Context Clues
How to keep AI agents building what matters, not just what compiles.
- No. 94Parkinson’s Law of TrivialityThe shed gets forty-five minutes. The reactor gets two and a half.8 min
- No. 93Disagree and CommitThe commitment is the easy part to remember. The disagreement is the part worth keeping.7 min
- No. 92Escalation of CommitmentThe more a decision belongs to you, the harder it is to let it lose.8 min
- No. 91ResultingAn outcome is one draw. The decision was the bet.7 min
- No. 90TripwireDecide what evidence will force the plan to react.8 min
- No. 89PremortemAssume the plan failed. Find out why before it does.6 min
- No. 88The Outside ViewThe details explain a project. Its reference class predicts it.5 min
- No. 87Stop ConditionAn agent run needs more than one way out. Finishing is only one of them.8 min
- No. 86Blast RadiusThe size of an action is not the size of its consequences.4 min
- No. 85Reversible by Whom?A decision may be reversible for the company and irreversible for the people who trusted it.5 min
- No. 84One-Way DoorsAgents made every decision fast. That was only ever safe for most of them.9 min
- No. 83Signal vs. NoiseWhen everything matters, nothing does.6 min
- No. 82Honest UncertaintyThe best agents know what they don’t know.7 min
- No. 81The Certainty TaxHigh-confidence outputs are expensive. Sometimes that’s worth it. Often it’s not.7 min
- No. 80Approval TheaterA sign-off that skips the actual checking is worse than no approval at all.7 min
- No. 79Dry RunWatching an agent long enough to trust it means it was already running unsupervised the whole time you were watching.5 min
- No. 78Conflict DetectionTwo changes can each look just as related to an old decision.6 min
- No. 77Decision DebtA decision does not stay correct just because nobody has formally reversed it.6 min
- No. 76Current StateUpdates tell you what happened. A current state tells you what is true now. Those are not the same job.6 min
- No. 75Standing BriefA system that only speaks when something clears its bar for interrupting you is right to be stingy about it.6 min
- No. 74Coase TheoremTwo sides can both be describing the same friction honestly.8 min
- No. 73Conway’s LawA system’s seams don’t come from a design meeting.7 min
- No. 72Nerve CenterHanding off a decision and handing off the reasoning behind it are two different transfers.7 min