Imagine there is a malignant stomach tumour. That is impossible to operate. And, can be done only through radiation.
The rays should reach the tumour with a particular intensity for the tumour to be removed. However, these rays are harmful that it would damage the tissues through which it reaches the tumour.
Suppose you are the Doc. How would you solve this? Think for a bit, and come back.
Problem 2
There was a powerful dictator, whose fortress could not be easily reached.
If the entire army of the opponent could reach the fortress at the same time, then the dictator could be defeated. The Major of the opponent army devised a plan.
He split the group of soldiers to multiple sub groups, and had their watch at sync.
The plan was to enter the fortress from multiple directions, and converge at the same time to the centre of the fort. The plan seemed to have worked.
Problem 3
A building in a small town was on fire. The Chief of Fire Service was at the place to inspect, while the locals were trying to pull off the fire.
There was a small lake near by, where the locals were bringing in buckets of water and throwing it on the fire. The Chief had to stop this at the moment to stop spreading the fire to the next building.
He asked all the locals to stop doing what they were doing, assembled everyone around the building, and on count of 3, he asked everyone to throw the water. The plan worked.
Now, did you solve Problem 1?
In case you did not, the doc had to throw in multiple rays of low-intensity from different directions on the body. Such that the point at which it converges, where the tumour is will have a high intensity radiation to destroy the tumour.
Research says, 10% of people solve Problem 1. 30% Solve when given the situation at Problem 2. 50% solve when given both Problem 2 and Problem 3.
David Epstein, the author of “Range” says, the more diverse your knowledge, more it could be used to question and come up with unique solutions.
Geniuses like Copernicus used analogies to question and think to discover why earth orbited the Sun.
Increasing the breadth of knowledge is more important than the depth, to Triumph in the Modern World.