For grown-ups
PremiseBench is for ages 15 to 18. It opens four well-known models as editable diagrams: a city that grows and ages (after Forrester's Urban Dynamics, 1969), neighbours who move when too few nearby are like them (after Schelling, 1971), a shared pasture with and without community rules (after Hardin and Ostrom), and an outbreak (the SIR model). Every premise carries a bar for how sure anyone is of it.
The task is always the same: change one premise, run the model again, and write a one-page model card. What is in the model? What is left out? Who would disagree with it? What evidence would change your mind? The card is printed or kept on this device; nothing is sent anywhere.
The models here are deliberately small, and the page says what each leaves out. They are arguments, not forecasts. A good conversation is about one claim that often comes up in policy debates: that helping will backfire. Ask your teen when the model shows that, and when it does not.
What it never does
- No accounts, no ads, no tracking — anything kept stays on this device.
- No streaks, timers to beat, points to chase or leaderboards.
- No chat, and nothing anyone types is sent anywhere.