In the 1996 talk Practical Thought About Practical Thought, Munger expressly attributes this maxim to Carl Jacobi. The reproduced talk confirms Munger’s use, but does not identify a contemporary Jacobi publication; Jacobi’s original wording and translation remain unverified.
“Invert, always invert” Credited to Carl Gustav Jacob Jacobi by Charlie Munger; original Jacobi source unverified.
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In the 1996 talk Practical Thought About Practical Thought, Munger expressly attributes this maxim to Carl Jacobi. The reproduced talk confirms Munger’s use, but does not identify a contemporary Jacobi publication; Jacobi’s original wording and translation remain unverified. Munger talk reproduction ↗
The original publication of this exact wording has not been established; no public-domain status is asserted.
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Fact-check
Often misattributed
Munger used the maxim while assigning it to Jacobi; use is not a claim of invention.
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Popular creditCharlie Munger
In the 1996 talk Practical Thought About Practical Thought, Munger expressly attributes this maxim to Carl Jacobi. The reproduced talk confirms Munger’s use, but does not identify a contemporary Jacobi publication; Jacobi’s original wording and translation remain unverified. Munger talk reproduction ↗
✓Munger used the maxim while assigning it to Jacobi; use is not a claim of invention. Munger talk reproduction ↗
Context
The setting behind the words
Munger uses inversion as one of five methods for solving difficult practical problems. His 1996 example explicitly sends readers back to the mathematician Jacobi, rather than presenting the maxim as his own coinage. The document establishes that chain of credit, but not a nineteenth-century German original. Munger talk reproduction ↗
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Carl Gustav Jacob Jacobi was a German mathematician whose work ranged across analysis and algebra. Charlie Munger invoked him as a model of reversing a difficult problem to find a solution. The checked Munger text establishes that attribution without identifying a contemporary Jacobi source for the English maxim.
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Carl Gustav Jacob Jacobi. Attribution discussed in Munger talk reproduction. Source and limits described above.
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Quotle.info. “Who really said ‘Invert, always invert’?” Last verified 9 Nov 2026. https://quotle.info/who-said/invert-always-invert/