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Do software-generated "connections" really generate inspiration?
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Posted by Cassius
Oct 25, 2007 at 04:42 PM
I asked this before in another topic, but there was no response.
Some have said that connections generated by software (such as wiki) have resulted in the user developing new inspirations. [Dump the info in, let the software make connections, look at those connections, and eureka! an inspiration.]
Have any of you actually had this happen. Can you give a real-world example?
Certainly we all have had the experience of reading something or hearing something which, along with our previous thoughts, resulted in an inspiration. But has anyone really had an inspiration as a result of a software-generated connection?
-c
Posted by Stephen Zeoli
Oct 25, 2007 at 05:14 PM
Cassius wrote:
>But has anyone really had an inspiration as a result of a software-generated connection?
Inspiration, when it comes to me at all, usually arises while I’m writing. This is why I like clean, easy editors… because there are no distractions. It is also why I prefer single-pane outliners: I can see the full context of my work, instead of having it chopped up and stored in little boxes.
However, my interpretation of the comments about inspiration coming from the connections made through software is more along the lines of having ideas stimulated based on connections that were not immediately obvious. This could only happen if you have built a large enough database of ideas already. I think in one of the examples I read, the user had said that he had a database of several thousand notes. It is easy to imagine that one would need an application’s help to comb that much data, because surely you wouldn’t remember it all.
That being said, it does seem that you can get the same effect from searching the web.
Steve Z.
Posted by Manfred
Oct 25, 2007 at 05:27 PM
(i) on software-generated “connections” - ALL the connections in my ConnectedText file have been created by me - it’s part of thinking about the material - and the first step in organizing the material
(ii) on “inspiration” I subscribe to the motto that creative work is ninety-nine percent perspiration and one percent inspiration;
(a) whatever inspiration there is, it is based on previous actions of mine (see (i)); it’s a gradual process for me, though I have had “aha” moments ;
(b) there is surprise sometimes (the longer you work with such a system, the more often). You create a link and find that there is a topic with that name already and it has connections to other interesting topics, which show that you have thought about the matter before—often in an entirely different context. And I find this extremely useful, even if it does not happen every day or even every week. But you do get surprised and thus stimulated to reflect some more on matters you thought about before.
I see wiki-like systems as extensions of natural memory, as “amplifying” my intelligence, not as replacing it. To say it again, it’s part a long-term approach; nothing that you would encounter in using a program for two or three weeks ...
Manfred
Posted by Manfred
Oct 25, 2007 at 05:29 PM
I didn’t see Steve’s reply; must have been posted as I was writing; I fully agree with him, however.
Manfred
Posted by Stephen R. Diamond
Oct 25, 2007 at 06:05 PM
I think maybe the question of whether connections generate inspiration can be subsumed under Manfred’s claim that certain contemporary software can amplify intelligence. I’m not sure ‘inspiration’ is clear enough in meaning, although I will answer Cassius’s question directly that I have never had a eureka experience arising directly from software connections, not where this experience has actually deepened by understand of the material. I have had such experiences in terms of how best to organize material in a given document. I won’t give an example, unless someone wants one, because I think everyone has experienced this, and it is fairly trivial.
Maybe to ask whether software amplifies intelligence it could help first to locate what technology or invention during our species’ existence undoubtedly have accomplished such amplification. In my mind without question the key development was the development of writing as such. (I leave out the advent of language generally, because it is so shrouded in mystery.) Writing is thinking on paper (there’s a book by that title), and thinking on paper has amplified our ability to think by allowing the thinker to follow a train of thought further and more consistently than he could without it.
I think—there’s certainly a lot of room for disagreement here, as well as consideration of the effect of different cognitive styles—that thinking occurs when one is writing and reading writings, not when organizing diagrams. The centrality of writing for thinking has some counter-intuitive implications that I embrace. My keyboard is more important for my thinking than any software. I perform typing exercises several times a week, and if my typing speed falls below 80 words per minute, I worry about it. If writing is thinking on paper, you would want your typing to keep up with your internal operations. Fast typing amplfies my intelligence.
Making software connections—in my opinion and experience—amplfies memory, not thinking. Is that a distinction worth making? I think obviously so, although exactly what the implications are may not be immediately obvious.If like me you are fond of analogies, the difference between the effect of enhancing thinking (intelligence) vs. memory is sort of like the difference between a faster computer processor on the one hand and more RAM and a larger hard disk on the other (assuming of course the hard disk space is actually used).
While the implications are not necessarily transparent, my value judgments are straightforward. I am more concerned with maximizing my processor speed than my RAM and more concerned with my RAM than my hard disk size. To me this means that any method that distracts or diverts from the process of writing as such is to be avoided. A corollary is that textual rather than graphical outliners are the instrument of choice during the brainstorming phase.