BWAA, Ha, Ha, Ha ... really?

The best I can do is a general problem solving scenario. 

This covers mental and physical problems more than social problems, but Instrumentation does address communication with both people and technology, so I will first review the mechanics of communication. Imperfect communication is a major source of problems in modern global (and personal) relationships.

Finding associates that complement one's skill-set is a superlative general strategy. Cooperation and collaboration are powerful problem solving tools. Cooperation and collaboration require trust. Trust is dependent on due diligence. Due diligence can not be accomplished without common understanding of the issues involved. Common understanding requires clear communication.

Therefore ...

Clear communication is the basis for the Instrumentation syntactic strategy. It is very mechanical to minimize possible misunderstanding between people who live on opposite sides of our fractious little planet. There are only two rules and one reason to remember.

• The order of components is [Subject]. [Predicate]. [Object].
  
• the brackets indicate optional sentence components
• a 'Predicate' can be anything from the Articulation layer (a verb, usually)
  
• and some things from the Specialization layer
  
• Each component should be completely described before the next component is introduced.
  
• "Bob . old . fat . on (the) floor . eats . asparagus ."
  
• this is the major source of clarity
  
• Instrumentation is designed to describe 'events' which are involved in 'relationships' with other events.
• this is how expert systems understand things
• events may be entities, actions, concepts or anything else
  

A Solution Oriented Instrumentality

1. Quick Fix - Stop the hemorrhaging. Deal with the symptoms so that things don't get worse. Never stop here! If you don't actually solve the problem, things will almost inevitably get worse.
   
   
2. Find - Locate the root cause of the problem. Remember that the first "root cause" found may not be the critical root cause. This step can take a long time to complete and may involve multiple iterations. Don't rush to be first with the wrong answer.
   
   
3. Correct - Design and implement solutions to all root causes. Design is very, very important. Proper Design makes implementation as simple and routine as possible.
   
   
4. Test - Make sure that your solutions work and will last. Testing starts when you implement the very first viable part of your total solution (which includes the quick fix). Every individual change should be incrementally sanity checked to make the cause of any new problems easier to find. Testing doesn't end until the total solution has proven itself under actual battle conditions.
   

This design uses the following eight Types:

Hard Focus Facilities

    Mathematics

This is Truth, unless it is false. You really can't say that about any other field of knowledge.

The only apparently 'gray areas' in mathematics involve things that we are not capable of comprehending, things such as infinity. Mathematics is always predictively certain when applied correctly and rigorously. Humans are often certain but only incidentally correct.

Math (my personal nickname for it) supports logic, scheduling, accounting, cooking, etc. Any activity which involves the manipulation of quantifiable entities or events is dependent upon mathematics. Math is a lot more than just numbers.

    Science

Know thy assumptions. Test thy hypothesis. Prove thy theories. All else is just drama.

This is a method used to expose the shape of reality. This shape has dimensions that include time, space, temperature, pressure, electromagnetic field strengths and many other quantifiable phenomenon.

Science is the source of factual information.

    Engineering

Dealing with the possibilities and consequences of reality.

This is where the rubber meets the road. If you are creating, improving or repairing anything that has a physical component (and a lot of things that don't) you are engaging in engineering. Proper design of an enduring solution is the province of Engineering (however, see also Philosophy below for aesthetic considerations).

Engineering is the art of balancing maximum performance upon the limitations of the materials involved.

    Study

No one knows everything. Bliss is not a useful problem solving technique.

This is in the 'Peril' spot because available information isn't always true. The integrity of the researcher has no bearing on the applicability of the result to your current problem.

Modern information sources (such as the internet) have made finding information physically trivial, but assuring factual certainty has become a more critical concern. A recent reputable book from the library may be harder to find, but it stands a much better chance of being correct. You can use the internet to obtain that book and have the best of both worlds.

You can't really tell what information will be useful until you need it, so it is best to study everything that you can understand. You don't need to know all the details of everything, but you need to be able to tell what general fields of knowledge are applicable to a given problem.

Soft Focus Facilities

    Philosophy

Why are you doing this (whatever it is)?

You can't truly solve any problem until you know what the ideal solution will be. Understanding the intrinsic philosophical background of the problems space is a requirement for holistic solution design.

Philosophy is the study of intangible ideals. This is also a major input to finding the root cause of the problem. Being the cause of the problem (and not being able to admit it) is the worst case scenario.

Solving problems is easier when you really care about the outcome. Artificially making yourself care is counter-productive in the long run. A coherent Philosophy can help you decide whether or not you should get involved with the problem in the first place.

    Learning

Not necessarily related to Study. This isn't a bad thing, Learning can happen at any time.

Any time anything goes right or wrong is an opportunity to learn. A 'fool' is someone who repeats their mistakes. If you don't want to be an ignorant fool you need to start learning.

Everyone is ignorant of something. It is better to ask a question and reveal your ignorance than to remain silent and ignorant. If you don't know something you are ignorant. The cure for ignorance is learning. If you don't ask you are stupid. True stupidity is incurable.

    Experience

You only get to stop gaining Experience once. In the meantime, make the best of it.

You can't keep doing the same thing and expect anything to change. In order to decide what to do next, you need to know what's available. This should be a harbinger of both Study and Learning.

    Dream

Your brain needs it. Dream is the essence of Soft Focus.

This includes all unfocused thought, not just dreams while asleep. Some problems can only be understood when you stop staring directly at them.

Before dreaming can be a useful problem solving technique, you have to truly understand all of the Hard Focus aspects of the problem. Dream is never a substitute for Study (or for having an applicable comprehensive Philosophy).

Lay it on the Tables

This design only shows positive terms. Negative terms would be the opposite of each 'passive' term listed below. If the term is 'active', the negative form will invoke the function or be used to capture the state or current Value.

Disclaimers:

Intelligence is not a single thing. Intelligence is a convenient name for a collection of mental skills which are used to solve (and sometimes cause) problems. It can be broken down into a near infinite number of talents such as memory, mathematical ability, pattern recognition, deductive and inductive reasoning (which are themselves collective entities), etc.

Apparent intelligence varies according to the task at hand. Someone who appears brilliant in a classroom may look like a complete idiot on the street (believe me, I speak from personal experience). 

Instrumentation is intended to organize data so that it can be used more easily, but fluent use of Instrumentation would only demonstrate facility in a few individual skills. It would be highly premature to attempt to predict the skills involved at this point in the development process.

Instrumentation may augment some mental skills and degrade others (I would be shocked if there was no effect at all), but guessing in advance of hard performance data is a fools game. I hope that Instrumentation will facilitate artificial intelligence, but that won't help you until you have a computer in your head.