Dear Filippo,
You ask: "Does Johnson-Laird know of the work of Sawyer, who suggests that our
apparent flashes of inspiration occur only because we are not conscious of
the work our brain is doing to solve the problem?"
By analysis, implication and/or theory, consciousness can become conscious of many things that are per-conscious.
When we don't have such methods to help us, and, in the moment, we are likely to call an experience of inspiration a flash or some such instantaneous thing. Why? Well, because that is what we experienced, in consciousness.
Knowing that other things go on in the brain is a little bit like working out that your lover has spent 2 hours in front of a mirror to create a face and cultivate a gaze that appears to you as natural, beautiful and full of genuine emotion. You still get excited even though you might also have worked out that you have been preparing yourself for hours, days, weeks, months, years for this moment of wonder.
Mature designers, thinkers, lovers, have strategies for bringing on wonder and creativity moments. That is, we can know a lot about per-conscious events if we bother to find out.
cheers
keith
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