The Map is not the Territory
Ninety Mental Models from Fernam Street (Review)
Sometimes, you encounter someone else's work and are struck by awe. They accomplished exactly what you had set out to achieve for yourself.
Admiration can be a terrifying force. It makes you freeze. For a moment, you feel your work is meaningless. If your project is already out there, why keep writing?
The first knee-jerk reaction gives way to a deeper realisation.. You can stand on their shoulders, reference their work and continue with your quest. If another fellow intelligent human being has pursued a similar path and achieved success, it means you are on the right track. Later validation is still validation. Yet, in a world where competitive dynamics are everywhere, it comes veiled with a nagging message. Maybe you're late to the party, and you're certainly less original than you thought you were!
Today, I felt like this encountering Fernam Street, the work of former intelligence analyst Shane Parrish. This popular newsletter aims precisely at mastering what others have already figured out. The blog is named after Berkshire Hathaway's HQ address, and you can find a lot of popular Buffett & Munger’s tropes in it.
What’s funny is that I discovered it completely by chance, while I was doing some very open-ended market research with an AI. You could say it was ChatGPT that recommended it to me!
This are some of my highlights from Fernam Street.
The Map is not the Territory. Understanding the difference between perception and reality can be incredibly tricky. Orienting around your mind is a complex task. You may need many different maps.
The image is borrowed from influential semiologist and mathematician Alfred Korzybski. Here, you can find his original paper on “Non-Aristotelean systems and their necessity for mathematics and physics” (from his book Science and Sanity, 1933). It’s a highly technical read, but worth skimming through.
It is the perfect introduction to the Mental Models program, a curated list of thinking tools, which by analogy can be used to make sense of complex phenomena.
Mental Models. Shane’s catalogue of over 94 mental models is invaluable. He makes the very smart choice of organising them by discipline: Physics, Chemistry, Biology, Microeconomics, War and Strategy, Human Psychology.
In comparison, my program of organising mental models (“stories”) by dimensionality (Story with N characters…) is an order of magnitude more complex.
Reading through the list I realised that only the ones that are borrowed from Physics (thermodynamics, inertia, velocity, leverage…) have a clear sense of dimensionality. The other are mostly “multi-dimensional”, or as dimensional as you like them to be.
A catalogue of analogies to think about how we think can take us very far; but how can we integrate it better with the way we make decision? What are the natural case studies for a applying such a long list of modelling tools?
Complex Adaptive System Introduction. On an additional note, his introduction to complex systems is also very well-written. A good introduction if your new to the topic. Enjoy!
Hope this finds you well and you’re having a great summer. Talk soon,
David
Farnam Street does great summaries, but if you want a deeper dive into primary or secondary sources on CAS, you can try David Snowden, Jennifer Garvey-Berger and Juarerro. 😊 Disclaimer: I work with the former and have association-by-company with the others.