I read an exchange recently that
made me think about what seems to be Charlie Munger’s inscrutable rationale for
not being more explicit in providing guidance to those who would follow in his
mental models approach to learning. Munger’s partner Buffett, of course, gets
called on more frequently to expand on the book “Security Analysis” penned by
his mentor Benjamin Graham. Buffett often replies that investing is so simple
that were he to write such a book, no one would believe it.
Munger’s mental
model approach isn’t that simple—Charlie admits as much, writing, “You
may say, ‘My God, this [mental model approach] is already getting way too
tough.’ At the same time, Munger does seem to think that the system is simple
enough to be learned, and, presumably, taught. Immediately following his ‘too
tough’ remark, Munger writes, “But, fortunately, it isn't that tough—because 80
or 90 important models will carry about 90% of the freight in making you a
worldly-wise person. And, of those, only a mere handful really carry very heavy
freight.”
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| Charlie Munger Teaching Mental Models. |
So why doesn’t Charlie teach it more
systematically, more explicitly? I have some ideas. A recent exchange about
basketball prospects in advance of the upcoming NBA draft got me thinking about why Charlie Munger doesn’t teach it and how we might
profitably adopt his insights into acquiring what he calls worldly wisdom.
A participant in a recent NBA chat
asked about Myles Turner, a talented prospect out of the University of Texas.
He wrote that turner, “is known as a nice rim protector/defender, though when I
watch him, his feet are really slow and he can't move side to side. Should I be
worried?
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| Myles Turner's Running is a liability. And can be improved. |
Chad Ford of ESPN responded, “He's
been working on it. Talking to his trainer in Vegas, he never really was taught
how to run. I know that sounds weird, but when you watch him, it rings true.
I'm told he looks dramatically better. It was just about teaching technique and
getting his legs a little stronger….If he's fixed that, he's a very intriguing
prospect.”
I was reminded of a couple other
examples from the world of professional basketball. The first was from Kyle
Korver who reported how jarring it was to see trainers at PPP tell him his
jumping form was poor and then show him visual evidence. Seeing the excess and
unnecessary strain he was putting on his body because of poor form and a lack
of strength—both correctible conditions—he resolved to change.
Korver arrived at P3 in Santa
Barbara a half-decade ago with a ravaged left knee, some elbow pain, and a game
that was slipping away. the staff at P3 ran Korver through a series of tests,
taking care to measure the amount of force the player generated on both sides
of his body. Grantland’s
Zach Lowe recounts, “Korver had almost no oomph, and what oomph he had was
isolated in his right leg.” P3 Founder Marcus Elliot noted that, not only was
he asymmetric, but “by NBA standards, he had a handicap.”
Bad mechanics were likely to lead
to overstressing his right leg—and additional injuries likely to result from
there. L.A. Lakers’ longtime trainer Gary Vitti in a wonderful New
Yorker piece described how complicated it is trying to keep high level
athletes health over the course of a long and grueling season (he might well be
talking about investors keeping their minds clear over the long haul of their
careers, too). “Kobe comes down wrong, and has a tibial-plateau fracture. Steve
Blake is behind a pick and puts his arm out as a guy’s running by, the guy hits
his arm, and he tears his ulnar collateral ligament. It’s a baseball pitcher’s
injury! So it’s a complete fluke. Jodie Meeks goes for a jump shot, comes down
on somebody’s foot, rolls his ankle. Pau Gasol strains a flexor muscle in his toe,
we strap his toe down, now he changes the mechanics, now his pelvis shifts, and
the load goes to his adductor—and he strains his adductor. Xavier Henry runs
into somebody, and he gets knocked off balance, and he comes down in an awkward
position. How’s that related to anything?”
In Korver’s case, Elliott and staff
at P3 retrained Korver’s body in a way akin to what Munger proposes people do
to improve over the ‘normal’ function that evolution has gifted them with.
Simple, repetitive exercises aimed at making him stronger and improving his
mechanical function were the whole plan. As Lowe concluded, “Korver would never
jump high or run fast, but if he could start moving before his opponent and
reach peak speed faster, he might eke out the tiny opening he needs to shoot.”
That sounds a lot like Munger on making fewer errors in recreational tennis; 80 percent—and I'd argue that,
especially on the men's side, that might be closer to 90 percent—of the points
are decided by winners, about 80 percent are decided by unforced errors.
Charlie Munger has an amazing
system for compiling experience across a broad latticework. In short, Munger’s
ideas are to fix the small cognitive mistakes people make in a similar way to
Myles Turner’s trainer (reportedly) fixed his gait. Unlike Turner’s trainer,
though, Munger prefers not giving people too much guidance in the process of
what Wittgenstein called ‘removing the crookedness’ from their thinking.
His reasoning is twofold: 1)
because he doesn’t want it to be too easy, 2) because it sticks better when
people have to work for it.
I suspect Munger has another reason that I think is pretty
ingenious—and remarkable given his extreme self-confidence—that I haven’t
heard him express. I think Munger also doesn’t want to give too much away
too explicitly to allow for individual idiosyncrasy. In just the same way my
old tennis coach didn’t tinker with anyone’s swing more than he had to, Munger
recognizes that people need to be comfortable with the way they use such a
system. And not ‘spoon feeding’ people will afford them greater flexibility in
acquiring the mental models approach and makes novel application more possible.
Just as Buffett’s application of the ‘cigar butt’ approach to investing he
learned from Graham improved by adding Munger’s key insights into
investing—particularly regarding the importance of business strength. Were
Munger to teach his system more exactly, he’d run the risk of turning a dynamic
method into a moribund catechism.
One of my favorite thinkers, Michael Oakeshott makes similar point in discussing the way different kinds of knowledge are acquired. While I don't think Munger is familiar with Oakeshott per se, I do think Munger's thinking demonstrates a remarkable implicit understanding of Oakeshott's distinction between technical and practical knowledge. I’ve written on
Oakeshott’s distinction between these types of knowledge elsewhere, but he thinks that practical knowledge,
unlike ‘technical’ knowledge, is “not susceptible of formulation of this kind.
Its normal expression is in a customary or traditional way of doing things, or,
simply, in practice. And this gives it the appearance of imprecision and
consequently of uncertainty, of being a matter of opinion, of probability
rather than truth. It is, indeed, a knowledge that is expressed in taste or
connoisseurship, lacking rigidity and ready for the impress of the mind of the
learner.”
Munger, like Oakeshott, recognizes
that this apparent imprecision is misleading. Practical knowledge can be—and is
regularly—taught. But not in the ways people think—and certainly not via some
textbook. (I actually think Munger is too optimistic regarding acquiring wisdom
through books—Oakeshott notes that the stuff Munger has in mind to teach can’t
be learned only technical knowledge can be learned from a book or even via an
online correspondence course). Where Oakeshott thinks much of technical
knowledge “can be learned by heart, repeated by rote, and applied mechanically”
he regards practical knowledge as impossible to be taught or learned (I think
he’s either wrong about this, or he’s stated his point too strongly), it can,
rather, only be “imparted and acquired.” This kind of knowledge—the kind Munger
is interested in—“exists only in practice, and the only way to acquire it is by
apprenticeship to a master--not because the master can teach it (he cannot),
but because it can be acquired only by continuous contact with one who is
perpetually practising it.”.
But what about the injuries that
occur by leaving people to their own devices? If Munger could prevent such
‘injuries’, shouldn’t he? In one way, I think the answer is yes. And that’s why
I’m as crazy as I am about incorporating Munger’s ideas for a system of mental
models into formalized education. At the same time, though, I have come to recognize
the sagacity of Munger’s not intervening in providing people more direction in
acquiring the kind of wisdom he believes (and has demonstrated) is possible to
acquire—even as people getting ‘injured’ because of (treatable) crooked
thinking all around him.
Learning from one’s mistakes is one
of the best things a person can do. Munger does talk a lot about how important
it is to be able to acquire wisdom via vicarious experience so that you don’t
have to experience everything first hand in order to understand it. You’ll have
to suffer too much if you go about it that way. But there’s wisdom in the old
adage ‘experience keeps a dear school, but it is a fool who will learn by no
other.’ But there is something powerful about the lessons we learn by suffering
the consequences of our own mistakes. It is, I suspect, why Buffett named his
conglomerate ‘Berkshire’.
The upshot is that we can acquire
and use an integrated system of mental models, just as Munger suggests. But we
might have to (mostly) get it the hard way. Maybe the model of
master/apprentice or coach/player is appropriate to getting this kind of
knowledge—I do know I’d love to apprentice under Munger. But I wonder if
there’s a way to incorporate Munger’s system into school curricula? Let me know
if you have any ideas on that score.
