The box shown in the figure four compartments of equal size and a perimeter of 112 cm. What is its area in cm2? That's the problem - including the book excerpt practices of open problem , Gilbert and Michel Arsac Mantis (CRDP Lyon, 2007) - which has been recently raised a family, for my beloved wife. Three of us to look and we left all three in different directions. One tried to put all this into an equation, the other issued heroic assumptions. Personally, I found it quite easy and I present here the fast that I found.
in itself, regardless of the solution to this problem. What is interesting is to see that - facing the same problem - each person took a different path (and there are others yet). None of these roads was fundamentally wrong. Some are no doubt easier than others but they all led to the solution.
This applies almost always when this problem is presented to an audience, mathematician or not. Beyond this mathematical problem, one might think that is exactly the same face to any other "problem" ... family problems, social problems, professional problems, health problems, problems of life!
It is rewarding to first realize that facing such a problem, there are several ways to solve it. According to our personality, we will choose one or the other, but that does not mean we have the "right" way. There are others that also result in resolving the situation. Some are more complex than others, but the level of complexity does not it depend on the degree of perception of the person placing the solution in practice? In other words, a track I can seem very complex but in fact be very simple for anyone who develops it.
These different tracks, these different approaches to the solution often create misunderstandings harmful if not perspective. Take for example any ethical or moral issue. This is not because the other has an approach angle different from mine that it necessarily wrong. If already facing a simple mathematical problem, there are different possible starting points, what should we think of moral or ethical problems that are both complex and both open in the sense that no one "answer" as possible?
When I was asked this mathematical problem, I was very happy to have found a quick and easy simple solution. Seeing my family look, not without difficulty, some interesting solutions in itself, I was really challenged: have not we too often tend to think that the answers to complex questions are simple when we see from our point of view, when in reality they vary depending on the personality of each of us?
The truth is rarely universal. It is built around what each perceives reality. Far from being a limit to human intelligence, this variety of approaches is what makes all the wealth.
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