A wider world · Collection guide · 5 stops
Recognise power & manipulation
Use this route to examine persuasive language, organisational incentives and polished success stories. It moves between an essay, a corporate failure, an internal memo and investigative reporting before ending with satire. The point is to become more precise about evidence and consequences, not to assume every institution hides the same story.
Browse this collection in reading order →Suggested routes through material saved to explore. I haven’t read or watched everything here yet. The order and prompts are editorial suggestions based on available source text, excerpts, descriptions and synopses; they are not personal ratings or claims of completed viewing.
Notice what the words make invisible
Orwell’s essay begins with language because unclear or inflated phrasing can conceal an action before you start evaluating it. Practise turning an impressive claim into a statement you can actually question.
Pause & try
Choose a public statement. Rewrite it using a named actor, a concrete action and an identifiable consequence. What information is still missing?
Look at incentives inside a success story
Documentaries · Est. 1 hr 30 min
Enron: The Smartest Guys in the Room →
Collected by The Unintuitive ↗
Enron’s rise and collapse gives the language exercise an organisational setting. Watch how reputation and incentives interact, then distinguish warning signs visible at the time from explanations that only seem obvious afterwards.
Pause & try
Identify a reward, an inconvenient fact and a person with reason to ignore it. What independent evidence could have challenged the story?
Read the logic when it is stated openly
The reported Facebook memo exposes a stark argument about connection and growth. Read the surrounding reporting too, including how the memo is framed and contested, rather than treating an isolated quotation as the entire case.
Pause & try
Write the goal the argument prioritises, the cost it accepts and the people who bear that cost. Where would you challenge its reasoning?
Follow the rules as well as the rhetoric
Articles · Est. 6 min
How McKinsey Makes Its Own Rules - Ian MacDougall →
Collected by The Unintuitive ↗
ProPublica’s McKinsey investigation adds questions about institutional arrangements and conflicts. It follows the internal memo to shift attention from what individuals say to the structures that let decisions proceed.
Pause & try
Map who advises, who pays, who decides and who is affected in the case. Which relationship needs disclosure or independent scrutiny?
Use satire to test your recognition
Thank You for Smoking is a fictional satire, offered here as a lens on argument and persuasion. After the reported cases, notice the difference between making a position sound defensible and supplying evidence for it.
Pause & try
Describe one persuasive move in the film. Find a real example of the same form of argument, then evaluate its evidence separately from its style.
After the five stops
Take it into your own life.
Apply the actor, incentive, evidence and consequence questions to one current claim you encounter. Keep facts, interpretations and unanswered questions separate. A useful result is a better-supported judgment, including knowing when there is not enough information to reach one.
Continue exploring
Items 1–5 are the guided route above. The remaining items are listed alphabetically below; choose what interests you next. These numbers match the collection shelf.
- Cocaine Cowboys → Find on the shelf: Cocaine Cowboys →
- Hoop Dreams → Find on the shelf: Hoop Dreams →
- How Larry Gagosian Reshaped the Art World → Find on the shelf: How Larry Gagosian Reshaped the Art World →
- Icahn → Find on the shelf: Icahn →
- Icarus → Find on the shelf: Icarus →
- Industrial Society and Its Future → Find on the shelf: Industrial Society and Its Future →
- Inside Job → Find on the shelf: Inside Job →
- Jesse Willms, the Dark Lord of the Internet → Find on the shelf: Jesse Willms, the Dark Lord of the Internet →
- Psywar - The Real Battlefield Is The Mind → Find on the shelf: Psywar - The Real Battlefield Is The Mind →
- Sour Grapes → Find on the shelf: Sour Grapes →
- The Century of the Self Series → Find on the shelf: The Century of the Self Series →
- The Education of a Libertarian - Peter Thiel → Find on the shelf: The Education of a Libertarian - Peter Thiel →
- The Fog Of War → Find on the shelf: The Fog Of War →
- The Gervais Principle, Or The Office According to “The Office” → Find on the shelf: The Gervais Principle, Or The Office According to “The Office” →
- The Inner Ring → Find on the shelf: The Inner Ring →
- The Man Who Ate Hollywood - Mark Seal → Find on the shelf: The Man Who Ate Hollywood - Mark Seal →
- The Mastermind → Find on the shelf: The Mastermind →
- The One Percent → Find on the shelf: The One Percent →
- The Pervert’s Guide to Ideology → Find on the shelf: The Pervert’s Guide to Ideology →
- The Psychology of Human Misjudgment - Charlie Munger → Find on the shelf: The Psychology of Human Misjudgment - Charlie Munger →
- Whoever governs Singapore must have that iron in him → Find on the shelf: Whoever governs Singapore must have that iron in him →