For many years I led creative writing workshops. Early on I noticed that some writing prompts tended to keep people entrenched in analytical thinking and their subsequent writing was heady and dry. These exercises often involved using a word or newspaper headline to write from. Their writing might have been slick and witty, but it…
In 1973, neurobiologist Roger Sperry stated: “There appears to be two modes of thinking, verbal and nonverbal, represented separately in left and right hemispheres, respectively. Our educational system, and science in general, tends to neglect the nonverbal form of intellect. What it comes down to is that modern society discriminates against the right hemisphere.” To…
The physicist Arthur Zajonc says that our culture needs the artist’s cognitive capacities. But what ARE those cognitive capacities? Perhaps those capacities include the artist’s willingness to be confused, welcoming any unlikely connection that shows up. Perhaps it’s his or her sensitivity to nuance and qualities of beauty that others miss. Perhaps artists are more…
Metaphor is at the core of nearly all scientific breakthroughs and acts of genius. Celebrated scientists like Niels Bohr, Richard Feynman, and Albert Einstein relied on metaphor to help them make new discoveries. Clearly, fundamental change depends upon our ability to engage with metaphor. In other words, metaphor is an act of genius.
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