Quotes About Problem-solving

if you are in a situation or difficulty, you can make a U-turn; instead of putting the blame on something outside or on someone else, look within yourself to see how you have contributed to the problem, and then find a way to restore peace to the situation.

Google's scientist-in-residence Ray Kurzweil47 revealed in an interview. He said that when he is working on a difficult problem, he sets aside time, right before going to bed, to review all the pertinent issues and challenges. Then he goes to sleep and allows his unconscious mind to go to work.

That word process is key. You don't just "find" answers to complex life problems (or any type of complex problem, including business ones). You work your way, gradually, toward figuring out those answers, relying on questions each step of the way.

If you fear not having answers to the questions you might ask yourself, remember that one of the hallmarks of innovative problem solvers is that they are willing to raise questions without having any idea of what the answer might be. Part of being able to tackle complex and difficult questions is accepting that there is nothing wrong with not knowing. People who are good at questioning are comfortable with uncertainty.

It's one thing to see a problem and to question why the problem exists—and maybe even wonder whether there might be a better alternative. It's another to keep asking those questions even after experts have told you, in effect, "You can't change this situation; there are good reasons why things are the way they are.

David Kord Murray, a former rocket scientist42 who worked on projects for NASA and later became the head of innovation at Intuit, made a study of connective creativity in his book Borrowing Brilliance. According to Murray, "The nature of innovation [is that] we build new ideas out of existing ideas." Murray cites Einstein, Walt Disney, George Lucas, and Steve Jobs as prime examples of innovators who "defined problems, borrowed ideas, and then made new combinations.

if you never actually do anything about a problem yourself, then you're not really questioning—you're complaining.

Should you find yourself in a chronically leaking boat, energy devoted to changing vessels is likely to be more productive than energy devoted to patching leaks.

I can build a hyperphase jump gate, I'm sure I could have figured sex out. Insert Tab M into Slot F. Repeat until done.

Failure is doing nothing about a problem that bothers us. If our efforts don't go as we hoped, we still learn and can take a new approach next time.

By relieving the brain of all unnecessary work, a good notation sets it free to concentrate on more advanced problems, and in effect increases the mental power" Alfred Whitehead math text

The technical definition of heuristic is a simple procedure that helps find adequate, though often imperfect, answers to difficult questions. The

The technical definition of heuristic is a simple procedure that helps find adequate, though often imperfect, answers to difficult questions. The word comes from the same root as eureka.

The spontaneous search for an intuitive solution sometimes fails—neither an expert solution nor a heuristic answer comes to mind. In such cases we often find ourselves switching to a slower, more deliberate and effortful form of thinking. This is the slow thinking of the title. Fast thinking includes both variants of intuitive

students can solve much more difficult problems when they are not tempted to accept a superficially plausible answer that comes readily to mind. The ease with which they are satisfied enough to stop thinking is rather troubling.

If you wish to experience your System 2 working at full tilt, the following exercise will do; it should bring you to the limits of your cognitive abilities within 5 seconds. To start, make up several strings of 4 digits, all different, and write each string on an index card.

The bat-and-ball problem, the flowers syllogism, and the Michigan/Detroit problem have something in common. Failing these minitests appears to be, at least to some extent, a matter of insufficient motivation, not trying hard enough.

These students can solve much more difficult problems when they are not tempted to accept a superficially plausible answer that comes readily to mind.

When System 1 runs into difficulty, it calls on System 2 to support more detailed and specific processing that may solve the problem of the moment. System 2 is mobilized when a question arises for which System 1 does not offer an answer, as probably happened to you when you encountered the multiplication problem 17 × 24. You can also feel a surge of conscious attention whenever you are surprised.

If a satisfactory answer to a hard question is not found quickly, System 1 will find a related question that is easier and will answer it. I

When the question is difficult and a skilled solution is not available, intuition still has a shot: an answer may come to mind quickly—but it is not an answer to the original question.

intuitive heuristics: when faced with a difficult question, we often answer an easier one instead, usually without noticing the substitution.

when faced with a difficult question, we often answer an easier one instead, usually without noticing the substitution.

If you can't solve a problem, then there is an easier problem you can solve: find it." P