Talk:Lateral thinking/Archives/2016

Showing how tools for lateral thinking are used
The example about photocopiers, under the heading "Random entry idea generating tool," and the example about polluting factories, under the heading "Provocation idea generating tool," show how to use tools for lateral thinking, but the example about Solomon does not. So the two former examples should come before the example about Solomon.

Some people only read the beginning of a Wikipedia article, so the most useful text should be placed there. The more useful, the higher up it should be.

The more useful the information in the beginning of an article seems, the more likely it is that people read more of the article.

It is better for Wikipedia if people find the articles they read, or part of articles they read, more useful.

What do you think?

Thanks to McGeddon for the example about Solomon, reformulating the examples, and the easy-to-check source (New York Magazine).

The examples about photocopiers and factories show that lateral thinking, the idea generating tools, really can create new ideas. These examples also show HOW lateral thinking can generate new ideas. In addition these examples show that the ideas in these examples are probably produced through lateral thinking and not other types of thinking.

RLee (talk) 21:33, 14 December 2016 (UTC)

Suggestions for improvement
The second paragraph says that, according to de Bono, lateral thinking deliberately distances itself from the standard perception of creativity as "horizontal" imagination, that is, having many ideas but being unconcerned with the detailed implementation of them. But what the Wikipedia user calls horizontal imagination here is part of de Bono's lateral thinking technique "the concept fan". In his book "Serious Creativity" he writes "Moving backwards from the purpose of the thinking we then have the 'broad concepts,' approaches, or 'directions' that would lead us to the objective." This quotation is from page 129. RLee (talk) 18:28, 29 December 2016 (UTC)