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At the start of Dan Levy’s book Maxims for Thinking Analytically, a book about Richard Zeckhauser’s tools for thought, is this riddle: “Mary and Jim want to paint a room together. If Mary painted alone it would take her 2 hours, and if Jim painted alone it would take him 3 hours. How long would it take to paint the room if they paint together?”

It’s not 2.5 hours.

Zeckhauser’s first maxim is: “When you are having trouble getting your thinking straight, go to an extreme case”. We used this maxim to ask: was the Ohio vaccine lotto a good idea? And it probably was.

Danny Meyer uses a version of this maxim too. One of the most important factors for a restaurant’s success is the location. (Overall it’s a hard business). Meyer wants to avoid errors of commission. Even if a restaurant proves successful it is “stuck with” the location. So Danny explores many locations to find something that works and ask an extreme question:

“Sometimes a space says, don’t plant anything here, this place should not be a restaurant. The first question I ask myself when I look at a restaurant space is: would I want this even if it were free?” Danny Meyer, July 2021, The Knowledge Project

Another way to consider this kind of framing is the expression you couldn’t pay me to. One advantage to living in the south, where football rules the roost, is the access to football. If you like it that is. One friend uses you couldn’t pay me to to express her feeling about SEC football games, the same games where tickets can be hundreds of dollars.

Levy’s riddle is easy once we slow our thinking. Thinking fast we average the work, and get 2.5 hours. Thinking slow(er), like Zeckhauser, and we notice that Mary alone would take two hours. That’s the extreme.