Will the Digital Age Destroy Creativity?

[coberst]

Will the Digital Age Destroy Creativity?

Solitude makes it possible for us to gain access to our most inner reality. Through solitude we find the ability to sort out the structure of our thoughts, to gain access to the meaning of our ideas and attitudes. Solitude provides access to our imagination.

Imagination and reason are the aspects of the embodied mind, which, in levels of sophistication, sets our species off from our nearest non-human species. It is imagination that provides man with the flexibility to adjust to a changing environment but it is imagination that also robs man of contentment.

Our non-human ancestors are guided by instinct alone. Instinct is the impulse that determines the behavior in a pre-programmed response. But our species has added to this survival response system a high level of imagination, which allows us to fit into a changing environment for survival. Reason and imagination determines the destiny of the species. Discontentment, bred by imagination, motivates man to seek a different way; reason facilitates the change by offering the options for change. The discontent of imagination is the catalyst for adaptation.

The product of imagination can become either reality and fantasy. Fantasy can provide an escape from reality or, as is evident in our accomplishments of science and the arts, it provides the ingredients for new ideas, which like the theories of Newton and Einstein establish the paradigms for technology.

Freud wrote, in his paper Creative Writers and Day-Dreaming, “We may lay it down that a happy person never phantasies, only an unsatisfied one. The motive forces of phantasies are unsatisfied wishes, and every single phantasy is the fulfillment of a wish, a correction of an unsatisfied reality.” Critical Thinking, i.e. evaluative thinking not negative thinking, makes a correction of an unsatisfactory reality possible.

Freud considered fantasy was an escapist practice, a turning away from reality rather than a confrontation with reality in attempted change. He considered fantasy as a derivative of play; the child, in growing older, turned from fantasy focused upon an object to castles in the air. Freud theorized that the pleasure principle was replaced by the reality principle.

Present day psychology considers that fantasy is part of our biological endowment and that the discrepancy between our inner world and our outer world compels man to become inventive thereby leading to an active imagination. Imagination is the attempt to bridge the inner world and the outer world of man. Imagination is the engine of play.

Goya wrote “Phantasy abandoned by reason produces impossible monsters; united with her, she is the mother of the arts and the origin of their marvels.”

Do you often seek solitude?

In our Digital Age is solitude possible for young people?

Will the Digital Age destroy solitude and thus inhibit imagination and thus creativity?

[alexander]

How would digital age destroy creativity, as far as i have seen digital age inspires creativity, tis a different type of creativity, though not completely, but creativity nontheless. Its a new, digitized process, though it takes roots in the old. It's like philosophers pondering industrialization and machines taking creative thinking away... but lets now think back on it, has it?

Many times creativity and by that beauty is hidden in plain sight as digital age becomes more and more complex, the beauty becomes simpler, for the beauty is not in complexity, but rather the opposite form, the simpler the beauty, the harder it is to achieve.

ponder that for a bit

[coberst]

“Today’s kids aren’t all right, according to the author of The Dumbest Generation. Mark Bauerlein discusses his controversial theory of how the digital age is hurting a child's verbal intelligence.”

The hand held electronic gadgets and the Internet have created the means for constant interaction between one another thereby diminishing any time for adult contact or interaction with the world via newspapers and books.

“Mark Bauerlein, a professor of English at Emory University, compiled his frustration at young Netizens in his recent book The Dumbest Generation: How the Digital Age Stupefies Young Americans and Jeopardizes Our Future.”

“Bauerlein, 49, says younger generations don’t spend enough time learning about the world at large, writing: “They are latter-day Rip Van Winkles, sleeping through the movements of culture and events of history, preferring the company of peers to great books and powerful ideas and momentous happenings.”

Author: The Web is Making Kids Dumber, Encouraging Them To Ignore World Events - Digital Journal: Your News Network

[Zythryn]

I disagree.
I bet if you went back to the invention of the Television you could find professors that wrote the same thing.
And again when radio was invented, and again when the printing press allowed mass distribution of knowledge through books ('young-uns will stop getting wisdom from their elders when they stop listening to stories and gain knowledge without wisdom through books')

[alexander]

First of all, knowledge has nothing to do with creativity, lack of knowledge does not mean or cause lack of creativity. When homo-neanderthalis started decorating their caves 32000 years ago, they weren't very smart, according to our current standards, yet their creativity made the genus survive and prosper.

I am of the digital age, i can tell you straight up that if i average out the books i have read with how old i am, i have read less then 1 book/yr of my life, so would you say i meet your "Dumbest Generation" profile? am I dumb?

[coberst]

alexander

I shall pass.

[alexander]

its not a provocative question in any way, actually an honest one. I see that you have made 1151 posts, there is a good chance you have read some of mine, but with all honesty do you think of me as dumb, and as i have said, i dont take offense, i know that i only know what i know, and nothing more. But your oppinion would be an honest one, and input quite valuable, at least i'll know what my reputation out there's like.

here's the thing i agree that there is a lot of stupifacion with increased netizenship, but it's just isn't fair to say that it makes all dumb, net is a big toy and a big resource, which side of the scale do you choose to stand

also, do you want to get back to net and creativity?