People, books, and breakthrough ideas—connected to the mental models and moves you can use.
3,456 entries
Marie Kondo's KonMari method shifts the criterion from 'should I discard this?' to 'does this spark joy?' The method follows a specific sequence: clothes, books, papers, miscellaneous, sentimental items—ordered from easi…
Before you hand work off, flag the parts where you personally doing them is part of the result, and keep those.
Market power is the ability to sustain prices or other terms above a competitive benchmark because competitive constraints are limited
A standard finite-state Markov convergence theorem states that an irreducible, aperiodic chain with fixed transition probabilities approaches a unique stationary distribution independently of its initial distribution
A Markov model of democratization represents transitions among explicitly defined regime states using specified probabilities
A Markov model represents next-state probabilities using a current state assumed sufficient for that prediction
Dennett challenges the ease with which readers imagine Mary as knowing all physical facts while assuming that seeing color must reveal an additional fact
Maslaha is the Islamic legal principle that the public interest or common good can serve as an independent basis for legal rulings, even when no specific textual authority exists
Abraham Maslow's observation: 'If the only tool you have is a hammer, everything looks like a nail.' The tendency to over-rely on familiar tools, frameworks, or approaches regardless of the situation—because the tool you…
Abraham Maslow's motivational theory that human needs are arranged in a hierarchy: physiological needs (food, water, shelter) → safety needs (security, stability) → belonging needs (love, community) → esteem needs (respe…
Some expert knowledge—tacit skills, professional judgment, contextual intuition—cannot be transmitted through documentation or lectures
Bloom's model proposes that given sufficient time and instruction, virtually all students can master any objective
Advancement determined by demonstrated competence, not time spent
Compare candidate carriers on capability, constraints, total cost, control relation, and a small pilot instead of grabbing the trendy tool.
List every candidate carrier, person, tool, or habit, then screen each on raw ability alone: can it do this exact operation at the quality, speed, depth of context, and consistency the work needs? Ignore price, ethics, and preference here.
Master craftspeople develop embodied understanding of material behavior beyond data sheets
Two lists crossed, with something in every intersection. Rows are one kind of thing, columns another, and the cell holds whatever happens when the two meet. Because every pair gets a cell, a matrix catches interactions that a table of averages hides, and it also shows the empty cells, which are often the real finding.
Robert Merton's sociological observation (from Matthew 25:29: 'to those who have, more shall be given') that advantage compounds: early success creates conditions for further success, while early disadvantage creates con…
A ladder whose rungs are written as what you can do at that level rather than as a grade. Because each rung is a behavior, you place yourself by checking which description is true of you, and the rung above tells you the next thing to practice. Written well, it doubles as a test: if you cannot demonstrate the rung, you are not on it, whatever it felt like.
A conservative decision rule: choose the option whose worst-case outcome is the best among all options' worst cases
Maya in Advaita Vedanta is the cognitive error of taking surface appearances for ultimate reality
Named after Robert McNamara's Vietnam War strategy of measuring success by body counts: the error of making decisions based solely on quantitative metrics while ignoring qualitative factors that are harder to measure but…