36 pm
Why would it be assumed that every 4 year old would react like a know-it-all? From personal experience that is certainly not true. Plenty of young children will openly say “I don’t know” when questioned about something.
@BonnieShadow33
July 10, 2025 at 7:16 pm
In many scenarios, I have no problem being intellectually humble. Still, and I don’t know exactly what the difference is, there are times when I honestly believe that I know all there is to know about a certain something, or that I’m right about how to interpret a situation, and it’s rather humiliating to find out that I’m wrong.
@ozzyg82
July 10, 2025 at 7:56 pm
The colour-ordered books makes me happy.
@gofeeder2326
July 12, 2025 at 1:49 am
It’s a very good video. Both men are really smart.