Inventor's Paradox

CORE DEFINITION

Described by George Polya, who noted that a more ambitious general problem can be more tractable than the special case that prompted it. Because a general formulation removes arbitrary numbers and accidental constraints, the essential structure becomes visible and the proof or solution covers many cases at once. The core claim is that deliberate generalization is a solving strategy rather than an evasion. The qualification is that generalization must preserve solvability, since abstraction that loses defining constraints yields vagueness instead of power.