| Oh, the delicious irony of this post. YOU used a mental model - 'the game of chess' - yet failed to see that it doesn't map to the real world. If you had paid more attention to mental models, you would have realised that chess is a very poor model to use to compare to the world of business. Just take the very first in that list - 'the map is not the territory.' Have you ever seen decisions being made using Spreadsheet data that hold fine in formulas or projections? (But then don't translate to the real world?) This is a very common problem in business and part of the reason I will move very cautiously before hiring an MBA once more. 'Really good chess players don't consciously think like that, at least not in a sort of pronounced way. They've incorporated knowledge and play by intuition. They can make 'good moves' in a second or two.' This analogy simply does not hold. The best investors/entrepreneurs as proven by their records DO swear by mental models. Not just Munger. Chuck Akre has a ridiculously simple mental model - the three-legged stool. Jeff Bezos is also a big user of the concept. I interact with investors regularly. Many of them also use mental models, unsuccessfully. The difference between them and the best is that their mental models are woeful (Post hoc ergo propter hoc). They'd have a better understanding of their mistakes if they were to dedicate more time to learning more deeply about this topic. ~ Why is a chess player more worthy of your respect than Munger, Buffett or Bezos, who are playing infinitely more complex games? And at a much higher level of success than you or I? Do you need reminding that they are not just dealing with the psychology of ONE other player, but that of _millions_? What is it about these giants that causes you to immediately discard their wisdom? I think a better question is one you should be asking yourself: "What am I missing here?" Because by definition, if you can muster the humility to see it, you are clearly missing something |