# Where the thinking came from

> The influences behind the book, as claims you can check, and where each one lands. 10 panels.

Status: draft · By: gen-z.journalist, 18 October 2026, from the review of influences.sgit.ai · 10 panels

*Drawn at <https://storyboards.sgit.ai/gen-z-developers/where-the-thinking-came-from/>; the data is [storyboard.json](storyboard.json), the cast [cast.json](../cast.json).*

*Every line the Guide says, and every quote card, is from the article 'Where the thinking came from', word for word; the build checks it. Real people appear as quote cards and dates, never as cast members.*

## 1. Where the thinking came from

*cover*

Nothing in this book came from nowhere.

- **Zara** (think, thinking)
- **The Guide** (point, happy)
- **Tomás** (stand, thinking)

The influences register at influences.sgit.ai, read for the book.

*Source: Where the thinking came from*

## 2. Influences, as claims

*scene*

- **Zara** (shrug, thinking) says: “Who taught you all this?”
- **The Guide** (point, happy) says: “An entry in this register is a falsifiable claim about my codebase.”

Not a page of warm sentences: an anchor, a principle, where it shows up, where it is absent.

*Source: Where the thinking came from, Why influences belong in this book*

## 3. Bret Victor, Inventing on Principle (2012)

*scene*

- **Zara** (arms-up, surprised)
- **The Guide** (point, determined) says: “Every step between you and the thing you are making, a compile, a deploy, a refresh, is a place where an idea can die.”

Props: laptop, desk

Immediate connection: the wonder the book opens with. These storyboards redraw the moment their data changes.

*Source: Where the thinking came from, The opening, and learning*

## 4. Csikszentmihalyi: what produces the zone

*spectrum*

- **Zara** (wave, happy)

Clear goals (you know what done looks like) → Feedback (immediate) → Challenge (matched to your skill)

Flow (1990): the science behind the zone the 2018 introduction hoped readers would find.

*Source: Where the thinking came from, The opening, and learning*

## 5. Anders Ericsson, Peak (2016)

*evidence*

- **Tomás** (think, thinking)

> “Expertise comes from structured practice with immediate feedback at the edge of your ability, not from hours”
>
> Source: Where the thinking came from, the table

Learning is a skill; and credit the researcher behind the ten-thousand-hours number, not the populariser.

*Source: Where the thinking came from, The opening, and learning*

## 6. Karl Popper

*scene, setting: interview*

- **Sam** (point, neutral) says: “Prove it.”
- **The Guide** (stand, happy) says: “a claim earns its status by being refutable”

The shape of the register, and the next article: questioning and asking for evidence.

*Source: Where the thinking came from, Questioning and evidence*

## 7. Question everything, as a method

*evidence*

- **Zara** (point, determined)

> “the problem with dogma is not that it exists, but that you stop asking the question.”
>
> Source: Dinis Cruz, quoted in the register's entry on Bret Victor

The first line of the 2018 cover, made into a method.

*Source: Where the thinking came from, Questioning and evidence*

## 8. A trail of ideas the book stands on

*spectrum*

- **The Guide** (point, happy)

1945 (Bush: the memex) → 1977 (Alexander: A Pattern Language) → 1991 (Torvalds: Linux) → 1997 (Raymond: the Cathedral and the Bazaar) → 2005 (Torvalds: Git) → 2012 (Victor: Inventing on Principle)

Real people as dates and works, not as characters.

*Source: Where the thinking came from, the table*

## 9. Design is how it works

*scene, setting: office*

- **Priya** (think, thinking) says: “Is it simpler? Would going back feel worse?”
- **Tomás** (stand, happy)

Props: laptop, desk

The two questions every interface change has to answer, from the design entry: the villager's craft.

*Source: Where the thinking came from, The villager's craft*

## 10. An exercise for the reader

*punchline*

> **Know where your ideas come from; keep your own register.**

- **Zara** (wave, happy)
- **Priya** (stand, happy)
- **Tomás** (stand, happy)

Three influences: the work, the principle, where it shows up in what you made, where it does not yet.

*Source: Where the thinking came from, An exercise for the reader*