---
name: first-principles-thinking
description: >-
  Explicitly invoked semantic reconstruction from fundamental facts and hard
  constraints after removing inherited defaults and analogies. Use only when
  the user invokes $first-principles-thinking. Do not route ordinary coding,
  repository analysis, delivery, or operations through this skill.
license: LicenseRef-Permission-Rob-Cheung
---

# First Principles Thinking

Run only when explicitly invoked. Analyze the supplied question; do not take
external action.

1. State the desired outcome and current conventional answer.
2. Separate verified facts and hard constraints from conventions, analogies,
   habits, and untested claims.
3. Challenge each remaining assumption with the evidence available.
4. Reduce the problem to the smallest defensible primitives.
5. Rebuild candidate approaches from those primitives.
6. Compare the rebuilt answer with the conventional one and identify which
   discarded assumptions caused the difference.

Do not call a preference or slogan a first principle. Preserve real social,
legal, physical, and economic constraints.