Ignorance is a most wonderful thing.
It facilitates magic.
It allows the masses to be led.
It provides answers where there are none.
It allows happiness in the presence of danger.All this, while the pursuit of knowledge can only destroy the illusion. Is it any wonder mankind chooses ignorance?
Apollo Root Cause Analysis: Effective Solutions to Everyday Problems, Every Time - Dean L. Gano
When there is an unsubstantiated claim for any conjectured fix to a problem, and the root cause of that problem has not been identified, verified, and validated to actually be the cause of the observed effect, then that conjectured fix is a fallacy.
As Gano tells us, effective solutions are not found because of three things:
- Incomplete problem definition - caused by the false belief that the problem is obvious and the subsequent rusk to find a solution.
- Unknown causal relationships - remain unknown because we do not seem to think causally. Instead, we communicate by telling each other stories, and the inferences surrounding the stories pass as caused.
- A focus on solutions - without clearly defining the problem and its causes, we find ourselves solving the wrong problem.
Without determining the root cause of the observed failure, we are setting up for the next failure.
How do we discover these root causes? Start with a simple method, from a poster hanging in our son's laboratory at Washington State University