A quick recap: A Generalist's foundation is Intellectual Humility, which Emerges from our perpetual race to the bottom of Dunning-Kruger, and inoculates us to the epidemic of overconfidence.

But humility is only the foundation of our abilities. In the epidemic of overconfidence, Vibe Coders & Visionaries create a sea of bad ideas, and our humility powers the skepticism needed to sail through it.

The ability to generate new ideas is one of the things humans do best. Progress is a direct results of our good ideas. When we see things we want to change in the world, we come up with ideas for how to make it better.

When dealing with Wicked Problems, the ideas become hard to produce, and even harder to validate. This is when the epidemic of overconfidence can create problems, as the most confident among us defend their ideas with misplaced certainty. It's tempting to think that if you just bring together the people with the right knowledge and ideas, you can ride their expertise to inevitable success.

But that's not what happens, most ideas will fail.

Marty Cagan, the godfather of Product Management, taught us this important lesson.

The Two Inconvenient Product Truths:

1. Most ideas will not work, whether for cost, feasibility, or usability reasons
2. The good ideas will still take many iterations to deliver the intended benefits

While Marty's proclamation is in the context of Product Management, it is broadly true about all ideas: startup concepts, how best to raise your child, how to get a job, and home projects (the worst). We're swimming in a sea of bad ideas.

Well, Marty, meet the Generalists with our intellectual humility. If most ideas fail, the path to success depends on how quickly you can catch your failures. We should start placing as much value in "that idea won't work" as we do in "this idea will work," because most likely it won't.

Our humility makes us aware of the limits of our knowledge, but we see those same limitations in the knowledge of others. We become skeptics, equipped to sail through the sea of bad ideas.

All ideas are built on assumptions, bad ideas are built on bad assumptions. Sometimes assumptions are known but invalid. Other times assumptions are unknown, stemming from overconfidence, and this creates bullshit. Skeptical Generalists are excellent at calling out bullshit.

Two types of people trip on unknown assumptions: Vibe Coders & Visionaries.

Vibe Coders miss assumptions of depth, they come up with ideas which are not feasible within the domain. Their ideas are the result of the confidence of thin competence. If you don't know enough to know how little you know, you're likely to think unrealistic ideas are feasible. Vibe Coders bring shallow solutions to deep problems, "Security is important, so I solved it by asking [Insert AI Tool] to whip up an authentication process."

Visionaries miss assumptions of breadth, they come up with ideas which are not feasible outside the domain. Their ideas sound like magic because they are created for ideal conditions and propose simple solutions to wicked problems, without Analyzing the Systems they exist in. Like I tell my son, we live in a complex world so you should always be skeptical of simple answers. Visionaries bring narrow solutions to wide problems, "We need to increase margins, so we're building [Insert Agent Name] to do [Insert Complex Process]."

Skeptical Generalists can catch both types of unknown assumptions: helping Vibe Coders see that security extends far deeper than authentication, and helping Visionaries see how their new AI Agent will impact profitability, consumer trust, and employee morale. Our skepticism doesn't provide us with the right direction, that depends on our next emergent ability, but it prevents us from running in the wrong direction.

So again, the Generalists show up like Gandalf 🧙, orchestrating ideas across depth and breadth, sometimes surfacing the most unlikely of creatures (ideas) as the ring-bearer (solution).

We are all Vibe Coders & Visionaries at times, Generalists included. The process of ideation requires getting all ideas out on the table by asking questions about what's possible. We have to ask bold questions to produce bold ideas, and it's alright that most of those ideas will have bad assumptions.

The fastest way to move forward from here is finding and Testing Assumptions. Armed with our skepticism, Generalists become skilled Assumption Assassins, filtering through the bad ideas to find the best path forward. Assumption testing has been the leading character in the scientific method, product management, and the startup worlds for decades, yet we still imagine a world where uniquely expert people bring uniquely brilliant ideas.

Our skepticism emerges from our humility and makes us skilled assumption assassins in the sea of bad ideas. Avoiding the bad ideas is great, but it doesn't tell us where to find the good ideas.

For that, we depend on innovation, which emerges from the predictive brain.