Zeroth-Order Principle: A Big Picture Perspective Means Assigning Voting Rights to Truths

We are now entering the final section of our modern thinking tools course, which I call “Higher Viewpoint Reflection.” The term “higher viewpoint” is borrowed from the renowned book Elementary Mathematics from a Higher Standpoint [1], published in 1908 by German mathematician Felix Klein. Just as studying advanced mathematics allows one to look back at elementary mathematics and see common structures emerge from what were once scattered pieces of knowledge because you’ve ascended to a higher vantage point, this section will elevate us even further. Having discussed numerous thinking tools previously, we will now explore several overarching and universally applicable ones.

In this lecture, please allow me to share an original concept called the “zeroth-order principle.”

A zeroth-order principle refers to the most fundamental and important principle that governs a certain matter or decision. It possesses a peculiar characteristic: precisely because it is so fundamental, people are often reluctant to discuss it, preferring instead to talk about its modifications or exceptions.

For instance, “star players are very useful to a team” is a zeroth-order principle. However, because everyone knows this truth, stating it seems trivial. Thus, people prefer to discuss: “It’s not always a good thing when star players join; it might even cause team conflicts and disrupt the locker room atmosphere.” This statement is not wrong, but it’s merely a secondary consideration. We must never abandon the primary benefits due to secondary drawbacks.

Another example is “modernization is good,” which is also a zeroth-order principle; ordinary people understand its benefits. Yet, some scholars are particularly keen on exploring the downsides of modernization: how it has disrupted warm interpersonal relationships and dismantled traditional rural economies. Consequently, in their discourse, they gradually adopt an anti-modernization stance. However, if asked to return to being farmers in the past, most would likely be unwilling.

In fact, people are not easily deceived by false principles. A more common predicament is being hijacked by principles that are correct but unimportant. These principles are not entirely useless; they are merely modifications of zeroth-order principles and should not negate the zeroth-order principles themselves.

The human brain is a multi-party political system. When faced with a situation, you always have many voices in your head, and you can articulate all sorts of principles—yet, relative to your objective, the influence of most of these principles is negligible.

A principle can be 100% correct, yet only deserve 1% of the weight.

However, most people possess only a “truth-falsehood judgment system” but lack a “weight judgment system”: any factor that sounds reasonable seems to receive an equal vote, with sesame seeds, stones, and mountains all being counted with the same weight.

The education we receive from childhood, and the exams we take, primarily assess “right or wrong,” because right and wrong have clear standard answers. But “importance” has no standard answer—it depends on your goals and is a subjective judgment. You need to learn how to distinguish between what is important and what is not.

The Physics Inspiration and Core Definition of Zeroth-Order Principles #

The term “zeroth-order” comes from a traditional method used by physicists: when faced with a complex problem for which an exact solution cannot be found, one first calculates a rough answer that captures the main contradiction, which is called a “zeroth-order approximation.” Then, based on this, corrections are made, adding first-order corrections, second-order corrections, and so on, progressively increasing accuracy. This method is called “perturbation theory.”

For example, if you ask how many days are in a year, the zeroth-order answer is 365 days. This answer is imprecise, and someone will immediately point out that it’s wrong, that the Earth takes more than 365 days to orbit the sun! So, we can apply a first-order correction, which is to add one day every four years, known as a “leap year.” Then someone else might say that even the first-order correction isn’t entirely accurate, and they’d be right, so there’s also a second-order correction: no leap year in full centuries unless divisible by 400…

The correction terms for the calendar can be added ad infinitum, but they can only fine-tune the result; they cannot overturn the zeroth-order principle that “a year is approximately 365 days.”

This illustrates the relationship between zeroth-order and higher-order principles: higher-order terms are secondary quantities; they can correct zeroth-order terms but are not qualified to replace them. You must first acknowledge the correctness of a zeroth-order principle before you can talk about correcting it. Those who immediately speak at length about corrections have often forgotten the origin of what they are correcting.

So, how does one find a zeroth-order principle? Physicists’ approach is “dominant balance”: when faced with an equation containing many terms, first identify which terms are dominant and temporarily ignore the rest [2].

Once this idea is understood, it reveals itself to be ubiquitous. Mao Zedong’s On Contradiction states that when studying any complex process, “one should devote all efforts to finding its principal contradiction. Once this principal contradiction is grasped, all problems will be readily solved” [3]. Grasping the principal contradiction is equivalent to grasping the zeroth-order principle.

Deng Xiaoping’s expression for this was “hard truth.” In his Southern Tour Speeches of 1992, immediately after stating, “We should pay attention to the stable and coordinated development of the economy,” he continued: “But stability and coordination are also relative, not absolute. Development is the hard truth” [4].

A closer look at Deng Xiaoping’s statement reveals its “physical intuition”: Deng Xiaoping did not say that stability and coordination were wrong—those are also principles, and they are correct—he said those principles were soft. Soft principles can be debated, but hard principles must be followed. At that time, the debate over “socialist or capitalist” was raging, and each opposing argument, taken individually, seemed reasonable. Yet, as soon as Deng Xiaoping uttered those words, the debate ceased. He did not refute anyone; rather, he “demoted” all other principles.

Whether something is right or wrong is one thing; whether it is important or not is another.

Strictly speaking,

A zeroth-order principle is the minimal causal model that, given a specific goal, time scale, and comparison objects, is sufficient to determine the direction and primary magnitude of a conclusion.

It contains three keywords:

“Direction”: it tells you whether A is superior or inferior to B; “Magnitude”: it tells you the approximate scale of the advantage—for example, whether it’s one percent better or ten times better; “Minimal”: it doesn’t necessarily contain only one factor, but it retains only the fewest dominant terms, with not a single one being superfluous.

For example, what is the zeroth-order principle for “should I change jobs?” Given the goal of income and capability ten years from now (goal + time scale), and the options of “staying” or “changing jobs” (comparison objects), the minimal causal model determining direction and magnitude has only two components: whether this position allows you continuous exposure to people stronger than yourself, and whether this industry will expand or contract in the next ten years. Everything else—the boss’s temper, commute distance, desk orientation, stock option terms—are merely correction terms.

The Big Picture Perspective: Lossy Compression of Information and Causal Control #

Only after understanding what a zeroth-order principle is can you truly grasp what a big picture perspective entails. A big picture perspective is the insight into the one or two most critical “feedback loops” within a complex system.

The difference between the big picture and details is not one of grandeur versus minuteness, but rather one of control versus ornamentation.

Military maps don’t depict every tree, every stone, or every clothesline of every household, but they will always mark bridges. A bridge may not be larger than a forest, but because supplies must pass over it, it possesses “causal control.” You might know every tree and remember the joys and sorrows that unfolded at the village entrance… However, if you cannot point out the location of the bridge outside the village, such familiarity is utterly worthless.

A big picture perspective involves “lossy compression” of information. It disregards most content, requiring only the retention of three core elements: direction, magnitude, and mechanism. You might think “ignoring” is easy, but ignoring is actually a difficult skill that many find hard to master: you must allow yourself to be imprecise in unimportant areas.

Individuals without a tolerance for error cannot develop a big picture perspective; they constantly seek exceptions, qualifiers, and additional conditions, ultimately running aground on the shoals of detail.

Why We Obsess Over Details: Evaluability and the Focusing Illusion #

So, why do people so easily obsess over minutiae and struggle to grasp the big picture? The reason is that “conspicuous” matters naturally attract attention, while “important” matters require setting a goal first, then calculating and judging.

For example, a job seeker faces two job offers with similar salary levels. How should they choose?

Logically, one should conduct some research to assess factors such as career growth potential and job stability. However, many people will make a choice based on a minor detail—for example, the first job is closer to home, saving ten minutes of commute time daily.

Why? Because growth potential and stability are difficult to evaluate, while commute time is immediately apparent.

In 1996, Christopher K. Hsee, a behavioral scientist at the University of Chicago Booth School of Business, proposed the “evaluability hypothesis” [5], which states that the easier a factor is to evaluate, the greater the weight people assign to it in decision-making, even if the factor itself is not important.

One of Hsee’s famous experiments involved asking people to estimate the value of two used professional music dictionaries. Dictionary A contained 20,000 entries but had a damaged cover; Dictionary B contained 10,000 entries but was in pristine condition. If people were asked to evaluate only one dictionary independently, Dictionary B would receive a higher valuation because it was like new. However, when both dictionaries were presented together, people were more willing to pay a higher price for Dictionary A—because A clearly had more entries and seemed to offer greater practical value.

This explains why women attach such importance to height when choosing a partner. In reality, studies show that a partner’s height has no significant impact on marital happiness [6]—but height is simply too easy to evaluate and too conspicuous.

A middle school teacher who has worked on the front lines of education for decades might believe they have a profound understanding of education. However, the number of students they have actually taught in their lifetime is merely over a thousand. They do not fully understand the ins and outs of the current educational landscape, nor can they foresee the future direction of education; what they have seen in their lifetime is merely a cross-section at a particular location—this makes it difficult for them to imagine other possibilities. They will revere their limited experience as the ultimate truth of education.

Another concept comes from Daniel Kahneman’s “focusing illusion” [7]: “Nothing in life is as important as you think it is when you are thinking about it.” If you only concentrate on a specific detail, you will mistakenly believe that this detail is the decisive factor.

Details often make one appear professional, just as elaborating on higher-order principles often makes one seem intelligent.

One hundred years ago, scientists were often generalists in their field, like Darwin, capable of grasping the big picture of their discipline. Today, however, scientific research has become an ordinary profession, sustaining the livelihoods of many. The vast majority of current researchers investigate extremely minute problems within their specific fields, with a level of specialization that is often incomprehensible… Yet, when they write grant applications, they invariably claim that the problem they are studying is the most important in the world.

If you immediately feel reverence when someone discusses detailed issues, you have likely fallen into the trap of the “focusing illusion.”

The True “Big Picture”: Local Control Determined by Your Goal #

There is also another type of person who is just the opposite: not only do they not get bogged down in details, but their hearts are set on the whole world!

They have opinions on whether the Federal Reserve will cut interest rates next month; they can deduce the next steps of the Russia-Ukraine war; they can articulate the deep-seated contradictions of the macroeconomic situation with great coherence. Just as every taxi driver in Beijing is a “national advisor,” everyone in Brazil is a football coach.

So, do these people possess a particularly strong big picture perspective? This is not a true big picture perspective.

The true big picture is determined by your objective function. To measure whether a factor is zeroth-order or higher-order, you should examine how much causal control it has over your goal. If your work is related to foreign trade, the US-China trade war would be very important to you; otherwise, you should pay more attention to the specific elements around you: your industry, the company you work for, your personal skills, your family, and your health.

For most people, macroeconomic factors are higher-order secondary quantities in their life equation, and their importance should rank after your own personal variables.

Professor Zhou Qiren noted in a speech in October 2025 [8]: “Regarding macroeconomic policies or Trump’s affairs, no one will listen no matter how much you say; but the matters in your hands, you can control.” He also gave an analogy to entrepreneurs in Yantai [9]: global weather is, of course, the most macro, but what you truly need to worry about is the weather in Yantai today. Zhou Qiren stated:

「不妨试试，将刷屏时间减掉一大半，看看究竟错过了什么大事。省出来的时间用来做什么？对企业家而言，可以集中更多时间去研究真正值得你研究的事——那就是客户、你的客户、唯一为你们公司付钱的客户！」 “Why not try cutting your screen time by more than half and see what major events you actually missed? What to do with the saved time? For entrepreneurs, it means concentrating more time on truly worthwhile research—that is, your customers, your customers, the only customers who pay your company!”

Of course, this isn’t to say that macro issues are not worth spending time on, but grand narratives should be separated from one’s own decisions.

We shouldn’t pretend hurricanes don’t exist, but there’s no need to expend energy “shouting” at them.

Your true big picture perspective is not the national-level big picture, but rather the “local small picture” of your specific domain.

Practicing Zeroth-Order Principles: Weighing Trade-offs and the Reversal Test #

Grasping a zeroth-order principle, in short, means distinguishing priorities. And priorities, in turn, depend on your goal setting.

The primary mental discipline is to “first ask about weight, then about truth or falsehood.” If something is unimportant to you, then its truth or falsehood is also unimportant to you, and you shouldn’t spend time verifying its authenticity at all.

Chinese people refer to this action as “quánhéng” (weighing). The original meaning of “quán” is a steelyard weight. As Mencius said, “Quán (weigh), and then you know the heavy and the light”—“quánhéng,” therefore, means to measure importance.

A famous anecdote records someone asking Mencius: “It is a rule of propriety that men and women should not touch each other. Given this, if a sister-in-law falls into the water, should one use a hand to rescue her?”

Mencius replied: 「嫂溺不援，是豺狼也。男女授受不亲，礼也；嫂溺，援之以手者，权也。」“Not to help a drowning sister-in-law is to be a jackal or a wolf. That men and women should not touch each other is propriety; to rescue a drowning sister-in-law with one’s hand is ‘quán’ (expediency/weighing).” In the face of a life-and-death matter like saving a life, what propriety are you still adhering to? Knowing what is urgent and what is important, that is “quán.”

The “quán” here is also the “quán” as in “power.” Every aspect has reasons for spending money, every person has strengths, and every project claims to be the most principled. So, to whom should these limited resources be preferentially allocated? Granting you power means entrusting you with the responsibility of weighing these options.

Furthermore, there’s no need to be exhaustive when considering a problem. If you ask, “Have I missed anything?” you will never finish deliberating. You only need to perform a “reversal test,” asking yourself, “What else could completely overturn my conclusion?”

If you prioritize self-growth, an extra ten minutes or a saving of ten minutes in commute time might be irrelevant to you; but if you prioritize family life, and those extra ten minutes daily mean you miss picking up your child from school, then this factor is sufficient to completely overturn your conclusion.

However, there is a category of factors that can never be treated as secondary quantities: these are “hard constraints.” If a low-probability risk, once it occurs, means bankruptcy or is a matter of life and death, then it must be given a “veto power”… In the words of physicists, it means “the perturbation series may not converge.”

Some people overthink things, turning them over and over, finding it hard to decide, precisely because they are constrained by unimportant secondary factors. Once the direction is clear, deep analysis can stop, and details can be left to the implementation level.

A big picture perspective is half about knowing what to pay attention to, and half about knowing when to stop paying attention.

The Demeanor of Those with a Big Picture Perspective: A Comparison of Zhuge Liang and Kong Yiji #

So, what kind of temperament do people with a big picture perspective usually possess? Let me share an anecdote.

According to Wei Lue as cited in Pei Songzhi’s commentary on Records of the Three Kingdoms, when Zhuge Liang was studying in Jingzhou in his youth, among his classmates, Shi Guangyuan, Xu Yuanzhi, and Meng Gongwei all “strove for meticulous mastery” in their studies—“while Liang alone grasped the general idea” [10]. When others studied, they would painstakingly examine every single character and word, pondering its meaning; Zhuge Liang, on the other hand, focused on the core essence of the entire book and its most important logical framework.

“Striving for meticulous mastery” means treating every sentence as equal, while “grasping the general idea” means assigning voting rights to the core principles within the book.

Wei Lue also recorded: Zhuge Liang once asserted that his three classmates would later serve as provincial governors or prefects; when asked about himself, he merely smiled without speaking. Later, the three indeed generally attained such offices, while Zhuge Liang rose to the position of Chancellor.

Luo Guanzhong was perhaps inspired by this historical passage when, in the “Battle of Wits Against the Scholars” scene in Romance of the Three Kingdoms, he specifically wrote a monologue for Zhuge Liang, where he described himself as a “scholar of the noble sort” while those literati from Jiangdong were “scholars of the petty sort”:

“小人之儒，惟务雕虫，专工翰墨，青春作赋，皓首穷经；笔下虽有千言，胸中实无一策。” “Scholars of the petty sort only care for trivialities, specializing in writing; they compose essays in their youth and exhaust themselves studying classics until old age; though their pens produce thousands of words, their minds possess not a single strategy.”

From this, it is clear that the characteristic of these “scholars of the petty sort” was not a matter of moral failings such as greed, plagiarism, jealousy, or treachery, but rather a lack of a big picture perspective.

Isn’t this also the meaning behind Lu Xun’s character Kong Yiji, who prided himself on knowing “four ways to write the character ‘hui’”?

Our course has elucidated numerous thinking tools, and readers might encounter even more principles during their reading. Sometimes, when juxtaposed, certain principles might seem contradictory. Consequently, people often ask me: “What is the scope of applicability for the principles you articulate? And where is their ‘measure’?” In reality, they are not contradictory. Which principle is the zeroth-order principle at any given moment is for you to judge on the spot; its “measure” can only be determined through specific analysis of the concrete situation.

“Striving for meticulous mastery” might make you seem clever. But “grasping the general idea” and seizing the zeroth-order principle is true wisdom.

A Gatha for Proof #

A single leaf before the eye obscures a mountain, Pluck it away, and then believe the sky is vast. Countless mundane matters keep humanity’s gaze cast down, Yet they cannot compare to a single moment of looking up.

Notes #

[1] Klein, Felix. Elementarmathematik vom höheren Standpunkte aus. 3 vols. Leipzig and Berlin: B. G. Teubner and Julius Springer, 1908–1928；中译本：〔德〕菲利克斯·克莱因著，舒湘芹、陈义章、杨钦樑译，齐民友审：《高观点下的初等数学》（全三卷），上海：华东师范大学出版社，2020 年。

[2] Callaham, Jared L., James V. Koch, Bingni W. Brunton, J. Nathan Kutz, and Steven L. Brunton. “Learning Dominant Physical Processes with Data-Driven Balance Models.” Nature Communications 12 (2021): 1016.

[3] 毛泽东：《矛盾论》（1937 年 8 月），《毛泽东选集》第一卷，北京：人民出版社，1991 年。

[4] 邓小平：《在武昌、深圳、珠海、上海等地的谈话要点》（1992 年 1 月 18 日 — 2 月 21 日），《邓小平文选》第三卷，北京：人民出版社，1993 年，第 370—383 页。

[5] Hsee, Christopher K. “The Evaluability Hypothesis: An Explanation for Preference Reversals between Joint and Separate Evaluations of Alternatives.” Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes 67, no. 3 (1996): 247–257.

[6] Joel, Samantha, et al. “Machine Learning Uncovers the Most Robust Self-Report Predictors of Relationship Quality across 43 Longitudinal Couples Studies.” Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences 117, no. 32 (2020): 19061–19071. 另见《精英日课》第五季，别相信直觉1：婚恋大数据

[7] Schkade, David A., and Daniel Kahneman. “Does Living in California Make People Happy? A Focusing Illusion in Judgments of Life Satisfaction.” Psychological Science 9, no. 5 (1998): 340–346.

[8] 周其仁在北京大学国家发展研究院《寻路集》新书分享会上的演讲（2025 年 10 月 14 日），全文见《周其仁最新演讲：细处、宽处和高处》，新浪财经 2025 年 10 月 24 日。https://finance.sina.com.cn/stock/stockzmt/2025-10-24/doc-infuxceh7640145.shtml

[9] 周其仁：《烟台夜话 —— 企业家要把有限的精力集中到真本事上》（2023 年 5 月对正和岛企业家的分享，后收入《寻路集：在全球网络中寻找合适节点》），新浪财经 2025 年 9 月 26 日转载。https://finance.sina.com.cn/cj/2025-09-26/doc-infrvnmn0576791.shtml

[10] 陈寿：《三国志》卷三十五《蜀书·诸葛亮传》，裴松之注引《魏略》。