𝗪𝗵𝘆 𝗶𝘀 𝗶𝘁 𝘀𝗼 𝗲𝗮𝘀𝘆 𝘁𝗼 𝗿𝘂𝗹𝗲 𝘁𝗵𝗶𝗻𝗴𝘀 𝗼𝘂𝘁, 𝗯𝘂𝘁 𝗺𝘂𝗰𝗵 𝗵𝗮𝗿𝗱𝗲𝗿 𝘁𝗼 𝗿𝘂𝗹𝗲 𝘁𝗵𝗶𝗻𝗴𝘀 𝗶𝗻?

I'm fascinated by the words we use when we talk about rules. Not just the rules themselves, but the metaphors and assumptions wrapped around them.

One expression I keep coming back to is, '𝘐 𝘸𝘰𝘶𝘭𝘥𝘯’𝘵 𝘳𝘶𝘭𝘦 𝘵𝘩𝘢𝘵 𝘰𝘶𝘵.' We say it all the time. But we almost never say, '𝘐’𝘥 𝘳𝘶𝘭𝘦 𝘵𝘩𝘢𝘵 𝘪𝘯.'

The phrase 𝘳𝘶𝘭𝘦 𝘰𝘶𝘵 has a physical origin: drawing a line through something to remove it as an option. In that context, you can't rule things in, you can only rule them out. It’s a simple metaphor, but a revealing one. We instinctively understand what it means to eliminate something.

In part, because the rules we’re most likely to notice, especially the unwritten ones, are the ones that tell us what we can’t do, or shouldn’t do. It’s the things that are ruled out that are most likely to piss us off.

Yet what I constantly find in my Human Risk work — helping those who make and enforce rules to come up with better ones — is that the approaches they’ve ruled out are often the very ones that would make their rules more effective.

The unwritten rules that constrain the rule-makers are reflected in the written rules they create.

My job is to help them rule more in.