Binaries

Okay so, been busy, most of my posts so far were written months ago and were scheduled to post while i was occupied, but now i’m back so let’s have fun with a simple but insanely useful concept in deduction: Binaries!

So, the title is really self explanatory, a binary is just a word that refers to two things. In Biology a binary system is used as a base for the nomenclature of living things, each living being is classified into different categories based on the idea of “it either has X quality, or it doesn’t”, depending on the answer the creature either goes down one path or another, which might then branch off into another binary option of the same nature, or just establish a category the living thing fits into (a species for example). So how do we use this idea in deduction?

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Well much like the variety of living creatures, the behaviors of people and the effects they have on their environment is massively extensive and very complex, and being able to reduce things to binary options can be very useful to navigate this big, tangled ball of options we usually run into when deducing. So how do we do it and how does it help?

Let’s start with how it helps. There are many ways in which i teach to see deduction in your head, these are all meant to first and foremost give you an easy understanding of how deduction can work theoretically, and to allow you to use these mental constructs that represent deduction, as tools to pull out when actually deducing. For example, seeing deduction as a Building in your head (in reference to my Building Theory) allows you to understand the structure a deduction can take, but also gives you a tool and a reference to look back at when deducing so you can orient yourself and think “okay, how do i reach the next floor or the building?” or “should i just keep expanding on the base and focus on making a large first floor, or should i aim to have multiple floors? how easy is either option based on what i’m deducing?”. In a similar manner, binaries will give you a good mental image of the structure of a deduction, and help you massively as a tool

So when actually employing binaries as a strategy when deducing you’re aiming to make the chunk of your deductions that you’re applying it to into a bit of a flowchart that looks something like this:

So the idea becomes, reducing every possibility in a deduction to two options, these options are usually (but not always) yes or no questions. So instead of looking for a person’s hobbies, of which there could be many, you’re aiming to narrow down the list by either proving they engage (or don’t engage) in one specific hobby, or proving they engage (or don’t engage) in one whole category of hobbies. So the question “what are this person’s hobbies?” turns into “Does this person like to read?” or “does this person go out a lot?”, both of these questions have two mutually exclusive answers, either yes or no, nothing in between. So now you want to look for proof of either of these answers, you’re now not looking for what hobbies this person could possibly have, you’re no longer on the lookout for anything that could possibly point towards some hobby, no matter how small of a clue it is, no matter how obscure of a hobby it points towards, you’re now looking for things you know reading often (or not reading often) is accompanied by, or things you know indicate this person doesn’t go out a lot, which would mean their hobbies are mostly indoors, which would eliminate a whole chunk of possibilities

Now for the nuances of this: I said the answers to these binaries are mutually exclusive, either one or the other, nothing in between, and yes that’s sometimes true: people are either married or not married, people are either employed or unemployed, etc. But this is real life, and in real life things are rarely that simple.

Yes someone could be married and could exhibit all the signs of not being married (for example they could be looking to cheat, and simply doing a great job at hiding their existing marriage). Obviously the existence of in-between states destroy the idea of a binary option, it’d be great to think someone is either right or left handed, but oh oh, ambidextrous people exist.

So keep in mind that this is a tool that helps in the process of deduction, not a tool meant to build an entire deduction from scratch. Just because you used this tool and established that someone is an introvert doesn’t mean you shouldn’t subject that conclusion to a test to see if it stands, it also doesn’t mean you should 100% stick to it because it’s the only explanation to what you’re observing. Maybe the person is an ambivert, maybe you’re catching all the signs of an introvert because they’ve been cooped up at home for a couple of weeks and there’s barely any sign of them going out, these are options that should be explored, and the way to explore them is through the use of all the other tools i give you and all the other skills you have in your repertoire as a deductionist.

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In short, this tool doesn’t outrank any other methods, it’s simply a vehicle to help you hone in or discard possibilities. In the ambivert example, sure, you may not know if they’re an introvert or an ambivert by using binaries, but you’re sure as hell they’re not an extrovert, which is very useful information

Now you may ask “how do i know what things come with someone not going out a lot, or with someone reading a lot? i haven’t studied that, i don’t know what signs to look for!” and to that i say, you don’t have to study that, and yes you do know what signs to look for, it just takes a little imagination. I answered a question about this a few weeks back and i recommend reading it here, and i’ll maybe make a post about it if people want it and if it would be useful to have separate from that ask, Try to employ the same startegy i describe in that answer any time you feel like you can’t deduce something just because you haven’t studied it enough, you’ll be surprised how much you can deduce using simple, basic understanding of situations.

With that i’ll leave you and go write the next post after this, as always if anyone has questions just hit me up, i answer all questions on Mondays

Happy Observing

-DV