Post by onlymark on Oct 14, 2010 17:36:01 GMT
Following on from the Sods Law thread I suddenly remembered the fascinating subject of how to search for something and the numerous methods used depending on who is searching for what.
Whilst in the Police I was given a course on this very subject, but from a perspective of collecting evidence.
The powers that be have different methods for searching a house or building to searching open ground.
Search and Rescue have methods and patterns depending on if it is at sea or on land and factoring in the terrain.
Mountain Rescue teams also have their ways.
In short, everyone who is searching for something has to do it in a systematic way for it to be effective - as you would expect.
So, when you've lost your keys, but you know they are somewhere in the house, work out a system if after an initial 'rummage' search they are not to be found.
One other important factor though, especially when doing this, is concentration. Too many times, and it has happened to all of us, is whereby we search somewhere and swear blind it isn't there. Then later go back and it has suddenly appeared.
No it hasn't, you just got distracted the first time.
As with men and women giving road directions, the sexes search in an entirely different way.
A woman will look in the most likely places, then gradually the less and less likely until she repeats the search areas and then gives up or it is found.
A man has a different method.
A man will sit on the sofa with a beer and the remote for the TV/DVD and ask, "Sweetheart, do you know where .......... is?"
I find this method the most effective, least time wasting and the best use of energy and resources.
Anyway - a spiral search around a dead body -
A grid search is useful for all sorts of things. You may find that someone like an archaeologist will first map out a large area into squares, and then an individual grid search will be made of each of those squares. They may use a different method of searching each smaller grid, there are several ways to do it -
And then you have a method of searching by plane -
So the moral of the story is - if you've lost something, you can take comfort in the thought that probably someone before you has also lost the very same thing.
And neither of you has ever found it again.
Whilst in the Police I was given a course on this very subject, but from a perspective of collecting evidence.
The powers that be have different methods for searching a house or building to searching open ground.
Search and Rescue have methods and patterns depending on if it is at sea or on land and factoring in the terrain.
Mountain Rescue teams also have their ways.
In short, everyone who is searching for something has to do it in a systematic way for it to be effective - as you would expect.
So, when you've lost your keys, but you know they are somewhere in the house, work out a system if after an initial 'rummage' search they are not to be found.
One other important factor though, especially when doing this, is concentration. Too many times, and it has happened to all of us, is whereby we search somewhere and swear blind it isn't there. Then later go back and it has suddenly appeared.
No it hasn't, you just got distracted the first time.
As with men and women giving road directions, the sexes search in an entirely different way.
A woman will look in the most likely places, then gradually the less and less likely until she repeats the search areas and then gives up or it is found.
A man has a different method.
A man will sit on the sofa with a beer and the remote for the TV/DVD and ask, "Sweetheart, do you know where .......... is?"
I find this method the most effective, least time wasting and the best use of energy and resources.
Anyway - a spiral search around a dead body -
A grid search is useful for all sorts of things. You may find that someone like an archaeologist will first map out a large area into squares, and then an individual grid search will be made of each of those squares. They may use a different method of searching each smaller grid, there are several ways to do it -
And then you have a method of searching by plane -
So the moral of the story is - if you've lost something, you can take comfort in the thought that probably someone before you has also lost the very same thing.
And neither of you has ever found it again.
