Category: ideas

“The brain is not the mind. It is probably impossible to look at a map of brain activity and predict or even understand the emotions, reactions, hopes and desires of the mind.”

“We do know that much of what we associate with creativity – whether writing a sonnet or a mathematical proof – has to do with the ability to link ideas, entities, and concepts in novel ways. This ability depends in part on the very thing that caffeine seeks to prevent: a wandering, unfocussed mind.”

“‘Darkness increases freedom from constraints, which in turn promotes creativity,’ report Anna Steidle of the University of Stuttgart and Lioba Werth of the University of Hohenheim. A dimly lit environment, they explain … ‘elicits a feeling of freedom, self-determination, and reduced inhibition,’ all of which encourage innovative thinking.”

The sight of an injured rat hauling itself along a Manhattan sidewalk prompts Arielle Duhaime-Ross to consider the struggle between the two antithetical impulses.

“We are the Ambivalents, unable not to see both sides of the argument, frozen in the no-man’s land between armies of true believers. We cannot speak our name, because there is no respectable way to confess that you believe two opposing propositions, no ballot that allows you to vote for competing candidates, no questionnaire in which you can tick the box, ‘I agree with both of these conflicting views’.”

“The awe and the wonder that powered the Superman mythos slowly bled away, and he became just another guy with his underwear on the outside, just like all the others.”

Why the ever-living heck is the second word in “just deserts” spelled with one s but pronounced like desserts?

“That’s okay. That’s a win, if we do that. Because it means we survived, and we changed to meet changing environmental conditions.”

“Western societies perceive the world as knowably rational and systematic, leading to a widespread loss of a sense of wonder and magic.” Hence The Hobbit, etc.

“The wiring and plumbing of a building will soon start to become integrated and grown like our bodies’ nervous and digestive systems. More materials will be able to heal themselves and they’ll clean themselves.”