Right answer - Wrong reason
"They may have the right answer for the wrong reason." I took this out of context from chezlaws comment in another thread where he was making a valid point with it because it contains a neat philosophical twist. It's a normal phrase and it's sentiment is typical of, say, a voting system.realizing that the phrase often means "at least they're doing the right thing ( the solution is the one I want implemented)". That's how it seemed chezlaw was using it when I noticed it and I'm not arguing how the phrase is used..it's used how it's used.
Yet, even in some simple situations, I tend to think of "the right answer for the wrong reasons" as "the Wrong answer." Political considerations, as above, aside- "the right answer" requires the right reasons in order to be right, else it falls under some intellectual version of cousin Vinny's "lucky guess".
Now, I don't think my view on this is the majority view in many situations that arise. Most politicians I deal with ( and I deal with many) are very 'results oriented' thinkers, as are most people. The scientific commmunity is where you find more 'process oriented' thinking and perhaps that's one reason I'm more comfortable there.
luckyme,
if I thought I was wrong, I'd change my mind
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