
Mental Models Box – A collection of models useful in everyday life - thugger
https://www.mentalmodelsbox.com/
======
paulgerhardt
The nice thing about mental models is you have so many to choose
from[1][2][3][4][5][6][7][8].

[1] [https://medium.com/@yegg/mental-models-i-find-repeatedly-
use...](https://medium.com/@yegg/mental-models-i-find-repeatedly-
useful-936f1cc405d)

[2]
[http://www.defmacro.org/2016/12/22/models.html](http://www.defmacro.org/2016/12/22/models.html)

[3] [https://fs.blog/mental-models/](https://fs.blog/mental-models/)

[4] [https://nesslabs.com/mental-models](https://nesslabs.com/mental-models)

[5] [https://amzn.to/2KiKQEg](https://amzn.to/2KiKQEg) (Don't recommend)

[6] [https://amzn.to/2GOHoz4](https://amzn.to/2GOHoz4) (written by DuckDuckGo
founder Gabe Weinberg)

[7] [https://amzn.to/31lfK4Q](https://amzn.to/31lfK4Q) (A classic)

[8] [https://amzn.to/31tX17l](https://amzn.to/31tX17l) (Haven't read but
recommended by others)

~~~
blairbeckwith
Interesting that you don’t recommend the Farnham Street book. It’s been
sitting on my shelf for a while, and I’m a big fan of a lot of what they put
out. What don’t you like about it?

~~~
paulgerhardt
Have you ever had a subject matter that you are comfortably familiar with
explained to you through a strained analogy in a patronizing manner that makes
you question the speaker's own understanding of the material? This book is
full of those.

Here's a representative excerpt from early in book:

“ __Imagine you are on a ship that has reached constant velocity (meaning
without a change in speed or direction). You are below decks and there are no
portholes. You drop a ball from your raised hand to the floor. To you, it
looks as if the ball is dropping straight down, thereby confirming gravity is
at work. You are able to perceive this vertical shift as the ball changed its
location by about three feet. __

 __Now imagine you are a fish (with special x-ray vision) and you are watching
this ship go past. You see the scientist inside, dropping a ball. You register
the vertical change in the position of the ball. But you are also able to see
a horizontal change. As the ball was pulled down by gravity it also shifted
its position east by about 20 feet. The ship moved through the water and
therefore so did the ball. The scientist on board, with no external point of
reference, was not able to perceive this horizontal shift. __”

The other half of the book is Charlie Munger quotes. I would say skip the
trouble and go straight to reading “Almanack”.

------
sushisource
Really nicely presented site, but I can't be the only one who's tired of what
feels like people constantly "name dropping" these models to make a point.
Just because it has a name doesn't magically make your argument more
impactful, you still have to convince me.

~~~
scrooched_moose
Similar to the fallacy fallacy:

The fallacy fallacy is a logical fallacy which occurs when someone assumes
that if an argument contains a logical fallacy, then its conclusion must
necessarily be wrong.

[https://effectiviology.com/fallacy-
fallacy/](https://effectiviology.com/fallacy-fallacy/)

~~~
atarian
Thank you. I knew this was a thing but I never knew what to call it.

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anthilemoon
Thanks for sharing! I like the simple design. One piece of feedback I got when
I wrote a blog post about mental models [1] was that mental models are easy to
understand, but people struggle to figure out how to actually use them. In
addition to the examples, it would be great to add concrete applications to
each cards.

[1] [https://nesslabs.com/mental-models](https://nesslabs.com/mental-models)

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bliss
Good material, nicely presented.

This is similar to My Cognitive Bias - they have a browser plugin that opens a
random cognitive bias when you open a new tab (chrome, firefox) - basically
like flashcards for embedding the knowledge - I probably found that one here
too.

[https://mycognitivebias.com/?utm_source=MyCognitiveBias&utm_...](https://mycognitivebias.com/?utm_source=MyCognitiveBias&utm_medium=Chrome%20Extensions&utm_campaign=footer%20link)

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jcutrell
I’ve started to accumulate mental models on my personal site. I hate how buzzy
the language has gotten, but I _do_ see the value in this accumulation.

One thing that’s missing: how these models connect, and ways of picking the
models you need for a given thought experiment. This is a service or app I
would gladly pay for, particularly if it provided the ability to add my own
models, relate them in a smart way, etc.

~~~
xpe
Choosing the mix of applicable models is the art of wisdom. Connecting all
models pairwise would have O(N^2) complexity.

But I agree, writing down your thoughts on how models interact helps you
understand their focal points and limitations.

To extend this line of thinking —one might hope that the synthesis of multiple
models would get more elegant — but this would likely come at the expense of
interpretability to particular situations. This line of thought is discussed
extensively in the philosophy of science and complexity theory.

~~~
myself248
But nobody needs the full pairwise everything, just a few related concepts,
like "If this seems close but doesn't quite fit, have a look at P, Q, R, and
S?"

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alexpetralia
As usual, I plug my list of mental models if anyone is interested!
[https://alexpetralia.github.io/newsletters](https://alexpetralia.github.io/newsletters)

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cuddlecake
Is there any sort of fallacy that the saying "use the right tool for the job"
in the context of programming languages / datastoring technologies etc. can be
categorized with?

I always have a feeling that this might be a fallacy, because tools are
usually defined as "carrying out a specific function", but there is no
specific function in regards to programming languages or datastoring
technologies other than "make machine do" and "store data" respectively.

The rest just seems to be sideeffects. Kind of like you can either insert a
nail into wooden board or produce a gaping hole in a Human's skull, whereas
the function of a hammer is just to apply force to a relatively small surface
(more or less). There are many right tools for inserting nails into wooden
boards or producing gaping holes on human skulls, which is why I'm starting to
think that the phrase "Use the right tool for the job" is preemptive
hindsight.

You could always choose the right tool - so why didn't you do that?

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acangiano
A related, fun book I have been reading is The Art of Thinking Clearly. I
recommend it if this topic interests you.

~~~
Matticus_Rex
I just started this yesterday and a quarter of the way in the main thought I
have is that I wish I'd read this in college. Picking up this stuff all at
once would have been way more useful than doing it slowly (sometimes
painfully) over a decade.

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tunesmith
People love lists of models, fallacies, and cognitive biases. I don't think
any list of them can be authoritative though because they all slice the
concepts up differently. But when well-presented I think lists like these are
still valuable because they're entertaining to review, and can remind people
of how to be better thinkers.

My theory is that pretty much any bias or fallacy can be derived from simpler
rules of causation - truth, and the logic of necessity and sufficiency.

Appeal to Authority: Is it really true that if A says x is true, that x is
really true? Is x really true?

Confirmation bias: Is it really true that if I want x to be true, it is true?
Is x really true?

Survivorship bias: Is it really true that if x is true, that this set of x's
causes were sufficient to yield x? Is this set of x's causes always sufficient
to yield x?

etc, etc.

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Ente
I like this, but the collection of models in there does not seem to be very
rich. Do you know how often they plan to add a new model?

~~~
devinjflick
They have a suggestions area, where you can submit your mental model. They
probably expect to grow with the use of that

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ultrasounder
This is the kind of stuff that keeps me coming back to HN. Awesome stuff!!

~~~
james_s_tayler
If you like this - Buy and read The Model Thinker.

~~~
ultrasounder
Thanks for the suggestion. Will add it to my reading list. Nothing beats a
book.

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ivh
The site does not seem to say who made it, but it sure reminds me of Shane
Parrish (Farnam Street blog) who wrote a book about about mental models, among
other tings.

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jammygit
Mental model posts get upvoted a lot on here. Do people on here actually use
them regularly and benefit?

~~~
james_s_tayler
All the time. I find they help you reason about the long term outcomes of
things or directions things are headed in. They provide a nice framework for
thinking about things. Rather than looking at every situation on a case by
case basis you start to see aggregates of situations and once you see the
abstraction then everything becomes "another one of those". The more
abstractions you find, the more you see the patterns.

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devinjflick
Just a thought, maybe a weekly or monthly email subscription with updates of
whats been added?

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Congeec
here[1] is a comprehensive list for those who want to know more about
fallacies.

[1]:
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_cognitive_biases](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_cognitive_biases)

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palashkulsh
really great design

