Insight Through Induction
Image by RÜŞTÜ BOZKUŞ from Pixabay
Induction is the path to transformative insight. We all aspire to be insightful. After all insight is what solves problems!
Insight doesn’t come unbidden. It is not a mere bolt of lighting. Careful cataloging of relevant details is necessary to set the table for the creative leap that is insight. Details can synergistically add up to a pattern that unlocks the solution to seemingly intractable problems. Cultivation of the disciplines of learner’s mind serves to optimize the arrival of insight.
Here is an approximate transcript of the podcast “Insight through Induction:”
Perhaps there is no figure so tied in the popular imagination to brilliant flashes of insight as the legendary detective Sherlock Holmes. Nearing the end of one of Conan Doyle’s convoluted stories we await Holmes’ “Elementary my dear Watson” followed by an account of his airtight logic that lines up all the particulars and points unequivocally to the astonished perpetrator of the crime.
Join me today as we consider “Insight Through Induction.” I can’t promise you’ll attain the mythical status of Holmes, but I believe you’ll see a clearer path to developing deeper insight that will help you solve the problems you care about.
In the previous podcast I began to operationalize concept formation. Concepts are patterns that we recognize from a collection of examples. Pattern recognition employs inductive logic. It moves from specifics to a generalization that accounts for the specifics. Inductive conclusions cover additional cases we haven’t yet observed. For this reason, inductive generalizations are provisional and subject to possible revision as we use them to order our world. We use our inductive generalizations to make predictions. The predictions employ deductive logic. Deductive logic proceeds from the inductive generalization (typically called the major premise) to a specific test case (which is the minor premise) and the predicted outcome is the conclusion.
I was out with one of my grandchildren this morning collecting leaves for his school collection. We had very limited time, so we were quickly picking leaves, photographing the bark and the arrangement of the leaves and moving on to the next tree. We were gathering clues. We planned to make a positive ID of each tree based on all these specifics later. In one case, however, the answer came more easily. The leaves looked like they might be those of a chestnut, so we took the pictures and were about to leave when we noticed chestnuts all over the ground beneath the tree. Case closed. At this time of year chestnut trees produce chestnuts! In the spring when the tree was in flower chestnut production would be a deductive prediction. In the fall the evidence was all over the place.
We make sense of our world through concept formation. We collect a group of particulars to formulate an idea—the idea is a concept. It is important to recognize that we encode our encounters as a group of related concepts; we do not record the event verbatim. As I’ve emphasized previously, the brain is not a database for particulars. Rather, the brain recognizes and creates patterns from particulars. We reflexively look for invariant attributes in formulating our conceptual categories.
Take the concept of a tomato.
In my backyard we have the last of this year’s crop of tomatoes. This year we have grape tomatoes and Roma (Italian plum) tomatoes. Last year we had beefsteak tomatoes. They look very different, but they are all tomatoes. Tomatoes are properly categorized as fruits, but that conceptual category also includes plants that are very different from tomatoes. Tomatoes grow on vines, but there are many other fruits which grow on vines that are not at all like tomato vines—say raspberries which are also growing in my yard.
The concepts in our brain are minimalist rather than maximalist. The bare concept of a tomato links to many other concepts including fruit, vine, taste, color, etc. We do this instead of creating a single Wikipedia entry in the brain that says all there is to say about tomatoes. The rudimentary concept of a tomato is enriched through connection with other concepts that are linked to a multiplicity of other concepts. This is our conceptual framework.
Education at all levels is rife with the unwarranted belief that knowledge can be directly transferred from person to person. However, what is knowledge to one person is just information to the recipient. Knowledge comes only as the product of wrestling with information to formulate concepts. The information may be quite sound, but it is the product of someone else’s thinking. Their cognitive abstraction is mere information to me. It is not until I grapple with the information in search of a pattern that I can possibly formulate my own abstraction—my own concept or idea.
Shane Parrish of the Farnham Street podcast (which often contains helpful observations about thinking) makes the analogy between a fact recipient and a line cook who is just following a recipe. (Go to 1:01:22 and following.) The recipe is the intellectual property of the chef who created it. When things don’t go as expected, the chef can troubleshoot the process and make appropriate corrections because he or she understands what makes it a success. Line cooks, however, are mystified when the recipe doesn’t work and don’t have a clue about why or what to do to fix it.
There is simply no way to eliminate the intellectual tussle with particulars in search of a pattern. Dispensing facts for recall on demand is pseudo-learning and it is not deep nor durable. All reasoning proceeds from my organized framework of concepts and concepts cannot be directly transferred. Education should consist of expert guidance to ensure that neophytes encounter appropriate sets of specifics sufficient for those rookies to recognize patterns and create the necessary concepts. A few helpful nudges from the expert may be needed if the rookie is floundering, but never teaching as telling.
Consider an example of this strategy from the Bible. In the book of Genesis chapter 2, we find Adam being tasked by God with naming the animals. Most commentators believe this naming was purposeful and involved a classification based on the observation of specifics for each animal. Indeed, God declared that the names Adam gave would be the last word on the subject. Adam was looking for patterns in naming the animals. There was an even bigger picture, however. Adam was given this task to provide enough specifics that he would conclude that none of the animals corresponded to him. God wanted Adam to feel his uniqueness and his aloneness. In the middle of all that was good about the creation God said out of earshot of Adam “It is not good for the man to be alone. I will make a companion for him who corresponds to him.” (2:18) Instead of just telling Adam, God orchestrated a discovery process. The result was that Adam felt his lack keenly. God graciously responded to this need by creating Eve. Adam wrote a poem to Eve beginning with this line: “This one at last is bone of my bones and flesh of my flesh;” (2:23)
Here's another biblical example. The most important inductive conclusion you will ever formulate is that you are a creature living in a world that God created. God says in Romans 1:20 that there are enough concrete particulars accessible to everyone everywhere that that inductive conclusion is inescapable. Here’s the verse:
“For since the creation of the world his invisible attributes—his eternal power and divine nature—have been clearly seen, because they are understood through what has been made. So people are without excuse.”
There should be no question about the power of induction to drive deep and durable learning.
Although we are hard-wired to recognize and formulate patterns from a collection of specifics, that does not mean the process of induction is always (or even usually) easy. Induction is not a linear process. It is not the application of a formula or a rigid set of rules. Induction is decidedly an individualized creative process. Creativity is built within each of us, but it waxes and wanes depending on a variety of factors. Epistemologist Esther Meek calls the quest for patterns “a kind of creative scrabbling … an imaginative casting about.” (p. 53, A Little Manual for Knowing)
Image by Wokandapix from Pixabay
Scrabble, of course, is a game where a random collection of letters is used to produce real words. Success in Scrabble requires a good vocabulary and creativity. Likewise, concept creation is dependent on your existing framework of concepts as well as creativity. When you are stuck you need to “imaginatively cast about” as Meek says. Use your imagination and look around at what you already know with fresh eyes. A problem-solving technique often employed in mathematics is to write down what you already know. When you spell this out clearly, inferences are easier to make, and gaps are easier to identify.
I remember like it was yesterday homework from my high school geometry class. The assignment was to do the first proof of the semester. I was overwhelmed. I had never done a proof before. How to get started? There was an example of a geometric proof in the text, but what I was to prove didn’t seem much like the text example. I forced myself to write out clearly what I did know followed by a big blank space and what I was supposed to prove (my conclusion) at the bottom of the page. I tried to break down what I did know in even more basic form and suddenly, I could see that #1 led to 2 and if 2 was true, then 3 would have to be true and the desired conclusion would follow. The beauty of that “aha” moment cheers me even as I write this.
Seeking clarity about my existing concepts may reveal that they are not well-articulated. My concepts may need more precision or perhaps they are a contradictory admixture of ideas. Getting unstuck may require unlearning a faulty idea. The moment of truth may have come that shows I have a misconception. I can’t build new understanding on misunderstanding!
Another point of attack in my “creative scrabbling” may be to see if my pool of specifics is tainted. Do all the particulars belong or have some slipped in that are poor exemplars? Dithering in the specifics doesn’t create clarity. Better a small pool of sterling examples than a large one with extraneous distractors. Conversely, I may be trying to get by with too small a pool of specifics. Perhaps I need to find more examples to see the big picture. Just as in Scrabble, the pieces I currently have won’t get me anywhere and I need to gather additional specifics to get unstuck.
To see the pattern in a collection of specifics through “creative scrabbling” is to have insight. The OED defines Insight (n) def. 2
a. The fact of penetrating with the eyes of the understanding into the inner character or hidden nature of things; a glimpse or view beneath the surface; the faculty or power of thus seeing.
A historical example shows the power of insight gained through “creative scrabbling.” The Rosetta Stone was engraved in 196 BC with a decree from King Ptolemy V Epiphanes. The decree was recorded in three languages, Egyptian hieroglyphic, Egyptian Demotic and ancient Greek. It was discovered near the town of Rosetta in the Nile Delta in 1799 during a Napoleonic campaign in Egypt. Almost immediately the potential of the inscription in three languages as a means of decoding Egyptian hieroglyphics was recognized. The decoding of the hieroglyphics proved to be much more difficult than anticipated even though many scholars worked on the problem. It was not until 1822 (two hundred years ago) that the code was cracked by a relatively obscure scholar, Jean Francois Champollion. Champollion had an edge because he had learned the modern language of Coptic Egyptian Christians. The structure of the Coptic language proved to be key to deciphering Egyptian hieroglyphics. Champollion’s insight made him the Father of Egyptology—a title he is still given today. The specifics on the Rosetta Stone required the additional specifics of the Coptic language structure before there were enough clues to inductively unlock Egyptian hieroglyphics.
While insight can’t be commanded, it can be cultivated. To see a pattern that was previously hidden is insight. Every time you find a new pattern and formulate that regularity as a concept, you demonstrate insight. To others who haven’t yet seen the pattern your insight may appear magical. But there is no magic involved. Cultivating the dispositions that lead to insight should mean that you are increasingly able to help others to use the same dispositions to see the “hidden nature of things.” This can bless them through unlocking their potential. It can also enable you to be more effective in persuading others as you help them to see how you arrived at your insight. This in turn will help teams to function with greater cohesiveness as they own the same vision with no arm-twisting necessary.
If you’ve never read a Sherlock Holmes mystery, I recommend you start with The Adventure of the Copper Beeches. I’ve linked to a summary article here and a pdf download of the story is available free here. The logic of Holmes is mostly induction based on an impressive collection of specifics (clues) including some that others haven’t noticed.