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Framing Complex Ideas – Public Reading List

How might we help readers internalize complex ideas?

This is a question I grapple with regularly when I write content about neuroscience. Over the past year, I've found a number of helpful resources for getting better at communicating complex ideas and I wanted to share them here.

This reading list was originally put together for a learning club I was facilitating, where we had discussions every week for a month (Feb 11th - Mar 8th. 2021).

Now that we're done, I wanted to make a public reading list so that anyone can drop in and browse through the readings we’ve done in the learning club.

This is just the first iteration, so if you have something you'd like to contribute, please don't hesitate to reach out!

Week 1: Introduction

An overview of the main ideas we cover – Tim Urban interview (15 min).

"For those seeking to convey complex ideas to others, start by identifying how it’s complex to more efficiently simplify the concept to others."

Week 2: Metaphors

This week we’ll be focusing on using metaphors to deconstruct your ideas.

"This is why metaphors are so good at explaining complex ideas. We get fine-grained control over what's most important about the concept, and cut out all the noise." – Maggie Appleton

Main readings:

Optional further reading if you want to learn more:

Week 3: Storytelling

This week we’ll be focusing on using stories to communicate your ideas.

"Stories about complex issues are best told through the lives of people whose experiences illustrate the various systems at play." – Annie Neimand

Main readings:

Optional further reading if you want to learn more:

Week 4: New Mediums for Conveying Knowledge

This week we’ll be focusing on conveying knowledge through writing.

As a medium, books are surprisingly bad at conveying knowledge, and readers mostly don’t realize it. – Andy Matuschak

Main readings:

Optional further reading if you want to learn more:

Week 5: New Mediums for Capturing Complexity

This week we'll be focusing on non-linear writing formats.

“We don’t have a lot of different articles. We focus on something like two different big topics at any one time. We try to map all the different perspectives along with all the relevant information, which is needed for an in-depth understanding of a topic. – Julia Köberlein

Main readings:

Optional further reading if you want to learn more: