Bias reduces noise—if you know <em>roughly</em> what to expect, then being biased by those expectations means you won’t get distracted by less relevant data points.

We usually complain about systems ‘getting in our way’, with arbitrary criteria that determine success. But this goes the other way too. Much of my success and that of those around me is similarly mechanical. Not luck, effort, or nepotism.

The nervous system teaches us the most important lesson about human behaviour: the main thing our body does is transform the world into adaptive responses, and the nervous system is at the very core of it. But beyond that, it’s mostly just a mess.

The ‘naming’ problem, where by naming something we feel we have explained it, the ‘language’ problem, where the words we use stop others from understanding, and the ‘question’ problem, where we fail to find the right questions, are common and funny.

The ‘Great Man’ theory of history has the history of ideas moved forward by individuals. But by thinking of these as ‘Great Ideas’, or better ‘spirits’ of ideas, we’re encouraged to examine their motivations, which is surprisingly effective.