“I have already explained to you that what
is out of the common is usually a guide rather
than a hindrance. In solving a problem of this
sort, the grand thing is to be able to reason
backwards. That is a very useful accomplishment,
and a very easy one, but people do not
practise it much. In the every-day affairs of
life it is more useful to reason forwards, and
so the other comes to be neglected. There are
fifty who can reason synthetically for one who
can reason analytically.”
[swedish translation from which I read it would
be, last section;
"Only one man of fifty has the ability
to think analytically, the rest is dedicated to
puzzles all the parts together and hope to
thus obtain an overall picture in the end"]
-A study in Scarlet, 1887 (Sherlock Holmes), by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle
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