Mental models

by anthilemoon • 7 years ago

140 37 7 years ago

rawland• 7 years ago

As the site is down: http://web.archive.org/web/20190725120100/https://nesslabs.c...

Here a "quick" summary:

    Anchoring: a cognitive bias where an individual relies too heavily on an
    initial piece of information—the “anchor”—when making decisions.

    Backward chaining: working backward from your goal.

    Classical conditioning: you’ve probably heard about Pavlov’s dog. Classical
    conditioning is a learning method in which a biologically potent stimulus—such
    as food—is paired with a previously neutral stimulus—let’s say a bell. The
    neutral stimulus comes to create a response (salivation) that is usually
    similar to the one created by the potent stimulus (in this case, food).

    Commitment and consistency bias: the desire to be and appear consistent with
    what we have already done.

    Common knowledge: knowledge that is known by everyone or nearly everyone,
    usually with reference to a particular community. Common knowledge doesn’t
    necessarily mean truth, but most people will accept it as valid.

    Comparative advantage: the ability to carry out a particular economic
    activity—such as making a specific product—more efficiently than another
    activity.

    Diversification: the process of allocating your resources in a way that reduces
    the exposure to any one particular risk.

    Economies of scale: the cost advantages that businesses obtain due to their
    scale of operation. The larger the scale, the smaller the cost per unit.

    Efficient-market hypothesis: a theory that states that prices fully reflect all
    available information. The hypothesis implies that is should be impossible to
    consistently beat the market, since market prices should only react to new
    information.

    Game theory: an umbrella term for the science of logical decision making in
    humans, animals, and computers.

    Hyperbolic discounting: a model which states that, given two similar rewards,
    people show a preference for one that arrives sooner rather than later.

    Illusion of control: the tendency for people to overestimate their ability to
    control events.

    Incentive: something that motivates or encourages someone to do something.

    Inversion principle: the process of looking at a problem backward. For example,
    instead of brainstorming forward ideas, imagine everything that could make your
    project go terribly wrong.

    Loss aversion: people’s tendency to prefer avoiding losses to acquiring
    equivalent gains. We are basically more upset about losing $10 than we are
    happy about finding $10.

    Margin of safety: in a business, how much sales level can fall before a company
    reaches its break-even point.

    Maslow’s hierarchy of needs: a five-tier model of human needs, often depicted
    as a pyramid, in which needs lower down in the hierarchy must be satisfied
    before people can attend to needs higher up. In order, the needs are
    physiological needs, safety needs, love and belonging, esteem, and
    self-actualization.

    Mechanical advantage: also called the law of the lever, it’s a measure of how
    much your strength is amplified by using a tool or mechanical device.

    Mere-exposure effect: a psychological phenomenon by which people tend to
    develop a preference for things merely because they are familiar with them.

    Norm of reciprocity: the expectation that we repay in kind what another has
    done for us.

    Normal distribution: a theory which states that averages of samples of
    observations of random variables become normally distributed when the number of
    observations is sufficiently large.

    Operant conditioning: a learning process where the strength of a behaviour is
    modified by reinforcement or punishment.

    Redundancy: the duplication of critical components of a system with the
    intention of increasing its reliability. For example, a backup or a fail-safe.

    Scarcity: the limited availability of a commodity, which may be in demand in
    the market. Basically, when something is in short supply.

    Signalling theory: the science of determining whether people with conflicting
    interests should be expected to provide honest signals rather than cheating.

    Status quo bias: a preference for the current state of affairs, where the
    current baseline is taken as a reference point, and any change from that
    baseline is perceived as a loss.

    Supply and demand: an economic model which postulates that, in a competitive
    market, the unit price for a particular good or service will vary until it
    settles at a point where the quantity demanded will equal the quantity
    supplied, resulting in an equilibrium for price and quantity transacted.

    Surfing: the business principle of “riding the wave” of a new technology,
    product, or trend.

    Survivorship bias: the logical error of concentrating on the people that made
    it past some selection process and overlooking those that did not, typically
    because of their lack of visibility. Happens a lot in entrepreneurship.

    Tribalism: a way of thinking in which people are loyal to their social group
    above all else.

anthilemoon7• 7 years ago

Thanks so much for pasting it here! That's my website and I'm on the phone with my hosting provider.

lonelappde3• 7 years ago

4 spaces is for code, not blockquote. Using it for blockquote breaks HN layout. Use > to make blockquotes readable.

lonelappde3• 7 years ago

4 spaces is for code, not blockquote. Using it for blockquote breaks HN layout. Use > to make blockquotes readable.

windexh8er2• 7 years ago

The site looks like it's having a bad day right now, but in line with the subject I recently picked up "Super Thinking: The Big Book of Mental Models" [0] by Gabriel Weinberg of DuckDuckGo. Fantastic read on the topic. The audiobook is good as well, but if you go that route make sure you grab the illustration PDF as it's got some entertaining memes that go along with the topical areas.

[0] https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/41181911-super-thinking

graeme• 7 years ago

Were some of the models new to you? I read the first few chapters but found I was already familiar with all of them. Possibly I’ve just read too much on the topic already to get use out of it.

I read a lot of positive feedback about the book, so I’m wondering if I’m missing something.

manojlds• 7 years ago

It felt more like a beginner's intro. Some were new for me, but I would call myself a beginner.

jph• 7 years ago

Archive.org link: https://web.archive.org/web/20190725120100/https://nesslabs....

anthilemoon7• 7 years ago

Thank you!

jasode• 7 years ago

Side note curiosity... I noticed your html tags were WordPress and that your site resolved to Godaddy servers. So I looked at Godaddy's Wordpress hosting costs.[1] I see that Godaddy's $6.99 price tier says it's appropriate for ~25k monthly visitors.

It would be interesting to see what your traffic stats were that caused the "503 Service Unavailable error" and "Resource Limit Is Reached".

[To the downvoters, did I ask an inappropriate question about web hosting?]

[1] https://www.godaddy.com/hosting/wordpress-hosting

(I see that your live website is back up and the page transfers ~426kb. So multiply by 25k is ~10.7 GB of bandwidth. Following your comment about Netlify, I see that their $0 tier includes 100 GB of bandwidth.)

JackFr2• 7 years ago

Had me until the fake Einstein quote and the misspelled link to Farnam Street. Lost me for good.

martin-adams• 7 years ago

Is it this quote that you're referring to?

> “To break a mental model is harder than splitting the atom.”

I've tried to find any reference to this either being fake or misattributed, but can't find anything obvious. I'd love to know what you're referring to when saying it's fake.

anthilemoon7• 7 years ago

I didn't realise it was fake. If it is I'll remove it once the website is up-and-running again.

Kaibeezy2• 7 years ago

Einstein joke is a common meme. Typo is inconsequential and probably fixed in the non-archive version.

The article is substantive and interesting. Well worth a look.

JackFr2• 7 years ago

You're absolutely right. I was unnecessarily snarky.

scyclow• 7 years ago

Eric Weinstein wrote a good article several years ago arguing that the concept of kayfabe, taken form professional wrestling, is a great thing to have in your cognitive toolkit https://www.edge.org/response-detail/11783

lonelappde3• 7 years ago

It's not his fault for his name, but it repeatedly frustrates me to see Eric Weinstein mentioned because every time I think the reference is to Eric Weisstein, who build the math encyclopedia. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eric_W._Weisstein

febin• 7 years ago

I have been working on this for a long time now. It helped me achieve small success in writing(My articles gained some attention and ended up publishing a book with packt). I am still a beginner, long way to become a good model thinker.

Here are a few books, I recommend.

1.The Great Mental Models : General Thinking Concepts (Beginner Level)

2.Super Thinking (Intermediate)

3.The Model Thinker (Intermediate-Advanced, you can also take the coursera MOOC "Model Thinking" by the same author)

I am also working on a tool to assit people in thinking with models. If anyone is interested to try out the beta, you can signup here. https://forms.gle/xn9mESKZwUMD2y6RA I am hoping to release it next week.

Here are a few screenshots of the tool I am building. (Note: It's in MVP stage, not a finished product)

https://imgur.com/Jzxw4uz

https://imgur.com/XhiVJQM

anthilemoon7• 7 years ago

I'm the author of the article. Thanks for the hug of death! Currently on the phone with my hosting provider. A friend will help me move to Netlify later.

If you did manage to read the article and enjoyed it, I write a weekly newsletter with stuff like that. Will actually send the next one in a few hours: https://nesslabs.com/newsletter

ben509• 7 years ago

It's worth gathering a list of things as a reference, but it's not very interesting to read. Worse, listicles are on so many "viral" pieces it's become a big turn-off.

It would be more engaging if you picked a few items and went into depth in their commonalities, differences or origins.

anthilemoon7• 7 years ago

Thanks for the feedback! I mostly write as a way to learn new stuff and it really helped me to create this list. Good idea for a follow up article.

carapace• 7 years ago

Include the Meta-Model: http://www.nlpls.com/articles/NLPmetaModel.php

apo• 7 years ago

Using https://web.archive.org/web/20190725120100/https://nesslabs....:

The article is a list of 30 items in the category "mental model" bracketed by some high-level opinions. Included on the list are:

- areas of research ("game theory")

- broad motivational factors ("incentive"

- basic business terms ("margin of safety")

In other words, I wouldn't consider many of these things to be mental models.

Furthermore, the article offers no examples of the "great power" of mental models.

Unfortunately, this article isn't unique in mental model discussions. Most of them follow the same pattern.

To future authors: the world doesn't need yet another recapitulation of a list from Wikipedia on mental models.

Instead, try taking an item on the list and doing something surprising or unique with it.

If it seems like an anti-pattern ("tribalism"), show how useful it can be to the reader. If it's vague ("signaling theory"), give down-to-earth examples illustrating how to use its principles in daily life. If it seems like something that "mental gymnasts" would do all the time ("backward chaining"), expose its pitfalls.

Or, try to develop a good definition of the term "mental model." I see it used far too frequently with a citation to some other source. The author does this, but the quote doesn't clear up much. The definition on Wikipedia is just plain vague and may explain why these lists tend to include things that don't seem to be actual mental models but rather fields of study.

lukethomas• 7 years ago

For anyone interested in mental models, I strongly recommend checking out Askeladden Capital's website (http://www.askeladdencapital.com/). He's written something like 500k words on it.

chiefalchemist• 7 years ago

30 is a lot to keep top of mind, and there's more?!? It seems to me - and I have to give this some more thought myself - some of these can be grouped (read: chunked).

For example:

6. Comparative advantage

7. Diversification

8. Economies of scale

In short, if you go for 7 you compromise 8, or vice versa. Also, 6 and 8 seem to couple.

Another example,

2. Backward chaining

14. Inversion principle

Both seem pretty similar.

Moi? I'd prefer a list of 10 that I can commit to memory and be able to recall without too much trouble, than a list of 30+ that I'm going to read, smile, think "that's nice" and then forget.

Does anyone have a more focused list they can recommend? 2. Backward chaining

greggyb2• 7 years ago

6 and 8 don't naturally pair in the way people commonly think.

Comparative advantage is a confusing term in my mind. I typically substitute 'relative' for 'comparative'. It is an idea rooted in opportunity cost. The key insight of the concept is that there are benefits to exchange among two parties, even if one party holds an absolute advantage in production of all goods and services. There is a good discussion in the wikipedia article [0].

It is a useful exercise to work a couple of examples between two parties who each produce the same two goods, but at different costs.

When stripped down, it seems simplistic. But it is an incredibly useful mindset. A non-rigorous example, with completely made up nonsense numbers.

Consider an individual with a lawn. This individual needs their lawn mowed. They happen to be a superb lawn mower. They can mow their lawn in 30 minutes. Anyone they hire takes an hour to mow the lawn. This person has an absolute advantage in mowing their own lawn. Our hypothetical person can find someone who will mow their lawn (in an hour) for $1. Our hypothetical person can earn $10/hr. If they choose to mow their lawn (30min) they lose out on $5 of income. If they work 6 minutes, they can earn enough to pay for the lawn to be mowed. Thus our hypothetical person can choose to spend 30 minutes to mow their lawn, or they can spend 6 minutes to have their lawn mowed (async q;). Despite being a better lawn mower, our hypothetical person has a comparative disadvantage in lawn mowing.

[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Comparative_advantage#Ricardo'...

lordnacho• 7 years ago

The comparative advantage description is not quite right. At least not detailed enough, it needs to point out that it's a relative efficiency, not absolute.

The canonical example is the CEO who is both better at strategy AND better at typing than his secretary.

greggyb2• 7 years ago

I'll expand that it's a double relativity. It is my opportunity cost among options, relative to my counterparty's opportunuty cost among options.

It's not enough that the CEO is better at both strategy AND typing than his secretary. We must know the CEO's ratio of productivity between typing:strategy AND the secretary's ratio of productivity for the same.

Say the CEO can produce 5 strategies in an hour, or could spend the hour to produce 3 typings. And the secretary, in an hour can produce 1 strategy or 2 typings.

The CEO could give up 5/3 of a strategy to produce a typing. Her secretary, on the other hand, must only give up 1/2 a strategy to produce a typing. Thus it makes sense for the CEO to exchange her strategies for the typings produced by the secretary.

If the ratios were instead CEO 5/3 and secretary 3/1, then it would make sense for the secretary to produce strategies and trade them to the CEO for the CEO's typings.

Emma_Goldman• 7 years ago

Interesting, though the list is conspicuous for being almost entirely limited to 'models' from neoclassical economics and cognitive and social psychology.

runningmike• 7 years ago

There are Nice Oss tools for playing with mental models, e.g. See https://nocomplexity.com/causalloopdiagram/ a clone of loopy.

emanuer• 7 years ago

This is amazing, it took me some time to understand it, but now I am blown away by the simplicity of the tool and the possibilities it holds.

I already started gaining insights in some systems I am currently involved with.

Could you point me to more resources like this?

sova• 7 years ago

Some are very different from my names for them; Visualize Success is my #1. And the chant "how awesome this will be when it comes together." Then later on we would have this "Start with the Result/ What's the effect you want?" (also mainly as a vision, but maybe as a writing exercise of various sorts).

Now flip all your visualized result-thinking on its head and, having identified all your needs, find someone in the world who has the same needs and help them achieve them.

Superpower modes come when you're tuned into the needs of more beings than just yourself, which takes the emphasis away from "mental" and "my own" and puts it more on "the situation" and "the people in it"

Mental models

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