Mental models and framework thinking

Table of Contents

You can’t really know anything if you just remember isolated facts and try and bang’em back. If the facts don’t hang together on a latticework of theory, you don’t have them in a useful form. - Charlie Munger

If the facts don’t hang together on a latticework of theory, you don’t have them in a usable form. You’ve got to have models in your head. And you’ve got to array your experience both vicarious and direct on this latticework of models. – Charlie Munger

If you understand a general principle, you don’t need to see every one of its illustrations. – Henry David Thoreau

What are Principles and Mental Models?

Thinking in frameworks

Discipline your mind to think in frameworks.

Frameworks are structures to help organize your thoughts - so that you can identify the key levers that influence a result.

The goal of framework thinking is to have a library of these frameworks on topics that are important to you.

If you can connect different frameworks, the amount of depth and insights that you can provide are great.

Mental frameworks are descriptive, predictive, and help expose blind spots – and all mistakes come from blind spots.

Proper mental frameworks must be composed of time-tested and robust principles - “the big ideas from the big disciplines.” Forming them is important no matter our stage of life, context, or future goals as they help sharpen our thinking, judgment, and decision-making. Rather than having ideas floating around aimlessly in our heads, our mental frameworks will allow us to organize and categorize information so that they become interconnected and robust understanding.

If we can create our own mental frameworks in which to organize, categorize, and interconnect information, we can deepen our understanding of the world. This will make us more effective thinkers, improve our decision-making, and reduce our blind spots, resulting in more complete and fulfilling lives.

A latticework of Mental Models is an integrated approach to thinking where mental models combine with, challenge, or supplement one another. It’s an example of the sum being more than its parts and is more of a mindset and approach than it is an exercise in simple recollection.

Where can we find good Principles and Mental Models?

How can we build a Latticework of Mental Models effectively

Good mental models center on fundamental truth, human accomplishment, human foibles, and the arduous path to wisdom.

  1. Consider use cases for various models
    1. what would this look like in my world?
    2. how might I have used this over the last three months?
  2. Identify a trigger.
    1. What’s the trigger where you will remember to use the model?
  3. Make connections.
    1. Note taking - Purpose and Benefits
  4. Write down your thoughts.
    1. Note taking - Purpose and Benefits
  5. Use the Learn function.
  6. Explore new combinations and case studies.
    1. Learn from others.

Benefits

Train your brain to think fast before you speak.

To think fast, you need to put your knowledge into frameworks. Sort them. Organize them. You can recall the topics that you want to talk about very quickly. What are the key levers that make sense?

If you can do this, you don’t have to get derailed by garbage corporate words like “vision, strategic, etc.”

Steer - don't follow

(another video from the same channel).

Why do some people always know what to say? They can never get flustered. They can always answer questions on the fly. The answer is not high IQ. We can train our brains to do that as well.

In a nutsheel, it is taking back control in stressful situations and steer the conversation towards what you want to talk about instead of just following along what other people are leading towards.

Why do a lot of people have trouble with steering and instead just follow?

The answer is, they struggle to find a point towards which the conversation needs to be steered towards. They have trouble figuring out where the conversation needs to go.

Examples of frameworks

  1. Regret-Minimization Framework (refer to Book - The Amazon Way)

  2. Systems and Goals

  3. Second-Order Thinking

  4. Use Complexity Partitioning when you are Overwhelmed by things

  5. Learn by Inverting

  6. Occam’s razor

  7. Lessons about Strategic Thinking from Chess

    In an age of infinite leverage, judgment - not work determines success or failure - Naval Ravikant

    There is a treasure trove of strategic frameworks that can be learned from Chess. How to become a more strategic thinker through mental models that we can learn from playing chess.

    1. Control the Center
    2. The True Value of a Piece
    3. Position Over Submission
    4. Owning The Initiative
    5. Tactical Retreat

Strategic and Effective Thinking

How to become a more strategic thinker?

What is good judgment, if not the ability to think clearly and strategically, and then make good decisions?

Throughout your 20s, you can bust your ass, work really hard. But at that age, we have no good judgement. We make bad decisions. We apply our efforts towards low leverage opportunities.

The problem for most of us is that we’re never really taught how to make good decisions. As a result, we tend to make decisions based on emotions and then justify them with logic. That is not going to get us very far in life. What will? Start using mental models for thinking more strategically.

  1. Asking questions
  2. Avoid Intense Ideologies. Have an Open Mind. Use the Rule of Rethinking.
  3. Book - Asking the Right Questions-A Guide to Critical Thinking
  4. First principles thinking
  5. Habits - Write to think
  6. Second-Order Thinking
  7. Reduce Brain Fog And Improve Clear Thinking
  8. Talking out loud to yourself is a technology for thinking
  9. Why Speaking to Yourself in the Third Person Makes You Wiser
  10. Effective people think simply
  11. Book - Seeking Wisdom by Peter Bevelin
  12. Use strategic mindset to learn things and overcome challenges

Cognition, Consciousness and Critical Thinking

TODO

  1. https://fs.blog/mental-models/
  2. https://fs.blog/2016/08/fundamental-attribution-error/
  3. https://fs.blog/2017/04/mental-model-hanlons-razor/
  4. https://fs.blog/2017/05/confirmation-bias/
  5. https://fs.blog/2011/08/mental-model-availability-bias/
  6. https://fs.blog/2009/08/what-is-hindsight-bias/
  7. https://modelthinkers.com/mental-model/com-b-behaviour-change-wheel
  8. https://modelthinkers.com/mental-model/decision-tree
  9. https://modelthinkers.com/mental-model/deliberate-practice
  10. https://modelthinkers.com/mental-model/east-framework
  11. https://modelthinkers.com/mental-model/fast-and-slow-thinking
  12. https://modelthinkers.com/mental-model/focused-and-diffuse-thinking
  13. https://modelthinkers.com/mental-model/habit-loop
  14. https://modelthinkers.com/mental-model/hyperbolic-discounting
  15. https://modelthinkers.com/mental-model/idea-sex
  16. https://modelthinkers.com/mental-model/map-vs-territory
  17. https://modelthinkers.com/mental-model/mungers-latticework
  18. https://modelthinkers.com/mental-model/systems-vs-goals
  19. https://modelthinkers.com/mental-model/t-shaped-people
  20. https://modelthinkers.com/mental-model/temporal-landmarks
  21. https://modelthinkers.com/mental-model/temptation-bundling
  22. https://modelthinkers.com/mental-model/ulysses-pact

Reading material

  1. https://ltcwrk.com/introduction/
  2. https://modelthinkers.com/playbook/build-a-latticework-not-a-list

Book recommendations

  1. Mental models are so valuable that billionaire Ray Dalio’s only book is full of his best mental models.
    1. Book - Principles: Life and Work
  2. Charlie Munger’s only book is packed full of his top mental models too.
    1. Poor Charlie’s Almanack: The Wit and Wisdom of Charles T. Munger, Expanded Third Edition Hardcover – 2005 by Peter D. Kaufman (Editor), Ed Wexler (Illustrator), Warren E. Buffett (Foreword), Charles T. Munger (Author)
  3. Thinking In Systems: A Primer Donella H. Meadows , Diana Wright
    1. https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/3828902-thinking-in-systems
  4. For anyone interested in the practical application of systems thinking, Eli Goldratt’s Theory of Constraints (outlined in his 1984 book, The Goal) provides a good foundation.
    1. https://www.goodreads.com/author/show/66037.Eliyahu_M_Goldratt
  5. If you’re interested in a deeper, more philosophical approach (complexity science) I would recommend looking into the “Complexity Explorer” courses at Santa Fe Institute. For more info, there’s Melanie Mitchell’s “Complexity: A Guided Tour” and the books published by SFI Press.
  6. On YouTube, there’s also “Systems Thinking with David Shapiro” which features interviews on the topic.

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