31–40 of 43 posts
NB: In many occasions laughing maybe the most appropriate option!
Earlier quoted context omitted.
What were the tests? And how were you anomalous? From your description, it sounds like this was a more validating experience than awards. Why do you think that is?
The anomalous stuff just popped up in the team building stuff. They displayed the results and I wasn't normal, intact my results seemed like they might be completely wrong. At the time I was working for a large courier company, in an IT department, improving delivery tracking systems. To get someone off the scale in metrics not generally found in an IT department is an anomaly. Maybe if it was a group of artists I ma…
https://secure.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/wiki/Dunning%E2%80...
What about practical, creative ideas, aka. hacks and lifehacks? Most of the people I know dismiss any 'non-standard' solution unless you actually implement it, and then force them to accept it. If you tell your idea before actually realizing it, there's no way they'll let you.
Also reminds me of stories from "Surely You're Joking, Mr. Feynman!" - it seems that Feynman experienced this first-hand as a child, when trying to optimize some kitchen chores (one of the solutions is now sold in stores, and nobody objects it now...).
Most people operate in their day-to-day via procedures. They learn that to accomplish task X, they do A then B then C.
Creative ideas require a procedure-less thinking process (or at least one where the procedure is not all that important so long as X is accomplished).
Most of the time I've hit resistance to a creative idea is because it requires people to learn new procedures to implement the idea. "You mean to accomplish X I should do A then D then F? What's wrong with A, B then C?"
Even in the face of evidence that the new idea might be easier, or faster, or as a side-effect also accomplish task Y, people simply don't want to take the mental effort to learn the new process.
Creative thinking is just not highly valued among the vast majority of humanity and it's a very hard sell.
"What do you think of this new idea?"
- "I don't like that, it's not something I'd want. I think it would be pointless."
- "Wow, this is amazing!"
The study sounds dubious. (Though I do agree with the conclusion, but for other reasons). > For example, subjects had a negative reaction to a running shoe equipped with nanotechnology that adjusted fabric thickness to cool the foot and reduce blisters. As if no reasonable person could ever have a negative reaction to that? I hope this wasn't their only test. Personally, I think most people are biased against creativ…
Article lost me here. Because its hard to judge an idea as 'novel and high quality' in prospect. They should have used an idea that's proven but unknown to the test subjects.Makes the study harder but you end up with more concrete proof.
It is totally reasonable that people act like that. They already have experience in how they solve their daily problems. So beside being highly unlikely to work, new ideas also mean a cost of relearning old habits. This is a big cost and people don't want to do that. Actually we spent a lot of time and energy to not need to relearn our habits so often. Not having to pay this cost is luxury or maybe even goal of life…
Now, on the flip side, some creative ideas are awesome, and would be great, but no one knows about them, and everyone is tired of suffering through the 99% that are fiascoes, so they resist them. It's a pity, but the response is a reasonable one. Thus both the barriers to, and the rewards of, a truly groundbreaking innovation are high, and the innovator is called upon to do a lot of painful, frustrating, tedious selling of the idea.
I've observed this as well and I think I've recently glommed onto an idea that seems to explain it. Most people operate in their day-to-day via procedures. They learn that to accomplish task X, they do A then B then C. Creative ideas require a procedure-less thinking process (or at least one where the procedure is not all that important so long as X is accomplished). Most of the time I've hit resistance to a creative…
Also, I remember a study done a long time ago on primates on an island. They all had a very specific way of opening coconuts or whatever, that they taught their young and each other, it wasn't very effective. So the researchers taught one of the primates a new and better way of opening a coconut and released him back with the others. Even though they others could clearly see that his way of opening coconuts was better and easier, the group stuck with the ways of the old. Perhaps because they wanted to conform and not stand out. Little by little a large number of them started using the new method over time. And when a certain percentage of them were using the new method the others converted as well. Lesson: We do what we do because society tells us to.