How do the thinking geniuses differ from ordinary people? (Part 3)

Which thinking strategies helped Alexander Fleming find penicillin to save millions of lives from mold nearly a century ago, Alexander Graham Bell invented the phone and Thomas Edison built a recorder in the late 19th century. ?

Please read to the third part, also the last part of a three-part series of thinking strategies that have created geniuses that have contributed to the world in all areas from science to art. Series aggregated from the Creativity Post and many other sources.

Part 3: Geniuses are people who can create solutions from contradictions, differences, unexpected events

Creative from contradictions

Physicist and philosopher David Bohm, one of the greatest theoretical physicists of the 20th century, says that geniuses are capable of thinking differently because they can withstand the simultaneous presence of things. conflicting, contradictory or incompatible topics .

Geniuses are capable of thinking differently because they can withstand contradictions and contradictions.

In the book The Emerging Goddess: The Creative Process in Art, Science and Other Fields (The Goddess of Rise: A Creative Process in Art, Science and Other Areas) , Dr. Albert Rothenberg, a researcher famous for the creative process, has identified this ability at many geniuses such as Einstein, Mozart, Edison, Pasteur, Joseph Conrad, Picasso.

Physicist Niels Bohr thinks that if you keep the opposites together, your thoughts will stop and your mind will move to a new level. Cessation of thinking will help intelligence outside of thinking begin to act and create a new form. Thinking around the contrary will facilitate a new perspective of freedom that emerges from your mind. The ability to visualize light is both a molecule and Bohr's wave that led him to the concept of principle of complementarity , a universal principle that governs quantum particles.

Danish physicist Niels Bohr (1865-1962) was the father of quantum physics. Bohr's contributions to early theories of atomic structure and quantum physics helped him win the Nobel Prize in physics in 1922.

The content of the additional principle he raised in 1928 states that "Contraria non contradictoria sed complementa sunt" (original Latin) - Reverse is not a contradiction but complementary, meaning that reality has The contradictory nature, such as the behavior of quantum particles at the time of the wave, is the particle, or the coin has tails and heads, but these characteristics are not contradictory but complement each other to create a comprehensive understanding of quantum particles. "Bohr's complementary principle is the most revolutionary scientific concept of the century (20) and is the center for 50 years seeking the full meaning of Bohr's quantum concept" , according to Physics Today No. 16 January 1963.

The invention of Thomas Edison's civil lighting lighting system is a combination of wiring in parallel circuits and high resistance in light bulbs, two things that traditional thinkers think are impossible because they have been The assumption is not compatible with each other. Because Edison could reconcile the conflict between two incompatible things, he could see that the relationship led him to his breakthrough invention.

Link different things

The famous ancient Greek philosopher, the ancestor of formal logic, Aristotle, sees metaphor as a sign of genius. He said that individuals who have the ability to recognize similarities between two separate areas and link them together are those with special talents. If things are not the same in some ways, it is possible that they are the same in other ways.

By observing the similarities and differences between the inner activity of the ear, the movement of the eardrum on the ear bone and the movement of the thick phone screen on a magnetized steel bar, Alexander Graham Bell devised the electricity. Voice today.

On the first day of June 1875, while testing and sending telegrams on the same line, Bell heard the sound of steel clanging in the assistant room Thomas Watson, who was tasked with giving telegrams to him. Running to Watson's room, Bell realized that when Watson snatched the steel bar in his room (transmission room), the steel wire when vibrating on the magnet would create a variable current through the wire, making the steel bar in his room (reception room). ) also vibrated and he heard the sound of steel on the other side. The next day, Bell repeated the experiment and could transmit some sound from the upper floor to the lower two floors.

Almost a year later, March 10, 1876, Bell and Watson successfully tested the device to help him talk to Watson when they were in two different rooms. When he spoke into the phone: "Watson, come here, I want to see you" , Watson ran over and said he heard and understood what Bell just said.

Alexander Graham and the first phone he invented in 1876.

On one day in 1878, Thomas Edison made a tape recorder after finding a similarity between a toy tunnel and the paperman's movement and sound vibrations.

A recording version invented by Thomas Edison.(Photo: Thoughtco).

By observing the woodworm digging tunnels in the wood through pipes, people can carry out construction under the sea.(Photo: Hornet Photography).

Einstein devised and explained many general principles by visualizing the similarities between everyday events such as sailing or standing at a stop when the train passed.

Prepare yourself to seize the opportunity

Whenever we try to do something and fail, we will end by doing something else. This seemingly simple statement is the first principle of creative randomness. We can ask ourselves why we can't do what we intend to do, and this is a reasonable thing to expect. But the creative surprise poses another question: What have we done? Answering this question in a new way beyond expectations is a fundamental creative act.

It is not fortunate that the creative point of view is the most important thing in creativity. Alexander Fleming was not the first doctor to notice mold made up of airborne bacterial bacteria when studying deadly bacteria. A less capable doctor might disregard the seemingly irrelevant result but for Fleming it was "interesting" and wondered if it had potential. That "interesting" observation led Fleming to find penicillin, a powerful anti-inflammatory active substance that saved millions of lives, in 1928.

Alexander Fleming.(Photo: Historic UK).

While thinking about how to make a carbon fiber for a filament, Thomas Edison played with a piece of window polishing powder, turning it around and twisting it in his fingers absently. When he looked down at his hand, the answer caught his eye: making the carbon fiber twisted like a rope. The great American psychologist BF Skinner emphasized the first principle of methodology researchers: when you see something interesting, quit everything else and study it.

Too many people fail to answer the knock on the opportunity because they have to complete some predetermined plans. Creative geniuses do not wait for random gifts that they seek to discover unexpectedly positively.

Conclude

Recognizing common thinking strategies of creative geniuses and applying them will help you be more creative in your work and personal life. Creative geniuses are genius because they think "how" and not "what" thinking .

In an interesting study of Nobel laureates living in the United States published in 1977, sociologist Harriet Zuckerman discovered: big physicists who won Nobel prizes like Enrico Fermi (Italy) have 6 Award-winning students, Ernst Lawrence (USA) and Niels Bohr each have four. JJ Thompson (England) and Ernest Rutherford (New Zealand) trained 17 Nobel laureates. It is not accidental. It is clear that those Nobel laureates are not only creative in their own power but also able to teach others how to think creatively.

1. How do the thinking geniuses differ from ordinary people? (Part 2)
2. How do the thinking geniuses differ from ordinary people? (Part 1)