creativity and blogging2

Blogging and Creativity

Nature Blogging Conference2008

Royal Institution

Clare Dudman

1.Thank you for deciding to come to this session on blogging and creativity. I am going to talk a little about one scientist's theory of creativity and the experimental evidence then go with it and then hand over to Brian. I'll then go on to say how I think all this can be applied to blogging later.

Henri Poincaré (1854-1912)

2. This is Poincaré who was a mathematician and all-round genius. There are 5 schools in the French Academy and it is a privilege to be elected to just one - Poincaré was elected to all 5. As well as solving problems he was interested in how the mind works when it solves problems. In other words the Eureka Moment - that moment of creativity in Maths and Science and the Arts too.

Strong coffee!

3. One night he drank too much coffee and while he was lying there trying to get to sleep he thought he somehow witnessed this creative process taking place in his unconscious.

Hooked atoms

4. His impression was that ideas - just from living and learning - accumulate like hooked atoms and hang on walls of mind for when they are needed - an idea he got from Coleridge and Kubla Khan.

Preparation: hooked atoms let fly!

5. Then, when someone starts to work on a problem the relevant ideas become unhooked, fly around the room like atoms in a gas, and collide. This is called preparation. Most of the collisions produce useless, unattractive combinations and if a suitable one doesn't occur quickly...

Impasse

6. The person feels stuck. This is called an impasse. Poincaré thought that f this happened it was important to give up...

Incubation: atoms keep flying

7. Go away and stop actively working on problem. Poincaré used to take a walk. Other people have taken a bath. However the mind is still working. This is what Poincaré thought he saw that night under the influence of the strong coffee. Atoms continue to fly around and collide in the unconscious. Until, if that person is lucky...

Illumination

8. the right ideas collide to produce a combination so beautiful it bursts through to the consciousness. This is called insight or the eureka moment.

Wider apart the better…

9. The best ideas, the most beautiful 'right' combinations come from experiences that are wildly different experiences, that are stored in widely different places. They may be common knowledge that no one has ever thought of combining before e.g. icebergs floating and shapes of continents - continental drift. Therefore, according to Poincaré 2 stages necessary for creativity...

Stage 1:Preparation leading to impasse…

10. Stage 1: Preparation period leading to impasse - where ideas are accumulated and worked on consciously.

Stage 2: Incubation leading to Illumination

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11 Stage 2: Incubation of ideas - ideas mulled over unconsciously - leading to insight. Ideas popular with Einstein and psychologists in the twentieth century. Taken up again in the twenty-first century by

Mark Jung-Beeman Associate Professor at the North Western

University, Illinois

12. Mark Jung-Beeman. He is a psychologist at the Northwestern University in Chicago who says that he wants to reveal how people think; 'to try to link the brain's wetware to the mind's software.' Links Poincaré's ideas to experimental work in the laboratory.

Compound Remote Associate (CRA) problem.

Think of a word that pairs with each of the following words:

cross, rain, tie

13. He has developed CRA problems. He gives his subjects (usually students) 30 seconds to find a word that can be added to the words in front of them to make a new word. Answer? bow

1. Type, ghost, screen.2. Office, mail, bird.3. Stone, mile, iron.4. Tooth, potato, heart5. Catcher, food, hot.

14. Here are some more. Writer, Box, Age, Sweet, Dog. Jung-Beeman has found that these problems can be solved in two ways. Either by...

Trial and error - formal thinking strategy

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15. Trial and error - using a formal logical thinking strategy. Or...

Insight or Illumination



16. in a flash of inspiration. In other words a eureka moment. It is this creative thinking that most interests Jung-Beeman. The tests are useful because they can produce a lot of results very quickly. He has found that over all half of all the problems are solved by logic, half by insight. Students are presented with problems while being monitored using EEG and MRI scans which together give a good indication of brain activity - where and when it occurs for each type of thinking.

Stage 1:Left hand side: logical thinking= preparation



17. Initially left hand side of brain is used as the problems are tackled formally. This is equivalent to Poincaré's preparation.

Stage 2: Impasse. Frontal lobe switches sides.



18. If not an immediate answer there is an impasse and at this point Jung Beeman has found that a point in the frontal lobe becomes active - which indicates the brain is switching sides from left to right hemisphere thinking.

Stage 3: weak associations on right side of brain: Incubation



19 Then the right hemisphere becomes active. This indicates more creative and imaginative thinking and associations (which are weaker and more distantly connected) is taking place.

Stage 4: Insight - activity in the right hand side of brain…

20. Just before the subject presses the switch to indicate they have solved the problem (by insight) a point in right hemisphere lights up as idea bursts into consciousness.

…can actually be seen during f-MRI scan

From TRENDS in Cognitive Sciences Vol 9 No 7 July 2005 Mark Jung-Beeman et al.

www.psych.northwestern.edu/~mjungbee/PLoS_Supp.htm



21. Actually lights up in MRI scan - as here. The light shows which parts of the brain are being activated. Then, immediately afterwards the subject presses the switch.

For creativity use both sides of brain…left then right.



22. So for creativity need both parts of brain. Left side for preparation and dislodging ideas, then over to right for weak distant associations.

How can blogging influence creative thinking?

Depends on stage....

Blogging and Preparation Stage

For Initial preparation stage - as Poincaré and other people have said, depends on accumulation of ideas and information from as wide an area as possible. The greater the number of different experiences the better. Var iety is important. The internet in general is helpful for this but I propose that blogging, especially looking at other people's blogs, has various special and unique advantages for this stage. In particular it gives ACCESS to

Different cultures



23. Different cultures. These have different ways of looking at things - a non-Western approach. They are less self-obsessed. Religion and the greater good may be more important. Just by looking at things from this view-point can broaden the horizon. Studies have shown that those places with large immigrant populations are the centres of innovation and creativity. An example that struck me in a series of films I saw at the British Library on what causes creativity in science was the Basel inst of Immunology. Although it was only open just over a decade it brought together scientists from all around the world and produced 3 Nobel Prize winners. Can imitate this with the blog.

Different disabilities - mental and physical



24. Another group which are uniquely represented with blogs are people with completely different outlook - disabled mentally, physically, or ill... For instance a woman I met had a degenerative disease and I have come across people without limbs or hearing that I would have not come across in ordinary life - and they have unique answers to things. For instance - the woman with the disabling disease invented innovative and impressive solutions to combat her problems with mobility.

Different specialists

25. Different specialists - not only in science but arts, engineering...all useful different ways of seeing. Many examples here - just looking on the Nature network - but else where too of course. My blog deals with snails in a light-hearted way - and it is amazing to find the many weird and wonderful links through this lowly creature - inputs from naturalists, engineers, jewellers, artists. Each eager and happy to share what they know. Can INTERLOPE, be a sort of voyeur on another world and bring expertise from one to another

Intimate

www.zoology.ubc.ca/~redfield/who.htmlBlogging is ... 26. Intimate. Allowed right into another world. How does the world look from within another person's mind? A blog may be the nearest thing that we can encounter. Through blogging we can enter the scientists laboratory e.g. Rosie Redfield at The Redfield Laboratory University of British Columbia has each of her team writing blogs. Some have more details on the lab experience than others but http://www.zoology.ubc.ca/~redfield/who.html She says that blogging is good 'Blogging about our ongoing research doesn't only actively promote interaction with other researchers, it helps me remember that science should be a community activity.'

Democratic



27. Democratic - open to everyone - rich experience. Everyone's experience counts and they can all comment. I have had comments from Nobel Prize winning scientists to children doing their homework on my blog. They all count and all have equal and valuable contributions that can make you think in an entirely new way. Part of the Engaging Science scenario. By including everyone they have some ownership in ideas and increases the confidence of members of all the community in science.

Up-to-the-minute

usefulchem.wikispaces.com/

28. Up-to-the-minute. Blogs such as Jean-Claude Bradley's and the assortment on Useful Chem Project http://usefulchem.wikispaces.com/ have a philosophy of sharing and collaboration up-to-the minute material.

Free speech



29. Can be anonymous - liberating for some - can give true opinion - let your freak out. Express wildest, wackiest ideas without worry of what peers think so can test them out. An example of this is McCabism by Roger McCabe - an independent physicist and philosopher with an assortment of ideas in difficult physics - some more wild than others. In one series of blog posts he pretends to create a black hole in his living room - all based on sound theoretical basis - and relates this amusingly to the bible.

Blogging and theIncubation Stage

For Incubation - thought processes important. Switching from left to right and right-sided, free association of the many ideas. Propose the advantage to creativity is the posting to your own blog. How can blog posting encourage brain switching and free association? How can it encourage us to think laterally and 'differently'?

Lateral thinking/free-association



30. Ideal for linking and easily going from one idea to another because you are on the web (and seeing all the blogs mentioned before). This hopping about for information can lead to free-thinking...which leads to switching between left and right hemispheres.

Night-time/24hour blogging



31. Blogging at night, or all times of day or 24 hour bogging as an experiment means that your unconscious is more to the fore like Poincaré's. Exhausted dream-like state means you are more likely to let go and make right-sided associations. Ala Kekulé (benzene ring) and Mendeleev (elements in rows).

Writing in character



32. Can assume another character - liberating - I have a Dr Grump who sometimes makes an appearance who is allowed to let rip on all sorts of bogus science that she find in news reports.. Just by pretending to be someone else can cause you to think like someone else.

Games - guessing, crossword etc

33. Playing is also important. (Richard Feynman The plate started wobbling in a way that caught Feynman's interest, and he succeeded in explaining the motion by the classical mechanical equations. This made him feel so elated that he went on to his quantum mechanical problem of spinning electrons and, lo and behold, solved the problem that he had been working on for a long time. This led him to the research that eventually resulted in his Nobel Prize. Can play as much as you like in your blog because it is yours to do with as you wish. Can play word games, matching games, software games - take part in a regular Saturday competition

Poetry, short stories…

Fetid with winter's dead leaves,the soil, as it warmsin spring, elbows out off its bedthe split seed...’ (Kay Cook)

34. Borrow from the arts - express ideas in poetry, short stories, pictures, photos, art work - all can be used to find associations e.g. dualism wave/particle and cubism. Metaphors - architecture and buckminsterfullarene.

Competitions, stupid questions, art, pictures…

…To write a story of exactly 101 words (not including title) written using words spelt exactly as you say them (e.g. I wint downt laik an got owt me buk. Twas gud buk. I cudnat stop reedin.) The theme is 'guilty pleasures'.

35. Competitions on blog - encourages others' contributions - also useful. Another way of interacting and seeing things from another's point of view.

Jokes, captions…

36. Humour - very important - experiments have shown more creative, more insightful thought, when happy. Contribute to Newsbiscuit - collaborative team sending in satire on news stories. A good scientific example of this is the Ignobel awards - very much web based - and is transferred around the world via blogs.

Support

37. Blogging encourages support and excitement (the first 'vision' of Engaging Science in the Society Consultation document) - gather together same-thinking people into a community who will support and encourage each other - also important for new ideas - bravery to go through with them and develop. For example the collaborative lab blogging and the network above.

Teamwork

39. Leads on to teamwork - develop ideas together - share expertise. Bounce off each other - as above. For instance, in my own experience I am now collaborating with the editor of a magazine in Los Angeles in writing a novel about science. He is interested in architecture, and I am interested in the way I can communicate science. We have different ideas about everything and yet we come together on our blogs.

World-wide and unlimited

40. Wor ld-wide and not time dependent. Can link with anyone over the world. I have links with people in all parts of the globe and use blogs from long ago as a source and ispiration. Can go back in time and reawaken interest from an old blog-post.

Preparation = variety of information coming in…

41. In summary. Preparation for a blog post = first stage - ideas from other blogs.

Incubation = thinking differently to produce information going out

42. Blog post writing itself allows incubation and insight buy encouraging you to think differently - with ideas going out to others to see.

Both together produce insight

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