Ask HN: The most valuable question no one asks

11 points by dont_be_mean 11 years ago | 16 comments

I bumped again recently onto the following quote by Voltaire: "Judge a man by his questions rather than his answers."

This got me thinking when I visited the ask page in HN: what's the most valuable question one could ever ask?

The answer might be: "why?" But in some situations, like social gatherings, asking why can be a recipe for disaster. Are there no other questions that can be equally revealing?

What kind of questions do you like to ask?

toumhi 11 years ago |

This is of dear interest of me. So much that I actually keep a list of questions in Evernote.

from the book "change your questions, change your life":

  - What do I want?
  - What are my choices?
  - What assumptions am I making?
  - What am I responsible for?
  - how else can I think about this?
  - What is the other person thinking, feeling, and wanting?
  - What am I missing or avoiding?
  - What can I learn?
  - ... from this person or situation?
  - ... from this mistake or failure?
  - ... from this success?
  - What action steps make the most sense?
  - What questions should I ask (myself or others)?
  - How can I turn this into a win-win?
  - What's possible?

Questions from "no more mr nice guy":

  - what do I want?
  - what feels right for me?
  - what would make me happy?

from forgotten source:

  - if there were no limits on your life...
  - ... where would you live?
  - ... what would you be doing in your leisure time?
  - ...  what kind of work would you be engaged in?
  - ... what would your home and surrounding look like?
  - what do you really want in life? (write down 3 things) what prevents you from making it happen?

from sebastian marshall:

  - what am I doing?
  - why am I doing it?
  - what are the results?
  - what are the highest value activities I’m  not doing?
  - what can I cut?
  - What hard questions am I avoiding?

proveanegative 11 years ago |

"What part of what I'm doing is responsible for my successes?" Credit to Less Wrong for this one.

giraj 11 years ago | |

Thank you for this one. I think it ties in nicely with the idea of "goal factoring" (also from LW) where you ask yourself "why am I doing what I do? Is there a more direct way of achieving this?" This can be helpful when working with habits and maintaining harmony between your goals and emotions.

rayalez 11 years ago |

I'm not sure if it's the most valuable, but it's definitely one of the questions that gave me a lot of valuable insights and changed my world view dramatically:

"Which of my beliefs are false?" Or "What, among the things I believe in, is not true?"

This question seems very obvious for any intelligent person to ask, but as I put more and more attention to it - I discover more and more shocking things about myself and the world. I have SO much more false beliefs than I've expected.

Because I think of myself as skeptic and atheist, as a rational and "scientific" person, I had no idea that me, and other sceptics/atheists still hold so much beliefs that turn out to be ridiculous and made up when you look at them closely.

And I have no idea how much more is left to discover.

The book that really taught me to ask this question, by the way, is Jed McKenna's enlightenment trilogy. I disagree with a lot of it's new-age'y ideas, but I got a lot of value out of it because of this question, highly recommend it.

To put it shortly "put as much of value and attention into unlearning things and identifying the false knowledge as you put into learning and knowledge"

wrd 11 years ago |

What is the root of human behavior? What are all people striving for? And how does the ensemble of individuals striving for the same thing(s) produce the systems we live in today? These questions are some of the most fundamental questions you can ask, and answering them is tantamount to solving one of the deeper meta-puzzles that life presents to you. You are your biology, psychology, and environment, and understanding how these all influence each other is incredibly useful.

tristanisfeld 11 years ago |

There are many great questions here! And some great ones about questioning what you know and your beliefs, and ensuring for everything else, you apply the same logic or reasoning while analyzing the facts and whether or not those have somehow been distorted by a social "telephone game", or manipulated to fill a talking point, before you make a judgement. It's really nice to see others asking the same questions as that.

I have one question to add. I learned this while studying philosophy, from Emmanuel Kant on ethics, kantian ethics. Something along the lines of:

"Is what I'm about to do right now, something that I would want everybody else in the world to do?". For ethical and moral self or organizational regulation. Should I throw this wrapper out of the window. Should I yell at this barista for screwing up my venti caramel frappuccino. Should we disclose this... you get the idea.

JSeymourATL 11 years ago |

> what's the most valuable question one could ever ask?

"How can I best help you?" Asked with the sincere intention to be of some assistance.

Incidentally, great book recommendation, Give and Take: A Revolutionary Approach to Success. http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/16158498-give-and-take

daly 11 years ago |

What matters most is what you do for free -- John Gorka

What would you do if nobody paid you to do it?

wannano 11 years ago |

At social gatherings, when people are talking about what they do for a living or what they spend their energy on, I like to ask them: "What is your drive?" or "what drives you to do that?"

justintbassett 11 years ago |

"How do you know what you know?"

Don't be afraid to cross-examine your own beliefs!

arh68 11 years ago |

What routines am I slipping into?

For example, why am I still reading HN? I don't mean to imply all routines are bad, but awareness is ~60%. Why am I reading more lately?, etc.

avni000 11 years ago |

What are you deliberate about not doing?

degutan 11 years ago |

"If you are wrong, how would you know?"

What evidence would convince you your opinion should change?

wallflower 11 years ago |

What do you really care about?

When is the last time you felt you were lucky? (in the non-sexual sense)

mindcrime 11 years ago |

Depends on context, but I like variations of the ole

"If you could wave a magic wand and change one thing about (your life | your job | this situation | your marriage | whatever), what would you change?"

Another good one, is this - after asking a series of questions, ask

"Is there anything I should have asked you, that I didn't?"

This seems more appropriate for business conversations than casual smalltalk / social situations, but you might be able to riff on it and come up with some useful variations.

Also, for when talking to doctors:

"What's the worst thing that could be causing my symptoms?"

"Could I have multiple problems contributing to these symptoms?"

"If this diagnosis were to turn out wrong, what would the correct diagnosis then probably turn out to be?"

Credit to "How Doctors Think" for the above three (not necessarily word for word, but the spirit of them anyway).

neduma 11 years ago |

what do you want? what is the one thing u want it very badly?