Think Differently. Solve the Impossible.

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Why do so many investigating a topic end up reaching the same conclusion?

Driving through Utah recently, I was struck by the smoke from the wildfires. The scale of the fires was staggering. Later…

Every Electrification Decision Assumes the Grid Will Be Ready

Electricity is becoming the foundation for more and more of modern life: electric vehicles, heat pumps, AI data centers, semiconductor manufacturing, residential electrification. Each decision may be reasonable on its own…

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This is a real-world example of how measurement and attribution can shape how a problem is understood—and how easily we might end up solving the wrong one.

A Note on How to Think About

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What if the debate about data centers isn't really about data centers? What if it's about something much larger What if it's about how societies decide which problems deserve attention, which narratives become dominant…

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When I started reading about AI companies training music-generation models on copyrighted songs, the story seemed straightforward.

• Artists claimed their music had been used without permission.
• AI companies were accused of training models on…

Want to see the data instead of only reading the headline? Here’s a simple way to start.

First, install Anaconda. It gives you an easy way to run Python without needing to be a programmer. After installing it, open…

When we read a headline, we're rarely looking at the evidence ourselves. We're looking at someone else's interpretation of the evidence. That doesn't necessarily make the headline wrong. It does mean we're trusting someone else's conclusions. My mother used to…

This essay is about how certain words stop explaining things — and how that quietly breaks thinking, decisions, and progress.

A word may start as a useful concept and lose its meaning as it becomes overused. When that happens, it…

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Israel, Survival, and the Logic of the State

When people discuss the conflict involving Israel, Iran, and the broader Middle East, they often begin with explanations like oil, religion, politics, territory, or nuclear weapons…

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One thing I recently realized is that I had been making an assumption every time I heard the word war in the news. I assumed there was a moment when something officially became a…

If software feels slower even as hardware improves, this explains why. The issue is not effort or quality. It is accumulation driven by incentives. Here’s the pattern, why it made sense, and how teams can reverse it.
 

Part 1: Why

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How Smart-Sounding Arguments Go Wrong

If you start with the wrong question, you can reason your way to the wrong answer perfectly.

I came across a claim about beer…

and it’s a perfect example…

This piece is a demonstration of how I break down complex claims to reveal assumptions, missing context, and framing errors.

We live in a world saturated with information: headlines, dashboards, expert statements, performance claims, charts, footnotes, and fine print. The…

We live in a world saturated with information: Labels, headlines, expert statements, fine print, scientific claims, footnotes. The challenge today isn’t access to information — it’s knowing what to trust. Some information is wrong. Some is technically true while being…

Recovery Questions for Clarity, Insight, and Better Decisions

Most confusion isn’t caused by low intelligence — it’s caused by compressed language.

People think they disagree about ideas, when they’re reacting to unexamined assumptions embedded in words. Language regularly…

Outdated Detection Tools — and Newer Technologies That Could Save Lives

Fentanyl is the deadliest drug in America,  responsible for more than a quarter of a million deaths and quietly infiltrating medicine cabinets, nightstands, backpacks, and streets across the country…

The Hidden Cost of “Green” Power — and How to Fix It

Solar panels are sold as the ultimate win-win: free energy from the sun, no pollution, no guilt. Put them on your roof and you’re part of the solution…

America feels divided in a way that’s different from disagreement. Disagreement is normal. It’s healthy. It’s how pluralistic societies work. This feels different. Conversations feel brittle. People self-censor around friends and family. Every issue becomes moral, urgent, and absolute. Compromise…

Many systems fail not because people work too little — they optimize the wrong metric.

Federal regulations meant to reduce fuel consumption rely on a simple metric: average miles per gallon (MPG). That sounds reasonable — until incentives start shaping…

The smarter the team, the more efficiently it can scale the wrong objective.

We tend to assume intelligence is protective.

If a team is capable, analytical, experienced, and rigorous — surely they won’t pursue the wrong objective. In reality, high…

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What da Vinci, Tesla, and Einstein reveal about solving better problems

They Didn’t Think Faster. They Thought Differently.

Most people look for better tools to solve problems. 
History’s most impactful thinkers looked for better…

I had David Weiss, Flat Earth Dave, as a guest on my podcast. Dave's a famous advocate for the idea that the earth is flat.  As wild and crazy as the idea is, I was fascinated about why people think…

Most of us picture banks the way we picture a person making a loan: You have money in your account. You hand some of it to someone else. Your balance goes down, their balance goes up. Total money in the…

This analysis does not defend any government or leader, and it does not minimize documented abuses or governance failures.

If you’ve followed recent news about Venezuela, you’ve probably heard one of two explanations. Either, “We removed a bad guy,” or…