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Useful Mental Models (2016)
- wslh 9y agoRe efficient market hypothesis + five forces: new markets are inefficient and you can sit on top of a big opportunity. More, when your company has real customer leads and profits.
- xtony 9y agoWhat does LRU (least recently used) have to do with picking the highest-priority problem? But overall, pretty good overview and I appreciate the links to other sources.
- DrImplausible 9y agoTo pick an example out of thin air, think of stage act trying to keep a number of plates spinning. You can keep a number of them going, but the LRU one is the one most likely of falling because it's lost some energy, and you need to check it to keep it up in the air.
- AnimalMuppet 9y agoThat's a great explanation for something the article didn't explain very well. Still, LRU only works if they are of equal importance. Otherwise, work on the important one, even if you've worked on it more recently than the others. A related idea is the "tyranny of the urgent". You can't let the urgent things keep you from doing the important things. (I stole this from a booklet with the quoted title, which stole the idea from the manager of a cotton mill.)
- JonasJSchreiber 9y agoI appreciate the planning fallacy. I usually do this implicitly but I just changed an expected timeline on a JIRA epic from 80 hours to 160 days after reading this.
- t3chn0SchO0lbus 9y ago"I can look through all of my emails before the end of the day"
- pm 9y ago80 hours to 160 days? Or do you mean 80 hours to 160 hours?
- finaliteration 9y agoThe article said, “upgrade the units and double the estimate.” So 20 hours -> 40 days -> 80 weeks -> 160 months
- xyzzy_plugh 9y agoThere's a reason I encourage calling a collection of epics a "fantasy".
- Afforess 9y agoWatch out - there is a reverse bias, Parkinson's law, that work expands so as to fill the time available for its completion. This is why Elon Musk sets absurd deadlines he rarely can meet, to resist the expansion of make-work and administrative bloat which consumes longer-timed tasks.
- vanzorn 9y agoA personal favorite on the subject of mental models: A Lesson on Elementary, Worldly Wisdom As It Relates To Investment Management & Business Charles Munger, USC Business School, 1994 http://old.ycombinator.com/munger.html http://old.ycombinator.com/munger.html
- kaycebasques 9y agoAs far as I can tell, Munger is the one who really popularized the notion of mental models, so this is a must-read. For anyone not in the know, Munger is Warren Buffett's business partner. The basic idea is to collect an interdisciplinary checklist of different paradigms for viewing the world, and then run through that checklist and apply each mode of thinking to whatever tough problem you're working through. HN readers probably already know all of this, but I just love this approach to thinking and wanted to share the wealth :)
- branweb 9y agoThe founder of DuckDuckGo published a similar list of mental models a little before this one. His list is longer, but there is some overlap between it and this one: https://medium.com/@yegg/mental-models-i-find-repeatedly-useful-936f1cc405d https://medium.com/@yegg/mental-models-i-find-repeatedly-use...
- jonahx 9y agoKent Beck has a similarly-themed list of mental models: https://www.facebook.com/notes/kent-beck/a-searching-and-fearless-intellectual-inventory/1179765038723025 https://www.facebook.com/notes/kent-beck/a-searching-and-fea... I love the idea of cataloging your interests at this high-level of abstraction, and wish it were more common.
- alexpetralia 9y agoIn case there is any interest, I write a bi-weekly newsletter on mental models, covering not just the concept but how you can apply them to your life: https://alexpetralia.github.io/newsletters https://alexpetralia.github.io/newsletters
- quickthrower2 9y agoIt would be good to include some mental models for attitude towards money. Things I have noticed about myself: No problem paying for something that absolutely needs to be done. E.g. repair a leak in the roof. Replace something. Don't notice money spent on regular monthly payments. E.g. mortgage. Don't notice $1000 spent as 50*$20 but more frightening to spend $1000 at once. Fear of loss when investing is big. It feels like such a leap of faith to invest in anything. However spending the same money as the investment on a holiday is OK for some reason. Easier emotionally to not earn $1000 than to earn it and spend it, even though the financial outcome is the same. Has nothing to do with working hard etc. It's hard to hodl!
- gerad 9y agoEarn $1000 = $500 after taxes. :)
- andrei_says_ 9y agoI use the multiplier the other way around. When I am about to spend $100, I remember it’s about $150-160 in earned money.
- c3534l 9y agoMore like 800, I don't know why people like to exaggerate how much goes to taxes. Median marginal federal tax rate is 15%, which means on average it's less than that.
- virgilp 9y agoDepends on country. Here, for a salary you typically pay 45% tax and the employer pays an additional 2.25% - so that's pretty close to the parent comment. (however, for e.g. stock gains you only need to pay 10%)
- vostok 9y agoI would be very surprised if the median HN user had a marginal tax rate of 15%. At last year's rates, I would expect something like 36%. Of this, 28% is federal, 1.45% is payroll, and 9.3% is state. These add up to more than 36% because of deductions.
- rubicon33 9y agolots of models for combating optimism, but few for combating pessimism. written for sure from the perspective of an optimist.
- bello 9y agoFarnam Street Blog also has their comprehensive list of mental models: https://www.farnamstreetblog.com/mental-models/ https://www.farnamstreetblog.com/mental-models/
- ww520 9y agoWow. This is a great list. I've seen individual ideas here and there but never put together in a list. This is excellent for exploring these ideas in one shot.
- K0SM0S 9y agoNice. This is a good addition to "List of cognitive biases", a Wikipedia article I've liked to read from time to time ever since I discovered it, years ago. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_cognitive_biases https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_cognitive_biases As a Stoic, it's good food for thought to improve your "perception" of life and the world.
- myaso 9y agoI personally find a lot of the material about cognitive biases hard to swallow -- I was forcing myself really hard when I read Kahneman's book. There were some good points but while reading it something just seemed off in a way similar to trying to break down the world into a rigid dichotomy -- likes "is the a ok approximate anwser?" "Yes" "Would I use it?" "Possibly with great skeptism and appropriate weight given the context, but likely not"
- K0SM0S 9y agoI still have to read that book. Thanks for reminding me. About rigid dichotomies though, including the page I linked, I think it's a cognitive bias in and out of itself. I take these observations as "food for thought", literally, not ready-made conclusions to swallow. A good basis to reflect upon things, but it's just that, the initial spark.
- myaso 9y agoI agree. But I think the value these biases actually provide in helping to understand what is going are more limited than people make them out to be. It's much more powerful to simply internalize the worldview of somebody who knew what they were doing, or several of them -- you're not starting from scratch and you're not using models like a dictionary without knowing how to write.
- ShabbosGoy 9y agoThe method of loci[1] is missing from this list. I am a visual/spatial learner, and find it quite useful for quick information storage and retrieval. [1] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Method_of_loci https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Method_of_loci
- aizatto 9y agoI think this is great! I love to explore how I think by asking myself questions on how I do things, be it decision making or planning. I created this site which I use to help me figure things out. https://www.deepthoughtapp.com/en/topics/decisions/ https://www.deepthoughtapp.com/en/topics/decisions/ https://www.deepthoughtapp.com/en/topics/planning/ https://www.deepthoughtapp.com/en/topics/planning/
- joe_the_user 9y agoEfficient market hypothesis That's a kind of ideological way to phrase the situation. It's easier to just describe the "stable market hypothesis"; however things are organized is the way that market structures have stably gone and thus can't easily be changed (whether market are efficient or not). This includes all the points in the parent plus the point that you may have improved on app/gimzo X significantly over the weekend but the market probably still won't jump to your solution easily because of mind-share/network-effect/existing-investment/market-leader's-connection-to-customers/etc.
- arundelo 9y agoThe efficient-market hypothesis is an idea that already has a well-known name. In the article the words are a Wikipedia link.
- joe_the_user 9y agoIndeed, I'm pretty familiar with it. It is well known, not universally accepted and a variety of ideology implications go along with it.
- ChubbyGlasses 9y agoFront page test – an ethical standard for behavior that evaluates each action through the lens of the media/outside world. Example: What would happen if HN found out we’re mining our users’s IMs? I feel like I might be okay with it if was a university (.edu domain) and I knew it was anonymized. Not sure I'd be okay with a random blog doing that.
- shidhin 9y agoGreat list. Incidentally I started an Instagram and Twitter account this week, to stick to my resolution for continued learning, where I plan to post one mental model per day. Please check it out if you're interested, and I'd appreciate your feedback. https://www.instagram.com/mental.models/ https://www.instagram.com/mental.models/ https://twitter.com/learnmodels/ https://twitter.com/learnmodels/
- stanislavb 9y agoThat's so useful. Everyone should read this list.
- mythrwy 9y agoMost of these are really good, especially productivity and time estimation. Some I do not agree with (although perhaps the model presented is useful depending on desired outcome). -Efficient market hypothesis: Markets are not fully efficient and the state of the world is not optimal. Thus opportunities exist. It's our job as engineers (and business people/humanitarians/writers/philosophers etc.) to recognize and correct these inefficiencies. Look for them. Its not easy and thus is called work. Do it anyway. -Base Rates: People are over-optimistic. They are also bad at finding similar things to compare. -Emic vs Etic: Dangerous form of mental laziness. While it might be "efficient" it leads to underestimating people and phenomenon, missing out on valuable information and, as the old saying goes, judging books by their covers. Sometimes valuable lessons and opportunities can be found in strange places. And often it isn't even what is said or even "anti-lessons". Better to remain somewhat open and listen without preconception and with consideration as much as possible. -Bias for Action: Unsure about this one. Looking back I'm not sure if I regret more actions I didn't take or actions I took that were mistakes. I think probably the second has had more negative impact. But I've been a fairly active person, maybe for a less active person it would different. In my case though very often doing nothing would have been the better choice. -Charitable interpretations: These do make relationships go better. Especially for people who take advantage of others. I'd recommend outward charitable interpretation, inward cynicism. It's usually more accurate for prediction. But cynicism does make a person unpleasant and negative so best not to display it. -Global Utility: A dangerous precedent. But sometimes yes, indeed needed. Be extremely careful of deals with the devil though and prefer principal, honer and fairness as much as possible. The long term gains are usually greater. The long term effects of short term utility can sometimes be fatal. -Reasonable Person Principal: Meh "reasonable" can be whatever a group decides. It's not always good. However, no need to keep someone around who doesn't fit the agenda. Hopefully you don't see them in the 30 under 30 list in a few years though. Otherwise it's a pretty good list.
- JHH_18 9y ago
- JHH_18 9y agoReminder? Good.
- Double_a_92 9y agoTheres a spelling error on "counterpary"
- amelius 9y agoNice, but imho the list should be accompanied by at least three real-world examples per model. Otherwise, many of the models may seem contrived and practically useless.
- kaycebasques 9y agoGreat list! Two criticisms: 1. One mental model that I applied when reading this post on mental models (so meta!) is "audience". As I was reading I thought to myself, "Who is this guy? Why should I trust his mental models? Is he living a life that I want to duplicate?" I mean it with respect and with no malice towards him, he's probably awesome. It's also possible to pick up useful mental models from people that you may not necessarily want to emulate. All I'm pointing out is that it's been really useful for me to consider the motivations and track record of the person giving me advice, before I take that advice to heart. 2. It's a long list! I wonder if it'd be more fruitful to have a shorter list, but to apply each mental model rigorously, every time. Charlie Munger (the guy who popularized mental models, as far as I can tell) himself is a huge advocate of checklists. I remember him saying something along the lines of "you have to be disciplined about your mental models. You have to apply every one, every time. You can't pick and choose."
- b0rsuk 9y ago"The teaching method" - I observed this myself while helping Python newbies on the internet. Pretty often when you're answering a newbie question, you gain a deeper understanding of the problem. Newbies don't ask exactly the same questions as you have in the past, so you start seeing old problems in new light. Also, you dust off your skills. Moral of the story: helping people on IRC can be a fun and enlightening past-time.
- b0rsuk 9y agoEmic and Etic: I observed that I very often disagree with people who use anime forum avatars. A few of them came close to getting banned (I'm not a moderator anywhere), others made really poor arguments.
- mrfusion 9y agoThe funny thing about expected value. Even if the expected value of a one dollar lottery ticket was ten dollars, it still wouldn’t be worth playing.
- jodrellblank 9y agoPeople always say lottery tickets have low expected return and aren't worth buying, and then use that to conclude that people are stupid. Instead of concluding that people do buy lottery tickets, so their model doesn't accurately model "value".