Everything has been thought of before, but the problem is to think of it again. -Goethe. Use the stepping stones of analogy. Remember that what the natural model suggests is usually a principle that nature has evolved or employed to solve a particular problem or necessity in a given situation. The way a clam shell opens suggested the design for aircraft cargo doors. The built-in system weakness of the pea pod suggested a way of opening cigarette packages, a method now widely used in the packaging industry. The same fundamental principle – that models for the solution to our problems probably already exist, we do not have to create them from nothing – can be applied to all creative thinking, not just to inventing new products. Take human organization for example. Most of the principles involved can be found in nature: hierarchy (baboons), division of labour (ants, bees), networks (spiders’ webs), and so on. If you are trying to create a new organization you will find plenty of ready-made models in human society, past or present. Remember, however, that these are only analogies. If you copy directly you are heading for trouble. Nor are we limited to nature for the kind of metaphors or analogies that trigger creative thinking. The point is that the model you have reached may well have been suggested by an analogy from nature.
Posted on: Wed, 21 Aug 2013 05:01:12 +0000
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