Tag: brain

Nature

[box]This post originally appeared on the FTMF.info planning blog.[/box]

In this post, let’s explore the link between the twin worlds of microbiology and creative thought, drawing inspiration from three brilliant scientific discoveries. Labcoats on, people!

1. Sponges

If a sea sponge (phylum porifera) is forced through a sieve to disintegrate it down to its cellular level, those cells, if left alone, will recombine into a sponge again:

Lesson: some ideas only make sense as a whole – passing them through a ‘sieve test’ can reveal whether they were ever meant to be, while others may naturally merge together.

2. Slime Molds

A single-celled slime mold (physarum polycephalum) can solve mazes, mimic the layout of man-made transportation networks and choose the healthiest food from a diverse menu – and all this without a brain or nervous system:

Lesson: deploy resources efficiently – really smart solutions often arise naturally, yet knowing what’s best still requires lots of prior research. But hey, if a slime mold can do it…

3. Artificial Jellyfish

Scientists have created an artificial jellyfish using silicone and muscle cells from a rat’s heart. The synthetic creature, dubbed a medusoid, looks like a flower with eight petals. When placed in an electric field, it pulses and swims exactly like its living counterpart:

Lesson: even the most difficult concept can be somehow ‘brought to life’ – be it in a new context, through the addition of a couple of key ingredients, or sheer appliance of science!

Pachanga Boys: Time

Had to share this stunning track, discovered via a recent Future Disco show. It’s the sort of music that just lets the mind unfold, encouraging some really powerful comments and imagery to spill out onto the pages of YouTube:

this track changed my life, this is like reborn feeling.
Im shaking and flying all the time.
I can cry and laugh at the same time.
I wonna listen to this song on the moment I die.
You spin my inner universe….thank you forever

i dont know what to do now it has finished

160 quid on discogs to buy. sounds good to me. i wont be playing it tho, il be framing it and putting it up on the wall and buying the mp3 to play. 300 copies in the whole world of this beauty. one of the finest tracks i will ever hear.

omg at :45 i knew i was in for a ride but DAMN

it’s 6am, and the sun is just starting to peak it’s head. the engine is purring on my white ferrarri 355 cabrio. the wind blowing through my hair, relaxed and loose from a night of dancing. i inhale on my last muratti cigarette. as the smoke fills my lungs my brain sharpens and i remember the name of the girl sitting next to me. it’s a fifteen minute drive back to the villa but i wish it could last forever. pure bliss. pachanga, boys. pachanga.

I was trying to make an awesome comment but it’s impossible. Nothing can describe the beauty of this track.

Cattaneo played this song at the end of moonpark last April 14th, and sudenly, without warning, some of my friends and myself looked at eachother, stop dancing and started hugging eachother, some of us even couldn’t help crying, it was a moment I’ll always remember, time stopped, we were there, we were happy, life had a meaning.
Thanks Pachanga boys. Thanks.

13 Tools to Promote Divergent Thinking

New ideas can come from anywhere, but are often hardest to find when you’re actually looking for them. However, I believe it’s possible to jumpstart your brain, even under pressure, by applying yourself to a bit of divergent thinking:

Divergent thinking typically occurs in a spontaneous, free-flowing manner, such that many ideas are generated in an emergent cognitive fashion. Many possible solutions are explored in a short amount of time, and unexpected connections are drawn. After the process of divergent thinking has been completed, ideas and information are organized and structured using convergent thinking.

Wikipedia

So to help anyone out there who may be stuck for ideas, here’s my list of divergent thought helpers:

  1. Stumbleupon – highly recommended: tell it your interests and hit ‘stumble’ to be sent to a random site
  2. Buzzfeed – hit the randomize button in the top right corner (occasionally NSFW) to see something usually quite cool
  3. Mystery Seeker – type something in the search box and receive a set of google results for a totally different subject
  4. The Wiki Game – start in one place on wikipedia, and try to end up in another, while seeing loads of content on the way
  5. We Heart It – inspiring and high-quality imagery, often captioned, and with decent search functionality
  6. We Feel Fine – an emotional search tool, potentially good for scanning & visualising need states
  7. Popurls – see the freshest stories from a range of great online sources, with customisation options
  8. Newsmap – a visualisation of the latest news, powered by google (quite old but potentially interesting)
  9. Thesaurus.net – high quality thesaurus dictionary: search synonyms, antonyms, rhymes, quotes and idioms
  10. Visual Thesaurus – see the associated meanings between concepts – worth paying for
  11. Bing Visual Search – search the web visually in an intuitive, exploratory way
  12. oSkope – discover images, videos and products related to a search query
  13. TouchGraph SEO – see the links between topics and websites

Finally, and it may take more time for ideas to emerge this way, but TED really is an amazing resource for this kind of thing. I recently attended TEDxObserver, after which my head was swimming with ideas.

Can you suggest any of your own?