Quotes About Problem-solving

Substituting one question for another can be a good strategy for solving difficult problems, and George Pólya included substitution in his classic How to Solve It: "If you can't solve a problem, then there is an easier problem you can solve: find it.

Studies of the brain have shown that the pattern of activity associated with an action changes as skill increases, with fewer brain regions involved. Talent has similar effects. Highly intelligent individuals need less effort to solve the same problems, as indicated by both pupil size and brain activity. A

Substituting one question for another can be a good strategy for solving difficult problems, and George Pólya included substitution in his classic How to Solve It: "If you can't solve a problem, then there is an easier problem you can solve: find it." P

A bat and ball cost $1.10. The bat costs one dollar more than the ball. How much does the ball cost?

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

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

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

Nous y tournons en rond, généralement plus soucieux de chercher des coupables que de trouver des solutions.

Only one thing can help us now," said George. "What?" asked Harold. "Rubber doggy doo-doo," said George.

Stay the patient course Of little worth is your ire The network is down

When your only tool is a hammer, so the saying goes, everything looks like a nail.

Design and technology should be the subject where mathematical brainboxes and science whizzkids turn their bright ideas into useful products.

Many people are caught in a knot of self-destructive behavior and are unable to see it or appreciate how they themselves have tied it. Each believes the problems lie somewhere "out there," surrounding them but beyond them, rooted in external circumstances. They also believe that the solutions to their problems are "out there" too—the right man, the perfect woman, a more appreciative boss, a more interesting job, the right diet.

What follows is a review of the results of one study I worked on, sponsored by the Institute for Psychedelic Research at San Francisco State University in which the objective was to enhance creative problem-solving ability.

His eyes measured the little chamber. How two people could survive in so small a space was as difficult to grasp as the conventions in contract bridge. Perhaps there was some simple key that would solve the problem, and he would have the subject of another book.

the goal of a mapping effort isn't to complete an artifact, but to address the challenges the diagrams help discover and understand. Diagrams

School is often based not on problem solving, which perforce involves actions and goals, but on learning information, facts, and formulas that one has read about in texts or heard about in lectures. It is not surprising, then, that research has long shown that a student's doing well in school, in terms of grades and tests, does not correlate with being able to solve problems in the areas in which the student has been taught (e.g., math, civics, physics).

The old adage "necessity is the mother of all invention" remains as true today as it did back in 3500 B.C.

That was my first lesson in real politics. . . . If you are cast on a desert island with only a screwdriver, a hatchet, and a chisel to make a boat with, why, go make the best one you can. It would be better if you had a saw, but you haven't. So with men.

If you are cast on a desert island with only a screwdriver, a hatchet, and a chisel to make a boat with, why, go make the best one you can. It would be better if you had a saw, but you haven't. So with men.

Experience has taught me, said Peter (...) that no situation finds Bunter unprepared. That he should have procured The Times this morning by the simple expedient of asking the milkman to request the postmistress to telephone to Broxford and have it handed to the 'bus-conductor to be dropped at the post-office and brought up by the little girl who delivers the telegrams is a trifling example of his resourceful energy.

Capital Letters Were Always The Best Way Of Dealing With Things You Didn't Have A Good Answer To.

The technology involved in making anything invisible is so infinitely complex that nine hundred and ninety-nine billion, nine hundred and ninety-nine million, nine hundred and ninety-nine thousand, nine hundred and ninety-nine times out of a trillion it is much simpler and more effective just to take the thing away and do without it.

The impossible did not bother him unduly. If it could not possibly be done, then obviously it had been done impossibly. The question was how?