25 years ago I’ve got books written by Coxeter, Smullian, Sam Lloyde. After this I’ve been confused with question, how others can solve puzzles, that I’m not able to solve? After tens years of searching I can state the answer as: risk + bruteforce speed + intelligence quadrant.
This quadrant is a result of several years expirence of problem-oriented thinking about analytical tasks. This is neither “original thinking”, nor “createive thinking”, this engineering of thinking process in order to solve given tasks.
If we have solution, but we don’t know problems associated, this is called — testing. This requires applying check-lists (see. The Checklist Manifesto by Atul Gawande). Lists itself are the plain sets without hierarchy.
If we adding hierarchy of sets, then mind-maps occur. (see. Be Creative — Now!: The 2-in-1 Manager: Speed Read — instant tips; Big Picture — lasting results by Steve Rawling).
If problem is clear, and we have to find solution, to logic-graphic method of A.P. Egides based on gestalts is perfect (actually there is only russian editions of his book “Intellgence Labirynths: Scientists Are Not Born”). His method adds genus-species and compound relationships between sets.
If even a problem is unclear, the concept analysis is used. This approach is developed by S.P. Nikanorov (spnikanorov.ru). I have visited courses by A.G. Teslinov (teslinov.ru). This approach is using Nicolas Bourbaki’s theory of sets, and sets stages apparatus by S.P. Nikanorov.
Complexity of these intelligence languages is increasing in accordance of their representation, and increasing complexity also increases their power. E.g. concept approach is used for modelling tasks for thousand years (concept of Jerusalem existence for 1000 year, concept of continous education in Russia for 500 years).
As I know, S.P. Nikanorov was included in world’s top 10 thinkers list by US Library of Congress in 1989.
Important point is that there is no large advantage using conceptual approach, if logic-graphic method is enough, or mindmap will fit the requirements.
Methods in intelligence quadarnt are the thinking languages, that can be of different strictness. For programmers it could be explained through programming languages, that could be of strong or dynamic type system, they could have “syntax sugar” and so on.
Common rule is that — the more language is strict, the less probability of getting error and vice versa. E.g. Pascal requires declaring variables in specific part of program, so there is less probability of getting variable error comparing to Visual Basic with switched-off Option Explicit.
Interesting examples about affecting language on intelligence are mentioned in Through the Language Glass. Why the World Looks Different in Other Languages by Guy Deutscher:
- English language allows to hide gender in phrase “I was at neighbour”, gender of neighbour is omitted by language. Russian language requires to mention gender, while saying this phrase.
- Some tribe’s language requires to make a definite answer for question: “How many wifes do you have?”. Literal meaning of answer is: “When I’ve seen them last time, there were five of them”
So, for stricting the thinking language we make it more concrete. There is a phrase — language is given for us to lie (in ancient times man had to bring mammoth’s meat for woman, after inventing the language the “I’ve caught such a large mammoth” phrase is enough). So mentioned thinking quadrant’s languages allow to maximize the correctness of “said” to reality.
According to minimal system requirements for software, there are also requirements for using analytical thinking methods. Some of them require large amount of working memory (RAM), so training N-Back excercise would be useful (see. John Jonides and other studies on https://www.gwern.net/DNB-FAQ)
My explorations and investigations show that 6–7 level in Single N-Back excercise is correlated with 120 IQ, 7–8 level is about 140 (testing was done on mensa.no test).
So learning the analytical intelligence quadrant and developing working memorty allows to anyone to become a genius, all needed is the will. So it is very useful to know about pitfalls of this way. For these reason it will be interesting to see the interview with most intelligent human on Earth in 90-s, Christopher Langan:
The more you will develop your intelligence, the more hesitant and unsure you’ll become. I’ve got my close relative, that has been developed +200% to his working memory for several months, after that he has got strong hesitation and lowered his self-esteem.
So there is very large mistake in such books and films about intelligence development, like “Flowers for Algernon” by Daniel Keyes, or “Limitless” movie. Otherwords, these people more likely will become solitary hermits, than will use theire abilities to write/speak or make business.
So everyone, who will step forward to develop his own intelligence should remember: main method to get information about reality is to act. Doing something real, betting skin-in-the game, one can explore world better that any long thoughts and talks. (actually this article is example of my act — trying to see if this information would be interesting for people out of Russia?)
So practical meaning of all these approaches from intelligence quadrant is the simple economy: faster do conclusions, pay less price for errors, minimize error cost and move on.
Ones read N.N. Taleb may recognize ideas from “Black Swan” — “Antifragile” — “Skin In The Game”. Due to my expirience it is required to read N.N. Taleb’s book while moving through intelligence develop ladder, studying theory in practice.
These are results of long searches about how to solve problems of any complexity, that allowed to reach goals in teamwork, that were not solved by anyone before.
I’ve made an educational program for my colleagues solving analyst’s development tasks — after several years there are interesting conclusions. During “Day of IT-Knowledge” I’ve held classes with more than 300 schoolchildren in Russia.
So further probing to reality led me to starting “Analytics for All” project, the idea is to provide anyone on the globe with analytic thinking intelligence. So I can teach webinars for groups, enterprises for free, all I’ll need the video from listeners — for “Leaders of Russia” contest — I’ve stated international level. If you are interested, you can mail me — “aintxt (barking dog) mail.ru”.
So other idea led to creation of Telegram-channel (@aintxt), where I will state advices for myself as analyst beginner. For first time, there will be translated posts from main channel (russian) and other things.
This article uses paintings by Olesya Volkova
