problem

NOUN

 1A matter or situation regarded as unwelcome or harmful and needing to be dealt with and
overcome.

‘they have financial problems’

‘the problem of ageism in Hollywood’

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Synonyms

1. 1.1 A thing that is difficult to achieve.

‘motivation of staff can also be a problem’

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Synonyms

2. 1.2as modifier Denoting or relating to people whose behaviour causes difficulties to

themselves and others.

‘practitioners help families develop strategies for managing problem behaviour in teens’

‘a problem family’

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 2Mathematics Physics 
An inquiry starting from given conditions to investigate or demonstrate a fact, result, or law.

Example sentences

1. 2.1Geometry  A proposition in which something has to be constructed.

Compare with theorem

Example sentences
 2. 2.2 (in chess) an arrangement of pieces in which the solver has to achieve a specified
result.

Example sentences

Phrases

 have a problem with

o Disagree with or have an objection to.

‘I have no problem with shopping on Sundays’

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Synonyms

 no problem

o Used to express one's agreement or acquiescence.

‘‘Can you come over here right away?’ ‘No problem.’’

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 that's your (or his, her, etc.) problem

o Used to express one's lack of interest in or sympathy with another person's problems.

‘he'd made a mistake but that was his problem’

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Origin

Late Middle English (originally denoting a riddle or a question for academic discussion): from Old French
probleme, via Latin from Greek problēma, from proballein ‘put forth’, from pro ‘before’ + ballein ‘to
throw’.

https://en.oxforddictionaries.com/definition/problem

A1 a situation, person, or thing that needs attention and needs to bedealt with or solved:

financial/health  problems

Our  main  problem is  lack  of  cash.

I'm  having  problems  with  my  computer.

No one has  solved  the problem  of  what to do with  radioactive  waste.

The very high  rate  of  inflation  poses/presents  (= is)  a  serious  problem for the  government.

Who is going to  tackle  (=  deal  with)  the problem of  poverty  in the  inner  cities?

[ + -ing verb ]  Did you have any problems  (= difficulties)  getting  here?

I'd  love  to come -  the only  problem  is  I've got  friends  staying  that  night.

a question in mathematics that needs an answer:

We were given ten problems to  solve.

problem child, family, etc.

a child, etc. whose behaviour is bad

More examples

 Traffic  congestion  in  large  cities  seems  to be an  insoluble  problem.

 Her only problem is  lack  of  confidence.

 I've had  continual  problems with this  car  ever  since I  bought  it.

 Tiredness,  loss  of  appetite  and  sleeping  problems are all  classic  symptoms  of  depression.

 Desperate  measures  are  needed  to  deal  with the  growing  drug  problem.

Thesaurus: synonyms and related words

Idiom(s)

have a problem with sth/sb

no problem

(Definition of “problem” from the Cambridge Advanced Learner’s Dictionary & Thesaurus © Cambridge
University Press)

 English

 American

 Examples

"problem" in American English

 See all translations

problemnoun  [ C ] 
US  /ˈprɑb·ləm/

something that causes difficulty or that is hard to deal with:

Financing the camp’s  athletic  program  is a problem.

He has a  serious  health  problem.

I’m having problems with my  in-laws  again.

mathematics A problem is also a question to be answered or solved, esp. by reasoning or calculating:

math  problems

(Definition of “problem” from the Cambridge Academic Content Dictionary © Cambridge University

Press)

 English

 American

 Examples

Examples for 'problem'

BETA

These examples are from external sources. Click on the  icon to tell us what you think.

https://dictionary.cambridge.org/dictionary/english/problem

By Atanu Chaudhuri on Tue, 14/01/2014 - 19:49 IST

Classification of real life problems

Though at first glance it seems that the world is filled up with real life problems of infinite types, some
sense of this apparent sea of problems can be made by classifying them.

Problem classification is in itself a problem solving technique.

We may classify a problem on the basis of aspect of life in which it occurs. We highlight here a few of the
important ones.

Classification of real life problems based on aspect of life in which it occurs

Relational:

This forms one of the largest problem area. You may be having a relational problem in your family, with
one of your close friends or in your work area with your boss or colleagues. Whatever be the problem of
this type, surely emotions and feelings play very important roles in resolution of this kind of problems.
Technically these are affective problems where personal emotions are involved to a great degree.

Abundant literature and how to's are available for resolving some of these problems that are relatively
more frequent. We are sure many of these advices will prove to be valuable, but possibly you will be
quite confused in dealing with the many advices. You would stand better chance of getting out of such
problems if instead you start applying systematically the basic principles and techniques of problem
solving that you know yourself.

A great truth is,

in any problem situation, the best help is yourself.

For example, in a serious difference with your boss: first do the root cause analysis trying to understand
why the problem arose. If you find it, do the alternative scenario analysis, exhaustivelycharting the
actions that you can take and likely outcomes of each action. There are effective and systematic
methods for both of these analytical tasks. It is useful to remember in any problem solving where the
problem is not emergent, that time resource can be used in many cases very effectively in conjunction
with favorable actions on your part.

Above all, one or more among the large set of problem solving principles will always be applicable in
any type of problem, even an affective problem. For example, principle of 360 degree approachsuggests
you look at the points of view of all concerned, not only yours. Thinking from the point of view of the
other person greatly improves chances of problem resolution in affective problems such as conflict
resolution.

In short, even in a tough affective problem situation you stand much higher possibility of resolving the
crisis over some time, if you analyze and take decisions systematically using all the problem solving
resources at hand yourself.

Role of experts:

In many grave relational problems use of expert help improves chances of success considerably. In this
domain expert help may be a Counselor, a Psychiatrist, a Psychologist or a wise and trusted friend. There
should not be any hesitation to get such help if you need it. In this case, method to find a troubleshooter
becomes important. Choice of expert help should itself be a problem to be dealt with analytically.

Health:

Health related problems are part of our lives. In this area we have the physicians or doctors as the
experts. When you are sick, you need to consult the most suitable doctor or the hospital that is available
to you. After you choose an expert, usually your responsibility of decision making ends. It is up to the
experts now to cure you to full health.

But you face a serious decision making problem when

 you can't decide which expert to go to, or

 your expert is unable to cure your disease and you need to decide whether to consult a second
expert, or

 your disease is advanced to such a state that cure becomes a chancy affair, or

 on your release after cure, the after-treatment care loopholes make you sick again.

These are only a few of the problem scenarios that may arise in your personal health domain. Remaining
healthy and getting fully cured from a troublesome disease are complex problems. The experts working
in this domain will only attend you up to an extent - rest of your time of life you yourself need to work at
remaining healthy.

Some of the guidelines follow.

 At the very outset, to remain healthy, you need to know and follow healthy habits - the principle
here is,

Preventive maintenance is much cheaper and better than reactive maintenance after a failure occurs.
  It is necessary for you to know the basic reasons behind common and major ailments so that
you can analyze your ailment first before going to an expert. This also should help you to choose
the right doctor for your disease.

 If you experience a persistent abnormal physical symptom, you shouldn't delay consulting a
doctor at all. Any persistent symptom may be due to deeper lying serious causes.

 If you find it hard to decide which type of expert to consult, what you need is a good General
Physician, expert in Medicine. He is the generalist to guide you to the right specialist.

These are only a few of the doables in this area. But if you acquire the basic knowledge in various areas
of this important domain, you would be able to use your analytical ability and apply more generic
problem solving principles to gain best possible results.

This is primarily a Diagnostic and Cure problem domain.

Work and career:

Which job to do for earning your living is an important decision problem. It is rather a dynamic problem,
as it does not wholly depend on the actions that you take. The market forces and job situation change
dynamically over time. You need always to balance various aspects of this important part of your life,

 You should be satisfied in doing a job.

 Your stress level should not be such as to turn you sick.

 You should earn a sufficient amount to sustain and build a buffer for your growing financial
needs.

 You should be able to spend some amount of quality time with your family regularly.

 You should go on increasing your skill set and level to be in demand continuously over time.

 You should be able to save sufficient amount so that you are able to stop work after due time.

This is not at all an exhaustive list of conditions that you would need to balance. Recommendation is to
list out the criteria or conditions exhaustively and choose the right mix of criteria judiciously for your
decision making. Technically this is a dynamic multi-criteria decision problem area.

While on job again, you would face varieties of problems of different kinds. For facing some of these you
would have received trainings, but finally how you cope up in work environment would depend upon
your problem solving and management skills.

Academic:

Which subject to study or which trade to learn are very important decision problems as these are closely
intertwined with what job you would do finally. Many important problem solving principles and
techniques such as, working backwards technique, principle of segmentation or multi-criteria decision
making principle can be applied here with good results.
While undergoing a course again, a separate class of problems you have to face. How best to learn, how
best to prepare for exams, how to perform well in exams are a few of the important sub-problems that
you must solve for best results in an academic career.

In all the above types of problem situations, systematic application of one or more than one of the basic
problem solving principles and techniques such as problem breakdown technique, principle of
exhaustivity, zero based problem solving, working backwards technique etc. would always produce
higher quality results in comparison to solving the problem with a random approach. 

Classification of real life problems according to the time you would get for solving the problem

We may also classify real-world problems according to degree of immediacy of action or time available
to solve the problem. such a classification is:

Static problems

Problems where the problem solver gets reasonable time to analyze, form a suitable strategy, evaluate
feasible approaches and recommend a solution for implementation belong to static class of problems.
Following are some of the Static problem sub-classes:

 Choice problems – such as choosing a vendor, recruiting a new employee, choosing life partner,
buying a new car, choosing an out-sourcing partner. Analytic Hierarchic Process or AHP is an
effective method for solving these problems.

 Ranking problems – such as ranking participants in a music competition, ranking students in a

course, performance ranking of operational units in an organization, ranking universities in a
country. AHP again is useful.

 Evaluation problems – such as performance evaluation of employees, performance evaluation of

telecom network. AHP is applicable here.

 Design and R&D problems – design of a marketing campaign, design of a product, R&D
problems. Most R&D problems are highly complex and inherently uncertain in nature. Need of
innovation is high in these problems. Application of Innovation creation concepts is needed here
for better results.

 Strategic problems – such as forming a marketing strategy, forming an HR strategy, forming a

material management strategy, making a national plan, budgeting and so on. Significant AHP
applications exist in this area.

 Varieties of important daily life problems where you have time to analyze before taking action.
Many of the basic problem solving armory resources and inventive principles can be applied
effectively in this diverse problem area.

Dynamic problems

Problems where the events in the environment continue to happen independent of the decisions taken.
In these situations time of decision making is short. Examples are: driving a car for going from one place
to another, rectifying a poorly maintained telecom network, counseling a patient, treating a patient. One
can club tactical and operational problems in this category.
Emergent problems

Problems where decision making needs to be instantaneous and largely by intuition. Examples are: fire
fighting, fighting at war-front, critical-care support in situations such as flood, earthquake and cyclone
devastation.

We remind you again the important truth:

There is no single method or strategy to deal with all kinds of problems.

Two important classes of problems that may occur in any of the above types: Multi-criteria decision
making problems and Diagnostics & Cure class of problems:

 Multi-Criteria Decision Making (or MCDM) problems: Life is full of choices and evaluations.
While buying a car, you have to choose one among many options; while recruiting a marketing
manager for your company you need to evaluate and choose one among the many aspirants for
the position; while selecting a location for your new factory, you need to make a hard choice
between a few promising locations. Apart from choice problems, ranking, or even strategic
decision making cases also fall under this category. 
Solution of this class of problems involves evaluation of a set of options on the basis of a set of
suitable qualitative criteria or characteristics. This class of problems is so abundant that from
mid-sixties usable and effective methods were introduced and improved to treat this class of
problems as scientifically (with least amount of subjectivity) as possible. These problems were
classified as MCDM problems and today we have a mature set of powerful methods to deal with
this special class of problems that are abundant around us.

 Diagnostics & Cure class of problems: All doctors, physicians, paramedics and related
professionals work with this kind of problems. Furthermore, any artifact, that is, man-made
object, or natural object that is failure prone, concerns us with this kind of problems. Artifacts at
home can be your laptop, mobile device or washing machine; at work it may be a computer
network, a communication network, or the sewage system; natural failure-prone object needing
maintenance may be a forest, or the natural environment itself. If you think awhile you will be
surprised to find that failures may occur at so many unthought-of places. Failure treatment is a
separate subject.

Lastly it is important to remember that,

 innovation or thinking new is an essential ingredient to high quality efficient problem solving,

 context awareness, or clarity about all interdependent elements in a problem domain is crucial
for assured problem solving, and

 deductive reasoning binds all the problem solving resources together in a chain of decision -
action - event to deliver you the final desired solution.

Problem solving

Problem classification

Types of real life problems

Static problems

Dynamic problems

Emergent problems

Diagnostic and cure problems

Choice problems

Ranking problems

MCDM problems

Problem solving concepts

Real life problem solving

http://www.suresolv.com/problem-solving-concepts/types-real-life-problems

Mathematical problem

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

'Suppose you walk past a barber's shop one day, and see a sign that says:
"Do you shave yourself?
If not, please come in and I'll shave you!
I shave anyone who does not shave himself,
and no one else".
So the question is: "Who shaves the barber?"'
—the barber paradox

A mathematical problem is a problem that is amenable to being represented, analyzed, and possibly

solved, with the methods of mathematics. This can be a real-world problem, such as computing
the orbitsof the planets in the solar system, or a problem of a more abstract nature, such as Hilbert's
problems.

It can also be a problem referring to the nature of mathematics itself, such as Russell's Paradox.

Contents

  [hide] 

 1Real-world problems

 2Abstract problems

 3Degradation

 4See also

 5References

 6External links

Real-world problems[edit]

Informal "real-world" mathematical problems are questions related to a concrete setting, such as "Adam
has five apples and gives John three. How many has he left?". Such questions are usually more difficult
to solve than regular mathematical exercises like "5 − 3", even if one knows the mathematics required to
solve the problem. Known as word problems, they are used in mathematics education to teach students
to connect real-world situations to the abstract language of mathematics.

In general, to use mathematics for solving a real-world problem, the first step is to construct
a mathematical model of the problem. This involves abstraction from the details of the problem, and the
modeller has to be careful not to lose essential aspects in translating the original problem into a
mathematical one. After the problem has been solved in the world of mathematics, the solution must be
translated back into the context of the original problem.

Abstract problems[edit]

Abstract mathematical problems arise in all fields of mathematics. While mathematicians usually study
them for their own sake, by doing so results may be obtained that find application outside the realm of
mathematics. Theoretical physics has historically been, and remains, a rich source of inspiration.

Some abstract problems have been rigorously proved to be unsolvable, such as squaring the
circle and trisecting the angle using only the compass and straightedge constructions of classical
geometry, and solving the general quintic equation algebraically. Also provably unsolvable are so-
called undecidable problems, such as the halting problem for Turing machines.
Many abstract problems can be solved routinely, others have been solved with great effort, for some
significant inroads have been made without having led yet to a full solution, and yet others have
withstood all attempts, such as Goldbach's conjecture and the Collatz conjecture. Some well-known
difficult abstract problems that have been solved relatively recently are the four-colour
theorem, Fermat's Last Theorem, and the Poincaré conjecture.

Degradation[edit]

Mathematics educators using problem solving for evaluation have an issue phrased by Alan H.

Schoenfeld:

How can one compare test scores from year to year, when very different problems are used? (If similar
problems are used year after year, teachers and students will learn what they are, students will practice
them: problems become exercises, and the test no longer assesses problem solving).[1]

The same issue was faced by Sylvestre Lacroix almost two centuries earlier:

... it is necessary to vary the questions that students might communicate with each other. Though they
may fail the exam, they might pass later. Thus distribution of questions, the variety of topics, or the
answers, risks losing the opportunity to compare, with precision, the candidates one-to-another.[2]

Such degradation of problems into exercises is characteristic of mathematics in history. For example,
describing the preparations for the Cambridge Mathematical Tripos in the 19th century, Andrew
Warwick wrote:

... many families of the then standard problems had originally taxed the abilities of the greatest
mathematicians of the 18th century.[3]

See also[edit]

 List of unsolved problems in mathematics

 Problem solving

 Mathematical game

 List of mathematical concepts named after places

References[edit]

1. Jump up^ Alan H. Schoenfeld (editor) (2007) Assessing mathematical proficiency,

preface pages x,xi, Mathematical Sciences Research Institute, Cambridge University
Press ISBN 978-0-521-87492-2

2. Jump up^ S. F. Lacroix (1816) Essais sur l’enseignement en general, et sur celui des

mathematiques en particulier, page 201

3. Jump up^ Andrew Warwick (2003) Masters of Theory: Cambridge and the Rise of

Mathematical Physics, page 145, University of Chicago Press ISBN 0-226-87375-7

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mathematical_problem