A Claude Skill by Gary Griffiths
Strip any problem, decision, or strategy down to its foundational truths and rebuild from zero. Stop solving the wrong problem elegantly.
Download the Skill — FreeMost decisions are built on borrowed logic. Industry norms. Competitor behaviour. "Best practice." Analogies from other domains. Inherited assumptions that nobody ever tested.
The result is smart people building elegant solutions to the wrong problem.
This skill forces you to find what's actually true before you build anything on top of it.
Six phases
Make sure the right question is on the table before deconstructing the wrong one.
Surface every hidden assumption using Socratic questioning. Classify each one: inherited, analogical, untested, or structural.
Strip to what is verifiably true using Aristotle's Four Causes. Material. Formal. Efficient. Final.
Rebuild three distinct solutions from first principles alone. No borrowed logic. No best practice.
See exactly where conventional thinking was leading you astray and what it was costing you.
The single highest-leverage action that conventional analysis would never find.
Use it on
Bid decisions. Product strategy. Pricing. Architecture choices. Go-to-market planning. Any decision where the stakes justify slowing down to think properly before committing.
How to install
Download the .skill file
Open Claude (claude.ai)
Go to Settings → Skills and upload the file, or drag it into any conversation
Type "first principles this" followed by your problem