Coronary artery disease
Sherlock Holmes uses a variety of different methods when solving the mystery in A Study in Scarlet. The methods include; working backwards, deduction, and false argument by elimination. I will be describing these in this order because I theorize that in the end Holmes is really making educated guesses or assumptions. By addressing these methods in the descending order that follows, I hope to show that anyone could make these assumptions but wind up with a very different outcome depending on how the variables are eliminated. WORKING BACKWARDS is the method whereby a person starts with an end result or event and works back through a logical set of reasoning to arrive at certain conclusions. This is often used at crime scenes to build a case. Usually the police
With today's forensics saliva would have been gathered and tested before such a conclusion would be made. I do not believe Sherlock Holmes provides us with a useful method of the way a social scientist goes about his work. When Sherlock Holmes was solving the mystery he used very loose associations that he then considered facts. This is probably the strongest method that Sherlock Holmes utilizes when solving the case. FALSE ARGUMENT BY ELIMINATION is the method whereby an explanation of an event that often involves the illicit assumption that one of a brief series of possible explanations must be correct. Therefore, his deduction could be right on but because there are so many variables that could impact the outcome we can not say for sure that he is correct. He works backwards through a set of plausible explanations that could be correct but are really just one possible scenario. This could certainly of happened and could very well be the cause, but Holmes never eliminated any number of possible outcomes based on the same set of observations. He rather deduces in his own mind how a certain set of events have occurred based on what he has heard from the other detectives and his own observations of the crime scene. An example was when he sniffed the dead man's lips. DEDUCTION is defined as reaching a conclusion by reasoning. Sherlock detected a slightly sour smell which led him to the conclusion that the man had had poison forced upon him. Sometimes he would state that a set of observations created a certain outcome. Deducing a conclusion is only as strong as the reasoning behind it.
Common topics in this essay:
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ARGUMENT ELIMINATION,
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