Stakes in the ground for my future self...

Inspiration

‍Jason Crawford stands out for his approach:

• Anticipates and addresses counterarguments constructively
• Provides proper credit to others
• Uses primary source imagery effectively
• Includes concrete historical examples
• Contextualizes developments with "life at the time" details
• Opens with human stories that illustrate risk or challenge
• Provides excellent sources for further reading
• Creates thoughtful dialogues between opposing viewpoints

Other Writes I Admire:

• Samo Burja and the Bismarck team - it’s hard to separate writing style from quality of content here - they have both. The style is clear, structured and coheres with the content (theory and research method). Analysies focus on making clear, sometimes bold claims, regarless of popular agreement or disagreement. The communication is always subtle, yet never needlessly complicated. Having a single analytical theory with clear terms to work in (live player, dead player, functional, non functional, etc.) presumably makes this clarity easier to achieve. While I don’t have one theory that I intend to work within, defining terms and discussing any relevant theory (implicit or explicit) at the outset seems a good proxy for now.
• Lisa VanDamme's narrations, summaries, and explanations: clear, poetic, romantic, analytical - all at once. How, I do not yet know.
• Dan Rasmussen (Verdad) for clear writing on sometimes quite technical finance topics
• Celina Halioua’s presentation (not writing in this case) at the Roots of Progress conference has a tone, structure, and level of clarity that I appreciate.

Some Principles

Write to Clarify, Not Persuade

1. First, write to clarify ideas for myself
2. Then, write to clarify for my readers
3. Recognize these are different processes, and the first must come first

Embrace Iteration

• Start small, simple, and somewhat messy
• Iterate regularly
• Escaping Flatland - fitting form to context. Good advice.

Use AI Tools Thoughtfully

• Use them to challenge myself, never to replace my judgment or taste
• Ask: What remains unclear? What alternative perspectives did I miss? Etc.

Write Before, During, and After Creating

• Make room for intellectual exploration before building (though this is sometimes disparaged)
• In particular, explicate values I want to embed in designs beforehand
• Helps to avoid simply embedding default thinking or external values into creations
• Consider writing about things worth making, before they exist, especially if few others are
• When possible, propose experiments to test ideas
• Also allow for / encourage yourself to write reflectively during or after the process of creation

Maintain Proportionality

• Neither overstate nor understate claims
• Clearly state what I think and why
• Present alternatives and reasons for not choosing them
• Acknowledge uncertainty when present
• Propose ways to test hypotheses
• You can always list questions - nobody asks enough questions

Aspire to Philosophical Depth

• Cultivate good epistemic hygiene: is this true? How do I know? How could I know?
• Ask why
• Don’t be afraid of recursive lines of questioning
• There is need for this everywhere, but there is particular opportunity in the world of design.

Implementation

• Review these goals when beginning a new post - use them to structure approach
• Evaluate writing based on these goals after first draft
• Consider what these goals / principles miss: what do you find yourself appreciating in your writing that diverges from these? Why?

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