DELIBERATE AND COGNITIVE CREATIVITY
Deliberate and cognitive creativity is the kind that comes from sustained work in a discipline. For example, Thomas Edison, the inventor of the electric light bulb as we know
it, was a deliberate and cognitive creator. He ran experiment after experiment before
he came up with an invention. In addition to the light bulb, Thomas Edison invented the
phonograph and the motion picture camera. He held 1,093 U.S. patents, and more in
Europe and the U.K. Some of his famous quotes include:
I am not discouraged, because every wrong attempt discarded is another step
forward.
I have not failed. I’ve just found 10,000 ways that won’t work.
Many of life’s failures are men who did not realize how close they were to success when they gave up.
Edison is a great example of someone who used deliberate and cognitive creativity.
According to Dietrich, this type of creativity comes from the prefrontal cortex (PFC).
The PFC is right behind your forehead. It’s not that the PFC is where creative thought
takes place; it’s more that the PFC allows you to do two things:
Pay focused attention.
Make connections among bits of information you’ve stored in other parts of
your brain.
For deliberate, cognitive creativity to occur, you need to have a pre-existing body of
knowledge about one or more particular topics. When you’re being deliberatively and
cognitively creative, you’re putting together existing information in new and novel ways