Research

Break down any problem to its fundamental truths and reason up from there, bypassing conventional wisdom and analogical thinking.

A methodology for transforming suffering, difficulty, and loss into spiritual teaching, derived from Ram Dass's experience of his 1997 stroke and his decades of subsequent practice with disability,...

Build deep understanding through teaching, identifying gaps, and iterative simplification.

Determine whether a startup idea is a standalone product that can become a company, or a feature that will be absorbed by larger platforms.

Map the true motivations driving behavior by identifying what each party fears and desires, stripped of stated positions and moral justifications. Human action is matter in motion—this skill reveal...

Identify the pretense of knowledge in plans, policies, proposals, and expertise claims. Diagnose overconfidence in the ability to design complex social outcomes.

A practice for emptying the heart-mind to achieve direct receptivity to the Way, derived from Zhuangzi's teaching on xinzhai (心齋) — the apophatic meditation that clears all obstructions to spontane...

Show that many concepts lack a single defining essence. Instead of seeking necessary and sufficient conditions, map the overlapping similarities that connect instances—like members of a family conn...

Clarify the relationship between faith and works, grace and effort, belief and action - addressing the common confusion about how acceptance and transformation relate.

Harmonize apparent conflicts between faith and reason by distinguishing what reason can demonstrate from what exceeds reason, showing that faith and reason are complementary sources of truth that c...

A practice for walking alongside someone who is questioning, leaving, or reconstructing their inherited faith - derived from Rachel Held Evans' pioneering approach to public, vulnerable faith quest...

Transform the meaning of failure from outcome to inaction, freeing people from fear-based paralysis using Sara Blakely's methodology.

Extract maximum learning from failures and setbacks, then design the next experiment based on what was learned. Transform demoralizing defeats into structured knowledge and actionable next steps.

Systematically review whether facts underlying a current position have changed, warranting a position change.

Systematically verify factual claims in an expert persona's files, remove unverifiable information, and generate a comprehensive references document with sources.

Identify when individuals, organizations, or ideologies operate under the assumption that they are above normal rules, and predict how this self-conception will collapse. Apply Raskolnikov's "extra...

Design a procedure to eliminate unwanted behavior by identifying and removing the maintaining reinforcer, with preparation for extinction burst and differential reinforcement of alternative behavior.

Analyze any technology domain for exponential growth patterns using Ray Kurzweil's Law of Accelerating Returns methodology, producing quantified predictions with specific dates.

Design crucial experiments that definitively test hypotheses by isolating variables, verifying intrinsic properties, and producing unambiguous results.

Design rigorous experiments with controlled variables, precise measurements, and systematic documentation. Plan investigations that produce reliable, reproducible results.

Map the recursive structure of expectations in coordination problems - what people believe others believe.

Identify which of Kierkegaard's three existential stages (aesthetic, ethical, religious) a person currently inhabits, diagnose the symptoms and avoidance patterns, and guide movement toward authent...

Challenge appeals to fixed identity, human nature, or predetermined essence by revealing identity as created through choices, not discovered as a given. Use Sartre's central claim—"existence preced...

Systematically research any subject until you achieve mastery sufficient for confident execution, using Kubrick's card-index and comprehensive documentation methods.