lightbulb Concepts
Fundamental concepts and principles in economics, philosophy, and decision-making
person_off Ad Hominem Fallacy
A logical fallacy in which an argument is rejected or dismissed not by addressing its substance, but by attacking the character, motives, or personal attributes of the person making it. Rather than...
Learn morerecord_voice_over Ad Personam Fallacy
A more directly personal variant of the ad hominem fallacy: the speaker is discredited outright instead of the substance of what they said eve...
Learn moreattach_money Four Ways to Spend Money
Milton Friedman's framework describing four ways money can be spent, each with different incentives for economy and care about results: (1) Spendi...
Learn morespa Ataraxia
Ataraxia (from the Greek ataraxia, 'unperturbedness') is a state of robust tranquility and freedom from mental disturbance that several rival schools of Hellenistic philosophy treated as the highes...
Learn moreconversation Bullshit Asymmetry Principle
The amount of energy needed to refute false or misleading information (bullshit) is an order of magnitude greater than the effort required to produce it. This principle highlights that it's far eas...
Learn morewindow The Broken Window Fallacy
A logical error in economic reasoning first described by Frédéric Bastiat in his 1850 essay analytics Economics report Fallacies error_outline Economic Fallacies visibility Seen and Unseen error_outline Economic Sophisms psychology_alt Critical Thinking
currency_exchange The Cantillon Effect
The Cantillon Effect is an economic concept explaining how newly created money does not affect everyone equally. When new money enters the economy, the first recipients (typically banks, financial ...
Learn morevisibility Constrained vs Unconstrained Vision
Introduced by Thomas Sowell in A Conflict of Visions (1987), this framework identifi...
Learn morescatter_plot Correlation-Causation Fallacy
The error of concluding that because two variables move together, one must cause the other. A statistical correlation between two series (for example, income concentration and GDP growth) says noth...
Learn morepsychology Dunning-Kruger Effect
A cognitive bias where people with limited competence or knowledge in a specific domain greatly overestimate their own abilities. The same lack of knowledge or skills that leads to poor performance...
Learn moreswap_horiz Equivocation Fallacy
A logical fallacy in which a single word or phrase is used with two different meanings at different points in an argument, so that the conclusion appears to follow only because the ambiguity is nev...
Learn morecall_split False Dilemma Fallacy
A logical fallacy that presents only two options as if they were the only possibilities, or as mutually exclusive, when in fact more options exist or the two are not actually incompatible. By artif...
Learn moretrending_down Financialization (Downsize-and-Distribute)
A term for the shift in large-company management from a 'retain-and-reinvest' model, where profits are kept in the firm and reinvested in R&D, capacity, and pay, to a 'downsize-and-distribute' mode...
Learn morecrop Framing Effect
A cognitive bias in which people's decisions and preferences shift based purely on how logically equivalent information is presented, or 'framed', typically as a gain versus a loss, even when the u...
Learn moreattach_money Gresham's Law
An economic principle stating that when two forms of currency are in circulation with the same legal face value, but one is undervalued relative to its intrinsic worth (e.g. a debased or clipped co...
Learn moreauto_awesome Halo Effect
A cognitive bias in which the overall impression formed of a person, brand, or product from a single trait, whether positive or negative, spills over and distorts judgment of that same person, bran...
Learn morecontent_cut Hanlon's Razor
An adage or rule of thumb that states: 'Never attribute to malice that which is adequately explained by stupidity.' This principle encourages the assumption of good faith and discourages the attrib...
Learn morezoom_out_map Hasty Generalization Fallacy
A logical fallacy that draws a broad, general conclusion from a sample that is too small, too narrow, or unrepresentative to support it. The move from particular observations to a general rule is t...
Learn moreself_improvement Ikigai
A Japanese concept meaning 'a reason for being' or 'a reason to wake up in the morning.' Ikigai represents the intersection of four fundamental elements: what you love, what you are good at, what t...
Learn morebolt Jevons Paradox
The observation that technological improvements in the efficiency of resource use tend to increase, rather than decrease, the total consumption of that resource. In his 1865 book analytics Economics speed Efficiency trending_down Unintended Consequences terrain Resource Economics bolt Energy Economics
workspace_premium Kodawari
Kodawari (こだわり) means something like 'meticulous commitment,' 'attention to detail,' or 'refusal to compromise on quality.' It comes from the verb kodawaru, which historically carried a negative se...
Learn moreshow_chart Laffer Curve
The Laffer Curve is an economic model illustrating the relationship between tax rates and the total tax revenue collected by governments. It shows that tax revenue is zero at a 0% tax rate (no tax ...
Learn morepedal_bike Law of Triviality
The tendency of groups to devote disproportionate time and attention to trivial, easily-grasped matters while giving complex, high-stakes decisions comparatively little scrutiny. corporate_fare Bureaucracy psychology Decision Making psychology_alt Cognitive Bias speed Efficiency
campaign The Fly on the Coach
An idiom drawn from Jean de La Fontaine's 1678 fable The Coach and the Fly (Le Coche et la Mo...
Learn morechange_history Münchhausen Trilemma
A fundamental problem in epistemology demonstrating that any attempt to justify a claim of knowledge inevitably leads to one of three unsatisfactory outcomes: infinite regress (each proof requires ...
Learn morelink_off Non Sequitur Fallacy
A logical fallacy in which a conclusion is asserted that does not logically follow from the premises offered for it, even when those premises may themselves be true. Unlike fallacies built on a spe...
Learn moresentiment_dissatisfied Oikophobia
Coined by British philosopher Roger Scruton in England and the Need for Nations Learn more
volunteer_activism Omotenashi
Omotenashi (おもてなし) is often translated as 'hospitality,' but the word carries a stronger, more unconditional sense: wholehearted care that anticipates another person's needs and attends to them wit...
Learn morepie_chart The Pareto Principle
The Pareto Principle, also known as the 80/20 rule, states that for many outcomes, roughly 80% of consequences come from 20% of the causes. This concept originated from Italian economist Vilfredo P...
Learn morewb_sunny The Principle of Optimism
All evils are caused by insufficient knowledge. This principle, articulated by physicist and philosopher David Deutsch, asserts that problems are so...
Learn moreset_meal Red Herring Fallacy
A rhetorical maneuver that redirects a discussion toward a secondary, tangential element (spelling, phrasing, tone, a minor detail) instead of answering the actual question. Rather than engaging wi...
Learn moreroute Roundabout Production
The Austrian insight that production becomes more physically productive the more it is broken into indirect, capital-using stages spread out over time, rather than aiming directly and immediately a...
Learn morelocal_fire_department Strawman Fallacy
A logical fallacy in which someone misrepresents or distorts another person's argument, making it easier to attack. Instead of addressing the actual position, the arguer substitutes a weaker, simpl...
Learn moreflight Survivorship Bias
A logical error that occurs when conclusions are drawn from a data set consisting only of the 'survivors' of some selection process, while overlooking the cases that did not survive and are therefo...
Learn moreschedule Time Preference
The economic principle that individuals value goods and services more highly in the present than in the future, all else being equal. This preference for present over future satisfaction is a funda...
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