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💡 Weekly Thought Exercise: Assumption Stack

This prompt comes from the hour long Bryan Johnson Impact Theory interview in 2018 where he discusses the thinking strategy he's using to figure out his life's mission (which would become Don't Die).

Author

Eva Gutierrez
May 30, 2024 • Estimated Reading Time: 2 minutes

I went down a Bryan Johnson rabbit hole, Reader.

It brought me to this Impact Theory interview from 2018.

Bryan talks about assumption stacks and how "you can't trust your first thought."

That got my brain whirring into overdrive.

Charlie Munger's observation of the mind was that it tends to latch onto the first idea or conclusion.

Once an initial idea or conclusion gets into our mind, we tend to shut off inquiry and stop questioning that initial premise.

He explained it through an analogy of sperm fertilizing an egg.

Once the egg is fertilized - it's game over for the rest of the sperm.

This mental behavior likely evolved as an energy-saving mechanism.

But it can cause us to accept flawed or incomplete conclusions without further scrutiny (ahem - social media health influencers - ahem).

Copy and paste this thought exercise into your AI of choice (I prefer Claude for these types of conversations).

Give yourself 15-20 minutes to go through this.

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