1. One of the biggest sources of idiocy is the belief that you need to have an opinion on everything.
2. If you want to be right, don’t try to be right, try to be less wrong. If you want to be smart, don’t try to be smart, try to be curious and humble.
May 4 • 22 tweets • 6 min read
A NEW MENTAL MODEL MEGATHREAD HAS ARRIVED!
In 20 tweets I’ll summarize 20 of the most useful principles I know.
Estimated reading time: 4 minutes.
Value: A lifetime.
Thread:
1. Dopamine Culture:
“Every kind of organized distraction tends to become more and more imbecile.”
— Aldous Huxley
The delay between desire & gratification is shrinking. Pleasure is increasingly more instant & effortless. Everything is becoming a drug.
What will it do to us?
Jan 2 • 12 tweets • 2 min read
In my years on Twitter, I’ve summarized hundreds of useful concepts into tweet form.
Here are the best concepts to help you navigate 2024, as chosen by the editors at @UnHerd
Thread:
1. The Opinion Pageant:
The rise of social media as the primary mode of interaction has caused us to overvalue opinions as a gauge of character. We are now defined more by what we say than what we actually do, and words, unlike deeds, are easy to counterfeit.
Dec 27, 2023 • 22 tweets • 5 min read
In 2023 I learned hundreds of useful concepts.
Here are 20 of the best, to equip you for 2024:
1. Licensing Effect:
Believing you’re good can make you behave bad. Those who consider themselves virtuous worry less about their own behavior, making them more susceptible to ethical lapses.
A big cause of immorality is self-righteous morality.
Nov 25, 2023 • 22 tweets • 5 min read
A NEW MENTAL MODEL MEGATHREAD HAS ARRIVED!
In 20 tweets I’ll summarize 20 key principles to understand the world.
Estimated reading time: 4 minutes.
Value: potentially a lifetime.
1. Herostratic Fame:
Many people would rather be hated than unknown. In Ancient Greece, Herostratus burned down the Temple of Artemis purely so he’d be remembered. Now we have “nuisance influencers” who stream themselves committing crimes and harassing people purely for clout.
Sep 3, 2023 • 7 tweets • 3 min read
Amid the bewildering cacophony of info, how do people decide what to believe?
They tend to automate their reasoning in 1 of 5 ways. As such, there are 5 kinds of "NPC", each with its own customs and shortcuts to "truth".
Learn to recognize each with this handy guide.
THREAD:
1. Conformists:
These people trust the process by which society reaches consensus, so accept the mainstream view on all things. The trouble is, consensus is often illusory:
Jun 16, 2023 • 42 tweets • 10 min read
A New MEGATHREAD Has Arrived!
In 40 short tweets I’ll explain 40 concepts to expand your mind.
Thread:
1. Bat-and-Ball Problem:
A bat and ball cost $1.10 in total. The bat costs $1 more than the ball.
How much does the ball cost?
If you guessed $0.10, wrong!
It’s $0.05.
You missed the “more than the ball.”
When we react instinctively, we react to a simplification of reality.
Apr 26, 2023 • 11 tweets • 2 min read
Today is the birthday of the legendary philosopher-emperor Marcus Aurelius, one of history’s wisest and most quotable figures.
So, in honor of the great man, here are 10 of his most powerful quotes (annotated by me):
1. “It is not death that one should fear, but never beginning to live.”
Is there much difference between spending all day on Twitter and being a corpse?
Mar 17, 2023 • 42 tweets • 8 min read
Peoples! A new MEGATHREAD has arrived!
In 40 tweets I’ll explain 40 mind-expanding concepts you should know.
Thread:
1. Dysrationalia:
Just because someone is intelligent, doesn’t mean their intelligence is pursuing intelligent goals. It’s possible to devote a genius-level intelligence to justifying idiotic opinions and behaviors. Tragically, a common fate of intellectuals.
Feb 20, 2023 • 12 tweets • 3 min read
10 WAYS TO AVOID BEING FOOLED
In 10 tweets I’ll explain 10 heuristics that will make you smarter.
Thread:
1. Epistemic Humility
Don't try to be right, try to be less wrong. Avoiding idiocy is easier to make a habit of than achieving genius, and by beginning from the position that you're somewhat wrong you'll become more aware of your blindspots and find it easier to change your mind.
Jan 27, 2023 • 12 tweets • 3 min read
Your beliefs are most likely to be bullshit.
Here are 10 reasons why, and 10 things you can do about it.
Thread:
1. Belief Bias:
Arguments we'd normally reject for being idiotic suddenly seem logical if they lead to conclusions we agree with, because we judge an argument’s strength not just by how strongly it supports the conclusion but also by how strongly *we* support the conclusion.
Dec 28, 2022 • 12 tweets • 2 min read
In 2022 I learned hundreds of useful concepts that improved my understanding of the world.
Here are the 10 best:
1. Solomon's Paradox:
We're better at solving other people's problems than our own, because detachment yields objectivity. But Kross et al (2014) found viewing oneself in the 3rd person yields the same detachment, so when trying to help yourself, imagine you're helping a friend.
Dec 22, 2022 • 13 tweets • 7 min read
There are over a billion websites on the internet, yet most people never use more than a dozen.
Here are 10 little-known websites that give you superpowers.
If I regularly read a website, I'll pay for it. But when I occasionally need to check an article from a website I don't regularly read, I use RemovePaywall to lift the paywall.
Nov 25, 2022 • 43 tweets • 9 min read
Friends, a new MEGATHREAD is here!
In 40 tweets I will explain 40 useful concepts you should know.
Thread:
1. Ostrich Effect:
We often try to avoid info that we fear will cause us stress. Thus bills and work emails remain unopened, bank balances remain unchecked. This is counterproductive because ignoring a problem doesn't eliminate the problem or your anxiety; it only prolongs them.
Jul 8, 2022 • 42 tweets • 8 min read
My friends, a new MEGATHREAD has arrived!
In 40 tweets I’ll explain 40 useful concepts you should know.
Reading time: ~7 minutes.
Value: a lifetime.
Thread:
1. Gruen Effect:
Ever notice how when you enter a large grocery store, common items like bread & milk are right at the back, and the journey there is labyrinthine? The layout is designed to confuse you, so you become lost, and end up impulse-buying items you don't need.
Jun 16, 2022 • 4 tweets • 4 min read
Hungarian photographer Kerenyi Zoltan superimposes old photos over new ones taken from exactly the same spot to create "windows into the past."
In 40 tweets I'll explain 40 mind-altering concepts.
Reading time: ~7 minutes.
Value: A lifetime.
THREAD:
1. Littlewood's Law:
Around once per month, each of us experiences a "miracle" (an event with odds of one in a million). Across the world miracles are literally happening all the time, but because there are so many of them we perceive them as mundane.
Feb 11, 2022 • 42 tweets • 10 min read
My friends, a new MEGATHREAD has arrived!
In 40 tweets I’ll explain 40 useful concepts you should know.
Reading time: ~7 minutes.
Value: potentially a lifetime!
Thread:
1. Social Proof:
When unsure how to act, people copy others, outsourcing their decisions. When Sylvan Goldman invented shopping trolleys, people didn’t want to use them because they seemed silly. So Goldman paid actors to use trolleys in his stores, and everyone quickly followed.
Jan 2, 2022 • 54 tweets • 13 min read
Ever wonder how wokeness managed to so rapidly dominate Western cultural institutions?
Well, the CIA may have had something to do with that.
Before you ridicule, read this THREAD:
Soon after the CIA was created in 1947, it set up the Propaganda Assets Inventory (PAI), which was tasked with waging a war of ideas against the Soviets. The first ideological battleground of the Cold War was the arts.
Sep 17, 2021 • 42 tweets • 9 min read
My peoples, the time has come for a MEGATHREAD.
In 40 tweets I will explain another 40 concepts you should know.
Strap in. Here we go:
Abstraction: There are scales of explanation. A human can be considered a person, mammal, collection of cells, collection of stardust. Sometimes the reason people can't see eye to eye is that they're unwittingly considering things at different levels of abstraction.
Nov 27, 2020 • 4 tweets • 1 min read
Many see social media as a problem, but I'm still amazed by it. Being able to read thoughts and follow events in real time across the world is a power past generations would've considered magic. We've essentially been granted clairvoyance & telepathy, and we complain about it.
Sure, tweets can be maddening & misleading, but ultimately Twitter shows you what you've chosen to see, so if it's stressing you out, consider the possibility that the problem is you, by looking at the kinds of people you interact with, follow, and are followed by.
