Today I’m going to be facilitating the third Tools for Thought Interchange event. While each of the speakers will have something interesting to show off and talk about, that’s not why I’m most excited.

Thinking is difficult. Thinking well requires discipline, intention, and technique. Just like our physical muscles, our mental muscles have to be built up in the intellectual gym in order to do the work. And also like our physical bodies, our efforts in thinking can be multiplied with tools.

Writing itself is one such tool. “Language is the policeman of thought,” as Brian Goetz pointed out. Writing helps us clarify our thinking, spot faulty logic, simplify and synthesize different strains of thought. We think better when we write.

The general-purpose computer is another such tool. In Media for Thinking the Unthinkable, Bret Victor demonstrated a few examples that hint at how a computer can help us think better. But the reality is that we’re merely scratching the surface. As Bret stated:

We must get away from pencil-and-paper thinking. Even when working on the computer, we still think in representations that were invented for the medium of paper.

What’s exciting about the Tools for Thought Interchange is that it’s a forum, one tiny little opportunity, for practitioners and tool-builders to exchange ideas, to show their work and their workflows, and to chip away at the creation of new media for thinking better, together.

Right now, the plan is to meet once a month. We already have some great speakers lined up for August. If you’re interested in speaking, whether it’s showing your own thinking-with-a-computer process or demoing a tool you’re building, feel free to fill out this form.

Hope to see you there.

Things that caught my eye

• Alexey Guzey wrote about his experience with remote co-working: “I no longer believe that it’s possible to achieve extremely high productivity sustained over long periods of time working on difficult projects alone, so now I spend the majority of my working time co-working with my friends over video in my virtual gather.town office.” This mirrors my own experience working remotely over the past decade. I go out of my way to schedule paired “work sessions” as I find that I maintain a higher level of focus and productivity, and I find I’m just plain happier at the end of the day.
• Playdate pre-orders start tomorrow! Not only am I excited about this petite little game console, but it’s also an open platform for developing new games. I can’t wait to see what wild creations we see over the next year. At $179, I’ll definitely be picking up one of these, if only for tinkering.