Chapter One: Deduction, How to solve any problem
11:16
I was always fond of Sherlock Holmes and how he was always able to quickly find the solutions to nearly impossible situations. At first, I didn’t believe that there was someone with that capability, after all, he was a fictional character. I did some research and found out that he was modeled after a real person, Dr. Joseph Bell, he was a professor at the University of Edinburgh and a surgeon during the 19th century. Combining facts and spotting details was one of his biggest specialties. The ability to read body language gave him an incredible talent, for example, he could tell if someone was an alcoholic with a simple glance, without his subject saying a single word.
The first step to becoming an amazing problem solver like Sherlock Holmes starts with knowing how to deduce a situation. There are a few key category skills that will help you understand what exactly deduction means. I will summarize them into six different categories for you. These will help you improve your problem-solving skills.
1. Setting Goals:
What is it exactly that you are trying to do or solve. Setting goals keeps you in track of what you want and are doing. Making goals helps you narrow down the situation and really help you concentrate on what you are doing. Once you accomplish those goals, you can now set new ones. These steps will overall make you become extremely efficient.
2. Knowing What To Look For:
First, you would need to filter out any irrelevant information. It may be hard to figure out what is relevant and what isn’t. But this will help you declutter and stop you from dead ends. For example, you are trying to solve the cause of death of a patient at the hospital, you might not need to consider that the patient was allergic to peanuts when the patient wasn’t showing any signs of allergic reactions. So that filters out that theory. So you keep digging until you find the answer. Like, you find out that the patient was using antidepressants and ironically used those medication mixed with alcohol and overdose, leading to their death.
At first, you will encounter these “dead ends” quite frequently. Please, don’t get discouraged and just keep trying.
3. Absent Information:
Not everything you need is always at your disposal or right in your face. The ignorance of absent information or not asking questions can really delay the time of the answers you seek. For example, a robber snuck into a house and stole many goods and no one heard a peep from their dog. There was silence throughout that night. Now, what type of questions would be asked typically? Did they break a window? How did the perp get in, right? But that is aside from the point because he got in quietly. The real question is why didn’t the dog bark? Why was the dog,” the guard”, so silent? Did the dog know the robber? Therefore, the perp had a key answering the first question. So that narrows down the suspects dramatically.
4. Use All Data:
Basically, use all knowledge you have to try to solve the situation. This is where experience comes to play. It can be from a past situation or from just something that you learned and remembered. For example, your are trying to catch someone from lying. So there was murder in that someone’s home, but they didn’t hear the yelling because they were “washing their hair”. But the 9-11 call came from a bystander due to the treacherous yelling that the person showering inside “didn’t hear”. But here’s the thing. The person in the shower just got a perm done just a day ago. Now here is where all data comes to play. You can’t wash your hair until five days after you get it done, therefore, you caught them lying and there is no other explanation why they didn’t hear the screaming unless they were covering for someone or they were the murderer themselves. So, you see the knowledge you have, even if it seems irrelevant, it can really boost your problem-solving skills.
5. Learn From Your Mistakes:
You’re human and always learning. Don’t ever get discouraged when you’re wrong. Always learn from your mistakes, no matter how small or big it is. This will help in future reference and shorten the problems longevity.
6. Practice:
With practice, you can achieve anything. Learn how to store information (Chapter 3), and learn how to apply to certain situations. Remember the more you practice the more experience you gain. If you practice these categories, your reasoning and problem-solving skills will excel the more you use them.
GOOD LUCK!
More From This Collection . . .