Re: Creativity

"Mr Michael Bibby" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote in message
news:[EMAIL PROTECTED]
>
> >Greetings, everyone.
> >
> >While I'm not a mathematician or a physhologist, I've taken cognitive
> >philosophy as a secondary course here at my university, and I've yet
> >to figure out the answer to a set of simple questions, which seem to
> >bother my teacher a lot:
> >
> > What is creativity? How exactly do you define it, and how do you
> >simulate it? Is it purely random, or it is somehow linked to our
> >memory?
> >So far, I wasn't able to produce a suitable answer to them.
>
> you are not alone, no body has been able to produce 'suitable answers' to
these
> kinds of questions.

I disagree.  There are many studies and theories that give suitable answers.
Suitable in terms of behaviors and thoughts and scenarios and results that
exist when creativity (as defined below) happens.

"the ability to make or otherwise bring into existence something new,
whether a new solution to a problem, a new method or device, or a new
artistic object or form." (Ency Brit)

Ther is ample evidence of what creative people do:

Cracking Creativity: The Secrets of Creative Genius
by Michael Michalko

There are first person accounts of what it is like to be in a creative state
of mind:

Flow: The Psychology of Optimal Experience
by Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi

And there are lots of studies about drugs that enhance or depress creative
output/thoughts.

Building A Better Thought Trap:
Nutrition for Colossal Creativity & Peak Performance
Carlisle Bergquist, MA, MFCC, Ph.D.c.

Janiger O, Dobkin de Rios M. LSD and creativity. J Psychoactive Drugs 1989
Jan-Mar;21(1):129-34 (ADAI jl).

There are well-documented connections between the manic episodes of bipolar
disorder and artistry, creativity, and charisma.

Bipolar Disorder and the Creative Genius
HimaBindu K Krishna
(http://serendip.brynmawr.edu/bb/neuro/neuro98/202s98-paper3/Krishna3.html)


Etc. etc., in several hundred other references.   Is this an exact, complete
answer - no.  But we do not have exact, complete answers to a lot of things
(tops amoung them would be: " What is life?)

Is it suitable?  For what we must ask:
For understanding what constitutes creative thought/results by example: Yes
For undestanding some of the neurochemical bases for creativity: Yes

That is a pretty good start IMHO.



>
> Maybe
> >someone here could help?
> >
> >Thank you.
> >
> > -- Mihai.
> >
> >
>
> Mickeyd