White paper on creativity - ebla center

Chapter 1systems, in which there is a more urgentapproach to the issue of change,flexibility, and the capacity to tackleproblems and deliver new solutions indecision-making.A basic definition of creativityUntil neurobiology and psychology revealthe physical mechanisms (brain and body,mind and emotions) of the production ofcreativity (Damasio, 1994), we cannotrely on a general theory of creativity. Forpractical purposes, therefore, we willrefer to creativity as a process and to itsdependence on emotions and the outsideenvironment.Faced with a far from well-codifiedconcept of creativity, various cognitiveapproaches were developed in the 19thand 20th century. Some researcherssought to measure it in terms of itseconomic value and defined the creativeeconomy as the overall set of creativeindustries and services (Howkins, 2001):from the “content industries” to softwareand design. Others have analysedcreativity through its interaction with thelabour market and the urban socialstructure (Florida, 2002): who are thecreative workers? What is their worldlike? What are the rules of the market?Some experts have investigated topicssuch as: the cognitive and psychologicalaspects of creativity (Amabile,1996;Legrenzi, 2005), the phenomenon ofcreativity with reference to the art andculture economy (Bryant and Throsby,2006; Santagata, 2007) or with referenceto linguistic processes (Chomsky,1968) orcreative inferential learning mechanisms(Boldon,1991). Lastly, some studies haveanalysed the extraordinary dramaticbiographies of artists in an attempt tomap out the intellectual andpsychoanalytical features of creativegenius in behavioural variables such asthe manic depressive syndrome, feelingsof guilt, schizophrenia, etc. (Kris andKurtz, 1934; Jameson,1984). The creativeprocess of a genius seems to be neatlysummed up in this context by the ratherelitist vision of Pablo Picasso whoclaimed: “I do not seek, I find”.For the practical purposes of this <strong>White</strong>Paper we will initially refer to a workingdefinition made by the Nobel prizewinnerfor economics Herbert Simon(1986) and to a specific feature of therelation between creativity and theoutside environment.We said that creativity is a way the mindworks. We might add that creativity is anact of the human brain which takes theform of a process helping us to think andsolve problems in a way that may beconsidered creative. For Simon, creativitybasically lies in the capacity to solveproblems. "Acts are judged to be creative whenthey produce something that is novel and that isthought to be interesting or to have social value.Interesting or valuable novelty is the touchstone ofthe creative" (Simon,1986). This nonsubstantivedefinition has the advantageof describing a process or a procedureinvolved in producing creativity. In fact,according to Simon to be creative, aperson must be trained, have expertise, andknow how take risks; and these objectivescan be reached through the tacit orexplicit transmission of knowledge.The second distinguishing feature ofcreativity has been highlighted byneurobiological research on the relationsbetween brain and body, and emotionsWHITE PAPER ON CREATIVITY 19