A different, surprising, significant conclusion drawn from the *same* data as others steers the conversation in a new direction (so do obvious conclusions drawn from *new* data that you get earlier than others, but that’s being ahead of the curve, not ‘thinking for yourself’)
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Thinking for yourself is paying relatively more attention to road than to other cars for overtakes. Bigger irregularities are like counterexamples. Everybody goes around left around the pothole, you go right and gain, and so people behind you go right too. Hey you’re leader now!
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Everybody can see the visible road (known data) but minimizes thinking by staying in their narrative lanes, following local social proof leaders who got their roles by their last bit of thinking for themselves. Upcoming turns (new data) are seen by narrative-leaders first.
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“Seeking alpha” by being “ahead of the curve” is like overtaking on the turns. The opportunities to do that depend on the macrostructure of the road. Election results, quarterly earnings, results of key upcoming science experiments: these are overtake-on-the-turn opportunities.
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But waiting for these turns is a reactive thing. You can only respond to opportunities, not create them. People who can really think for themselves don’t need to wait for the turns. They can overtake on the straights too. Bonus: This also gets them first shot at turn overtakes!
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In the analogy this means paying *relatively* more attention to the road than to other cars, compared to other cars. You also have to pay attention to other narratives besides the one you’re flowing with right now because you’re going to weave among them.
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If you do it well enough, for long enough, other cars will start following you, and at some point you’ll be leading a faster dynamic narrative weaving among the slower static stay-in-lane ones, slowly gaining a net speed advantage.
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The faster you go, the more other cars turn into the territory. They’re just a higher-order kind of road friction to use in fitting your path. Imagination helps you see at this higher-level, as others’ narratives turn into your background.
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To get back from the analogy to the conceptual point: thinking for yourself means consistently surprising people with new angles, whether or not there is new data to work with, to the point that others start following you.
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You turn into a leader attracting converts from existing narratives, and craft a new one that treats the existing narratives as the terrain. You don’t fit their ideas of ‘lanes’ (tribal partisanship paths) because you are laying dynamic new ‘weaving’ lanes at the next level.
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So to think for yourself, you need intelligence yes, imagination, yes, but mainly you need nerve. And if it works, the willingness to lead. At least for a while.
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End of conversation
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