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Lessons

Every published lesson, theme by theme. Each lesson is a Concept Development Study taught Socratically. Keep a notebook; answer every pause before you read on.

Theme 01 · 3 lessons

How to know

See clearly. Test hard. Fail usefully. Prefer evidence over authority — and treat “I don’t know” as strength.

  1. 1

    Seeing vs believing

    Observation is not belief. Falsifiable claims take a risk; empty ones don’t. “I don’t know — here is how we’d find out” is where inquiry starts.

  2. 2

    Falsifiability

    A claim is scientific only if something could prove it wrong. Spot claims rescued by excuses or hidden in vagueness, then design a test — fixed in advance — that could kill your own favourite idea.

  3. 3

    Choosing your questions

    Every question is a road, and some lead to misery. Check a question before you answer it: is it answerable, is it testable, what does it assume, what does success optimise — and who pays if you succeed?

All lessons in How to know →

Theme 02 · 2 lessons

First principles

Strip problems to what is true. Rebuild from axioms. Separate nature’s limits from culture’s habits — including jobs and money.

  1. 1

    Strip it to what is true

    Judge what is possible from what a thing is made of and what physics charges — not from habit or analogy. Build an energy floor for a kettle and for aluminium, and read the gap above it as nature’s limit or ours.

  2. 2

    Frame the problem, then invent

    When machines generate ideas cheaply, what stays human is choosing the problem, framing it as a function with its physical floor, and judging the answers. Then invent on purpose with TRIZ.

Go further The TRIZ refresher in Skills & resources: contradictions, the 40 inventive principles, and why no inventive trick beats a physical floor.

All lessons in First principles →

Themes 03–10

In preparation

Lessons for these themes are not published yet. Each theme’s outline is on the curriculum page.

Method adapted from John S. Hutchinson, Concept Development Studies in Chemistry (Connexions / Rice, CC BY 2.0).