Notes
Notes on
unfinished thinking
Short notes on organising, testing and developing ideas that are not finished yet. Each one takes a single question a person might type into a search box and says what the evidence supports and where it stops.
How do I explain an idea clearly?
You explain an idea clearly by choosing one listener, writing the point as a claim with its reason attached and sorting your first draft by the job each sentence does. Then you lead with the point, give each reason one example and ask an outsider to say it back before you polish any wording.
How do I turn a voice note into a clear idea?
Turn a voice note into a clear idea by marking each stretch as background, a repeat, a tangent, a claim or a question, then writing the claim you kept returning to as one sentence that could be wrong. A short list of what that sentence dropped keeps the idea as uncertain as you were when you spoke.
How do I challenge my own assumptions?
You challenge an assumption by writing it as a sentence that could be false, writing its opposite underneath and asking what you would expect to see if the opposite were true. Rank the list by the damage if each is false and the days it takes to check, and give only the top objection a real look with a stopping result set in advance.
How do I organise my thoughts when they feel scattered?
Organise scattered thoughts by putting every fragment on one page in its rough form, labelling each as a claim, a question or a reaction, and starting from the one claim whose truth would change the most of the others. The rest wait on a dated list you return to only once that claim has been checked.
How do I stop going round in circles on the same idea?
You stop going round in circles by giving every sitting with the idea one question, a time limit and a written output, and by counting the sittings that produce nothing new. When repeats pile up, change the idea under pressure, set it aside until a fixed date or drop it, and treat each of those as a decision you can write down.
How do I turn a vague idea into something I can test?
Turn a vague idea into something testable by writing it as one claim that could be false, finding the assumption that would sink it, and designing a small check with a stopping result written in advance. Each of the four written steps removes words nobody has defined, so the idea can be shown wrong before you build or write anything large.