Hi Carol,

Thanks for those really interesting comments. I agree that ideas have a time
- the zeitgeist - as you suggest. For example when Einstein developed
special relativity, Fitzgerald and Poincare were on the brink of a similar
discovery and who knows how many other less well known scientists were on to
it too at the time or even earlier ? But I would argue that a discovery, at
least in science, isn't an act of creation but one of serendipity. No one
ever planned a discovery or knew when it was imminent, but that's not to
suggest a lot of creative thinking didn't lead up to it. In a sense one is
witness to a discovery but it isn't the product of an individual or group. I
think it was Pasteur who said "Chance favours the prepared mind" and I think
being prepared (which doesn't require one to join the scouts) is the best we
can do. 

So in a sense a disparate group can catch an idea and they don't need to be
in communication with each other (though in science they almost certainly
would be aware of current knowledge and thinking).Usually though someone
gets there first or at least we celebrate those who brought it to our
attention first (the innovator) which is not the same as saying they thought
of it first. I guess we will never know who thought of any idea first.

Your second point really fascinates me and it concerns how a group of people
involved in any activity (I assume) can spontaneously harmonise and act as
one. This in my view is what I would call a spiritual experience in the
sense of that word in its more modern usage being extricated from its
associations with religion. It is a sense in which ones' personal experience
goes beyond the boundaries of ones' familiar sense of self and I agree with
your observation "...there are few more satisfying moments available to us
as human beings." Is it a creative experience as well ? and is creativity
the same as spirituality ? - there's a whole conference here (but in the
experiential sense of what is implied in these questions and the way one
arrives at such experiences - would there be any value in attending one ? -
probably not!) 

I had in mind a group of people brainstorming to find ideas. If only the
holistic experience you allude to could be achieved in those circumstances,
but it rarely is - hence my belief in those instances of only individuals
having new ideas. I do take your point about group creativity with those
examples you cited and thank you for responding.


Best Wishes,

Kevin 
University of Leicester 

-----Original Message-----
From: List for people wishing to share knowledge experiences of curriculum
design [mailto:[log in to unmask]] On Behalf Of
Carol Macgillivray
Sent: 21 July 2009 03:29
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Re: FW: How drafts reveal the creative process?

Hi Kevin, 

With you on the maths, but I am not sure that I buy your reductionist
take on synergy. 

First because history is littered with ideas being 'of a particular
time' with creative solutions being arrived at in parallel. If you are
'creative' and riding the zeitgeist, there is a strong likelihood that
someone else in a similar discipline has caught the same wave. 

Second, because synergy is not infrequently demonstrated in team sports
or cooperative art in many forms -such as when a football team moves
seamlessly and with near-telepathic grace or performer partnerships
crackle with electricity (Tracey/Hepburn, Fonteyn/Nureyov,
Laurel/Hardy?) or a jazz ensemble hits their stride - such special
performances show ideas being played out in real time, creating a
synergistic whole.  In short this is when a group acts as a brain;
bouncing individual ideas together to generate new ideas in the moment -
I would argue there are few more satisfying moments available to us as
human beings. High fives need an opposing hand. 

 

Perhaps this leads to an interesting point: Timescale of creativity...

 

Carol

	-----Original Message----- 
	From: List for people wishing to share knowledge experiences of
curriculum design on behalf of Kevin Byron 
	Sent: Mon 20/07/2009 19:57 
	To: [log in to unmask] 
	Cc: 
	Subject: Re: FW: How drafts reveal the creative process?
	
	

	In spite of the popularity of the multiple intelligences model
as yet
	another way of slicing and dicing the person (in this case
preferred
	learning styles), I think it is flawed in that these
intelligences have big
	overlaps with each other and in common with other 'typing' tools
eg MBTI, we
	incessantly swish and swash around from one to another and to
another.
	
	We are different things to different people and we draw on
different
	intelligences in different situations. Though this is not to
suggest we are
	all things to all people. The simplicity of that model can be
questioned
	further when creativity is brought in to the picture. For
instance why
	logical and mathematical are con-joined by a hyphen defeats me.
There's
	absolutely nothing logical about doing mathematics except in
retrospect and
	this is where the importance of drafting comes in especially for
students.
	
	So when we look at a text book of mathematics and we see a proof
let's take
	something as basic as Pythagoras'theorem do we see any
creativity ? - no -
	just a series of logical steps that lead from a hypothesis to a
conclusion
	and confirmation of the hypothesis. Is that how people do maths
? -
	absolutely not. When you don't know the destination you keep
trying
	different routes (drafting) and it may take years to get there
but what is
	left behind and what gets published is the one clear path that
led to the
	conclusion and it looks so obvious in retrospect. So it is with
scientific
	research too. We teach maths in a logical fashion but it doesn't
make you a
	better mathematician - it's creative skills that make a good
mathematician.
	
	With regard to the idea of group creativity - I am not so sure
about this.
	To be reductionist about it a good idea only happens in an
individuals'
	brain when two neural networks connect and produce something
bigger than the
	sum of the parts. Most of the time something lesser than the sum
of parts
	arises and the connection is weakened. When we collaborate we
make social
	connections and this can facilitate more ideas but no two people
can have
	the same idea except extremely rarely. The group may agree
something is a
	good idea and it may have built on many earlier ideas by
individuals but
	only one person can have a good idea. Maybe we need a different
concept for
	what has been described here as 'group creativity'. In my view
groups
	collaborate: they share and communicate ideas and stimulate
further ideas
	but the group as a whole don't have an idea - but individuals
do.
	
	Cheers,
	
	Kevin Byron
	University of Leicester
	
	    
	
	 
	 
	           
	
	-----Original Message-----
	From: List for people wishing to share knowledge experiences of
curriculum
	design [mailto:[log in to unmask]] On
Behalf Of
	Kleiman, Paul
	Sent: 20 July 2009 14:55
	To: [log in to unmask]
	Subject: Re: FW: How drafts reveal the creative process?
	
	It occurs to me that there may be something here that ties in
with
	Howard Gardner's Multiple Intelligences i.e. multiple creative
	intelligences.
	
	Of the original seven intelligences (now 8, with the possibility
of a
	ninth) it is only the first two that, traditionally, have been
regarded
	as essential to education - Linguistic, and Logical-Mathematical
- hence
	the focus on the 3Rs (or 1R, 1W and 1A, so much for 'linguistic'
	intelligence!)
	
	Higher education research is framed almost entirely within the
	Linguistic and Logical-Mathematical (witness all the problems
with
	Practice-as-Research), and demands that whatever our various
process
	e.g. making marks on paper, making and composing sounds, moving
in
	space, we present it, or at least demonstrate its worth, within
the
	confines of those two intelligences.
	
	Paul