Studies show that sketching and doodling improve our comprehension — and our creative thinking. So why do we still feel embarrassed when we’re caught doodling in a meeting? Sunni Brown says: Doodlers, unite! She makes the case for unlocking your brain via pad and pen.

In her book “Gamestorming,” Sunni Brown shows how using art and games can empower serious problem-solving.

Maker Cities – Boing Boing.

ver at the Information Daily, my Institute for the Future (IFTF) colleague Jason Tester wrote about “Maker Cities,” a concept that IFTF is currently exploring through on-the ground ethnography and a forthcoming forecasting game, created with BB’s legendary developer Dean Putney! Jason writes:

The DIY ethos of making isn’t limited to creating physical objects—stuff. Makers are starting to reimagine the systems that surround the world around them. That is, they are bringing the “maker mindset” to the complex urban challenges of health, education, food, and even citizenship.Makers are coming together in civic innovation hackathons to prototype new forms of citizen-led governance. Makers experimenting with new forms of community launched what would become the sharing economy, establishing new ways to measure and create value in local economies. And needing capital to make their ideas real, makers were the earliest adopters of crowdfunding platforms like Kickstarter and Indiegogo. Crowdfunding raised an estimated $2.8 billion in 2012 to fund projects, and new specialized sites like neighbor.ly and Fundrise focus on group fundraising for municipal projects like building parks or upgrading failing infrastructure.

This last space of civic crowdfunding points to a common thread found in many of these broader examples of making—the systems being remade are often rooted in cities.

The Concoctory is a Denver based shop for makers, crafters, artists, budding electronics enthusiasts, the simply curious, and everyone in between.

Find a fun kit to play with? Maybe you just want to sketch a bit. Our Lab is designed just for that! Grab an arduino, some free Wi-Fi and hang a while.

Want a more structured learning environment? Sign up for one of our Workshops. All of our workshops include the price of the kit, materials, and use of equipment. RSVP here on our site to save your seat!

via The Concoctory | Creativity Shoppe.

“Connectionism, today defined as an approach in the fields of artificial intelligence, cognitive psychology, cognitive science and philosophy of mind which models mental or behavioral phenomena with networks of simple units¹⁾, is not a theory in frames of behaviorism, but it preceded and influenced behaviorist school of thought. Connectionism represents psychology’s first comprehensive theory of learning²⁾. It was introduced by Herbert Spencer, William James and his student Edward Thorndike in the very beginning of the 20th century although its roots date way back.

Connectionism was based on principles of associationism, mostly claiming that elements or ideas become associated with one another through experience and that complex ideas can be explained through a set of simple rules. But connectionism further expanded these assumptions and introduced ideas like distributed representations and supervised learning³⁾ and should not be confused with associationism.

Thorndike, the most commonly cited connectionist, summed his ideas on learning into three laws of learning, which should have accounted for both human and animal learning:^{4) ”} http://teorije-ucenja.zesoi.fer.hr/doku.php?id=learning_theories:connectionism

Connectionism is a set of approaches in the fields of artificial intelligence, cognitive psychology, cognitive science, neuroscience, and philosophy of mind, that models mental or behavioral phenomena as the emergent processes of interconnected networks of simple units. There are many forms of connectionism, but the most common forms use neural network models. (Wikipedia)

ART-OPOLOGY: Social Fashion Monsters.

Ramo loves Claire, but he is an Alldunn, and she is a Halfie, and their romance is forbidden in the world of “Le Tableau,” a French animated film now released in English as “The Painting.”

The children’s-story premise is that these people live in a painting, which the artist left unfinished. (In Claire’s case, her face has not been colored in; from the neck up, she looks like a black-and-white Modigliani.)

The palace-dwelling Alldunns, who revel in their superiority at having been completed, resemble the ruling class of “The Hunger Games,” and their attitudes are politically familiar. “If we let in Halfies, why not Sketchies and animals?” one says. “Where will it end?” Yes, the poor Sketchies. They live in darkness and fear, considered creatures that should have been erased.

Ramo, Lola (Claire’s pal) and a Sketchie named Quill go in search of the painter, which amounts to a search for God. Along the way they enter some gorgeous paintings come to life and learn they have the power to complete themselves. After all, the painter left them with everything they needed.

via From an Unfinished Canvas, a World Springs to Life – NYTimes.com.

Thomas Edison once said, “Genius is 1 percent inspiration and 99 percent perspiration.” In this episode, we take a closer look at where that 1 percent comes from.

The Creative Process

Anne-Marie Slaughter had been the director of policy planning for the State Department for two years — commuting from Princeton, N.J., where her family lived, to Washington, D.C., where the job was — when she realized something had to give.

“It was a fabulous job, but at the end of two years I simply had to recognize that I needed to be at home,” Slaughter tells Morning Edition’s Renee Montagne. Moreover, she adds, “I wanted to be at home, and there was no way to do that and to do the kind of job that Secretary Clinton needed me to do.”

via From Mother To Daughter On ‘Having It All’ : NPR.

We propose a cross-disciplinary discussion of three propositions:

Exaptation is critical in the emergence of new niches in ecology, economics, institutions, technological systems, and ideas.

History shows that innovation and serendipity are linked. Serendipity has regularities, if not rules.

The emergence of a Paretian Long Tail creates conditions under which numerous innovations and recombinations of existing strategies compete for success, as in a rugged fitness landscape.

via Institute of Advanced Study : Exaptation, Uncertainty and Technological Change – Durham University.