Edward de Nono

Lateral Thinking

Creativity

ClevernessCleverness WisdomWisdom= Lens with sharp = Lens with sharp focusfocus

= Wide angle lens= Wide angle lens

= like knowing, = like knowing, technically, how to technically, how to cook a superb mealcook a superb meal

= like designing a = like designing a meal to fit available meal to fit available ingredients & to fit ingredients & to fit what we feel like what we feel like eating at the momenteating at the moment

= like having a library = like having a library full of booksfull of books

= knowing which book = knowing which book to read at this momentto read at this moment

= about how we get = about how we get information & how we information & how we use informationuse information

= about how the = about how the information fits into information fits into the world and our own the world and our own valuesvalues

Wisdom= is not a function of intelligence.

= is more about perspective than about details

= takes place in the “ perception “ area

= seeks to take the ‘ helicopter ‘ view, so that everything can be seen in perspective and in relation to everything else.

= Ability to see through surface appearances.

Wisdom

= Ability to imagine possibilities and to consider them

= The disinclination to get trapped in the easy judgment of false certainties.

Perception

• Most of the faults of thinking are faults of perception

• Wisdom takes place in the perception areas

• Wisdom is about broader perception, deeper perception, richer perception.

• Perception is how the mind organises the information that is coming in from the world outside.

• = is not only what is physically in front of our eyes but what the brain does with this information

Perception

Perception is how the mind organizes the information that is coming in from the world outside

Perception

• We live in the world we ‘ see ‘. But the world is not the physical world around us but the ‘perceived’ worlds in our minds. The physical world may be exactly the same but different people will see different things.

• Classics: The glass is half full or half empty

• The mind does not take photographs.

• It brings in information, experience, frames, present contexts, feelings and emotions. All these get organised by perception to give us ‘ the way we look at the situation.’

• Age 0 – 5 is the age of ‘why’?

= just to get more info & link up their small pieces of perceived world into a larger perception

• Age 5 – 12 is the age of ‘why not’

= probe for info and play with ideas; creative

• Age 12 to 75+

= Over time our individual perceptions settle down to give us our personal view of the world

= That is how we see the world. That is the world in which we live and act. That world may be full of inadequacies, prejudices, stereotypes and confusion. That is the only world we have.

Perception

Perception decides

how we structure the world around us

David Perkins ( Harvard University )

• His research showed that most of the faults in thinking are faults of perception

• Seeing only part of the situation, bringing along an inadequate frame and using emotional selection of information.

Perception is a matter of picking out the patterns that we used to seeing.

It becomes difficult to see things in another way unless we make the effort demanded by wisdom

We can look at the world through a chosen

“ Frame “.

This sensitizes our attention, so we notice what we set out to notice.

One of the major faults of perception

is picking out just one part of the situation and ignoring the rest.

Professor John Edwards:• Fond of saying that a teacher with 20 years experience may indeed have 20 years experience or may have 20 times a one-year experience.

• If you always look at things in the same way then more experience only provides more books on the same shelf.

• Age permits you to have more experience but only if you permit yourself to be open to new experiences.

Wisdomis about awareness and possibilities:

awareness of the world around;

awareness of possibilities and choices.

The pieces could be arranged in a number of different ways.

All these are possibilities

Possibilities is the key to wisdom.

Possibility is the basis of creativity.

Possibility is the best antidote to arrogance.

Possibility drives exploration

Wisdom encourages different thoughts and values.

This gives a richness of perception.

There does not have to be a choice of one and a rejection of the others.

We usually believe that if you are right at one point then all you have to do is to move forward.

This is not so.

You may need to move back to change something which was perfectly right at the time.

Another important consequence is the realization that no amount of “ tinkering “ with an existing ideas will suddenly change it into a fundamentally different ides.

The new idea may require a basic rearrangement of the components.

What is “ Parallel Thinking “ ?= You introduce the new idea ‘ in parallel ‘ or alongside the old idea.

You allow both to co-exist. You might even give people the option of choosing.

If the new idea is valuable, over time it will gain force.

Yet this simple strategy is tough in practice for people. Why? Because we have been taught to want the ‘ one truth’. Both ideas or methods cannot be ‘ right ‘. One must be right and the other must be wrong.