原文：

Caveats for beginners

It is clear that the rigidity of the pyramid rules enables you to start with an idea anywhere in the pyramid and discover all the others. Essentially, though, you will either be working from the top down or from the bottom up. I have tried to tell you exactly what to do in a general way, but the possibilities are endless, so that questions are inevitable. Following are the answers to some of the most commonly asked questions from beginning users of the pyramid.

1. Always try top down first. The minute you express an idea in writing, it tends to take on the most extraordinary beauty. It appears to have been chiseled in gold, making you reluctant to revise it if necessary. Consequently, never begin by just dictating the whole document ‘to get it all down,’ on the assumption that you can figure out the structure more easily afterwards. The chances are you’ll love it once you see it typed, no matter how disjointed the thinking really is.

2. Use the Situation as the starting point for thinking through the introduction. Once you know what you want to say in the bulk of the introduction—Situation, Complication, Question, and Answer—you can place these elements in any order you like as you write, depending on the effect you want to create. The order you choose affects the tone of the document, and you will no doubt want to vary it for different kinds of documents. Nevertheless, begin your thinking with the Situation, since you’re more likely to be able to think up the correct Complication and Question following that order.

3. Don’t omit to think through the introduction. Very often you’ll sit down to write and have the main point fully stated in your head, from which the Question is obvious. The tendency then is to jump directly down to the Key Line and begin answering the New Question raised by the statement of the main point. Don’t be tempted. In most cases, you will find that you end up structuring your document less effectively.

翻译：

初学者须知

显然，金字塔规则的严谨性使你可以从金字塔的任何一个想法开始，并发现所有其他相关想法。然而，本质上，你将要么从上而下进行，要么从下而上进行。我已尽力给出大致的操作步骤，但可能性是无穷的，因此问题是不可避免的。以下是一些金字塔初学者常见问题的解答。

1. 始终先尝试自上而下的方法。 当你将一个想法写下来时，它往往会展现出非凡的美感，仿佛被镌刻成金，让你不愿在必要时进行修改。因此，永远不要只是为了“写完全部内容”而开始动笔，假设可以之后更容易地理清结构。大多数情况下，一旦你看到打印的内容，你会喜欢它，无论其中的思维有多么不连贯。

2. 使用情境作为引言思考的起点。 一旦你确定了想在引言的主体部分中表达的内容——情境、复杂情况、问题和答案——你可以根据希望创造的效果随意排列这些元素的顺序。选择的顺序会影响文档的语气，而且你很可能会希望针对不同类型的文档进行调整。然而，仍然要从情境开始你的思考，因为按此顺序更容易引出正确的复杂情况和问题。

3. 不要忽略引言的思考。 通常你会坐下来写作，头脑中已完全明确了主要观点，从中显现出问题。此时的倾向是直接跳到关键线并开始回答主要观点所引发的新问题。不要被诱惑。大多数情况下，你会发现这样最终会降低文档结构的有效性。

原文：

4. Always put historical chronology in the introduction. You cannot tell the reader 'what happened' in the body of the document, in an effort to let him know the facts. The body can contain only ideas, and ideas can relate to each other only logically. This means that you can talk about events only if you are spelling out cause-and-effect relationships, since these had to be discovered through analytical thinking. Simple historical occurrences do not exist as the result of logical thought, and therefore cannot be included as ideas.

5. Limit the introduction to what the reader will agree is true. The introduction is meant to tell the reader only what he already knows. Sometimes, of course, you won’t know whether he actually knows something; at other times, you may be certain that indeed he does not know it. If the point being made can be easily checked by an objective observer and deemed to be a true statement, then your reader can be presumed to ‘know’ it in the sense that he will not question its truth.

6. Be sure to support all Key Line points. An idea has to be supported until you have answered all the questions likely to be raised by it. Naturally, not every point needs the same depth of support. At the Key Line level, however, all points must have at least one level of support. This is particularly true if you use the ‘therefore’ point in a deductive argument. If you find yourself with no need to support the final point, then you have overstructured your argument and probably need only an inductive grouping.

翻译：

4. 在引言中加入历史时间顺序。 你不能在文档正文中告诉读者“发生了什么”，以此让他了解事实。正文只能包含观点，而观点只能以逻辑的方式相互关联。这意味着，你可以谈论事件，但前提是要阐明因果关系，因为这些关系需要通过分析思维来发现。简单的历史事件不属于逻辑思维的产物，因此不能作为观点包含在内。

5. 将引言限制在读者会认同的内容上。 引言的目的是仅告诉读者他已经知道的内容。当然，有时你可能不清楚他是否真的知道某些信息；而在其他时候，你可能确定他确实不知道。如果所提出的观点可以被客观观察者轻松核实并视为真实陈述，那么可以假设你的读者在某种程度上“知道”这一点，即他不会质疑其真实性。

6. 确保支持所有关键线要点。 一个观点需要被支持，直到你回答了由此引发的所有可能问题。当然，并不是每个要点都需要相同深度的支持。然而，在关键线层次上，每个要点至少需要一个支持层。这一点在你使用“因此”作为演绎论证中的观点时尤其重要。如果你发现不需要支持最终的观点，那么你的论证可能结构过度，可能只需要一个归纳性分组即可。