How can I find out if all the sheep have come in from the field? Count them as they are going out, and count them again as they are coming in.
How can I remember how many sheep that person owes me? Write down their name, the word “sheep”, and the number of sheep.
How can I resolve conflicts with someone without fighting, when just talking it out with that person doesn’t seem to be working? Find some person whom we both respect, have each of us explain their view on the situation, and follow the respected person’s advice.
Yes, but even so, there may be lots of problems that I think are 50% solved or maybe wide open and that it turns out are maybe 95% solved (loosely speaking), and I’d still like to hear about those.
Can we start a thread for unproductive but frequently asked questions that can easily be replaced with other, more productive questions? Like if you’re asking this, you probably mean to ask something else. Does that sound useful?
One example of these is yelling at a small child, demanding to know why they broke something, which is not that useful because small children sometimes don’t have good answers or they have answers that don’t quite take all of reality into account. (For example, maybe the child wanted to see what would happen but didn’t realize might be permanent or unfavorable.) The more productive question is “How can we prevent you from breaking these types of objects again?”
“Do you think this is a good and useful idea? And can I perhaps legitimize the idea further by persuading you to start the thread instead of me since you’ve been starting a lot of repository threads lately?”
See? Questions are a tricky business! That was an unintentionally round-about and meta way of demonstrating it.
I would be very cautious about any claim that any “problem” is totally, finally, and uncontroversially solved.
When a problem gets to that point, no one is calling it a problem.
And even then, better solutions may come along.
How can I keep warm when going outside on a blustery fall day? Wear clothing.
How can I eat without spending all my time hunting? Buy food from other people who specialize in that.
How can I retain key thoughts more precisely than by mere memorization? Write them down.
Other “solved problems” from early human history:
How can I find out if all the sheep have come in from the field? Count them as they are going out, and count them again as they are coming in.
How can I remember how many sheep that person owes me? Write down their name, the word “sheep”, and the number of sheep.
How can I resolve conflicts with someone without fighting, when just talking it out with that person doesn’t seem to be working? Find some person whom we both respect, have each of us explain their view on the situation, and follow the respected person’s advice.
Another category is questions like “(2x^8)/3 +62/4 = x” where the method of obtaining the answer is well defined, but the answer itself is unknown.
I know the answer.
Yes, but even so, there may be lots of problems that I think are 50% solved or maybe wide open and that it turns out are maybe 95% solved (loosely speaking), and I’d still like to hear about those.
Can we start a thread for unproductive but frequently asked questions that can easily be replaced with other, more productive questions? Like if you’re asking this, you probably mean to ask something else. Does that sound useful?
One example of these is yelling at a small child, demanding to know why they broke something, which is not that useful because small children sometimes don’t have good answers or they have answers that don’t quite take all of reality into account. (For example, maybe the child wanted to see what would happen but didn’t realize might be permanent or unfavorable.) The more productive question is “How can we prevent you from breaking these types of objects again?”
You can start whatever threads you want! You have the power! (What question should you have replaced that question with, I wonder...)
“Do you think this is a good and useful idea? And can I perhaps legitimize the idea further by persuading you to start the thread instead of me since you’ve been starting a lot of repository threads lately?”
See? Questions are a tricky business! That was an unintentionally round-about and meta way of demonstrating it.