Abstract
We are an intensely creative species. Creativity is the fountainhead of our civilizations and a defining characteristic of what makes us human. But for all its prominence at the apex of human mental faculties, we know next to nothing about how brains generate creative ideas. With all previous attempts to tighten the screws on this vexed problem unsuccessful – right brains, divergent thinking, defocused attention, default mode network, alpha enhancement, prefrontal activation, etc. (Dietrich and Kanso, 2010) – the neuroscientific study of creativity finds itself in a theoretical arid zone that has perhaps no equal in psychology. We propose here a general framework for a fresh attack on the problem and set it out under 10 foundational concepts. Most of the ideas we favor are part and parcel of the standard conceptual toolbox of cognitive neuroscience but their combination and significance to creativity are original. By outlining, even in such broad strokes, the theoretical landscape of cognitive neuroscience as it relates to creative insights, we hope to bring into clear focus the key enabling factors that are likely to have a hand in computing ideational combinations in the brain.
Highlights
The last half century has seen a veritable explosion of knowledge about the mind and how it works
The principal reason for this situation is that all current psychometric tests used to look for creativity in the brain are based on divisions – divergent thinking, defocused attention, remote associations, for instance – that (1) are false category formations, given their exact opposites – convergent thinking, focused attention, or close associations, in this case – precipitate creative ideas (Dietrich, 2007b) and (2) result in constructs that still consist of many separate mental processes that are distributed in the brain
For explorations in terra incognita, we have proposed that the implicit system can still be creative, but this creativity must be limited to the blind algorithms in nature (Dietrich and Haider, 2015)
Summary
Reviewed by: Michał Wierzchon , Jagiellonian University, Poland Caroline Di Bernardi Luft, Queen Mary University of London, UK. A Neurocognitive Framework for Human Creative Thought. For all its prominence at the apex of human mental faculties, we know next to nothing about how brains generate creative ideas. (Dietrich and Kanso, 2010) – the neuroscientific study of creativity finds itself in a theoretical arid zone that has perhaps no equal in psychology. Most of the ideas we favor are part and parcel of the standard conceptual toolbox of cognitive neuroscience but their combination and significance to creativity are original. Even in such broad strokes, the theoretical landscape of cognitive neuroscience as it relates to creative insights, we hope to bring into clear focus the key enabling factors that are likely to have a hand in computing ideational combinations in the brain
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