[prox]

Adding to that there is indeed what is called “Divergent thinking” [1], it is a way to explore thoughts in a diverse way and the ability to come up with creative solutions.

This is different from the more linear directed thoughtpatterns promoted in institutions. I often find people in the HN crowd to be more in the latter crowd than the former, but nonetheless intelligent.

1: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Divergent_thinking

[bmitc]

Thanks for the link!

When I speak to artists or people in more creative fields, I find that, typically, the conversations are more improvisational in nature. The conversation just ebbs and flows naturally, with energy and a lot of spontaneous thought building. The strange book Impro is a good read for this.

Whereas, when I speak with engineers or scientists, it feels like the conversation has a much higher chance of lurching, especially when you start to veer off the beaten path.

I consider myself to be a bit more divergent than most, but being in a technical field is a bit of an impedance mismatch. I think a component of divergent thinking is sometimes extreme thinking, wondering about what if and ignoring, for the time being, how to get there.

[prox]

I hear that. I usually have the same, I studied art and all of the people I met in that sphere are different from a general crowd, and quite a contrast to the offices I later worked in as a front end dev or designer. I usually ended up with meeting like minded people from other departments rather than my own (which often was interpreted as not being loyal to any team in the department —-ack office politics, what a minefield!—-

The book impro, who is it’s writer? I see a couple of results coming up.

[bmitc]

The book I was referring to is Impro: Improvisation and the Theatre by Keith Johnstone: https://www.amazon.com/Impro-Improvisation-Theatre-Keith-Joh...