Most commonly, I hear answers like the following: Brilliant thinking is rare, but courage is in even shorter supply than genius. And it's psychologically difficult because anyone trying to answer must say something she knows to be unpopular. It's intellectually difficult because the knowledge that everyone is taught in school is by definition agreed upon. Whenever I interview someone for a job, I like to ask this question: 'What important truth do very few people agree with you on?' This is a question that sounds easy because it's straightforward. It's unlike any event you've ever been to.ģ. When we set out to create a series of public workshops called Re:Think we decided to base them on developing fluency with first principle ideas and applying them to solve business problems. Indeed, the single most powerful pattern I have noticed is that successful people find value in unexpected places, and they do this by thinking about business from first principles instead of formulas. The paradox of teaching entrepreneurship is that such a formula (for innovation) cannot exist because every innovation is new and unique, no authority can prescribe in concrete terms how to be more innovative. There is no formula for innovation and there never will be Don't forget the lessons of co-evolution and the Red Queen Effect.Ģ. When you get caught up in the sexy of creating something new, which is more difficult than people expect, your competitors might be going from '1 to n' and eating your lunch. However, there is a '0 to 1' trap that a lot of people get stuck on. However, if we create something new on the other hand, we go from '0 to 1.' If you take something that exists and improve upon it you go from 1 to n. To Thiel there are two types of innovation. It's a point worth considering and is another layer to the mental model of time. Echoing Heraclitus, who said that you can only step into the same river once, Thiel believes that each moment in business happens only once.

Peter thiel 0 to 1 pdf