The principles and laws you’ve never heard of
Why Read This
What Makes This Article Worth Your Time
Summary
What This Article Is About
Giacomo Falcone, a Substack newsletter writer focused on productivity and self-improvement, presents nine lesser-known mental models — named laws and principles drawn from psychology, economics, and political philosophy. The list spans a wide range: from Hanlon’s Razor (assume incompetence before malice) and Price’s Law (50% of output comes from the square root of participants) to Falkland’s Law (when a decision is unnecessary, it is necessary not to decide) and Amara’s Law (we overestimate technology in the short run and underestimate it in the long run).
The article is written in Falcone’s characteristic list format — brief, punchy, and conversational — and is explicitly aimed at general readers rather than specialists. Each principle is presented with a one-line definition, a short real-world illustration, and a practical takeaway. The collection as a whole argues, implicitly, that knowing the right mental shortcut at the right moment — whether for managing people, building habits, or navigating decisions — is a form of intellectual leverage available to anyone willing to learn it.
Key Points
Main Takeaways
Assume Incompetence, Not Malice
Hanlon’s Razor advises that when something goes wrong, poor judgment or lack of skill is almost always a better explanation than deliberate sabotage.
A Few People Carry the Weight
Price’s Law reveals that in any productive group, just the square root of total participants generates half the results — making top-performer retention more valuable than raw headcount growth.
Writing a Problem Halves It
Kidlin’s Law holds that clearly writing down a problem provides immediate cognitive clarity, making even overwhelming situations feel structured and manageable rather than chaotic.
Inaction Is Also a Decision
Falkland’s Law reframes restraint as strategy: when no decision is genuinely required, choosing not to decide is itself the correct and disciplined move — not weakness or avoidance.
We Misjudge Technology’s Timeline
Amara’s Law explains the dot-com bubble and the internet’s eventual dominance in one rule: short-term hype consistently overshoots reality, while long-term impact consistently undershoots our imagination.
Distance Makes Us Wiser
Solomon’s Paradox captures a universal irony: people give excellent advice to others facing problems but routinely fail to apply the same clear reasoning to their own identical situations.
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Article Analysis
Breaking Down the Elements
Main Idea
Named Mental Models Are Practical Intellectual Tools
Falcone’s implicit argument is that giving a concept a name — a law, a razor, a paradox — transforms it from a vague intuition into a usable mental tool. Each principle in the article compresses a complex pattern of human behaviour into a single memorable phrase. By learning these names, readers gain a faster, more precise vocabulary for diagnosing situations they already encounter every day — in workplaces, relationships, and their own decision-making.
Purpose
To Entertain and Equip — Intellectual Utility Wrapped in Casual Reading
Falcone is transparent about his purpose: these are laws “that make you look brilliant when you drop them casually over coffee.” The goal is equal parts entertainment and practical utility. He wants readers to finish the article with nine new mental models they can actually apply — not a theoretical framework, but a portable toolkit. The newsletter format reinforces this: each entry is short enough to read in under a minute, but substantial enough to remember.
Structure
Personal Introduction → Named Entries (Definition → Illustration → Takeaway)
The article follows a tight, repeating micro-structure for each entry: a named principle, a one-sentence definition in a block quote, a brief real-world example or implication, and an optional punchy closing line. This format is highly scannable and designed for the newsletter medium where readers are skimming quickly. The personal introduction and conclusion maintain the author’s voice as a connective thread across what would otherwise be nine independent definitions.
Tone
Conversational, Confident & Wryly Practical
Falcone writes with the casual confidence of someone who genuinely enjoys ideas and wants to share them without ceremony. The tone is warm rather than academic — he uses phrases like “The math is brutal” and “Invest in your mind first. The returns compound.” Humour is dry and brief. He never condescends or over-explains, trusting the reader to grasp implications from a single well-chosen example rather than an exhaustive explanation.
Key Terms
Vocabulary from the Article
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Tough Words
Challenging Vocabulary
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To a satisfactory degree; sufficiently enough to meet the requirements of a situation — used to say that stupidity alone is a complete and sufficient explanation, with no need to invoke malice.
“Never attribute to malice that which is adequately explained by stupidity.”
To describe or represent something in a way that makes it seem more admirable or desirable than it may truly be — here used to critique the cultural tendency to treat constant decision-making as a virtue.
“In a world that glorifies decisiveness, not every situation requires our input.”
To judge the value, extent, or importance of something as being greater than it actually is — the first half of Amara’s Law, describing how short-term enthusiasm for new technology routinely exceeds what it can actually deliver.
“We tend to overestimate the effect of a technology in the short run and underestimate the effect in the long run.”
Treating something as more important than other competing options, giving it first attention and resources — used in Wilson’s Law to argue that investing in knowledge should come before the pursuit of financial gain.
“Wilson’s law states that prioritizing the acquisition of knowledge and intelligence is what leads to financial success, and not the reverse.”
A fact, event, or situation that can be observed and studied — often used in psychology to describe a pattern of behaviour that is reliably documented across many individuals and contexts.
“The Solomon paradox is a psychological phenomenon where people offer wise, rational advice for others’ problems, but struggle to apply the same judgment to their own lives.”
Separated from something by physical, emotional, or psychological space — used to describe the detachment from a problem that enables clearer, more objective thinking than direct personal involvement allows.
“We’re much more expert when we’re distanced from a situation.”
Reading Comprehension
Test Your Understanding
5 questions covering different RC question types
1According to Price’s Law, in a team of 100 people, just 10 employees would be responsible for producing 50% of the total work output.
2According to the article, what is the most common source of frustration at work, according to Gilbert’s Law?
3Which sentence best captures the core warning of Coyote’s Law about the dangers of granting power?
4Evaluate the following statements about the laws and principles described in the article.
Premack’s principle states that a less desirable activity should be completed before a more desirable one, as a form of self-reward after the effort.
Amara’s Law uses the dot-com bubble as an example of short-term overestimation of a technology’s impact.
Wilson’s Law argues that knowledge and intelligence should be prioritised before the pursuit of financial success, not the other way around.
Select True or False for all three statements, then click “Check Answers”
5A manager, frustrated with a colleague who missed a key deadline, immediately assumes the colleague was being deliberately obstructive. Based on the article, which principle most directly challenges this response, and what does it suggest the manager should assume instead?
FAQ
Frequently Asked Questions
Solomon’s Paradox describes the psychological gap between the quality of advice we give others versus the quality of decisions we make for ourselves. It is named after the Biblical King Solomon, celebrated for his extraordinary wisdom — yet whose own life was marked by costly personal misjudgements. The paradox captures a universal irony: emotional distance from a problem enables clear thinking, while personal involvement clouds it. As the article puts it, “we’re much more expert when we’re distanced from a situation.”
Premack’s principle, sometimes called “grandma’s rule,” states that a more probable (enjoyable) behaviour can be used to reinforce a less probable (avoided) one. In practice, you attach a new habit you want to build to an activity you already love. The article’s example is using the reward of eating chocolate to reinforce the desired behaviour of reading a book chapter. The key is sequencing: the desired activity serves as the reward that follows the targeted behaviour, increasing the likelihood it becomes routine.
Yes — and the article addresses it with deliberate brevity. After explaining Amara’s Law through the dot-com bubble and the internet’s eventual dominance, Falcone poses a one-line question: “What about AI? We’ll see.” This understated close implies that AI is the current candidate for the same pattern — currently subject to both enormous hype and scepticism — and that its long-term impact may exceed even our most optimistic current projections, just as the internet eventually did.
Readlite provides curated articles with comprehensive analysis including summaries, key points, vocabulary building, and practice questions across 9 different RC question types. Our Ultimate Reading Course offers 365 articles with 2,400+ questions to systematically improve your reading comprehension skills.
This article is rated Beginner. Falcone writes in short, clear sentences with minimal technical jargon, and each principle is illustrated with a concrete everyday example. The vocabulary is accessible throughout, and the list format means each idea is self-contained — readers do not need to track a sustained argument across sections. The main comprehension challenge is accurately matching each law to its correct definition, which requires careful attention rather than advanced inference.
Giacomo Falcone is a Substack newsletter writer who publishes weekly editions on productivity, mental models, and professional self-improvement. He mentions in this article that his newsletter has been running for nearly two years and that one of his signature series — The Concepts to Succeed in Business — covers 24 frameworks specifically aimed at professional contexts. His writing style is practical and list-driven, designed to deliver usable ideas efficiently for busy readers rather than offer deep academic treatment of any single concept.
The Ultimate Reading Course covers 9 RC question types: Multiple Choice, True/False, Multi-Statement T/F, Text Highlight, Fill in the Blanks, Matching, Sequencing, Error Spotting, and Short Answer. This comprehensive coverage prepares you for any reading comprehension format you might encounter.
