Faculty I · How to think
Think like a hacker
Read the grain. Treat constraints as the brief. Invert the loss. Keep a spine.
Five papers. The reflex that makes every later room cheaper.
Paper 01 · 14 min
The grain of the system
Woodworkers cut with the grain. Hackers read it first. Documentation is the brochure. Incentives are the wood.
Paper 02 · 12 min
A move the budget didn't include
The original hacker ethic is curiosity with consequences. A hack is an unforeseen use of a designed object — obvious only after it works.
Paper 03 · 12 min
Constraints are the brief
Amateurs hide the ugly constraint. Hackers put it on the title slide. The missing designer is not an insult. It is the assignment.
Paper 04 · 14 min
Inversion and second order
Ask how you would lose, then refuse those moves. Then ask what happens after your clever move, when everyone else can see it.
Paper 05 · 10 min
The ethics of the clever move
Cleverness without a spine becomes fraud, or worse, a waste of other people's trust. The college has a short list of refusals.