Humans are prone to cognitive biases. Don’t rely on your intuition to make important decisions. Instead, understand the most common mental models to improve your thinking. Build your very own metacognition toolkit to face choices with a calm, informed mind.
Popular articles in this category include be careful of the optionality fallacy and the Occam’s razor fallacy, avoid falling prey to illusory correlations, use checklists when you can’t trust your brain. Learn about the curse of knowledge, The Cobra Effect, and Parkinson’s Law.
Writing an educational article about something you want to learn about may be one of the best ways to study a topic. The Feynman Technique—which I recently discovered may have been coined by Scott Young—helps you understand anything by pretending you are explaining the concept to a child or someone who has no prior knowledge …
Welcome to the fourth instalment in our interview series, where I ask highly creative and innovative people how they manage to achieve more without sacrificing their mental health. Our guest is Dr John L. Collins, a Chartered Mathematician and Chartered Physicist who holds a PhD in Nuclear Physics and Semiconductor theory from Aston University. John …
Read moreConnectedness and complex systems with Dr John L. Collins
Writing has many science-based benefits. It can help you develop your self-authorship, reflect and create metacognitive routines through journaling, and has been shown to make you happier and healthier. For something that’s completely free, it’s a pretty good deal. Beyond these benefits, writing is also a thinking tool. Not only for personal management, but for …
“The eye sees only what the mind is prepared to comprehend.” — Robertson Davies. A person who thinks women are bad drivers is more likely to notice driving mistakes made by women. A detective who is convinced a suspect is guilty is more likely to pay attention to evidence corroborating their intuition. And, while someone …
Read moreConfirmation bias: believing what you see, seeing what you believe
Scenario 1 – Joe and Jane decided to play a game in which they toss a coin a few times. Every time a head came up, Joe had to give Jane $10 and every time a tail came up, Jane had to give Joe $10. They could toss the coin any number of times they …
Read moreCognitive biases in entrepreneurship: a research report
We are obsessed with optionality. Not sure what to do with your life? Most people will tell you to get a degree. Not quite sure what to do with this degree? Go to grad school. Still not quite sure? Get a consulting role at a big firm so you can decide what kind of job …
The Stanford marshmallow experiment is probably the most famous study in delayed gratification. In 1972, a group of kids was asked to make a simple choice: you can eat this marshmallow now, or wait 15 minutes and receive a second treat. In the paper, the researchers highlighted two significant findings. First, not physically seeing the …
Read moreYou can eat your mallow: debunking the marshmallow test
When trying to solve a problem, we often tend to look for useful facts that may guide us to the “correct” answer. This type of thinking—called convergent thinking—works great when the problem we want to solve is clear and requires a reasonable solution. But for bigger, more complex problems, convergent thinking may be too limited. …
I’ve never been a huge fan of knowledge management tools. Too rigid, too complex, not adapted to the intricacies of the human mind. I never managed to get on the Evernote or Notion bandwagon. It always felt like trying to fit a square peg in a round hole. Instead, I have been using a combination …
You have a plan. It sounds like a good, solid plan. You’ve written it down. You’ve even asked for feedback. You’re ready to execute. Then, down the line, something goes wrong. Despite all your effort and care, the painstakingly crafted strategy doesn’t seem to work. What happened? The reason why most strategies fail is they’re …