Thinking about Thinking, Creativity, Innovation and Design
“If I have seen further it is by standing on the shoulders of Giants.” Isaac Newton The above quote captures the essence of the interaction between neurobiology and culture. An individual mind or a team of minds may be driven towards breakthrough ideas but it is the culture that provides the point of departure. Every …
Continue reading "Creativity – The Human Brain in the Age of Innovation"
"There is a way, if we allow ourselves to be guided by nature's optimism and nature's wisdom." Jay Harman, The Shark's Paintbrush, p. 289. In this blogpost, we will explore ways that nature can provide inspiration for The Global Challenges Prize 2017: A New Shape. We will focus the attention on swarm intelligence. Bees use …
Continue reading "Decision-Making in Animal Communities – Remodelling Global Cooperation"
"The best way to survive a crash is not to crash" What should a car manufacturer focus the attention on? What ideas are embedded in the concept car manufacturer? Cars! Of course a car manufacturer deals with developing the best, safest, fastest, most energy-efficient cars. But what if we extend the concept "car manufacturer" and …
Continue reading "Volvo, LifePaint, Airbags and Expanding Concepts and Markets"
Can you make a list of 10 innovations that would help you to complete a marathon? I am rather sure that backpack contraption that feeds you a steady stream of tomatoes is not on the list. The Tomatan can be loaded with six mid-sized tomatoes and it weighs 8, 1 kg 818lbs). One the positive …
Continue reading "Innovations that Complicate Things – Thinkibility Nibble"
Can you design something so that people stay politically engaged? How would you design a fabric that is made out of waste? What if it was possible to design a spot where people feel safe? Or a game that provides people suffering from Alzheimer game with a channel of communication? The artist and innovator Daan …
"Are you LEGO rich? Do you have an idea for a LEGO set? And are you a Creative consumer?" Yes, adults play with LEGO too and there are over 250.000 registered members of LEGO User Groups throughout the world. LEGO, one of the most creative brands in the world, is using its fan community to …
As we welcome 2015, some of us may think that it is now too late to make a real impact. As we reflect upon 2014, we may moan over that another year has passed and we have not make that breakthrough yet and perhaps, perhaps we never may. We believe that we cannot make a …
Spiderman! The perfect example of stealing from nature. A spider's web is used to catch criminals. Jeff Karp is not a specialist, instead he has between twenty to twenty-five ongoing projects. A multidisciplinary approach to create biomaterials and devices for therapeutics. The Karp Lab uses bio-inspiration to develop ideas. Their innovations do not mimic nature, …
Day 23 - Creativity Think out-of-the box and devise a creative way to storage and supply in supermarkets. The storage and resupply in supermarkets have not changed since the concept was introduced around 1960. It costs a lot of man power, shoppers experience inconvenience, it is slow and it is not integrated in the whole …
Day 22- Creativity Ask yourself “How Might We” solve this problem. Pick a problem and explore ways that the problem might be solved. Redefine the challenge in nine ways. Express the goal in a new way, use new words and rephrase the problem. You find great everyday problems that needs to be solved here. Imagine …
Day 21- 23 – Creativity There are a range of techniques that can be used to help you create something new and valuable. Distancing is similar to Backward Thinking – a thinking strategy to avoid mental inertia or being locked in one’s logic bubble. Distancing means that we create deliberately some emotional, psychological and mental …
How does ideas happen? Or rather how can I make it happen? The aim of the 99U Conference was to discuss idea execution. Often we focus attention on idea generation, we explore various creative methods to get ideas and improve upon ideas and solutions. But what happens when your ideas are brought to life. What …
Continue reading "Gut Churn – What does it Feel Like to Execute Ideas?"
"I aim to create a living lamp that needs as little care as a houseplant." Teresa van Dongen Have you ever watched a stretch of beach lit up by bioluminescent plankton? Glowing bioluminescent waves and organisms have been used as inspiration and innovative solutions to human problems. The zero electricity lamp was designed by Design …
To keep an open mind while solving a problem is a crucial factor in a creative approach to thinking. A story sparked our interest in writing about the differences between chimpanzees and humans when it comes to creative thinking. You can read the whole story in Michael Michalko's article "The Difference Between the Way a …
Continue reading "Chimpanzees are More Creative than Humans"
Can looking away from the problem, lead to more creative insights? Look at the words below and think of a single words that can logically be paired with all of them. Pine Crab Sauce By using the remote-associates test, where a person is given a series of words, John Kounios and Mark Beeman, found when they …
Sustainability is an approach where we try to create and maintain conditions under which humans and nature can exist in productive harmony. But is the approach enough to make sure that we have and will continue to have water, materials and resources that can protect out health and the environment? Innovations using symbiotic biomimicry as …
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"
Below are two videos where nature is used to gain insight into problems. Biomimicry is a method where you look to nature and natural systems for inspiration. Many innovations have been created using biomimicry, which is a process to spark innovation and creative ideas. The idea to base a flying robot on an animal that …
What are the benefits of spending the day in an office where there is no need for artificial lightning during the day? According to John Seely Brown, (co-chair at the Deloitte Center for the Edge and former chief scientist at Xerox), an organisation that frequently produce innovation share three characteristics: visionary leadership an organizational commitment …
Does the idea of conspicuously dreaming up the next innovation appeal to you? Does it sound tempting to build storm proof cities in your mind? Solve mathematical problems? Or simple find a creative solution to the dripping tap while you are consciously influencing your dreams? We spend around 6 years of our lives dreaming. Yet …
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