Holistic Problem Solving
www.noirlands.com
Why the plenary approach.
There is an old parable of the 5 blind men, who are given a task by God to identify an object that is before them. The object they are identifying is an elephant, but the first man touches the leg of the elephant and says it is a column, the second touches the tail and says its a broom, the third touched the body and says its a wall, the fourth touched the ear and says its a fan, the last touches the trunk and says its a snake. So they all come to the conclusion that the object is a wall with a snake, fan, column, and broom attached to it. Their blindness disabled their ability to see an entire picture that was right before them.
And all too often this blindness that we experience as thinkers comes as a result of the frames and categories we think in, they limit our ability to see the whole problem/solution in an interconnected way. This is called simultanagnosia, it is the ability to perceive the details of an object but the inability to see the bigger picture and the relationships between the fine details. Because we cannot see the bigger picture, research, and problem-solving become misdirected and often a waste of time because researchers are researching for the sake of publishing, not to solve any problems.
“Science at its best is a search from commonalities, regularities, principles, and universalities that transcend and underlie the structure and behavior of any particular constituent, whether it be a quark, a galaxy, an electron, a cell, an airplane, a computer, a person or a city.”
— Geoffrey West
Furthermore, we must not confuse intellectualism as a foundational principle to solving complex social issues that everyday people face. It is often intellectualism (the exercise of the intellect at the expense of the emotions) that acts as the barrier for certain perspectives and voices to be heard. This bias is folly, insofar as intellects are far removed from observing our problems on a human level. It is those who experience the problem first hand who will always give the most insight to people-centered problems in the first place. Furthermore, the world is devolving and being disrupted by religious wars, massive exploitation, natural resources depletion, sprawling pollution that is all being driven by intellectualism.
If we are ever to solve human problems, we must humble ourselves and listen to the humans whose problems we wish to understand and solve.
Organizations will often pontificate on how they want their employees to think outside of the box. But what happens when we live outside of the box. Although categories have their obvious benefits and use cases when attempting to understand certain topics, destroying categories and unleashing pure thought is how innovation happens.
I won’t try to convince you, whether you may be an academic or scientist, that the average human being more often than not, has valuable insight to contribute to solving problems. Much of the time that insight comes in the form of their experiences and the smallest details that often encapsulate much of the bulk of the problems.
Allowing inclusion has proven to many organizations that the diversity of thought and background offer different perspectives when striving to reach solutions.
This melting pot approach to understanding our world creates a rich environment for literature and intellectual culture to naturally evolve and offers insight that traditional academic institutions often gloss over because of their inherent biases.
This model really is the university model, without the departments, the doors, or glass ceilings because our goal is common, but the solutions provided come from a variety of approaches enabling us to see and frame our problems differently and collaborate beyond the traditional fetters and boundaries drawn by research that doesn’t come from first principles.
