Engineering Inspiration

Abstract

This chapter proposes a computerized tool to promote inspiration in a specific, but very important, kind of scientific creativity, for significant scientific breakthroughs are often enabled by conceptual revolutions. The creative process is often divided into four phases: preparation, incubation, inspiration, and verification/elaboration. The proposed tool enhances the incubation phase of scientific creativity, with the goal of inspiring fruitful reconceptualization of a problem. It accomplishes this by exposing the scientist-user to continuous sequences of images designed to engage innate, unconscious cognitive structures. The sequence is not fixed, but may vary either randomly or under user direction. When this image flow seems relevant to the problem, users can record their position in it and their own ideas with a variety of low-interference recording techniques. Several simple image flows are described, along with the computational engine for generating them.