Post – 49 No More Steps on The Ladder

Will there be a point when a random person or God forbid, you or I can’t have any more good ideas? That is a scary-freaking thought.  Worse than a clown suddenly appearing behind you as you brush your teeth for the night. Notice the cognitive bias of thinking it is OK for harm to come to a stranger but not someone I know. That is called in-group bias. 

Actually, upon thinking about it, maybe it is not so scary.  Every single day, there are people who have had their last good idea.  That is sad for us, because let’s face it, if we’re involved with The Creativity Algorithm, then we value good ideas.  So, we are thinking with our value system, not theirs.

Those people who have had their last good idea, maybe they don’t miss it.  Maybe it’s like reading. At a certain point, some people stop reading and simply watch TV or some sort of screen.  To our value system, that seems awful, but for them, that’s OK.  They are comfortable. They seek comfort over growth. If you are bothered by that prospect or if you are bothered by anything, you are thinking with your subconscious, gut, and intuition. Try to think analytically with your conscious mind. If you get to the point where intellectually you know it shouldn’t bother you, can you ever convince your subconscious to not feel bothered?  That is a good sophism. If we can’t change, whether it is our thoughts or feelings, what is the point?

Like any good intellectual explorer, we should ask why.  Why would a person stop having good ideas?  Is seeking intellectual comfort the cause? Or, is comfort the result of never being surprised by a new, challenging idea? I don’t know if we’ll ever get the answer to that for the same reason it is difficult to get any other fact in psychology.  Unlike the elements of chemistry, peoples’ differences introduce too many variables to account for in most studies. 

Maybe that is a question we should tuck away and let marinate or simmer. Will we notice which good idea is our last?  How would we notice it? I am not trying to start an existential crisis or start a panic that the end is near. It’s just an extension of the question are there a limited number of good ideas we can have?

I read a cool article by Stephen Hayes (Hayes, 2023).  In it, he does some nifty mathematical extrapolations from the idea that an average person knows about 46,000 words.  All of those words have several meanings.  More importantly, all of those words are connected to a certain number of other concepts or relations. From these and similar concepts, Hayes comes up with an unimaginably large number of thoughts that our minds can have.

I am not suggesting that all of those thoughts are good ideas. Maybe only a small partition of them would be good ideas.  If Hayes’ number is so ridiculously large that it is functionally infinite, then we can use the concept that even a small part of infinity is still infinity. 

That comes at the question from a cognitive psychological approach. We can find a similar conclusion by following the biological approach.  Let’s say there are 85 billion neurons in the human brain(that might be a slight overestimate, but it makes the math easy). Each one of those is connected to roughly 30,000 other neurons.  They communicate with each other with approximately 200 neurotransmitters. You can see where this is going.

If that basic summary isn’t big enough, consider that for most of psychological history, the only brain cell that was noticed and counted was the neuron.  Well, throw in another 900 billion glial cells that can communicate and now the number approaches something for which we do not have a name.  (Note: glial cells were ignored for most of psychology’s history because they do not produce electricity and were thus thought not to communicate.  Also, almost all brain cancer is glial in nature and not neuronal because neurons so rarely grow.)

All of that still doesn’t answer the question of when or whether we will stop having good ideas.  As the title suggests, what if you are climbing a cognitive ladder on a journey of growth and exploration and then, you find that there are no more steps?  The rungs of the ladder of ideation just stop. 

This is where I am going to abandon the numbers and science of the earlier section and jump into some nerdy fantasy. I suggest that if we keep climbing, the rungs will magically appear beneath our feet.  Momentum and intention are the only things required to make the next step appear. Climbing makes the ladder longer. 

So how does this help Sales Managers help their employees or any follower of The Creativity Algorithm have good ideas more often?

The important thing in both approaches, the cognitive where thoughts are measured and the biological where cells and chemicals are measured is that both rest on the idea of connections. If we want good ideas we must explore the concepts of connections. Connections between cells is called a synapse. A connection between words can turn into an idea. 

Our task then is to make connections. We already know, lots and lots of things.  We have billions of brain cells which means we have the raw material.  We just need to put them together in a new way. “Newness” is onr pillar of creativity.  Usefulness is another pillar. Check out post/episode 9, Academic Definition for more on that. 

I suggest that connections or at least the right kind of connections will not be made when we are stressed.  So, in order to foster connections, we should find a nice comfy alpha state. An Alpha state is a relaxed state named for the brain waves that accompany daydreaming.  A nice comfy alpha state might not be sitting in a dim, cool room with slowed breathing.  Or, it might be a brisk walk on a sweltering summer day.  If walking relaxes you, then you know that good ideas often come during that walk.  

Here is the sophism before the takeaway. Try to think of something that cannot be connected to other thoughts. Don’t say it is not possible.  Instead, say it is not possible yet. 

Take Away:  Whether it is being still or being active, do what works for you to get into a relaxed, alpha state.  Hopefully, you’ve played with the idea of cognitive connectedness.  Now, let’s go up one step on the ladder.  Would there be a use for an idea that is totally disconnected from any other thought?  Imagine a glass case floating in the air surrounded by a vacuum. In that case is an idea so pure that it has never known another thought.  Can you think of a use for that?

Spreading the Thoughts:  Ask a friend if they can have a thought that is not connected to another thought. Ask them if doing so would be a good thing or a bad thing.  Whatever they say, listen intently. Try to connect with their ideas.

Next Post: Word Games

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References

Hayes, S. C. (2023, March 17). The Astounding Number of Thoughts Your Mind Can Produce. Psychology Today. Retrieved May 31, 2023, from https://www.psychologytoday.com/intl/blog/get-out-of-your-mind/202303/how-many-thoughts-are-in-your-head