The Neuroscience of Creativity, Perception, and Confirmation Bias | Beau Lotto | Big Think
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Published 2017-06-28
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To ensure your survival, your brain evolved to avoid one thing: uncertainty. As neuroscientist Beau Lotto points out, if your ancestors wondered for too long whether that noise was a predator or not, you wouldn't be here right now. Our brains are geared to make fast assumptions, and questioning them in many cases quite literally equates to death. No wonder we're so hardwired for confirmation bias. No wonder we'd rather stick to the status quo than risk the uncertainty of a better political model, a fairer financial system, or a healthier relationship pattern. But here's the catch: as our brains evolved toward certainty, we simultaneously evolved away from creativity—that's no coincidence; creativity starts with a question, with uncertainty, not with a cut and dried answer. To be creative, we have to unlearn millions of years of evolution. Creativity asks us to do that which is hardest: to question our assumptions, to doubt what we believe to be true. That is the only way to see differently. And if you think creativity is a chaotic and wild force, think again, says Beau Lotto. It just looks that way from the outside. The brain cannot make great leaps, it can only move linearly through mental possibilities. When a creative person forges a connection between two things that are, to your mind, so far apart, that's a case of high-level logic. They have moved through steps that are invisible to you, perhaps because they are more open-minded and well-practiced in questioning their assumptions. Creativity, it seems, is another (highly sophisticated) form of logic. Beau Lotto is the author of Deviate: The Science of Seeing Differently.
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BEAU LOTTO:
Beau Lotto is a professor of neuroscience, previously at University College London and now at the University of London, and a Visiting Scholar at New York University.
His work focuses on the biological, computational and psychological mechanisms of perception. He has conducted and presented research on human and bumblebee perception and behavior for more than 25 years, and his interest in education, business and the arts has led him into entrepreneurship and engaging the public with science.
In 2001, Beau founded the Lab of Misfits, a neuro-design studio that was resident for two years at London's Science Museum and most recently at Viacom in New York. The lab's experimental studio approach aims to deepen our understanding of human nature, advance personal and social well-being through research that places the public at the centre of the process of discovery, and create unique programmes of engagement that span the boundaries between people, disciplines and institutions. Originally from Seattle, with degrees from UC Berkeley and Edinburgh Medical School, he now lives in Oxford and New York.
www.labofmisfits.com
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TRANSCRIPTION:
Beau Lotto: Every behavior that we do, we do to reduce uncertainty. We do it to increase certainty. When you go down below in a boat and your eyes are moving and registering the boat, and your eyes are saying, “Oh, we’re standing still,” but your inner ears are saying, “No, no, we’re moving.” And your brain cannot deal with that conflict so it gets ill.
The stress resulting from uncertainty is tremendous in our society. It increases brain cell death. It decreases plasticity. It makes you a more extreme version of yourself. We do almost everything to avoid uncertainty. And yet the irony is that that’s the only place we can go if we’re ever going to see differently. And that’s why creativity, seeing differently, always begins in the same way: it begins with a question. It begins with not knowing. It begins with a 'why?'. It begins with a 'what if?'.
And I should also say that these assumptions are essential for your survival. Every time you take a step your brain has hundreds of assumptions: that the floor is not going to give way, that your legs aren’t going to give way, that that’s not a hole, it’s a surface. So these assumptions keep us alive. But they can also get in the way, because what was once useful may no longer be useful. So your brain evolved to evolve. It's adapted to adapt. So a deep question is: how is it possible to ever see differently if everything you see is a reflex grounded in your history of assumptions?
Read the full transcript at bigthink.com/videos/beau-lotto-creativity-is-anoth…
All Comments (21)
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This is beautiful. Learning is not "gathering information," it's "eliminating assumptions!"
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"Nothing interesting begins with knowing" Deep and true
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Got really good in the second half. "Our brain can only move in small steps, not giant leaps." It's so hard to remember that when you're disagreeing with someone, or trying to motivate them to change.
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Wow I wonder how can he explain this abstract complex concept so fluently. Not even stoping to think for a second. This is crazy.
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As someone who really loves to have deep discussions, I become somewhat comfortable in feeling uncomfortable. What I mean is, that you have to accept that others might have better facts, or that you're not always right, or that you deal with people that have a completely different opinion, yet you're not disrepectfull to them. In other words, it becomes more about listening than convincing. I do not know if that has really much to do with what is said here, but I feel that I am most creative in discussions when I feel very uncertain and that I really enjoy it when I meet someone who's actually better than me, even if they think and believe the complete opposite of what I do.
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I've always felt that I naturally gravitate towards uncertainty as opposed to away from it. I'm always changing my mind and can sometimes even doubt my most certain beliefs.
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So, I think what he's saying is, for example, Salvador Dali paints a melting watch and we observers might go "wow! What a crazy concept!" But for Dali, it wasn't a big creative leap as he was already painting distorted objects. The melting watch was a logical next step for him but we're on the outside of his brain looking in, and don't have his references or experiences to inform us.
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Here is an unpopular opinion: Creativity thrives when your freedom is restricted, and uncertainty is good for creativity given that most of the other areas of your life are certain (in order). Unlimited freedom kills creativity and results in mediocre outcomes.
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I always had a similar concept in my mind, but to express all of it through language was a real struggle. Amazing philosophy.
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Creativity comes with a price of psychological distress, highly anxious people are highly highly creative, because they process a lot of information at every moment than an average person, but these highly anxious people had to overcome over thinking to reach that creative level, they need to get to a threshold to get creative, to stop over estimating and over analyzing is most difficult thing to attain for them, that's why most creative people often experience psychological distress
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"Creativity is intelligence having fun" Einstein
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I started off with the assumption thinking, "oh here's another hippie gonna tell me something simplistic and market it as something interesting and smart..." But actually, he really is a genius and has thought through all of this. Questioning assumptions is vital to critical thinking AND creativity and they are interlinked.
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I need to talk to this guy. He’s a genius. He knows how to use analogies and guide you through an explanation. Amazing.
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"what's possible is based on your history" gets interesting when you consider the shared history of reading or listening to someone else. Our brains work in small steps, but we can recognize a thought or idea as particularly brilliant and choose to focus on it. Those small steps, if pointed in the right direction, can make massive leaps in terms of outcomes
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Had about 4 mindgasms over his talk.
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In short, creativity is hard work. It's not one giant leap but lots of tiny jumps into the unknown. 1% inspiration 99% perspiration. I'm telling myself this as I write it because people can't appreciate your hard work until something huge has been achieved.
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The fact that he can convey the ideas in such simple manner shows how articulate he is. Great video.
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This was a good Big Think!
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I'm absolutely loving the neuroscience videos BT has been posting lately. This one definitely didn't disappoint!
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OKAY. The implications of this are SO COOL. The idea of “creativity is connecting the seemingly unconnectable” and “creativity is having fun” are SO important to me and help to show me why validating my experience and joys is SO important (coming from someone with deep shame about basically everything about me)
