Communication is the source of and solution to all of our problems. Every great advancement and disaster in human history can be traced back to the same thing. And there is no escaping that.
I have spent the better part of the last decade studying people in escape rooms as they attempt to work together to complete challenges under pressure. After designing over a dozen different escape room scenarios and observing thousands of groups experience them, I concluded that the one factor which is most likely to determine the outcome is how well a team communicates with each other.
Language is the foundation of communication. The Rosetta Stone unlocked entire civilizations by bridging communication gaps. The Bible became the most widely distributed text in human history because it gave societies a shared framework for meaning, morality and history. The printing press placed ideas into the hands of everyone who would reach for them just as large language models are now beaming them into the minds of all who are open.
And when communication fails, the consequences are just as profound. The Titanic had warnings that never reached the right people. The Hindenburg was a chain of ignored signals. The Challenger exploded because engineers who knew better could not get heard by the people who made the call. Wars start with failed communication. Civilizations collapse when they stop listening.
Puzzles sit at the center of this, just like in our escape rooms. Puzzles are communication tools that span every culture, every language, and every era of human existence. They are how we teach, test, guard and connect. They predate written language and are the clues to what comes next. The great mysteries of the universe: gravity, dark matter, the origins of consciousness, what exists beyond what we can observe. These are the most complex puzzles humanity is facing. Mathematics is the language, physics defines the rules, and every major advancement in technology is what happens when another piece of the puzzle is solved. Humans discovered how to create fire, split the atom and travel to other planets. Just imagine what puzzle will be solved next.
This is the thread that runs through everything I write. Whether I am breaking down what happens when a group of strangers walks into an escape room, exploring the history of puzzles across civilizations, or writing about the ways we connect and fall apart in real life and fictional ones, it always comes back to the same thing.
Puzzles are the engine. Communication is the proof.
I design and build escape rooms for a living. At their core, escape rooms are a series of interconnected puzzles and clues woven into a challenge that can be completed. Rooms with answers, exits, moments where the door opens and everyone walks out feeling like they conquered something.
But life is not an escape room. Every obstacle overcome leads to the next one. Each time you succeed another level begins. Every door opens into another room. Nobody wins, maybe no one is supposed to. Maybe the puzzle is the point.
Maybe the truth is, there is no escape room.