Question your Assumptions

The Invisible Hand, Buttcracks, and the Blood Beneath It All

The future has a way of defying our expectations. The millionaire isn’t always the one in the corner office—sometimes, he’s the guy under your sink. Heroes turn into villains, villains into victims, and even something as seemingly objective as your blood is now a portal into hidden insights about your health. Longshoremen collect royalties for jobs they don’t do, private equity firms are buying up HVAC companies as if they were tech startups, and it turns out Christopher Columbus might not have been Italian at all but a Jewish sailor escaping persecution. If there’s one lesson here, it’s that what we thought we knew is usually only half the story. In every field—from labor to medicine to history—the real breakthroughs come when we question our assumptions.

“The future is already here—it’s just not evenly distributed.”

— William Gibson

Today is either Columbus Day or Indigenous Peoples Day—or maybe it’s both, depending on where you live. Like so many things in modern life, the story of Columbus is no longer as simple as a day off and a parade. Now, thanks to a Spanish documentary thriller, we have the added twist that Columbus might have been a Sephardic Jew, driven not just by a quest for new lands but by the need to escape the Spanish Inquisition. The documentary makes this case using 20 years of genetic research, although critics are quick to point out it hasn’t undergone peer review. Still, the possibility that the man who “discovered” America may have been a fleeing outcast brings a certain irony to the cultural tug-of-war between honoring him and denouncing him. History never sits still, and every time we try to nail it down, it shifts beneath us like a wave beneath a wooden ship.

“The man who moves a mountain begins by carrying away small stones.”
— Confucius

It’s not just history playing tricks on us; the world of business is pulling some strange stunts too. The real gold rush today isn’t in tech stocks or crypto but in plumbing, HVAC, and electrical companies. Private equity firms are pouring billions into these blue-collar sectors, turning tradesmen into quiet millionaires. Many of these business owners aren’t cashing out and retiring; they’re sticking around to scale their companies with PE backing. Meanwhile, a surprising number of young people—50% of Gen Z and 42% of millennials—are planning to trade in their white-collar dreams for the security of a skilled trade, betting that a wrench and a toolbox will offer more job stability than the corporate grind.

“In the middle of difficulty lies opportunity.”
— Albert Einstein

The revolution isn’t limited to labor and history; it’s also happening in the tiniest drops of our blood. Companies like SomaLogic and Olink have made it possible to measure thousands of plasma proteins from just two microliters—data that can transform how we understand health and disease. This isn’t another Theranos fiasco; it’s real science, backed by vast data sets like those from the UK Biobank, which integrates genetic, lifestyle, and health information from half a million participants. With these tools, we’re not just diagnosing illnesses—we’re beginning to forecast an individual’s entire health trajectory, potentially preventing diseases before they appear. The future of medicine isn’t just about cures; it’s about knowing what’s coming long before it arrives.

“It is not the strongest of the species that survives, nor the most intelligent, but the one most responsive to change.”
— Charles Darwin

The funny thing about the future is that it rarely shows up where we expect it. It’s not always in Silicon Valley boardrooms—it’s also in the sweat of blue-collar workers and the data hidden in our bloodstreams. What looks like a historical hero may turn out to be an outcast, and what seemed like an ordinary job might be the key to a millionaire’s lifestyle. The lesson here is simple but profound: the world is much more interesting when we take a second look at the things we thought we understood. Whether it’s Columbus’s true origins, the wealth potential of a plumber, or the untapped knowledge in a drop of blood, the real breakthroughs happen when we see the familiar in a new way. The future isn’t just coming—it’s already here, hidden in plain sight.