Perfect Deduction, Possible. Perfect Induction, Impossible

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From the course by CentraleSupélec

On Strategy : What Managers Can Learn from Philosophy - PART 1

374 ratings

CentraleSupélec

On Strategy : What Managers Can Learn from Philosophy - PART 1

374 ratings

In the expression “creative thinking”, the keyword is not creativity; the keyword is thinking. With the help of great philosophers, you will rediscover the art of thinking. To help leaders to be rigorous even without figures, great philosophers have lots of ideas. Managers are invited to rediscover the art of thinking. They should understand the role of mental models, realize the importance of cognitive bias, agree on clear definitions and efficient criteria etc. Creativity demands the ability to unshackle ourselves from conventional ways of thinking, to "think outside the box". But we need to go a step further. Once outside the box, we need to construct a new box or boxes (that is, new intellectual frameworks or models) to help us structure our thinking. Only once we have done so can we generate truly game-changing ideas.

From the lesson

How do we Think ?

In the first lecture, we’ve seen that if we want to change the world, we have to act. And if we want to change our perception of the world, we have to think. So now… it is time to think about the way we think !

You can not Think About your Clients ! 6:33

To Think is Like to Play : Playground, Rules,… 5:20

Concepts are Simplifications5:35

Perfect Deduction, Possible. Perfect Induction, Impossible9:09

The Power of Analogy and the Black Swan 10:56

Knowledge, Belief, Representation and Idea 9:05

Meet the Instructors

Luc de Brabandere
Professor at Ecole Centrale Paris

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Now, we have a definition.

We finally can tell exactly what is to think.

To think, it's mostly about using and producing mental models.

It's mostly about using simplification and simplifying.

We can travel on different modes.

It's a good definition.

It's a good definition.

I want to be sure you're with me.

Let's make a little exercise, two exercises.

I will propose two short sentences, unfinished, and I will ask you to

finish the sentence twice, and you, then we can see the difference.

Sentence number one, an example of a car is.

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You can tell Mercedes, Fiat, Honda, Volvo, what you want.

Not too difficult.

Second sentence.

The car is an example of.

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What comes in your mind?

Probably the first idea is public transportation.

It's an example of a way to move.

No problem.

But think twice.

[BLANK_AUDIO]

Go on thinking.

The car is an example of, I don't know, a big problem for the future.

Or is an example of the genius of the human mind.

Or the car is an example of something I like to drive.

Or is an example of a word with three letters.

You see the difference.

It's the heart of the brain.

With sentence number one, an example of a car is not a big deal.

Volvo, Ferrari, Rolls Royce, okay.

This is deduction.

The starting point is the idea.

You have in your mind, what is a car?

And you go down to the world and you can answer.

Not a big deal, not a big deal.

Few risk of mistake, if you say an example of a car is

airbus, somebody says, no hey airbus is a plane, its not a car.

So okay, not a big deal.

The other sentence, it's the upper part of the visual.

You move from, I force you to the concept.

The car is an example of, you have no, I force you to the concept.

So, you move la, long, along induction, and most of the time the first one.

Is an old one.

The car is an example, public transportation

[SOUND], it's the souvenir of an old deduction.

It's called comfort zone.

It's comfort zone, not a big deal, but never

forget, you have a lot of freedom when you induce.

And this is the heart of creativity.

When you deduce, little freedom.

An example of a car is Ferrari, well, and I think

one day deduction will be completely on machine, but that's another topic.

In induction, you have a lot of freedom.

So of course the nature is to go back to the comfort zone.

The classic example of transportation, okay, not a problem.

But don't forget there are many, many other answer.

A model, a concept, is never good.

Never bad.

Never true never false.

The only relevant characteristic for a model of a concept is it useful?

Is it useful?

And this is important to remember, when you conceptualize, when you organize

the world, what you see about the world in different clusters, categories.

You have a lot of freedom, and when we will talk about creativity later on, you

will see how important it is to challenge the way you organize.

You build your category.

In a way, deduction is easy.

It's easy.

And I repeat myself, one day on machines.

Induction is, hm, not easy.

You can, you can imagine a perfect deduction, no.

You do it three times, you have three times the same results.

You cannot have a perfect induction.

Because a perfect induction would require an infinity amount of time.

Infinity amount of time.

You cannot take the whole world into account.

Your million clients.

A perfect induction is impossible.

Impossible.

So concepts, ideas, hypotheses, suddenly coming,

popping into the mind are only possibilities.

Possibilities.

We are now in the heart of the thinking engine.

And the heart is, probably to realize how different the two, the two

arrows are dejection, not a big deal, induction, it's, it's fantastic.

It's where the human mind can really explode.

Can, of course there is sometimes risk

for mistakes, but also probability for great ideals.

So, let me describe some more characteristics

on the same, on the same visual.

So, the reality is, bond.

It's observed, and a model.

The model has, has goal to explain, to give some sense to the world.

And the two arrows are completely different.

In deduction, and for those of you

familiar with mathematics, you know this word algorithm.

What's an algorithm?

It's a kind of logic, pure deduction that move from the idea to the world.

It's beautiful, and you have better algorithms than others.

But, one day for machine.

In the induction mode, you don't have algorithms.

What do you have?

Heuristics.

Heuristics, it's interesting.

It's like, it comes from the Greek Eureka, I have found.

Heuristics is a way to find, but you don't have this strong

logic of algorithm in just a way to find.

For example, imagine you lot your keys somewhere.

How do you find your keys back?

There is no arguing.

You have a heuristic, your way, so yesterday I was there, no I was with.

Oh no, no, so this, this kind of attitude is heuristics.

Heuristics are the only way to produce concepts,

but you understand immediately how fragile it is.

You cannot have certainty as a concept.

A concept is useful.

More useful, less useful, but never true.

So, you have other differences.

In a way there is some analysis in the deduction model.

Alright.

And of course, in the induction, we're talking much more about synthesis.

Systhe, you bring what's in front of you and poof you produce something.

And another difference is, in the deduction

process you have a lot of numbers.

That's interesting because in the induction

Process, you don't have any numbers.

And sometimes people within companies are a bit puzzled with that.

Sometimes they are excellent with numbers, accounting, process, docs, and

sometimes they're a bit lost when you don't have numbers.

But that's a fact you remember bait and you have

to obey the forces of thinking to be a good thinker.

It's a fact, you need concept.

Now probably, with two last element on

this visual so far, you see the difference.

When you think, you use a model, or you build a model.

And I repeat what I said ten minutes ago,

to think is mostly about using and producing mental models.

[BLANK AUDIO]

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