If strong ideas that face friction come out stronger, then why would you need to insulate them behind locked doors from external stimuli? Shouldn’t they easily vanquish external stimuli and validate themselves? Unless the point is to recognize the strength of timeless ideas. But even if an idea worked well the first 999 times, it doesn’t mean it will also do so the 1,000th time—you shouldn’t strive to crystallize tried-and-true ideas into static heuristical husks: Heuristics that almost always work can still critically fail, with black swan moments.
‘Always run faster’ can make you stumble down a hill and break your ankle. ‘Always deploy capital prudently’ can make your business miss out on bold plays, as ChristianKl commented. Since even your best ideas are fallible, the goal should be to discern which part of the idea was wheat, and which was chaff. “Run fast, but not if it’ll overexert yourself, here’s an explanation to assess when that’s about to happen.” “Deploy capital prudently, but make allowance for calculated risks, and here’s an explanation for how to assess those opportunities.”
These distinctions require active criticism ‘in the arena,’ even if—especially if, rather—it’s at the risk of swaying under new information in the ephemeral territory of the immediate. It requires a willingness to suspend an idea’s universality if a better explanation carves an edge case where it doesn’t apply, or even subverts the whole paradigm (slow and steady wins the race!). But that only happens if you’re willing to part with even your best ideas, instead of jailing them behind thick walls and padlocks—which insulates them, yes, in an echochamber.
If strong ideas that face friction come out stronger, then why would you need to insulate them behind locked doors from external stimuli? Shouldn’t they easily vanquish external stimuli and validate themselves? Unless the point is to recognize the strength of timeless ideas. But even if an idea worked well the first 999 times, it doesn’t mean it will also do so the 1,000th time—you shouldn’t strive to crystallize tried-and-true ideas into static heuristical husks: Heuristics that almost always work can still critically fail, with black swan moments.
‘Always run faster’ can make you stumble down a hill and break your ankle. ‘Always deploy capital prudently’ can make your business miss out on bold plays, as ChristianKl commented. Since even your best ideas are fallible, the goal should be to discern which part of the idea was wheat, and which was chaff. “Run fast, but not if it’ll overexert yourself, here’s an explanation to assess when that’s about to happen.” “Deploy capital prudently, but make allowance for calculated risks, and here’s an explanation for how to assess those opportunities.”
These distinctions require active criticism ‘in the arena,’ even if—especially if, rather—it’s at the risk of swaying under new information in the ephemeral territory of the immediate. It requires a willingness to suspend an idea’s universality if a better explanation carves an edge case where it doesn’t apply, or even subverts the whole paradigm (slow and steady wins the race!). But that only happens if you’re willing to part with even your best ideas, instead of jailing them behind thick walls and padlocks—which insulates them, yes, in an echochamber.