On a recent trip to the grocery store I shambled by an otherwise nice SAAB with a “Bernie Sanders 2016” sticker on the back bumper, the hood up, and three scrawny hipster guys (late 20s going on 11) slouching around it, occassionally cranking the engine.

“Can you, like, give us a jump?” one man-child asked abruptly as I passed. (What ever happened to the simple courtesy of excusing yourself before you interrupt another person? “Excuse me, can you, like, give us a jump?”)

“Probably not. I walked. Besides, you don’t need a jump. Your engine is cranking fine. There’s nothing wrong with your battery.”

“But we need a jump.”

I was momentarily surprised that not one of these young males had any idea of how to solve the problem of a car that won’t start. That surprise quickly passed as I recognized this as one more manifestation of a very widespread problem: an inability to think rationally about problems. This inability to rationally analyze and solve problems, an inability to make rational decisions, shows up throughout our society — in our personal lives, in public policy debates, and, of course, at work.

Rational — one might even say scientific — analysis, problem solving, and decision making is a core activity for anybody working in a Lean environment, so it’s a set of skills that many people new to Lean will need to learn or refine.

Fortunately there are ways of reasoning — thinking about a problem in a organized way — that can help us understand and solve many problems and make better decisions. In effect, the Toyota improvement kata is simply the routine use of some of these thought tools in trying to solve problems and make decisions.

Philosopers generally recognize two logical protocols, inductive reasoning and deductive reasoning. Scientist almost always recognize the process, but rarely the name, of a third such protocol: abductive reasoning. Each of these has a set of formally and precisely defined rules that do little more than confuse most people. At a basic level, however, they are actually pretty easy to understand. Let’s look at some definitions and some examples.

Abductive reasoning has been described as “inference to the best explanation.”

Basically this means that we consider the available information and figure out what seems to be the most likely explanation for a particular problem. In short, we make an educated guess.

Just because we believe that’s the best explanation doesn’t mean it’s the right explanation. We must test our hypothesis. If our educated guess, our hypothesis, our inference to the best explanation, tests out to have been on target, great. If not, we discard that hypothesis, reexamine the evidence (including the new and important evidence that our first hypothesis was wrong), and start over with a new best explanation. We test that.

By process of elimination, we may find the right explanation for a problem. The Toyota improvement kata as described by Mike Rother is simply a formal implementation of this cycle of abductive reasoning.

You may recognize abductive reasoning as one way of describing a scientific process: observe, devise a hypothesis, test the hypothesis, repeat. Abductive reasoning always results in new knowledge, if we are only open to recognizing the new knowledge, or capable of understanding it. Abductive reasoning, or simply abduction, is the most fundamental of scientific methods.

Our second logical method, induction, is the practice of determining what general conclusion or conclusions we can logically reach based on the information available. Induction won’t give us an exact answer, an answer true in all cases. It only gives us a likely answer. Given a likely answer, we can make reasonably good decisions, which is a crucial difference from abduction. Where abduction is about problem solving and gaining new knowledge, induction is more of a decision making tool.

In large part, inductive reasoning is reasoning guided by experience. It’s pattern recognition. Given a large enough base of information we can reasonably expect a particular outcome, although we recognize that a different outcome is possible.

We deal with patterns all day every day. A weather forecast that predicts an 80% chance of rain is based on recognizing weather patterns. “When we see these sorts of weather patterns,” the meteorologist might say, “about 80% of the time, it rains.” Given this knowledge, we can make better decisions: “Hmmmm, shall I paint my deck today? Oh, there’s an 80% chance of rain? It’s probably not a good day to paint my deck.”

Our third method of logical inquiry, deductive reasoning, begins with statements about a situation or problem. These statements, called ‘premises’, must be true for deductive reasoning to work. We can then figure out — deduce — what else must be true if these premises are indeed true.

Among teachers of philosophy there is a classic example of deductive reasoning: “All men are mortal. Socrates is a man. Therefore, Socrates is mortal.”

Well, duh.

Deductive reasoning — if this is true, then this is true, and this is true, so that must also be true — is a very powerful method in philosophy, theology, discussions of morality, and so on. Because deduction can’t give us really new knowledge it’s of fairly limited use in a Lean environment.

For example, going back to where we started, deduction by itself isn’t of much use in figuring out why a car won’t start. Every sign was that that Saab was out of gas.

We can’t be certain the car had no gas with which to feed the engine without removing the tank, fuel filter, fuel pump, pressure regulator, pressure accumulator, and fuel lines, and looking inside them to insure that they were empty. But if we did all that and found that there was no gas in the car, we could use deductive reasoning to say “A gasoline-powered car without gasoline won’t start. The Saab is a gasoline-powered car. It contains no gasoline. Therefore the SAAB won’t start.”

Well duh.

Far better to use inductive reasoning: “The car won’t start. Consider the evidence. The gas gauge reads empty. When we crank the engine no smell of gasoline comes out the exhaust pipe. In most cases when 1) the engine cranks but 2) the car won’t start and 3) the gas gauge reads empty, and 4) there is no smell of unburned gas coming from the exhaust after cranking the engine, in most cases — not in all cases, but in most cases — the car is out of gas.”

Decision: Walk to the free-market gas station down the street and buy some free-market-supplied gasoline to fill up your free-market-supplied Saab so you hipster socialists won’t have to wear out your free-market-supplied Red Ball Jets (or whatever children’s tennis shoes you wear) walking (WALKING!) home.

Having a grasp of these three problem solving protocols won’t provide us with all the answers we need, but the discipline they bring to problem solving and decision making allows us — and sometimes forces us — to recognize and admit to having zones of ignorance that hamper our ability to solve problems or make the best decisions. Recognizing problems, and having tools to solve them — abduction, deduction, and induction — puts us most of the way to solving difficult problems and making better decisions.

Update: People have asked what these goofball socialists finally did with their Saab. I’m not sure. By the time I got out of the free-market grocery store they had persuaded somebody to give them a jump. The car, needless to say, still wasn’t starting.

And these people believe the government should own the factors of production and people like them should make all economic decisions. Shees.

Consider the implications of socialism from a Lean perspective: Socialists believe the government should control all the factors of production. The most important factor of production is the human brain. From this we conclude deductively that socialists believe the government should control your brain.

 

Copyright 2016 by Paul G. Spring. All rights reserved.