The Non-Statistical Man by Raymond F. Jones Read Free Book Online

read, if you will. And the job was tough, because it required that he be self-taught. He didn’t learn the best way; he learned to read by moving his lips, and he never tried seriously to improve upon this.
    “To drop the analogy now for the real circumstances: Man found there were numerous ways of solving problems and* reaching generalizations about the world around him. He could get his own answer on an individual basis and go ahead and apply it, for one way. But he’d already learned that, on a strictly physical level, there was strength in numbers; so he was suspicious of the solitary approach to anything. He developed the method of comparing proposed solutions to problems with his fellows. Sometimes there was a radical difference—the same problem affected different Individuals in widely varying ways. But it seemed like a good idea to stick together instead of going it alone. Compromises were made; the concensus of opinion was taken, and the majority decision accepted by all.
    “Thus was bom Society—and with it the art of statistics, the submergence of the Individual in the Group.”
    “I don’t know where you learned your sociology, Professor—but if anything like the scene you describe actually occurred, that was the birth of Man’s triumph over a nature he could not combat singlehanded. It was the birth of his realization that the combined effort of many Individuals can accomplish what none of them can do done.”
    “No,” said Magruder. “This is not what was bom at that time. A concerted attack on Man’s problems does not depend on his present Society. Cooperation is more easily obtained through much different instruments.
    “Without exerting himself to work out such different instruments, however, Man was forced to cling desperately to the tool of his invention, Society. Inherent within it was the concept that the Individual was a servant of the group. In any question of conflicting welfare the Individual expected automatic defeat; sometimes he has fought against it, but never with any heart or expectancy of winning.
    “Statistical methods were the obvious intellectual tools with which to manipulate and describe Man as he functioned in Society. The Individual was of no import, so why bother devising a means of accommodating him? In writing insurance policies, it is important to you to know only that one out of a certdn dozen men will die of cancer. Which one is of no concern to you—unless it is yourself or someone for whom you have an affection. In this case, however, you have lost your usefulness to Society as an impartial statistician, and Society will replace you.
    “As a method of reasoning, which would fit his Society, Man developed logic—statistical induction of generdizations from many individual instances. It works fine in predicting the characteristics of the group, but no individual instance can be deduced from it.
    “But from time to time there have appeared short bursts of a stronger, more subtle, and completely incomprehensible means of reaching a generalization—the one Man bypassed when he invented Society; the non-logical process called intuition.
    “Within the framework of our culture it has been impossible to describe, and the conclusions reached could not be defended in any logical manner acceptable to Society.”
    Bascomb shifted uneasily. “And now you have corrected these defects?” he said.
    “Yes,” said Magruder. “Man can now be taught how to reach generalizations through the method of intuition. And please note that the inductive operation by the intuitive method yields a different type of generalization. The intuitive generalization is of the type of the Natural Law, which, unlike the Statistical Generalization, does permit deduction of individual instances.
    “The intuitive method, therefore, is the only one that does an individual any good!”
    “And you can no doubt prove as well as teach what you say,” said Bascomb.
    Magruder smiled. “The proof, as