Thinking about Thinking, Creativity, Innovation and Design
Language is not innocent, it determines how reality is interpreted. Words create logic bubbles that are difficult to escape from. The way we use words may prevent us from finding solutions, restrict new ideas, and lead to wrong public policies. In this blog post we will try in a simple way to explain how thinking …
Continue reading “Language is not Innocent – How Thinking Patterns are Created”
Having summarized existing approaches, could we escape from those and find fresh approaches to mitigate or even counteract the effects of climate change?
Try to come up with at least three ¨escapes¨: alternative approaches to mitigate global warming.
In the crucial month of February, in those weeks before the major outbreak in Europe, there was still room to stock up on protective equipment, to scale up the laboratories, to expand the purchase and production of test materials, to prepare for the removal of serum with antibodies in healed patients. Only, it didn’t happen. …
Continue reading “Thinking about the Spread of the Coronavirus (2) – Concepts”
Every technological invention creates a dynamic system of interactions and feedback loops with society. With new technology, it is therefore important to make an attempt to visualize the dynamic system that is evoked by the new technology.
Classical rational policy analysis and interactive policymaking are basically reactive concepts.
An innovative policy can only come about if policymakers redefine themselves as designers instead of problem solvers.
Think of the word Forest bathing. What do you imagine? What images flash through your mind? What feelings vibrate in your body? Then think of the word Environment and explore the images and feelings. The words we use to express our ideas, emotions and thoughts are not neutral. Our language is not innocent rather it …
Continue reading “Creative thinking for the living planet – ecospin doctors”
Nowadays, innovation is very in fashion. As a person, you should be innovative (creative?). A product should be innovative to tempt you to buy it (why?). Research should be dedicated to innovations (instead of discoveries?). Or even worse, boards of directors feel compelled to proclaim a “year of innovation” or ask their employees for …
Photo Kusa shoes Love this short film about absurdity! Apart from making me smile, this is also a great visual thinking exercise. Challenging yourself to explore possibilities and new scenarios can lead to not only new insights but also be a starting point for an innovation. Absurd ideas and visual images can help us to …
What could we learn from solved cold cases? What has caused that the case is solved after years of investigations without results? What were the reasons that a solution was waiting for discovery, but never did? Solved cold cases are illustrative for how we think wrongly. In September 1961, 25-year-old Lucy Johnson, mother of one, …
How to recognize concepts? A concept can be described as a perceived pattern or regularity in events or objects. We form groups of different events or objects into a single category on the basis of some underlying similarity. We are often not aware of what aspects or characteristcs that are underlying the categorization of events …
As an introduction to a series of blogposts about conceptual thinking we will start by paying attention to “ISH-Thinking”. A concept is an abstract pattern in the brain that stands for some regular, recurrent aspect of the world, and to which any number of different words can be attached. Sometimes ago we already pointed out …
In this blog post, as you can see in the upper left hand corner, we will focus on the quality of information, an essentially white hat thinking activity. Quality of information as a distinctive focus area or Area of Improvement (API) could be vital for many information intensive enterprises, but also for any other thinking …
Continue reading “More, More Information, Yes, Sure, But Relevant?”
Recently we came across a handsome book by Jodie Newman called Business Creativity. In the chapter about Creative Toolkit, we found five tools that we clustered around the theme Change Point of View, because basically they come all down to the same principle. As we earlier pointed out each of us looks at the world …
Continue reading “Change a Point of View – Thinking Strategy”
Design has been used throughout history to control our behavior. Hausmann designed the broad avenues in Paris with the aim to better control riots and revolutionary uproars. There are designs that prevent you from lying on a bench, so called anti homeless benches. Citizens have built low viaducts to prevent buses going into the town to …
In an earlier blog post Language is not Innocent – How Thinking Patterns are Created we suggested that people construct thinking patterns from their earlier experiences and the agreements they make with their fellow humans about the meaning of behaviour and things. This is convenient because this ways of engaging in the world produces predictability, routine …
thinkibility 