Re: Spectrum of Thought( was Imagination vs Critical thought)

The Low Golden Willow (phoenix@ugcs.caltech.edu)
Thu, 19 Jun 1997 12:16:12 -0700 (PDT)


On Jun 19, 1:05pm, QueeneMUSE@aol.com wrote:

} I see, and I will think about that. You have a point. Conversely I have
} become convinced that this perceived "sliding scale" model frees one to more
} creative thoughts ( To visualize this: compare it to the slide from the
} dreamlike highly illogical state of sleep, into the clear alert morning
} thoughts of scheduling, and back to musing, say in a shower, to the creative

Actually at the moment my model has constant creativity, and it is the
criticism which slides freely. If you call random spew creativity, but
I suspect that is what it must amount to under the hood. When you're
tired you're not too focused, more ideas get through, you feel more
creative, and some of them might even be good. When you're sleeping
you're not focused at all and your mind goes on a random walk. That it
makes as much sense as it seems to do while you're asleep is probably
due to our neural networks desperately trying to find patterns. If
you're too tightly focused and critical not enough ideas are allowed to
live long enough.

Hallucinogens perhaps actively affect the creation of ideas, vs. simply
tearing down the critical walls; I wouldn't know. For my purposes a
constant source of idealets with varying intensity and quality of
surrounding filters works as a model, so far.

Smart people have more dumb ideas than dumb people, because dumb people
don't have ideas. Really smart people, of course, recognize their dumb
ideas before they open their mouth.

That last sentence was not meant as a jibe at anyone specific.

Merry part,
-xx- Damien R. Sullivan X-) <*> http://www.ugcs.caltech.edu/~phoenix

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