Do schools kill creativity?

[AthenaAwakened]

If this is your best defense, evidently not.

Do you think all new and original ideas are good?

Because, for example, you don't seem to find my idea to analogize creativity to failure to obey traffic laws particularly good or useful.

You're moving the goal posts again.

You have gone from stating creativity is overrated, which has gone over like a lead balloon, to now demanding that I personally defend the goodness of all new and original ideas.

tsk, tsk, tsk

 

[doubtingt]

ERJEHJAO jfrtoki jajisjpe o

I followed fewer rules in writing the first line than the second.

Which gave you something to read?

Both

They are both something to read.

The first shows more creativity than the second.

The first is not more creative. It could be easily created by a completely non-intelligent random letter generator. IF creativity is defined in a manner that makes the first line "more creative", then there is nothing positive about creativity and we shouldn't be at all concerned about "killing it with education".

The first also does not provide anything to read. Reading is not merely the act of passing your eyes across strings of letters, which is the only thing that the first one provides, other than providing an example of something uselessly "original".

 

[EricK]

Does anybody here feel that:
a. They are less creative than they were as a child
and
b. This reduction in creativity is a direct result of the education they received in school (rather than, say, the way they were treated by their parents, or an inevitable consequence of aging, or spending years in a dull job etc)

 

[AthenaAwakened]

Does anybody here feel that:
a. They are less creative than they were as a child
and
b. This reduction in creativity is a direct result of the education they received in school (rather than, say, the way they were treated by their parents, or an inevitable consequence of aging, or spending years in a dull job etc)

I wouldn't say less creative, but differently creative.

I think certain teachers tried to stifle creativity and others cultivated it. But it was the seventies and high stakes testing wasn't around.

 

[dismal]

Do you think all new and original ideas are good?

Because, for example, you don't seem to find my idea to analogize creativity to failure to obey traffic laws particularly good or useful.

You're moving the goal posts again.

You have gone from stating creativity is overrated, which has gone over like a lead balloon, to now demanding that I personally defend the goodness of all new and original ideas.

tsk, tsk, tsk

My point all along has been that creativity is overrated (by some) because not all original ideas are useful.

And, why didn't you answer my question?

Did you not find my idea to ask it very useful?

 

[dismal]

Ok. I agree with the first and second thing.

As for the third I don't know who you imagine is arguing for the stifling of creativity in the general. I have argued it's not helpful or useful for certain things with a specific example being interpretation of traffic laws. I do think we should stifle creativity there.

To use language doesn't require any formal education. It only requires exposure to language at the right time in development. Children know grammar already and use it before they even go to school. Normal humans have a universal innate grammar.

Nobody has an innate driving skill. Driving is entirely a learned skill.

So you agree we should stifle creativity with respect to driving?

 

[Togo]

As for the third I don't know who you imagine is arguing for the stifling of creativity in the general. I have argued it's not helpful or useful for certain things with a specific example being interpretation of traffic laws. I do think we should stifle creativity there.

I don't. Creative solutions to traffic rules are what keep the roads open when something unexpected happens, and what saves lives when there is an accident.

You could even argue that traffic rules don't work unless applied by creative people.

Generally speaking, when there are rules to be applied, there are also exceptions to be applied. It's generally unhelpful to regard rules as sacrosanct and not be violated under any circumstances, just as it's unhelpful to regard rules as guidelines that should be ignored in practice. Instead what various cultures do is to elevate either rules-following or exception-creating to high status, and then find reasons to support the converse position. So in the US, where rules are often held to be universal and eternal, the finding of exceptions is an important enough practice to spawn one of the largest concentrations of lawyers on earth. In Brazil, where rules are generally held to be unimportant compared to the particulars of a given situation, great effort is given to finding particular reasons why laws should be followed in terms of the circumstances of the case.

One of the principal ways of eliminating conflict arising from following laws or rules is to creative in their application.

 

[ksen]

Did you not find my idea to ask it very useful?

We just didn't find your ideas to be very creative.

 

[AthenaAwakened]

Did you not find my idea to ask it very useful?

We just didn't find your ideas to be very creative.

 

[dismal]

As for the third I don't know who you imagine is arguing for the stifling of creativity in the general. I have argued it's not helpful or useful for certain things with a specific example being interpretation of traffic laws. I do think we should stifle creativity there.

I don't. Creative solutions to traffic rules are what keep the roads open when something unexpected happens, and what saves lives when there is an accident.

I put this statement in the category of things that are so absurd no one who spent a moment contemplating the implications of what they were saying would ever argue them, but will still get relentlessly defended on the internet.

 

[dismal]

Did you not find my idea to ask it very useful?

We just didn't find your ideas to be very creative.

Help, I'm being stifled over here.

It's really quite remarkable how little tolerance some people have for original and entertaining new ideas.

 

[ksen]

It's really quite remarkable how little tolerance some people have for original and entertaining new ideas.

i agree

 

[Togo]

I don't. Creative solutions to traffic rules are what keep the roads open when something unexpected happens, and what saves lives when there is an accident.

I put this statement in the category of things that are so absurd no one who spent a moment contemplating the implications of what they were saying would ever argue them, but will still get relentlessly defended on the internet.

In other words, you can't imagine why they would be true, and thus don't want to think about them?

If it helps, I'm paraphrasing material from the Judge Institute, Cambridge university's business school, on making businesses more creative. So roughly 100,000 intelligent and educated people have gone over it pretty thoroughly now.

It's also been discussed in popular form in books such as 'Did the Pedestrian Die?'
http://www.amazon.co.uk/Pedestrian-Insights-Greatest-Culture-Guru/dp/1841124362

The reason why it comes up in cultural work is because different cultures tend to view rule following very differently, which obviously has implications for global businesses. The idea that the best way to encourage the following of rules is to remove any form of creativity is one those ideas that sounds plausible, until you start to think about it. Creativity is not just random sequences or behaviour without rhyme or reason, it's working with existing familiar elements to create new solutions.

 

[dismal]

I put this statement in the category of things that are so absurd no one who spent a moment contemplating the implications of what they were saying would ever argue them, but will still get relentlessly defended on the internet.

In other words, you can't imagine why they would be true, and thus don't want to think about them?

I can't imagine anyone who has ever driven thinking it would be a good idea for all the drivers around them to be acting creatively with respect to the speed they were going, the direction they were traveling, where they were exiting, what they did at a red light or stop sign, etc.

But I can imagine people taking ridiculous positions on the internet and digging in to absurd lengths.

 

[Bronzeage]

To use language doesn't require any formal education. It only requires exposure to language at the right time in development. Children know grammar already and use it before they even go to school. Normal humans have a universal innate grammar.

Nobody has an innate driving skill. Driving is entirely a learned skill.

So you agree we should stifle creativity with respect to driving?

You are free to create uses of the word creativity, which reinforce your point. This does not make your point any more valid. We might as well declare chopping down a tree to be a creative act because it creates a stump.

 

[dismal]

So you agree we should stifle creativity with respect to driving?

You are free to create uses of the word creativity, which reinforce your point. This does not make your point any more valid. We might as well declare chopping down a tree to be a creative act because it creates a stump.

I don't think there has been much dispute about the definition of creativity. See earlier posts.

Would you like to define it differently than what has been suggested by myself or others?

I agree with you that it would probably be best if we had some standard definition of the term instead of people getting creative about it.

 

[fromderinside]

I can't imagine anyone who has ever driven thinking it would be a good idea for all the drivers around them to be acting creatively with respect to the speed they were going, the direction they were traveling, where they were exiting, what they did at a red light or stop sign, etc.

So there's Joe Terdkicker proud owner of a tripped out F-450, lights, bumpers, sissy rails, pin stripping, power package, stablization package,leather, jack struts, the whole bit - obviously someone is advertising his tiny penis here - all pissed off because his sup. at the ditch digging sight where he works dressed him down because he decided to have a but while pipe was being laid where he was responsible for guiding it into the ditch. Yet, there he was with all this power, adrenalin, no testosterone, no mind, and pissed. I change lanes in front of him unaware he was a shit bag ready to go off. He did. He jerked his truck into an adjacent lane cutting some little lady off, accelerated and wedged his big ass truck in front of me.

What to do, what to do? I could run in to him which is what I think he was hoping for or I could jump into that place he left, get in front of him and back int to my lane leaving him with the decision on whether to ruin his truck and get even with me or not. No penis, no glory. He backed off.


Its all about creativity and insight.

 

[ksen]

But I can imagine people taking ridiculous positions on the internet and digging in to absurd lengths.

me too

 

[dismal]

I can't imagine anyone who has ever driven thinking it would be a good idea for all the drivers around them to be acting creatively with respect to the speed they were going, the direction they were traveling, where they were exiting, what they did at a red light or stop sign, etc.

So there's Joe Terdkicker proud owner of a tripped out F-450, lights, bumpers, sissy rails, pin stripping, power package, stablization package,leather, jack struts, the whole bit - obviously someone is advertising his tiny penis here - all pissed off because his sup. at the ditch digging sight where he works dressed him down because he decided to have a but while pipe was being laid where he was responsible for guiding it into the ditch. Yet, there he was with all this power, adrenalin, no testosterone, no mind, and pissed. I change lanes in front of him unaware he was a shit bag ready to go off. He did. He jerked his truck into an adjacent lane cutting some little lady off, accelerated and wedged his big ass truck in front of me.

What to do, what to do? I could run in to him which is what I think he was hoping for or I could jump into that place he left, get in front of him and back int to my lane leaving him with the decision on whether to ruin his truck and get even with me or not. No penis, no glory. He backed off.


Its all about creativity and insight.

Again: Sometimes creativity is good. Sometimes it's not.

You don't disprove this by citing a time when you think it's good.

 

[GenesisNemesis]

We just didn't find your ideas to be very creative.

Help, I'm being stifled over here.

It's really quite remarkable how little tolerance some people have for original and entertaining new ideas.

Are people intolerant or are they simply disagreeing with your assertions?