Communication Is Everything.

communication is the foundation of intelligence, progress, and society itself

Hello Substack,

This is a reflection on intelligence, innovation, and our place in society. I want to make a bold but simple claim:
Communication is everything.

It shapes how we think, what we know, and how societies evolve. It might even be the key to solving the biggest crises we face today.

How Do We Understand the World?

We can’t grasp the full complexity of the world. Our brain simplifies what we see, hear, and experience into models - what some call mental models or system thinking.

You don’t think about every muscle in your leg when you walk. You don’t think of every syllable when you speak. You use internalized, learned shortcuts. That’s what a model is.

And this is true not just for physical actions but for thought itself.
We think through models, and these models are learned.

At birth, we don’t even know how to speak. But over time, we absorb language, rules, behaviors, ideas—many unconsciously. These become the foundation of how we think.

Humans are not smart. We are great at sharing ideas.

Let’s look at evolution and progress.
Humans from 200 years ago had the same brains we do. Genetically, nothing changed. And yet back then, there were no computers, no planes, no internet.

So what changed ?

What we call "progress" and "intelligence" lives not just in individuals but in the space between us.
Ideas are stored, transmitted, evolved - not in genes, but in communication.

So my point:

Communication is not just a tool; it is intelligence.
It is the engine of human progress.

Communication as a System of Shared Models

Humans progress because we’re able to share models—ideas, concepts, frameworks—with one another. The more advanced our methods of sharing ideas, the faster we progress.

Take science: its purpose isn’t just to "know" but to communicate models of how the world works.

Einstein's equation E=mc² isn’t just math, it’s a translation of a conceptual leap: that mass and energy are two forms of the same thing.
That’s the model. And the genius wasn’t having the insight, it was making it communicable.
Progress is to translate the invisible into the shareable.

Every sketch, diagram, formula, or metaphor is a communication tool, a model bridge between minds. Without this shared understanding, there is no science, no collaboration, no progress.

So yes:

Communication is everything.

It’s not just how we connect, it’s how we evolve.
Our brains didn’t get better.
Our shared models did.

Crisis: When Communication Fails to Keep Up

I think we all dream of changing the world in some way. But something feels broken now. Despite having better tools than ever, we seem worse at solving problems.

Why ?

Because our communication systems are not evolving fast enough for the scale of our world.
Our traditional forms - language, media, governments - were built for slower, smaller societies. But now? Every society talks to every other. Conflicts are global. Ideas move at the speed of light.

And yet our tools for understanding each other haven’t caught up.

Social media was a chance to reinvent communication - but it got engineered by too few people, with the wrong goals. Profit, engagement, outrage - not clarity, empathy, or collective intelligence.

We’ve outgrown our communication tools. I think that’s the root of many crises.

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We’re not smarter than our ancestors. We evolved our shared models and our communication tools.

To keep evolving, we need to design better ways to communicate—not just faster, but deeper. With clarity. With empathy. With the goal of building common ground.

If we fail to create communication systems that match the complexity of our world, we will stagnate—or worse, fall apart.

But if we succeed, we’ll unlock the next level of human progress.