Creating & Editing Content

Suggested uses and prompts

Whether they are originals or references, inputting currently proposed changes in CommonOutcomes is key:

Current affairs:

  • What do you think should be done at this scale/in this area?
  • Can you think of any public proposals that are worth relating and evaluating?

Causal thinking is key to creating relations and outcomes, with either backward or conditional thinking on one hand, or forward/consequential thinking on the other.

Causal reasoning:

  • What's needed for this change to be realised?
  • What are the various consequences of this?
  • Why should this action be carried out?
  • Are these two changes causally connected?

Another way to input changes is to think about past and future changes. Past outcome pathways have generally better data to back them up, and could sometimes be replicated in whole or in part in new situations. Future thinking may help mitigate risks and more generally, foster objective-based thinking on a longer term.

Past and future:

  • What chains of actions/outcomes happened before in this community?
  • Could those could shed light on current endeavours?
  • What do you think are desirable goals our outcomes in 10, 50 years from now?

Guidelines

Styling of titles and descriptions

Node titles should be kept short while being descriptive enough to identify the idea it represents. This means that details can often be kept in the node's description, unless crucial to distinguish different alternative nodes. Furthermore, we advise against repeating the scope in the title, so that the same node could branched into different scopes.

Nodes may represent ideas that are novel—unreferenced elsewhere—or may refer to existing ideas or projects, in whole or in part.

Whether in titles or in descriptions, do not copy verbatim content from other sources. Instead, you should either refer to the name of the ideas itself, or summarise/rephrase them within the specific context of the node modelled.

Connections between nodes refer to alleged relations of causality and therefore do not run the risk of copyright infringement.

Sourcing

When the node's idea exists elsewhere, include references to the original sources.

Wherever credible sources provide valuable information to back up a causal relation, include it in the references of that particular connection.

Legality

Do not write text suggesting actions that are against the law in any jurisdictions relevant to the specified scope.