Techniques for Establishing First Principles

There are many ways to establish first principles. Let’s take a look at a few of them.

Socratic Questioning

Socratic questioning can be used to establish first principles through stringent analysis. This a disciplined questioning process, used to establish truths, reveal underlying assumptions, and separate knowledge from ignorance. The key distinction between Socratic questioning and normal discussions is that the former seeks to draw out first principles in a systematic manner. Socratic questioning generally follows this process:

Clarifying your thinking and explaining the origins of your ideas (Why do I think this? What exactly do I think?)
Challenging assumptions (How do I know this is true? What if I thought the opposite?)
Looking for evidence (How can I back this up? What are the sources?)
Considering alternative perspectives (What might others think? How do I know I am correct?)
Examining consequences and implications (What if I am wrong? What are the consequences if I am?)
Questioning the original questions (Why did I think that? Was I correct? What conclusions can I draw from the reasoning process?)

This process stops you from relying on your gut and limits strong emotional responses. This process helps you build something that lasts.

“Because I Said So” or “The Five Whys”

Children instinctively think in first principles. Just like us, they want to understand what’s happening in the world. To do so, they intuitively break through the fog with a game some parents have come to hate.

“Why?”

Here’s an example that has played out numerous times at my house:

“It’s time to brush our teeth and get ready for bed.”

“Why?”

“Because we need to take care of our bodies, and that means we need sleep.”

“Why do we need sleep?”

“Because we’d die if we never slept.”

“Why would that make us die?”

“I don’t know; let’s go look it up.”

Kids are just trying to understand why adults are saying something or why they want them to do something.

The first time your kid plays this game, it’s cute, but for most teachers and parents, it eventually becomes annoying. Then the answer becomes what my mom used to tell me: “Because I said so!” (Love you, Mom.)

Of course, I’m not always that patient with the kids. For example, I get testy when we’re late for school, or we’ve been travelling for 12 hours, or I’m trying to fit too much into the time we have. Still, I try never to say “Because I said so.”

People hate the “because I said so” response for two reasons, both of which play out in the corporate world as well. The first reason we hate the game is that we feel like it slows us down. We know what we want to accomplish, and that response creates unnecessary drag. The second reason we hate this game is that after one or two questions, we are often lost. We actually don’t know why. Confronted with our own ignorance, we resort to self-defense.

I remember being in meetings and asking people why we were doing something this way or why they thought something was true. At first, there was a mild tolerance for this approach. After three “whys,” though, you often find yourself on the other end of some version of “we can take this offline.”

Difference between Analogy and The F.P

Another way to think about this distinction comes from another friend, Tim Urban. He says^[3] it’s like the difference between the cook and the chef. While these terms are often used interchangeably, there is an important nuance. The chef is a trailblazer, the person who invents recipes. He knows the raw ingredients and how to combine them. The cook, who reasons by analogy, uses a recipe. He creates something, perhaps with slight variations, that’s already been created.

The difference between reasoning by first principles and reasoning by analogy is like the difference between being a chef and being a cook. If the cook lost the recipe, he’d be screwed. The chef, on the other hand, understands the flavor profiles and combinations at such a fundamental level that he doesn’t even use a recipe. He has real knowledge as opposed to know-how.

Examples of First Principles in Action

So we can better understand how first-principles reasoning works, let’s look at four examples.

Elon Musk and SpaceX

Perhaps no one embodies first-principles thinking more than Elon Musk. He is one of the most audacious entrepreneurs the world has ever seen. My kids (grades 3 and 2) refer to him as a real-life Tony Stark, thereby conveniently providing a good time for me to remind them that by fourth grade, Musk was reading the Encyclopedia Britannica and not Pokemon.

What’s most interesting about Musk is not what he thinks but how he thinks:

I think people’s thinking process is too bound by convention or analogy to prior experiences. It’s rare that people try to think of something on a first principles basis. They’ll say, “We’ll do that because it’s always been done that way.” Or they’ll not do it because “Well, nobody’s ever done that, so it must not be good. But that’s just a ridiculous way to think. You have to build up the reasoning from the ground up—“from the first principles” is the phrase that’s used in physics. You look at the fundamentals and construct your reasoning from that, and then you see if you have a conclusion that works or doesn’t work, and it may or may not be different from what people have done in the past.^[4]

His approach to understanding reality is to start with what is true — not with his intuition. The problem is that we don’t know as much as we think we do, so our intuition isn’t very good. We trick ourselves into thinking we know what’s possible and what’s not. The way Musk thinks is much different.

Musk starts out with something he wants to achieve, like building a rocket. Then he starts with the first principles of the problem. Running through how Musk would think, Larry Page said in an

interview, “What are the physics of it? How much time will it take? How much will it cost? How much cheaper can I make it? There’s this level of engineering and physics that you need to make judgments about what’s possible and interesting. Elon is unusual in that he knows that, and he also knows business and organization and leadership and governmental issues.”^[5]

Rockets are absurdly expensive, which is a problem because Musk wants to send people to Mars. And to send people to Mars, you need cheaper rockets. So he asked himself, “What is a rocket made of? Aerospace-grade aluminum alloys, plus some titanium, copper, and carbon fiber. And … what is the value of those materials on the commodity market? It turned out that the materials cost of a rocket was around two percent of the typical price.”^[6]

Why, then, is it so expensive to get a rocket into space? Musk, a notorious self-learner with degrees in both economics and physics, literally taught himself rocket science. He figured that the only reason getting a rocket into space is so expensive is that people are stuck in a mindset that doesn’t hold up to first principles. With that, Musk decided to create SpaceX and see if he could build rockets himself from the ground up.

In an interview with Kevin Rose, Musk summarized his approach:

I think it’s important to reason from first principles rather than by analogy. So the normal way we conduct our lives is, we reason by analogy. We are doing this because it’s like something else that was done, or it is like what other people are doing… with slight iterations on a theme. And it’s … mentally easier to reason by analogy rather than from first principles. First principles is kind of a physics way of looking at the world, and what that really means is, you … boil things down to the most fundamental truths and say, “okay, what are we sure is true?” … and then reason up from there. That takes a lot more mental energy.^[7]

Musk then gave an example of how Space X uses first principles to innovate at low prices:

Somebody could say — and in fact people do — that battery packs are really expensive and that’s just the way they will always be because that’s the way they have been in the past. … Well, no, that’s pretty dumb… Because if you applied that reasoning to anything new, then you wouldn’t be able to ever get to that new thing…. you can’t say, … “oh, nobody wants a car because horses are great, and we’re used to them and they can eat grass and there’s lots of grass all over the place and … there’s no gasoline that people can buy….”

He then gives a fascinating example about battery packs:

… they would say, “historically, it costs $600 per kilowatt-hour. And so it’s not going to be much better than that in the future. … So the first principles would be, … what are the material constituents of the batteries? What is the spot market value of the material constituents? … It’s got cobalt, nickel, aluminum, carbon, and some polymers for separation, and a steel can. So break that down on a material basis; if we bought that on a London Metal Exchange, what would each of these things cost? Oh, jeez, it’s … $80 per kilowatt-hour. So, clearly, you just need to think of clever ways to take those materials and combine them into the shape of a battery cell, and you can have batteries that are much, much cheaper than anyone realizes.

BuzzFeed

After studying the psychology of virality, Jonah Peretti founded BuzzFeed in 2006. The site quickly grew to be one of the most popular on the internet, with hundreds of employees and substantial revenue.

Peretti figured out early on the first principle of a successful website: wide distribution. Rather than publishing articles people should read, BuzzFeed focuses on publishing those that people want to read. This means aiming to garner maximum social shares to put distribution in the hands of readers.

Peretti recognized the first principles of online popularity and used them to take a new approach to journalism. He also ignored SEO, saying, “Instead of making content robots like, it was more satisfying to make content humans want to share.”^[8] Unfortunately for us, we share a lot of cat videos.

A common aphorism in the field of viral marketing is, “content might be king, but distribution is queen, and she wears the pants” (or “and she has the dragons”; pick your metaphor). BuzzFeed’s distribution-based approach is based on obsessive measurement, using A/B testing and analytics.

Jon Steinberg, president of BuzzFeed, explains the first principles of virality:

Keep it short. Ensure [that] the story has a human aspect. Give people the chance to engage. And let them react. People mustn’t feel awkward sharing it. It must feel authentic. Images and lists work. The headline must be persuasive and direct.

Derek Sivers and CD Baby

When Sivers founded his company CD Baby, he reduced the concept down to first principles. Sivers asked, What does a successful business need? His answer was happy customers.

Instead of focusing on garnering investors or having large offices, fancy systems, or huge numbers of staff, Sivers focused on making each of his customers happy. An example of this is his famous order confirmation email, part of which reads:

Your CD has been gently taken from our CD Baby shelves with sterilized contamination-free gloves and placed onto a satin pillow. A team of 50 employees inspected your CD and polished it to make sure it was in the best possible condition before mailing. Our packing specialist from Japan lit a candle and a hush fell over the crowd as he put your CD into the finest gold-lined box money can buy.

By ignoring unnecessary details that cause many businesses to expend large amounts of money and time, Sivers was able to rapidly grow the company to $4 million in monthly revenue. In Anything You Want, Sivers wrote:

Having no funding was a huge advantage for me.
A year after I started CD Baby, the dot-com boom happened. Anyone with a little hot air and a vague plan was given millions of dollars by investors. It was ridiculous. …
Even years later, the desks were just planks of wood on cinder blocks from the hardware store. I made the office computers myself from parts. My well-funded friends would spend $100,000 to buy something I made myself for $1,000. They did it saying, “We need the very best,” but it didn’t improve anything for their customers. …
It’s counterintuitive, but the way to grow your business is to focus entirely on your existing customers. Just thrill them, and they’ll tell everyone.

To survive as a business, you need to treat your customers well. And yet so few of us master this principle.

Employing First Principles in Your Daily Life

Most of us have no problem thinking about what we want to achieve in life, at least when we’re young. We’re full of big dreams, big ideas, and boundless energy. The problem is that we let others tell us what’s possible, not only when it comes to our dreams but also when it comes to how we go after them. And when we let other people tell us what’s possible or what the best way to do something is, we outsource our thinking to someone else.

The real power of first-principles thinking is moving away from incremental improvement and into possibility. Letting others think for us means that we’re using their analogies, their conventions, and their possibilities. It means we’ve inherited a world that conforms to what they think. This is incremental thinking.

When we take what already exists and improve on it, we are in the shadow of others. It’s only when we step back, ask ourselves what’s possible, and cut through the flawed analogies that we see what is possible. Analogies are beneficial; they make complex problems easier to communicate and increase understanding. Using them, however, is not without a cost. They limit our beliefs about what’s possible and allow people to argue without ever exposing our (faulty) thinking. Analogies move us to see the problem in the same way that someone else sees the problem.

The gulf between what people currently see because their thinking is framed by someone else and what is physically possible is filled by the people who use first principles to think through problems.

First-principles thinking clears the clutter of what we’ve told ourselves and allows us to rebuild from the ground up. Sure, it’s a lot of work, but that’s why so few people are willing to do it. It’s also why the rewards for filling the chasm between possible and incremental improvement tend to be non-linear.

Let’s take a look at a few of the limiting beliefs that we tell ourselves.

“I don’t have a good memory.” ^[10]
People have far better memories than they think they do. Saying you don’t have a good memory is just a convenient excuse to let you forget. Taking a first-principles approach means asking how much information we can physically store in our minds. The answer is “a lot more than you think.” Now that we know it’s possible to put more into our brains, we can reframe the problem into finding the most optimal way to store information in our brains.

“There is too much information out there.”
A lot of professional investors read Farnam Street. When I meet these people and ask how they consume information, they usually fall into one of two categories. The differences between the two apply to all of us. The first type of investor says there is too much information to consume. They spend their days reading every press release, article, and blogger commenting on a position they hold. They wonder what they are missing. The second type of investor realizes that reading everything is unsustainable and stressful and makes them prone to overvaluing information they’ve spent a great amount of time consuming. These investors, instead, seek to understand the variables that will affect their investments. While there might be hundreds, there are usually three to five variables that will really move the needle. The investors don’t have to read everything; they just pay attention to these variables.

“All the good ideas are taken.”
A common way that people limit what’s possible is to tell themselves that all the good ideas are taken. Yet, people have been saying this for hundreds of years — literally — and companies keep starting and competing with different ideas, variations, and strategies.

“We need to move first.”
I’ve heard this in boardrooms for years. The answer isn’t as black and white as this statement. The iPhone wasn’t first, it was better. Microsoft wasn’t the first to sell operating systems; it just had a better business model. There is a lot of evidence showing that first movers in business are more likely to fail than latecomers. Yet this myth about the need to move first continues to exist.

Sometimes the early bird gets the worm and sometimes the first mouse gets killed. You have to break each situation down into its component parts and see what’s possible. That is the work of first-principles thinking.

“I can’t do that; it’s never been done before.”
People like Elon Musk are constantly doing things that have never been done before. This type of thinking is analogous to looking back at history and building, say, floodwalls, based on the worst flood that has happened before. A better bet is to look at what could happen and plan for that.

“As to methods, there may be a million and then some, but principles are few. The man who grasps principles can successfully select his own methods. The man who tries methods, ignoring principles, is sure to have trouble.”

— Harrington Emerson

Conclusion

The thoughts of others imprison us if we’re not thinking for ourselves.

Reasoning from first principles allows us to step outside of history and conventional wisdom and see what is possible. When you really understand the principles at work, you can decide if the existing methods make sense. Often they don’t.

Reasoning by first principles is useful when you are (1) doing something for the first time, (2) dealing with complexity, and (3) trying to understand a situation that you’re having problems with. In all of these areas, your thinking gets better when you stop making assumptions and you stop letting others frame the problem for you.

Analogies can’t replace understanding. While it’s easier on your brain to reason by analogy, you’re more likely to come up with better answers when you reason by first principles. This is what makes it one of the best sources of creative thinking. Thinking in first principles allows you to adapt to a changing environment, deal with reality, and seize opportunities that others can’t see.

Many people mistakenly believe that creativity is something that only some of us are born with, and either we have it or we don’t. Fortunately, there seems to be ample evidence that this isn’t true.^[11] We’re all born rather creative, but during our formative years, it can be beaten out of us by busy parents and teachers. As adults, we rely on convention and what we’re told because that’s easier than breaking things down into first principles and thinking for ourselves. Thinking through first principles is a way of taking off the blinders. Most things suddenly seem more possible.

“I think most people can learn a lot more than they think they can,” says Musk. “They sell themselves short without trying. One bit of advice: it is important to view knowledge as sort of a semantic tree — make sure you understand the fundamental principles, i.e., the trunk and big branches, before you get into the leaves/details or there is nothing for them to hang on to.”

Elon Musk 如何比其他人學得更快更好

為什麼 Elon Musk 可以在四十歲中期於四個不同的領域（軟體、能源、運輸和航太）創造四家數十億的公司？

為了解釋 Elon Musk 的成功，其他人指出了他冒險犯難的工作倫理（他每週定期工作85個小時），替未來設定扭轉現實的願景，以及他難以置信的韌性。

但是所有這些我都覺得不夠解釋他的成功。很多人都有這些特質。我想了解他做了什麼與眾不同的事。

當我不斷閱讀關於 Musk 的幾十篇文章、影片和書籍時，我注意到一大塊拼圖失踪了。傳統的智慧說，要為了成為世界級的人物，我們只應該專注於一個領域。 Musk 破壞了這個規則。他的專長從火箭科學、工程、物理、人造智能到太陽能和能源。

在前一篇文章中，我稱像 Elon Musk 這樣的人為 “專家通才”（由 Bain＆Company 董事長 Orit Gadiesh 創造的一個名詞）。 “專家通才”在許多不同領域廣泛學習，了解連接這些領域較深層的原則，然後將原理應用於其核心專長。

根據我對 Musk 生活的回顧和與學習和專業知識相關的學術文獻，我相信我們應該在多個領域學習，以增加我們突破性成功的機率。

旁注：想把你的學習習慣提升到一個新的水準？我創建了一個免費“學習如何學習”的線上講座，你可能會喜歡。

樣樣通樣樣鬆的迷思

如果你是一個喜歡學不同領域的人，那麼你可能很熟悉這個善意的建議：

“成熟點。專注於一個領域。“

“像傑克那樣什麼都懂，沒一樣專精“。

隱含的假設是，如果你在多個領域學習，你只能學到表面，無法精通。

長時間以來”專家通才”的成功顯示這說法是錯誤的。跨多個領域的學習提供了資訊優勢（因此也是創新的優勢），因為大多數人只關注一個領域。

例如，如果你在技術行業，而其他所有人都只是閱讀科技出版物，但你也對生物學了解很多，你有能力提出幾乎沒有其他人可以想到的想法。反之亦然。如果你在生物學，且你也了解人工智能，那麼你比其他所有人都有資訊優勢。

儘管有這個基本的見解，但是很少有人實際上超越他們所在的行業

我們在自己領域裡其他人陌生的新領域學習，將讓我們做出別人無法做到的組合。這是專家通才的優勢。

一個有趣的研究反應了這個觀點。它研究了20世紀前五十九位歌劇作曲家如何達到精緻工藝。相較傳統說法-表現最好的人只能通過刻意的練習和專業化達到成功，研究員基斯·西蒙頓（Dean Keith Simonton）發現剛好相反：“最成功的歌劇作曲家的作品傾向於推出混合種類的作品，作曲家通過交叉訓練來避免過多的專精（過度訓練）造成的僵化，” 這也總結了 UPENN 研究員Scott Barry Kaufman 在“科學美國”雜誌上的文章內容。

Musk 的“學習轉移”超能力

根據他的兄弟 Kimbal Musk 描述，從他十幾歲的年紀開始，每天都會閱讀兩本不同學科的書。置入這個情境，如果你每個月讀一本書，Musk 可以讀你所讀書籍的60倍。

起初，Musk 的閱讀跨越了科幻小說、哲學、宗教、程式設計和科學家、工程師和企業家的傳記。隨著年齡的增長，他的閱讀和職業興趣擴展到物理、工程、產品設計、商業、技術和能源。這種對知識的渴望使他能夠接觸到他從未在學校學到的各種科目。

Elon Musk 還擅長一種非常具體的學習方法，大多數人甚至不了解的“學習轉移”。

學習轉移正在將我們在一個環境中學到的東西應用到另一個環境中。它可以將我們在學校或書中學到的內容應用到“現實世界”中，也可以將我們在一個行業中學到的東西應用到另一個行業。

這是 Musk 閃耀的地方。他的幾次採訪表明，他有一個獨特的兩步過程來促進學習轉移。

首先，他將知識解構為基本原裡

Musk 在 Reddit AMA 上的答案描述了他如何做到這一點：

將知識視為一種語義樹是重要的 – 確保你在進入葉子/細節之前，了解基本原理，即樹幹和大樹枝，不然沒有辦法掛任何東西在上面。

研究表明，將你的知識轉化為更深層次的抽象原理有助於學習轉移。研究還表明，一種技術特別強大，可幫助人們直覺的潛在原理。這種技術被稱為“對比案例”。

我們來看看它的工作原理：我們假設你要解構一個字母“A”，並明白什麼使“A”成為A較深層的原理。我們進一步說，你有兩種方法可以用來做到這一點：

你認為哪種方法比較有用？

方法＃1。方法1中的每個不同的 A 讓你看出每個 A 哪些一樣哪些不一樣。方法2中的每個 A 都一樣無法讓你有任何洞見。

當我們學習任何東西時，通過觀察許多不同的情況，我們開始直覺什麼是必要的，甚至製作我們自己獨特的組合。

這在我們的日常生活中是什麼意思？當我們進入一個新的領域時，我們不應該只採取一種方法或最佳實踐。我們應該研究很多不同的方法，解構每個方法，然後進行比較和對比。這將有助於我們發現潛在的原則。

接下來，他重建新領域的基本原理

Musk 學習轉移過程的第二步涉及將他把人工智能、技術、物理和工程方面學到的基礎原理重新構建到不同的領域：

在太空領域，如此創造了SpaceX。
在汽車領域，如此創造了特斯拉與自駕車功能。
在火車領域，如此預見了超高速管道列車(Hyperloop)。
在航太領域，如此預見了起飛和垂直著陸的電動飛行器。
在半機器人(cyborg)技術上，如此預見了接觸你的大腦的神經介面。
在支付技術上，如此幫助建立PayPal。
在AI技術上，如此共創 OpenAI，一個非營利、限制AI往負面發展的機率。

加州大學洛杉磯分校心理學教授和世界領先的類比推理思想家 Keith Holyoak 建議人們問自己以下兩個問題，以磨練他們的技能：“這讓我想起什麼？” 和 “為什麼會這會讓我想起那呢”

通過不斷地查看你環境中的物件和你閱讀的資訊，並詢問自己這兩個問題，你可以在大腦中建立起幫助你跨越傳統界限進行連接的肌肉。

底線：這不是魔術。這確實是正確的學習過程

現在，我們可以開始了解 Musk 為何會是世界一流的專家通才：

他花了很多年時間以60倍速度閱讀，盡可能像一個狂熱的讀者。
他廣泛地涉略不同的學科。
他不斷地把所學解構成基本原理，以新的方法重新建構。

在最深層次上，我們可以從 Elon Musk 的故事中學到，我們不應該執著專業化是事業成功和發揮影響力的最佳或唯一的途徑的教條。傳奇的專家通才巴克明斯特·富勒（Buckminster Fuller）總結了我們都應該考慮的思維轉變。他幾十年前就分享了這一點，而今天也是如此：

我們正處於一個時代，狹隘地走向認為專業化趨勢才合乎邏輯、自然以及符合大家想要的;如此想的同時，人類已被剝奪了全面性的理解。專業化促成了個人的孤立感、徒勞感和混亂感。這也導致了個人把思考和社會行為的責任留給其他人。專業化產生的偏見最終會導致國際和意識形態的不和，從而導致戰爭。“

如果我們投入時間學習跨領域的核心概念，並將這些概念關聯回我們的生活和世界，那麼在各個領域之間的轉移變得容易和快速。

隨著我們建立“首要原理”水庫，把這些原理與不同領域聯繫起來，我們突然獲得了能夠進入以前從未學到的新領域的超級力量，並迅速做出了獨特的貢獻。

了解 Elon 的學習超級能力有助於我們深入了解他如何進入一個已經有 100 多年的行業，並改變這領域競爭的整體基礎。

Elon Musk是其中一種，但他的能力並不是神奇的。

想要像 Musk 一樣學習嗎？我建了一個你可能會喜歡的免費“學習如何學習”線上講座。它是基於世界頂尖企業家最佳實踐的學習。

本文獲得原文 How Elon Musk Learns Fast and Better Than Everyone Else 的 Michael Simmons授權。

照片來自 Elon Musk – How I Became The Real ‘Iron Man’ 2017

引發驚人的爆炸力！ Elon Musk 知識軍火庫中最強殺傷力的武器 : 「第一性原理」（ First Principle )

「我會運用「第一性原理」思維而不是「類比」思維去思考問題。在日常生活中，人總是傾向於比較 — — 別人已經做過了或者正在做這件事情，我們也就去做。這樣的結果只能產生細小的叠代發展。「第一性原理」的思考方式是用物理學的角度看待世界的方法，也就是說一層層剝開事物的表象，看到裏面的本質，然後再從本質一層層往上走。」

— SpaceX、Tesla 電動汽車及 PayPal 創辦人 Elon Musk

什麼是「第一性原理」（ First Principle )？

所謂的「第一性原理」是一個量子力學中的一個術語，意思是從頭開始計算，只採用最基本的事實，然後根據事實推論，創造出新價值。在 Elon Musk 開發 Tesla 特斯拉電動車案例中，很多專家覺得電動車是不可能流行起來，因為電池成本在歷史上一直也降不下來。600美元 / 千瓦是市場的公價，電池從一直也是那麼貴，它的改進和降價總是很慢，所以它未來短時間內也不大可能大幅度降低價格。

但 Elon Musk 卻不認同，在他公司新電池的開發階段中，他率先屏棄現時市場所有生產電池組的已有技術，把電池組的構成物質全部分解，還原成最基礎的材料：碳、鎳、鋁及其他用於分離的聚合物，這種還原使他了解到重新構成了製造電池的「基本事實」（ Fact ）是什麼。

無可否認，上述的金屬成本如果在市場需求沒有大幅度改變下，是絕對降不下去的，可是他卻發現了當中剩下來的成本還包含了很大部份是屬於「人類協作過程」而生的成本，而他相信凡是人類協進的事情，就必定存在優化空間。

透過這些「基本事實」，Elon Musk 和團隊再把原材料每個部分再細緻分析及實驗，並把每項工作流程再優化重組，比如，在美國生產可能稅費比較高，那就不要在美國生產了；某種原有技術的模塊設計上出了問題，那就改變設計，最後他和團隊把各部份優化原件，加上全面改良的生產方法，整合成現時以能大幅度降低電池的生產成本為前提的電動汽車。

而把「第一性原理」的思想放在 Elon Musk 的 SpaceX 計劃，他也同樣挑戰過去太空運輸技輸產業中「成本就是那麼貴」的專家偏見，他先還原製造火箭「基本事實」，發現了一架火箭的原料成本原來只佔火箭的總成本的2%，而餘下的成本其實是其他製造過程的成本，而有了這層認知，他便朝著優化另外98% 的成本方向，把現時製造火箭的成本，降低了到現時的10% 。

這就是「第一性原理」（ First Principle ) 的爆炸力。

可是為什麼我們明明和 Elon Musk 身處在同一個世界，卻看不到 Elon Musk 看到的「第一性原理」（ First Principle )？為什麼？難道真的只是因為他比較有錢，接觸到較多高級知識份子嗎？總結原因，我認為有三大理由:

一、我們看不到，因為我們缺乏「硬學科」訓練

「第一性原理」（ First Principle ) 其實是事物底層規律的總結，就以泥石流作為例子，當你知道「從山頂上滾下的石頭會愈來愈快」這個基本事實後，如果當你不幸遇上泥石流時，你會選擇儘可能往山的兩側跑，而不是和順著山谷和泥石比拼鬥快，這個知識對你來說，可算是「野外求生」的知識，然而如果你能把這個知識發掘到底層，它其實就是為牛頓第二定律 F＝ma，有了這個底層知識，你不單能避開泥石流，更有可能想出造火箭方法。

而你能把這個大家也看得見的眼前「基本事實」，或「野外求生」知識，向底層發掘為大家也無法輕易以肉見看見的牛頓第二定律 F＝ma，需要的就是「硬學科」，例如數學、物理及化學。這些「硬學科」也許我們在求學時期早已學過，但在現在日常生活中，或許只餘下發薪水或買菜時，常用的加減乘除外，才有用武之地。

那為什麼我們從不會思考過如何融會貫通地使用呢？因為我們不明白這些「硬學科」價值在哪裏。

相比起心理學、經濟學和社會學等人文學科需經常配搭前置假設才能應用，「硬學科」是完全建立在基礎假設及邏輯思維分析之上，例如數學就是一個完全不依托真實存在的世界，透過假定範圍，幾乎所有的推論都是正確，因此它的知識可以算是更可靠，更貼近「第一性原理」（ First Principle ) 的本質。

二、我們看不到，因我們「自以為知道」

在一般學習書藉經常提到 : 個人認知的「知道」與事實上的「知道」的四象限中，我嘗試提再把它演繹為四個不同的層次 :

不知道自己不知道」Level 1 ：以為自己什麼都知道，自以為是的認知狀態
「知道自己不知道」Level 2 ：有敬畏之心，開始空杯心態，準備好投入學習
「知道自己知道」Level 3 ：抓住了事情的規律，提升了自己的認知
「極致的意會」Level 4：對事情的掌握，已經變成一種渾然天成的意會，在別人輾轉思量之際，你已立即能下準確的決定

認知」幾乎是人和人之間唯一的本質差別，技能的差別是可量化，但認知的差別卻是本質性的，不可量化。人和人比拼的除了是實踐力外，更重要是洞察力，

你的求知慾通常是由「你知道了自己不知道」（Level 2 ）開始產生; 人選擇不去求知，主要是因為大部份人一直也停留在「不知道自己不知道」（Level 1 ）。

「不知道自己不知道」（Level 1 ）的狀態是因為自己連那個「不知道」是什麼都沒有搞清楚，這就好比西醫只知「發炎」，而不知何謂「上火」。

對中醫來說，西醫所謂的「發炎」（ Inflammation ），其實是指「上火」，而火是有「實火」與「虛火」之分，而在虛實之中，治療方法也是可以完全截然相反。

而西醫卻因為從不知「上火」一字（或可以說就算就知道，也不重視「上火」在西方醫學知識系統的融合），只相信「發炎」便能解釋一切現象，因此亦錯過了在辨症時，以虛實之火去下更準確的藥方的機會，也錯過了自己發掘應對炎症不同程度症狀的新啟發，這就是「不知道自己不知道」（Level 1 ）的狀態所引發的問題。

三、我們看不到，因為我們「急功近利」的學習態度

學習是需要「基本功」的累積，凡事追根究底，深入學習，是要經歷流汗、未知、腦汁和時間付出。在華人以「考試結果及職業導向為最終學習目的」的情況下，我們早已失去了對學習的深索熱情和樂趣。

當你身邊人也在職場的高速公路上怒奔，大家終日也在看「三分鐘學會Google 的創新法則」，「三十分鐘不敗精讀法」，「三天快速增加你的財富收入」，並和你吹噓著上述的方法是如何啟發及有效，在創業場或職場上同樣具有競爭心的你怎能不焦急？在這裏我和你談學習需要時間練「基本功」，你也許會想 : 「別人都已進步都那麼快，再談基本功我就已做大輸家了！」

可是請停一停，讓我們能否用科學化的方法，再重新思考一下:

在正常人的能力成長曲綫中，其曲線的前期一般會隨著學會了具體方法和技術後快速增加，我們解決問題的時間會愈來愈短，對一些開始時還是有難度的事情，到達中期頂峰階段，經過練習後就會變得易如反掌，可是這個成長曲線到達後期就會失去向上升的動力，為什麼？

因為我們大多數人在日常認識問題時，一般只會依靠直覺、個人經驗、簡單的線性思維、因果關係、意識形態和價值觀偏好，而這些思維卻會引發 :

（1）我們無法發現事情之間深層次的關聯，我們眼前的認知都是一個分散的點，是一種孤立且斷裂式的認知，例如你無法明白到底 SpaceX 和 Tesla 電動汽車到底有什麼關係？

（2）我們面對超出自己日常工作的問題時，不知從何下手，更無法準確把握關鍵環節並合埋地預測事情的發展趨勢，例如你無法理解如何由電池組的構成基本原素，預測到解決澳洲電力危機的解決方向？

我們經常都聽到身邊那些在職場闖蕩了幾年的人會埋怨自己在公司已學不到任何新事物，感覺成長已到達天花板，真正原因不是你成長得太快，而是因為你的天花板太矮了。這個天花板，就是由你急功近利的學習方法所造成，因為你只看到天花板一個個孤立的點，而看不到天花板外原來還有樓宇的鋼筋水泥結構，城市空間的規劃原則，城市的發展的建築歷史。

相反如果我們能反其道，以慢打快，採用「第一性原理」（ First Principle ) 的學習原則，我們的成長曲線就會出現這個模樣 :

我們在學習的前期，雖然會因自己需不斷訓練和掌握基本原則，而令學習速度變慢，但當我們掌握了整個學科的理念和方法後，學習的能力就會大幅提升。

你可以透過「第一性原理」（ First Principle ) ，從底層的規律，以跨領域的方式，不停地活潑游走並累積，而隨著你的知識愈多，你的成長曲線會增長得愈來愈快，而當你能整合的知識愈多，你的知識就開始產生了爆炸性的威力（股神巴菲特最親密的戰友 Charlie Munger 稱之為「Lollapalooza Effect」），透過這種學習和成長，你會更容易獲得對未來更準確的「預測」，從而獲得先機，成為產業中的新先知。

鑽研知識的路，從不擁擠

我曾經聽過長輩感嘆 : 「今天是一個資訊和知識爆炸的社會，比起以往互聯網年代前的世界，當年的世界單純和清靜好多。」我認為這個觀念是謬誤，人類文明的發展，本來就是包含著混亂和喧鬧，以往的世界你覺得清靜，是因為訊息傳遞缺乏效率，而訊息內容的力量在傳遞的過程中，也會像熱力傳遞過程中會逐步遞減，所以接受者才不會有現在如直播般的「衝擊」。

同時，我們必須在一片「資訊和知識已爆炸」喧鬧聲，重新分清在這些爆炸中，到底什麼是「資料」、「資訊」和「知識」（這個分類將會在下一篇文章詳細解釋），現今的社會爆炸的是「資訊」，更正確來說是「垃圾資訊」，而非知識。知識的製造門檻是極高，並非你說爆就爆，因此鑽研知識的路，是又闊又人煙稀少，你以為人多的部份其實也不過追求快速「學習具體技巧」的方法論人群，它們和我們今天所分享的「第一性原理」（ First Principle ) 或底層定律，是完全在處於不同的程度。

總結今天的分享內容，我們理解了 :

1. 「第一性原理」（ First Principle ) 的定義
2. 我們看不到的「第一性原理」（ First Principle ) 的原因 : 缺乏「硬學科」訓練、「自以為知道」「急功近利」的學習態度
3. 我們學習「第一性原理」（ First Principle ) 的好處 : 獲得長遠累進的成長曲線; 得到對未來的洞見及獲得機遇

由今天起，讓我們一起刻意練習（ Deliberate Practice ) ：

最近幾年，有什麼知識是你當初認為是不重要，但後來你才後悔自己沒有早點知道？
反思自己在上述過程中，有什麼關鍵的事件、人物或原因令你醒覺上述的知識真的很重要？
嘗試運用「第一性原理」（ First Principle ) 的思考方式，發掘出你在學習認知中，那些經常見到但自己卻一直沒有觀察到事情，並找出改良方法，例如 :

為什麼我對數字總是很不敏感？

原來過去我總會以「人類是有血有肉，不能被量化」和「人的靈感直覺比機械式操作更重要」這類借口，輕忽了逃避學習數理 ;

那為什麼我會輕忽數理的重要性？

因為我是人文學科的人，所以每次面對數理相關的問題都會總是很沒有安全感，覺得自己比理科生低人一等……

也許你會有興趣

Elon Musk 如何比其他人學得更快更好

附註:

Elon Musk Photo Credit http://media2.govtech.com/

Occam’s Razor: The simplest solution is always the best

Always ask ” Is that necessary to add into it ? ”

” Simple is the best ” —- >> Anthony

Now that we appreciate the need for simplicity in designs better, let’s see another great concept. You may have heard of Occam’s Razor; did you know that you can apply it to web design? When you’ve got it in your “toolbox”, you’ll have an edge in the marketplace.

Occam’s Razor, put simply, states: “the simplest solution is almost always the best.” It’s a problem-solving principle arguing that simplicity is better than complexity. Named after 14th-century logician and theologian William of Ockham, this theory has been helping many great thinkers for centuries. Many industries swear by it.

How to Use in Design

In design, Occam’s Razor encourages us to eliminate unnecessary elements that would decrease a design’s efficiency. So, when two products or designs have the same function, Occam’s Razor recommends selecting the simpler. Therefore, when evaluating your designs, analyze each element and remove as many as possible, without compromising the overall function. This should ensure that you remain with elements you have minimized as much as possible but which still work perfectly

With the flexibility and power of the web and our design tools, it’s easy to get carried away. Designers can end up making very complicated sites or designs that may have a lot of functionality and information, but are difficult to use, build and maintain. One might think the site can do more, but it actually accomplishes less.

This is commonly an issue where companies feel the need to put everything they possibly could up on the website in the rare case that someone wants the information. In an increasingly competitive market, the pressure is on to get the message “out there”. What companies often ignore is that the overwhelming majority of the users will access about 20% of the content on the site (see the article on the Pareto principle; you’ll find the link at the bottom). Being ruthless about the value that a page or piece of content provides and removing anything unnecessary will make significantly stronger, more effective designs. It may be hard to weed out those unnecessary parts — you may say your business has nounnecessary parts; look harder.

For designers, using Occam’s Razor is all about careful thinking. It easier than you might fear. For instance, an editor-author who has a fiction career, but who also ghostwrites for clients, calls us. She tells us what she wants in her design:

Big handwritten font — autograph
Her photograph
Large-font mission statement
Contact information
Picture of the ranch where she works
Daily writing tip box.

Right away, we see we’ve got much to work into her design. Our author insists on an elaborate, decorative landing page. She loves her ranch and believes other writers will love it, too, so she wants a large photo of it.

We have to decide how to prioritize these elements. So, let’s see what’s necessary:

Author’s photograph
Signature/autograph—her branding
Mission statement.

These three parts embody her service. We want to present a famous author who can help other writers. However, we can move the unnecessary components to other pages using link buttons:

Daily writing tips
Contact Information
Picture of ranch.

We can show the ranch with her contact information, and we can perhaps design a daily writing tip as a pop-up.

The phone goes; our author loves what we’ve done with the design. However, she wants her ranch to feature on the landing page. We say: “We’ll see what we can do.”

Using Occam’s Razor, we see that we can fade the ranch into the background so that the images are there, but don’t distract. We want to cut out “noise”, which would distract/confuse users. So, we remove everything that would have got in the way. Our author friend is an enthusiastic person, but her enthusiasm gets the better of her. She’s scared of writers not contacting her. That’s the problem: she’s trying to push all her goodies onto the landing page, not appreciating that the flood of information will make user’s go: “What?” Instead of showing her good name and service in the best way, she got desperate and tried to squeeze ideas in, making a maze — walls, pictures, text, and spaces sprawling everywhere. Users coming to her site want help; they don’t want to have to work out how she can help them. Worse, it would tell them that this person can’t get ideas across properly. Why should they want her to write for them?

Occam’s Razor cuts down the walls that keep a message from getting through. Also, this rule speaks to the age-old saying that “A design isn’t finished when there is nothing more to add, but when there is nothing left to take away.” Design simplicity is elegant, sophisticated and much more effective than the complex decorative style that is so prevalent on the web these days.

Simplicity shows care, understanding and effort

Author/Copyright holder: 62 Models. Copyright terms and licence: Fair Use

It’s easy to think that the words “simple” and “easy” might show a lack of sophistication, or that working to produce simple designs means you don’t have to work very much. You might worry that a client will think that it took you 10 minutes to design something that he/she could have made.

Let’s do a reality check. Our author-ghostwriter has noticed the high number of hits her site is getting. She certainly doesn’t think that we’ve been lazy; she knows that we worked magic for her. The proof is in the number of page views — users have found it easy to navigate. Instead of shutting off on the landing page after squinting in confusion, many went on to learn more. The design’s simplicity, showing images and text in the best way (remember the other design principles here, such as the golden ratio), puts them at ease. They have a good user experience; most see her site’s simple, comprehensive design reflecting her skill as a no-nonsense writer who’ll work the same magic for them.

With this in mind, we can pat ourselves on the back for having done it for her. However, let’s look at what we did. We:

Asked how many elements the landing page needed,
including choices or decisions our friend wanted users to make. She wanted them to click on her daily writing tip box so they could see previous days’ tips. We linked this elsewhere.
Asked what she wanted her users to do the most.
She wanted people contacting her for help writing books. So, we highlighted the contact box, but we added one that took users to another page, where they could read all about her services first. This information was far more detailed than the simple description we put on her landing page: “Making manuscripts move into book and movie deals.”
Asked if a user, regardless of background, could get confused/frustrated. Her initial concept was confusing. We imagined approaching the design as ordinary people. Our friend wants to help other writers; well, if an 88 year-old author is looking for someone to clean up his manuscript, he might have had trouble with her design.

In summary, we translated what the writer wanted into a website that was easy to understand and use for the target users. Keeping in mind Occam’s razor, we focused on the key elements and keeping the interface simple.

The Internet is saturated with intricate and exquisitely complex designs. Many flash at us, offering all sorts of benefits, their designers not aware that it’s distracting, commonplace, and cheap-looking, Simplicity is refreshing.

Keeping Accessibility in Mind

Keeping our designs simple means that the websites we build are accessible. Creating a simple layout, with carefully placed images (remember the Rule of Thirds?) and simple, to-the-point, pithy text will keep users on the page.

Author/Copyright holder: Polar Gold. Copyright terms and licence: Fair Use

What gets them navigating to the call for action, such as the shopping cart depends on how you guide them. Did you:

Shave off the unnecessary bits?
Tone down anything loud or distracting?
Use plain language?
Would my 80 year-old neighbor understand what the website is about?
Would my grandmother be able to buy what I offer through my site and feel good?

Or, you can always make a “reality check”:

And above all, will my users understand the website’s added value and how it targets their needs and desires?

The Take Away

Occam’s Razor is a problem-solving principle devised in the 14^thCentury that states that simplicity is better than complexity. It has many applications, running from detective work to deductive reasoning about the cosmos.

We UX designers find that it empowers us to aim past the tendency to over-think our designs. It’s easy to focus on a cool idea, without standing back and asking if it’s essential to what we want to achieve. Occam’s Razor lets us approach and plan a design carefully. Our tendency is to keep adding what seem like great elements, sometimes worrying that if we don’t get all we want in one place, we’ll fail by a) weakening the message, or b) looking lazy.

Think of Apple. Steve Jobs’ philosophy embraced Occam’s Razor. His iPad and iPhone, for example, are the proof: one button on the front of a seamless, self-contained device.

By asking ourselves a few questions about our design and our users’ expectations, and reacting accordingly, shaving off the clutter or moving less important bits to other pages, we’ll serve our users and ourselves best. Remember, your design isn’t ready until you’ve found that you can’t take anything else out. This isn’t like repacking a suitcase to match a weight limit; it’s about deconstructing your design. When you’ve got your piece down to its bare essentials, that economy will pay dividends. By getting in ahead of your user’s eye, you can judge. Their page views and clicks will tell you if you’ve made the right choices.

Okay, so you’ve made it all the way here but you’re thinking: “I live by the principle of the simplest solution is always the best”. Where’s my take away? Now that you have a name for this principle, it is yet another advocacy tool to user with your client, boss, colleague. Whenever they insist about adding more functionalities, more elements, more and more, remind them of the Occam’s Razor.

References & Where to Learn More

Duvall, A. (2015). “Taking the Occam Razor Approach to Design.” Speckyboy Design Magazine. Retrieved from: http://speckyboy.com/2015/05/21/taking-the-occam-razor-approach-to-design/

McConnell, C. (2010). “Occam’s Razor: A Great Principle For Designers.” Web Designer Depot. Retrieved from: http://www.webdesignerdepot.com/2010/07/occams-razor-a-great-principle-for-designers/

Hunt-Barrom (2015?) “Occam’s Razor: More than just a Design Principle.” Clemson Edu. Retrieved from: http://www.clemson.edu/mapcux/classroom/transcripts/occam.pdf

Lant, M. (2010). “Occam’s Razor and the Art of Software Design”. Private Blog. Retrieved from:

Occam’s Razor and the Art of Software Design

The Pareto Principle and Your User Experience Work: https://www.interaction-design.org/literature/arti…

Contrast effect – The art of thinking clearly

Dating Advice and Contrast

we tend to judge the value of something based on what we have to compare it to.

If you are seeking a partner, never go out in the company of your supermodel friends. People will find you less attractive than you really are. Go alone or, better yet, take two ugly friends.

In other words, “we usually decide something is beautiful, expensive or large if we have something ugly, cheap or small in front of us.”

Ever purchased leather seats in your brand new car without thinking twice? $3K for leather seats may seem minuscule compared to the $60K you just spent on your new wheels.

How about this sale, was $100 now down to $70? Sounds like a good deal, unless you go next door and see the same product for $70 every day.

This very illusion is exploited by industries daily and we tend to react by jumping at the chance without noticing our money disappearing. Instead of falling victim to these deals, do your homework. If you can get leather seats for $2.5K elsewhere either use this knowledge to bargain down the salesman or go elsewhere. And always be sceptical of ‘sale’ prices.

Lesson 2: You use availability and comparison to determine value rather than looking at actual pros and cons.

Taking your more attractive friend to a club with you is a bad idea. Doing this makes you less likely to score a date. This happens because the comparison to your more attractive friend makes you appear less attractive than you really are.

Regardless of what we think, making absolute judgments doesn’t come easily to us. Instead, we rely on comparisons to make decisions. We choose the option that looks better instead of examining real pros and cons. This is called the contrast-effect and is also why product discounts work so well. If a $100 item becomes $70, we see it as better than an item that is normally just $70 only because of the comparison.

Similarly, companies use the idea of scarcity to get customers to buy. When they use phrases like “today only” or “limited time offer,” the brain sees a potential missed opportunity and resorts to making a purchase.

If you want to break through these biases of scarcity and comparison, focus on the value of items. When you see something is 30% off or “only while supplies last,” think only about the costs and benefits of purchasing the item.

不只人，公司也要「斷捨離」！看企業諮商師運用一個原則，成功拯救衰敗中的老牌企業

撰文者：林耀煜非讀BOOK 2019.01.29 7,088

奧卡姆剃刀定律──學會化繁為簡

日本一家大型日化企業收到顧客的投訴，他購置回來的肥皂只是一個空盒子，裡面並沒有肥皂。為了預防類似的事情再發生，他們斥鉅資研發了一台X光監視器，以監視生產線上每一台出貨的肥皂盒，以防再次出現漏裝肥皂的事件。

另一家小企業也遇到了這種問題，他們採取的方法是，購置一台強力工業電風扇，用風扇去吹每一個從流水線上經過的肥皂盒，沒裝肥皂的空盒子便會被吹下來。廣告

以上2種方法，都能解決漏裝肥皂的問題，但哪一個更好呢？奧卡姆剃刀定律告訴我們，當2種方法都能實現目的時，簡單的那個方法（電風扇吹空盒）更好。

奧卡姆剃刀理論，又稱「奧康的剃刀」，它是由14世紀的英國邏輯學家奧卡姆聖方濟各會的修士威廉所提出。在當時，經院哲學和基督教神學經常為「共相」、「本質」之類的話題而爭論，這讓威廉感覺厭倦，於是他在《箴言書注》中提出了「如無必要，勿增實體。」的觀念（即簡單有效原理），「那些用較少的東西就可以做好的事情，就不要浪費較多東西去完成。」

用現在的話來說，就是我們不要人為地把簡單的事情複雜化，要抓住事情的根本，保持事情的簡單性，解決實質問題，才能更快更高效地把事情處理好，因為很多時候，繁瑣的程序只會讓我們產生更多的煩惱。

奧卡姆剃刀理論還有另一種闡釋：當2種理論或方法可以得出同樣的結果時，簡單的那個更好。奧卡姆剃刀理論可以應用於企業管理、個人生活等各種領域，處理問題時，我們也要儘量以繁為簡，把複雜的問題簡單化。

企業管理：化繁就簡，抓住本質很重要

漾芷公司是一家規模較大、歷史悠久的老牌公司，公司生產的產品曾經在市場上熱銷一時，至今在消費者的口碑中依然很好，但是公司的業績卻出現了下滑趨勢，所以公司的董事們都坐不住了，決定聘用職業經理人嚴徊徹查公司問題，進而對公司進行改革。

經過一段時間的觀察，嚴徊發現，公司內部結構臃腫的情況太嚴重，市場部門的調查研究報告要經過組長、部門經理、副總經理審查，最後才能讓總經理看到並作出決策，而日理萬機的總經理經常在半個月後才會作出相應的指令，等到真正執行起來，又得再走一遍又一遍的程序，待到新產品真的上市，真正的黃金期早已過去。

這樣的問題同樣存在於產品研發部，工程師研發出一個新產品，總是要向上彙報，如果研發部經理或者任何一個關口不認可，那麼改良產品的機會就會徹底喪失。

嚴徊還發現，漾芷公司內也存在著許多老牌公司普遍存在的問題──領導層老化的問題，真正有才華的人忙忙碌碌得不到晉升的機會，而某些管理人員卻悠閒自在地領著高薪厚祿。

在發現這些問題後，嚴徊把自己精簡部門和相關的建議提交上去，如：讓總經理下屬分設研發部、生產部、銷售部、財務部、內勤部等多個職能部門，各部門只有一名上級，其他人可根據年資和業績獲得相應薪水，員工向部門主管直接提交建議，部門主管直接彙報給總經理，各個部門要對各自的業績負責等。

嚴徊大刀闊斧地裁掉許多人，也給了許多有才華的人晉升的機會，如此一來，不但簡化了辦事流程，也明定出各自的分工和責任，使得一年過後，漾芷公司的業績有了大幅提升。

隨著社會的發展，我們的生活愈來愈忙碌，想要得到的東西也愈來愈多，於是在不知不覺間，我們的企業在快速發展的同時，也在被自己製造的各種麻煩所拖累，如：當企業組織不斷膨脹，制度愈來愈繁瑣，檔案愈來愈多，效率卻愈來愈低，員工們在各種複雜的環境下逐漸迷失了自己，每天忙忙碌碌，但真正做的有價值的事情卻沒有幾件，最終導致企業低績效運轉。

有人說，管理之道就是簡化之道，的確，簡化管理作為一種古老而嶄新的管理思維和能力，對於企業發展具有重要意義。

所以，在企業管理中，我們也需要使用奧卡姆剃刀，來剔除那些低效、低價值的累贅，以保持事情的簡單化。

1. 精簡機構

在新型的企業管理中，傳統且嚴格的等級制度已經失去了意義，員工之間更多的是平等的分工合作關係，組織之間的資訊傳遞完全可以通過網路即時實現，公司也完全可以以顧客的需求為導向，迅速做出決策，而員工的積極參與，更可以讓決策更具實戰意義。

2. 關注核心業務

當一家公司業務太多時，難免會顧此失彼，難以獲得高額回報。而當其專注於核心業務時，則可以實現簡潔高效，讓產品在市場上更具競爭力，以最少的代價獲得最多的利潤。傑克• 韋爾奇在擔任通用電氣公司總裁時，就曾作出決策：如果一個產品不能做到本類產品的第1或第2名，那就一律賣掉，並將一個瀰漫著官僚氣息的公司徹底打造成了一個充滿朝氣和生機的企業巨頭。

3. 簡化流程

馬克．吐溫曾經在教堂聽牧師的募捐演講，當他聽到5分鐘的時候，深受感動，於是決定捐出身上所有的錢，牧師講到10分鐘時，他已經有些麻木了，於是決定捐出身上一般的錢，等到牧師結束演講進行募捐時，馬克．吐溫已經被冗長的演講折磨得心情十分糟糕，他不但一分錢也沒有捐，反倒從捐款箱裡拿走了2美元。

所以，若把簡單的事情複雜化，只會讓整個事件變得扭曲，企業管理也是如此，繁冗的流程很容易消磨掉員工的激情，也可能會導致員工在工作中抓不住重點，影響公司上下的決策和行動。

跟麥當勞學「奧卡姆剃刀法則」：只做1件事情，就讓銷售額翻倍

撰文者：黃楸晴管理知識內參 2019.08.19 15,553

圖／Dreamstime

管理知識內參，做你的線上MBA補給。

什麼是「奧卡姆剃刀法則」（Occam’s Razor）

奧卡姆剃刀法則的中心思想是：如果有2種方法都能達成目的、解決問題，選擇比較簡單的方法會更好。廣告

例如，工廠有2條生產線是用來包裝A物品的，現在工廠也要開始包裝B物品。一個方法是將其中一條生產線直接停掉，變成包裝B物品；但這個方法需要廠內人員把A物品的零件都拿下來，再把B物品的零件放上去，造成包裝人員的閒置，浪費工時與產能。

另一個方法是當人員還在包裝A物品時，負責放零件的人員把B物品的零件放上生產線，變成逐步換線。

2個方法都能達成換線的目的，但顯然選擇第2個方法會更省時、更有效率。

「奧卡姆剃刀法則」給管理者的啟示

奧卡姆剃刀法則主張不要把事情複雜化，要抓住問題的根本，才能更有效率地解決問題。換句話說也就是「化繁為簡」。這項原則適用在企業管理、個人生活等各個層面。

「奧卡姆剃刀法則」有哪些實例？

著有《Double Your Business》一書的Lee Duncan，是一名專門幫助企業成長的諮詢顧問。他透過奧卡姆剃刀法則，成功提高一家餐廳的營業額。

原先，他替這家餐廳增長25%的人流量，但餐廳銷售額卻沒有提升。

於是他回過頭問餐廳老闆，若每名顧客的平均消費額提高80元、甚至160元，會有多大的差異？結果他們發現差異非常大，不論是在利潤方面或營業額方面。

Duncan會問這個問題，只因為他一直記得這項基礎公式：利潤＝客戶數X客單價（平均交易金額）

在這個餐廳案例裡，雖然餐廳增長了25%的人流量，但總體銷售額卻一直很低，其實問題出在客單價太低。

發現這個問題後，Duncan聯想到關於麥當勞的一件軼事。麥當勞初開業時，規定員工幫消費者點餐時都要問客人一個問題：「你想要加點薯條嗎？」就做這件事情，就讓麥當勞的利潤翻倍。

於是Duncan向餐廳老闆提出簡單的改善建議：

．提供餐前酒
．提供開胃菜（例如義大利餐廳可以提供大蒜麵包；印度料理餐廳可以提供印度薄餅）
．向客人推銷有較高利潤收入的主餐
．賣一些比較有趣、不尋常的利口酒（餐後甜酒）

每名顧客只要買單1、2件額外服務，就可以提高客單價、增加餐廳的銷售額。

人們常常會不小心將問題複雜化，Duncan透過這則餐廳案例，完整詮釋出奧卡姆剃刀法則的優點，他在最明顯的地方尋找解決方案，順利解決銷售額增長的難題。

Mental models ( DefMarco)

These are some mental models I find useful. They’re rooted in decades of experience of thousands of experts – a modern equivalent of folk wisdom. Mental models are useful to quickly and correctly reason about seemingly intractable problems. They require quite a bit of intuition to properly internalize, but once you’ve internalized them they’re relatively easy to apply. They’re also easy to forget in the moment – use this post as a checklist when thinking about complex problems.

This is a living document. Instead of creating an exhaustive list on day one, I will add models as they arise (and as I discover new ones).

Productivity

The small-improvements method – the observation that psychologically frequently making small incremental improvements is a better approach than attempting to fix big looming problems once.
The just-get-started method – Joel Spolsky’s observation that just starting to work on a small, concrete, finishable problem puts your consciousness in a productive state.
Corollary: Just do something concrete. Anything. Do your laundry, or dust the counters, or add a single unit test. Just do something.
The top-five-problems method – Richard Hamming’s algorithm for doing important work. Periodically ask yourself: “what are the top five most important problems in my field (and life), and why am I not working on them?”
Corollary: What are the top five most important problems in your field (and life), and why aren’t you working on them?
The LRU prioritization method – since you can only work on one problem at a time, it’s usually sufficient to pick the most important problem, work on that, and ignore everything else. This method also works with organizing most things (from email to physical possessions).
The teaching method – Richard Feynman’s observation that teaching the basics is an excellent method for generating profound new ideas, and for putting consciousness in a productive state.
Corollary: If you’re stuck, put yourself in a position where you have to teach someone the basics.
Planning fallacy – the observation that humans are overly optimistic when predicting success of their undertakings. Empirically, the average case turns out to be worse than the worst case human estimate.
Corollary: Be really pessimistic when estimating. Assume the average case will be slightly worse than the hypothetical worst case.
Corollary: When estimating time, upgrade the units and double the estimate (e.g. convert “one week” to “two months”).
Forcing function – an external, usually social, constraint that increases the probability of accomplishing a set of tasks.
Example: Pair programming.

Hypothesis evaluation

Efficient market hypothesis – the state of any given issue in the world is roughly as close to optimal as is currently possible.
Corollary: It’s unlikely that the status quo can be easily improved without significant resources.
Example: Cucumber juice probably doesn’t cure cancer.
Example: The iPhone app you wrote in a weekend probably doesn’t double the phone’s battery life.
Statistical mechanics – probabalistic systems that follow certain laws in the long run can have perturbations that diverge from these laws in the short run.
Corollary: Occasionally the status quo can be easily improved without significant resources (but it is unlikely that you found such an occassion).
Idiom: In the short run the market is a voting machine, but in the long run it is a weighing machine.
Idiom: If an economist saw a $100 bill on a sidewalk they wouldn’t pick it up (because if it were real, it would have been picked up already).
Base rates – you can approximate the likelihood of a specific event occurring by examining the wider probability distribution of similar events.
Example: You’re evaluating the probability of success of a given startup. Ask yourself, if you saw ten similar startups a year, how many of them are likely to succeed?
Example: You caught an employee stealing, but they claim they need money to buy medication and it’s the first time they’ve ever stolen anything. Ask yourself, if you saw ten employee thefts a year, how many of them are likely to be first offences?
Note: This method is especially useful to combat optimism andoverconfidence biases, or when evaluating outcomes of events you’re emotionally close to.
See also: Techniques for probability estimates, reference class forecasting, prior probability.
Emic vs etic (aka inside vs outside view) – two perspectives you can choose when evaluating persuasive arguments. The inside view is time consuming and requires you to engage with the arguments on their merits. The outside view only requires you ask “what kind of person does sincerely believing this stuff turn you into?”
Corollary: You can usually predict correctness of arguments by evaluating superficial attributes of the people making them.
Example: If someone is wearing funny clothes, purports to know the one true way, and keeps talking about the glorious leader, you can usually dismiss their arguments without deeper examination.
Warning: This method usually works because most kooky people aren’t innovators, but will misfire in important situations because many innovators initially seem kooky.

Decision making

Inversion – the observation that many hard problems are best solved when they’re addressed backward. In other words figure out what you don’t want, avoid it, and you’ll get what you do want.
Corollary: Find out how people commonly fail doing what you do, and avoid failing like them.
Example: If you want to help India, ask “what is doing the worst damage in India and how can we avoid it?”
See also: Failure mode.
Bias for action – in daily life many important decisions are easily reversible. It’s not enough to have information – it’s crucial to move quickly and recover if you were wrong, than to deliberate indefinitely.
Idiom: One test is worth a thousand expert opinions.
Idiom: The best thing you can do is the right thing, the next best thing is the wrong thing, and the worst thing you can do is nothing.
Note: The best people do this naturally, without brooding, and with a light touch.
Expected value – a simple model for evaluating uncertain events (multiply the probability of the event by its value).
Corollary: Sometimes you’ll have to estimate probabilities when it feels really hard to do.
Example: Chance of winning NY lotto is 1 in 292,201,338 per game. Let’s say the grand prize is $150M and ticket price is $1. Then the expected value is roughly $0.5. Since $0.5 < $1, the model tells us the game isn’t worth playing.
Warning: Looking at expected value often isn’t enough. You need to consider utility to make good decisions.
See also: Techniques for probability estimates, shut up and multiply, scope insensitivity.
Marginal utility – the change in utility from the change in consumption of a good. Marginal utility usually diminishes with increase in consumption.
Example: The first car in your garage improves your life significantly more than the second one.
Example: Because utility loss from losing a dollar is negligible relative to utility gain from winning NY Lotto at ridiculously low odds, it might be worth buying a ticket even at negative expected value (but seriously, don’t).
Corollary: Think through your utility function carefully.
Strategy and tactics – empirically decisions tend to fall into one of two categories. Strategic decisions have long-term, gradual, and subtle effects (they’re a gift that keeps on giving). Tactical decisions are encapsulated into outcomes that have relatively quick binary resolutions (success or failure).
Example: Picking a programming language is a strategic decision.
Example: Picking a line of reasoning when trying to close a sale is a tactical decision.
Corollary: Most people misuse these terms (e.g. “we need a strategy for this meeting”).

People

IQ, RQ, and EQ – respectively, intelligence quotient (assessment of the mind’s raw horse power), rationality quotient (assessment of how well the mind’s models map to the real world; a measure of efficiency of the IQ’s application to real problems), and emotional quotient (ability to recognize and label emotions).
Corollary: brilliant people can be jerks and kooks, empathic people can have wacky ideas about reality, and effective people can have average intelligence.
Structure and agency – the observation that human behavior derives from a balance of internalized cultural patterns and capacity to act independently. The interaction of these two properties influences and limits individual behavior.
Corollary: Pay attention to the need for structure and independence in each individual.
Corollary: Put a structure in front of even the most independent-minded people, and they’ll internalize it.
Corollary: People often behave the way they believe their role requires them to (as opposed to the actual requirements of the role).
Corollary: Pay attention to how people perceive their own roles, and break their expectations with caution.
Social status – the observation (particularly in improv) that social status is so important to humans, that modeling status alone results in extremely realistic performances.
Corollary: Pay attention to how people perceive their own status, and break their expectations with caution.
See also: Self-serving bias.
Controlled vulnerability: – the observation that humans are attracted to confidently expressed vulnerability in others but are scared to be vulnerable themselves.
Corollary: Humans feel strong attraction towards others who confidently display vulnerability.
Corollary: Humans feel a strong desire to reciprocate vulnerability. Vulnerability expression by others gives them a sense of safety to express themselves, followed by a feeling of relief and a strong bond with the counterpary.

Groups

Mere-exposure effect – an observation that humans tend to develop a preference for things, people, and processes merely because they are familiar with them. This effect is much stronger than it initially seems.
Corollary: Merely putting people in a room together repeatedly, giving them a shared direction, symbology, and competition will create a group with very strong bonds.
See also: In-group favoritism.

Communication

Story arc – human beings are wired to respond to storytelling. A story arc is a way to structure ideas to tap into this response, typically by describing a change in the world.
Example: Once upon a time there was ___. Every day, ___. One day ___. Because of that, ___. Because of that, ___. Until finally ___.
Writing well – use arresting imagery and tabulate your thoughts precisely. Never use a long word where a short one will do. If it’s possible to cut a word out, always cut it out. Don’t hedge – decide what you want to say and say it as vigorously as possible. Of all the places to go next, choose the most interesting.
Charitable interpretation – interpreting a speaker’s statements to be rational and, in the case of any argument, considering its best, strongest possible interpretation. Charitable interpretation makes conversations (and relationships) go better.
Nonviolent Communication (aka NVC) – a communication framework that allows expressing grievances and resolving conflicts in a non-confrontational way. Structuring difficult conversations as described in NVC makes the process dramatically less painful. NVC contains four components: (1) expressing facts, (2) expressing feelings, (3) expressing needs, and (4) making a request.
Example: You didn’t turn in the project yesterday. When that happened I felt betrayed. I need to be able to rely on you to have a productive relationship. In the future, could you notify me in advance if something like that happens?

Policy

Global utility maximization – our innate sense of fairness is often unsatisfiable, and attemping to satisfy it can occasionally cause much grief in exchange for little gain. It’s much better to optimize for the needs of the many, not for an idealistic notion of fairness.
Corollary: There are times when it makes sense to be unfair to the individual in the interest of the common good.
Example: It makes sense to fire an underperforming employee who has valid excuses for their poor performance.
Idiom: It is the greatest happiness of the greatest number that is the measure of right and wrong.
See also: Preference utilitarianism.
Tragedy of the commons – a set of circumstances where individuals acting independently in a reasonable manner behave contrary to the common good.
Example: Tourists taking small artifacts from popular attractions.
Corollary: Governance is necessary to preserve the common good.
Front 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?
Warning: Incentivizes extreme risk aversion, often without appropriate consideration for potential gain.
Reasonable person principle – a rule of thumb for group communication originated in CMU. It holds that reasonable people strike a suitable balance between their own immediate desires and the good of the community at large.
Corollary: Fire people that are offensive or easily offended. (It usually turns out that people who possess one of these qualities, possess both.)
Note: unreasonable persons can be extremely valuable in greater society (e.g. journalists, comedians, whistleblowers, etc.), but usually not in small organizations.
Overton window – the range of ideas a particular group of people will accept. Ideas range in degree of acceptance from policy, to popular, sensible, acceptable, radical, and unthinkable.
Corollary: you need to be sensitive to the overton window when presenting the group with cultural changes.
Political capital – the trust and influence a leader wields with other people. Political capital increases when you make other people successful and decreases when you make unpopular decisions.
Corollary: Spend political capital carefully.

Product design

Target market – a predicate that partitions new leads into opportunities and distractions. A good target market function is terse, has a discoverable domain, and has a well defined probability of close in a specific time bound.
Example: Anyone who has a Cisco password has a 50% probability of close within 30 days.
Internal press release – you start developing a product by writing an internal press release first, explaining to target customers why the product is useful and how it blows away the competition. You then test it against potential users (it’s much easier to iterate on the press release than the product).
Corollary: If the press release is hard to write, then the product is probably going to suck.
Quantum of utility – a rule of thumb for launching the product. A product possesses a quantum of utility when there is at least some set of users who would be excited to hear about it, because they can now do something they couldn’t do before.
Note: “Launch” can be defined as a private beta, or even giving the product to a friend. The point is to get it into the hands of someone who’s not in the building as soon as possible.
Worse is better – a design philosophy which states that solving the customer’s problem and leaving unpolished rough edges empirically outperforms “beautiful” products.
Example: Lisp Machines vs C/Unix.
See also: Worse is worse.
Kano model – a model for categorizing possible features to optimize resource allocation. Essentially partitions the product into gamechangers, showstoppers, and distractions.
See also: How to build great products.

Business

Five forces – a model for analyzing the competitive intensity and therefore attractiveness of an industry. The five forces are: threat of new entrants, threat of substitutes, bargaining power of buyers, bargaining power of suppliers, and industry rivalry.
Note: this is essentially a base rate estimation model for companies in an industry.
Power of defaults – the observation that people favor the familiar over novel places, people, things, and processes.
Corollary: Overcoming the familiarity heuristic at scale requires enormous activation energy unavailable to startups.
Corollary: It is dramatically easier to capture mindshare before people’s minds are made up, than to change their mind later.
See also: Default effect, path of least resistance, brand equity.
Economies of scale – the advantages due to size or scale of operation, where cost per unit decreases with increasing scale.
See also: Network effects, brand equity, first mover advantage.
Price/performance curve – the observation that the price of important technology drops and performance improves over time.
Example: Moore’s Law.

The Art of Thinking Clearly

Author: Rolf Dobelli

If you love reading about psychology and human behavior, The Art of Thinking Clearly is the book you don’t want to miss. There is a paragraph in it that is best summing up the book:

Thinking is in itself not pure, but prone to error. This affects everyone. Even highly intelligent people fall into the same cognitive traps. Likewise, errors are not randomly distributed. We systematically err in the same direction. That makes our mistakes predictable, and this fixable to a degree—but only to a degree, never completely.

Note: This book covers 99 common cognitive errors we’re facing in everyday life which I didn’t include them all in my reading notes.

My Reading Notes

The failure to think clearly, or what experts call a “cognitive error” is a systematic deviation from logic—from optimal, rational, reasonable thought and behavior. By “systematic,” I mean that these are not just occasional errors in judgment but rather routine mistakes, barriers to logic we stumble over time and again, repeating patterns through generations and through the centuries.
If we can learn to recognize and evade the biggest errors in thinking—in our private lives, at work, or in government—we might experience a leap in prosperity. We need no extra cunning, no new ideas, no unnecessary goals, no frantic hyperactivity—all we need is less irrationality.
In daily life, because triumph is made more visible than failure, we systematically overestimate our chances of succeeding. As an outsider, we succumb to an illusion, and we mistake how minuscule the probability of success really is.
Investors frequently fall victim to the sunk cost fallacy. Often they base their trading decisions on acquisition prices. “I lost so much money with this stock, I can’t sell it now,” they say. This is irrational. The acquisition price should pay no role. What counts is the stock’s future performance (and the future performance of alternative investments.)
Reciprocity is a very useful survival strategy, a form of risk management. Without it, humanity would be long extinct. It is at the core of cooperation between people and a necessary ingredient for economic growth and wealth creation.
The confirmation bias is the mother of all misconceptions. It is the tendency to interpret new information so that it becomes compatible with our existing theories, beliefs, and convictions. In other words, we filter out any new information that contradicts our existing views.
We judge something to be beautiful, expensive, or large if we have something ugly, cheap, or small in front of us. We have difficulty with absolute judgments.
With the availability bias, we prefer the wrong information to no information.
Hindsight bias makes us believe we are better predictors than we actually are, causing is to be arrogant about our knowledge and consequently to take too much risk.
There are two types of knowledge. First, we have real knowledge. We see it in people who have committed a large amount of time and effort to understand a topic. The second type is chauffeur knowledge—knowledge from people who have learned to put on a show.
The illusion of control is the tendency to believe that we can influence something over which we have absolutely no sway. Do not think you command your life through life like a Roman emperor. Rather, you are the man with the red hat. Therefore, focus on a few things of importance that you can really influence.
Never judge a decision purely by its result, especially when randomness and “external factors” play a role. A bad result does not automatically indicate a bad decision and vice versa. So rather than tearing your hair out about a wrong decision, or applauding yourself for one that may have only coincidentally led to success, remember why you chose what you did.
Abundance makes you giddy, but there is a limit. When it is exceeded, a surfeit of choices destroys the quality of life. The technical term for this is the paradox of choice.
We respond to the expected magnitude of an event, but not to its likelihood. In other words: We lack an intuitive grasp of probability. And it leads to errors in decision making.
Induction seduces us and leads us to conclusions such as: “Mankind has always survived, so we will be able to tackle any future challenges, too.” Sounds good in theory, but what we fail to realize is that such a statement can only come from a species that has lasted until now. To assume that our existence to date is an indication of our future survival is a serious flaw in reasoning.
The fear of losing something motivates people more than the prospect of gaining of equal value.
In groups, we tend to hold back not only in terms of participation but also in terms of accountability. People behave differently in groups than when alone. The disadvantages of groups can be mitigated by making individual performances as visible as possible.
We can understand linear growth intuitively. However, we have no sense of exponential growth. Why is this? Because we didn’t need it before. Our ancestors’ experiences were mostly of the linear variety. Whoever spent twice the time collecting berries earned double the amount. Whoever hunted two mammoths instead of one could eat for twice as long. In the Stone Age, people rarely came across exponential growth. Today, things are different.
The halo effect occurs when a single aspect dazzles us and affects how we see the full picture. The psychologist Edward Lee Thorndike concluded that a single quality (e.g., beauty, social status, age) produces a positive or negative impression that outshines everything else, and the overall effect is disproportionate.
It’s not what you say but how you say it. If a message is communicated in different ways, it will also be received in different ways. In psychologists’ jargon, this technique is called framing.
In new or shaky circumstances, we feel compelled to do something, anything Afterward we feel better, even if we have made things worse by acting too quickly or too often.
We should be careful to get out of an experience only the wisdom that is in it—and stop there; lest we be like the cat that sits down on a hot stove-lid. She will never sit down on a hot-stove lid again—and that is well; but also she will never sit down on a cold one anymore.
The introduction of “now” causes us to make inconsistent decisions. Science calls this phenomenon hyperbolic discounting. Put plainly: The closer a reward is, the higher our “emotional interest rate” rises and the more we are willing to give up in exchange for it.
When justifying your behavior, you encounter more tolerance and helpfulness. It seems to matter very little if your excuse is good or not. Using the simple validation “because” is sufficient.
Decision fatigue is perilous: As a consumer, you become more susceptible to advertising messages and impulse buys. As a decision maker, you are more prone to erotic seduction. Willpower is like a battery. After a while, it runs out and needs to be recharged. How do you do this? By taking a break, relaxing, and eating something.
A single outlier has radically altered the picture, rendering the term “average” completely meaningless.
When people do something for well-meaning, non-monetary reasons, payments throw a wrench into the works. Financial reward erodes any other motivations.
Verbal expression is the mirror of the mind. Clear thoughts become clear statements, whereas ambiguous ideas transform into vacant ramblings. The trouble is that, in many cases, we lack very lucid thoughts. Therefore, if you have nothing to say, say nothing.
Information bias: the delusion that more information guarantees better decisions.
Effort justification: when you put a lot of energy into a task, you tend to overvalue the result.
Raise expectations for yourself and for the people you love. This increases motivation. At the same time, lower expectations for things you cannot control.
If you like something, you believe that the risks are smaller and the benefits greater than they actually are. If you don’t like something, the opposite is true. Whether you like it or not, we are puppets of our emotions. We make complex decisions by consulting our feelings, not our thoughts.
The belief that reflection leads to truth or accuracy is called the introspection illusion. Because we are so confident of our beliefs, we experience three reactions when someone fails to share our view: (1) Assumption of ignorance, (2) Assumption of idiocy, and (3) Assumption of malice.
Our brain is not built to recognize the truth; instead, its goal is to leave behind as many offspring as possible. Whoever seemed courageous and convincing created a positive impression, attracted a disproportionate amount of resources, and this increased their chances of succeeding. Doubters are less sexy.
Risk means that the probabilities are known. Uncertainty means that the probabilities are unknown. On the basis of risk, you can decide whether or not to take a gamble. In the realm of uncertainty, it’s much harder to make decisions. You can make calculation with risks, but not with uncertainty.
Money is money, after all. But we don’t see it that way. Depending on how we get it, we treat it differently. Money is not naked; it is wrapped in an emotional shroud.
We are confident that we notice everything that takes place in front of us. But in reality, we often see only what we are focusing on.
Essentially, if you think too much, you cut off your mind from the wisdom of your feelings. Emotions form in the brain, just as crystal-clear, rational thoughts do. They are merely a different form of information processing—more primordial, but not necessarily an inferior variant. In fact, sometimes they provide the wiser counsel.
We seldom forget uncompleted tasks; they persist in our consciousness and do not let up, tugging at us like little children, until we give them our attention. On the other hand, once we’ve completed a task and checked it off our mental list, it is erased from memory.
Absence is much harder to detect than presence. In other words, we place greater emphasis on what is present than on what is absent.