Thinking Outside the Box: A Misguided Idea

Although studying creativity is considered a legitimate scientific discipline nowadays, it is still a very young one. In the early 1970s, a psychologist named J. P. Guilford was one of the first academic researchers who dared to conduct a study of creativity. One of Guilford’s most famous studies was the nine-dot puzzle. He challenged research subjects to connect all nine dots using just four straight lines without lifting their pencils from the page. Today many people are familiar with this puzzle and its solution. In the 1970s, however, very few were even aware of its existence, even though it had been around for almost a century.

If you have tried solving this puzzle, you can confirm that your first attempts usually involve sketching lines inside the imaginary square. The correct solution, however, requires you to draw lines that extend beyond the area defined by the dots.

more at link.

Edward de Bono created an entire industry from his version of thinking “outside the box” – which he called “lateral thinking”. I read his books and tried his methods but I don’t think they made me more creative. Personally I think the whole “lateral thinking” thing was a beat-up. Hoax is probably too strong a word, but I doubt his seminars resulted in much improvement in creativity.

You might find that you can be more creative by thinking inside the box…

http://online.wsj.com/news/articles/SB10001424127887324188604578541843266186054

Let’s start with a cliche, then do the join the dot puzzle.

Let’s start with a cliche, then do the join the dot puzzle.

other way around.

I agree with the dot puzzle thing. It was the dot puzzle that led to the phrase. Let me digress slightly with another dot puzzle I saw recently. “Place ten dots in a symmetrical pattern of five lines with four dots each”. I bet you can solve this. But without being told that there were multiple solutions, would have found all five solutions?

pesce.del.giorno said:

Edward de Bono created an entire industry from his version of thinking “outside the box” – which he called “lateral thinking”. I read his books and tried his methods but I don’t think they made me more creative.

They’ve helped me. Particularly his concept of “brainstorming” which has so entered the public perception that we tend to forget where it originally came from.

One that really struck me, was where he was asked for a way to make roads white, knowing in advance that limestone doesn’t work. Rather than concentrating on “what can we make roads from” he concentrated on “what is white”, which led to him solving the problem by making the road from glass. That’s a perfectly good solution, but not one I would have thought of.

mollwollfumble said:

I agree with the dot puzzle thing. It was the dot puzzle that led to the phrase. Let me digress slightly with another dot puzzle I saw recently. “Place ten dots in a symmetrical pattern of five lines with four dots each”. I bet you can solve this. But without being told that there were multiple solutions, would have found all five solutions?

pesce.del.giorno said:

Edward de Bono created an entire industry from his version of thinking “outside the box” – which he called “lateral thinking”. I read his books and tried his methods but I don’t think they made me more creative.

They’ve helped me. Particularly his concept of “brainstorming” which has so entered the public perception that we tend to forget where it originally came from.

One that really struck me, was where he was asked for a way to make roads white, knowing in advance that limestone doesn’t work. Rather than concentrating on “what can we make roads from” he concentrated on “what is white”, which led to him solving the problem by making the road from glass. That’s a perfectly good solution, but not one I would have thought of.

So roads made of glass work better than limestone roads?

dv said:

mollwollfumble said:

I agree with the dot puzzle thing. It was the dot puzzle that led to the phrase. Let me digress slightly with another dot puzzle I saw recently. “Place ten dots in a symmetrical pattern of five lines with four dots each”. I bet you can solve this. But without being told that there were multiple solutions, would have found all five solutions?

pesce.del.giorno said:

Edward de Bono created an entire industry from his version of thinking “outside the box” – which he called “lateral thinking”. I read his books and tried his methods but I don’t think they made me more creative.

They’ve helped me. Particularly his concept of “brainstorming” which has so entered the public perception that we tend to forget where it originally came from.

One that really struck me, was where he was asked for a way to make roads white, knowing in advance that limestone doesn’t work. Rather than concentrating on “what can we make roads from” he concentrated on “what is white”, which led to him solving the problem by making the road from glass. That’s a perfectly good solution, but not one I would have thought of.

So roads made of glass work better than limestone roads?

yes. Also offers other uses for the road.

roughbarked said:

dv said:

mollwollfumble said:

I agree with the dot puzzle thing. It was the dot puzzle that led to the phrase. Let me digress slightly with another dot puzzle I saw recently. “Place ten dots in a symmetrical pattern of five lines with four dots each”. I bet you can solve this. But without being told that there were multiple solutions, would have found all five solutions?

They’ve helped me. Particularly his concept of “brainstorming” which has so entered the public perception that we tend to forget where it originally came from.

One that really struck me, was where he was asked for a way to make roads white, knowing in advance that limestone doesn’t work. Rather than concentrating on “what can we make roads from” he concentrated on “what is white”, which led to him solving the problem by making the road from glass. That’s a perfectly good solution, but not one I would have thought of.

So roads made of glass work better than limestone roads?

yes. Also offers other uses for the road.

So where are examples of this in use? Must be fairly costly.

dv said:

roughbarked said:

dv said:

So roads made of glass work better than limestone roads?

yes. Also offers other uses for the road.

So where are examples of this in use? Must be fairly costly.

I’d have to see more about this glass road before I could comment. Things like tyre/road adherence.

Tamb said:

dv said:

roughbarked said:

yes. Also offers other uses for the road.

So where are examples of this in use? Must be fairly costly.

I’d have to see more about this glass road before I could comment. Things like tyre/road adherence.

From memory it is recycled glass that was tested as replacing part of the road materials.

I mean is this a real, practical solution that is in use or just someone some author cooked up that wouldn’t work in real life?

roughbarked said:

Tamb said:

dv said:

So where are examples of this in use? Must be fairly costly.

I’d have to see more about this glass road before I could comment. Things like tyre/road adherence.

From memory it is recycled glass that was tested as replacing part of the road materials.

To make the road white?

roughbarked said:

Tamb said:

dv said:

So where are examples of this in use? Must be fairly costly.

I’d have to see more about this glass road before I could comment. Things like tyre/road adherence.

From memory it is recycled glass that was tested as replacing part of the road materials.

Part of. That makes a lot more sense.

dv said:

I mean is this a real, practical solution that is in use or just someone some author cooked up that wouldn’t work in real life?

http://www.environment.gov.au/system/files/pages/9014ac31-f832-48bd-85b9-f02d8ef70fbe/files/waverley-council.pdf

http://www.afgc.org.au/media-releases/media-releases-archived/261-recycled-glass-used-in-road-and-pavement-in-bondi.html

http://www.swinburne.edu.au/magazine/10/179/future-travels-down-a-glass-highway/

I have other links if that doesn’t help.

roughbarked said:

Tamb said:

dv said:

So where are examples of this in use? Must be fairly costly.

I’d have to see more about this glass road before I could comment. Things like tyre/road adherence.

From memory it is recycled glass that was tested as replacing part of the road materials.

Proly broken bits of glass inplace of aggregate

dv said:

roughbarked said:

Tamb said:

I’d have to see more about this glass road before I could comment. Things like tyre/road adherence.

From memory it is recycled glass that was tested as replacing part of the road materials.

To make the road white?

Did I say that?

Thinks, here is a box, how can I get into it?

roughbarked said:

dv said:

roughbarked said:

From memory it is recycled glass that was tested as replacing part of the road materials.

To make the road white?

Did I say that?

Someone said it at the start of this thread.

http://www.pca.state.mn.us/index.php/topics/preventing-waste-and-pollution/recycling/recycling-market-development/recycled-market-development-innovations/glass-as-road-aggregate.html

The article linked in the OP is (in my opinion) an excellent example of valueless contrarianism.

For truly creative thinking you need to be able to think outside the box, it isn’t enough just to be told that thinking outside the box is required.

But this doesn’t mean that actively trying to think outside the box is of little or no value, it means that it is difficult to do.

The Rev Dodgson said:

The article linked in the OP is (in my opinion) an excellent example of valueless contrarianism.

For truly creative thinking you need to be able to think outside the box, it isn’t enough just to be told that thinking outside the box is required.

But this doesn’t mean that actively trying to think outside the box is of little or no value, it means that it is difficult to do.

IMO seeing the whole picture is more important otherwise you get the “Nice idea, shame it didn’t work “ situation.

i think the article just shows that some people are more creative than others and that simplistic slogans wont change that.

>other way around.

Meant thread title.

or you fold the paper up so that the first node touches the last

wookiemeister said:

or you fold the paper up so that the first node touches the last

(taps finger alongside nose)

captain_spalding said:

wookiemeister said:

or you fold the paper up so that the first node touches the last

(taps finger alongside nose)

yeah someone showed that puzzle to me once and I did that , there was silence