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Prompts·4 min read·

The Dense-Material Decoder: Read the Paper You Keep Bouncing Off

Paste a research paper, contract or technical document and Claude translates it at your level, then hands you the questions to interrogate it with.

It isn't over your head, it's in another dialect.

You open the paper everyone's quoting. Three paragraphs in, there's a term you don't know, then a second one defined using the first, and by page 2 you're reading words without taking in meaning.

So you close it and read someone's summary instead. Now your opinion on the thing is really an opinion on a stranger's opinion of the thing, and you've quietly outsourced a decision you should be making yourself.

Here's what's actually happening. That document isn't hard, it's written in a dialect for people already inside the field. Roughly 20 pieces of vocabulary and a handful of conventions are doing all the gatekeeping. Get those translated and the material underneath is usually well within reach. The trick is asking for a translation you can climb, not a simplification that leaves things out.

I use this on Anthropic's research papers constantly. I'm not a researcher, I use Claude every day, and this is how I read primary sources rather than someone's thread about them.

What's Inside

  • A plain-English decode of every term and symbol in the document that's doing real work.
  • The argument stripped to its logical skeleton, so you can see what actually depends on what.
  • The specific weak points a critic in that field would attack, and 5 questions to test yourself with.

The Prompt

Paste a research paper, contract, or technical document into Claude, set your real level and why you're reading it, and let it translate the document into something you can climb instead of skim.

Dense-Material Decoder prompt
I'm going to paste something I can't read properly. Your job is to get me to
the point where I can read it myself.

MY LEVEL: [e.g. no background in this field / undergrad maths but no stats /
I know the domain but not this method]
WHY I'M READING IT: [the decision you're making, the argument you're checking,
the thing you're learning]

THE TEXT:
[paste it here, or upload the file]

Give me, in this order:

1. THE ONE SENTENCE
What this document is actually claiming or doing, in language my mum would
follow.

2. THE VOCABULARY WALL
Every term, symbol or piece of notation in here that's doing real work,
defined in plain English in under 15 words each. Include the ones a specialist
would assume are obvious. Those are usually where I'm stuck.

3. THE ARGUMENT SKELETON
Strip out the hedging and the method detail. Show me the logical chain as
numbered steps: they assume X, they did Y, they found Z, therefore they claim W.
Mark clearly which step is the weakest link.

4. THE TRANSLATION
Now walk me through the document section by section at my level. For each
section: what it says, why it's there, and whether I can skip it given why I'm
reading.

5. WHERE IT'S WEAK
What would a serious critic in this field push on? Sample size, assumptions,
funding, or the gap between what the data shows and what the conclusion claims.
Specific to this document. No generic research caveats.

6. MY QUESTIONS
5 questions I should be able to answer about this text once I understand it.
Do not answer them.

Rule: never simplify by leaving things out. If something is genuinely
complicated, say so and give me the handhold I need to climb it.

This is the prompt that turns a document you keep bouncing off into a translation you can climb, plus the questions that prove you actually understand it.

How To Use It

  1. 1Paste the whole document, not an extract. Section 3 only works when Claude can see the full chain of reasoning.
  2. 2Be honest in the level field. "I know the domain but not the method" gets you a far more useful translation than pretending you're a beginner, or pretending you're not.
  3. 3Answer the 5 questions in section 6 yourself before you close the tab. That's the step that converts reading into understanding.
  4. 4Make it yours: Add "I need to make this decision: [decision]" and section 4 turns into a filter, telling you which sections actually matter and which you can walk past.

Give it a go and let me know if you find it useful!

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