Thinking Before Eating: A More Rigorous Heuristic

Many people proclaim to understand something because they study it. But you cannot know a thing by studying the thing, you have to create the thing. Playing Beethoven is replicating what you see in front of you, it is not creating the thing you see in front of you. Those who don’t create don’t understand.  It doesn’t matter what you create, but if you want to understand something you must attempt to build it. 

Placing bets means wagering something of value on the outcome of an uncertain event with the hopes of achieving a payoff.  The decisions we make in life are akin to placing bets, and as with all bets, access to good information is what increases the chances of a bet achieving a payoff. Most people approach accessing good information by conducting research, analysis, understanding odds and placing all these into a clear strategy. But what really makes systems tick is something deeper than anything research, analysis, odds or strategy can access. This deeper “good” information that really makes systems tick aligns with what we call intuition.  In this episode I discuss the importance of betting what we (truly) know. 

Getting triggered means someone experiences a strong emotional reaction to a particular stimulus or event. But there is a good side to being triggered. Getting triggered can compel us towards positive action. We can deliberately trigger ourselves to produce good work by putting in place things that compel us to write/speak/draw etc. in the best way possible.  In this episode I argue that we should set up our projects, and life, so as to be positively triggered.

A lot of people try to be their hero. But not only can we not do what our heroes do, our heroes cannot do what we do. It is our unique abilities that make us bring value to the world. The same thing can be achieved in countless ways, and those different ways are what the world needs. We need to stop trying to be our heroes. We should use heroes nothing more than peripheral inspiration, and instead flex the muscles we have.

Math education consists primarily of learning rules to arrive at results. But these tricks bypass what is really happening. They can lead to a superficial grasp of mathematical concepts and hinder deeper learning and problem-solving abilities. Many of the skills we learn in schooling, and after, are akin to the mindless rules we learn in math. We have to learn something far deeper than rules to truly understand our work and our world. We can achieve true understanding by asking questions, engaging with the material, teaching others and above all applying our knowledge to real-world situations.

Important things see the light of day, not by some plan or deterministic outline, but by making changes en-route to the goal. It's adaptability that matters in the face of real world situations. Finding the right mix of people, places and things happens as you move.

Suggested Reading Related to Intro Example
The Apocalypse Factory: Plutonium and the Making of the Atomic Age by Steve Olson

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The Documentary by Alexey Ivanov

Some performances deliver deep authenticity, with standup comedy being a good example.  Extremely authentic performances show us something we all should have; that ability to reach deep within us and share what we're really thinking, despite the risk this might pose to our normal, settled lives. Humans have evolved to filter for authenticity, as this leads to better information groups can use to solve problems. The world needs our authenticity, we just have to find it.

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Is This Anything? by Jerry Seinfeld

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Catch It by Yrii Semchyshyn

History is loaded with "bad" / "dumb" ideas. And this includes those made by high-ranking officials and government agencies. Looking at the various schemes and plots left on the drawing board one wonders how anyone took them seruously.  But most of today’s useful inventions were deemed absurd at the time. This tells us that we need to have a lot of bad ideas to land on good ones, and if that's true, then we should be more concerned with taking the shots, then landing the shots.

Suggested Reading Related to Intro Example
Nuking the Moon: And Other Intelligence Schemes and Military Plots Left on the Drawing Board by Vince Houghton

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Sneaky by Oleg Kyrylkovv

Our lives are adversely impacted when our interactions are purely transactional. We see this play out in devastating fashion in industry, where certain businesses can cause great harm to society due to their insulation and disconnection from the lives they sell to. But this isn't just for businesses. Our personal and professional lives depend critically on organic, face-to-face interactions with real people. In this episode I argue that a successful life needs to be in direct contact with the effects of what we say and do, and that this is only possible by being in real groups with real people.

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American Cartel: Inside the Battle to Bring Down the Opioid Industry by Scott Higham and Sari Horwitz

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Coniferous forest by orangery

People look for stability in the labels we give ourselves. Our job, our title, our salary, the associations we join. But the only thing truly constant in life is its ever-changing nature.
Those labels we take comfort in are in constant flux, getting reshaped and redefined by a changing economy, and the technologies that drive it. In this episode I argue that instead of looking for stability in the not-so-stable categories we create for ourselves, we can find greater security, peace and contentment by embracing the dynamics of life.

Suggested Reading Related to Intro Example
The End of Work: The Decline of the Global Labor Force and the Dawn of the Post-Market Era by Jeremy Rifkin

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Anton Kornienko