The Last Lecture (2008)
“a problem well put is half solved.”
“The Pattern of Inquiry” from Logic: Theory of Inquiry
Logic: Theory of Inquiry (1938)
Variant: It is a familiar and significant saying that a problem well put is half-solved.
Help us to complete the source, original and additional information
Do you have more details about the quote "a problem well put is half solved." by John Dewey?
John Dewey 62
American philosopher, psychologist, and educational reformer 1859–1952Related quotes
Buckminster Fuller
(1895–1983) American architect, systems theorist, author, designer, inventor and futurist
World Design Science Decade 1965-1975 Phase I (1965), Document 3 : Comprehensive Thinking, "Venus Proximity Day", p. 33 http://challenge.bfi.org/sites/challenge.bfi.org/files/pdf_files/wdsd_phase1_doc3.pdf
1960s
Context: One of my working assumptions which has been proven successful so often as seemingly to qualify it as a reliable tenet is that A problem adequately stated is a problem solved theoretically and immediately, and therefore subsequently to be solved, realistically. Others have probably stated the principle in many ways. The assumption is that the inevitability of a solution's realization is inherent in the interaction of human intellect and the constantly transformative evolution of physical universe. At first the, only subconsciously apprehended, approaching confluences of complex events make themselves known intuitively within the intellectual weather. Then comes a gradually awakening consciousness of the presence of new families of differentiating-out challenging concepts of every day prominence. It is with these randomly patterning families of separate concepts that evolution is about to deal integratively. As a now specific unitary problem it may be disposed of effectively when and if that unified problem becomes "adequately stated" and thereby comprehensibly solvable.
“If you cannot solve the proposed problem, try to solve first a simpler related problem.”
George Pólya
(1887–1985) Hungarian mathematician
Mathematical Methods in Science (1977), p.164
“Each problem that I solved became a rule which served afterwards to solve other problems”
René Descartes
(1596–1650) French philosopher, mathematician, and scientist
“Death solves all problems — no man, no problem.”
Joseph Stalin
(1879–1953) General secretary of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union
This actually comes from the novel Children of the Arbat (1987) by Anatoly Rybakov. In his later book The Novel of Memories ( In Russian http://www.sakharov-center.ru/asfcd/auth/auth_pages.xtmpl?Key=18637&page=307) Rybakov admitted that he had no sources for such a statement.
Misattributed
“Any problem solved is a new problem made.”
Karl Pilkington
(1972) English television personality, social commentator, actor, author and former radio producer
Podcast Series 5 Episode 1
On Life