Macromegas #14 - Second-Order Thinking
Applying Second-Order Thinking to Geopolitics, Economics & Technology
Hi Friends,
Happy Monday!
Applying Second-Order Thinking to Geopolitics, Economics & Technology
Imagine you live in the early 90s. You hear of the Internet, that weird network for geeks and researchers. Chances are thin that you would have thought of the game-changing consequences it would have on the world.
The exact same thing happened with mobile phones and smartphones. Even the most revered experts of the times famously failed at it.
We have a tendency to think through the prism of the present, the familiar, the non-change.
And to some extent, it does make sense: at the scale of a human lifetime, disruptive change does not happen often. Many potential innovations fall short of expectations.
In the past, the deepest innovative changes took generations to mature and reach their full disruptive potential: stock markets, the electricity, planes, etc.
Considering how fast the adoption of new technology is moving those past 2 decades, identifying those new trends as early as possible is critical to anticipate change.
In my opinion, there are a few main aspects to consider if you want to have a chance to grasp those changes in advance:
Knowing your history lessons - I don’t believe anyone can pass on thousands of years of collective factual experience. Analogies are everywhere.
Reading broadly - you need to expose yourself to new ideas, as remotely plausible as they might be. Other scientific fields than your core one work a charm. I am also a strong believer in Science-Fiction - I even think you should not be allowed to hold any critical government/planning functions without some basic Sci-Fi readings. Asimov on his own started describing something very close to the Internet decades before its real appearance. He theorised AI moral many decades ago in his Robot series, and most of his thesis still holds. No arguing that fiction is a basis for shaping reality, but forgoing some of the most brilliant early insights about change feel very sad to me.
Thinking critically - asking ourselves why. Reformulating. Cross-checking authors’ theses with one another. Knowledge is there. Unfathomably too large to be comprehended by any human brain. The edge relies on how we challenge it, internalise it, and structure our thinking. This is the foundation of Second-Order Thinking: when governments spend trillions of cash they don’t have in stimulus and sometimes raise their debt-to-GDP ratio by a solid 2-figure percentage change, if you think “all is fine”, you’re most likely in for a bad surprise. It might be tax hikes, devaluation, depression, global banking systemic failure… who knows? But by thinking one step ahead you will understand that there will be consequences, and that’s quite something to hold to already.
Exposing your ideas to challenge - as knowledgeable and brilliant as you can be, nothing prevents tunnel vision better than other minds debating your ideas. It can be friends, colleagues, online groups… as long as it is a constructive debate and not ad hominem attacks.
Being aware of human evolution, psychology and biases - human brains have changed little in the past thousand years. The ancient parts of our brains have not changed that much in millions, even in hundreds of millions of years. Since the change we are talking about is applied to our human society, understanding how our brain works is absolutely fundamental. This is an aspect we’ll never forget in this newsletter.
Thanks for reading and have a great week, full of critical thinking,
V