If there are two meta-skills that unlock the door to learning just about anything, they’re these: • first principles thinking break down and reconstruct complex ideas • cognitive bias literacy ensures that this reconstruction isn’t distorted by faulty reasoning First principles thinking allows you to break down complex topics to their most fundamental elements. It helps strip away the bias that comes from personal experience. Most of us operate on assumptions built over time, and while experience is useful, it can also create mental inertia. First principles thinking forces you to pause and observe what something actually is, not just what you assume it to be. But there’s a catch: this process only works if your reasoning stays clean. Even if you’re skilled at breaking things down logically, biases can quietly sneak in and distort your understanding. So if you want your first-principles approach to actually work, you need to actively train yourself to spot and correct these distortions. When you put these two abilities together you can pick up a new domain, dissect it properly, and avoid most of the traps that lead others astray. Especially when you layer in feedback-integrated iteration, which lets you pressure-test your models. Once you’ve mapped it out you can reintroduce your experience, but this time with intention.

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