creativity vs the closed mind

[peterm1]

On a similar theme, Arthur C Clarke (at least I think it was him) once remarked:

" If you ask an old, wise and greatly respected scientist if something is possible and he says yes, then you had better believe him. He almost certianly knows what he is talking about. On the other hand if you ask the same scientist if something is possible and he says no, then you are wise to doubt his conclusion."

I always thought this was a very perspecatious observation about the nature of aging and the closed mindedness that sometimes goes with it even with (maybe especially with) very wise and respected members of the community. It recognises that when some one like this says something is not possible, then that is more likely than not just a closed mind talking. But when, against the odds, they say yes it is possible then that has real weight and gravitas and deserves close atttention because people like this do not say that lightly.

 

[f16sunshine]

It's not a contradiction, it's the way things are. The most creative and inventive people are usually the most confident and focused. They have an idea and never stop until their vision is realized. The open minded are often floundering around, with no direction, ambition, or drive, and create shallow, meaningless things that are usually cliched copies. They're better at debating philosophy than actually doing anything.

Some would say debating philosophy is doing something.
It's an exercise that brings unexpected rewards.
Rewards that surface when it's time to get that vision realized.

The fear of the "known unknown" is the biggest killer of creativity in my observation.
The mind knows something is not known yet... is afraid to discover that something in fear of it being perceived as unpleasant or a failure.
Strike that fear and creativity flows. Sometimes so does the unpleasantness and failure.
Exercise that muscle enough and the failure becomes less frequent.

Not everyone is born with RAW talent.
Some of us need more courage and therefore exercise than others to get to a place of great and successful creativity.

 

[Keith]

I heard the expression "Life begins at the edge of my comfort zone!" the other day.

It's certainly true for a few I know and possibly creativity works the same way for many people?

 

[Sparrow]

I heard the expression "Life begins at the edge of my comfort zone!" the other day.

It's certainly true for a few I know and possibly creativity works the same way for many people?

... really odd this, but I just picked an Oblique Strategy card after reading your post and it said "Discard an axiom" so I'm not sure

I may pick another later to check 🙂

 

[icebear]

I heard the expression "Life begins at the edge of my comfort zone!" the other day. ....

Thanks Keith, love it !

 

[mgermana]

I've been reading Nietzsche lately (since the author I'm researching read him), and he asks a very similar question regarding history. One ignores history to one's peril, Nietzsche admits, but one must also be able to break free of past convention, else one submit to what he calls the "super-historical". The paradox is this: the goal is to act "unhistorically" (read: creatively) but to do so one must know the history one is bucking against or emerging from--i.e., one must think super-historically. To do one or the other leads to failure; one must do both in order to succeed.

So I guess the Nietzschean answer to the OP's question would be: closed-mindedness and creativity are consonant rather than dissonant. The goal, from this philosophical perspective, is to think creatively but act in a manner consistent with a closed mind.

I'm not sure if I agree with this or not, but it does re-cast the question as an integral part of the history of ideas.

 

[Sejanus.Aelianus]

I've been reading Nietzsche lately

You're a very brave man to admit that, in my opinion.

😀

 

[mgermana]

You're a very brave man to admit that, in my opinion.

😀

Hence the caveat that I wouldn't be reading him if the subject of my research hadn't read him first! 😀

I must say that while some political appropriations of Nietzsche have, historically speaking, brought out the reactionary aspects of his philosophy, literary critics have, in general, cast him as more radical than reactionary. The fact that Ayn Rand and Gilles Deleuze can both claim him as foundational to their own ideas is proof enough of Nietzsche's elasticity.

But back to photography...

 

[Sejanus.Aelianus]

But back to photography...

Oh yes. Do you think he'd regard the Leica M3 as the ÜberKamera?

😀

 

[mgermana]

Oh yes. Do you think he'd regard the Leica M3 as the ÜberKamera?

😀

No, but new RFF threads about the M3 would qualify as examples of Nietzschean "eternal recurrence"... 😀

 

[shadowfox]

Closed mind = To be firm on one's belief.

It works well if the belief is reliable and true. Otherwise, not so much.

 

[Turtle]

I look at some photography and think it is utter garbage. Does this make me closed minded? I'm not so sure it does.

Said 'garbage' may be the best thing ever to someone else (or perhaps even the majority), but to me it is still garbage, assuming I have opened my mind to it as fully as I can. I try to do this, but we are all human and we can never be totally open minded. Once all angles have been exhausted, should a person refuse to form an opnion because they don't want to be seen to be closed minded? I think opinions are absolutely essential for each of us to be taken seriously as sentient beings, but to some the very formation of these 'verdicts' is the definition of closed mindedness.

I am personally not a fan of disingenuous compliments and the wishy washy world where nothing is 'bad' and everything is 'good, just different' but at the end of the day, everyone's perspective is different.

To me the definition of closed mindedness is when someone refuses to re-evaluate despite being presented with new information. This separates it from 'conviction.'

PS off to photograph genitals in preparation for Arles.

 

[nikon_sam]

I heard the expression "Life begins at the edge of my comfort zone!" the other day.

It's certainly true for a few I know and possibly creativity works the same way for many people?

Stepping out of my Comfort Zone is something I don't like doing but every time that I have I've survived...for me it's the fear of failure or appearing foolish...but even when I have failed, I learn, I try again, sometimes I even go back and kick it's butt...but I've survived...I haven't died from stepping out of my comfort zone but some of my fears have...

An interesting quote I found...

"Hell begins on the day when God grants us a clear vision of all that we might have achieved, of all the gifts which we have wasted, of all that we might have done which we did not do" – Gian Carlo Menotti

 

[raphaelaaron]

My take is that we're all a closed off in some way. That's how life is. We find what we don't like because it doesn't work for us and then find what we gravitate more towards because it gives us something positive.

People can be creative and supposedly "closed minded". One thing I realized is never to limit human ingenuity.

For instance, I'm in school studying medicine but my love for photography is burning brighter than ever. It was even in med school (a place one would think black and white is black and white) where I learned to appreciate various forms of art other than photos through students with similar interests. It was in this institution even that I found that creativity was just a part of understanding class concepts just as much as knowing the hard facts.

The mind is a fascinating machine. I say build your creativity and cultivate your limits just the same.

 

[rluka]

From the title, I thought you meant peoples with clinically closed mind such as the savants 😛

 

[Frida]

People often refer to someone else having a "closed mind" if they fail to consider our point of view. since we're all pretty adamant about some things, could many of us consider ourselves open minded, given that definition ?

Yeah...calling people closed minded is often simply a shorthand for stating they don't agree with your beliefs about a particular issue. I think people who disagree with gay marriage, for example, are closed minded, but ultimately that just means I think they're wrong. It's kind of like how people use the term politically correct when they really mean they're upset that they have to use manners their grandparents didn't.

 

[Richard G]

The quote above from F Scott Fitzgerald looks like a reworking of Keats's 'negative capability'.

Artists often flourished in a community of artists, some breaking free, others keeping pace with each other, rivals. Too much openness to the new may dissipate energy and stall the honing of a technique or a vision. What we know of such movements through techniques etc is what has succeeded so we do know of it. Some artists found their third medium or whatever, and it suited their vision and they stuck with that.

I just borrowed from the library a book on Contemporary New Zealand Photography, having admired the New Zealand photography I have seen here and in f11, and admiring New Zelanders in most things. My daughter looked in it first and quickly dismissed it as rubbish. So I was very much primed to give it a generous assessment. I opened the book and just had no interest in where the artists featured had taken photography. Is that a closed mind? Maybe.

 

[Turtle]

Would this translate as, 'learn historical lessons but recognise that the present is not exactly the same as the past. Therefore find novel solutions and apply best judgment'?

I guess this discussion explains why so many artists found drugs and alcohol so useful. And madness.

I've been reading Nietzsche lately (since the author I'm researching read him), and he asks a very similar question regarding history. One ignores history to one's peril, Nietzsche admits, but one must also be able to break free of past convention, else one submit to what he calls the "super-historical". The paradox is this: the goal is to act "unhistorically" (read: creatively) but to do so one must know the history one is bucking against or emerging from--i.e., one must think super-historically. To do one or the other leads to failure; one must do both in order to succeed...

 

[Sejanus.Aelianus]

Well, try this on for size: yesterday's science fiction is tomorrow's old technology.

Up until the nineteenth century, change was the exception and the world, for most people, was the same as the world their grandparents knew. For most of the last two centuries, the framework in which most people reach maturity has changed a great deal by the time their children reach maturity.

In such a world, surely it is not to be wondered at that many, if not most people seek to hold on tight to any certainty they can find. Thus the "closed mind", which began this discussion, is a useful survival strategy. If that is true, then "creativity" is threatening, as just one more agent of change. Any creativity the individual exhibits, then, may well be compartmentalised away from the core values that the individual holds hard to.

Many people have written about this but, to my mind, the best exploration of the possible consequences is John Brunner's "The Shockwave Rider", which explores, in a science fiction novel, what effect constant and massive change might have on individuals and societies.

Incidentally, if you read that book, you may wish to consider the date of publication (1975), when contemplating just how well he predicted the Internet and its ramifications.

 

[mgermana]

Would this translate as, 'learn historical lessons but recognise that the present is not exactly the same as the past. Therefore find novel solutions and apply best judgment'?

Yes. Henri Bergson made a similar observation, critiquing both deterministic and teleological views of history. In short, the past is a virtual precondition for an actualized present that opens onto a fundamentally fluid (and equally virtual) future. The present is a reply to, not merely an expression or extension of, the past. How one replies affects the becoming of the future. See Bergson's Creative Evolution or Elizabeth Grosz's lucid summary of the temporalities of Darwin, Nietzsche, and Bergson in The Nick of Time for much more.