modelthinking

There must also be some vulnerability of the state in the form of internal divisions and economic or political reverses. Otherwise, popular discontent is unvoiced, and popular opposition is simply suppressed.

Any successful model, even though it may reproduce only a few features of common sense, will prove to be a powerful extension of common sense in some field of application.

A system can be analyzed as an eco system if it has independent, competing agents who can change and adapt to their environment.

People handle having lots of choices in two ways: by “maximizing” or “satisficing.” Maximizing is exploring all the options, weighing them, and trying to get the best. Satisficing is thinking about what you need and picking the first thing that fulfills those needs. Satisficing is living by “good enough.”

Exposure to the modern world has made us better adapted for complexity, and that has manifested as flexibility, with profound implications for the breadth of our intellectual world.

“I never make exceptions. An exception disproves the rule.”

Maybe I am biased by my preference for soft data like ISM. Perhaps I care about ISM New Orders too much. You know what leads the New Orders? Housing. How is the housing market looking right now? We get that picture from the chart above. Sure, I have included more soft data on there from the National Association of Home Builders, but that index has

given a number of observations, you can actually gain information by throwing information away!

We can then say that it’s a statistical improbability that any single person will be an extraordinary performer in all areas of life, or even in many areas of their life.