• What is the human mind?
    The brain is the core for all human emotion, interaction, passive, and active processes. It is the "processor" for ourselves. It acts like a sonar, sending out a signal and getting a response back. If you're into automation then it is like a Programmable Logic Controller. It does this by sending out chemical information from one neuron, or nerve cell to another. The receiving nerve cell then generates chemical information is called a neurotransmitter.
    Big deal right?

    Well, knowing how your brain reacts to information and it's limitations to that information is the first step in knowing how to troubleshoot. If the brain has never processed information before, then it will have a hard time doing it. Just try to break dance with no formal training, or try to shoot a gun from 200 meters away and get a bullseye. The brain reacts to information, but it takes a while to stick. The first time the brain does something, it is slow. It takes up to 12 tries to fully grasp the concept and a total of 10 years doing the action to master it.

    If you don't have 10 years to spend, and you want to do something now, there's got to be a way, right? Well, there is. Simplifying the action you are trying to troubleshoot with information that is very clear to the brain makes it easier to clunk through the actions, and the brain reacts the same way it would with the experienced action that it does with the new action by sending a chemical transmission to the neurotransmitters that it knows. This is called Transferable Action.

    Sitting back and breaking down a problem into it's key components, and re-imagining those components as a whole is the way to troubleshoot.

    In this scenario, say you are a chemical scientist, and you have gone to a mining shaft. The workers there just had an accident and want to know when the shaft will become safe to re-enter. You find out they are mining coal, and they spilled sulfuric acid, both of which you are familiar with.

    You think about what the key components for the problem is:
    Mining shaft
    Oxygen
    Sulfuric Acid
    Coal
    Pressure

    You then look back on your past experiences, one of which had to do with sulfur and coal, and then some training you had on confined spaces. Remembering these, you take a fan and begin ventilating the mine, and writing down the chemicals.

    Knowing the chemical makeup of both substances, you calculate the time it would take it dissipate the acid, and factor in the ventilation of the mining shaft. The miners thank you, and you go on your way.