Formal system of thinking method 1

Simplicity is the cornerstone of greatness.

16 19, 23-year-old Descartes couldn't sleep late at night, and drew two vertical lines on the paper. What he didn't expect was that his two straight lines completely changed the track of later mathematical development. In today's view, what he created is only a very simple mathematical tool-mathematical coordinate system, which any middle school student will use. But its establishment has solved the problem that algebra and geometry are independent of each other. From then on, everyone can use all the methods of algebra to study geometric problems, laying the foundation for the development of analytic geometry and calculus.

Engels said: "The turning point in mathematics is Descartes' variable. With variables, motion enters mathematics, with variables, dialectics enters mathematics, with variables, differentiation and integration become necessary immediately. "

The law of thinking is the unity of thinking content and thinking form, which complement each other. The most typical is the establishment of formal logic, which provides a correct thinking tool for human scientific thinking through simple formal rules. Traditional thinking learning is often limited to the content and ignores the thinking form. They take the form of thinking as a matter of course, but don't study the laws of it.

On the basis of the three super-thinking methods, the formal tools of thinking methods are formally explored and the formal system of thinking methods is established. The formal tools of thinking methods are a series of articles, which will help you understand simple daily thinking tools from a deeper level and establish a higher-dimensional formal system of thinking methods.

In particular, it should be noted that:

Although almost everyone has studied the coordinate system in mathematics, most people just use it to solve mathematical problems. Faced with practical problems in life and work, they often think that these problems have nothing to do with the coordinate system of mathematics.

For example, how do you answer the following questions?

If your answers are all similar to the following answers, then your thinking problem still stays at the one-dimensional level:

There seems to be no problem with these answers. In fact, they are all one-dimensional and low-dimensional thinking, only knowing one aspect of things and solving problems unilaterally. In many successful trainings, successful masters often confuse students with one-dimensional thinking, and they often attribute the success of outstanding people to only one dimension of hard work. In fact, in addition to hard work, success also has dimensions such as environment, luck, ability and talent.

Teacher Wu Bofan mentioned the word "blind dimension" in his cognitive methodology, and also summarized the disadvantages of insufficient dimension. If a certain dimension is missing in our thinking, our thinking will not see some places, which will lead to cognitive deviation and eventually make wrong decisions.

For example, in the minds of people who lack artistic and cultural dimensions, cultural relics are just a pile of garbage. This has happened in history. A Taoist named Wang Yuanzhuan once sold a large number of Buddhist treasures in Dunhuang Mogao Grottoes to British archaeologists at a low price of 200 taels, which caused great cultural losses.

Dimensionality is cognition, and the fatal point of single dimensionality lies in its solid understanding of this vast world from a single perspective, which is the beginning of disaster. For example, the blind touch the elephant, and the blind can only understand the elephant from one dimension of touch. Finally, some people think that elephants are walls, some people think that elephants are trunks, some people think that elephants are water pipes, and some people think that elephants are jade. Obviously, mistakes and a single dimension cannot fully understand things.

In the science fiction novel Three-body, one of the important reasons why high-dimensional creatures can easily attack low-dimensional creatures is that high-dimensional creatures have more dimensions and can see many things that low-dimensional creatures can't. For example, an ant only knows how to move left, right and back on a two-dimensional plane, while we humans can move up and down and perceive three-dimensional space in addition to moving left, right and back. Although we only have one dimension-height, we can easily determine the direction of ants.

The dimension of thinking determines fate, and the dimension of having determines what you can see. The higher a person's thinking dimension, the broader his thinking, and he can see many things that others can't. A single thinking dimension doomed a one-dimensional thinker not to see many things.

If you master the relevant thinking methods, it is easy to think about the above three problems in two dimensions.

We only need to add a dimension to the original dimension, and we can get more thoughtful answers.

Time: If we add an "emergency" dimension to the "important" dimension, we can get the four-quadrant rule of time management.

Communication: Add a dimension of "you know" to the dimension of "I know", and you can get the window of johari.

Products: Add a "relative market share" to the "sales growth rate" dimension to get the Boston matrix.

We find that after adding only one dimension, our thinking becomes clearer and more organized, and we can deal with more problems. One-dimensional thinkers can only think extensively along one line, while two-dimensional thinking can deal with many problems on one plane. It classifies the original chaotic things more reasonably and carefully, which makes us analyze and think more concretely and carefully. Take time management as an example. If we only deal with things according to their importance, we will be helpless for those unimportant but urgent things. After adding the dimension of "urgency", two-dimensional thinking can help us arrange important and non-urgent, important and urgent, unimportant and urgent, unimportant and non-urgent things.

Two-dimensional quadrant method refers to an analysis method of classifying and analyzing things (events, work, projects, etc.). ) as the basis of analysis, and find out the solution to the problem.

This is the two-dimensional quadrant method, similar to Descartes' mathematical coordinate system, except that the key dimensions of things replace the X axis and Y axis. It turns the original complicated things that are hard to think clearly into mathematical problems, divides them into four quadrants of small problems, and then makes targeted thinking. As long as anyone grasps the two key dimensions of things and simplifies them, he can use the two-dimensional quadrant method to think clearly and improve his ability to analyze problems. Two-dimensional quadrant method has gone beyond the limitation of mathematical coordinate system and become a formal tool of workplace foundation, which appears in many fields such as management, marketing, human resources, time management and so on.

Why is two-dimensional thinking better than one-dimensional thinking?

Writing here, we will inevitably ask, why is it better to add one dimension to two-dimensional thinking than one dimension?

1. Thinking change

On the surface, two-dimensional thinking only divides things more finely, from the original two categories to four quadrants.

The classification of two-dimensional quadrant method is actually not a simple dimension increase, but a change of thinking. One-dimensional thinking is very easy to fall into black-and-white thinking, which is very single. However, the world is complex, and many things have multiple attributes, which cannot be simply divided by a single dimension.

For example, asking a good question is half solved, so what kind of question is a good question?

Obviously, a good question has multiple dimensions. If you only think from a single dimension, it will not be a good question. For example, if you only consider how to lose 30 kg or 1 kg, it will not be a good problem. You need to grasp the key dimensions of things and think from the dimensions of size and concreteness, which will help solve your problem.

Step 2 think more carefully

The finer the thinking, the better. From one-dimensional thinking to two-dimensional thinking, it is an upgrade from extensive thinking to refined thinking.

One-dimensional thinking is only an analysis of things in two, which is very extensive. Two-dimensional thinking divides things into four quadrants, which can be analyzed qualitatively and quantitatively, and is more helpful for us to accurately understand the essence of things in each quadrant, so as to formulate targeted solutions. For example, the well-known four-quadrant time management rule is like this. Everything is divided into four quadrants, and then each quadrant has a corresponding plan.

For another example, now we have to judge whether something in life is worth doing. If you simply think that only those things that can bring you benefits are worth doing, then it is very easy for us to be satisfied immediately and only pursue immediate interests. For this reason, the copper mine teacher put forward the copper mine rule, which manages everything from the income value and half-life He can decide whether it is worth doing and how to do it according to the nature of each quadrant, instead of burying his head in everything.

Classification is only the foundation, and more detailed thinking is the purpose of two-dimensional thinking. If you further quantify the dimensions, your classification will be more detailed and your thinking will be more detailed.

3. Dynamic thinking

Marx believes that everything is always in the process of development and change.

One-dimensional thinking emphasizes the choice of black and white. Two-dimensional thinking greatly buffers this opposition, and each quadrant can be transformed into a nearby quadrant, thus changing its original nature. As long as the number of dimensions changes, four quadrants can be transformed into other quadrants. Moreover, this dynamic transformation process is a process from quantitative change to qualitative change, and the quantitative change in dimension will eventually lead to the change of nature.

Take Boston Matrix as an example, it divides the company's products into problem business, star business, cash business and thin dog business from two dimensions of "market growth rate" and "relative market share". Although the four businesses are different in nature, they can be transformed into each other. Today's problem business may be tomorrow's star business, and today's star business may become cash business tomorrow. The conversion between quadrants not only provides us with a direction to improve our business, but also rings the alarm bell for us to guard against recession.

In addition, the aforementioned Johari Windows can also improve our communication ability through mutual transformation.

By adding a dimension, we can think more carefully, control more changes and deal with different situations in life and work.

Lenin said: Natural science has no doubt that the matter it studies only exists in three-dimensional space, so although the particles of this matter are too small for us to see, they must exist in the same three-dimensional space.

Thinking should objectively reflect reality. Two dimensions only exist in our minds, and the real world often appears in three dimensions. For example, in the real world, it is difficult for us to find a space with only length and width and no height. Following the two-dimensional coordinate system, Cartesian coordinate system also created a three-dimensional coordinate system to solve problems in real life. Similarly, two-dimensional thinking is only the basis of three-dimensional thinking.

Although three-dimensional thinking is only one dimension more than two-dimensional thinking, the thinking capacity of three-dimensional thinking has doubled. Take the RFM model of operation field as an example, it only adds one dimension, but quantifies the user value from eight aspects, which is twice as much as the four quadrants of two-dimensional thinking. Obviously, three-dimensional thinking is more detailed.

Besides meticulous three-dimensional thinking, what is better than two-dimensional thinking?

I think three-dimensional thinking is more detailed, comprehensive and systematic than two-dimensional thinking. The third dimension of three-dimensional thinking is usually not the increase of dimensions on the same plane, but the height, such as strategy, overall situation and wholeness. Then, it is a kind of ascending thinking, that is to say, our thinking is more stereoscopic and systematic than two-dimensional thinking. For example, operators usually consider how to make better products, how to increase more users and how to improve their operational efficiency, but bosses can often think about operational problems from a higher dimension, from the dimensions of strategy, management and talents.

Chen, from "Proposal to Relocate the Capital of Jianfan": "Those who don't seek eternal life don't seek for a moment; Those who do not seek the overall situation do not seek territory. " The place where three-dimensional thinking transcends two-dimensional thinking lies in the pattern and vision, which allows you to jump out of the thinking limitation of two-dimensional thinking and get the idea of strategic location architecture. At the same time, it also requires you to have higher cognition in order to master this dimension.

Whether learning to read and write or cultivating professional skills, we should think about what is happening now from the perspective of life planning or career development.

Whether you are engaged in your own work or personal career development, you should think about your current work from the perspective of strategic planning or industry trends.

Not bound by the status quo, taking the initiative to think in a higher dimension and thinking in three dimensions can make your career path go higher and further.

We know that human beings live in a three-dimensional world. So, is there anything else besides three-dimensional thinking?

In theory, the answer is naturally there.

For example, the four dimensions we often say are Einstein's "four-dimensional spacetime" composed of space and time, that is, adding a time dimension on the basis of length, width and height.

There is also the theory of 1 1 dimension proposed by M theory, which holds that our universe is 1 1 dimension and consists of vibrating planes.

Many sci-fi movies and novels are also showing us this multidimensional space, such as Starcraft and Three-body.

However, since our discussion is based on three ways of thinking, we will not introduce this way of thinking in depth.

Think of the mountainside as a mountain peak, and think about problems from multiple dimensions and high dimensions, so as to fully understand things and get better answers. What kind of thinking dimension you have determines the level of your thinking.

Finally, there is a key issue in the full text that I have never discussed, leaving it for everyone to think about:

How to establish a broader and deeper thinking dimension for yourself?

More dry goods:

Elites are controlled by methods, and it takes 150 sets of thinking framework tools to do things.

100 set of business analysis framework to help business people systematically master the rules of business operation.

Operation experts are good at solving problems scientifically, and 100 sets of methods and tools can realize efficient operation.

Efficient growth begins with the accumulation of a large number of thinking frames.

Ability transition system: how to improve your ability systematically

Process thinking: the underlying logic to make the work better and better.