Quotes About Reasoning

I had," said he, "come to an entirely erroneous conclusion which shows, my dear Watson, how dangerous it always is to reason from insufficient data.

I said that he was my superior in observation and deduction. If the art of the detective began and ended in reasoning from an armchair, my brother would be the greatest criminal agent that ever lived. But he has no ambition and no energy. He will not even go out of his way to verify his own solutions, and would rather be considered wrong than take the trouble to prove himself right.

WATSON: Then you are yourself inclining to the supernatural explanation.      HOLMES: if Dr. Mortimer's surmise should be correct, and we are dealing with forces outside the ordinary laws of Nature, there is an end of our investigation. But we are bound to exhaust all other hypotheses before falling back upon this one.

He was, I take it, the most perfect reasoning and observing machine that the world has seen, but as a lover he would have placed himself in a false position.

It is not really difficult to construct a series of inferences, each dependent upon its predecessor and each simple in itself. If, after doing so, one simply knocks out all the central inferences and presents one's audience with the starting-point and the conclusion, one may produce a startling, though perhaps a meretricious, effect.

They were admirable things for the observer - excellent for drawing the veil from men's motives and actions. But for the trained reasoner to admit such intrusions into his own delicate and finely adjusted temperament was to introduce a distracting factor which might throw a doubt upon all his mental results. Grit in a sensitive instrument, or a crack in one of his own high-power lenses, would not be more disturbing than a strong emotion in a nature such as his.

Insensibly one begins to twist facts to suit theories, instead of theories to suit facts.

It is a capital mistake to theorize before you have all the evidence. It biases the judgment.

I assure you, my good Lestrade, that I have an excellent reason for everything that I do.

Then, how do you know?" "I see it, I deduce it. How do I know that you have been getting yourself very wet lately, and that you have a most clumsy and careless servant girl?" "My dear Holmes," said I, "this is too much. You would certainly have been burned, had you lived a few centuries ago.

He has considerable gifts himself. He possesses two out of the three qualities necessary for the ideal detective. He has the power of observation and that of deduction. He is only wanting in knowledge; and that may come in time.

No, no: I never guess. It is a shocking habit—destructive to the logical faculty.

Science of Deduction

The emotional qualities are antagonistic to clear reasoning, I assure you that the most winning woman i ever knew was hanged for poisoning three little children for their insurance-money, and the most repellant man of my acquaintance is a philanthropist who has spent nearly a quarter of a million upon the London poor.

Holmes," I cried, "this is impossible." "Admirable!" he said. "A most illuminating remark. It IS impossible as I state it, and therefore I must in some respect have stated it wrong. Yet you saw for yourself. Can you suggest any fallacy?

There are fifty who can reason synthetically for one who can reason analytically.

I have heard your reasons and regard them as unconvincing and inadequate.

It is an old maxim of mine that when you have excluded the impossible, whatever remains, however improbable, must be the truth. (p. 261).

His conclusions were as infallible as so many propositions of Euclid. So startling would his results appear to the uninitiated that until they learned the processes by which he had arrived at them they might well consider him as a necromancer.

Eliminate the impossible, and what ever remains, however improbable, must be the truth - Sherlock Holmes

It is a capital mistake to theorize in advance of the facts.

How often have I said to you that when you have eliminated the impossible, whatever remains, however improbable, must be the truth.

I have already explained to you that what is out of the common is usually a guide rather than a hindrance.In solving a problem of this sort, the grand thing is to be able to reason backward. That is a very useful accomplishment, and a very easy one, but people do not practise it much. In the everyday affairs of life, it is more useful to reason forward, and so the other comes to be neglected. There are fifty who can reason synthetically for one who can reason analytically.

Pero el amor es una cosa emocional y todo lo que es emocional se opone a ese frío razonamiento que me parece la cualidad más importante del hombre y que antepongo a lo demás