2024 年 9 月文摘

Founder Mode

The way managers are taught to run companies seems to be like modular design in the sense that you treat subtrees of the org chart as black boxes. You tell your direct reports what to do, and it’s up to them to figure out how. But you don’t get involved in the details of what they do. That would be micromanaging them, which is bad.

Hire good people and give them room to do their jobs. Sounds great when it’s described that way, doesn’t it? Except in practice, judging from the report of founder after founder, what this often turns out to mean is: hire professional fakers and let them drive the company into the ground.

experienced C-level execs are often very skilled at managing up

开源是自由的，永远

“开源（源代码）”是受美国宪法第一修正案保护的言论自由，而“软件”是一种产品，受出口管制法律管制。

瞎逼逼：研发效能度量的得与失

最低端的不懂技术的老板，会像工厂组长那样，研究一个程序员每天的打卡时间：这个公式可能是「下班时间 - 上班时间 - 午休时间 = 工作时长 = 你对工作的上心程度」，如果粒度更细的话，可以计算你每次进出门的打卡记录差值，也可以在厕所装上计时器，再完美的扣除「带薪拉屎」的时间。

圈复杂度。.. V(Graph) = Edge - Node + 2

代码当量 ELOC = equivalent line of code

没有量化数据基础更容易陷入「向上管理优于一切」。

扁鹊说：我大哥在人家未发病之前就把病根给除了，防患于未然，因此名气连家门口都出不去；我二哥能在人家病情刚起时就给治好，就好像他每次看的都是小病一样，所以他的名声不出当乡本土；我呢，看起大病来，又是在经脉上穿针放血，又是用些猛药贵药，又是开刀做手术，所以人人都觉得我的医术最高明。

如何评价知乎的匿名机制？

Great minds discuss ideas. Average minds discuss events. Small minds discuss people.

匿名类应用让每个人释放心底的恶念，盒子打开，魔鬼出来。他人即地狱，每个人也是自己的地狱。匿名应用即地狱

浅谈 Apple Intelligence

新 AI 技术的应用往往是对现有场景和过程的改进或补充，没有创造出以前不存在的全新场景，所以对于已经掌握了用户关系的产品来说，后来者无法形成威胁。我喜欢举的例子是 Adobe 能在 Photoshop 中增加 AI 功能，Stable Diffusion 和 Midjourney 却不可能做出替代 Photoshop 的产品。在这种情况下，谁掌握了与消费者的直接关系，谁就掌握了市场。

Apple Intelligence 是目前为止最让我兴奋的 AI 产品。之前的各种 chatbot 都仅限于给用户提供答案，实际根据这些答案执行动作还要靠用户，而 Apple 则有条件让 AI 代替人完整执行一些任务。

自行车给自己带来了什么情绪价值爽点

都说中年油腻男人要么成为钓鱼佬，要么折腾键盘、路由器、充电头、NAS、自行车。

Safe Superintelligence Inc.

对话 30 年游戏从业者许怡然：太折腾容易做无用功，有时候你得等风来

其实人本身就是一个自然的产物呀。嗯，就是，你想想大自然的基本规律是热力学，第二定律就是熵增，人是熵减的。

我是觉得巴菲特说那个话。对，就是世界上机会多得很，错失机会不怕的是你抓了一个错的，对吧？有 100 个机会你抓住一个你就赢了。你不能，可能指望着那 99 个你全抓住。一个坏的机会，你抓一个就死干净了。你连抓三把你就彻底别干了，你就什么都没有了，时间也没有了，钱也没有了。… 不做也是一个很好的选择。这是一种选择，你千万别以为什么事不做不是一个选择，是真的什么都不做，你选择了不做也是一个很艰难的选择。那可不容易，相当的难。

我觉得首先有几个误区。首先第一，因为你特别热爱游戏，因为你特别热爱玩游戏，你玩游戏玩的特别好，玩游戏花的时间特别多，然后你玩游戏玩的特别精，就导致你觉得你适合去做游戏。首先这是第一个误区，因为玩游戏玩的好的人太多了，我可以非常负责任的告诉你，在男孩子 10 岁到 20 岁的这个区间段之内，几乎可以说没有几个男孩玩游戏玩的不好的，你只要给他游戏玩，他都能玩的倍好，所以这件事就可以忽略不计。

这个行业它其实也是一个一将功成万骨枯的行业，它有一个悖论，就是我不愿意冒险，可是很多大成的东西都是冒险出来的。

找钱这个事情对游戏行业才是最重要的。最重要的之一吧，当然核心的是你得找到那个真正有能力的天才制作人。但是你手里没有钱，你见到这个天才也没有用，你帮不了他，你帮他编点程序，你帮他画点画，这些都是杯水车薪。你真正帮他找到钱了，才能雇很多人帮他写写程序，雇很多人帮他画画，那找钱这个能力就变得很重要，左手找人，右手找钱。

漫谈哲学与编程

理性是超越的，本质在于追求无限 超越的意思是说理性本身不依赖任何现实或者经验社会中的任何对象，无限 实际上就是说理性本身需要达到的某种理想状态。

理性的调节性是引导经验去追求无限，追求绝对，但是永远也达不到。达不到也有作用 — 它使得经验科学不断的前进，并且有了明确的目的和方向…

聊聊 nostr 和 审查

https://github.com/nostr-protocol/nostr

It’s a very simple idea: each person can publish their notes to multiple relays (which are just simple servers), and people who follow them can connect to these relays and fetch the notes. The protocol just defines the messages that can be sent between clients and relays in order to publish and fetch the content they want.

These relays can be hosted by anyone and have any rule or internal policy they want. The fact that the protocol is open makes it so that, as long as there is any relay willing to host someone, they can still publish their stuff for their followers, and the followers can find their stuff in that relay.

Relays can also lie about data published by others, but to ensure that isn’t a problem, public-key cryptography is used and every note is signed. When you follow someone you’re actually following their public key and clients will check notes received from relays to ensure they were properly signed.

The hardest part is how to find in which relay you will find notes of each people you follow, since they can be anywhere, but it’s not an unsolvable problem. There are multiple heuristics currently being used to approach this by different clients and new ones can always be added.

我做系统架构的一些原则

原则一：关注于真正的收益而不是技术本身 原则二：以应用服务和 API 为视角，而不是以资源和技术为视角 原则三：选择最主流和成熟的技术 原则四：完备性会比性能更重要 原则五：制定并遵循服从标准、规范和最佳实践 原则六：重视架构扩展性和可运维性 原则七：对控制逻辑进行全面收口 原则八：不要迁就老旧系统的技术债务 原则九：不要依赖自己的经验，要依赖于数据和学习 原则十：千万要小心 X – Y 问题，要追问原始需求 原则十一：激进胜于保守，创新与实用并不冲突

对于 X-Y 问题，也就是说，用户为了解决 X 问题，他觉得用 Y 可以解，于是问我 Y 怎么搞，结果搞到最后，发现原来要解决的 X 问题，这个时候最好的解决方案不是 Y，而是 Z。 这种 X-Y 问题真是相当之多，见的太多太多了。所以，每次用户来找我的时候，我都要不断地追问什么是 X 问题。

Go 语言、Docker 和新技术

Go 语言能吞食的一定是 PaaS 上的项目，比如一些消息缓存中间件、服务发现、服务代理、控制系统、Agent、日志收集等等，没有复杂的业务场景，也到不了特别底层（如操作系统）的中间平台层的软件项目或工具。而 C 和 C++ 会被打到更底层，Java 会被打到更上层的业务层。这是我的一个判断。

Anti-corruption Layer pattern

Use this pattern when:

• A migration is planned to happen over multiple stages, but integration between new and legacy systems needs to be maintained.
• Two or more subsystems have different semantics, but still need to communicate.

There is No Time to Sleep

How LLMs Work, Explained Without Math

I personally do not see LLMs as having an ability to reason or come up with original thoughts, but that does not mean to say they’re useless. Thanks to the clever calculations they perform on the tokens that are in the context window, LLMs are able to pick up on patterns that exist in the user prompt and match them to similar patterns learned during training.

正在加速崩塌的是「中文」，不是互联网

833 中文互联网正在加速崩塌｜何加盐

创新的真谛

限制才能激发创新

创始人模式

You must design the culture you want, otherwise, it’ll be designed for you, you might not like what emerges

Your culture is the shared way to do things (and often they’re) based on the lessons you’ve learned ….. Your culture is the behaviour of the leaders that get mimicked all the way down every single person… The way a leader designes the culture is not by writing out list of values, it’s by basically leading by example every single day.

大企业病的所有问题都来源于部门和指责切分，业务是垂直的，但是技术和赋能最高效往往是水平的。

The Evolution of a Programmer

https://www.ariel.com.au/jokes/The_Evolution_of_a_Programmer.html

https://github.com/SuperPaintman/the-evolution-of-a-go-programmer

Rob Pike 语录

What We Got Right, What We Got Wrong

what’s good and bad in a programming language is largely a matter of opinion rather than fact

Our original goal was not to create a new programming language, it was to create a better way to write software. We had issues with the languages we were using—everyone does, whatever the language—but the fundamental problems we had were not central to the features of those languages, but rather to the process that had been created for using them to build software at Google. The creation of a new language provided a new path to explore other ideas, but it was only an enabler, not the real point.

In short, Go is not just a programming language. Of course it is a programming language, that’s its definition, but its purpose was to help provide a better way to develop high-quality software, at least compared to our environment 14 plus years ago.

One of the things that bothered the programming language community was that the early Go compiler was written in C. The proper way, in their opinion, was to use LLVM or a similar toolkit, or to write the compiler in Go itself, a process called self-hosting. … writing a compiler in its own language, while simultaneously developing the language, tends to result in a language that is good for writing compilers, but that was not the kind of language we were after. … Our unusual approach was in no way an insult to LLVM or anyone in the language community. We just used the tool that best suited our task. And of course, today there is an LLVM-hosted compiler for Go, and many others, as there should be.

The key missing piece was examples of even the simplest functions. We thought that all you needed to do was say what something did; it took us too long to accept that showing how to use it was even more valuable.

延迟退休可能是对一代人的违约

官员和专家支持延迟退休方案，因为这不仅不触动他们的既得利益，还能给他们带来利益；多数公众之所以反对，是因为这种改革没有触动他们最反对的养老双轨制。

在养老问题上，改革的次序应该是，先改掉双轨制，再谈延迟退休；先加大政府投入，再谈公众责任。

如何辨别 KPI 驱动的技术项目

KPI 驱动的技术项目指的是表面上是为了切实解决某一问题，但实际上却是为了满足 KPI 或 OKR 需求应运而生的项目

拒看新闻的生活艺术

不读新闻不会错过任何真正重要的事：如果有一件事真的很重要，你會來得及知道的 ── 從專業報導，從你的朋友、丈母娘或任何一個跟你聊過天的人那裡得知。

敬告青年

自主的而非奴隶的； 进步的而非保守的； 进取的而非退隐的； 世界的而非锁国的； 实利的而非虚文的； 科学的而非想象的。

闲白

德不配位，必有灾殃；德薄而位尊，智小而谋大，力小而任重，鲜不及矣。

内容电商毁掉了内容

内容电商所创造的内容，本质是为了转化成某种物品的销售，内容在这里是一个媒介，不是最终产品。

真正造成问题的不是微信，而是互联网的免费模式，所谓“羊毛出在狗身上，猪来付费”的模式。这种模式创造了极大的财富和财富增长率，以至于即使提供直接付费模式也显得太不刺激，更何况提供直接购买内容的各种阻碍太多了。

朋友之间的双向选择

其实真正的在生活中的好朋友，是没事的时候才坐在一起。而不是有事的时候就一起，有事的时候基本上就是业务往来和利益交关嘛。

The HEY Way Manifesto

我的 2023

打工的目的是早点赚钱赎身不干了，而不是让你在青楼当头牌。

《Rework》摘录及感想

37signals manifesto

We work with smart clients who understand that it’s the customer, not org-charts or office politics, that matters most. These clients are hard to find, so when we get them we treat them well.

The money you save by using your cousin’s buddy is nothing compared with the cost in time and money required to undo his mistakes.

we forgo the bloat and bureaucracy that plagues our industry. We don’t have red tape or 5 layers of management. When you talk to us, you talk to us – not someone representing us.

Occam’s Razor

The principle states that one should not make more assumptions than the minimum needed. This principle is often called the principle of parsimony. It underlies all scientific modelling and theory building.

This principle is part of epistemology, and can be motivated by the requirement of maximal simplicity of cognitive models. However, its significance might be extended to metaphysics if it is interpreted as saying that simpler models are more likely to be correct than complex ones, in other words, that “nature” prefers simplicity.

MegaEase 的远程工作文化

团队管理的头等大事是找人，没有之一。远程团队需要的人的一般需要有这些特质：能独挡一面的人；沟通能力很强的人；能自管理和自驱动。… 你会发现，这样的人是任何一家公司所渴望的人，和远不远程无关。

招不到这样的人，你只能为他们不能自管理和自驱而招“经理”，不能写出好的代码而招“测试”，不能很好的沟通而招个“项目经理”，不能独档一面，而要把好的人安排给他们当“教练”，而好的人则会被累死

人数越多的团队，基本上来说，就更偏劳动密集型。劳动密集型的一个特征就是，大家整天在想，得整点什么事给这么多人，好让他们忙起来。而人数少的团队，因为人不够，所以每天都在想，什么样的事更重要，什么样的事可以自动化，怎么做更有效率……

把「开新坑」作为「心灵按摩」

今天和朋友聊到做产品的状态，一个人（或几个人）做产品时，最好还是集中精力并且在不超过三个月的时间内发布出来，所谓「一鼓作气」，不然真的很容易「再而衰，三而竭」。

我在做产品过程中会加载的默认心智模型：技术选型很重要，如果没选好，就会留下技术债，影响未来的发展和维护；同时把玩新技术也很重要，这样做产品的过程中，还能体验和玩新的技术，做产品+玩技术两不误。 还有一个「因」是，我作为产品经理，又作为工程师，无时无刻不在「自我打架」：关于产品需求和技术实现到什么程度的打架。尽管我还是会尽可能让自己按一个产品经理的思维去做产品：我会写产品的需求文档，具体到每一个功能时，也会写份文档，但是等到具体的技术实现特别是交互细节时，还是会遇到写文档时没有想到的点，于是又会呈现出「工程师思维」占上风的状态，开始进入玩技术、磨细节的状态……

如何理解佛教所说的众生皆苦？

苦是如何来的呢？佛学认为有从以下的八个方面，即：生、老、病、死、爱别离、怨憎会、求不得、五蕴炽盛。

伟大的巫师经常独自行事，只要空气中的元素依然回应他的咒语和呼唤

Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic. 任何足夠先進的技術都與魔法沒有區別。

虽然发展新科技需要继承旧科技，但就像操作系统和编程语言有 Support Lifecycle 一样，旧科技是会因为失去用户而失传的。当一个旧科技失去用户后，它确实跟魔法没有区别了。

Portals 实际提供的是暗示，就像是舞台上的提词，具体的行为和情绪需要演员来呈现一样，Portals 里体验到的丰富的感官刺激来自于大脑对这些暗示的想象和补全。当大脑对现实世界和虚拟世界的体验都够多时，它就能理解这些暗示，渲染出最好的虚拟世界。

月刊（第 18 期）：逃离社交网络 ⭐

互联网中「社交网络」给我们带来了更多的消耗。

这些「消耗」具体表现在以下三个方面：

表达力被弱化 专注力被剥夺 个体价值被遗忘

在《论语言的通货膨胀》一文中作者提到了「语言通货膨胀」这个概念——“币制是交换财富的手段，语言是表达思想和情感的媒介；如同制币与其背后财富的不匹配而生的通胀，语言和语言背后的思想、情感的不匹配，就是语言的通胀。若某个词语被随意、频繁地使用，该词语的词义将被弱化。此时，该词语所能表达的情感也将被弱化，导致情感表达的不到位，这便是语言的通货膨胀现象。

research as leisure activity

The idea of research as leisure activity has stayed with me because it seems to describe a kind of intellectual inquiry that comes from idiosyncratic passion and interest. It’s not about the formal credentials. It’s fundamentally about play. It seems to describe a life where it’s just fun to be reading, learning, writing, and collaborating on ideas.

BMPI 周记 008：设止损而勇试错

交易的本质就是设置止损，然后赌一把

找点事干

罗大佑在采访中表达了这样的看法：他认为网络最大的罪恶就是好像什么问题都可以迅速给你【答案】，以至于现在的年轻人体会不到那种「找不到答案」的感觉，而他那个年代很多东西都是要自己去找的，这个【过程】非常重要，因为罗大佑坚信好音乐一定是挣扎出来的。

Connection with reality

As generative models get better, more and more people will just assume that a given piece of text, image or video is likely fake,

So if you’re creating a business, a piece of content, anything really, think how it relates with the real world. Ask yourself: how can you provide that connection? How can you provide reality as a service?

Interview Learnings from former CIA Intelligence Officer

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QVVe2rCHtN0

For you to be a step ahead of everyone else just do an action, any action, and you’ll already be ahead of everyone. Even if you fall, you’ll already be four steps ahead of everyone else.

Using motivation just exploits something that people are already prone to do, and we just give them something that they want. If they’re not motivated, then we use manipulation, so they can actually give us what we want.

Moral Flexibility is a gateway for manipulation, which makes something acceptable in one context, but unacceptable in another context.

Then there are three spheres: the public, the private and the secret.

The public sphere is the safe zone… The private sphere is what the people in your inner circle see…The secret sphere is where all of your secrets lie: To move from one person’s public to secret sphere, you need to pass by the private one first. We want to have someone to tell our secrets, but we don’t have enough trust on the people that are in our private sphere. Once you get to someone’s secrets, they’ll trust you so much that even if you break their heart. They’ll resist leaving you, because it is very rare to find someone who we can tell our secrets to.

four core motivations: Reward, Ideology, Coercion and Ego

Kimi 创始人杨植麟最新分享：关于 OpenAI o1 新范式的深度思考

Quiet Compounding

Their entire financial universe was contained to the walls of their home, which allowed them to play their own game and be guided by nothing other than their own goals. That was their superpower. It was actually their only financial skill, but it’s the most powerful one of all.

Why it’s impossible to agree on what’s allowed

it’s very difficult to get people to agree on what moderation rules should apply to a platform.

两则故事：Intel Minnow，日本高分子化学

我一位高中同学当时在 Akron 读博，他听说这事儿以后就问了他的美国导师，“我们是不是杀死了日本人的一个行业”。他的导师回答“不，我们是给一具尸体照了次镜子”。

Retirement Ages by Country

佛法的终极奥义

Husserl 的现象学理论认为，我们所感知的一切事物都呈现为意识中的现象或表象。我们对世界的认知，本质上是意识活动的结果。

诸行无常，诸法无我，涅槃寂静

我为什么想要研究 AI 美学

从人类文明的演进来看，电影以及其他所有艺术形式，始终作为反映人类社会现实的一面镜子，映照着人类的梦想、恐惧、希望以及真实生活。

技术的进步既带来了「恩赐」，也伴随着「剥削」，而这两者之间往往存在不平衡。

技术进步在重塑权力格局的同时，也带来了新的不平等。… 任何技术的发展都不是中性的，背后反映了一定的价值取向和利益诉求。

AI 虽然展现了惊人的创造力，但并不能取代人类对生命意义、情感体验等终极问题的思索。相反，它可能成为一面镜子，借助与人类迥异的「创造性」，让我们重新审视人性和生命的本质。

AI and Neurography

Brainfuck Enterpise Solutions

人工智能与心智表征

达到我的要求很不容易，系统不仅需要一个心智，这个心智还要能对自身状态进行表征，才可能对外界表述出来。

松耦合，语义界面，及人工智能

这是一种非常自然的倾向，只要没有系统性的手段加以阻止，持续强力一种贯彻某种结构方案和设计原则，就必定会发生。广而言之，任何紧耦合系统都是如此，

任何紧耦合系统最终都会遭遇某种极限，在某个临界点之后，让系统在功能上变得更丰富更强大的任何努力都将是得不偿失的，系统仍然可能继续进化，但此后的进化会以一种（姑可称为）生态位漂移的方式进行，即，系统可能增加某些新特性，增强某些旧特性，但为此不得不牺牲另一些特性，在某处进行改进的同时，容忍另一些地方冒出一些难以修复的 bug（因为其乱麻性质，避免或修复这些被新改动牵出的新问题成本太高了），有时候这些地方反正已经很少被用到了，所以也没人介意，久而久之，系统抛弃了某些特性，发展了另一些特性，从而适应了新的生态位。（可以想象，在很长时间内，那些被抛弃的特性的遗骸会像一条条阑尾那样继续挂在这副丑陋的庞大躯体上）

从孤立生产者到市场分工合作体系的发展，是一种元系统跃迁（metasystem transition），而元系统跃迁是突破紧耦合系统发展极限的一条常见途径：当丰富壮大一个紧耦合系统的努力变得日益得不偿失时，出路不是继续改进既有系统，而是另起一个层次，将既有系统纳入一个多系统共生合作体系中，从而创造出一个具有更多层次的系统，而在该体系中，各成员系统之间是松耦合的（或者更准确的说，它们之间的耦合是足够松的）。

软件工程中，对付那些已经达到科斯临界点却又不愿丢弃的遗留系统时，一个常见办法就是为它创造出一套界面来

据 Stanislas Dehaene 的理论（见《脑与意识》），意识是一种由前额叶皮层激发的全脑激活状态，前额叶就像 DNI，当它从各知觉系统收到某些类型的情报时，会将其向全脑广播，在数百毫秒中、在分布广泛的众多脑区触发一波高度活跃的神经活动，假如 Dehaene 是对的，那么丹内特的多重草稿模型中的每个意识瞬间，就是来自不同知觉模块的多重草稿中成功抢到麦克风的那个，经由全脑广播而触发的一轮脑活动，这些意识瞬间继而在记忆中被组织为一套连贯的自我中心叙事，后者构成了我们对世界的体验。

各种高级意识活动之间的互动，是通过一种语义界面进行的，因而也是松耦合的，它们之间的互动关系既有合作，也有竞争（抢麦），这一情形很像国会中发生在议员之间的事情，他们或各自表达自己的看法，提出各自主张和立场，或针对其他议员的观点提出正面或反面的证据，或支持或反对的理由，他们相互争辩或支持，站队和拉帮结派……，最终，某种决议会从中产生，

所谓理性，并不是一个单一算法，而是由众多独立平行构件（算法）组成

模块专业化使得系统具有一种内在保守性，不会随训练数据的变化而过度摆动，因为每个模块的输入输出和反馈回路都被其“专业兴趣”局限住了，会自动忽略训练数据中的其他方面；这一点背后的原理是世界之可理解性假设：世界的某些局部与侧面一定比其整体更稳定、更一致、更少变，否则世界便是不可理解的；经验也告诉我们，专家与非专家的一个区别就是，前者的观点更少随近期事态变动而摇摆。

模块的内在保守性是可积累发展的前提，每个模块保持大致稳定，各自随训练继续而精炼（即框架稳定的同时在边际上改进），同时系统时不时添加一些新模块，令其认知能力随可用模块增长而不断升级增强，变得越来越全面、老练和精到。

语义界面也不是没有代价，界面就是一种契约，语义界面是基于一套概念框架的一组契约，不仅契约本身是一种束缚，概念框架在帮助我们认识世界的同时，也约束了我们的认知可能性，不妨称之为范式锁入，

The Plumber Problem

“The Plumber Problem” is a phrase I coined to describe the experience of watching a movie that touches on some subject area that you know way more about than the average person, and then some inaccuracy in what’s depicted distracts you and takes you out of the movie.

Tight Aggressive Entrepreneurship

Carefully choose what you work on, but once you do, pursure the project with intensity.

Not every brainfart deserves to see the light of day.

Higher Vibrations

An intelligent man is sometimes forced to be drunk to spend time with his fools.

Big IDGAF Energy

The Smart Web does exist (but it needs your support)

Sakana, Strawberry, and Scary AI

GPT-o1

World Building

The more complex or valuable is whatever you’re trying to sell, the more important it is for you to build a world around that idea, where other people can walk in, explore, and hang out – without you having to be there with them the whole time. You need to build a world so rich and captivating that others will want to spend time in it, even if you’re not there.

the actually hard problems in the world worth working on are system problems

The last important feature of all worlds is time. There are two important rules you need to follow here, invariably. First, your world should exist predominantly in the present. … The second rule … is there needs to be a strong concept of the arrow of time. … and it’s the backdrop against which all of your storytelling and all of your world takes place.

Multi-layered calendars

The Untethered Soul: The Roadmap of My Personal Growth – Part 4

reality is enough

First Follower: Leadership Lessons from a Dancing Guy

It was the first follower that transformed a lone nut into a leader

Let’s go! The 12 Startups in 12 Months Challenge Starts Now

The idea is that a fixed timespan helps you quickly find a few ideas worthy of your undivided focus.

The Cook and the Chef: Musk’s Secret Sauce ⭐

any other physical phenomenon in the universe, data and logic are far more effective tools than faith and scripture. … When it comes to most of the way we think, the way we make decisions, and the way we live our lives, we’re much more like the flood geologists than the science geologists.

MuskSpeak is a language that describes everyday parts of life as exactly what they actually, literally are.

how do you cause something to change? You direct your power towards it. A person’s power can come in various forms: your time, your energy (mental and physical), your resources, your persuasive ability, your connection to others, etc.

Musk calls this “reasoning from first principles.” I’ll let him explain: I think generally people’s thinking process is too bound by convention or analogy to prior experiences. It’s rare that people try to think of something on a first principles basis. They’ll say, “We’ll do that because it’s always been done that way.” Or they’ll not do it because “Well, nobody’s ever done that, so it must not be good.” But that’s just a ridiculous way to think. You have to build up the reasoning from the ground up—“from the first principles” is the phrase that’s used in physics. You look at the fundamentals and construct your reasoning from that, and then you see if you have a conclusion that works or doesn’t work, and it may or may not be different from what people have done in the past.5

A scientist gathers together only what he or she knows to be true—the first principles—and uses those as the puzzle pieces with which to construct a conclusion.

There are no axioms or proofs in science because nothing is for sure and everything we feel sure about might be disproven. Richard Feynman has said, “Scientific knowledge is a body of statements of varying degrees of certainty—some most unsure, some nearly sure, none absolutely certain.”

personally, I think that engineering is better because in the absence of the engineering, you do not have the data. You just hit a limit. And yeah, you can be real smart within the context of the limit of the data you have, but unless you have a way to get more data, you can’t make progress. Like look at Galileo. He engineered the telescope—that’s what allowed him to see that Jupiter had moons. The limiting factor, if you will, is the engineering. And if you want to advance civilization, you must address the limiting factor. Therefore, you must address the engineering.

“What will most affect the future of humanity?” and put together a list of five things: “the internet; sustainable energy; space exploration, in particular the permanent extension of life beyond Earth; artificial intelligence; and reprogramming the human genetic code.”

“When something is important enough, you do it even if the odds are not in your favor.”

Musk sees people as computers, and he sees his brain software as the most important product he owns—and since there aren’t companies out there designing brain software, he designed his own, beta tests it every day, and makes constant updates. That’s why he’s so outrageously effective, why he can disrupt multiple huge industries at once, why he can learn so quickly, strategize so cleverly, and visualize the future so clearly.

Creative thinking is a close cousin of first principles reasoning. In both cases, the thinker needs to invent his own thought pathways.

Dogma is everywhere and comes in a thousand different varieties—but the format is generally the same: X is true because [authority] says so. The authority can be many things.

dogma has a powerful ally—the group.

Tribalism is good when the tribe and the tribe member both have an independent identity and they happen to be the same. Tribalism is bad when the tribe and tribe member’s identity are one and the same.

Most of the major divides in our world emerge from blind tribalism, and on the extreme end of the spectrum—where people are complete sheep—blind tribalism can lead to terrifying things.

If you start looking for it, you’ll see the chef/cook thing happening everywhere. There are chefs and cooks in the worlds of music, art, technology, architecture,7 writing, business, comedy, marketing, app development, football coaching, teaching, and military strategy.

Conventional wisdom is slow to move, and there’s significant lag time between when something becomes reality and when conventional wisdom is revised to reflect that reality. And by the time it does, reality has moved on to something else. But chefs don’t pay attention to that, reasoning instead using their eyes and ears and experience. By ignoring conventional wisdom in favor of simply looking at the present for what it really is and staying up-to-date with the facts of the world as they change in real-time—in spite of what conventional wisdom has to say—the chef can act on information the rest of us haven’t been given permission to act on yet.

What makes Musk so rad is that he’s a software outlier. A chef in a world of cooks. A science geologist in a world of flood geologists. A brain software pro in a world where people don’t realize brain software is a thing.

Everything around you that you call life was made up by people that were no smarter than you. And you can change it, you can influence it, you can build your own things that other people can use. Once you learn that, you’ll never be the same again.12

It’s for this reason that Steve Jobs looks back on his firing from Apple in 1986 as a blessing in disguise. He said:14 “Getting fired from Apple was the best thing that could have ever happened to me. The heaviness of being successful was replaced by the lightness of being a beginner again. It freed me to enter one of the most creative periods of my life.” Being fired “freed” Jobs from the shackles of his own history.

The Consultant Out of Time

embraces context switching as core to the practice of consulting, and views context-switching as an advantage for the consultant